Blanket city run along soaked in rain. Idiot Boy wastes his time visiting a passing crush at the other end of town. Slips between two houses and a metal sheet, communal refrigerator in the middle of the road filed with half-empty soy bottles.

Dead bell stop, mocking red blink of the operator. Father arrives, a mess of wiry muscles and hair.

“Hey. Is Coffin Cat here?”

“Who?” Father squints at Idiot Boy’s cap. Idiot Boy avoids eye contact.

“Um.”

Recessed in the blackness behind Father, a Figure says, “You looking for Coffin Cat?”

Idiot Boy nods.

The Recessed Figure turns. “I’ll go get her.”

Father returns to his parched body on the couch, content.

Indistinguishable forms move back and forth in the kitchen to the right. They stop their pacing and glance at Idiot Boy as he passes. Idiot Boy avoids eye contact and slips into the left-bound arterial vessel.

“So this is the heart chamber I’ve been living in,” Coffin Cat says as Idiot Boy enters her room. There is music gear. “It’s pretty comfy.”

“Oh, sick mic,” Idiot Boy says, pointing at the mic behind Coffin Cat’s head.

“I feel like a ghost,” Coffin Cat replies, falling on her bed.

Idiot Boy settles next to her. Animal distance. Intensely aware of his rain-soaked right shoe. “Same.”

Nothing comes out right, intersubjectivity a false God to mediate the impossible kernel of being, nobody can find nor express. Idiot Boy searches for connection. He glances around the heart chamber, at the music gear, but nothing grips. Four pears sit on a table by the window, their skins garish green in the harsh grey light.

Coffin Cat moves from the bed to the floor. She opens a virtual aquarium on her computer; fish eat pellets dropped from the sky to **** out coins to buy more fish to **** out coins to buy more fish. Capitalist investment and accumulation. Every few minutes a rocket-spewing robot teleports into the aquarium to attack the fish. Ruthless competition in the global marketplace.

“No! Why would you swim there, you ******* fish?” Coffin Cat yells as one if her fish is eaten by the nomadic war machine. “So dumb. ****. Why did it eat my fish?”

A knock at the door. The Recessed Figure from earlier enters the room. “Hey, mind if I join?” Their arms dangle like fine threads of hair.

“I like your music gear,” Idiot Boy says, pointing at nothing in particular.

“Idiot Boy also makes music,” Coffin Cat adds from the floor.

The Recessed Figure does not respond. They are enthralled by their phone, streak of dead pixels along a digital chessboard, minute reflection of their own gaunt face in the glass. After an extended period, they decide to move none of their pieces. A gaping coffee grinder rises out of the rubble at their feet. They begin filling it with tobacco from broken cigarettes.

“I’m surprised you’re still playing this,” Idiot Boy says to Coffin Cat. “I swear this is one of those games designed to ruin your life. Get addicted, stop going to work, become a hikik weaboo.”

“Already there, man,” Coffin Cat laughs. “Nah, this is my new job. I’m going to be a professional gamer.”

“Stream only PopCap games.”

Another knock at the door. Tired squander in an endless pacing of flesh. Strawman enters and nods at the Recessed Figure. “Hey bro.”

“Good to see you, man.” The Recessed Figure plugs the coffee grinder into the wall. “You got any ciggys?”

Idiot Boy points under the table and says “Ahh” with his mouth.

The Recessed Figure empties it into the coffee grinder. The device whirs into motion, creating a centrifugal blur, a mechanical and headless hypnotic repeat.

Idiot Boy and Coffin Cat look for horror movies to watch. The Recessed Figure empties the contents of the coffee grinder onto a metal tray. Strawman repacks it into a ****. White smoke fills the empty column, moves in slow motion like an oceanic rip a mile off coast, surface seething with quiet, impenetrable violence.

Idiot Boy refuses the first round. It’s never done him any good. Face turned to smoke and the wretched weight of a tongue that refuses to speak. Headless carry-on as time ticks through the clock face.

The door bursts open. Everybody turns as Manic Refusal or the Loud Person saunters in.

“I can’t believe it. I can’t ******* believe it. They’re selling me off!” the Loud Person says in exasperation. “First time back in New Zealand in five years and they do this to me!”

“What? What’s happened?” Strawman asks.

“Some rich ****** in Australia has bought me as his wife. I knew it, I knew if I came back, my parents wouldn’t let me leave again. Whole ******* thing arranged!” the Loud Person laughs bitterly, before hitting the ****.

“Oomph, that’s rough,” Coffin Cat quips from the side.

“No, you don’t even understand. This is the first time back, the first time back in five years, and I’m being sold to off some rich ****** who owns all the banks in Australia.”

“But like, who is this guy?” Strawman asks, pointing.

“And he’s been reading all my profiles. He has access to all my information. I don’t even have control over my Facebook profile. Grand Larson’s logged in as me, posting for me,” the Loud Person continues. “I met him once in Australia, clubbing, and now he’s tracked and bought me.”

“That’s creepy as ****,” Idiot Boy says.

“So he’s not a complete stranger?” Strawman asks.

“I can’t believe it. I can’t ******* believe it. First time back in five years and I’m being sold off!”

Idiot Boy decides one hit from the **** wouldn’t be so bad. He packs the cone with chop, lights and inhales. Smoke rushes through the glass channel, a swirl of white ether, more than he’d expected. He quickly passes the **** to Coffin Cat, before collapsing onto the bed, eyes closed. A suffocating sensation fills his body. He sinks into the chasm of himself, further and further into an impossible, infinite depth.

“Still working at . . . ?”

“Yeah, yeah. Management. Hospital. You?”

“Like, property. Motions.”

“Subcontracting? Intonements?”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“Mmm.”

Idiot Boy doesn’t know what’s going on. He feels sick and tries to get Coffin Cat’s attention, but cannot move his body.

“Come on. Sell me drugs, Strawman.”

“Nah. I don’t deal drugs. I don’t deal drugs.”

A strange silence stretches like an artificial dusk, a liminal duration, the hollow click of a tape set back into place in reverse. The Recessed Figure coughs and the Loud Person whirs back into motion.

“I can’t believe it. I can’t ******* believe it. They’re selling me off! First time back in New Zealand in five years and they do this to me!”

The Recessed Figure makes a noncommittal noise.

“I knew it, I knew if I came back, my parents wouldn’t let me leave again. Whole ******* thing arranged!”

Coffin Cat laughs quietly.

“No, you don’t even understand. This is the first time back, the first time back in five years, and I’m being sold off to some rich ****** who owns all the banks in Australia.”

“How about this fella? He doing okay?” Strawman asks, pointing. Everyone turns to Idiot Boy and laughs affectionately.

“Still working at . . . ?”

“Yeah, yeah. Management. Hospital. You?”

“Like, property. Motions.”

“Subcontracting? Intonements?”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“Mmm.”

“Sell me drugs, Strawman.”

“Nah. I don’t deal drugs. I don’t deal drugs.”

