a fair die

A fair die
can not be bought off
by hot puffed breath
and rubbing of hands.
It's perfectly symmetrical, 
with no unevenness within
in centers of off-center weight 
to pull and shift with favored 
spin that settles any settled way. 
This die's mind was made up 
at birth. They made it and they 
kept the mold. Its sides and 
surfaces are worth precisely 
even facets, squared in perfect 
and indifferent truth: of nothing
said or chosen first. This die 
won't know until the physics 
tell it to, and it won't add 
a hint of lean, subjective
draw. But is that even 
possible? Can such a thing 
be in control? For look! 
Each side has little scoops!
Each dotted with a drop 
of white. But: each side has
a different count. Now: all 
that weighs, however light. 
It must throw off the calculus. 
Or: what was done inside this 
thing to subtly offset the count?
The one side must weigh more 
than six, precisely by the added mass
of five less scooped-dot negatives.
I guess 
so long as we don't know, can't 
calculate upon the fact of tiny this
and missing that: this die is fair. 
Hey wait. 
This surface: is it flat?  

hours waking days

I've been up for hours in my dreams
making up for wasted time 
making such discoveries 
and other things as shall be mine,
much as I am wont to do!
Waking hours waking days, 
and uses I have put them to - 
except, perhaps: a higher grade
than usual and everyday. 
Not the best I've ever been. 
Just a happy consciousness 
of being on a streak, a roll: 
the zone where muse and vision sit 
and flow and aim in such made things. 
Comfort in a pushing past. 
Familiar always, suddenly. 
Surprising always. Gratitude. 
But I'm asleep. The joke's on me.

curtain caller

With bows and bells on,
taking bows, the author steps
out of the wings. A bit bow
-legged, bellicose, and belting
out a hymn: himself, he sings. 

sexy from all sides

Every girl on instagram 
I know, and every woman too
and even every creepy dude 
is making camera eyes
at you.
It's pouty sexy 
from all sides 
in he-beef chic 
and she-shebang
I know 
that's what the app
is "for." 
In fact, this
is all perfectly
normative behavior
for this particular
planet and nano-epoch
end transmission. 

shy climber

If trees had knees, would we climb more
or less of them? If trees had legs,
but rooted deep - would we
be more or less nervous
to work our hands along and in, 
and stick our toes in clefts 
and push and grab our way 
up shins and thighs, drawn up 
towards hips  - would we 
breath sighs and blush relief
to find our arms around the waist?
Now jerking, scrambling up to arms 
and shoulders, perched in safe embrace? 

Or would it seem too much 
like imposition to presume 
such place?

Or would it only motivate us 
onward, upward, finding face?

the overrate

love is overrated 
pretty much your whole
life 
looking
back on it,
you can see
the errors fundamentally.
The expectations so dashing and dashed,
how cocky you were you fool.
You can see.

Or looking forward 
to it with an electric jump,
or wry eyes and fatalism, or
so bled of hope you can't see,
but you carry a deeper imprint
every year. You don't need to see
what you can't stop feeling. You
know not to get your head in
too deep, and with wise eyes,
regard your past mistakes.

You'll be sure to do them
differently this time, 
you've learned, you know
that love is overrated. Except
every moment you're in it,
once doubt is swept away
and despite yourself, you
can't believe it. Can you? 

It's too good to be true 
just then, is part of the problem. 
The other is, you've kind of come 
to know for sure. Love is overrated 
eventually. Except this time 

if humans were birds

“We are the sovereign lords
of it. We alone have mastered
the artificial and uncanny ability
to FLY - which separates us
from all the other living things
except bats, and see what we’ve
done with it! Why, we’ve flown.

All over the place! It’s crazy how
we dominate. Oh, true, bugs and
stuff - this is lower-order tool use
for sure. See how easy we eat them
for proof. We are the unnatural and
self-majestic sky-flying motherf*ckers,
motherf*cker!”

“But Skylar, what’re those silvery things?
We hear rumors they sucked Pelican Bob
into a wingmouth in a time of legend!”

“Did not Pelican Bob bring down the Anti-Bird?
Let’s have no more myth and metaphysics, these
legends have their place frightening the hatchlings.
They are fables.” “But we can see and hear them!”

“They are atmospheric phenomena.”

