tousle

cool cotton on cheek
breath against neck
two in curlicue
an ampersand
asking and?
fingers tousle hair
as the air electrifies
heart defies head
in a fond farewell bed

cavalier

perspective gained by time
books, music, art; these too amend
quiet talks with a friend
all assist but in the end
scope still narrowed
by the confines
of a single mind.
sometimes, i know, i hold too dear
things about which i should be
far more cavalier -
slights unintended rend me
yet, hurts given purposefully
i oft forgive too easily.
as if some inner meter calibrated
to a setting slightly off,
but would i
if i could
reset?
and if i did would i
still be me?
or am i made differently
so as to see the world
as i alone can see
or is all the world set so
but hide it better?
i don't know.

ken

tear the sky in two

hurtling through

in metal tubes

deep beneath the sea

creatures in the dark
live off a spark

from volcanos

never seen by man

or by machine
microbes talking
fish that walk and

those but few examples

of the neverending samples
of the weird and the stupendous

the world is wide

and full of wonders

and things beyond

our ken

the day to day

packed with mysteries

I cannot comprehend
though I do my best
to absorb it

every day above

the ground 

the earth turns
in its orbit

and more amazement
to be found

foozle

future uncertain
always is

but still I wonder
if I foozle
with every decision
befuddled by the
complexity of causality

make a choice
and hope

aureate

lovely you are kind and sweet
with smile sad and heart so great
I wish I had language aureate
to describe you as you deserve
but here words fail me
as I fail you
and that I leave you
no reflection on your value
but on where our journeys intersect
despite deep connection of heart and intellect
our old wounds time has yet unhealed
so to rest apart awhile
whole to become again
recuperate, rejuvenate
and maybe, if I am very lucky,
reconvene at a later date

milquetoast

too long
i've let
the world
happen to me
a milquetoast
propping up the walls
and taking the fall
for all
i've paid
for the sins
without the
joy of the sinning
only won when it's
pyrrhic winning
no more
no more
boldly take the wheel
and if i crash
and end trapped
in mangled steel
entombed
at least i'll have cast off
this damp and heavy mantle
of a morality heeded by none
but me

jeopardize

queries expose
the equilibrium delicate
spun sugar construction
jeopardize
a future
yes
with certainty
i wish
almost never
the same as
i get
and asking
always risks
no
maybe
no better
& tears will melt
confection
its sugar
no match
for my salt

stolid

though miles
and miles away,
i lean upon you still.
rest my soul
upon your words
as once
my head upon your chest.
in these,
my stolid, stuttering days
when head nor tails
of the world can make -
your solid uttering
murmured softly
in my ear
reminds me,
whether far or near,
comfort and kindness,
held most dear,
distance cannot sully.
and loneliness,
like all things,
is only temporary.

litotes

delivery dry
he couldn't tell
sarcasm from sincerity
a flair for litotes for
fine feeling unfeigned
"I couldn't be happier for you,"
she said as she kissed his cheek
and walked away.

ideate

vast mysterious imagination grand
grinds into existence from words
new life
the mind makes worlds
because someone willed them so
work upon my willing
building tales great and wild
taking up space
filling all the hours
that I wait
but never did I ideate
that it would take so long
to find one who'd join me here
and make of life a song
but I will not leave yet
for I hear humming in the distance
and the tread of feet
upon the clouds
the firmament for my castle in the air

zeroth

the wheel turns
strips away
that which is not
me
the affectations
from accumulation
of too much information
amalgamation of presumption
protestation turned to devastation
through too many permutations
reset to my zeroth self
and begin again

dally

languidly lingering longingly
flip the pillow to the cool side
& hope you see my cool side
you also dally and delay
the incursion of pants
and other people
we're both extending
the dalliance
a delicate dance
just in case there's a chance
that this time we've met
the person with whom
to dawdle away
all the days

ramshackle

the gravelly wheeze of his breathing
a whistled melody insouciantly soaring
over the syncopated beat
of his ramshackle heart
he's doing an arrhythmic soft shoe
scratched out in the sands
poured from an hourglass
that has no more turnings
but was dropped
by liver-spotted palsied hands
to shatter on the ground
and set the stage
for his final dance

nomenclature

i know myself
i think
i know
no - no name
i know not what
i'm called
but am called to call out
to declaim & stake my claim
all the same
i am
NoName
no nomenclature
yet devised
to differentiate
the state of my nature
from those standardized
carbon copy cookie cutter classes
placing all their emphasis
on who goes what and where
and silently tear out their hair
lost in the fear
that when they're gone
it will be
as if they were never
never even there
replaced so quickly
but me
i comfort myself
that i am rare
that my disjointed jagged edges
that keep me from fitting in
do not fit their taxonomy
and so
unlike them
i am free

hector

there is no bully better
than your own browbeating bully
your inner child gone wild
demanding lunch money
shoving you against the lockers
taunting and torturing
hectoring you on the playground
whenever the adults look away
churlishly hurling immature insults like rocks
so precisely to leave you bleeding internally
but with such a beatific smile
no one would believe the child
anything but angel

quincunx

equipoise personified

poised on a precipice

a rolla bolla act

           