Idiot Boy slowly opens his eyes and stares out the window. The same grey light as before. He moves his arm further towards Coffin Cat, but is still too weak to get her attention. The same strange silence stretches. The Recessed Figure coughs and the Loud Person whirs back into motion.

“I can’t believe it. I can’t ******* believe it. . . .”

As the conversation repeats over and again, Idiot Boy begins to think he has become psychotic, or perhaps entered into a psychotic space. He thinks of computer algorithms, input-output, loops without variables, endless regurgitations of the same result. Human machines trapped in their own stupid loop. Drug-****** neuronal networks incapable of making new connections, forever traversing old ones. Short-term memory loss, every repeat a new conversation of what has already been. The same grey light painted upon four pears by the window.

He’s not sure if Coffin Cat’s laugh is getting weaker with each repeat.

Signal-response. The exterior world oversaturated with variables: roadways, rivers, forests, wildlife — an ever changing scene to respond to — the illusion of depth. Automatic response mechanisms reorient to new stimuli. The soul rises like surfactant, objectified fractal diffusion. A becoming without end.

But within the border of this interior world, the light stays grey. No input, no change; the same dead repeat, over and over, until sundown triggers a hunger response. Lined all along the street, a black box ceremony of repeating machines, trapped in their idiot cults, walls of clay and blood.

Idiot Boy finally gets Coffin Cat’s attention. She helps him through the house’s arteries to reach rain and wet stone, overcast skies. As he shakes in shock, Coffin Cat mumbles, “It’s cold.”

Idiot Boy sits silent on the ride home. Travels through himself. Tunnel through the body or Mariana Trench. Loses his footing before a traumatic void. Leaves the car and pukes.

(Plaster cast at Pompeii)                    

                [THE TOUR GUIDE]

                “Ladies and gentlemen, here we are at Pompeii's
                fabled Thermal Baths where heated water was
                passed through duct work in the walls.  One can          
                imagine Nero himself stopping here on one of            
                his visits.”

[BONITO]

Bonito stepped out of the bathhouse and looked up.
Vesuvius rumbled - shaking ash and fire skyward.
Breaking into a run he sought the south road,
glancing back anxiously at the
vast dark cloud billowing down the mountain.

                "The principal city roads were recessed
                and wagons were required to have standardized
                wheelbases and clearances to fit in channels cut
                into the stone.  Follow me please to the residential
                area.”

He gained the road and his feet
pounded the stones of the “via stabiana.”
The cloud multiplied and fell on the city.
Ever deepening layers of ash clogged Benito’s path.
Heart pounding in his chest he lengthened his strides.

                “Leaving the opulent villas with their spacious
                atria, we now enter the market area where we
                shall see a display of remarkable interest.  During
                excavations, empty spaces were discovered in
                the ash deposits.”

The rising ash captured his left leg.
Bonito inhaled the fiery air and ******
forward into a burst of falling soot
but was unable to finish his stride.

                “Archaeologists poured plaster into the voids
                revealing the outlined bodies of Pompeiins
                trapped in their final moments.  Take, for example,
                this man caught in mid-step with no time
                to escape the life choking dust.”

*June, 2006

Every passing moment
Caught staring at the blissful sky
Decorating the ceiling

Awash in the glow
Of light that hides away just out of frame
It's been burning low

Thoughts of my life still beckon, as the world takes a somber tone
But the timing is right, pulled in this effortless misdirection
It's numbing

Found myself here
Why isn't that enough...

A gilded cage. Maybe
I guess
I'd rather let the summer air drench the weathered wood
Another recessed cycle, all timeless til its over
Lie here lifeless
With nothing left to fight
Only time

This great white wolf made for traversing wilderness giving it the most identifiable sound for its
Wild uncompromising soul beautifying the night wind adding an extra chilling effect but giving
Unspeakable comfort too it tells of freedom and possibilities latent in us all but he is reduced to
Confinement in a small enclosure pitifully no larger than a small yard his is a life sentence with
All these noble creatures that is at hand what would be so awful to set him free after five
Years and replace him with a kit a lot of his five years would be in youthful play and when he
Did mature and the wear begins then repeat the action we ourselves have and experience this
Fate we have a great white pure spirit that longs to be masterful but our eyes and the things we
See deface and scar our opportunities that are innumerable but dark bars hold us in pens their
Shadows show on our fleece that is white as snow there is the outward physical blackness but
Of the greatest sadness it burrows into the sacred hidden places of the mind this is a tether
Most cruel but outwardly we convulse with misery but can’t clearly identify why misery and
Sadness hounds us without end we all desire love but we practice selfishness and try by greed
To use others to give us what we think will make us happy what darkness grips us what light
Would be found and we would emerge from deep pits if we understood giving helping others is
Where satisfaction out weighs gold and its benefits are perpetual well being to making the soul
Gleam as white as brightest day and this will not become cankerous and subtly start to shrink
Your heart to bitter ridicule of your own self you can go forth groaning or singing blackness
Befalling you at every turn or your heart will be leaping over fast moving streams that have
Depths of joy they rush over your feet and then swirl upwards from your feet all through your
System until your head is invigorated and swimming bestowing on you pleasure your heart will
Leap like a hart you truly will be the envy and guide to others that you unsuccessfully sought at
Other times in devious ways and you were so misguided you were plagued with a unreachable
Denseness you fight with such fervor but it cost the loss of everything but by simple obedience
And surrender to the much over looked and demeaned golden rule all it asks is love your
Neighbor as yourself what a healthy and wise statement love yourself without restraint now
Just go and double it by giving the same consideration to your fellow man and then vanquish  
The darkest and most powerful restraints by confessing I see deaths grip it has perfected traps
That are mine alone and it is not in our power that we can break free but His power is without
Equal why should I languish in this black dungeon when on white wings as an eagle is my true
Potential I was made to fly in bluest skies and to match the cool moist clouds I was made to
Make a show only to be sky bound not locked in myself and become hidden by my black
Outlook that obscures what love I am capable of

Bonus
Imperfections
The kindest evidence the savior passed was the marks he bestowed in the most gentile articulation in this
His wise choices matched imperfection to our needs. One of the most telling attributes of women can be
Her hands but what if they are slightly marred the grace only flows to a deeper level quickness is
Replaced by deliberate action slower more thoughtful and profound a touch placed with this kind of
Feeling goes to a measure instantly felt it is not just the ordinary but a thing of force that unravels
Trouble mysteriously it finds the hidden knots looses them allows love to flow wide and full. Perhaps a
Man no longer strides with a power that has an assurance maybe he is depended on a stick for support
Where power is diffused it only changes channels it makes the heart stronger the eyes feel it too
Humanity in others is recessed the blunder the self efficiency drains from boisterous streams into calm
Assessment a flow that harnesses possibility not vain bravado that can at times wound those who are
Weaker and that are struggling. If times try men’s souls then imperfection can be a clarion call the
Placement of virtue at the lead where sometimes pride is the driving force this writing came from seeing
A woman walking in a sunny scene and she had a blotchy spot on her arm others could observe this and
Be to one degree or another repulsed but to the man who loves her it is a special calling card it
Touches makes the forces revel in a display that sets her apart from all others an instrument of sound
That separates from the den isolates carries a marker that generates tenderness, esteem, and honor
Thou art the tune and sound of a masterful violin play nothing else in my presence nothing else will do
Your imperfections makes another whole don’t ever fret over your special make up it is the breath and
The visitation of the divine in the human form boldly brushed in the shadow perfected by sun light

