Cricket Tickets

The crickets have sold their violins
The children have lost their infectious grins
The “news” from our media spins and spins
In America

The hungry they multiply every day
The unemployed long to work for day’s pay
The people protesting inhale pepper spray
In America

The politicians claim to do U.S. a service
The voters look fastball and the media curves U.S.
The parasites pout that they don’t deserve U.S.
In America

The ground is exploding from new technique Fracking
The forests are dwindling from endless tree whacking
The climate is changing but the will to change lacking
In America

The schools once our pride are under duress
The teachers are handcuffed but still do their best
The funding each day it grows less and less
In America

The military must always be forever supplied
The brass at the top care not who has died
The thought of empire shrinking must be denied
In America

The blue collar worker is disposable fodder
The service provided like dirty dishwater
The foundation beneath U.S. will soon crack and totter
In America

The wizards of Wall Street command our attention
The crimes they commit foster little retention
The “best and the brightest” belong in detention
In America

The middle class that once was pride of our nation
The elites are determined to destroy this generation
The revolution coming may be our salvation
In America

America, America…a beacon to the oppressed
America, America…we’ve sure as hell regressed
America, America…its priorities all askance
America, America…the crickets didn’t have a chance

Fie Lie

Fie on Obama deceiver-in-cheif
"Change and hope" electoral delusion
A Pox on White House, the den of the thief
From actions most foul, draw thy conclusions

Duplicitous cunning, oratorical
Thine tongue falsely glib, deceit in thine eyes
His crimes are many, categorical
Dining on sophistry, colossal in size

He rode into town, waves of glad tidings
Triumphant promise, 'midst columns of stone
Mansions atop hill, trust in his sidings
To the folk in street, he tosses mere bone

To be fooled in itself, 'tis not a crime
Foot upon same path, we must not this time

One-Termoil

America is addicted...Obama is conflicted
His choices are restricted...to two
He can be the people's man...be firm and take a stand
Reduce dependence protect land...in lieu
Of more corporate induced lies...disaster horrendous in size
Yet a "junkie's" cherished prize...'tis true
So whilst teeing up your ball...with back against the wall
The hoodwinker who will fall...is you
If that pipeline should go through

Mainline Pipeline

Voices go shrill and blood will boil
As "hope and change" approves the oil
Not a speck will soil his hands
On its trip from Alberta's tar sands

Then one day will come a leak
Defiling environment, despoiling a creek
By that time Obama will be gone
Penning his memoirs on distant manicured lawn

"Transparency" was what he wrote
As we sail to perdition in lead bottomed boat
One year hence another election thrill
Neanderthals, war mongers and corporate shills

White Collared

Country Club Buffets…Wall Street Knaves
Death Panelist Recipient…Fascist Incipient
Republican Healthcare…Voucher Pass
Stipend Used Up…Plutocratic Crass
Rodeo Drive…Tiffany’s is Splendid
Wars of Empire…Never Ended
Yachts in the Harbor…Dinghies at the Helm
Blue Collar Workers…”Serfing” the Realm
Oysters Rockefeller…Gold Rimmed Plate
Libraries Shuttered…Preservation of the State

Bottoms Up

Ten years sitting in a tiny, stinking, rotten jail cell
Nine years of marking X’s on an old calendar
Eight years of dreaming ‘bout the first twenty
Seven years of thinking where she was
Six years on the same mattress
Five years, I can’t wait
Four tries, knotted sheet
Three feet high
Two, One
Bye

Blood .... Shot

I heard the bells ringing…distant village
My crepuscule world…so close about me
Helpless I lay…to those who would pillage
From “Her” I sought comfort…once heavenly
We’d met on day…when sunbeams pierced rainbows
As cloud shaped ships…sailed skies cobalt blue
Golden, crimson leaves…your hair in moonglow
Grandeur abounds…mine eyes turn back to you
Your beauty majestic…and soon we wed
‘Twas soon I learned…you were quite insane
Nature’s pomp stopped me…wanting to be dead
View of flawless snowflake…pacified pain
Vision preserved me…sight my greatest prize
I lay hearing bells…listening with no eyes

Library Card

They burnt last book today…save one
“Twas heresy they said…and from that book
A black cloud formed…raining pages so once read
Paper fluttering…’twas only sound
Soon works of mankind …took root upon the ground
The sanctimonious…could not bear to look
Wisdom doth… indeed flower…from more than just one book

Lager of Love

Can’t find your life…bottom of a bottle
Sure as hell wasn’t goin’ to stop my tryin’
“Brewski!… Barkeep…collectin’ an army o' dead soldiers”
Down came another beer
“Booze won’t drown your sorrows, son
Only gives ‘em somethin’ to swim in”
“Tell it to the Marines old man…and listen…
You got a snorkel?”

