You asked a question
But it wasn’t really a question
It was a trick
You had the answer, already
And you only asked me
To make sure I agree
Or to see if maybe
I’d sell out, and simply
Pretend I could be
What you want from me
Boy did you see

Blinded by the light
Revved up like a deuce
Another runner in the night
-     -     -
Madman drummers bummers
Indians in the summer with a teenage diplomat
In the dumps with the mumps
As the adolescent pumps his way into his hat
With a boulder on my shoulder
Feelin’ kinda older
I tripped the merry go round
With this very unpleasin’
Sneezing and wheezing
The calliope crashed to the ground
The calliope crashed to the ground!

We’ve got Dino Dana on the big tv
For no other reason than to control me
And something only a kid wants to see
On every electronic there could possible be
One pad with Cocomelon
The other with some kind of ant cartoon
Two kids
Every device in this house
I’m hiding under the covers on this phone
Because there’s surely some princess show
The little one wants to see
For no other reason than to maintain
Massive control
Over me

Friday night I crashed your party
Saturday, I said I’m sorry
Sunday came and trashed me out again
I was only having fun
Wasn’t hurting anyone
And we all enjoyed the weekend, for a change
I’ve been stranded in the Combat Zone
I walked through Bedford Stuy alone
Even rode my motorcycle in the rain
And you told me not to drive
But I made it home alive
So you said that only proves that I’m insane
You may be right
I may be crazy
But it just may be a lunatic you’re looking for
Turn out the light
Don’t try to save me
You may be wrong, for all I know
But you may be right

She’ll only come out at night
The lean and hungry type
Nothing is new
I’ve seen her here before
Watching and waiting
She’s sitting with you
But her eyes are on the door
So many have paid to see
What you think
You’re getting for free
The woman is wild
A she-cat tamed
By the purr of a jaguar
If you’re in it for love
You ain’t gonna get too far

If you search for tenderness
It isn’t hard to find
You can have the love you need to live
But if you look for truthfulness
You might just as well be blind
It always seems to be so hard to give
Honesty
Is such a lonely word
Everyone is so untrue
Honesty
Is hardly ever heard
And mostly what I need from you
I can always find someone
To say they sympathize
If I wear my heart out on my sleeve
But I don’t want some pretty face
To tell me pretty lies
All I want is someone to believe
…

Mister,
You are falling apart
And whatever drug prescribed to you
Is pulling the seams even faster
Because you don’t take it like you’re supposed to

I never saw Grampa in his pajamas
He always came to breakfast fully dressed
He could have perhaps thought it was rude
But maybe grampa just slept in the ****

He keeps calling you a cheat
Every time you’re not in sight
He claims you’re banging some other guy
He knows he is not right
Guilt unconfessed, held inside
Turns into accusations
On the flip side

He says, “she is withdrawing money from my account without my permission.”  
I said, “she is stealing from you”
He likes to sugar coat
Or maybe he needs to

I will stay in the back of your mind
I will stay there for years
Perhaps your whole life
And though it’s not the place
I’d choose to be
Any spot is fine for me
It’s your mind
So in it, you are the boss of where I will be

Once he starts paying attention
Again
If he ever does
He’s gonna think to himself
“****, that girl’s kinda endearing in a nutty way
But she sure writes a lot of poetry

My guy is a diamond
Precious and rare
So sparkly and beautiful, too

My guy is platinum
Hard as metal
Adorning my body
Almost a jewel

My guy is silver
He could be better
But still worth wearing outside

My guy is steel
Strong and true
And he is almost stainless
Too

My guy is a rusty old bike
On which I used to race
But our riding days are over
He’s rotting away without a trace

Women can sometimes be kinda daft
We call disloyal men “dogs”
I’m not sure if we do so because we don’t
Know men
Or maybe we don’t know dogs
We don’t know pigs, either
Snakes, though…
Snakes we understand

Maybe it’s just me
But it sure feels good to sneeze
Sometimes it’s expected
Tingle in nose
Sometimes it’s a surprise
But a sneeze is one of the pleasures of life
That just doesn’t get it’s due
But that’s because
It can be loud and obnoxious too
It’s surprising to me
How much sneezes have in common with
You

He never actually said it to me
He just wrote it in his poetry
I suppose it’s a testament to what a great poet he is
That I took it so personally

Yesterday I saw a fly
Caught in a spiderweb
It was struggling so earnestly
I could feel it’s pain in me
So I let the fly go to be free
And that would have been the end of the story
Except now that spider is stalking me
He’s sitting up there in his web in the tree
Patiently plotting revenge on me

