it's like the ghosts have all the notes
for all the holes in all the harmonies
a harbinger marooned between an echo
and a living thing.

love is like a nest of all vanishing birds.
just a cusp of abandon and sky.

the woolen steel of fresh snow
crunching between chickadee tweets  
in the crisp air; where a thousand submarines
sank into the supremacy of being swallowed whole
like a vast morsel of madness. stars unhinged
from the sky  like a broken void
for a toy.

to dismay with.

your high tide silhouette
wreathed in oblong stars, grinding-
an ethereal horizon
churning specks of Everything
in a rotating portrait
of a center of
Gravity.

where Love is the rest of it.

When you can’t make sense of the moon
and you perish the thought of more thinking
but “ here they come “... and the hour is late upon you
like truant aspiration, delirious and cactus-eyed
in the palm of unbelievable hands.
You are the first one to not know how this feels.
and you feel it! It’s like a frozen cadet in a permafrost trench
in a field of poppies and happy landmines.
like a grim pregnant pause on the cusp of a vacation
to chrysanthemums that have never been to war
on purpose.

Now
that i spin….
when before; the Sunrise, fell!
and the moon docked
in a paradigm like
a cargo of
blind
love
and astronauts…. I have become
the Cartographer’s Stenographer
in a mute room full of -
angular moments, momentous….
and a bowl full of green cherries
because god is funny now.
now that
I spin.

where our daisies nightly… and our minds politely -
just might be
the rightly garments of
our inner varmints.
or Something has just
Might Be.
but something precisely -
has dawn in a vice. armaments shiny.
and all of our beautiful
dying -

dying ignightly.

parentheses.

so Love is outside
We.

Two of you are walking through the door with glass mittens
and meteors purging all speed through a tube of the absolute dark.
And nothing can stop you.
As you both descend, gliding on fumes Sumerian and actually music -
our eyes connect. I breathe your moons through my derelict Paris, frankly.
You lord over all you survey, like honey in god’s eye… asking for bees
that speak fork in all roads that may lead to flowers
that can’t recall the agony of beauty.
your candleheart glory melons…. spilling into bliss accidentally...
with all the grace of a gossamer etude
in the Silence of a mindful desire
paralyzed
by the Love of You.

i saw all of you.

immortality is easy-peasy. you play dead.

you live now. and simply continue. you just get on with it.
zig-zag in plain sight. like a shimmer in an old daguerreotype.
if you must fade. always do it sideways.

i have tea. i suspect the morning is surrounding the world with a tiny cup of sunlight.
and there are no usual things. everything is unusual. everything.
i am here now… and i feel it. and i will never have a cage with a bird inside. i am not cruel.
i’m drinking tea.

i’m not bored. i’m just waiting. my eyes are never sure about the splendor. they suspect a spring
attached to tiny gears, die cut whirligigs and ethereal hands attending; deep underneath my gazing. and i am still tired… the shackles of entropy hold sway and i contend with easy wit in a fog of sparkles. it’s a sloooooow glorious. even with too much sugar in my tea, because sleepy.
you get out of bed to greet me.

it’s a good day.

This Love Song seemed like a safe place to unpack my ****.
But a safe place is where Lyrics go to die.
And this is Not a Song.

and it starts like this. all the time.


II

i fella sleep in a widdle boat and told a seagull that i was having a dream
about talking to seagulls and he was astonished to have the pleasure of meeting a boat
that had the good sense to plug the hole with a poet…. because they never wake up
and they do so with extreme prejudice. that simply screams Resident.
In Fact!

He’d never even seen a boat. So there’s THAT. I offered Seagull “ The Cool -Side of The Pillow. “
So I could sit upright for a moment and jot this down. He was like “ What’s a pillow? “
And I had no idea what it was that brushed against my legs
but It was There. then It was Gone. when i stopped using the metaphor.


I was treading a fathom
of pixie dust and transgender proto-gods, all cuddling in a huddle of metaphysics
as adorable as a radioactive abrupt

stop.



