We first sexed in a tumbling, fumbling manner;
The time had come, it seemed to us,
To consummate our ****** lust.

The Valley was shakin' to The Rocks,
A popular Irish band;
We'd had our fill,
I sparked the engine,
And parked my bike on Techumseh Hill.

The summit was dew damp;
We spread wide our pants,
Not knowing who should go for whom,
So we relented to the crescent moon;
I acquiesced to the shooting stars
When my eyes

Diverse moons have filled my nights,
Long since the grassy knoll,

The honey in the lion sounds like a delicious thing––
a gentle balm capable of subduing
the cruellest of monsters.

According to the stars and tattooed,
you fancied yourself king of the jungle––
lazy in hot African afternoons.

Golden and tawn with sleepy sun-gold eyes,
shaggy mane, muzzle red with
the blood of a gazelle.

Did you think me such easy prey?
Or was I so much fermented honey,
only a sweet intoxicant.

Sun warmth seeps from jungles of cold concrete.
I mistook your gargoyle wings
for those of a guardian angel’s.

I overlooked your rough skin, your
crooked hawk nose and your skinny ribs,
and assigned fine things in you that didn’t exist.

So duped, I acquiesced to your slimy kiss.
Your mouth a neglected cemetery,
teeth a row of mossy tombstones.

Vampire. Incubus. Your seduction like grotesque death.
You named me tempest in a teacup,
but I was the eye of the storm.

Until the night the eye was eradicated,
and the storm blew in,
striking me dumb with your sound and fury.

But no spattered blood and no spreading bruise
to be found in the pattern of the kaleidoscope.
No cause for alarm.

Today I am lost in a picture show,
a beautiful world coloured by nostalgic past.
Women’s lips the vivid red print of a velvet valentine.

Head in the Clouds, I fantasize about a certain scene.
Because you think violence is ****––
retaliation – ******* in my dream.

Give me an eye for my eye,
for all the eyes you plucked, from women and breadwinners.
Give me blood running down your back, sweet as honey.

Another enchanting "Barry Hodges Memory" poem for you all!

O glorious Art Deco edifice, tucked away behind the 'Dilly!
In your near century of hospitality, how many millions of visitors
Must have thronged your rooms, meeting, greeting, eating, sleeping
And (need I specify the obvious?) ******* away the fleeting hours?
How sad it is to think that the dear Regent Palace has fallen victim
To the money-grabbing developers' philistine wrecking *****.

Rumour came to me in the Seventies that the ground floor cocktail bar
Had gained a somewhat , shall we say, *louche reputation,
Being frequented by ladies of the night and part-time gigolos;
And that the hustle and bustle of the reception area meant that
Staff would hardly notice if guests invited a newly made friend upstairs
For some horizontal entertainment, be it on a cash or ex gratia basis.

Several evenings, perhaps after a night at the theatre, I paid a brief visit
To the dimly lit bar, with its sophisticated black pianist tinkling out a tune
In the very best Casablanca tradition, perhaps even crooning a little ditty.
One summer night I recall I dropped in, probably post-prandially
More in hope than serious expectation, ordered an over-priced G&T;
And settled down to assess the odds on some casual leg-over action.

Much to my surprise I was soon joined by a large middle-aged blonde
(to a naive young chappie, any woman over 35 is no spring chicken);
She was Icelandic and big with it in the mammary department,
But not fat I hasten to add, just sturdy, like a splendid Wagnerian Valkyrie;
Yea, I knew she was gagging for it when she confided that, only last week,
She had shared l'amour with a young stranger in the Wienerwald al fresco.

I cannot recall much of our no doubt fascinating intellectual conversation
And I certainly can't remember her name, but I do know I readily acquiesced
To her generous invitation to participate in a glug of her duty free allowance
Within the intimate privacy of her spartan little bedroom on the seventh floor.
Delightfully, to my mild pleasure, our upwards journey in the crowded lift
Enticed her to caress my eager testicles in a heart-warmingly experienced way.

Over a malt whisky and, following an extended exchange of warm saliva,
We ended up stark ******* naked in the rather narrow single bed;
Sadly, my recollections of our coupling have gone the way of all flesh
(but my well-preserved diary for that year notes I gave her the works thrice)
And I do vividly remember wondering what time the Underground started
on Sunday mornings as I was no longer enamoured of her tobacco breath.

Now, dear reader, we come to the ****** of my night of Nordic nookie:
Just as the dawn's early light was filtering through the ill-fitting curtains,
My partner in lust informed me that she desperately needed a squirt
(I fear I omitted to mention that the RPH didn't run to en suite facilities)
And that, rather than struggle down the corridor to the communal bogs,
She intended to void her bloated bladder in the waiting washbasin.

She enjoined me to be a gentleman and to refrain from watching her
As she performed her toilette and I assured her, with a covert smile,
That I would not breach her urinary modesty. Thus I slyly observed her
Waltz over to the window and, with the assistance of a handy little chair,
Hoist her ample buttocks up on the basin and let fly her steaming ****;
O, what a romantic sound it made as it splashed onto the porcelain!

As I lay there, entranced by the sight of my piddling blonde Brünnhilde,
An unexpected sound intruded over the splatter of her seething waters:
O Jesu! Suddenly, in the veritable twinkling of an eye, the basin's supports,
Unequal to the unscheduled weight of the female Goliath squatting thereon,
Gave way and what's-her-name fell to the economically carpeted floor,
Screaming in fear, spread-eagled in ****-drenched shattered chinaware.

