Poetry
365 works
Self-Portraits Hearten Being
They hold the moment, represent the face.
As artwork or pictorial snaps,
self-portraits capture visible traits.
Don’t Flip Around. No Flipping.
I don't have a remote control in my hand
like I used to when I was watching television in the 90s
but I can still control everything I see
Parting Ways with Her Long-Term Rental Agreement
Prettiness is not a rent you pay for occupying a space marked ‘female’.
—The Secret Lives of Dresses by Erin McKean
It never sat well
In Ninth Grade, After You Painted Mother and Children by Diego Rivera
Don’t forget: hold somebody’s hand through the dark. —Joy Harjo, Conflict Resolution…
Beings: Poems
i
We the People’s Weather Report
The atmosphere shifted in ninth grade.
Thunderstorms controlled the air.
As if an anvil
A Perpetual Burgeoning of Realisations of Absurdity
Berlin is a collection of former strangers
to their own homeland, current foreigners
in a strange land, outsiders who never felt at home
Territorial Chaos: Insect Versus Human
—inspired by the painting Gemälde "Schleudern" by Michael Schoenholtz (Germany) 2014
—for my Longfellow neighbors, together in courage
i
THE POTENTIAL OF A POCKET TREASAURUS
She laid her measurements on the table at the Fates’ tailoring altar,
Clotho stopped spinning, Lachesis measuring, Atropos dropped the scissors.
No libation, no chant, no sacrifice did she offer or genuflect,
we erased our concrete circles
Today’s chatbots blur lines of conversations
that seem void of “How are you feeling today,
old friend? It’s been too long.” The space
Hunger & Me
I have a pet sadness called Hunger.
Kind of a no-brainer really, the name.
Like calling a black cat Lucky
A Category 3 Poem
Most of his poems were categories three or four.
Anything less wasn’t worth the bother.
The fives were rare, the sixes, special, but sevens,
Joshu’s Cat
A monk asked Joshu, “Has a dog Buddha-nature or not?”
Joshu answered, “Mu.” — Joshu’s Dog, The Gateless Gate
The way of the cat is the whim.
Make-Believe
A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence – David Hume
Honestly, I’m just an amateur believer.
I don’t make a living out of my beliefs.
Laundry Day
Pitied flesh monsters where cells tango
on protein and lipid dancefloors
yet live as contradictions of our nature
Whispers of Living Dust
Recognition or (re)cognition persistent patterns
of thought energy we sometimes call self
or sometimes self-delusion. Observers,
Before And Aftermath
A heavy frost on a clear night,
constellations telling their stories,
moonlight squandering its hold on darkness,