Just the smallest speck  -
A mote of red, reminder
That bare hands aren't best
Used to wipe at shards of glass.
Funny we use something as
Delicate to cover a photo,
As if there beneath rests
Something so precious
It can be protected
By crystal fragility.
Yet paper's still intact -
Even were it not,
Image is stored digitally.
There could be hundreds more
If they're what we'd want,
Enhanced to erase blemishes
Unwanted age, pasted ersatz
Smiles upon our faces,
A window into a past
That probably never existed -
I don't remember anymore.
Perhaps plastic covers
From now will be best.
I prefer the sound acrylic
Makes when it strikes.
Dull thuds die easily -
No sounds of permanence,
Nor as hard to clean, either.
Though, picture's stained,
Shouldn't have touched.
Then, frame wasn't the aim
Of all that rage, was it?

I've read far too much psychiatry -
Now knowing from ear to there
Many mysterious processes
That make one's mind blink -
Acute chemical reactions,
Therapeutic medications...
But academic texts
In their dryness
Seem to lose
Life's realness,
Why we think
As we do.
That *****
That comes loose
To throw one off course
Could not be all chemistry.
So academically written are words
To those authors who don't live them.
I'd rather imagine some error of cooking -
That tarragon substituted for basil
Or marjoram instead of sage
Gave that strange taste
To the sauce of my life
That salt could not
Cover over.
A wife
Imbalanced
Wasn't my choice
As young lovers married.
Yet in time I heard the voice
Mimicking demons, evil in cycles.
Excused and forgiven as nature's vice
At first  - then when wrath affected children...
A man can only accept his own scars
As the consequences of his living,
Entered into wide-eyed, willing.
By knife's nicks I've survived,
Callused skin is tougher.
But to save the tender
I think I'll give up
Cooking.

Insanity isn't contagious
As go diseases,
But as butter
It does
Spread

Always a gray sky
Filled with something
That'll stay there -
Rain or snow -
Could be thunder
It won't share.
Whatever
Would come cursed,
Pain or joy not to know.
Though when it
Empties
Even barren hearts
Sometime see beauty
In soft snow flakes
Masking dull landscapes;
Springtime downpours
Clean
Staleness from air
For hours,
Making amends for trouble.
That release
Could connect us.

Sweet nothings,
Our pillow talk...
All my names
Poured in
An open ear,
More hot tar
Pounded down
With open fist
For emphasis
Suggesting that a
Pencil may just fit
To keep it there,
Or tickle that part
Of my brain
That keeps me sane.
Today I lost my eyes,
Tonight no hearing -
Always thought it nicest
To die in sleep.

The wolf's gnawing at my liver -
Doesn't hurt yet, really.
Every now and then he pauses
To look at me,
Cool, blue eyes,
We two.
He's hungry;
I'm tired.
Better than eating chocolate
By the fire at night -
Sweetness dulls the teeth,
I'm told,
And warmth only slows us.
Better off cold
Here in snow drifts,
With draughts of vinegar
And brine to keep minds sharp.
Soon, I'll nourish a tree,
Feed its roots.
He'll *** on me.

Glass in my windows rattled
So furious was the birth.
Once over, peace more
Serene in face of wrath
We had seen.
All who saw regarded
In awe fresh beauty -
Time did stop, and sound.
We saw wonder in newness,
Familiar land transformed
To heaven's purity -
Then set out to to sequester innocence,
Sacrificed to our convenience.
We moved and pushed
Poisoned and cursed,
Rallied weapons to beat it.
So now Snow looks like us
Broken, finally defeated;
Grey, scarred and ugly,
Age taking shares by day,
Life by slow trickles
Ebbing away,
Long since lost of purpose.

Last October I wandered a new trail
Leaves had begun to turn and fail
Some stillness 'tween the trees beckoned me,
"Come see"
But it was nothing new again
I had been there once before
So trod a little more
Familiar ground, green beards on rock
Crunching sounds, lichen liveried trunks
Can' t fathom still how
Solid earth let my body down
To stretch out flat, posed a corpse
In his leafy coffin, I suppose
Above, a blur of yellows, peeling
Paint drifting from the forest ceiling
Into slightly parted lips:
Ave Verum Corpus
Then remembering the cherished face
I yearned to see 'ere I leave this place