To say I was beside myself with mirth would be an understatement but,
Gentlemanly as always, I managed to pass off my gargled giggles
As evidence of gallant concern. As soon as common decency permitted,
I made my excuses and left the disconcerted dear to tidy up a bit.
But I will confess to emitting a huge howl of uncontrolled laughter
As I raced off to the nearest toilet (I too was bursting for a huge slash).

Is humanism Utopian?
You really have to think about it.
Or is it rather more dystopian?
No, then I think you’d never doubt it.
It seems that disbelief is best.

Humanism owes a debt
to thinkers of the Enlightenment,
although I haven’t paid it yet,
I think of it as my entitlement
to settle it at some behest.

I very early cleared my mind of Kant,
experiencing a vast relief,
approaching his chef d’oeuvres extant;
removing knowledge to allow belief;
the opposite of what he had expressed.

It occurred to me I ought to dig up
(or should I say instead ex-hume?)
what constitutes at least an egg-cup-
full of wisdom that I might consume
with non-platonic zest.

But wondering how on earth to do so
and thinking he might hold the key,
I fixed my sights on Jean Jacques Rousseau
and set sail for my destiny,
while trying not to feel depressed.

Voltaire’s voices loudly rang in deaf ears
as did the Persian Letters of Montesquieu
and failed to still my latent fears.
And thus I felt no need to rescue
Adam Smith (morality-obsessed).

To put Descartes before the Horse-
men of the Apocalypse
War, famine, pestilence and worse.
Who could guess it would eclipse
my thought, wherefore I was oppressed.

Or take the case of Denis Diderot
a friend of Hume and others seedier.
and one you might consider so
rash as to produce an encyclopedia
to get his knowledge off his chest.

That precious quality of truth
was Mary Ann’s# description of it.
It would not take a Sherlock sleuth
to simply thus produce a conviction of it:
an elementary request.

I cut my questing teeth on Russell.
His secular logic had a profound effect
and seemed to stir each red corpuscle
inhabiting this fervid non-sect-
arian but doubting breast.

I later turned my eye on Dawkins,
and his concern with my divine delusion.
A sceptic whose inspiring squawkings
validate my disillusion
and emphasise an ill-starred quest.

And so I felt the pointlessness of it.
Progress is the best end for a man to see
And belief simply produced less profit
for reality’s dispelling of my fantasy.
So, in the end, I acquiesced.

#Mary Ann Evans, aka George Eliot, in *Adam Bede

Old blue is snorting bath salt-
In the same bathroom where he nursed the only battle wound I’ve ever had-

I had swung on the prince of Hopkins county-
My knuckle caught the crystal of his watch-
Pop and howl, edge and line-
Thrown askew by force-
(my) good young blood ferried wolf flowers from one side of the sink-
to the other-

Time kept-
Bone acquiesced-
Verity-

Old blue would tell you that he only remembers contrition-
While humming the Gardenia Waltz.

Perhaps I peered too closely into the abysmal potholes of other people’s souls
of whom I had no business pilfering through in the first place.
Now I ponder about feelings and memories that do not belong to me
some of which are long forgotten, disregarded, or even irrelevant.
Of this information that I have unearthed and processed, I know not what to do with it.
I am perpetually preoccupied with what lies beneath the surface point, which is what pushes me forward, yet could propel me to my downfall.
I just sit here and anxiously ponder this arcane information I acquiesced
through means not noble to my standard of normal morals.
There is nothing else to do.
For I rest here in the realm of reality.
This is no novel of fiction for me to figure out.
I can’t flip through the pages of people’s plights.
Something like that does not fall within my rights.
I am a mere meddling mortal amongst other mortals.
I am no god who sits proudly upon their plethora of others’ secrets.

I am just another human being.

I skip rope with mortality
We play hide and seek at least once a week
My favorite hiding spot is the bottom of a pill bottle
Or a carbon monoxide quartet played in b minor
Though She always finds me
I’m chastised for being weak
I always say She because She has me intrigued
But who is She to deny me the ease of eternal sleep
When in time I’ll see for myself that it’s a corrupted dream

In the sun I bloom in thralls of ecstasy
And a splendor unseen unless your eyes are on the childish setting
In this light I toil over a slowly rusting slinky
I marvel at its ebb and flow
Unbeknownst to its proper meaning
On the box reads “Life and Death” but to this it has no means to me
But the sun doesn’t shine forever
And soon its warmth will leave me to wither
Then that rusting slinky takes hold of me
Extreme with avarice so bitter
And no thoughts of ever leaving
To combat this I reach into my box of cigarette kisses
To extract a couple of sweetlings
A long draw of articulate death
While I listen to the tobacco weeping
Their cries against a moonlit sky
Marks the stay of a frivolous execution
Though I am not without disillusion
I can feel it in every breath
Just as a child believes they’ll always be free
I’ve acquiesced to a not so slow, slow death

You are the figure who passes by my window;
The black that breaks the uniformity of the light
The stain that breaks the white folds of my curtain
The shape my heart throbs at sight.

You are the shadow I peek across my sills
The silhouette I long to meet
The fiction I fancy to be real
The phantasm I recall, over and over, in my head.

