John Stickney hosted a 30-day 30-poem exercize for April.
Here’s mine.
This is my 6th or 12th or ??th poem-a-day run… once years ago started a poem-a-day and wrote at least one per day for 6 to 8 months.
This batch felt good.
~ ~ ~
April fools
I & I
oh happy daze
~ ~ ~
Mobius Lip
Have a new product — fake feces: call it Sham Poo
Too often chicken humor is just a bunch of bad yokes
My rock ‘n’ roll’s more walk ‘n’ stroll
If you’re a wharf, are you judged by your piers?
Wanna be happy? Try merryjuana
I used to breed dogs, but my penis got tired
If the road’s faulty, it must be the asphalt
I need a refresher in walking Escher
Dying’s no way to live
~ ~ ~
A fog and rain and cold day
not my first
not my last
~ ~ ~
After the Garden
Cold warm cold this cruelest month
fog dimming Eliot Street
dirt heat sweet to uncool night
lilacs lost in memory’s desire
root pain faux gain
for the fool
the devil
and the tower toppled
Eve ever nude admires herself
in the skin of the apple
the cat’s meow
the yellow fog
of frog on log
~ ~ ~
My belly’s filled
my bum is wiped
I’m set to good and go
~ ~ ~
Which end are you —
fork handle
or tines?
Holder, or held?
molder or meld?
dealer, or dealt?
~ ~ ~
Sirens night wail
coyotes harmonize howl
we quiet between
~ ~ ~
Manimals
Dog on floor snoring
wife clacking laptop
my lap cat purr
His human leaving
he barks and whines
in Stockholm syndrome
Dogs piss on things
cats knock stuff over
I do both
~ ~ ~
Life with Wife 11
Soaking sun in parking lot awaiting wife
at dentist when she sends this text:
“Be careful, I guess there’s a guy outside the building
with a knife. They are calling the cops.”
I hide my weed.
~ ~ ~
Suntimes
After midnight alley
of serpentine night
up dances sun
Yellow electric line
across bright blue sky
catches eye
Spring growth
slabs of yellow, white, greens, blue
hope
Sun shines down
on cold-hearted humans
rotting in their gold
Sometimes sun
on eye-closed upturned face
is enough
Sit in sun
suck its go
become autotroph
~ ~ ~
Six Thoughts in Search of a Brain
It is what it is
you know how it goes
life
Walking dog
my pain versus his needs
constant compromise
Lotta levels
to unfolding disaster
from “Oh fuck” to “Holy fuck”
Is writing renga
by yourself
masturbation?
There’s no
below below which
I will not go go
It’s one of those days
best to get some sleep
start again
~ ~ ~
Status Report 304
The fireplace nibbles
bit by bit at the dark
and cold
Wind chimes
and old-time bong clock
trickle talk
Stone life nice
easier on others
and myself
~ ~ ~
Status Report 305
Life’s hard
you’re bored
I’m slow
I turned 24 in prison
with 9 months
till go
~ ~ ~
Reached my goal
made it from wake to sleep
no medals please
~ ~ ~
No Beginning No Middle No End?
Is it the Big Bang?
The Big Bounce?
Some Conformal Cyclic Cosmography?
They cry cosmological inflation
graceful exits
and mirror worlds
but where are the sky splotches?
The space blobs?
The primitive gravitational waves?
Primordial black holes?
Right-handed neutrinos?
Why is that side of the sky
the same temp as this side?
Why no isolated photons?
Come on dudesses and dudes
give me something to work with here
besides the steady state universe
or eternal inflation
(sounds like my household expenses)
the long poemed multiverses
the sexually oscillating universes
with its Big Crunch
and “branes in bulk”
Is it a flat hologram projected onto the surface of a sphere
or digital simulation on a vast computer?
What is this no time no place space
we rebound from
beyond this event horizon’s
no beginning no end
of no place to be or have been?
~ ~ ~
Spirit to bone
bone to flesh
flesh to worm
worm to earth
earth round sun
sun around a long long time
the rest
but time and chance
~ ~ ~
She lies sleeping in our broken chair
beneath once-plush blanket
body weary from work
responsibility, stress
maybe me
due my 27 years extra entropy
as I crumble toward compost
and posthumous fame
I know I make her life better
and worse
of curse
while she refines me and mine
sublime
The world’s tooth and claw
flee and fight and fuck and feed
but within pus of need
and bleed
we heed occasional pockets of plus
the flowered field, the honey flow
the sun of warm and slow
~ ~ ~
Lesson Plan
4-wheeled ants
scurry to hurry
rat wheel cage
Weathered whether
grows and slows
rise or slide of time
Big-bellied men
fat-assed women
who’s who’s?
