Do you ever just,
Get a dark empty feeling?
Like nobody cares anymore?
Like if tommorow morning,
Your dead,
Nobody would care?
The only people,
You once cared for,
Dont care anymore?
Lately, I havent been caring.

There's something ecstatic
With the way you dribble your lips,
******* the silken corners of your teeth
Like a mirage of flickering sunbeams
Radiating from the foliage
Of two crimson river beds.

As your hand fumbles
Through your velvet hair
A mercurial hide explodes
Like a figment of the universe
Gateway to the distant worlds
Of wonders left unknown.

Those hazel pair of astral orbs
The origin of stars
Stare through and true
Piercing me without blades
Burning my body petrified
In an ephemeral ecstasy.

My soul flutters with the hymn
Of the fiddling zephyr
That strums to the beat of my heart
A pounce to my seething core
Emancipating a salvo of sensations
To an ethereal phantasm.

A dream that it never was
An episodic tale of this eclectic void
Of twisted reality
That snatches me to the depths
Of my wildest fabrications
A state of lucid insanity.

There is no great guide and conductor
taking you through some great plan.
you wont get through any golden gates
because you were scared into doing good.
chances are chances and wishes are wishes,
not a preplanned destiny.
Do things because theyre right
not because some character in the clouds
told you to.

guide yourself through good and bad
have faith in that maybe we're responsible
for our own greatness.
have faith in us as a species and not a
sim-ulated play mate.

i sleep with a light on
because I'm scared of the dark.
my mind tells me there are dangers of the dark.
sleeping in the dark wont hurt me.
in many ways the dark is my light.
you might think so too.

A poet falls in love much too easily,
But it is never easy to love a poet.

Songbirds enjoy a diet of variation;
Beetles and worms rarely make good friends.

But seeds spring up where they will.

In the book Going Solo,
Roald Dahl wrote about a woman
Who refused to eat anything with her bare hands
Instead, everything had to be handled with utensils
Knife in one hand and fork in another
She described the satisfaction of fruit cutting
The inexplicable joy at cleanly cleaving peel from flesh
Skill precise as a surgeon
Cutting it up according to Nature's dotted lines

I tried it on the same fruit
Somehow it just didn't feel right
Too refined, too silent

Unlike the practised deft peeling with bare fingers
Fingernails digging into the fruit, both refusing to compromise
Until eventually, the rind gives way and a cut is made
And from that same opening, tearing outwards
Sounding like strips of velcro are slowly being separated
The uneven globe of translucent orange flesh coming naked
Its pith shielding you from its full bright glory
Pulling it apart by halves, and then quarters, and then tenths
Each crescent shaped carpel in its mouth sized perfection
Sacs accidentally bursting, fingers sticky with juice

That is how an orange ought to be peeled.

My existence is taunted by the mesmerizing aroma,
The delightful demitasse of her Mocha brown essence,
A mere arm’s length away yet still an unreachable distance,
The inviting warmth of her crema’s supple surface,
Intensifying temptation to unending heights.

Espresso feelings brew for an eternity,
The barista’s pressure refusing to cease,
Steaming desire straining at every point,
Ever seeking release from the torment.
Ground, grated and pulverized am I,
In the grip of my addiction –
A tortuous thirst that can never be quenched.

But for the warm dark brew being wrapped in the sleeve of another,
I would pour her in to the most precious Italian ceramic bowl,
  Embrace her warmth in the palms of my adoring hands,
Breathe in her rich exotic essence,
Explore her complex depths each day till the end of time.

And still I’d wake each morning anew,
Longing in my never ending desire for another sip,
A deeper understanding and appreciation,
My lips longing to embrace but one more luscious drop,
Love’s ambrosia - the hot dark brew.  


Stuart Zukerman
Vancouver, B.C.

then why is that which is so blatant to thee
so inexplicably illogical to one's own eyes
for never before have eyes pondered to see
what had never been sought
what value, what worth
is placed upon a singular soul
out of such great breadth
that one's own may be deemed as
insignificant or
inexplicably illogical
to so many eyes
for never before have any eyes
had such a perspective
as to see
this soul
with any sense of hope
for hope is insignificant and
inexplicably illogical and
invisible
for what proof lay awakened as to substantiate such substantial existence
as to declare this soul
to have any worth, any value
if so unseen