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.

To behold the daybreak!
-Walt Whitman, Song of Myself from Leaves of Grass

In days like this one,
when rain drops so light
& everything dips
into weeping grey
my sanity longs for memories.

My sanity longs
like impulsive recalling
of plummeting sadness
in greying day
sashaying mournful recollects
from sunrise to daybreak.

Remembering vanishes
in the joyful marrow of life.

There, forgetting lives.

Tell me the last time
bliss comforts your soul.

It is a transient tick
too stiff to evoke.

What about the last time
pain feigns your saneness.

Memories turned into bullets
slitting shrapnel
warping into my soul.

Happiness lasts for a second.
Sadness, a lifetime.

Tell me how to get rid
the hurting clout of ache
existing as a blunt fragment
benign yet reminisced.

Daybreak pours so hard
and my sanity like a waning light
crawls back in a miasmatic cave
along the river known
to be a home of a witch
& her cursing narrative
of throwing silver saucers
making her a spotless shadow
through vestal times
never again a thriving spirit.

Forget Blake. Forget Whitman.

Only in daybreak
where everything
churns into life,
my sanity shrinking back
collapsing
into surreal gaps.

Here & there,
my sanity longs for memories.

A rip in the door, a tip in the drawr,
Philosophy or trigonometry,
Epic failure,
Filled with pens & paper clips,
Minds to the matter,
Key opening frogs,
Toads totaling mirrors,  
Mane of Moroccan Curls,
Sashaying  across broad shoulders,
And smooth hips,
Laying on clouds,
Because you can't afford to breath,
On the ground,
Tree topped eye lined,
Eye lids,
Shut.

No, no, no,
that's not how it happened at all.
Precocious children
have never been afforded that much influence
and Emperors, then as now
are largely unafflicted by shame.

And it's a good thing too
- why, if the story had gone
the way Anderson had it,
neither I nor any of the men of the town
would have our jobs
at the Magic Cloth factory

You do realise
that the trade in Magic Cloth
supports all the world's major economies now,
don't you?

Nor would the aristocracy
look half so stylish,
sashaying hither and thon
in the glorious altogether,
applauded by the taste-makers
and notably contemptuous
of child-like observation.

silken honey dew essence ,
natural bioluminescence , Aura pulsates in time to the  flowing blood veins ,

fingertip lips taste like lightning just before it flicks the ground with his forked tongue -

stomach tingle , heart dip , drop.
lose it all , lose it again -
transfer the same -
enlarge the plane,

feel the vibrations of:  never the same , again. Expansive minds roll on ...


                                                           ­          ~~~*

Escaped moan is free, darkness turns to light.
the whispers,
   kept between you and me.

Animal instinct , Divine instinct

        slips in.
                          slips out.

carving chasms and canyons out of skin...a glint of menace  and copious amounts of mischief dance in his eyes , like a snake charmer sashaying the imaginary into existence.
                        
                      the space dew tastes....like raspberry Champagne bubbles...


the energy flows are opening now,  to handle the cosmic ******...

one must prepare -
an untrained mind , might combust -
or worse yet , attract the dijins for foolish endeavors into treasure map waters...

Sensi bows - game , set , match.

Practice makes Perfect..

She stops before the glimmering mirror,
falters and prepares.
Gangly and awkward,
Legs unfolding, leaning forward
she drinks.

A slender skyscraper gallops,
sashaying.

A wet bud uncurls and blooms.
Winding, uncoiling, plucks a leaf.

Enchanting daughter of heights:
Embraced by the clouds,
Smooching the stars.

Towering sky-queen, ossicones her russet crown.
Bronzed cloak, auburn jewels.

From protuberant knees to shadowy lashes,
a lofty leader,
willowy wanderer.

She struts into the room.
Sashaying.
A sensual movement of the hips...
Tight clothes, firm but rounded muscles
half-parted lips.
The confidence is like a perfume.
Her fragrance subtle, but backed with the power in her eyes.
She sits.
Strips out of her coat.
Corset with strings,
a tattoo of wings,
sweet little sparrow...
Are you an angel?

