Her soft pale goddess skin
Had not been sun kissed
In six harsh months
While earth above
Also suffered much
Demeter’s sorrow was shared
Condemned
By godly men
A starving child
Ate one pomegranate
Now her captor demanded
She must suffer in this hellish cave
It’s always the gods
That come up with
The strangest harshest ways

Her soft pale goddess skin
Had not been sun kissed
In six harsh months
While earth above
Also suffered much
Demeter’s sorrow was shared

Condemned
By godly men
A starving child
Ate one pomegranate
Now her captor demanded
She must suffer in this hellish cave

It’s always the gods
That come up with
The strangest harshest ways

I am the waystation
For the tentative and broken hearts
For the unformed and uniformed lovers

No toll bridges
Just patience, and friendship
Letting her slip between sorrows
Then on to loving someone new
And as the guardian of such lost hearts
What can I be expected to do
But love them deeply and completely
Building them a cocoon
Being for them a soft womb
To heal their wounds

Until, like all loved ones do
They leave me to
Moving on to better lovers

He can’t sleep. He can’t speak. He just whistles. The wind works its way through his tight teenage lips, disrupting the subtly silent suburb. Frequencies fluctuate. In the distance a dog barks. Then another dog barks. The piercing sound of high pitched whistling doesn’t stop. Aside from his holey jeans, old flip flops, and smelly green shirt, whistling is all he has. The sound resonates with everything he is.

He whistles with the lost hope of love. There is a soft undertone of sorrow. His whistle is as beautiful as a piccolo. It is more fluid than a flute. Farther in the distance a mournful howl echoes in response to the whistle.

The night carries him onto a bus. One stranger stares scowling viciously.

Another strangers growls, “Shut the **** up.”

However, this pied piper cannot. He refuses to stop. The whistling continues.

        Up and down, it is a haunting sound. Fifteen minutes of whistling while the bus carries him home, to nowhere. Here there is an empty alleyway with a metal grate giving off waves of stray heat. He works his way to the one dumpster occasionally stocked with the days rotten left overs. To some the stench would turn their stomach, but to him it is sweet salvation.

An officers asks him to stop and show his I.D, to no avail. The request is repeated carrying a hint of arrogance and anger. Even so, the whistler is unable to stop. A hard hand grabs his wiry arms. They struggle, another officer joins the fray. Somewhere along the line a foot smashes against his ribs. He whistles for them to stop, pleading with his pursed lips. Steel toed shoes smash his gaunt face. The whistler finally stops.

The cops do not. Years’ worth of rage works itself out on the young man’s body. Inside his skull the whistling continues accompanied by a ringing. Pain singing and singeing his brain, leaves him breathless. This is nothing new. It is no worse than his history. The red welts, the black bruises, the damaged ear drums, and the broken larynx, all the scars from previous violence.

Violence meant to silence. Beatings that stole the words from his breaths. Speaking through the wind was all he had left. A secret language he kept to himself. The dead tell no tales. Instead the wind whistles back at a broken corpse.

It begins with the hunger
A deep and painful feeling
Consumes his entire being
And leaves him weak and reeling

The need drives him to attack
A nibble here or just a snack
He waits in the alleyways  
To dine on one who's lost their way

The primal urges rise from within
The darkest hunger consumes him
And in this moment of passion
He is transformed into a wolf of action

His hands extend twisting to and fro
His eyes bulge and neck lays exposed
Body quivering with pain and anticipation
As he begins his dark transformation

The flesh reveal itself as it tears and stretches
Hand ripping across his face ripping and scratching
The fur forces itself out of his chest
As his screams become howls of agony

Finally his leg bend and crack
He is finished and ready to track
The hunter is finally unleashed
Beware of the darkness  fear the beast

The words will forget us
Like other dead languages
Surreptitiously replaced
With a new phrase
By a new phase
Like Latin giving way
To the languages of our day
All the worlds that lived within
Being forgotten
Leaving only fragments
And taxonomy behind
The words will forget
Our exactitudes
Will settle on platitudes
Vagaries and simplistic
Representations of our present
Will be all that is left
Of this life we led