You are but real as a dream;
So near, yet far.

Friendly Joe Rabbit
Was not in the habit
Of running the race
To the end
He took every shortcut
Beware of the wrong-cut
And found every turn
Every bend

He said to Tom Turtle
I’ve hopped every hurdle
The race I will clearly contend
And though you are slow
Hither you go
You’re steadfast
A trusty old friend

She said to Tom Turtle
I’m taking it slow
And so he will know
This isn’t a show

He trusted Joe Rabbit
To follow him through
He said it was true
Before she even know

Tom Turtle she said
I’ll trust you instead
And cautiously I’ll go
My way

Joe Rabbit pursued
Like courtship he’d woo
The race to the finish line drew
The staggering pace
That had to erase
Before he was finished she knew

Tom Turtle her friend
Had lost in the end
And happily she acquiesced
Joe Rabbit my dear
The answer is clear
I’ll switch sides
I’ll now go with you

I’ve fallen in love
From heaven above
Joe Rabbit you’ve now
Won my heart
But right from the start
Joe knew he was smart
He knew how the story
Would end

They now share one heart
And never will part
As lovers their story
Goes on
Their friendship so dear
No reason to fear
Their future is now
Very clear

Two lovers apart
Who followed their heart
To live without worries of woes
And right to the end
They’ll always befriend
Their journey was now to begin

From living apart
A home they will start
And happily they’ll live
Through their days
Joe Rabbit, his speed
Was all they did need
Their love now is fully ablaze

Forever is clear
Their future so dear
Happily ever after
The song of the day
True love finds a way
A bridal bouquet
To carry away
A bride always be
Thanks to Joe Rabbit and me

So here’s to the day
Joe Rabbit did say
Live your life
As husband and wife
Live happily ever after

I won the race
No more a disgrace
Tom Turtle has nothing
To say
Thanks to you all
Time to clear the hall
And everyone
Have a good day

Sunday’s an auspicious day to suggest
that you, as a student, take a recess
in order to try and decompress
from our studying and stress

Now, of course, if you’re so possessed,
or some might even say obsessed,
you could study for a test,
we all want to do our best
but some work habits can oppress
and leave one all depressed

Just  take a needed rest
and if your needs are unaddressed
get caressed when you’re undressed
some would have that thought suppressed
or simply left it unexpressed
but under oath I would attest
and to a priest I have confessed
all my roommates acquiesced
that for relaxation it’s the best
and quickest way to get unstressed

there are a hundred things I could suggest
you type “A”s tend to make everything a contest
in this, there are no professors for you to impress
this isn’t a competitive, academic trap, trick or jest
I just know that, on Monday, this girl will be refreshed

I didn't know your name back then.
I practiced love with other men.
I burned my lips on words like yes.
I didn't know your name back then.

I practiced love with other men—
a reckless, shipwrecked malcontent;
a willing, waiting queen undressed,

I burned my lips on words like yes.
I warmly, weakly acquiesced
and woke to wonder if I'd dreamt.

I didn't know your name back then.
I studied sin with other men
and broke my heart on words like when.

pasty white ghosts haunt
the corpse blue cornfields of Iowa
whispering wisps of smoke
shimmering shadows of the past
setting the pace for the rat race
that is the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election

senators billionaires doctors
frauds liars fools
campaigning for selection in an
archaic and outdated
form of governance

witness the spectacle
the orgastic worship
of solipsistic oligarchs
bloated by their own
sycophantic rhetoric

it's just another form
of all-American
entertainment

each orator's charismatic adage
froths forth from a
throat like a grave
pragmatism throttles hope
as we stoke the fires of
self-indulgence and neglect
the fact that we acquiesced
as another deceiver stole votes

we're choking on placebo pills
every ballot cast is another act of apathy
escapism pleading vainly for a
savior to rescue our sick society but
these hands didn't evolve so we could
collect a representative to lead us
blindly into one fiasco after another

these fingers penned  
humanity's symphonies and
these calloused palms have
toiled for years under an apathetic sun
we learned to make love
using our fingertips and
with these fists
we could chart a new path
but only if we raise them in
defiance

our only chance is leaderless resistance

struck by lightning twice by twenty-four
this astronomical record was hers, Guinness proclaimed,
this lady so famed, top of her class at Stanford, then Yale Med,
and blissfully wed, to a surgeon who always came in second

this did not matter at Cabo, or even in their first condo  
but as her curriculum vitae grew faster than a Walmart receipt
on Black Friday, he scrubbed up for one bloodletting after another, removing appendixes, and appendages, feeling her shadow
grow heavy, even in the bright lights
of his operating theater

his first was, of course, a nurse, though at least her age
his second, a decade newer model, fixed his lattes at Starbucks
number three was the neighbor with whom they shared
nothing but a fence, and a few awkward stares

her hours in the lab with petri dishes grew, and  
she never let on she knew, that her clean shaven number two  
was lying with others to stand himself  

when he asked for a divorce--number four requiring more
than liquid exchanges in sweet hotel suites--she acquiesced and even let him have the Welsh Corgi, the cabin in Aspen,
and half the 401K

to this day, she recalls imagining his liaisons  
while she married menacing molecules to one another
in tubes under faithful light, seeking answers to questions
asked by the dying she would never meet
a lump would only grow in her throat    
if she thought his scalpel never sliced
the heart of number four, for five

The clock becomes a detachable head.
Acquiesced to the ground
The fragments become priceless.
Wrinkled people grovel over the eager glass
Pick them up and risk the cuts.

