Truth is the daughter of time.
Lies are at best her half brothers.
Truth longs for a lover to come;
her milky whiteness uncovered.
She does not wish to be ruled
by the Crown or by Papal decree.
She is not Agenda's handmaiden,
she simply longs to be free.
Had I but the skills of a Goya
I could make Truth's beauty well known.
Michaelangelo, too, could portray her
for truth's often captured in stone.
Some will tell you that
Truth is quite beautiful,
as the last of her veils hits the floor.
I agree that her figure's impeccable;
She always leaves me wanting more

Two folded sheets of paper
were secreted in his stovepipe hat.
He rehearsed the phrases in his mind
on the platform where they sat.

The air was cool and tolerable
on that remembered day.
The smell of death hung in the air
from heroes Blue and Gray.

A Doctor of Divinity intoned a simple prayer.
A local band then played.
Doctor Everett spoke two hours
In his solemn practiced way.

Only then did Lincoln rise.
His face seemed sad and grey.
I was then a child of five
standing fifteen feet away.

There upon the Field of battle
amidst the legion of the death.
He did honor to their sacrifice
And the sacred cause he led.

He spoke about equality
He promised a rebirth.
Government of the people
would not perish from the earth.

That is all that I remember.
of the consecration day.
His words will live forever
Like the deeds of Blue and Gray.

The stubborn little Maple leaf
held on when all its fellows fled.
They carpeting the ground beneath
a vast lushscape of gold and red.

Leaf held on thru wind and rain,
the last survivor of its race.
Leaf held on past Turkey day
maintaining there its pride of place.

Then Leaf grew lonely, I suppose-
Like the summer’s final rose.
Leaf envied then the flakes of snow
Who fluttered past to their repose.

Then, just as winter came to call,
Leaf felt a tug and then a snap.
Flying, tumbling on the winds
Fall to Earth. Fade to black.

We walked up to the Fun House,
Together, arm in arm.
The ticket taker watched us
with a smile devoid of charm.
"abandon hope, who enter here."
He mirthlessly intoned.
" For some who come together,
will end this night alone."
We walked among the mirrors,
together hand in hand.
At first they were quite innocent,
These walls made out of sand.
Our images were stretched or shrunk
as magic mirrors can.


Then we came to mirrors
unlike the ones before:
My face resembled Satan's,
My girl looked like a *****.
We were somehow seperated
by these walls of molten sand
We ran from that place screaming
like two souls who had been dammed.

We were reduced to silence
by the nightmares that we saw.
Not a word was spoken
as I walked her to her door.
The ticket man had spoken
and the words he spoke were true:
We had spent that time in Hell,
The love we had was through.

When making arrangements for ending it all
be sure to consume the right pills,
for the medicine chest contains many things
They prescribe now to cure other ills.
He’d said his goodbyes and he’d written the note
On the day that he thought was his last.
When he saw he’d O.D’d on Cialis instead
he was taken back and aghast.
For Cupid, not Thanatos, had answered his call
leaving him hard as dried plaster!
Though his wife was impressed-
And gave it her best-
He still throbbed on the edge of disaster.
Two pros they then called
To give it their all
To deal with this “gift” that keeps giving.
Despite their best efforts
He rampant remained
And he thought to himself “This is living”.
His medical doctor had just the thing
to keep Priapism in check.
When he finally went slack
There was no turning back
They at least kept it out of the Press
Upon further reflection
the hope of resurrection
Made him rip up his note and go on
For Life is worth living
with a wife so forgiving
of a spouse with a four hour bone.

Default on your debt,
Yet not rue the day.
why worry-
The bundesbank
will save the day.

German taxpayers
grumble and moan
At the cost of supporting
the whole Euro zone.

Next the Italians
neck deep in debt,
then Ireland and Spain,
both financial train wrecks.

