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Seattle when I was 23
Go Northwest, young man, Northwest
Rode those ferry boats
Sang at Kells, was blessed

Wonder if I'll get back
56 you know
Seattle misty rain
Seattle aglow with snow

                         Yo espero.
A quiet
young woman
in a library
reading books
with diagrams
of bomb shelters
and *** positions

She's thinking
of her future
They call the ship 'Burden,'
An indestructible vessel,
Rival to the monsters of the sea.
It's exactly what the people needed,
For you see,
In the depths lurked a beast.
Eighty tentacles, four trade ships tall and wide,
A hundred-thirty teeth when it's smile lied.
They called it, "Kraken."
It was nothing of the likes you've seen,
Emperor of the dark sea.

The Burden could hold fifteen hundred men,
Arming harpoons, cannons, muskets, wit.
The king ordered them to turn the seas red with gore,
Call forth the Kraken,
Strike it dead.
Then to the king,
They would drag back it's head.

So come high-noon,
The ship was in place,
Above the deepest of sea caves.
Letting forth crates of bait,
Staining the waters of the sea,
Until the sailors heard a rumble,
Shake the Burden's iron shell.

Up from the waters came long river's hell,
Tentacles like spires towering well beyond the sails.
But the crew held steady,
"Tighten the ropes, arm our cannons,"
Cried the captain,
"Then fire!"
The seas filled with blood,
The sky filled with gunpowder, fractured shells,
A shriek rang out from the deeps.
The cry of death,
From the Kraken itself.
Tentacles sinking away,
"The head!" Cried the captian,
So Lutenent Lucus dived after the creature.

Tied by a rope,
Pike in hand,
The creature's head,
He began to drag.
Though, glancing over his shoulder,
Through the murk he could see,
The form of a woman swimming away.
Some curse broken, he decided,
A soul freed from grim reality.

Peace.
I love a good sea fairing story!
Do not stand
          By my grave, and weep.
     I am not there,
          I do not sleep—
I am the thousand winds that blow
I am the diamond glints in snow
I am the sunlight on ripened grain,
I am the gentle, autumn rain.
As you awake with morning’s hush,
I am the swift, up-flinging rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight,
I am the day transcending night.
     Do not stand
          By my grave, and cry—
     I am not there,
          I did not die.
— Clare Harner, The Gypsy, December 1934
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Do_Not_Stand_at_My_Grave_and_Weep
“In some office sits a poet,
and he trembles as he sings,
and he asks some guy,
to circulate his soul around”
Joni Mitchell

<>

joni:
your both sides
then and  now,
was my guiding glasses
for a life of motley loving
and love, gained, pained,
lost and found
as a younger man,
and now, as old soul
with rear view perspective,
the glasses tinted transition grey,
(matching his pallor, his hair.
his transient perspective,
trembling fingers as he writes,
with humility,
0
pleeze circulate these
decoded words
mate them out of clay
hoping  come new daylight
one or two, even a few
will lend a rosy thistle, blow softly
an encouraging breeze
upon this poem
the freedom to burn into
glowing embers
in our circulating worlds
of pass/fail
it’s my mere soul
you pass judgement
with a hint of tasteful scents
on
and beyond
with an
honorable push
your mentioned
breath,
guiding them
to the currents
where poems go to
blossom
Nov ‘ 24
mom says
i’m the best person she knows.
i smile.
i’m good at pretending.

she says i’m kind,
but i know when it’s a performance.
she says i’m gifted,
but it feels like a trick
i’m barely pulling off.

my sax squeaks,
my test scores blur,
my muscles ache in the water.
and still she calls it talent.

i nod along,
quiet and guilty.

if i’m so good,
why do i always
feel like a lie?
the sky is soft tonight
and so am i,
thinking of you
the way i always do,
reminding myself
of my overflowing love.

baby,
you make everything
feel like music again.
like late summer light
on tired skin,
like laughter in the car
with nowhere to go.

i’ve written you
a hundred ways,
but still
this feels like
the first time.
Let’s not sleep—
let’s overthink!
Let’s rethink
every awkward blink.

Let’s write a novel
in our head,
then cry about
what we should’ve said.

Sleep is boring.
Peace is fake.
Let’s spiral till
the morning breaks.
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