Bouazizi’s heavy eyelids parted as the Muezzin recited the final call for the first Adhan of the day.

“As-salatu Khayrun Minan-nawm”
Prayer is better than sleep

Rising from the torment of another restless night, Bouazizi wiped the sleep from his droopy eyes as his feet touched the cold stone floor.

Throughout the frigid night, the devilish jinn did their work, eagerly jabbing away at Bouazizi with pointed sticks, tormenting his troubled conscience with the worry of his nagging indebtedness. All night the face of the man Bouazizi owed money to haunted him. Bouazizi could see the man’s greasy lips and brown teeth jawing away, inches from his face. He imagined chubby caffeine stained fingers reaching toward him to grab some dinars from Bouazizi’s money box.

Bouazizi turned all night like he was sleeping on a board of spikes. His prayers for a restful night again went unanswered. The pall of a blue fatigue would shadow Bouazizi for most of the day.

Bouazizi’s weariness was compounded by a gnawing hunger. By force of habit, he grudgingly opened the food cupboard with the foreknowledge that it was almost bare. Bouazizi’s premonition proved correct as he surveyed a meager handful of chickpeas, some eggs and a few sparse loaves. It was just enough to feed his dependant family; younger brothers and sisters, cousins and a terminally disabled uncle. That left nothing for Bouazizi but a quick jab to his empty gut. He would start this day without breakfast.

Bouazizi made a living as a street vendor. He hustles to survive. Bouazizi’s father died in a construction accident in Libya when he was three. Since the age of 10, Bouazizi had pushed a cart through the streets of Sidi Bouzid; selling fruit at the public market just a few blocks from the home that he has lived in for almost his entire life.

At 27 years of age, Bouazizi has wrestled the beast of deprivation since his birth. To date, he has bravely fought it to a standstill; but day after day the multi-headed hydra of life has snapped at him. He has squarely met the eyes of the beast with fortitude and resolve; but the sharp fangs of a hardscrabble life has sunken deep into Bouazizi’s spleen. The unjust rules of society are powerful claws that slash away at his flesh, bleeding him dry: while the spiked tendrils of poverty wrap Bouazizi’s neck, seeking to strangle him.

Bouazizi is a workingman hero; a skilled warrior in the fight for daily bread. He is accustomed to living a life of scarcity. His daily deliverance is the grace of another day of labor and the blessed wages of subsistence.

Though Allah has blessed this man with fortitude the acuteness of terminal want and the constant struggle to survive has its limits for any man; even for strong champions like Bouazizi.

This morning as Bouazizi washed he peered into a mirror, closely examining new wrinkles on his stubble strewn face. He fingered his deep black curls dashed with growing streaks of gray. He studied them through the gaze of heavy bloodshot eyes. He looked upward as if to implore Allah to salve the bruises of daily life.

Bouazizi braced himself with the splash of a cold water slap to his face. He wiped his cheeks clean with the tail of his shirt. He dipped his toothbrush into a box of baking powder and scoured an aching back molar in need of a root canal. Bouazizi should see a dentist but it is a luxury he cannot afford so he packed an aspirin on top of the infected tooth. The dissolving aspirin invaded his mouth coating his tongue with a bitter effervescence.

Bouazizi liked the taste and was grateful for the expectation of a dulled pain. He smiled into the mirror to check his chipped front tooth while pinching a cigarette **** from an ashtray. The roach had one hit left in it. He lit it with a long hard drag that consumed a good part of the filter. Bouazizi’s first smoke of the day was more filter then tobacco but it shocked his lungs into the coughing flow of another day.

Bouazizi put on his jacket, slipped into his knockoff NB sneakers and reached for a green apple on a nearby table. He took a big bite and began to chew away the pain of his toothache.

Bouazizi stepped into the street to catch the sun rising over the rooftops. He believed that seeing the sunrise was a good omen that augured well for that day’s business. A sunbeam braking over a far distant wall bathed Bouazizi in a golden light and illumined the alley where he parked his cart holding his remaining stock of week old apples. He lifted the handles and backed his cart out into the street being extra mindful of the cracks in the cobblestone road. Bouazizi sprained his ankle a week ago and it was still tender. Bouazizi had to be careful not to aggravate it with a careless step. Having successfully navigated his cart into the road, Bouazizi made a skillful U Turn and headed up the street limping toward the market.

A winter chill gripped Bouazizi prompting him to zip his jacket up to his neck. The zipper pinched his Adam’s Apple and a few droplets of blood stained his green corduroy jacket. Though it was cold, Bouazizi sensed that spring would arrive early this year triggering a replay of a recurring daydream. Bouazizi imagined himself behind the wheel of a new van on his way to the market. Fresh air and sunshine pouring through the open windows with the cargo space overflowing with fresh vegetables and fruits.

It was a lifelong ambition of Bouazizi to own a van. He dreamed of buying a six cylinder Dodge Caravan. It would be painted red and he would call it The Red Flame. The Red Flame would be fast and powerful and sport chrome spinners. The Red Flame would be filled with music from a Blaupunkt sound system with kick *** speakers. Power windows, air conditioning, leather seats, a moonroof and plenty of space in the back for his produce would complete Bouazizi’s ride.

The Red Flame would be the vehicle Bouazizi required to expand his business beyond the market square. Bouazizi would sell his produce out of the back of the van, moving from neighborhood to neighborhood. No longer would he have to wait for customers to come to his stand in the market. Bouazizi would go to his customers. Bouazizi and the Red Flame would be known in all the neighborhoods throughout the district. Bouazizi shook his head and smiled thinking about all the girls who would like to take rides in the Red Flame. Bouazizi and his Red Flame would be a sight to be noticed and a force to be reckoned with.

“EEEEEYOWWW” a Mercedes horn angrily honked; jarring Bouazizi from the reverie of his daydream. A guy whipping around the corner like a silver streak stuck his head out the window blasting with music yelling, “Hey Mnayek, watch where you push that *******.”

The music faded as the Mercedes roared away. “Barra nikk okhtek” Bouazizi yelled, raising his ******* in the direction of the vanished car. “The big guys in the fancy cars think the road belongs to them”, Bouazizi mumbled to himself.

The insult ****** Bouazizi off, but he was accustomed to them and as he limped along pushing his cart he distracted himself with the amusement of the ascending sun chasing the fleeting shadows of the night, sending them scurrying down narrow alleyways.

Bouazizi imaged himself a character from his favorite movie. He was a giant Transformer, chasing the black shadows of evil away from the city into the desert. After battling evil and conquering the bad guys, he would transform himself back into the regular Bouazizi; selling his produce to the people as he patrolled the highways of Tunisia in the Red Flame, the music blasting out the windows, the chrome spinners flashing in the sunlight. Bouazizi would remain vigilant, always ready to transform the Red Flame to fight the evil doers.

