I run this muddy track on these big old shaky wheels
With numbers on my back and a helmet on my head.
I drive around in circles and they call me "Crazy Ed".
I drive. That's how I stay alive.  I just like how it feels.

I've got a batch of children and a drop-dead gorgeous wife.
She puts up with me when I leave to tinker on that wreck.
And all week long I'm trucking, gone, to earn an honest check.
And still she cheers for me each Sunday while I risk my life.

Someday I'll hang that helmet on the hook there by the door,
And toss away this mud-caked suit with "92" on back.
I'll give that gorgeous wife of mine a kiss, and *****-whack,
Then play around (in circles!) with my Kids there on the floor.

Cover my sins with halo gold,
my feet with olive green,
And kiss the ******
As they bury me.

Six can carry me
Out to the shore
While the gulf-sun settles
Away in the west.

Do this for me and I'll leave you my treasure
A hollow warm pocket
A painting  or two
And cast my illusions to
the winds and the sea.

Please do not cry at my overdue passing.
Laugh and imbibe
and stumble a while
and smile
at the space which
I've left here for you.

chal, o eru.
raigh nu wandh' heh
cu aj i tdju o.

o eru
raigh wa nacca yeh
o ama, ama nay?

o At Ka tona.
ko hok ton chal.
sey o eru.

Ha, waka se
O
Ha, waka se
O
o eru
o na
o.

Light crests and wanes
swift
speed flicker
moon unsure.
Skin swells then thins
with heat
wind
destiny.
Radio blackout.
Alone
I think I
Touched
God.

Who was it carved these lines
In ancient hand
Faded now
By sand and wind
And patient Time?

Whose voice on chiseled stone
calls on to us
Covered now
With mossy virtues
Lost,  unknown?

Should I now in my crewel
of saddened heart
And remorse
Add a stitch
Of love eschewed?

Should I wield stick and stone
And worry down
into this rock
My ****** tale
Of love unknown?

And ages hence, some thousand years
when this creekbed
sits up high
Will some fellow
read my tears?

No.  I will let my fingers roam
these runic forms
Singing loud
The loss we shared
Beside this stone.

How sweet that an unwritten face
kisses me on this last hour
of Now before the
Not Now of tomorrow.

Across the wind of Einstein's count
And upon hopeful pigeon's wing
I kiss you back
And wish you happy sun.

It's not about the rhyme
but the time spent
bending the words
to fit
you
You fit
To the words, bending
Spent time.
To rhyme?

I woke up today.
Yay!

Ride high on your
Blue horses
into Into.

I don't mean that.

Fix the hole I have
In my blue wall

I have no wall.

Scream happy no sound
here in the gallery

(Look!  You got a wall!)

She did not inherently enjoy
the work
It was often wet, and heavy
To pound and scrub and rinse away
his filth
his day stink
while whistling
in her thin summer dress
barefoot out in the backyard
(the only sweet touch she knew of him, the soft grass there.)

She did not find happiness or joy
in the work
He was often wet, and heavy.

In her dark childhood her mother had lied
(Dear Mother)
"Give all that you have to him Dear child
And you will find
Some small happiness"
(Oh, dear Mother).

She did not enjoy
the pain
of his pain he scrubbed over  her
wet and heavy
as he pounded and washed away
his day loss
his filth
whistling.

The Jesus in her knuckles
wept with every twist
of sock and collar
bled with every *****
of button sew.

And one drunk morning
she found him there
snuggled in his ***** puke
neck-tangled in the clothesline
blue and quiet.

The hole was easy
She had been digging a hole
for years
wet and heavy.

She whistles now and enjoys
the work
sun-dry and sweet
pinning her dresses
on the new rope
while she enjoys
the grass tickling her toes
(the only sweet touch she knew of him, the soft grass there.)

"There is danger in that night
Where shadows swell and steal the light
And strangers stroll the emptied street
With   hooded eye and shushing feet,
Where thieves and brigands skulk about...
Please, my children, don't go out!"

          "Mother! Father!  How you fuss!
             Can't you hear it call to us?
             Can't you hear its music play
             Strange refrains from Far Away?
             Young blood burns to run and leap
             Where shadows crawl and myst'ries creep!"

"Wards of Evil roam the road
Wanderers from Hells abode,
Refugees from Satans gaol'
Wicked banshies shriek and wail!
Here inside it's safe and bright...
Please don't go out in that night!"

             *"But how we yearn to wander there,
                Out into the star-spun air,
                Out where sacred secrets dwell.
                Drink, we must, from moon-kissed well!
                So let us go, let us take flight...
                For we are children of the night."

Temperance for itself was not her virtue,
Nor was meekness.
She often would boldly and loudly
Run into the fray,
Singing lullabies
Half-naked
Dragging that **** one-eyed bear
Behind her.
She wielded it like a poleaxe
Against my knee
As she dashed into
Her Nowness of being
Then out of the room,
Her new-found feet
Carrying her off
Around the next adventures corner.