When many days had passed, whence memories blurred with time
And in secret banks were stored, but left unguarded since their prime,
A photo whose fresh recall did unwanted thoughts evoke
Whose owner couldn't but lapse and yet-untapped sorrow provoke.
As if by divine scheme derived or as the Fates would have it designed,
The sickened world he saw with all its lust and love deprived
The illness was their absence, and the world he madly cursed
For its fate and his aligned, conspired and scheme rehearsed.
A more sorrowful realization into those memory banks recessed,
Such thought-provoking power there couldn't another photo possess
But how perfect that this one should a saddest thought impart
To whom unwelcomed gifts as such affected more the heart.

clutching at pebbles
thrown hard into sky as birds
bitter yolk of unceasing raindrop
ideals personified, then scattered in leaf
a coarse blending of the soul and what is
scream of forgotten swing alone in sunshine
a fear internalized, an unquenched song of watery despair and silence
pacing, pacing, toward and away from a melody that is
as intangible as balloons whispering to decaying stars
fading into nothingness, brief respite, void of sound, emptiness most
profoundly pierced with kaleidoscopic shards of senses and memory;
with music of blueberries, gleefully dropped
into tinny pails overflowing from wistfulness
with touch of unblossomed rosebuds admired,
unyielding like crabapples moist in calloused palms
with smell of tree, unrepentant and unchanging,
yet gnarled and longing, indistinct, uncertain
with taste of wind, speckled purity of truth elusive,
of realization categorized, of wispy but unrelenting passion
with the image of a hope
etched, recessed, scorned, repressed, grasped, suspended in song
the maybe’s and the why’s
the can’t’s and the shouldn’t’s
the have-to’s and the why’s
then slowly fingers defiantly uncurl from stone, in motion unrefined
and quietly, fervently; quietly, fervently, I begin to sing...
a mottled snapshot of my mind.

Imperfections
The kindest evidence the savior passed was the marks he bestowed in the most gentile articulation in this
His wise choices matched imperfection to our needs. One of the most telling attributes of women can be
Her hands but what if they are slightly marred the grace only flows to a deeper level quickness is
Replaced by deliberate action slower more thoughtful and profound a touch placed with this kind of
Feeling goes to a measure instantly felt it is not just the ordinary but a thing of force that unravels
Trouble mysteriously it finds the hidden knots looses them allows love to flow wide and full. Perhaps a
Man no longer strides with a power that has an assurance maybe he is depended on a stick for support
Where power is diffused it only changes channels it makes the heart stronger the eyes feel it too
Humanity in others is recessed the blunder the self efficiency drains from boisterous streams into calm
Assessment a flow that harnesses possibility not vain bravado that can at times wound those who are
Weaker and that are struggling. If times try men’s souls then imperfection can be a clarion call the
Placement of virtue at the lead where sometimes pride is the driving force this writing came from seeing
A woman walking in a sunny scene and she had a blotchy spot on her arm others could observe this and
Be to one degree or another repulsed but to the man who loves her it is a special calling card it
Touches makes the forces revel in a display that sets her apart from all others an instrument of sound
That separates from the den isolates carries a marker that generates tenderness, esteem, and honor
Thou art the tune and sound of a masterful violin play nothing else in my presence nothing else will do
Your imperfections makes another whole don’t ever fret over your special make up it is the breath and
The visitation of the divine in the human form boldly brushed in the shadow perfected by sun light.

In the black of night,
one winter long ago,
the bones spoke to me
from their perch upon
a tomb.
Creaking in the cold,
and shining brightly by
the light of the moon.

“Come and speak,”
they called, but the voice
was only an echo.

I stepped forward
in the crackling snow, and
the bones leaned forth.

“It’s grown cold, and
we are lonely,” they said.

“Who are you?”

“We are the Dead,”
they replied.

Silence stretched out
across the graveyard
and snow began to wander lazily
from the heavens.

It gathered on the bones,
who did not move.
They peered down to me,
empty sockets where eyes once sat,
then dried to dust.

“What need do the dead have of visitors?”
I asked.

The skull cocked to one side,
and the gathered snow slid
from its gleaming dome.

“The Dead need and want
all those things which have
long lost meaning to the Living.
We have as much right to company,
and twice the need.  
The cold earth is also
dark, and silent.
It is there the Dead go mad.”

The snow tumbled down,
another layer upon another,
and neither of us stirred.

I watched a trickle of blood
flow from a socket of the skull,
sliding down to color its teeth
a dark crimson.

A single drop fell
from its mouth,
impacting upon the snow
at the foot of the tomb.

The dark red stain
spread across the snow
of the yard,
turning it to
a tundra of blood.

The gravestones stood high
above the bloodied freeze,
and high above them all
stood the tomb.
Sitting there,
the gleaming, bleeding,
grinning bones.

“It is there the Dead go mad,”
they repeated.

The insane screams of a thousand dead souls
pierced the silence of the night,
and the tombstones crumbled
into the snow.

The ground swelled
as if turned to a vengeful red sea,
and spat the bodies below to the surface.
A mass of bone, flesh
and dirt replaced the
snow around me.

The bones above gazed out
upon the carnage,
jaw agape.

Screaming.

Louder than ever,
unmuffled by the earth,
the bodies of the dead shrieked to the heavens.

The gray winter clouds above
turned to soot
and fell from the sky.
The full moon burst into view,
casting its cold glare
upon the horror.

The Dead writhed and shrieked,
bony fingers and heels digging
at the ground around them.
Rotting flesh fell from muscle,
muscle fell from bone.

From atop the tomb,
the bones turned back
to me, screaming
“IT IS THERE THE DEAD GO MAAAAAAD!”

The skeleton burst into dust
and rained down upon me.

And the screaming ceased.

Slowly, slowly,
the writhing bodies
grew still.

Their eyes,
cold and bright,
stared wide at the sky above.
My ears rang with their screams.
I shuddered.

The bodies recessed
back into the earth.

Soot rose back to the heavens
to cover their watchful eye.

Looking back to the tomb,
I saw the bones returned
to their perch.

But now they gazed upon me
with my own eyes.

“It is here,” they said.

And I could not look away.

“The Dead go mad,”
I answered.

Subatomic
Silver smoky sauntering lovelessness
Spots on arms, purple and green
Sickness and sleepless
Wow-like, wicked witchcraft catching

Tones humming zzz'ing
Screaming across elbows
Tucked into the ****
Concrete carnivalesque berserk wildness

Ferally and virily.