The bumps and potholes in the road jostled Bouazizi’s load of apples. A few fell out of the wooden baskets and were rolling around in the open spaces of the cart. Bouazizi didn’t want to risk bruising them. Damaged merchandise can’t be sold so he was careful to secure his goods and arrange his cart to appeal to women customers. He made sure to display his prized electronic scale in the corner of the cart for all to see.

Bouazizi had a reputation as a fair and generous dealer who always gave good value to his customers. Bouazizi was also known for his kindness. He would give apples to hungry children and families who could not pay. Bouazizi knew the pain of hunger and it brought him great satisfaction to be able to alleviate it in others.

As a man who valued fairness, Bouazizi was particularly proud of his electronic scale. Bouazizi was certain the new measuring device assured all customers that Bouazizi sold just and correct portions. The electronic scale was Bouazizi’s shining lamp. He trusted it. He hung it from the corner post of his cart like it was the beacon of a lighthouse guiding shoppers through the treachery of an unscrupulous market. It would attract all customers who valued fairness to the safe harbor of Bouazizi’s cart.

The electronic scale is Bouazizi’s assurance to his customers that the weights and measures of electronic calculation layed beyond any cloud of doubt. It is a fair, impartial and objective arbiter for any dispute.

Bouazizi believed that the fairness of his scale would distinguish his stand from other produce vendors. Though its purchase put Bouazizi into deep debt, the scale was a source of pride for Bouazizi who believed that it would help his profits to increase and help him to achieve his goal of buying the Red Flame.

As Bouazizi pushed his cart toward the market, he mulled his plan over in his mind for the millionth time. He wasn't great in math but he was able to calculate his financial situation with a degree of precision. His estimations triggered worries that his growing debt to money lenders may be difficult to payoff.

Indebtedness pressed down on Bouazizi’s chest like a mounting pile of stones. It was the source of an ever present fear coercing Bouazizi to live in a constant state of anxiety. His business needed to grow for Bouazizi to get a measure of relief and ultimately prosper from all his hard work. Bouazizi was driven by urgency.

The morning roil of the street was coming alive. Bouazizi quickened his step to secure a good location for his cart at the market. Car horns, the spewing diesel from clunking trucks, the flatulent roar of accelerating buses mixed with the laughs and shrieks of children heading to school composed the rising crescendo of the city square.

As he pushed through the market, Bouazizi inhaled the aromatic eddies of roasting coffee floating on the air. It was a pleasantry Bouazizi looked forward to each morning. The delicious wafts of coffee mingling with the crisp aroma of baking bread instigated a growl from Bouazizi’s empty stomach. He needed to get something to eat. After he got money from his first sale he would by a coffee and some fried dough.

Activity in the market was vigorous, punctuated by the usual arguments of petty territorial disputes between vendors. The disagreements were always amicably resolved, burned away in rising billows of roasting meats and vegetables, the exchange of cigarettes and the plumes of tobacco smoke rising as emanations of peace.

Bouazizi skillfully maneuvered his cart through the market commotion. He slid into his usual space between Aaban and Aameen. His good friend Aaban sold candles, incense, oils and sometimes his wife would make cakes to sell. Aameen was the markets most notorious jokester. He sold hardware and just about anything else he could get his hands on.

Aaban was already burning a few sticks of jasmine incense. It helped to attract customers. The aroma defined the immediate space with the pleasant bouquet of a spring garden. Bouazizi liked the smell and appreciated the increased traffic it brought to his apple cart.

“Hey Basboosa#, do you have any cigarettes?“, Aameen asked as he pulled out a lighter. Bouazizi shook the tip of a Kent from an almost empty pack. Aameen grabbed the cigarette with his lips.

“That's three cartons of Kents you owe me, you cheap *******.” Bouazizi answered half jokingly. Aameen mumbled a laugh through a grin tightly gripping the **** as he exhaled smoke from his nose like a fire breathing dragon. Bouazizi also took out a cigarette for himself.

“Aameem, give me a light”, Bouazizi asked.

Aameen tossed him the lighter.

“Keep it Basboosa. I got others.” Aameen smiled as he showed off a newly opened box of disposable lighters to sell on his stand.

“Made in China, Basboosa. They make everything cheap and colorful. I can make some money with these.”

Bouazizi lit his next to last cigarette. He inhaled deeply. The smoke chased away the cool air in Bouazizi’s lungs with a shot of a hot nicotine rush.

“Merci Aameen” Bouazizi answered. He put the lighter into the almost empty cigarette pack and put it into his hip pocket. The lighter would protect his last cigarette from being crushed.

The laughter and shouts of the bazaar, the harangue of radio voices shouting anxious verses of Imam’s exhorting the masses to submit and the piecing ramble of nondescript AM music flinging piercing unintelligible static surrounded Bouazizi and his cart as he waited for his first customers of the day.

Bouazizi sensed a nervous commotion rise along the line of vendors. A crowd of tourists and locals milling about parted as if to avoid a slithering asp making its way through their midst. The hoots of vendors and the cackle of the crowd made its way to Bouazizi’s knowing ear. He knew what was coming. It was nothing more then another shakedown by city officials acting as bagmen for petty municipal bureaucrats. They claim to be checking vendor licences but they’re just making the rounds collecting protection money from the vendors. Pocketing bribes and payoffs is the municipal authorities idea of good government. They are skilled at using the power of their office to extort tribute from the working poor.

Bouazizi made the mistake of making eye contact with Madame Hamdi. As the municipal authority in charge of vendors and taxis Madame Hamdi held sway over the lives of the street vendors. She relished the power she had over the men who make a meager living selling goods in the square; and this morning she was moving through the market like a bloodhound hot on the trail of an escaped convict. Two burly henchmen lead the way before her. Bouazizi knew Madame Hamdi’s hounds were coming for him.

Bouazizi knew he was ******. Having just made a payment to his money lender, Bouazizi had no extra dinars to grease the palm of Madame Hamdi. He grabbed the handle bars of his cart to make an escape; but Madame Hamdi cut him off and got right into into Bouazizi’s face.

“Ah little Basboosa where are you going? she asked with the tone of playful contempt.

“I suppose you still have no license to sell, ah Basboosa?” Madame Hamdi questioned with the air of a soulless inquisitor.

“You know Madame Hamdi, cart vendors do not need a license.” Bouazizi feebly protested, not daring to look into her eyes.

“Basboosa, you know we can overlook your violations with a small fine for your laxity” a dismissive Madame Hamdi offered.

Bouazizi’s sense of guilt would not permit him to lift his eyes. His head remained bowed. Bouazizi stood convicted of being one of the impoverished.

“I have no spare dinars to offer Madame Hamdi, My pockets are empty, full of holes. My money falls into everyone’s palm but my own. I’m sorry Madame Hamdi. I’ll take my cart home”. He lifted the handlebars in an attempt to escape. One of Madame Hamdi’s henchmen stepped in front of his cart while the other pushed Bouazizi away from it.

“Either you pay me a vendor tax for a license or I will confiscate your goods Basboosa”, Madame Hamdi warned as she lifted Bouazizi’s scale off its hook.

