I'M MAKING nachos in your toaster oven. The chips fall in the pan without a problem. Beans, evenly distributed (if I do say so myself.) Salsa- good to go. Then the cheese. Generic brand shredded cheese blend. I dangle my (washed) fingers into the zip-lock bag, grab a generous pinch and rain mild cheddar down on my gourmet meal. And I feel the tears building. "No," my conscious scolds, "you will not cry over shredded cheese." I add another pinch for flavor, then another to assert dominance. I slide the pan into the tiny oven- triumphant! But the next task breaks me. I freeze when I try to adjust the heat setting. I hear your voice so clearly, like you're still calling from the next room: "you have to press the TOAST button, it cooks much faster."  The tears start to roll. I think about how excited you were when cheese bubbled perfectly- "just a little brown, ever so slightly crispy." We would joke about your persnickety preferences, likely a product of your superior taste. Of course, you would have appreciated anything I made for you, but it was always better when the dish matched the idea in your head...when I made it like you would have made it (if you were only well enough to cook for yourself again.) In the present, I poke the TOAST button and flee the kitchen as to not cry in front of the smothered chips. I sit on the sofa and break down, gasping in childish sobs. "I miss her," I wail to an empty house. Warm tears coat my cheeks in the air-conditioned room. I feel so small. I feel so foolish for crying over stupid, little things. I feel so... so... A bell dings in the kitchen. I wipe my sleeve across my face and traipse back to the toaster. Hand into oven mitt, mitt onto pan, pan onto table. I grab the plastic tubs of sour cream and guacamole from the fridge and a spoon from the drawer that sticks a little when you try to open it. I pick the non-wilted bits off the head of lettuce and rinse them under the faucet. I finish the recipe. I pull out a chair. I sit down to nachos for one.

Could be I’m on a mission:
Convince the entire world
I am the World's Greatest Living
English Language poet;
Of course, genius such as mine
Goes generally unrecognized until
The posthumous crowd weighs in.
And yet, wouldn’t it be nice?

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Yes, wouldn’t it be nice?
(The Nobel Prize,
Tribute at the Kennedy Center,
A MacArthur Grant,
The Presidential Medal of Honor,
Reverent BJs from hipster groupies . . .
The Poet Laureate in his vicarage,
Enjoying my sweet twilight celebrity.)

(Cue “Guys & Dolls” soundtrack: “What's in the daily news?
I'll tell you what's in the daily news.”)
23: Beheaded at Nigerian Election Rally!
Amanda Knox Gets Away with ****** Again in Italy!
Kung Pow: Silicon Valley Penisocracy Crushes Ellen Pao
German Crash Dummy Co-pilot Flies Jet into the Alps!
Hilary’s Emails Are *****!
Sierra Leone Ebola Lockdown!
Iran: Kooks with Nukes!
Sri Lankan President’s Brother Dies from Ax Wounds!
Saudi Diplomats Evacuate Yemen!
Stampede at Hindu Bathing Ritual, Bangladesh Kills at Least 10!
Simply put:  THE WORLD IS IN A STATE OF ****.

Perhaps it’s time we turn again.
Seek solace in poetry—
“Yeah, chemistry,” insists my Sky Masterson,
My “Guys & Dolls” alter ago.
Surprised? You shouldn’t be.
All poets are gamblers & moonshiners.
We polish our chemical craft,
Sweet-talking the distillation apparatus,
Getting us, getting at linguistic essence.
Cunning linguists are we.
(Colonel Angus, are you back?)
Oyez! Oyez! The gavel raps:
“The Curious Case of Sam Hayakawa.”
We open this hearing to determine
Whether or not S.I. Hayakawa—guilty of
Numerous crimes against humanity & other
Professional Neo-Fascist “entrechats.”--
Whether or not he merits a kinder, gentler
Wikipedia BIO.
(Wikipedia ( i/ˌwɪkɨˈpiːdiə/ or  i/ˌwɪkiˈpiːdiə/ WIK-i-***-dee-ə) Wikipedia)
We open this forum, focusing on his
Courageous stand against the
SDS & Black Panthers, part of
An unlikely coalition: The Worker-Student Alliance
& It’s rival, Joe Hill Caucuses.
Da Name of the Place:
(“I like it like that!” Hot Chelle Rae-“I Like It Like That” lyrics| Metro Lyrics www.metrolyrics.com Lyrics to 'I Like It Like That' by Hot Chelle Rae. “Let's get it on, yeah, y'all can come along/Everybody drinks on me, buy out the bar /Just to feel like I'm.”)
The name of the place: San Francisco State,
1968-69, the longest student strike in U.S. history,
Led successfully to the creation of
Black & Other Ethnic studies programs
On campuses across the country,
And, one could argue,
Gave the green light to
Osama Hussein Obama,
Our first Uncle Tom President.
But I digress.