"We've seen them on the ground!"

"A hoax." 

long haiku

The hated lawn, ornamental
shrubbery and other plants
so loathsome and pitiable
as to need human tending: stunted,
propped, subjected to innumerable
irregular mass decapitations
and savage prunings
by a furious maniac
- the price they endure
for their questionable
privilege of domesticity.

wrack

There's no solution to any of this. 
So far away from whatever's bliss.
Innocence taking the greatest hits 
and forging ahead as ignorance.

Naïve or jaded, falling to bits, 
or holding together in aching 
cracks. All of the facts are piling up
to falling down, and everything
fits into many lacks. But,

we know.

We remember, 
and see the gleams.
This is the same world,
however it seems.

It's all stretched out now
and falling in. There's nothing 

to do but end and begin. 

someone waiting

There's someone waiting
for you everywhere. No, 
it's not your best self, 
your future self 
you've been imagining. 
It's someone else. And she 
can wait indefinitely. 

Ice is water

Ice is water you can't drink. 
But so is steam, and so are clouds.
And so are seas. It makes you think,
water's not too drinkable! Considering
by parts and whole.

Which makes 
you think,
some thoughts 
don't really add much
depth to life's broad course.
But passing over, washing
through, you might as well 
just sip a few and try the taste. 

And drink your full for now, 
and let the rest just flow, 
or sit, or spill, go
otherwise to waste. 

shame caution

Shamelessness is dangerous.
That aimless inhibition prompt 
lays snares of consequence and guilt
to trip us, everywhere we'd want 
to take our valor for a spin - 
and leave discretion's bare, bereft
behind at home! A-wallowing. 
For shame! Best be behaviorless,
lest valor's indiscretion wrest
some veil aside, and all be known. 
We'd never rest from labors, then. 
To soak and scrub escutcheon clean 
- a labor which we know is vain!
But that is how we've always been, 
to our acute and chronic shame.  

memory's slow will

As day moves its course
through drifting marks 
intended to class
and to organize,
divide and define
our fits and starts: we wake
to a sense we cannot cognize.  

As day moves its course,
inexorably shorn 
of distinguishing features
in weeks and years, 
decreasing distinction
of moments and months, 
the moment is now:
come bed your fears. 

But we don't know how, 
so we'll never know when. 
It's time now to wake, or 
to sleep again. To eat 
all our dreams, oldest-first 
and complain of the stale 
in the bread, and the mold
someone broke, long before
we were born - so that when 
we grew up, we could find 
all that fits in one's head 

To explain, understand 
and defend why we'll have
to be dead. 

Presumptuous Song

Audacity’s veracity not trying to be bold
But bold words call for bold times, friend
- and some truths must be told

I don’t presume that you would care,
it’s all the same to me.
Not wearing any underwear
- or even pants, you see.

I never get presumptuous
unless I’m about to get, get
get sumptuous

Intrepidation is my style
encouragement, less so.
I’d rather you intrepidly
go anywhere you know.

Intimidation is for wimps
- who wants timidity?
Be bold as brass, and do your best
- it’s all the same to me.

I never get presumptuous, etc. 

panic over nothing

I hate to panic over nothing. 
That's a lie. Honest review 
of my emotions in the moment
suggests I love it. What I hate
is finding out
it was over nothing.

You see: in panic,
Instinct and intuition 
are firing all cylinders 
at solutions to the same
usual question in the ol' 
"What do I DO?" routine. 

Full of sound and fury relatively
empty of sense, reason and judgment, 
signifying potentially everything 
at stake, anything can happen 

if you only panic right - on 
a canny instinct intuition binge!
We got this, haven't we?

Feels like! 

It's exhilarating, with a sense 
of dread and doom and rising 
to meet it: pluck and what-the-fuck,
I got this. EAT A DICK, PANIC! 

So in the moment, I'm kind of 
vested in the idea that my panic 
is about something. Worthy panic. 
Worth the rear to rampant, canny
defiance and bristling tactical arrays
rotating into and out of position 
all over the place, dithering.
Disarrays, really, but intent. Intense.   

