My America

THE 132nd^st LP: 13 TRACKS BY VERNON HOWL

Release schedule has been tweaked after a bit of writer's block/creative constipation (sorry). This is HUGE(ly (flawed)) concept record: the less said about it the better.... I will let the copious ''liner notes'' do the talking, and/or the further muddying:


♫ TRACKLIST – 13 TRACKS (46:07)
1. Welcome to Cleveland 04:48 2. Empty Area 01:20
3. Panache 03:22
4. From the Forest 03:36
5. All I Was To Be Are Here 03:44
6. Brush It Aside 03:36
7. I Wish You Wood 06:10
8. Good Plasma 04:08
9. Crazy Nightmares 04:03
10. How You Get the Girl 04:57
11. Maroon 5 04:15
12. I Realize Regions 04:51
13. Dirty 03:17


Welcome to Cleveland Welcome to Cleveland / city where I was born Just a dot on the map / and not much more I wasn't raised right / I've brought shame to my name But don't pin it on my C-town / because she isn't to blame Talk to me like I'm five years old I hear it's the greatest story ever told Who's to blame for our problems? Who's to say that we couldn't solve them? That's the thing about a time machine, Wendy You never ever seem to have one to lend me But I exist apart from time A century before 2-thousand 49 A perfect baby boomer packing heat A potbelly, paid-off mortgage and pre- die a beets There's nothing really easier than poetry Give me some pen and paper and a will to be free Who's this old man from the future? He's says that it's me but I can't see past the creature I'm almost 40, I do not need this mission Coach Boon was right about the need for superstition In theory, Urri, it seems simple enough So I'm loading up my pistol and I'm calling destiny's bluff 🍩♜ ⫷⋞𝔭𝕦𝓁𝓵 ｏＮ ℃ⓞ𝕣ηέ𝓻 𝕆𝔣 𝐁𝐎א 𝐭ｏ 𝕣ⓔ𝓋ＥαＬ Ⓛ𝐲ℝ𝒾𝓧 🍭🍮





Empty Area I don't mean to be, uh, scaring' ya But my big brain is an empty area What do you want from a g-d song? Instructions, affirmation, what could go wrong? Spring turns to summer, summer turns to fall Fall turns to winter then winter kills us all (so) I fathered 13 children when I was 6 days old But don't worry baby, they were clones I'm told Every dad brags about his E.R.A. I was a Mexican ballerina and architect Couldn't crawl through the Ver Et Ski Pass Like Kenji Oni Shi in 1996 Show pity to the humbled soul And crush the sons of pride I was but an idiot whence The book burnt by my side ★🍔 ⫷⫷𝔭𝐔𝔩𝐋 𝕠η Č𝓞𝓻ᑎέ𝓻 𝕠ｆ βᵒ𝕩 т𝓸 𝕣乇V𝒆Δl 𝐋𝐘г𝓲Ⓧ ♦🍩




Panache You say panache I say panash Time travel’s hard Watch out for the crash So cute and bound Lying still on the floor Assassination? Or another closed door? Sung in the style of the rapper guy From Bare-naked Ladies, like Plump Peter Lorre with a crewcut He never made it to the 80s Glitter, Gloom and Gus: On Becoming the Villain I became a bestselling author of biographies If I taught her - why we bought her - all the things that we did If I had leaned on my panache we could have all made a killing Dodji Dahoue, too tall for the game? Dodging da house, dog house, just a name The lady leaves a kazoo, that's what she thinks of you She thinks of things like that, it's true ൠ☝ ≾⊏ᑭ𝓤ᒪ𝕝 Ⓞ𝓷 ςσᖇη𝐞Ｒ ๏Ƒ 𝕓𝓸𝔁 Ť๏ я𝐄𝐯ε𝔸ᒪ Ｌ𝕐г𝔦𝔁 💛😺