ACTING SFSU President, Dr. Hayakawa—
Perpetual audition, the pressure on,
Feisty, independent-minded & combative,
Screaming at that skeevy student mob:
(Skeevy as in “He bought the thing from
Some skeevy dude in an alley.")
Declaring “A State of Emergency,”
Calling in the SFPD, whose
Inexplicable slogan says”
“Oro en Paz,
Fierro en Guerra.”
Archaic Spanish for
Gold in peace,
Iron in war, by the by,
For you holdouts,
Those of you who still
Think the “English First Movement”
Breathes life still.
I’ve got more news for you:
That crusade died long ago,
Locked up, dark & shuttered,
Bank Repo thugs, their thick
Neck muscles flexing from side to side,
Sashaying across the parking lot,
Like John Wayne on steroids,
Right up to the front door.)
The SFPD: San Francisco city fuzz,
(As they were known at the time) &
The California National Guard, as well,
Obstreperously, generously catered by
Governor Ronald Wilson Reagan,
(Early stage, Alzheimer’s at the time.
But still very much “The Gypper,”
Still chipper in Sacramento.)
Ronnie--keenly interested in
The Eureka State’s congressional clout,
Lassoes a seat in the U.S. House of Lords:
AKA: The U.S. Senate, SPQR.
It’s still hard . . .

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Still hard to believe that California was once
Rock solid in the clutches of the GOP,
Gripped tightly in the Party’s
Desperate talons. But the grip slipped,
Slipped in the slip-sliding 1970s.
It got harder and harder . . .

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Harder and harder to remind
Leroy & the rest of his ebony posse,
That it was Abraham Lincoln—
“The Great Emancipator” himself—who was,
Our first Republican President.
The Emancipation Proclamation:
That toothless rhetorical flourish,
Based solely on Abe’s
Constitutional authority as
Commander-in-Chief,
Not on a law passed by Congress.
It was just Abe blowing smoke
Up their ***** again,
Just an egalitarian blast from
His Old Kentucky past,
A youth spent splitting rails,
Busting his *** just like
Any plantation ******,
A stark plebeian commonality,
Too deeply etched to be ignored.
Poor Abraham Lincoln:
Probably a **** Creek crypto-Jew,
Neutered by the opposition:
His very own Republican majority Congress,
Another example of the GOP
Shooting off its own foot, right up there
With Mitt Romney’s "47 percent of the people,”
The rhetorical gaffe which cost him his
Second & final shot at the White House.
But I digress.

Senator Sam S.I. Samuel Hayakawa:
That inscrutable Asian fixer, is now U.S. Senator,
Republican, California, 1976-83
Pulpit-bullying his Senate colleagues,
Fiercely opposed to transfer of the
Panama Canal & Panama Canal Zone to
Panama: a diplomatic no-brainer; Duh?
Their freaking name is on both of them.
Senator Sam, obstinate & blustering:
"We should keep the Panama Canal.
After all, we stole it fair and square.”
And Hayakawa, later the driving impetus
Behind the Far Right “English Only” movement.
His co-founding an "Official English"
Advocacy group, U.S. English;
Their party line summarizes their belief:
“The passage of English as the official language will help to expand opportunities for immigrants to learn and speak English, the single greatest empowering tool that immigrants must have to succeed."
That’s how they sold it, anyway.
In sooth: just old-fashioned nativist
Anti-immigration hysteria.

Hayakawa: always the high achiever.
Hayakawa: The Great Assimilator,
Preaching his xenophobic Gospel:
“Immigration Must Be Reduced!”
Aryan rhetoric, of course,
A bi-product of radical authoritarian nationalism,
A movement with deep American roots.
Senator Sam: a Japanese-Canadian-American,
Always tried too hard to fit in.
Sam, comfortable in Chicago during WWII,
Not personally subject to confinement,
Advocated that Japanese-Americans
Submit to FDR’s 1942, Executive Order 9066.
“Time in camp, will eventually work to Japanese advantage."
Later, during the Congressional debate over
The Civil Liberties Act of 1988 . . .
(Passed the House on September 17, 1987 (243–141)
Passed the Senate on April 20, 1988 (69–27, in lieu of S. 1009)
Reported by the joint conference committee on July 26, 1988,
Agreed to by the Senate on July 27, 1988 (voice vote) and
By the House on August 4, 1988 (257–156,
Signed into law by President Ronald Reagan 8/10/88.
He opposed $reparations for WWII internment:
“Japanese-Americans should not
Be paid for fulfilling their obligations."
Some guys, I guess, would say, or
Do anything for Bohemia Club membership.
Plagued by night terrors, nonetheless,
His Manzanar nightmares, his vivid
Imaginary experience at other Japanese
Internment Sites: Tule Lake & Camp Rohwer.
Stalag (German pronunciation: [ˈʃtalak])
Stalags, infamous still,
“Stalags ‘R Us,”
Still palpable memories for
Issei ("first generation")
& Nisei ("second generation").
See: 323 U.S. 214. Korematsu v. United States
(No. 22: Argued: October 11, 12, 1944.
Decided: December 18, 1944.140 F.2d 289.
The opinion, written by Hugo Black,
Chief Justice Harlan Stone, Presiding.)

