I know, it's four in the morning
and I should be sleeping,
but these thoughts I keep thinking,
they just go on endlessly.
I think about my past
and how I got to where I am,
who I want to be become,
and who I love being with.
I think about how I've grown
and about how my dog has grown  
I think of conversations I can't remember the endings to
and I remember the worst parts
of everything too.
I wonder how my distant family is doing
and whether or not they think of me too?
But near the end of this sequence
I always come back to me and you.
So you see, there are things
that keep me up late at night,
it probably would help if I just closed my eyes.

The plot of dirt has vines growing
But the rain drowns them again.
In the water, the leaves dance lazily,

waving, the pool floods over the broken
sidewalk, kissing my feet
I rush through.

The sky gives me a coat of mist
And I hug myself tighter
Wishing I could sleep.

Some of my friends swear they are, but I'm not.



(sonnet #MMMMMMCCXL)


Rain.  Just a whisper as how twilight thence
Steals thinly 'cross the ist more fragile scale
Of wet?  I caught that note in sweet all hail
To say "it can't be--!" puddles' ghostly sense
Now winking lightly from the blacktop, whence
That subtler voice of traffic hissing, pale
In deeper shadows' lonely wake, t'avail
Was't true, and phone recharging, what from hence?
I'm sleepy.  Blackened silhouettes hulk fer
Good measure in the darkness, like a crew
Upon some ghastly mission as it were,
But I'm too tired for aught now, lying down to
Effect right in this stuffed chair.  Call it poor,
And one espresso long gone, kiss me too?

02Apr17c

I looked in the mirror this morning
but I swear I didn’t see anybody
There was a body but no one to fill it
Flesh and blood set on auto pilot
aimed for six feet under;
Black rings wrapped around my eyes
with a straight face
I Plunder to get to the shower.
Semi-awake to fill up empty space.
Because getting out bed is relentless,
I do it every day like clockwork,
but every time it gets a little harder.
Like someone adding weights to my hour hands
'Till one day I won’t get up.
I can barely make it to 9 O’clock
… in the morning
I look at the sun and start mourning
Because it means I must heave myself
Out of bed and pretend that I am living,
When my bed knows otherwise.
It’s smarter than I because it knows to lay still
And let the world pass by.
Humans are supposed to fake it 'till we make it,
But all I want to do is make my bed
So, I can go back to sleep and let the world pass by.
Sure, I’m a stand-up guy
But I probably only held the door for you
Because I fell asleep on the way out.
And if you say thank you
it will remind me to wake up
and keep me pretending to live.
No doubt I fall asleep all the time.
People think I have bad hearing
But I’m just sleeping with my eyes open.
If I don’t respond just give me a little nudge
And repeat everything you just said.
I’m not deaf …   or dead yet.
I just can’t keep my mind open
For too long before the demons crawl out.
Thus, I fall asleep and fight in dreams
To wake up to your next sentence
More exhausted than the last.
It’s not my fault
I’m just a little bit dead
And a little bit sleepy

WASHINGTON IRVING WROTE A NOVEL
ABOUT ICHABOD CRANE
LITTLE SLEEPY HOLLOW
WILL NEVER BE THE SAME

LITTLE SLEEPY HOLLOW WAS CURSED
BY A HORSEMAN MOST DREAD
HE WAS RIDING IN SLEEPY HOLLOW
IN SEARCH OF HIS HEAD

THE HEADLESS HORSEMAN WAS
IN THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR
SO FOR HIM SEARCHING FOR HIS HEAD
WAS NEVER A CHORE

ICHABOD CRANE WAS
A TEACHER MOST STRICT
WEATHER THE GHOST STORIES WERE TRUE
WHO COULD EVER PREDICT

ICHABOD TEACHES THE CHILDREN
OF FARMERS IN THE VILLAGE
BUT ITS THE YOUNG GIRLS OF FARMERS
HE SECRETLY WANTS TOO PILLAGE

KATRINA VAN TASSEL A
BEAUTIFUL YOUNG STUDENT
ICHABOD FALLS IN LOVE WITH HER
BUT WAS IT VERY PRUDENT

HE WAS INVITED TO THE TASSELS
FOR A PARTY MOST RARE
KATRINA AT THE PARTY
DISMISSES HIS WITHOUT CARE

ICHABOD LEAVES THAT NIGHT
ON HIS HORSE HE RIDES
ITS AN EERILY DARK PATH
HIS HORSE DOSE STRIDE

ICHABOD IS SCARED AND SEES
A LARGE DARK MAN
HE YELLS TO THE STRANGER
AS LOUD AS HE CAN

SO ICHABOD RIDES SCARED AND FAST
BUT ALONG SIDE COMES THE MAN
NOT WILLING TOO PASS

ICHABOD NOTICES THE RIDER
REALLY HAS NO HEAD
THIS JUST FILLS ICHABOD
WITH THE MOST SINFUL DREAD

ICHABOD AND THE STRANGER
RACE TO THE TOWN CHURCH
FOR THIS IS WHERE THE GHOST STORIES
FIRST CAME TO BIRTH

ICHABOD RACES TO THE BRIDGE
AND NERVOUSLY LOOKS BACK
THE STRANGER HAS DISAPPEARED
OFF THE GHOSTLY TRACK

BUT HE NOTICES THE STRANGER
HIS HEAD HE DOSE HURL
ICHABOD FALLS OF THE HORSE
HIS WORLD IS IN A WHIRL

THE NEXT DAY ICHABOD'S
HORSE FINALLY RETURNS HOME
WHERE IS ICHABOD
WHERE DID HE ROAM

THEY LOOK FOR ICHABOD
AND FIND HOOF PRINTS
AND ICHABOD'S HAT
SO NOW THE FOLKLORE IS BORN
IN SLEEPY HOLLOW THAT'S THAT

" WISDOM IS LIKE MANURE IT'S NO GOOD UNLESS IT'S SPREAD AROUND ENCOURAGING OTHERS TO GROW"