Friday, December 31, 2021
Weightless
Thursday, December 30, 2021
Time
Time is satire
He has me laughing
Makes me move while standing still
Time is a dancer
Cheek to cheek
We whisper
of infinity
He holds my hands and rocks me
leading the way
But oh, my feet!
I have a few steps left.
The band plays on
Trumpets and saxophones
On the 1
On the 4
I'm counting
He says, "don't count"
Just feel it.
Wednesday, December 29, 2021
Tuesday, December 28, 2021
Blind Faith Cafe
Every time I walk past it I called it the Blind Faith Cafe.
I picture you sitting up there, at a table, behind the little miniature iron fence,
on the cement, just high enough above the sidewalk to look down on everyone,
Smelling their folly
yet perched, silently, at a distance,
like a canary in a cage, crapping out all your self righteousness.
Keeping your distance from me, as if I were anathema
to your guilded lockets of longing,
you fondle your pearls while I stand in my wet golashes
daring you to move.
I have no idea how the coffee tastes at the Blind Faith Cafe,
but I imagine it's bitter and in desperate need of cream.
Friday, December 10, 2021
The Sparrow
I wrote a poem about the war
for forty years, it changed
then all the people were the same
they just had different names.
The long forgotten memories of trees
and men who walked along.
The strange winds blow now,
around Christmas time,
but I hear the Native song.
The man he walks with a bow and arrow
and sings with--
and does not shoot--
the sparrow.
Thursday, December 9, 2021
Hairdryer
It's amazing how small I am, like a bug, or a beetle, snug under the rug.
It's almost noon and here I am, humming nonsensical symphonies between my teeth.
I do not have the tap water enough
to call Poseidon from the sea.
When you tipped me down the drain,
baby, bathwater and all,
perhaps we should have thought
that I might need a hairdryer.
Monday, December 6, 2021
Car Tires
It was a ribbon in the hair
of a dragon by the sea
Her missing teeth were all I saw
as she called out to me
A siren
screeching
the car
pulled
away.
Sunday, December 5, 2021
Corner pocket
You're so hot.
You got the last shot.
You crime, you dine, you shine, you swine.
You're so cold.
You've got the gold.
You wake, you shake, you make, you create.
You've got nothing on me
You've only got
Something on yourself.
Saturday, December 4, 2021
Hemp
Cupid sat down and lit a candle, shining
In his eyes was the flame, burning
In his heart was your name.
Black eyelash, FLICKERING
It's just a LIGHT on a distant hill.
Rubies glistened on her fingers
Her rings told stories and whispered moons
Rummaging their reflections
On the waters of the tide.
Wednesday, December 1, 2021
Point of Arrival
The face in the window looked weary
The reflection was yellow and thin
The moon in the sky was hanging
Plunged into place
Like a nail
A nail in a wall
Chilly and bright.
The train conductor was tired
The train itself had a sparking fuse
Its metal was dark, dead and dreaming
As it clattered and squealed
Screeching, quiet and loud
Along the way
A long, long way
along the track.
The point of arrival was taken
The ticking of clocks became mute
When the midnight rider walked the aisles
In his giant leather boots
The moon stayed there in the sky, firmly like a drum
Silent until it was struck
struck with the edge
the hard edge
of a hammer.
Sunday, November 28, 2021
Time to Shine
I walk upon the street in sneakers which squeak
and lead me to the lamppost where dim light shines
and radiates its soft glow upon the black, flat and barren stretches
on which looms out from underneath the shadows which creep
like the dead rising from graves, their grey hands sprawled
as they are crawling toward the light.
Yet the light shines on, aloof to the calls of the darkness,
deaf to the wild dogs and cats scurrying and lucky rats
quickly escaping the fate of road kill pigeons
smashed to feathery dust under car tires
creating odd, abstract art,
next to road stripes and pieces of trash strewn next to the drain pipe.
The light knows not these tragedies, but shines on,
simply because it's time to shine.
Wednesday, November 24, 2021
Hit the Ground, the Story of Seeds
The seeds you plant they tend to grow
whether haphazard or in rows
not caring where they've been thrown
by hand or where the wind has blown
shooting up their tiny leaves
like hands reaching up to touch the air
arriving clean, simple and bare
but--it's not as if they dared
or--as if they arrived scared
it's just what they do!
The lesson that they give is this,
so I will make sure it is not missed,
we can't control how tall it rises
how many branches or leaves abound
if the trunk is rough or round
the only control we have, you see
is where exactly
it hits
the ground
Tuesday, November 23, 2021
Baby Snakes
The hypotenuse of the many-headed hydra, as she stood at impossible heights. The muses are hypnotic. He filled my ears with constant radio static, about his past exploits and his changed nature. It was impossible to believe anything he said because my heart with breaking, with a thousand baby snakes rushing out. The sky scrapers, with their mirror-like windows, reflect the sky.
Monday, November 22, 2021
1920
Breathtaking, what the night escapes from as the dawn runs down the street, rushing to the taxi and the stolen moments, before the lid of the jar is pried open and the butterflies escape.
Sunday, November 21, 2021
Ennui
The woods rush by the window of the train. The girl from Russia stopped me on the street. The coffee now has sugar but not cream. I need to stretch my tired aching feet. I'm taking a big trip to kill the dragon, a vacation to a deserted place, where wheels are still falling off the wagon, and scars from gravel sit upon my face. Where ticking clocks and melted remedies, are poured out in bottles on the table, where fate combines with jilted fantasy, and I burn the bridges if I'm able.
My life is just a fable. And the murmers that I hear...just the people on the train, as they go through their own lives.
Saturday, November 20, 2021
Dear Dagger
Dear Dagger,
I've held you long enough and need to let you go. You've been under my coat as I walk the street, on rainy nights when the train rushed by. I've gripped you tighter than I needed to, especially when I heard footsteps behind me, listening as I walked, to hear if they were drawing near.
I've placed you in the holster, muscle memory. I've kept you at my side even when I'm having tea, because I didn't completely trust my company.
I've kept you when you're sharp, and kept you for years until you were dull. Yet I knew I would be able to use you effectively with extra muscle.
Now, I want to drop you on the floor, hear it clatter and have nothing to defend myself with other than fists and feet. Moreso, to not live in constant battle mode.
Farewell Dagger, thank you for being at my side.
Sincerely,
Faith
Friday, November 19, 2021
That Old Dress
Every memory mends itself into this hemline.
Each thread of red silk pulled in the direction that best holds.
Underneath the clean line there is a mess--
made of all the criss-crossing stitches of untold stories.
Big Catch
Flipping nets into the sea in the middle of a hurricane?
over the sides of the boat, just off the coast--do it in a hurry!
There she wobbles, her knees locking and eyes squinting to the spray
She is the subconscious fisherwoman of your soul, eager to catch the day,
join her!
