Growing up
She loved staplers
They kept things together
Nothing was ever lost

  Then one day
  Mommy & Daddy
  Became unstapled

Now she favors scissors
They cut things apart
So many things lost
Starting with her

An Old Wives' Tale:

Hello Canton of Neuchâtel
Bitter homecoming
  What's your spell?

Decay
This way
  Pearly Russian Doll

Absinthe makes the heart grow fonder
But your dreams spill from the glass
  Sawn asunder

Your holy relic, O Green Fairy
With honey on the brim
  Wormwood berry

How now
Brown cow
Bombinate
Swiss Miss
Relocate
  Exploratrice

A wreath for your head
Glass slipper for your foot
  Ah yes, to sleep in your magical bed

Laisse tomber!
  Laisse tomber!

Sodden your soul
And **** all other Lanfray
Otherwise, this rue of earth will
  Swallow you whole

Shell casings strewn
On a rooftop
A grassy knoll
An underground garage
This is what ensues
When you hate the man
In front of you in line
And he happens
To step into Texas

Because i am lawn furniture

And you are Antarctica

The two of us have ample rime

But not a single drop of warmth in our blood

We lived through all the bright nameless, blameless places

And the turning of the *****

The year we fell down

In an illusion of separateness

Is where we came to know

The fragile silence

Within a map of echoing glass

Pointing further out than we once thought

Everything ravaged, everything burned

Take me back to a time
when a vow
was the color of
everyone's tomorrow

Take me back to a place
where a promise
never led to
man's great sorrow

Where the breeze
would linger in the grass

No one ever questioning
how long it would last

Driven by red
riding hood,
wheels of eternity run
hot and cold
along the tracks
in her arm.

Around the bend
there are jigsaw
pieces of a puzzle,
scattered as destinations
once towns and villages,
now fodder for
the migrant beginner.

According to fable,
there's a wolf at the door,
home is no longer
a worthwhile rendezvous,
but a trap of origin.

Misery is a train ride,
a stray fantasy,
lingering in the wilderness
of her fractured mind.

She sells her gold bracelets,
for she needs
the dark coal,
she seeks
its deep freeze.

She can then
be many things
along the journey,
just never
a connection,
never a permanent signal.

Awaiting the hot element
of a shifting sun
she surveys the pond
in minimal raiment

Concealed in the thicket
she loosens ties and stays
til away from hips they fall
and onto the grassy knoll

She ventures to the edge
one toe in to assess its viability
playfully ******* the surface as
she waves him hither

Besotted by the nakedness
of her artless endeavor
he disrobes in quiet
anticipation (of sorts)

Come to her he shall
and with a fair bit
of ****** and parry together
they shall master the water

There once was a rotten tax collector
Who combed the rich Italian sector
   He lined his grimy pockets
   By cheating those he audits
Alas! today's appointment was one Hannibal Lecter

It's hard enough
Trying to walk
In someone else's shoes

But to repeatedly
Get stepped on
And told you stink

Can cause a real hole in your life

She came in a thousand unsolved pieces

A myriad of ways to be put back together

But none complete her...

If you give a troll a cookie
He will never stop with just one
Like cancer he'll spread
And infect his poison, just for fun
He used to live under a bridge
Now he resides in our very own community
Stopped he must be, my friends
Lest he terrorize HP with impunity

The sun has her heart on setting, and so takes an impetuous bow.

The mountains open trees like umbrellas, to which their budding wildlife gather under.

High above the lamplight district, a cluster of crows assemble on a wire, taking a vote over which direction to take wing.

The grumpy locomotive steams ahead, hissing at its schedule and the possibilities of further rust.

A lady of style, turning on her heels from the salon, swears to the heavens she'll get even if anything ruins her hair.

And you, just this morning...

waving goodbye to me from an upstairs window with a smile, but silently praying I will return to you alive and in good health.

Does your life
feel like a bad flight
on an airplane?

You saved and saved
to pay for first class
but got stuck in coach.

No matter where you went
or who you met
there was always turbulence.

And even that all-expenses-paid
dream vacation to paradise
went down in flames.

I saw you for a brief moment
  Yesterday
Your hair was the length of
A football field
   And as dark as the pigment
Of my imagination

Even in your evening gown
You could kick
    Like Trinity from The Matrix
And give your favorite
Retired thong
New life as
     A slingshot

You are everything I can't
    Remember
    -- Or at least a little bit of it
And I could love you maybe
    Or at least like you

But I know you're not
    Real
You can't be real...

Like Mac N Cheese
You are just another
     Honest-to-goodness
Disappointment
     Right out of the box

Waterworks are failing

Nile faucet tears

***** powder salt

Plague blood wine

Fermented analgesic sea

Swallow Ebers papyrus

Swallow ******'s scroll

Raze the periscope, this is no crusade

Born blind under duress

They sink mid-thigh in pools of acronym

Copper pennies at their toes

Can't wish for things they haven't been
taught to believe

Steal them instead

They'll get a parade for far less

But then again the winds might turn

The sea might divide master and slave

And there they shall be peeing their pants

"In caelum fero--we make our mark"

You picked a bad day to fight, Egyptian

Pay dirt
Pay phones
Pay the sitter for her time in hell
with the twins
You'll never earn enough
to call long distance
Unless you move to Italy
and live the dream
of making heart-shaped pizzas

gravitate to me
enter the flame

breathe deeply
to hold within

what adds color
is life for us

the air we share
a sustenance

It's no accident
When love is sown
Into a quilt
And wrapped about
Our shoulders
On a cold winter's night
Just like it's no accident
When we toss aside
Such blanketed warmth
When the new dawn
Beckons us to come out
And play

We love only
To betray

Blindfolded in the center ring

The crowd wants blood

Everything forgotten
to pandemonium

The bell rings

The round begins

If nothing else
one thing is certain

We're in for the fight
of our lives