The Cool School (62 page)

For Virgil Moorefield

Verbal Abuse
, Summer 1993

In the nineties we found ourselves in a weird place, with poetry as we had known it dissolving before our very ears, morphing into stand-up comedy, often of a faux self-deprecating confessional variety. Quite unhip. We were rescued, however, by of all things performance art and such solo performers as Ann Magnuson, Spalding Gray, Karen Finley, and Eric Bogosian. Mr. Bogosian is also a playwright. His
Talk Radio
was made into a movie directed by Oliver Stone and starring the author. He has acted in many films and played one of televisions most beloved cops on
Law & Order: Criminal Intent.

A silhouette against the back wall of the theater reveals a man speaking into a microphone. We hear a basso profundo radio voice à la Rush Limbaugh.

I
WAS
SHAVING
this morning. Shaving with a disposable razor and suddenly I thought of my
Dad.
I wondered, “What would I be doing right now, if it were forty years ago? If it wasn’t 1994, but 1954 and I’m my own Dad?” And I imagined myself going downstairs, and there’s my wife and she’s not racing to meet the
car pool, no,
she’s making me
breakfast.
She’s got a gingham apron on, she’s making me bacon and eggs . . . which I eat with tremendous pleasure because I’ve never even
heard
of cholesterol before.

And here are my children sitting at my 1954 breakfast table and they’re well-behaved and well-dressed. In fact, my son is wearing a
necktie. I’m
wearing a necktie. I pick up the morning newspaper—all the news is
good:
we’ve won the war in Korea, they’ve found a cure for polio, employment’s up, housing’s up, everybody’s
happy.

I own my own home, I own my own car (which I wash every single Saturday), I love my wife, I like baseball, I believe in the President, and I pray to God in a place called
church.
No drugs. No drugs
anywhere.
Only people doing drugs in 1954 are William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg!

No one’s
complaining.
We’re not hearing about women’s rights and homosexual
rights
and minorities’ rights and immigrants’ rights. No
victims
. No sexual
harassment
. No worries about the environment. The environment is just fine, thank you.

No therapists. No twelve-step groups. No marches on Washington. No homeless people. No
AIDS.
Just good old-fashioned values like honesty and hard work and bravery and fidelity. And that’s
it.
It’s America forty years ago. Everybody’s working. Everybody’s straight. Everybody’s happy.

And I thought to myself, what a wonderful world that must have been, a world without problems. I would love to be there right
now
. And then I remembered a
terrible
nightmare I’d had last night.

Now lemme tell you about this nightmare: It’s the middle of the night, I’m in bed, of course, who shows up in my bedroom but
Bill Clinton.
As I said, it’s a nightmare. He takes my hand and he says, “Come with me.” And we float out the window and into the night air, and down to the street and we drop into this open manhole.

And we’re walking around in the sewers, Bill and I. I’m thinking, I never trusted this guy, where’s he taking me?

We walk and we walk and we come to this big cave and in this cave there are all these people lying around on mattresses, smoking things: pot, crack, hashish, opium. Whatever these people smoke.

And through the haze, I see all these familiar faces! Oh, there’s Whoopi Goldberg reading the
Communist Manifesto.
And there’s Ralph Nader bitching about something. And Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins leading a peace rally. And Roseanne Arnold having sex with Madonna. And Ice T and Ice Cube and Vanilla Ice and all the other pieces of ice and all the other
troublemakers
and
commies
and
lefties
and people with green hair and tattoos and goatees and
rings through their noses and rings through their nipples and rings through their penises.

And some of them are marching around protesting something . . . there’s another bunch of them counting their food stamps and
welfare checks.
Right in front of me a bunch of idiots are watching
Beavis and Butt-head
on MTV.

And I’m horrified. And I turned to Bill and I said, “Bill, where are we? I’m frightened.” And he said, “Don’t you know?” And I said, “No. Hell?” And he laughed and he said, “No, of course not! This isn’t Hell. Look around you. Don’t you recognize the place? This is America, 1994! Better get used to it.”

Let’s go to a commercial.