III

Ah yes… someone was cooking bacon… and bacon is sleep’s kryptonite. so the dream was a wrap.
and i had a bird’s nest woven from the silk of my discarded cocoon. codename: Chrysalis.
and my mouth was dry. a stubborn dry that follows a deluge of phantasmagoria  
on a Futon that is a God to cat hair. My Futon is Oblique and Omnipotent.
Apparently.

Uber Mecca for Cat Hair. I fell asleep on that.

you got the fever.
i heard the rumors.
you in-cyst
I’m the tumor.
we got legs.
we got spiders
we got thumbtacks
we got *****.
we got a dead Poseidon.
and just enough Chalk
to trace a sun.

and we ain’t talkin’.
and we ain’t not.
we got sidewalks
that hate walks.
we got pinwheels
we got hurt.
and that’s peculiar.
cause i feel nothing.
And I Know
that i know exactly
how that feels
for some reason.

and it shows.

You can be polite. Or you can tell all the Julia’s in the world the things you think about when they’re talking to You.  You could just…  Start. Talking.  It would be delicious and taboo and all that, and maybe a little awkward for all the Julia’s but the mainest thing… It would be impossible to ever. give. a ****. ever. again. You Know This. You Know It Like you Know how many bottles of champagne it takes to even Begin to be enough champagne. This skill is highly prized. And you can DO this. You can do this Sophia. Right here. Right now. You can - tch. You’re not even listening to me, are you?  That is awesome.
    I can see it all now… one, two maybe five Julia’s all yapping away in a Vera **** pincer formation and then….! You open your mouth. The stars fall. The Julia’s are like “ What the-? “ and you, Sophia… Drowning the Gallery. Using all the colors you discovered on your expeditions. A Rainbow made of Lions. I can see it. And you can DO this. You can do this Sophia Conasta. Right here. Right now. You can even begin with a… You’re not even listening to me, are you? My God! you’re beautiful.
Like a bomb that uses a fork because ground zero was no place be Un-Civilized. In fact. Ground Zero wasn’t even a Place until you got there. And let your Self, drop! I mean to say…. You can be polite. Or. You can be Sophia being sophia. period. There’s a lot of tuxedos at this Event, have you noticed that? When did they come back? And why lord! do they all look terrible?
    How long have I been gone? What the hell is Julia talking about now? That’s Leonard Maxwell and his assistant, April Alcott.  She burns money to watch it burn-Ironically, but she’s not sure if she’s doing it right because if it Meant Anything in the first place, she would be first to have no clue what it meant. So now she nails it, but never gets a prize. She bought a lot of my dark stuff from 5 yrs ago that paid for the flat in Portland. What the hell is she wearing? A rhinestone baby Jesus tongue stud? I love these parties. I hate these parties. I’m Sophia Conasta. Celebrated Artist whose Body of Work has astonished the Hoi Polloi of the Art World, and totally lost right now.
     What is Julia’s problem? Did she lose a Horse? Again? Somehow?Or Something? Open Bars Are Go! I’ll just weave my way over to the Gayest Cabal and Julia will be scraped off like a Barnacle* By GUCCI, and then I’ll be clearly Minus One Julia. That can only be a good thing. And - Open Bar. Breathe, Drink
Genius.

.

Declan Shapiro had a switchblade. One day he didn’t go to school and got really good at not knowing why his father shot 9 nine people he had never met, and then shot himself when the cameras arrived.
He mastered the basics. And these were the basics. Then you work your way down. Got it?
So Declan Shapiro stole a car. Stealing glances at this point just didn’t have the Juice. He parked the car in the trunk of the car. His genius was to drive it off a cliff a few miles outside of town, with a brick and belt strapped to the wheel and the stick. It was so beautiful to feel something that it nearly killed him to thumb a ride into town and leave all those emotions on the edge. He was home by 9:35 pm and that’s what he told the cops. There was meatloaf with a ketchup smiley face next to some mashed potatoes on a paper plate just being the worst sort of super fan.