Hayakawa: a strange duck, of course,
But we mustn’t ignore his strong credentials,
And I’d like to disabuse anyone here
Of the notion that it was anything
Other than his academic record
That got his case to this Forum.
Oyez! Oyez! The gavel raps:
“The Curious Case of Sam Hayakawa.”
So begins this fractured Pardoner’s Tale,
This petition for forgiveness,
The Capo di Tutti Capi,
Presiding: the original Italian mafioso,
His Eminence--the Vicar of Jesus Christ,
The Supreme Pontiff
Pope Paparazzi of Rome!
Roma: the only venue large enough to
Dispense dispensation of this magnitude.

Hayakawa: everyone says his C.V. is “impeccable.”
But did anyone ever freaking Google it?
Just where did Professor Sam go to school?
Undergrad? The University of Manitoba,
Truly, by any Third World Standard
A great bastion of intellectual rigor;
Grad school? McGill and U Wisconsin-Madison.
He was a Canadian by birth,
His academic discipline was Semantics.
(As in “That’s just semantics,”
That all-purpose rejoinder in any argument.)
Professor Hayakawa, The Semanticist,
He taught us: “All thought is sub-vocal speech.”

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Hmmm? We think in words.
The medium of thought is language.
If you grok this for the first time,
Let’s stop to celebrate our enlightenment,
With a cultural nod of respect,
We salute our Islamic brethren.
Radical Islam: the new bogeyman,
Responsible for keeping lights on in Alexandria,
Paying the defense & intelligence bills,
Sustaining that sinister
Military-Industrial complex
Ike warned us about.
Hang in there, Mustafa, old buddy.
Like the Cold War, this insanity
Will eventually blow over.
Orwell’s Oceania will reshuffle
Its deck of global grab-***, and a
New enemy will suddenly appear.
Big Brother, as always,
In the full-control mode,
Simply put: on top of the situation.
So Hurrah!
Allāhu Akbar. “God is Great!
The Takbīr (the term for the
Arabic phrase: usually translated as
"God is [the] greatest.")

“All thought is sub-vocal speech.”
What a simple, yet profound insight!
Just a short hop, skip & jump to the
Realization that, perhaps, the clarity
& Power of our minds can be groomed,
Improved upon by mastery of—
In Sam’s case, anyway--the English Language.
Was this, perhaps, the germ of U.S. English,
The political lobbying organization
He co-founded, dedicated to making
English, the official language of the United States.
Hayakawa: a wooly conservative of his own design;
No wonder Governor Reagan loved him.

Dr. S.I. Hayakawa, a colorful and polarizing
Figure in California politics during the 1960s and 70s.
Can we forgive his daily afternoon naps.
Asleep on the floor of the U.S. Senate,
Leaving California so pathetically,
So ostensibly under-represented.
Senator Sam’s comatose presence at
Washington-on Potomac; the
District of Columbia.
A long time ago,
In a distant galaxy . . .
Far, far away.

TEAR GAS.
Alas, long before he got to Washington,
Long before ever setting foot off campus,
He called for tear gas to
Disperse those pesky college kids.
I repeat myself for emphasis:
He authorized the use of tear gas at SF State.
Tear gas: a lachrymatory agent?
Actually, a potentially lethal
Chemical agent . . .
(Yeah, Chemistry!
To wit: Sgt. Sara Brown,
Referencing “Guys & Dolls” again.)
Outlawed for use during wartime,
Banned in international warfare
Under both the 1925 Geneva Protocol; & the
Chemical Weapons Convention;
“Tear gas:  a weapon of war against
The people. We believe that
Tear gas remains a chemical weapon
Whether used on a battlefield, or city streets.”

Thus, history will be your judge,
You unleashed tear gas on college kids,
So I wouldn’t expect a rep makeover
Any time soon, Ichiye-san, my ichiban friend.

Autonomous talking faces
Blathering on & on about
Endless government *****

Like a perpetually new iPhone
There's an App for every view
Install. Use. Reboot.

Multi-dæmon robocop
Seduces his sci-fi fans
With tales of grandeur & success

A printer spliced with a vacuum
Pay it with ink; have it print what you want
It'll **** you good

And then

Late at night in the quiet of a Sunday moon
The zeitgeist peels off his human suit
Plugs itself into the wall
And has cybernetik ***
With its self-aware CPU.

The Helos hovered silently
as the Seals roped to the ground.
They touched down on Sesame Street
where the “Big Bird” could be found.

The C.I.A. had tracked him
Using feed from P.B.S.
President Mitt o.k’d the hit
when we tracked him to his nest.

A blue grouch in a garbage can
liay bleeding on the floor.
That **** named Cookie Monster
won’t eat  cookies anymore.