The raging winds and sea merge to make her vision blurry
but she knows the ropes by heart
she's been fishing here before
every coarse thread, every move
is memorized,
and she will show you.
Once memory is gone, then what? The winds die down
and now you are in that raft,
floating on the Trade Winds
towards Cuba, with her,
trying to remember why you pushed the boat from shore in the first place?
Then a large colorful shadow moves under the boat and she jerks awake.
You cry: Bait? Who needs it!
Let her use her hair as fishing twine.
Rip open her chest and throw her heart on the line.
There is no sense in missing the chance
to make a big catch.
Wednesday, November 17, 2021
The Staircase
There is a little staircase at the head of my bed, it runs from here to Mars.
I run up it when I am dreaming to go sit at the bar, which is on Mars.
I sit on the stool and dream of school and all the things I have to learn,
while the atmosphere steams and the surface of the planet burns.
I am in a bubble made of glass,
I watch the planets spin and the constellations pass.
Tiny green men with hammers work on spaceships
and tell me things I need to know.
Then I fall slowly, like a fog or a dreary day
back into myself as I silently lay.
I proceed to wake up,
and generally make some black coffee.
I start running down the staircase at great speed
to meet the day.
Tuesday, November 16, 2021
Racing Up
Sunday, November 14, 2021
The Fourth Wall of the Glass House
If it looks like a writer and smells like a writer, it's a piece of paper.
After I get about two or three thousand of these entries done, then I can start to find the real dinosaur bones.
Let he or she who is free from ink, throw the first stone to shatter the fourth wall of the glass house.
Saturday, November 13, 2021
A Long Road
I have a long road ahead of me. I do not have boots on, that would be too ambitious. I think I will stay in bare feet. Now, it's not meant to be tough, exactly. It's not like the Christians walking through the woods, hitting themselves with willow whips--can you imagine? But it's still a trek for the sake of trekking.
Friday, November 12, 2021
The Tap Dancer
The tap dancer's billowing arms are floating up and down quickly, like a large canvas mast struck by the wind. The weight of his torso leans forward, almost bringing him down to the ground, before he springs up. A grasshopper is no country animal, although he lives in the wheat and the green grass on the prairie. He seems simple, yet is resolute in his hopping, scary almost, the way he reaches top speed like an aerodynamic machine within a short time. He becomes a blur, a blink of the eye.
The big auditorium is empty, except for the tap dancer.
I hear his feet echo in my mind.
Wednesday, November 10, 2021
Halloween
Like a rabbit escaping from the thicker psychological bramble of the Salem witch trails, Halloween is sugary these days, full of chocolate and fake blood, laughing kids and miniature Snickers bars.
Our Own Nature (Travels to L.A.)
People are moving to L.A.
in their Volkswagens
in their cargo pants
dreaming of being an actor
dreaming of being a writer
dreaming of being a waiter
until the lights turn on.
I can see the exhaust of their cars
filtering up off of the deserts
in Nevada.
I can see their odd smiles
reflecting in the rear view mirrors.
I suppose we all have a little twinge
of ambition.
I suppose we all are like Turner
ready to be strapped to the bow of a ship
and feel the waves
to get the sense
and the timing
of our own nature.
Tuesday, November 9, 2021
6 Days
6 days and 99 channels, nothing is on, except fear and misery, bottled up in a fashionable trend and sprayed like wildfire and Mountain Dew shook up all over the--
Did you hear that silence is golden?
Let me bite the coin and return again tomorrow.
Wednesday, November 3, 2021
Lemonade Braids
The lemon of her lips is making this sour kiss sweet.
The sugar king is cradling her broken back.
He's back out on the street,
sifting through the cans and the Coke bottles
trying to find her feet.
Dance again?
These shoes are old.
Like ballet slippers from when she was a little girl.
Who cares?
Life is short.
He remembers yellow taxi cabs and lemonade stands.
She tried to sell homemade wine until she was called in for supper.
The street lights were coming on, but she had a crinkled dollar bill.
The transistor radio was sinking in the ocean.
How did he ever think he would find the author of that lullaby
he used to listen to as a child,
hiding the music underneath his pillow
pretending to snore
when footsteps came?
It takes so. much. strength. to make lemonade,
twisting the half fruit and then pouring portion after portion into the jug.
It takes so. much. combing. to make the hair straight,
then smooth it out like Chinese paper before dividing it into three's.
Saturday, October 30, 2021
Playing Cards and Crosswords
She ripped the lamp shade, she flipped over playing cards. The Queen of Hearts stares across forever. It would have been better to work for weeks at crossword puzzles, in the newspaper, in the chair, where the light was bright and unnatural.
Friday, October 29, 2021
Liquid
There is no good place for a wet hat.
The books in the bag will get wet and we can't have that.
I shake it off.
I think of the guy from the East Coast talking about how the
kids toddle down the hallways as if they're drunk, because
the floors are warped as the wood and the joists
are from 1890.
When he spills a drop of water in the kitchen
it rolls towards the corner like
liquid mercury.
My sister has a better bathtub than I do,
it's giant like a pool, you can almost go swimming.
I was in a river once, deep enough to swim.
I wore goggles and moved like a fish
watching the rocks change under me.
I wonder what it's like to be water.
To be everywhere except in a stone.
In the sky in a thunderhead
suspended.
In the eye of the lady at the edge of the valley
throwing dirt on a pile of rocks.
In the spit of a cow.
On the sweat of a forehead.
In the boiling water of soup.
In the wine before it silences laughter.
Thursday, October 28, 2021
Super Girl
Elastic radio boy meets girl
traffic running into the cave
Bite into the apple
Gold is funky too
Snapping fingers crawling past
wires into glue
Radiator helicopter
restitution wonder hips
fog and juxtapositions
Atomic threats reap benefits
television ceiling fixtures
lead a final life
pry it from your fingers
pry it from your fingers
pry it from your fingers
Touching the cattle fence
electrocuted into a dance
too cute for silence
zipper your mouth
for crying out loud
angelic xylophones are radiating bell tones
summoning you
to the call of duty
Wednesday, October 27, 2021
The Red Herring
She sleeps so beautifully, your desire for truth, curled up and comatose
while the wolves roam freely, sirens blaring to the call of freedom
while wise men sit in shadows and count beans and rocks
waiting for the return of the potters who will sit in rags
and bare feet and make jugs.
When they are dry from the kiln, and the fire has hardened them
we still put them in the sun to bake
they need to be extra strong
to hold the water from the dam.
Tuesday, October 26, 2021
Monday, October 25, 2021
It's Time
It's time to make up for lost time
it's cold outside of the door
I scribbled a rhyme on the paper
hoping you'd forget it on the floor
but you swooped down like a hawk
and stole the tail of the mouse
I ran inside of the wall
I was in my own house.