“This will be the first to go”, she said grinning as she examined the scale. “We’ll just keep this.”
Like a mother lion protecting a defenseless cub from the snapping jaws of a pack of ravenous hyenas, Bouazizi lunged to retrieve his prized scale from the clutches of Madame Hamdi. Reaching for it, he touched the scale with his fingertips just as Madame Hamdi delivered a vicious slap to Bouazizi’s cheek. It halted him like a thunderbolt from Zeus.

A henchman overturned Bouazizi’s cart, scatter

She was like the iron pyrite
The teacher asked them to examine, and describe;
Cold, dense and prickly,
Difficult to love.
Given the right light
And a gentle handling,
Oh, how she'd sparkle,
But in that place, expectations and sensory overload
rendered her lumpen, and resistant.
Removed from her books and her inner world - all she needed -
And placed in a maelstrom,
She was bewildered and forlorn.
Un-cooperative, they called her,
And the teachers loved the other gems instead,
Pretty little nuggets; Ruby, Jasper, Jade.

Two years of discouragement and dislike
And even the tentative sparkles had darkened.
The other gems enjoyed each other
And moved away from her magnetic pull,
sensing difference.
No outright meanness, not yet,
But hints were brewing, whispers had started
And she wandered alone, in the playground,
Talking to the seagulls, and singing to herself.
The teachers only wanted conformity
And called her parents to voice concern
about her lack of friends.
Had they asked her, allowed her to have a say
She would have told them it didn't matter
But they were determined that it did, to them, if not to her,
And her parents were added to the burden of people
Worried and disappointed, watching.
She knew now, she was different, she had always known but never minded,
Now it was a problem. She didn't fit,
Like that scratchy purple uniform, around her chubby waist
Food didn't judge, dislike or condemn.

That life ended, and a new struggle, in a new school, began.
This was harder; the meanness was apparent now,
Difference wasn't tolerated
And someone wandering alone was a target.
She found a place to hide, behind a staircase, with a book,
But they found her, removed her and patrolled her only refuge
Forcing her to submit to the torture.
Every day was a war zone,
So she found another way, and embraced ill-health, stealthily
Spraying deodorant directly into her own face
induced asthma attacks; and not all those  ear infections were real,
She was an accomplished actress.

She got through it, millions do.
She found her own place, her own friends in her own time.
Among Onyx, Jet and Tigers Eye
Her darkness didn't mark her out as different,
And all that fake illness
Was great prep for theatre,
Where she was able to return to her inner world,
And no-one cared if you feigned madness
Or embraced the real thing.
Difference was celebrated,
The whispers now, were that she had a great stage presence,
And a talent to be nurtured,
Not a difference to be despised.

We stalked hawthorn hedgerows,
Backyards our battlefields,
Wielding wooden swords,
Dustbin-lids, for our shields.

We scouted railway cuttings,
Long abandoned and disused,
Where friendship’s blended alloys,
Were cast, forged and fused.

We patrolled village streets,
Marched along muddied lanes,
Proudly defending ‘our land’,
From raiding, heathen, Danes’.

We boldly challenged Vikings’,
Beneath a Sixties-summer-sun,
Bonding loyalty, faith and trust,
That will never, come undone.

Those days will not return,
Memories-mismatched-truth,
Recalling the fallen heroes,
Fighting follies of our youth.

Protecting imagined Kingdoms,
Lost in time, for evermore,
Boy soldiers standing guard,
In Castles built from straw.

The hurdles I must *******
gauze against breath
within this gripe
of well patrolled
polite sobriety

What clarity can I operate ?

take a breath
expel a myth
pattern a thought
create an action
reset and repetitude

“If you or someone you know
Has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s . . . ”
You can tell a great deal about UNLV,
My Vegas morning, easy listening
Radio station of choice,
When I first sit down,
Sit down to work in the morning,
One can surmise from the
Target demographics of so dire,
Such sober pronunciamentos, by
DJ Mueller, 91.5 The Source»
Live from UNLV/KUNV
Las Vegas kunv.org/KUNV
The Jazz Lounge with
Frank Mueller, Thursday, 7:00 am-11:00 am.
So don’t say I never
****** your ****--metaphorically speaking—
Herr Mueller, my good friend.
And while we’re on
The subject: WORK.
They never tell you that
Writing is such ******* hard work,
Which explains my need to **** up &
Lubricate the mechanism,
Before I start.
But I digress.

Just in case you haven’t noticed,
In case you had not been taking heed, CNN:
There’s an exciting new, radical ******,
Left-wing personage & presence
Making a play for the main room,
Center stage, center ring
Global Palace & Amphitheater.
I refer, of course to
Pope Francis:
Media-savvy, media mensch,
Crafting his own image,
Playing to the masses,
Choosing the namesake--
Francesco—right outta the gate,
Zip outta some Franco Zeffirelli
“Brother Sun, Sister Moon,”
Saint Francis di Assisi,
Talent show.
Born Jorge Mario Bergoglio,
In Buenos Aires, Argentina,
He worked briefly as a
Chemical technician
(Read: “bomb maker”)
& Nightclub bouncer
(Read: “sadist”)
Before resuming
Seminary studies, 1969.
(Tribute PSA: October 29, 1969: Happy 40th Birthday to a Radical Idea! Bill Duvall, SRI computer room. Late 1960s, the evening of October 29, 1969 the first data travelled between two nodes of the ARPANET, a key ancestor of the Internet.)
Pope Francis is a master at technology,
As any aspiring Global Wizard must be.
He has a special web site:
“Papal Bulls & Other *******.” Palabras del Papa Francisco - News.va www.news.va/es/source/vatican-va Translate this page PAPA FRANCISCO. AUDIENCIA GENERAL Miércoles 13 de mayo de 2015. [Multimedia]. Queridos . . .

Francis: Pope in Rome,
Signing international treaties again.
The Holy See himself—that
Wacky Argentinian--
One of many Lefty Cardinals,
Pulls off upset ordination in
Vatican City, God’s little 110 acres,
Our world’s smallest city & sovereign state,
Patrolled by a wacky-striped
Swiss Wackenhut Swat Team,
The Vatican: former playground for Nero,
**** Command Central for Caligula,
Construct of Mussolini’s $92 million
(More than $1 billion in today’s
Ever more worthless,
Ever more inflation soaring money!)
Lateran hush money,
Vatican monopoly money,
Seed money for colonial expansion,
Il Duce signing on behalf of
King Victor Emmanuel III,
Remembered today
Mainly for his short stature, &
Exile to Alexandria, Egypt,
Where he died and was buried.
“Vic the Man,” as he was known
Here in the Principality of Monaco,
“Vic the Man in Monte Carlo.”
But I digress.

Just the other day, Pope Francis
Signed another international treaty,
Recognizing Palestinian statehood,
Generating praise from Palestinians, &
Criticism from Israelis, who said:
“The move does not advance peace efforts.”
“Even this Philo-Semitic pope,
This pope who cares about the Jews,
Even he doesn’t get it,” said
David Horovitz, Editor,
The Times of Israel,
Which is what one would expect from
The guy who wrote the book:
A Little Too Close to God,
Still Life with Bombers:
Israel in the Age of Terrorism . . .

