South Florida
if you were a body part,
you’d be an armpit.

You’d be a bulged vein
on the side of a forehead
forever locked in a scowl
behind sunglasses.

You speak the language of horns
middle name, finger
blood type, combustible

You're a melting ***
that's boiled over the lid
sweating salt water at the brows
eyes red as the brake lights
in the maddening brightness,
you’re torrential daylight
heating nerves like greenhouse gasses
waiting for a reason to explode.

You’re a tropical motilov cocktail
no one can afford
2 parts anger, 1 part stupidity
full of yourself in a souvenir glass with a toothpick umbrella
You're all image

You’re all talk: the curse words
breaking out the mouths
of the angry line mob at Starbucks in the morning
You’re the indifferent silence
in the arena at the Heat games leaving early,
showing up late
due to the distance
from Brickell to Hialeah,
West Palm to Pompano
the gap between the entitled and the under-paid
a skyline of condos in a third world country
You’ve always been foreign to me.

You’re winterless, no chill
you attract only hurricanes
and tourists,
shoving anything that isn’t profitable
out of the way like post-storm debris
into the backyards of the Liberty City projects,
onto a landfill off the side of the Turnpike
Hide it beneath Bermuda grass,
line it with palm trees
if only conceal your cold blooded nature:
I see you.
You are overrun with iguanas,
blood-******* mosquitos
hot-headed New York drivers
not afraid to get hit

You get yours, Soflo
and you'll go as low
as the flat roofs of your duplexes
and the wages that can barely pay the rent to get it
latitude as attitude
temper as temperature
if you were a body part
I swear you’re an *******

south of the brain, one hour
in all directions,
I’d find you.
You’d impose your way
onto my flight to the Philippines,
to Seattle, to Raleigh
You’d follow me like excess baggage,
like gravity,
bringing me back when asked where I'm from:

That area north of Miami, I’d say
(the suburbs, but whatever, we are hard in our own way)
I'd show you off on their map
like some badge of grit,
certificate of aggression
I know how to break a sweat
walk brisk, drive evasive
ride storms in my sleep
I know you, I’d say,
“He’s a friend of mine.”
and I’d watch them light up
and remember
the postcards you've sent them
of the sunrise,
welcoming brown immigrants
onto white sand beaches
You were foreign to us
yet raised us as your own
in the furnace of your summers
iron on iron, the forger striking
softness into swords
built for survival
I'm made of you

my South Floridian temper
cools down
in your ocean breeze

if you were a body part,
you'd be a part of me
a socked foot in an And1 sandal
pressed to the gas pedal
as my drive takes me north
of your borders, far from home

I see you
in the rear view mirror,
tail-gating
like a sports car on the exit ramp
the color of the sun.

you are the light at the end of a tendril. a spindle of dread, woven in caustic guile of argyle
parallelograms...phantom realms of solid waste. you are the pin in the subject. gating satan through a thimble
of crocodile tears, the new symbol.
the rude glyph in black bibles and strong drink, en-kindling the dead. rodents ponzi the scheme
of hell’s maze, with lies...your lies...
you have  eyes that  lead aside from your heart’s plot
you are saboteur. banal.
unrestrained waste. you are the fin in the barracuda puppet, grazing the wrist of Dim Henson
huffing crystal gorillas in the congo of your foyer
you are
the black chandelier.

teach me your cheap trick
striking off ‘ iron-on’  pinkie swears
your praline heresies... your  ‘ no remorse’    code
lay bare to me.

better my better angels,  to fathom the loathsome ****
of your actual mind. keep me abreast of your wretched games...
apply the rod of your wrong  love, above all.... you must betray.
you must know in your fetid rot
of a third eye... the phlegm genius of **** blindness.... teach me the rictus of
cold hearted.  a false god in my lotus !

spare me the chaste suzette
flip me the ***** that spits fables.
learn me the savage puns
to pummel you         sustaining your worst done.
grant me the lethal beans for my sacred cow
trade me the idylls of your forked heart
for your crushed null
and crossed
bones.

imagine if we wrote 'ampersand' instead of 'and'.
ampersand you invited me into the light, cuddled me senseless in our darkness. i swear i could see for the first time. i told you i loved the sea, but your words crashed like waves on the breakwaters gating my heart.
"bae, we cannot always be beside what we love".
maybe that's the nature of our love. that your deflated buoy can no longer save the drowning me, that you sink deeper in your abyss of ideals.
Today i'm writing a postcard to you from my past, hoping you could extrapolate into the possibilities of our future. We made hypothetical promises in our religious fervour, in the unsettling chill of a certain Midsummer night.