Tuesday, October 19, 2021
Double Duty
I was smoking and knew I shouldn't be, sheepishly on the porch trying to act casual, when I see two women and a stroller which doesn't have a baby in it. Their thick hair was dark brown reddish color, and dusty blond, respectively, and they stood in sweats, meandering around the speed bump in the alley, pausing to adjust the load, arguing quietly but respectively, probably homeless, saw me looking. One looks at me and asks if she can please have a cigarette, and says she'll pay me for it. I shudder and say I rolled it and could roll one, and she again insists on paying me. Thinking better of furthering the interaction, I hand her the cigarette from the first story porch and you'd think it was the hand off between God and Adam in the Sistene chapel. She thanks me profusely for the used item and goes so far as to say God Bless You. One person's trash is another's treasure. I got rid of guilt and got a blessing on top of it. She did me a favor saving me from cancer. Even after the light goes out the strange torch of karma burns.
Monday, October 18, 2021
Paradise Found
He says he doesn't deserve his problems and I suggested that regardless, he has to solve them. Listening endlessly to the playback reel of every challenge he has faced is giving me heartache. I need a dose of medicine.
He is blind to the wild dove which is awaiting entry into his soul, sitting quietly on the wires, waiting for a creeping smile to start. On the edge, he will fly in.
Sunday, October 17, 2021
Good Problems
It's a good problem to have, I mused internally, practicing my pleasant attitude.
It is my job to be polite and courteous when declining the demon and reclaiming my sense of intelligence and righteousness, reserved only for myself.
It's a table for one, and if I am unclear, it's because I still can't decide if I have enough meat on my bones.
I've been licking your spoons and waiting for you to drop science in my lap.
However, I've been changed, my blue jeans are dress slacks now.
I will choose my own problems, and if you give me yours, I will offer you my decoder ring, so you too can see the forest through the trees and build your own life.
It's not about independence, that would be too simple, and it's a theory from a document written by slave owners anyways, so I am not giving salt to that Roman Army, not today, and not ever.
Nope, it's a clean line from impressionism to the daylight in your eyes.
Saturday, October 16, 2021
The Distance
The difference between the pursuit of the hobbyist
and the call of the professional is a wild distance
not unlike the length a crow flies,
or geese when they are going South for the Winter.
It is no small step, no curb jump.
It is no distance between the car door when it is opened or closed,
not a short distance like the edge of the coffee cup to your mouth
as you take a morning sip.
No, the distance is much greater.
It's the distance of the clouds as they spill across the sky across the lake
seeming to go on forever, stretching their bones
in their hands
fingers tingling toward the horizon.
If I don't make it, and you put a coin in my mouth
when I am buried low, so be it.
When the cold stone sits above my head
I will at least have known
that it was no short distance from here to there.
Friday, October 15, 2021
For the Birds
The panic set in and petals of roses began flying around, poltergeist style through the wet air.
The frantic energy of power lines started inside the generator then remained in control, until the final moment.
I don't know what that was like, to completely lose balance.
Only the birds, dropping one by one off the power lines, really know for sure.
Electricity itself is panic, we've only recently simply learned to control it.
Plug in a toaster, flip a light switch.
For the bird, he sits there and doesn't turn into Frankenstein soup when the lighting strikes.
He is not connected to the ground.
If his beak was copper, it still wouldn't matter.
He could not peck his way with Morse code back to the source
of the rain.
Thursday, October 14, 2021
Resolutions
Fast and moving, slow yet going, these are the sands in the jar, turn me sideways, how far, tip me over and stand me on my head, now time is moving backwards. The linear haunts of doves stuck in the rafters, let them fly free when the tornado rips the roof off. Destruction is such an odd lullaby. Let me get my mandolin, I will strum it quickly, and the heart of the matter will be resolved.
Wednesday, October 13, 2021
Sunday Morning
Battered, black and blue, it's just some pancake batter with some blueberries, what did you think it was? I am not injured, I am just a Sunday monring.
Punked out and smoking, it's just a stick of incense, what did you think it was? I am not smoking out by the lake, staring at the stars, judging how close the lighter can get to my nose to catch the last hair of tobacco.
Yes, when the choir starts to sing.
No, when the quiet sets in.
Where do you find it?
Between which pages?
Tuesday, October 12, 2021
Slipping and Sliding, and Sipping
I am sipping coffee, it is luke warm. Listening to Paul Simon and realizing it's been 20 years since I lent him an ear. Outside there is an orange cone, standing on a pile of rocks, next to a building in the alley. I suppose the cone is there so that no one will back into the rocks. There's a puddle stretching out, a little lake, a sliver of nature, creeping across the blacktop. I wonder if the orange cone can see his reflection there. I won't suspend disbelief today. She is such a trapeze artist, always stretching high and flying and flipping above the safety net. I suppose my ribs can only take so much spinning, sometimes the roller coaster is bound to topple apart, screws are bound to fall out, the grease is bound to stop working, and the screeching cart will come to a halt. I will put my hands down.
Ashes at Dusk
The meadow lark painting...
the one where the woman is looking up
and the sun is bright, burning orange
and the rest of it is brown and muted.
I learned that this dark color was called
raw umber.
There's also burnt umber, and yellow ochre.
Whoever painted that one knows
at the end of the day
there's a moment
when time stops.
The color of the day then, is muted. Not known.
The sun's light is the last strong glimmer.
Monday, October 11, 2021
Three Days
Three days and I haven't eaten any bread, haven't looked in any mirrors, and haven't moved in any shocking way. I've been so busy dreaming that my aluminum foil helmet fell off in the wind.
Friday, October 8, 2021
The Cloth
When night is strung like black cloaks
hanging between the lamp posts
daylight is like white towels and their pristine
clean rectangles.
Wednesday, October 6, 2021
Like a Christo
I inhaled deeply to sense the rain, it was almost sliding off of the tar roofs and plastered wet stains to the brick walls of the buildings. The power lines were wrapped up, choreographed, it seemed, by pure chance, as they swarmed the pole in a game of hand over hand on the bat to see who goes first. All I smelled was the bark of the nearby trees, the piss from the train station steps. I also heard a few birds chirping.
The power fan I purchased from the hardware store was keeping my computer cool, it was overheating with each video project I did for the church choir, somehow, despite all odds, I ended up helping make songs for the Big Source. It looked like a throwback from the 1940s where there were machines and appliances that looked like space aliens. I had lately been thinking of how the story of Eve completely undermined the whole idea of knowledge.
Sipping on coffee was a bitter pursuit, but while looking at the veins on the leaves of the houseplant, I groaned with the morning and came awake. Tiny sticks of burned incense littered the flowerpot like soldiers or scarecrows. I tried like hell to imagine a bird, flying out of the center of my heart.