Massive inflation-
The price all will pay.
So that rioting Greeks
Can live the Greek way

There are loves that are inseparable,
loves that never leave.
Loves that can define us
This much I do believe.
I remember well my own first “love”.
A Love I brought to bed.
I brought along a flashlight too
To discern the words Love said.
When all my family was asleep
from my pillow I’d retrieve
My treasure from the Library
And I’d begin to read.
That was my first chapter book,
A mystery, I recall.
Of all the words I’ve read or writ
It was the start of all.
I like to find that book again
and hold in one more time.-
and in the touch and smell of it
Recall a simpler time.

In the clearing stands the garden,
one made beautiful by you.
There is laurel, here is Holly,
and scents of lavender and rue.
In the center of the garden;
a rock that was your Poet's chair.
Sadly it is empty,
Paddy, you've been gone two years.
Your refuge and your metaphor
both in this secret bower.
Here you shared your wisdom
about Love's redemptive power.
This beauty were impossible
without your patient toil.
Your mind knew well which plants would
grow in this type of soil.
In your absence can your garden thrive
without the Gardener's care?
Perhaps within this place of peace
your shade yet lingers there?
Though we still grieve your passing
we mustn't seek you in the dust.
You are present in your flowers;
in your verse you bide with us

Immediately the oyster felt it, a piece of grit, a source of pain.
The little creature could not expel it; every attempt was in vain.
How to endure this rank discomfort? How to bear it and survive?
The Oyster had but one solution, one thing left for it to try.
Each day the oyster’s own secretions coated that tiny piece of grit
And in the end, when all was done, the oyster made a pearl of it.

When, like me, you lose a parent while still young.
There is this pain you bear inside.
Each day it haunts your waking thoughts
However you might try to hide.
Day by day you seek to cope, though it seems helpless at the first.
A year or more might pass before you feel that you’ve survived the worst.

Time, like that oyster, seeks to heal; to encapsulate loss and regret;.
Tim to heal, Time to grieve, just accept you can’t forget.
So you keep your public face and show that bravely to the World
Until the lacuna in your soul, with Time’s mercy, becomes a pearl.

I sit in the bottom of a Well,
Its walls worn smooth by time.
Above, a solitary star,
One of seven sisters, shines.
Neutrinos in abundance,
like angels on a pin,
of minute mass, invisible
are forever pouring in.
All about me they dash by
Without an outward sign..
Even in these hidden depths
They’re an elusive find.
They speed on through to other fates
And leave me to my climb.

The day is grey, the clouds hang low, and, in the air, a winter chill.
Upon the beach called Omaha an old soldier stands; a promise to fulfill.
Full Seventy years ago this man, weighted down with gear and kit,
raced across this wet grey sand, and, by some miracle, remained unhit.
Friends who’d survived that longest day, and all the long days after it,
had purchased the bottle held in his hands. As the last man standing
he had charge of it:

His eyes, watery from the wind, Looked at the bottle in his hands:
A Dom Perignon Brut Champagne, the 47’ vintage year.
He thought about his comrades gone. Surely they were heroes all
Who spilled out from the Higgins boats to breach the ***’s Atlantic wall.
He felt the presence of the ghosts, all those who fell upon this shore.
Boys, really, almost all eighteen, who’d died
answering Freedom’s call .

He tore the foil with old gnarled hands; His Arthritis made a chore of this.
Thin wire held the cork in place and was so difficult to untwist.
Once free his placed his thumbs upon the curved underbelly of the cork
The cork shot free across the sand and bubbly foam
chased after it.

He was not a religious man, it seemed impious for him to pray
Though he recalled so many had, that day they bled their lives away.
How best to honor these fallen men? Who had pledged their lives, each to each.
It was then he turned the bottle down and poured the contents
on the beach.


Some would declare it sacrilege to let that vintage go to waste.
The old soldier smiled and felt at peace.
He’d seen the vintage of 26’ poured out in buckets
In this very place..

What is one death out of Fifty eight thousand?
One house full of weeping in a divided land?
Examine, minutely, the loss of one solider,
one single example of so many last stands.
His sisters hair, now streaked with grey,
She lights a candle in a church
in memory of that fatal day
when her brother's airplane fell to earth.
Freedom's sacrifice paid in blood
by lance Corporal Ronald Powell.
It was an August day like this,
but far away and long ago.

