Like things growing closely in clusters
are the memories of sweet trying to understand truth
when wrong arms reached out and offered devilish friendship.
As a child you sat reading softness and hope and butterflies
untitled poems rhymed in your head,
Nightmares woke you up, so cruel as to drive you here.
All windows closed and flies and stink festering within
and burning fires untended threatened to burn you down.
As you sit, still reading alone,
poems unwritten.

visible

by shadowed
casts

with small artifacts
reflected

a small glow
in the dark

looking black

until I focus or un
my eyes

look askance and catch

it is not absence of colors
or glow

the why
I am

invisible

and it is beautiful
the snow fall making a winter blanket
for all the trees
meanwhile
on the other side of the world
a child in his bed gets his leg blown off
or just dies with nothing but hunger and pain
so I went about hanging lights on the
two evergreens in my yard
and the fake plywood santa
in his sleigh and all eight tiny reindeer
and had a realization again
of a boy and a ******* the streets of downtown Atlanta, Chicago
Detroit, or New York or Daleville
with no home, trying to live out of a small chevy or Ford or
Dodge , while Chevy and Dodge, got government help?
And they have no books , and their mom has bruises and
a broke arm and tries to care for them and cries while they sleep in the backseat and knows she could have done better and
is against the windshield in her hating herself
ashamed with not a bit of hope,
and I sit the star on top of the Tree and the glow lights the lawn and santa
winks in a pattern and Rudolph's nose glows red,
and it is all so beautiful

time issues forth then blends us  into reminisces
resolves to tick and continue as spawn and fry
swim forth into a swarming mass of
death into an ocean bereft of feel
upon our dead bodies they feast.
A few returning, miraculously, upstream
to where they issued forth,
begin anew the circle,
regrowth and death so every day ticking.
Issuing forth our cells
to  feed natures
next beginning.

Blessed we all are we know it with expanding technology we are so blessed with. Unlike our ancestors, we no longer beat our clothes on a rock after
washing them in the nearest stream. Now we stream a video. Aren't we lucky?
Firewood, is now a luxury. Only the rich warm themselves, by the fires We hack and split oak now for fun.
Now when we hack it's Home Depot or Target we seek For a real warming.
We drive almost on autopilot, with GPS and text. We are just so **** busy paying attention, we don't see the collision.
Mom used to make dinner. And all the family would gather.Discuss politics or homecoming. Now politics are virtually one sided and homecoming is done on Skype. Hello poetry.
Think about it.
Are we better off?

from the top of my mullet mohawk
big head, poppin'
in and out of the nearest
******, no-stoppin'
me jack the hammer hittin'
once I got started
that day momma
spit my *** out:
collidin'
with my father
who may have been my brother
no tellin'
with every authority figure
who had the *****
to try and tell me what to do,
with the man arrestin'
handcuffed around foot and ankles
everyone who had no money,
never knowing the system
from my day of creation
society was rigged:
a bunch o'  twisted ***** *******'
leaning towards the rich *******
making the haves have more
the have-nots fightin'
for the scraps, no religion had
answers,
feelin'
just like a hungry dog
behind the locked barred
four-star restaurant doors,
so, takin' whatever I can
what is left  I guarded every scrap
like it was somethin'

for we all fall into love, sin , life
into abominations which our fathers
might scold,  

we may fall into darknesses ,
where the only light
is so dim only one star

light might find us, there
so few of us escape, the blind
rage , the animal instinct

among the others caged the same,
we might mistake sameness
for right for reality, and

for the few , who manage to climb
out with skin wedged under
our nails think ,

there is one of a million,
that one who saw the light
of the one star

it's brilliance as not sanctifying
brutality , who , then
saw more than one star

but heaven, saw man's potential
truly, his sins as nature,
and his future

of the world growing
more godlike, more
forgiving

betrayed the rest,
to climb out using them as
ladders,

for our sake, for our
future, nurturing
like a mother and her baby

peace , sanctity
in man, in nature together,
in abandoning

the past, for
what grace does the past
remember?

played a rigged game
of solitaire missing
            the Queen of Hearts
from his deck,
            and therefore never
once, not one time, won.
          
But, he continued shuffling on-
           with hope his luck could change
and  just one time win this game.