Breadcrumbs

I searched for our footprints
Signs indicating… we’d once been there
Lapping water caressed my ears
The old oak remained at sentry
Coots worked without snorkels
And the old rusty tractor still plowed the past
Wind, rain, time… had conspired against me
Vanished
Forever lost, in perpetually shifting soils
Muddy paws, size 13’s…yesterday’s walk

Footprints

Poetry written…by men more great than I
Easily found…’tween books many pages
Judge not too harshly…with a loving eye
I shan’t be mistaken…for time’s true sages
‘Twas o’er fifty years…’ere I found mine pen
Road to discovery…littered with waste
Half century aged brain…scoured again
Each day flows by…consumed am I with haste
Yet a trail I shall leave…scattered with crumbs
Some may soothe thy palate…others less so
You may say he wrote…with protruding thumbs
Or find a gem…perchance I’ll never know
I do know I’m the sky…and you the stars
One day we’ll fly…beyond red skies of Mars

Grad Dad

A moment in the sun…but I have no son
A tear in my eye…small drink of water
A flag fluttering…the battle’s been won
Proud Father awaits…stage walk of daughter
The clouds pass on by…crowd erupts in cheers
The names of the honored…float on the wind
The waiting’s been long…now I’ve no more fears
That which she earns today… one can’t rescind
I recall the first day… on her new bike
I remember the day when she turned ten
I cringe at teenage photos…anger spiked
Oft’ rocky road…I’d travel it again
Diploma in hand…beautiful to me
My little girl…for all the world to see

Stab to Slab in Under an Hour

Never I’d dreamed…terror of a zipper
The last teeth closing…Final glimpse of light
I lie in blood…in puddle…a dripper
Death uninvited…swan song of the night
You travel end miles…in a “body bag”
Plastic on your skin…hemoglobin hair
Journey seems so long…why must driver lag?
Slab in the morgue…impatient for its faire
Cold…oh so cold!...your drawer, your bed, your tomb
A sliding of rail…a click of the lock
‘Tis only temporary…inverted womb
Fly you no more…having left earthly flock
Arrive mortuary…unzipped once more
Antipodal drops…crimson on the floor

Dig Them Dregs

Johnny blew Larceny on his Goldman Sachs
The “rollers” did bump and grind
Cat was whooping, wailing down Fifth Avenue
A hep tune called “No banker left behind”
Perks and bonuses…no government onuses
Wall Street’s back, snortin’ greenback crack
Paper or plastic they ask old Mother Cupboard
For one lousy half filled grocery sack

Dig Them Dregs

Johnny blew Larceny on his Goldman Sachs
The “rollers” did bump and grind
Cat was whooping, wailing down Fifth Avenue
A hep tune called “No banker left behind”
Perks and bonuses…no government onuses
Wall Street’s back, snortin’ greenback crack
Paper or plastic they ask old Mother Cupboard
For one lousy half filled grocery sack

‘Twas blustery day, the clouds passed quickly
Except for one that loomed oh most darkened
I lived far off and alone, quiet…sickly
Adumbration o’erhead…’twas death harkened?
I stood in grim fascination…mute, fearful
As if rooted to ground, of which I stood
Thunder clasped and mine eyes became tearful
Day had arrived, no more knocking on wood
I found my legs… gathered my possessions
There actually was only one it’s true
Stark reminder… my greatest transgression
Photo taken…before I’d murdered you
I woke prostrate upon the kitchen floor
Silhouetted corpse…lightning framed in door

Dinner Guest

‘Twas blustery day, the clouds passed quickly
Except for one that loomed oh most darkened
I lived far off and alone, quiet…sickly
Adumbration o’erhead…’twas death harkened?
I stood in grim fascination…mute, fearful
As if rooted to ground, of which I stood
Thunder clasped and mine eyes became tearful
Day had arrived, no more knocking on wood
I found my legs… gathered my possessions
There actually was only one, it’s true
Stark reminder… my greatest transgression
Photo taken…before I’d murdered you
I woke prostrate upon the kitchen floor
Silhouetted corpse…lightning framed in door

Sancti-fried

Drive thru…I do
Half in the bag…bloodshot blues
Vows are simple…Treat me Nice
Don’t be Cruel…Throw your own rice
Fat belly…Cheeseburger breath
Porkchop sideburns…Jacked on meth
Got a hunk a hunk of Burning Love?
Fully sanctioned from the Big Guy above
Vintage Vegas…Sin City
Ostentatious…But ‘tis a pity
If Gay you are…SOL
When Elvis plays…the wedding bells

Keel-Mauled

On her tummy they performed tuck and roll
From her nose removed a pinkish mole
Her breasts were parted up and lifted
The sag around her bottom sifted
Smoothed out all the facial wrinkles
Adorned her hair with glittered sprinkles
Colored contacts and plumped up lips
Sixty years old, what a trip…S.O.S Abandon Ship!

