For Fathers’ Day this year: My Father Remembers Many Legends While I’ve Forgotten Nearly Everything I Knew About Math And Chemistry. At my substack: bit.ly/4oEfwlf

My story about the birth of The Fugs—text together with video of the story as read at No Bar in 1993—at my substack. Don’t even bother to ask—this is exactly how it happened, X-Ray Spex see-thru glasses and all. bit.ly/4eCXOel

A poem with chocolate for our weight loss journeys. At the substack: bit.ly/4erFaWB

A poem, now at my Short Histories substack. At the link below. josepadua.substack.com/p/what-its-l...

I’ve started a Substack page where I've reposted some older essays. New work coming soon. josepadua.substack.com

A poem for the day

Plastic flowers were the first steak sauce.

At Vox Populi today, my poem: wp.me/p4xqzG-scy Thanks to Michael Simms.

I like yacht rock precisely for its subtle undertones of loss and desolation and how every song in the genre seems to be saying "It's too late, you've fucked up everything."

Take a poem in full color, write a photo in black and white; dance the way honeysuckle smells, or put a country cover of an old fresh rock song in the middle of my yellow dinner plate.

Coming in Spring 2027, from the Univ. of Pittsburgh’s Pitt Poetry Series, my second book— Earth Shattering News and Other Catastrophes Considered While Listening to the Genius Of Love. Thanks to the editors at the Pitt Poetry Series for bringing me into the fold.

As a person with Tourette's I don't beliieve I owe an apology to anyone who is uninformed regarding my disability. I mean, I can be nice and explain myself. But I don't OWE anyone anything. It's not my burden to carry--I have enough burdens as it is.

One day I will make a feature length film but I'll delete each and every scene until there's nothing left to do but complain.

We tell ourselves stories in order to fuck up the algorithm.

MERRYHAPPYHOLIHANNUKWANZAACHRISTMAS: A MIX IN SOLIDARITY WITH ANY AND ALL ANTI-FASCISTS FOR THE YEAR 2025 AND BEYOND My holiday mix is up. It’s seasonal AF this year. bit.ly/4p5ZwXB

I'm never sure who I'm mad at until I tell them to fuck off.

I was never more weirded out by someone than that time I was in the Trover Shop on Capitol Hill and ran into one of my coworkers from the Library of Congress who was buying a book called Dress for Success.

A poem for today....

Let your every utterance, be it of love or contempt, be an act of defiance against a regime that can only express the trite chasm of its malodorous nether hole.

"Revolution begins when you are able to see right through the spectacle, which isn't to say that time spent rehearsing isn't time well spent. It's just that you need to know the difference between rehearsal and revolution." Reading at Nov 2, 2pm at Roaming Roast in York, PA.

Antifa lyeth between the Christian nationalist bride and her hedge fund managing bridegroom CONTRA MIKE JOHNSON.

When the population is lulled to sleep by a media that acts as a massive pacifier for corporate interests, any attempt to sever the political from the artistic realm should be considered an act of violence.

Mayor of Chicago Brandon Johnson calls for a general strike, at least 300,000 people attended the protest. #3E #NoKings #EndImpunity #EndOligarchy #EndAutogenocide #EpsteinFiles

THE NIGHT JIMI HENDRIX DIED My poem on Jimi Hendrix is up at the Mixtape Review (thanks to the crew there!) where you can read the poem while listening to “Purple Haze.” I took the photo earlier this week of what I believe is called The Moon That Cannot Be Named. bit.ly/3KHf4md

CHICAGO — Outside an elementary school during dismissal… horrifying. What have we become?

MAGAs have the incredible ability to take even the greatest extravagance and excess and turn it into something incredibly shallow and dull. Indeed, they think they're so interesting even though they're the most boring people on earth.

The point of cruelty is to hide one's stupidity: one doesn't need to understand what one destroys horribly. Just look at the stupidity of the current regime.

In these days of certain madness and uncertain escape, here’s to getting away—getting away from it, with it, in spite of it. And, sometimes, just staying and fighting it. My poem is at Vox Populi today (thanks, Michael Simms!) wp.me/p4xqzG-qBP

What started as a trip to hear two #poet friends read, ended up encompassing so much more - but oh the joy in hearing @josefpadua.bsky.social & Heather Davis read in-person! Great space. Great host. Great night. Standing room only! heatherlynnedavis.com/poetry/ josepadua.com #poetry

In Lancaster, tonight! Two, not one-but TWO awesome poets! @josefpadua.bsky.social I’ll be in attendance & would love to see you there!! (And what a great place for a reading!)

POETRY READING with Heather Davis and Jose Padua This Thursday September 18 at 7pm, Heather and I are reading for the Turning Wheel series at the Fescue Gallery, 140 N. Prince St. in Lancaster. There will be an open mic afterwards.

The struggle to be real is slowly losing its traditional grammar. A new language will have to emerge if we are to have any chance at survival.

I have a poem up at Vox Populi today. Thanks, Michael Simms! wp.me/p4xqzG-qBF

Next week, September 18, Heather and I will be reading for the Turning Wheel series. 7pm at the Fescue Gallery, 140 N. Prince ST, Lancaster, PA.

At this point, as a poet, I'm not speaking truth to power, I am simply trying to get revenge.

Arrested for filming it. And look how excited they all are to get some *action*. 🇺🇸 Watch fascism work.

I avoid those who have no empathy, but I flee from those who have no sense of irony because they're the ones more likely to be sociopaths.

In contemporary society, most of the tools necessary for any sort of pragmatic approach to learning and problem solving have been corrupted, thus paving the way for the large scale smash and grab thievery being practiced by the current regime.

It has always been easier to look for villains and heroes rather than examine the broken and corrupt systems that enable the rise of said villains in the first place, thus leading us to seek comfort in the concept of heroes rather than creating opposing systems.

Yesterday it rained hard AF for almost an hour here. And then, for almost another hour, it rained as hard as the meatloaf scene in Chantal Akerman's Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles.

In capitalism what is disposable is of more value to the system than that which perseveres or persists; thus, a better future depends on us being a perpetual pain in the ass. In other words, teach your children well.

A poem for summer and those days when the air struggles to move.

the absolute best scene in all of cinema... "i am your king!" "i didnt vote for you!" monty python THE HOLY GRAIL youtu.be/Nku7kdol5GY?...

One more Electric Sonnet for National Poetry Month, which was back in April, I know, but here it is now because fuck the capitalist patriarchy.

On the 4th of July, freaked with acid, freaked with jazz. Another of the Electric Sonnets.

"[Trump's] fascism can no longer hide behind empty rhetoric, decorum, ritual. His authoritarian convulsions have revealed how easily checks and balances crumble. His shameless heartlessness is his brand...." www.truthdig.com/articles/mig...