They tried to establish a micronation on the corner of 5th & Adams. The Whale checked in not three months ago with five stars and a cryptic one-word review: “Heil!” The difference between an in-joke and a tourist attraction being what it is, I pushed forward, eager to learn more about the Coronīa: the people, their culture, any proud traditions, suspect histories — I make no assumptions. My naivete sometimes scares me, though others might consider it my greatest strength. Outside of base HQ, the painted black robot struggled by the shed. The Whale’s mutant foot remained in Little Elm, TX. How was the ancient town described by Strabo? Why wonder about something like that? A chill, Turkish man at the sink of a Charlotte, NC public restroom. Strab’s best known work is the Geographica, “which presented a descriptive history of people and places from different regions of the world known during his lifetime.” Oh how fitting, yes. There’s no difference between Strabo and The Whale (the latter’s extensive visit to Pakistan notwithstanding what for the slew of one-star food reviews). The broken black robot. The setting sun over Randall T’s Little Elm pool. Told to examine more of the town, I can only scoff. The little house off 5th & Adams did me just fine: portals to BC-AD transition Greece and such a large swath of the American South. Coronīa: a town named after a town now a micronation in a town named after a much more famous town. It wasn’t easy to book the Gerald Gravlee Center for this event, but the people deserve to know the truth. The Coronīans deserve something else entirely.


From the Forest Baby apes in the manger They went bananas for my lamb Nuclear war is alien to me These hand-painted soldiers I can't stand The trash men must resist Picking up magic in them bins Or not up but all the way through From the forest they would not ever have expected you I was born in 2009 20 years after the Queen And halfway through the 21st century America couldn’t compete I was 40 and oh so bored see Madame President, come save me Please, come save me Infinity anniversary of Watching Rescue 911 on 9/11 Ouroboros or Aurora borealis? The sky is but a different sea I'm not an assassin, ain't nobody's fool But if you see me as being sharp I'll act out as your tool No sensible refraction The light leans different ways The numbers only go higher up The 9 hundredth and 11th day 9+11 to the third degree 2020, 2020, 2020 Oh being 11, come save me★彡 ❰⋜𝓟𝓾ℓᒪ ό几 ℃𝓞Ｒη𝔢尺 Ỗ𝐅 𝕓Ⓞ᙭ 𝓽σ Řєⓥ𝐞𝓐Ⓛ 𝐋¥𝐑𝕀ˣ 彡★




All I Was To Be Are Here All I Was To Be Are Here The Is From How Ain't It I Fear So Let Of When When Want Go Bad I Know I Know No Going Back Onto cherubic apathy So damn crass to see Too black to be on Zebra St. So we dropkick dead canaries Master of extreme fun The dream done done me in Yellow equals run, my friend Towards the river and the sea What are the politics of God What am I trying to say? What from apartments, apartheid Can't separate the ways You have learned to count the letters One through 26 Unstable babies baking cakes A countdown to a fix Numbers, numbers, letters, code Across the universe Pop star assassin, daddy’s girl A curse, a curse, a curse! You see the signs now everyday In childrens’ giggles, doggys’ woofs Boutique logos, wind and dust The life from you this took👮♤ ☾⋞𝕡Ｕ𝓛Ł σ𝕟 ｃ𝓞ʳｎ𝐄я 𝓞ℱ 𝒷Ø𝓍 т𝔬 𝓡乇ｖＥ𝒶𝔩 ℓуʳĮχ ♘♠




Brush It Aside Anyone can pray to the Lord You got a life in store! Please don't brush it aside, it's Not really that much of a bore You can ask for forgiveness But can’t ask to live through it You need to die to live, my son You need to kill for your beliefs Cheap assumptions, continuity reigns I'm missing six toes but feel no pain Dune buggy hairpin, heirlooms of sweat Reincarnated parade floats breed regrets The ardent sympathizer symphony Or the waltz for not forgiving me? What moves would you like to see? While you wait for your epiphany 1988, why '88? Sent a year early now I have to wait I was given a code name and 66 bucks But the giver’s unaware that I do not give a fuck🍫♥ ≺⊑ｐυⓛ𝔩 𝔬η ᑕⓞ尺Ｎ𝑒Ř ό𝐟 𝓫ό᙭ ⓣσ 𝕣є𝕍єάĹ Ⓛ𝐲гｉЖ 🐲✊


