Just some stupid girl,
just fourteen years old.
She should have stayed silent.
She shouldn't act bold.

Just some stupid girl
lacking all sense of dread.
Classes for girls?
She should have been dead.

Just some stupid girl
only infidels note.
She took a shot to the head,
next a knife to the throat.

Just some stupid girl
that we failed to ****
filled with stupid ideas
that are not Allah's will.

Just some stupid girl
that some have called brave
just for daring to think
she won't wind up a slave.

It was on this day in Thirty one,
That our City got this present;
A Douglas fir, nearly 20 feet,
in Rockefeller Center.
Just simple workmen giving thanks-
Not a single one percenter!

There was just a hint of tinsel
and no lights upon that tree.
Tiffany did not mold Glass stars
for common folks to see.
On that Inauguration day
No speeches certainly.

The stand was simply two by fours
Formed in a simple cross
The Evergreen a symbol
of Everlasting life, of course.
A tiny hint of sacred
amidst Secularity.

Those were dark days in our nation
with so many in distress.
Was it faith or Optimism
The workers were trying to express?
Perhaps they are one and the same
Just in a different dress.


Tonight we light a grander tree
And the mayor makes a speech.
These are days when a better life
seems just beyond our reach.
No longer called a Christmas tree,
Divorced now from that Faith
I feel like something precious died
And we’re left with just the Wraith.

Over many years he built it-
One Panel at a time.
A model of transparency,
A marvel of its kind.
Its terracotta flooring
gave it passive solar heat.
It's placement on a hillside
was a vantage hard to beat.
When he glanced up to the rafters
there Orion, splendid, shone.
With the Hunter as companion,
He would never feel alone.
He took pride in self sufficiency-
wood barrels caught the rain
Solar panels met his modest needs-
off the grid, against the grain .

He always had an open door
as he placed no faith in Locks.
-but sometimes, every now and then-
He wished he had a rock.

“Shots Fired.” “Officer Down”
The Navy Yard is a killing ground.
High above the Atrium floor,
The first person shooter
wants to run up his score.
I enter the atrium and dive for the wall
as singing death pays my partner a call.
“Officer down, building 197”
He’s a lucky one, his Kevlar vest saved him.
I crawl on my belly towards the stairs.
Will he add to his total ere I make it there?
I pass the corpse of a pretty girl,
with a puzzled look upon her face.
A red rose blooms from her white blouse.
Fear flees as anger takes its place.
The swat team enters and exchanges fire.
I make the stairwell and start creeping higher.
I remove my shoes and in stocking feet
I silently climb toward the deadly sounds
I stumble upon a security guard
Who nevermore will make his rounds.
What happened next, I’ll always remember
about this deadly dark September.
A deep breath to calm me,
I chambered a round.
Was it my shot that brought
the mad murderer down?
There were many shots fired
That terrible day
As hunter, become hunted,
was brought to bay.

I checked on my partner.
I called my wife.
I am more than happy to get on with life.
The shooter is on the coroner’s table.
I write up the incident as best as I’m able.
I left out the part about the girl
Who has gone, we hope, to a better world.
She gave me courage, she banished fear
She is probably the reason that I’m still here.

A Prehistoric Dragon Fly/ Encased in amber, on display/ Caught my eye as I passed it by/

                                    in the museum yesterday.


Encased in amber, as if time/ itself was stopped and held at bay./ You will never know decay

                                    Or another summer's day.



                                    You in amber, me in time

                                    Both are trapped and on display.

                                    You in resin are enshrined,

                                    while I am seen encased in        
          rhyme.

He knew the secrets of this wood
He knew it should be shaped for good.
He was not sure that he approved
when the Centurion came
seeking a rood.

The grain was heavy and unforgiving
It was surely meant to serve the living.
Now a means of torture it must be
for some rebel rabbi from Galilee.

Whipped and scourged like a beaten dog,
a poor excuse for a son of God.
He staggered through the streets of the City
Cursed and reviled for few showed pity.

His grieving mother, one courageous friend,
and his woman stayed until the end.
Nicodemus helped to take him down
with my ladder he had brought from town.

Those who died with him fed the dogs
but the Rabbi did not share their fate.
His body was lain in a Hillside tomb
on Nicodemus' own estate.

What happened next depends on Grace
What transpired there on the third day?
Did the body rise or was it just misplaced?
Some will scoff while others pray.

I contemplate the rough hewn rood
Now to me it seems a stranger.
Was it used for good or ill?
The secret is held
in the hands of the Maker.

The old man at the hospice
was in a world of pain.
His sight was gone,
his heart grew weak
and not much time remained.

I don't recall who asked the question,
but I was struck by his reply.
It contained a world of wisdom
from a soul about to die.

Someone had asked the dying man
"If wishes were for free-
and I could grant you one last wish
what would that last wish be?"

He didn't wish for fortune
He didn't lust for fame
He cared not a whit for money
or to escape his gnawing pain.

" I think, if I had one last wish
before my times gone by-
I'd be a babe in my mother's arms
and hear a lullaby."

" That would be a good way to pass
- not soaked in urined sheets-
but comfortably in Mother's arms
and gently rocked to sleep."

That very night the old man died,
He passed on in his sleep.
I hope he's in his mother's arms
with no more cause to weep.

This child will teach us how to love,
and let us hope again.
God’s Son, nurtured by a girl,
this child of Bethlehem.

This child can make a family
where there was none before,
and make us crave the crafts of peace
and not the arts of war.

