I know
the feelings she
stirs in my ***** when I
look at her are wrong 'cause she's my
sister

to live
     every day
     in morbid dread
sharp cold spikes
     driven deep into
          the chest
anxiety
  conditioned,
  learned, pressed

screams

     in my head,
          and yet
               remains unsaid

ballad
from the eighties
vibrates my car speakers -
for a moment I'm reminded
of you

serpentine road
turns into the sun;
   my throttle opens

I hate zombies
they are the infantile enemy
the foe against which there is
    no guilt
the essential
        human
questions of right of wrong
  of morality
never apply to the cerebellum-craving
undead.  It's us or them
   hunt or be hunted
   **** or be killed
they are enemies that fail to
      challenge
   our notions of what it is
   to be us
give me a werewolf any day
or rather - any moon
the tortured lycanthrope
   forces the protagonist to
choose to **** because
    unlike zombies
there's always
   a chance
   however small
   that a werewolf
can find
redemption

Bravery
I thought I was brave
with the scars to prove it.
My legacy -
   broken bones,  split knuckles,
   black eyes and loose teeth.
   Adulation and respect.
I fought  both man and isms
Never backed down.
But a black man, driving
an Uber taught me the truth of
true bravery.
Harassed, insulted, threatened by
a low-life passenger,
  white racism covered in a cheap suit and tie,
he refused to take the bait.
He denied himself the pleasure of
      justified violence.
He told me his story -
and anger for him, righteous indignation,
crashed over me in furious waves.
I admonished him for not
confronting that mans ignorance
   with a closed and determined fist.
Never back down, right?
Gently, he spoke the truth of
   black men in America.
His eyes caught mine in the rearview mirror.
You, he said, are innocent until proven guilty.
Protected by a system that
oppresses me.
I am guilty - period - and would be lucky
to be arrested, not killed,
  in a confrontation with that bigot.
So he did nothing, let the swine in a tie
off at his destination,
and drove on - leaving that pig to
wallow in his hate.
His bravery earned him nothing.
No adulation. No respect. No recognition.
Nothing except another day of life.
Another day with his family.
In contrast - my lifetime of bravery.
A pale reflection, when set beside his truth.
He was brave, not I.
My self-styled bravery, forever
tainted
by my privilege.

somewhere
on unending
back roads of Nebraska
I left behind the ghost of my
cancer

brittle leaves
swirl in circles
behind the motorcycle

Send me nudes, you said
I sent you my naked
truths instead -
An unfiltered and unapologetic
glimpse into my heart
my innermost self
That part of me that so
rarely sees the light
of day much less the
judgement
of another soul
In the end, staring at my
demons, at my fears, and
my weakness you
failed to see
my strengths, my beauty,
or my integrity
You looked into the
abyss of me and
blinked

dog-paddling
in zero gee
   my beagle

the trial
is over; the
debate’s just beginning
they’ve all just earned their Facebook law
degree

they frown
at my tattoos
as I ride past their church;
I think if they had stones they would
cast them

steamy
beads of sweat
between her dusky *******
little rivers of pleasure
that collect in her navel
and threaten to spill with
each exhalation
distract me long enough
to avoid the
     little death
that look in her eye
seen only when
riding me
or on the back of
my motorcycle
    reignites my
passion and
all too soon
    I die

“Sorry babe”
I breath fire as I stare
down at her naked
body - the twisted sheets
damp with futile sweat -
“I have
  whiskey ****.”

his frail form
offers a salted tribute
to the warriors lying
dead and dying on and under
his geta.  A thousand
clacking sounds rise up
into the stormy seas as
these tiny samurai know
defeat once
again.

guitar's
wailing tonight;
long, slow, melancholy.
The only way he knows to say
goodbye