It was noted, by all who saw
           him, shuffling alone, bereft,
that never once, not one time,
           did he ever cheat.
He was destined to
           always play this
rigged game,
honestly.

lines go
through a vine
growing deep
in a well drowning
a theme of loss unspoken
goes unsaid
I get it
your loss goes
on rhyming
with
mine.

Cross creek crooked
flows
"tween **** dead bluish growths
above
because
seeing just the shimmer
of the bottom
of the river
a murky bed bottom-fed
sun shine flicker
ripples trickles seeking levels
seeds fed with moisture may
cause
roots to grow
unbeknownst
to the majestic.

my hairline sweat and tears
mist from a shoreline,
paint down my wrinkles like waves cresting
a rocky beach,
my colors so dissolved, all my fleshy canvases
exposed to too much sun, my piercings all droopy,
teeth falling out. I need a hair cut a good dentist and Dr.
Phil. Or just strip down to my loincloth
go back to Rochester,
run with  wildness, as I did then
through brush and bathed in purple
abandonement, virile unabsorbed
lazing under the mulberry brush
the willows swaying down to touch my unscarred youngness,
with hope with hunger, then.

I asked a thief to steal me a peach,
He turned up his eyes;
I ask'd a lithe lady to lie her down,
Holy & meek she cries.

As soon as I went
An angel came.
He wink'd at the thief
And smild at the dame--

And without one word said
Had a peach from the tree
And still as a maid
Enjoy'd the lady.

- William Blake, 1863

It was the
  night before Halloween
all through the crib
   all were stirring putting on costumes,
all were dressing as ghosts or goblins,
in the hope treats were near.

No one was in their beds
   while visions of chocolate
danced in their heads,
   mamma, in her costume (****)
I in the living room playing
   Walking Dead replays.

When, out on the lawn, there arose
   such a clatter, I sprang from my DVR
to see what was the matter.
   In a flash I realized,
Santa was drunk and
   arrived two months early.

If you were my lady
I am a carpenter
would you be my babay
tomorrow
I would give up this quest to overcome
loneliness
work my calloused hands to tender sores
every minute
grind away my hardness
wipe away the dirt from my ***
so thee would see my shine
and my true grit.
If I were a true poet
I would have asked you better,

of a sandwich a smoke a beer
at the end of a hard day
a word of praise
a smile from the world

cognizant of the real world
hardness and people's fears
worries
I sit and contemplate

why I feel so god ****** good
getting a Daily
when all I write is simple
heart and feelings and connecting

as much as I might to fellow
humans and their dreams
desires laugh
and try to cry with them

I got rewarded when you wrote back commented hearted
it's more than I deserve to be paraded as the Daily
but it was all of you who made it happen

and I won't forget or take it as my championing
it is ours our dream our sweetness our caring in full view now
the working man
the lone  poet

the songstress alone at her keyboard
a bit of song  a few hellos a heart a word here and there
not a popularity contest
each is equal to me
and deserving

this is your Daily, too
everyone
on HP!

or reached out so far I fell over my words
or promised more than I could deliver
or said I love you without meaning it

or planted visions in your head insincere
all I said was meant and from my heart
from the vault where feelings actually exist

and to be your one and to make myself whole
from the deeper things I thought life
was about, to the point where I might

believe life again had meaning, oh, meanings are so
specious, I found, So when I think I see
a shooting star again,

I will question my sight, my sanity
and hold my tongue
mute. Swollen

Upstairs, top left
Deerfield Apts. 8b,
you remember, on Fort Rucker Boulevard
across from the fire station,
right next to the golf course
on the left, *******,
just past the power station
you remember how to knock?
Don't you?
Ask for  Espinosa
tell him Carlos sent you.
Make sure of the weight,
and don't even consider
paying yourself.
I will take care of you,
you get that.
Call me when you leave ,
pronto. Remember?

pounding working a sweet sweat up
toiling the ground of earths' belly
plunging as far in as possible
as deep as deeper going goes
as the pressure builds from down under
trying to stay aware of a gusher
or a pre-mature *******
the drill spinning the earth reeling making
groans that emanate from way down deep
the temperature with each ****** spin ******* rising,
higher louder from deeper from somewhere
hidden until now, then, releasing the earths' buried treasures
the earth filling the sky the horizon with releases.

