2am
listening to the song of the gnat
as I sit having a crap
book in hand
I always read here
since I had small children
the only place I got any peace

the song stops
I can feel the itch
tiny legs massaging skin
looking for a way in

more people killed than are alive today

quite a reputation for one so small
we always called them gnats
never mosquitos
the gnat sounded more diminutive
less of a threat
but as it turns out
they are connected through
their Latin name, Culicidae  

so I wonder about malaria
how it's coming back to our shores
as I finish the paperwork
and hear the song resume
disturbing it's evening meal

A flake of gold I found in your soul
A boom town it shall never be,
Except for the one digging your hole
How you were left suffering.

Curse those murderous mines
And **** those mosquitoes,
I wish it were me a thousand times
Your soul off to greener meadows.

Don't be scared to cross the gate
Baron Samedi now guides,
Loneliness to acclimate
A widow's final goodbye.


"I never knew afterwards for how many hours of that journey I had flown with a corpse for company because, when I landed, the man was quite dead." ~ Beryl Markham

Thanks again America.
Long ago, you sent me to war
prepared to shed my blood.
I was lucky, mine was spared.
But some hitchhikers came home with me:
tiny, wriggling, tropical parasites.
They love my aging body.
They are true like ******.
They cannot leave me till I die.
Occasionally, they decide to dance.
No doubt, they enjoy themselves.
All they cost me is fever
and appetite,
sleep and peace of mind.
After all these decades,
you still want my blood,
but now you are content
to trouble it inside my veins.
Thanks Again America.