Vibrations equalize
and everyone is holding hands
stuffing their distractions and sadness
into a sack
looking into each others’ eyes
blurring the faces into one
letting go is hard at first
but then after it is hard
to keep from spinning out of control.

At first sharing for simplicity
and then in a disease involuntarily
for daytime T.V shows
and self-help-how-to-do-your-life books
by self-proclaimed seers and prophets
reading the palm of your hand
which is also mine
and his.

No time
to stop
not for a second.

you are
the god
and all the questions are answered

you are the ice that covers sidewalks
warmth will defrost thought out actions,
instilling the masterpiece.

Response:
Why not look inside of you?
Are there questions that cannot be answered?
Yes but only because of detail
and the sharp and spiky squares of  
Science.


the dance we learn to stop dancing,
goes on after us and goes on into forever.
like forever may not be there.
it doesn’t seem to note or care
that the space between your two ears.
comforts my neck best
or constellations crossing your chest
constantly suggests no matter the rearrangement
no coincidences are circumstance
I’m trying not to look for it
some reality where I belong

if forever sees it has missed a beat
laughing and playing.
I so obediently repeat
what you’ve so gracefully said to me.
Life is not a sign for anything else.
It is more of  an enigmatic saying from a hermit
below a full moon
purely nonsense insane.
…but realizing the smile with which it was contained.

we all need the fun,
we all need some bliss,

what's gotten into you?
-
you shall be missed.

Met a physics major at university
I was into her, and she was into me
We hit it off so well we agreed to a date
the beginning was so nice but
the ending not so great!

She was so cheery
talkin' 'bout
String theory, it
left me weary
cuz I didn't want
to talk about
science

She was so cheery
talkin' 'bout
String theory, it
left me weary
cuz I didn't want
to talk about
science

After our meal, she said
"let's go for a walk"
When I asked what for
she said, "I just want to talk"
While holding hands, walking
and gazing at the sky, my
romantic mood was ruined
and here's the reason why

She was so cheery
talkin' 'bout
String theory, it
left me weary
cuz I didn't want
to talk about
science

She was so cheery
talkin' 'bout
String theory, it
left me weary
cuz I didn't want
to talk about
science

Handwriting on the wall,
it didn't look too good
She asked me to rethink
my position if I could
I considered pros and cons
and I almost acquiesced
But then I realized why
our breakup would be best

She was so cheery
talkin' 'bout
String theory, it
left me weary
cuz I didn't want
to talk about
science

She was so cheery
talkin' 'bout
String theory, it
left me weary
cuz I didn't want
to talk about
science

String theory, left me weary, string theory
Sigh, sigh, sigh, sigh
science
String theory, left me weary, string theory
Sigh, sigh, sigh, sigh
science
     (repeat and fade)




Mark Toney © 2022

“Childhood only exists”
“While its innocence lives”
“In time, it is replaced”
“By what, our invidious reasoning gives”          WIZDUMBs BY JA 223      

When I was very young, some years before my teens
Before those wild ambitions, invaded all my dreams

I was naive, yet unafraid; my life was filled with awe
I ran and played, unperturbed, exploring things I saw

I had no needs, beyond my own; no greed had yet set in
Not then aware, that my needs, could evolve into a sin

I had no great desires, put no value, on what I lent
There was no hidden meaning, no reward, in my intent

I had no inhibitions, had not yet tasted fear
I marveled at the joys of life, which now I hold so dear

I rushed headlong thru life, and gave it not a thought
Back then, knew not life’s lessons, still needed to be taught

All of my convictions, lived free within my heart
Before my brain took hold, and tore them all apart

My innocence of reasoning, was good and sweet and pure
This loss of childlike judgement, one day I would endure

I thought not of, what I should do; back then I had no clue
Thus unafraid, tried everything, and so my knowledge grew

With each mistake, I’d try again; from each a lesson drew
Discovered life, not as it seemed, and so, would start anew

I searched for all the answers, to things I did not know
Unknowing that this knowledge; would corrupt my soul

I did not yet, discriminate; knew not that color mattered
This crystal mirror image, for me, was also shattered

My innocence preceded, all I thought and dreamed
Until I finally realized, that the world had intervened

I discovered that not always, black was black nor white is white
That sometimes right was wrong, and sometimes wrong is right

That friends do come and friends do go, but our wish, is to belong
And each of us, must prove our worth, for a friendship to be strong

That family blood; makes our bonds, much closer than the rest
In times of need, if good or bad, our family stands the test

And so my childhood ended, life’s road got in the way
The consequences of my choices, have led me to this day

A life once lived and filled, with the ease of its simplicity
Now sadly acquiesced, to its contrived, duplicity
BOEMS BY JA 239

Inter-wreath souls communicating in silence
Despairing distance just making it more intense
Slow dancing fumes of proximal hazy memory
Flashing lights of the destined future glimmery

Fateful rendezvous of unprepared agitation
Acquiesced drift along the preordained creation
Out of the blue we fell in love,now suffocatingly confined
And why love, the grey shade concealations so refined