He smokes. Lips pull thin white clouds of relief into his lungs but when he is done he will head back in to the dark den of machine men. There used to be better days. Now strange alchemy has turned his soft body hard, smooth skin wrinkled, white teeth cracked and yellow, and soul into a mutilated mess. The fence vibrates with his passing frustration as one foot cracks the corner. Would have been a ****** mess if not for the tight steel toed shoes, that add about half a pound a piece. His fatigue weighs so much more. A heaviness stops him at the door. It is like he is walking in a world of gravity set at twice the normal rate. Safety goggles, lunch lady hair net, and ear plugs have become his nighttime uniforms.
“Five hours and twenty-three minutes to go.” He recites like Dustin Hoffman’s rain man.
The mechanical madness beckons him in with a thud da dud, thud da dud, thud da dud.
“At least it is a midnight shift and not a hot summer day shift.” He thinks as he shrugs off the last remnants of his reservations.

I woke up in the wrong earth
There is violence and depravity
Religious abuse and insanity
Politicians paint the world with fear
Distorting the words of drunken prophets
So they can control people
Wars waged for profit
Should have listen to their poets
To balance out the science
Kids **** their parents
Some parents deserved it
I woke up in a world
That makes me feel so worthless
Banks own us all
Print their own **** money
Own the images in our head
We are counted in the red
**** I woke up in the wrong world
I should have stayed asleep
Maybe if I go back to bed
I wake up in a better world

They broke me with the shadows;
Fears and uncertainty,
loss haunting me,
till hope turned towards
celestial possibilities.

They broke me with love;
One father figure
who I figure
has something better
for me.

They broke me with confusion;
Contradicting rules
cornering this fool
till, I submitted.

And when I didn’t,
they broke me with fear
and hellfire.
Till, I either died
or gave in
to their desires.

You are a rusted soul
Spitting sweat and ice cold fire
Queen, king, queer dear of contradiction
Reality is a fiction
Because you are ethereal

For those who don't know
You are special
A work of strange abstract art
Dark angles of a dangerous heart
That finds the purity
Of who you are
Crossing through to
Who you will and want to be
You are the poet

The poet yearns to live free
Flowing in full fields
Yielding flocks of
Daisies, marigolds
Violets, and roses
Till all noses
Explode
From sheer delight

The poet yearns to love deep
And see the secret hope reciprocated
The hunting heart hurt and relocated
Burnt like a blown out building
Decimated leaving only enough room for
One spark of hope

The poet yearns to be seen
To be heard and understood
Have the world comprehend
His being
Soul dislocated but invigorated
With all that he has created

In the choppy Sunday waters
A piece of cardboard
swims just below the surface
only inches away
from the safety of the grassy shore.

Farther out a plastic bag struggles
slightly submerged
it cannot decide
whether it should drown
or fly away with the wind.
Instead, it floats wide open
******* in air
but never escaping its purgatory.

A grin with thin rimmed glasses,
smiles with delight
as she speaks to her sprites,
whispering
with hands wide,
telling them to listen to
her tale of things that go
bump in the night.

“When I was very young
there was a crooked old tree
that sat savagely waving
down the road from me,
a mess of gnarled branches
that looked like they could
grab you up and take a bite.

One day I went out to play,
saw a small squirrel,
and chased it all the way.
Until, it climbed up that
wooden monstrosity.

Distracted,
I did not notice
how the grass reacted,
shrinking under my foot falls.
I failed to see
how far I had actually gone,
because to my little mind
the distance from my yard
to that tree was shorter,
but in reality, it seemed to be
approaching me rapidly
as what was behind
faded out of sight.

Daylight became night
quicker than expected,
and I suspected
that I should go home,
but when I turned around
I found that I was lost,
and all alone.

I heard a twig snap,
then felt a limb smack
me on my lower back.
My body seemed to contract
as I lost my breath,
and a fog of coldness
washed over my flesh.

