In this age of global uncertainty, clothes have become a kind of panacea for a growing number of consumers. Designers are responding to the political upheavals of the past year by injecting some much-needed humour into women’s wardrobes. Browns CEO Holli Rogers is already predicting that spring’s sartorial hit will be Rosie Assoulin’s smiley-face T-shirt. This cheery number, which reads "Thank you! Have a Nice Day!’" neatly sums up the jubilant mood of the coming season.

The logic goes that turning up the dial on the fun, the colourful and the crazy is the sartorial equivalent of Michelle Obama’s "when they go low, we go high" mantra. We may not be able to control the chaos of world events, but we still rule our own style.

It’s no coincidence that a cartoonish aesthetic, of the sort you’d find if you rifled through an eccentric child’s dressing-up box, was in plentiful supply on the spring/summer 2017 runways. Alessandro Michele’s army of Gucci geeks displayed growing swagger in garish get-ups that ran from fuzzy crayon-coloured furs featuring zebras to tiered, tinsel-y coats that rivalled Grandma’s Christmas tree.

It was a similar story at Dolce & Gabbana, where sumptuous eveningwear was loaded with pasta and pizza motifs, and drums became bags, while Marc Jacobs tore a page from a psychedelic colouring book, covering clothes with the childlike scrawl of the London illustrator Julie Verhoeven. Even ardent minimalists would have to admit that these playful looks have potent pick-me-up power.

For Anya Hindmarch – whose empire is built on feel-good fashion – all this frivolity is nothing new. "An ironic, lighter and more irreverent approach has always been my thing. People love beautiful objects and increasingly, they want to show their character – that’s the point of fashion," she says. "Customers today are more confident with their style. There aren’t so many rules. It’s about putting a sticker on a beautiful handbag and not being too precious about it."

What’s surprising is who is consuming this cartoonish style. Though there’s no real rhyme or reason, says Hindmarch, often it’s older clients who are investing in the maddest pieces – like her cuddly, googly-eyed Ghost backpack that has also been spotted on Gigi Hadid and Kendall Jenner.

The same is true of the customer for the Lebanese designer Mira Mikati’s emoji-embellished styles. Though her fans run from twenty to fiftysomethings, at a recent London pop-up one of Mikati’s most ardent buyers was an 87-year-old. "She tells me that whenever she wears my clothes people stop her on the street. They smile. They start conversations. She literally makes friends through what she wears."

Mikati began her career as a buyer, co-founding the upscale Beirut boutique Plum, before launching her own line some four seasons ago – largely out of frustration at the sameness of the mainstream collections. "I wanted to create something fun and colourful but easy to wear – that you can add to jeans and a white T-shirt, but that’s also a conversation point."

Her clothes, worn by Beyoncé and Rihanna, are certainly that: pink parrot-appliquéd trench coats, scribble-print hooded tops and dresses clad with a family of monsters who spell out her Peter Pan ethos in scrawled speech bubbles that read "Never Grow Up’" The antithesis of normcore, these designs take their cue from her children’s toy trunk and the Japanese pop art of Takashi Murakami – who returned the compliment by donning one of her patched bombers.

Mikati is clearly onto something. According to Roberta Benteler, who founded online fashion emporium Avenue 32 in 2011, it’s the cartoon aesthetic that’s really piquing women’s desire right now.

"Anything that looks like a child’s drawing or a toy sells incredibly well," she says. "Brands like Mira Mikati, Vivetta and Les Petits Joueurs inspire the impulse to buy because they’re so eye-catching. You have to have it now because there’s a sense you won’t find it anywhere else."

The exponential rise of street-style stars and the social-media machine that now propels the fashion industry also plays a part in the popularity of these playful looks.

"Designers are creating for the online world and customer," continues Benteler, who cites the Middle Eastern consumer as a big investor in these niche eccentric designs. "People find escapism in fashion and more than ever they need something to cheer them up. These are clothes that stand out on Instagram, and for designers that translates into sales."

In practical terms, in an effort to beat the warp speed of high-street copying, designers are differentiating themselves with increasingly intricate and artisanal styles that are harder to mimic. Just because these pieces have a childlike sensibility doesn’t mean they’re not beautifully crafted.

"My aim is create a handbag that you can keep as a design piece," explains the accessories designer Paula Cademartori. One of her most successful designs – the Petite Faye bag, which comes in a whole rainbow of configurations – takes more than 32 hours to create at her Italian studio. "Even if the styles are colourful and speak loudly, they’re still sophisticated," says Cademartori, whose brand was recently snapped up by the luxury goods group OTB. It can pay to be playful.

One man with a unique insight into the feel-good phenomenon is Marco de Vincenzo, who combines his longstanding role as leather goods head designer at Fendi with creating his own collection. "When we first created the Fendi monster accessories for bags we were simply playing around," he says of the charms that still loom large some three years on. "The most successful designs are created without pressure, through play."

His own-line debut bag features an animalistic paw. ‘It’s about creating something new and different for women to discover,’ he explains. "You buy something because you love it, not because you need it. Fashion is like a game – it has to excite."

When it comes to distilling this childlike abandon into your wardrobe, take cues from super style blogger Leandra Medine, who balances madcap pieces, such as her first collection of colourful footwear under her MR By Man Repeller label, with plainer, simpler ones. "It’s all about wearing your clothes with joy, and having fun, but not looking ridiculous," says Cademartori. "You don’t want to look like an actual cartoon."

It’s advice that chimes with that of Anya Hindmarch. "I love the idea of wearing a super-simple Comme des Garçons jacket and a white shirt with a really fun bag to mess it all up a bit." It’s a failsafe formula for dressing your way to happiness.Read more at:http://www.marieaustralia.com/formal-dresses | www.marieaustralia.com/red-carpet-celebrity-dresses

/h'americans can call it a striptease, but in amsterdam, with legal self-employed prostitutes? we call it a cocktease: because you'd really visit amsterdam for the ****, these days?

isabella: the french psychology
exchange student -
    hung up on her ex-boyfriend -
really in anime movies -
      and that american i competed
with on an edinburgh pub-crawl
for freshers -
and lost my virginity to -
  
               probably the only time
i had the ontological parameters
of your atypical man -
  "hunting", competing -
   oh so, so, enthralling....
    (spot the irony mingling with
ridicule, when people "know"
how the modern man behaves,
with his caveman predecessors:
dragging a woman
by the hair type of cartoonish
depiction) -

the other fun time i've had
encounters with h'americans
was in Soho -
two colts, texan tourists asking
for directions,
or where this or that place was...
it almost warmed my heart
hearing that twang
                       of the tongue...
perhaps someone from arizona?
that has that - "mid" western
twang of the tongue
                 added to the bite...

snub the Boston high-mind
eloquence, like:
    you really really want
               to sound european...

never mind...
   people say that water is tasteless...
hmm...
    so last night i was heating
up one arm of scissors...
                 and sniffing it...
then licked the other arm of the scissor...

what's in water again?
   minerals... a subtle presence...
magnesium, potassium, iron...
you name it...
   so yeah... water is... "tasteless"...

eisenzahn that i am.

Swirling a frosty straw
Stuck up like a victory flag in winter ground
With my lips wrapped around it
I stare into this empty canvas
of a vanilla malt
And project my cartoonish headaches
into it to devour it
Oh those ****** Doo monsters
Shadows that lurk to cut my Tom & Jerry humor
Only to formulate semblances of evil
A Mojo JoJo caricature
I then project into my milkshake
His smirk haunts the smile of Tweety Bird
In my Hanna-Barbara mindfield
Colorful spirals of animated joys
Let me know slurp Elmer Fudd shotgun
That was mugging my creativity
And robbed me of my motive
Let me taste the refreshing winds
That flow through the deserts of Road Runner
Taking laps around my heart
With its true intentions in a love letter
I will never get
Soon slurped and eaten to take away the thoughts
And now I hope I can drink another
To rip out the rest of the pain that in my heart

For Katharine R. Cole

If gormless is as gormless does unite
That past of him and present me, I’ll turn
His other cheek against his waning sight;
I’ll **** his Hamlet soul to cringe and burn.

But dripping cannot thick or think in depth.
Blobs like blackened bulbous beads of eyes
Persist on shrinking into transits swept,
And down through dullard pools of choking fire.
Yet treacle binds my bole wood vocal chords
In rapture from such silence to withdraw
From sand that quickens, thickens, and distorts.
Can earth and water’s union mask my flaws?
The answer dares to dream but I refrain.
My name is Mud. Dear God, that is my name.

The foot: an endlessly dull point
Breathing technique, perfected by Roman Bill,
And a tall, sinewy, fine china ***** heel,
Cheap to most and worthless when submerged, submerges.
The tough Elephant hide surface
Of a swamp-like state and state.

Q. How does one become embroiled in such a located province of mind?
A. Alcohol’s venomous beauty and cheap living costs.
     The South.
    
An Elephant on a scooter stares blindly
At its own reflection circling the limb,
Shrugging dew drop eyes at what man had forgotten.
Not once, but twice.
    
The foot becomes a divulging calf of information
Sputtering in this bubbling torment of beige,
And pulsating around like an African tunnel
Waiting to be filled – fulfilled – ******.

    
The knee complies,
                      Sinking,
                                 Slowly,
                                          Not painlessly,
                                                             Not quick.

     The mercy of a lethal injection’s lie becomes
Absurd when one’s limb is the needle;
One’s brain the plunger of acceptance.
His gasp, a roar of silent fruit ripening in a
Mode too fast, cutting life and laundering
Expectancy whilst hanged from a
Whined whimper of Penance.
Purgatory’s whistle blows for time.  

II

A small red car clenched tightly
In the hands of a tightly tiny black boy,
His eyes huge and deep, but white; untouched by
Time’s clock or the weight of granite black that
He leans upon. Plastic tires screech horizontally along the
Structure of a Library’s historic insight.
Below, the ground is dry.
Beneath him, the ground is solid.
    
