Granted men
Have every right under
The God given sun
To be as they wish,
Ignorant and bold,
Sarcastic and cocky,
Beautiful and ugly,
To be assailants to the kind at heart,
Those needing acceptance,
The lonely few with good souls,
And it is granted.

Where is justice
But in a verse,
Behind closed doors in your
Most private collection,
The guilded fist to air
In a drunken rage to what
You had seen earlier
And how we wish we had spoken
Up.

Granted we know it was wrong,
And as we have done nothing,
It was granted....
Oh to have punched his mouth,
Instead I bit my lips,
And they bled too.

an in-reverse onomatopoeia,
or rather, onomatopoeia
is how poets speak baby
to god before the waves
and the whirls of tornadoes
in tango...
who said man's words
ever compliment the already
void, hunting a labyrinth
in a cul de sac?
            man and no number
the man with a pair of
two left hands,
parasitic Vatican and:
    fascist libra foetus mafia...
fake... I don't want to
pay alimony before she
decides to have an abortion...
I'd start with petting
animals before raising children,
and, respecting your mother
till... you thirst for women
no more...
      hardly...
                what part of
"share the love" which isn't
share the misery is supposed
to be a Defoe invitation
by request, of Friday?

‪Dancing salsa in a cave‬
‪Makes it harder to behave, ‬
‪But it's easier to repeat‬
‪Your footsteps in the Cuban heat‬
‪With kisses, as I feel brave.‬

always on the very edge of panic

a tortured affliction

I learned to dream of another place

and that place never let me forget

it was to here I was headed

and here I would be free.

Dear, Sweet, Damascus,
Even your vinegar will
attract hungry flies.

Of the tick-tick mark of the train,
the Twenty items or Less that you wouldn’t have needed
had you not been walkin’ down Newbury
toward hopeless following
nowhere mud-feel-footprints.
Motif of heavy heartening rain that scours the courtyard
back ‘round my building
that skillet valley of impossible nighttime.
Ring slipping finger, couple standing farther together and wild a gracious call brushes against the grade of man’s terrible
mountain

There is a little boy
Who walked a dirt road
It was lined with birch trees
He carried a cello twice his size
Dragged his feet
Kicked up a cloud of dust
Took breaks on big roots
Played out of tune melodies to passers by
Newsboy cap turned up
His only quarter a hint

There is a small girl
She has a bow on her dress
A bow on each pig tail
And her best go of one on her shoes
She eats cucumber sandwiches
While her grandmother
All eighty years of her
Drinks hurricanes and talks up a storm with the woman down the block
She learns words like “give a ****” and “lord knows”

There is a gentleman
Hat hung beside him on a nail
Sitting in a tire up porch top rocker
His snores hum Amazing Grace
The chair squeaks harmony
His leather shine tin is crusted from disuse
Never quite remembers much
Still knows mama’s cooking by smell alone
He leaves voicemails to busy grandkids

A cloud of dust passes by the old man
Tickles his nose
Causes him to sneeze so hard he wakes up
Mama and the little bow haired girl
Who giggles so loudly the little boy picks up his hat and runs