#visitors
No one ever comes
to visit, I like that, though --
it is regretful.
Dec 30, 2025
Dec 30, 2025 at 2:22 AM UTC
stagnant frustration
no vacation from
my station, little to
no elation, burn this
nation with no
foundation, and on
the grave a single
carnation.
Nov 28, 2025
Nov 28, 2025 at 11:55 AM UTC
In all my iterations, and my frequent reiterations,
Introspection reflection, run a muck, I find it unnecessary
To talk to God; the reason being quite simple, is
It and I are in constant dialogue, nary a pause, chattering
Round the clock, 24 seven, night and day, sleep interruptus,
I think to myself God has some nerve,
why can't he bother others?
in other parts of the world…
And so he does!
Visitors from far away lands, and languages I do not understand, but applaud their attempts to decipher the English one, that we share in common; if the lands are exotic, the names are more delightfully so, almost ****** It excites and titillates, to greet these kindred souls whose words be greeted by puzzlement, intrigue, like the delight of rediscovering vanilla, it's the same language spoken differently!
and god smiles and says:
"knew you would eventually speak my soul language!'"
Jul 29, 2025
Jul 29, 2025 at 11:23 AM UTC
The old threshold is
not worn out, my visitors --
step right over it.
Feb 23, 2023
Feb 23, 2023 at 2:35 AM UTC
a 2021 holiday story
Lisa’s dad has a visitor from out of town - a “very important man.” He came early. He was dressed casually, in slacks, and a jacket over a mock-turtleneck. He was genial, behind tortoiseshell glasses, but he seemed ordinary, polite and a bit grandfatherly.
The adults visited, in the living room, while we girls played gin-rummy. Later, seafood was delivered from “Le Bernardin” - I got fried shrimp and 18 raw oysters on the ½ shell (yum).
After dinner, I was free (having set the table) to relax on Lisa’s balcony and watch the city. It was cold-ish but the breeze had gentled, it was the tail end of dusk and the fast-darkening sky was bluer than blue. Why waste time sitting inside on the Internet flipping Instagram’s flat little pictures - when there’s this stunning, 3D reality available?
The important man came out to smoke a cigar. The steady breeze blew the smoke away in the other direction. We sat silently, like astronauts in space enjoying the view of earth. The city's traffic, reduced to pinpricks of red and white light, reminded me of dewdrops along a spider web.
After a few minutes, he pointed his cigar at the view and said, “The city lights, a seductive woman, a cigar and bourbon - who needs more?”
I was momentarily confused, then I bristled, but didn’t show it. Of course, it was just fluff and flattery, a non sequitur compliment from another age - aimed at both of us really - so polished it wrapped around again to the generic. He, of course, was the romantic lead and I the seductive woman. “Is that what I am?” I asked myself, trying to transpose the male gaze.
The glass door opened, interrupting the moment and Leeza (12) came out with a tray and two huge pieces of Dutch-apple-pie à la mode for the two of us. She looked at the avuncular man and said, “I could only carry two, can I get you something?” “No thanks,” he said, raising a bar glass half full of bourbon. A moment later Lisa’s dad joined him, saying, “I called Mumbai and bla, bla, bla, boring boring.” Leeza and I took our leave.
Lisa and her mom were just finishing the dishes. I came close-up to Lisa, flounced my hair and said, in my slinkiest voice, “I’m a seductive woman.” Lisa laughed and replied, “Well of course you are!” Her mom, Karen, also understanding the joke, rolled her eyes. I could almost feel Leeza, locked onto us, trying to decipher the context for that exchange.
Lisa says, in a conspiratorial whisper, “I think he has a thing for you,” wiggling her eyebrows. “Ooo, Marry me, DADDY,” I say, batting my eyes and wiggling vampishly.
“Shhh,” Karen says, shaking her head, finger to lips and chuckling.
Jan 21, 2022
Jan 21, 2022 at 7:36 AM UTC
I believe that fire was still a mystery
when the hunt was interrupted by the visitors
knowing that the creatures were startled by their presence
these visitors could passively drop the gold dust
into the creek from which they drank
and as expected, the dumbfounded four
with mouths agape
watched in disbelief without twitching a muscle
though it is not ascertained
that disbelief was a function of the thought
process that they were at this time
capable
it was not lost on these creatures
however,
our forefathers
that these odd newcomers were far superior
than the mastodon they were tracking with rocks
the 3 visitors gave a glance to their soon-to-be hybrid offspring
and were off
the ability to convey their experience when they returned to their caves
fell futile
there were as yet no grunts to properly describe what they had witnessed
the DNA structure leading to the ceiling
of the evolutionary scale was no longer a towering, folding beast
but rather a mere stepladder
fire was discovered
tools, arrows, weaponry
and monuments that we have yet to explain how
were constructed
while the last true human
but a young child when the visitors came
who had observed from afar
drank only from a pond that they had not touched
he passed like a story from the ancients
forgotten in time
Apr 3, 2018
Apr 3, 2018 at 4:08 PM UTC
We are just visitors
For a brief time
Travelling through a few milestones
Our time is finite
Our interactions are finite
So, why have an ego
Which is also finite?
