patterned love responses
spiraling outward from
the chest in search
of hearth and
hemlock to
soothe the brittle
bones of a
generation lost
to time.

I remember a feeling
once felt in
the spacious quality
of my life
in its infancy.

a 'coo' to my
mother--her face
beaming through
the unknown
harshness of life
yet to touch me.

father was out
working, adding
more and more
points of stress to
his life to provide
for the seeds
he sewed in the
soil of his youthful
ignorance.

adulthood snuck
up on me too and
now its too late to
go back.

these days
the only coup
that will save me
is the one
I perpetrate
against myself.
the one that
corrodes my beliefs
and illuminates
the extent of their
misconceptions about
the world and
what it means
to be me.

loyal are the lashes
that lick my flesh
serving the blood
that drips and
flows to the
soil of my own
wasted youth.

all I can do now
is look forward
to the unknown
that looms ahead;
terrifying and promising
failure and change
alike.

pray to your altars
and cry to the
invisible mute gods;

they will answer
in kind in the
laughter of children
playing upon
your spent life.

and so it goes--
life eats life
and mother's die
too.

use your voice
while you have
it--speak of clouds
and storms that
broke you, of winter
and the living
silence you've endured.

praise be to the
broken and the
weary of heart, for
in the breaking is
the great gift
of life

and what you
become after each
shattering is nothing
short of your
endless potential.

Say goodnight
to that psychopathic
narcistic guy.

You all used to say
you were about to make
America great.

So, say goodbye
to that uncouth
wanna cause
a violent coup
dipstick dude
who many of you
were following
through to
treason.

Must be a
hard pill to swallow
cause you haven’t taken
the medicine
of getting rid of him
and accepting
the election.

Such a bad *******
for the fool who
won’t move on
fast enough.
Instead, he is
getting everyone
riled up
and stealing money.

It’s not even funny,
how he hurt so many.
It’s a cold chilly January
as he tries to dismember
that capitol with his fans.
Then throws them
under the bus.

This is how he uses
and abuses his stooges,
just ask Mike Pence.

So, forth hence
say farewell
to the ne’er-do-well.
He might not be
going to hell,
but if we are lucky,
he will be going to jail.

the capitol is burning .

                      the capital is burning .

We'd be on the list,
he said

In days past,
that list for VIP-s only
was for a screening, a fashion show
A red carpet, a gallery soiree

But days before the Election
he was quietly referring
to a purge list
A VIP of a different sort

We'd be on the list,
he said,
if there was a coup,
for being artistic dissidents

The sun sets in Hollywood
and I'm in the VIP Room
which is my living room
praying, hoping for peace

I expected a chariot,
was trained to hold reins,
feed horses,
and know when to whip them.
Hours I spent shuffling across sheer faces
to teach me the balance necessary.
I took notes from oaks on how to keep my feet firmly planted,
legs bending, never breaking.
I suffered the hurricane
to learn to not blink with wind in my face.
I humored Time, to learn from its spinning wheel
so that I might know my own.
I turned to the trust of beasts
thinking they might one day guide me.
I glared at charioteers,
My coliseum competition.
I sat, eyes closed, by the ocean
To acquaint me with a roar
I would expect from an audience.
I stripped myself bare
So that I may learn the choices of judges.
I was prepared for a chariot.

But what arrived was a ratty coup of unknown make;
a wheezing, rusted contraption with wobbling wheels,
a cracked, insect-stained windscreen,
valves of leaky ichor,
a missing cigarette lighter,
a lockless glove box,
a tailpipe that belched black omen,
windows that rolled by hand and got stuck,
seats of the kind of leather your skin sticks to in the summer and froze in winter,
and an AM/FM radio filled with static.
No spare tire.

I was livid.


This vehicle was to carry me to my onward days,
to the paradise of my imagination?
I was to collude with my romantics in the passenger seat
of this rolling mausoleum?
To commute to my place of wage
and not have my vessel reflect my value?
To pass my days of leisure
knowing a bunker of my perturbation watched from the driveway?