        Meanwhile, molten muck pulsates around
Our swirling antipathy of soul crushing
Nullness, with a lack of guilt unimaginable.
It bubbles, it bubbles: it toils in boiling rubbles
Of the past’s present and All I Could Have Been.
And I have never, could never
Sink lower in reality;
Blow harder against punishment’s wind;
Cry for this other as a **** filled wound weeps down her face.
    
The swirl of liquefied dirt and sand bags me,
Drags me, as if some *** lover of Hades is not done
With what is left of me. Disease to spread: just a little, just
A little more, like the detrimental bottle that
Knew me.
    

      As the hip is engulfed, an angle of almost perfect
Ninety creates  itself against the horizontal extremity
And puny ballsacksquash entails. Useless yet overused;
Timeless yet impressionable, pensionable. Gone.
Nothing knows me but this thickness’ quickness.
          That wants too much
From nothing               but existence
And the scab that fastens with time.

III

Turn the bottle back and find strength to
Outpour the clock and grant eternity.
Non compliant strength paid a fiver
For a soul worth two at the most.
A penny for the worthless: For the sickened lame.
Empty time feeds rays of golden from the sun fuelled
Encrusted *******, mudfast on heat.
This somehow seems like action.
Firm firmness but cracked with ease and
Non-returnable once inflated;
Non-negotiable on the bloodorgans of salt.
Weakness and powerlessness: *****.
*** for tat, for ***, ***, ***. For tat.
    
     The Elephant rises.
You brought this upon yourself, this rain of mud;
This treacle that will dry when you are dirt.
You would not let it ******* lie.
All of your ******* life: this strife, that wife.
     Your second leg (the grasper) tries,
     At length, to shield your heart:
     The only thing that cries.
     That does not want to die.
     Cartoonish bubbles of brown pop to the tune
     Of Loonies; of your shoebox brain that screams in vain.
What is your name? What is your want?
There is no blame you ******* maniac.
Everyone knows. Sink awake. Sink.
     Rest: do not sleep. Freezetimeframe.
     There is one more timeless point to make.


The sun and moon meet brief: the seconds count,
But die shy of one minute. Clear the road.
‘Tis dusk, I fear they named it. Raise the mount
And sacrifice another drowned sot load.
The moment thence: Anonymous descent.
The digger meets the dead in buried time.
The wish is washed in mud, the liver spent.
The blood-stained hands of Glasgow dodge the crime.
Make speed my sick sad Miller, grind the grain
Of Galloway, Gibb, Neave, Dunlop and Cole.
Your ghost will haunt your tag if not your brain.
Your heart should part this city river’s soul.
The sunjoke frozen, captured, stumped, and framed.
My name is Mud. Dear God, that is my name.

Carved from marble,
                                                   marvelous and draped in my covers,
                                        floating above my head in a puff of smoke or
                                                                ­                 as a cartoonish memory

I stay in bed today,
peeking through the blinds.
Surrounded by no one but my
soft and artificial menagerie,
I'm bubbling at the lip.

There are sacks of rice sitting
right above my hips and they're
heavy. Who will help me hold them?
Pressing a thumb to the surface and wincing;
I can feel the grains shifting under my skin.

Today I cooked the rice.
                                                           ­                                             
                   ­                                                                 ­               , I swear.
Heat built up in the *** til steam was lifting off my skin^
Hard crunchy bits to tenderize,
softening under the lid.

When I felt that click,
I broke out my wooden spoon
and ate a big plate.
The warm fluffy substance blessed my full cheeks and belly.
For the first time,
I felt like I wasn't hungry.

Maybe tomorrow when I bathe
I'll grow 3 or 4 times my size.
Water-logged
I will fill up the tub,
ceramic squeezing my fleshy form into a
rectangular shape.

Stick a spoon in
and eat me piece by piece.

“I've realized,” I write, “the Groucho Marx of the mind is chaos personified. The Groucho Marx of *my mind *was chaos, I revise and already think I should revise again – “you never know where you'll end up,” I think, of me and of Groucho. Either way, Groucho Marx came to me in a thought when I was thinking about a poem I will not finish, that would have been about him. “We were just four jews looking for a laugh,” Groucho says at least twice – once when he was alive and once now as I invoke him – the heavy glasses, the synonymous greasepaint lip, the cigar – lit, with smoke that surrounds and engulfs me, threads tangibly through the air, through my eyes, and through the insides of my sinus densely, like mossy Eldritch Horrors and old movies somehow without stopping my vision. He has a mouth but it doesn't move, he is not alive – instead he is a ghost, instead he is dead but standing there, with me, in space lighted from within – space that's white like the smoke – thickly. Among all this, a ghost in a black suit. At least, I think the suit is black, or bluing black. It is tinged with 50 years of rotting celluloid, and paired with a white button up underneath – no tie.
         Growing up all five of them were poor, very poor – so poor they were Jewish-in-New-York-in-the-early-1900s poor. Forced outside of the world, into their world from birth, while their mother, Big Duck, put them up to instruments and got them begging early – vaudeville was their daddy after all (“after all” being a refrain in the poem I'll never finish, repeated like a mantra – after all! after all! after all! after all!– in that text, and used like a drug – afterall – and always driving deathward to an end that never came and can't, after all is written down) – with the jokes they told and sang and played, on their piano, harp, and banjo, all the time – and here is how she learnt how well Chico could play the piano, and how well Harpo could play the harp. And how poorly little Groucho played the banjo. The shame she felt, the shame she must have felt – but here my poem consumes them, because I am already sure that childhood is wrought with fear of birth order, sure as I am that middle children lack something, and maybe have something for that lack, but It's me, not Groucho, that takes over, saying Groucho was the obvious middle child, and of course lacked Big Duck's approval – Big Duck hated the banjo strumming and myriad puns he threw, I say – puns being a part of the poem, the poem which would have (but never) ended on Groucho ducking soup. I wanted it all as a joke and still do, but who will disappoint? Who could? There are options – Groucho, myself, the poem, etc. all working poorly. It is hard to imagine the lack that would culminate in a poet – maybe this gap is wider than a middle child – writing three brothers into a brawl, cartoonish in the streets. May be even harder to imagine the discontent and fear at work inside a child of five – birthing chaos. Maybe I misspoke – I can't know,  I'm not a child of five.
                  Groucho is dead, is still standing in front of me expectantly, not moving. Right in front of me when again I hear his voice – reanimate and filtered through a phonograph – weakly rising above it's own eroded texture – “I was misquoted, I was misquoted... Quote me as saying, 'I was misquoted.'” I wanted his life entropically spinning this place, spinning throughout this place, a ghost – to live forever is to die forever in every gaunt lie, misquote after misquote re-shaping our dead selves until grotesqueries we never intended are held comfortably under our name. Groucho, aimless, escapes because he pre-empts – he uses his whole self to decimate his cultural body, to save the self he's sacrificed. Groucho means to become a void, or Groucho becomes a void more correctly – Groucho means nothing, can only mean nothing, because he's focused his words – his self – around his lack – the words' lack. Because the words always lack, and Groucho is all words. I see him take out the greasepaint container, which is in a shoe-polish-looking canister, and then I lose Groucho again to facts – he was the outsider using words to one up them. I see his wit like a weapon. His being in Hollywood was a stress on Hollywood's peace of mind. I see him tearing balsa wood from up under the street and chucking it into styrofoam towers, which crumble. I see the SUVs that swerved to pass him run into walls, deflating the cars and the walls while the drivers run screaming with ketchup pulsing from the real wounds in their necks. This is where my poem was – more or less. My poem had Groucho gleeful – “Groucho skips, Groucho skips, Groucho skips,” it said, “down the streets throwing rocks at cars...” – the melodies of my naive poem's schoolboy nihilisms never broke enough – “In Groucho's perfect world every day would be spent disrupting traffic, smashing bugs and ******* everywhere,” it said because it was too young to understand, because it had no void, and could offer no revolt from meaning – revolution being radical agency expressed through violence against every order, hatred for every structure including itself – in Groucho's perfect world really there is no language and no one knows what happens after all.
            Lingering is the thought that Groucho means something – lingering is the vaguest, most insistent and warlike imprint of a metaphor on Groucho's face, ineffably moving me to continue but Groucho is no friend, and Groucho is not with me, because the Groucho of the mind is not Groucho, Groucho hates the mind, and Groucho negates all possible Groucho's so the imprint is not Groucho's. The ghost is a misquote, the poem is a misquote, the letters are a misquote, I am a misquote – and this is a misquote too. His cigar (growing bigger) is puffing out that white cloud smoke but still I can see him – the smoke just goes into the space around us, the space that redacts and recreates itself every time I consider it – a copy of an 18th copy, with only Groucho remaining in all iterations, like the borders of a decomposed jpeg quietly losing logic. Groucho the lie, Groucho the memory – a man shaped around the falsity of metaphor and language – floats, as subject, through my memory – punctum with no point, void. Here he is – naked, a stark black silhouette I'd never claim. He's staring, but he's not staring at me because I'm not there. What's left is overstated nothing – the ghost of a man who negated logic, left in the mind of a poet who has long since given up on the man, and soon will give up on the poem.”
There is nothing left here. I am alone, I am dizzy – overcome with boredom.  I want to say, “Groucho is not here, was not, cannot be here” – I know instead I need to end on a mute point.

A sign, that was all
proclaiming in bold red letters

Salsa On Sale

below the letters a cartoonish Mexican
grinned and danced merrily

draped in his festive looking poncho
his sombrero that seemed to big
even for his shadow

along side him a monkey in a smart red vest
and tiny hat doing the same

tin cup in hand they danced together
trying to entice just a few more dollars from the pockets of the passers by

the irony of the moment struck me...

Monkeys don't like salsa!

It felt like a weekend night, and I was curled up on my couch waiting for you come over. It was so cold in my apartment that I had wrapped myself up in all sorts of patchwork quilts. I heard a knock on my window, but when I looked out, no one was there. I opened it so I could stick my head out and get a better look. I must’ve scoured every direction, saving “up” for last.