Remember.

She was the heartbeat of desire,
while I was a dry upper crust of a writer.
She was the Flamingo, fluid with grace.
I was just a stiff member with a bank teller’s face.
I lay with the lady as a matter of course
We woke up the next morning with all innocence lost.
I married Viv then and in London remained
where J. Alfred Prufrock cemented my fame.
It was between the two wars, when poets still mattered
Though the world of our birth was bruised beaten and tattered.
Viv had many needs that I couldn’t fulfill
Her one infidelity rankles me still.
The silence between us grew as loud as the Bourse.
Though our pairing proved barren, we never divorced.
My footsteps were haunted by this girl with my name.
I resolved we should part. My friends thought her insane.
Maurice, her brother, signed to have her committed.
I saw her just once, a perfunctory visit.
She was young when she died, just turned Fifty Eight.
My fate would be different, I had longer to wait.
Of the man that I might have been, little remained
She made me a poet, my dry soul she claimed

On a splendid sunny day with the Gestapo standing by,
A Munich Co-ed, the condemned, Sophie Scholl spoke for the last time.
Sure of her cause, strong in her Faith, the last petal of the White Rose
Bared her neck to the guillotine already wet with her brother’s blood.

Opponents of  an unjust War. The White Rose defied the Fueher’s rule
In their pamphlets they exposed the horrors of the camps
until they were condemned in a court of law.

Not every German was complicit; not all revered the red and black.
Some still thought for themselves and secretly they fought back.
Like Antigone of old, Sophie stood against the State:
certain, to the very last, of Love’s victory over hate.

For 40 years Joe waited
For the chance to buy a pair
Of Packer season tickets.
He was verging on despair.
That time had seen Joe
wed and Dumped,
his children grown and fled.
Joe had waited half a lifetime,
far too long for a cheese head.
Then came the notice in the mail
The ducats could be thine.
Joe jumped out of his rocking chair
in ecstasy sublime.
He danced and screamed
And shouted out
Like he would when
Green Bay Scored.
Just then Joe gasped and clutched his chest
And fell dead on the floor.
It’s sad Joe never got the chance
to cheer them from on high
To freeze his *** at Packer’s games
It’s so unfair Joe died
Still, tickets shouldn’t go to waste
So I stepped up and bought the pair.
The seats are up in “Heaven”
I’m certain Joe don’t care

Of poor old Joe, my dear late friend,
I cannot find a trace
I fear he found seats down below
in a far, far ,warmer place.

Why do I love you?
because you’re my child.
Since before you were born-
So it’s been quite a while.

I couldn’t resist you
No way and no wise
Since the first time I saw you
in your Mother’s eyes.


In part your remind me
Of those I hold dear
the sound of your laughter
the salt of your tears.

The way your tongue curls
And mothers’ cannot
You’re a storehouse of traits
That I can’t do without.

Your voice raised in song
Can be heard in the rafters
Your song is a gift
Handed down from ancestors.

Like me you love humor
With a sarcastic wit
As often as not
you score direct hits

So while I still breathe
And still can remember
I love you dear child
and the sound of your laughter.

Some will dance while others mourn
The "Iron Lady" who can't atone
for the deaths of the blanket men-
read her crimes on their headstones.

Some will dance while others weep
For a great conservative gone to sleep
but if you are a union man
you'll wish to god that she is dammed.

A flood of blood engulfed her brain,
such memories as did remain
were quickly in the torrent lost.
Do sins leave an indelible stain?

A lake of fire or a heavenly home?
Her ultimate fate remains unknown
No lone piper for her will play
unless there's one she has to pay.

In Mystic they have built a park in honor of the memory
of Grace McDonnell who was killed at Sandy Hook Elementary.
Elsewhere in Connecticut are playgrounds built to honor them;
the children and the teachers slain, so that we will remember when.
These innocents we could not save have playgrounds where they never played.
These bittersweet memorial parks are a sad remembrance of that day.
We saw their pictures, heard their names, our hearts brimmed full with sad remorse.
For twenty six children who were killed before their lives could run their course.