Tuesday, October 5, 2021
The Wing of A War
I sat on the wing of an airplane, looking at the night sky. The plane was a WWII bomber which was parked, permanently, in a park, on the edge of town, where the grass was home to bronze statues and a plaque. The wind blew through the trees. As they started to sway, and I closed my eyes. Opening them again I saw the Milky Way, impossibly bright. My heart grew heavy and I jumped off the wing of the plane, and landed in the darkness, careful not to break an ankle.
Friday, October 1, 2021
Getting Schooled
There is a history to the city which I never knew
About the highway that went right through
Neighborhoods and leveled the barber shops
About the buildings which grew up from the ground
Thirty stories high
To temporarily contain
The possibilities
Spraypaint on the wall doesn't do justice
To the missed time in school
The blackboard awaits the chalk
But it's I who walks
To school today
Thursday, September 30, 2021
I Long
I long to introduce you to your better self.
Your artist, your apothecary, your alchemist.
Your architect, your drawer, your painter, your prophet.
I long to help you unlock your treaure chest
on the desolate beach
and run your hand over all your hidden gems
and pearls
like a rosary
until you pray to yourself when you are weak.
I long to introduce you to your stronger self.
The one that is tough as boot leather, yet welcoming.
I long for you to find kittens in the empty boxes of your soul
and play with them, running yarn as long as your arm
and smiling which each tottering step.
I long for you to feel the sun on your face, every day.
I long for you to wake up happy, held for a moment in an embrace
just before you wake up, whether I am there or not.
I long to introduce you to your better self, the one that smirks at magic tricks
and is amused but has the real thing in the back pocket.
I long to shake your hands free of the false things
that comfort you
Shake them out like grass clippings on a blanket
wrap you in wool
give you hot chocolate
and introduce you to the warm fire
of your own soul
which chases away the shadows for once
and for all.
Wednesday, September 29, 2021
Gratitude
The passionate words I hear from mouths that are not my own
hit my ears differently.
Instead of a cold crack of a bat hitting a ball out to center field, it feels warmer,
like a pitch perfectly landing in a huge catcher's mit.
Tuesday, September 28, 2021
Eve & Newton
When Eve took the apple from the tree, after the serpent told her to, on that first bite, didn't she think to herself, this should have been a radish, or perhaps raw ginger, to better reflect the sour gravity of the situation? Apples are far too sweet, too tasty, too succulent, to refreshing to be part of such a calamity. The snake smiles and slithers away, perhaps thinking of oranges and lemons. Oh no you don't, thought Eve, why not bring me sour grapes instead? She threw the apple up to the Gods who held it, waiting centuries to drop it and hit Newton on the head.
Wednesday, September 22, 2021
I am an Echo
I have no where to go, I am waiting for you to speak.
Then I can move through the room, bouncing off of the walls.
In prudent silence I exist for all time until my moment arrives.
Tuesday, September 21, 2021
Monday, September 20, 2021
Freedom of the Mind
The ice is slippery,
I fell
into another dimension
winter of the soul
freedom of the mind.
The earth is dusty,
I stepped
onto the prairie burning
summer of the heart
freedom of the mind.
The stone is sleek and polished
I glanced
at it under the rushing waters of the river
spring of the vision
freedom of the mind.
The leaves are red and orange
I quivered
floating like a piano melody
rise of the spirit
freedom of the mind.
Sunday, September 19, 2021
Tempting Fate
I've often made up my mind at just the wrong time
Busy bee with honey lips
Seeing the signs and laughing at the guns.
Saturday, September 18, 2021
At Dusk
His black beard was the color of the sky without stars.
Her pen was broken and ink was spilling on the oak desk.
Their rough elements were caught in the door as they started the car.
One's work is never done not even at dusk.
People have a way of loking down the well.
She didn't know the difference between the sun and a flash.
He stopped the train with a loud yell.
It didn't matter when it crashed.
So long to Louisiana with its cypress trees.
If time was a string and I was a bell,
and I make a sound
I cannot tell.
Friday, September 17, 2021
Lucky Roots
The chunky hunk of ravaged bone left after the vultures desceneded from their airy throne was thrown, haphazardly by a buzzard, near a hyena, a paw, a beak, a tuft of fur. This is what had become of the zebra which had been running fast, desperate even, in his final moments. When I try to find a balance, like the zebra's fur, a black and a white, a yin and yang, I can just be, because I am like a tree, rooted in place. I do not run, therefore I cannot be chased.
Thursday, September 16, 2021
The Jogger and the Dead
A woman was jogging in the graveyard
The blacktop paths were clean beneath her feet
Perhaps she felt safer away from cars
While the quiet there gave her some relief
It was still an odd choice to say the least
She huffed and puffed among the grey tombstones
While the skeletons laid there fast asleep
She like them, dedicated and all alone
Her arms moved as she took another breath
More than anyone I have ever seen
She must be at peace with both life and death
Who knew it was in a fitness routine
It still struck me as a little crazy
Wednesday, September 15, 2021
Speech is Speeding By
Speech is speeding by I see the bits and pieces of it, like tornado shrapnel
out of Dorothy's window.
Why do I even mutter?
The Tin Man knows all my worries which stir my beating heart to speak.
The Lion nudges me to get off the ledge.
The Scare Crow he is long gone.
I miss him as he is running through the field.
Make me a big black crow,
make me an apple tree,
make me the flat face of the emerald,
as it gleams.
Tuesday, September 14, 2021
Sentimental Eye
The tear expands just before
it falls.
The cello tells my story better
than my words.
Sisyphus has great calf muscles
by now.
My tear is merely the same as the
sweat on his face.
Monday, September 13, 2021
Sonic Bonding
We laughed at the exact same time. I could tell you were about to tell a joke. You said it was told to you by a mime. Sign language doesn't have to rhyme. We were deaf, both of us, when we lived inside the drum. I surfed on the cymbals, screaming to a halt and falling headfirst into the sand as the waves threw me up like Jonas and I hit the cliffs. The pebbles started to fall like rain.
Sunday, September 12, 2021
The Future Missle
Way back in space time, blind to the pigs and the slaughtered rhymes
I found myself slipping into your black holes, wanting to go where I can't go
walking on the piano keys, hitting every black note.
Whispering through the trumpet tones when it blurted out the misanthropic
radio optics of my frequency frequently freeing me from my distress
you thought it was over I was reeling
spilling red thread from my retro dress
you had me so figured out every line in the sand
every moment of my life was a glass tower
but your dreams now are flattery
nothing no more power.
It's a future missle now, a plan of attack
a steroid pumping attitude to get your life back
I never meant to hurt you or cause you pain
why did you have to lock me up in this glass case?
I will burst out
break the glass
I will see you back
in class.
I'll be in the back with a sharpened pencil,
hanging on every word before launching skyward.
