124 - May 3 2024 - on spokes she goes

on spokes she goes with bags and packs
about the town, a gatherer,
her motivations no one knows
but I, and I would rather her
than any other, with the choice
and, having chosen, love my choice:
this gatherer, and gardener
and lover, with the gentle voice

123 - May 2 2024 - a bad exchange

I turn upon a rainy day
toward the glass that keeps me dry
and feel content right now that I
am warm, and I am civilized

How wretched it would be, I think,
to be a beast and be exposed,
with weather hanging off my fur
and with this cold immobilized

I know not how, out in the fields,
they stand there, seeming quite unfazed,
by the relentless misery
of Zeus’s every enterprise

Perhaps it is an artifice
and my complacency is flawed:
for they keep strong, while I grow weak
assenting to this compromise

103 - April 12 2024 - about the future

I’m writing about a future
some time
very soon from now
everything I imagined about my world
will be proven wrong
every friend is a wooden doll with an enemy inside it
every enemy contains a friend
and inside of those
roles flip again
and again they flip
until the doll is minuscule
it feels like a fleck of sand
a piece of grit I roll on my palm
and flick back onto the beach
friendships and enemyships are nothings
I am my own worst friend and best enemy
and I make myself into a nothing in the process
I get to be as empty as space
I get to be everything I want and don’t want
all at once
I twist myself open
and all the treasures inside me spill out
and they roll around on the floor
they roll under the couch
you have to kneel down
you have to prostrate yourself
you have to peer into the dark to find pieces of me
you have to reach your hand under the sofa
and try and grasp at what I’m saying here

102 - April 11 2024 - doghouses upon doghouses

doghouses upon doghouses, here I sit
collared up for my uncontrollable bark:
a menace who’s careless where he leaves his shit,
cavalier in my coursing around the park.

back on the leash, I imagine myself plain
my wants no more than a bone on which to gnaw
I feel I’m compliant, and easy to train
craving just a warm lap for my chin and paw

but this is an artifice, I acquiesce
to manifest time off for seeming contrite
and subject my mistress’s will to the test,
ere the gate swings loose and I run free and bite

093 - April 2 2024 - Wild Bill 2

one last sip from this long neck bottle, boys
before you escort me down to the clink.
I’ll go with no trouble, and make no noise,
if you’ll just hold up while I drain my drink.

yeah I shot him, yeah I gave him those holes
that leaked his life.  I made sure he was done.
so send me down to roast on Satan’s coals,
I’d shoot him again—with Lucifer’s gun.

090 - March 30 2024 - Lament of an Old Hunter

to every maid, in days days long past
who lay upon my bed
whom I lured in with lilting verse
and then ambrosia fed

each one, with coursing tears, I left
to hunt for other harts
for endless flew my arrow shafts
and true they slayed their marks

although these maids I made my prize
and mounted in delight
I find my quiver empty now
at twilight in my life

if once my words drew trance-like blinds
it’s magic I have lost
and where I stalked on summer grounds
I now exhale the frost

I wonder could they love me still
or have their lives progressed
to sanctuaries of content
no poetry can best

076 - Match 16 2024 - Life in the Sandwich factory

life in the sandwich factory ain’t so bad
the work is long, but I make my daily bread
the conditions are foul, but I cannot feel sad
splitting other men’s loaves, watching butter spread

watching robots peeling slices of the ham
and the rubber cheese flopping down to the slice
outside here it’s misery, get what one can
for the pay, and the heat, it’s my sacrifice

life in the sandwich factory is just that:
life in the sense that I am still living here
with nothing to hope for, I choose to stand pat
counting off my days, till my days disappear

068 - March 08 2024 - The Cage

the invisible bars of this golden jail
test me immensely, they bore me without end
I can hear liberation’s soft, distant call,
but strain at the cage and the bars will not bend

I lack nothing; and indeed they say I’m free
to roam as I please, and consort as I suit
no guard’s pikes would lower, if I sought to flee,
but my base circumstance I could not permute

this is, by my birth, an unchangeable fact
the past, like a caravan, follows my path
howsoever we range, we find ourselves back
in a well-paced cell, doing time unto death

059 - February 28 2024 - the package

a parcel came for me
unexpected on my doorstep
starliner tickets
one way
into the heart of our star

make me ashes and minerals again
and relieve me
from this always floundering
this always always deteriorating
bag
I call my home

shunt the wicked thoughts
and the careening desires
(I cringe to remember it all)
from my skull

return me to the heart of the reactor
and then
later later later

to the drifting cold gas
of the infinite

055 - February 24 2024 - The Way Backward

I do take seriously the notion that
the point of no return is always further
along the pathway than I probably thought,
but, that said, late turnings increase the labour
of reclaiming what’s lost, and thorned troubles branch
back where I trod, with my heart now made dour,
for when I strode down I was not an old man.

But I speak with conviction and with ardor
when I say I’ll come back to where I began
with my misfortunes earned transformed to favour;
even if it is my own coffin I drag
from the brambles into my purified grave.