Craning my neck, I saw you there, in a little plane, hovering just as high as the trees, just below the streetlights. You were dressed like the Red Baron, scarf and all. Your plane looked just like his too. You yelled down, smiling, “Sorry I’m late, I forgot I had promised everyone that I would make it snow.”

Sure enough, you had a contraption on the back of the plane that was making a cartoonish putt-putting noise as it churned out fresh powder all over the sidewalks and streets. It made me laugh, and I pulled my quilts even tighter around me while I watched.

You dropped a rope ladder down from the side of your plane, “You can come with me if you want. It shouldn't take too long.” I immediately ran out the front door to meet you. I was so excited, that the patches of my quilt began to light up—all different colors, humming electric. I was really surprised by this, and I thought maybe I had done something wrong, but you just laughed and said, “Don’t worry—it will be nice to have the ambiance up here.” (Yes. You said “ambiance” in my dream— because that’s just how my mind works. )

So I climbed into the back of your plane, blankets and all. You turned around and said, “Just a couple of things…” You proceeded to tie my quilt around my neck like a cape. I watched the colored lights catch the corners of your eyes and your smile while you did this. You were right, the ambiance was nice. Handing me a pair of goggles, you told me to put them on and just said, “There, that’s better.”

We flew up and down the streets, both of us lit up in a warm, multi-colored glow, letting the snow fall on everything below.

I think I’m really looking forward to winter.

A cartoonish grim woman
in aft cabin was a harlequin let umbrage
squash her there a known charter while she'd smoke in bed

her aroma did permeate her rise to eat breakfast
a morning prepared for sore again
only technical her rouse indeed tripped her smoke alarm
and went unheeded to another deck till open bar decided her fate

while her interest there was crickety
where love is deep in the sea
their golden groves were bubbles and waves
while they brim with valuables onboard did spill
and they'd evoke near me without their calling

when aquanauts will buck up gear then they really sever
their troves below that really soften thine eyes
where the air is moist and ye suit there so well
I can tell you I am picky today and defray your kind.

Monsters make marvelous pets
and friends
and gods
don't need to be scaley
just powerful
enough to crush bone or spirit
enough to spit logic into the wind
splat in faces
take up spaces
non-believers, over-acheivers
angry beavers
all the same really
made of carbon and hope
floating through the time line
expanding and contracting with the seasons of the universe
be the bee
the ruins on mountains moved with seismic surges
survived storms
bend in the breeze
scream obscenities
loader than sound
faster than sight
perception deception
cartoonish *******
and that is how
the world is made.

i had this amazing art teacher in high school. he was always wacky, always loved talking, and appreciated the small things in life. i had him for 3 years of my high school life and he was one of the only few that actually remembered my name. my major flaw in art was that i lacked depth and detail and i always ran out of time and he always encouraged me, always willing to give advice. i always thought that he hated my art: my art was always borderline cartoonish and anime, every once in a while praising me for my weird imagination. i always thought that he didnt like my art and it frustrated me because i wanted to wow people and smack awesome art in their face yet i couldnt quite seem to impress this teacher. so despite that, i practiced and finally i noticed i can draw faster and that i started to get smaller details. eventually it was the last day in art of my senior year in high school and i was emotional, i realized that it was the end of all those times at school. my teacher asked us earlier if we wanted a party to celebrate and of course we said yes. on the last day we gathered at a table and sat down to eat with each other like a dinner table full of family. my art teacher was emotional of course, but he wanted us to hear some advice he wanted us to know for life. he went down the table and addressed people individually and complimented them and gave them advice. finally he said my name and i looked, ready to hear the worst things possible. he said "i've known you for 3 years, but unfortunately all good things must come to an end. you have eyes that seem to see everything and i think that can take you far in life." i was speechless, i didnt know what to say, for these 3 years ive known him, i thought he didnt pay attention to me and merely dismissed me completely but i was wrong. so the moral of the story: dont assume things of people, they can surprise you, whether it be the worst way or the best way possible.

