that cat has lost
her mouse to a humane trap
sulks like meat loaf
Category: Poems
ashes ashes (20170917)
was everything you felt for me
a trick of the light?
some magician’s smoke
fanned to achieve
the appropriate density?
how many parts per million
were enough to make my
eyes water?
was the fire a reflection
in a mirror
without heat,
without the power to consume?
see my ashes for what they are
no trickery here
just crematory soot
bones to grind into flour
the origins of art (20170916)
a het up ape
in a t-shirt
swinging a hammer
i break everything
that drifts into
my orbit
i say this is art
but is it art
do animals make art?
what about termites with
their giant rippling mounds?
now that’s la sagrada familia
what was so bad about
living in the trees
what called us down
into the tall grasses
of the savannah?
the sun puts an ache in
my teeth and the taste
of burning ants on
my tongue
tacky kardia (20170915)
my heart beats
and i feel it in every inch
of my skin
i feel like
i’m inflating
one throbbing pulse
at a time
how will my
collection of hats
fit when i become
as large
as the room?
hogtied (20170914)
tie me at the wrists
and then make sure
to secure my thumbs
primates are handicapped
without the use
of their hands
it’s for your own good
after all, and this time
don’t give me a safety word
or better yet
gag me–i don’t mind
as long as i can breathe
it’s all fun and games
until someone collapses
a lung or has a stroke
of course this is just
a metaphor
we don’t even have rope
upon discovering an old polaroid that should have burned (20170913)
i stare out
of the instant photo grinning
in a dove gray tux
a formal high school event
one of two that i can recall
it is hard to look at myself
the me inside recoils
at all of that youth
at that smile
as with many old photos
this one has faded
in a dramatic fashion
along with most of my memory
of that night
my chest
alreadybleached white
is now a blistering snowstorm
a blizzard over my heart
that makes me doubt
that foolish cockeyed grin
plastered on another me’s face
was being happy that easy?
or was that the beginning
that moment when the damage began
the frostbite in the bones?
dove feathers drift down
and i am moving softly, slowly
practicing a display of teeth
s’alright (20170912)
somehow i sliced
a small arc into
the skin below
the first knuckle
and now it is a red
waxing crescent
much like the imprint
of an invisible
sharp fingernail
digging in
either in anger or fear
moon in the west
after sunset
cyclopian señor wences
done here (20170911)
don’t ring the bell
unless you know what time it is
i’ll tell you
for whom it tolls, my scrawny
little bit of circumstance
a brief flash (20170910)
something black flashes
in the grass
exactly the way
light doesn’t expand
overhead the sun blazes
behind a white cloud
and casts a long black shadow
across the sky
an oil slick on blue
underground
moving toward me
the bones in my feet
phalange proximal metatarsal
vibrate with its approach
something insensate and unilluminated
flashes underground
knowing me without knowing
breaking point (20170909)
i am a stained glass saint
and you are a high-pitched
tuning fork pressed against
my flattened multiple colors
you ring
i respond
with crack and shatter
fake gems from a pirate
souvenir shop scattered on
the floor
the red ones are my hearts
the blue ones whatever resolve
i kept in check
more hot lead
and patience
will be required
Words and Feathers 