There are so many others dead, lost lives that we don’t celebrate;
56 million at last count- not one playground in any State.
There are few pictures, they have no names, their humanity; denied of course.
Inconvenient little lives put down like dogs with no remorse.
How different would our nation be? Perhaps a touch less old and gray?
Instead we have built playgrounds where far fewer children get to play.

.

Janus is the portal god
who looks ahead and back
He is the god of time and change
who keeps the years on track.

Those years pass faster than before
and I grow still more grey.
at least, I muse, my hair's still there.
That's more than some can say.

Warm the snifter in my hands
before the fireside.
Raise a toast to absent friends
and to years gone by.

As Eleven sprints towards its end,
and the fire slowly dies,
forget the tears, recall the joy
for that way wisdom lies.

At first she thought it cute
that he would call a dozen times:
His dating style was quite attentive,
gentlemanly, and refined.

It got a bit annoying when
he’d question her at length;
but she wasn’t getting younger
so she agreed to set the date.

At work it was disrupting
that he called so many times
thankfully, both her employers
were of the understanding kind.

After their first child was born
she thought he would behave;
Instead he acted helpless
and abused her like a slave.

In the darkest moments of her life,
he’d seem to disappear;
She buried parents, by herself,
A time he should be there.

His jealous was crushing.
His conversation was inane.
He took the air out of the room
with his selfish, childish games.

So, while at a cocktail party,
a handsome stranger asked her name.
She wanted to dance slow with him,
The moth approached the flames.

The Memory of my Love
Is as a rose preserved from time.
Or like a treasured bottle
from a vintage year for wine.

I am haunted by her memory-
How our fingers intertwined.
The fragrance of her body
as I held it close to mine.

Now just the shadow of her smile
Brings tears to a dry place.
Funny how my heart can race
Within the ghost of her embrace.
.
She is unchanging, therefore perfect
Her aspect is divine.
I believe that year was vintage-
for love, if not for wine.

On this, the last night of our world,
As rockets flare and people scream,
A floating mount of artic ice
has made a nightmare of our dream.

Dear Charlotte, get into the boat.
Don’t make an orphan of our child.
I smile and lie and say that I
will be along in just a while.

She nods, and we share a final kiss,
a kiss redolent of goodbye.
It is my hope that they will live,
while I prepare myself to die.

Doomed gentlemen upon the deck;
noble, wealthy or in trade.
I play as brave as any there
In this, our final masquerade.

Their little lifeboat floats away
adrift upon a sea of glass.
I pray, for the first time in years,
full knowing that this cup won’t pass.

Should I go down with the ship?
That is the Captain’s choice, I hear.
Or put a gun into my mouth
And firing put an end to fear?

No. I will stand with these brave men,
Who made the choice that I have made.
We’ll leap before Titanic sinks
And in these depths  find honorable graves.

She was just a teen;
pretty ,blonde - and dying.
In a town in the Southeast
where she was born.

Cancer was her foe,
then in remission.
She’d been told
she would be sterile
even so.

A neighbor’s boy
escorted her to prom.
A special friend
within a
threatened life..

Could they be blamed
for trying to
steal pleasure?
Pain was her
companion all her life.

They joined their flesh
to share a moments pleasure.
Soon afterwards
her cancer had
returned.

A sick girl, thought sterile,
found to be with child.
She would not take
their poison in her veins.

The Doctor didn’t know
her heart and will.
She vowed her child
by cancer won’t be claimed..

She willed herself to
bring her babe to term.
Just barely lived to hold
him in her arms.

Like Simeon in the temple
she had lingered
Until, at last,
the torch of life passed on.

Her lover wept and held
her as she died.
Though she was then blind
she heard her newborn cry.