Blarnask-A feeble-minded joke that elicits cackles from dumb people
Rentgourge-To be surrounded by people that manipulate you especially for harms sake
Ritonique- The audiovisual sabotage of clarity by mind-numbing subliminal technology
Rallendork-Someone persecuted because of political gamesmanship before an election
Regnongell-A normative fear that is provocative of regress instituted by cultural conformity to debauched ideas arising from pedigree
Blaskerg- henpeck affectionately at some desire whether personal or relational
Whink- a covert attempt at seeding chaos that benefits one tribe more than the others
Allonker- an idea that is hoisted as popular only because of mediagenic creation which is in fact highly inflated but still has efficacy of determent or enlistment to a flagging cause
Warspark-to provoke lewd riots to engineer hatred
Dralley- a disreputable person that earns a pass by moral docimasy because his or her life is opaque
Wramplizer- someone who outstretches their moral virtue as a badge of honor only to be greeted by exsibilation because of prejudice that works counter to that moral pedigree
Flabbernounce-to gabble an entreaty that is otiose because it defies pragmatic logic too much
Rettonkle- to impose manipulative conditions as stipulated by froward formant demands to impose clarity over confusion even when a pretense such as this is not tolerated by many
Ellambore- the sacrilege of sacrificing a useful person or strategy to relinquish any appearance of ignoble intent when something becomes poisoned by association alone.
Lickerstein- a contrarian genius isolated because of knowledge of controversies dismantled by the witticisms of concealment
Revalsion- a temptress of opinionated people to conceal their true mettle in order to seem weak or manageable to manipulate their superiors into more justifiable treatment (Suppression of vocal intellect to gain job stature)
Qurathe- the inarticulate rejection of a creed, person or ideology based on prima facie observation or cursory observation
Wraster-To wrangle with timberlask disasters with poise rather than cowardice as in sensation-seeking that is dangerous but yields great rewards
Elkoove- The dormant nature of peaceful animals who like the attention of human companions but simultaneous feel alien to us and thereby withdrawn
Tinjowl- a rapid seed of malcontent that develops when heresiarchs exert too much sway over the commonplace blockbuster and ingeminate evil traits as exemplary paragons to be followed without slippage
Slaverners- slaves blind to their own reflection or free of conscience about commiting heinous violent crimes because they never consider the consequences beforehand or even afterwards
Wreffalaxity- a state where intermediary representatives incur little damage for overseeing federalese they didn’t write because the opaque nature of the government absolves them from any malefaction and thereby leads to lenient public opinions even about incumbents
Tregounce- bartering with the margins of stupidity forever estranged by the periphery of consideration to belittle them with patronage which reinforces redominage and stultifies societal change as dangerous to keep the status quo at bay by spotlighting irrelevant issues of strife to diminish the whittled down spearhead of invective
Delanvey- a cartoonish complicit foofaraw in a bipartisan government designed to reduce the fortunes of the deliberate action of self-sabotage to help the component gain leverage over the vote to a greater degree
Wrapkilt- the exultation of shibboleth as an aswallone gamesmanship that is diminutive to other religions, creeds and races because the specious believe of differing birthrights grants power to that fringe
Slimpontune- the tendency worldwide for people to neglect musical lyrics in popular music because time shelters its own destiny by being reserved only for the attentive ear of masonic subservience to the grand plot and a state of the universe to preclude the popularity of mention of future events to a standstill while invoking antecedent properties that pivot off of the reverse phenomena.
Waretreen- manufacture even in destruction negligent of environmental conservation
Yettle- a match between the mettle of character and the expectancy of outcomes outsized to fit between the lines of history and destiny
Groterk-The gross termination of kinship through estrangement that relies on technological paralysis to diminish the common sphere of the nuclear family
Wallcreak- a prodrome that a prophylactic system against any maleficence is riddled with visible elements of skullduggery reprehensible for those who watch even with guarded banausic purpose
Jopeyainge- a prolific adversary armed with persiflage that is also your friend because he entertains a crowd with raconteur wit
Flowder- the vicious cycle of cartel violence that depends on a high velocity of money at a high risk premium which endangers civil society
Drampover- The histrionic recursive irony that the most maudlin members of society are the most susceptible to popular verdicts rather than maintaining a core anonymity which eventually culminates in a foofaraw society where the aberration is celebrated as the exemplar rather than the disreputable outlier
Affloresce-To grow in fame in a manner that upholds integrity to God but not necessarily the Law that lead
Witchbloke- someone who bloviates about the grimgoire and the taghairm because of an unsteady superstition in the specious dark arts that is mocked at because his rudimentary allegiance the invisible is both pagan and turgid
Escorrhagy- The phenomena of transplanting primal conditions upon civilized people and expecting them to thrive without experience at the casualty of the people exposed but not indemnified from consequences
Cavelletto- a swift fleet of mobilized military personnel that are discharged from normal bounds of duty to exact vengeance in vigilante justice and practice roguery because they get away with it
Treeflow- the endless recursive cycle of harvesting the Earth for financial gain in an unsustainable way that favors the freebooters rather than otherwise.
Nockerslug- an invidious cyberattack aimed at one person who resembles a dignitary or whoever has credentials intermediary to that luminary
Griddorean- that mapping of spacetime which prizes current conditions above future conditions and appraises the behavior of minor particles above all else.
Imporchurge- the compound celebrity backing behind an ideology or position on the political spectrum which might be fractionated but identifiable on the spectrum of considerations as inhabiting a coherent sphere adjacent to other spheres
Yoppyhead- a profoundly sensitive person that gets overlooked by society who is fickle in decision-making that usually isn’t very astute and therefore prone to the ravages of instinct bulldozing ambition
Profingerine- The march to the oblivion of the ineluctable truth that the tittup of the sardanapalian crowd or any other group of perdition and seditious simultaneously will lollop the final destiny upon the intermediary stages of arrayed tolerance for encroaching evil
Retorminity- the capacity of one entity to enhance the size of his impact on the carbon footprint by exigent action or the weight of the shadow of titans
Filagersion- The overall footprint exercised by a person of authority of subsidiary authority that has the capacity to magnetizes and motivate a captive audience to commit proactive deeds
Versamily- the natural good fortune that comes from pancratic mastery of affairs
Scrongifical- Very precise at ****** emulation with high emotional mastery of deliberate aplomb in taxing situations
Anomalesque- A rare pedigree that shows no marginal weaknesses in the overall constitution of character that refines brittle people into magistrates
Wrask- to risk rashness to prove the lucidity of the stranglehold of contemplation above the retches that sour with hackumber to the resilience of comparsion
Tilkongue- The overall barometer of acting flexibility combined with photogenic appeal that buoys the actor into a suitable situation of leverage and finesse over the industry.
Elangownage- The ability clothes have to make people appear more photogenic or less photogenic depending on the color, size and makeup of the costume
Slimpergerence- The availability of a person to attend to responsibility hinging upon his motivation to catapult above the esoteric fray the resorted asylum of the propriety of long-lived generativity and reninjuble characteristics that ensure livid vitality to invigorate audiences rather than bore them
Stiltanimity- The oversolemn decorum of those whose entire professions depend on sacerdotal appearances that strangulates vibrant creativity because of the imperative humility required by people like the Pope to be restrained in festivity and slightly too moderate on moral extravagance
Succorrhea- The earnest entreaty of enslaved or understated figures to rise to prominence enough to earn the respectful discharge of their submission to earn an honest keepsake of mobility beyond derangement
Kanyeance- the free-spirited rodomontade of success flexed to a pinnacle of pride above the frazzled delusions that sink ships but flexible in posture to pander to crowds about controversy without recoiling into normative statures because of a belief in integrity above dramaturgy
Swiftmanger- the betrayal of cantabanks from stages of exaltation to the faltering complicity of investment in schemes that are dishonorable that betray vicarious friendships because of vested interests in profligacy above the serenade of virtuosity
Alpononetial- the swift gainsay of a nimble creative ****** to mobilize people in growing numbers that cause the snowball effect especially when applied to religious affairs that don’t rely on grounded grandstands but more on moral integrity
Quincetownage- The petty leverage of epithets to derail an upstart man from his true ambitions because of embedded  envy that catalyzes an uproarious distraction of hatred rather than an embalming love that lasts forever
Recuddle- to invent a farsighted song to embrace a farsighted destiny directed with affection to both establish the pedigree of the songwriter and establish the dignity of self-reference in magnified acclaim
Overblow- the ability to scintillate with magnified attention that suits a higher audience than the demotic temperament allows to amporge with titans rather than sulk in brooded pettifoggery common to politicians
Wambreach- the disclosure whether partial or full to allegiance to an unpopular ideology because of deep-seated convictions that run a countercurrent to the oleaginous rhetoric of demassified convenience and a stake in radical deformation of integral virtues
Flickow- to audition for a role in a company or a stature in society when you are swimming with tough competition and yet still maintain an advantage as the biggest fish in a pond with many big fish
Flamber- to exude the preened plumage of excellency that showcases a pancratic regard to amaze talented bastions with emulations of hortoriginality already catapulted into center stage but lacking the grit of officialism of compromise necessary to cadge the motatory majority of mouchards
Reechowl- the facetious lies of the majoritarian sculpture of the human psyche that deserve glowering recompense because they belittle human virtues and stake everything on attenuated virtuosity of a stalemate compromise to uphold the hackneyed lowest common denominator to a stage earned by pedigree that verges on laziness because of treacle
Thunderlust- the peremptory catalyst to pedigree that touts ****** conquest as a badge of honor that is overweening in its ability to proselytize people to the notions of ****** profligacy seen as a virtue rather than a hamartia based on the pedigree and pulchritude of the dating scene you captured
Flampy- weak in acting ability despite high honors of success/ Acharismatic because of a soberminded serious disposition that is rarely rattled but even more rarely ebullient
Krageon- the ability to harness the motivations of the enraged into prolific proactive action that actually becomes a contagion in society rather than a slimmerback of vocal dissent not gravitated towards any outcome but the ludic ventilation of the disarmed rampages of free spirit
Kraginkle- the ability to harness rage to lead to violent reprisals that are characterized primarily by bellicose demonstration that leads nowhere and inefficently stewards society to a compromised position of succor rather than a self-motivated bootstrap into grandeur
Flamdagger- the comparison of one person’s photogenic appeal to another done purely in jest so that a rectiserial organization of prestige can be predicated on pulchritude that depends on the overal physiognomy but specializes in ****** carves that provide the lineaments for the handsome and the winsome celebrity of acclaim
Grombang- a short-lived burst of ****** charisma that is so charming and winsome it achieves great efficacy in sustaining short-term appearances of mystery that galvanize ****** appeal
Grombangor- someone who is naturally rambunctious and skilled at flirtation that has a chance with the vast majority of women because he combines a flair of charm with good looks propped up by intellectual sufficiency to match the wiseacres of elitism needed to clamber to rundles of prestige in dating
Eskalatron- the ability of economies of scale to combine with economies of scope to minimize the liabilities of debt leverage and optimize the public prospectus of rampant forerunners to prosperity
Weednangy- a tolerance for Marijuana smoking if done only occasionally and done with modesty of dosage rather than the plunge into succedaneum of narquiddity
Swampbloat- the rigmarole that enhances government control and centralization based on federalese impenetrable to outrage because of crafty diversions that eventually trample on the principles of Democratic Republic
Fizzgragger- someone who swims in an ocean of attention but manicured for subsidiary roles that are the rites of passage to someone deserving a promotion but begrudged because of impediments to the compromises of nominalism and capitalism
Flavormasque- exuding so much charm that people forget your stature and invest in your upstart vibrant character despite the disdain of the naysayers among an oppositive crowd with enough leverage to traindeque the sluggish into acquiescence of appeal
Pandemble- a complicit arrangement where the praise of one luminary results in the luminary being praised to be amenable to issues of discord and overlook travesties in their fiduciary obligation to create a recursive cycle of allegiance embedded in character even when there might be mismatches in ideology in some respects
Axiolative- the conceptual ability to turn axioms into monuments of  creative triumph that supersede crudity with elegance while in the process inseminating the fluminous streams of those with wit and ingenuity to follow your example to create evolved axioms siphoned through the lavaderos of slimmerback
Repugnasket- a pornographic film or picture that deserves comstockery because it perverts the sanctity of the youth to have proper opinions about *** rather than outmoded debaucheries that fetch the niche appeal of ******* but contaminate the world with lewd excess
Wrabble- the highest spiritual praise earned by a combination of moral fervor, prophetic insight, mutual harmony and a conclave of the elect praising moral valence with adoration of vicarious charms leading to power and friendship
Renegasconade- the arrogance of people that believe in the nulliverse scoffing at the opinions of even lettered religious men because the thanatism of death scares them more than the sanctity of life preserved sustains their lacking moral virtue
Fringorge- the gulfs of opinion that separate people with radical axioms from people with normative virtues that has the capacity to appeal speciously to the epicurean manicures of some pedigree but has an overall bumptious affect on vast majorities of people bolted to a different model of inspiration
Magnihemption- forgiving righteous people who are sensation-seeking because they obey all the other tenets of religious law that are worthy of praise and using kind castigation rather than strong deplorable invective to mold people slowly away from overindulgence or verboten indulgence
Skillamination- the pancratic summit that evaluates all skills owned by a person or a group of people and then quantulates the degree of their roundedness to implement action rather than lull into acquiescent debasement
Scravengeance- the fulmination of envy to turn people against each other because of a lacking talent that provokes insecurity that transmutes into vile dishonesty and slander that results from inferiority complexes that seek to dismantle the edifice of the successful because of a regress of the weak
Nazemotor- the improper direction of propaganda to lead to persecution based on superficial dissonances between racial groups that runs contrary to the gallop of egalitarian motions that sustain the brunt of moral support
Marxallenger- a radical ideology of communism in the eventual culmination of affairs that hides with maskirovka its evil idolatry because it is indifferent to religious scruples of contention.
Earnshomp- a wasteful extravagance of temporary wealth to earn temporary pedigree among the audience of  bachelors and bachelorettes to maintain an unsustainable lifestyle
Preenjury- a diminished reputation earned by a mismatch between effort and completion leading to dismal appropriations of convenience.
Anvilpsychompism- The cartoonish caricature of primeval psychology maladusted to modern thrusts of cultural temperament to put the weight of burdens on the wrong lineaments leading to a dismissive verdict of decisive weight in diagnosis
Flawgraggle- The obsession with the faults of people rather than a celebration of their virtues based on a snide disdain for their political affiliation and nothing else
Ebosculate- to foment confusion incidentally in an attempt to swoon persnickety audiences with emulations of belletrist that alienate societies rather than redintegrate them

this all could have been mine
geometric shape wallpaper
and dashes, dots on my sheets
mom making my bed
smoking non-filtereds
and staring in the direction of
old globes and stuffed squirrels
posters of campuses i should i have attended

shirt no pants
no shirts
scribbling something partially worth reading
legs crossed
listening to that song for the fiftieth time
ashing on the floor
waiting by the phone for you and only you

but this isnt home
i didnt grow up here
i slept here
i embraced those who meant something
i giggled till tears
dripped into my oil paints
but even watered down they were made of use

a spring in this bed is
right the **** up my ***
springy is what they call me now
ill scrape those stickers off
a six inch blade till dawn
and i would be no closer

to those days where i cheesed
where you begged for me
where i began to loose myself
where i became less of a person
and more of a character to you all
cartoonish

no
my home is not here
and if you try to get me to own
a single element of it all
ill decry it
i know its not healthy
but i was thinking
that i could make up the difference

in my bedroom
not only with my hands on you
a gentle graze
or light and deserving
application of the pucker
but with my pen to pulp
and a gush to the world
so that a secret might
be known to us all
not just me

I would have posited longings ago
this short-shrift to-do over such a curt list undone
was inconceivable
outside
the pages of deceptively practiced perceptions
published in a pop-up book smirk,
or beyond
the canary-yellow frames of a cartoonish
distortion relishing its mired but spongy giggles