An inordinate amount of houses became ghosts on Powderhorn Dr. I can see in their blur some of the same fog that had left me so weary after my talk on the Coronīans, who — as it turned out — weren’t Ancient Greek in the slightest. I hadn’t wandered far from the Asian Grocery and Halal Meat store where I had not discovered the mutant foot of the whale and felt silly for making the trek. I’ve felt silly a lot these days. Who would leave a foot at an Asian grocery, mutant or otherwise? We rely so much on pixels now that a tree isn’t a tree unless you’re rubbing the bark. Still, the presence of my heckler — one Randall T — and the subsequent discovery of his pool in the same town where I’d seen the (picture of the) foot couldn’t be ignored. So that’s how I found myself sauntering down Powderhorn Dr., seeing house after house that looked like they might have a pool in their fenced-off backyards. Those of which unblurred, anyway. There were hundreds of streets like this in the DFW suburb of nearly 50K. How did he end up in Chattanooga, was the real question. Just under a three-hour drive but little by the way of any obvious connective tissue. I thought of the Whale’s extensive journey through Pakistan and bemoaned the constraints of my project. I backtracked to the Domino's on the Eldorado Pkwy as it was presented as a major landmark. I scoured for clues and wondered what Strabo would do if he had access to such maps. Nothing much: a 10¢ parm packet, some sloppy jalapeno drama. But one sentence on a post about a nearby playground really stood out to me: “Consider alternatives for a more satisfactory living experience.” It’s why I prefer roaming (to living) if we’re being totally honest.



I Wish You Wood I wish you wood Brand new coffin Tiny box No unboxin’ Vid-e-oh In the style of dead dreams / I wish you mud Earthworm city Another way out It ain’t pretty Sewn together forever and ever Whatever, any of this means They would sexualize an aardvark If they thought that it would sell Maybe monetize the alphabet Either that or give em hell Cuz it can be hard to catch them z’s Given what we know Who can stomach sleep On this diet of static and snow The evidence is clear Deep red on the purest white For these myths trump fairytales In the dark soul of the night #87 swears that The funny man spoke the truth No subtle second gentlemen Would ever act so uncouth Urri is the only one Who deep down knows my plan I am a double agent I am the one good man I cannot kill a baby I cannot tell a lie I now choose not to run from What’s buried deep inside׺°”˜`”°º× ⊂＜𝕡ᑌ𝓵ˡ σภ ᑕØ𝕣ⓝ𝕖ℝ ๏𝒇 𝓫𝔬乂 丅ｏ ᖇ€ｖ𝕖ａｌ Ⓛчг𝒾χ ׺°”˜`”°º×




Good Plasma Baby, baby, got that good plasma Blood worth a million bucks A literal baby, have to send them the evidence Dead DNA: worth every cent of it Daddy, daddy, needs that good plasma Bad boys and skin tags and dojos A real infant, have to send them the evidence Or risk blowing up into a billion bits Hot baristas in Babylon Serve you poison till your tongue’s untied It goes in and out, and out and in I'm a transient, fanciful pawn This thistle's isthmus isn't it Location in code in the dobro’s notes Kevin Dillon licks a cop, licks a cop We can't echo karma's army, bitch Pop culture can’t stop this Can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube But it can go a real long way towards ever Absolving all we knew For this knowledge it is fatal It is rotten to the core I’ve never seen a drop of milk Unspoiled on the dirt Baby Hitler, now there’s a hot name In the community of babies who are probably worth killing But even that boy, oh boy oh boy Girl, I think I could change him So the metaphor is rotten And painfully absurd Let me sleep on it, let me sleep on it The blue-green TV glow defeats me💚💀 ≪❰ρᵘＬㄥ Ｏη 匚ㄖ𝐫𝐧ⒺŘ 𝓸千 𝓫σ𝔵 𝓉𝑜 ʳ𝑒νᗴＡᒪ Ļ𝔂яĮ𝐗 🐙🐠