With silence, we endowed recentful persuasion  
With lectures, we plundered for destined evasion
My love, we lived love for life sustained both
Now we travel opposites as we found loathe

So long, what we came together for
So long, to our ever enjoyed rapture

The mailbox that bears my name was filled with notes from God's secretary,
each notarized with an antioxidary,
regretting to inform me
| a meeting cannot be yet arranged,
{that} the schedule will just not allow |
And as my eyes palavered with each and every flowing word,
{The clerk had impeccable penmanship}
the sorrow hit me like a God ****** hammer,
falling flaming from the gloomy clouds,
splitting my skull without a sound,
and if I could accurately express exasperated stammering,
my letters in return would be that-

So to temporarily occupy my infinite time,
dine do I, on plates of leaves, as the guest of hounds from Hell,
And O! they do not bellow but whimper quietly.
They softly said as I was fed to second-guess my piety,
but whether they meant to be so dour it was difficult to tell.
So as I ate my mind escaped and I fell and fell and fell
(not unlike a hop/skip/jump straight into a well.)

The hounds with zeal! they laughed at me
as I tumbled into darkness.
O! how lonely falling is, it can only end in pain.
As I swirled into the pit I see my past is feigned.
The darkness then began to waste away as light unfurled,
and fast and sure my flailings ceased, and I landed on my porch.
The force my feet had bent the boards and my mailbox erupted.
The letters God had sent to me fluttered coyly in the breeze.

I remembered how the lamb I had eaten was most oily,
   and I vomited-
But all that came from my tired organs was the milk of human kindness.
I rose and stood la'statuesque,
frozen,
like a victim of a Gorgon-
My limbs then quit;
I acquiesced,
and fell again onto my porch.

I could hear the cackling that drifted from the matted muzzles of the hounds,
hiding in the shrubs nearby.
I tried to yell
but hounds from Hell
can only hear a lie;
I whispered, "Yes, I'm doing fine, I ask you, don't assist..."

The laughing stopped a'suddenly and silence took ahold.
I lied, I lied!
I lied as I were dead.

The hounds understood and turned to dust, vanished with the wind.
O! how lonely falling is, the landing ostracizes,
and there I sat, a porch pariah,
until the mailman returned with the sun,
bringing bills and notes from God,
and soon my mailbox will again be filled |

| And confound me like a divining rod in a boat
When everything points to true and right,
abandon do I all my hope |

(Warning:  Explicit and mildly disturbing)

The door to the room burst open as two lovers twisted into the
gaudy motel room, causing the roaches to scatter to safety.
His tongue was exploring her mouth as he pushed her up against
the wall.  She wrapped her legs around his waist in anticipation.

They made their way to the bed, ******* as they went.  His brown
leather jacket landed on the back of a chair, followed by his shirt.  Her
blouse fluttered carelessly to the floor.  He pushed against her and then...

a pause

He saw what she was looking at and smiled.  "Don' worry babe, I only use
that on people I don't like.  I like you".  He took the gun out of the waistband
of his pants and set it on the nightstand.  Hesitation, but soon more clothes
were shed until there were no more.   His eyes hungrily explored her body,
preparing for a night to remember.  She smiled and bit her lip as his eyes
looked her over.  "You know what really gets me off?".  He grunted in
response, to which she whispered in his ear.  He laughed.  "**** you're
*****, girl".  He acquiesced, though.  His mouth went on her breast, followed
by a soft bite.  She gasped. He was shocked when liquid trickled onto his tongue.  
He pulled back and looked up.  She was just staring at him, alluring eyes begging him to continue.  He felt slightly light headed.  He stopped.  He tried moving away, but he again found himself at her breast.

Another taste.

That feeling of light-headedness again.  Several times this happened, he tried to start the deed that he had come here for, only to find himself back for more.  He slowly realized that he couldn't move away.  He was trapped.  He now suckled in earnest.  His brain screamed for him to stop, but it was out of his control now.  She stroked his hair, traced her fingers along the scars on his back.  Bullet wounds.  "It's ok, sweetie.  You're a bad man, but we're gonna make it better, aren't we".  His thoughts raced, but there was nothing he could do.  
His body was betraying him.  He was paralyzed.

A shudder

He felt odd, his whole body felt as if he was being wrapped in a warm blanket.  Soothing voices lulling him to sleep.  His body relaxed.  He felt himself slowly shrinking.  He felt all his memories rushing by him, unaware that they were slowly being erased.  He was in his late 30s, yet he now looked to be no older than 17.  He forgot about the first time he'd shot someone in cold blood.  He forgot about his father drunkenly beating him.  He forgot nights in the emergency room.  His body continued to shrink, as his memories left.  He was no older than a toddler now.  He forgot the first woman he struck in anger.
He forgot becoming his father.  He curled into the fetal position. The woman sat
up now, and wrapped him in her arms, rocking him slowly.  "There there...that's better now.  You gonna be a good man this time.  We keep tryin' 'til we get it right, won't we?"

He was an infant.  Newly born.  Finally he released.  He looked up at the woman he would now call mother.  It wasn't the same woman that he had come into the room with. She smiled down at him, earning a yawn from the babe.

"That's right, you go to sleep now.  Things'll be different in the morning"

She kissed his forehead and wrapped him up in his old leather jacket while she dressed.  When she was finished, she looked around the room.  Seeing that everything was accounted for, she picked up the child and vanished into the night, determined to get it right this time.