Ernie, Bert and rubber ducky
Were in the bath they say
When Seal team six broke through the door
and blew them both away.

Big Bird hid in Hooper’s store
While all this had transpired.
Then he laid down suppressing fire
With a weapon he’d acquired
Several Seals lay silent
in that sleep that isn’t sweet.
Snuffleupagus opened up
and forced a Seal retreat.

A stealth Helo exploded
raining wreckage on the street.
Maddened Muppets hurling Bricks
compounded Mitt’s  defeat.

As of today Big Bird’s at large.
Him we couldn’t whack.
The briefing failed to tell us
That a Liberal Bird fights back.

Av hysteri jeg skriker flammer og håret reiser seg i lynets dødelige knekte streker.
En halvveis setning, en ikke ferdiggjort fasong.
Elektrisk knust glass fyller mine nesebor og nåler sikker ut av øynene.
Jeg er så død som djevlen selv.
Jeg vrir meg under bakken og mine bein, ja, hele mitt skjelett er dømt til å bli gift som etser gjennom alt som kommer anig. Som syre i mitt blod vrir årene seg i smerte i mine iskalde fingre.
Å være greit å ikke gjøre ferdig.
Det er absurd! Min smerte eier ikke grenser.
Å roe seg at alt er dårlig.
Å roe seg med alt som er så usselig.
Det er umulig når jeg selv vet at mitt eget beste er noen andres aller verste.

There once was a candidate Ryan
The right wing see in him their lion
This nemesis to our healthcare
Paul only fights for good wealthcare

He voted with Bush to disaster
The economy never fell faster
Wee is his knowledge of foreign affairs
If he gets the job we'll need daily prayers

A bad Catholic some blogs call him
Some hope pestilences befall him
Many think he's no wiser than Palin
That could cause Mitt Romney's failing

He'll hurt poor folks; he'll hurt the middle
We'll starve as old Mitt plays the fiddle
So it would be better to vote not at all
Than choose young Attila, this candidate Paul

A hippie hocked a louie on Sammy
when he landed in San Francisco.

Sammy didn't respond;
he just wanted to make
his connecting flight home.

Sammy wasn't proud about
some of things he did in the war;
so he figured he probably
deserved the garlands of disdain
an ungrateful nation bestows
upon itself in fits of self contempt.

Sammy shut down and tuned out,
soon his heart was as dead
as a tombstone until he visited
the monument.  

He would often recall the story
that as he approached the darkened
wall he could sense ghosts loosening
themselves from the black granite.   

Sammy swore that Jimmy Lynch
who went MIA on the final week of his tour
gave him a bear hug and told him
as long as the beer stays cold
and he don’t lose the church key,
everything's groovy and he’s
hanging tough until the rest
of the guys show up.

Jimmy pointed to the Lincoln Memorial
at one end of the mall and to the
Washington Monument at the other,
emphatically stating that our monument
was forever linked with the greatest Americans.

Yeah meeting up with Jimmy
helped Sammy to start shaken
off some real bad stuff.

Mazie knew her husband for a
month before they got married.
A week later Freddie was off to Vietnam.

Freddie was KIA during the Tet Offensive
and his repatriated remains are peacefully
at rest in the red clay of Georgia.

An always faithful Mazie
came to the monument
a few years after it was dedicated.  
She was struck by all the keepsakes
people left at the base of the wall;  
Zippos, baby pictures, a copy of
The Catcher in the Rye, a fifth
of Makers Mark, Pink Teddy Bears,
votive lights, a red 57 Chevy model,
a left handed catchers mitt, and
a pack of Lucky Strikes.

She palmed rosaries and
crucifixes that salved sore
running wounds and David’s
interlaced Star sounding a Shofar
pleading a case for peace.

Mazie is most moved by the names.  
Rows and rows of names. The scroll
begins in a modest manner and
as the wall climbs the names
of a country's vigilant sons and
daughters tower over her head.  
So much living history; spoken
in the unique accent of a country’s
diverse plethora of luminous tongues.

The stories written into the black granite
tell a tale from every state; claiming
the ears, heart and mind of every citizen. 
Each chiseled letter captures every bit
of sun and deep creeping shadow
inching across a great nation.

“I’m  71” says Mazie.  “When I look
upon the wall I see my 21 year old
Freddie as he looked on the finest
day of his life.  He will never look
any other way to me.”
  
“I didn't want to go to see it,” Franny said,
“a cold piece of stone won’t bring my son back.”

Franny did finally go...

When it rains the wall weeps.  
The wall wept all day,
the first time Franny went.

Many were rubbing
the impressions of
dearly departed names.

Franny too, kneels to the
presence of her son’s name.

With a mother's
grateful fingers,
she touches the wall's
damp surface; wiping
the drizzle from her
child's sodden face.

Kneeling before his semblance,
she rubs his etched edges
onto tiny bits of paper.

