FIRST

Be it a girl, or one of the boys,
It is scarlet all over its avoirdupois,
It is red, it is boiled; could the obstetrician
Have possibly been a lobstertrician?
His degrees and credentials were hunky-dory,
But how's for an infantile inventory?
Here's the prodigy, here's the miracle!
Whether its head is oval or spherical,
You rejoice to find it has only one,
Having dreaded a two-headed daughter or son;
Here's the phenomenon all complete,
It's got two hands, it's got two feet,
Only natural, but pleasing, because
For months you have dreamed of flippers or claws.
Furthermore, it is fully equipped:
Fingers and toes with nails are tipped;
It's even got eyes, and a mouth clear cut;
When the mouth comes open the eyes go shut,
When the eyes go shut, the breath is loosed
And the presence of lungs can be deduced.
Let the rockets flash and the cannon thunder,
This child is a marvel, a matchless wonder.
A staggering child, a child astounding,
Dazzling, diaperless, dumbfounding,
Stupendous, miraculous, unsurpassed,
A child to stagger and flabbergast,
Bright as a button, sharp as a thorn,
And the only perfect one ever born.

SECOND

Arrived this evening at half-past nine.
Everybody is doing fine.
Is it a boy, or quite the reverse?
You can call in the morning and ask the nurse.

things are not what they seem to be.
a blade of grass is a field of ruin,
dust moves in a circle,
and death is a false end.

things are not what they are.
god is existence,
the future is set in stone,
yet even mountains move,
given time.

things are not.
faith is complacence,
an onyx tower, buried,
in the amber depths of the heart...

Then there was the sudden stillness
of thousands of birds on the telephone wires
strung like records of our transgressions
in an unquiet pattern against
roiling gray sky.
How had they come there, how
in their alien dance had they conceived
this tautness, this bizarre
and malefic solidity
from their own selves,
a tension like a hand
on the small of your back, at the nape
of your neck.

Then there was the sudden stillness
of thousands of black birds on telephone wires,
black stones on a string, a long dash
on granite sky—

Spitting to the rhyme,
it’s like I’ve been stuck in rhyme,
in between the tick
and tock of father crime,
all the right gestures,
         right stares,
      seem to all be right there,
all the right words,
but I just don’t seem to care -

is it there?
in there, over there
   -where
all the **** is shared upon
    the foreign lips
    of a deadly “****”,
deadly ram in the hot spot,
     top notch of shame,
   deep, deep,
back,
     in the game,

                 in the light…

My heart is full of love
But my mind is full of pain
My dream’s to rise above
But my fears are all the same
In this world of confusion
We fall into this state
We get lost in the illusion
Where are words cut deep
To the point that we break
And our hearts begin to weep
As our love becomes too weak
I apologize for it all
For every fight I cause
From not taking your call
To putting feelings on pause
I take all the blame
And with it, the shame
The old me would shout and scream
Fought first
Until he blew his steam
The new me will show respect
Listen to your words
Take them and reflect
This old me is the past
The new me is now
And now is here to last

I feel it rising
In the silent room
I feel it escaping my throat
I don't want it to be revealed.
I will stay calm.

I feel it coming
Up my neck and throat.
It's becoming to strong for me
It's clawing its way out.
My mouth slowly opens
And it rushes into the open, empy room.

The scream is only heard
By the disrupted silence
It keeps coming and coming

How do I make it stop.