It is tempting to ignore the
Sheer ego, the colossal megalomania
That is Jorge Mario Bergoglio,
Truly a personage of great moral suasion,
Whether he’s cleaning the feet of the homeless,
Dialing up strangers for late-night chats or
Convincing the self-described atheist,
Raúl Castro to give Catholicism a second look . . .
This pope who took the name of a
Nature-loving pauper,
This Pope in Rome,
Francis:  Transformative,
Revolutionary gust.
Pontiff, from Latin: “a bridge,”
Spanning the God-Man divide.
We are talking about a brotherhood,
That survived both Borgia & Medici,
And other assorted kink-fests for centuries.
Just what bizarre peccadillo
Required the resignation of
Benedict XVI, in itself, a
2,000-year first?
Francis:  the first Jesuit Pope.
Francis: the first Pope from America.
Francis: “The circumstances surrounding
Benedict's decision to step down
Will titillate scholars and the journalists alike,
For many years to come,
Given his resignation came so soon
After the “VATI-LEAKS” revelations:
Vatican bank corruption,
Pederast-priest cover-ups, &
Other ignominious fiascos
Requiring significant damage control.

One would think that an institution
With their own royal observatory,
The Papal See’s inter-galactic,
Night-vision telescope, Mount Graham,
Southeast of Tucson, Arizona,
Could steer clear of faulty stars.

1937

bushido invasion
memory still vivid in the Chinese
of a slaughter
prisoners
chopped and lobbed into the river
display their heads
let the next line kiss the remains
but the time is ticking
and the water is only pink
prisoners
mowed down
with bullets
and laughter
they can turn and swim
Japanese aim is good
not one makes it to the other side
the pink
is a deep red flood
becoming a dam
with the bodies of
children
ladies
gentlemen

why did those murdered forget
the purple mountain legend
when it burns
the city falls
why did they not flee faster

the policy issued
plunder
burn
******
do not let that little boy
take revenge
5 years old
they severed him

Japanese leaders saw a chance
to remove any pity
in the solider
they ripped out
humanity
inserted
brutality

training exercise
hoist your bayonet
plunge forward
twist
extract
plunge
twist
extract
men with bound wrists
considered subhuman
butchered
plunge
twist
spit

routine puts soldiers at a disadvantage
fire is added
fields are swamped with oil
and laced with people
patrolled edges
keep the cries alive
the only release
death

movement is needed
tanks must pass
chatting soldiers hang out the sides
wheels roll over the bodies
filling the ditches
carcasses
and
wounded
if there is not enough
they found the closest Chinese
and added it to the pile

competition
2 leaders
in a fight to show superiority
uptake a challenge
to win is 100
swords are withdrawn
ignore its' eyes
the race
a beheading
lost count
up the stakes
150

only the beginning
for the women

a hunt commences
females do not leave the house
there is not one in the streets
rounded up
army trucks
bringing in loads
******* like animals
chained to racks
*****
commonly gang-*****
bleeding to death
aged under 8
over 80
a pregnant women
***** to death
her fetus cut out
and destroyed
encouragement
from higher ups

and the advice given
pikankan is acceptable
every warrior should
do not let them talk
**** the pigs
when they are done being women

more than 20,000
maybe less than 80,000
defiled
in the carnage

journalist support
with authentic recounts

but with time
confused hospitalization
of the soldiers
who puked every meal
and gagged from inside out
as the horrors ate them

the only relief
an international safety zone
perhaps 20 Westerners
to help a mere 300,000
only half
at intervals
Japanese crossed the fence
for the women hunt
for Chinese soldiers
recognized by calloused hands

irony
******* on a Westerner arm
a symbol
as he aided
survivors of the massacre
and the Nazis in Nanking
aghast
leaked information
on the horrors
and
****** ordered silence

a single surgeon
a lucky boy with only one bayonet puncture
another
missing eyes
missing ears
half a nose from
100 tied together
set on fire

Japanese photography
of bonding moments
as they watched
a house packed tight
panicked people on roofs
to escape flames
jumping

6-8 weeks later

more refined brutality
enforced prostitution
and intake of *****
****** cigarettes for children

the West
in ignorance
watched the German rise
forgot responsibility
to humanity
in the Asian wars

no apology
denial
unfair hatred
of later innocent Japanese generations
mention of Hiroshima
amuses some Chinese
doesn't bother others
it's not everyone
that's still too many

lacking sympathy
the road to brutality
lingers

We proposed for Witches Abroad on Broadway, a costume.
As a lure to students, orange and black candy.
Dancing at the prom, cell phones caught the ghouls.
This stretch of road was full of cool cats.
Unlucky ones were left on the side as skeletons.
We swept them clear with our broomsticks.

Our guns were not as brutal as broomsticks.
Bristles hid the ******* end, as if in costume,
No flesh, just skeleton.
Like bags of orange and black candy,
They were left, full of calico cat.
Our familiars, our friends, dinner for a ghoul.

They pulled at the ghoul,
In the hands of a witch, danger came by broomstick,
When ghouls snacked on cat,
In their orange and black fur costume,
Tasting sweet, like candy.
They beat them up and down, but they find another skeleton.

Them ghouls come faster, giving birth to others, another skeleton.
Vocalizing desire for black and white, red and yellow make orange, a ghoul,
Howls for student flavored candy.
A witch lays out one, then another with her broomstick,
Removing the face mask and costume.
Them that can, holler their outrage in cat.

Your *** was revealed in orange and black on a calico cat.
Females cooled themselves of ***, unwilling mates to a skeleton.
Once alive, copulating loudly, now in a death costume.
Walking upright, a neighborhood was destroyed by a ghoul.
Neighbors watched, a witch patrolled on a broomstick.
Your students were seen as human candy.

One wife beater had a juicy rind, sweet and soured candy.
At the dance, hors d’oeuvres were made of cat.
Shot forward, it can create a hole, can a broomstick.
Where stomachs used to be, a skeleton,
Death conquers all, no more ghoul.
One, now many properly attired for the Danse Macabre in costume.

I found an orange, as broomsticks cleaned Broadway of cat candy.
In my student costume and human face mask, my path is crossed by a cat.
It disappeared as if it never was, visible only to Death, a skeleton made by ghoul.

Griselda gratz kept sixty cats,
She fed them very well
On angel cakes and raisin flakes and acorns in a shell.

Her furry crowd patrolled,meowed
About her tiny house,
Griselda gratz kept sixty cats,
To catch a single mouse.

Classic style of Born shoes have been known using leather, instead of synthetic man made materials. As you know, leather is a natural moisture wicking agent and helps keep the foot dryer and cooler. Another special feature of Born shoes is the Dryz sock linings that is available in Born shoes sport style.