or themes were  them or I don't even remember
anymore the drunken high wavering feelings dizzying
exact places nor time,  of where I was on that date or whom I might
have said to a flirt or grabbed a thigh bravely or slapped a cushiony
cue ball banking the eight ball with skill winning
a hundred dollar bill buying the whole ******* bar a drink
and
a *******,
just know that was me when, then. I had less problems younger
stouter energetic time left on my tab,
a deadly eye a smirk of confidence, that youthly
obsession with being tough. I banked the eight ball last week while breaking and still am aching a week later. Now.

the saying quaint is memory
I am surprised i remembered it
six almost long decades
since I tried to tell myself to never forget
how the  day is wonderfilled
we have sandboxes
beloved pets
steel toy cars and backyards
we explore like jungles
swings and naps
when life gets tiresome
amongst the sunrises and hours spent
getting acquainted
to this life
a sister who is nice
at times
and moms and dads
peaches and
cream
longings to grow up and see
everything
sidewalks leading to
we do not know where
just dream
they have sights unseen
deep down in the
grey of now the
hard to read story of those years
all are written down
archived
like bubblegum on a bedpost
sweetness of that first kiss
that recall
of  days
that are so malleable
just don't forget
or get all old

round plentiful satisfyingly rotund
Peggy was almost two at once
she didn't intend that
just happened
a hormone thing
she was pleasing and still a world of big beautiful
and happy acting
she had hair like Rapunzel flowing like a golden river
down her back mountainside
to her log like legs
and when she hugged you
it was like a polar bear
so warm
she had spares
spare love to give , was grateful
innocent
as a dove
experienced as a *****
made me almost fall deep into love
I am glad
I wore a parachute

My three daughters and I
Spot, Blue and sweet Timex,
live within the walls
of this Verona like  apartment,
Missy, the Black Lab who played nursemaid
to these three I believe, aided and abetted
sweet Timex's foray.
I, a Capulet, truly love my daughters
but easily fly into rages,
wishing a fair and providing man for them,
not the hell of the Montague clan,
namely bighead. Bighead roams the streets the alleys the back woods
no earnings or propriety,
no means to his unmatted fur,
his wild houls in the night, testament.
The nurse then, on a late night, asked to go out.
I tired, got complacent and out timex flied!
She returned a week later,
not the young kitten, playful,
but a Cat, with hunger in her eyes.
Spot and Blue, still are eager to discover the outsides,
Probably filled in on all that is there,
by Timex. And she no longer plays.
She even meows different now,
seems to meow
O Bighead, wherefore art thou Bighead!

and he had a little small bull pup, that to look at him you'd think he wan's worth a cent, but to set around and look ornery, and lay for a chance to steal something. But as soon as money was up on him, he was a different dog; his underjaw'd begin to stick out like the fo'castle of a steamboat, and his teeth would uncover, and shine savage like the furnaces. And a dog might tackle him, and bully- rag him, and bite him, and throw him over his shoulder two or three times, and Andrew Jackson which was the name of the pup Andrew Jackson would never let on but what he was satisfied, and hadn't expected nothing else and the bets being doubled and doubled on the other side all the time, till the money was all up; and then all of a sudden he would grab that other dog jest by the j'int of his hind leg and freeze on it not chew, you understand, but only jest grip and hang on till they thronged up the sponge, if it was a year. Smiley always come out winner on that pup, till he harnessed a dog once that didn't have no hind legs, because they'd been sawed off by a circular saw, and when the thing had gone along far enough, and the money was all up, and he come to make a ****** for his pet bolt, he saw in a minute how he'd been imposed on, and how the other dog had him in the door, so to speak, and he 'peered sur- prised, and then he looked sorter discouraged-like, and didn't try no more to win the fight, and so he got shucked out bad. He give Smiley a look, as much as to say his heart was broke, and it was his fault, for putting up a dog that hadn't no hind legs for him to take bolt of, which was his main dependence in a fight, and then he limped off a piece and laid down and died. It was a good pup, was that Andrew Jackson, and would have made a name for hisself if he'd lived, for the stuff was in him, and he had genius I know it, because he hadn't had no opportunities to speak of, and it don't stand to reason that a dog could make such a fight as he could under them circumstances, if he hadn't no talent. It always makes me feel sorry when I think of that last fight of his'n, and the way it turned out.