If it's all over nothing, what a fool! 
Paging mister melodrama, crooning
that old #1 hit of his, "What Do I Do
(PANIC)?" weaving and panicking,
panicking and at the same time, weaving
- working furiously at that warping, 
wefting, shuttling loom of his, weaving
tapestry of response in brilliant hues
and fine detail, responsive to the vast dark 
shapes looming more suddenly 
than was polite. 

Panicking into error, perchance.
One knows it! In the moment, one
knows one might be! What daring
gall and nerve we have, we who
panic. All over nothing, though?

What a post-panic letdown. Where's
the triumph we risked so assiduously, 
dared so boldly for over nothing? 

One wants one's panic to be right. 

Don't be a teen

Don't be a teen 
Don't be a teen 
We've all seen reports 
and evidence. We've all 
seen the special episodes, 
the movie plots, 
the behavior of teens 
that made us wince. 
Don't be a teen! 
Don't be a teen! 
So just this wince, this once 
just don't. Step nimbly past 
that awkward stage. Society's 
afraid of teens, despite 
we say they're all the rage. 
Just be a kid 
Just be a kid 
then suddenly, 
when you're too big 
to pass for child?
Take one big look 
around, big step.
Grow up. 
Take charge!
No running wild 

hunger blessing

I bless your larder and kitchen and cupboard.
May they be overflowing with choice,
'til you can't decide deliciousness
- until some inner, impatient voice
grabs the next thing it sees, and fixes it up,
and lingers it so deliciously down.
May all of your appetites find sate,
and smile redeem each privation's frown. 

I'm the bad

I got your year in rock right here, bay bay
I came to be the one who’ll stay
The Anti-Nice: the opposite
of what you meant when you talk sh*t
I back you up against the wall
because you’re indefensible
you lost the last best chance you had,
you can pray Good luck,
you can Ugly it up,
But

I’m the Bad.
I’m the Bad.
I’m the Bad. Get
off
My
Tip.

Conspiracy is on my side
Step to me you get swept for a ride
They’ll lock you up. Who held the key?
Don’t put yourself through hell for me
I’m so mean I mean it all
My soul is indestructible
You only did the best you could 
God he is great, Jesus is Good,
But

I’m the Bad, etc.

the sexy part

if you were a deer
I'd be an antler. 
Sexiest antler in the world

and if you were a tree,
I'd be a twig or a branch or a limb, 
sexiest twig, branch or limb 
in the world

and if you were a bird - 
I'd be a feather. 
Sexiest feather in the world 

and if you were with me, 
we'd be together. 

And I'd be a part of you 
never apart from you 
the sexiest part of you 
in the world 

and if you were a rose-bush 
I'd be a petal. 
Sexiest petal in the world 

and if you were a road, 
I'd be a pebble, 
sexiest pebble in the world. 

I don't mean on top of you, 
I'd be embedded. 
Sexiest bed in the world 

And anyone could ask me 
where this road is headed 

'Cause I'd be a part of you 
never apart from you 
the sexiest part of you 
in the world 

And if you were real life, 
I'd be pretending. 
Sexiest daydream in the world 

And if you were a song, 
I'd be the ending. 
Sexiest fade-out in the world 

And if you were gone, 
I don't know where I'd be. 
Sexiest missing in the world. 

And if you were wrong, 
I know which part I'd be. 
Sexiest excuse, justified
insanity plea or otherwise 
exculpatory factor in the world
 

call me back

I was sitting outside on the patio 
when from the distance, across 
the common depression (flood 
basis) I heard a staccato horror 
movie scream. It was human 
but barely, all jammed together
into one word: callmeback!

It sounded like the scream 
of not the victim. But 
the monster. It was 
scary not scared. 

"CALL ME BACK" 
a very different voice 
sang-song rang out,
in long alto notes. 

After a long pause. 
Farther off. Then finally 

like a whisper directly 
in my ear 

call me back! 

It was really a high, hoarse
holler but from so far away 
now,

I don't think I will

catholics think fish

Catholics think fish are vegetables. 
There's a reason for it - Jesus didn't 
come here for the fish after all, plus 
there always is - but somehow come 
Fridays in Lent, I'm always eating birds. 
Missing the find, feathered, friendly 
distinction. Birds can't be animals -

there are too many of them. "A few 
fewer wouldn't hurt," I purr,
feasting fancily fast, grinning 
like a canary with whiskers 

think look

I think of you now and then 

never less than fondly 

and you'll cast me a sudden look as if

to say hey man what's up? Can I help you?

and I'll be like wtf 

NOPE. JUST THINKIN' 

that's all

abiding rule

I admit to being stronger on parentheses
than quotation marks. I mean, I never have
much doubt on quotation marks, but it’s all

instinct at this point. This particular case
must've been some teacher or professor
who disliked the thing on arbitrary personal
principle, and

as time went on,
that opinion crept over the mental fence.
Mutated into a rule.