Most newer laptops have an S-video output built-in. You have probably guessed already that these www.facebook.com toms shoes outlet video outputs send the video signal to your TV. You guessed right. Hours of paddling can be enjoyed in this remote yet easily accessible location surrounded by Prospertown Wildlife Management Area. Neither gas nor electric motors are permitted, but since the lake is not patrolled regularly, a few tend to slip in now and then. Nevertheless, these waters rarely become crowded, even on the hottest summer weekend.

Evening Weddings ?These may be black tie, formal, or informal. But black-tie dress implies that a man is expected to show up in a tuxedo and women should wear a long or short cocktail dress. If the occasion is listed as ormal or informal? the man can wear a dark suit in navy, black, or charcoal grey ?with a beautiful dress shirt, jeweled silk tie, and a pocket square in a color tone to complement the tie.

Reports regarding child labor surface periodically. Children crawling in mines, faces ashen,  body deformed. The agile fingers of famished infants weaving soccer ***** for their more privileged counterparts in the USA. Incredulously, I recognized from a few angled lines at the end of the drive Charlie's ever-present scrap metal pile. Cedar and deciduous trees in the wooded areas were distinguishable from one another in simple, but deftly penciled strokes and swirls. He'd even captured the farm's power sources - tractors with hay wagons, the farm truck, pea-sized draft horses, and two diminutive figures in the front yard..

It should be mentioned that if you move to their playground, you will find there a real criminal wild level. It is the only level where murders happen because a fight for swag is carried there. You try to nap a piece?of property from the jaws, even if it is your own property, but the things for you may be finished badly.

Face and strap color - Another new trend in watch design is with the dials and straps. Watches, both expensive and cheap, are now being made in bold and exciting colors. Just be careful about buying a colored watch if it is going to be your everyday watch.

Having learned under the tutelage of LOSTerminds Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse, it's understandable that the talented (babyandyUSA-March-11) twosome that are Horowitz and Kitsis want to do nothing less than shoot for the stars by crafting and equally compelling world filled with good and evil character, not to mention life and death stakes. Unfortunately, the one thing that really seems to have gotten, well lost this season is the fun. In other words, when you're responsible for writing a show about handsome princes, damsels in distress, witches, fairy-godmothers, etc鈥?it would be nice if an episode could go by that doesn't involve a grisly ****** or loss of limbs..  2013-03-14.

Once upon a time
There was a Girl and a Wolf
One in hunger
The other on the brink of fear
The girl shivers and cries
Collapsing as her legs go numb
She wipes away her tears
And she clears her eyes
To see glowing eyes at the forest fringe
A place she was told never to venture
For a she-wolf roamed that wood
One with no pack
One that her grandfather told stories of
One whose hunger could never be satiated
She has heard the horrible tales
Ones that caused a tradition
To spring in fear of it
It was said the beast could never die
There was a chilling curse
Set on that tangled wood
That caused this she beast to be immortal
But the little one had to go
A child's curiosity is never quelled
So she edged ever so close
Leaving a trail in snow
Battered velvet dress
Starting to tear
Fingertips moving at a crawl
The eyes at the edge have lost the sparkle
She can see the beasts battered fangs
No growl, no howl, no sound at all
The white wolf did not pounce
Not like one should
The child had prepared
Steeled her fragile heart
Waiting for fangs to puncture
Moving her small hand ever so slow
She reached under her frozen dress
Revealing her father's ****
Laying it the edge of the wood
To feed the she-wolf
The wolf's eyes never blinked
Frozen as the weather itself
So they sat gazing at one another
The girl gazed and gazed
Inside this creatures black eyes
She found the reason
Why the wolf patrolled the edge of the wood
Like a fleeting shadow
Inside that wolf was not a beast
But a woman instead
Beautiful she was
That brought tears to men's eyes
This princess of sorts
Was the Lord's daughter
Who also sought what the forest covered
But her curiosity became her everlasting doom
She patrols this wood
To protect ones outside the fringe
    From the curse that transformed her

I.

Prideless, they tore railroad men’s brown *******
lurking the thirsty Kenyan banks.
Red moonlight sluiced from brambles and linen skins
pressing upon tawny flesh, igniting fire of feline eye.

Imperious, they patrolled the union jack encampment
lingering in shadows of long-labour’s dreamless sleep
until the smoldering campfire morning
when one hundred hammers lean in one hundred corners.

II.

Maneaters in glass houses can’t throw stony glances—
the power to haunt having run off with the ghost.
Now, they reign over the acrylic savannah
sneering—not out of regal disdain, but mild discomfort
from dust mites nitpicking at tautly taxidermed pelt.

Rebel eyes that halted an empire now cast
dull marble stares at fossils in the floor
and derailed trains of un-terrified school-children
near a hissing robot-box called Mold-A-Rama
spewing magma into plastic tyrannosaurs.

At eight weeks old, she was our newly rescued mixed beagle pup.

Noah named her Daisy. Not a name I would have chosen, but certainly as sweet as

memories of Grandma's homemade molasses
bubbling in the old iron kettle brought out from the smokehouse for only one day each year on a crisp fall morning.

By sixteen weeks it was evident that all involved in the rescue didn't know squat about Beagles. After a frantic thirty seconds on Google, our mistake was quite clear in the form of about five hundred red and black and tan photographs.   We were the proud but red-faced and slightly shocked owners of a "**** Dog". Yep. And Daisy was her name-o.

Two years and seventy pounds down the road, I sat in my morning solitude spot this day with a good mug and a good book watching the nut hatches, house finch, and Black-capped/Carolina Chickadees tearing that special blend seed up as Daisy patrolled the yard for squirrels with one eye and her nose to the sky watching for the lone and clever Rock Pigeon scout that always precedes the flurry of flying rodents raiding my feeder. I can't help but to smile as Daisy glances at me through the deck door glass to see if I am admiring her skill and diligence.   I am.

This being a Sunday before the dreaded M word day, I tend to lounge lazily around the house in my worn Clapton pj bottoms and hol(e)y Langley T-shirt. My shadow follows me from comfort to comfort spot knowing that I leave a trail of odd snacks from my kitchen perch to living room couch to study to lazy bed, and back again. She is showing a bit of winter fat.

