Fake news

Poetry is dead
The news went unannounced
the morning after
nothing significant happened
overnight, like the falling
of a star
none had ever heard
of.

All extermination outside
control is an infinitesimal iota
or inkling of discontentedness.

People are anxious and sad-
ly digressing.

These people around us,
called Friends,
dwell in a hive,
it is known to be
unsafe to stick one's arm
or neck out-
side.

Neither milk nor honey were effective
remedies
for the human condition
of bread and blood and jealousy and revenge.

Fact check: adding prescriptions won't remove you-
unless taken as instructed.

Poetry is often, by Anonymous.

All gossip is fast food.

There were reports of random rhymes and recently
too much illicit alliteration which went awry from
strict poetics, dismissed originality, refused mint-
ability and silently went about matching cases
where poetry became art and art made life
(more) poetic.

And yet it was always so,
documented.

Footnote: the value of 1,000 words has decreased significantly.
All photos have become 'Public Property'.

Religion has been resurrected for persecution.
Nothing is sacred.
Nobody is scared.
All coincidence is evidence of Magic.
And maybe
it was miraculous
and newsworthy,
Poetry was written
encoded into our genetics,
like the language
found on the tip of our tongues.

It feels good to roll your R's.



Painting by Francis Luis Mora, 'Morning News', c.1912 in San Diego Museum of Art in Public Domain.

Out of sight, out of mind

There was no homeless problem in our town.
The sprinklers had fixed that
one troubling grassy spot.

Sure there were a couple,
but it wasn't an epidemic.
The city wouldn't stand
(for it) (up to it)
a chance
against a larger economic problem.
Oh yes, the wealthier town next door,
they had never seen one.

Recent studies have shown
the middle parts, the guts,
are all without glories and good bacteria.
The classless class as a whole
is one deducted paycheck away
from being homeless.
Who knew it was that easy to give up
debt
or not have what we never needed?

At the shopping center on Tuesday,
a decently dressed man sat on an iron bench.
He did not smell bad. His eyes were not red.
His shoes were not worn thin.
He had no holes. He had no major injuries
that could be seen.
His hairs had all been trimmed
his frame hung
loosely folded
staring at nothing.
As if any more could happen by 10am,
he seemed spent,
and resigned
that the show must go on
without him.

He was chainsmoking
and every in between
cigarettes, he would stand up
for himself,
violently punching the air,
wordless and weaving punches
with his whole body
at invisible villains.
He had money for cigarettes.

The shopping center security had been called
by the elderly woman in the bakery
who only drank one cup of coffee
and complained
about its lack of strength
every day.
The restaurant manager
next door
kept his head down
not saying a word
until his meds kicked in,
until he had a stiff drink.

It was crazy, they all said,
watching the man,
boxing the air.
Clearly,
he does not care what they think,
it was lunatic
the way one could live
like that,
angry at nothing.


Painting by László Mednyánszky [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.