Pounding Nails in the Floor with My Forehead
, 1994

It seems appropriate to end with a comedian. Comedy has always represented the front lines. It doesn’t just sit there in its comfy coffee shop, it gets up in front of louts, drunks, and hecklers and challenges them to a mental fight. Well, great comedy like that of Lord Buckley, Lenny Bruce, and Mort Sahl did. It picked up where the poets left off, with the facts. In 1966 Lenny Bruce was arrested for using nine specific words. Seven of them appear in George Carlin’s “Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television” routine, which wound up figuring prominently in a test case before the Supreme Court.
As
a result of that decision you will hear “motherfucker” on the radio only between 10
P
.
M
.
and 6
A
.
M
.
, unless it’s a hip-hop station that the FCC can’t understand.

I’m a modern man,

digital and smoke-free;

a man for the millennium.

A diversified, multi-cultural,

post-modern deconstructionist;

politically, anatomically and ecologically incorrect.

I’ve been uplinked and downloaded,

I’ve been inputted and outsourced.

I know the upside of downsizing,

I know the downside of upgrading.

I’m a high-tech low-life.

A cutting-edge, state-of-the-art,

bi-coastal multi-tasker,

and I can give you a gigabyte in a nanosecond.

I’m new-wave, but I’m old-school;

and my inner child is outward-bound.

I’m a hot-wired, heat-seeking,

warm-hearted cool customer;

voice-activated and bio-degradable.

I interface with my database;

my database is in cyberspace;

so I’m interactive, I’m hyperactive,

and from time to time I’m radioactive.

Behind the eight ball, ahead of the curve,

ridin’ the wave, dodgin’ the bullet,

pushin’ the envelope.

I’m on point, on task, on message,

and off drugs.

I’ve got no need for coke and speed;

I’ve got no urge to binge and purge.

I’m in the moment, on the edge,

over the top, but under the radar.

A high-concept, low-profile,

medium-range ballistic missionary.

A street-wise smart bomb.

A top-gun bottom-feeder.

I wear power ties, I tell power lies,

I take power naps, I run victory laps.

I’m a totally ongoing, big-foot, slam-dunk

rainmaker with a pro-active outreach.

A raging workaholic, a working rageaholic;

out of rehab and in denial.

I’ve got a personal trainer,

a personal shopper,

a personal assistant,

and a personal agenda.

You can’t shut me up;

you can’t dumb me down.

’Cause I’m tireless, and I’m wireless.

I’m an alpha-male on beta-blockers.

I’m a non-believer,

I’m an over-achiever;

laid-back and fashion-forward.

Up-front, down-home;

low-rent, high-maintenance.

I’m super-sized, long-lasting,

high-definition, fast-acting,

oven-ready and built to last.

A hands-on, footloose, knee-jerk head case;

prematurely post-traumatic,

and I have a love child who sends me hate-mail.

But I’m feeling, I’m caring,

I’m healing, I’m sharing.

A supportive, bonding, nurturing

primary-care giver.

My output is down, but my income is up.

I take a short position on the long bond,

and my revenue stream has its own cash flow.

I read junk mail, I eat junk food,

I buy junk bonds, I watch trash sports.

I’m gender-specific, capital-intensive,

user-friendly and lactose-intolerant.

I like rough sex; I like tough love.

I use the f-word in my e-mail.

And the software on my hard drive

is hard-core—no soft porn.

I bought a microwave at a mini-mall.

I bought a mini-van at a mega-store.

I eat fast food in the slow lane.

I’m toll-free, bite-size, ready-to-wear,

and I come in all sizes.

A fully equipped, factory-authorized,

hospital-tested, clinically proven,

scientifically formulated medical miracle.

I’ve been pre-washed, pre-cooked, pre-heated,

pre-screened, pre-approved, pre-packaged,

post-dated, freeze-dried, double-wrapped

and vacuum-packed.

And . . . I have unlimited broadband capacity.

I’m a rude dude, but I’m the real deal.

Lean and mean.

Cocked, locked, and ready to rock;

rough, tough and hard to bluff.