To be continued....

r ~ 9Feb14

Your cheek rested on my chest light
pressing the silence bright for a moment
in your dark porch feelings had weight
but I was reluctant to detach to speculate
about where we were and what we held
too secure to need to share talk at all
like the black cat blending into the explored
our world still unbound by word patrolled walls

the street lamp flickered with temptation
asking elemental questions on decisions
reason on or off proving only a distraction
illuminating your attractions from a distance

above us a curtain stirred
up against an open window
lulled by slight rain cloud
blurring the moon to slow
cuddle in love with a dream
seen sweetly on half show
to only a lonely lane
and me in the light kiss
you gave with all that's pure
from a girly whirly place
full of pink hats and allure
making the darkness shake
when I saw the look in your eyes
sure with what I couldn't mistake
as yet told only in storybook ways

I almost dared to try and speak
but you felt the twinkle of stars too
shyness fluttering your lashes
and passion escaped and flew
skies beyond intensity to catch
respite in what little sleep it could
before getting bedded by an au revoir
which l foolishly leapt into turning round
pulling up a collar against the late hour
leaving you a wave to hide my two minds
I notice you pull your curtains together

cold sheets made bearable
when you phoned
to see I was safe
to hear your voice
saved me from strife
and though not face to face
we spoke of what in our lives
was finally in place
behind your curtain of love

my fingers slid down the natural gradient
stretching the fabric all the more sensitive
felt as a soft moan might pad on a sheet
intent on some scheme or hunt secretive

Wandering the wild shore among the dunes
The sunset colored the peaks in glowing gold
In the shaded purple folds, gray gnarled driftwood was strewn
In anticipation of the moon I strolled

I love the cold white light of a waxing moon
A heavenly body my path to unfold
To illuminate foot prints where they were strewn
Alone with dunes and beach by me patrolled

From atop the sand dune a moonlit lagoon
The V shaped ripples from water fowl, look, behold
The surface like molten glass behind the loons
Man, cannot dominate that which I behold

It’s February, 2015, a Saturday and here I ‘yam.
Back in sunny California again:
The sun shining brightly again
On My Old Hemetucky Home,
Another mutant Stephen Foster tune.
Hemet: Riverside County,
Southern California,
The so-called Inland Empire,
According to the hyperbolic parlance,
Of sharkskin-suited land speculators,
Truly, the last of the
Patent medicine, liniments &
Snake oil hucksters.
Hemet: little oversight & lax policing
Yield a thriving, local
Medical-marijuana industry.
You are comfortably tucked . . .  
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(THAT’S RIGHT, *******: A ******* COMMERCIAL RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ******* POEM!  GIUSEPPI MARTINO BUONAIUTO--SURELY NOBODY”S FOOL—FINALLY FIGURING OUT HOW TO MAKE POETRY PAY, THEREFORE AVOIDING THE DIED-IN-THE-GUTTER BIT.)
You are safely tucked behind the impenetrable
(www.tucks.com)
Wackenhut G4S Security-
(www.wackenhut.com)
Policed & Patrolled walls,
Of your typical over-55 gated lunatic asylum.
“For Active Adults,” reads the sign,
Whatever that means.
I’ve been thinking about the adventurous young.
What is it these bright,
Wander-lusting whippersnappers
Fixate and obsess about.
Like dropping out & coasting for a while.
Dropping out & coasting:
Not as easy to pull off for 20-somethings these days,
As it was in the late sixties/early seventies,
Flush times for Guns & Butter.
Where is it cheap to live?
Where on . . .
“This blessed plot, this earth,
This realm, this England . . .”
Where on this ozone-depleted,
Global fondue fungus ***,
Can I go to just sit still?
To think:  to make sense of it all?
It’s leisure, Kemosabe.
Leisure cultivates philosophy.
LEISURE:
The very stuff of curiosity and
REACH—
As in: “One’s grasp should exceed one’s reach”—
Idleness leads us,
Gifts us with understanding &
Self-awareness.
You are 21 again, and restless.
You are unwilling to just settle in.
So, where do you go?
Where can you live on savings?
To not work,
But not go hungry?
To just sit still,
Contemplating the state of the wicket,
Be it wicked or sticky.
Today it’s Prague and Berlin—
Or, for the truly decadent: Bangkok.
For us it was Florence or Paris—
Or, for the truly frugal,
Driving our cars to Mecca: Montreal,
"La Métropole du Québec"
Sanctified are the places we’ve chilled.
Shrines & vortexes; each holy latitude,
As Han Solo drolly reminds us:
“It’s not the years; it’s the miles.”
The amount of ground covered,
A blessing devoutly to be wished in Old Age:
But I digress.
Just the thought of hanging out
Some place really cool,
Yet relatively inexpensive--
In a parlance acquired
Over the years and the miles,
Tactfulness learned,
Manipulating the language
For fun & profit.
Common sense is aged in the barrel
And the bottle, rephrased.
Vernacular Viniculture.
Which proves my point:
If you live long enough &
Read enough of the right stuff,
Eventually you’ll discover
A precise, more exact vocabulary,
Appropriate for Old Age inner monolog.
Would Old Age be tedious?
Boring, for those who
Never went anywhere?
Both physically & spiritually speaking.
Are memories our only revenge on Old Age?
And for those hiding behind the barriers,
Safe. Ignorant. Jolly. Dull.
A fast track toward senility &
Evanescence.
Does Alzheimer’s seek out & destroy the
Most cloistered among us?
While those bold & beautiful,
Experienced, still spinning,
Still weaving a tapestry in 3-D Technicolor.
Remembrances of things past . . .
(Get back in your hole, Marcel . . .)
And as the AARP crowd knows so well:
We Baby Boomers really had it pretty soft.
Boom economics,
Conspicuous consumption,
Coonskin hats, Betsy Wetsies & Hula Hoops!
By and large:
FUN TIMES!
No Great Depression,
No chocolate rationing.
A jungle war pretty much optional,
For most of us of the
American bourgeoisie.
We’ve got a lot to remember.
We’ve much to be grateful for.
Electronic media changed everything for us.
Television and movie theaters gave us
Alternative dimensions,
Parallel lives,
Multiple identities.
Experience so real that
To see it on the screen
Was to live it, oneself.
Perhaps those video downloads
Might prove useful one day.
Comforts out on Golden Pond.
Will you still need me?
Will you still feed me?
When I'm sixty-four?
Grazie, Sir Paulie.

RESPECT
Mr C Penguin the head of the house
Wears a uniform and listens to Strauss.
Seals plonked by the door as a draught excluder.
Chimps are taking tea in the parlour Room.
Judging how many cakes they can consume.
“Get a brush Foxy and sweep up those crumbs,
I will be charging them double when the time comes”
Mr Badger making endless trays upon trays of cakes
For the ignorant posh chimps and the mess thy make.
“Bag the goose and send the felloe to me,
I will give the chimps something to do for free”
The penguin cracked his knuckles and gave a cough
He had told the chimps he had taken the day off.
“The goose is here” half smiling “the goose is here”
The chimps shook, gulped and felt a trifle queer.
The goose frog marched in and the chimp went limp
“Right you posh lot, eat nicely is that clear chimp”
“I’m not old fishy pengy” he snapped straightening his wing,
“no hanky panky on my watch, nothing, no anything.
“I run a tight ship chimp, my rules old chum.”
The chimps heard right and put an end to the fun.
“Respect, respect,” the goose patrolled his little space
The chimps now ashen with a worried look on their face.
It is all about respect

I do not remember my father as a demonstrative man,

but, hobbled though he was by a pre-war psyche,

we never doubted the depth of his affection for us.

His love of nature shaped our own perceptions of life

and his love of sport showed us the path of true competition,

that the essence is not to better others but to better oneself.

