I laid nose-to-nose, in tall, old grasses, with a spirited coyote, some nights ago.
He said to me, with lips unparted and low, shiny eyes - to listen.

Hesitantly, I inched forward and nudged that coyote with my face, prodding him for something more.

But, nothing came.
He simply stared back at me, unblinkingly.

“I listen!”
I shouted with a heart on fire.
“I listen more than anyone I know!”

The coyote continued his staring game, quieting my bosomed flames.
Stubborn - they erupted, something ugly, from the valley, into the mountaintop.
Spilling from eyes, in the mountainside, I screamed back into his so loud,
The mountain ached from its shut in echo.

Patient " the coyote waited.
So, I stopped.

Somehow surprised, I found that, after the flames subsided into greys of ashes, in silence, I had begun to listen.
That coyote’s eyes were urging eyes, unmoving " unrelenting.

Obedient, I drew forth my worn, careful bag out and placed it, gently, in the dirt between us.
The coyote snatched it, in the grain between our breaths, and held it between clenched teeth.

I glared at him with challenging eyes " he stared back at me, just the same.
I reached out to grab it, but halfway there, I heard the coyote command me,

“Stop.”

The coyote lay there, my ashes raging about loudly " still silent, my bag between his teeth.
As the ashes settled, his glaring eyes mellowed, and I watched as he gobbled it up.

--

A crow cawed somewhere.
The full moon shone down approvingly.

My soul sighed once.
My body followed.




The coyote slept -
I bowed my head in silence.

even from a
distance
she wants to
make sure
that
you are
looking
at her

even if
you are
not

she
will see
to it
that her
un-plunging
neckline
is not
plunging

and

no flesh
shows
where the t-shirt
is just a bit short,

a royal hand
run through
flowing hair

when you pass her
she will say it
without say,
it is she who is
passing,
make way

then
when

she draws close,
as much as a hug
a cell phone
emerges as if
by magic
in her clasp

stares at it
unblinkingly,
places it
regally to
the ear
and before
you never
see her again
in your life
there is that
hint of a smile
hook like
at the corner
of her eyes

I imagine they will look at me with
Patronizing incredulity
When they ask “So, you love him?”
& I unblinkingly answer
“yes”
here they will chuckle with great
condescension and worry,
believing I don’t understand the meaning.
Perhaps, they are right.
The trouble is:
I don’t like him.
It’s not merely that.
I am somewhere between
I-am-mildly-interested
I-like-him
& I-am-going-to-marry-him.
Which, in the smallest of my mother tongue, leaves me
With love.
I love him, in my way.
In the way I—with twenty years behind me—believe is love.

The black waters lap gently
At the shore of an obsidian beach.
I stand with my feet
Just submerged under the water,
My nails shining with kuro polish.
A shinigami waits beside me,
Its hands clasped behind its back
And its gaze fixed unblinkingly
At the distant, curved horizon.
Friends, enemies—I do not know yet:
All I know so far
Is that we’ve been standing here, together,
For quite some time,
And that every so often,
One of us will reach out
And clasp the other’s hand.

What a strange place this is, hovering between the perpetual dark and the grey light of dawn. It was nowhere you would find on any map. It was said to exist only in the psyche, in that moment between sleep and wakefulness. But  I found it and, should these words ever be read, you will know that I am there still …

Tall ramparts of the dullest stone rise up skyward. Sightless windows stare out across a strange landscape: it is not possible to make out any landmark for the mists twine in psychotic patterns making the tangible invisible to the eye.

I came to this place … I don’t how I got to be here. As I write down these words, I try to recall my journey but my memories are as fogged as the barren mist-infused heath below me. It is as though I have been here for a lifetime, maybe more. I seem to have a sense of having been somewhere other than this place but it is impossible to draw a coherent recollection from my mind.

It is cold here in my room high in the turret of this place. The cold stone arch that is my only eye to this outside world is presently covered with a ragged curtain. There are faded colours discernible on it; age has dulled them. It ***** forlornly in the insignificant breeze that blows through the window. It is dark outside the window. I know it must be as the tears in the drape are showing no light coming through.