Smooth shoulders
as she exposes her neck
while the rest of the room
stares on perplexed
like stopping to see a wreck;
As she strokes her hair,
we silently stroke her ego.
She knows she is something to see
And when we finally remember to breathe
I'm left gasping for air
with a tightness between my legs
I hadn't realized was there.

And she smiles like she knows.
She does but
Then she turns away
Continues on her way
and I'm raking my nails
through my sheets
for days.

walking Van Dieman’s Land
Hobart
following footsteps through the park
christmas roses on the arm of campanulas
sashaying in the winter wind
an oxymoronic botanical dance
appropriate given the place

isle of heat to the north
isle of ice to the south
between
this isle of freedom & hope
place of salvation when the centuries turned
18th to 19th
settlement ships sailing south
feeding their human cargo
on dreams

time moves on
21st century now resides in the park
where vertical walls carry your headstones
telling your story
explaining how you stained the earth with your blood
and
why the ether echoes with your tears

so many lives measured not in years
but
in days or months

you are honoured now
finally
very right

Center pressure on the tip
Of the glassed pleasure,
Release a million particles,
Watch them rest on the air.
Thousands of master dancers twirling, spinning,
Sashaying their paths to refuge.
Inhale, exhale.
The atoms entice, capture.
Pleasuring senses with alluring influences.

Just like a ballerina, trapezed,
Carefully and gracefully
Leaning her swan-like neck
Away from her poor partner,
Afflicted by the contrast of halitosis.
Another focus of pressure:
The last of inconveniences amended.

I may be that girl
you see passing by
a cheeky grin
and a twinkle in her eye
That little smile
is really just for you
she'll gaze into your eyes
so you'll know it's true

Shaking that little *****
'coz everything's alright
greeting you each day
with a wave and a 'Hi!'
She hopes to make you feel great
with her good mood and delight

You may hear her coming
with her dainty sunkissed feet
slipped into flip flops
her painted toes look a treat
Sashaying by
in a floaty summer skirt
she's a 'people person'
not a naughty little flirt

She hopes to see you again
to give a wink and a saucy smile
It's to see you on your way
and remember
you're her favourite by a mile

; )

I felt it, i had it, 16 times down the road, i had it. cut like ***** clean on ice down the back of my throat. Tickled my tongue with wishes of lust. 34 days crashed into 3 and half hours of manic words, thrown out in to the air accompanying articles of clothing i wished we'd never worn. I cut it open early, i could smell the beauty of the fight that was to come. I would not protest, because 'thou does protest too much' you would say as you clamped my hands behind my head and threw me down like a linebacker making his 100th play with the cheerleader watching from the sidelines. I threw pictures at you, ones i had taken when you weren't looking, ones that you wished juliette lewis had been in the background, sashaying some old country moves. I found eyelashes in places i had never felt before, counted a thousand wishes off the palm of your hand.

Zipped me right back up like some old vintage boots, turned me around six times and downed your beer and told you to try it just once, and i would kick your ***, bruce lee style circa 1982. I lost my lines, found them under your footprints, lost my voice and found it imprinted underneath the lipstick you left on my inner thigh. Breathless i watch you walk towards me, like a mirage, like you were swimming underwater, fully clothed. And whoooo-weeee HOLY cow, i gave you one more over-the-shoulder-knock-me-out-backwards-she-was-the-rumour-i-tol­d-ya-about stare, made you wonder eh? Made you think i was something else eh? Never think i am anything more than what you think i am. I wore those boots, i frikkin owned those boots, and **** i looked GOOD.