He transfused the ocean into us so thoroughly

that we will go to our graves with salt on our lips.


At all the painful pinnacles of growing

my father was there like a crampon you know will not fail you.

A towering lighthouse in his hat and dark suit

as he led me through the convent gate on my first day

and gently cut me adrift in the cruel seas of education

where the nuns patrolled the playground like killer whales

in search of seals.


He went ahead to each new town to make things ready for us

when I started boarding school he let me go in confidence

he bailed me out of scrapes with the law,

he was as certain as the mountain of his beloved Taranaki

and as solid as the beams of a whare runanga.


When I returned from overseas

my father and I found a space in our lives

where we could really get to know each other.

Through a winter that sparkled

he led me on odysseys into his soul

through the walkways, forests, rivers and coastline

of the city of his birth

which will, one day, witness his death.


If I were allowed only one memory of my father

it would be this: seaweed expeditions.

The northeast winds blew a bounty for his garden

onto the reefs around Belt Road

and at low tide we descended with our gumboots and sacks

to gather the fleshy harvest with its nitrogen-rich pods.

He had a system.

We heaped the seaweed on a number of high, dry rocks

then bagged from first to Iast to allow time for the seawater

to drain and the burden to be lessened.

I watched him as he moved around and about as deliberately

as a crab,

gathering the morsels,

bending to scoop the necklaces from the sea,

the sun's purple fire in the white, white, white of his hair.

He had seaweed in plenty at home,

it was the experience he craved.

When they burry me, remember my feet
Which trekked every step on broken streets
Felt the sands course through the toes in heat
Through the winters snow and the icy sleet
Tip toed at night, in the shadows, discrete
And in the day stomped to the beat
Carried me to a love so sweet
I beg of you, remember my feet

When they burry me, remember my knees
Which cushioned the flips and falls of the trapeze
Held up my frame with the greatest ease
And never knelt to anything in displease
Sprang up in the summer’s breeze
Survived through the winters freeze
And only bent to the love I wished to please
I beg of you, remember my knees

When they burry me, remember my hips
That were there for all my trips
Danced and shook for tips
Witness the beauty of an eclipse
Helped me stay balanced in all my slips
Swung side to side on moonlit strips
My love, who so tenderly grips
I beg of you, remember my hips

When they burry me, remember my hands
Which toiled and worked in foreign lands
Saluted in honorable commands
Showed knowledge that still expands
Gestured my souls demands
Conveyed a message that understands
Maintained a love that stands
I beg of you, remember my hands

When they burry me, remember my chest
Where my heart beat without rest
Gave me bravery in every quest
Allowed me to pass every test
Grew for those oppressed
Out front when I progressed
Where my love, became expressed
I beg of you, remember my chest

When they burry me, remember my head
Smart enough to help me earn my bread
Heard in passing, everything said
Looked upon the horizon spread
Felt the pain, when my body bled
Kept my body fed
Laid next to my love in bed
I beg of you, remember my head

When they burry me, remember my soul
How it took others on an emotional stroll
Made me conscious of my body toll
Gave me purpose, a position role
Appreciated everything in its whole
The spirit world where it patrolled
My love, whose heart it stole
Above all, I beg of you, remember my soul

You gave her bouquets of branches,
because she saw more beauty
in sticks than flowers.
And today I was asked what phase
the moon would be in tonight,
to decide how discreetly
he could kayak on an overly patrolled lake,
beneath the stars.

Seven cigarettes and others,
to ease the tribulation of a
warm lonely summers night,
where unplanned contacts,
led to strange content.

A book and a boy and a pen,
and a thousand words
that had yet to be inspired,
through a faulty habit
that took paychecks and too many hours.

Darkness molded itself around my peripherals,
like the ones your grandfather watches baseball out of,
and the love that pushed through the cloudiness,
to enter my cornea with grasping motions
from pretty faces with laughter to spread but no dime to spare.
They are the reason why

In a small church parking lot
I found beauty in the delicacy of change,
and the way things can crumble
and bloom,
so very near to each other.

"I ate civilization. It poisoned me; I was defiled. And then I ate my own wickedness."*
- Aldous Huxley

i let my head hit the brachiaria.
cyan sky rolled past,
and it seemed to me as if

my past itself was dragged out of my body,
excorcised and pulled up
and traveled with the sky's current

the sky is moving,
impossible and slow.
the clouds jog with a rush.

sometimes i think i have never
felt at all
with my year ****** up,

on their way to Mongolia or
Philadelphia,
I tried to desperately recall

sullied at the thought i couldnt.
I thought about how i always embarrassed you
in public

how i'd turned into an embarrassment
at this point in time
my pure innocence

that flowed in the past gently
uncomfortably shifting and
wondering how certain things felt

i don't know
manhood devoured me like
an apple.

in the garden
i walked
tried to spot all the perennials

and i did
and i thanked mankind for taking up the
habit of finding wild plants

bringing them into our lives
i see a sign, the museum is holding an exhibit on
british pastorals and hellscapes

i tell her we should go.
she agrees
walks across the street to buy a wire.

my blood ran down my body
onto the linen
Egyptian cotton

like the princesses who
married at 14,
at 13 i laughed

when they asked me to go the square
and at 15 i felt it my responsibility.
the fetid collapse of my

sincerity and my serenity
flowed through my being
patrolled round

my purity like
a culpable
sentry

i closed my eyes
and i felt the sheets heavy with
plasma

i blinked and
everything turned to burgundy
the subway grates licked at my ankles

the poplar and elms
in firestone
laughed at me,

who had so eagerly
held on to a fray
consumed by mankind

gutted with
certain
toxicant.

I feel it sometimes
driving through the backwoods
of Georgia
along narrow winding roads
patrolled by tall solemn trees,
and no lights for miles...

praying my tires hold up,
that the thermostat stays cool...

this is no place for a *****
to get lost,
or stuck,
and this *****
doesn't need a history
lesson to know
what I feel
in my shango bones...

and yesterday I saw it
screaming in black
from an off-white wall
at a pit stop in Macon:

" I hate n#&&@rs
  let's killem all..."

and I started packing mentally,
stacking the frost bite,
hustle and rat race
that chased me down
south
in the first place

back into my duffel bag...

I had a train to catch

~ P (Pablo)
(7/27/2013)

The stars on the flag started falling off
when Private Walker returned home
to Tennessee after six months of being
in country in Afghanistan.

At Camp Leatherneck on the treadmill
he folded five points to pentagrams,
imagined fireworks nova his welcome back.

The flag rarely flapped in the arid silence
of base camp.  Was MIA everywhere else.

He landed unmet in
Chattanooga on Veterans Day
in time to catch the parade highlights,
which happened two days earlier,
being ignored on the airport monitors  
in the hustle of terminal traffic.

No flags decorated Broad street shops,
no watchers waived the red, white and blue.
Police motorcycles fronted the parade
and patrolled the back in sunglass alert.

Two Vietnam vets shouldering hunting rifles
marched grimly in parade formation followed
by alternating school bands and ROTC cadets.