U U U THANK U...............Rice Krispie
ANNDD BEATS LEAP CURIOUSLY HIDING
UNDER THE SHEETS

Perfervid fervency.

Idling- white crisps
Blinding silences
Sticky fingertips and lurid looks
Tape after tape of binded irises in the pupil symposium,
Where side-by-side the seams mend together

Innards scissor sideways
Upways downways
Exteriors in rhythmic sync

Tastes like lolli-pop rocks
Watermelon- dazzling gold
Front-step excited eyes binding.
See-cells intertwined and idling-pupils
Dance and discover
Wild hypnotic trysts of skins
Twisting in cotton scenes
Hours of comfortable comforts of living
Women and men handling
Fun funds 'n' bon-bons; investing in the bond.
And going back for seconds.

The head riffs over riptides and causeways, lip-lies and kisses on Broad Way.
Two cadavers, hog-tied. Kissing longways and long ways.
Perogative oxytocin. American Express massages scented oils and lotions.
Persons of interest abetted in sweating. Heaving torsos.
Throwing legs, arms, and sparklers. Redonkulous nectars are microscopic.
Sweet flavors on taste buds or lit by recessed black light optics.
Massaging the rhinoceros husk in this 21st century sarcophagus,
Whiles of Wilders' words were spoken
Nickels of wood soaking in splintered tubs
Thumbs under surveillance. Sneaking inches of suspicion
Leaves treated with lacquer, fables beaten within inches of their lines;

Live its Friday night!
Deviled veterans draped in moon-hide rise
Defiling puerile twenty-something lives.

These wild highs in debts of purs'd thighs
Vexed by personal lies. Hexed in white-out lines.
Riled midnight rides inside this pyre of redolent pie- stroke six and nine
Intertwine in one human form supine
While quaffing nectar wine from the vine
Rancor drives the crime and anoints bold creature types to dine
At the interstice of Sublime.

It’s a lovely restaurant.

   Lovely.

   There is no artificial lighting. Just hundreds of candles that flicker from recessed niches in the walls and on every table.

   And you’ve done everything right so far. From seating me in my chair, with the slight brush of your knuckles across my bare shoulders as you removed my light jacket, to taking my purse from my bloodless fingers to place it next to my feet, you have excelled. As you knelt beside me and ran your fingertips up my bare leg you lift your perfect lips into a melting smile that promises everything.

   I want everything

   And there you are, sitting across from me. So perfect, my dream, my nightmare, my man of the hour, my choice. The candle light is kind to you and as I stare over the glass rim of a red wine I’m enthralled by your voice. I don’t know what you're saying but you just have to keep talking and I’ll just keep redrawing you in the candlelight.

   You have utterly, beguilingly captured me.

   The candle on the table has lit a fire in your eyes. I imagine the fires of Hell burn there and shiver at the thought of all that wickedness. The way you ran your fingers through your hair has tricked me into thinking that two small (very ****) horns protrude from your head. It’s an illusion, but one that I’m happy to run with.

   As you pick up my hand and feather kisses along my fingertips I feel the brush of the stubble on your face which I’m sure wasn’t there when we walked hand in hand to our table but the ****** hair is unmistakable. Is it possible I’m here with a Lycanthrope? Will our evening end with me running bare foot through the woods while a howl scrapes delicious shivers down my spine? Will I fall to my knees, a victim of the beast as it stalks me, scenting the wind, marking it’s prey, spying me and leaping to devour me? One glance at the full moon suggests I might be in for a wild night.

   In the candlelight you morph into all of my fantasies. But now, I’m just hungry.

   The illusion is just too hard to hold. I haven’t eaten since my last foray into the mortal world and I’m too tired to hold onto the hope that I can make it past reality.

   The restaurant drops away. The candles burn down to one lowly guttering torch and you're just a little boy (next to my 712 years) standing in a cave, where I have lured you and you're more than aware that you're not desert, you’re the main meal and the adrenaline coursing through your beautiful veins have my fangs dropping and my eyes smoldering but don’t worry, I can make it pleasurable, if I want to, it depends whether my fantasies have been strong enough, but I will respect you…

   Of course!

The kindest evidence the savior passed was the marks he bestowed in the most gentile articulation in this
His wise choices matched imperfection to our needs. One of the most telling attributes of women can be
Her hands but what if they are slightly marred the grace only flows to a deeper level quickness is
Replaced by deliberate action slower more thoughtful and profound a touch placed with this kind of
Feeling goes to a measure instantly felt it is not just the ordinary but a thing of force that unravels
Trouble mysteriously it finds the hidden knots looses them allows love to flow wide and full. Perhaps a
Man no longer strides with a power that has an assurance maybe he is depended on a stick for support
Where power is diffused it only changes channels it makes the heart stronger the eyes feel it too
Humanity in others is recessed the blunder the self efficiency drains from boisterous streams into calm
Assessment a flow that harnesses possibility not vain bravado that can at times wound those who are
Weaker and that are struggling. If times try men’s souls then imperfection can be a clarion call the
Placement of virtue at the lead where sometimes pride is the driving force this writing came from seeing
A woman walking in a sunny scene and she had a blotchy spot on her arm others could observe this and
Be to one degree or another repulsed but to the man who loves her it is a special calling card it
Touches makes the forces revel in a display that sets her apart from all others an instrument of sound
That separates from the den isolates carries a marker that generates tenderness, esteem, and honor
Thou art the tune and sound of a masterful violin play nothing else in my presence nothing else will do
Your imperfections makes another whole don’t ever fret over your special make up it is the breath and
The visitation of the divine in the human form boldly brushed in the shadow perfected by sun light.

Gave of salacious self, your just due
My one and only dream I wanted to come true
Earthbound after a meteorite crash
Healing properties within this castaway shall come to pass
Wings has been tenderly clipped
The aftermath of a silent emotional eclipse

Walking, running, and soaring, keep flapping but slowly slipping
Heartbeat dipping, ripping
Slowly suffocating as I’m contemplating
Feelings keep overruling, dominating
Restless from stagnation
Mental searching for relocation
Suspended, spent, recessed from the relent

In the hunt for a pleasurable escape to soar to the sky
No questions no earthly whys
A Galactic Dream Weaver
Da Vinci Code, I’m picking up my telephone receiver
The Holy Grail secrets for my mind to set sail
The marooned answers found in life’s details

Standing in vain, waiting for a starship from a cosmic believer
No expressive deceivers
My Mazda 5, an Uber, or a Lyft driver can’t get me up there
Without restraints, I need to inhale celestial air
Showered by a beautiful spiritual given rainbow
Sentiments offered from a treasured chest as they stream when they softly flow

A Gordian knot devoid of hope, a beanstalk, for me, too slow
Something one must know
As your presence comes to offer me a sweet riding tow
Spirit is now on the run
Trying to astral plane beyond the sun
I need to glance down from the stars
Up and beyond, emotions, mistakes seem so miniscule and far

The beginning, the ending, where I descended
The integrity of a tattered angel, a cocoon of self, until my cerebral cortex is Heavenly mended
As my earthly presence blends within
Keeping a rein on life’s sins

I do not know if my salsa dance has come to an end
The absence of loss as emotions reflect to bend
Does time ever remain the same
Please don’t forget my name
On the contrary
For the love given from a twinkling star, and a kiss from an earthbound fairy

An avalanche.
Rocks coming stumbling towards me. The warmth of lava makes me perspire but when I run fast, progress is recessed.
Languish buries my feet from underneath. My only supplies are useless... the desire to leave my heavy knapsack is relentless. The rush for survival going on, you think it would be first to dispose... but I am latched onto materialism

.