I'm a throwback, baby
     atavistic and masochistic
I'll pay for dinner and
  I'll hold the door
you can complain and
     vilify this good guy
but I can take it.  Your
feminism does not and can not
     impel or compel
me to forgo my manners because
    you
        can't
           tell me how I should
                expect to respect
          you

there’s a gun in my pocket
heavy with the essence of
another man’s soul
still swirling in the smoky barrel
in this dark corner of this lonely
and forgotten
bar is the man who played
Thanatos and brought to
inevitable conclusion the yearnings
of a single human life
in this corner, sipping cheap
whiskey
and smoking
foreign cigarettes is a
killer with a conscience
but you’d never know it
steady hands and
unwavering eyes
greet the bartender
I order another
shot
and pat my thigh, keeping
the soul in the chamber
for just a little longer
because, really, it’s  my soul
that’s been stolen by that
gun in my pocket

(note - This is a haibun; a Japanese writing form that combines haiku with prose.)*

Two days on the road, two thousand miles on my motorcycle. Hard miles; my *** so sore that every bump in the road brings biting pains up my back and down my legs.

I’m riding alone. No highways. No hotels. Camping in fields and eating in greasy diners. Seeing the America not available to the Interstate. The real America. I’m rough riding across the continent and this isn’t a mid-life crisis. I’m on a mission.

There’s been a ghost haunting me for five years. And yesterday, somewhere on the back roads of Nebraska, I left that ghost, the ghost of my cancer, behind. The specter of death that lingered on me, over me, and around me after excision of the tumors is finally gone.

Contrary to opinion, ghosts are heavy. With mine gone, I ride through the night – the stars and my newfound peace my sole companions. I stop only when the false dawn begins to turn into the real thing.

serpentine road
​curves into the sun;
  my throttle opens

The country diner I find myself in front of welcomes both me and the morning sun. I’m tired, sweaty in my leathers, and covered in road dust as I enter. And I’m deaf, the roar of the road is still loud in my ears.

I tell the waitress I take my coffee black – as black as my soul. My joke falls flat; what comes from my mouth is a rough growl, thanks to a dry throat. It earns me dark looks from the other diners. The ***** biker with no manners.

I have a moment of tired reflection and then I get a visitor to my table. An old lady, dressed in her Sunday best, moves with slow deliberation and takes an unexpected seat across from me. Her frail hands wrap my grimy ones in a cool and gentle grip.

Her eyes, framed by a wrinkled face that smooths as she smiles at me, capture mine before she bows her head and prays loud enough for all to hear. “Lord, please help this young man find his way. He’s lost, alone, and needs your guidance to help cleanse his heart and his soul.”

She kisses my hand and, without another word, stands again. There’s a reverent silence as we all watch her sit back down at her table and take a bite of her breakfast as if nothing exceptional had just occurred.

I look out the window as the rising sun reflects off of my bike, thinking that, here, maybe it wasn’t really that exceptional at all.   And thinking; lady – I’m not lost; I’m finally finding myself again.

red cardinal
alights upon my bike –
  notices me

I worry about everything, baby
I'm a
    writer - a poet
    passion begets anxiety
it's my job  hell
I even worry about
        my worrying
my stress is recursive
mere moments only can I
    break the loop
      forget to worry
        and smile
usually it's when I'm
    with you

when you have had
one too many
you can’t write coherently
and need to stop
trying to be deep
and meaningful
give it up, man
with five shots of
whisky
in your gut
you’re not a poet
you’re just a man with
too many words and
not enough sense to
stop typing

when they're
eating my brain;
I hope they choke on my
fears, self-loathing, and mostly my
regret

the rocket launch;
inside Orion
a new star

dolphin slaughter
   in disingenuous and exquisite
Japanese inlets
hunger as an epidemic
   in the shadowed corners of
the world
putrid and rotting flesh
rampant disease
gmo crops making us all
     fat
these are things to
          worry
about, to fret and rally over
   yet here
I sit, wondering in
      mild horror
why I write better poetry
with
    two
       shots
of whiskey
  in my gullet
than when I am sober

at my age
drinking whiskey
with young
Marines
is a poor choice
Decades of practice
and years of experience
keep me seemingly
sober
for longer -
I beat my nephew at
chess
in five moves
bragging about my skill and
prowess
but really, my nine shots
to his
three give me an
unfair advantage;
I’ve learned to handle
my whiskey
I mock these young
soldiers
for their lack of
stamina,
knowing all the while
they will wake at
0600,
run three miles,
and feel great
while I will
sleep
until 0900
and feel like
**** all day

the fog outside my window creates
miniature halos around each
streetlight -
mocking me with their
barometrically-induced
divinity
how the **** can a streetlight
find God when all I find
are more reasons to dislike
my fellow man?

