Tyler Fugazzie

a dripping welcome
shrouded in sweat like a 2120 olympian meeting an exoplanet floor, or a nascent earth,

umm ..a mystic
umm ..ample breaths, drenched air in your lungs

weighed down, burning
vacating toxins
recycling the world, perspiring

“I’m not questioning it.”

The crater-colored creatures exchanged wide-eyed, furrowed looks.

“You don’t want to know?” said one of the creatures.

“You’re not even a little curious?” said the other.

“Nope,” I said as I dug my feet deeper into the glowing graygreen sand and sipped on a ringed Piña Colada. “Listen boys, I appreciate the interest, but I’m not really feeling it.”

The creature with the whiter facial hair put his pad away, “We have citizens from all over Xcceaius traveling to visit you. Food leaders, sleep leaders, love leaders, self-esteem leaders, safety leaders; they all want to meet and talk to you.”

I motioned for a waiter to come over, pointing to my glass and mouthing out the proper sounds for a refill.

“That’s cool,” I said, “but I’m chill. This view is nice. Why don’t you write about this nice view.”

The creatures grew frustrated. “You are an alien ‘invader’ of our planet, we have no clue how you arrived, and you don’t seem to have any plans to leave this cushion we’ve provided you. What’s your problem with answering a few questions?”

“I don’t have a problem,” I answered, dabbing more sunscreen on my nose. “Here’s what I know: I walked out of my house looking for a beach, and I found one.”

The senior creature stood up and threw his pad down. “That doesn’t answer anything!”

“I don’t know what you want from me,” I said while blaming my lips.

The creatures stormed away, which made me happy because I was getting pretty tired of dealing with their nosiness. I noticed a long line of vehicles forming out of the corner of my eye, so I flipped down my sleeping mask and waited for the melatonin breeze to settle my breathing.

So I connect to which one?
He connects where?
She connects to what?
Does anyone remember who goes where?
Who’s in charge here?

I’ve been through these hundreds of times
It happens to us, we’ll be put back together

This isn’t where I was
Bob’s too far away
Susan lost her sisters
The triceps are connected to the calves
The biceps to the pecs
The quads to the neck
This is a mess 
This is a mess

Okay it screwed us up this time
It’s never done this before
Let’s hold out hope for the next go

Next go comes 
And it’s a mess again
Bob is dead
Susan’s dead
No one knows where the triceps went

The muscles hold a meeting
Decide to rebuild themselves 
But departing from tradition 
They decide to build a city
A real body of work

bury my body next to biggie
tell them i drank beer
imported from the bronx
tell them we drank ideas
from domestic brethren
admiring the writing of fellow natives
trying to navigate the plains and flagging waves
and changing days
from ruins to rain
steinbeck to beck
kerouac to cobain

I like being as original as possible: in my thinking, my speaking, my writing, my jokes, my ambitions, and my creations.

To an extent, the pursuit of originality is fruitless, as we’re all inspired by something and somethings. You can’t create from absolute zero and you can’t have output with no inputs.

Right now I’m working on a new collection of poems. The issue at hand is the title, which is also the name of the first poem and the overarching thesis, theme, and focus of the collection.

I had “pedestrian” in mind, after pruning down from “pedestrian quest” or “pedestrian question.” These led to “better pedestrian” which is very, very close to what I want.

Today I wanted to change it to “better on foot” which I currently think is the perfect title, but I researched and found there’s a record label already using that name.

I found the perfect name, but someone found it first, and now I have a lumpy throat thinking about putting out a work that shares a name with something else.

It’s funny, considering Hool was derived from the root word of Whole, and is a real person last name, and The Bronze Age is an entire multi-century era in modern history, so I shouldn’t be as concerned, especially if I’m getting more comfortable with sharing and more understanding that it isn’t worth sacrificing a better name in order to stay “original” in the naïve sense.

Who who are these people
What’s this on my body
They’re all staring at me

I’m a star! A star I tell ya
I’ll have to tell mom and dad
Oh boy
Look at this, look over here, look over there
They’re so mesmerized
I must be doing this right
This is so exciting
I love these people, these are my people, these are my friends

Wait wait where are you all going?
No don’t leave me
How can you do this to me
You wake me up, these pretty projections shine on me, you eat me up, chew me up, and then spit me out
Just like that? It’s only been a short time

No one’s left watching
They left me
I’m finished
I thought I finally found it and now it’s gone
I feel so blank

Hey, someone’s coming in?
Another person?
And a group of kids?
Now some teenagers?
An older couple?
College lovers?

They’re back! But wait a minute
This is a whole new crowd
But they’re all facing me
The projections are back

I’m back!

write briefly

right silence

I played baseball for about fourteen years. From tee-ball up until I quit my senior year of high school, at which point I was riding the bench, caring more about academics and hanging out with friends before leaving for college, and in no spot to outrank the people playing in the same positions as me. They were more talented and worked harder, baseball being what they wanted to pursue in college and beyond, so they deserved the spots regardless of the rampant parental politics happening behind-the-scenes on our team. I later rediscovered the joy of baseball during college when my friends and I played intramural softball four years in a row, making it all the way to the championship, uh, semi-finals in our final year.

There were a lot of life lessons I picked up from playing baseball.

One lesson, the one I want to discuss now, involves keeping your eye on the ball. Hitting is a complex process involving a perfect harmony of movements; your joints and muscles and bones and mind and bat moving in conjunction at precisely the right time to connect the bat with the ball, to send the ball in a direction that’s away from any fielder. Without overly reducing the process, one of the most important parts of the hitting process is a seemingly simple task: keep your eye on the ball. You can only hit what you see, and keeping your eye on the ball keeps your head down to allow for a proper, smooth, and strong swing. If you take your eye off the ball, you’re going to miss 9 times out of 10.

In my life right now, I feel like I’ve been taking my eye off the ball, and I’m sure this is an issue many people are dealing with at this very moment, whether or not they’re conscious of it. I’ve been letting distractions get in the way of my pursuit of growing, learning, writing, exploring new ways to express myself through artistic means, and exploring enough of life to ensure I stay excited, inspired, and fresh, and helping others along the way.

Sometimes it’s the distractions on the benches, or the field, or the stands that cause you to take your eye off the ball. The hypothesized (or real) snickers of haters and doubters on your own team who want to, or expect to, see you fail. You want to move your head and throw the bat at them, or take the time and pleasure in running over and beating them silent. Sometimes it’s the distractions in your own mind, the doubt, the memory of other people advising you about how to best hit the ball and what you should be doing, the fear of failure, the memories of previous missed swings, the shame in allowing minutiae and external circumstances dictate your performance, the confusion of it all.

Don’t get caught up in the distractions, they’ll always be there. Keep your eye on the ball and knock it out of the fucking park.

a thin slice
a finish line you never reach
but always chase

that lady laughed like a Pillsbury doughgirl into the black coffee cold, she was passionate, after profit

earmuff taxis and hotel neon lines

i know manhattan is an island made of metal and money, an entire empire built upon desire
and the subway is a steel drum concert
asking us to imagine all the people

imagine? they’re right in front of us
a million on, a million out
and we cascade and escalate through tunnels to save time, which is all the time, and time is money, how else would we have this city without an abundance?