On my writing table is a candle that is burning with a yellow flame. It sputters as the breeze catches it unawares. My candle casts a little light; enough to write with. I look down at the yellowed paper and my words you have just been reading. In my hand is my pen. How old-fashioned; a feathered quill. At the top of the table is a small *** and the trail of ink suggest this is my ink-***. Strange. It seems perfectly natural and familiar to be writing these words in this archaic fashion yet oddly out of place also as though a thread of a memory is tugging somewhere in my brain telling me it cannot be real. My hand reaches out to rub the surface of the table. It is rough, hewn not by a skilled artisan but functional. A shiver courses through me and I draw my rough cloak closer about me …

I don’t know if I had slept but becoming aware of my surroundings, I can see a little greyness coming through the drape over my window. It is not daylight in the sense you would know it; it is never daylight here. The candle is no more than a stub now and it’s flame is gasping it’s last breath. My surroundings are eerily visible now in this dull light. I can see the door across to my right. It is old and heavy with a large handle and studded panels. I expect to see a bed but craning my neck all I can see is a rough straw pallet in the opposite corner. That part of the room is still hidden in shadow so I am surmising that the rumpled pallet and rough blanket heaped against the wall is where I sleep. But I do not remember sleeping.

My pen is laid down next to the sheaves of manuscript I had clearly been working on. All this time, whether sleeping or writing, I had not considered whether I was alone here in my room. There was nothing in that moment I considered it to suggest I was here in anything but solitary isolation. Yet something made me look again at the rumpled bed in that dark corner. I realised then with a start that what I had assumed to be just my bedding had a clear form. Straining my eyes against the grey shadow, I saw an imperceptible movement. I held my breath, unsure if my eyes were deceiving me in this half light. I pushed against the table to lift myself as quietly as I could from my chair and padded over to the bed in the corner.

Crouched against the wall was the form of a woman. Her breathing almost imperceptible, coming in short, tremulous whispers. Clearly she was sleeping but something told me it was not a comfortable sleep but rather a sleep brought on by sheer exhaustion. Her pose was unnatural; half lying, half crouching. Her hands were clasped against her chest and rose and fell with each breath. I staggered backward my heart pounding in my ears, drowning out the sound of her breathing.

Turning to the table, my trembling hand reached for the candle and, cupping my hand to protect the dying light, I crept back to her. In the faint yellow cast of the flame I could see her more clearly. A once silvery gown now grey and tattered covered her small frame. There was a rough blanket draped carelessly across her shoulders. Her elfin face was as pale and dull as the grey light and threads of golden hair hung across her face. I found myself reaching out to her only to brush a strand from across her eyes. In that moment her eyes flew open and stared wild and frightened. Immediately she cowered back against the wall whimpering like a cornered animal. The shock of her awakening startled me and I fell back from my crouched position. Her hands flew up to protect her perfect face and to my horror, I saw they were bound at the wrist. Who was she? Why in all the gods’ names was she here, my apparent prisoner?

I recovered my senses and as gently as I could I approached her again. The blanket had fallen from her shoulders and in the still guttering candle flame I saw what I could only guess were silver feathers seemingly growing from her shoulders. This was impossible. The light was playing with my senses surely?

Reaching out to her I ever so gently touched her clasped hands now held against her face as though in prayer. She let my take them in mine – so delicate, so perfect, so cold to the touch – and my fingers slid down to her bound wrists. The binding was a dull silver, so flimsy yet seemingly strong enough to hold her hands together. There were welts where the bindings had dug into the flesh. And now she stared unblinkingly at me, sheer terror in her eyes.

I let her hands go with more force than I intended and recoiled from this scene, my whole frame trembling, my skin crawling with cold dread. Had I done this? I cannot remember. If I had, why? I closed my eyes willing it to be no more than a nightdread. Opening them seconds later I realised what I knew; that this was real, as real as anything could be in this strange world I found myself in.