Let us be friends with the world
With the people, plants
Trees and climbers
With the butterflies
And the beasts as well
Since our journey is finite
Make Life as easy as possible
And make it merry as well..
Leave a few sweet memories
For those who come after us.
Sep 28, 2017
Sep 28, 2017 at 1:11 AM UTC
I am in a wheelchair on grass
outside the hospital
I hear birds sing and distant traffic
I stare into the darkness
trying to fathom my blindness
my toes feel itchy even though
my legs have gone
and the stumps well bandaged
hello Grace
a voice says from my right side
Anthony?
I say
is it you?
yes Grace it is
he says
I sense him near me
I reach out to touch him
he takes my hand
Donald said you were coming
I say
did he?
Anthony says
I hear someone else come
and place something
on the grass nearby
this is Philip
Anthony says
hello
a voice says
a hand take my mine and shakes it
how are you?
Philip says
rather lost
I say
any news about your eyes?
Anthony asks
they think I will always be blind
I say
o so sorry
Anthony says
I hear them sit down
and whisper things I cannot fathom
look Grace I'll be honest with you
if Donald told you
I was thinking of marrying you
then he got the wrong end
of the stick
Anthony says
I look toward the voice
and stare at darkness
I see but as you yourself
never told me about marriage
then it doesn't matter
I say
(Donald said Anthony said
he was going to ask
but I say nothing)
who would want
a blind legless woman
for wife anyway?
I say more bitterly
than I intended
it's not that
Anthony says
it would be out of pity not love
he says
I mean not the love
necessary to handle such
he adds
Clive may have done
but he's dead
I say
killed at Dunkirk
there is silence
I look away from the voice
and look downward
maybe you will find
that someone
Anthony says
after a few moments of silence
maybe I will
I say
a hand touches mine
I'm sure you will
Philip's voice says
and are you the expert
on finding matches
for blind legless women?
I say coldly
look Grace I must go
make a telephone call
Anthony says
and he goes off
it is quiet for a moment or two
how would you like
to go out for a meal somewhere?
Philip says to my left
like this?
no in a dress
and with make up
he says
who would want me
in their restaurant like this?
I say
I know a place where
we would be welcome
he says softly
and you would want me
like this there?
have you a dress and make up?
he asks
no my house was bombed
I lost everything including
legs and sight
I say with a sigh
maybe I can buy you a dress and clothes
if you tell me your size?
I have no coupons
everything has gone
I say
I can arrange that
I work for the Foreign Office
he says
why would you want to?
I say
I admire your courage
he says
I look toward the voice
I tell him my size and other things
then sit quiet looking
into the darkness again
Anthony returns and sits and says
look sorry about the short visit
but I've got an urgent message
must go
he says and he kisses my cheek
and goes again
I'll do what I can Philip says
and he kisses my hand and goes
I am left alone
with bird song
and itchy toes
which are not there
and I sit
and sigh and stare.
Jan 9, 2016
Jan 9, 2016 at 6:14 AM UTC
Got my whole world closed down
In a lockdown
Under surveillance
Hoping no one can see what's inside
No one is allowed in
Without special permission
Yet you’re here
How did you get in
You snuck in under my radar like no one before
You must have some serious skill
But now I must remove you from the premises of my world
You are a threat to the wellbeing and surroundings
You don't belong here yet
How did you get here
Why are you here
My whole world is closed down to everyone around me
In a lock down with security heavily guarding every part
How did you get in
Sure you can visit
Sure you can take a peak
But don't cross inside
That's how it's always been
So how did you get past the barb wire
How did you get past the landmines
Snuck in under my radar
Now I don't know how to get you out
You know to much already
Seen too much of what happens in here
How did you get in to this place
Where no one else has been aloud before.
My world is closed down to everyone else
So how did you sneak your way in
Please don't leave
Visitors are nice
And are few and far between
I don't mind them once in a while
Promise you won't spill the secrets you have seen
Or the secrets you have heard.
You've seen too much already
You know too much now.
Sep 15, 2014
Sep 15, 2014 at 8:48 PM UTC
She had stopped crying.
All evening in her black-mesh coup de voodoo.
On the plane she had been crying
For her Summer pal. Yesterday she had been to market
Big brown bags and white bags, little pink bags filled with crimsony scents,
Capricornia, looseleaf newsprint, postcards, and colored pencils,
She had hands full of handles, bags bundled, stitched in strict Saturday fashion.
He could barely break a step, he could fake dance with her feet on his tip toes.
She was only three quarters the perfect size to fit inside his frame.