This child, now born, will change the world
from mundane to Divine.
The wisdom of this innocent
like the star, in darkness, shines.

The Lady loves me-
I’m certain of it.
It’s not just my read
of a look or glance.
She confessed her love
in a verse redolent
of forbidden
passion and romance.

Elizabeth is of the old faith,.
a highborn lady of eighteen..
She is young like my own daughters,
How inappropriate would our love seem?

I was tutor to the Prince but
Edward’s reign too soon is done
Catholic Mary will be our Queen
I must  to the continent be  gone.

The Wealthy must pay their fair share
Here in the “Golden State”
Fifty three percent or so
Here by the golden Gate.
They will likely move to Utah
where the skiing’s just as great.
We rule by Proposition,
It’s Democratic and it’s fair!
But when we have to pay for Pensions
It seems the money isn’t there.

California pays its workforce
with Golden I.O.U’s.
We hope Obama bails us out
Before they all come due.
Our growing Mexican population
plans for la Reconquista.
They smile as each old ****** dies
They mutter “Hasta La vista”
Governor Moonbeam’s back in charge,
The Terminator’s gone
Pelosi’s back in Washington
What could possibly go wrong?

Six tons of fine Carrara marble
lay supine on the Cathedral grounds.
Agostino had carved two legs,
then he had laid his chisel down

Rossellino's turn was next
to wield the mallet in his hand.
The guild learned he was better suited
to carve meat than sculpt a man.

A quarter century came and went
The giant lay in the churchyard there.
He waited for Michelangelo
to come perfect his stony glare.

They raised the giant on his feet
and asked opinions on the stone
Michelangelo was the one engaged
to finish David for his new home.

David, a symbol of liberty,
Defiant like the Florentine state
His stony glare was turned towards Rome,
a warning to the Fearsome Pape.

He was certainly buzzed,
Drunk, a better word,
When his convertibles wheel
Struck a tree near the curb..
A woman’s scream;
then silence, shock.
He whispered her name
But no one answered back.

The artist was dying,
But still he observed:
The drip, drip, of his blood
Onto asphalt that’s cracked.
Death imitates art.
Now break, gentle heart.
Sirens sound in the distance
a bright light in the dark.
As all neurons fired
in search of a spark.

She was fished out of the river just beneath the mighty span.
Her clothes suggested affluence. Her death bespoke despair.
I sent two men to search the spot from whence she took to air.
Her dead face poses the challenge; can you find out who I am?

Her prints? Not in our database. No purse and no I.D.
She wrote no note that we can find before she took her leave.
Was this some broken love affair? Is there no one to grieve?
The witnesses to her leap are few and contradictory.

Her hair is blonde and shoulder length, neatly coiffed and trimmed.
I notice that she bit her nails, but never will again.
She should be off in college; a new beginning not an end.
The M.E. bags the body. Soon the autopsy will begin.

I look through missing person files, to match a face and name.
I dread the call I’ll have to make to drain some parents’ hope.
To lose a child by her own hand- how can a parent cope?
The tox screen shows no drugs present. I had thought the same.

Female Caucasian, about nineteen, no birth marks and no scars.
Our Janet Doe was pregnant. Was that motive for her leap?
Did her condition make her desperate for this forever sleep?
Surveillance footage yields a clue. To pursue I’ll need my car.

The Tap room reeks of Guinness; the night is near its end.
I show her picture to the barkeep- This girl was here tonight.
There’s a glint of recognition and new facts brought to light.
He doesn’t know her name, but he surely knows her Friends.

They are sitting at a table, looking somewhat worse for drink.
I get her name and address. She is “Janet Doe” no more.
Celene attended N.Y.U. she had been majoring in law.
I left them deeply grieving and not knowing what to think.

This morning I will make the call, the saddest one of all.
“Can you come in to identify the wreck of your hopes and dreams?”
“We think your daughter took her life, at least that’s how it seems.”
To hear her mother’s sobbing is the hardest thing of all.

For thirty years I’ve worked this beat, but today I cried.
I’m not inured to suffering or indifferent to pain.
I’ve seen the broken bodies and think it such a shame
whenever wingless angels try to fly.

The old black man had CA in his bones.
His pain by opiates barely concealed.
His nurses at the hospice were frankly amazed
that his proud heart, so far , refused to yield.

Within the lattice of his brain, he saw
his young self on the baseball field.
He'd been an all-star, twice MVP.
A threat to homer  or to steal.

Thad Tillotson was on the mound.
Paul Blair took his lead off second base.
His Orioles were the  leagues elite.
The once proud Yankees were in fifth place.

Frank Robinson stepped in the box
The distant black walls were his goal.
This time he did just enough
he drove a single through the hole.

As he reached first and Paul Blair scored
Reuben Amaro took Joe Pepitone's throw.
The first base coach ; a winged Seraphim,
welcomed Frank Robinson to the Show.

He was at the hospital
until he learned it was a girl.
That fact was just in-congruent
with his model of the world.
Don't look to him for child support
for he will give you naught
He'll delay, deny and threaten
and you'll spend your life in court.
He's devilishly handsome
and can complete a forward pass.
If asked to put a ring on it
he'll look at you and laugh.
He was last seen in the minor leagues
but he never got "the call"
There are "Baseball Annies", hangers on
prepared to bare their all.
So today is not his day
He never has and never will
considered Fatherhood
as more than just a passing thrill.

I found a place where we could talk
undisturbed, an hour or two.
A verdant grove, a treasure trove
of colors green and blue..

