Goldenlocks

I stumbled upon a short 

story, written

as if it were a poem-

Lines broken like cracks in the side-

walk that one steps

Over

Its title did not evoke its

gait and I hazard to observe-

if it walks like a big duck

it could be a small goose

and then

what do profiles 

Reveal or musings in marginalia...

What makes a poem,

a place, a sense of something familiar

almost like thoughts

Severed

So many stories

follow a straight line

and then

I 

turned a corner

saw a different path

without backstory and confident

Nobody

was following me

(anymore)

and then

it was done. 

Artwork by Virginia Frances Sterret, 'Old French Fairy Tales 0077 in Public domain in US, via Wikimedia Commons.

The mouth heals fast

Tongue is too fat
to speak-
not because I bit it,
when I should have
known thy musclar
self-well-enough-
when I should have
known well enough
to shut up.
It is still swelling-
pride protrudes itself,
a warning-

NEVER
put that in a poem.

And Do Not Step on the grass
while seeds sit on top, germinating
like a poem. Too much
disruption
dislodges
any potential root
formation.

It is best not to flex with words
or assign metaphor more meaning
than conceivable
or suffer the stretch.

Here the open gash pushes
the inside out-
hypersensitive to air, this is where
salt heals,
and the best solution
showed its work,
long-hand,
ones carried
over the columned
poem.


Painting by Jules Breton [Public domain], 'The wounded Seagull' 1878 via Wikimedia Commons.

A murmuration of bodies

It is not all about the long (form) poem,
or the short (form) poem that

captivates the reader to go on,
but form, oh form! It must be solid-set-and square-

there it is identifiable in space,
man-woman-yin-yang,
it must lie there

flat and
come around the full circle of Oh, I see,

and be intriguing, as eyes tend to be drawn
to bare bellies showing

the sex

it becomes impossible to look away, rude
to rend attention from the white scene that unfolds
sheets,

we tend to go too far in our search for likeness

in passing, we come upon the sight of a crash-
rollover and rubbernecking, our prying eyes seek
identification (relationship) of bodies,
make and model,
fault and genre
or scheme
or theme
(the way we drive).

The way
we seek familiarity in reflective surfaces projected
outward from flat atoms that cling together making a solid
point

reflective and with water
like cement, belly flops
that sting and leave a body red
scared us straight.

I see me

Cadence reminded the reader that the
human body and its homeo-static form,
feels it is not wise to slip into
a semi-permeability-stage-phase-
that would be weakness,
or prose

in words of erosion which sink quite naturally,
predictably.
Under pressure diamonds are made
by poets sitting on ideas
awaiting the train of thought,
engineering the license to use lines
at unsafe speeds

with glaring lights, blaring horn

blowing by

en route thru

to

the scene.

                   The limp body becomes
                                                     ejected
                   and stains the concrete
                   longer than rubber-
streaks.

Anybody can learn to drive
a point
Home
(some are more [w]reckless than others)
and the point Being
only the poet knows where they are going (if they do)
it doesn't help.
                       Detours and congestion both seem inevitable.
There is no way around
the good poem.

It just lies
there
(as in Found)
or flies away
on an impulse, taking the words with him wherever he goes,
traveling light
never arrives.





Image of starlings in flight at sunset taken February 2006, By Tommy Hansen.B.A.C. at da.wikipedia [Public domain], from Wikimedia Commons.

Currency calculator

I worry when we need milk 

and wonder where the daily bread will come from.

Too many survive famine. 

Child support is over a week late. 
The Department holds the money it collects from others,
on behalf of others, extra days, 

in an interest-bearing account.
The Department makes more money
that way, it adds up in
arrears and years that cannot be spent
growing and splitting heirs.

The college decisions are coming in. 

We all wonder where this will take us. 

We need to pick a meal plan. She will not starve,
she hopes-
they better have good coffee. 

While driving to take the truck in for an unknown repair, 

the sky held up its coolest winter blue,
the air was crisp like minted dollars,

and I could not take my eyes off the sky
while riding home.

It said everything.

And utterly cloudless,
when I spy a shuttlecock of white, like a flash, in contrast to the blues,

I watched this meteoric figure against the broad daylight
falling, fading, falling, 
and finally, disappearing into the sky,
it all sunk in.

