03/31/20 Just a Walk, Nothing to See Here

You walked to the water

without leaving a note,

without argument

or expectations,

without time

sweeping your feet from the sand

like a kiss

in the morning

you walked to the water,

without measuring the distance

between me

and the sea

you walked

to the water

without your summer dress,

like a birthmark

on the earth

begging the moon

to accept your surrender

you walked to the water

without words

no discernable purpose

at all

or proclamation of causes

rights

or rituals,

outmeal still boiling

on the griddle,

the last bird of the bluehour

painting the sky indigo, lilac, and green,

an unexplored dream bating your lips,

without a hello

or goodbye,

by no prayer

or vengeance…

it’s not as strange

as it seems,

you walked

to the water

and returned with some tea.

I gotta stop fumbling

with your memories

like this.

They always come out

better than I remember.

I’m sorry

when I don’t tell you

all

that I see,

but you walked

to the water

and I feared

it wasn’t with me

and I watched in suspense from the window

as you showed me

how to be free

to the water and back,

the beginning

and end,

From the earth

to the sea

03/30/20 Detention

I remember sitting in detention

when I was little

for one accident of imagination or another

often,

though I rarely went

preferring instead to jump a gate,

steal a book,

bounce a basketball in the park

by myself

dreaming

of when I would be rescued from the simple architecture

of failed dreamers,

sleeping in backseats of cars

without a care in my heart

when somewhere a bell rang

signaling another meeting

in the woods

where no one was allowed to look at the trees or talk back to the sun.

That’s what I remember about detention –

all the ways a mind has

to break free and travel

03/29/20 The Cat Has Something to Say

If the rain doesn’t stop

I’ll have to stay home,

bake a bread of two,

tell my cat we’ve had to postpone Easter –

he won’t care

but I like telling him things

like there’s a decision to be made

and we’re voting,

you know…

it’s like democracy;

a malnourished lineup

of yes or no options

on the other side of which

is an animal

that sleeps sixteen hours a day,

just wants its dinner

and will say nothing in return.

Ooooooo, the sun just came out;

ignore all I’ve written;

here, hold my pen

03/28/20 Fraying Lines

Let me feel grateful for the solitude,

but there are those who can’t rest;

let me worship peace with an alarm clock set on snooze indefinitely,

but everyday another worker screams, naked in neglect;

let me write my little words

like there’s meaning in abstraction,

myth,

metaphor,

but the front lines are far, far out there

where the rest of us can’t reach;

let me dance party in the kitchen,

but there are billions crying;

let me ponder the river,

but an orange clown rages with deceit;

let me water my garden,

a homeless thief suffers in an alley

with a last duty;

let me contemplate which greens to sauté,

but I know someone, somewhere starves their love.

Good, bad;

wrong, right;

I cannot engineer a solution

– this is a mutual tide –

we are adrift, billions of little rafts,

tied together;

take care to check the fraying of your lines

03/27/20 The Source

Poetry is dangerous

it will make you walk backwards to the source

with a dozen memories on your back

scratching for another way in.

“Wait,

until the road is clear;”

“send a scout;”

“pray like there’s a miracle coming;”

“maybe,

when you’re old and wise,

you’ll receive an official invitation,

why offer everything to an invisible cause?”

-- the ministers suggest.

The past is scrupulous like that,

is sells a thousand reasons,

but not a single purpose to be found

that’s worth the sound

your feet make on the sand

to that which waits to meet us

03/26/20 Shadow Box

There is no reason

to withdraw a thought,

but for the purpose

of what love forgot.

We’re only sediment

the cosmos brought,

well, not too shabby for

cosmic dust with art.

What you leave

in your unopened hand,

the seeds of an unoffered friend.

There’s not much else to

this exercise,

just a wound that lingers

in your shadow box

03/25/20 One Personal Disaster

A mean drink falls to the ground,

a stranger staggers,

somewhere

a two bit con man brings a failing child to the pawn;

an orange baby screams obscenities

from a tainted teat;

glass shatters on the linoleum

where dreamers sleep,

leaving behind a rock,

with no signature –

it must have been the weather…?

It’s roooooooough

outside,

been blowing smoke for weeks. The

economy can’t get its fix,

century old puss oozes from the cracks between the classes,

and the whole earth shutters,

as neighbors bring news

of another lullaby

gone

sweet.

Birth,

death;

proclamations of power,

defeat,

love and surrender;

kindness is just a gift for yourself,

without knowing its messenger.

We could all blow up,

any minute,

from the pain,

or trudge ahead by the light of undiscovered galaxies.

Hell, sometimes I want to go squeeze somebody till the anger recedes,

but instead I’m here with you,

exchanging bread and pleasantries.

This is ain’t a holy act,

just one of necessity.

I was once a pirate with dreams of being a scavenger,

now I play with these slippery words,

which

only

barely,

ever

make

much

sense.

What will you do with your one personal disaster?

03/24/20 First Person, Somewhere, In Writing

What am I doing with

this feather in my palm

describing a miracle…?

I’m built for war.

Okay, fine, I’ll stay here

set up by the window,

I’ll just keep a record

and vote with the bagels.

Every window has a light

and an eager stranger.

Power is fluid

authority is not;

each life has only one author

-- yes, story is turbulent,

so much depends on the weather,

but do not offer your evanescent “I”

For anything less than a miracle

03/23/20 Virtually, Blooming

Spring is the time of paradise

birds,

new music on your sleeve,

a world freshly thawing…

But instead here we are,

full of restrictions

like a pre-pubescent boy

in space camp.

If this lasts

we’re never gonna

find touch again;

we’ll high-five, virtually,

virtually

we’ll play,

we’ll be

virtually

in business.