This is a moment. How great is this? I am not waiting around for it, for you, because waiting means i have lost time. I would rather dream of you, idolise our future, walk around like i owned the place, hold my head high and make nuclear footprints down weary roads. Every day, is like this to me, i am not perception, i am not thought, or theory or idea or time....i am no-ones government.I bent high and low, warped and wrapped my face around forces i could not understand, stretched my arms wide open around the world and its sons-of-a-*******, and it still didn't fit, so threw the ****** off.  My heart is tattooed on my arm, slightly above my scar from that second-time-round-relationship that got me nowhere, but i cut it out, that's me, that's how my love rolls; thats why my love rocks; bad *** high roller, floating, fighting-til-it-dies, beautiful awesome heart.

So i packed up with my cigarettes and my phone in my back pocket, met you at the car with a bottle of JD and two limes. I thought you looked too good, your hair like that, and your half smile. I wanted to make you a movie star of local proportions, so that the credits would hold your name and mine together in lights, and local boys would be too scared to ask your name. I made you a cd, sat with my camera and took pictures of the places you said you hated, watched as your collarbone played hide and seek with your hair, your mouth moved to songs you didn't know. 16 times i turned, 16 times you got me, i had you at that. So i took off my socks and shoes and got ready for the drive of our lives, because the needle was better than the reality.

Hot ****** energy

seeping through my pores

sashaying wantonly

I kneel on all fours

He grabs my buttocks

and enters fast

a hard rough ****

fulfills my lust

Withdrawing slowly

he slaps my ***

Oh, what he does to me

I, once again, come

i said goodbye to the desert
spit out a few grains of rust and sand
as i sat in the back of my mother's grand marquis
i was bidding farewell to the long plaid skirt i wore to school every day
the school that was mercifully unmarred by bullets
the glitter on the popcorn ceiling of my grandparents' home
the smell of an overwhelming saturday evening
which stank of discarded waste and cigarettes
we were going somewhere special
goodbye nuevo laredo

eight years later
i said goodbye again
to a neat little home
nested tightly amongst the bricks of others
a hilly backyard
bluebonnets sashaying on the side of the highway
mexican restaurants every three blocks
that could never replicate what i once had
stars and stripes holding steady in the shade of a sycamore tree
a glittering city in the distance
i was in love
and i was going somewhere special

i was elated to escape
both of my previous lives
always finding myself awash with uncertainty
adrift as i committed and uncommitted to a series of distractions
from the beastly recesses of my pruned little brain
that snarled about hopelessness
abandonment
a lack of worth
and motivation
maybe i knew i was meant to run
since the moment of implantation

my new neighborhood is impeccably silent at night
no hollers to strain my ears for
no ominous pop-pop-pops
(was that a firework or could it be...)
no jovial music with thundering basses and large round drums
i eat pork drenched in teriyaki sauce
and drink green tea in the evenings
on the train, i gaze at the empty stares of other passengers
my gaze is also unreadable
i practice the strokes of a kanji
one, two, three...
my husband and i meander through temples
heavy and groaning with the weight of a thousand years
of life
benevolent buddhas and Cheshire-grinned demons
i can't help but think of the message of a western God
that my mother recited to me every night in the black of our room
sometimes i shuffle my feet in the square space of my living room
to the tune of cumbia

i used to think that i didn't have an identity
no confinement to a culture conceived by the likes of men
but i am what i am
and i never actually escaped

Sashaying, down to the black lake
With her toes leaving a trail of blood
Anguish and pain, urging her onward
Never ceasing, she glides forth

Purple and blue mark an otherwise unblemished face
Riotous heart beats on
In perfect rhythm of far away drums
Nearer to the edge, she comes
Catching her white ****** dress on a log
Every stitch coming undone
Slowly, she walks into the black lake
Sinking slowly to relieve her pain, is the Swan Princess

Madrigals of March
echo throughout the Port lake backcountry
with river dancer vibrations , lapping waters ,
sashaying marsh grass along her fertile shore
Uplands of live oak , elm , birch and sycamore
Shadows of raptors and herons alight brown pasture in
evening performances , evergreen seedlings helicopter
into the unknown , bass note bullfrogs , light breezes
chaperone a gaggle of redwing blackbirds bound for
sweet home* ...

