He had wings that
gave him flight.
The sun was
beautiful and bright.
It melted into the ocean.

But there is danger in
flying too low as well,
just ask the mermaids in
the depths of hell.
The seawater screws
up the lift.

Fly to safety and
peace,
not the
fantastical or
far-fetched.
You don't need to
have it all.
Beware of

too

much



ambition.

I am not The Last Spring Overture
My birth name was Spring, not Greig
And I am not the last of us
Although I soon may sadly be.
I gave my violin away
To someone who abused it
And died with it still in its case
And unavailable to me.
I loaned my autoharp to one
Who never gave it back to me.
My mandolin was somehow stolen
Off my wall during a party.
Years have brought me dolorosa
For the music I’ve not made
On instruments I never learned to play,
The voice that wouldn’t do my will.
My mind can play that Overture
And does it almost once a week
So maybe what I said was wrong
I am The Last Spring Overture
ljm

Art history matters. New Master’s degrees
Lead to dull innovation in poetry. Please
Try to write us a poem where meaning is plain
And no MFA patriarch needs to explain.

a statue carved by Bernini/a plate of eggs painted by Velázquez  

Jane, dear Jane, you’re a porcelain idol.
The time has arrived for your verse to unbridle
Itself and reveal some slight traces of life;
We know you are smart, but that dull butter-knife
Of your poetry, smearing the references ’round
Is like Sylvia Plath/Gertrude Stein/Ezra Pound…

personal pan pizza with unlimited free toppings

Those weird sudden line breaks confuse us, in fact,
And the rarefied dishes you name-drop get cracked
On the floor of your poetry, leaving us shards,
Risking splinters for muses and mystified bards.

my arm breaks off  like the shell/of a freshly-filled cannoli

You deadpan in monotone, stunningly brave,
But your tortuous verses go straight to the grave.
Academic obscurantists murmur and nod
As they lower the corpse of your work in the sod…

carelessly thrown baby/a designer toilet cistern

You ought to re-frame and then tighten your lines,
So replete with Old Masters and euro-trash wines:

(…weirdly-named liqueurs in a Rococo  palais)

Why would you not, then, aspire to coherence,
Dismissing the need for white male interference?
Your verses cry out for some fatherly guidance
To try and make sense of your history of silence.

That book in the wicker basket,
North aisle of the nave,
Is one of the saddest things.
Messages for the little ghost who lies,
Alongside,
Some Anglo-saxon kings.

(I watched nobody read it
From a distance.
Her shoulders were shaking.)

Later,
Nobody went with me to London again,
On the train.
The NPG is a short walk across Trafalgar Square
From the station,
And there
(On the third or fifth floor - can't recall)
Was the drawing - so small,
Behind bullet-proof screens,
Alongside,
A bunch of Tudor queens.

(I think I read that she is on tour at the moment.  Australia perhaps.  I wonder who she is rubbing shoulders with now.)

They want bodies.
Warm, compliant bodies. Moving parts.
Hands that open doors and flip switches.
Spines that bend but don’t break.
They want eight hours of labor, plus the commute,
plus the side hustle,
plus the ever-present smile that says,
"I’m lucky to be here."

But bodies need rest.
And there is nowhere to rest.
No shoebox. No storage unit.
No couch, no floor, no friend with a spare key.
Just asphalt and backseats—if you’re lucky.
Just parking lots and fear and pretending to be fine.

We’re told to buy the things that prove we’ve made it:
the ergonomic chair, the smart toaster,
the streaming subscription that numbs the noise.
But where do we put it?
Where do we live with it?
They expect us to consume while we disappear.

They want machines
—but with human elegance.
They want efficiency
—but with soul.
They want labor without the laborer’s needs.

We are the product and the producer.
The face and the function.
They demand dignity at the front desk,
but deny it in the zoning map.

We work full time,
and still live in our cars.
If we have one.
If it hasn’t been towed or repossessed.
If there’s a safe place to park without being harassed.

Why?
Why can you clock in at dawn,
and still sleep under stars you didn’t wish for?

Because they want bodies.
But they do not want the burden of keeping us alive.