It's been so long since we had shared
some time like this alone.
I cannot blame you, Mother Dear,
-it was I who chose to roam.

It's true that I'm kept busy-
what with school, my job, my home.
Still that is a poor excuse
to leave one's Mom alone.

I see the changes time has wrought,
Those times that saw me stray.
The Spring is missing from your step
Your visage has grown gray.

You have been patient, loving, kind,
through the Autumn of my years.
I've heard your cries in winter winds
In April storms, your tears.

I hope there's time to make amends
for all the wrongs I've done
To dance once more beneath the Moon
as radiant as the Sun.

Through Summers ' heat
and icy rain
The stone faced guardians
remain.

They stand fast
when the snow lies deep.
They stand their guard
where the heroes
sleep.

Long Summers past
there was a war
and boys in butternut
charged gloriously.

Then broke upon
the blue clad wall
as cliffs repel
the storm tossed sea.

Now of that host
not one remains
to sound the charge
or scale a wall.

The stone faced guardians
remain
long past the bugles'
dying call.

The Jupiter is on the launchpad.
The count down  is proceeding smooth.
On board there's a crew of robots;
for Man there is no room.

Yes, those androids look like us;
and, once, there was a time
when human Scientists themselves
designed some android minds.

Now AI has progressed so far
that circumstance demands
that the designers of this crew for space
must have titanium hands.

This crew will never tire.
they need no food to eat.
Radiation that would **** a man
they'll easily defeat.

The distances in space are vast
at even half the speed of light.
This robot crew will long  endure
after my last good night.

There are headed for Tau Ceti.
Exoplanets there abound.
They'll transmit their data findings
to those here on the ground.

I worry for Posterity;
Fear clouds my troubled mind.
Once  our species were explorers
now we're  forever left behind.

In widowhood, Mom lived alone
in the house that was her pride.
Though a faded glory to others 'eyes
it still held her dreams inside.
Still, Mom was growing feeble
in terms of strength and mind.
Assisted living loomed ahead,
just past that Christmastide.
So all us children reconvened
to bide our home farewell.
We decked her halls with garlands,
Her doors with Christmas bells.
For years she'd had a tiny tree
placed on a table stand.
This Christmas saw a Douglas fir
which made her home look grand.
We gathered round the Christmas Tree
and raised our voice in song
After a cup (or two) of cheer
not a single note seemed wrong.
Evening came and that tree shone bright-
lights twinkling in the dim.
There were hugs and kisses all around
to all my next of kin..
That was our last Christmas in her home
The last that we would share.
In Memory it is evergreen-
so let me linger there.

George Zimmerman
desperately
sought some way
To silence those
who call for blood.
He’d be defenseless,
Once released,
As Eric Holder has his gun.
In such a desperate situation
The answer came
Like sweet salvation.
To keep his name
off the public tongue,
where he’s reviled
as if a ****,
George filed a name change
with the courts-
And henceforth will be called
Ben Ghazi

The man in the casket
was beloved in this town.
To us kids he’d been “Doc”-
Its hard believing  he’s gone.

A long time ago,
on a field far away,
He had been a young Giant
waiting his chance to play.

“Doc” Graham had played baseball
in many minor league parks,
in an age before lights,
in an age before darks.

An elegant fielder
with a strong rifle arm
“Doc” had one “cup of coffee”
and then he was gone.

He played in right field
on a warm Brooklyn day
you could look it up
the old professor would say,.

He played in the field
but was denied an at bat.
He was waiting on deck
when Claude Elliott flied out.

Though quick as the moonlight
through shadowy leaves,
“Doc” never again played
in the National League.

He hit  the books instead
and became a physician
In our small town of Chisholm,
he found a position.

A lifetime of love
yields a lifetime of care:
He tended our needs
and shared in our prayers

No trace of self-pity-
having missed that at bat.
Being “Doc” to us all
meant far more to him  than that.

Now Moonlight is elusive
never grasped in your hands.
But on nights short of heroes
I remember this man.

It was seen from a distance,
the oncoming beast.
Surely faith's fragile Armour
would shield you at least?
If, in the encounter,
it's no help at all-
The problem, my dear,
is your god is too small.

The cosmos is a vast
and curious place
Our comings and goings-
machinations of fate.
He who is , He the master,
The soul of it all
He is past comprehension
and your god is too small.

There' a man on a cross
on the hospital wall.
Crucifixions take place
every day in it's halls.
Life's last little drama
in which ripeness is all..
Faith can move mountains
if your god's not too small.

I've seen good men suffer
with His name on their lips.
Their cups didn't pass
as the nurses changed shifts.
I wouldn't conclude
faith has no place at all.
Just sometimes, in extremis,
our god is too small

Dearest creature in creation
Studying English pronunciation,
   I will teach you in my verse
   Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse.

I will keep you, Susy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy;
   Tear in eye, your dress you'll tear;
   Queer, fair seer, hear my prayer.

Pray, console your loving poet,
Make my coat look new, dear, sew it!
   Just compare heart, hear and heard,
   Dies and diet, lord and word.

Sword and sward, retain and Britain
(Mind the latter how it's written).
   Made has not the sound of bade,
   Say-said, pay-paid, laid but plaid.

Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as vague and ague,
   But be careful how you speak,
   Say: gush, bush, steak, streak, break, bleak ,

Previous, precious, fuchsia, via
Recipe, pipe, studding-sail, choir;
   Woven, oven, how and low,
   Script, receipt, shoe, poem, toe.

