Written for a Friend Frightened of his Screens
by Preston Houser
for F.L.

on a day like this when it’s too hot
to do much more than stare or sleep
I follow the cats’ lead and find a cool place to lie
if I had any fur I suppose I’d lick it
that’s what world LA culture does to you

I read poetry but the only poet that makes sense
in this heat is Charles Bukowski who thought that
the certainty of death would make us love one another

but it doesn’t

he was right about that
Bukowski’s conclusive epitaph was “don’t try”
and I certainly agree with him there
I remember liking the poem “tv”
where the poet switches channels between the movie
Alexander the Great and roller derby—a “great night”

Since you broached the subject of television
aka the glass teat, boob tube, idiot box
I thought I should mention that even though Orwell
envisioned a television that watches the watcher
he could not for all his prophecy foresee
that a camera in the tube looking back at the viewer
would not be necessary, the screen on its own
would pacify nations—he was wrong (nice try tho)

nevertheless cameras are everywhere
on corners cars corridors rooms helmets
God may be dead but all-seeing Santa thrives
even J. Kerouac lamented that there were so many cops
that one could not even aspire to be a proper hobo
“The woods are full of wardens” was Kerouac’s conclusion

what with cameras recording so much
that only more cameras can watch it all
I’m reminded of the perfect unsavory metaphor:

mid-nineteenth century, a southern whorehouse,
a white couple going at it
a black servant enters mid-fucking
with a tray of drinks that he puts on the table
exits
hooker and client pay him no mind

today the proverbial house n. has morphed into
the camera the twentieth-century electronic n.
weird but that’s how I see it
tv makes us it or tries anyway
scary but nothing to be afraid of

that’s the parano…I mean that’s the poem
for all the good it will do
delete after reading

—apologies to C.B.

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To see an earlier posting of four poems by Preston, click here.

Preston ‘Kaido’ Houser, adding atmosphere to one of WiK’s events in his role as shakuhachi master