038 - February 7 2024 - A Short Pledge

I take wending routes, through soft tropical seas
with the southern crane perched smartly on my left
and my little bark creaks, following the breeze
while sidereal time makes gentle my breath

whatever such troubles, left stacked on the dock
I fled from, they have drifted now from my sight
the clamour and bellows by calm waters stopped
and nothing but peace between I and the night

and well may I turn, when my wrappings come free
and my stitches are plucked, and my plans are set
and well may I strike with the best company
and well may I right things, done wrong,  but not yet!

034 - February 3 2024 - on winter

they told me the winter could instruct my mind
that it, relentless, cracks and peels our pretense
it is not without mercy, nor is it kind,
it simply is, in true sanctity and depth

its power is peace, it lulls the world to sleep
it blankets fallen leaves in its soft domain
and far below wracked barren branches it keeps
small burrows snugly, until spring comes again

but the call to pause, when one wanders the void
is a siren’s lullaby, make no mistake
this place may be tranquil, but it is not warm
and once you succumb to its call, you won’t wake

033 - February 2 2024 - dark dogs

I came out from my sickness with a new sense
purity of mind and resolve of the heart
that for time I’d wasted I’d make recompense
by promising all I had left to my art

whatever dalliances, tawdry, held me
let them now rot; I consign them to the scrap
I live for the pen, and language’s fancy:
O! the breath of the muse is all I can ask

I lost much to illness, and my time is short
dark dogs ring the low flame burning at my desk
from the shadows their eyes watch, lucid as quartz
for the moment I waiver, and dream of rest

032 - February 1 2024 - A Spacewalker's Lament

this little port here will not yield to my wish
complain though I might, with a crackling plea
and the countless stars, blazing behind my back,
still and gelid watch, silent mitts on the screw
as I burn my air, helpless, witless, miles aloft

can this be my truth? (I put it to the door)
this girl whom I loved with her vacuum cold heart,
could deign to spurn me, where each breath is precious
while inside she sighs, quivering gulps of air
and not one desire to share from her rich tanks

030 - January 30 2024 - Little Elegy to our Ship

Thus on we go, our small ship drifting slowly
I cannot know what dangers lie before us
yet she’s secure, and we rest in her surely
as we approach the heat of Dido’s furnace

out at the fold, where diamonds come up coldly,
to the sea sphere, where the ground has no respite
to Delia, the orb of art and story
To Cynthia, where the Founder lost his life

This ship of ours is running out here darkly
toward a plot so curious and bizarre
that they would trust it more if we spoke falsely
these strange reasons that we’re in amongst the stars

023 - January 23 2024 - axtric

Axtric, the brother I left behind me,
though only slightly later would he be
when we were born, on the same day, and in
the same bed, such as all lives must begin,
we lived different, and I had to wander
and he, poor lad, was made to surrender
to the concerns of dying parents, and
and their growing dementia, while I, grand
and stately in my offices of court
place myself among the noblest sort.

Long did I think that this brother of mine,
who once was my mirror, although some time
has passed, and I hear that he is still thin,
was in every respect the lesser twin,
but now I doubt, for here among the best
I trust no one, and each day is a test
of diplomacy and safety, equal,
where no misstep will deserve a sequel
yet Axtric has none he lives in fear of
the simple seek only friendship and love.

022 - January 22 2024 - the barons of geyst

the barons of Geyst draped in furs
rose in the days of the old king
and sired a child of such allure
that of her grace the bards would sing
from one orb to the next

misfortune alas was her fate
she fell into a founder’s hex
for broken vows and love misplaced
and all the anguish war effects
were sadly to be hers

the vicedauphin of her own world
a promised groom since she was young
with shifting politics conferred
although her helpless heart was stung
unto another bride

no sustenance would she partake
and never would her tears subside
from sorrows that no words could slake
as to her chambers locked inside
in silken sheets she curled

018 - January 18 2024 - to the founder

On the left eye; a fierce and roiling sea,
a lonesome figure set against the waves
no other soul to mark that he would be
the first of many, cursed to early graves.

And whether it was monsters, or the gale,
or some capricious fortune quick foreclosed
the measure of his courage, no avail
against the judgement Cynthia imposed.

Thus on these waters, when I guide my ship,
my eyes surveying cross this fearsome stretch
that punishes the blithe in her cold grip,
I pray for life, but never discount death.

015 - January 15 2024 - On the Poet's Wanderlust

I never feel quite so good as I do
as when I am outbound, into the sky
and none of the draw of my hearth and home,
nor comforts quiet life supply,
seem quite as radiant and true
as my desire to roam.

Of my wanderlust some can not construe
what makes me to endlessly turn my eye
to faraway hardships I’ll face alone;
to which I can give no reply.

Such are the pleasures I pursue,
and my life is my own.

001 - January 1 2024 - Goats and Monkeys

This is a speck of dust I keep in a small corner
It’s so small that the entire universe can see it
and entire galaxies and clusters of drifting gasses
a billion years wide can rub it between their fingertips
and the grease of the universe can accrue on its surface
and turn it gradually into a pearl of infinite roundness

This is a universe I blow off my palm like a speck of dust
It rolls about gathering with dander and crumbs
to form civilizations and aspirations and notions of the sacred
jammed in behind the back leg of my writing desk