The grand disappearing act. And she was only ifs and suicides.
A stranded ray of sun-draped hair on a cooly porcelain forehead, the segments were all just wrong,
Something so wrong, trembling heart cries over a mute coo through a flattened tongue.
The sickle tongue, dodgy on Tuesday's, She had a simple mug, oh! But so cute and soothing, the nape
That wrapped around, my arm lapped its hands in a clapping ginormous duck's bill!
Lapping rhythmically. Thwack! Thwack!
Like no crying I had ever heard. Nor Earthen beauty I had never seen.
Her little lamb legs lumbered over, her awkward thinness and long limbs spilt on top of her,
Her tiny shoulders searching for support from her hips. White aurulent doll head on a stick,
She had sad defeated eyes, whimpering, pathetic,
Too small, and she shuttered and she shook,
And she shivered out every teardrop her body ever made. And she fell back on her bottom, and looked
Up as if to see a white steed standing with her guy striking a poised hand down to her,
He split down the middle, stammering, broken pieces of words crumbling out of his mouth
With eager intentions. He was too weak
To give her his feet, or pull her up in, he hadn't the gumption. He was fully occupied standing,
He wept too; then shuffled a little
Towards where she had fallen. He knew she wasn't right
She couldn't get the devil out of her piercing blue pupils, she couldn't
She lied.
Then she just piled on top of her knees and fumbled as if to rise like a demure lamb trying to rise off its Newborn legs, she just curled her legs,
So stiffly built, and narrow footed, built with such inequality to her siblings,
She got in the way of herself, a little lamb that could not manage.
Too whittled for him, he tried, he really tried, but three years had drained his strength, no real help.
When he sat her upright on her bottom, she opened her eyes, and for a moment smiled, grabbed for His hand but then after awhile she was lost, she lost interest, her pupils wandered.
He was orchestrating everything.
A real project, much more urgent and important. By nightfall she could not stand. It was not
That she couldn't smile or laugh or love, she was born
With everything but the will to live -
That cannot be destroyed, just like a love.
Melancholy was more important to her.
Life could not get her attention.
So she died, with her handles still in her hands, green grass stains her legs.
She did not survive another warm summer night.
And then he wept uncontrollably again.
"The wind is oceanic in the elms
And the blossom is all set."
2
The boy has come back
From the seashore, and atop the plateau.
The woes of women are like a genocide
In the morning, when the killing is over,
And the heat begins, and the bodies lie,
And stark life moves for its sobbing bones,
The curved women move with fire.
Father Father Father the girls
Are weeping, and crying and I cannot resist that gentle frailty
They are shucked in their skin suits rising from their soporific slumbers
In decadent leathers and frou frou dresses. They cling to bold faces,
Nothing can escape that cold crying of women weeping for their princes.
Blood-letting rage cannot overthrow the meadow from the pebble brook,
As a laden head bleats its tarnished tongue across a milky breast, it cannot
Escape the sounds of blue-stained teardrops cascading across the plains,
The sounds of woolbirds braying while their skins are sheared against the
Sluicing sound of water rushing through the flume.
All summer they have lamented, gorging on melancholy, tottering their cotton pyramid heads,
Shaking their cries in deliberation, bald skinny victim women screaming out!
Cotton-mouthed clams yaffing, hearts in panic, wholes of bodies clambering in a *** of woe.
They roost useless, pollard and wethered, jealous
Squinting out the last droplets of desperation from their eyes, screaming their mouths in awful
Togetherness, this cacophony of tortured tongue-song
They curdle the last notes of despair out under knotted breaths
With every inch of strength left inside them, they bray this way and that.
Their mothers scream out in wretched despair, ahhh!
On distant cliffs, on scrawny legs
Their stiff pain goes on and on in the September heat.
"Only slowly their hurt dies, cry by cry,"
Whipped bodies toting wergeld on a shore.
The Day She Died
Was the gloomiest day of the new century,
The first of calamitous, unfortunate autumns to come,
The first dying breath from piceous lungs.
That was yesterday. Early morning, soft rime droplets
Frosted to every blade of grass, not like any other
Earlier June day we've ever had. In the deep twilight
The syzygy announced the moon and demoted the sun.
The Earth-crisp frost nuzzled snow droplets.
Black bands of ravens whipping. Martens littering
Fresh kills of red-eyed rabbits on stark white stale
Summer lawns. A fox grayed, its cold bones
Mapped by ravaged feasts. A possum prowling
In a spot of tawny light.
The concrete spread into a maze
Of black veins ripening in the acute niello
Destitution of its widening cracks,
And when the summer left
It left without her. It will have to accept,
In the paley dim light of this vengeful wilderness -
She is gone.
But for now the warmth has not returned but a naked, half-pomegranate
Rotten moon for us two.
And a great vacancy in our memory.
Apr 26, 2014
Apr 26, 2014 at 5:58 AM UTC