Where my world
meets their world
I caught a glimpse today
A precious scene
of does and fawns
and the fawns had come to play
Behind my kitchen window
I dared not make a sound
But then, I think they noticed me
and were gone in leaps and bounds

Breath was what mattered
all the days since his birth
Now dressed in fine pine
and a suit of his worth
Slowly descending
into the soil's firth
For death be it only
what lies in the earth

So many
live as prisoners
behind bars
made of the cold steel of hate
Dead men walking
with hearts too hardened
to grant reprieves

Some decisions are easy
But some we are left to wrestle
With bad and the good
The what-ifs and the shoulds
Eventually ground up in a pestle

The face that lives
inside the blot
is content today
not to stir the ***
To disturb the peace
is to break the lease
with the only friend
the man has got

It was through
But a single reed
That I held up in my hand

My eyes took aim
At the winter sky
As I walked through chilly sand

And for a time
I felt as though
The sun was smiling at me

It lit my way
The rest of the day
Before it hid behind the sea

I'm unarmed man
dancing in the street
to the tune of a gun
fired at my feet
I cannot stop moving
for if I do
I'll see my pride leaking
from a ****** shoe

Are we but homeless, threadbare waifs
yearning for our mothers
Searching for love
with a primordial hunger
in the darkness of "existential horror"?

To be so uncomfortable
in the present moment
as to rush to get to the next one
Dancing like feet
touching hot coals
A machine of perpetual  motion

He thought he was
a child of nature
Loving all creatures
you see
He couldn’t believe
what had just occurred
“How could this happen to me?”

As he sat in the road
all ******
talking to the EMT
he suspected
it was a woodpecker
that had mistaken his head
for a tree!

He stood in this forest
of trees at night
and he couldn’t help but stare

at the light
peeking through the leaves
letting him know it was there

He gazed upon
this beacon of hope
waiting to say a prayer

asking God
what he wanted of him
and why should he even care

Then came
an ethereal answer
as if riding upon the air

“Look for all that is good
in your life
Then be grateful enough to share”

Dreams are to escape
The laws of physics
They’re the playgrounds of analysts, psychics, and mystics
Ethereal visions of a make- believe earth
But in the end
We’re unsure of their worth

Lying in the driveway
sleeping in the rain
a man melting before my eyes
and leaving such a stain
"Just a dream" I tell myself
and forget about what it means
But, the next day in the driveway
the bluish tint of jeans

If you feel the earth breathing
through the ocean's briny tide
Sense a mountain watching
as you walk along it's side
Color the forest canopy
as it migrates through the seasons
Marvel at Nature's tantrums
and the mystery of her reasons
Float upon a silent stream
as it meanders through your soul
You know that there's no part of you
that is greater than the whole

Difficult to know
what’s in one’s heart
when one so rarely
looks there
And taking a peek
into Pandora’s box
risks the release
of a nightmare

She appears along the avenue
In Victorian elegance
Her feet bouncing beneath her skirt
As if itching for a dance
She twirls her lacy parasol
High into the air
Moves across a crowded walk
As if no one else was there
May dear sweet Eliza-Doo
Woven in the fabric of her time
I find myself an unhappy man
Living without her in mine

All the birds have flown away
and a nest is what remains
I feel more and more
like that beat up bike
that's been left out in the rain

The rooms in this house
now sit in silence
They are but shrines
gathering the dust
of fond memories
Sometimes, when I walk past
their doors
I think I hear playing
But, then, I step in to the crushing
disappointment of quiet, empty space
They have left us alone
Dazed and confused
with no inkling of what to do next
And the heartache
Did I mention the heartache?

Beware of the man
with the sharpened wit
He be a swordsmen in disguise
Using the air in his lungs
he duels with his tongue
splitting damnable truths
between lies

How ironic the insight
that my mind
spends much of it’s time
blind
to the reality that it is
stuck in the head
which is stuck up the ***
of a blundering fool

Riding through the sunlit countryside
in a roadster with the top down
on a fresh summer day
The greens are greener
The skies are bluer
As the bright colors fill my eyes
the essence of the day fills my soul
and I need not ask
why anyone would wish to be anything but alive

I yearn for that moment
the serenity I’m seeking
Found in a landscape
Not noticed before

Spellbound by it’s beauty
and no words for the speaking
The peace so completes me
I may hunger no more

