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Tag Archives: poetry

a shoebox contains what was on the dining room table in a year-plus accumulation

not the bottle caps nor burrito wrappers nor anything else that would be considered “trash”

rather the shoebox contains what might be a regrettable loss if discarded

there are many business cards with appointment reminders and receipts and addresses of good friends and incomplete poems and illustrations on index cards

and the owner of the dining room table, the sole resident of the apartment, applauds this baby step towards a sane conductance of his daily life

but knows he has merely checked in at base camp for a climb of mount kilimanjaro

but it’s something

Awe Inspired Fun

As divers from the sky fall to the earth

With flying-squirrel tech and Plan B chutes

Engaged is one on guessing her net worth

Involved’s the other, flexing lats and glutes.

Now cliffsides peel away and greenswards beckon

Santana riffs and Dylan lyrics meld

Puréed epiphanies lend sense to reckon

Intrinsic navigation of the veld.

Released by ripcord pulls, the chutes unfurl

Engendering the braking of the falls;

Delivering safe-passaged boy and girl,

For yet another ride unbound by walls.

Umbrellas, canopies and awns are things

Now alchemised to take the form of Wings.

in these climatically incendiary times

and in this dutch oven we call the valley of the sun

the weather guy on kjzz referred to the temperature range for the next few days as “in the one-teens”

meaning between 113 and 119 degrees fahrenheit
.

the jackass in the white house talks of buying “or annexing” greenland

were i a conspiracy theorist i would say that his climate change denial plus his collusion with the petrochemical predators in fucking up the environment were part of his sinister plan to make greenland one of the only inhabitable places on earth

so that with “annexation” (rape with violence) he would consummate the biggest real estate deal of all time

while simultaneously extending the trail of tears into the 21st century and into the arctic circle

since approximately 89% of greenland’s population is indigenous greenlandic inuit

.

but i am not a conspiracy theorist

drop a syllable and i become a piracy theorist

and my theory, backed by circumstantial evidence of the long history of theft and fraud and pillage perpetrated throughout his career

is that donald trump is a pirate of the worst sort

of the same ilk as spiro t. agnew and Bluebeard

and he’s given this country a jolly rogering since day 1 of term 1

and should be made not to walk the plank

but to walk a mile at high noon here in phoenix

wearing speedos and flipflops

with the temperature in the one-teens

some kisses were perfunctory

and merely punched a ticket

whilst others were spelunktory

bilingual and wicked

but in between were sacred blossoms

from orchid girl to duchess

as just as sheer as gossamer gossams

electrifying touches

.

her holiness of honeyed voice

still calls her now and then

she lives alone by fate and choice

but likes to chat of when

last century they had a time

and as she reminisces

a mountain goat resumes her climb

enfueled by sacred kisses

grandmother’s chanel number five

bludgeoned her grandson’s nose

and he blinked back tears when he hugged her

.

sixty years later

the grandson weeps for his grandmother

as more pieces of the puzzle of her click into place

.

it has become obvious

that as a tri-delt alumna she had desperately needed

to feel as though she were still in the game

a friendly looming chatterbox held court with his dark friend

in the valley of the sunshine where the shadows bring relief

and the dark beplumed nonlady wished the yakyakyak would end

but she sat in silent dignity

endured the long debrief

at long last the non-yak yakker asked her what she made of it

and she cocked her head in thought and looked her friend up in the eye

and she shrugged; allowed a birdbrain like her didn’t give a whit

she just wished for unlocked wings and open windows for to fly

and her friend reared up and clacked his beak but grinned and said exactly

and you know that’s what i’ve thought for years and added good for you

and his friend beak-smiled at all the nonsense

said matter-of-factly

and kept to herself the evidence her pal’s a birdbrain too

the tomato slicer clocks out heads home takes a nap/awakens mid-afternoon and it still being too hot to walk outside/takes a look at movie listings on amazon prime

he sees a jack reacher title/and clicks on it to find to his dismay that it is not the new guy/but a miscast tom cruise instead/but it has some good improbable action/but is plagued by commercials/so he exits playing about 45 minutes in

clicks on the “continue playing” button for the good the bad and the ugly/which he’d watched a chunk of in its greasepainted glory a week ago/with clint eastwood and lee van cleef and eli wallach as the arch archetypes

the tomato slicer noted with astonishment that this spaghetti western miraculously left a taste of spaghetti in his mouth

making him hungry so he took a convenience store burrito from the fridge and reviewed the microwave instructions and followed them

and as the burrito was cooling saw in the amazon prime listings thunderbolt and lightfoot/with clint eastwood and a really young jeff bridges and george kennedy

the delighted tomato slicer fired it up/he’d missed this film in the 70s but always wanted to see it

and it tasted like sawdust but in a good way/and smelt of the linseed oil the tomato slicer used/when he was briefly an oil painter in the mid 70s

oddly though no trace of turpentine was in the scent

there is no accounting for taste, i suppose the tomato slicer mused as he fired up bad boys clint and jeff again

and as he ate and watched/he couldn’t help misting up/thinking about what time had done for and to eastwood and bridges

plus poor george kennedy had died ten days after his 91st birthday more than eight years ago

but the movie being nice and raw and weird soon banished such mawkish thoughts

yet the tomato slicer having finished the burrito/now daydreams of amidnight snack of a tomato-and-mayonnaise sandwich on extra-sour san francisco sourdough bread

and a big glass of cold cold milk

and another movie

Bishop Confers with Rook

Hey Rook, said the Bishop, the Queen’s Knight has his eye on me

I am threatened

How about defending me?

.

Can’t, said the Rook

You may well go down in a move or two

But it will be for the greater good

.

I don’t want to die! cried the Bishop

.

Cmon, Holy Father

You guys are born to be sacrificed

They might even make a saint out of you

.

You heartless pile of bricks! the Bishop sniped

You have never given me so much as the time of day

.

Not true, said the Rook

I pray for you every move

That you do the right thing

Now go to King’s Bishop Six

And we will win

.

Reluctantly the Bishop did as told

And the enemy Knight ran him through

And four moves later the Enemy was checkmated

According to the Maker’s plan

.

The Bishop sighed as he was put away

Another game another lancing of the heart

But every piece gets put away sooner or later

And, miraculously,

Each new game starts with Resurrection

And Re-Deployment