I knew then what I must do and turning to my table I looked frantically amongst the sheaves and found the blade I had been using to pare my quills. Grasping it I returned to the pallet and approached her, blade in one hand, sputtering flame in the other. She gasped in horror as I drew close to her. How stupid of me. The poor creature was terrified of me, terrified by the cruelties I must have inflicted upon her.

“Hush, I mean you no harm.” My words seemed to belong to someone else. I placed the candle on the floor and reached out for her hands again. Pulling them toward me, I told her I was going to remove her bonds. She seemed to understand and, though still staring wildly like a frightened child, she let me insert the blade under her bindings. I could only imagine she had trusted me once and was now prepared to do so again. With a deft flick, the bindings parted to the blade and slithered to the floor. She turned her eyes from me for the first time to inspect her wrists massaging them lightly. She looked up at me once more and though she spoke no words, her eyes framed the question, “Why now? Why now after so long?”

I stood up and backed away from her and gestured toward the door: “It is time, that’s all, time for you to go.”

Rising uncertainly from her rude bed, this angel, for that is surely what she was, stood before me trembling. I removed the cloak from my shoulders and placed it about hers, my fingers lightly brushing the feathers on her shoulder blades. I gestured toward the door once again saying as I did so: “Walk toward it; I shan’t stop you. There is no lock; it will freely let you pass. I will not follow.”

The poor creature turned from me and walked to the door. Grasping the handle, it opened with a groan. She passed through and was gone …

In a stupor, I went toward the window and pulled the drape to one side. The sky was still grey but now a silver moon hung in my vision. I sensed a movement to my left and saw my angel soar across the face of the moon and into the gloom.

I walked back to my table and sat heavily down. Grasping my quill and dipping it into the inkpot, I reached for another sheet of parchment and continued to write in the hope that you will find these words and tell my story …

the lavender blooms in a shadowed instant
while we stalk past along the path
its fragile strength surpassing ours
breath with no lungs
food with no mouth
as blessed as we are with eyes,
we pass over them, unblinkingly,
free beauty ignored.
no sparkling mist of smoke,
no flick of a wand,
but the progress, the process of  life
is a magic, the likes of which
we barely know.

Call, call, call.
She wills him to call.
Stares unblinkingly at the phone,
focusing the entirety of her concentration,
all her brain waves, like a battalion,
cleaned, loaded, rifles all ready and aimed at the little device.
Ten thousand fingers clutching ten thousand tiny triggers,
ready to shoot ten thousand guns
at the slightest vibration or ring.
Waiting.
Waiting.
Waiting.

Run, Run, Run, Faster Than The Wind
Chase Me, Find Me, Catch Me, Fix Me From Within

one upon a time, I knew who I was
my favorite color, my favorite word
I could say things unblinkingly
without conforming to the herd
but now, my means for survival
through each stressful day
is to not divulge information
in any single way
people who think they know me
merely have only met my shell
I look happy, gay, and free
when inside, I'm not actually well
I wish for closeness
I wish for them to know
the inner side of myself
the part I can't seem to show
at the same time, I'm running
what this closeness is, I couldn't say
if not heart, then it's always distance
that stops me from feeling this way
no one runs after me
no one cares to try
none have ever been able
to catch me as I run by

Run, Run, Run, Faster than The Wind
Chase Me, Find Me, Catch Me, Fix Me From Within

(There’s a song for this: ‘Confessions’ by Sudan Archives)

I remember it like it was yesterday (it was yesterday).

I arrived on a cool (42°f), blindingly sunny New Haven afternoon. It was as if they’d opened up that troubling ozone hole just for me.
I was as happy as I’ve ever been to be back. It was as if New Haven actually meant freedom.