This is why I abhor rules,
and abolish all obedience I cannot abide
by never making habits of it or them,
since - why would I?
They don't coincidentally meet
some inner need that pleases me.

Which is what rules and obedience 
are for, correct? 

This particular case
was never a rule I respected.
One of those I’d observe in passing,
nowhere else - and then, only because

I'd already done it! By the time I remembered 

I'd decided to disobey the damn thing,
whoops. Principles
run the same gamut
or is it gauntlet: they 
never pop up during moral
dilemmas, which don't occur.
So I never have chances to seize

my ancient and brilliant array 
of principles, compiled and admired 
in starry-eyed ideal-eating youth, someone
would say one of their principles. My eyes 
would shine, and I'd beam at them "Yes, 

that sure could take the kinks out 
come hard decision time!" I could 
totally see how it could! It was a 
lie! A false confidence job on me 
by me! There I was, patient collector
and admirer, racking them up idly
and sorting them in order and reorder,
until years, decades later I looked in 
on them and saw they were dusted thickly 
with unuse. And I started and I stalled.
And I started again, wracked and riddled 
my brain, but I couldn't recall

one single instance

where even one had intervened, 
nick-of-time, as they're supposed to.
It's what they're for! 

Apparently (best I could work out at the 
time) I am too thick in the moment, 
immersed in all factors and concentrating 
way too hard for the idle thought to rise, "Hey,

maybe some shit that has nothing to do with 
this moment could be just the trick?"

I bet if I ever did do that, what I'd get 

would be some bullshit 
"grammar" or "manners" rule 

some professor had foisted off on me!
Which knowing me, I'd be just perverse
enough to deploy, but
it wouldn't exactly fix

anything

It's why I refuse to obey. 
Only observe. Or in my best 
moments 
abide. 

made manifest

What did you always used to do?
And now you don't. And it's killing you. 

Who did you always want to be? 
And now you don't. 

Anyway, you can't. It's gone up ahead,
no way to see. 

Why must we always be these ways?
Unable to hold, unable to keep
as the changes creep in between days
and weeks, and amaze us with fits 
that suffocate - 

- where all used to be wild, free air, 
sunlit waves, green hills, trees and sheep, 
folding into dreams

that awaken to futures of cities and skies 
we'd stride every day toward, 
worth all our lives

But it's not the person who used to be
going forward to meet whatever shall come.
And a good bet, whatever there is
won't bring back what you wanted it for 
in the first place, hon.  

But maybe some. 

Then again, maybe more than what
we imagined will come. 

dactylstylography

Using a finger,
trace letters on skin -
this trick has no name,
so far as I've heard.

But it's quite the most
excellent writing there's been,
even if it's more guess
than knowing the word.

dynamic response team

Seeing each other's arousal 
("oh jeez"), we spring 
as if urgent -
for need has called 
and response has become 
high duty indeed.
Reciprocal gone 
full blown mutual.

You were the first 
- that time you saw 
me distracted by you
in the midst of talk,
my chagrin arose 
full fluster and rue. 

Your eyes awoke 
from across the room 
- you actually said 
"oh jeez," dropped 
your doing and ran,
slid the last halfway 
on your knees! Perfect 
aim in poise and élan,

arrived just

in the nick of time, stopped
to save the day, to fulfill 
some trust. 

It became a joke to live up to
and for. It grew obligation 
from gift galore, and it seems
to have made emergencies 
rather more routine, and joy
a chore we absurdly enjoy,
if possible even more with ease
than before, since we know
that we live to please. 

Like firefighters,
in a station that bursts
disgracefully in conflagration 
enflamed, we hang 
in suspense on the edge 
of a bell, making chili
and talk, playing improvised
games. Fixing recipes we've been
dying to try, killing time, making life
till the call comes in - and we drop
all our doing (and one of us always
says to this day "oh jeez,") and
we leap to respond! To begin, 
springing into the act
on high alert duty routine
at a run! 
 