The battle is fought and our victory won,
My General has ordered me to run,
From Marathon’s plains to Athens Agora
to tell the elders of the battle’s outcome.
Oh gods on high grant us surcease
from threats of invasion if no true peace.
I have fought in the front line
and raced to and from Sparta in two days’ time.
Now fatigued and nearly done
I speed toward home from Marathon.
We will not suffer Eretria’s fate
Their city burned, their folk enslaved.
No! Thousands of Persians we have slain.
Our city on a hill is saved.
I’m short of breath and weak from wounds
Even as the walls of our city loom.
“Nike!” I cry! “Rejoice, we’ve won!”
As my proud heart breaks and I am done.

Registrations are way down at Clown Colleges today.
No one wants to scare small kids for the peanuts that they pay.
Older Bozos are alarmed that no one is enthused
to follow their profession and try to fill their shoes.
Sales of makeup are way down, ditto for funny clothes.
And vendors can’t remember when they sold their last red nose.
When the one ring circus comes to town clowns will be hard to spot
The clown cars that they used to drive are rusting on the lot.
The reason for the scarcity is obvious to me;
All those with clown potential serve in Washington D.C.

The corn is crowned with flowers
as harvest's end draw near.
Men and Women, Lads and maids
all raise a rousing cheer.
Pile high the wagon with the fruits
of Ceres Golden Horn.
The fortune of the fields is ours
for now is Harvest Home.

In the dead of Winter came
a dread that did not give its name.
A thought whose source would not disclose
the fear that all those living know.

In the dead of winter came
those short lived days we pass in vain.
Anger, short lived, but intense
at Love without its recompense.

In the Dead of winter came
a bitter cold without a name
Disease that would not run its course
The bitter pill of our divorce.

Drink is the doorway to despair
and yes, I sought some comfort there,
when human voices all went still
to warm me from the Winter chill.

Clodius’ ashes rose above
The Curia in flames.
His supporters filled the streets
crying out his name.
In a city ruled by violence,
One wracked by rival mobs,
The rule of law grew as silent
as the altars of her gods.
Pompey the great, sole consul,
His ally, Milo, would betray...
The eloquent grew fearful
of themselves becoming prey.

I do not blame you, Caesar,
you have ridden history’s tide.
Marc Anthony, your Lieutenant,
Is a loose cannon at your side.
I think I blame the Romans,
those who sought a life of ease,
They, who dance to the music of time,
brought our Republic to her knees.
I know she was imperfect,
(At times our poor were squeezed.)
Yet Rome, Mankind’s greatest hope,
Now succumbs to your disease.
So place the garland on his pate
For I have ceased to care.
Like Catalina, we have lived,
Our epilogue: despair.

“Beautiful” she said;
And none can her gainsay.
The poetess who spoke,
then, in quiet, passed away.
Cossetted within her husband’s arms,
frail and small in death’s repose,
Never again would she put pen to paper.
No more sonnets would her art compose.
Her illnesses had dogged her all her life.
Only morphine kept the pain at bay.
It also gave to her a heightened sense
of the beauty of mundane reality.
How vividly did her expressive eyes
Put words to thoughts and thoughts to
printed page.
She was the wild enthusiast of life,
whose poetry was the spirit of the age.

The thing about losing one’s mind Is that it doesn’t happen all at once.
No, the loss is a creeping gradual thing, never occurring in a *****.
It starts with some forgotten names; some dear, some famous but, to you, not.
Next you’re at a loss for words you’ve often used but now cannot.
You find yourself on an oft trod trail which suddenly is strange and new.
Its getting dark, its growing cold and the police have to be sent for you.
There is a fear that chills the soul that only knows that it knows not.
Hanging on that precipice fearing you will be forgot
Yet when that last forgetting comes your fear will be forgotten too.
And you’ll greet Death like an old friend whose name will surely come to you.
.

The call went out
It meant one thing.
Death in the line of duty

Women keen
and Grown men weep
at the loss of youth and beauty.

The empty locker,
The owner-less gear,
silence that is a presence.

Brave Liam lies dead.
The fireman’s friend
Pity the parents their loss

The owner less toys,
The master less pets,
How to make sense of it all?

There is a spot
atop a hill
beneath an old shade tree.
It is the place my parents rest
and thus is dear to me.