She sees him,
made manifest in the stone.
As if through a glass darkly,
a found son looks back,
onto the face of a caring mother.

Franny hangs onto the quiet
memory of his voice,
shimmering in the soft lilt
of a warm dark stone.

This deep core Vulcan gneiss,
at last emerged from the hardest stuff,
sculpts a perfect likeness of a tear stained nation.

The Harmonizing Four: Rock of Ages

In Honor of
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial
Washington DC

Oakland
Veterans Day
2013

Why Do You Always Have To Hurt Me?
Why Do You Always Have To Think So Negatively?
Why Do You Always Look At The Glass Half Empty?
Instead Of Looking What We Have,
I Guess The Ice Cubes In That Drink,
Make It Hard For You To Think,
Always Complaining That It's Not Good,
Yet You Wanna Go To The Party In The Hood,
Mess Up Your Life,
But Saying You're Making Life Right?
You Have A Past,
But Who Am I To Judge?
I Thought This Would Last,
But Now It's A Life Long Grudge,
Saying You Stopped All This Nonsense With Drugs And ****,
Yet If I Ask About Your Past You Start To Yell At Me,
Criticizing My Beliefs Because They Have No Cross To Be Nailed To,
But Being In This World I'm Starting To Live That Lifestyle Through,
Criticize The Unknown Because You Are Afraid,
Yet You Love Discriminating Because You Think It's Brave,
Not Thinking Twice About Conspiracies,
You Just Don't Think Critically,
Unlike Me You Think We Are A Match Made In Heaven,
When Truth Is All You Want To Do Is Pop Prescription Medicine,
You Don't Think About You're Long Term Negative Affect On Me,
All You See Is My Glass Half Full,
Never Looking At It Empty,
And You Don't Like That So You Strive For Us To Be Equal,
This Romance Is Like A Never Ending Sequel,
Hands Tighten Around My Throat As You Try To Kiss Me,
But After The Fact You Sit There And Just Try To Diss Me,
Trying To Smother Out The Truth,
Letting Chaos Run Loose,
Your Just Another Hand To Help Tie The Noose,
Waiting To Strangle My Inner Being And Make Me Scream Truce,
First And Foremost I Believe Everybody Lies,
And I Will Relate To That Until The Day I Die,
Black And White Frames Try To Swallow My Color,
Making Me A Copy Just Like Every Other,
You're Like A Bill O'Reily Or Maybe A Mitt Romney,
When I Try To Speak The Truth You Always Interrupt Me,
I Don't Mean To Name Names,
But These Are Few Who Bring Us Shame,
For Trying To Think Outside The Box,
Who Put The Key Inside The Lock,
And You Sit There Telling Me How School And My Belief's Are Bogus,
But Who Are Trying To Act So **** Heroic?
When I Soar On A Natural High You Say Im Crazy,
But At Least I'm Not Sitting There With A Glass Half Empty...

First of all
we all have experience
all these people
just want you to believe
that all of these problems
caused by the need
it destroys all our hope
sends us away
but all of this growth
has matched the last two
we gotta look to george w.
to find all the problems
losing all our hope
just where he got us
so when were losing all our hope
lets cut our pride
If you look overseas
then go drink a beer
their hope was gone
now its become
but that was just a lie
mitt wanted us to hear
their hope is gone never to return
and thats just what he wants to do here

the priest, whose tomato face looked like it might explode under collar tension,
gave the valedictory at the friday night execution
the yellow-toothed, combover'd serial killer buckled in electric chair
kept staring at the door, expecting an ally to crawl in late but not too late
the mother of one of the victims rattled on about
how she didn't care that the killer had an allergy to the anesthetic used
in lethal injection      he's going to die either way     what's it matter?
buzz of fly    crack of rolled program against empty folding chair
(yes, there were programs, and whoever laid them out knew their typography)
buzz of fly raised upward, toward the black, magma-cooled ceiling
audience chin up, pupils circled fly as the priest droned on
about everlasting life like a Paul Simon song from his youth
like a catcher's mitt from his youth like a youth from his youth
the boyfriend of one of the mothers of one of the victims
said he was hungry    pancakes sound good, don't they?
I love it when syrup gets on the bacon, you know? love that.
a pudgy guard with bleary eyes and 12 a.m. shadow
rolled his index finger   lowered his brow, telling the
priest to wrap it up   so the priest wrapped it up
by reading the names of the victims
Tara Barnes, 17, Rachel Lythe, 10, Julie McPherson, 13,
Serenity Strongman, 15, and Mary Beth Williamson, 13
the priest said something about judgement as
the boyfriend of the mother of one of the victims
took another swat at the fly                       missed
any last words? the priest asked
where's James? the killer asked, he was supposed to be here
did you guys give him the right time?
the guard nodded to a lab coat by a black box
then a hiss then a hum then an inhale
the first jolt of alternating current for

instantaneous brain death

hard to tell if they succeeded in that
for the second jolt came only a moment
later    this shock's aim to fatally damage
the internal organs, overstimulate the heart
and the killer's face looked like a horse's leg
then an exhale then a hum then a hiss
and the killer's face looked like the crinkled
skinmemory of a cicada
it was late   most of the best restaurants already closed
but we could go to that diner off 63rd, the boyfriend
of the mother
of one of the victims, said

Donald quacks. We better duck.
Tell the Cubans to mute that trumpet
While we, together, improve our luck
(or end up ruled by a Socialist Strumpet.)