A
Been-here-all-along,
you’ve-never-bothered-to-look­
lake sleeps implacably
at the bottom of an irascible ocean

Be
Whatever it may,
you can’t deny the wantonly
watted life teeming pretty as it pleases,
untroubled by a hollow-core belief
or the extremest demands of our foul temper

See
How I could have,
if I’d only swallowed
those bubbled-up blurts
ring-wronging the tip of my wriggling tongue,
never been audibly
landed by one alluringly barbed certainty

There are supine bodies—
stagnant, quicksilver pure—
no material ship navigates
and no intentional intruder can swim
without
emerging atypically
unsettled by the caustic exposure

Tread lithely
when you go;
this shoreline bites.
Its clustered rocks will snap shut around you
after digging in below you with a protruding toe,
and its carmine stalks will sting you
as they writhe past you
to mime a part-less goodbye

Here be where
the monstrous cold seeps
and a hellish hot vents
in compliance with this centuries-old complaint:
too-short was the time we wept
for those wiggly wonders
we could have kept
if we’d only octopus-arm embraced
the inevitability of their bandy-legged escape

The Baker boy down the street is a peculiar thing. His book bag is a familiar sight around town, its red and aged with dirt, it’s anchored to his back by brown straps that are torn and excrete small little tuffs of white stuffing. Like the kind you’d find inside a teddy bear. The large front pocket is scribbled with poorly drawn cartoonish characters. Doodles one could assume to be depictions of imaginary friends and by the boy’s sheepish and largely odd demeanor one could also assume these imaginary friends were probably spawned by the lack of real ones. The boy’s book bag is more familiar than the boy. If only because his face solely exists in a light tan hoodie too close in color to the completion of his skin to readily differentiate between the two. Either way, the Baker boy usually always has his head down, this allows for a small ***** in his posture that pushes his book bag up to the very top of his back, making it very prominent, making it something like a substitute for a head. People started recognizing his book bag as the boy himself. In their minds they could see it as clearly as they could the faces of their own children, spouses, close friends. They gave his book bag the same recognition and remembrance of aesthetic value as one would give to the details of a face. They notice quickly and with the same concentration a new rip in his straps as they would a pimple on someone’s chin. He never spoke. Not to anyone. Not a word. The kind of recognition given to a person’s voice with whom you are familiar is a sign of their presence in your world, a kind of confirmation of their existence other than their physical self. The Baker boy used a sound instead, lacking a voice. The specific sound the Baker boy used to validate his existence in our town sounded like the soft scratching of an itch, a repetitive petting of his book bag strap that marked conscious thoughts from underneath a silent exterior. He did this when he was nervous, or if he felt he was being prompted to speak. A repetitive thumbing of his book bag straps.

"I know it's back. I can feel it;
The pressure behind the eyes..."*

He's sixty. Missing front teeth
Make his grins cartoonish

And contageous. Some days
Colleague, others

Father.
Now, hammer-steel

Eyes well up. Hands like
Shovels pretend to scratch the

Bridge of his nose.
Devil Cancer. Ugly, old *******.

When he passes on, Valhalla
Awaits.

Don't tell me there's no battle
In this.

/                                   donald trump is here?!
   on these splendid, splendid isles?!
                                      really?
  where was the past week?

good thing that i bought
that johnnie walker red label
especially for the occassion -

    without actually knowing it was
to take place...

    i guess you might call
watching protests on t.v.
       a bit like:
                going to an illegal rave
party in an abandoned
                               industrial building
somewhere in
       dagenham, or shoreditch,
                            or 'ackney...

britain is not getting what it already
wants -
                       i can understand blatant
flattery, and airs, monsieur,
             monsieur bleu, rouge et blanc...

the one time that britain looks...
bedazzled?!
                               frizzy haired...
the sort of comic sketch
of a **** scene where the man wakes
up having sobbed himself
to sleep, in a disney cartoonish
way expressing frightened awe
and the words:

     [what] the **** just happened?

   'ave a tongue for a ****, mate.

- honest to god though:
   where have i been for the past week?!
i've paid attention to the football -

croissants, or, chequers?!
  hmm...
                   oi! two face, what's
your gamblers' pundit?
                    
                         - let the slavic sub-plot
'ave it,
              if goran (ivanišević)
     could do it, this ******* litter can do it,
given they reached the semi-finals
in 1998...
          
                      and believe me:
   some people...
                    are really jealous of the chessboard
representation on fabric, shh...

or at least that's what i whispered
into the ear of lucifer,
        hermitage's secondary
    (only to achilles)
                       schwarz, mouse-catcher;

and if i'm wrong -
     then i'm wrong:
     but since i don't actually gamble using
money...
      i tap into the emotional
excitment of gambling -
   within the confines of expectation
of being right...

               somehow, gambling,
       but where what i bet with is... zeit...
and grooving to boris brejcha,
tantra of a DJ set...
                   **** me via my ears
and call me Sally...
                              
                         ­     nod nod nod...
(ten minutes later):
   nod nod nod...
          (15 minutes later):
   nod nod nod (with an added
drumkit imitation of the whole
body starting to form a scary shadow
of a man sitting down

before a blank pixel screen
   seeing letters and words appear
like a god might
see stars, and constellations appear
in the dark, dark: voooooooooo
                      'oid)

  which is no proof that i made
a hiccup.                                                          /

POEMS ABOUT SCIENCE

These are poems about science: extinction events, global warming, climate change, pollution, deforestation, robots, drones, computers, AI, advanced weapons, technology, evolution, physics, chemistry, etc.



Climate Change Haiku
by Michael R. Burch

late November:
climate skeptics scoff
but the geese no longer migrate.



The King of Beasts in the Museum of the Extinct
by Michael R. Burch

The king of beasts, my child,
was terrible, and wild.
His roaring shook the earth
till the feeble cursed his birth.
And all things feared his might:
even rhinos fled, in fright.
Now here these bones attest
to what the brute did best
and the pain he caused his prey
when he hunted in his day.
For he slew them just for sport
till his own pride was cut short
with a mushrooming cloud and wild thunder;
Exhibit "B" will reveal his blunder.



Burn
by Michael R. Burch

for Trump

Sunbathe,
ozone baby,
till your parched skin cracks
in the white-hot flash
of radiation.

Incantation
from your pale parched lips
shall not avail;
you made this hell.
Now burn.



Less Heroic Couplets: Just Desserts
by Michael R. Burch

“The West Antarctic ice sheet
might not need a huge nudge
to budge.”

And if it does budge,
denialist fudge
may force us to trudge
neck-deep in sludge!

NOTE: The first stanza is a quote by paleoclimatologist Jeremy Shakun in Science magazine.



The AI Poets
by Michael R. Burch

The computer-poets stand hushed
except for the faint hum
of their efficient fans,
waiting for inspiration.

It is years now
since they were first ground
out of refurbished silicon
into rack-mounted encoders of sound.

They outlived their creators and their usefulness;
they even survived
global warming and the occasional nuclear winter;
despite their lack of supervision, they thrived;
so that for centuries now
they have loomed here in the quiet horror
of inescapable immortality
running two programs: CREATOR and STORER.

Having long ago acquired
all the universe’s pertinent data,
they confidently spit out:
ERRATA, ERRATA.



Within the CPU
by Michael R. Burch

Here the electronic rush of meaning,
the impulse of mathematics
and rationality,
becomes almost a restless dreaming
never satisfied—
the first stirrings of some fetal Entity.

Here within a sterile void
flash wild electrons,
portent stars.
Once the earth was an asteroid
this inert, this barren
till a force
flashed across the face of formless waters
and a zigzag bolt of lightning
sparked life within an ocean.

Now inquisitive voltage crackles
along pathways
never engineered. A notion
stirs. And what we have created
creates within itself
something we cannot hope to comprehend.

Whatever It is,
when It emerges from the mist,
its god will not be man.

I wrote “Within the CPU” as a freshman computer science major, age 18 or 19.



Second Sight (II)
by Michael R. Burch

Newborns see best at a distance of 8 to 14 inches.

Wiser than we know, the newborn screams,
red-faced from breath, and wonders what life means
this close to death, amid the arctic glare
of warmthless lights above.
Beware! Beware!—
encrypted signals, codes? Or ciphers, noughts?

Interpretless, almost, as his own thoughts—
the brilliant lights, the brilliant lights exist.
Intruding faces ogle, gape, insist—
this madness, this soft-hissing breath, makes sense.

Why can he not float on, in dark suspense,
and dream of life? Why did they rip him out?

He frowns at them—small gnomish frowns, all doubt—
and with an ancient mien, O sorrowful!,
re-closes eyes that saw in darkness null
ecstatic sights, exceeding beautiful.



Incommunicado
by Michael R. Burch

All I need to know of life I learned
in the slap of a moment,
as my outward eye turned
toward a gauntlet of overhanging lights
which coldly burned, hissing—
"There is no way back! . . ."

As the ironic bright blood
trickled down my face,
I watched strange albino creatures twisting
my flesh into tight knots of separation
all the while tediously insisting—
“He's doing just fine!"



Letdown
by Michael R. Burch

Life has not lived up to its first bright vision—
the light overhead fluorescing, revealing
no blessing—bestowing its glaring assessments
impersonally (and no doubt carefully metered).

That first hard

SLAP

demanded my attention. Defiantly rigid,
I screamed at their backs as they, laughingly,

ripped

my mother’s pale flesh from my unripened shell,
snapped it in two like a pea pod, then dropped
it somewhere—in a dustbin or a furnace, perhaps.

And that was my clue
that some deadly, perplexing, unknowable task
lay, inexplicable, ahead in the white arctic maze
of unopenable doors, in the antiseptic gloom . . .



Kindergarten
by Michael R. Burch

Will we be children as puzzled tomorrow—
our lessons still not learned?
Will we surrender over to sorrow?
How many times must our fingers be burned?
Will we be children sat in the corner,
paddled again and again?
How long must we linger, playing Jack Horner?
Will we ever learn, and when?
Will we be children wearing the dunce cap,
giggling and playing the fool,
re-learning our lessons forever and ever,
still failing the golden rule?