I’d opened the door to our suite, dragging every bag I own.
After intense hugs, I'd said, “PIZZA - NOW.”
So, Lisa, Sunny and I, after some debate, selected Town Pizza.
Town Pizza’s specialties are those thin, gourmet pies with crust-free cauliflower crust, oil (not environmentally problematic tomatoes), topped with panda cheese and tofu.
In a shocking development, I got the cheeseburger special which I hit like a vape. †

SO, the three of us were there, happily devouring. Not bothering anyone, when this guy stopped at our table to offer us salvation and introduce us to - whatever (yadda yadda yadda)

I didn’t catch the entire pitch; I may have momentarily dozed off.
“No, Thank you.” Lisa said, politely but dismissively.
Not taking the hint, he reached into his cheap shoulder bag for pamphlets and began a new tac.
“Go away.” Sunny said, unblinkingly, but he jabbered on, showing the unaware persistence of long covid - like we were interested or tolerant.

“I’ll show you my bra if you’ll shut up,” I said, with my best deadpan face. Lisa and Sunny shrieked with several kinds of outraged laughter.
He became a statue, like a Twilight Zone episode where time stops for one person. A second passed during which he didn’t blink or breathe. “eheheheheheheh* I toned, like a buzzer.
“Two late!” I gameshow said, shrugging, “You didn’t verbally accept, sorry, I don’t make the rules.”
He shook his head and walked away—with Lisa and Sunny giggling and waving him off stage.
Our mission was accomplished. We’d defended our water hole like lionesses.

A few minutes later Lisa said, “He DID shut up, I’m not in law school, but I think you owe him a flashing.”
“I guess he wasn’t in law school either.” Sunny observed, between bites.
“I’m taking this to the supreme court,” I promised.
“How did the supreme court get to decide every ******-little thing?” Lisa asked, biting her abomination flavored pizza.
.
.
slang and notes…
devouring = eating like barnyard animals
Twilight Zone = More, so much more, than the most creative moment in man’s evolution. *
panda cheese = Ok, I made that up because it sounded gross.
† the author, in no way, endorses vaping, vape-related consumables or accessories

have you ever noticed
that when people stare out the window on a bus or train or car or plane
that their eyes follow every single detail at a whiplash inducing speed
but their head stays put?
it's like they're mesmerized by something, something no one else can see
and they have to stare, unblinkingly
so it doesn't disappear.
their eyes flit back and forth like someones head, while watching a tennis match.
they rarely blink
until they tear their eyes away,
close
sleepy, unfocused suddenly
and stare straight ahead,
like nothing happened.
**recovery

Parents
My father hung in the belfry
so many called him father
but the old woman in the house where I lived
said he was my father.
When I met Mother superior her eyes
softened for a second
The hanging was an accident
at his funeral came the bishop attended
to stop any rumours of suicide.
The old woman and I watched the proceedings
at a distant  
I did see the face of the prioress in the window
it was unblinkingly stern but in
afternoon light I saw tears in the corners
of her eyes.
The old woman cackled and said, she gave you
to me to look after.  
I had a silver cross on my bedside table
the old woman said it was a gift in case I wanted
to become a cleric one day.

If you look upon me,
from above or from below,
being swallowed at all ends
by a gang of thirsty serpents,
then understand that in my eye
i am shaking in a trance
and am only dancing with
my fellow dancing snakes.

HAHAHA

If you watch me
from in the darkness of my closet
which you've wandered into,
not knowing that I have left its door cracked open for you
for the curious candle light
of my small stadium to peer into,
and you unblinkingly catch me
while you're caught in the act
of pouring my body
into a cup
crafted from a piece
of my frozen soul
which I have extracted
from the contents
of the cup itself,
drinking and gargling and giggling while joyfully singing
of the sorrow that the light has while it has to watch,
with nowhere else to go,
then know that my mind
is the light
while I crumble under the comedy
that is its glow.

AHH HAA HAA
HAA HAA HAA HAAA

We are a connection
turned in on itself.

It leaves everything that it brings.

The fornicating black hole
giving birth to itself
is nothing
but the brilliant
uselessness
of any song
that god sings.

Let us sing.