Saturday, September 11, 2021
Corresponding Parachute
Miles of the madness drawn down threads
spinning on the wheel lengthening dreads
petals of the flowers fixtures on the scene
syllabalic majesty on tough streets lean
People and the papers peeking at the news
nosy to the neighbors sitting on the roof
binoculars and frying pans
shocking to the teeth
the minds of madness grinning while
the bankers and thiefs
keep on
taking quarters from the pockets of the jeans
the shocking gestures meant a lot of
caught the attention of
the money changers at the temple funky in their dance
The wedding of the credit cards and the marriage of the damned
I stopped you just before
you got
blood on
your hands
tipping on the mysteries I drank the secret juice
and plotting my demise and jumped
and opened up
my corresponding parachute.
This prose was written in the fashion of a drum solo.
Friday, September 10, 2021
Maple Trees
Equally efficient in separating the high from the low
her atoms spin silently beneath her crown
growling in the morning light
her sun fighting its way through the forest of her mind
as she chooses which book to read.
She is sufficiently undressed enough to know that the heart
stuck to her sleeve was not attached with superglue
and can be removed, like an errant leaf
in the autumn, stuck to her sweater.
A pile of books makes for a good thing to jump into
she rakes them together with her fingers
she gathers them from the lawns of bookstores
and pulls them from the shelves.
They sit here in a pile of many colors,
fighting their way into the forest of her mind.
Trees make paper of course, and paper makes words
where her thoughts grow, like oak trees
or raspberry bushes, knotty pines and maple trees
swaying silently in the breeze.
The wind is motion and the trees are caught between
stillness and flight.
The decision comes down, the choice is made, her thoughts are split by an axe.
It flows like maple syrup.
This morning everything she reads is part of a tree.
Thursday, September 9, 2021
Ode to Black Ink
I thought all of this black ink was going to dry clean
that the paper would remain white. I thought all of this white paint
would splatter perfectly on the black canvas and I would be
here,
some angel,
some inverse Jackson Pollock standing on the edge of the
Empire State building waiting to swan dive into traffic
and rising like a phoenix with scrapes and bruises
but still fully functioning
and heart fully beating.
It started then with this black ink--mightier than the sword.
Here with this ink I lay into humanity, I lay into posterity
I write the dream into fruition I shape desperate boredom
with my bare hands into a clay like man.
I write words which state my point of view, my mind, my brand.
I am almost delierious with the drunk power each tiny speck of black has,
becuase together they become greater than the sum of their parts
whether I like it or not they become a legacy
if to no one else but me
so I judge myself
because the critics are out to lunch and if I come up short
I only have myself to blame as I look into the mirror
looking forward as much as I can despite the reflection
where the distance in the mirror
is just what's behind me.
Funny how that works.
Wednesday, September 8, 2021
War of the Roses
The roses grew in rows along the road
we picked them up and stuck them in our shoes
The fragrance was strong, the sun shone like gold
we climbed the hill and hummed a honey tune
A tiny speck of red among the green
told us that the artist's brush had painted
A scene of glory not unlike a dream
A summer's day so fine we then fainted
We slept like puppies next to the roses
Oblivious to what time supposes
as if we found a sleepy poppy field
where all wounds of war can now be healed
What a find! Soldier of fortune
spin the wheel
and rest here where your bones and your heavy boots
are wrapped up in the rose's roots
that slip around your souls
like eels
running to the ocean
underground
may your hands rise like a hammer
to hear a thousand birds stammering
as they sing a joyful tune
the roses are in bloom
Tuesday, September 7, 2021
Vigil by the Lake
The seance started slowly, building up steam
until it fed the demons and the everlasting dreams
the sunsets and the lullabies never heard again
the night that the waters won and stole our only friend
His turtles and his salamanders now will run astray
with no one to care for them and nowhere to play
Everyone's heart is saddened, and heavy here tonight
to watch the boy as his soul silently takes flight
Sunday, September 5, 2021
Sugar Water
The pine tree hangs over the garden, its long green boughs falling like curtains while a hummingbird whirs dangerously close to my ear and sticks its long beak into my brain to take out some sugar water. Why not let the alphabet take a break and just write poems with mud today? I would like my hands to be covered in the clay that made Adam, and for lunch I'll have the apple that caught the eye of Eve. It's all water over the damn now, anyways. The Sistine Chapel has already been built, Thoreau has already lived by the pond, what shall I do to find some spiritual corner? Tilt my head and let the hummingbird in?
Saturday, September 4, 2021
Twin Invisible Eyes
I've got twin invisible eyes
I see the past and the present at the same time
They meld into one perspective
two halves of one sea
I've got long strong arms that swing
like a pendulum
time no longer holds my face to the floor.
Instead I fly on the trapeeze
back and forth like the tides
each side of the coin shines in its own way.
Friday, September 3, 2021
Everywhere Except Canada
I fell in love with a blue man. He was wearing a black hat. The brim of the hat was custom made. I had a goldfish named Linda at the time and she moved with flowing orange flags, waving her fins to say hello when I came home. It had been a long week, I had travelled everywhere in my mind. Everywhere except Canada. The forests there were too pure, the rivers too clean. Instead I had spent time at Miami's coldest beaches, waiting for the seaweed to be untangled from my feet. I was barefoot as I crossed the Brooklyn Bridge, silent as I walked through James Baldwin's black and white San Fransisco, separate from those lonely South Dakota nights that Cowboy Jake used to tell me about. I was riding in a blue car, thinking all these black thoughts, the orange traffic lights were flashing as I made my way away.
Thursday, September 2, 2021
Stones Making Bubbles as They Fall
Her heavy voice sunk down like a stone into the sea
or a riverbed on the edge of the Mississippi
Where toil and trouble was not Macbeth
it was the life that many led
So many hands on so many drums
have made these rhythms which are now
at the jazz club.
Every conga drum and every cajon
every burst of laughter
that bubbles up.
Wednesday, September 1, 2021
Evidence of Human Life
The bobby pin was bent,
it looked like two fingers making a peace sign.
It fell from her black hair,
and landed on the blacktop in the hot sun.
That is why it glistened.
My shoe stuck to some gum,
which had also landed on the sidewalk.
It was less glamorous,
but evidence of human life nonetheless.
Gravity does not wait
for me to finish my ambitious errand.
The sweating summer street
today is full of fragile life glistening.
Tuesday, August 31, 2021
The Cynic
I try to keep my cynic in a cage
I guild each bar so she stays
her mouth is foaming with the lies
fed by silver spoons gleaming like war planes
in the sky
Sometimes her mind is buzzing
like multitudes of preachers and popes on Sunday morning
muttering and shouting and searching
like a distant click clack of a train car
humming like a motor, a truck, or powerlines
Other times it is quiet and dark
as black as the inside of a coffin
of a small child killed by an American bomb.
