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This steel pan
in the dirt,
off the shoulder,
outside Quartzsite,
sun bouncing off like a flare.

Handle loose, rim dented,
but not ruined;
still whole enough.

It felt like one I swung
at Tomaso’s,
sweating
through the rush,
that night
we plated sixty covers
in under an hour.

This pan, and I,
were used
the way hard things are:
oiled, scrubbed,
flame-kissed and blackened.
Something thick stuck once,
then let go.

I lifted it,
right hand curved
around the handle
as though it never left.
Some things remember you
even when you forget yourself.

I set it in the backseat,
beside the blanket and bag.
thought I’d clean it up,
tighten the handle,
set it on flame,
hang it by a stove again.

I don’t believe in ghosts,
but I believe in steel,
in things that hold the heat
and give it back to you.
#memory #flame #heat #found #work #kitchen #loss
I flowed into the dark blue ocean of symbols.
Just yesterday,
I walked with heavy footsteps,
well-grounded.

But once again,
an irresistible force lifted me.
I wanted to see what was above.

Then I came back,
changed,
less happy,
a part of me scattered
in that an alternative universe.

Now, worlds overlapping appear,
The sun is shining with different light.
Words change their meaning.
The fog thickens so,
I can no longer see fissures
under my feet.

Step by step, carefully,
I try to pass through
a dimension of forgotten dreaming.

I don’t want to be stuck
inside an illusion for too long.
Looking at my heart still glowing,
devoured by some voices,
bite by bite, crumb by crumb.

They come in need,
then dissolve like ghosts.

How can one love,
under the heavy weight of knowing—
with Lapis Lazuli pressed
against my chest?

I don’t want to vanish
into sticky spider webs
into formal language  
that is too cold,
too detached.

Two forces fight inside me
To see the truth, even if it hurts,
or to close my eyes,
and idealize brutal reality.

Looking in the distorted mirror,
observing love quivering on the verge.
And thus, the Earth becomes the theater.

The cynical facades ******
with pretended freedom,
taking every hour,
every month,
every year,

into

PROGRESSIVE
DE…HUMANIZATION
isn't it strange, that you meet yourself in different people, in new faces,
The person you witness and become, the imprint remains
It is part of you, subdued but brewed like cyclonic wind
Decode others with empathy, look beneath the eyelids
The door to the soul, it looks just like mine
From the exterior, what is, all these coverings?
We have hidden the warmth quite beneath everything.
Day to sweeten
Day to finish a thought
Day to exact sovereign
Day to dream, a world is odd...

Done?
Wealth of a sincere wish
Taken to example, for a kinder love
Silence is a house, seek me when a star's finished

The tired eyes of tragedy
*** of a wanton song
Never heard, except by my marvel, an oddity
Of measured distance, for decency, all along?

Time with a friend
Sharing a word, with sallow imagination...
Tirades with a ploy, is this the end?
Couth or courage, adding the face of silence

Fate of desire, that came:
Fate in a charity, to serve
Fate of a copious sense, of shame
Fate has made a with, without a dread to earn a curse
peek a boo, the craving for caffeine is going to make me sick...?
Before violence
Before there was silence
All I know is we deserve it all
One straight road
No going home
Scared of hell?
We laid the bricks for the road
Now all we think about is going home
Atonement comes, but we are still alone
Tranquil with a tranquilizer
I am not sure if we are coming home
Now our tears are the most apropos
I hide in words — tucking under their shade;
Dressing letters up with sequins and baubles.
Now showering in limelit obfuscation.
Makes it seem as if I am really there:

Dressing letters up with sequins and baubles
Blinding myself in the flashing of their colours;
Makes it seem as if I am really there
Amidst flowered touchless abstraction.

I blind myself in the flashing of their colours.
Submerged in repetition, my thumb drowns
Amidst flowered touchless abstraction,
Swirling in whirlpool ******* me underneath:

Submerged in repetition, my thumb drowns
Now showering in limelit obfuscation,
Swirling in whirlpool ******* me underneath.
I hide in words — tucking under their shade.
tonight, You glanced off
the wall like a suggestion;

just headlights, though. I
see You in everything.
writing a poem on the bus
and the elderly woman sitting next to me
says oh, is it about us
Intricate labyrinth of neurons
Within whose web I dally, caught
Tangled synapse-bridged *****
Continuously recalling tallied thought

Laser-etched steel-plate memories
Deny wisdom so dearly sought
Reinforcing episodic-twisted realities
Revealing epiphany where is naught

Neuronal circuits staccato-fire rapidly
Tetanizing notions trauma-wrought
Spike-timing-dependent plasticity
Potentiating emotions distraught

Swearing healing by hippocampal oath
Promising surcease to wet-work hard-fought
Neurogenesis rebuilds hope for both
Amygdalan peace and neural-networked bio-robot
Hope this one wasn't too cerebral... 😉
a decent night's sleep,
my body to keep,
early light invades the
blinking eyesight, and
an indeterminate sky,
yet offers us an
either/or,
heads or tails,
success or fails,
what will the gods
offer us all humans,
to select, elect for this
anniversary of our
country's formation?

the slow rising sun
over the North Fork
will soon provide its
decision/incision for
our nation tumultuous,
turbulent, course direction

it appears that the silent
dawning will give us yet
another chance, a morning's
golden hour, with that irradiating
light that bathes us with visionary,
equality of light, light of equality,
but
last night's thunderstorms leave
us the detritus of savagery of
thunderous rains that came
with fury, reflecting our confusion
and the danger shoals that appear
with no warning, yet reminds us,
once more,
one more time,
even in troubling days,
of the blessings
of opportunity
that each day,
each unique sunrise
provides us choices,
and
skies have now spoken:
the early warming rays are
reminding hints that a new day
owns equal opportunities to
make our country beautiful
for spacious skies and
amber waves, of
water and light,
if we choose wisely, rightly...

July 4th
Silver Beach
Shelter Island
2025
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