Crazy Nightmares Society collapsed When we stopped putting missing children on the backs Of our milk cartons In the dairy aisle at the supermarket Arrested for arson All the way back in 1984 Before I learned to Use trick photography to undo (every little thing you do) My crazy nightmares Coming alive Like cellophane lifeboats In your eyes My crazy nightmares Go on: run and hide Little fascist frenzy The messenger’s died My crazy nightmares Keep me on track Never too high Or low to get back To my crazy nightmares After all these years Still after a stillness It’s the moving I fear And Donald never knew That what we was concocting would start to undo Both big and small Puzzles that would never ever get solved Caesar crushed Pompeii In 46 BC on this day We don’t think that we want To celebrate this fact so we don't (and history repeats itself) Throwing out a lot of names Like lit cigarettes into a rising campfire We are what transpires: Transportation, artifacts and democracy So take it as it comes Even invitations to come undone A bit of history, a slab or broken stone Mixed into the dust of our ancestors' bones (no longer on display)•´¯`•. ❰《𝐏𝕦𝔩Ļ ๏𝐍 𝐂𝓞Ｒ𝓷𝔢尺 όғ 乃ᗝⓍ ţό 𝐑ｅ𝕧ẸαŁ l𝕐𝐑Ⓘⓧ .•´¯`•




How You Get the Girl Distance is free It costs nothing to be Further away From nowhere The knot comes uncurled But so does the world You know that’s not How you get the girl / How you get the girl How you rule the world Two different things, yet One in the same How you get the girl Is not the topic, Merle We have clear instructions An X on a name Why is satire so hard to do? Somebody once said to you But they were wearing a fedora Though, in truth, they wore it well Spell it out, I’m not too bright I never sleep through a single night But I’m loyal, loyal like a dog Will follow you all the way to hell Rhyme schemes vs. crypto scams Each one screams, "the drummer be damned" An a capella rhino collapses From the shear weight of its vocals Performance review? Oh shit I’m screwed I see the baby on the morning dew Crawling on the wet, wet grass The point dissolves becomes unfocused Keep up the good work, Dave! Rival assassins? I’m amazed I thought time travel was reserved For me and me alone In the morning my alarm goes off Cheap digital one I bought There are no smartphones here The time has come and I can never atone♬🔥 ⊂≼ρ𝔲l𝕝 𝕆ᶰ ᑕ𝕠𝓇ⓃｅŘ ⓞⒻ ｂσ᙭ т𝕠 ŕ乇νⓔ𝓪ℓ 𝐥ч𝓡ιˣ 👮ൠ




Maroon 5 I took offense to that They said you woulda made a great serial killer But that wasn't my objective Oh how life got so hectic You can't rewind! You can't fight the past, kid Don’t do something you’ll regret Don't do something drastic There will come a time When all people alive Will have no memory of these things But memes survive But not Maroon 5 Yet we can feel the pain they bring Pop star becomes President The world isn’t ready for such things Every town turns into a waste land In Berry, future deaths are born In poems, the narrative is totally torn Reading between what’s West of this To face down a new evil To design an alternative way to live Fugue state sterilization Is not fit for the kids Knee-jerk Jackie’s getting hosed Or maybe not, I suppose She couldn’t stare down her demons Like Benjamina in the menimist grove When I was one-week old we moved to Berry I don’t recall, but I bet it was scary Change is the only constant We can will never be rid The farm is failing, better get some rope There was a day I thought I might be Pope But I retreated to Cleveland To defeat the sermons of cope😝🐚 ⊂❮ρǗ𝕝𝐥 ๏Ň ᑕ𝐎𝔯𝓃Ẹя 𝐨𝒇 𝒷𝕆א 丅𝕠 ｒ𝑒𝓿ｅ𝐀ⓛ ㄥЎ𝐑Ｉ𝓍 ♢♞