We don't walk. This is
serious biz! That's a fact.
No one winks. We don 
serious mien and we 
mean it! So trained
we don't even think.
We giggle and squirm
out of uniform, into proper kit
on a call like this - as around us, 
headquarters begins to smoke. 

There are flames to catch, crackle
pop and hiss. There is duty 
to serve, and a day 
to save which was never 
in doubt or fear. No joke. 
It has gone past a joke,
as practice perfects 
in play, in routine 
going every which 
random way. 

There's always that 
one firehouse 
that burns down 
each day.

cylon eye

Weeks fly by 
where days stood still
because 
of meaning's open hand
you take and fill
to overspill,
or close. 
A trick 
by your
command. 

wayfaring

I don't picture you dawning 
in brightening sky, 
lifting you higher 
or even high
I don't picture you deepening 
darkling despair,
stern and unbowed 
with a painstaking care, 
or popping a curtsy 
with ironic mirth. 
Wond'ring what now 
has become of the rest. 
I don't picture you naked 
in splendid rebirth, 
or shining arrayed 
in whatever raiment
suits best. I don't picture
you really at all. Not
as such. I imagine 
such pictures can't hurt 
or help. I imagine you are
who you've shown, who 
I know, and I bet 
my idea of you 
has nothing on you 
yourself.

I expect 
pain hurts,
doubt gnaws, irritates.
I imagine you equal to any
such sums as could add, multiply,
exponentially better or worse. 
I expect that life vexes and bucks, 
but I bet you are up to such stakes,
pounding deeper or raised
in all blessing or curse, even though
you'd prefer smaller stakes to come.

I picture you not averse.
Just a little bit pissed, nonplussed, 
and reserving one's judgment on one
you can trust. Who is you, of course. I hope
you know: you can trust that one. I do. 
You must. Sure wayfarers grow unsure
upon unsure ways, but that's only
'cause that's the responsible thing
to have done. 
 
Only in ways made careful and sure
do we find and recall irresponsible ways 
are fun. 

archrivalship

We can't lock horns without a toot or two. 
Our grappling matches mostly just excuse 
how you pat my back, I pat yours for you. 

Our enmity, dependable as day - has grown 
enthused, infused with something gay.
A fondness, and a grudging real regard. 

Let's make this next step very fucking hard. 

whole cloth

We are made of whole cloth 
by our own deft hands. Bolts 
and reams of rough cotton and 
wool, raw silk, nature. And 
nurture: spanking gorgeous 
textiles and patterns, tweed,
houndstooth, twill. We feed 

and feel this warp and weft
in us, as we grow. It shrinks
to fit until we outgrow it and 
we split. We cut and stitch 
it tight again, each time. 

It splits again. We cut and eye 
and choose and find to shape 
and make what suits our kind. 

Our kind of one, we're tailoring. 

So much whole cloth. Such styles 
and tones and forms we make 
to be, each time we grow 
and split. So to begin.   

Apex

What if when we're eating meat 
the meat were still alive?
What if trembling twitch and squeal 
gave our savage hearts a thrill? 
And what then if additionally, 
we literally were lions and wolves? 
Could we still hold our heads up? 
Believe ourselves so masterful?  

Glad Reaping

So let us go a-maying, lasses!
Find our values in the fields.
Let us go a-merrying, like asses
we’ll assess the yield of grasses
and sweet wildflowers!
Let us go a-maying, lads!
All of us without dismay,
in disarray exulting glad
and reveling in powers fine,
to find ourselves sweet making hay
as summer sun beats shining skin
to brass and bronze, while shadows lay
their deepened plot to steal the day. Some
mother puts the kettle on. In stone and clay,
recumbent, caught, so flagrant and delicious
won, we’ve scattered lying all for naught.
In perfect pose and natural touch,
We all gleam cold and settled in.
The sun has made a monument.
These souls were so alive here once. 
These statues once had souls within.

