water was showering over me
warm steam with coffee scented molecules

quenching the dry air.
a thought was in my mind:
porcelain can’t hold coffee grounds.
something nice would be fresher air
as fresh as frenchly pressed coffee.

so, in my thoughts, i dripped on the rug
and made footprints over to cup one
(it was wasting heat, losing steam)
so i used the momentum
of its northward-traveling aroma.

an air freshener was made
(as i turned the cup in my hand)
to a catapult of filtered black sand
no grounds to spill, but coffee’s scent
poured through the air as it went.

lifted level, tipped right askew,
my nostrils flared as coffee flew.
the air freshener that was thought
occupied a braid of air,
perfect aroma.
then liquid’s caught.
gathered by carpet, furniture and clothes,
coffee no longer kissing my nose.

my eyes open,
the warm steam is still around.
thoughts no longer on coffee grounds,
but rather the soap in my hair
and on warm cup one
still waiting there.

The footprint of this place
is a freshly razored face.

Mother Earth’s been ‘beautified.’
trees, grass, roots, shrubs,
stubble shaved from the chin,

neck and face smooth.
Underneath this house.

The whiskers have been shaved
        she’s dolled up
But in gruff’s stead
        there’s a wart on her face
A fossilized, mortared blackhead.

I come home to the darkest it’s ever been.

Every light choked off; there’s a cinch somewhere in the hose.
It’s the stillest it’s ever been here, for ten years.

The last time it was this still the trees grew a different way:
        not all twisted, sideways and flat

        not planks and sheets.
They grew straight up and down,

        but with branches going left to right,
        but with leaves swallowing sunlight.
They were spindly, fat, twiggy and thick.
not stapled, smashed, ground or shaped
not nailed, glued, pressed into place.

I come home to the quietest it’s ever been.
Every sound gagged; the fan’s gummed up.
It’s the most silence this place has heard for ten years.
The last time it was this quiet Forest ruled the place.

The ground below will never grow
green or brown extensions of carbon earth
-not since the concrete took up hearth
-not since ten years ago.

does anyone know why I don’t believe?

because in all the stories good

always has to work too hard

to stand a chance against bad, 

no matter what.



because the numbers are always 

stacked against light,
even if darkness dies in the end.

why is it so hard? why can’t love always

have the advantage, from the very beginning?

isn’t that how we all think 

the world is: basically good?



that’s why I don’t believe:

because there are some people who,

no matter what is done or said to them,

will never appreciate what they are born with.

whether they deserve it or not 

doesn’t matter.

it’s lots of luck, the way I see things.

love, happiness, life: hard work, 

but lots of luck. 

and the first piece of that luck

is being born into a place with free
air, sunshine, birdsong, friends and family.

most have that, some not, but all have

breath in their lungs.


I will never believe in a god

because there are those

who can’t see their luck,

who can’t count to seventy-seven years

and realize how little time they have

to live the life that luck gave them.
if it was god, they would appreciate

what they have. they would be born with it.

like air, sunshine, birdsong, friends and family.

His wrinkles went somehow deeper

than those of a national will do.



And his eyes were somehow darker -

not without a brightness in them -

intelligence behind a film, foreign repose.



I saw from the hood on his red coat

that he was passing through the land

not that the coat was novel or strange

his hood was tighter, more practically donned.



His whiskers were somehow thicker

scratching the surface of the Great Land
a beard from three days’ unshaven growth

the stubble, wisdom of an Englishman.



Far different than I, not better, but old

emotions just a hair deeper hidden

than mine were: shivering in the cold.



I knew from his voice, his language: 

mine was his, mine the younger.



A shaman with a home on the Eire

though not from that verdant spot

souls are all equal, nation matters not.



An infusion of Alastair’s yarrow root 

diluted in cold, sprayed sea water

coaxed home to the waves the sunlight

our trust and a handshake.

I will not attribute honor



to the bloodiest of games



to cold, condoned killings



faceless murders without blame.



War is to the green-clad



a state-sanctioned game



I will not call that thing honor



for which good men should feel shame.

the clash & legacy of it all

do yes to my mind appeal,

but blood & bone, flesh & souls:

shattered. my heart can feel.