It is a pleasant spot they chose,
now blanketed in snow.
I place my wreath and give a thought
to a Christmas long ago.

That Christmas Eve my father brought
a tree that filled the room.
My brother worked to fix the lights.
The girls sang Christmas tunes.

Atop the tree an ornament
A star that shone like gold.
Reminder of the miracle
of Christmas long ago.

The house is gone
and they have gone
The youngest has grown old.
Still I recall my sisters song
and that star that shone like gold.

He was, at home, most comfortable
in collared shirt and jeans.
Just not the sort to put on airs
Or fancy dress, it seems.
In his later years, especially,
It seemed style had passed him by.
So his new blue suit gave me a start
With the new Red power tie.
The haberdasher had done him proud,
But he wasn’t that sort of man
Still, given the occasion
I knew he’d understand
I asked a moment at the end
Just before the lid was closed
To memorize the face I loved
Lying there in his new clothes.

Their leader was incompetent,
well-meaning but untried.
He lead his men into a trap
Then fled and let them die.

The Indian and British troops
Were outnumbered by Khan’s men
When their artillery was silenced
It was clear how it would end.

The soldiers of the Sixty Sixth
fought gallantly to the death.
When they turned to make their final stand
There were eleven left.

With sword and lance and cartridge
They battled hopeless odds.
On the dusty plain of Maiwand
They would, shortly, meet their God.

When their ammo was exhausted
They decided steel would do.
They charged then, in the face of death.
those men, so proud, too few.

When the last of them lay in the dust
having fought to their last breath.
The Khan himself paid them respect
For they had earned their rest..

When the rivers dry up
And don’t run towards the sea.
When the last of the seed corn
has died.
We may find fiscal hedging
Has all been in vain.
Is there something else we might have tried?

In the warm stagnant water
By the thousands, fish die.
The worst die off I ever did see.
Its funny how there is no shortage of flies-
I can’t say the same for the bees.

We look to the soil to sustain us on Earth
As we poison and plunder the sea.
In the Amazon, companies plunder and burn,
****** the earth’s forestry.

When the last crop has failed
And the rivers run dry
And we can’t catch a thing in the sea
The stewards of earth will be called to account
And will learn you can’t eat currency.





“Only when the last tree has died, and the last river has been poisoned, and the last fish has been caught, will we realize that we cannot eat money.” –Native American proverb

I have never been an advocate
Of “woman’s right to choose”
because I think an infant’s life
is too precious to lose.

In the case of Marie Fleming,
I might plead for an exception:
This brave Irish woman,
Her body wracked with mortal pain,
Sought surcease from suffering-.
a peaceful rest to gain.

She did not fear that final breath
as the young and healthy do.
She sought a death with dignity-
the same as me and you.

MS was her enemy-
She could not do the deed.
She asked the courts to let friends help
To be there in her need.

Denied of an assisted end,
Marie died yesterday.
I hope that she passed peacefully
and sleeps til Judgment day.

Her wicker casket was borne to church,
She rests there in the yard.
She bore pain unendurable
before she met her God.

We are more merciful to pets
When they face shorter odds
Than the courts were to Marie
Who‘d been dealt the thirteenth card.

Her face and form intrigued him
She had such classic lines.
"I must get her in my studio,
I have just the piece in mind."
He hired her right then and there.
He paid her well to pose.
His artist heart beat fastest
at the moment she disrobed.
Her hair cut short, much like a boys,
small breasted and so trim.
Her features first in plaster cast
formed perfectly by him.
Later he would cast, in Bronze,
"The huntress" **** and bold.
In truth her arrows struck his heart
and Love poured forth, I'm told.
A happy life together shared-
alas, they both are dust.
In statue form she's ever young
for Bronze will never rust.

In fair Verona where Will set the scene
Belle Fortune moves the markers up and down.
Two households both alike in dignity
Fiercely compete for fear of losing ground.

When Juliet saw Romeo at the dance
Events were set in motion that, perchance,
Would see fair Juliet as our Romeo’s bride
but ultimately result in her suicide.

