Moving her lips

Distracted by a flicker, brutishly I burrowed

under the thickset arboreal pathway, forward through,

not needing a Virgil

Whereby, I found myself subdued and lowered

my angel body, knelt upon the gathering scrag,

with knees upon the well curb, my two soles

Watching my back, I feel the frosty shade

Safer now, I may close my shamed eyes

And I know why others have come too.

I reach right into my hip pocket,

making a tiny discomfit chime,

half-expecting the birds to flap.

I take out the three pennies

used for the i-Ching,

fingering the Nineteen eighty-four first,

it sits in the color of old adobe

streaked in rain grime.

I toss it into the blackness that is not

Empty nor dry

and I wait, waiting, listening, breathing,

hearing nothing...

The next one picks up the red in the sun and

glows facing its prospect of good conduct-

Two thousand and one

sided History, the honest man does not smile

I let it go as impersonal,

It falls quickly

I lean in

this time

and I don’t hear it hit

gulping back it was swallowed hole.

I never wished.

The last one left, I save for a

second thought, more

about splashless wishes

for Change.


Painting by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

“Here”

Raise my hand-Why

would I point to myself

up high?

That is an outdoor activity-

cloud seeding and closing in on where

parchment persists.

Not spoken to, only @

A step back, none needed

knowing any more than No.

Tell me again what Confucius said-

To air is human.


Painting By Paul Louis Martin des Amoignes (1858–1925) (Bonhams) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Origination

American?  Am i canned? Is that what the label reads? You tell me-

This house has tile floors, no plush carpeting -that is the cold hard truth.

I cannot drink soda or alcohol.

My body craves salmon and vegetables;

fruit in the summer, cabbage in the winter.

Potatoes are best not fried.

I don’t have extra fat, or change, or time, or

extra-ordinary investments in status.

I do not own a pet, but a certain grey cat thinks he owns me.

I have been blessed with no religion.

I like water. I am not married. I love the children 

I was fortunate enough to support-unconditionally.

I do not chit-chat or pretend, I do not have a group of Best (Fake) Friends.

I don’t make predictions or apple pie very well, neither of which are really true.

Celebrity is maniacal and silly, 

the practice of politics are dumb diversion tricks, 

making bunnies is easy, that is not magic.

I use mirrors for safety. There is  a dusty one over my 

bedroom vanity. I do not like to make-up my face(s),

although costumes can be fun at a party. 

I do not like parties or gambling.

I am gainfully not an employee,

I make no money and have more than I need. 

Luxury is not the same 'Thing' to me, it is not a tangibility.

Slang, yeah, I find myself speaking in some art, not knowing what it means,

it sounds like beauty and looks Interesting or foreign.

I am not shrinking, I am still growing. I am not afraid of death.

I am just passing through. 

Quietly as can be...

Will I pass port?


Image credit John James Audubon [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

When (Hi-Q) Haiku

Is it Now? It is

Not anymore, just checking

It could be any time…




Painting (oil on board) by William Etty (1841) in [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Aromatic Aura

How fast does smell travel?

Why must we try to identify the source?

What if----like light---

the colors- have not blossomed

yet in us?

The smells  seem too obscure to identify individually,

as in comparing puce or magenta and tastes of rust.

We take in the deep red rose delightfully-

We pull the yellow little weeds sourly-

Sort of sorting…

Is there a clear line where the scent drops off?

As in event horizon,

Sort of, Danny D. would offer.

And scatter or spray,

It works the same way

At the atomic level

What does it Do?

Save face.

The rock has not the same

fears.

Making sense of it,

We had to take it all in-

side.

There was no place safe

to hide from the smell

we all know too well

already.


Painting By Francisco Iturrino (Santander, Spain, 1864 - Cagnes-sur-Mer, France, 1924) Born in Santander, Spain. Dead in Cagnes-sur-Mer, France. Details of artist on Google Art Project [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Engine trouble

The man was not just skinny but scraggly.

His mother kept telling him to get a job. He still listened to his mother.

He worked. He worked in an auto-shop learning lubes and fine-tuning-

Until they stopped making them

like they used to.

His father used to 

drink alcohol like a liquor store sprinter. Naturally, he got thirsty too, and drank

and stank the same as his father, his mother would say every day.

Grease or oil, bitter battery acid or brake fluid and gin, 

and all over again, the evolved monkey man

with the sooty stained hands that exclude him from white paper work, shows silver

linings along his brow.

Every now and then he picks up a brush, a ladder, a little girl and moves just a stroke away

from happiness in his days. His mother said she prays for him.

He should have picked up a shovel or an ice pick, manners or a real lady,

but is too weak to make them work

for him.

He falls into a five year hole. 

He comes out in smooth pieces, 

none fit tight and his well-being wont hold water, slipping on surfaces,

He is sees light

And knows he is being saved for another life, another 

day to die, his mother said ladies first when he listened.

The old lady in a broken down car, pulled over on the roadside waves for help, 

it is all white and frozen, steam surrounds her.

The mechanic stops

himself for a moment 

before moving on, 

simply too skinny to spare anything-

a white canvas, waiting for him to return 

the favor.



Painting by Jacob Jordaens, The Satyr and the peasants (1620) in [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.