If you stop and be silent
You will see
(Well, hear, really)
The crickets are playing you a symphony
One of a kind, never before heard
And they’re doing it so gleefully
Tweets and twangs
Tingles and pangs
Pitters and pats
Crickets’ symphonies sound like that

Sometimes
I feel defeated
By my own need
To be noticed or readed
If I could settle for being obscure
I’d surely have a more peaceful world
But here I am writing this poetry
And it hurts my soul when nobody cares to see
I love these poems
They’re part of me
Apparently
Not as beautiful as I wish they could be

If God really liked humans best
We would be able to fly
Yeah, we’ve got these incredible brains
But God clearly loves birds more than you or I

My muse keeps taking off on me
Now I’m writing bipolar poetry
When he’s around, it’s flowy and free
But when he’s gone
It’s stuff I don’t like to see
So I need a new muse
But how does one get one at will?
Is there some sort of muse application
To find a replacement
Or do I need to wait for a cosmic event?
Are muses found
Or are they Heaven sent?
I surely know they can be lost
No idea where mine went
Please apply for the job of muse
If you’re also perfect and smart
Clever and romantic
Full of grit, and also heart
And can speak right to my soul
You might be the person to fill this role

It’s like peeling off a sunburn
Once it has killed a layer of skin
And it comes off in huge
Satisfying flakes
And then little ones
That still want to stay
But I peel those suckers
Anyway
Shedding someone who could not stay

He quoted Miss Piggy
It was the corniest thing I ever did see
But just call me Kermit
A frog who happens to love corn on the sow
Eating it
With only frog teeth
I don’t like to bite when I’m ******* my meat

Excuse me,
Lady online
I’m playing Scrabble with
You are obviously not some mortal being
But a person who has ESP
Using your power
In scrabble to beat me
Or at least, throw me off of my game
Every time I’ve got the
Perfect move
You take my space
That I didn’t get the chance to take
And I appreciate that’s how you win the game, and beat the crowd
But psychic powers shouldn’t be allowed

I wonder what the neighbors think
Of our
Sidewalk chalk outlines of the kids
Each kid likes to get done twice
Four little bodies outlined on the pavement
What a sight!
Do they feel they’ve encountered a
Grisly crime scene?
Probably not
Considering
The sidewalk chalk tracing is a weekly thing

He wasn’t a mistake
He was a mis (ter)
I couldn’t take

My grandkids are playing with an
Adjustable bendy track
On which to run their cars
And this has quickly escalated into the
Race track wars
Of course
It is true
All the pieces look exactly the same
But
There is a particularly special piece
The little one thinks she has claimed
And now, out of the fifty other racetrack
Pieces
That could do the job
Her older brother
NEEDS that one
Particular piece
Apparently
For no other reason than
To **** with me

My grandson is being attacked
From the inside out
Or maybe outside in
But that poor child
Has the itchiest skin
They call it eczema
And give him bunches of creams
But nothing really  works
Or so it seems
My daughter has searched far and wide
For relief for this poor child
She even wrapped up his whole body
In ace bandages filled with medicine
And kept him like that for the day
She also made use of oven mitts
Held on by duct tape
I wish I could find some miracle cure
For this poor child’s skin
But I am completely helpless to aid
In  attacks coming from within

My grandson
Likes his *****
A LOT
He is only three
If I hadn’t raised a lot of boys
This would be alarming to me
As understandable
As it may be
To like ones *****
One must take their hand out of their pants
While walking down the street
He hasn’t figured it out yet
How creepy it does seem
Walking around with your hand in your pants
For everyone to see
It’s not like I can wean him off it
It appears to be glued on
So please ignore this little
Three year old
Walking around town
With his hands down
In his Underground

Sometimes it’s smartest to pretend it didn’t exist
Dear  Lone Ranger
Don’t be a stranger

It used to be
When he said the word “baby,”
I thought he was talking about me

I’m not the one who’s so far away
When I feel the snakebite enter my veins
Never did I wanna be here again
And I don’t remember why I came
Candles raise my desire
Why I’m so far away
No more meaning to my life
No more reason to stay
Freezing feeling
Breathe in
Breathing
I’m coming back again
Hazing clouds rain on my head
Empty thoughts fill my ears
Find my shade by the moonlight
Why my thoughts aren’t so clear
Demons dreaming
Breathe in
Breathing
I’m coming back again

He left me better than I was found
Lots of treasures
I will always carry
I hope he can say the same about me
Reciprocity

