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friends or frenemies (feminist safety instruction card)

a coastal flight, boredom has me riffle through the various
offerings in the seat pocket, and on the safety instruction card
come across this...
<•>

she’s blunt, direct, proffers me an either/or choice,
game on either way, pick door A or B, up to me,
she’s no lady, but a hipster shooter using semi-automatics,
three lines of verse, rat-a-tat-tat, your guts spilling,
hoho you’re dead or kicked in the *****, at the minimum

if only she knew what she was up against

I got words for which there ain't no antidote,
can whip her into a lovers frenzy with cooing metaphors,
slap her with stingers so that she’ll retreat hasty to another site

friends or frenemies, how juvenile, how sweet, how absolutely
childish girl, no interest, play in my arena, I have studied with
the masters and lionesses and offer you no terms but this:

be my lover

extend your reach, speak slow and soft, open and willing,
my sonnets demand close attention, slowing and holding,
building links into chains that make boundaries into a single
tie that binds, not for now and not for later but for the only measure that poets alone command: forever

concede and give up that conceit that tough is a defense,
lose everything for rewards you have yet to witness, conceive,
in my circle is in my circle where the intuitive rules and gasps of shocking come so frequent, they are normal breathing

be my lover

knowing that we will never meet never see the inside of
the furnace that can be dreamed-created with tonguing verbs,
adjectives that dance intertwining pas de deux,
oh my femme fatale, my agent provocateur,
let us learn together how,  to teach each other
come,
will be the only action word ever required

come
come write me
come together
come close my eyes
come open them wider
come free me to be a one two

anger is false brevity - loving is the languid forever languishing flames of golden burning orange caramel, word chips of
liquidity that verses, penned passioned calculations,
see how takes many stalks needy to  birth bound into a
single sheaf, count the wips of smoky wispy slivers,
combine and separate, the calculus of recombinant,
offering a unique poem with a momentary invitation,
an equation of equality and there is no diverse different


<•>

the first class steward sh/wakes the dozing body
with an apology;
“landing soon, would you like some breakfast before we land?”

the sleepy soul replies,
come to me with water,
just water...for my dream
The Allusionists (Mary Winslow and Jeff Steir)

these two allusionists  **(not illusionists!)


composition is a criminal sentencing, a full-time sensitizing,
a never ending t/rue seeing, recalling, photography by word.

I am a career criminal.  I know.

these two retranslate by digging into word wells and
well hid storage closets under stairs so that we,
the not-in-attendance may envision their sightings with
two hands clutching, comprehending almost better than
the one who is actually there.  

for our version, the one they provide is,
coffee with cream,
scotch with a  beer chaser, tea with honey,
all to be, sipped slow, so
the hot frost on my the chest, infiltrating nostrils,
Vaporub-spreads slow and easy, brainward.  

the allusionists.

the habitual employers of this
specific filter,
(word weavers, I call them behind their backs),
weaving is not in my eternally planned skill set.  

I do so admire their tapestries
that guilt alone demands tribute and obeisance
and this poor imitation.  

I do so admire their tapestries.
November 25, 2017. 11:07 AM.
<>

No, He said.

I want you
wanting.

I want to taste the miracle of your desperation,
need,
lick the sweet sweat of tense from the hairline well hid
on the back of your pleasuring neck.

I need your needing constant completion,
but not succeeding.

The airborne aroma of your desires are fiery, arousing,
stimulus sensating me by the unending beauty of dissatisfaction,
this virus desirous, infection, makes my perpetual wanting  
for an incomplete perfect woman,
forever seeking betterment,
perfectly complete.


<>
11-15-17 11:51pm
mixed up emotions re this one; who is the striver, who is selfless   and/or selfish;  can be understood in many different ways
(the gate is a crowded mess, please no special requests, be thankful you got a seat, this flight is sold out and I’m beat.  
I get up and stand on my chair and say)

I give thanks for:

the uncommon greatness of common sense

for the steady approach of that wondrous day when
kindness is neither random or unexpected,
but the rule, not the exception

for our opinions and deeds, that are our own,
derived without coercion, born from our thoughts and observations and that
we are equal to both
owning them and to
changing them

that we live in a time that friendships can grow just through the quick exchange of words leaping bounds

for eyes that see deep deeper than skin,
ears that hear
what those ashamed wish you didn’t, hands that grasp regardless of distance,
the taste of  kisses that come easy sweet  

for the  day when I at last knew,
the pleasure of giving
so far exceeded receiving,
that giving and receiving became
synonymous

that I learned that the best skill to possess  is
to anticipate
the needs of others

that my lucky position in this world permits me
to act on the things for
which I am thankful


that someday I will need no longer inquire,
are you my poem,
for the answer will be self-evident to us both
LGA 11/22/17 1:00pm
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


This is not a poem.  This is about a poem.