When Tanner Percy McQueen lost her virginity on purpose, the purpose was a thing that words were powerless to express, and yet she will never forget the premise. It was like keeping track of every fork in a lie to avoid getting caught in one, with all the panache of up close magic. Her room was a mess because she was looking for her loose change. A girl's gotta eat. Her mother, apparently, had to drink all the Benadryl and watch Animal Planet. Tanner Percy McQueen got her **** together and hopped on her bike with the banana seat all the boys wanted to be. She got where she was going before she realized her heart was broken and this was the place that didn’t care to talk to her about it. It was just noise and pills and beautiful monsters. They had hot dogs you could get for 2 dollars and she had 2 dollars so…. She bought some Ecstasy instead and told Stacy Mathers she was fat and that she wanted to kiss her on the mouth but it hurts when she wakes up and the world is still there and that she got this bracelet from some creep in a parking lot who never even tried to make a pass at her. She had no idea it glowed in the dark.

The Misfortune of having you all to myself
has Irony’s respect. Only games without masters
call Love “ Sensei “. And every one of them
thought Irony was Abe Vigoda
sifting through the entrails of a Tuna Melt, at Morty Yang’s
looking for the cookie choking on a Bilingual Mobius strip
of impenetrable punchlines.
And always late to a funeral like The Good Gin.

we slept on a bed of fails
and our lives as footstools on soap boxes began
as only the best endings require
before waiving the usual fee, and diving into the role
of a last time nobody knew was The Last Time.
chewing up the screen between  intimate strangers
calling all the shots on the set by telepathy
like a betty davis that would never ever not help you
if it helps to sniff glue
or to hardly ever do
and then stop.
or not.

yeh, We Got THAT betty davis.

we found the most corrosive script
and mangled that baby with the camera obscura still rolling
And that guaranteed we had something to show the wolves at the door.
that would generate the buzz in the saw
that you Can’t UnSee.
and what follows?

anybody’s regret.

we slept in cots on the Lot, a lot.
but that was all in the papers that we rolled
to smoke the ***. in all the rags in Coolsville.
our collapsing star rising on page six
of a Charles Bukowski restraining order.
and as I recall, there was no catering -
for locations that devolved into gothic cathedrals
that slept with your expectations to get the part.
and we didn’t know that was a thing.

But hey,
you made it hurt
like you already
knew.

we flipped a coin to see who would yell “ Cut “ !

And then...

now it's all
you do.

The Book had bones. Belied by Time’s vendetta with Vellum.
I had finished. And all the revels in It -
Seeped from an Unwell Spring where Winter’s Wound
would always keep the Venom
A Keepsake in remembrance of an Inner Child
as Precocious as a swarm of Locusts…
wherever tomes were broken at the spine…
He focused.

Felt the Leather like a Priest - Recently released from draconian vows His chastity would have long despised…
If his Innocence had only known the Eve
of his Destruction as only an Inner Man recalls.
But Hallowed were the halls.

Despite the Gravity so rare a thing as wisdom brings -
He Levitates as every chapter churned the milk
that fattened a golden calf
Into butter enough for Loaves of Zero. Plus one.
and a crust of Yes.

At the Rubicon, a step was taken
into a Wilderness of No Return
Where the Natives had no word for Exile.
And a Child was A Curious Thing

To the Death.


II


The Book had bones. And I know because
I found them in the margins
While turning the last page in a reverential stupor…
More words!
And I found them - !
Fluent in AfterThought
As I read them like stroking
a panther.

And I Quote…… "


you think and thus you speak
whatever Thinking thinks
To Think a lot.

And Speaking -
speaks what Thinking
spoke of speaking
after Thinking
Thoughts.

So -
Thoughts are Thunk.
And Thinks are Thinked
and all the Speaks
have Spoke.  "

and now begins The  Cramp of Legend
for my anonymous hand ! Oh joy !
my pharmacist will be Kip with The Beard.
Because Akiko in a Lab Coat is more than I deserve
or something... Ever felt like that?

Oh God! I hope she didn't Quit !

If you have eyes that hang lanterns in mid-air
and smooth skin where your wrinkles sleep,
and a broken heart where you come from…
mending rivers with tears and old photographs
of antique cameras encased in opal coral
on a seabed of shipwreck and silt...