my terrible imagination

From my huge coffee cup 
every time I drink deep 
I drink a slug. Because 
mid-pre-deep satisfaction 
sip - I think "a slug" "could
have fallen in there, and 
be drowning or drowned 
and poached besides, from 
the lingering heat. Oh opaque
dark surface tension of coffee 
bitterly delicious, unsweet, 
uncreamed - would you be 
so foul as to hide a slug 
or a bug from me, by 
your innocent physical 
optical properties? It 

would brush my lips
an invisible heaviness
in suspense! And cause me 
to go "EUH" like that one 
beloved ex-beloved of mine 
used to love, but dread to hear

the cause. I imagine my hand 
involuntarily flung away from 
my head flung the other way, while 
my poor body - caught without 
training or instruction, specifically 
pulled its ace spasmodic jerk 
recovery move - and my poor coffee! 
Flown all over, cup still falling in 
slow motion, beyond recovery - 

it will be dashed to bits 
and the slug will crawl out 

however, this is no news to me. 
I live like this. Every time coming 
in from the patio, the ersatz French 
windows, to be navigated with three 
things and two hands, it all goes sly 
on me. One thing tumbles then I
in deft reaction send all things
flying and hitting and bouncing
or breaking, as usual, as always.
But not yet. Always not yet 
it didn't happen yet so - may 
not be so inexorable, after all. 
We'll see. "HANDLE IT!"
sometimes I even say aloud. 
In affirmation, a command.  
Physical interaction with reality
daunts in mind - yet easy 
in practice! Forewarned

is forearmed. And with my 
imaginary and highly-trained 
four arms I manage all tasks 
with ease and grace, prompted by
a galvanizing flash of mismanagement 

- a premonition like a superpower. 
I love it, it saves me in the nigh-barreling
down future moment (which in the event,
misses by miles); alarms, dismays me
and saddens me in the present; and does
nothing at all to me in the past. How could it?
The past is made of what futures hit. This 

was another sweet miss, guidance 
systems clicking and flying on all 
cylinders, rotating and pounding 
in air, engineless and uncoordinated
but flawless in operation, "flaw" 
being hard to conceive in such 
chance unplanned undesigning ops. In close 

conversation now

with some withsome one who matters.
They say something, and of course,
my response is almost unimaginable horror 
and dread and regret food and fuel and I SAID
IT - to me, I did, it's obvious I did - 
the original hypothetical immersion
specialist am I, I am and I CAN FEEL
IT I said it

and I can feel why I did.
I don't know WHY why, but
I can feel why. Of course I would
say a thing like that, yet I can already
foresee such consequence. The fall in their eyes 
has found me out.

I am this terrible 
thing you know.
They now know. 

It is not pleasant, but due to canny
foresight and acumen it can be yet
averted by special means. In the nick
of this split stretched instance I step back 
soul ripping free from my fleshy skinny
clothesy back without rending anything
material, assume kung fu soul stance
and SNAP THAT NECK - my own neck, 
the neck of the offending one - from behind! 

Such relief and release. You jerk 
I judge, richly and with deep, dark 
tragic sad scorn, for - he was a good 
boy, once. 

Mischance averted like clockwork. 

Nobody's really better at this than I, 
as far as I know. I'd be curious to know, 
if they are. If they aren't, I'll know the reason
why, and it's one of my favorite things about
me really, in a sense. The coping thriving defense
mechanism I inhabit and expand to become 
when imagination threatens 

is fulsome and fearsome in one. Scary. 

I can PREVENT MYSELF suddenly 
and without cause dropping way too much
stuff I carry, by the merest laser-locked 
action focus of hard, paid attention 
clicked in. Taking over. Impressive

Oh, really? I never found it so. I deal
with it out of hand. Out of hand, out
of mind I say. "Oh, 

it was nothing."

new mind regimen

To increase your mind, 
I recommend listening 
to a new language, imagining 
what meanings might be 
- use intuition wildly, 
and find reason bound 
to imagination by speculative 

means.
Next 
perhaps fantasy. Fancy is too often 
too flighty, let your fantasy be rigor
and strict discipline, I mean
in logic
terms 
not
anything necessarily or consequentially
sexual. Perhaps romance is on your mind? 

If so, begin burly training of the mind's
imaginary muscles, especially 

the other's. In mind, 
test and extend, stretch
their limber lithe limbs 
and give them a real 
workout! Pay special 
attention to the butt glutes. 
Use 
this. 
Try repetitious motion! Then 
tell the other how they did 
in your mind? It could be 

time for brutal honesty. 