My label was showing,
flipping out from behind the collar
of my non-U.S.A. made shirt
Sri Lanka I think,
but I can’t see the back of my neck from here

Perhaps that is why they stare or
maybe it is why they don’t?
Well, that's okay, I’m new here,
first time on this floor
(I pushed the wrong elevator button)

Fancy suits and low cut gowns,
hors d'oeuvres, champagne, noses held high,
some are long ones to look down or up at
“Bat in the cave! Oh, did I say that out loud?
Sorry lady, no I wouldn’t like any avocado"

Whispers, murmurs or just low talking,
there must be a hundred of them
I thread myself through the crowd
making my way to the podium where I speak,
“Hello I am a poet and I’d like to read you something”

A strong gust of wind races against my face,
not air from any open window,
but the breeze created by their mass exodus
as they head for the outdoor terrace
for a smoke or to spit on those below them

Then I saw her, standing in the middle of the room
all alone, staring up at me
Deep brown eyes, dark glistening hair
and a smile that out-beamed the overhead recessed light
“I’d like to hear your poem,” she said in a euphoric voice

I gazed upon her mesmerized, feeling my throat tighten,
sweat appeared on my forehead as I lifted
a slip of paper from my back pocket
I looked it over and looked over at her…again
Then, taking a deep breath muttered,

“I must apologize, for it has become obvious to me
there is no more beautiful poem than the one
standing before me at this very time
To read these words which I have penned
would only pale to this I find”

“Thank you, that is very sweet of you,
would you like to go for a walk in the park?
I’d much rather be outside than inside
and maybe you can read me some
of your wonderful poetry there?”

“I’d love to, but what about them?”
I asked motioning toward the crowd on the terrace
She picked up the tray of sliced avocado, some champagne
and slipped them out the door, then giggled,
“Those insiders will be just fine outside for a while”

As we headed down on the elevator
she leaned up and kissed me
and it was at that very moment, as my heart
was nearly beating out on my chest I knew,
(I had pushed the correct elevator button)

and sometimes I wonder;
maybe if i looked like her
he would love me

but them I remember the painful stab of his words
and keep them close to my heart, forever unchanging, to keep me from changing
because maybe he'll settle again.
maybe he'll come crawling back and enfold me in the dark recessed of his mind
with whispered i love you's
that you tuck away into the crevases of your open mouthed soul

but then,
I remember him saying *******.
that he meant it. that he really, really meant it.
and then him walking off
trailing behind him the wrappings of me
as if i was some excess piece of lust, he just brushed me off
and never
ever
did he look back again

it rained the day after Christmas and

you said you’d prefer snow.
it reminded me of London

so I kept my mouth shut and pushed your hands
further between my legs.
“eat my pineapple,” I instructed
as the *** coated my tongue.
“carry me through

the tiki bar and do pushups in the empty
space while I brush my lips on your temple.”

we were married on the corner
of Queen and Dunn;
our officiant on one knee, clad in blue knit
I

never thought I’d be here.

across oceans you recessed
further into my insomniac brain.
your eyes are green, right?
turn around:

it’s less romantic if there’s no eye contact.
track our distance across my sternum --
I’ve never been to Azerbaijan.
I took advantage of the fact that you were wearing black
and forgot to outline my
shape in chalk.

“Tiffany are so proud to now be not just in Rome but on this actual street, Via Condotti,” said Florence Rollet, group vice president of Tiffany Europe, last week.

The shop is housed in a 16th Century, arch-fronted building a gemstone’s throw from the nearby holy trinity of Italian high fashion; Gucci, Fendi and Prada. The interior is light and cool, a calm contrast to the bustling street outside. Silvery grey walls, white marble floors and subtle Japanese touches such as a painted mirrored screen recessed in the store’s high ceilinged fashion room provide the decor. Stately ariel photographs of the Empire State and Chrysler buildings by Jeffrey Milstein are on the walls, as essential to New York’s skyline as St Peter’s dome and the Coliseum are to Rome.

The fit between New York’s 179-year-old luxury jewellers and Rome is neat like a signature 6 pronged, platinum ‘Tiffany’ setting holding a brilliant-cut diamond. “Our diamonds pop from the other side of the room like nobody else’s,” said Melvyn Kirtley, Tiffany & Co.’s chief gemologist, here to support the launch. “This year we’re also celebrating 130 years of the Tiffany setting. It was invented by Charles Tiffany in 1886,” he explains. “Tiffany cleverly floated a diamond with this setting above the finger. This lets in more light which helps diamonds to dazzle. Before his innovation, all diamonds were set very low on the finger,” he said, frowning at the thought.

The linking figure between New York and Rome is Audrey Hepburn of course. In Breakfast at Tiffany’s and Roman Holiday Ms. Hepburn’s wide-eyed, elfin face bridges these two cities at a unique time of glamour and post-war optimism, the 1950s. This was also a period of economic confidence for both cities. So it was a coup for Tiffany & Co. to have model, artist and New York resident, Emma Ferrer, Hepburn’s beautiful 21-year-old grand-daughter to help with their launch celebrations. Rome-based British acting star Katy Saunders was also on hand to dazzle. Celebrations climaxed with an al fresco dinner and dancing to New York’s spin master, DJ Cassidy at Villa Aurelia, a 17th Century pile. The house and gardens overlook the ancient city from the Janiculum Hill, one of Rome’s famed seven hills.

If any of Tiffany’s new Roman customers needed reminding of the company’s glamorous heritage, on the ground floor of the shop is an area dedicated to archive pieces by Tiffany’s most feted jewellery designer, Jean Schlumberger. Displaying such unique and beautiful objects as Diana Vreeland’s Trophee de Vaillance pin which the legendary Vogue fashion editor commissioned from ‘Johnny’ Schlumgerger in the 1940s. Beside it is Liz Taylor’s Fleur de Mer brooch given to her by husband, Richard Burton. Tiffany bought it back from the Taylor estate at the auction of her jewellery in 2011. Ms. Taylor herself is forever connected to Rome her starring role in the film Cleopatra. It was made at Rome’s Cinecitta studios in 1963 and co-starred her future husband as Marc Anthony.