All two thousand stars dripped down,
faded blue in the rush to show the next ad.
Every which way he looked
the rushing crowd turned his back to him.

He remembered Anousheh, the girl
whose name meant everlasting/immortal.

The child who hugged him,
kissed his forehead when he gave
her a Hershey bar from
his mom’s care package
while patrolling the base perimeter road.

The friend, the daughter, the grandchild
who died in a Taliban wedding bombing,
one week after her seventh birthday,
three days after their embrace.

His heart, his tears, his breath,
his every word was Anousheh.
All was and will be forever Anousheh.

And when he prayed
he prayed like Anousheh,
and on his knees at the airport
he faced her outbound heart
and prayed for a mutilated world.

You hope that university will answer all of life’s questions, but nope.

I don’t know, I.

There was a guy who’d been hanging around outside our residence lately. Too consistently. At first, I thought he was someone’s friend but he’s always alone. He wasn’t doing anything or bothering my roommates, but that asymmetry set off my alarms.

He looked at me once (which I suppose isn’t a crime), I think, it was quick - a blink of sharp curiosity. I mentioned it to Charles who took his picture. The next morning he said the guy’s a legit student who has no criminal record, so maybe I’m all wrong.

Every girl’s encountered a creep or two before. They’re seemingly everywhere, as if mandated by law, like auto insurance. Most girls develop a sixth sense, a creep-dar. Nowadays, creeps have a new name, “incel” ("involuntary celibate") and they’re a recognized, online subculture. Next, they’ll have a coat of arms proclaiming, “We Would if We Could.” It’s as if awkwardness, a normal human foible, has been distilled into something dangerous.

Although the campus looks like a garden or a perfectly manicured ‘stepford’ park, we joke that it’s really a locked-down, patrolled, surveilled compound, with guards, cameras and card-key access to everything. Which, I suppose, is all to the good.

Our creeper wasn’t there Friday, and he wasn’t there today, so maybe he was nothing.

I don’t know, 2.

I was in Sunny’s room. We were going shopping in a few. There was a little pink book on her bed - a diary!! I’d never seen it before and it was open, about three-quarters of the way. She too-casually moved to scoop it up, like the neglected book of a sorcerer.

My GOSSIP-dar Alerted like a class bell. “Hmm” I hummed, head-tilted, then I laughingly lunged for the book.
Sunny’s eyes went wide for 3-billionths of a second and she snapped it up with the speed of a striking cobra, “That’s MINE” she said, rigid with seriousness.
“What’s going ON?!” I asked, but she shoved it into her night table.
Another mystery!
‘Sleeping dogs,’ I thought to myself.

I walked or sauntered or dashed or stumbled, no...
staggered! or swaggered, or was it stepped, no...
I jogged or, bolted, no stomped or slid no...
hopped! or was it skipped no hop skipped and jumped...
or sauntered! no i said that one, it was swaggered! no....
I stampeded or dogged or shlepped no bounced or was it...
I stamped or ed or rolled? no strolled! haha yes Strolled! no...
I stalked that was it or was it followed no no it was sojourned
sojourned! sojourn? no it was galumphed or marched, no charged...
aha sauntered! no! ******! it was ambled or slogged, trounced? or tromped, no rambled, yes I rambled on! no no thats not right, I plodded, trod no tread! no strided, thats not even a word, sloped, no...
govereetted, or persnicketied, or skreed, or preened, no no no none of that is right....
I sauntered! no no, swaggered! no was it promenade? prowl. no patrolled, parolled, no no thats way off...
I trekked, trudged, no fudged, no dogged! like george! he dogged it all the time, no I said that one, slogged or sashayed no trooped, no perambulated, or moseyed? or hoofed it? no it was definitely sauntered, no no it wasn't sauntered it was a dawdle, no lurched, or hawked, no stopped,
no no it was definitely movement, thats it! it was a movement! no no no that can't be right I paced, yes i paced back and forth and thought about life for a awhile....

no no that wasn't it either it was really more of a strut, or a saunter, yes saunter! no swaggered! no no
**** you words....

I wandered or was it roamed, no limped, gimped! no...

minced.... or no yes! minced... wait.... no it was a hike, yes I hiked up a mountain with  friend of mine, or was it climbed, no no thats not right...
I slandered, no.... pandered! no... I meandered, haha actually no i think  it was a peruse, or no a beat! no.... I cut a rug! or actually i think it was more of a stumble no....

ah yes it was walked, I walked about sixty blocks today

They buried him at Calverton,
the sky provided tears.
His mourners were the Few, the Proud.
No next of kin appeared.

For years he’d wandered City Streets,
a casualty of war.
The V.A. patched his injuries,
they couldn’t bandage what he saw.

The State had little use for him,
once the Peace accords were signed
His tiny pension was just enough
to purchase anodyne.

The blessings of a dreamless sleep,
He sometimes found in wine.
Otherwise he was on night patrol
With friends he’d left behind.

It’s hard to live civilian life,
His haunted mind was too far gone.
His body slept in Central Park
while his soul patrolled Khe San.

Then one night, more cold then most,
that solider finally yields.
She found him, dead, beneath the bridge
That he’d called “home” for years.

That kindly New York City Cop,
who knew he was a Vet,
arranged a simple funeral.
-That’s more than many get.

Present, aim, ready, fire!
They fire three quick rounds.
Accompanied by a tape of “Taps”
They commit him to the ground.

The reek of bourbon vanilla lingering through the sappy tones
Of creased leaves and crooked horns, enveloping the royal grave
Embedded with stone, the coronated statue of vines and thorns
Twirling around the remaining cores

Rotten cells and dark floral gourd, an unstable mass crawling
Amongst the bare, rotten shores
The empty shells howl its name - the king
Of naught
Brought to death on the brink - in a whim

Clasping roots and grasping vines,
Luscious soot and dull amethyst,
The graveyard of which the warriors of Gaia
Patrolled in everlasting melancholy - the betrayal of the monarchy
In which they found pleasure in the guilt of misery
They atone for the death of the reign,
Raining in droplets of sulphur and rosebuds,
Meek of the pink of the roses, embroidering the newfound majesty

Alas, the journey of futility,
The thorns grasp its throat
The emperor has been coronated to cease once more.

.

I can barely count the miles
of criss-crossed asphalt,
painted lanes in all directions,

barbed wire fences
creating corn field quilts
in endless mosaic patterns,

rivers winding and unwinding
beneath bridges spanning
picket fence neighborhoods and cities,

stop signs and detour barricades
shifting the flow around *** holes
and borders patrolled

My eyes blur of chalk marked sidewalks,
hopscotch squares washed out by storms
which have found me lost more than once

The distance seems unyielding, a formidable foe
to this dream repeating in my mind
of the moment we finally meet

Still I keep walking, wondering
will worn out shoes and 99 cent burgers,
be enough fuel for this destination

Regardless, I shall not stop
until I reach you, falling exhausted,
finally into your arms, into your heart