MICHAEL LEE JOHNSON

MICHAEL LEE JOHNSON

SING IT FRANK, PHYSICAL THERAPY

Sing It Frank

I'm busy at physical therapy

struggling with back spasms

looking out this window, these clouds

this rain, slice this thunder,

listening to your songs over again

on the Muzak for this 6th week in a row,

peddling this mechanical bike,

might as well be a mechanical bull

with a heat pad on my spinal cord.

I'm deep inside your larynx 10 minutes

3 times a week tickling it back and forth,

jousting and reviewing those playgrounds

of all your illicit affairs.  With a few shots of vodka

peddling these wheels with intensified pressure

I can appreciate Lana Turner, Judy Garland,

Lauren Bacall, even Marilyn Monroe.

"This is my kind of town Chicago is,

my kind of town Chicago is."

DING DONG SCHOOL (V2)

I am Northern maple syrup Northern Quebec

tap those nails and buckets into my bark let me scream like a bitch in pain

dreams out of exile to South Caroline, Georgia old-time hash

half dozen eggs mixed fried together red spuds, cheap coon meat.

I am as simple as Ding Dong School

TV show Miss Frances 1952,

intelligent as Einstein IQ 162, good test

both mixed in a corn bag with wheat, wild rice, touch of honey.

Talk to Lindy now, talk to me ex-lover

come on to me once again in a dream

like you used to do live,

ice picks in hand, brown sugar in a side bowl

everything sweet until the cops came by.

COMPLIANCE (V2)

I'm no Leonard Cohen

smarter than Rod McKuen.

I can't talk you into anything

until you get that damn car

fixed, the brakes, duct tape

the muffler sounds with gorilla glue,

hubby gone your business grows,

your children leave,

that house sold

karate those kids intramural

for me to get lucky

with you, a rabbits foot

and your open compliance.

GIVE ME BOOZE OR GIVE ME JESUS

Give me booze or give me Jesus

If we listened to the bottom of the vodka bottle,

or finished the last chapter book of Revelation,

the spirits toss in the cards, the chips-

pray for a gambler.

Listen to summer sun, birds that chirp,

these are the beginnings and where it ends.

Maya calendar.

JOURNALING, LABELING THEORY (V2)

(Juxtaposition Style)

Breaking news this just in,

1:15 PM December 15, 2013,

I found out labeling theory

has a personality.

It has impact of its own.

I love today because I

found out I have a mental illness.

Formally, diagnosed,

now I am special.

Shrink, Dr. Pennypecker, knows me well.

We visit 15 minutes every 3 months.

I have known him for 9 months.

Simple sentences just make more sense.

Simple sentences make me feel more secure.

After 9 months he says, "I've sort of figured

you out, you are a manic depressive, stage 2 hypo-mania."

I ask my shrink, "can I cast my vote?"

In this PM news, I gave him permission.

Life is a pilgrimage of pills.

I cast out my net to catch myself,

save myself.

Life is a pilgrimage of prayers.

Note:  it could end here.

He does not know the difference

between manias, verses six shots of vodka.

I suffer from a B-12 deficiency.

I need extra thiamine symptoms psychosis.

I place my lid down on forsaken table,

foreskin, I forgive.

A dead shrink, middle of the road.

I crack my knuckles,

pass sleep two next night.

Creativity flows fragmented.

I kick gravesites up then down.

MICHAEL LEE JOHNSON