Mark Twain

busy me
and Missy just lives
I envy her sometimes

her just a dog without responsibilities or bills
catering to the kittens whims
growling

every now and then when
they won't leave her alone

it is an impediment If I am focused
on correct
if I am seeing your decisions on
me
why do I ask? Am I correct.
I want go sail on my impediments.

I pause in places, you do not.
I write my heart out, trying
to let out
what hurts what bothers
what is conjuring my inner thought?

If I am meek, or contemplating, what will you
or I think of me?
If I speak my truth, and leave a comma out,
or mispell (ie) one word,
does my feelings go unheard?

I've a song many truthful
as a genre they run the gamut
from country sad to blues
to new york manhattan mainstream cool
the hot spots
no
I have a song many heartfelt
spoken as a tear fell out of
my eye had to stop singing
there for a min
yes  a song that sings to
christmas carols 364 days of the year
- chestnuts roasting on an open fire-
watching Breakfast at Tiffany's again singing
Moon River until cat
comes back
don't get me started
about Audrey,
or Linda Ronstadt in her day
I still have that song
it is long
not written down
but committed
to memory
and so many others

In the depths of life's chaos there is hope
   a light of salvation to pursue,
       Joy, in a fleeting glimpse,
            but a small moment of tender peace,        
                calms the restless eternity.

of all  my pet peeves
my pet's ****
my cats stink my
Labrador getting pregnant
running from the IRS
a warrant I am am sure is imminent
might be more
upsetting is,
how bad my Tigers are.
I might not live very much,
but

a was b cause c ause he d id e arned f irst g ave h is I d
j ust K arl L oved m any n ot o ne p er q uite r s ane t o
u ndo v ery w ell X poses Y z?

over the hills where wild raspberries grow
ripe under the mulberry bush in the valleys
blush hidden from most , sweet nectars rush
I found Eden and Eve and everything
yet no apple  or serpent,
desire entwined with
limbs -  fruit of heaven
on earth- her awaiting

Words and meanings
lost in the realism
as i stutter
of a dream
and fret in your
presence
wishing for
continuance
or at
least ac·knowl·edg·ment
of my spice
your iridescence
your blush-mine
insecure, shy
and my hope is your heart
is forgiving, pure!

to her, her I miss
full of her
I sit here without her

I feel her yet    
cannot hear or touch her
but

I know she wherever
whatever she does
she knows

and feels me
full as I do her
she is here

here in trances
she goes through, too,
we just are us, wherever

whatever us is,
we are, she means that such,
I am certain, i too
mean as much.

you pose proud
in gentle soft
candles

before my rigid
consonance and stringent need
flickering

gracefully sweet
you proffer
as I savor
deep

you flow
we merge
near rage
enthralling

together rage
my sweet,
my sweet.

the memory of
a movie
the first glance
at Mona Lisa
the first echo of  Marlene Dietrich
singing,
where one time
thrills were really in the back seat
of a sixty four Buick. my sedition
almost fictional taunted,
attracted me ultimately to another realm.
a sphere of passion to be
more than reality. A vision where I could
dream up what was needed in an instant.
a ******* of sight smell feel:
blinds pulled: a slave to imaginating.
conveniently fitting my insanity,
my ****** passion energy
alone with flickering Universal
glamour girls. I then fell for
Marilyn. Oh god it was on.

woke up late sweaty moist tired
hurried to get my clothes on brush my teeth
ran out without my phone
came back and fed the kids
the labrador and the three musty cats
grabbed my phone
ran out forgot my keys
came back and changed their water dishes
brushed my teeth again to insure
the beer breath was at least minty
went out again started the van
and decided to say **** it all
I have cash
tomorrow I will do the work
today I am gonna
lay around like a lazy cat or labrador and
if someone knocks on the door
I may pant but I ain't getting up

which why ways I turn I
thought of my mom and
our relationship,
saw me as her thirty years ago
I saw her become I
or me become her morphed
into what I disliked as a kid
was now me
the martyr
the saviour complex
the reasons I have stray cats dogs and people
depending on me,
and not one of them does anything for me, just asking
for more of
me.
Hi Mom!