For a while, we put our problems in a box in the attic.
We'd visit, now and again, to deposit an annoyance or two.
But then we started adding bigger problems, and space became tight.
We bought a trunk.  It was cedar, designed to keep the moths (and our consciousness) out.

One day you went up there, and discovered I'd taken up nearly the whole trunk
with a gray sweater, full of holes, coming undone at the seams.
You wanted to know how it got there— you'd never seen it before.
I didn't exactly remember putting it there, at least not all at once.  
It would explain its tattered nature.
You told me to just get rid of it.  It's all worn out, you said.  What's the use keeping it?
I told you I was still working on finding all of the pieces.
You acquiesced.  You usually do.

For a while, the trunk was all we needed.
I left the house and came back with more pieces for that gray sweater.
It eventually became more of a blanket, but the trunk still kept it in, though the wool
would threaten to spill out in tufts whenever I opened the lid.

Eventually, it overflowed the trunk, creeping out onto the floor, down the attic steps.  Into the house.
You asked if I'd found all the pieces yet.
No, I haven't.  The bigger it gets, the more holes it sprouts.
I start to wonder if I've been making new holes to patch old ones, taking thread from the seams,
and leaving the edges ragged, fraying.
I'm fraying.
And neither one of us is good at sewing.

Perhaps it was her voice itself, clear and simple,
Unalloyed by any classically trained fol-de-rol,
Or possibly the nature of her faith
Displayed with such clarity, such transparency
By that very instrument,
But in any case, she had utterly bewitched the populace
Of the place known as Ahwaga by her distant cousins,
And when she stood on the Delaware & Hudson platform
The next morning, they had cheered her lustily,
All but begging her You must return to us,
But the train had lost its footing on a sharp grade
Mere hundreds of yards before making the station at Deposit,
And she was lost in the carnage and conflagration.
The townspeople she had said her farewells to that morning
Were distraught, their feelings a mix of grief
And an odd sense of culpability, a nagging misgiving
That perhaps this was an omen, some augury
Denoting that their own faith was not up to scratch,
And so they had taken her back to their own burgh
To bury her in a manner befitting her piety
(She had been travelling with siblings,
But they acquiesced to the plan, though how willingly
Not wholly apparent at the time,
And made no clearer through the ramble of time)
And so she was laid to rest in a plot
Surrounded by ornate fencing, her grave marked
By an obelisk pointing unambiguously to her Heaven,
And it is said that, on autumn evenings
When the breeze rustle the dying leaves just so,
You can hear the spirits of her Mohawk brethren
Come down from Quebec, murmuring songs
Telling of the spirits living in the trees and hedgerows,
Spoken in the ancient tongue
Of the languid, unhurried Susquehanna far below.

Is a man
who acquiesces to love's embrace
ever sinless? (never a lamb)
always libidinous? (perpetually the wolf)  

I pondered this (stigmatic) question
as I entered the densely-wooded trail,
to seek my analogous answers
in the enchanting mystery of the naked forest--

Much as I had before,
seeking truth and solace in love's embrace;
tucked within her ample *****,
where I had once lain my head
gently flowing with the rise and fall
of her chest--

much like the advances and retreats
of aching waves on the beleaguered shore.

I traveled the woods, taking it all in--
as I, the woods,
and the woods, my love,
and the earth, my foundation,
and the sky:
My god.

I heard avian sprites dance in the thickets and brush,
scampering away from my intrusions.

These birds; be they so timid in my presence?
Or, in their sprite-like visage,
do they simply mirror such intrinsically motivated ambulations;
their impalpable purposes impervious to Man's prodding.  

I feel I seek their fleeting company in my mind's eye,
who wanders incessantly in its dreadful musings,
while my earthly senses
merely soak in what is to be seen.

And I see the naked overturned tree--
victim of the vitriolic hurricane's rages;
who lies ashamed before my queried glances,
silently panning from empty branches
protruding from a battered trunk,
down to her meandering roots--
who look meaningless in their desperate search
for earthly riches.

I almost feel guilty enough to cast my eyes from her sight--
and she is left to only rot in the foliage
that once entertained her life;

and her in turn having once contributed
to the beauty
I precede,

in the impending vernal equinox
alluded by the returning chansonettes
of those dainty birds--
who sing and dance among those branches sturdier than hers.

I felt her woes accumulating in her shameful exposure
to wicked love's throes and I wept alongside her.

(Pitiful, unspoken empathy.)

---

I finally make it to the overlook,
and the rugged solitary picnic table--
where I sit and gaze over the cove,
and the shore that lurks beneath
my commanding earthly footing.

Sighing at the merrymakers perched atop their aquatic vessels--
their cries and screams of elation reaching me,
like mocking phantoms lurking in the woods,
echoing off the hollow shells

(and I write this all with numbing fingers
and tearing eyes, blinking furiously
in frigid but calm winds never hiding their presence)--

I see them, closer now as I make my way to the beach;
but how is it I am the one sinking,
when my feet are the ones planted firmly on the shore?

My shoe'd feet seep into the wet sand--
a dull orange, so lifeless and cold;

Infinitely malleable.

As I once was,

in love's embrace.