Say, expecting fraud and trickery:
Daughter, laughter and Terpsichore,
   Branch, ranch, measles, topsails, aisles,
   Missiles, similes, reviles.

Wholly, holly, signal, signing,
Same, examining, but mining,
   Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
   Solar, mica, war and far.

From "desire": desirable-admirable from "admire",
Lumber, plumber, bier, but brier,
   Topsham, brougham, renown, but known,
   Knowledge, done, lone, gone, none, tone,

One, anemone, Balmoral,
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel.
   Gertrude, German, wind and wind,
   Beau, kind, kindred, queue, mankind,

Tortoise, turquoise, chamois-leather,
Reading, Reading, heathen, heather.
   This phonetic labyrinth
   Gives moss, gross, brook, brooch, ninth, plinth.

Have you ever yet endeavoured
To pronounce revered and severed,
   Demon, lemon, ghoul, foul, soul,
   Peter, petrol and patrol?

Billet does not end like ballet;
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
   Blood and flood are not like food,
   Nor is mould like should and would.

Banquet is not nearly parquet,
Which exactly rhymes with khaki.
   Discount, viscount, load and broad,
   Toward, to forward, to reward,

Ricocheted and crocheting, croquet?
Right! Your pronunciation's OK.
   Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
   Friend and fiend, alive and live.

Is your r correct in higher?
Keats asserts it rhymes Thalia.
   Hugh, but hug, and hood, but hoot,
   Buoyant, minute, but minute.

Say abscission with precision,
Now: position and transition;
   Would it tally with my rhyme
   If I mentioned paradigm?

Twopence, threepence, tease are easy,
But cease, crease, grease and greasy?
   Cornice, nice, valise, revise,
   Rabies, but lullabies.

Of such puzzling words as nauseous,
Rhyming well with cautious, tortious,
   You'll envelop lists, I hope,
   In a linen envelope.

Would you like some more? You'll have it!
Affidavit, David, davit.
   To abjure, to perjure. Sheik
   Does not sound like Czech but ache.

Liberty, library, heave and heaven,
Rachel, loch, moustache, eleven.
   We say hallowed, but allowed,
   People, leopard, towed but vowed.

Mark the difference, moreover,
Between mover, plover, Dover.
   Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
   Chalice, but police and lice,

Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label.
   Petal, penal, and canal,
   Wait, surmise, plait, promise, pal,

Suit, suite, ruin. Circuit, conduit
Rhyme with "shirk it" and "beyond it",
   But it is not hard to tell
   Why it's pall, mall, but Pall Mall.

Muscle, muscular, gaol, iron,
Timber, climber, bullion, lion,
   Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
   Senator, spectator, mayor,

Ivy, privy, famous; clamour
Has the a of drachm and hammer.
   *****, ***** and possess,
   Desert, but desert, address.

Golf, wolf, countenance, lieutenants
Hoist in lieu of flags left pennants.
   Courier, courtier, tomb, bomb, comb,
   Cow, but Cowper, some and home.

"Solder, soldier! Blood is thicker",
Quoth he, "than liqueur or liquor",
   Making, it is sad but true,
   In bravado, much ado.

Stranger does not rhyme with anger,
Neither does devour with clangour.
   Pilot, pivot, gaunt, but aunt,
   Font, front, wont, want, grand and grant.

Arsenic, specific, scenic,
Relic, rhetoric, hygienic.
   Gooseberry, goose, and close, but close,
   Paradise, rise, rose, and dose.

Say inveigh, neigh, but inveigle,
Make the latter rhyme with eagle.
   Mind! Meandering but mean,
   Valentine and magazine.

And I bet you, dear, a penny,
You say mani-(fold) like many,
   Which is wrong. Say rapier, pier,
   Tier (one who ties), but tier.

Arch, archangel; pray, does erring
Rhyme with herring or with stirring?
   Prison, bison, treasure trove,
   Treason, hover, cover, cove,

Perseverance, severance. Ribald
Rhymes (but piebald doesn't) with nibbled.
   Phaeton, paean, gnat, ghat, gnaw,
   Lien, psychic, shone, bone, pshaw.

Don't be down, my own, but rough it,
And distinguish buffet, buffet;
   Brood, stood, roof, rook, school, wool, boon,
   Worcester, Boleyn, to impugn.

Say in sounds correct and sterling
Hearse, hear, hearken, year and yearling.
   Evil, devil, mezzotint,
   Mind the z! (A gentle hint.)

Now you need not pay attention
To such sounds as I don't mention,
   Sounds like pores, pause, pours and paws,
   Rhyming with the pronoun yours;

Nor are proper names included,
Though I often heard, as you did,
   Funny rhymes to unicorn,
   Yes, you know them, Vaughan and Strachan.

No, my maiden, coy and comely,
I don't want to speak of Cholmondeley.
   No. Yet Froude compared with proud
   Is no better than McLeod.

But mind trivial and vial,
Tripod, menial, denial,
   Troll and trolley, realm and ream,
   Schedule, mischief, schism, and scheme.

Argil, gill, Argyll, gill. Surely
May be made to rhyme with Raleigh,
   But you're not supposed to say
   Piquet rhymes with sobriquet.

Had this invalid invalid
Worthless documents? How pallid,
   How uncouth he, couchant, looked,
   When for Portsmouth I had booked!

Zeus, Thebes, Thales, Aphrodite,
Paramour, enamoured, flighty,
   Episodes, antipodes,
   Acquiesce, and obsequies.