I tried to hew a chariot of my own,
but first the wood of the trees of my garden proved too weak.
Then my crooked wheels seemed to want to separate away from each other.
And the only beasts to pull it were dogs,
made fat from the gristle of my meals that I threw them
in my days of anticipation.
I conceded to the coup.

Misery so often my chauffeur,
I plotted and plodded along with the wheels I was given,
Diverting my eyes from Apollos in the sky,
Pulled by glistening pegasi.

A friend,
also couped up,
Told me to make the most of it.
So I’ve been trying.

I tried to take its namelessness as something to which I might give a name.
As it wheezed I heard it breathing, liable to collapse, but
Alive
nonetheless.
The warped wheels wove their own way,
and I imagined the invisible burden of unseen beasts
with greater senses of direction than mine.
I saw the insects in front of me as company.
As the pipes oozed, I conjured hopes that they were like a gallbladder,
concentrating bile then removing it.
I sensed that the missing lighter meant I shouldn’t be smoking.
The glove box lacked a latch for ease of access,
and I read from the messages scrawled in smoke in my rear-view mirror.
The effort made to breathe through the manual windows
made me appreciate the breaths I took.
The broken sound system taught me to make my own music.
And the lack of a spare tire taught me to drive very, very carefully;
There would be no second chances.

The coup is a symptom of my broken hopes for my future’s reality.
But,
unlike the chariot,
it is real,
and its state of breaking can
Hopefully
be fixed.
I can sit when I wish to be seated.
I can bring others with me wherever.
The direction is dictated by me and not the whims of beasts.
The AC stutters, but it’s there.
There’s a trunk where I can put my memories.
And,
also unlike the chariot,
I can go very, very fast
if I want to.

Twilight washes the bedlinens blue
And striped with flickering light they seem to move
And beckon us to lie in their folds,
Drawing away our clothes,
Pushing some to the floor.
Who are we to resist,
As the pretty song of strings off-key,
Winding through the forest rain
Like a goddess shedding robes,
Manipulates our minds and skins,
Only appeased by the union of
Heaven and Earth, of you and I?
Let us oblige them with our bodies,
You descending like the rain upon me
And I rising to you as the urgent river in waves
Beneath you until we are One?
If only for a night, in the Indonesian dark,
The tinkling droplets on the roof,
The flickering fires, the clouded desires.
We will send our lust into the mist and air,
So that it knows us when we are done at last,
And in every night until the world ends.

Establishing hierarchical roles
Nicaean council for food stuffs
The meal that breaks ones fast
A culinary czar
His Rasputin, not another repast
His downfall not so obvious
A cuisine coup d’état,
Caffeinated beverages.
‘Twas coffee that stormed the breakfast Bastille

Ian Kennedy and Pavle Pavlović

As Sol the Rouge begins to rise,
it warms Eve’s heart, but Downs her eyes.
A dusty halo round the flame
will touch the dunes and dawn proclaim,
as distant dusty storms reflect
on Eve’s dry eye and her deject.
To get up now it is her task –
No more in Sol-light can she bask.

You must recall: it was Eve’s Gran
who went to Mars to start a clan.
From little pool Eve chose her Buzz
and paired with him, who was her cuzz.
Through porthole now Eve sees no wood,
nor earthy ground for motherhood.
With hasty zeal space courier flies;
A sandy landing ’fore her eyes.

So, as the dawn of morn is broke,
our Eve then hops, with grace unspoke,
goes out of base to Lander Stop
to fetch the parcel she does hop.
Her ‘FedEx’ was by Earth prepaid,
and on this day had come her AID,  
by careful voyage, with prosp’rous end,
the ***** arrived that Earth did send!

Low-G and man-made air do need
the seed to make a better breed.
Incestuously is not a scheme:
a gene pool needs a brand new stream.
We want no feeble Mars-strain seed,
So A.I.Dee is for the deed.
From Earth doth come the flow of genes
as bottled stuff – you know the means!

