~
Sleep, no sleep
No making plans
New bed linens eat my dreamland
And settle in the wilderness of my ever-opened eyes

I see you
I see me
I see everything
I'm a play with no final curtain
The story continues unabated
And the ridiculing light of day
Is as sacrosanct as an unused blanket
Nonetheless, I'm checking in
Sleep, O sleep, swallow me
~

Rose was a Red
Dodgers are blue
We're stealing signs
How 'bout you?

Cheat like this
Not like that
One's okay
The other picked at

Keep to tradition
Not technology
Yeah it's confusing
So is most any ideology

Lost underneath the hood
she made sure
he stopped to ask for directions
then with map in hand
and strapped to the seismograph
she tremored into the land
of eternal sunshine

Two cups of happy
One cup of sad
A fair share of passion & caffeine
A whole lot of doodad
(You know what I mean?)
Even throw in a bit of the absurd
Now mix them all together
Shaken and stirred

~
Cold cold heart
Frozen plumage
Like a peacock
Her ladyship
In the campfire light
Skating about the pond
Of her own vanity
~

I hide
In rooms
Cold and spacious

Sleep is a hunter
Triggered
and mendacious

Through cracks
In crevices
Here I am

Studying the arts & architecture
Of historically
Dead mayhem

Affixed and frozen
To the ceiling
Of my head

Where twisted thoughts
Grin signature
Red

I can quote
All sorts
Of useless things

But none so urgent as prayers
In escaping what
My polar opposite brings

When it's said,
They threw the book at him
That can be rather misleading.

I mean, was it as harmless
As a flimsy graphic novel?
Or something far more frightening,
Like an unabridged dictionary?

The judge threw the book at him,
And awarded his wife with
Everything but the kitchen sink.
That way he could still
Drown his sorrows.

It must have been the dictionary...

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

~
Belonging to Eden,
the garden of
inescapable pleasure.

Prepare to fall again
for the pretty things.

The desire to preserve life
lies at the root.

The way of flowers
--let them beckon and bloom--
sincerely upright,
vessels for memories,
methods of communicating
with distant versions of yourself,
a conversation that could
drift into tears or laughter,
personal revelation
or total silence,
depending on the mood.

If only time and thought
could be as perfectly
arranged as flowers.
~

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

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.

Dying is not a crime
But for playing God
I'll probably do time

Pretty little euthanasia
My disconnected phone
Always going home

That open window
To the fire escape
I am the center of a lake

The kids next door
Liked to play with me
Now we don't see them anymore

Time is the wrinkle
On my otherwise nice life
It keeps secrets
It places blame
It determines value
It comes with cost
It measures war
It holds out for love
It reminds me
To pick up the kids
From school at noon
Reel me in, tune me out
I'm at its every beck and call

The road not taken
turned out to be
the path of least resistance,
and easy street
the highway of tears.

Who knew?

circumference
area
radius
locate where i end
and you begin

protons
and neutrons
inside this atomic nucleus
our energy levels
hover in the clouds

how can't we fall
for the rotation
of this sphere

this densely
structured wonder
of our assembled love

I dreamt I still knew myself the moment you turned your face to me

you were about to enter a very personal space: a diary, a dream journal, a shoebox of love letters, a suicide note, the angry ramblings of a madman

Standing on the bridge where we're no longer suffering, the dream exhaled

and joy found eternity running over the closing frame, floating away in every direction where time intervenes

~
the night starts here,
the night starts here
in the dunes,
fixed in time;
incipient waves falling into place,
their subtle purpose
to roll over and sing;
the fountainhead above us,
like it's above the shore,
attaching softness to a shell.

we blew on a dandelion
and the whole world disappeared;
love is a mysterious shape,
love is a remembered rhythm.

I have trembled
my way deep,
I'm a guest in here,
drinking at the stream,
seeking bliss in
the plural homemade kiss:
peppermints and orchid rain.

we please the night,
we please the night in interlude,
and it merrily leaves us that strand
of pearls called "good morning."
~

Ashes of my son
in this bottle
wash ashore
to remind us the years are fragile
and too quickly they're no more

Strands of my daughter
on this brush
remain a lovely brunette
and a none-too-kind truism:
we begin to die from the very outset

A stone's throw is all we have

Earth is in orbit.

I can see it in the window.

From the window of this
Conflict-free
Facility.

A crew of
Four souls

In gravitational symphony.

A crew of
Four colors

Ad rem and
Unsegregated.

The vastness of space
Brought us together.

What's the transmission?

"Why can't the world below
Live like this?"

~
Who can circumnavigate Avalon's depository and the palpable swoop down toward earthier terrain?

Yet, here I am.

Where is your gravity taking me, Kahn?

This building is an invitation, and I am humbled in this sense of arrival. The books are stored away from the light. So a man with a book goes to the light, the serenity of light.

And therein lies the hidden meaning.

But you won't let it become just a building; you want it to remain much a ruin; it's all somehow sinister in its celebration.

Occasional distraction is as important in reading as concentration.

And I'm reading between the lines in a corner carrel, looking out at academic crop circles; I grapple with each texture: it's this combination of imposing austerity and weathered familiarity that you seize upon to make your current landscape hospitable.

This building is an instrument, creates a sound in my head akin to music; and this music remains a glowing source of solitude, all driven by a desire to be hidden but sought after—a celebration of all things lost and unnamed.

Here I find closure by opening a book.
~

Oh dear!
--
So sheer!
--
No coverage
In the rear!