If you pause to reflect and the mirror
needs a minute to adjust to the absence
of your vanity… and all your coats
smell of wet dog rescue and soup kitchen
and your god is a living thing
that knows why you ask questions
that have answers
but you just like the sound of love’s voice…
so you pretend politely.
and pray for real.

then let my mind tick. to imagine thee
in all your wondrous oddity
allow me the privilege of adoration
and a moment alone
to caress your wings
with all the tenderness of a wish
without a name.

and i’ll abide.

she lives where the cell phones die without remembering
the tone assigned to a cryptic stream of social Lilliputians
on a list of offenders, and befrienders; all caroling at random
for a stitch of thyme or to barter with banter and allusions.
she sleeps where her bed has fallen in love
with southern exposure; but openly flirts with an eastern sky
boiling over with morningstar and brindle night .
her thread count...
an imaginary number
between sleep and a full moon…
and her pillows have embroidered her silhouette
as she takes slumber to meet the parents of her proclivities
that have ever held sway over all of her charms.
how her forks and knives pay conjugal visits to spoons
To the clank elegance of her signature
explaining the vacancy she hordes without joy.
armed with only a loaded pun
in the barrel of her ***…. and a thousand safaris
beyond game. where a woman can breathe without pretending
the pink flamingos are Rodin on Ritalin
she can howl in her own language without poppies.
she lives in that house on the hill
that wasn’t there yesterday.
and the paper boys  
all want to
be men.

so oleander.

The air is damp in the basement where several boxes trade baseball cards
With long-forgotten toys in
various stages of disrepair.
A 30ft. hose, pretending to be a reticulated python; commits to the role
In an asymmetrical coil of hunter’s green, weathered and neglected. It becomes a reptile in a garden of reverie.
Next to an oil can full of rusty nails and sawdust. To seldom applause.
At night, the seeping mirror is placid and black on concrete between crates.
A washing machine windges in an existential spiral
of bespoke filth and hand-me-downs.
you can hear the rain patter like fat cats in bubble wrap
as a late dinner sinks into the catacomb, crooning pork chops and maple
with a hint of ambergris’ and misbegotten broccoli.
When the hour is late… the mice chat as metallic slugs lace silver thread
to weave a two-dimensional sweater
for a concrete god
in the dark.
with no
hands.

that wind at your back
with my eyes and my name
is me breathing.

those clouds overhead
with hands full of rain
is my song.

that tree by the porch
where you swing -
holds a torch
and my
meaning.

evergreen in your season.


II

those butterflies
that can’t tell
the flowers
about you….

are telling them all
just the same.

they know all about
how my love
surrounds
you.

and now they’re
doing the
same.

the morning had no coffee. just had 98 degrees by 10 am
and a barn on the lean in the distance.
where time never cuts the grass and nothing happens.
dirt roads pray for death or slow traffic. and clouds like smoke
from a bellicose pipe… on the lips of a medicine man
who became a woman when a cloud called him “ medicine man “
while the peyote was barking without dogs, was unleashed
to prairie in the marsh where the bogs agog
with summer candy in its peat moss.
no dowsing rod to spare a child the ridicule of finding god’s pond
with a stick obeying a cop.
the morning had no mirrors. just broken glass and aspartame
and very minor miracles. no part of a red sea. only dust mites
and last night’s *****. the trucks won’t stop complaining
about the radio. because you have no radio.
and when you sing on those long trips to the corner store…
your truck is like “ what the ****? “
and “ this guy must hate trucks….” and all sundry regalia of suffering
from a hole in the muffler and a tone-deaf pilgrim
on half a tank of sunshine and vermouth.

with a dent
in a twist.

My Solitaire is irascible in aspect. Just over the Hill there; I used to carve my initial conditions into a blank stare, or a block of omission. But now my stratagems soar far beyond the pondering of Loneliness. Even Abandon cannot fathom Me.

     I tend to orchids that have earthquake hearts and care for the waning moons in my terrarium of phantoms and glass apples. i anoint the chasm with vespers of Isolation that sparkle like a madness in phosphorus ecstasy. My books are Discreet.
I am their Shogan.