Like small talk, no granular attention is paid.
Burned up. I am broke anyway. 

Just like today. This week, I am weaker
than gravity.

Lighter with empty pockets and incinerating
into nothing,
but solid air pumping in and out of the chest

like fire and ice,
all the elements are there and it is enough 

for a poem. 

Photo credit By Clivelindsay at English Wikipedia, 'Comet McNaught with moon setting over the sea' [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Clean sheets

The poem stared back
at the two pleading eyes

saying nothing
about white or black

nor was any indication given
as to where a poet

should set up thoughts
for the night

with rigging and taut lines
for a reader to traverse across

in high winds
and find their own

-balance-

if the stanza is strong enough
to support mass tourism

and photography.

If you look long enough
or blur your eyes

an Image develops,
what comes through

was over-exposed, covered
with a starch of pareidolia

it was still safe enough
to be considered
shelter.






Painting by Désiré François Laugée [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

X-plosion(s)

This is not what I intended to say.
Nor is this how I meant to convey this multi-
layered
meaning-making
sense of sense.
I set out, propositioned with pen in hand,
I aimed the ink at the receptive white page
to say this
one thing
and the damn poem veers left, starts
skidding out of control,
hits something solid,
rolls over
Itself
and only comes to an abrupt semi stop-
where interia is held in
mid-air,
over their heads,
emits an ominous scent,
and makes men
flee for fear of losing
oneself

A paltry passenger without my own;
controls, levers, pedals, wheels, dials, gauges,
buttons to push,
signs or signals to lead and follow,
I am
Left with this
loss of direction
I resign to not fight the fear
of dead ends.
Scribbling and scrambling
I get out while I can.


Image credit By Anonymous [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Trees before forest

Long ago,

I relished, savoring that golden hour

In which people so often flock to the sea

Eyes set on the dipping radiant sun

And me now

Caught completely off-guard, unarmed,

By the bright gold glint reflecting upon

The beige page I cradle,

This glare that makes me lose

Place, interest, grip

in, on, or about anything

but this propositioning, this pen

and a poem

waiting for me

to see it there.


Painting by Tom Thomson [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

How the paper crumbles

Tiny tufts of binder paper speckle the ground like bread

crumbs leading to the bulging trash bin.

A blotched tattoo on the outside of the right pinkie,

signal lines filled in and out, a writers stamp.

That far away look is not a place others may go.

Declawed and domesticated, the body observes

and stalks the other.

Taking it all in scraps left over much too much,

nauseated, not needing much more

than nibbles found inside spiral ring cages, 

scratches to self, all

half-fulfilled by my stunted scepter.

Thinking there was more than enough time

to put the ending first, to do the editing in trim tufts,

to say this is my home, this is lace, this belongs

and this is sewn to hold more

meaning, 

to say here is a poem

and poof, it is flown away.


Image By Anonymous [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Conversion: Haiku(s) 3

To start to learn a

Poem, beginning in love

Ends inside physics.

To try to poem

Muse in music but listen

Particulate-ly.

Make something better

Hang words, draw self, a stick man

The fire needs you.

Image: Edward Steichen, 1921 [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.
Description from wiki: "Steichen was on holiday in Venice in 1921 at the same time as the dancer Isadora Duncan who was on her way to Greece with her dance troupe. With the promise that Steichen would be able to make motion pictures of her dancing on the Acropolis, Isadora persuaded him to accompany her. While she managed to pose for a few photographs at the Parthenon, it was with her pupil and adopted daughter Thérèse that Steichen produced this startling and remarkable image: She was a living reincarnation of a Greek nymph. Once, while photographing the Parthenon, I lost sight of her, but I could hear her. When I asked where she was, she raised her arms in answer. I swung the camera around and photographed her arms against the background of the Erechtheum. And then we went out to a part of the Acropolis behind the Parthenon, and she posed on a rock, against the sky with her Greek garments. The wind pressed the garments tight to her body, and the ends were left flapping and fluttering. They actually crackled. This gave the effect of fire -- 'Wind Fire' (Steichen, A Life in Photography, np)"

The Poet (Haiku)

Why do you poem?

An attempt to word wisely

while I understand.

Image by James Sant [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons (Enigma).