Everything here is for the best
Full of glitter and gaiety
We forget the nasty past

WWD was good for me; a
Worse fate should have followed
Pan gloss the past and be here now

The rat, the crocodile, the fly
Fulfill their natural function
Indeed, as Candide

We built our home
We stacked our wood
She made our garden grow

We’ve travelled the world
Had picaresque adventures
Au contraire, Voltaire

Happiness is possible
Enjoy it as it happens
Make it the best of all workable worlds

Eye eight Iowa’s spill chicken.
Its' all-moist never rite.
Tern Otto-collection rough.
Lean two spill Youseff;
By egg dictionary.

There once was a boy from Eureka
Not Kansas nor even Topeka
He took stock of life
Went off with his wife
To kayak in Lake Tanganyika

I am tired of mendacity
Tweeting mansplainingly
Daily weekly repeatedly

True is fake while
Making it Great
Only to the base

Stop fake news
Choose
Vote

It ser-erves nothing
This hic-coughing
Day two of three

But (hic) but (hic) it happens
Every fi-Uk! five seconds
Diag-FRA-AM! (****!) explodes

Count back=ak=wards

Hold your breath

Get some sil-EEP!

Pa-ay!-per bag

Sca-are me, please

Drink water
Little swa+ah+llows

I’ll Just wait it “awht”
Out

fifty percent you
half and half me
not talking coffee, mate

conflict restrictions
blame game inflaming
regiment the argument

facts, ma'am just
remember trust
as you ******

I am so happy sad
I could explode
Like unexplained
Unexpected
Unknown ordinance
In Laos

The way out
Is to go
Not there again
But over there when
Out of comfort zone

Meet and greet
Eat what is
Reciprocate smiles
Miles from home

Not under boss of anyone
Soon that will be me

Freedom from everyone
But my spousely vows

Freedom is just another word
For third world adventures

Pele's hair falls, tears drop
Seething red rage
Shoots high to sky
Black earth roils

Sign of end times?
History fissures?
50th ****** at 45th?
Or just fiery creation?

I saw from the sky
Dragon’s sulfur breath
Shoot two hundred high from
Black cheeks through cracked teeth

What a time to be on the big island
And witness such destructive creation
True wonder,  true jeopardy
Nature fierce in its orange display

Love, love, love
It’s that simple

There is only one ingredient
Do I have to say it?

Love, love, love:
Lil’ Draculina to baby

Ms. Black back from
Outside to in

Fred into
Well, Fred

Buddy boy served it up;
We got “Love, love, love!”

I try to live it:
Goodness not godless

It bears repeating:
Love, love, love.

Coincidence incident
A million to one fun
Reliving long past moments
At years end

We find similar photos
Millions of moments later
Hundreds of miles apart
At tears end

Non-believer conundrum?
Mathematical non-sum?
Chance happenstance?
Or just friends?

The light strikes
Moment illuminated
Frozen in time

Snap the shot
Then think you got
That moment in mind

Scintillating shafts
Floating through past
A memory of mine

Not really then
Not really there
Memories be kind

Yosemite denizen of
Potato dimension

Not rat but rabbit with
Rabid storage habits

When you don’t hibernate
You better compensate

Be the advocate ant
Not absent grasshopper

Support your PBS
It’s your better Nature

There’s an itch that
Can’t be scratched

That’s what you see on me
Face pock-marked red

(Legs worse with this skin curse
A mottled battlefield)

Dead patches picked at
Skin flayed raw

My admission:
A compulsion…

Work the edge with a
Fingernail wedge

REMOVE DEAD SKIN!
Quick dry then dead again

Itch, scritch, pull scab anew
My dark avenue.

Oh, the quasi-related grace
Of saliva on the toes;
The reds, the blues, the greens
Of pregnancy.

Castration?!

We melt like mosquitoes
Across the heated causeway
In June;

Pepto-Bismarck?
I hate shocking pink.

So, it was a dark and stormy night and
Father Larry O’Flannigan
Was feeling excited as he
Maneuvered the rainy streets with
Five extra-large cheese pizzas

Elated and happy because
Teenage catechism class
Had gone so swimmingly well
He wanted to reward them
Hence the crusty comestibles

Crossing 10th and Vine
Rain pelting cars and pedestrians
He slipped and tripped
Pandemonium of pizza boxes
Pell-mell into puddles

The chagrined good father
In an unsettled state
Hurt, wet, disheveled,
Exclaims:
“Jesus Christ! God Almighty!"

A pious passerby exclaims
(An older lady dressed for rain)
“Father! Please! Language!”
The sheepish priest sputters:
“Em, cheese and crust got all muddy…?”

Wally and I would race
Fulfilling our childhood task
Collecting office papers for fire.

One of us: your office.
Grabbing your wastebasket first—
Looking for fobidden pleasure treasure.

Around the fire pit,
Forms 623-A and 506-D were flames.
Miss July? We claimed!