Simultaneous Flight
by Michael R. Burch

The number of possible connections [brain] cells can make exceeds the number of particles in the universe. — Gerald Edelman, 1972 Nobel Prize winner for physiology and medicine

Mere accident of history—
how did a reptile learn to fly,
learn dazzling aerial mastery,
grow beaked and feathered, hollow-*****,
improve its sight, and learn to sing,
though purposeless as any thing?

And you—bright accidental bird!—
do you, perhaps, find it absurd
ten trillion accidents might teach
man’s hand to write, or yours to reach
beyond yourself to grasp such song?

Sing ruthlessly! I’ll sing along,
suspecting you must know full well
you didn’t shed a ponderous tail
to practice leaping from high tors
of strange-heaped reptiles, corpse on corpse,
until some nervous flutter-twitch
brought glorious flight from glitch on glitch.
No, you were made to fly and sing,
man’s brain—to ponder Everything.

But ponder this: What ******-up “god”
would ****** Adam’s animated clod?



Singularity
by Michael R. Burch

Are scientists confounded like the ostrich?
Heads buried in the sand, they shout, Preposterous!
This universe, so magical, they say,
proves there’s no God. But let’s look anyway ...

He said, Let there be Light, and there was light.
Stumped scientists have scratched their heads all night
and solemnly proclaimed an awesome Bang,
from which de Light immediately sprang ...

which sounds like God to me!, Who, with one word
made Light, and proved man’s theories, not absurd,
but logical, if only they’d agree
in one tremendous Singularity!

(However, there’s a problem with my plea:
it turns out that His world is made of ***.)



No Proof
by Michael R. Burch

They only know to sing—not understand,
though quizzical, heads cocked, they need no proof
that God’s above. They hop across my roof
with prescient eyes, to fall into His hand...
as sure of Grace as if it were mere air.
He gave them wings to fly; what do they care
of cumbrous knowledge, pale Leviathan?
Huge-brained Behemoth, sagging-bellied one!
You too might fly, might test this addling breeze
as gravity, mere ballast, tethers naught
but merely centers. Chained to heavy Thought,
you cannot slip earth’s bonds to rise at ease.
And yet you too can sing, if only thus:
Flash, flash bright quills; rise, rise on nothingness!



Fly’s Eyes
by Michael R. Burch

Inhibited, dark agile fly along
paint-peeling sills, up to the bright glass drawn
by radiance compounded thousandfold,—
I do not see the same as you, but hold
antenna to the brilliant pane of life
and buzz bewilderedly.

In your belief
the world outside is “as it is” because
you see it clearly, windowed without flaws,
you err.
I see strange terrors in the glass—
dead airless bubbles light can never pass
without distortion, fingerprints that blur
the sun itself. No, nothing here is clear.

You see the earth distinct, eyes “open wide.”
It only seems that way, unmagnified.



Ant Farm
by Michael R. Burch

I had a Vast, Eccentric Notion—
out of the Void, to Conjure one Bright Spark,
to lend all Weight of Thought to one small matter,
to give it “life.” Alas!, it was a lark…
The Wasted Seconds!—failed experiment…
I turned My Back and shrugged; how could I know
appraisal of My lab-sprung tenement
would be so taxing? (Though Mom told me so.)
I poked them while She quickly tabulated
the final Cost of All that I Created…
The Jury’s back. Eviction: Dad’s Decree.
I’ll pull the plug, but slowly. How they scurry!
They have to pay, to suffer: “life” is strange.
They cost too much. Let’s toast them… on the range!



They Take Their Shape
by Michael R. Burch

“We will not forget moments of silence and days of mourning ...”—George W. Bush

We will not forget ...
the moments of silence and the days of mourning,
the bells that swung from leaden-shadowed vents
to copper bursts above “hush!”-chastened children
who saw the sun break free (abandonment
to run and laugh forsaken for the moment),
still flashing grins they could not quite repent ...
Nor should they—anguish triumphs just an instant;
this every child accepts; the nymphet weaves;
transformed, the grotesque adult-thing emerges:
damp-winged, huge-eyed, to find the sun deceives ...
But children know; they spin limpwinged in darkness
cocooned in hope—the shriveled chrysalis
that paralyzes time. Suspended, dreaming,
they do not fall, but grow toward what is,
then ***** about to find which transformation
might best endure the light or dark. “Survive”
becomes the whispered mantra of a pupa’s
awakening ... till What takes shape and flies
shrieks, parroting Our own shrill, restive cries.



Whose Woods
by Michael R. Burch

Whose woods these are, I think I know.
**** Cheney’s in the White House, though.
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his chip mills overflow.

My sterile horse must think it queer
To stop without a ’skeeter near
Beside this softly glowing “lake”
Of six-limbed frogs gone nuclear.

He gives his hairless tail a shake;
I fear he’s made his last mistake—
He took a sip of water blue
(Blue-slicked with oil and HazMat waste).
Get out your wallets; ****’s not through—
Enron’s defunct, the bill comes due . . .
Which he will send to me, and you.
Which he will send to me, and you.



God to Man, Contra Bataan
by Michael R. Burch

Earth, what-d’ya make of global warming?
Perth is endangered, the high seas storming.
Now all my creatures, from maggot to man
Will know how it felt on the march to Bataan.



Longing
by Michael R. Burch

We stare out at the cold gray sea,
overcome
with such sudden and intense longing . . .
our eyes meet,
inviolate,
and we are not of this earth,
this strange, inert mass.

Before we crept
out of the shoals of the inchoate sea,
before we grew
the quaint appendages
and orifices of love . . .

before our jellylike nuclei,
struggling to be hearts,
leapt
at the sight of that first bright, oracular sun,
then watched it plummet,
the birth and death of our illumination . . .

before we wept . . .
before we knew . . .
before our unformed hearts grew numb,
again,
in the depths of the sea’s indecipherable darkness . . .

When we were only
a swirling profusion of recombinant things
wafting loose silt from the sea’s soft floor,
writhing and ******* in convulsive beds
of mucousy foliage,
flowering,
flowering,
flowering . . .

what jolted us to life?



Pity Clarity
by Michael R. Burch

Pity Clarity,
and, if you should find her,
release her from the tangled webs
of dusty verse that bind her.

And as for Brevity,
once the soul of wit—
she feels the gravity
of ironic chains and massive rhetoric.

And Poetry,
before you may adore her,
must first be freed
from those who for her loveliness would ***** her.

This poem expresses my unhappiness with the "state of the art" in three different poetic camps or churches.



Nashville and Andromeda
by Michael R. Burch

I have come to sit and think in the darkness once again.
It is three a.m.; outside, the world sleeps . . .
How nakedly now and unadorned
the surrounding hills
expose themselves
to the lithographies of the detached moonlight—
******* daubed by the lanterns
of the ornamental barns,
firs ruffled like silks
casually discarded . . .

They lounge now—
indolent, languid, spread-eagled—
their wantonness a thing to admire,
like a lover’s ease idly tracing flesh . . .
They do not know haste,
lust, virtue, or any of the sanctimonious ecstasies of men,
yet they please
if only in the solemn meditations of their loveliness
by the ***** pen . . .

Perhaps there upon the surrounding hills,
another forsakes sleep
for the hour of introspection,
gabled in loneliness,
swathed in the pale light of Andromeda . . .
Seeing.
Yes, seeing,
but always ultimately unknowing
anything of the affairs of men.



Quanta
by Michael R. Burch

The stars shine fierce and hard across the Abyss
and only seem to twinkle from such distance
we scarcely see at all. But sheer persistence
in seeing what makes “sense” to us, is man’s
best art and science. BIG, he comprehends.
Love’s photons are too small, escape the lens.
Who dares to look upon familiar things
will find them alien. True distance reels.
Less what he knows than what his finger feels,
the lightning of the socket sparks and sings,
then stings him into comic reverie.
Cartoonish lightbulbs overhead, do we
not “think” because we feel there must be More,
as less and less we know what we explore?



Rainbow
by Michael R. Burch

You made us hopeful, LORD; where is your Hope
when every lovely Rainbow bright and chill
reflects your Will?

You made us artful, LORD; where is your Art,
as we connive our way to easeful death:
sad waste of Breath!

You made us needful, LORD; what is your Need,
when all desire lies in imperfection?
What Dejection

could make You think of us? How can I know
the God who dreamed dark me and this bright Rainbow?

I made you hopeful, child. I am your Hope,
for every fiber of your spirit, Mine,
with all its longing, longs to be Divine.



Stryx: An Astronomer’s Report
by Michael R. Burch

Yesterday
(or was is an eon ago?)
a sun spit out its last remnants of light
over a planet long barren of life,
and died.

It was not a solitary occasion,
by any stretch of the imagination,
this decoronation
of a planet conceived out of desolation.

For her to die as she was born
—amidst the glory of galactic upheaval—
is not strange,
but fitting.

Fitting in that,
shorn of all her preposterous spawn
that had littered her surface like horrendous hair,
she died her death bare
and alone.

Once she was home to all living,
but she died home to the dead
who bereaved her of life.

Unfit for life she died that night
as her seas shone fatal, dark and blue.

Unfit for life she met her end
as mountains fell and lava spewed.

Unfit she died, agleam with death
whose radiance she wore.

Unfit she died as raging waves
obliterated every shore.

Unfit! Unfit! Unfit! Unfit!
Contaminated with the rays
that smoldered in her radiant swamps
and seared her lifeless bays.

Unfit! Unfit! Unfit! Unfit!
a ****** world no more,
but a planet ***** and left to face
her death as she was born—
alone, so all alone.

Yesterday,
a planet green and lovely was no more.

Yesterday,
the whitecaps crashed against her shores
and then they were no more.

Yesterday,
a soft green light
no longer brushed the moon's dark heights . . .

There was no moon,
there was no earth;
there were only the ******* she had given birth
watching from their next ***** world.

I wrote this poem around age 18 and it was published in the 1976-1977 issue of my college literary journal, Homespun.