With Tybalt and Mercutio both dead,
And Capulet and Montague estranged.
Young Paris sought fair Juliet to wed
not knowing of her loss of maiden-head.

Romeo was banished for his crime,
a sin for which a peasant would have died
Their two households, joined because they wed,
remained divided by their foolish pride.

Summer’s fierce heat shimmered in the air,
oppressive in the absence of a breeze.
With Friar Lawrence’s help, Romeo’s girl played dead,
as if struck down by some unknown disease


Romeo , in Mantua, heard that his Juliet
Lay dead amongst the sleeping Capulets.
A draught of deadly poison he obtained
So they might sleep together once again.

When Romeo met Paris at her tomb,
Words led to swordplay, leaving Paris dead.
Would not the world have been a better place
if Romeo had kept it sheathed instead?

Unshriven, Romeo drank the poison down-
the only son of Montague now dead.
Perchance just then fair Juliet revives
Bereaved, she took his Dirk to bed instead.

Authorities, arriving at the scene,
could only mourn a brace of kinsmen lost.
Capulet and Montague were reconciled
Their amity bought at a fearful cost.

Come to bed, darling, for sure the hour is late.
Most certainly, your conference call can wait.
The children are asleep and I’m abed,
So work must wait, come play with me instead.
Don’t waste these hours with fitful sleep tonight
when you and I could fill them with delight.
Unlace that camisole and let it drop,
A goodly start. I didn’t say to stop!
Then, turning towards me with an impish smile
Lose the slacks and add them to the pile.
Then, taking sight of my most firm intention
Remove your hose, the devil’s own invention.
When we are wearing just our birthday suits
Arch your back like a feline in pursuit.
Keep the heels, they’re red and bold I swear
They spur me to enjoy my favorite pair.
Those orbs of night won’t ignored my dear
As we effect conjunction of the spheres
We stifle cries as we make our cradle rock.
We'll tell the kids it was an aftershock.
Some nights are cold but this one needn’t be,
If you fall asleep held safe and warm by me.

The Vessel was a thing of clay.
the sort you use, then throw away.
It was worth little, of itself,
but that vessel was filled with Love.
It poured out Love upon the Living
Free and selfless was its giving.
When at last the clay was dry,
it was the vessels time to die.
It shattered on the sands of time,
now half a lifetime gone from mine.
The vessel was my Dad you see-
and by his gifts I was set free.
I wept the day he met his end-
will I ever see his like again?
God willing on a higher plane
I'll get to call again his name.,
but if my journey ends in dust,
he taught me how as all men must.

Dull sublunary lovers need
the help of 3D glasses
to ever seen things differently,
or grasp just what romance is.

We poets see things differently
because we take more chances.
The seen and unseen, we embrace
without cardboard enhancers.

Could Love even express itself
without our helpful similes?
Honor or Courage, without our help,
would be just pale  facsimiles .

We are the guardians of the words
that hollow men would empty.
Poetential is our flaming sword
against their verbal  entropy

There is a bankrupt government
Down in Washington D.C
A petty despot is presiding
from sea to shining sea.

The Senate is dysfunctional
The House perhaps is worse-
Obsessed with banning *** acts
That they hadn't thought of first.

They furloughed the non- essentials-
Eight hundred thousand out the door.
Had they looked around the chamber
They could find five hundred more!

They’ll be no negotiations
As they fight over the purse
We’ll pay fines or buy insurance
Affordable care-my ***.

A President elected
Largely based upon his skin
Will be followed by a woman
With more baggage than an INN

A bigger group of hypocrites
I hope never to see
Than this Congress full of Baboons
Posturing on T.V.

Anonymous is a funny name
for a writer on an Opt-Ed page.
I'd want a by line I suppose
if I were going to step on toes.
I know the President would glower
to find me speaking truth to power.
He'd say "You're fired!" on the spot
but I 'd have my  verbal parting shot.
Hashtag "Not Me" is all you hear
from senior officials who quake in fear.

