Abrupt

For awhile we could live / where the air blew rumors /
of trash barges up the Hudson / and helicopters pounded against the dome …

Dr. Phil was angry today. / We talked about my feelings /
which I thought he wanted to hear. / But the man kept shouting at me …

The world blinks. / The world blinks
and it is awake, / awake in the dark …

[An Opera in 3 Parts at 4AM]

The poem I will write
Will blow your fuckin’ mind …

“Watch,” he said, and he was digging …

“Jocks only think about sports, nerds only think about sex.” — Revenge of the Nerds

communist sperm storm consommé-ting
soup rite seed time action …

Argyle socks, cozy stoned cats, / lick the ankles of my beloved.
Running through the Texas night …

(with apologies to Joyce Kilmer)

[Sequel to "Fire Sale in Saṃsāra"]

[How I experience shopping.]

[An A-B-C Poetry Challenge, a la OWLcrkbrg on thisisby.us]

The smoke from your sacrifice / Galls Heaven’s nose
Black fire grinds / Into sky …

Nobody knows / At night my eyes shoot fire;
Padded cats slink skeptic / Past this frenzy …

[What the quiet might be like.]

[Written for the Pentalogue Poetry challenge on thisisby.us.]

[Fractal haiku]

In Mexico a baby’s crying, crying,
In Calcutta, the cattle step and groan. …

What was rich and alive will become flat.
What was only jelly shall stand and walk. …

I do battle with the ego / It parries every thrust
Absorbing all my anger / In orange plumes of rust …

Ash is in the air …

Great green stalk of life
Kindly deigns to coexist
With us pink humans

Now begins the slide / Into darkness …

Part the leaves a little / Grasp the hanging pod …

I close my eyes against the flood / but have no eyes to close. …

Ignore the dreams, / they are confusion:
the devils’ chorus, / urging change. …

I was your guest / it was your wine
where’d you go? …

Pink blush of the happy young bride,
Gone in a distant ship’s whistle …

microscopic multiplying, / great shapes nudging towards becoming …

darkout / and moon scrape the sky …

i don’t believe that anything’s impossible

The sound of metal on metal.
The sound of metal on bone. …

oh, when we first met
you told me that the desert would reclaim us …

Now the sun burns the waters / clears the shredded sky
and peels back the skin / of the exposed …

Eyes gleam in darkness want to kill us
Pierce our air-conditioned haze / Our false bubble …

yes i remember the place / and the taste of your throat
down the tracks through a hole in the fence …

Your wars drag rust across the planet,
leave stains of oil not erased by rain …

Hold me in emulsion / Freeze my nights gone by
Give me back one moment / (He whines before the knife)

[A limerick]

[from a conversation with xrew]

The Crone whispers in confusion
Vocoded incantations warping matter into mind …

i threw roots down on your rocks
blown where no seed could go …

into an abyss
hissing with broods of unhinged / regret …

In the sandstorm our metal tempers,
while the flesh decides and steels / itself for rage …

This photo has an overlay / In the dimension of flow …

the incandescent night / is not peaceful …

Out! Out of work –
The workers leave their folds …

[Song of the Naughty Little Mermaid]

it begins angry / a ghost
gold around the edges …

In the factory / wafers gleam in their cages,
green like the carapace of beetles …

Cake-fed impotence / Snores, dreams in gold
Wakes, coughs, shivers and farts …

quite possibly / one could pass through life
unscathed by the blade of confusion …

across the deserts of the floor / up the walls, down the hall …

Garlic bread on a board
Old wood counters, etched with cuts …

meet me in the stochastic light
lasering through shepherds on that hill

Open wide / Say “Aahh”
Say “Ow!” / Say “Oooh!” …

soap / softens in / the corner
rust and wood / water falls / cellar door …

untie the knots that bind you
upend the changers’ scales …

diligent segmented process
gliding across / turning …

i love you,
like dried blood cakes a nostril …

joy is dead / and the long goddamn centuries
stretch out before me / plastic / uncaring …

the impulse to glory is hot / i know, i know, i know,
cause nothing else tells me to grow …

the wise man / always keeps a jar of antiseptic
and cotton swabs / and forceps / and a good sharp blade …

HAIR-CAKED SCABS
FLIES SIP TEARS …

a certain imbalance / to my smile / was the alert …

the room where i grew up
had bold child-color curtains …

I ride with the children of Judah
on subway cars, / past fish markets …

a breeze cools me / sun-blind before
a sparkling fountain / luster of heavy power …

awake on the street / my fellow dust
the lines of Eden sag from overuse …

Elysian grove, pink petals bright,
With twisted wood, and dome of light …

You are the keystone and the axis
pole of salt becoming word …

Hominized / Wild fragments in communion
Harmonized …

It is easy, / in the season of renewal,
to take a greening twig for a sign …

Some are silver, some are cursed
Some do better; some do worse …

Wood darkens into night
shapes of houses, soft …

FORGET / TING APPLES SUCK SKINNY
DOWN-AGES / OUT / HANDED NODE …

snake not striking
umbilicus / amber linkage …

Salt shore, / where the seaweed grows,
and the tide kneads life / slow …

Bushman on the savanna / shaking a rock at the sky
Words like desperate fingers, dying / fumble towards him …

This bird’s grating squawk
predates the rusting of springs …

what words, in turtle shells
arranged / like ruined obelisks …

Let me be Human.
Give me the vision to proceed …

Old splashed shadows,
Feathers, on asphalt, matted …

I left myself on the beach,
with towels and shoes, a book, lemonade …

Can I really claim this mind? / This matted den
I call it mine. / But why? …

Thanks to the Mother
For her sweet red gift …

My grid / Extends to the seam
Between land and sky …

You tunnel holes in the night
Write songs for excuses …

Agonizing angel / Beautiful girl
You were sent to torture us all …

In time they’ll come with hammers
And board up all the doors …

Stolen moments / You failed to control.
Torn back by partisans of time …