The  purple ripples in the air
Advise you that there’s anger there
Anger that is not contained
By someone who was anger trained.

Listen to the things he shouts
He’s mad as hell without a doubt.
Here he comes towards your door
What is he so ******* for.

You didn’t barge into his lane -
To cut him off would be insane.
You only gently honked your horn
And now you get his shouting scorn.

He bangs the window of your car
And you now know he’ll go too far.
It’s clear he is a total ***
So stomp your foot down on the gas.

Leave him in a cloud of smoke
And give yourself the final joke.
Leave him shouting in the street
And tell yourself “Revenge is sweet”
ljm

With just
Two words to use
To say the things I must
I find my dictionary closed.
I’m lost.

A ghost
In search of words
That hide from Poet’s pens
And make contact impossible
For friends.
            ljm

The Clock Eater loves the taste of fine time
Sauteed in juicy New York minutes and served
With seconds spiced with instants and moments.
He’s a founding member of the Clean Plate Club.

The Clock Eater does not wear a watch.
To him there is only this moment in time,
Like a freshly baked roll it’s aromatic
Impatiently waiting to be devoured.

The clock eater has an evil, hungry soul
And he hides in unexpected corners
Waiting for a precious leisure moment
To stuff into into his greedy face.

The Clock eater doesn’t often share
The banquet that is on his plate,
Perhaps a nibble now and then
To ease the other diner’s wait.
ljm

Time for the sadness to find an end
Time for the hateful words to hush
Time for the wounded to find a balm
Time for universal love to blush

Time to find abandoned paths
And travel on them once again
Time to lend a helping hand
And plant new courage deep within

Time to act when there’s a need
To be the person who steps out
To bridge the rivers yawning wide
With cataracts of fear and doubt.

Time for the star that glowed one night
O’er the hills of little Bethlehem
To work a magic in our souls
Eliminating “us and them”

Time to bathe in gentleness
And soak in honesty
Time to set the world alight
With all the things that ought to be.
ljm

Whispers that morph into screeches
Disturb the strands that tenuously hold
The ragged edges of reality aloft
In storms of self recrimination and regret.

Slender stalks of rationality bend down
Beneath the weight of foolishness
Grown fat and heavy in indulgence
That is justified by cobwebs of desire.

The music in the background plays
On bagpipes and a penny-whistle band
While the conductor tries to turn them in
To violins and harpsichords, and fails.

A river jumps it’s muddy banks
And floods the playing field with muck
As strands and stalks give up their load
And it all falls to nothingness.
ljm

Dear Father
I’m alone in a very scary place
And I’m not certain how I got here.
I lost sight of the footprints I was following
And wandered off the pathway you laid out for me.

The wind is cold and the sky is dark.
I just heard screeches from the nearby woods
And this path ends in only brambles.
Kneeling on the rocky ground
I beseech the Lord to rescue me.
He either doesn’t hear my cry
Or this is where I need to be
To learn to never take my eyes
Away from the light that guides me.
ljm

In a world with far too many people
With way too many things to do
In so many places that are
Just too hard for them to get to,
We can only wait.

The traffic lights are slow to turn
And the phone is never answered.
The vending machine does not give change
And Fed-Ex never stops out front
Even though we wait.

In a world where real is mostly fake
And Fake becomes a brand name,
We spend the funds we do not have
On things we’ll never ever use,
Not even if we wait.

The processes that make things go
Are grinding to a halt.
The future mimics yesterday
And we can’t see tomorrow.
So we can only wait.
   ljm