Gravity ~ Sunday, March 31, 2024

Into each moment
nothing but a pendulum
to swing back and forth
old insults foment

each second builds with a click
a grave momentum
changes poles from north
holding the course to the south

magic with a flick
of the wrist, to place
mushrooms in a damp forest
each cap as to trace
nerves to a war chest
tracked slowly by an old sleuth

Greek Baklava with Honey and Pistachios ~ Sunday, March 31, 2024

To weep for the dead
overwrought Grecian mother

weathering the storm
each day, enough said
each day, nothing gets better
pull your hair, cover

for when the bees swarm
ordinary thoughts arise
replace her sweater

the daughter who died
heavy to watch your burden
each day honey cried

death shares no pardon
each day, afresh you despise
as April showers
deal lily flowers

The Great White Heron ~ Monday, March 25, 2024

Stories cut snippets
trial runs across plucked harp strings
organ pipes blow notes
recall the puppets
informed as marionettes
emboldened with springs
sails hoisted on boats

cast black flags in the sunshine
until white egrets
triggered by a boy

spread their giant wings to fly
noises from a toy
impart the blue sky
presents full of pickle brine
present dots in oil
enjoy vinegar
taste sweetness with sour, so far
soaring in their toil

Pellucid Babble ~ Sunday, March 24, 2024

Incoherent speech
necessary to point out
called psycho babble
order out of reach
how to help Mumble Bunny
each sound from a spout
reads tea leaves, Scrabble
entitles privileged blank tiles
not to sound funny
though words make no sense

spit it out, Chatter Sparrow
pitch the ball, Mike Pence
evades the wheel barrow
enters a hideout, then files
charges against Trump
humble, not a bump

Artificial ~ Friday, March 22, 2024

My favorite book
you are fiction with your lies

forget your childhood
as I take a look
vision fails over the years
orange, a towel dries
read you as the wood
in a forest, all the trees
their pulp feed our fears
eggs hard-boiled with crime

butcher block cuts of sirloin beef
orders soup, a dime
outcrops on a reef
killing coral with the breeze

L'Imperturbable ~ Thursday, March 21, 2024

Let sleeping dogs lie
Interference forms a wave
made under control
partly by the die
eminently cast each time
royalty must save
tranquil on a knoll
undisturbed dogs calm, sedate
reason solves the crime
by breaking the law
as rules place lines to follow
boundaries tooth and claw
lonesome howls, hollow
empty stomachs, wolves berate

Blasphemy ~ Sunday, March 17, 2024

In the final years of Tiberius
not one but four of us got together

to write a cautionary tale, fiction
honestly based on the life of Gaius
everyone believes our character real

forget the fact he was lashed by leather
in separate works based on our diction
now this madman proved well a criminal
as represented by two thieves we feel
left the reader without doubt what went wrong

yet people saw a man in what we wrote
everyone is entitled but the throng
as decades past became one being smote
remotely by charm, our work done, final
sealed and yet open again and again

of course, to interpretation, they read
for centuries, our canonical books.

Take a hike all the way up Binn Ghulbain
if somehow we transcend time with our lies
burn us at the stake for treason instead
every writer wonders how their work looks
relative to others over the years
if we won the lottery, then our spies
under pseudonyms took our work to heart
single-handedly, we laughed at empire

no one knew we had no faith in our art
or that our books would not end up on fire
thank God, so to speak, Jesus, we shed tears.

Exegi monumentum ~ Sunday, March 17, 2024

As I am to blame
simply as such since my birth

I enter the light

as from darkness, shame
mother, I exit your womb

to seek out my worth
of value, despite

becoming accountable
lest a marble tomb
as a monument
makes me seem for a moment
end redoubtable

---

Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)

8 December 65 BC – 27 November 8 BC

exegi monumentum aere perennius
regalique situ pyramidum altius,
quod non imber edax, non Aquilo inpotens
possit diruere…
(Odes III: XXX, lines 1-4, published 23BC)