Please don't monkey with the geyser,
Don't peel 'taters with my razor,
   Rather say in accents pure:
   Nature, stature and mature.

Pious, impious, limb, climb, glumly,
Worsted, worsted, crumbly, dumbly,
   Conquer, conquest, vase, phase, fan,
   Wan, sedan and artisan.

The th will surely trouble you
More than r, ch or w.
   Say then these phonetic gems:
   Thomas, thyme, Theresa, Thames.

Thompson, Chatham, Waltham, Streatham,
There are more but I forget 'em-
   Wait! I've got it: Anthony,
   Lighten your anxiety.

The archaic word albeit
Does not rhyme with eight-you see it;
   With and forthwith, one has voice,
   One has not, you make your choice.

Shoes, goes, does *. Now first say: finger;
Then say: singer, ginger, linger.
   Real, zeal, mauve, gauze and gauge,
   Marriage, foliage, mirage, age,

Hero, heron, query, very,
Parry, tarry fury, bury,
   Dost, lost, post, and doth, cloth, loth,
   Job, Job, blossom, *****, oath.

Faugh, oppugnant, keen oppugners,
Bowing, bowing, banjo-tuners
   Holm you know, but noes, canoes,
   Puisne, truism, use, to use?

Though the difference seems little,
We say actual, but victual,
   Seat, sweat, chaste, caste, Leigh, eight, height,
   Put, nut, granite, and unite.

****** does not rhyme with deafer,
Feoffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
   Dull, bull, Geoffrey, George, ate, late,
   Hint, pint, senate, but sedate.

Gaelic, Arabic, pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific;
   Tour, but our, dour, succour, four,
   Gas, alas, and Arkansas.

Say manoeuvre, yacht and *****,
Next omit, which differs from it
   Bona fide, alibi
   Gyrate, dowry and awry.

Sea, idea, guinea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria.
   Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean,
   Doctrine, turpentine, marine.

Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion with battalion,
   Rally with ally; yea, ye,
   Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, key, quay!

Say aver, but ever, fever,
Neither, leisure, skein, receiver.
   Never guess-it is not safe,
   We say calves, valves, half, but Ralf.

Starry, granary, canary,
Crevice, but device, and eyrie,
   Face, but preface, then grimace,
   Phlegm, phlegmatic, ***, glass, bass.

Bass, large, target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, oust, joust, and scour, but scourging;
   Ear, but earn; and ere and tear
   Do not rhyme with here but heir.

Mind the o of off and often
Which may be pronounced as orphan,
   With the sound of saw and sauce;
   Also soft, lost, cloth and cross.

Pudding, puddle, putting. Putting?
Yes: at golf it rhymes with shutting.
   Respite, spite, consent, resent.
   Liable, but Parliament.

Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew, Stephen,
   Monkey, donkey, clerk and ****,
   Asp, grasp, wasp, demesne, cork, work.

A of valour, vapid vapour,
S of news (compare newspaper),
   G of gibbet, gibbon, gist,
   I of antichrist and grist,

Differ like diverse and divers,
Rivers, strivers, shivers, fivers.
   Once, but *****, toll, doll, but roll,
   Polish, Polish, poll and poll.

Pronunciation-think of Psyche!-
Is a paling, stout and spiky.
   Won't it make you lose your wits
   Writing groats and saying "grits"?

It's a dark abyss or tunnel
Strewn with stones like rowlock, gunwale,
   Islington, and Isle of Wight,
   Housewife, verdict and indict.

Don't you think so, reader, rather,
Saying lather, bather, father?
   Finally, which rhymes with enough,
   Though, through, bough, cough, hough, sough, tough??

Hiccough has the sound of sup...
My advice is: GIVE IT UP!

Some time had passed already
since we’d come down from the trees.
We still walked with an awkward gait
Sore backs and aching knees.
Lar still might be alive, old mother,
if he hadn’t pawed my mate.
When I saw him mount her
in the brush
All I felt was rage and hate.
The jawbone of an *** was near
I took it in my hands.
I brought it down upon his skull
I killed with these two hands.
I wouldn’t let the Jackals have
the body of my friend.
I covered up his corpse with stones.
this is where it ends.
As a tribe we are too small, too few.
to let the blood lust linger.
We must keep moving further north
until we are out of danger.
Old mother nodded sagely.
Lars clansman did the same.
I promised I would share the catch
with the children of his name.
Some book may talk of Abel-
that at Cain’s hand he died.
but it was the tribe of Lucy
that first committed Hominidicide

Il est VALIDATION dans la Ville des Lumières
Alors que le bilan de ces attaques sont évaluées.
Au ****, je l'entends encore sons rudes des sirènes
Comme notre corps d'ambulanciers est aux abois
Ils vont me hanter dans le sommeil, tous ces jeunes visages morts,
que je chasse ceux qui ont commis ces crimes.
Il est trois heures du matin et ma tête crie pour le café;
La caféine me aide quand je suis privé de sommeil.

La puanteur de -fer sang ne peut pas être échappé
Il est trempé dans les chaises à cushioned-
Je prends en bas de la déclaration de celui qui survived-
Ce soir, cette bonne fortune était rare.
Il fait le mort et a vécu, avec la mort tout autour,
dans ce théâtre de la mort et le désespoir.
"Ils ont massacré les otages, un à la fois,
leur but était de tuer tout le monde ".
"Ils ont assassiné mon amant, ils ont assassiné mon ami,
Je regardais mort, gisant dans leur sang trempé ".