Yet if computers can disclose
by close analysis of prose
what Shakespeare did or didn't write
I'm sure the identity will come to light.
I think the turncoat might be named "Dan"
but I'm not willing to take the stand.
Cory Booker, who knows the law,
still thinks it must be Kavenaugh.

The first night that they slept apart
-I think because he had a cough-
He grabbed his pillow from their bed
Mimed a kiss and then was off.

Their separation lingered on
like cancer growing in a womb
Days into weeks turned into years
each spouse in their separate room.


Anniversaries came apace
To the separate cells wherein they dwell
All marveled at “togetherness.”
None could glimpse their private hell
.
No kiss, no glance, no warm embrace
As would ward off a winter’s chills
No passionate heat or casual lust
Not that either needed pills

And then one day he failed to wake
Cool to her touch, she felt his arm
Detachedly she looked upon
Her love, long dead, now gone

She lay down on the bed once shared
And swallowed pills enough and more
To join her fellow in that sleep
They’d share together evermore.

On a cold winter’s night with the streets dark and still,
We converged at the Pillar with a plan and a will.
We placed sticks of dynamite Around and inside-
enough to send Lord Nelson upon his last ride.
In the wee hours of morning The fuses were lit.
We ran like mad devils so we wouldn’t get hit.
The concussive explosion made Lord Nelson fly.
Many windows were shattered, But nobody died.
It was fifty years on since our brothers in arms
Had proclaimed the Republic For which so many died.
The skyline’s been altered To reflect Erin’s pride.
The might Brit hero Will never again
Lord it over our Dublin Or free Irish men.

I think snow and I could become better friends
if Snow would confine itself to where the grass ends.
Snow should linger on ski slopes, packed powder preferred.
On my driveway and walks snow should not be observed.
For this white gift from heaven is not very nice.
Snow is cold and it's wet and it soon turns to ice.
Snow snarls my commute and makes parking a mess.
My back hates when I shovel, but I fear I digress.
Snow is beautiful, falling, driven by the wind,
but a pain in the ***** when the clean up begins.
Oh, I could wax poetic of snow's pristine beauty,
but my wife has assigned me to shoveling duty.
The lottery Genie could do me a big favor,
if my numbers all hit, she could well prove my savior.
On my beach, I'd recline, with a drink in my hand
and sing of "White Christmas" with my own back up band.

They had waited on blankets, in cars,
to view the Chrysanthemum stars.
Instead of a pyrotechnic display,
The authorities sent them away.
A brief blast of frightening power
consumed at once many a flower.
It appears a computer malfunction
was the cause of the mini eruption.
The engineered boom had gone bust.
Makes you wonder- now who can you trust?


In the desert that night 'neath the stars
Jupiter, Venus and Mars
put on their free, nightly, display.
People on blankets, in cars
very seldom look up to the stars.
There a bowlful of wonder and light
goes sight unseen most every night.
The gift of a child's sense of wonder
goes unwrapped by these mortals down under.

James Holmes awaited news of his fate. (Would his madness be held to mitigateHis terrible sin, his awful crimes; Life or Death, How to decide?)
What is Justice for multiple homicides?
He murdered twelve and injured more; Now what would the verdict hold in store?
A lethal injection, A Lover’s pinch, was that the outcome he devoutly wished?
Else he would get the world and time to contemplate his awful crimes.
He’d be Locked away from the world of men; never to be free again.
Haunted by souls he condemned to death; who had cursed him with their dying breath.


Life, the jury has decreed, as punishment for his awful deed.


He'll be locked in the prison of his mind; an awful penance is this gift of time.

Your impulses are generous, kind and pure-
But impose costs on us we can’t endure.
One point three trillion spent each year, tis said,
to keep our current poor in their own beds.
America has debt related worries
While social engineers break out new Mores.
Recent Grads despair of their careers
and student loans are going in arrears.
Priests, Teachers and the Boy Scouts, rank and file,
Apparently are staffed with pedophiles.
Socialism’s great and life is sunny-
until you run out of other people’s money.