---

А.С. Пушкин

Exegi monumentum

Я памятник себе воздвиг нерукотворный

---

What's in a name? ~ Sunday, March 17, 2024

Rui screwy rich and chewy never
understood defense mechanisms make
immature children rhyme when confronted

singularly by otherness, whether
cause for concern is based on differences
resolved by negating facts for the sake
each child finds in friendship, disappointed
with the strange boy from another country
yet to form cliques to defend the senses

rich with imagination, what is strange
is not what children know but adults see
coloring and othering to derange
how children perceive possibility

as a danger to resources, hungry
now to learn something new outside the no
decisions to control the world at large

challenges to status quo, the normal
however mundane and routine, to grow
each day and watch forces infiltrate sight
whether or not such acts are meant to barge
yet unintentionally into shall

night no longer be dark, our feet on land
ever floating towards the sky, sunlight
vulnerable children must be aware
ever cautious and vigilant of where
reason grinds principles into fine sand

Easy on the Eyes ~ Saturday, March 16, 2024

Indulge as if, as if you looked like her
the model on the television screen
but you don't, or maybe by chance you do
what can I say, maybe you look like Cher
and maybe I look like Brad Pitt, a joke
I look like Harry Styles without the sheen
of course, you scoff, wishful thinking but you
know what it's like not to afford the bling
the model herself can't afford, she's broke
in a hole in New York City, welcome
to Paris, to Praha, to Budapest
perhaps both you and I are just too dumb
not lacking in accomplishment but lest
I wake my demons her rings I can't swing

On the Sly ~ Wednesday, March 13, 2024

After the first hit
from that date, I could forget
there was no way out
even just to sit
recognize the need to breathe

transcend all regrets
how to escape, shout
each morning like a rooster

feel under the sleeves
if to run away
resolves nothing, to stay home
say less, as they say
this road leads to Rome

how inside, I must not stir
in high school, I broke
their trust as I toke

forgotten days, high on weed
remember the drugs
only getting stoned
made me see myself, the need

to run away, twice
how the lack of hugs
alcoholism deboned
that family, I wish

drunk, what must suffice
alcoholism, I scream
to the rooftops, now
each night when I dream

I must tip the sacred cow

count myself a fish
of course, I can swim
under the surface, the sea
limited by sound
despite being slim

for I could never gain weight
or drink enough tea
rest, I now have found
gives me energy later
each day, the fader
tracks height, each hand, sleight

Shaved Head ~ Wednesday, March 13, 2024

About face I turn
between desire and regret
orders I observe
under duress, burn
the whole goddamned complex down

face left, face right, bet
as I learn to serve
crass casualty faces blame
each moment, I drown

I find myself caught

troubled from birth, from the start
until the onslaught
reason makes me dart
not from bullets but from shame

Photons ~ Wednesday, March 13, 2024

Others sleep, I keep
vigil over the body
each of us knows why
recent events, deep

dark wells, empty of water,
empty samādhi
cut out of the sky
as clouds in the desert sun
drown my dead daughter
empty, shallow pool
stiff corpse atop a table

underneath her school
not like a fable
to teach or learn a lesson
in this world, I seek
language as a clue

despite how the truth must hide
each note in a shoe
as I lose all pride
tag each lobster caught as weak
how pain cannot speak

Wayward ~ Wednesday, March 13, 2024

Conditions since birth,
over decades until death,
not only make me
deem myself not worth
inclusion within a team,
trusting not each breath;
in a dream, I see
only the facts beyond lies;
no way to redeem
selfhood from others;

since my original face
is like my brothers,
not lost to disgrace;
conditions are a disguise,
each breath is a choice

beyond reflection
in a mirror without stain;
rest in detection
to gain not obtain
honesty, lost in this voice.

Papa Kitty ~ Saturday, March 9, 2024

One night, while running, I saw a black cat
not necessarily crossing my path
except, like a child, seeking attention

night after night, I run mile after mile
in training for the marathon, to run
gives me the self-esteem to face each day
however tough it gets to get ahead
to keep my head above water and swim

while others drown in drugs and self-neglect
however much I care or want to help
in fact, I cannot even help myself
let alone a city in desperate need
even if I could open the flood gates

running gives me a chance to clear my head
under duress, I crack like a brown egg
now why didn't I say like a white egg
not that it matters, what's on the inside
informs us of nutritional value
not the shell on the outside of the egg
given this analogy seems puerile

I face each day by feeding that black cat

seen while running along the Lakefront Trail
and another tabby cat whom I saw
whining beneath a car as I walked past

as I stopped to check in to ask for help

but, of course, they both willingly obliged
little did they know they'd be indoor cats
attended to as if they were my kids
challenged to procreate, I failed in life
kiss the world goodbye, I love my two cats

case closed, so to speak, I ask for nothing
ask maybe for your time and attention
to listen to my thoughts on life and love

Gedankenexperiment ~ Thursday, March 7, 2024

As for the one who
snores, what does she get, Johnny?

