Sunday, April 08, 2012

He Don't Have To.

He don't have to water his 'maters,
And he don't have to water his taters.
The rain it came while he slept last night.

He don't have to water his yard 'n
he don't have to water his garden.
The rain it came while he slept last night.

He can take thee morning off. He
can sit on the porch a-drinkin' his coffee.
The rain it came while he slept last night.

Sunday, February 06, 2011

Gordian

He's a fixer
and he can't put it down,
this infinite knot of his subconsciousness.

"Maybe this time,"
he tells himself.
"Maybe if I untie THIS knot,
it will all fall into place

And the chaos inside my head
will begin to make some sort of sense."

But unfailingly, with every knot he unties
two more are revealed underneath.

He's laid it aside
who knows how many times
but he can't leave it alone for long.
He's a fixer.

As a kid, he took the telephone apart
to see how it worked. Satisfied,
he put it back together in the reverse order.
But his pain is not like that.

Above all, he wants to know WHY.
But there is no why;
what is, is. It goes no deeper,
no matter how hard he digs
or how many knots he unties.

The one thing he wants most of all to fix,
himself, is the one thing he can't.

And the fixer remains broken.

Saturday, February 05, 2011

Another Morning

And I wake
next to a warm body
that can barely conceal
her contempt for me.

I am her meal ticket
and she my cover story.
We're both miserable.

We liked,
even on some level
loved,
each other
once upon a time.

But there is no happy ending.

Our friendly arrangement
has frosted into
resentment.

All because some 2000-year-old
book of legends and Romans and fairy tales
has convinced me and my country
I don't deserve any better.

I wander into the kitchen,
start the coffee,
then see what mask I can find in the closet
to wear Out Into The World today.

Monday, July 31, 2006

Poem about nothing.

boring
coring
goring
whoring
mooring
pouring
roaring
soaring
storing
shoring
warring
sponges.

Saturday, July 29, 2006

One Orange Sock . . .

. . . and the rest of her black
except the tip of her tail
and two of her left whiskers.

She belongs next door
but they don't feed her,
so once a day she visits

happy for the scraps
of last night's supper
that I give her.

She rewards me
with a purr
and a brush against my leg.

Monday, April 24, 2006

Jesus, Made of Crackers.

He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him. - John 6.

The priest commands me to kneel.
Eager, I open my mouth wide.
He places it on my tongue.
Salty.
I swallow.
The wine.
The love.
The shame.
The fear.
The guilt.
The excitement.
Of what this man does to me.
He has made me a cannibal.

Saturday, April 22, 2006

When.

Remember when
the blood
rained from the sky

as if
God
was hemorrhaging?

When the wolves and ravens
swarmed the Vatican
and devoured their eyes?

When the first
soulless child
was born

To a dying mother
in the
catacombs?

Remember?
Remember when?