The wind lifted
a small pile of leaves
revealing tiny
black shiny beings,
a nest of chittering beetles
that started skittering
ever closer.

I cried out. No sir,
and tried to hoof it out of there,
but I had lost my sense direction
and didn’t know where
my small house was.

A little bug
that looked like
a hairy brown spider
leaped up on my dress.
I quickly flicked it off,
then flinched when
I heard something
purring.

I turned in time to see
a small pair of glowing eyes
focused directly on me.

The feline
passed by
rubbing gently
against my thigh,
and then strutted away.

I followed that kitty,
and I thought we
were heading back to my city.

We passed a stone fence,
and a small wooden hut,
a little gas station
that didn’t have much,
plus a tiny graveyard
and a busted gray car.

I walked so far
that my feet got blisters,
saw a stranger,
and cried out, hey mister,
but he didn’t even turn around.

I kept going not knowing
if I would ever get back.
Nervously, I started to laugh.
I had probably snapped,
cause I was scared and starving.

It was dark and cold,
and I couldn’t find
anyone to help me.
People didn’t even
acknowledge my presence
unless I bumped into them.
I tried to speak,
but no one would listen.

I never got home,
just settled here
in this little cottage
for the last
seventy plus years.

No one has stopped by,
in such a long time
so thanks for listening
to this story of mine.

Now, come closer my little dears,
because I am soooo hungry.
I don’t want to be rude,
but you look like food.

Why are you running?

You see when you heard me calling,
you shouldn’t have listened,
like me,
you to are now missing,
but I know where
your new home will be.
There’s a place in my stomach
because it is so empty.”

The little old lady smiled,
chasing the last small child,
with a sharp tap on his neck
she laid him to rest
in a well-dressed bed
of greens and liquid red.

This is an echo
A poem
That I have written
A thousand times

This is a rainstorm
Of humanity
A shower of grace
With thundering compassion

This is a sunny day
Where people learn
Not to hate
Forget the warring ways
And say
We will be ok

This is a love story
Not in a book
But written in a look
In one daily act
And then another

This is humanity
A spark you see
Of what I want to believe
That you and me
And everyone we see
Can be kinder
Wiser
Not prone to the hate speech
Of rich political hucksters
Not working the will
Of loudmouth proselytizers
Picking up new text books
Not old dogmas

This is the hopeful promise
That I tender in this poem
We can be better

The artist
Because before she is she
She is light
Not some romantic heroine
But more like ******
Dangerous
And addictive
Powerful
She is not a body
Not just flesh
Made to feel
Or fulfill male desire
She is fury and compassion
She is furious in her passions
Not clad in shallow fashion
Not mine to define
But one who shines
Throughout space and time
Part and whole
Of the human divine
A flickering candle
Dangling in the darkness
Trying to help me and you
See through to
What we need to do

Hell while I am at it
Not to be to dramatic
But for every her him
He who was a she
Or She who was a he
For you, us, or them
This is just one mad respect
Poem

It is a convergence
of classical cords
and caffeine
along with
the depth
of another
writer
who inspires
dormant desires.

I let the breath
of silently whispered
syllables
simmer in
the ocean
of my unconscious,

as ivory keys
percussively
pound little wooden hammers
against vibrating strings.

I am searching,
seeking
the speaking
of some cosmic being
that lives in me.

The utterance of
unnatural inspiration,
the soul of creation,
not a god force
but chemical particles
dancing in a storm
of confusion.

Dissonance
and novelty
gift me
each word
and verse's length,
but beyond this
I am still searching.

Still searching
in hopes the heart
of art will find me
successively
each day.