At the back of the shop a double-height square room features the Tiffany ’T’ collection as well as watches and younger, trend-setting pieces by Francesca Amfitheatrof, Tiffany’s current, and first woman, design director. “It took us a long time to find the right location,” said Ms. Rollet. “And now I’m thrilled. This place is perfect for us!”Read more at:www.marieaustralia.com/formal-dresses-perth | www.marieaustralia.com/formal-dresses-canberra

They* drove me across the country,
from the busy city where we departed
to intimate villages where they recessed,
and spent a star filled, moonlit night
singing songs,
their bodies casting long, wavy shadows
from campfires they huddled around.

Just as I got too cold and my wheels
couldn't turn anymore
did they *finally turn the spark plugs,
revving and igniting my despair and sensitivity
producing heat.

Sometimes they pushed
until I shoved
and scraped my rubber
on asphalt,
on rocks,
on sand,
on boulders big and small,
and I hit a flat-line;
the air I could hold in
no longer.

They rode me into a forest
whose undergrowth was as thick
as a bears' fur during the winter,
and redwood that spanned the horizon
you thought it could pat the constellations.
A forest teeming with life that
one would react like Wendy from Peter Pan--
never wanting to leave Neverland.
And I could see it in their
soft faces and squinting eyes,
bright and lit up with joy,
every detail apparent
as if I burst my headlights into high-beam,
directly on them.

It was there I ran out
of gas and my engines
parched for oil,
from the endless adventure
that was exhilarating and memorable.
One could, as a result,
easily forget responsibilities.

There was no service or refill station nearby,
so I was abandoned where I parked,
flat tires, rusty hood, broken chassis,
dilapidated suspension.

I've proved my worth
from when I was brought in
and over time
it wasn't enough.

*Only repairing, never maintaining.

From the physiognomy that bruises the vertical from Gaul; axiomatic metempsychosis elements were transferred from corporate primaries to third parties after the incipient expiration of Vernarth. This orphistic or mystical enchantment was brought by Wontelimar from Valdaine, emerging from insane drunkenness on the Ardeche Mountains, transmigrating euphony and medical justifications that were united with the reincarnated Helminth reminiscent of Vernarth. Such was a verme or worm that classified itself in his arm, munching in his elder veins elongated by parasites of commendable colonies and idiomatic, retro-emotional, and lyrical heights. Knowing that its baluster made capital letters in steps and life-giving questions by means of beads, and the oratic chain of Luccica's godmother that awakened in him translating expirative and presumptive psychophysical Zionisms of the eloquent millionth perspectivism of re-trance, when his putrid upright arm was recorded. and landing in his Abrahamic physical departure, dissociating his body, separating and alternating with his dexterous spiral Aorion tri-bracelet between the arm of Sagittarius and the arm of Perseus, liquefying into indissoluble modular stratagems for three bodies, plus the one that accompanied occupying triplets in posthumous individualities. Unconscious metempsychosis singularities brought the right-arm picking him up several times from the discursive hive of Wonthelimar, to convince him and tell him that he had not been with the Hexagonal Progeny for some time, without hindrance it brought him from Ardeche in lasting and concerting sets, gray senses looking at the valleys of Valdaine in pilgrimages towards the expectant Patmian plains. His expiration was reborn from the appendages of the water lilies that were grasped by the recessed lumbar powers and were trans-mentalized into related memories that subsist reincarnationist and degressive in plausive longing when re-advancing with revived intelligence, to indoctrinate themselves when raised from an emetic absolutist consciousness, and free from the greatest breaths of judgment is constant waste and reciprocity on shelves that started from an initial discipline already transmigrated, on skinned ardors eroding from astral ellipses in decayed individualities expiring in the Ego-Xifos (Ego-Sharps), that transpose the gorges that even through Hellenic geography that has not been shed by the blood of a Hetairoi.

Wonthelimar says: “hold on to my lazy arm and embrace Lazarus and his decayed fierceness! in different bodies I have seen your blood hang itself on banners with different super-life monarchies, in the germs of the Valdaine valley avoiding their retreat into fatuous materials that vilified the acrotera of your descended Megaron. Remarking on the genetic tricuspid, and emanating lineages of surviving to invigorate in the dexterous appendage of Aorion, which has to wail from the armpit of Betelgeuse with insensitive patches that mock to see him bleed for more than two thousand years without coagulating in possible anarchies more than nothing, before speculating from where the meager blindness of compassionate triple restraints has germinated, like a split Psychí or soul three times before predicting about the valleys and a castle, in infamous beatifies that do not bleed with me…, Wonthelimar ”. It is possible that they have sublimated us from the apathetic and brief radiance...?, Only in some moor or headland before tearing us from the banners or Vexillum of the inaugural that stuffs its already subsisted vehemence in spaces that are already acroteral, resting on peduncles in floral capitulars. And the immobile ones mold the support pustules…, the sap that runs horribly towards you and behind you! Incontinent to your dehydrated past lives redeeming subsistence and rubbing it, then excluding themselves healed properly from their wounds settled in muddy dreams of reviving them expired. Resulting from its origins from the Mysterium or Musterium as an enclave exacerbated in civil disproportions that were established since the Neolithic, without having sealed the doors of all the species that were trapped in the mysterious ice ages, based on ritualistic doctrines, through eager entities to obstruct lapses in the open air of the Spilaion Apokalypseo, having to be returned in possession of physiognomies and of all the enclosed species of the Neolithic Age ”. The bumblebees loaded with spherical honey in their legs, flew by the assembly of the warriors, crops, pastoral assemblages, and sharp stones that cut the wind that disturb the infants who fear the night sleep in the rough quarries that made them sedentary of venerable thermoregulated and climatic seats. Making of them and us revolutionary discoveries, for the interconnection of cooled flints in forests of Memento or Vademecun, to be erected on the megalithic plains, from where I come, rolling like a circular stone that moves the rocks of the World away from a near east, making some timorous and Asian oratics, I was able to get close to you Vernarth, who since the Neolithic I appear following you without giving up in the horticultural and in bovine frights. In this way, the water lilies and peduncles cordoned off the semoviente, full of thrones to conquer them, almost after having lost the calculations of the plasma that were being innovated from a Hetairoi by being reformulated from its incendiary essence, with such spasm being pardoned in the orbits of those who it the sustain themselves and wait for them bringing elaborate anonymous spare parts. Thus Wonthelimar spreads Greek fire over his golden breastplate, entering his transmigrated soul there, as fiduciaries of naphtha, sulfur, and ammonia in treats of previous and speculated oxygenated suitability that was transmitted in suffocating atmospheres by his deltoid when he detonated hatred in his eyelids.. His ***** inhibited signs of fear and hissing of freedom in fields of glory from a mythologized go diving between desolate flames of excretion, and throwing fuel that was not conceived of the same troubadour in the final redemption. (Among waters, minerals and ureas from the Hephaestus braze where dead proteins of cell warheads were stained, nitrogenizing acids that were from the common verb of Wonthelimar) ”.