I sprung out of this polka-dotted haze
rose up into a new exotic phase

a spring of fleurs erupted from my fount
forced
bulb March of mother May I's
forget-me-knotted hair
sashaying Miss American me
Ms. Primrose Promise
sprouting a court of daffodilian dandies
defrosting smiles of delight

tip-toe-Tiny-Tim Tambourine man
faerie of frivolity
waves his wand over
my zone 8

I bloom anew

Seclusion leads to wonder
Forgetting the sound of my voice,
As speaking loses purpose
And observation becomes my only drive.

A square with benches surrounded by trees
Pebbles clattering as kids would climb on
The mighty statue of an ancient judge.
A spot I made my own.

Random people passing by, few
Take shelter from chaos and heat,
Absorbed in their own minds
A frantic world seemingly leading to madness.

A ***** smelly sashaying woman seats on a bench,
Places her ******* garbage bags next to her
While rambling incomprehensible words of anger.
‘That’s where solitude leads you!’ I presumptuously think.

A slender tall middle-age man, just as ***** and smelly,
Comes up to her shouting she does not care enough
About him. She refuses to talk and walks away.
‘No matter who you are, feelings are always the same!’

A man in his sixties and a young sunny girl
Take their place on the bench, chatting away.
He narrates experiences she enchantedly absorbs,
‘A beautiful father and daughter scene’ I naively assume.

As they smile tenderly, his hand swiftly glides under her skirt,
She approaches him to kiss his ears and neck.
Such warmth, delicacy and joy heat my heart
Wondering what the judge might have to say.

As I take notes of my observations I raise my eyes,
A lonely loud sobbing kid is now sat on the bench.
His mother crossly approaches to scold him,
‘Another disrespectful brat’ I shamefully determine.

Once he finishes beating his feet on the ground
He looks up at the lady seeking an embrace. He gets consolation
For losing a toy, his departed father had carved a little while ago.
‘We all miss our father at some point.’

Those benches have been my parlour for many years,
Random people passing by, absorbed in their own minds
A frantic world seemingly leading to madness,
Until the day I realised I was one of them.

All these people populate my being,
They are the reason why I sense and live
In harmonic peace, feeling the inevitable unity
With a universe inhabited by such extraordinary yet

Fragile creatures.

Sunset

Viking pyres sinking
by degrees from North Manitou
annealing the portside window

on an overnight flight to Dublin
spilling dye downtown high
above the left field bleachers

finger painting suburban skies
of my childhood racing
to beat the streetlights

floating fire on Lake Superior
too many times to count
Malibu two nights one July

sashaying drunk on magenta  
going off to pout in the dark
when I called you a show off

you’ve seen me at my worst
I know all your florid secrets
little wonder we’ve grown

to resemble one another
incandescent palettes leached
wicking gunmetal horizons.

It'll be twenty years this spring.
Twenty.
I can still remember those red lockers,
and the cadgy way you took my appraisal.

I was so innocent then,
for all my ennui and dark eyeliner.
So young and untried.

Though we were only a year apart,
you had lived entire lifetimes
in the gap between us.

You offered me a taste,
and I devoured.
A ravenous thing,
I consumed every gleaming,
disjointed moment
in that bright world.

I was an experience ******,
and you were my dealer,
my fix,
Doling out paradigms,
in neat white lines.

They called it a hole,
but it never felt like that to me.
Each hit was a journey,
And we travelled everywhere.

I was a glitter bug,
sashaying in platform heels,
you were a fresh faced candy necklace,
in a tank top and wide leg jeans.
Together we ruled the night.

We were fast and irreverent,
Trademarked by our frenetic maneuvering.
Free as the changing wind.

We were raging toward the dawn,
We were getting lit up like Christmas,
We were being kicked out of clubs,
And having dinner with the literature.

We were building blanket forts,
and breaking hearts.
We were breathing sound.

We were discovering the Multiverse,
and burning it
the
****
down!

We were two rarefied souls,
barreling toward oblivion,
laying it bare,
laying waste.

Discovering infinity,
Discovering ourselves.