Tis with a smile and high regards
I tell the tale of Thor son of Asgard
With a strong and a firm physique
But not much wit of to speak
Bore his mighty hammer Mjolnir
Almost on par with his father spear
The dangerous lance known as Gungnir
Thor smote monsters from far and near
Frost giants and the serpent Jormungadr
With hammer in hand he stomped and smash
Bone and flesh broke like brittle glass
Each battle was greater than the last
Etched in mythology for all who would ask
Now who beyond that could compare to
The mighty feats that Thor would do
Without the power of thunder and lightening
Another hero fell beasts just as frightening
Built like Thor with a similar mind
To crush and **** the beast of his time
Just like Thor he bore the curse
Of a strangely epic kind of birth
With so much to live up to
What was a demigod to do
For all his might he was tragic figure
Accidentally poisoned by his own lover Deianira
Shortly after completing his twelve deadly  labors
Labors done in the name of sweet repentance
For the ****** of family he sought penitence
Still that is a tale that many know far too well
Thus I leave you this in comparison
Though I think they would have been good friends
Warriors till the brutal and ****** end
I wonder in a fight who would win

1.
Such vehemence
For immigrants
Border patrol
Vigilance
I never knew
A human being
Could be illegal

2.
A child should never be taught to hate
And human beings must never be insulated
Or inoculated against the horrors of war


3.
There is no liberation in this economy
Debt is a slower and slightly grayer
Variation of slavery
No more cotton fields but prison labor
Tell me where is our great modern emancipator?

1.
I am not even sad
But as I look at the bottle
The pills scream death
And I want it so bad


2.
Just sing the last song
The sweet and wrong one
A billion paths diverged
A millions lives converged
It’s just a swan song
May not be a fun one
But everyone
Gets a song

3.
Let the walls crumble
As life rides through the rubble
Happiness is a historic lie
Everything is more complicated
What was and what ifs
What will be
They are never better
Than what is

I got nothing better to give
no better angels in my soul.
Darkness is coming again.
It is a poker hand I was never going to win.
My heart sounds off beating
Thud da dud dud.

They stacked the deck and turned on the furnace
laid back and got ready to burn us
watching the ashes as they floated up
to dark thunder clouds.

Lightning flashes thud da dud dud
coursing through my burning blood.
Soldiers step on me,
while military boots stomp, splashing mud.
I hear them marching thud da dud dud.

In resisting despair’s darkest edges
I coopt that painful beat.
Strangers hear me singing thud da dud dud,
Till, I rest permanently in my defeat.

It took the
ancient yellow papyrus
and crumbled it into dust
costing us
the knowledge of
less familiar ages.

It erases
all the old angles
of ancient angels
that were painted
in sainted style
on chapel ceilings.

It saw small framed
dancing beauties
that grew up
and rounded out
shrivel
back in
bringing
sad tidings
of losses
soon to come,

and in the midst
of this movement,
no more tragic
for the transient
nature of all of it,

I let it linger,
just a little longer
as the last sandy bits
slip
from my fingertips;

See it fade
in the distant.
Until, it comes
to take me as well.

Time is mercury,
silver liquid poison
to the living
taking more then
it is giving.

It is Hermes,
a deft thief,
burgling
what the Greeks
sought to keep,
putting fools
asleep eternally,
so that even Aphrodite
cannot recall
those loved ones lost
to its terrible march.

Time may be linear
Space may be infinite
Even though we think the limits curve
Universes growing within themselves
Swirling around each other
Space is not an ocean of stars
The oceans are space reflected
In darkness looking down we can see up
But looking up we only see up
Tiny jewels in the infinite
Sending light
In light’s own years

DNA makes mistakes
Splits and combines
Creates new forms
Slight variations
Copying errors
That got us here
Evolution is not directed
Not inspected by the locals

Patterns may be
May form and disappear
But not everything has to have a reason

I find time
Equals age lines
Curving across
Swerving under
Eyes and open pores

Time equals
Exhaustion
Frustration
With the lack of
Speed and clarity
Of my thought
Processes
Killing my creativity

Time equals
Dying flesh
Proffering
Shiny black coffins
And dusty grey stone
Monuments

Time equals
Wisdom gain
Subtracting
Knowledge lost
In forgetting
In letting
The one inevitable
Come