This town has asthmatic headlights and bottle caps like tiny crowns for giant ants, snatching moonlight from the concrete, hoarding halos in blind alleys; where the homeless groan and dither in shadows like blackstrap molasses. The sign on the backdoor reads “ Exit “ like it was ******* Shakespeare, but across the street where the lamp is having second thoughts… a red brick unicorn is grazing on bottle caps with moonlight icing and a Yellow Cab idles in the Irony of Yellow.

     Parked cars are engaged in their telepathic games. The trench coats are keeping secrets and house keys huddled in a clump of disarray… in every palm. Neon shoestrings in windows, spell words with glass agendas, twinkling conspiracies that trade on your emptiness like a promise on the lips of a snail. You can hear the world spinning a yarn to knit a sweater thick enough to ward off the chill of an existential crisis.
Heard Carl’s Kid, Marty has a habit of catching butterflies and sewing butterflies to them. Carl says “ The Boy's gettin’ purty good.

The moral of the story
is never a suspect.
But always a
conviction.

Read tea leaves for the articles.
Scrapbook the
Fiction.

A stone has a Name that is Itself a Stone.
And only one Tongue can speak it.
A star is called by what It Is
And never answers. Deafened long ago
By the sheer magnitude of Being -
A Grain of Light in all the Dark Of
An Unfinished Dream
Of a Lonely God.

Stars are Occupied with Dividing Eternity
In half. Too Innocent to grasp
The Futility
Of every Beam of Light
Hurling at the Velocity of Now
Like a Ray of Sisyphus
Pushing a Premise to reach
A Plateau
At the Peak of an Infinite
*****.

Time Is Not An Illusion. It's Merely Meaningless.
With no Mind to Record even
The Passing of a Day.
Like a Void as placid
As a thimble of rain
Resting on a Counterpoint.

Without one.

He used to run with scissors
Now he creeps with a sharpie pen
To keep canaries in suspense.
And that beats a coal mine.
Cause up close…. It’s almost personal.
He can almost feel it
Twitching
in his enigma -
Like a holy ghost
Trying to kick.
And
nobody knows
The deal with
the shoebox
Full of sharpies
And all those
black canaries
Not to mention
Duct tape.

He keeps his griffins on a leash
And he can’t seem to sleep at night.
And He can’t even tell
if it hurts…

But he loves the way
That it's so easy to fake it.
And how anything
is possible
if everything
burns.

So i heard you got tracks after doing a train.
I bet you kept it to yourself and it got out just the same.
You parked your car where you lost it.
But the cops ran the plates…. And now you’re looking
At the kinda time you stole from your face.

You look like every mile that ever had it out for you.
You’re in the valley where you lost your kids
But kept the *****….
You wear the same thing every day
Like a cloak and a smile -
So you’re invisible to Angels
Until they Fall.

How’s That ?

I had no right to call you stupid and conceited.
When clearly i had other options… and i mean it.
I’m so sincere, you might - just faint straight away…
And since my iphone has a camera
Too dumb to hate your face….

You make me hurl that type of expletive
Nobody know what the heck it is.
I can’t believe. But There it Is !
You’re a ******* like -
it’s an imperative !
A mean drunk
who thinks that’s
Hilarious.

The way you *****
That Chica like - “ Theeeere It Is “.
then  “ wet-back, go back to China, ***** !“
Like some ****** that don’t know
what time it Is !

So my Clock Ticks a Tock Till you Tick me off.
Can’t blame a brother when the Other’s a Punk.
Another Goose Steppin’ *******
That I deal wit for fun.

I’d crack a joke
But then i look at you
Already The Pun.
Like some idiot prodigy
Stuck on one minus
one.

You can live a lie. But then you can’t be you.
Hard to simplify a box. Or a simple truth.
You could live
to die.
But that’s nothing
new.
Time had a plan...
Before you were
You.

I can push up daisies but I’m too lazy to off myself.
Safe bet i’ll double-down
on nothing less… I’m sure
Oblivion can wait.
But if not… tough ****.
I know a guy that knows a guy…
Can make -
a straight jacket
Fit.