I'll be the bed of wasps.
You be the dreams
of our *** and our dances
nourished and guided by stings.

She has a gift from the gods
For she is a seer
Eyes unblinkingly open
Seeing all the world
Flutter between her lashes
In choatic, chalked out frames
Body wracked by sobs
She begs the gods
To rip her eyes from her skull
She is an innocent
She rocks herself back and forth
But there is no comfort
For those who watch the world die
Every time they close their eyes
And sit on their beds, paralyzed
There is no comfort
For the seer

IVE BRUISED MY KNEES A SHADE OF SUN-KISSED INDIGO ATTEMPTING TO CRAWL AFTER YOU ON THIS UNMARKED TRAIL YOU PICKED OFF-HANDEDLY FROM THE MAP YOU KEEP IN YOUR BACK POCKET. I'VE SUNKEN SO DEEP THE TRENCHES HAVE BECOME THE SECOND HOME I SHARE WITH CREATURES OF THE NIGHT, THE ONE'S MY MOTHER TAUGHT ME TO FEAR. THERES ONE SHES OVERLOOKED, THERES ONE IVE OVERLOOKED AND ITS BEEN STARING AT ME IN THE FACE UNBLINKINGLY. I BLEED CONSTELLATIONS, THE ONLY DIFFERENCE FROM THE PAST OF MY SHADOW IS THAT SHE DID IT FOR YOU AND IM ONLY DOING SO RIGHT NOW WELL BECAUSE THE SKY'S A LITTLE EMPTY AND IT'S HARD TO FIND MY FOOTING IN THE DARKNESS, WITHOUT A JAR WITH THE HEARTS OF COLLECTED FIRE-FLIES THAT YOU KEPT AROUND YOUR NECK. WHERE MINE USED TO BE. I WONT BRUISE FOR YOU. NOT TODAY, NOT TOMORROW. NOT EVER. I AM SO MUCH MORE THAN THIS.

He got home around 8 pm and walked to the kitchen, almost mechanically. He put water to boil while he picked one of the two identical mugs kept in the cabinet. His eyes kept drifting as he made himself coffee and walked to the couch, forgetting the sugar as usual.

It had been two weeks since she killed herself and it still hadn't settled in his head. How can someone that you have known for more than a decade, just not exist anymore? He sipped from his cup and resisted the urge to spit out the coffee. He never drank coffee without sugar but today, he was too tired to get up again. "Maybe I don't deserve sugar in my coffee." he thought and took another sip. The curtains at the balcony danced slowly, to the grey evening breeze and he stared, unblinkingly. The curtains, almost a dreamlike hypnosis taking him back to memories. Memory, of their room at midnight and the black-blue bruises at her back. "I didn't mean to hurt you like this. I just... I am sorry." he had said. She was expressionless when he hugged her, as if she was dead already. He gasped as he looked away from the dancing curtains, breathing short breaths. It wasn't the first time that he was feeling guilty. He always felt sorry after every argument, every bruise and every time she screamed out of pain.

Before she died, she took the time to gather all the letters they had written to each other, old dried flowers, the dress she wore on their first date and all little memories that reminded of the happy times they spent together and arranged all of it on their bed. What did she mean by doing so? Maybe she wanted him to remember her by all the good memories or maybe, she wanted to taint those memories with what she was about to do so that no matter what he thinks of, he is always reminded of this.

He frantically got up and drained his coffee in the kitchen sink. The memories haunt him, even the good ones. It never was clear why she decided to **** herself and if it was because of him or not but either way, he was guilty.