On a hot August night
She appeared, the lost soul.
The sweltering evening
turning suddenly cold.
She was dressed in the clothes
She had worn when she died.
A bullet hole in her temple,
a handgun by her side.
A beautiful Stranger
at the foot of my bed.
A faint smell of lilac
from a specter long dead.
The Ghost didn’t speak,
At least not that I heard,
Nor could I, gripped by terror,
Utter one word.
World weary and sad
said her ****** expression.
A Love gone all wrong
was my honest impression.
Then she was gone;
Not a glimmer remained.
The warm summer evening
My stateroom reclaimed.
It was cold where she died
On the steps to the beach;
Her spirit is restless
and seems never to sleep.

Oh beautiful stranger
None can say why you died
But the coroner ruled
That it was suicide.

John Charles Buckley with his one man crew
set sail for Boston on the ocean blue.
With a makeshift sail and with favorable winds
they left Ireland behind and their journey begins.
Our cockleshell heroes soon lost sight of shore.
Not even a gull could they see anymore.
The days passed by slowly as they worked, side by side,
Slaves to the wind and the whims of the tide.
The Atlantic holds terrors,I cannot deny;
icebergs and fearful waves twenty feet high.
One starless night as they battled a squall
they were tossed like a cork with each waves rise and fall.
Sunburned and hungry, they started to drift
and their sense of time passing had started to slip
when they spotted a seabird, a sure sign of shore:
The harbor of Boston- their next port of call.
Their small wooden rowboat with the sail ripped and torn
was ******* to the dockside that September morn.
Heroes or Fools? I'll let you split the difference.
Theirs the smallest boat that had traveled the distance

My legs and arms flail
franticly, I propel my body
across the sand.
We are being pursued
by Killers.
I hear my brother’s screams
As his murderers rip
him apart.
I must reach the safety
of the water.
My stalker cries triumphantly!
He dives, I dive.
Mine is the victory!
Death has been cheated
It’s not easy
being born a turtle.

The old man, grey, bespectacled, with difficulty, rose from his chair.
If he’d come to plead for mercy, I doubt he’d find it here.
He struggled to stand steady with his Zimmer walking frame
As he gave his testimony we all felt his sense of shame.

“I was there when all this happened; I saw the smoke rise to the sky.
I saw the piles of ashes that were once like you and I.
I counted stolen valuables; Money, watches, gold.
I dared not speak objection. I did as I was told.”

He asked for a glass of water; this much he did receive.
He testified an hour without asking for reprieve.
He spoke about those distant days we see in black and white.
Of a Germany destroyed by debt and burning for a fight.
He then was young and good with numbers
He was the bookkeeper of Auschwitz;
He can’t un-see all he did see.

Although he never shot a girl or stabbed a sleeping child,
He’d tallied up their worldly goods to add them to the pile.
When the Russians over-ran the camp, he and the others fled.
They left behind warehouses full of the possessions of the dead.
The Jury must deliberate about what punishment is due
For this ninety year old **** who kept track of baby shoes.

From Cy Young to DeGrom
The distance stayed the same
Sixty feet, six inches
It’s the measure of the game.
Each base is Ninety feet apart
In Diamond shape arrayed.
Shortstops still get the runner
Wherever the game is played.
Home plate is Seventeen inches wide
And the pitcher toes the rubber
These are the articles of faith
For any baseball lover.
In every City in this land
Where Freedom used to ring.
The sounds around the Diamond
Were a welcome sign of Spring.
You can meddle with the mound
And fiddle with its height,
But don’t touch the distance from home plate
Unless you’re ready for a fight.
Its true we now play games at night
But surely that’s our loss.
When you tally up the profits
You forget about the costs.
This game was born for Summer
On hot afternoons they played.
When you lose the children, Manfred,
That is when you lose the game.
Our game is not played with a clock
Yet there’s an ending to each game
In this it is like life itself-
for the keepers of the Flame.

Your Randomness amazes me; you are the primal spark.
The Devil’s in the details for those of us who hunt the quark.
The particles accelerate around Cern’s race course track,
Then collide in a burst like fireworks that quickly fades to black.
One cannot really “see “a quark, those infinitesimal little things.
It is by their “works” we know them as they race around our ring.
At times it can be tedious, like counting angels on a pin
But finding basic particles is its own reward, my friend.
It’s hard to wrap your mind around the uncertainty within.
We can either know location or the direction of the spin.
Notions of causation must be checked at the front door
For bi locating particles don’t follow Newton’s laws!

Sweet Lesbia, hold me in your arms,
give me kisses without ceasing.
Your husband fights in Caesar's cause
and is no challenge in deceiving.
Your smooth white shoulders,beautiful,
that never see the Sun.
They are a feast for this poets' eyes
when your stola comes undone.
Beneath your tunica intima
are sweet ******* that fed your child.
I hope you'll bare them to my lips
in just a little while.
The shadows of the autumn Sun
creep clear across the room.
but Lesbia's sweet smile is enough
to brighten up the gloom.
Great Pompey has been put to rout,
Caesar claims the curule chair.
Outside the World has gone to Hades
Not that this poet cares.
For Lesbia is world enough
to treasure and explore.
If more were of my frame of mind
what need had men for war?

sunset in oahu by ginkguygagoogank



The Sun sank in the Waters off Oahu
as the old man raised the cordial to his lips.
The perfumed air was just as he remembered,
The sky was golden with the sun's last kiss.

