Category Archives: Poetry

The Top

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You walked right into that one. A room.

Look around. This is no hallway. You've stopped.
Maybe it's a big room with lots of little things. Maybe it's small.
A size queen would know the difference.

But you know better. Pacing around. How floors can imperceptibly rise so
nothing can truly be touched.

Stooping. Trying. Remembering.
Imagining.

As the little clocks with bells zing in swoops
heads talk like strangers who know you
took pain to reassure

The dim humanities crossed out in long lines of reasoning. That were made
to elevate us.

A signatory god on paper moves the mass planning
the planting of kibbles. And how else? In the snowy fields.
Where God made only snow.

Like a flat plain made of wire mesh that holds the bigger chunks. Too costly
solid metal, in long lines of coin. Where would the fun be? 

Without the commonplace that lags into hope?
It's not your fault. But still, sometimes

Those damn idol cows grazing in a room fattened, surely they know their fate:
the piston cracking their skull will result in the sweetest dining.

If you must ask, the only purpose that matters, serving
the pockets of our family has made life rich.

It is, as it always has been. Even
with the tightening lines. Only now, everyone pretends.

Or did they once dream of birds in the morning
sky, sweeping between trees, as all
children might?

But these ponderous wings, what raises now? The desire to be you? 

They do not know. Nor do you, as long lines of reasoning cross out humanities.
The lining of the pockets and insoles. The immense energy required to become
airborne.

And the figurines as static beatification adorn the mantelpiece of collectibles, each
a potential that will never be. Remember how they look at night, so warm and alive,
in the light of the fire? Such compliments.

On these nights, the rows of dreams wrap warmly, crossed out.
While the ledgers in a mesh of purposes, sift.

There are no spoken words that ease when arguments tie knots. Just gifts
in the wandering horde of expectations that feeds and takes
in their worthwhile positions.

Sylvia’s Holiday Halloween Party

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Under the couch, a candy, crispy strawberry
the bathroom smell gleams fresh with ammonia
rubber fingers twiddling like aprons from the 50's
where June and the pleated pants pressed flatly
covering the hard line from inside to out, made
presentable the clean bleach we speak happily

You see, underneath couches, beds and any space
where little gaps rise debris begins mingling in
wild cast-off clutters of filth that hide resisting
discovery and may appear as nothing to unwary eyes
but as they look I know what lurks so I suck them up
in a vacuum bag even in the gaps between, even in
the crevices of carpet threads, deep, steam clean

The little girls are visiting where spider webs
will not do, in the corners of the ceiling where
dangling webs might grip their pony tails and send
them screeching down the halls with little bugs dancing
as they fling about their curls to be free of species
invading the pristine haven of the bleached and pleated genes

And the witches in the wardrobe who ignore the vacuum's pull
giggling gingerly for their time alone with these fleeing skulls
cast candy in the couches to appease the parent's call
and twitter in the shrieking lass to wind the web anon
then send her forth a huddled mass to fear no more of trees
nor dancing with the brooms and beasts, nor pleating for the knees

And candy in the couches sat the guests all well and pleased
with ginger boys and girls resounding kiddy coos and leaves
moving shadows on the crystal glass from breezes in the moon
and doggie growls from nicely fed the meat steaks cross the room

Yes it's pleased to see you here relax and have your fill
such clean and tidy warmth you bring to compliment my will
a cookie for the cookie heart that's sweetness bound to taste
bitter in the dregs of wine that spoiled in your haste
search the dream that fills the sky at night, in wonder of all lies
and chew the meat of cabal fish to join your soul to mine
then wings will send us far to rest on truer shores of bliss
where dining hot on other's chests your secret comes to rest

At last we see the sparkled hand that bound you here to me
with power made of gummy drops and plastic heads and beams
these lovely children like my songs and heed them on their knees
and screeching though they go anon, it's far too late for please

Gas Station, Cigarettes at Midnight

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You do not care
  what people think
that baseball cap
cliched rugged spewing
like compelled worth
  was it surprise
  when I called you
a liar? or just
a smile like cats get
when minds focus?
you do not know
  how eyes betray
  people who see
    walking invisibly
    though monuments
  how many have gathered
    in old coliseums
    that stack neatly
  like sculpted torsos
  eclipsing in silhouette
    the man
So was I surprised
when you told me you wanted
  to be a cop
  after a marine
  and that Christ
moves you?
was that why
when I met your eyes
  tears came when asked
what large hurt
has unmade you?
  Would tears come
  on an island
with guns raised level
in the study between
  watermelons, heads and bullets
what honor left
    there
that you felt
  we needed?
that night
you told me
how stupid people
  were in the daytime
  chatting about nothing
as I watched
a stranger beauty
  this sadder face
    unfold
in origins
  and knew

The Wonderer

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The strange lit wick amidst
the larger seething seas of air
that send flames dancing, casting
little warm glows moving shadows
across the periphery of sight
in nights wondering for coming dawn
in this small circle of glass, melting
as a hand holds a rare familiarity

whether luminance bound in
machines, or the softer sense
of smoke rising in prayer
all were alone in their territories
missing the long rise toward almost
never quite morning

thick in jungled sounds around
the chanting of the village
a traveler guides the roads behind
planted for the heart of strangers

dense in green and human skin
this flicker on metal walls now
shine back upon what always was
itself larger than anticipation
and larger still in quiet rooms
where floods of light on squares
trickle outside like a distant stream