every day, all day,
on every channel
(CNN, MSNBC, FOX, ABC, NBC, CBS)
I see hour after
hour
of so-called news about
the latest boogeyman Arab,
celebrity pregnancies,
something else that
causes cancer,
a book that will
change my life,
or a heartwrenching expose
on teen drugs use in
suburbia.

hundreds of hours of
"news"
every day.  We talk
so much and still
fail to communicate.

And all the while, the light
outside
my window reaches enlightenment
without ever
saying
a
word.

little
nugget, wide-eyed,
hairless, with red-faced wails;
you just ate - why are we awake
tonight?

Whiskey
dark chocolate,
smooth jazz, and some gritty
poetry are all that I need
tonight

amber
nectar that burns -
the whiskey on my breath -
fuels my rage, my lust, but weakens
my ****

the false dawn
banishes
     false hopes
of finding sleep
ahead of the rising sun
transient glow accompanies
     first blush birdsong
the cardinal's aubade
     ushering
          greeting
     the brush's first stroke
across the canvas of night
twitching limbs
     bloodshot eyes
          nonstop freight train of thought
               all
                    night
                         long -
these afflictions allow me
to witness the lonely beauty
     of today's sunrise

Handcuffed
for buying a
flower from a roadside
vendor.  America summed up
right there.

You've been here before.  You woke up today and realized that the stress, the angst, and the foreboding that you've allowed to rule your life is there by choice.  You've gotten lost in the spiral of anxiety, again.

If it's not your health, it's your money.  If it's not the money, it's your kids.  If it's not your kids, you're worried about past life choices and how they will affect you tomorrow.  Your fears line up at the door, wrap around the block, and await their turn.  Your door is open to them all and you don't deny them.  You let them in.  

Once they are inside, you wrap your fears around you.  They’re a welcome smothering; a wearying security blanket of trembling phobia.  They are as familiar to you as they are distressing.  These constant, restless, companions are more comfortable than the unknown.  

Today, though, you stare at the line of fears and realize that something is missing.  Happiness.  Contentment.  Acceptance.  These are conspicuous in their absence.  And you remember an old Cherokee tale.  You have two wolves engaged in eternal battle inside you; one is fear and anxiety and the other is peace and serenity.  The strongest is the one you feed and you've been feeding the wrong wolf.  

You've done this your entire life in a self-centered, selfish, guilt-ridden, indulgent, fashion.  You wallow in the darkness because you're afraid you don't deserve the light.

You know you’ll feed the right wolf today.  But can you do it tomorrow?  

  mighty river;
the fish navigates
​as it will

Wear a bathrobe
when beating the keyboard,
when borrowing words from your muse;
Let the stale air in the
dim room
form as
     fragrant
beads of sweat,
thick with whiskey,
on your brow
Wonder if what you're
     writing
is poetry or ****
Proceed to not care and
write, write, write baby
because at the end of it all,
when the words are used up
and you've sobered up,
someone will tell you
     it's ****
and someone will tell you
     it's gold
But you don't give a ****, do you?
You just
     reach for the whiskey
bottle and ask your muse
     for some more
Netflix and chill
But hey, wear that bathrobe;
     it gives you character

plastic dinosaur
made from fossil oil -
  recursion

full flower moon
in its halo
a space station

I walked out of my office today at noon
and slid into the stream of pedestrians -
the hipsters stroking their beards,
the pale professionals blinking in the sun,
mothers pushing strollers through the crowd
with more skill than a racecar driver

before I knew it, I walked past my lunch destination
I kept walking - and watching
the people of my town share a sidewalk
without attacking one another

for a moment I was tempted to take a picture
post it on online,
make a socio-political statement;
if people from all walks of life
can share the sidewalk
can we not find common ground?