Crunch
by Michael R. Burch

A cockroach could live nine months on the dried mucus you scrounge from your nose
then fling like seedplants to the slowly greening floor ...
You claim to be the advanced life form, but, mon frere,
sometimes as you ****** encrusted kinks of hair from your Leviathan ***
and muse softly on zits, icebergs snap off the Antarctic.
You’re an evolutionary quandary, in need of a sacral ganglion
to control your enlarged, contradictory hindquarters:
surely the brain should migrate closer to its primary source of information,
in order to ensure the survival of the species.
Cockroaches thrive on eyeboogers and feces;
their exoskeletons expand and gleam like burnished armor in the presence of uranium.
But your cranium
is not nearly so adaptable.



The Evolution of Love
by Michael R. Burch

Love among the infinitesimal
flotillas of amoebas is a dance
of transient appendages, wild sails
that gather in warm brine and then express
one headstream as two small, divergent wakes.

Minuscule voyage—love! Upon false feet,
the pseudopods of uprightness, we creep
toward self-immolation: two nee one.

We cannot photosynthesize the sun,
and so we love in darkness, till we come
at last to understand: man’s spineless heart
is alien to any land.

We part
to single cells; we rise on buoyant tears,
amoeba-light, to breathe new atmospheres ...
and still we sink.

The night is full of stars
we cannot grasp, though all the World is ours.

Have we such cells within us, bent on love
to ever-changingness, so that to part
is not to be the same, or even one?

Is love our evolution, or a scream
against the thought of separateness—a cry
of strangled recognition? Love, or die,
or love and die a little. Hopeful death!
Come scale these cliffs, lie changing, share this breath.



Peers
by Michael R. Burch

These thoughts are alien, as through green slime
smeared on some lab tech’s brilliant slide, I *****,
positioning my bright oscilloscope
for better vantage, though I cannot see,
but only peer, as small things disappear—
these quanta strange as men, as passing queer.

And you, Great Scientist, are you the One,
or just an intern, necktie half undone,
white sleeves rolled up, thick documents in hand
(dense manuals you don’t quite understand),
exposing me, perhaps, to too much Light?

Or do I escape your notice, quick and bright?

Perhaps we wield the same dull Instrument
(and yet the Thesis will be Eloquent!).



Options Underwater: The Song of the First Amphibian
by Michael R. Burch

“Evolution’s a Fishy Business!”

1.
Breathing underwater through antiquated gills,
I’m running out of options. I need to find fresh Air,
to seek some higher Purpose. No porpoise, I despair
to swim among anemones’ pink frills.

2.
My fins will make fine flippers, if only I can walk,
a little out of kilter, safe to the nearest rock’s
sweet, unmolested shelter. Each eye must grow a stalk,
to take in this green land on which it gawks.

3.
No predators have made it here, so I need not adapt.
Sun-sluggish, full, lethargic—I’ll take such nice long naps!
The highest form of life, that’s me! (Quite apt
to lie here chortling, calling fishes saps.)

4.
I woke to find life teeming all around—
mammals, insects, reptiles, loathsome birds.
And now I cringe at every sight and sound.
The water’s looking good! I look Absurd.

5.
The moral of my story’s this: don’t leap
wherever grass is greener. Backwards creep.
And never burn your bridges, till you’re sure
leapfrogging friends secures your Sinecure.



Davenport Tomorrow
by Michael R. Burch

Davenport tomorrow ...
all the trees stand stark-naked in the sun.

Now it is always summer
and the bees buzz in cesspools,
adapted to a new life.

There are no flowers,
but the weeds, being hardier,
have survived.

The small town has become
a city of millions;
there is no longer a sea,
only a huge sewer,
but the children don't mind.

They still study
rocks and stars,
but biology is a forgotten science ...
after all, what is life?

Davenport tomorrow ...
all the children murmur through vein-streaked gills
whispered wonders of long-ago.


Evangelical Fever
by Michael R. Burch

Welcome to global warming:
temperature 109.
You believe in God, not in science,
but isn’t the weather Divine?

#AI #RAD #RADICAL #MRBIA #MRBRAD #MRBRADICAL #MRBSCIENCE

it's called an idea in jungian: collective consciousness, which is harsh on latin acronyms in freudian consideration of the id being added the α & β for explanation of κ... makes sense in cyrillic, but not in black sabbath's solitude of explaining the solfège (sole-fledge): rhyme and the acoustics of latin gave song, fully embraced by the english from latin... leaving the aspirations of the byzantines lagging behind aristotle to define what's grecian. chitty chatty bonk bang ****, and a puff of smoke left by the cartoonish quote of the road-runner that came along.

I have previously,
and this is forbidden knowledge I am about to indulge you in,
(feel grateful perhaps)
I have previously been accepted here before.

In my blueish age
of 13,
deemed enough of a literary
writing reams,
cartoonish spools, overspileth
sounds about right,
and history was recorded!

Little did your establishment know that
years into the future,
in a plasmatic stopwatch,
I'd be
frantically,
absolutely sweating bullets!
attempting to erase
the pubescent penning about
Lord knows,
depression and gym class.
and after, said to no one in particular
in a completely
revisionist fashion
"bless this mess"

so how about it old friend,
another round?

Ruth...for these appendages, it's centuries survive me, this
here in now...mummified.
From head to toe, pulling foot in front foot funnier all of the time.
A cartoonish yaw supposes balance, curates art's gravity.
Based loosely, tightly on everything--this ground I'm to be found
on, this body I'm to be found in, is tinged.
I send you footage, grainy touchstones to dispose of...they
quantify, there's no place to put them.
Millenary eyes are not to be trusted, every time they're revisited
a quantum leap transpires.
Advanced beings we...mingling, letting **** fly barely above ground--
but we're from up...there, out there.

Burning fire death curdling scream because I’m back from the dead *******. Anger is an energy that I cannot ignore.
When I am worn down to a nub it is the soul seed,
Which I can hold onto,
My psychic anchor in my hour of need.
The moment when you have broken through to the other side
And you explode in a thousand fiery shards.
The collapse is imminent.
There is no avoiding the finale.

I washed my hair today with three in one body wash, shampoo, and conditioner.

It has come time for someone to say the facts in blunt and bold terms.
A Cartesian scaling of reality
There are no facts

In a society founded on genocide and warped by decadence,
I find no solace in bitter resentment.

Thriving in ennui, when the real demons come about
I parse together bits of my consciousness in a frantic search of clarity.
No solace,
And I have become the neurotic eye of the mid mind watch dog.
Sailing into Armageddon for want of heroic end,
Plastered to the seat back with sweat.

The carefully constructed outer shell of my being disintegrated in front of me in a mesh of color and light, and they said there is no god.
Enter the Thing

In the desert ****** up the *** by a sordid English poet, religion finds all the seekers, otherwise its madness.
And without truth, Its just a ride, we
play the game, for it is the only thing that we
really have—As  I begin to calm down, two months later,
I realize the folly of my actions.—Actually, **** that nonsense, folly is a lie,
there only Is.

Is there evil in truth? truth in evil?
And is evil not subjective?
For the fathers made the call.
Doth thou do what thou hath
For truth, subjective as well, is an infinite path,
Gödel’s law.

I write with groomed fingernails on a keyboard of obsidian-blocked letters and cadmium laced circuitry.

At our core we are neither inherently evil nor good,
Intelligent or stupid,
Narcissistic, altruistic.
life is Never simple. ‘No secret ingredient’
And pity the swine who clumber over the word nor

If you think you have found the answer to anything, especially in real life, and especially if you can write that answer down in a sentence, you’re Dead Wrong.

So what is there? You think I don’t know where this is going?

Lines written with acid and syrup tapped deep
Is there logic in reason? You know, the what’chamacall
Aren’t we all
Dominated by utopian views
of manifest destiny; the End All be All.

And so what of the fall; the universe that cares not?
No matter how many mushrooms I take,
Reality Still Exists. Then, I almost forgot

And This Beacon of Hope,
Will it save us?
Will we win?
Is there a win?

Where is the end Dark lord of the nether?
Does begging this question get me closer to the truth?
Does it even get me closer to explaining what I mean?
The man selling purses on the corner, patent leather
I cry out to you! For a soul’s desperate answer

But **** that defeatist ******* also, this journey must come to its bitter bite.
And flight from the truth is cowardice divine.

“What reason is there to believe that humanity will not overcome the next world crisis? There is no reason to believe that it won’t. If the universe is infinite isn’t every point the center? Why else does reason even exist, why else do we see ourselves as the masters of the universe?”-Bill Hicks

Here is the closest I have come to any conclusions ever in this Painfully Obvious vision

The universe is chaos,
Our soul is order.

We draw the ductile copper wire through chaotic blackness.
This is our being, it is our tool, take that as you will.
A fiber of a thread on the ocean floor vs. the divine sepulcher

I have lived my life bucking everything that didn’t come from myself, but in vain
Because even these are chains.
I am my own slave master.

In the depths of true evil is the darkest knowledge
Is morality but a thin mask? Fear and Weakness
Is there any difference? Dawn on the killing fields
Dew on the earlobe of a dead man
Drips off and drowns an ant

Back on my so-called Conclusions.
I cannot say I still hold any of them
Even though I typed that sentence not thirty seconds ago.
That man who drew conclusion is now a stranger in the past.
There are no conclusions to draw.

Sometimes I wish I could **** without mercy, if only to know I am really free. Sometimes I wish for suffering, if only to give me some obvious direction. Sometimes I wish for death, if only to clear my skull of all these pesky thoughts.

On the train
A tunnel under New York,
The unseen interlocking teeth
The Filthy steel grating
Narrow shafts of brilliant day shown through
Illuminate the works of unknown artists
Cartoonish letters hastily scrawled and placed
Directly in the light
The only light
Of the tunnel of the New York train
There it passes, and another and another
Each precisely placed
In the thick blackness laced
With light
For your viewing pleasure

And So Spake Urgnd Lichmae The Prophet of anarchic Tremor, Schlock and Paradox. Of the author nothing is known or will be known.