I take it slow, I go with the flow;

I ride with the tide, I’ve got glide in my stride.

Drivin’ and movin’, sailin’ and spinnin’;

jivin’ and groovin’, wailin’ and winnin’.

I don’t snooze, so I don’t lose.

I keep the pedal to the metal

and the rubber on the road.

I party hearty, and lunchtime is crunch time.

I’m hangin’ in, there ain’t no doubt;

and I’m hanging tough.

Over and out.

When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops?
, 2004

Great care has been taken to locate and acknowledge all owners of copyrighted material included in this book. If any owner has inadvertently been omitted, acknowledgment will gladly be made in future printings.

Lester Bangs. How to Succeed in Torture Without Really Trying:
Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung
, Greil Marcus, ed. Copyright © 1987 by The Estate of Lester Bangs. Used by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc.

Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones). The Screamers:
The Moderns: An Anthology of New Writing in America
; reprinted in
Tales
(New York: Grove Press, 1967). Used by permission of SLL/Sterling Lord Literistic, Inc. Copyright © 1967 by Amiri Baraka.

Eric Bogosian. America:
Pounding Nails in the Floor with My Forehead
(New York: Theatre Communications Group, 1994). Used by permission of Eric Bogosian.

Richard Brautigan. The Kool-Aid Wino:
Trout Fishing in America
(San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1967). Copyright © 1968 by Richard Brautigan. Used by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Chandler Brossard. From
Who Walk in Darkness
(New York: New Directions, 1952). Used by permission of The Estate of Chandler Brossard.

Anatole Broyard. A Portrait of the Hipster:
Partisan Review
, June 1948; reprinted in
The Scene Before You: A New Approach to American Culture
, Chandler Brossard, ed., (New York: Rinehart and Co., 1955). Used by permission of The Estate of Anatole Broyard.

Lenny Bruce. Pills and Shit: The Drug Scene:
The Essential Lenny Bruce,
John Cohen, ed., (New York: Random House, 1967). Copyright © 1967 Douglas Music Group. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Lord Buckley. The Naz:
Hiparama of the Classics
(San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1960). Used by permission of City Lights Books.

William S. Burroughs. Last Words:
Nova Express.
Copyright © 1964 by William S. Burroughs. Used by permission of Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

George Carlin. A Modern Man:
When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops?
Copyright © 2004 by Comedy Concepts, Inc. Used by permission of Hyperion. All rights reserved.

Neal Cassady. Letter to Jack Kerouac, March 7, 1947:
The First Third & Other Writings: Revised and expanded edition
(San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1981). Used by permission of City Lights Books.

Del Close. Dictionary of Hip Words and Phrases: Del Close and John Brent,
How To Speak Hip
, Mercury Records, 1961.

Gregory Corso. Marriage:
The Happy Birthday of Death.
Copyright © 1960 by New Directions Publishing Corp. Used by permission of New Directions Publishing Corp.

Miles Davis with Quincy Troupe. From
Miles: The Autobiography.
Copyright © 1989 by Miles Davis. Used by permission of Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.

Diane di Prima. From
Memoirs of a Beatnik
(Paris: Olympia Press, 1969); reprinted by Last Gasp in 1988. Copyright © by Diane di Prima. Used by permission of Last Gasp.

Bob Dylan. From
Chronicles: Volume One.
Copyright © 2004 by Bob Dylan. Used by permission of Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.

Babs Gonzales: From
I Paid My Dues: Good Times No Bread, A Story of Jazz
(East Orange, NJ: Expubidence Publishing Corp., 1967).

Brion Gysin. From
The Process
(New York: Doubleday, 1969). Copyright © 1969 by Brion Gysin. Published in 1987 by The Overlook Press, Peter Mayer Publishers, Inc., New York, NY.
www.overlookpress.com
. All rights reserved.

Bobbie Louise Hawkins. Frenchy and Cuban Pete:
Frenchy and Cuban Pete and Other Stories
(Bolinas, CA: Tombouctou, 1977). Used by permission of Bobbie Louise Hawkins.