Up in the hay-loft,
Buried in the way-back,
*** caches established.

Thanks to Amazon,
A thought I think upon:
My dad read SERIOUS SOCIAL ****!

It wasn't always all about ***.

Problem ****
Floats right there
Odious, obvious

Truth was it was
Hard to push out
Complexity compacted

Elephant in the room
Restrained stain
Stirred words

Doesn’t come easy
I have jars on the shelf
Filled with
Jarring metaphors
Sparring rhymes;
Poems aborted

Dead ends.
Some just clumsy fumblings
Some un-clementine Frankensteins
Some too painful to finish
Some too personal to post

But for me, a life-line.

There is a little, little man
In a big, big house

A louse, a grouse
Smaller than a mouse

He tweets and tweets
Slandering pandering

Mouse squeaking
With all he’s got

A hurricane ****
A sneeze breeze

He’s
******

Today I lost my ****
I did; that’s all is it?
Older and bolder?

No, just lost my ****
Not bolder,  just older
Not good with it

I lost my ****
This is it
I’m old

What did she feel
As she clicked her heels
Dorothy over the rainbow?

Simple winner’s elation?
A dubious jubilation
Ennui; sodden sorrow?

Ding, ****, murderess
Dog, scarecrow distress
Walking the yellow narrow

Waking quaking with them
Neighbors, uncles and aunt Em
Fortold with cards Tarot

A heart made of tin?
Working wizard’s sin?
Deep in the marrow?

Good witch switch
Knowing bad from which?
Leaving only sorrow

How could she know
Tracks of lion’s sorrow
After that tomorrow

I really can't hear your words
As you walk away

I CAN BE LOUD
When I can't hear you

I can be an *******
As an excitable boy

When did we skid off the tracks?
Did you hear that coming?

I miss being touched
That doesn’t happen anymore

You are full partner
To all the the button pushing

I’m tired of this twisted tango
I just want to be felt and heard

Mind games
Literally;
Now.

How?
Mentally
Find aims.

Hide shames
Figuratively;
Somehow.

If I had a cape
I’d have escapades

My spiffy metal suit
Would be in pursuit

I’d write wrongs in bulk
With the build of the hulk

I’d echo-locate
Every reprobate

A transgendered Wonder
I’d end their plunder

Return the cash
In a flash

End the pain
We sustain

Save the world
As it whorled

Super-Duper
Super trouper

****-Man!

my first gun
was a bb gun
it had begun
second was pellet

then at ten, sleek 22
later, louder shotgun
beware clay pigeons!
can’t take memories away

i had to take
a driver‘s test to
be a regular driver
well regulated

ammendment:
background checks
psych evaluations
no weapons of war:
an assault on us all

Who will be the next White House resident?
Barack Obama set a precedent

I'm ready for the first woman…
I'm ready for the first Asian…
I'm are ready for our first Latinx…

What about an Amerind President;
Original resident as president?
Wow to that!

Which Hmong among us is ready to run?

Orange cheeto has to go.

Driving
Long way to go
Life is involved

Driving
Responsibly
Life is involved

Driving
Slow the **** down
Life is involved

Driving
Don’t cut in front
Life is involved

Driving  
Cut and then pass
Life is involved

Really?
Three seconds less?
Life should evolve

Here I am
I'd rather be
More now than then

A purge urge of
Places when

Say it different?
Do it different?
Be it different?
Is it different?

Subliminal
Submissions
Here now

Nostalgia is nice
By its very name
A pleasure filter

A smell

A comment

A picture floating by

Your personal time machine
Kicks in, transporting to
Warm and fuzzy

People

Moments

Joy

You might want to stay
But no, not real
Enjoy it though

Grief is a sneaky beast
Cornered sty in your eye
You know it’s there
But in a glance,
It’s gone

Or submerged:
A line of a poem
An old photograph
A trick of light and weather
A child smiling up at papa

And then come undone:
Throat coughs
Rivulets run;
You wax nostalgic.
It’s not not beautiful

Masters
Of illusion
Is that a ——

I see before me?
Or glue-gun
Construction

**** death camp ledger?
Oh! kay…
Guns, too?

******* battering ram?
And swords and helmets?
Ok.

We are making
A redwood grove?
A spiral galaxy?

A multi-platform space
Suggesting the
Heinous oppression of…

And what is in their hands?
What thing belongs there?
The colors again?

Hey, Mikki,
I miss you
And the work.

And that’s when Larry arrived. Sheila freaked and dropped her tequila. We tried not to noticed but then Juan chortled as most of us feigned indifference. It didn’t help matters that the shattering glass made Sheila’s Pomeranian yelp in a distinctly manic manner. Others tried to suppress giggles but soon we were all laughing. We couldn’t stop. When the Roomba from its niche tried to sweep up the glass, it was over. Time out. Sheepishly, Larry dropped to one knee. Before he could propose, Elsa, the Pomeranian, bit his hand, hard. Yeah; it went into the Roomba.