Poems require words.  This poem does not require words.

This poem requires memories' muscles.
This poem requires what is called colloquially love.

Learn that what we share here is not poetry.

Your poetic senses that produce the words that mark you present
are but surgical tools to extract, release the whole and the parts of you that help shape that single sense borning in your chest that defines you at any particular moment.

Quæ est mater Laureat.

She is the Mother Laureate.

She is the boundary you must learn to cross to be more than a re-arranger of letters and alphabets, but a translator of the human essence and fill our veins with the a sense of awe and wonder felt when we read each other and think aloud,
"yes, exactly, that was and is precisely what I was feeling."

She is the glue that keeps us sticking here, sticking together, each of us sticking to it.  

You do not know her?  
No worries, she will find you when you least expect it, perhaps
when you need it.

This is not a poem.  This is a human who's a poem.

Understand the difference and then you may begin a journey
that has no destination other than weaving the connective tissue that makes us anticipating excited when we log on.

Happy Birthday Mother Poet Laureate!

I do not think I can write a better not poem for you.  
Forgive me then, if going toward, I repost this every
October 24th as long as the chemical composition of
blood, God, spirit, logos or reason runs free within,  
exiting as words encased in tears that formulate into
human poetry.

nattyman

P.S.There are 800 poems here with Sally in the title, and least 700  are about Sally B.   If you like, please  feel to free to add yours, old or new.
tremulous and tender, the crook'd finger
neither timid or tentative,*
yet trembles,
though it be from
care, not fear, consideration, not trepidation

the renegade finger strokes her sleeping cheek,
tender the tip to each cell beloved, as if sealing a bond
there is no more to say

when awakening comes, one will be gone,
with no note, thus this last soft stoking, outline stroking
tremulous and tender, his finger, U shaped-crook'd,
but he is no longer is her
you


he leaves, departing, yet lightly shaking,
no longer can he be her prized and proud claiming show-horse,
gone, that man she loved, for he cannot abide his being
called a former, dark glory, a bent cane spirit,
his body, its entirety,  
crooked by weight of an improvident provision,
not just his finger, this, his, 
a greater intolerable,
his pain of failure unacceptable
and shame searing,
his woe bends his love acrooked
this old poet, one of the first, to see your wave,
when he was playing knick-knack paddy whack on his shoe,
the old poet then played two, and said,
yes, I will follow you

Please
imaging-imaging that old poet with a glanceable cursory,
a small smile whispered, with entourage of a nod and a wink,
stands, knowing he is in the delivery room, a witness,
to first steps of a babe starting a new life
marvelous miracle by touching a button, a new line written,
not crossed but connecting by pressing "Follow"
with a finger from a hand, a human fringe,
attached to a breathing mind and a thinking heart,
the first to follow you, a ceremonial gesture of
innovation magic incantation, a new moon blessing,
a living person believing, remembering, the longest ago,
his first own graceful acknowledgement and eyes speak,

yes, I will follow you

the new poet, astonished at this induction to the smallest
Hall of Fame that they alone own the only key, study that
number, that number 1, the first to follow, kinda looking over
their shoulder to make sure the old poet still there on the morrow,
sure enough there are now two, safe in the back pocket,
a tabulation of humans who speak volumes of trust, saying,
yes, I will follow you

the old poet, imaging-imaging the babe, dancing round
the room, invigorated, challenged and the faucets pouring,
can't write it down as fast as the trains arriving disgorging,
words unique in new combinations and the rush of blood
from heart to head to those newly literary fingers bleeding
happy creatures of creation as if they are Noah
setting sail to save us with verbs and adjectives
two by two all for now species unheard of

the old poet wants to send cautionary notes, the path strewn
with frustrations of no inspiration ditches and inescapable cliches
that sound fresh but just aren't, the disappearing satisfaction,
the inability to get it just perfect, and so many obstacles
to be prophesied,
but he does not, these things must be self taught,
today let it suffice the initiation, the first crowning of
**yes, I will follow you
for this the way of the poet

10/16/17 5:09pm
what an honorific terrific
to be the first to follow
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