To make the Martians extra strong
The Earth Decreed all inbreeds wrong:
All ***** from Earth-bound men must come.
Through outer space it must have swum!
In DNA do secrets lie,
tho’ some do think that fated sky
will give them scope to freely screen
the final flux of wanted gene.

“I’m not at ease, but lurk and look –
  I peer at pack from Earthly nook.
  Where linger ye, my family lift
  to proffer me some needed gift
  of fruit or nuts and comfort care?
  The time is right to use what’s there?
  No creature comfort do I need.
  My friends, I’m ready for some seed!”

“My boy must have my Buzz’s face,
  and then our girl should have his grace.
  A pigeon pair with rusty hair,
  and maybe also one as spare.
  We want his freckles on each cheek,
  that all who pass-by touch and tweak.
  Buzz wants them looking just like he
  yet also really be like me!”
                                                        
The­ season’s winds bring rain and freeze
and stirs up dust with just a breeze.
And when Sol’s power does make it soar,
the wind behind rolls more before.
If’s no heat from sunless sky,
with daylight gone, the storm does die.
Unlike her feelings which grow strong,
uprooting thoughts of what is wrong.

The storm now sounds like raging ire,
and echoes of her inner fire.
As sand blocks Sol for just a while,
it’s just so long that she’s fertile.
With redhead Buzz she wants to splurge.
To break Decree she now has urge.
“I need a gravid tum, now mine’s too thin!
  A child by him: I need to sin?”

To lock herself to Earthly Kit
and shrug off worry just a bit?
But she recalls her lover’s eyes
as endless hormones swell and rise.
“Here is The Kit for you to use”.
“I do detest! I do refuse!
Then fast it dawned on me.” – she smiled –
“I’ll flip the way to have my child.”

“ So at a juncture here I stand,
  with earthy Kit in my right hand.
  Now let me throw it out as trash,
  and see Kit burn to light gray ash!
  For we are first to break Decree.
  Oh gosh, it’s us! My god, it’s me!
  On Mars it is a primal crime!
  ’Hind bars might we be held to time?”

Unlike the Martian pioneer race,
they can no longer pick their place.
Air in the base is made for breath,
for outer air is instant death.
So Eve and Buzz are in the can.
And who’s to blame? It was their gran!
The Space Base is completely jail!
(Nor could they ever raise some bail.)

As red sky flares in real turn
then Earth’s old rules do curl and burn.
While sky does grow in ****** glow
Her love for Buzz will drive the flow.
“’Tis I, the bandit, burned The Kit,
with Buzz my man! To Earth: ‘Go flit!’
Like clarion storm I’ll shout, Rejoice!
and fiercely punch the air with voice.”

“This is the daybreak of my life!
  Tonight I really will be wife.
  I know this is my true found right –
  No more for me, moist tears at night.
  Instead, I spread some happy joy
  towards my big and beaming ‘boy’.
  O, Oh! how happy we are free,
  just jestful, zestful, Buzz and me!"

Next E-mail from the Earth appears,
and has our happy pair roll tears.
“A flaw was found in chromosome  
On all accounts must ***** succumb”!
“My heart confirms that right’s my choice:
  oh, come with me, let us rejoice!
  Today Mars broke the Earth’s Decree
  Last night we loved in our low-G!”

Next Sol does rise – Eve’s hopes do too,
as thoughts begin for Martian coup.
“Can women have new Martian Law
  to stop the rules that have a flaw?”  
“The Laws of Eve on Mars now reign
  and Earth does not its Laws ordain.
  From Earth it is today we deign
  that laws of Earth and Mars are twain.”

-----------------
Legal opinion: Eve's love-making was incestuous in two ways as it 1) involved having excessive intimacy in one third gravity 2) was with Buzz, her third generation cousin, which was against the reigning Earth Rule. (She escaped sanctions by going on to found the Martian Unilateral Declaration of Independence!)