I left my phone in my pocket - decided against
adding my unnecessary opinion to the
manufactured outrage
that is the sad truth of social media

I smiled at a pretty lady pushing her baby
she smiled back
and we shared a brief human moment
I kept walking

disease,
poverty, war -
hatred and bigotry
everywhere; yet each day birds
still sing

I command it all
with imperious verbal commands
automation through the ether
my lights come on
the television, voice activated
spoken queries answered by the
computer in my home
    - sports scores
    - weather
    - news
    - reminders
vibration of my vocal chords
compels my thermostat
orders my groceries
and plays my music
I am the master of my domain
and yet now, more than ever,
I control
    nothing

on this cloudless night
pushing through the Pittsburgh haze,
daring to present themselves,
entwined in cosmic tango, are
Jupiter and the Moon.
the bands play across a
diluted Jovian face. while the storm
    rages on
the lunar rocks and craters,
perfectly visible imperfections,
cast petulant shadows -
reminding me that
from destruction one can
   still find beauty.

bullies
online and off-
they hide from their demons
by becoming monsters themselves
in vain

that satellite
is wearing a cape!
  super moon

full flower moon
in its halo -
the space station

she lies
     amid a twisted and
       sweaty sheet
  a goddess basking in
     naked glory
  her silky wetness
     coats my beard,
     white and hoary
I grin,
     lay next to her,
   in mild conceit
as her body
   trembles in final throes
  of lascivious
     ******* delight
  low purr from her
    lips
  as my passion ignites
she gives
     me the look that I
     cannot oppose
     pushes me back,
  her head
     between
  my legs, a
   playful bite
  lets me know it's
     my turn

Green as the pirate seas Caribbean,
her eyes pulsate with the thundering surf.
Majestic squall, power most stygian,
lurks just beneath the surface of her mirth.

The salt-filled breeze, a warm westward phantom,
imparts its lazy life to flaming locks;
brushes the kisses that from angels come,
caresses lips, a smile that faintly mocks.

Tropical dress clings to a body lithe,
swaying gently on the sand-covered dune
gazing at the sea, a creature of myth
spoken of in countless stories and rune.

Enchanted, I am drawn to my Siren.
She sings for me alone - the least of men.

Bloodied fingers are badges of honor
that few men suffer themselves to accept.
Part of the debt the instrument incurs;
a separation of skilled and inept.

The mastery of half a dozen steel
strings oft becomes a lifetime endeavor.
This daring quest for musical ideals
demands commitment lasting forever.

A hollow body touches the essence
of perfection that is merely expressed
by mortal beings of inconsequence
who caress the Muse nevertheless.

Ten fingers endure torture on six strings
for melodies only guitars can bring.

fighting ourselves
we never see
  -- that alien ship

The Penguins are playing tonight
I have a belly full of high-quality
whiskey,
a fine cigar between my fingers,
and a pleasant buzz dulling my
constant anxiety.
The announcers play-by-play,
constant and frantic,
blares through my 70-inch television
adding artificial drama, but I like it.
I'm surrounded by my
precarious middle class wealth
while thousands of
slaves suffer and die in Lybia.
But I’m drunk, oblivious, and happy that
my team
just scored

Sweet thing
with vacant eyes,
don't back up off of me.
**** dancer, please be my girl
tonight.

The taste
of my cigar
and the whiskey in my
gullet can't fill the pit inside
my chest

The best men and women
in this life are not the
holy
or the righteous. They
are not
found in the
church or temple.
We live in a world
where religious
virtue
is conflated with
bigotry, racism,
and hatred.
Only the godless are truly
good.