He recalled that day they'd climbed up Diamond Head
and imagined red ball zeros in the sky.
Looking down on Ford's Island in the harbor,
imagining grim scenes from time gone by.

The restaurant was much as he remembered
when first they'd dined here fifty years ago.
It had been a special anniversary,
Still vivid in his memory, ever so.

He thought of something funny he could tell her,
an incipient smile was forming on his lips,
but his dear lost love would never get to share it-
he dined alone with the memory of her kiss.

“Till death do us part.”
Is a comforting phrase
To all those who repent
their impetuous days.
Those whose “I do’s” were followed
By a question mark,
Or who subsequently experienced
a quick change of heart.
It’s a comfort to them,
on their terminal day,
that their sentence is over
and they can get away.
When the last breath is expelled
Then their marriage is through.
They are free then to love
Anybody but you

The target of bullies
in his tender years.
They made his existence
one of misery and fear.
His mother embarrassed him
when she visited class
to discourage his classmates
from kicking his a*s.
He suffered in silence
He never fought back.
His mind became twisted,
He laid plans to attack.
He harbored resentments
for most of ten years.
He was silent and moody
and aloof from his peers.
He spent much of his life
alone in his room
playing first person shooter
and plotting their doom.
His teacher and Principal
had failed to protect him.
And he gave no forewarning
that they should expect him.
His victims were small
and defenseless its said.
They were not who he saw
as he made the room red.
He saw bullies and villains
Who had caused him despair
He saw the girls who had laughed
Or, worse, didn’t care.
There was likely one victim
In a class of that size
Who was, like Adam;
withdrawn, undersized.
The target of bullies
In his tender years
who found his existence
one of misery and fear.
Cut down by a bullet
by one of like mind.
He’ll be no second Adam-
Lanza ended his line.

Her blood alcohol level was point thirty three
when the trooper pulled over her car.
She had a flat tire and her speaking was slurred
As if she had just drunk a whole Bar.
She was over the limit and half in the bag
So they charged her with a D.U.I.
Yet her case got dismissed and the D.A. was miffed
When she proved she was naturally high.
In seems that some people who munch on French fries
Are host to yeast that is causing them grief, making sure that they never run dry.
For Stella’ own body was churning out brew thus explaining her bloodshot red eyes
(and her sad reputation as a cheap date as well as her poor taste in guys.)
Her babes that she nursed never fussed or complained
For her ******* they were naturally keen.
Kids back in High School all thought Stella was cool
(She was drunk off her *** as a teen.)
She now must watch carefully what she consumes
when she’s out for a night on the town.
She produces Grey Goose with her own gastric juice
So Pasta remains out of bounds.

The prowler entered wordlessly
into our back yard.
On padded feet he crept along,
finding an open door.
Like a thief in the dark of night.
silent , unobserved.
Up the stairs the intruder came,
I was taken unawares.
The prowler pushed the bedroom door
open just a crack.
He saw me snoring peacefully and
plotted his attack.
The prowler leapt upon my chest
A little ball of fur.
I'd wondered where our cat had been-
You never know for sure.

Father Time stood undefeated.
Bonds came close, but Barry Cheated.
Roger Clemens had a career for the ages
but oft fell prey to roid based rages.
Mariano Rivera was a more worthy foe
No pharmacological freak was Mo.
He threw one pitch, his control well learned,
and he chose to leave on his own terms.
I stood up and joined the cheers
the day Rivera last appeared
and, though I wept to see him go,
Time would never lay him low.
Mo Struck out Time, he had it cooking
A called third strike that left Time looking
like Beltran caught in the bright lights
good morning, good Evening and Good NIGHT!

Last night we kissed hands goodbye,
never dreaming that it was forever.
Unsuspecting that you, my dear child,
soon would lie cold and still neath the heather.

The graceless Sun thoughtlessly shines
I would eclipse it forever.
The death I prepared for was mine,
but God twists the knife and is clever.

First your sister, thirteen summers ago
Then, soon after, I lost your dear Mother.
Now you, daughter- taken from me.
There's no chance this old man can recover.

The comet that shone at my birth
Will soon light its way through the heavens
I beg that it bears me away-
lets me stop being Samuel Clemens.

Good friend, for Heavens’ sake forbear
to pluck the rose that’s growing here;
For many a season there was none:
too much rain, too little sun.

Enter this garden as a child would,
In life’s morning, all seems good.
Let wonder wander where it may.
Scarlett roses bloom today

Good Friend, for Heavens’ sake forbear
To pick the rose that’s growing here
her velvet robes will come undone,
if you should steal her from the sun.

For roses are in short supply,
These bloomed the day my mother died.
If you should take these, I’ll have none
This late in season, no more will come.

My apartment once was beautiful; hard woods and fine antiques.
Then civil war came to Aleppo and the fight was in our streets.
A improvised explosive shattered every pane of glass.
Hot metal and the fog of war obliterate my past.
I stand in the ruins of what was once our home.
My family has been scattered; I am frightened and alone.
I search about for some semblance of shattered civility.
A Deutsche gramophone recording has survived along with me.
My television has been shattered; I have no working phone.
Just a working turntable and I listen, all alone,
To the sweet strains of a chamber piece
That was written by Chopin.
I enjoy this scrap of harmony
in a  City of the dammed.

His calloused hands caressed the wood that, shortly, he would plane.
The carpenter was on his knees examining the grain.
The Romans wanted cross beams and the carpenter knew why:
Upon this tree the rebel, Jesus, would be crucified.