I 

stand at the center

 of this quincunx

health                               wealth 

me

love                               happiness

shift my weight

incrementally

this way                          and that way

                                         keep board balanced

as the fulcrum 

                                                fluctuates 

                                beneath

the world 

on which                                      

                     we stand

wobbles

eminently

saunter through the days
eminently confused
so many choices
we don't know how to chose
and what is right
and what is wrong
what is weak or
which is strong
what's win or lose
there's no knowing
what to take
and what refuse
every answer
has a consequence
unseen
and raises other questions
makes another
might have been
and the only answer
for me, and all of man,
is just to trust yourself
and do the best you can

subpoena

sometimes
i wish
i could
call up
the past
not colored
by me
or he
or she
but subpoena
moments
outside of
memory
to see
objectively
what was
so maybe
change
what could be

venerate

circle round
bend and bow
with every breeze
flowers venerating tree

so far beneath
but beatifically bound 
both reaching skyward

fauve

i lose you in
a maze of colors fauve
we wander through
splash of red
dash of mauve
and me, trapped in the yellows
of sunflowery Van Goghs
peek down the hall
to catch a glimpse
of your smile sauntering through
Matisse's technicolor meadow
and i am dazzled by how bright
the wonder of his pigments, tints and tones
but also by your eyes
likewise flashing in the light
to beckon me on
to the Cubists
in the room beyond

palooka

battle scarred boxer
nose crooked and rakishly askew
he knew more than she thought he knew
no palooka, he - bright eyed and wise
an upper cut above the rest
punching above his weight
but waiting for the knockout
who hooked him right
before she left cross
unwilling to roll with the punches
she walked away from the ring
and a broken grin

urbane

glittery gals in glamorous gowns
inverted flowers spinning
on slender stems
twirled by debonair dandies
the air perfumed with privilege
and desperation as they cling
to convention & cliche & each other
in conversation witty and urbane
yet dripping with disdain
titanic deck chairs rearranged
by bright young things
on a roiling sea of modernity
in their lavish but leaky boat
creaking with age and corruption

hubris

thought
it could not
happen
not to me
not again
walked in
to my own trap
so fortified
in belief
no more
could I
come to grief
hubris personified
so certain I
had, at last,
grown too wise
but as ever
easily blinded
by a smile

nonplus

no pattern discernible in the mosaic
as we lay it
shattered piece by shattered piece
we take the moments
of our lives nonplussed
with the fragmentary nature
the flashes of color
the cracked and jagged
edges of emotion
and set them down
with those who are around
so at the end
step back to see
a swirling sort of methodology
our piecemeal parts
make up a greater whole
our broken hearts
shine and bind us
in a composition
of compassion and community
to last in perpetuity
as the picture expands
beyond what we alone can see

amicable

Isn't it nice?
Isn't it sweet?
How easy they are
whenever they meet!
They say their hellos
and kiss on the cheek
and everything
seems so amicable.
Isn't it lovely?
Isn't it grand?
You'd never guess how it ended,
how the insults would land
and the tears that were shed
and the planning unplanned
now that everything
seems so amicable.
Isn't it darling?
Such a delight
now they're no longer
screaming night after night
they still hold the resentment
but pretend it's alright
no, it's not that they're friends,
it's just not worth a fight
and so everything
seems so amicable.

tranche

where is the joy
in a life subdivided?

in a love
parceled out
piecemeal?

each tranche
significant of quid pro quo,
therein lies your woe.

those met metered
and meted affection
until interest peters out

that is not what love's about

gormandize

intonations and implications
defying expectations
each syllable
delectable
hearty and whole
nourishing a soul
that had been
swollen and skewed
by half truths and lies
a spirit that would gormandize
all the empty rhetoric
so spiking and crashing
on diabetic dialogue
now robust on rectitude
and faith in man renewed

wisenheimer

the days are dark and all too short
for tempers short and moods too dark
in former days the glorious grumps
charmed with curmudgeonly air
but having to always jolly along
those who joy
in pointing out what's wrong
is exhausting and, simply, unfair
give me giddy, goofy wisenheimers
and whimsical wisecrackers
it's taken years, but i'm finally done
with the glum happiness hijackers

callow

Patience perforce
in supply superhuman
to captain and counsel
callow youth
with exuberance
and forbearance...
more than I dare!

So to all you teachers,
my cap I doff.

And this I say
to those who scoff,
until you do it yourself...
FUCK OFF.

moil

some days seem to race
running at such a pace
we note nearly nothing
a blinding blur flying past
neither good nor bad
those days can last

yet, time being relative
other days seem to live
at such a dragging rate
that sluggishly
we moil and toil
like wildlife drenched
in thick black oil

but still those days
we, too, forget
so in the meantime
cease to fret

time, like distance,
makes things hazy
though this we know
still always we
certain are
the hurts will us
forever scar

but those moments
merely trespass
the worst and best,
they both will pass

Beltane

on hilltops the fires burn
to show the sun how to behave
in valleys the lovers meet
to show the wheat
how to germinate
rejoice
and wake, World,
cast off your snowy blankets
shake off the cool fog
and arise this Beltane day
Summer, though yet not here,
is finally on her way