My wife won't stop
writing poetry
it pours forth
rich in imagery
nuanced in tone
brilliant
inspired
every line loved into existence
tucked gently into bed each night
and called into service
the next morning.

Whereas
my words are meager
meek
brittle and contrived
words that push a barrel
of horseshit
toward the setting sun
No hope of ever getting there.

Why do I try?
It's really a bit sad
numero dos is my destiny
in this poetic liaison
I am forever the dunce
in poetry school.

But my teacher is a babe
a truly hot number
so I'll continue to sit at the back
of the class
try to follow the lessons
and hope against hope
she says a kind word.

The bones of this earth
grind down our fates
our hopes
our dreams
our lives

And a feathered serpent rules
over these climes
this western hemisphere
these Americas
have you heard?

Something elemental shapes this
world
and tempers our lives.
Unknown to most.

The old ones
the people who lived here before
knew him

Quetzalcoatl
Kukulkan
God of learning
Wearer of the wind jewel
the one who whispers life
and death
through his lips.
And you must drink it.
Alive or dead.

The morning star is his sign.
The evening star
his farewell.

He carries the sun
as a shield
and your fate
your fortune
as a good luck charm.

Listen and look.
You will see
You will hear it.

Whispers like water
from the heart
the skin
the bones of this sweet earth.

Listen.
You will hear it.

Forty-eight floors up, a God’s-eye view

a man practices tai-chi on a tired patch of grass
he is measured, beautiful

families rest under new-green trees
in Yoyogi Park this early spring Sunday

Mt. Fuji rises like a myth, fading
to illusion in the gathering smog.



                                                            A few inches can be an impossible sea

                                                            we sit, silently contemplating discord
                                                            and the meaningless reasons for it

                                                            cherry trees paint the city pink
                                                            while faded petals cyclone at our feet

                                                            tears, fleeting as sakura
                                                            bloom and fall.

Lucid dreaming is the doorway
        to the unconscious.
So dream.
Do not stay closed
        behind cement barricades
        blocking the moon
        from shining.
Live.
Each second is for you.
The tumbling of life
         does not promise
            anything.
In one breath
you can have
        a time table
        handed to you.
A distinct framework
        of how much
        longer you shall be.
Stay in illusion.
Keep in mind
that very little
is worthy of
being screamed about.
Politics
        and
people games
        are not
         the substance
        of existing.
Picture colourful images
         that flutter
          playfully
            across the
           mental horizon.
A traffic light
      will
       blink
red, yellow, green.
A noise
        will dominate
         the shading sky.
These mean nothing.
Moments of distraction
        soon
         gone away.
Focus on fantasy.
Allow yourself
the freedom to
         celebrate
        the essence
        of harmony.
When you die,
       it will be
         your dreams
         that are
          remembered.
Breathe.
It's just
      a bad day,
      not a bad life.

I came to you
like a blinded man
a supplicant on the road to ruin
Someone who had once owned hope
but sewed it up in a sack
and gave it
to a beggar on the street

I came to you
like a condemned man
inches from the noose
holding hands with a phantom
a shadow masquerading as
wisdom
or death

Finally
I came to you
in desperation
the desperation of those
whose parents have disowned them
of those with a terminal disease
called life
a street corner clown
miming his passions
one false tear
tattooed on his cheek

And you humored me
Held me at arm's length
while you wove
a spider's web shield
to wrap up your heart
defend it
never truly surrender it

Yet you
dear heart
are my one

I never thought it would be like this
never imagined
that a bloviated moon
would sleep between us.
That a crows' chorus
would be our wedding march.
Yet here we are.
Dare I say it?
At peace.

I'm dying,
Feeling the comforting cloud of death
doing flip-flops through my strain.
Energy bursts are useless attempts
     at frosting flakes of panic and regrets.
Slipping.
Forgetting.
Curt instructions from a dangerous smile.

Cloud of death. Your mysterious tension
        caresses every
        blood-vein in my body.
My lungs restrict,
my lungs constrict.
Empty shallow boxes
      filled with the nothing of
        resistance.

Can’t anyone see? Does anybody know?

Does
    anybody
     have the
      slightest idea
       of just how
        tiresome
         paying
          attention
           can be?

So let me go. So leave me alone.
Let the fibres of believing unravel,
        slip apart
        like
        cracked glass
          about to
          shatter.
I'm hurting.
Disillusioned membranes zoning into silence.
The self-illusion so palpable and strong.
Hope
      is for people
             who have
                   flowers to grow.

Years later
muffled like new snowfall
this ash
permeating teeth and skin.

Back then, I was still naive enough to trust
Old Jimmy when he offered to fly me
over the blast zone in his beat-up Cessna
the words Scenic Tours peeling off its purple tail.

His latent appetite would later manifest  
on the ride home in his musty Cadillac
the passenger door dented shut
preventing an easy exit.

That day
gray extended
as far as eyes could see
denuded trunks laid to rest
in perfect unison

we flew
for miles and miles
over nothing living

just ash
permeating teeth and skin
fallen matchsticks
and men.