---

In the sand:
the lukewarm tracks of man and beast--
traveling side by side,
their destinations a mystery to me,
but their paths encapsulated in the gritty earth
where I once again sense the duality of my soul.

Man and beast imprinted in the malleable confines
of my innermost being, where
the ceaseless waves crash onto the shore
of my battered conscience,

and I feel sinking atop my muddy thoughts
the footprints of man and beast--
the biped and the quadruped--
stepping in tune to nature's melodies.

When I acquiesced to love,
man and beast did not step harmoniously
in the sand,
and the waves of lust crashed over my conscience
like the perfect storm.

In utter torment,
I shied from its ceaseless beatings,
but I foolishly dug my withering tendrils into the mutable sand,
and the wind's booming voice furiously knocked me onto my back--

and though her advancing body had suddenly lain atop mine,
with kisses like icy daggers and eyes like amorphous storm clouds--
her words and my conscience
lay heavier on me still;

On the shore,
and in the woods:
Where I lay naked and exposed,
where I lay shameful and remorseful,
where I lay hopeless and tasteless,
where I lay to this day--

rotting in the foliage that once gave me life,
and I in turn,

beauty.

You are poison
Hidden in the holy grail
I willingly drank
I fully submit to you

Make me bleed darling
Drink my blood
It is all yours

Suffocate me darling
Take my warm breath away
Keep it for your self

Blind me darling
Engulf the truth
I have acquiesced your will

Deafen me darling
Your sweet lies will be my music
I gave into you

You are poison
That given me pain
I gladly conceded
I am your possession

Knock knock...
Who's there?
It's the fire in your belly,
just checking you're aware...

Hey, you know... I'm still here...
I'm not going anywhere.
It seems I used to be volcanic,
now I  barely singe a hair.

Magmatic in my golden days,
when did I grow dormant?
As you aged you acquiesced,
not living in the moment.

Rekindle my cinders,
your indifference is abhorrent.
You used to fight for your beliefs,
now the white flag is a soaring.

Give me white hot purpose,
give me a voice that roars,
the Beastie Boys fought for their right,
why can't you fight for yours?

You only get one shot,
you chose a pushover to the core?
Don't be the heedless hero,
be an involved...
...*******...
Tyrannosaur.

Let me tell you a story,
Of death and a boy.
The boy was dead inside,
Outcasted and harassed,
But his friend and at last his family.

So walking along the street,
No one else had gone upon,
With his ****** body,
And crazy mice.
He met death a waiting.

As his time had come first.
Death incarnate,
And Living Death,
They talked and slowly but surely,
Became the best of friends.

He did not plead for his life,
Or beg to acquiesced,
Death being surprised,
At someone so unsure, being so content.
Broke the Law and the Word,
And let the boy go away.

One day the boy was a man,
In his own disfigured way.
Innocent at heart,
****** in all but the brain.
He walked with stones,
Hoping the weigh his fate.

And Death still followed,
As the protector and procreator,
The one friend that remained.

But alas Death grew sad,
As he looked ahead in time,
And saw that this lie would have to be corrected,
Dave would have to die.

So along the beaten path,
That got colder and colder,
The man became sad,
Yet sure in his task.
Suicide was his only option,
His desire for control on his fate.
What irony, what pity,
To see the trap that lay.
The universe is a cruel thing,
And it had been made late.

The man got to the cliff, at the end of the forest,
When readying to jump,
The lion took him head first,
And mauled, and ungutted,
He screamed and begged for help.

But his screams did not last long,
As Death settled in.
The look of fear, of recognition,
And a lone tear let out,
With his last lifeful look,
Into the eyes of his very first and last friend.

“You smell like you took a bath in whiskey.”

Josie wrinkled her nose.  Her words fell upon the shaded figure slumped against her doorway, silhouetted by a gas lamp across the street.  It was a familiar form; Josie couldn’t exactly remember the last time it had occupied the space.  

“It’s scotch, Josephine.”  
      
     The sentence bubbled out of the shadowed man.  He remained glued to the wooden frame, and Josie pondered closing the door on both him, and the night.  Eventually, the man straightened himself, and brushed off the wrinkled grey suit that hung loosely about him.  He performed a clumsy half-bow and stumbled past Josie into the living room, where he unfurled on the couch.  Josie grabbed some matches and lit the candles above the fireplace to mask the smell of liquor that had begun to fill the room.  

        “I have to ask, what brings you here?”  Josie said dryly, keeping a hand on the mantle, as she turned to face the undesired guest.  The silent void that followed her words was lifted by the man chuckling and sitting upright, bent forward with his elbows on his knees.

“Well, I was in the area, and to be truthfully honest the night’s growing old and I haven't had nearly enough to drink.  Unfortunately, as it were, I seemed to have spent the last of my coin.”

She waited for the man to continue, but he just stared sheepishly at her; She was not fully convinced that she wasn’t still asleep in her room upstairs.

“You picked the wrong home to come to.”

Josie muttered coldly and a small shudder coursed through her abdomen.  She wrapped her arms across her breast, and realized she was still in her silk nightgown.

“It was worth a shot.  Good ****.”

     The man grinned as he acquiesced her words, flashing ivory teeth which contrasted with the dark stubble of his beard.  He ran his hands through his slicked back hair before he locked them behind his head, then gave Josie a quick scan that made her shiver again.  

