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Archive for the ‘Poetry’ Category

If I Were a Child and You Were the Sea

Posted in Poetry on July 31, 2020| Leave a Comment »

If I were a child and you were the sea

I’d find a place for my ankles in you

And my hands and my curiosity

And you would rise up

With warm and sandy love

Rise up to my knees and then rise above

And I would find depth

For my shoulders and chest

And my neck and my mouth and my teeth and the rest

And when I knew you were faithfully cold

I’d give you my heat while the water takes hold

The ocean’s chilling black and the vast shipping lanes

Cut for all ships, squids, roaring seaplanes

I give to the sea all my hair and my hips

Give love in more ways than through just two soft lips

And you don’t have to cry for all the things we now share

Love in its ocean, joys, blood, toil, despair

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Scopes

Posted in Poetry, tagged , , on July 13, 2020| Leave a Comment »

When my friend had

His first child, he said

“Now I believe in God!”

“How can you not

believe

When you first look

Into his eyes

Upon the miracle of his life?

The miracle

That is your baby?

“How can you not believe?”

 

When I had my child

And I watched him crawl

Watched him stoop and learn to walk,

When I saw my son bend his knees

And hunch over

To pick up his first apple

I thought,

“Holy Christ!

“We’re fucking apes!”

 

 

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When He Told Them Whom To Hate

Posted in Poetry, tagged on July 13, 2020| Leave a Comment »

When he told them whom to hate

He gave them permission to hate.

When he gave them permission to hate

He gave them permission to feel.

When he gave them permission to feel

They loved him.

Loved him so much. Oh so much.

And then he had them by the soul.

And he could do with those souls what he wanted.

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Ruined Little Things

Posted in Poetry, tagged , , on July 11, 2020| Leave a Comment »

I have never said my piece

To strong men and to kings

And my eyes they sweep the ground

When their tragedies are unwound

And the tragedy is how they’ve ruined little things

 

You dress up in red lipstick

For a date with providence

And every set of eyes is a possible expense

Every new set of arms a residence

But passion turns to violence

And you pin your hope to wings

The tragedy’s the same

they’ve ruined little things

 

And a weak little man stands

In the corner doing what he can

Helpless to stop brutality

Not ever good for you or me

And soon it comes as sure as if he had the flu

He comes to love his abuser too

 

And as sure as he’s helpless

The boy he learns to sing

Anther lament of a life ill spent

They’ve ruined little things

 

 

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The Plague

Posted in Poetry, tagged , , , , , on June 26, 2020| Leave a Comment »

You have your bulky joy

You wear your youth like yarn

Piss mordant till you dye

It keeps your skin from harm

 

The smoke was once alive

In yellow plaster’s pores

Nostalgic from the wounds

Love has too many sores

 

And when the plague it came

We measured its hours too

The worst things about man

Turned out to be virtues

 

We once invented need

In the pre-pandemic dens

Like strangers on TV

We see ourselves back then

 

A life force is absorbed

In the city’s coming squall

This is how you love now

If you can love at all

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The Future

Posted in Poetry, tagged , , , , on June 12, 2020| Leave a Comment »

It was in the Times

The future is looking worse

Racial strife. Illness. Hate

No.

The future is not looking worse

It will look better

When we stop lying

About what the past was

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Timeless

Posted in Poetry, tagged , , , , , on May 23, 2020| Leave a Comment »

The year was 1911. The movie camera was new

And when it captured the young old souls

In the pinned frames and licked their faces

Onto emulsion, the timeless New York jaywalker

Paid his debt

To posterity by showing,

Abreast the speeding cars,

He still didn’t give two fucks

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You Cut A Cloud

Posted in Poetry, tagged on March 21, 2020| Leave a Comment »

The rain cleans your wound
A stab made into the body of luck
An impossible good shank
And all it did was bleed nothing
You lost a thousand words
From your living steak

And the wind lifted the girl’s hair
Mellow, nothing in her brain
But the surprise of knowing
You put a bunch of your dreams in her

You freed and oppressed her with
Your violence
You cut a cloud
And she lived in your rain

And you hope in your wordless despair
Hope she’ll miss you and the pain

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The Red Port

Posted in Poetry, tagged on February 28, 2020| Leave a Comment »

Guts spilled in the wreck
The pickle that floats the egg
A port where fortified wine
Filled the bellies of the sharks
Who dreamed it was you
Falling off the deck

You now get a shark drunk
To fill him with your sins
You have eyes and bones
For him to devour
For it to devour
Your job is to be devoured

You were as red as the port
Your body made the ocean
Into shark’s wine
Let the ocean be your mind

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So Many Colors

Posted in Poetry, tagged , , , on February 27, 2020| Leave a Comment »

Worries are hidden in mattresses

Like dollars and nickels

And relief comes from a clear ear

Suddenly unbanked of its wax

 

Remember who took me by the hand

Rumi stopped me and said:

Stop as you look at this carnival

Half of it is just your body

And the tricks it’s playing on you

 

And the carnival had so many colors

Red, green, blue

So many colors

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