The mallard was rebuked by Mitt;
adversaries began to bray.
The ducklings murmured: guy’s unfit
to be elected anyway...

Ni zindagi'ch aaja fer ni
Zindagi'ch aaja fer ni
Sathon russ gayi ae peed marjaani
Zakhman nu fer chhil jaa
Beh ja ankhiyan'ch ban ke paani
Zindagi'ch aaja fer ni

Vekh mere bul'chandre
Fer hansde ne dard bhula ke
Haaseya naal pawe aadiyan
Dil honkeya ton ankh ji bacha ke haaye
Fer mere muhre khad jaa
Taza hoje koyi yaad ni purani

Zindagi'ch aaja fer ni
Sathon russ gayi ae peed marjaani
Zakhman nu fer chhil jaa
Peh ja ankhiyan'ch ban ke paani
Zindagi'ch aaja fer ni

Langh ja ni rooh vich di
Agg fer ni lahu nu lag jaave
Hathaan utte kar totka
Meri zindagi di leek mitt jave haaye

Ankhiyan'ch neend radke
Ankhiyan'ch neend radke
Langhe chees koyi haddan de thaa ni

Zindagi'ch aaja fer ni
Saathon russ gayi ae peed marjaani
Zakhman nu fer chhil jaa
Peh ja ankhiyan'ch ban ke paani
Zindagi'ch aaja fer ni

We live in the land
were any thing can be
to reverse all the down
we lower the ******* rates
we help the in need
destroy all the hate
but to do that the hope is gone
**** the teachers and policemen
we don't need them here
this little group of people is stuck overseas
all they want is austerity
european decline
we may have to hard line
but thats what we'll do
go right to germany
on the edge of catastrophe
bring us all down to the edge of defeat
but all the germans
they'll be just fine
the romney team
already in decline
we don't need him here
ya know he needs us
to make all his billions with spending cuts
its almost a recovery
but thats not enough
he says **** the american people
all i need is me

jag skulle ljuga om jag inte erkände att jag minns dig
jag minns hur din famn var som en vagga för min trötta kropp
jag minns hur ditt leende satte ett stopp på allt jag trodde att jag var
för med dig så räckte inte mina andetag eller trösten jag trodde skulle göra dig hel
det räckte inte med maten jag fyllde din kyl med eller när jag träffade dina vänner som kollade på tjejer som om de vore tårtor i ett skyltfönster
precis som du gjorde

du höll upp mig med ett snöre med saxen nära till hands
snälla klipp ner mig och låt mig träffa marken innan du hinner skada mig igen
tänk om jag hade sagt så
tänk om jag sa åt dig att sluta
istället lät du mig vakna i fläckar av blod och i en kropp som inte längre kändes som min
men du lät mig aldrig vara ledsen för det var ju din själ som skulle vara trasig
det var ju du som förtjänade sympati
för en gång sa du ju
                                      f ö r l å t
och om jag inte säger okej till allt du vill så är det mitt eget fel
det är mitt fel att dina ögon inte längre är blå
men att mitt lår är lila från ditt grepp

jag minns den mörka parkeringsplatsen och hur jag gick från skratt till chock av din hand runt min hals
tänk om det hade varit suddigt som en dröm
istället minns jag mer än jag önskar
hur allt var så naturligt och självklart för dig
och då var det redan för sent att säga nej
min rygg mot din vägg blev min plats och jag skämdes över såren som du skapade
för kanske var det jag som låtit dem ta form
smärta
du bar en mantel av svek och ändå kunde jag inte se igenom dig

din skönhet försvann i ögonblicket mitt namn och våldtäkt nämndes i samma mening
men även nu känns det fortfarande som att jag vill säga okej
att allt är...
                    okej

This is a formal complaint to one Cupid
on behalf of the population of earth.

We find that you've become somewhat,
how can we put it mildly....
      unsavory
ever since you started drinking.  We've
found that you have not been taking
your job seriously at all since that time

We were understanding at first.  Your
job?  It's not an easy one.  It tolerates
almost no failure, and requires both
physical and mental capacity that is
beyond what most of us can spare.