“So how’ve you been livin’ Josie?  It’s been quite some time.”  The man crooned.

Josie rotated so she wouldn’t have to look at him.  She wished she hadn’t answered the knock on her door.  

“I’ve been living.”  

She attempted to mask the strain it put on her to say the words.  

Josie stood there, holding herself, when a hand gripped her upper arm—she hadn’t heard him move from the couch.  The man whirled her around and grasped both arms tightly.  Josie tried to twist free but it felt as if she was held by two iron vises.  

He bent downwards and shoved his lips onto hers; the taste compared to taking a swig from a bottle and almost triggered Josie to gag. She didn’t have a perception of how much time passed before she was able to breathe again.

“Just like old times, huh Josi—”

She left a red imprint of her palm on his right cheek; the man stumbled backwards with his face held in his hands.  It was etched with confusion mixed with disbelief.

“Leave.”

It was an order.  Josie numbly walked over to the door and opened it in silence.  The man paused and seemed to contemplate whether or not he would obey the directive, then dropped his hands to his sides and trudged across the cream colored carpet. She kept her eyes fixed on the floor as he passed through the open frame with clenched fists hidden in his pockets.

Josie made to close the door, but was halted by a sudden urge.  She ran to her purse and fumbled inside, then withdrew her hand holding a small drawstring bag of change.  Josie stepped into the flickering spotlight of the gas-lamp and heaved the coins at the man; she aimed for the small of his back.  

“Buy yourself something better tasting next time.”  Josie hollered, then crept inside and shut the door.

By: David W. Clare

She phoned me up: as she lied: straight to my face!

Phoney baloney, rang through my swollen head, she's unfit for the human race...

Begged me to bring her a pint of ice cream; I fell back asleep had a frozen dream...

Then, my car alarm blew a gasket
Those **** wild hoodlums are at it again?

I fell down in the street chasing after a cheap bottle of ***** to sooth my broken down blues... her breathe sounded real bad!

I acquiesced, then wanted to see her naked in bed undressed... I was depressed at the thought, she looked hot until I threw back the blanket...

I knew I was being used as her chisel... skanky cheap broad!

I took a taxi to her uptown flat, what a ******: room 17, next to that old gas station that got robbed last summer...

I was so **** drunk, I rolled up the stairs and her shoes fell on my feet!

Then I knew there was no hope, I lay there like the drunken *******!


(C) In perpetuity all rights reserved
(P) FilmNoirWorks

Lost again, or maybe I
just never truly found my way?
I never feel sure that I am
heading in the right direction.
Instead, my heart and my mind
continue their endless battles.
Will I ever win this internal war?

Will I always have to continuously
question myself, or will
the answer ever become clear?
Should I just keep muddling through
each day with really no end in sight?

Times like this challenge even
my own strength.  Do I
want to continue feeling like
this each and every day?
I thought I had the answers before.
Now, I am definitely not so sure.  

Behind my own smile lies great pain.
I have learned to cover most of it;
however, my eyes tell all, as they
are the window to my soul.  
My heart is kind, loving, and generous.
Yet, I feel that it should be much harder,
so as to not allow some things that
I have acquiesced over my life.  

I am not sure what it is going
to take anymore to help find
my way back to the correct path.  
I just know that this beaten one
is all I have known for so long now.
I am truly lost….

Vicki A. Zinn
November 24, 2013

does
the caged soul
in the lantern
make you wonder
if all things
bright and beautiful
were to be seen
but never felt?
or did your
scheduled interruption
of ludicrous
malcontentment
waltz right into
your empty mindspace
and pluck your
pretty eyeballs out,
because, well, i
obviously convinced
him to, and
what good were
they, anyway?
you never
saw me
storm into your
vaulted life
with half determination,
clear the dust
off your subconscious
so you could see
the constellation;
you city lamp,
it hurt your pride
when you learnt
to look inside
and found an
excavated void
of vice and
nowhere you
can hide,
tell me, was it
arduous to decide
to climb
the cliff
and learn
to fly?
i'll tell you why:
that vengeful
little bird
has acquiesced
without a word
to aim and
shoot you in
the leg, then
watch you grovel,
watch you beg
until you shatter
onto the floor,
heartbreaking
piteous and poor,
like a broken
autumn leaf
but it's not
pretty anymore;
molten wax
around your ankles,
i'll let you
ornament my
candle stand,
let you burn
right through
the night; i
should've known
my little
counting stars
were far too
bright, too fluorescent
for you, feckless,
worthless, bewitching
scrap of pretty, vain
frustration.

Tonight we’ll share the heavens;
Souls knitted into one,
Fly together we, the ochre moontrails,
on gossamer wings.

The decanter overflows with nectar;
its sweetness permeates the ethereal void,
like ephemerous orbs when touched
by the hands of a child.

The secret Garden’s lit by Eos’ mirth;
polychromatic hues emanate from glassine showers;
Gait filling the place, radiating in splendor,
Warming every psyche in its solace.

Silence may, yet rule the void;
Plenary peace acquiesced e’en for a nanosecond.
Then from some aperture, a tiny tingle crescendos,
as the angelic host thunder their majestic heralds.

Come with me now my beloved;
Dry I your tears with lotus petals,
Come with me now, reach out your hand
and together we’ll share a millennium in a succinct moment
in this paradise called DREAMS.