A professor explained to me once
how there is a limited number
of possible designs for making
an arrow point function as intended.

You can't stick a round rock on a stick
and expect it to penetrate like a dart.

It has to be sharp and hard, yet light
to fly like a feather straight and true
to the heart. I said, you mean like love?

She said, yeah, like love, kinda like love.

Many folks
wouldn't read
a poem
unless you put
a gun
to their heads.

I am that gun;
these words
are my bullets;
exactly
those people,
my target
of choice.
  - mce

Good job we never know
it's said

About the times
that lay ahead

Can we trust
what we feel

Do we know
this is real

Can it be
for the best

Do we care
about the rest

Think as you
thinking fast

Time will tell
will it last

Do we follow
head or heart

Can we bear
now to part

Are we selfish
are we blind

Would we be foolish now this far
to leave it all

Leave it all
behind

Your name
Snowballed once inside my brain
And was gone –
(I don't know the Russian for 'one' or 'two'
But for a minute I knew the Russian for you)

So go spend my winnings on the days you've lost,
Your blind-eyed perfect smile is worth the cost,
Good fortune means more to me than luck
But don't sit so close, love,
My poker face is ******.

(You were so good,
Your taste went on for days as no taste should)

One day soon I'll recall your name,

Where I'm from
All the snow melts in the rain

we are always asked
to understand the other person's
viewpoint
no matter how
out-dated
foolish or
obnoxious.
one is asked
to view
their total error
their life-waste
with
kindliness,
especially if they are
aged.
but age is the total of
our doing.
they have aged
badly
because they have
lived
out of focus,
they have refused to
see.
not their fault?
whose fault?
mine?
I am asked to hide
my viewpoint
from them
for fear of their
fear.
age is no crime
but the shame
of a deliberately
wasted
life
among so many
deliberately
wasted
lives
is.

These are days of change.
Eggshell cracks,
Sun rising differently.

Sometimes I put my ear to
The ground and listen.
Heartbeat choirs of

Our unborn children.
Seeds of poets.
Write love; not war.

you liked
red nail polish &
the smell of gasoline;
the molecular structure
of oxygen.

you liked orchestras,
dinner candles in empty bottles,
the sound of moving trains, you

stole
cheap ballpoint pens
  & you father’s new cigars.

you played philip glass on the piano,
put too much ice in your whiskey,
only ever cried in the shower.

you only owned one DVD.

you used newspapers
to light fires in flower pots but
never read them —
you got the news from the radio
in the car, when stuck
in traffic.     you ran red lights,
balanced on the edge
of the universe as if
life
was a tightrope
or some nihilistic punchline.

you had the courage of stars
and wildfire eyes — I tried
to find myself
outside of you.

you called me ‘baby’ and burnt
my lungs
with your perpetual cigarettes

&

I cannot
forget
you.

We knew nothing of war, we were
Brought up in peace.
Those days were a different
Colour than these.
We played in the fields,
Built houses in trees.
Few children on Earth were as
Lucky as me.

So distant, the light of
Yesterday's skies.
But I remember Paradise.

The smell of her neck, her
Hair in my face.
We'd lie there and stare into
Outter space.
We'd hide from the world, but
The world knows her heart.
She found us together and
Ripped us apart.

So distant, the home that I found
In her eyes.
But I remember Paradise.

I love to look back, but I need  
Not to pine.
Yesterday's carved in the
Backbone of time.
Pearls on the seaside,
Reflecting the past.
More solid than gold are the
Memories that last.

Smoke might rise from tomorrow's skies.
But yesterdays hide not a single surprise.
Time is a hawk, and despite how she flies.
I'll always remember Paradise.