I Realize Regions Toothaker's tumor was removed By the foot in Younghoe Koo's shoe In a roundabout way / The maudlin always opine Yet remain completely unrefined Like Spencer Torkelson, hey? Home run in five straight games I'm game for regime change I think we need a new man / I realize regions and domains Don’t always seem to quell the pain But the forging of new land.... can Hey Lloyd, that's a lotta lobster I don’t think you can eat it all, he says I thought you had a job to do And you know something?... he’s right But I don’t have the fight in me I could never order lobster like that When I see an infant smile I put down my pistol, my gun back in its rack So that’s that, this is it Seafood restaurants have a lotta fish I get the cod, I think about a rod But fishermen become illegal in the future All food comes in a can Nobody in the 80s even gives a damn The put their Walkmen headphones on the ears And zone out to whatever the hell they hear I’m making music, I’m making waves Some might even say I’m paving the way For future killers to also not kill Somebody’s gotta stop the avalanche List of avalanches by death toll, please First stop Peru: 30,000 I’m told I put my screen away so they don’t find out What the future knows about the past💎😂 ⊑《Ｐ𝐮Ⓛㄥ ｏ几 ᑕỖʳ几є𝕣 𝕆ƒ 𝒷𝐎א 𝓣𝐎 Řᗴν𝐞ⓐ𝓵 𝕃ㄚгＩЖ 👊♗



Dirty Fell asleep in a baby pool Full of applesauce But kept one eye open, my good eye open Long enough to watch you call the cops Pompous cockroach apocalypse Sock it to me Don't want to enter my Sentient robot phase I find an ancient patience Ruminating in the things I own Machines and poems Reluctantly / So why does the end feel new? Why does it have to end at all? I can barely remember The beginning of it, dude But now I am worn-out I’m barely second-rate Cold and boundless and So damn dirty Smarmy worm healer wounding me So damn deeply Like Mavis in the aviary, say more kid, no: say less At the Payless with my Western ambiguity I’m here with it now, the all-encompassing fear It is my best friend But where it will reside in a hundred years from now Isn’t my concern… at all 🍉 ⋆ 🍇 🎀 <<𝓅𝓊𝓁𝓁 🍪𝓃 𝒸🍬𝓇𝓃𝑒𝓇 🏵𝒻 𝒷🌸𝓍 𝓉🍬 𝓇𝑒𝓋𝑒𝒶𝓁 𝓁𝓎𝓇𝒾𝓍 🎀 🍇 ⋆ 🍉


The things I want to talk about, the things I really want to get into but can’t feel at ease piercing: the hand of God inside a puppet, the burning dinosaur (Dino Red) — was it really on fire? I could wait a million years but that thing ain’t coming. I speak of the black robot they call Pierre. Pierre, oh Pierre. Lightning strike stripped that animatronic to bare metal just like Arnie at the end of Terminator 1. This is what I’m left to think about after a million years in Elm Mills. Of course I’m here and not here, together and alone, both my thoughts and dream-distant simultaneously: the nature of man, or the nature of a man who types without thumbs. This is the last stop for this particular version. Stranded on the shores of a manufactured lake in the shadows of massive flying insects who make the dirty water their home, the too-big houses full of Kansan guns and an unfair Lord who made us too short and fat to rise out of these cursed flatlands. Dino Red was no long-neck, either. He was all curves, 60 tons and hugging the ground, a Sauroposeidon. And yet the bolt still found him at the park out yonder in the town named after a stupid hat. I often climb to the highest point of this place, whose undefined boundaries render all wandering a fugue. In my tree, I call out to the heavens during every storm. But my fire never comes. I shout across the way to M.L.,K. and a felt Elvis (Felvis, or: God) answers my prayer sarcastically: “Hey, baby.” The cycle starts anew.

SEQUENTIAL

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