Those were heady days,
and if I think about them long enough,
I can still get high on the flashback,

The swirl of fog through laser beams,
warm camphorous kisses
from loveable strangers,
Those deep beats...

If I close my eyes long enough,
I am transported
to a dark room somewhere...
A crumpled mess of girl,
you and I sloppily intertwined,
venturing ever elsewhere....

Two desperately seeking souls,
paired adventurers,
finding beauty in chaos,
in the unknown,
in heartache,
in everything.

Knowing that whatever we learned,
we learned in kind,
and that knowledge was ripe for the picking.

That everything is an offer,
an opportunity,
a lesson...

If one can just open herself,
to interpret the vibrations.

I went shopping today and bumped into an old friend from school. She’s all grown up now and that slightly-on-the-heavy-side ugly duckling with thick glasses, oily skin and pimples has blossomed into a lithe, olive skinned, sashaying vision of femininity. I asked what she had done and she gave me the usual but glib answer of “sensible food and lots of exercise”. But I know it takes more than that. After all, I was her shoulder to cry on when the pretty people needed someone as a verbal punching bag. After a few cups of coffee she confessed, “I may have changed on the outside, but my confidence still needs firming up. I still feel like a loser on the inside.” I guess we’ve all been there; on the wrong side of the tracks feeling like a steaming heap of something a cow just left behind. But if we only get so many trips around the sun, remember that there’s over 10 billion people in the world and every second you waste on an idiot is one second you could’ve spent making really good friends.

Kind of the same passion as the last priest hung
by the guts of the last capitalist only a touch less
ruthless & surely with a bare-breasted damsel
waving a black flag so high,

kind of a storming of the Tower by the raging mob
of whom a few have fallen 'neath the clubs & guns
of security but like warrior ants crossing a flowing stream
merely give themselves for the all to gain entrance,

kind of a pillaging of said tower with luxury furnishings
all sashaying upon gaudy, liquid thighs, gold this & gold
that all crowbarred & levered just right on out of there
to turn up all in bits & pieces at the 42nd St. Pawn Store,

kind of loading of the treadmill with those false narrative
propagandists for an old-fashioned milling of the poor
folks flour, grinding of the pulp, & a pounding of the fiber
for a deserved clothing of the cold & fragile,

kind of a revolution of justice, elemental & deeply satisfying,
of an ideal revenge, a reckoning, a pitiless, near merciless settling
of accounts with the poisoners, the exploiters, the fork-tongued
liars, the cheats, the merchants of a slow, silent death,

kind of a joyous, rapturous end-of-the-war drinking & embracing
moment of pure contentment & sense that actually all is well
in the world & that good does eventually overcome & that the
meek shall inherit one day & that come what may in the end
there will be an ecstatic blossoming roar of sweet & ultimate
victory.

daring to be
darling
those sashaying
buds of May

tempt me nearer
dearest
I am looking
for your flower

I will race
when your petals part
and there in your heart
a dance

Run away,
and maybe someday
you’ll come running back to me.

Run away,
and maybe this day
a clear blue sky will greet you, with a glass half full
of stars beneath your soft lit eyelids, sashaying
through fields of a dream.

You ran away,
and it’s okay.

I’ve fallen all over you,
but I know the way back up.

Just take the stairs,
even if it’s hard
and your heart beats heavy
and your breathing,
fast not steady.

I can show you the way,
back from hell.
I even left a light on,
show and tell.

Sunset

Remember North Manitou
years ago? pressed up against
the portside window
on an overnight flight to Dublin,
spilling dye downtown
above the left field bleachers,
finger painting the suburban skies
of my childhood racing
to beat the streetlights,
floating fire on Lake Superior
too many times to count, Malibu
two nights one July,
sashaying drunk on magenta,  
going off to pout in the dark
when I called you a show off.
You’ve seen me at my worst,
I know your all your florid secrets,
little wonder we’ve grown
to resemble one another,
incandescent palettes leached
wicking gunmetal horizons.