There’s a whalesong with a note, no whale can hit
Like a pinata’ in a hurricane. A swing and a miss.
There’s the impossible and then there’s the way it IS.

There’s
you and a bat -
That came with a Belfry.
You're ringing
the Bell
Or cracking the
**** thing!

II

You might be lost
but I found you…
so let’s put a pin
in that.

For now -
I’d like to know,
how many butterflies -
Have ever asked you not to
Laugh?

With his father’s eyes like two myopic raisins
Mounted on Corinthian columns in the utility closet
Of his mind palace; he came upon the wilderness
With a pouch of hardtack and a smartphone.
His leather boots repelling a light rain
Foreshadowing an odyssey that lay ahead
Like a jewel lodged in the appendix
Of a Cyclops snorting a meridian of crystal ****...
Scored for the price of a golden fleece.
He summoned his imaginary plan
And set foot upon an uncharted expanse.
His home behind him.

With his father’s eyes whistling to a silhouette
Of a lost boy and a mop.

My flagon of Ganymede, a frothy pontoon
Of ephemerals, flanking the dry-docked galleon
Of my youth. At once, prodigious and minute.
Like a fob on a club. Run aground and marooned.
Like a bald spot on stilts.
The Sea has resigned. And all Sirens departed…
Save a nameless nymph etching her song
Into the marrow of a length of bone -
Shaped like an orphaned
Hammer.

A scrimshaw calliope of petroglyphs
As garrulous as a Cauliflower
On a bed of velvet
As black
As an unborn
Sun.

The mug stains leapfrog a linoleum asphalt countertop, sunbathing in the breakfast nook.
A magazine proofreads a hole in a bagel. Scanning for clues to the whereabouts
Of a Jewish heart. Beads of Oolong tea archipelago from a resting kettle
All the way to the 'good ' China. A cup on a pearl, laying flat… ear to the ground.
Listening to the stories only Formica can tell. Deciphering the steam
Rising from a steep. Curling whiskers into omens, embroidered upon a shaft of light
Heaven sent. Postage dew. Gilding quaint luxuries, tucked in a cozy roost
Smelling of oak musk and slow roasted dreams, evaporating before memory may lay claim
To the riddles of Morpheus. There’s an aire of Return.  
It molts in the bacon fats hovering in the strata unique to kitchen islands lousy with active volcanoes that shuffle in stocking feet and terry cloth bathrobes. Restless and foggy minded.
Looking for the keys. And...
Chewing a thumbnail. Staring out the window. Where there used to be a car in the driveway. But the officer flagged a taxi. Explains the migraine, like a Vulcan; stoically flipping switches in a fuse box wired to a vague recollection of a soiree.
All the while holding a pitchfork and today's horoscope.
For irony and street cred.

{ But out of cream cheese. }

Concurrently... This part of the house still has the rustic naivete of a celibate beatnik picking teeth with a signature pen presenting an Hawaiian girl with a vanishing skirt; blinking in and out of Vaud-villainy, like Erwin Schrödinger’s Cat. A kind of hole in a barge with an ornate cubby; loitering with sugar cubes and a bendy plastic fern.
Like the foyer to a room, still under construction.
      A busy little metaphor, lounging around the east wing of a humble abode… like news clippings in a mason jar… it’s superfluous handle threading a ceramic eye.
Like a stainless steel joke under a refrigerator magnet, pinned to a plate in your forehead. As any lamp-shade with ambition.  
      Playing to a rough Cloud, hung over an ashtray; that has seen Better Days - envy the baroque occlusion of monotony and routine, merging a hangover - into morning traffic. Replete with modest gains.
And Horizons that stab bleary eyes that would know a gypsy
By the weight of her purse…
     When the day begins, it gains a foothold by the spine of an overdue book, reclining adjacent runcible spoons and antique kitche. As a bathroom light squeaks between a door and a frame.
As ancillary and precise as a beacon for a blindfold.

Like turpentine palming a brick. And Wagner.