There are many "you's" out there, on the highways, byways, freeways. Those that put others in harms way, excercising their egotistical need to be "first in line", "head of the class", so to speak; "**** the torpedoes, full speed ahead!" is their rallying cry.

It makes no difference what "YOU" are driving, old vehicle, new vehicle. Perhaps an overly powerful pickup truck, or an SUV, that makes YOU feel IMMORTAL. Ice, snow, rain, dark of night, makes no difference to YOU. Inconsiderate, rude, careless, makes YOU, dangerous. Today is no different, its "all about YOU." Speeding, weaving in and out of traffic, no need for signals, tail-gating,  trying to get that vehicle out of YOUR way, because YOU are being "INCONVENIENCED!" YOU, don't care! For this morning, like any other morning, "its all about YOU."

The lights are a bit glaring, as you begin to emerge from that state of unconsciousness, laying in that hospital bed, wondering where you are, who, and why, are those strangers standing around you.
They are the doctors, nurses, first responders, investigators, preparing for your reaction when you're told that the brains of your spouse and children had to be scraped off the pavement with a snow shovel.
You should be proud of yourself. For today is truly,
                                              "All about YOU!"

copyright: richard riddle April 03, 2015

the steel on steel clank
of a canal lock gating
is a lonely sound to hear,
and so too your parting words,
though wise, gentle and reassuring,
it is our channel that's closing
and I do whelm - what feels like tears.

Because of recent fatal accidents that have occurred recently in the Dallas area, I felt it appropriate to repost this piece.

There are many "you's" out there, on the highways, byways, freeways. Those that put others in harms way, excercising their egotistical need to be "first in line", "head of the class", so to speak; "**** the torpedoes, full speed ahead!" is their rallying cry.

It makes no difference what "YOU" are driving, old vehicle, new vehicle. Perhaps an overly powerful pickup truck, or an SUV, that makes YOU feel IMMORTAL. Ice, snow, rain, dark of night, makes no difference to YOU. Inconsiderate, rude, careless, makes YOU, dangerous. Today is no different, its "all about YOU." Speeding, weaving in and out of traffic, no need for signals, tail-gating,  trying to get that vehicle out of YOUR way, because YOU are being "INCONVENIENCED!" YOU, don't care! For this morning, like any other morning, "its all about YOU."

The lights are a bit glaring, as you begin to emerge from that state of unconsciousness, laying in that hospital bed, wondering where you are, who, and why, are those strangers standing around you.
They are the doctors, nurses, first responders, investigators, preparing for your reaction when you're told that the brains of your spouse and children had to be scraped off the pavement with a snow shovel.
You should be proud of yourself. For today is truly,
                                              "All about YOU!"

copyright: richard riddle April 03, 2015

Violet light Bleaches steaming emptied emus' bladders on time, I want I want I am amongst the Atman at dusk man's lust rises ****** parry as a guardian of the gourd the glory of the gore internal innards languish read the spare change small children inquire currency smell of bleach eases the crucible fixing my easel with ease as all society is, is a trap, a trap lime citrus as sweet as Virginity as **** as a tarp pushing out rain water for a creature's belief in solidarity, soil begs to return sustained by nourishment of the water table and rain shadow, fees lie fallow I am a three field system mid evil as a midwife. aggregate agates gating Gaelic gaiety, fair as faith fairly free as a fairy, pixie sticks mixed well with angel dust I return my receipt as I am an alchemist to Egypt saying 2 sips taste better, who's at a crude joke who explains rude yokes poked by a spear leering silence at the steer awaiting an opacity to light my lantern, forsake advancement for the sun bends gravity as an attitude, who of many resist the power of effulgence, even lycanthropes need hope for the souls as the basis of reflection brings the rains sparked in rainbows.

What makes a friend? cogar a creyo una mi Amiga Bonita hace difficl estoy muy triste para la pnta y ala comer mierda.

UV is not a Cavalier, the ultra violet alpha is a royalist

Because of recent fatal accidents that have occurred in the Dallas area, I felt it appropriate to repost this piece.*

Richard Riddle 11-06-2015

There are many "you's" out there, on the highways, byways, freeways. Those that put others in harms way, excercising their egotistical need to be "first in line", "head of the class", so to speak; "**** the torpedoes, full speed ahead!" is their rallying cry.