Sometimes she lays there not knowing what to do
sometimes the sadness is so heavy
it's not the weight of the world
but the difference between worlds
that has her down.
Then she awakes in the morning like a bird
but doesn't sing.
She's mad but it's not the mad hatter mad
from being stoned on the lead of American boredom.
It's a sinking mad, feeling the weight
of the darkness of the caves in Afghanistan.
She rattles the cage. If she wasn't in the cage,
we might not hear her at all.
She trembles the bars
reverberating to the heart of those who have lost
too much.
Hangs in the air like the stare of a young child looking
at the space where his arm used to be,
grunting to do daily tasks,
always thinking of land mines
in the back of his mind.
Even in this one grunt I hear
a whole coughing dissonant symphony of
foreign policy. Foreign...policy?
Kink the hose of infinity.
Sunday, August 29, 2021
The Devil's Palate
It was not red paint but the light of the fire
which splashed when the embers moved.
The Devil himself sometimes makes appearances.
Stoking the fire brings him out of the coals.
Stirring the salt and pepper of the ashes
one loose stream of light ventured forth
disappearing into the air as he swallowed it.
Saturday, August 28, 2021
Half Way There
Eighteen minutes left before we leave.
Didn't you set the car keys where I would remember them?
The earth is moving and I can't see the sun.
Not with these sunglasses on.
Where is your other ear?
Did you hear what I was saying?
This window is not going to go down.
I had it fixed last week.
Are you kidding me?
We're halfway there.
Are you going to get the keys or did you leave them by the gas pump?
Didn't you believe me when I told you?
No I wouldn't have known.
How would I have known that you need shades to see?
No, this isn't a time to argue.
But I heard you say...
One chance to go down to New Mexico in black leather jackets high on the night air, fixing to die on torn blue jeans that hug our knees like the riddles of ancient days. Slapping our thighs in time to jazz, wondering if our feet are too loud as we tap morse code lullabies in time to the pounding piano, heaving and sighing like a whale thrown onto a beach while the ocean roars out with its clattering sticks and snare drums, foaming at the mouth like a rabid dog, it never stops and it's not going to. We will have to head out the door whether we are ready or not.
We have no time left.
Friday, August 27, 2021
Joy and Mud
Joy is not muddy. It is a vibrant river, fresh from the mountain tops. When you're feeling cold, could you be my snow? All I ask is that you melt and run to me, wearing down every haggard rock in my brain until it is fine sand. Let's walk on the beach, shall we? Take my hand. Let's skip stones and talk of old times. I will pick up a stick and we will draw in the sand. Dragging it closer to the water, the sand becomes mud-like. The stick drags, and each new design is erased, as quickly as it is drawn, by the constant lapping of the waters. What then? Will you look at me with wide searching eyes, and say I told you so?
Thursday, August 26, 2021
1,000 Tuesdays
The pigeons and I under the viaduct
see the faded colors of the mural
I touch my hands to the paint
The trains don't come here anymore,
the last train to pass here
was 1,000 Tuesdays ago.
It raced there on the way to a black coffee boardroom
I was commuting in blue jeans
to the last creative ramp to board the arc
not realizing I was a unicorn
and that there are often free tickets to the Titanic.
It's hard to explain if it was a sense of ambition
or just a sense of purpose which drove me then
but I know it's something else now.
The color is deeper, even the black of the mural
although faded, is more opaque
than the coffee ever was.
Wednesday, August 25, 2021
Moving Through Time
Tuesday, August 24, 2021
Cupid's Cello
When cupid begins to play the cello
and art becomes a sky of rising suns
clouds of color soft as feather pillows
stretch up like fingers reaching for a drum
The humming of the birds and crickets too
join in this joyful melody we sing
The steady hands begin to strum the lute
and Cupid's bow goes deep into the strings
Composer's notes, nah, he doesn't bring it
He follows closely the rise of each kiss
What sheet music does Cupid use for this?
None I've ever seen, I think he wings it.
Monday, August 23, 2021
Exodus Street
I live on Exodus Street. Things are always moving. Last night I saw the Northern Lights richocheting off of the lamposts and hovering silently above the clouds, their rainbow fireshow heaving glowing darts higher than the sky could hold. The light seemed not to run out, but to simply go towards infinity. We were in the tenement buildings, pasted to the walls were the cut-out pictures of fashion girls and stock market reports which we had painstakingly removed from the magazines and newspapers with the sharp, tart taste of temptation and then cut with the dull scissors of addiction. The office boys had circled the word "Sell" in red pen, and we had picked up all the extras in the mail room, back when messages reached their destinations and when radios had knobs and rock stars had hair and--what? Where are you going? Not you, too? It seems things had just been waiting to fall off the ledge. The lemmings were out, the zoos were full of politicians and their tiny feet were creating dust storms as they ran closer and closer to the cliff. It seems everyone was running from a bum deal, getting the "bums rush." He had been on the park bench for too long, with all of his things, and the. Falling, falling, falling.
Sunday, August 22, 2021
Train Wreck in Kansas
I read a poem that made me think, I cannot write a poem at all.
It made my words just birds ramming into windows,
it made my ideas just fists busting into walls.
No, seriously, it was quite good.
It was thought out in metaphor and each piece lead to the next
I realized I have a far way to go
to lift the sideways steam engine
from the Kansas plains
and remove the debris from the prairie
and find beaty in the
sundrenched metal
and find soul in the
tipped over coal
in this
train wreck.
Saturday, August 21, 2021
The Way of Things
Basking in the glow, the ember rolls and falls
into the cool water and goes out.
I suppose that this is the way of things.
Friday, August 20, 2021
Which One
Skirting the issue, sifting through tissues, tamping the coffee grounds before making cappucino.
Sucking the life out of the balloon, mangling the mud before the monsoon.
Crimping the hair before the big dance, stamping the letter and taking the chance.
Her odd choice of clothes echo and fold, she is wearing the mask on her head.
Why not put it on her face? Instead she lifted the sheath of papers, stuck between the pages of the books she was constantly rubbing the ink talking about how it smelled. I wonder if in her mind is a series of bells, hanging on strings, and she never knows which one to pull.
Wednesday, August 18, 2021
Cafe Lighting
At the cafe, all the corners of the napkin were upside down. A girl with orange hair placed a steaming cup of tea on the table while above me I heard a bird rustling, then taking flight. Later, in the dark, almost asleep, my mind was counting the shadows and the thieves.
When I read a book in private later, on the train, the musty smell of the bookstore rushed into my nostrils. The clerk laughed, which stirred his short beard, when I asked if the book was fiction or non-fiction. The letters on the side of it read "Titian."
I wrote my number on the napkin, in ballpoint pen, next to the incense. Love was a 10-sided dice. I hoped he would call, yet I didn't want to talk. I wanted to hear the radio frequency in the bookstore again, to undress my intellect and bathe in the static of a thousand minds humming on the shelves. With the pictures stored in my mind, even with my eyes closed, I could write an entire novel on a napkin, if the light was right.