Life is full of tedium
And disappointment
And sometimes failure

And rejection
And depression
And retrograde intercessions

A constant brings me joy
A time/space place of hope:
Strange new worlds; new episodes

Right now, there is
a new Star Trek playing
Right now, there is
a new Stargate streaming
Heck, there’s several new
Star Wars movies in the planning

Now comes an older
but a new-old X-Files
I’m in heaven with
season eleven
Indulging in my Sci-Fi
Meme in ex-treme

A history lesson with
An ever rising screed

A lesson not lost
Of human cost

"Island, water,  huge!" is said
By orangey Cheeto-head

Jared, Jared, face so red
Kissing Kislyak in Trump’s stead;
A fleeting meeting—
Collusion conclusion?
Rrussia ain’t Prussia, Bellorussia!
Conclude to collude would be so rude
I’d rather be punk’d by Ashton Kutcher,
Jared Kushner. Gotcha!

She hit the wasp’s nest
The big orange piñata
And the angry elephants flew

A slimy smarmy swarm
“Witchey hunt; unfair”
Bouncey baby bawls

Gopers gulp and declare
“Witchey hunt; unfair”
Lockstep in discourse

Not mistreatment
Of the indecent
This impeachment

Forget circumstance and pomp
Now, right now is the time
To finally drain that swamp

My story is unexceptional
But for a few exceptions

A story uneventful
Except when remarkable

There are characters dull
And characters full

It’s a whirlygig existence
More than a water slide ride

Take note as it happens
No one else keeps score

We are all
Hungry hungry
Hippos

In Buddha’s boat
Staying afloat:safe
For tomorrow

And then she said, "No way, José!” But I did. I pulled back on the stick and quickly entered the new coordinates. We bounced off the atmosphere in an amazing collision of colored lights and gees. The warning blares hurt but she quickly muted them. Our frail capsules did what they should and our slingshot past Mars put us ahead. “Hang on,” I said, “this will be tricky.” Two pulses red, one violet, and then, finally, green. I threw up. She didn’t. But we had won.

“It’s on,” she said,
as she slid her hands
into her stirrups.

I countered with a hearty “Harf!”
and jumped aboard my steeley steed.
The klaxon clanged
and we were off.

I rounded the first turn inside,
scraping the turnstile.
She laughed heartily as
she glided swiftly by.
Suddenly, smoke and
screeching terrors!

Aluaurms sounded
Medicaloes swooped
swarming with pinging lights strobing
.
My steed whinnzied and shuddered
I swooped around and sloped down.
As I puttered to a stop,
she emerged from the twisted,

Ok’d.

That day, no one shivel lost,
but she had won!

Rain, righteous rain
Happening right now
Drumming the deck
Feeding the ground

Sun king finally sleeps
After summer dryness and heat
Let’s pre-remember winter
The season we re-enter

Fruitless friends
Who let you down

A pillow gone lumpy
Sour milk on cereal

Fruitless friends
Who let you down:

Disappointing pens

Old keys for forgotten locks

Pants that don't fit

A lonely left shoe

A two-cent non-forever stamp

Fruitless friends:

The bowl of bran
Sans raisins

Sad.

What makes me a little more radical
Besides not on sabbatical?

Kids in cages
Too low wages

Border closures but
Corporate tax havens

Government shut-down
Over a border wall? *****!

Intolerance is rampant
Sharp turn to white right

Much of this is revolting
More than those not voting

I don’t like that
Splatter-splat-splat stat

Chaotic parading of guns
On TV shows, every one

If we stop showing it
Will we stop owning it?

IT TAKES SECONDS TO AMEND
Laws protecting everyone.

Constitute!

Ergo I am
Sham, eye yam
Green eggs and spam

Ego flim-flam
Partizan
I am what I…

Thin line between
This and when
Between what is
And what’s not began

We walk and talk
And stop and look
As periphery beckons
Through subtle margins

Unheard symphonies
Unseen wonders
Almost patterns
Seeming schemes

An ambulance screams
Cars honk and careen
A child sobs and wails
Shadows whist away

My car has got it’s brain back through
A trick automotive lobotomy hack

It was acting a little manic, the whacked
Human Machine Interface Module part

The screen was seen as a scary
Kerouac consciousness stream

An obscenity screed; a
Muddled fuddled car scene

HMIM installed anew—
Electroshock therapy

Zzzzzzhhhxt-phsssszzxt!
Initiating … initiating … initiating …

“Welcome!
Destination?”

Number two gets knocked around
Snockered and knockered by
Plans backfired.

But Orville knows deep in his heart
(that is red red red as his nose)
That number two is still good, too.

One, golden, pure as driven snow cones
Head high held in the ozones
Knows not what just misfired.

Number three, trickster, conspired:
Pitting one against two.
What transpires inspired is clown!