If this is a test, we’ll pass, virtually;

we’ll be

in sight

but out of touch.

What a fine time

To love

What you surrender

03/22/20 Recipes for a Disaster

It could have been so

easy to explain;

deploy a proper instrument of blame,

cut words into a mockup

of the stars

and send away

to every

enemy you’ve loved;

then wait,

wait harder,

wait again –

and when the rain begins

forgiveness has come back

03/22/20 NL

If you couldn’t fly

what would be the effort of looking up,

but for that subtle longing

a bird gets

when it dips its beak into the sea,

reminded of the forces of others,

of tides,

of the waves,

object

permanence,

reemerging with something chewy

and sweet

in that bird kind of way,

and carried back to the wind

to the possibilities of dreaming safely

in the hands of the unreachable.

Look up,

look down,

its’s all the same –

a swipe of the heart,

and a return home

03/21/20 And the Dog says…

There’s a story about the man

who learned to fish.

Something about

dragging a thing

from the river,

wife at home

all rosy cheeks

preparing a salt rub

and a bushel of fiery moss…

What’s he doing today –

our atypical Jonah –

scrolling through options?

Walking a checkout isle

with disagreement about the margarine?

Rolling a blunt by the sea?

Fuck if I know.

I don’t know how to fish,

either.

All I’ve got is these squiggly lines,

who won’t entirely obey.

Oh shit!

I’m a shepherd dog

03/20/20 Dog Person

What is there to be afraid of

if not the ghost

of someone else’s mother

screaming at them

to pick up apricots

for tea.

Everything is an impression

when I talk like this,

except for the cat,

for who the whole world is a scratch post.

Look at that! I was born a dog person.

I guess the world

can

change

03/19/20 Wait for It

Wait…

You were barely seventeen,

barely still

barely born,

barely tapping on the globe

no impression

of before.

You were stealing by the light,

full of piss

dead inside,

how were you to compromise

what a boy

has to hide;

light the sage,

fight the night,

let it be,

let it slide,

you were walking out the door

but you stopped just in time

03/19/20 STA

There’s a tumbleweed

I’d been wanting to tell you about

for roughly half this hunt.

It’s not fiscally responsible

or progressive;

it just keep turning

real fast and sly-like

but in the same place.

It don’t have too much

of a personality,

but,

bless the road,

it’s little nowhere dance

be getting interesting.

I think there a code somewhere in there,

you know?

Like a,

a radio message from another place,

beyond where the postman come,

right here

to me.

No,

I don’t wanna

Put down the shiney,

its sweet evanescence make me wanna come home.

No need for your charity either,

I got this magic tumbleweed.

It tell me things

you

don’t

know.

It say

‘We be fine if we stay on the road together.’

Who care where the message come from?

Hey, put that riffle down,

That there is just the messenger,

Who come to sing me a song

03/19/20 LVP

She took me the edge,

because she wanted me to see the horizon more clearly,

and I tried jumping

because I believed I could fly.

She asked that I touch the soil

so that I knew where all life comes from,

and I stuffed my stomach with it

because my first word was ‘more.’

She shared the secret of family with me

and I plotted her wallet,

because capitalism was complicated.

She asked I write

some

thing,

and I went silent for a decade;

she worked all night,

and I snuck around the lower realms of the world.

Don’t judge too much.

It’s a Russian story

a Jewish story,

a mother-son kind of thing –

you know,

the kind of thing you laugh about on holidays,

when first introducing your family to strangers

03/19/20 JD

What’s one to do when the world takes a turn?

Don’t ask me,

I’m always spinning;

light looks like dark,

poison like medicine,

an old convict,

like the shell of a cage,

and truth,

like secrets

a large alien creature with rigatoni on its tongue

does

not

want

to share.

But have you seen my heart?

it’s large and its vulnerable,

beating with constant recollection.

Shhhh… don’t tell anyone,

But sometimes it plays music

03/19/20 ETB

Them berries are sweet,

don’t poke the cat!

The sky is smiling,

But I feel like a brat.

Whose job is it to

keep this world together?

I’d volunteer

but I’m already a member.

My plum morning star,

them berries are sweet,

don’t poke the cat

till I’ve had something to eat.

This roundabout song

is a whole different matter,

I wish I could just

eat a cheese platter.

With friends to my right,

in easier times,

though the berries stay sweet,

And the cat’s on my side

03/18/20 ZK

I mean, shit…

the boy’s got game:

weaving in and out of this conversation

with a charlatan’s droll,

tattoos crawling up his neck

saying things you don’t dare correct in public,

a clear eye to the horizon

with two shakers at the ready, on ice.

He’s

dan-ger-ous…

that whipper-snapper,

daring you with that wry-almighty

of a smile.

Coming for you,

My friend –

you be weary and pray,

cause when he gets here,

he’s gonna paint you a lifeline from the pain

03/18/20 WP

Bubba be special,

Humping back and forth between two worlds

With a rucksack full of brass,

And the musical poetry of the Bayou

Still cooling on his tongue,

Like the last morsel of something served in – yes, please! – too much butter;

Foie Gras, Andouille,

Or even anger at the bosses of the universe

Who have no want to steer this ship

And just collect their stipends.

Shiiiit, you crazy,

To believe

It aint’s gonna keep going back and forth

Like that bowler hat,

Gypsy beads in a cracked hand,

And Eternal Return.

But,

If I weren’t ready for surprises,

I’d never roll out of the old turf, its dank Friday night stands all polluted with unexamined presumptions;

I’d never be here now, by the light of every ancient civilization,

With love,

Sculpting masks,

Not so we hide – would you believe it? – but to help us breath.

There is many ways to cook up a storm;

Some of ‘em are beautiful