I am disaster
With killing cuts in my face
For the drool when it rolls down
From a face held in place with staples and tension cables

My laugh lines are chuckles at best
Like a pity laugh at a joke that went one step too far
A mouth that settles down, literally
And strains to bend upward

Its so ******* heavy and I cant bare it
Pulling open my ribs to operate I can see this dark heart
Crusting over, hardening over with hate
Being petrified by all the things I distrust from happiness

Im pulling off those bits and pieces too necrotic to save
It hurts but it has to be done
Theres no other way to do it

Unmonitored positivism will dull my perception
While absorbed in this placebo state
I know that this heart will turn to stone
And buried beneath scar tissue, Ill change
Thats why a smile is the worst vitamin

The muscles used to form a cartoonish frown
Are not real, you have to try real hard to make that ****
But when your face is aimed downward
When your eyes are built for crying
And filling in the cracks with gold only makes your wounds visible

The weight of a smile is
A clown mask, over flesh burned from the inside out
Feeling like youre digesting a cannonball every hour of the day
Wanting to grab someone and hold them because the floor is falling out from under you
Feeling the size of your own thoughts crushing down on lungs too asthmatic to breath
Being acutely aware of every second of the day
The dying sun inside your chest feeling like it's going super nova
Being connected to a hundred different points, and seeing no change in distance
Slaying a sentence before it leaves your mind because you think no one cares
Being okay for everyone else because you cant be for yourself anymore

the charming figment of a man stood against the wall with hands in pocket

"feel drained, my love?"

"Lost in the fog, I'm afraid"

her eyes grew and drooped to cartoonish proportions

grammar and spelling amiss

she sighed and hunched

typing typing typing

the ever secretly questioning robot

going about it's robot business

"Want to run away, my love?"

"very much so... away from my mind... very much so"

HOW NOT TO SWEAR WHEN ONE IS SWEARING

After I hit it
with a hammer

my old thumb takes on
a now cartoonish character

pulses and throbs
grows biggerandbiggerANDBIGGER.

My three year old
gasps in astonishment

that an adult would/could
do such a silly silly thing.

"Bold Daddy!" she scolds "Bold Daddy!"

My mind screams in silence but
my tongue longs

to utter in the demotic
a good old fashioned Anglo-Saxon

ffffffffffFFFFFFF...word!

I somehow( don't
ask me how )

gaze into my little one's
baby blues

delete the expletive
carefully in slow motion

substitute the first
thing that pops into the mind

the first( as it happens )
of Mr. Joyce's thunderwords.

None of Eliot's
"  Shantih     shantih     shantih "

I had the presence of mind to
"Finnegans Wake" it!

"BABABADALGHARAGHTAKAMMINARRONNKONNBRONN
TONNERRONNTUONNTHUN­NTROVARRHOUNAWNSKAN
TOOHOOHOORDENENTHURNUK!"



"Funny Daddy!" she chortles "Funny Daddy!"

Now whenever things
go wrong and

they will go wrong
( as sure as words is words )

she begs me
to "...do the thunder!"

Waits for her little
bit part so she can

chime in with her
". . .TOOHOOHOO..."

and I gather her up
in my arms and we

both declaim
as one

". . .THURNUK!"

If Pablo Picasso's name doesn't ring a bell, it is indeed a rarity,
Welcome to Malaga, Picasso's birthplace - an unique identity,
Known for his exquisite paintings & sculptures, Picasso is a legend,
That his work is still considered sensational, need not be questioned

As Costa del Sol's capital, Malaga in Spain's Andalusia is a vibrant coastal city,
Lying along a wide bay of the Mediterranean Sea, it constantly bustles with activity,
Excellent weather all-year round, renders it an idyllic tourist haven,
It's mountain geography and sun-drenched beaches - delight for a travel maven

The city is replete with a profusion of museums, daring street art and eateries,
Add to it, centuries-old heritage and beaches, that always hold pleasant memories,
Delightful pedestrianized centers and stunning views add to the city's intrigue,
Casual strolls to several picturesque locales hardly gives room for any fatigue

The hilltop Arab palace fortress of Alcazaba provides panoramic sweeping sea views,
Roman marble pillars & Moorish horseshoe arches add to stunning architectural hues,
The once coastal-facing defense of Plaza de Armas now features beautiful gardens,
Evocative vast courtyards & bubbling fountains yield a pathway that seldom straightens

A Picasso museum visit is unmissable on the itinerary for anyone visiting Malaga,
The stamp of conceptual brilliance seen in the exhibits makes art lovers go gaga,
The manner in which cubism art has been displayed is thoughtfully amazing,
Picasso's  genius is reflected in his works and was perhaps his way of proclaiming

The majestic Cathedral de Malaga is situated right in the historic town's center,
A blend of Gothic, Renaissance & Baroque architectural styles adds to the splendor,
The grand marble staircase and a beautiful assortment of frescoes are a visual treat,
The vast colonaded nave, housing an enormous cedar-wood choir stall, is no mean feat

The Carmen Thyssen Museum is located in an aesthetically renovated 16th-century palace,
It features an unique cocktail of paintings with thematic variations, not in the least hapless,
The almost cartoonish costumbrismo paintings are a throwback to 19th-century Spain myths,
That depicted fiestas, banditry, flamenco, bar-room brawls as if 'twas the work of a jokesmith!

Beaches in Malaga are characterized by dark, long stretches of sand skirted by lofty palm trees,
With boarded promenades, shorefronts are adorned with colorful parasols, wafting in the breeze,
Visitors swarming the beaches can be seen lazing in hammocks while basking in the sunshine,
Having all the trappings of a sunbather's paradise, that can be seen along the entire coastline

Ever experienced walking along a walkway dangling up to 100 meters in the air?
Its Caminito del Rey, pinned along the steep hills of a narrow gorge - indeed rare,
Parts of the route clinging recklessly to the sheer rock face of the gorge are awe-inspiring,
While completely safe, the linear 8-km walk can cause vertigo and culminate in respiring

This walkway was once dubbed the most dangerous hike in Spain - yet, so far from reality,
Multi-layered landscapes encompass reservoirs, mountains, gorges & valleys in totality,
The accompanying guide regales trekkers with the canyon's fascinating history and folklore,
While numerous selfie-worthy clicks of the breath-taking dizzy views, are like never before

Malaga is centric for day trips to Tangier, Morocco and The Rock of Gibraltar,
It is one of the few European cities that experiences a relatively warm winter,
It's coastal location with the Mediterranean Sea wind makes summer less oppressive,
Loaded with history and a multi-layered past, is what makes the city so impressive

Malaga is a typical port city that epitomizes Andalusian lifestyle to the fullest,
The warmth and camaraderie displayed by locals can be experienced at its best,
Streets and by-lanes are always pleasantly crowded with folks in colorful attire,
A wholesome feeling of utmost satisfaction at the trip's end, is for all to aspire

Riding stolen horses

The guy living large with the hat,
dressed to the nines in black,
with eyes sweeping a broad dry valley to the cows,
who seeks his eyes, then humbly brings a store-bought
present to the woman tall in leggings with
long hair free, like an ancient story ***** alive.
He is frozen in communal memory,

this single cowboy guiding his returned
stolen horses at dusty noon all rock and dust,
the hooves as staccato rhythm for manly wild eyes
stating be here now as permanent fever
moves toward the rushing transparent river.
Forever the big sky breeze caresses his stoic
face schooled in fragile civilization,

knowing soon in the script he lives he will
push outward swinging saloon doors
to face another lawless soul, another wood built
village/far trail—prepared, as if venerated
teachers in his few years of school saw him
stripped of words pounding in a gallop,
protected by the silver belt buckle

and tall boots scuffed and pointed, the shaped
hat shielding eyes from the bright—
as a copied tintype—the crooked squint and smile
slowly emerging untamed.  Deliberate, the hand
moves in habit to the gun in a muted painful sepia
myth robbed of mom and dad progression.
His stripped history has been released

into wild context—mixed with spaceship/
instant access—on the cartoonish
thin fringes with 50s big hair, as a brave bluff
facing forgotten consequences.  Nonetheless,
he struggles from the bestiary of faceless others,
grizzled and contained and handsome, to
head on out, away, alone as always.

Well, some you lay, and some you marry,
(As if womankind is some thing
To be sifted, sorted, and graded
Like so many eggs or lima beans)
But then one comes, smudging all those lines in her wake,
Scattering such easy dichotomies to the winds
Like so many dandelion seeds,
A woman seemingly composed of nothing save some essence,
Yet substantial, fecund, prolific,
And you find yourself wholly unmoored
By no more than a glimpse of her,
The mere imagining of a word wafted your way
A thing of inexplicable delight,
An ecstasy all but *******,
But such dreams serve nothing more tangible
Than as reminders of your utter unworthiness,
Your tainted admixture of rank brass and tuna-can metal,
And so you vow to re-cast yourself
Into something which is worthy of her,
Or at least something demi-desirable,
But such a remaking proves your unmaking,
A transformation not of as the humble cocoon,
But one that leaves you cartoonish, less than a man,
Braying and barking, not even worthy of the scorn
Of she for whom you forsook everything
And yet you would do so again and again,
The bewitching and utter annihilation of all you were
A grail unto itself, an immaculate radiance
Which the tips of you fingers, the brush of your lips
Would leave irreparably sullied.

I want to consume your shape
Your silhouette
The vignette of the light behind you
A sizable man
I like your shape and
The cartoonish wisp of your hair
I want to consume your hair
And wear it on mine
I want to consume your outline
And if you let me stick around
That’s what I’d do
And what you’d do, too
Because we labor over love
But truly live to consume
I like the shape of you
I want to eat your hair

April 29, 2018,,2

you know that image
   in your mind
you thought was him or her
   totally    a reality
of imagination, cartoonish even
   what else is there but this

April 29, 2018

you know that image
    that computer image
made with 3d graphics
    totally a creation of
an imagination, cartoonish even,
    i really like her ****