However...we feel that the alcohol is
affecting your judgement and character
in a way that we can no longer accept.
Below, we've listed the particularly
heinous abuses of your power


1.  Taking bets on what you can make people fall in love with.  John is now smitten with a cactus while Jenny can't stay away from the inflatable Santa Claus on the Morgans' lawn.
2.  Having very attractive women fall in love for your...erm...personal pleasure.  That's just offensive
3.  Having members of the same family fall in love.  The vulgarity of it all is just appalling!  It's an ****** epidemic!
4.  Shooting your arrows at Rhinoceroses and then laughing as they charge a poor unsuspecting person is not funny.
5.  Likewise, shooting an unsuspecting person and having them fall in love with a Rhinoceros who doesn't reciprocate is equally unfunny
6.  Last, but not least...Please fix the Republican Candidates.  Mitt Romney and Rick ******* are trying to get married next week.  While I'm happy that they are now "for" gay marriage, this cannot be tolerated.


So?  Do you have anything to say for
yourself?  Is that alcohol I smell on your
breath?  You don't even care, do you?
Well...we have no choice but to revok---OW!

Oh dear.

Flecks of violet, patch-quilt  loofah skin of  sponge-green iris, gold dusted
Emerald  eyes... wet stones in flesh tone, parachute baskets; paratroop lids
Descend... thin paradigms slip ; adrift upon a Seam of Tears. A saline Sea - with
Glass floor; lensing starlight over mint pink trampolines
covered in tiny copper filings,

And two Black Pools that Expand.
Two Sunbathing Night Blossoms -

Dead center. Unmanned...

Her cheekbones encroach upon Cataracts of Vacancy.
Lipid lathes of Lethe ; lips departed... red zeppelins, moist and mute . pontoons
Plump and mindless. Bee stung -
Open.

Soft mimes, glide
Over bleach and stain; over -
bone white; glide
Over Nicotine sigils, hiding -
in off-white
Enamel...

like anonymous petroglyphs for Dentists.
or Rosetta Stones for a lethargic Tongue.



II


Theta-wave turbines, throw rods and spark nods ... as others speak.
She resembles a dream-catcher’s mitt.
Words hiss now, and solid mist, twist the tell o' gram.
Into Fable's Armada !

Fog.... fog rolls in...   She rolls in, Beneath  a New Between. of Chasms
Hazardous grammar spasms, stammering -
Deaf tones of Diction -
All This ....In the Good Ear.
An Ear Of Cornucopias Delete.... The Dry Cob
Of  Annulled
Speech. [ but Morphine ]

Maybe a half-dozen kernels of distinct cream ; velveteen vague...
Or vivid - pleats in pure radiation.
?
Perhaps,  varicose inanities are expiation enough to drown a Kraken ?  Maybe God Happens ?

Let Ampule be the Judge.  Let Pack Mules be Priests.

As Others speak, Our Lily,  decrypts languidly left of linear... dislodged -
from Lexicons ....with long Odds, Against...
She Relents, Relentlessly-  And Utterly

Utterly Regardless...

She aborts pregnant ( .... )
pauses.

All this Fog rolls in... Agnostic.
She Robs
The Cuckoo... She De-bones the Soup
with Disjoint Comments.
And Scuttles
The Broth.

She's all Starlings and Polaroids.... Savage Pinwheels  and Aurora Vandals.

She's  All Plasma...
And Rapture -
with No Handles ...

She's Both Ends ... Burning
NOooo Candle .

A Wee Atlas; Shouldering A Loss
Ever Since Her World  
Was  Dismantled ..  A  Burden ( ... )
Lily
Phantom
Shrugs  

And Random Drugs..Atlantis.

Agnes McDuff collected strange stuff,
Or so the story goes:

There were old pots and pans,
String, rubber bands,
Boxes and boxes of clothes,
Newspapers, plates,
Books stored in crates,
And candlesticks lined up in rows.
Some mason jars,
Toy trucks and cars,
A model train with a whistle that blows,
Needles and spools,
All kinds of tools,
And shoes with holes in the toes.

There were tables and chairs,
Bookends in pairs,
A grandfather clock that was broke,
An old brass spittoon,
Some Sunday cartoons,
And a bicycle mssing a spoke.
Four or five hundred old wooden blocks,
Twenty-three pair of grey woolen socks,
A Christmas Edition bottle of Coke,
A board game missing directions,
A bat, a ball, a catcher’s mitt, two baseball card collections,
And a great big rusty tuba.  What a joke!

There was other stuff, but you’ve heard enough;
About what was stored in
The Attic of Agnes McDuff.

Part 2
Agnes’ attic was quite special
But not for the things it contained
But for how she had to get there
Please let me explain!

Agnes had a one-story house
A flight of stairs led to the attic.
When she opened up the door,
The light came on automatic.

It opened to a hallway
Where there was another door
Another light, another hall, and more stairs, which
Led back down to the first floor!

Where an elevator waited
To take her up again?
But it had just one button
And it was numbered “10”.

When she pushed it, it was crazy
The elevator turned upon its side,
Grew wheels and drove out on the street
For an amazing ride!

Across a long suspension bridge,
Then underneath a tunnel,
And then it went around and round
Like circling down a funnel!