Time equals life
But mostly death

Time’s arrow is a vicious little *****
Pulsing and pushing us ever forward
Till we forget what we regret
Vision failing memories sailing away
Faster and faster that little pointy *******
Is like a trickster who plays
Homicidal games with our life
I would kick the crap out of him
If he was a tangible he
And not just a concept that I can’t see

Time may be linear
Space may be infinite
Even though we think the limits curve
Universes growing within themselves
Swirling around each other
Space is not an ocean of stars
The oceans are space reflected
In darkness looking down we can see up
But looking up we only see up
Tiny jewels in the infinite
Sending light
In light’s own years
DNA makes mistakes
Splits and combines
Creates new forms
Slight variations
Copying errors
That got us here
Evolution is not directed
Not inspected by the locals
Patterns may be
May form and disappear
But not everything has to have a reason

When I am in pain
Time is a thief
With thick fingers
Squeezing every droplet
From my beating heart

When I am happy
Time is a thief
With nimble fingers
Stealing the moments
That will never come again

When I am angry
Time is the *****
That is ******* me off

And when I am apathetic
I wish that time
Was the greatest thief
So it could steal me
Away from myself

I’m tired of love poems
Of sonnets that lie
Waiting to capture
That sweet kiss
That deep seated wish
Of eternal love
But the truth is
Even love is impermanent
Under this firmament
Above the ground
Love can be found
Love may be sound
But people change
And promises exchanged
Can’t always be maintained
So give me a love poem
That licks its’ lips
At an angel’s hips
That shakes with fevered desire
Run its’ flaming course till it expires
Then finds it end peacefully
Buried beneath memory’s tree
Till then it’s me loving you
Loving me

I wanted to run to you
To prove that I was
A child of love
Rose man
Flower king
Hearty hippie hipster
But this is not the nature
Of my dreams
My life spews nightmares
Deep dark wells
Of despair
Despising the rising
Of my truest inner self

I wanted to run
With scissors
That cut through
The *******
Not knives to cut you
But blades that snip in two
The glue
The binds us to the past
To rip the elastic bands
That always snap back
To those fake static facts
Of the so called moral past

I wanted to run
But instead I stumbled
Bumbling buffoon
Cut myself instead of
Saving you

Now I don't run at all
I walk a little
But mostly I crawl
I don't call anyone
I’m in self-imposed exile
But I still believe
I can be a child of love

To be or not to be I wonder why
I live so hard that I cannot cry
Coveting cuts across her wrist
Open wounds remind us we still exist
Silky red ribbons run like dark waters
Bloodshot eyes to match the liquid
Seeing her sitting in squalor I shiver
Life’s lonely punch line left to deliver
Bottle of pills placed half hazardly on the sink
Razor blades falling in and I think
The stench used to be sickly sweet
Now rotting flesh makes a nauseating stink
Mouth that I cannot stand to look at
Eyes so ghastly I refuse look back
All we get is just this one try
To be or not to be to live or die
To falter or to fly and dream of lights in suicide
Leaving loved ones far behind

Today is a beautiful poem
Yesterday was a drag
Jet lagged from the bad
Sad and mad at this and that
But right now is good

There is no should of
Would of or if I could of
Not wearing a leather jackets
With pockets full of regret
I bet we never met
But today is a beautiful poem

Somewhere greed bleeds horror
Plants seeds of deceit in the streets
Were strangers meet violently
Were sorrows spill silently
Still to spite that or despite that
I cite facts or perhaps lies that
Support this poetic decree from me
That today is a beautiful poem

Flowers bloom in sweet perfume
While children die in locked rooms
From mothers who beat them with
Broken brooms
But the moon is a glorious sphere
That shines here and there
Cause today is still a beautiful poem

So I use the first line
One to a hundred times
A simple ruse to lose
Those heavy handed blues
And say that
Today is a beautiful poem

To a shallow person silence is a curse. It forces him or her to think about what they may be lacking or come to terms with their failures. However, to a thoughtful, and reflective person silence is a precious gift which allows him or her to learn new things about themselves and the world around them, to grow from their mistakes, and to adavance from their failures, instead of being stopped by them.