He’d never heard the rabbi speak to the admiring crowds.
He thought himself too practical to go in search of God.
In the temple he made sacrifice; he conformed and he complied.
He’d seen too many mad for God and noted how they’d died.

The carpenter thought it was a shame; this wood too good you see.
It’s a tragic waste of good timber to make a hanging tree.
Still the money came in handy as good wine was still not free.
Galled wine would be served in a sponge to this man from Galilee.

The crowd called for Barabbas when this Jesus was condemned.
He shuddered as he thought of the cruel way this life would end.
There is no dignity he could see in a death upon a cross;
mocked by the onlookers while his women wailed his loss.

The Roman paid him coin and slaves bore the beam away.
The sad procession passed his shop later that same day.
The Rabbi wore a crown of thorns, fashioned from the jujube,
and there, upon his shoulders. He bore the hanging tree.

The walls of this place
have protected me
since the moment I
was first aware..
Here in the darkness
I float upside down
like a fruit bat
asleep in his lair.
Now I feel pressure
and pushing
Something’s draining
the fluid of life.
A dim glow growing
constantly brighter
at the end of a tunnel
there’s light
My heart beat
is marathon racing
as I’m dragged from
my sinecure dark.

This new place is large
and its freezing
Put me back in,
I beg you
I scream.
My protests are ignored
as I’m prodded some more
Then I’m slapped
on the ****
by some cur
I’m lain down
on a warm curvy belly
and this woman, called mom,
weakly smiles.
At least this part
doesn’t seem
frightening
Perhaps I will stay
for awhile

It’s the bottom of your Liter
And you’re feeling little pain.
You stopped with friends on Baker Street
to get out of the rain.

London has a winter chill
That seeps into your bones.
So many people live here
Yet you feel so all alone.

The bottle lies beside you
And you fairly reek of Gin.
You muse is tugging on your sleeve
impatient to begin.

You long to live a simpler life-
perhaps a piece of land.
A place out in the country
with your woman close at hand.

But that’s not going to happen
There’s the trouble with the band.
Lawsuits flying back and forth
with unreasonable demands.

The alcohol helps dull the pain
of a lifetime of regret.
No one said it would be easy
And life’s not finished with you yet.

So you try to get two hours sleep
And you need a shower bad.
You’re heading back to Glasgow
For the best Sax you ever had.

Look into her eyes where kindness keeps
Or else a jealous dragon sleeps
Her eyes will tell if she’s true and fair.
Are you saved or dammed? The answer’s there.
Her words may dissemble and lips oft lie.
Those curves may distract as does her smile.
No, her eyes are where true beauty lies.
The sooner you learn this the sooner you’re wise.

It was a dry , sunny day in June.
that fact she would never forget.
It was the day she lost her partner
to a surfeit of regret.

She had taken their little daughter,
the product of donated *****,
to the nearby Hillside Park
and picnic'd on the side of a berm.

Jane had declined to come with them.
Jane was in one of her "moods".
Perhaps she shouldn't have left her,
but she thought Jane just needed to brood.

Jane was her beautiful partner
erratic, mercurial, bright.
Jane, who could light up the heavens
like a bolt from the blue in the night.

They returned to a silent apartment.
It was the stuff of nightmares, not dreams.
A red streak of blood in the bathroom
Her little girl started to scream.

A kind neighbor cared for her daughter
as she spoke to police in a fog.
The M.E.'s van came for the body.
Seeing Jane lifeless was odd.

Tomorrow, she must make arrangements.
She needn't bear this all alone.
It was time that she spoke with Jane's parents.
Softly weeping, she picked up the phone.

The day they knocked the Towers down
He thought he heard his nation's call
He signed his name on the dotted line.
Off he went to train for war.

Just five days into his first tour
insurgents, in a fire fight,
put a bullet in his spine
in a war commenced by George's spite.

He never after walked again.
He felt a burden to his wife.
Time and time again
he lay beneath a surgeons knife.

Until at last he said "enough"
I've had enough of this half life.
No food or drink would he accept,
his only path to that good night.

Before the soldier's "final tour"
Before he joined our honored dead.
He wrote a letter to George Bush
and this is what the soldier said:

Ten years have passed now since the day
a bullet left me half a man.
A victim of an unjust war.
Your vendetta I can't understand.

I hope someday you can accept
some blame and guilt for all your crimes.
For spending young Americans
on bootless wars in foreign climes.

I really like my muse, I do,
despite her incessant chatter.
It's just, at times, her timing *****,
when sleep, I'd much, much, rather.
It's true I love the verse that she
compels me to compose.
It's ever so much nicer than
my forays into prose.
It just that when it's four A.M.
and I would rather sleep-
She pops in with a word or phrase
that's just to good to keep.
So, obedient to my muse.
I reach for pen and paper.
I dare not lie about in bed
or make plans to betray her.
For so prolific is my muse
who comes to me each waking.
I dare not tick the Lady off
or even keep her waiting.

Hearts, it seems, are as fragile as dreams-
and quite as easily broken.
Frail as a paper valentine
Which is but true love’s token.
The widow maker kills the king
Before needed words are spoken.
Hearts, it seems, are fragile things
And quite as easily broken.

I said my plans out loud
and heard a deep throated chuckle.
I felt so foolish and exposed
and in a muckle of trouble.
For there’s many a slip
Twixt the cup and the lip
For those who chance to dare
And though you flee from
City to City
Fate will find you there.
So keep your secrets to your self
and shelter your designs.
Don’t dare to whisper on the wind
The debts you owe to Time.