parade then serenade me wordless foolish
brash then coyly fervently shush
me with that smile
fit me into the folds of silkish
flesh the  fuzz of peaches cushiness
brush me with eyelashes
feathered
long
like traces of
heaven flash
hold me with velvet
inside
arms of holding lastness
caution me with whispers scold
me with rushing cries

she is better than anything
she gave me unconditional love
infinity
the hopes she inspired me
to see the power to see
over the horizon
the courage to
stand tall
to reach it

Let us,
reverently grow imagery see
round the corner verbs
of history or herstory
bring through our straining
story equality for
black grey red white
see say
in colorless sighs
say no more anything
unless
it be color-blind.

fear,
   woe my depressions, woe are the scary thoughts in my
dark. Alive are the witches, the goblins the eyes
of Satan. I sleep warily, tossing,
visions between reality and fantasy, never
dropping.
Then and now I writhe
caught in thorn laden forests,
between trees that reach down shapes
of dark and clowns.
I sit directly within the growing
gloom and call them,
now to bring it on.
bring it on.

in theme now right disseminating lies
I know it all too well
it's one last score one last game
it is victory
the game
the goal the only thing
when conquering
is human toil
the waste and turmoil
the     consequence a factor in
but human suffering
holds no regard for
plans or deeds
just ultimate rewards
where human needs
are sought no more
that is the interfering thing
the flesh and blood
that goes hungry
so tell me all
you sudden
conquerors
has empathy no
path no more
has feeling lost
her last reward?

not one word, or all the princely sonnets, rhyme
nor may any dawn light my horizon
or moon glow glistening brighter, Mars
nor Venus, not any universe,contain
describe be nearer to perfect
than you, your glow
is all the worlds in essences of everything
ever made sweet, honey compared to you,
is bitter on my tongue, the moonlight
in your absence falls like darkness in my world
You, you are in my eyes, the only permanence,
the glistening diamond , the moon the sun the stars,
everything.

two
        hardlegs and two
                     babes
found
        raw eggs and ham
                       best
to add
      to frogs legs                    
                        yet
wound
       oddly up
*****
and hungry?

Naked and
          broke
               tweakin'

Seeking distraction from
        dissatisfaction I peek through
the cloven leaves aside the creek
        deep in the woods with my best
dearest friend, Chartreusse.

We climb trees together
          play with coyotes
run together pet the
          squirrels hold birds
in our gentle hands.

We eat on Nature's rewards
           fall in love easily
with each other
          the creek and the woods.
We move together.

Playfully we parlayed a creek
         the sun, and the woods
the wild dearness of hearts together
          woven in dreams.

I remember
           forever.
Chartreusse.

thought of a dream of a poem that barely spoke of
the wind, that wound down through the new leaves strong and young stemmed
securely fastened to the life blood limbs
and peacefully, momentary
soliticited
the workmanship of heavens wonders,
her legend young and strong
commentary psalms,
a reach where I reach reach
my limbs not far enough and hers
a realm reaching
taking my breath again.
My roots dissolving in hope.

seducing a retina all flesh like
and curvatures, how can eyes feel
soft pink or taste desire oh
they do
in the dark just feeling
how do eyes feel?
In the dark sensuousness
the tenderness
eyes have their ways
no mystery is all this no
Fantasy, too
eyes are the entry
to the mind's
godlike way

Such a dingy
     dusky night might be because
I seem ripe
     with a belly full of gas
can't help but belch
      and **** continuously
trying to write of love
       and stars.

So, please if you will excuse
         me, cause that was ripe and even
clouds my view, watery eyes i see
         bitterly smelling
anything but sweetness.


developing a relationship recently with Hoagland's
terse views of reality. please don't, he cries emphatically,
knowing the grasses and roots take on their own mortality,
he has believed in me for a long time, I nature
in quotation marks,
Lucky was real
to me in that word that verse
he described her wasted gray
and I shuddered
turned revulsed
but respecting the man.

The dusk  a cloudy
sty
blackened to blight
the rays
of days
before the fruit lost the limbs
barren- now shake-and
above the **** soaked grass
sanitary
past,
swaying in the memory
of glamour days,
some happily forget.