I cannot for the life of me
See my way through
This fatigue

My mind shifts uncomfortably
Unable to maintain
Any focus

My drive is demolished
How many days lost
With nothing accomplished

Bags overcome my eyes
I can’t easily stay awake
But my thoughts are diminished

Speech stumbles
Words slur
I wonder when wakefulness
Will shine again
When clarity will inspire me

The exhaustion runs so deep
That my skin is aged with it
All time delays for it
Slowing to less than a snail’s pace

Even after hours of slumber
There is a soul weariness
That clutches the very core of me
And I wonder if I will ever be me
Again

I am awake and no dream could compare to the thought of your small arms wrapped around me. Your body warm. Bare flesh upon flesh. A wave of merciful oxytocin. To gaze into your eyes and see a sunrise into a smile, cheeks flushing with the vigor of your poetic intensity. To love you even if it is not reciprocated, because you inspire me profoundly as an artist and a human being. Every message is precious, cherished more then you know, so welcome home to a world where your words belong, burning, brazen and beautiful in my mind. Thank you for making me feel better.

To my loves each and every one
You sweet ghosts of potential
Diaphanous specters haunting me
With what could and will never be
I do not lust for thee

Shame on me how I lie so easily
But I am learning to lose that part
To scrape that side of my heart clean
Till desire is just a passing thing
Just a mid-summer night’s dream
That only belongs to my memory

To you all who inspired said passion
I am grateful not hateful nor jealous
Of what I will never have or touch
For now the idea of love is enough
To secure my solitude with poetic platitudes
The attitudes I give latitude to reign
And not be ashamed is a full blooming pain
Parceled out with partial bouts of pleasure

You frequent my fantastic dreams ***
Coming and going as you please
Please do not ignore or forget me
I promise that I understand
We are just woman and man
As friends

Do not write to me
of the white blossom tree
when you never look up to see
the bright daylight
that reflects off
the bleached white petals.

Do not write to me
of the horrors of war.
Do not explore
the picture you
place before
the face you hate
much more,
when you have
never ever even
gone to war.

Do not write to me
of love and love lost
when you refuse
to yield to the blues
of loving someone
who will never love you
or that you will eventually lose.

Do not write to me
of humanity
when you seclude yourself
in a shaded corner,
sitting in cemeteries,
dreaming of heroes,
trolls, and beautiful fairies
while life goes on
without your participation.

Do not write to me.
Go out and live
to be free,
expressing only the things
that you live through and see
because every other poem
is just a fiction,
a projection
of the emotions
as you think they are
or believe they should be
not necessarily partially punctuated
stanzas of reality.

Bluish blackish night smokes grey clouds
Letting the lonely and lazy mists go floating by
Yes those loose vapors like spiky specters splitting vectors
Expanding the moons yellow haze, such a strange midnight afterglow
Now tall stick fingers form long wooden hands
Waving goodbye to older oak trees
Letting their brothers and sisters disappear from the land
Yes this is just another night of visual delights

Tonight I am god
My fingers are eternal
Keys that unlock
Your treasure chest
Cause your *******
To rise and fall
In rapid succession
Become your
Pleasurable obsession

Tonight your skin
Is a rubics cube
Ready to be
Played perfectly
Fondled and moved
Positioned till you
Come unglued

Tonight my tongue
Is ambrosia
Nectar of gods
That lashes and licks
The tips of your tips
From your quivering lips
To your quivering lips
Plunging deeper
And deeper into your soul

Tonight my eyes
Will scorch your
Tempestuous soul
Will strip you bare
Of your clothes
And self-control
Will make you squirm
Make you earn
Perfect pleasure

Tonight I am resurrected
Find that familiar flame
And you will burn the same
Sweet supplicant
If you ever forgot the flavor
Of desire and exhausting pleasure
I promise that tonight
You will remember