Magic life
where creed bound by bleed
sniffs at breath
Tooth and claw
claw and tooth
always been the truth
False profit of want
drives new god of get
awaiting fall from tree
Greed crawled from swamp
to lower limbic lesion
and named itself Capitalism
Right lane ends
wrong lane continues
while rich bitch other’s sins
Long ago
and far away
back when I believed
~ ~ ~
This almost summer night
thick with existence
road hiss
cricket creep
frog peep
broken muffler mash
dream schemes
waiting glue of dawn
when again
we get our rock
again upward go
where again we all fall down
again
and again
and again
man woman and child
There’s some insect
has no mouth
it’s born, flies, mates, dies
all in one day
no future, no past,
no planning, no ask
~ ~ ~
Pocket Marks
Was dating Construe
but she left
now I miss Construe
Lady’s digging green growths
from artist friend land
can’t wait to see her bloomers
Ass Prof sez Nose Prof fails
while Nose Prof knows
it’s nose not tail
Sometimes Botox
and sometimes
Bo doesn’t talk
Hired new law firm
– Tooth, Claw & Fang…
tired of pussyfooting around
Cow nipple juice
and bee vomit —
the land of milk and honey
Used to go to church
to Sunday worship Gauze
but my beliefs unraveled
~ ~ ~
Universal Health Care
Norway since 1912
Japan – 1938
New Zealand – 1938
Germany – 1941
Belgium – 1945
United Kingdom – 1948
Kuwait – 1950
Sweden – 1955
Bahrain – 1957
Brunei – 1958
Canada – 1966
Netherlands – 1966
Austria – 1967
United Arab Emirates – 1971
Finland – 1972
Slovenia – 1972
Denmark – 1973
Luxembourg – 1973
France – 1974
Australia – 1975
Ireland – 1977
Italy – 1978
Portugal – 1979
Cyprus – 1980
Greece – 1983
Spain – 1986
South Korea – 1988
Iceland – 1990
Hong Kong – 1993
Singapore – 1993
Switzerland – 1994
Israel – 1995
the U S of A
still drinks the blood of babies
~ ~ ~
Life with Wife 12
She said dead Leonard Cohen
sang this to her in her dream:
“I don’t want to hurt you
Like a battle wound
I freed the bell
I freed the bell
I freed the bell
I had to take”
~ ~ ~
Dog Day
Drifting into WouldaCouldaShoulda Land
I’m stopped by dog bone gnaw
look down
he’s on the floor
laser focused
scraping dead flesh
tonguing the marrow between
he’s *present*
Mr Be-Here-Now
who’s right
we gotta gnaw the bone we got
not some mythical later maybe better
or long lost perfect unicorn past
you do this bone
your bone
you scrape for scraps
suckle the marrow
and try again tomorrow
for moral
~ ~ ~
Dirt hides seed
heart holds need
desire grows
Today butterfly
yesterday caterpillar
tomorrow dead
First things first
which hurts worse
life… or birth?
The problem
with people
is people
Let’s face it
we’re all fucked up
one way or odder
It’s always a battle
between the proletariat
and the lariat
Stay in line
or pay the fine
no drifting from the herd
Everyday I make
from wake to sleep to wake
copy? clone? clown?
~ ~ ~
Fire walking water
water weighing time
time slipping slowly
somewhere down the line
where railroad trains moan happy
where even power’s kind
where weary worry wanting
never works the mind
cuz here folks getting nasty
here folks fuck the fine
here folks know the knife-back
here flux greed is grind
so while I don’t know what you’ve found
I keep my head underground
~ ~ ~
Converation with Wife 52
What do you call a mutated cow?
A moo-tant
What’s a cow who doesn’t moo?
Moo-t
A brooding cow?
Moo-dy
Where do French cow strippers work?
Moo-Lawn Range
Cow’s cultural center?
Moo-seum
They also attend moo-vies
watch Mickey Cow’s Moo’s-keteers
Trend toward moo-notony
Some become werecows under a full moo-n
while others read their favorite book – Leaves of Grass
Okay, this has been a-moo-ving
but time to moo-ve on
Thanks for the moo do
Oom
~~ ~
Beneath the bridge
in still warm water
fish wait
for the vibration of the coming train
to rattle the old wooden trestle
shaking down the bugs
from the underside
into the water
for dinner
~ ~ ~
Walking from kitchen to living room
swinging my arms
my forefinger thumps something
I look down
see 3 inch primitive black & pale wasp of 3-segments
circle me slowly then move on
I tingle with the might-have-been
~ ~ ~
Vector Graphic
Sun on face
dog on prowl
creeping myrtle licking feet
Too early
I park in alley
count rats
Warm dirt
cold night
fog
~~ ~
Bird treasure
shiny bits
left today
to pay
for yesterday’s kindness