The few and far of our not so
        Halcyon days have been lost
                Scattered to the winds
            Swallowed by the earth
Become statues of the streets
                  
             Yet here she stands
                 Strong and tall
  In the meadows of things to come
    She’s climbed mountains upon  
mountains of treacherous learning              
     Swam unblinkingly the never
                Ending rivers of time
           Floated on countless
       clouds of impossibility

    She’s got the moon in her eyes
      A glow that wax’s and wanes
        But can not be snuffed out
           Built to withstand time
             She is the tree that
           refuses to be cut down
        Commanding every space
                      she enters
     Tornado trapped in human flesh
      Voice an avalanche of dreams
                  Broken yet alive
     She’s a weaver making baskets
               from past struggles
      To hold the fruits of the future
          
                    She’s making it
                 She’s making it
               She’s made it
                                    On the way

                  Through the battle
                       Victorious on the
                                  other side
The forward path holds so much
                                                
Promise

Time flies by in the animated flashes between
the silver frames of the train’s windows,
moving as fast as each perceived thought,
a time machine rattling between future-past:
egg sandwiches downed with blue electrolytes,
rustling newsprint coexisting with touch phones,  
the woman in black journeying to a funeral
across from the discretely breast feeding mom,
a heart broken teen laughing at her exes
first TikTok dance she liked and saved.

A track repair forced a two hour timeout
for the executive in the gray suit
to the Natural History Museum, forcing
admiration of things greater than himself-
pterodactyls swinging on steel wires,
T-Rexes corseted in titanium tendons all
coexisting  with their extinction meteorite-
a flying blue whale finishing the diorama
of him ignoring his ancestors in ancient skins
around a dwindling fire pit as he exits.

The train rattles on slightly lurching
back and forth in a stasis of motion
that passes the upturned prairie grass
that transitions towards the end stop
and its final suburban destination.
The executive doodles a Buffalo
on his phone app, one that is obscured
by the barely drawn coal stoking locomotive
belching smoke like a cellophane flame
far from the small screen frame.

The smoke unravels to a vets wife
wearing a Navajo smock,
pearling and unpearling
the mistakes in the weave
of powder blue baby socks.
In the upheld light of her vision
the quartz bison teams the bluing
vista caught in the indigenous hunt,
red faces obscured in the herky-jerky
of horsed riders and hurling arrows.

She imagines her bright face boy
staring unblinkingly at the sky,
free of the stuttering window’s glare,
reveling in the glint of hooves and dust,
unaware of the rain and flies to come.

One strange movement
stops. You won't conform
an angel's thought dream.
And I will not give in to an epithet
for paradigm shift.

Unblinkingly you stare through
me weighing my
dewy eyes. They had spilled the ink
of heart. Subatomically, a mass
becomes a howl of unheard scream.

I want you for all the
pores of my consciousness. On a
blank paper you will write a betrayal
of cuckoo. The small songbird
cries in joy.

An earthern lamp burns
tirelessly. I cover the flame with
my palm to give you a handprint
of my waist.

Walking was once so weightless. But now I stand here, thoughtlogged, waterful. Gazing unblinkingly at the chlorine stained rocks, I rip the northern lights from my eyes. The thunder steals away, leaving ringing ears reaching for more, lightning returns to the sun. The storm is replaced with moldy gray smeared with cotton candy cirrus. Children make lemonade with no need for sugar, and passersby gulp too-big sips, and cavity drips from their rotting lips. Night falls, the children fold up their twenty-five cent stand and leave the lemon juice for the sweet-seeking hummingbirds. The children don't notice the grid in the sky. Glittering rows of nebulae and crescent stars framed the light-polluted navy; a hand imagined the constellations, drew them, and pasted each fraying corner, neatly, line to line, no coloring outside the lines, nothing left to the imagination. But wasn't that the point? To stare in wonder with someone you loved? Imagining, dreaming about the world beyond? Not a single corner/ piece was left unglued/ fluttering in the wind. There wasn't a single fluttering bit to peel back and reveal the ancient unknown wallpaper of the universe beneath.
I search for a cumulus to save me but I fall, finding the ground far too soon.