Monday, August 16, 2021
No More Sirens
The tender time to test my fate has come
The pirate ship has sunk and I'm adrift
The jug of rum is unstuck from my thumb
the world still wiggles underneath my ship
The Earth in all her curves looks flat to me
Perhaps I've spent too much time on the sea
Looking at the far-off curved horizon
Each slip and swell taking me ever near...
yet I can't reach what I have my eyes on
The harbor of my home she will miss
She's in Hades with her cape of chaos
The monks in saphron robes are not so far
eyes glisten as I listen to the stars
my elbows perched on the crow's nest up high
I almost hear the Heavens start to sigh
So close am I when tunderstorms let go
torrential rains then chill us to the bone
we are safe just by the skin of our teeth
when skies clear and sunlight offer relief
yet the moment I feel like I'm alive
is when I listen and I hear the storm.
Her and I speak through some ancient channel
A conch shell to the ear the static calls
Mysteries of the sirens and stone gods
The blue-black ooze of her blood now runs cold
All I see, a constellation shattered
Romance in the stars that never matttered.
True North?
I wandered on the sea foam sprays.
Posiedon's trident driven in her heart.
Her madness echoes into the coral
My sadness comes out through the darkest cave
The lips she once kissed have become
her rage.
Sunday, August 15, 2021
The Calendar for the Meek
The meek will inherit the Earth.
The sleek and slender fashion model will inherit the stares, when she is tilted on the magazine rack as I am buying brass tacks.
I speak like a fish out of water, bubbling to the surface I argue with the cashier about coupons.
Capitalism lives to see another day.
Keep me posted when the ruthless don't win.
Keep me posted when your postcards show flowers and not strange fruit.
Keep me up to date, I want to see the world that is behind the sunglasses
of the blind piano player.
Saturday, August 14, 2021
Bird of Paradise
The bird of paradise stopped on a tree, hung out on a branch, then flew away from me.
I watched him as he flew, and disappeared into the sky.
I wonder if that is paradise, whatever is out there.
Wherever he is flying to.
Thursday, August 12, 2021
College
They said to read Shakespeare, Milton and Freud,
and for life I would be better prepared.
I could go into Accounting or Law,
and slay boredom with a sword made of glass.
My friends were dressed in black and sulked a lot,
they were hip to the culture of changes.
I was caught in a dream of Cubism,
on the edge of perspective, awaiting hue.
Wednesday, August 11, 2021
Tuesday, August 10, 2021
BENT METAL
Bent metal rusted scraped the blacktop with a fist
Busking for the coins I dropped inside the well
Did I blow my fortune just to trade it for a kiss?
Only time knows and only time will tell.
The rats in the alley are smashed under wheels of trucks
Their bones completely flat they end up like
bear skin rugs underneath my shoes
Am I roadkill on your alley boots?
Sunday, August 8, 2021
Why Do Stars Fall?
(2) Stars are tiny shards of glass, thrown from the windows of a tall building in the sky. Many stars together make up a window, and there are many windows in this giant black skyscraper we know as space. The word skyscraper is ironic as it doesn't scrape the sky, it covers the sky, and bends with the arc of the universe to cover it entirely.
What is more is that each window glows with an office light. There are many many beings who make up the workings of the Universe, and they work here. Each window of stars, or galaxy, has an office behind it. Beings works there, on their computer, drinking moon coffee, for Infinity Corp.
We can't see them during the day becuase of the blue curtain with the clouds on it. This is where the beings work, making the meaning behind the curtain. During what we call night, they take a rest and sleep, yet the office lights are on. The cleaning crew is there, running the vaccuums, which sounds like thunder. Once in a while, the vaccuumers see the light bulbs are burning out. They change the bulb and have nowhere to put it, so they throw it out the window. It is just glass, but it catches the light, just for a moment, as it falls. We see the falling star, and we say "make a wish."
(1) Why do stars fall? They are tiny shards of glass, thrown from a tall building. The stars are actually windows, to a giant skyscraper which is black. It is so tall that it covers the sky, and bends too. Each window is an office light. Each light or sparkle has an office behind it. Someone works there, on their computer, drinking moon coffee, all during the day. We can't see them then becuase of the blue curtain with the clouds on it. This is where the people work, making the meaning for all of the universe behind the curtain. At night, they take a rest, and are sleeping, but we can see the office lights are on. The cleaning crew is there, running the vaccuums, which sounds like thunder. Once in a while, the vaccuumers see the light bulbs are burning out. They change the bulb and have nowhere to put it, so they throw it out the window. It is just glass, but it catches the light, just for a moment, as it falls. We see the falling star, and we say "make a wish."
Saturday, August 7, 2021
When the Stranger
When the stranger looks at you strangely, for he is a stranger, as he passes, you catch a spark of light. The shield on his blue-eyed cornea, the concave lens, brimming at his eyeball's edge, glistening.
It was just a sideways glance but now your mind is choking like a bent garden hose, then a faucet runs clean, and there is an undercurrent of thought rivers, polluted by his sympathy.
You feel a pull as the ego magnet is multiplying, a sunrise above a lake, the sliver blossoms into the fat sun of fire then dips down like a roller coaster into an ember when he looks away.
When was that moment, when you thought he knew you?
Friday, August 6, 2021
HEROICS
There's no standard handbook for heroics.
You climb the building and sit on the ledge,
looking out over the land below.
Simmering butterflies line your stomach.
Calm your nerves with nicotine, when they start to fray...
No one wants to clean up this crazy mess.
"Jumping is not an option!" the birds say, the clouds mutter, "put your heart back in your chest."
Sew up your sternum and just sit, for no war was ever won in one day.
Justice seems to move, but move just a little bit, like when the clouds move over the sun,
the day is grey but who notices? Your vision is behind your closed eyelids. You see sun spots.
You stand on the ledge, stoic. Up here, your feet are as planted and firm
as if they were on the earth.
Wednesday, August 4, 2021
PLASTIC MARJORIE
Plastic Marjorie, you live your life in a jelly jar
never looking at the stars you're always in the cupboard laying bare
Plastic Marjorie you are destined to be full of vinegar at
inopportune times
and say the wrong thing at cocktail parties.
Plastic Marjorie, won't you let me take you to the dance, one more time?
Let your black dresses flow, your silk hats taper into the windstorm
up on Broadway street where the rats and the tapdancers step in time
to gravel
Hurtle across my space time, ok Marjorie?
Put your hair in curlers, trip out while staring at the wall
many dinosaurs died to make you even...plausible.
Tuesday, August 3, 2021
The Rim of the Cup
The smooth circle has haunted men since Leonardo's time
as they tried to draw it and divide it and make it square inside
How will I believe the sun is merely an echo
of the top of my coffee cup?