It makes no difference what "YOU" are driving, old vehicle, new vehicle. Perhaps an overly powerful pickup truck, or an SUV, that makes YOU feel IMMORTAL. Ice, snow, rain, dark of night, makes no difference to YOU. Inconsiderate, rude, careless, makes YOU, dangerous. Today is no different, its "all about YOU." Speeding, weaving in and out of traffic, no need for signals, tail-gating,  trying to get that vehicle out of YOUR way, because YOU are being "INCONVENIENCED!" YOU, don't care! For this morning, like any other morning, "its all about YOU."

The lights are a bit glaring, as you begin to emerge from that state of unconsciousness, laying in that hospital bed, wondering where you are, who, and why, are those strangers standing around you.
They are the doctors, nurses, first responders, investigators, preparing for your reaction when you're told that the brains of your spouse and children had to be scraped off the pavement with a snow shovel.
You should be proud of yourself. For today is truly,
                                              "All about YOU!"

copyright: richard riddle April 03, 2015

Because of an upsurge in fatal accidents in the North Texas area, and elsewhere I'm sure, I believe it appropriate to repost this write.

There are many "you's" out there, on the highways, byways, freeways. Those that put others in harms way, excercising their egotistical need to be "first in line", "head of the class", so to speak; "**** the torpedoes, full speed ahead!" is their rallying cry.

It makes no difference what "YOU" are driving, old vehicle, new vehicle. Perhaps an overly powerful pickup truck, or an SUV, that makes YOU feel IMMORTAL. Ice, snow, rain, dark of night, makes no difference to YOU. Inconsiderate, rude, careless, makes YOU, dangerous. Today is no different, its "all about YOU." Speeding, weaving in and out of traffic, no need for signals, tail-gating,  trying to get that vehicle out of YOUR way, because YOU are being "INCONVENIENCED!" YOU, don't care! For this morning, like any other morning, "its all about YOU."

The lights are a bit glaring, as you begin to emerge from that state of unconsciousness, laying in that hospital bed, wondering where you are, who, and why, are those strangers standing around you.
They are the doctors, nurses, first responders, investigators, preparing for your reaction when you're told that the brains of your spouse and children had to be scraped off the pavement with a snow shovel.
You should be proud of yourself. For today is truly,
                                              "All about YOU!"

copyright: richard riddle April 03, 2015

37 years as an accident investigator, have seen many of these. This piece was inspired by Jamie Burkes, "BOOM". Thanks, Jamie!

My brother is coming after me with a knife
Somewhere North of Dares Beach Road
In Prince Frederick, Maryland.

There is lots of conversation.
He is manic and persistently after my throat.
I’m not sure what he is talking about,
But it comes at the volume of every
Missed connection the last 6 years has amassed.
Flood gating levy tumble.

His eyes are huge,
His knuckles and wrists always
Elevated above heart level
(Not like a zombie, just grasping in general).

He looks good.
Radiant even.
With a black backwards baseball cap.

We slowly make our way down past
Smoothie King where he lunges
And swipes the knife at me.

I am doing quite well at dodging
Every attempt to slash me.
Until we are under the Apex Theaters
Sign in front of Safeway.

The sun has nearly set.
The spring air is clean
And the sky is dark blue.

Gun pulled, shoots me in the forehead.

Bullet hits my pre frontal cortex
And then arcs severely down and outward,
Like half a parabola.

The bullet leaves through my occipital bone.
I am stunned, but completely unscathed.

I scream: “How am I not dead?!”
My brother barely looks interested.
I say: “What the **** is Wrong with you?!”

I wake up.

I feel so hurt
Alone
Feel like trash thrown away
Dont feel like the sun shines the same
Waking up early sleeping late not enough sleep in a day
Broken into pieces
Puzzles that never seem to fit
Why is this happening to me
Look at this
You dont want me at all
Ya actions say it all
I feel like i just might fall
I swear i fight with myself
Lying battling inner demons
Biting for some odd reason
Tail gating thoughts of you with some one else
My mind lost in thought
Ya daughter smiling wide
Grinning from ear to ear
Not a muthafcken care in the world
I must stand tall strong and stay invloved
Make sure my feelings are dissolved
Act like everything is resolved
Fake the happiness even tho im broke
Awoke from happiness is now a fcken joke

Age
25 July 2021

Heavy airs abating.
Disease of diseases gating.
Sounds of sounds fading.
Light of lights evading.
Ridicule invading.
Use of use more less.
Shaking now our test.
Moving very slow,
Nowhere left to go.

Darwin’s poem said,
Inevitable you be dead.
Heaven or hell presumed,
As the fires consume.

Others still have chores.
Zero is our score.
Love, our fire escape.
Blessed if that’s your fate.

Living life full long,
Loving keeps me strong.
Forgive who long life live.
They their best still give.
Remember to forgive.