If so? 

Be fascinated by it. Exclaim 
things like "Logic!" when 
a true or fair point is made. 
Make a serious, stern face 

and stroke one's chin 
with erect index finger,
in a way suggestive of
potent thought. 

Make eye contact electric 

and note, "I am still thinking 

about what you are about 
to say."

Make meaningful rise of
eyebrow(s) at this point of
yours. A point 
as valid
as it may be provocative, 
so worry! Cross

your fingers of both hands, stoop
and stand bolt straight, stoop
and sway low. Improvise rituals
which may propitiate the other. Groan
low in somber ululation, if asked 
what you are doing. Throughout, 

keep making eye contact meaningful. 

In these ways, you will realize 
and come to understand why 
I recommend listening to a new 
language, in order to increase 

your mind. Because 

we kind of wandered from that, 
and that 
didn't turn
out so well. Back to basics is best, 

but judge
for yourself, 
and your judgment

reflects

weird bus

I caught the bus
Santa Cruz down town 
in a couple of stops 
we were in N.J. 
three thousand miles wrong, 
so I got back off. 
And the bus rolled away. 

I looked around. I was 
at my college again. 
And stifling, suffocating 
from all the clothes. See, 
that bus rolled off all happy 
and nude! As every single one 
put their clothes on me. So 

I trekked campuswise 
to discover the place, 
and how it had been 
since all these years. 

I could barely move 
due to all of the clothes, 
and everyone I met stripped 
to add their gear. I inferred 
from this, I was some kind 
of goat of the sacrificial kind, 
with a load sincere. I might even
be killed by the weight of it all! 
All society's clothes, stripped-nude
taboos. Which,

somehow 

I chose? Taken on for them,
all the clothes they took off?
Well, not to be rude, but
I really didn't need this on top
of all else. I don't recall asking
to be this way. 

I'm happy for the whole wide world, 
if so! But I'm dying in here. Wait 

what, no - it's okay. That's actually 
a cute outfit! I don't mind 

that one so much. 

It fits

the glasshouse

We live in a glass house 
surrounded by stones
instead of a lawn.

Standing outside, partly
cloudy sky, the reflections
are ominous bathed in light.
Then a shadow comes over.
You see inside. The stones

are gone.  

The landscaper hated the
architect. The original owner
thought it was fun, then died.
He was stoned. An overdose.

You and me moved in. 
The place was a steal, since 
the world can see all - 
so we try to wear clothes 
- plus because of the ghost. 
We have grown rather close. 

recipe for we

We only exist wherein we agree.
Where we don’t, ‘we’ divides
to you and me, who clearly
exist independently. Except

wherein we combine to agree.
We agree to align, combine or unite. 
We electrify difference and charge 
our fight in some same, good cause. 
We are on the sane side, with all 
disagreement along for the ride.
 
It is held between us as lesser
than this. Our deep high stakes,
forged in pain and bliss
- for we've come to abide
in the difference it makes.

Disagreement agreed in 
because it redounds 
to both our sakes.

one-way dead end

I drove all the way wrong down a one-way street.
When I got to the end, I saw the sign 

and I was surprised.

Nothing special down here! Why did the law
with its arrows and lines try 
to keep us all out? What were they even 
protecting, then?

And...

...how does anyone come to such end? 
Except by coming the wrong way 
down! Then I saw 

with the corner, then front of my eye

this tricky little side-slip squick of a road! 
A hole in the cul-de-sac, in through which
I guess
trickles every little bit of the traffic load
down this back-tucked away little
corner of maze. Finding the secret path into,
going all one way like a dare and a bet.
And getting out of it - who knows?

Do you?  

a loosèd carol

That vorpal swordish tongue of yours,
and beamish eye and trappish mind
- it's good I am no Jabberwock. Or
if I am, you cut such slack. Too kind! 

contemptuous is contemptible

Contemptuous 
is contemptible 
in every case. Those 
who rationalize and 
justify merely stratify 
to their own disgrace. 
Find metrics, criteria to exclude
and disqualify others: "To you,

One should
be rude."

Yet no one 
whoever deserved
your worst 
can ever have deserved
the triumph of making
your worst 
be you.