The double V merged and intertwined forming an inverted double V, being the metric bulbar of Wonthelimar raising awareness of the upper and lower Vernarthian blocks, night falling towards a density of the same that moved raised on the north deck of the Eurydice ship, while everyone slept in the understand the "V" residing and originating from the annihilating biological duo of the immemorial of Vernarth and the Bumodos river, contemplating the suggestive salvage of sap after overcoming lymphomas in the battle of Gaugamela. Wonthelimar in tender loves misrepresented what he would achieve with his ****** healings next to the bold tributary, leaving in the vanguard and in starts from all the gigs that had condemned to Halicarnassus to be truncated next to infallible Canephores in disgrace to their executioners, branching all the branches of holm oaks of the articular of Wonthelimar that had been sheltering from the head, girdling itself in old debt collector and of souls in pain on the sleeping Nyons. The carriage perennially transshipped hesitant and unconscious individuals that the Falangists invited them to order, and spend the night shining in their Xifos in the bow with the inverted "V" to open up to the abundant exciting sea and find it in some Eden, being assembled in the primary kicks of an anonymous withdrawn, among all the cattle cooked with herbs that did not manage to sprout between one and the other.

The brawl is the symbiosis of the Megaron that exhibited the “M” united with the two inverted “Vs”, conceptualizing in Wonthelimar the vigil of early properties and phobias fragmenting in numerous odes in Thessaly, which were already re-agglutinating attracted from a patriarchal image from Hellas, under the pretext of Hellenistic consummations as a vocational institute race in primitives of Alexandrina Magnus, derived a few nautical miles to approach Patmos. The ship sailed across the sea, pre-conceptualizing the very universal being that revived in the Tracontero, looming out of all the waters like a nubile breaker that spoke to each other with words from Mageireméno Kefáli Votánon, "head cooked with herbs." Speaking in primitive alternate erudition and in tidal waves with more than twelve meters of territorial Argonauts making similar corvettes as the Gulf of Tarnetino, possessing distant and comparative sixty miles of the base that colonized Wonthelimar for new sources when encrypting in the Megaron. They persevere, captaining the Immature Polis that would be documented in Patmos, and in the town councils of the assemblage with ****** ceased battles, climbing towards a great cogitation height of the Megaron temple and the Theater of the Epidaurus, under the three darkness of the lilies bordering the Spilaion Apokalypseos.

In the hemicycle Theater of the Epidaurus, the stars worked for the nations of Asclepius together with Wonthelimar, thus healing emigrated musical sessions in palmistry and Parapsychology, where burdensome marks of interveners expectorated in vast impellers on the Koilones and in their softened and purged bleachers, from where each one was shouting towards all the winds and the advent of all the auditoriums absent by past and future generations, cheering lives in salvific voices, for those who cheer them with additional sheltered and attentive spectators from ultra-semicircular bleachers, not being on stage, better absent more than the actors of a drama to stay alive when they prowled towards the Diazoma, or corridor where all the spectators suffered from the same ordeal of Vernath's right arm and pectoral in decreasing lymphomas, in a greater capacity of incentive and saving grace. After this incident, Wonthelimar became a cause and effect of the Vernarth saga, but of transmigrated formality for the purpose of corresponding survival and of cellular restitution of what had died in him..., thus, everything would begin to be reborn towards a prop in a double aspect. The former commanders who were once his faithful servants would appear before this affront, to antagonize him and make him desist from joining as a Proceriato and Gigantum Form of the heroes of Gaugamela on Patmos.

Caught in your thicket of embellished verse
Trite but resolute
Efforts to crack the indestructible  

Here you say:
Willowy white Lily-of-the-Valley
Softly flowing waves of ecstasy
Delights a recessed heart
And resurrects the willful soul

I say:
No one knows the heart of one
Cast onward towards the billowy grey
Destined to revive
My vain attempts at life

The air is ****** up: it is a flower’s fault
a peony weeping and recessed
its creases looking like an elderly face –
I play dead, pretend to be aged than earth.

You count my rings as pine trees’
but I have few, if you’ll notice. You do.  

I would say your name if the oxygen was
not stolen away: instead, I tongue at
my teeth and breathe breathe breathe in
secret hoping the garden won’t reveal me.

A fairylike, but natural room I am in –
feel its rotten sap still giving sticky hands.

The delusional expectancy of arriving to a unified decision under a false, and somewhat mysterious banner leaves the tender footed Neanderthals to drawl and crawl towards their inevitable demise, at the hands of a lesser evil, catering to their cowardice, the ultimate usurper.
…

Barriers formed and forged in concrete molds left behind by a war mongering ancestry devoured by their ****** progeny.

An enemy approaches…

Throne rooms held in recessed hills, concealed in a shroud of fog, left off by the chilled steam stewing off yesteryears loss.

Heroes transported on expensive tapestry, in banners provoking deeds of old, and the memory of their meaning.

Hold in masses of collected honor.

Catapulted horrors break the line.

Strains of panic retreat in woeful singularity.

Fear infects the herd as arrowheads of cowardice break the chain-mail guard.

Women and children pushed behind a diseased king as he purges his principles in the face of death.

He seals the entrance in stone.

A son, known for his great misdeeds, and vast misfortunes takes step before his small family as the army approaches.

In a hallowed tomb as a mere boy, he heard the tune, uttered from the devil’s lips.

A summoning song.

Here he sings the treacherous tune as the sounds of heavy marching fill the halls.

The last barrier breaks.

Shrieks of terror erupt.

Demise is at hand.

Men lose their valor as they turn and flee, only to be met by a concrete reminder of their inevitable fatality.

The child’s voice grows demonic as the words begin to devour his soul.

There’s an odd presence in the room.

Death is prolonged…momentarily.

A void is opened.

The army begins to flee.

Victory is at hand.

Then the illusion of their invasion lifts, as soldiers, once more than visible, turn to ghosts, and finally fade from battle.

Cheers break out, only for a moment.

A hole opens in the center of the room, at first no larger than the size of a pin, but it expands outward at an alarming pace.

Guards scramble to funnel their people out of the breach.

An evil comes forth, once barred from the walls of this land.

It antagonizes the people with tales of its delusional sorcery.

Then thanks the young boy who brought it forth.

A world is soon devoured.

The end.