It was never sought after
The lost laughter
The slaughter of innocence
In exchange for greatness
The debate is
It takes great pain
To write greatly
And lately
I kind of agree
The best parts of my poetry
Are the lines that bleed me
Of my darkest emotions
And though I would not change my past
Mostly
I would not seek the sorrow of suffering
To become a revered writer
Or would I

When you don’t have to see
When it’s just a tv screen
Muted voices scream
But you can’t hear a thing

When you’re not on the ground
To feel the fear or hear the sounds
Then it’s easier to look away
It gets easier to stand and say
That waging war is okay

But when it’s your blood
Or the blood of those you love
When the price you pay is personal
Then the decisions are made more carefully

Too bad politicians and rich men
Don’t have to send their sons and daughters
Off to war to face an almost certain slaughter

Maybe if the generals and congressmen
The admirals and the president
Had to stand in the thick of it
I might trust their judgment

She is the ghost in the cool wet wheat field
Fog like form flowing gracefully past me
Leaving a smoking trail like a cumulus tail
Within the mist I manage to see
A fraction of the beautiful woman she use to be
Hair once fair black dissipates
Like vapors from a brick chimney stack
Strange eyes which once held an unrelenting light
Have lost their sparkle turning charcoal
And cold as December winter’s night
The harmonious voice that once tamed demons
And lifted the spirits of heartbroken angels
Has now become a mournful moan
I move to call her name but fear silences me
My lips barely part pleading to my dear Sharne
Please oh, oh please come back to me today
Or let me join you till we become
Duel shadow walkers down this dark corridor

To speak without any editing
Edging towards the ending
To talk without a purpose
Proposing nothing new
Just spewing modern niceties
As modern nice people do

To speak with no intention
Yet live by your words
I wonder do you have to yell
Or will the whispers be heard

To speak
Tongues touching syllables
Tasting the virility of what language is
Links to the past and present
But push us to a future
Were we have no clue
Of what we will do

To speak as I do
As I choose to
Be sociable with you
Let it all hang down and out
Let us speak to figure it out
Let us speak until breath
Becomes non-syllabic death
And we can speak no more

You can paint infinity
on a set of plates
that lay here before me,

share a season’s story
leaving out what is gory.

You can dance in skewed
perspectives,
make rainbows cry
while a little child
staves off this painted rain.

You can make manifest
the spirit over which
you give dominion
to all who live in
this little world.

Let lovers walk
from pools reflecting
many shades
that illuminate
the end of days.

Can take the infinitude
of every instance
that made you, you
and summarize it
in multiple tints
of blue;

Take the beauty
and wonder of
a stranger’s face
lit by inspiration
as she reads
by a windowpane,

while I can take apart
and break the art
you made with your heart,
to write this silly little poem.

I have never been to the snowy peaks
Of sitting stones that pierce the clouds
Cutting strange patterns in their
White vaporous forms

I have never boated through the muggy swamps
Deep within the borders of our southern states
Dark marshes that seem to be made of moist jungle green
With camouflaged gators lurking just beneath
Ready to gobble you up

I have never seen the center of an ocean or a sea
Never been lost with only water on the horizon
The only life left to see swimming deep beneath me

I have never walked the tundra
Seeing nothing but winter’s frosty sheet
Awestruck with my dumb luck
But becoming snow blind
Alone with my mind
In a vast white wasteland

I have never and perhaps I never will
For lack of opportunity or depths of fear
But in your photos and words
I have seen this world
What a gift you have given me

You will never know
The peace of acceptance
Once you are finished
Put to earth
Life was harsher than the dirt
Parents made you feel worthless
Cause you wanted to wear a short dress
Because you felt different
Cut off
Disowned
Disavowed
One friend after another disappears
And no one hears
The sobs
No one feels the salty tears
No one holds your hands
Or offers you a hug