Little kids always seem so shy when you first meet them
They tilt their heads down, their small eyes locked unblinkingly on you
I let myself come down to their height, though it's not much of a distance to make up
I see how big the world looks in their eyes
It's sudden the moment they decide to love you
And suddenly they're bursting with energy
Winding up for the high five, showing off their magic wands, hugging you and waving
When you leave and that final soft-cheeked smile
That breaks my heart every time, because one day I know that smile could be as broken as mine
Because that's what you get when you decide to love
You gave me the light of innocence, of happiness
And I hope in that moment when we met,
I gave you the same

In terms of kindness,
Grown ups could learn a thing or two from you

Poetry stares, unblinkingly,
in dilemma―
at mindless extremism.
Evolution of words,
was going retrograde.

Your pretty face―
needs dusting. I was
curious to know about the story
of night shifts.

Sometimes I am hit―
by your feline grace to go for
immolation of male chauvinism.

You ***** the barriers,
so that I won't
reach your lips. The moon
went laughing whole night.

A slow poison, like
hemlock, you drink the hurts
to stay alive in a wax house.

Body blow becomes
a brand.
Talking to trees, hitting the trunk.

You were weird
asking for the blank
book to read the unwritten
poem.

Sometimes you watch the
rains unblinkingly
in timeless stance.

Like an amputee
walking on terrace wall
for a glimpse of moon.

Someone has come
to lie down on the rock
to meet the death-
after the unseen hands painted his face black.

I would weep gently.

I have fought it , struggled through it,and faced it unblinkingly.  
In the end I lost ,my strength was insufficient. At the cost of loosing my heart. I let her control it. For the simple purpose of being beside her. She was worth every crack , every tear every break
      Before I new it my paper cut
              Became a gush
                    I'm bleeding out
My crash became my fall
          My heart her toy and I played along

routine as morning rooster's call,
death stares us down unblinkingly,
with the faint sting of alcohol.

without much willingness to brawl,
virility, agility,
or much of anything at all,

how could we be bound by thrall?
how far goes durability?
where has it gone, our wherewithal?

forgetful trees lose leaves in fall -
our lovers leave consistently,
routine as morning rooster's call.

You said
this was it.

The fog over the
shoulders will
sweep the profiles.

You did not know
how to give, and I
would not know, how
to take.

Maples, pears, and ginkgos
will show the fallacy
of colors in autumn.

And you, unblinkingly
watch a
poet's dilemma.

And I would just only stare
into your eyes.

and still I feel infuriated at myself
concerning squandered funds
passively, senselessly, and willingly
surrendered nest egg
to computer hackers
(imposters, jackknifing, and liquidating)
coercing me to forfeit funds,
whereby yours truly (me) blindsided
thru convincing telephonic dialogue
witnessing unquestioned trust

I unquestioningly, unerringly, and unblinkingly
carried out instructions
essentially cadging, depleting, and exhausting,
checking and savings accounts (mine)
courtesy convincing scheme
yoking naïveté (mine)
with FAKE conspiratorial claims
Citizens Bank tellers
linkedin as thieving magpies
(twittering bird brain analogy

hatched courtesy yours truly – me)
once ridiculous ruse beak came obvious,
I never ceased
maligning self as half cracked egghead
repeatedly replaying telephonic scenario
only this time
with home grown perspicacity triumphant
and fraudsters, marauders, and usurpers
harangued, interrogated, and jailed
critiqued, maligned, and whipped
courtesy just law of the land.

Clear as day,
I still recall the bloke
who chose one alias
(probably quite a few
in his bag of tricks)
videlicet Harvey Specter,
he coaxed at least one poor sucker
(the writer of these words)
to fork over his life savings
without yours truly batting an eye,

whose gullibility now legion
among the posse of scoundrels
sharing the ease with which
money plucked out figurative fingers
(like taking candy from a child)
diminishing paucity of integrity,
increasing perspicacity of acuity,
where wool will never
be pulled over my eyes
(ewe can bet my bottom dollar)

against being fleeced,
and now a heightened awareness
a wretched costly life lesson
inflicting a painful financial contusion
additionally severely wrecking, pummeling,
and bruising psyche suddenly woke
keenly alert to the bad to the bone
doggone wicked wily weasel ways
of unrepentant rapscallions.