This circular line, the orbit of us all.
Did you feel the heat of the sun today, cascading down your back?
Burning your skin with its piercing, as if jealous of you
down here on Earth while she is stuck in the sky
hanging there like a chandelier, burning for all time,
do you ever think of how SHE feels?
No I just crept into the shade
to dream and inhale the darkness
The corners were all so sharp there
the sidewalk, the curb, the edge of the buildings
The power lines, now those were a mess
strewn up on the pole like my Aunt Jenny's jet black hair
as she piled it up with giant sea shell clips
How did electricity ever get through that yarnball
to power the refrigerators and the washers
or start the day when someone plugs in a toaster?
It comes down from the pole in a straight line.
Thursday, July 29, 2021
It's Literally Happening
A girl plops down next to me,
then shuffles
to the side,
A stone gangster glances no
glances, he is staring straight ahead while
the train is zipping by
the background blurrrrrs,
silly chatter fills the train car tonight
the elevated train in Chicago...
For now, the stakes are low
it is early--there is no cigarette smoke or rowdy boys wanting to make it into a dance
The homeless men who will sleep here at 2 a.m. have not yet boarded. It's because they are on the streets yet with their old coats, which they will use as pillows when they come.
Photo by Hannah Frank: Photo of unidentified commuter
Saturday, July 24, 2021
A Bomb From Mars
The circuit board was cracked and splintered, there
on the steps by the alley where the lit
cigarette was thrown before the car drove
by with the package in the trunk bumping.
It was a bomb from the planet of Mars
with the whole thing ticking...waiting to blow.
The cops were hovering around like bees
their tan raincoats flapping as they looked down
surveying the scene and writing in books.
The grime on the foot print near the tire track
was going to crack the case wide open--
if only they could see it.
Infared glasses might help, or x ray vision to
determine it was brought here by a man
who was just a travelling alien.
He was here from Mars, fresh from Mercury,
carrying a bomb that would blow up,
proving the aliens are just a mob
and they saw us here on earth and they thought
us humans are not doing a great job.
People are dying underneath the tanks
factories are blowing out the black smoke
we've had all this opportunity...
Let's not make our chance at beauty a joke.
Friday, July 23, 2021
Our Time on Earth
The storm is coming, it will start to rain
We will bathe ourselves in the new rivers
The sparrows know the secrets of the clouds
they whisper words that fish and turles hear
We bubble up not knowing where to go
Gurgling like babes fresh out of the womb
These drips will drop down to the hard, dry soil
Our time on earth is over far too soon
Thursday, July 15, 2021
THE TRAIN
He walked through the woods, through the alley in the city, through the dreams of his mind, down the tunnel of where she was. He was in the subway tunnel but felt displaced, unknown. The late night train would be rolling through soon, and the rats would scatter and the billboards would shake for an instant, before the magazine ready models went back to their plastic gazes, staring at nothing for eternity. His lips felt dry and wanted a cigarette, a taste of a salty kiss, but it was no more. He grasped the leather strap of his bag and slung it across his shoulder, harder than he needed to, and waited for the train.
Wednesday, July 14, 2021
UNFETTER
The rim around the coffee cup tipped up then down I took a sip
It stung like bees criss crossing on my fingertips like a hush up to my lips
what was this silence? Dark and mellow strange but never bitter
the pitter patter of tiny feet, these long lost demons running down the hall
I stopped and counted them all
I scooped them up like stars in my hand
and shouted to the wind as I released the sand
Now, now, NOW! Do I understand?
Do I unfetter?
I do understand.
I do unfetter.
I lose my better half to become whole.
Tuesday, July 13, 2021
STAYING LOCAL
He is in Katmandu sending me letters about the colorful trash
I thought we might reconnect like on a rotary dial phone
The way time has passed has been less like a banana peel slipping under my foot
and like a hood around people kissing in that one Magritte painting
She is in China, explainning the training to the people there
she said they live in shacks and the sunrise coming up through the smog
is other worldly.
I meanwhile took a trip to the grocery store.
Later in the rain I walked by it again, soaking wet, and bought a poncho
made of plastic from a homeless man named Alvin for $6.
It was a good purchase and I got what I needed, and he would get supper later.
Sunday, July 11, 2021
A TREND CAME
Wednesday, July 7, 2021
Monday, July 5, 2021
HOT WATER
(2) Hot water makes tea, you steam up with soliloquies
ghostly moving through the locked gates
you spill suddenly, I am standing on the ground
pondering the make-up of your soap box
Why do you talk so fast?
Rivers always get where they are going.
as you reverberate through the locked gates
Oil makes black top, I am standing on the ground
pondering the make-up of your soap box
Why do you talk so fast?
Rivers always get where they are going.
Wednesday, June 30, 2021
CARPAL TUNNEL
Friday, June 25, 2021
HORACE SILVER & THE T-SHIRT
I will not be the one
that freezes.
Thursday, June 24, 2021
THE NEW NOMAD
Tuesday, June 22, 2021
Dark Poetry
I thought I'd write dark poetry
to take all my darkness and put it into line
but I didn't want my actual self to be dark, just the words.
I thought I'd take my cynicism and lay it out bare
but I didn't want to actually be cynical
I didn't want to actually not care.
Yet here I am brooding like a fool.
I thought I'd tell a white lie
to take all my darkness and cover it with a sheet
but I didn't want it to be the undertaker of my word, just a shield.
I thought I'd take my honesty and stir it in a pot
but I didn't want to cook it completely,
I would not be able to eat it.
So here I sit and nibble on the truth.
I thought I'd get a blue mood
to take all my rhythms and groove them into the dawn
but I didn't want to get a hangover, just to hang out.
I thought I'd sit by the window with my hand in my chin
but not let myself go completely.
I thought I'd let my imagination run
but I wasn't going for Olympic gold.
Monday, June 14, 2021
TRIANGULAR JUGULAR
on that window sill
where my elbows sit
and they make
a triangle
hands on my chin.
An A flipped upsidedown.
A V waiting to be redrawn.
Lines are boundaries, lullabies
Lure me to my dreamstate
sleepwalking foggy down the hallway.
Perspective merges then radiates
the doorways and the staircase
windows are now stained with color
they used to be clear
we could see each other.
(1)
The jugular falls in a triangular way
the plans we made when the stars were bright
flipped upsidedown
Lines were drawn boundaries
Crossed eyes and lullabies
lured me to my dreamstate
sleepwalking foggy down the hallway
messed up with guns and the occult
felt squares and grandma's quilts
lit cigarettes on the edges of the ledge
that window sill
it's such a small thing
it's no big deal
it's just chipped paint
that window sill
where my elbows sit
and they make
a triangle
hands on my chin.