You were ******
By the those who demand
You conform
Where there was no  warmth
The clock cuts you bitterly
Condemning you to be lonely
And I cry all the more
Knowing you won’t be the only one
Not the only daughter wanting to be a son
Not the only male that wants to be female
Not the only soft face harden
Or hard face softened till the sorrow overflows
Till everyone you know closes the door
And you disappear forever more

There is a painful vacuum
Not a naked desire but still
A longing unfulfilled
That hollows the soul
It is why babies wail
Why old men wake crying
From beginning to end

We evolved to be touched
Skin on skin does not need to be
A ****** frenzy
A hug, a handshake
And pat on the back
Or a hand on his shoulder

The old man waits
The silence of isolation breaks
Oxytocin rushes through his system
Rebooting forgotten feelings
Restoring diminished capacities
It does not return all abilities
But enlivens deadened synapses
Yes it is very cerebral

Without it we wither away
Stewing in mental and physical decay
So, have you touched someone today?

To understand alone
is to be a reckless observer,
a sea faring adventurer
on a leaky boat
that floats
across the cosmos.

It is to be a materialist
who claims to be spiritual,
seeing specters
in his reflection
not in the natural world.

It is to be well trained
in the art of
escaping the trappings
of temporary love,
wrapping oneself up in
sweet affections
which you know
can be so easily discarded.

It is driving undirected,
Impulsive,
Obsessive,
the searching
for something
you have never seen
and in the finding
knowing there is
so much more to learn.

It is nihilistic, fatalistic,
franticly selfish
even in the most
unselfish acts.

In the end
it is the loneliest
journey into oblivion.

Is our evolution a Greek tragedy

Tales of success and stories of sorrow
Borrowed from one generation
Transferred to the next

And the Dna cycle goes on
Loss after loss

Providence expanding
Families disbanding
New lands conquered
New deals bartered

Proteins become Amino acids
Amino acids become DNA
Light sensitive cells
Develop depth and width
Four fingers find the fifth
And we expand the breadth
Of breathing distance
Between us and our species of origin

Oh the stories that could be told
Of love, and ***
Of love, and loss
Of birth and death
History unfolded

But the tragedy is
That it is all history that
We managed to miss

We only piece together
Small pieces of people and animals
Play the game of clue
To glue and deduce the truths
Which are swirling in a muddy bowl of
Unwritten stories

I knew a woman who used be
A beautiful intense kind of mystery
Deep and dark as a star less sky
Who found friends so easily enthralled
By her surgical and creative madness
Red rivers running still, filled with sadness
With the deepest affection I embraced her
Like a little sister

When she disappeared
I feared pain had overrun
The wonder and deliberate darkness
I had drawn so much inspiration from
Keeping my own company
I wept for the loss of a dear friend

So when she came back in
Beautiful Emily transformed  
Into radiant Darrin
Glowing from the growing
The seedling of his truest self
I wept gently, happy to see
How close to happy he could be
Daring to pursue the truth
In spite of those who insisted
He  persist in pursuing a lie
I love how he found the truth inside

When I misplaced my faith
And had to find
Something to ease my
Questioning mind
I studied
Numerology
Astrology
Reflexology
The Chinese Zodiac
Neglected scientific facts
To try and fill the lack
Of wisdom
Looking for some ego boost
In my spiritually void youth
Such a goofy kook
Believed in spooks
Not spies but ghouls
Walked with other fools
Who thought they could cast spells
That they fought monsters from hell
And battled dream demons
It took a couple of years to transition from
One magical thing to the next
Till I finally settled on the logic of
Reasoning
Science
And love
Of humanity
But at thirty four
I got a whole lot more
To learn

We weep for the lost children
Aged harshly by violence
Skin mutilated with red marks
Soul scarred with broken hearts
Bruises and verbal abuses
But as they grow older
Bitter, angry, and colder
Our empathy disappears
And those who need love
Adults who need compassion
And patience
Are lost in a sea of apathy
Cause it is easier to care
For a cute kid
Then it is to help
A traumatized adult