For consolation
obscenities heard
recently, at a rally

take the politics
hate, anger and greed
empty of productive work

objections aside
nothing in a box
exists or does not exist

without a quick peek
how a cat survives
obeys no consequences

Pride Flags ~ Tuesday, March 5, 2024

On June 28, 1969, in Greenwich Village,
no one thought about a baby being born in Bombay, India.

Just in time to hear the police enter the bar in New York City
until a riot took place at the Stonewall Inn on Christopher Street;
no one thought a lick about the birth of a boy so, so far away,
each day an event of historic proportion occurs, nothing stops.

Tides splash breakwater but people's lives continue as unaffected,
wait until the rise of the oceans from glaciers, only time will tell
empty cabarets after hours that its patrons having left their tips
need to go elsewhere, to go eat breakfast, steak and eggs, or to go to bed,
to open closed doors behind which lives left hidden and secret blossom,
yet, each new challenge shines a light on character and integrity.

Each day, a child grows and learns how to act mature, older, an adult
if they are challenged, it may take longer to grow into adulthood
given conditions within each family, a child may mature too fast
how they may become stunted by learned behaviors within their circle
to discern the truth, the difference between the good and what is harmful.

Nothing in the year, Nineteen Hundred Sixty-nine was more eventful
in terms of effects, than the NASA moon landing, a thing of beauty
not even a bar meant for gay and lesbian clientele, raided
each time by police for a quota, a shakedown, but a rebellion
transforms a nation and the whole global culture over fifty years
each time two men kiss in public or two women show each other love
each day, a child grows aware of all forms of love, they become mature
not even Aldrin, Armstrong and Collins could make children awaken.

How love is different than an adventure, a risk by three astronauts
under conditions where accuracy matters, a mistake, fatal
nothing like a war to remind people of death, how fast life is lost
driven by the need to protect and serve the rights of foreign people
read all of the names of soldiers who died abroad in South East Asia
each day, learn ten names, in thirteen years, statistics for casualties
dead from combat keeps the living busy learning about young soldiers.

Say their names, is left for 9/11, and yes, other sad events
in a world where war is constantly somewhere else, ideology
xenophobia, and defense mechanisms inflames eyes with fear
the anger and greed of military defense against the red scare
yet now, the Cold War sounds like the Hundred Years' War, just an old entry

not just 69, but the extent of the war, a child never knows
in the war zone, yes, elsewhere in suburbia, blessed with ignorance
not until their dad, their mom, brother or sister don't return back home
enough is enough, just like children, adults act, to get attention

if, as the reader, the desire to disagree, to argue a side
no more than a point, no cure for cancer or hate, survive, overcome

Greenwich, the Village, take the boy to Kew Gardens, only for two years
return to Bombay, to Goa, to India, never in his life
even his family extended settled down in Nairobi, Kenya
everywhere he goes, a stranger as othering fills the status quo
nowhere feels like home, childhood in California, the waves, beach and sand
welcome to sunshine and Eastern mysticism, Surf City, the pier
into the ocean fell time after time in storms, in high school, the boy
challenged decency, wrote an indecent story, a writing sample
how they took offense, tried to expel him from school, teach him a lesson

Visions of sorrow, of decay and suffering, how the world lacks sense
if he could live life all over again and start afresh, a clean slate
leave that to others, too many problems to solve, too much to clean up
let sleeping dogs lie, after so many mistakes and fifty long years
as to change the past becomes just speculation, forgive and move on
give people their due, honor the good, learn the truth, find in all, beauty
each day, a baby is born somewhere in the world as events happen

Venture Capital ~ Sunday, March 3, 2024

When I was a child
how easy it was to meet
everyone, be friends
not that I was wild

I was not feral but kind

would that I could greet
as many as ends
such in themselves, and not means

as to seek in mind

childhood as a wealth
how focus blindly obtains
in kind, types of health
like capital gains
destitute in holey jeans

The Devil's Sonata ~ Sunday, March 3, 2024

Handsome Squire Voland
at the microphone, stage right
no lyrics, just voice
displayed on demand
studied in manners and grace
orders a gin flight
madness is his choice
each night, frenzy heightens pitch

Demons back his face
entourage to score
music as merchants of sound
on the chthonic shore
netherworld unbound
scratch a nefarious itch