Father of Noise
by Anthony McCann

Anthony McCann seeks out the elusive Other with all the raucous self-loathing of a mad saint. Eroticized, debunked, adored and despised, the sayer of these incantations ventures, with appropriate fearfulness, into the unknown, buoyed only by the persistence of the body in its current manifestation. His penetrating, pervasive doubt lends a perverse clarity to the journey, and lends shape to the spirit world.

Skywalker Ranch

I was struggling to embrace the new technology
when quite on accident I drained the harbor, dredged the locks,
and devastated the local economy now finding myself
still trying to yoke this motor, runaway outboard
in a burrowing fury.
O my heart, manic mudskipper, surging in mud.
Writing these lines I am overcome with fatigue and despair as if
the temperature had risen suddenly and I,
inner pioneer and amateur pharmacologist, were sweating
true bricks!
I give up, get off my knees, take off my lifejacket.
Because no one lives here anymore, except security
and the gardeners. I am the world’s last actor,
I have to inspect the “winery.” Add some more dust
to the bottles, peel more paint from the barn,
sodomize the ingrates. Do you have a raygun
or perhaps a stick of commemorative gum? I need to pretend
that I am under attack from the air.