I know an old lady who swallowed a fly
I don’t know why she swallowed the fly
Perhaps she’ll die
She stayed far away from spiders, though
When something don’t taste right
Old ladies tend to know

How does one put on the brakes
When they desperately want to RUN?
How does one hold back the tide
When on it’s waves one longs to ride?
How does one
Block out an unreliable sun?
Don’t relegate oneself
To the shade
Take it in small doses
Hurry up and learn
Suns have the potential to burn

You came for a while
Sat on my shoulder
Enrapturing to my eye
I wanted to keep you nearby
But it’s wrong to rip the wings from a butterfly 🦋

The wild eagle
Is seducing me
I hear his call
It might even be a loud moan
The wild eagle is calling me home
While he continues to roam

You carry your pain settled in your bones
I wish and pray you could let that **** go
Those demons
Are merely now almost conquered figments
You’re past it
You have almost won
Drop them
Set yourself free
That surely sounds like winning to me

Hollow words sound so beautiful
As they echo
In an otherwise empty room

I’m feeling calm, but I’m never relaxed
I feel it coming, but I’m holding it back
I’m off the edge, but I never attack
I’m straight off the moment, but I still come back like that
I’m a strong man, weaker than I once was
**** and bramble, still hard to handle
I can hold my own if you need me
I’m standing here, can you see me?
Sometimes I’m standing where I wanna be
Sometimes I hate you, but you feel so nice
I know you think I’m gone
But I’m all in, don’t get me wrong
Sometimes I know I’m gonna lose it
I’m all caught up. I’m faking
….

He must be on some secret mission
Saving democracy
Or maybe he’s climbing Mount Everest
To fulfill some childhood wacky dream
Maybe he’s performing ritual sacrifice
On a spiritual journey
Maybe he got hit by a truck
Or otherwise just ran out of his luck
All of these things I pretend it could be
And I’m over here avoiding reality
He ghosted me

Maybe you haven’t changed at all
You might always have been this way
And now I’m just noticing it
Because I’m taking it personally
And I’ve got to realize
The person you are
Has nothing to do with me

The space between
The reasonable
And my insecurity
It seems pretty obvious
He is avoiding me
But maybe it’s normal
To get so busy
To not find a few minutes
Within almost a week
To see what I’m up to
Or even peek
But maybe it’s my insecurity
Baggage carried around by me
I feel it’s not too much to expect
Lack of neglect
But hey, no harm, no foul
Good for him
He must have a life that is busy and full
Or more likely has another girl
And it’s kind of my own fault innit?
He never said he didn’t
He said a lot of things
But maybe not to me
I might have imagined it all
Because I wanted it to be

There is a bird
Outside my window
But not the kind of bird I am used ta
To me, it sounds like a crow
But he clearly thinks he is a rooster

I am here in front of a bunch of poets
About to say something they may find absurd
I want to say to those who communicate this way
Actions speak louder than words
Wooing through verse
So romantic, at first
But it’s really just empty words
As much as I’d like to believe them
What I see is more real than anything I’ve ever heard

Thank you for piquing my interest
And thank you for tingling my toes
It really made me bloom
My heart getting almost too big for this room
And even though it didn’t last
It’s a bright point of my past
Got me spinning like a the perfect ride
In the tilt a whirl
In an otherwise boring slump
But as much as you get my heart racing
I cannot be a chump

He is the type of man who responds to demands
And I am the girl who hates to be demanding
The problem with him:
Disappearance often
Which he is entitled to do
I am not writing this for me
I am writing this for him
I hope he sees
I feel like it will bring him growth
Knowing what I think I know
I want to give him a glimpse from
An outside point of view
But it’s taking the rhyme out of this poem
No matter how much the words sound alike
Because it’s a love letter too
And sometimes love has no reason or rhyme
But I have to admit to myself
He and I
Might not be a good match
In love
However the friendship will stay sure and strong
My whole life long

Do you think we get all the answers in Heaven?  
Or does that only happen in Hell?

The distance between what boys actually mean
And what we girls hear in our minds
We hear “I love you”
When he says “I love you,”
But he means “I like you just fine.”  
He says “I’ll be there,”
We hear “I’ll be there,”
But he means “I’ll come around sometime.”
He says “we have a bright future,”
We hear “we have a bright future”
He means “let’s take it a day at a time”.
The distance between what he meant
And I heard
Is so far apart that it is absurd
No harm and no foul
Lesson learned

I’m delusional enough to believe
It wasn’t me he decided to leave
At least not because of me
I tell myself
He was scared
Or too busy
What ever fairy tale
That allows me to still believe