I often come down here          (cold)
Into the cistern                           (damp)
Into the chalice of                     (holy)
Mouse run dark                          (secret)
Mother and Father                    (power)
Cannot hear me                          (listen)
As I splash quiet                         (deep)
With my friends                         (love)
Fuzzy and wet                              (hold)
And squeaking                            (happiness)
As we                                               (together)
Roil round                                     (joy)
And laugh.                                     (forever)

I can't find my pockets
There
Is change
Maybe
A quarter or a nickle
Or a dime
For gum
My bike waits
Leaning
Outside with the old Gum
Of others who lost
Teeth
Or pockets
While my teeth
Smile
At the old guy
Waiting
For my money
Left in lost pockets
As my bike topples!

I don't rhyme stuff just to rhyme it
Though I do it all the time.  It
Seems to follow some odd pattern
Though it doesn't seem to matter.
Words just fall into their spot.
It tends to happen quite a lot.
Take this here, for one example-
Use it as a simple sample-
I can't help it; It's my nature...
Syntax, meter, nomenclature.

(And if I've offended thee
with my skewed-phonology,
     I bow and beg and plead.
For it is only silly rhyme I
Tend to write from time to time
     To make your eyeballs bleed.
To make your eyeballs bleed I do with verse obscure and all askew
     And dire opinion spake)

So if I have offended thee
Just take a nap and you will see
My meaning when you wake.

Cats is funny
On the floor
Too darned quiet
They don't snore
Silent even
When they yawn
Bite and scratch
When stepped upon.

Dogs is better
When they *****
Wake 'em up
And they so happy
They ain't jealous
While you're at
The molling of
The Scornful Cat.

Every time I pass by the old empty house there on the corner-
I wonder-
Had I been there, in that time- not so long ago-
One sunny Sunday- in the spring step of her youth
Would she have seen me on the walk?
And if I had- with bouquet in hand- climbed those five wide steps to the door
And knocked...
Uninvited-
Would she have danced with me on that day-oh, not so long ago?
"Here but for a picnic" I would say-
Would she laugh and take the day with me?
Or would my presence there-
Uninvited-
Disturb her from her untitled words
And change things too disturbingly?
Alas it is only a romantics dream
That Miss Dickinson would allow an idyll of mine own
To enter into her pre-scribed theme
And so I put aside the thought of my hearts truth
And turn away from that empty window-as I pass by-
I will not be the one to steal those words from the World-
I will avoid those five wide steps to the door-
Uninvited.
And I will dismantle my time machine.

He was all of fourteen when they stomped on the Queen
(Such ungainly, undignified bounces)
And he sat, wide of eye, while up there in the sky
Those two men juggled pounds weighing ounces!

He dreamed that night of their glorious flight
(Of the WHOOSH! and the ROAR! of those rockets!)
And laughed when he learned that they later returned
With nothing but rocks in their pockets!

Indeed I trusted her with all my heart.
Her eyes, they seemed to bleed an honest truth.
Her hands were soft and Soothe! I fell, indeed
Into her trap, her dark and dreadful part.

She glammed me in and lied with honeyed verse.
She led me down her lovely, mottled path
With lemon tea and scented candle laugh...
I fell into her subtle diatribe.

Oh heart!  You have deceived me once again!
Yet still I follow all your promised hope
And end up with your noose just dangling there...

And all the while she pulls me on and on
With beauty hiding just beyond her Vow.
So now, dark heart, I walk the final stair.

I lose my way whilst searching for my Love.
So many, vagrant sins distract and pull
That moment and the subject, and I fall
Into the Pit below, and Sky above.

She beckons still;  she calls me, lures me on.
And so I travel blindly, growing weak.
Some crazy god denies that which I seek,
And wicked women hold me past the dawn.

My heart is true, but I am just a man.
A simple man, an honest Father's son,
A grandson of a man who tilled this earth.

And this I just keep tilling, whilst I seek
To find that Love so hidden from my heart.
I hope she'll wait.  This hellish road is long.

With cloud above and planet neath my feet
With shadow sweet within my hollow breast
I traipse this scalded ground from east to west
In search of my one lost love, She!  My sweet!

I dare not tarry on this lonesome quest.
Odd winds afoot I struggle down this path
And even in my emptiness I laugh
At some dark gods infernal, ugly jest.

I do believe I'll find her, one fine day'
And we shall dance together happily.
She'll kiss me, and I'll know our Love is true.

I do believe that we were meant to be.
Until then i will walk these clouded roads'
With sky above and Time beneath my shoe.

She  ...is the Goddess of my four-in-the-mornings
... is the Florence Nightingale of my debilitated wanderings.
...does not judge.
...simply pours as I ignore the menu.
...always returns just in time to top me off.
...wears that stained, pleated apron like Aphrodite wears the summer wind.
          (With that spittle-slick pencil
          Balanced so precariously behind her left ear)
She... renders quiet absolution, with creme, and sugar.