How sad we are
that the good of living
is when the bad
doesn’t know that we’re there
We fly under the radar
in hopes that if spotted
the evil won’t even care

Wise man say
that a valiant effort
can never be anything less
than a righteous failure

Please don't take a picture
that you'll only leave behind
Don't bother with the memory
or keeping me in mind
I'd rather not be there
if you are never going to care
So, please don't take a picture
if you would be so kind

I can fancy myself a painter
Standing where the sea meets the shore
With my feet in the sand
and a brush in my hand
the canvas as an open door

to an ocean of abandoned dreams

How ironic
this entropy of thought
that life
as a series of random occurrences
is nothing
but the death of destiny

The evil of it’s pursuits
knows no bounds
for it is a powerful time traveler
It lives in the past
but, feeds on the future
to grieve the present
And, it is truly
the enemy of us all

I  have died
many deaths
and labored through
many shallow breaths
Dreading so, what I might face
If I peered into the space
between the frames
of my mind's worst horror movie

I ache for the warmth
of a midsummer day
and the slow rocking rhythm
of a hammock's sway
All Winter's gloom
on clouds far away
and if left up to me
that's where it would stay

At the moment
of his greatest despair
he leaned back hard
his arms and hands outstretched
as if nailed to a cross
All he could utter
of his inconsolable grief was
“We’ll get’em next time”
But there is no next time
There is only today
and today a sort of death has crawled
up inside him to mock
all his worn-out platitudes
Like
“When the going gets tough
the tough get going”
“Tomorrow is another day”
and
“It ain’t over til the fat lady sings”

I did not know
where I was heading
for most of the night
with a drink in each hand

Until I woke
early the next morning
face down on the beach
one eye in the sand

Evil is innocence
unspeakably betrayed
as it laughs at it’s partner
about the deal that was made

How dull the instrument of alcohol
In service of emotional pain
For come the dawn
the effect is gone
and the wolf is at the door again

I’d like to see
the tree full of ribbons
to let me know
I can come home
Before I arrive
at my father’s doorstep
I’ll brush off my shoes
and spit in my comb

Take my face
into your hands
and tell me
that you love me
Though a reason
for each grain of sand
exists for you to spurn me

How are these colors of Autumn
possibly described by words?
It is like God speaking to us
through a prism of light
unique to the day
A special painting
that like a footprint in the sand
is erased by an evening tide
but never in our imaginations or our memories

These bullies
Of pragmatic reality
Mean to be the death
of all dreams
For they will not rest
Until they’ve done their best
To destroy that which glitters and gleams

Perhaps, it is enough
To cope with the noise
Of one’s own random, undisciplined thoughts
Never mind the madness
Of others

For one
His own mountain
For one
His own stream
The peace
To wash over
The mind’s
Empty screams

Free my hand
Bound to this whip
Of my father's making
And if you must
Lop off the hand
To stop what it's been taking

"Gather unto me
all that is mine"
They scream from the alleyways
and empty bottles of wine

If a man is not doing
what his deepest self likes
he might want to notice
who is driving
But, to get to that
deepest part of himself
it’s going to take
some deep diving

May we find the separation
between
our heart's heaven
and our mind's hell
and see it as
the light of things

We are born
as a feather
unburdened by the weight
of our primitive agonies
What our eyes will see
our minds will be unlikely to forget

Time can take
the bloom from your rose
the spring from your toes
turn your poetry
to a vapid prose
To be unhappy
is such a waste of it
so shed your grave clothes
and make haste of it
because time
truly waits for no one

All I have to be
Is a haunted human being
Gaunt with the shame
Of a lamentable past
Then looks thrown my way
From those I send fleeing
Frightened by ghosts
Freed again at long last

Sofie loves the sun
and now she’s having fun
thankful that Spring is near
and Winter’s nearly done
She skips out around the yard
rhyming like a bard
Her poems are like
these playful songs
to heal all the badly scarred

To see not light
but, only darkness
is to live in a world
under a dull and lifeless spell
A type of trance or sleep
where dreams are as black as night
and the soul is nothing other than
a fellow cave dweller

May the sun
be the face of god
and all it’s light his robe
as he takes
a morning stroll
across this sleepy globe

If all is quiet
in your life at the front
be thankful for a roof and dry floor
But, get out the mops
before the other shoe drops
and water rushes through
every door