Two Poems by D.W. Lichtenberg

The Upset of My Hope Fool

I wrote Chet this email and I was telling him you know best friends are like two guys on this deserted island and like there’s a bunch of little islands all over the ocean and I would ask Chet if he wanted to go to all the other islands with me and I asked him: Chet would you go to all the other islands with me if I asked you to? And Chet called me the next day, I kinda wished he’d just emailed me back, really given me a response, you know, it was a serious email, it was for real, instead he kinda gave me this lecture, called me a hope fool, said he is the upset of my hope fool, went on telling me about this and about that, but I wasn’t really listening because I was pissed he didn’t just respond to my email, I think I’m going to save that email for saving’s sake. And I hung up. And I was crying. And I thought, you know, I like crying, I like crying, it sounds like living, definitely sounds like living. And I am constantly waking up thirsty. And what I wanted him to say was: even though everyone else might not know what’s going on, I get you, man.

You are in denial you are catapulting towards identity you are running and you are running into the sea and you keep running and you are running and you are running on water and you are running in water and you are sinking in water and you are drowning in water.

The Signs of Occupy Wall Street

In the Fall of 2011 protesters took the streets of Lower Manhattan.
Excerpted here is a selection of the signs they held.

“STOP ROBBING THE MIDDLE CLASS TO PAY THE RICH”
“THE FANCY CANNOT CHEAT”
“GREED IS AN ADDICTION”
“MONEY IS TALKING TO ITSELF AGAIN”
“PEOPLE ASK WHAT A PROTEST IS ABOUT”
“MONEY SWALLOWS THEM BACK IN”
“EAT THE RICH”
“THIS IS TAKING FOREVER”
“WE CAN SEE FOREVER”
“THE SKY IS NOT THE SKY AT ALL”
“AN ACTIVITY THAT GENERATES NO PROFIT”
“LIFE ONLY GOES SO FAR”
“I CAN’T STOP THINKING ABOUT DEATH”
“WAKE UP”
“I MAKE SENSE”
“THEY LIED”
“WE NOTE THE INVISIBLE WEB”
“YOUR DAD TOLD ME TO TELL YOU TO LOOK AT YOURSELF”
“ON ITS WAY FROM NOTHING TO NOWHERE”
“OUR TENDENCY TO POINT”
“SO ARE WE REALLY MOVING”

D.W. Lichtenberg is the author of The Ancient Book of Hip, an exploration of the phenomenon of hip. He is a writer, a filmmaker, a caffeine addict, an obsessive cleaner. Some of the language from “The Signs of Occupy Wall Street” is appropriated from Rae Armantrout.

Photo credit: luanarodriquez, morguefile.com

Check out HFR’s book catalog, publicity list, submission manager, and buy merch from our Spring store. Follow us on Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.