It dropped upon a railroad track
Hooked onto the caboose
And followed to the roundhouse
Where it finally broke loose.

It turned around a couple times
And ran out toward the street
The elevator ran, of course
Because it had grown two feet!

It ran across an avenue,
Around a lake, and through a park
And then through another tunnel
Where it was very dark.

A mile later it emerged,
At Agnes’ house, by her front door!
The elevator walked inside,
And was on the second floor!!

So that’s how Agnes reached her attic,
Perhaps someday you’ll go there too,
Push the elevator button,
And you’ll find my story’s true!

Part 3
Agnes stood there in her attic
And smiled at all her stuff
That almost ends the story of
The Attic of Agnes McDuff.

But Agnes’ story can never end
Her smile turned to a frown,
Because you see poor Agnes
Forgot how to get back down!!
PwL  May 1, 2015

I love baseball.
The smell of the grass, the crack of the bat, the pop of ball hitting mitt.
I love baseball.
The friendship, the camaraderie, the seed shells littering the ground.
I love baseball.
From behind home plate, to the on deck circle, to the bullpen in right center field.
I love the fist bumps I recieve, entering the dug out after a well placed sac-bunt.
I love the hollers and cheers when the ball flies over the fence.
I love seeing the other players and knowing they love the same things as me.
Standing on the top step of the dug out, impatiently waiting for my spot in the lineup.
I love watching my shortstop tag out runner after runner.
I love my pitcher hitting his spots and I love our left fielder diving for pop flies.
I love catching and blocking ***** in the dirt.
I love the bruises I find on my body after every game.
I love keeping my foot on home plate before throwing over to first on a double play.
I love seeing the lights and hearing the cheers, knowing they're for me, my team, my sport.
I love baseball.

I study hallucinations
scattering all over my eyes
Everything you see
you know its not as it seems
looking to the sky
at the stars
maybe get high
hallucination in the mind
trippy feeling vibrations
freedom in america is my song
until man brings us down
stay free in america
*** mitt he's already drowned

an old man discovers a ghost in the closet

but in the mirror a young boy smiles.

My hands are numb
And uncooperative as I struggle to write,
"University Bapstist Church"
On this little piece of paper in my hand.
I'm earning my "Beat Mitt" shirt.
November 6th, 2012.
You bet I did my part;
All 2 1/2 hours worth.
Standing outside of Carver Hall.
Nose running. Hands cold.
Wind blowing. No sunlight to keep us warm.
But I didn't do it for the shirt.
I did it to help make some kind of change.
I know I didn't do much,
But at least I did something.
And that's a hell-of-a-lot more than most can say.

It is Christmas in July
The neighbor's having  BBQ's
Inviting not just a few, but as many as they can fit
To roast Smores and sing songs around the fire pit
They even gave a poor boy a soft ball mitt
They fed some local homeless men and women too
They also inspired some random acts of kindness
I hope the trend spreads like wildfire
It is a wonderful time to put aside any family feuds
I don't know if the story will make the news

It is really up to me and you, to make it Christmas In July and all year too!

some days, his eyes are full with angst
his arms down his sides, with his fists as closed as his ears
and all I want to say is I know how it is
to be so angry you don't know where to go
because the whole world lights you up like a dry stick of explosives,
how it is to have your feelings being so big they start to feel
like extensions of your limbs,
waving uncontrollably
and all you can do to avoid their friction from setting you on fire
is either to cut them off or keep your arms down your sides

but I step aside, because he can no longer take in my words
his six year old eyes are filled with the nothingness of
an anger so big and unlabeled
but someday, I will tell him and he will understand
I will tell him that even though my blood is not in his veins,
I will cleanse it from soot and silt,
I will be his human shield from this world
I will tear kingdoms apart and slay every last creeper
just to help him level up

and I will uncontrollably, explosively and unconditionally
love him

//

vissa dagar är hans ögon fyllda med ångest
hans armar längs sidorna, med nävar lika hårt stängda som hans öron

och allt jag vill säga är att jag vet hur det är
att vara så arg att du inte vet vars du ska ta vägen,
för hela världen får en att tända som en torr bunt sprängämnen,
hur det är att ha känslor så stora att de börjar kännas
som förlängningar av dina egna armar och ben,
okontrollerbart viftande
och allt du kan göra för att förhindra att deras friktion tänder eld på dig
är att antingen hugga av dem eller hålla armarna längs sidorna

men jag går undan, för han kan inte ta in mina ord längre
hans sexåriga ögon fyllda med ingentinget
av en ilska så stor och oettikerad ilska

men någon dag ska jag berätta för honom och han ska förstå
jag ska berätta för honom att även fast mitt blod inte flyter genom hans artärer,
ska jag rensa det från smuts och sot,
jag ska vara hans mänskliga sköld från den här världen
jag ska slita kungariken itu och döda varenda creeper
bara för att hjälpa honom att levla upp

och jag ska okontrollerbart, explosivt och villkorslöst
älska honom