I work at night.
My eyes lighted by the merest glimmers
from dark recessed memory.
There I can caress my thoughts;
warming them within cupped palms
pressed against the temples, as in prayer.
My church, however, left me long ago,
refusing to believe in me.
The feeling was mutual.

we are always on our way
we beat our chests,
broken clocks, we are honest twice a day.

our groundhogs overstay
in cuckoo nests
we are always on our way

in metric evenings led astray,
most of us have been recessed,
broken clocks, we are honest twice a day.

we are made to coil halfway,
beat those who love us best
we are always on our way.

we make time prepaid
and tendons compressed,
broken clocks, we are honest twice a day

we say
we are guests
we are always on our way
broken clocks, we are honest twice a day.

what are we doing here?
who are we?
could it be mere animals of evolution,
or something more?

consciousness,
thought simply resultant biomechanics
instinct propelling us forward on
rails laid by the genetic makeup of mankind
common sense or even decency
impossible to intercede impossible to
pry wheel of raging cart from track

dominance destruction greed consumption
a white knuckle ride
maniac grin adorning psychotic visage
speed bumps people, morals and expression
all for the powerful's possession
riding the narrow rails of instinct's destiny
until
wall struck impossible to penetrate
regardless weight of gold and accumulation
from society's centre outward the world to explode
choking to death on our own exhalation
drowning in the sea of our own consumption

the absence of empty filling this suit
hope that there might be another way
another path or at least reason
a hand better suited the lost to guide
to veer us from this path—
this societal suicide

a means to explain inner inclination
my inside bigger than the outside
spirit locked within a jar
a vessel
contained dimension not fitting this dimension
ethereal hands pressing against its walls
screaming internal
I want out
freedom home
though the path to which
the unknown
terrifying to the core
this longing
to be somewhere, but
knowing I shouldn't be in a hurry to go
spoken not by word but emotion

I would not tempt with trick of parlour
too insignificant to make demand
in bed, eyes closed
feeling connection to foreign land
speaking inside my mind
not alone in the dark
yet there lay no one next me
is that you,
scratching at the wall of recessed psyche?
behind, hiding passage to infinite knowledge
awareness obscured from consciousness' sight
for a time
for my existence as a man
until the end
until those final frightful moments
then
when hope and terror stand as equals opposing
might I finally realize spirit's truth,
or cease altogether—never to know

darkened eyes
read
Illuminating
Words
absorb well woven
  language  
into deeply  recessed
caverns
flashlight of  knowledge
soothes  a weary heart.

Cooped within ancient bodies,
this inhabitant dwells amongst an elder net
of crabby, crotchety, curmudgeonly claque
of old folks, only a portion of population I met
which achey, flaky, kooky motley crue
disgruntlement fed as peevish pet
aye be earnest asper my assessment,
but some (quite frankly) getting ready and set
to lay down their limb mitt less lives,
even those who survived harrowing encounters as a vet.
-----------------------------------------------------------
­quotidian gossipers punctuate air waves while:
sitting, riding, quartering, puttering, operating, navigating,
motoring around on scooters (the sole means of locomotion

for many elderly residents),
whose sole occupation incorporates:
zapping, yelping, yakking, whining,
weeping, verbalizing, venting,
uttering, undulating, thundering,
squawking, squabbling, screeching,
rumbling, rattling, quibbling, quarreling,
prattling, pestering, okaying,
offending, needling, nagging, mumbling,
maligning, leering, lampooning,
kvetching, kibitzing, jesting, jabbering,
irritating, insinuating, heckling,
harping, glomming, gabbing, fulminating,
fretting, exclaiming, emoting,
denigrating, damning, carping, cackling,
bragging, begging, agitating, acting  
analogous to bad *** kids itching
for playground foo fight during recess,  

which comparison might be apropos
since majority of energy and time expended
complaining about nobody's business
concerning this, that, or another tenant...
thee management not exempt from
badmouth outbursts), where nondenominational
AARP qualified members congregate
within what constituted former auditorium
of repurposed elementary school,

hence quite some years ago (an honorable
NON GMO gluten free cheerful toast made,
instituting batter use then building standing vacant)
a bona fide unanimous dogmatic, heroic,
linguistic welcome sans titular viz zit head
where alumni of alluded alma mater, ivory fiery,
classy academic solvent atomic structure
became amalgamated, appropriated,
assigned a new life, whereat fob dost
electronically activate innermost recessed sliding doors,
principally, quintessentially, resoundingly availing maw
formerly entrancing students into
Schwenksville Elementary School,
though some years ago repurposed
with barely a trace constituting current subsidized
how zing facility re: Highland Manor,

the residence of thyself and missus
(approaching third month anniversary),
whereat I dune hot give a rats *** if aimless
airless baseless banter, ceaseless chatter,
dubious dabbling, et cetera if this solitary
ruminate thinker the subject de jure
of parlayed people portraying
penultimate purposelessness.

I saw you walk to me, across
the Place Bellecour, and I smiled.
The shuttered windows
and my unshuttered expression
told you that it wasn’t the time for this,
but the recessed windows on the grey roofs
and the off-white brick told me it was.

I saw you walk to me, across
the Place Bellecour, and I smiled.
The spires of the distant churches
and the unbroken line of sight
called to you that we better hurry on,
but the lines of windows (like members of an audience)
shouted at me to kiss you.

I saw you walk to me, across
the Place Bellecour, and I smiled.
A deep blue surreal sky and the
whisper of a floating white cloud
shouted to you to say yes,
and the white cloud of up and above
cheered me on, evermore,
to Paris and to Lyon.

A voice may open doors to corridors,
dusty and untraveled creaking floors
which lead to vast and unlit recessed rooms,
shut down tight, their vacancy assumed.
Should you have the curiosity
to follow, know you this: the voice will be
your unrelenting guide, compelling you
through portals from until now you withdrew.
The voice will still the recoil of your mind
and weave within your thoughts and intertwine
into a past and present tapestry
of dreams and fears spun with realities.
Colored with your rapture, tears you spill;
the cloth is yours, do with it what you will.

you are standing
in a studio
in front of a painting
with your head cocked to one side
chewing on your lip
hands folded at your chest
mind racing with
the running and skipping brush strokes
pulling you from one corner
of a canvas planet
to the farthest point
at the edge of the acrylic
where you and i stand
at the endless ocean of white walls
recessed suns illuminating
great plateaus
rising like revolutions from the deep
and the bristles of God
delineate my hand from yours
with a dark line
a moment
becoming permanent
as the air flutters past
removing our mortality
as it goes
and you look at your watch
and you unfold your arms
and move to the next piece
where i am waiting
ready
to hold you again.

- ©2013 Gabriel Anthony Garza

goodnight .... old girl,
goodnight, to you,
you quiet house,
you blessed home.

are you glad to see
another day done?
within yourself,
your hidden recessed places
are you sighing in relief
as we settle safe in our beds.

your present loves,
all accounted for,
sleeping within your teak
and nail embrace.
or do you prefer,
the drumming of our feet,
the hum of activity,
of when we are awake,
and bustling and bumping,
about your frame?

or is it best when we leave you,
silent and alone to contemplate,
in the sun and wind on a work day? my lord, the secrets you must keep, the lifes, that you have held close behind these old walls.

you must groan and cry,
with the weight of some memories, yet, others cause you to smile and sigh in near-miss relief.
you have stood strong and sturdy,
for almost one hundred years,
in one form or another,
your girth has expanded,
with the growth of family,
from farmers cottage, to three bed,
with study
and nannexe out the back.

you have been
all but knocked down,
rebuilt, reworked and restored,
to former glory.
you have withstood,
the element's rage
and time's insipid attempts,
to shift you, from your place
upon the cliffshead.

you have, and do,
do well, to hold us
all within.
and now,
just before i sleep,
i want to thank you old girl,
for the way, you keep us all safe.