In the halls of the universals, whosoever we are -
We are not equipped. We emerge from mothers, tumbling ever forward into hordes of wane and bucolic meadows, thrashing in the kiln of Time. We soar amongst ourselves… in the pitch. In the dark.
Our totems are twigs and twine.
We hold the moon accountable, but not for madness.
She holds the key to the shadow, and we wants it.
But haven’t any angels to approve. So we haunts it.
Like songbirds with eyes of stone.
Perched on the lip of an urn.

Mr. Ingle made a Grand Entrance seem fay and indecisive and marginally *******. His noble bearing hauled a profile of privilege that could sink a showboat. He was the only man whose Innate Vanity was a certified genius. To see him saunter distractedly along the pier to inspect his fleet is to wonder how a languid stroll and a kick in the nuts were now one and the same. You marvel at his flowing cape and covet his unseemly wealth, but his stride has found you lacking, and in your covetous heart you know yourself to be Unworthy, and better men than you have envied Master Ingle, but every one of them paid handsomely to do so.
     His gray eyes sparkled. Proof of how good it was to have no idea how to give a **** for free. The belt that cinched his tailored breech had a buckle that made men of stature and means feel like all they do is pick their noses all the time, no matter who's around. It was a belt, only one such as Mr. Ingle was worthy to cinch above his waist. His silk shirt thought the belt an oafish clod and told it so, but no one else would dare!
Not without attaining immunity from the boots and even then, you’re talking to a boot!
     Mr. Ingle made a grand entrance; and the local gentry politely hated the ******* and returned to whatever pastry they were elegantly dismembering with all the teeth they were born with money enough to buy and have installed, as Ingle's eye fell upon Herchel Finn, whom he loved best for reasons he was paying someone a king's ransom to discover, and he was pleased

As magellanic clouds collapse into a spoon
i wander off... my satchel strapped to my salubrious stride.
my eyes unmanned. now binary soul nova
resting on my cheekbones... boring holes in the landscapes
to catch a glimpse of the carousel underneath.
spinning on it's side.

perpetual.

While bathing in the last rays of a bright idea -
receding; in accord with epiphanies of mellifluous delight.
my lifespan, now an Always without a comma -
blessed by new bones... thin as reeds to take flight and escape.
where other worlds gleam in the Labyrinth -
night deprived.

unfathomable.

[ can't wait ]

pappi ain't got no shoes, no how. that's how you float.
chip a tooth on the moon. and you gots yourself a lawsuit.
sleep with stella, and dangle.
she got a roof you cain't trust.
you got a barn full of blind owls.
and nothin' ain't right 'til you leff it -
where you found
the ******
thing.

and that's not a ruse, it's just ridiculous.

Counterclockwise asphalt necktie
Broomstick moonshine... one busted tail-light.
Hard luck crust -
on a crumb of starlight.
Cross-stitch moonbeams and nothing
but midlife.
Ain't nothing to
mood swing.-
With nothing to feel like.
Get born. Get dead.
Fix **** -
tail-light.

she had a black belt in carrot and stick.
but her olive skin derailed every dignity
for a glimpse, and skipped the cigarettes
to keep the peace that nearly cost us
the war.
she had an aire of impossible disregard.
festooned with golden hooks and kool-aid.
a wire brigade of barbs
with two eyes - vacant...
save a dispassionate wail
of an absent goddess
for all your
grief.

with your pain, immodest.

but no longer
underneath.

life is the gift
that keeps on giving you -
a dead-end job
and a dog park to walk through...
in flip-flops -
with no socks
and -
no dog to talk
too.

something
smells bad
and you hope
that it's not
you.

but nothing gets
worse
and that's
how it
stops
you.

I feel your breath on my face
and your hair in my eyes.
then i'm all the way back -
when there were
no lies.
i get stuck
where the knife
in my back strikes the nail
in my palm. And
never ask you
where the hammer
came from.

we are all of us; Love, that has not understood -
the meaning of Itself. far too fragile to grasp the
varnish from the night picket fence. but ever mindful
of our boundaries.

and found it.

when it never
made
sense.