To Be With You

Dyed bones, dead, alone, lie upon the hill
Their markers long forsaken, lost to time
They once laughed, danced, cried, as living do still
Laughter sighed, tears dried… wind brings icy clime
A child of seven, she passed very young
Two brothers, same day…mother’s tragedy
An old man who once, had an acid tongue
I search for stone… forever is to thee
‘Tis ancient this graveyard…my love persists
Across the centuries…heedless of years
In barren corner…your grave doth exist
I throw self on soil…dampen it with tears
Dead I shall so be…on Necropolis
Embracing you…free, from Metropolis

The Last Generation of De-regulation

Tracers streak into a nighttime sky
Anarchy and Avarice waltz in shadows
Crumpled top hat awash in fetid gutter
Tattered remnants of Red, White and Blue
He built an EMPIRE
He forged a STATE
He did the BUILDING
Now the starving, the pitiable
Do partake of the FEAST
‘Twas FREEDOM that killed
The profligate BEAST

Breathless Ceremony

My love, my love please tell me that it's you
Although you lie dead, I still hear your voice
A crescent moon drips red, your lips so blue
I’d infuse thee with life, if I had choice
We’d danced at nightfall, ‘neath constellations
Made wish on falling star, love beneath moon
I’m now prone to wild…gesticulations
You swore you’d never leave, now gone so soon
A maddened plan have I, debauched, depraved
Cemetery fence, shall not halt my task
With shovel, I advance upon your grave
Under stormy skies, your visage I’ll bask
Thunder makes music…I grasp icy hands
Caress pallid skin…exchange wedding bands

All in a Day's Work

A Nigerian “soldier” rapes a nine year old girl
A Chinese coal burning facility belches toxic smoke
A small boy in India digs through garbage…for his breakfast
A woman in Afghanistan blows herself and 47 other people to smithereens
A fat hedge fund manager sweats profusely looking up at bouncing silicon
A pompous athlete points to sky after hitting a fifty thousand dollar home run
A hurricane blows across a mid-west landscape ripping limbs from trees and people
A Palestinian, ancient and wise, points out to kids where his “country” used to be
A man armed with chainsaw removes one more piece of life sustaining Brazilian rain forest
A toothless 40 year old woman pushes her home, a shopping cart, under a rippling U.S. flag
A man is tortured somewhere in Eastern Europe for being in the wrong place at the wrong time
A Mexican farm laborer stretches his aching back before resuming his “salad making duties”
A Muslim man is beaten senseless by British hooligans for the sole crime of wearing a turban
A “Man of the cloth” coerces a young boy with angelic voice to come later for “private lessons”
A politician somewhere…everywhere, looks about attentively before sticking hand in “cookie jar”
A dog, a cat, a raccoon, a deer is crushed beneath the wheels of what is euphemistically called “progress”
A child is born, a woman dies, a man laughs, a “lost soul” cries, and the cycle is forevermore repeated
And God, watching from the beginning of time and the outer boundaries of amaranthine space
Weeps

Backseat Lullaby

Summer…1950 Chevy Coupe
Kosmo’s drive-in…Here she comes
Satin shorts…Roller skates
“Blue Moon”…on the push button
She licks delicious lips…”Eating or just looking?”
“The menu looks great baby”
She laughs… harps from heaven
“If I was your baby…would you rock me to sleep?”
“Relax honey…I got the pacifier”

No Rewind

Summer stars, loud guitars…fade away
Camaraderie…slowly separates
Sultry winds chafed youngish skins…yesterday
Mine eyes do inform me, ‘tis getting late
We drank nectar of youth…no tomorrows
Climbed mountains of the brain…forever lost
I hear the old tunes… they oft’ bring sorrow
No one tabulated, the future cost
Friday nights were always, something festive
A toke or two of herb…cold keg of beer
The record’s stopped playing…I grow restive
Gray hair and wrinkled skin…make message clear
Youth lost on the young…so the story goes
Songs drift on wind…I still feel summer’s throes

Frontier Fascist

In Maricopa County…they like takin’ things slow
Excludin’ that stalwart lawman…who folks call “Sheriff Joe”
Detained, Investigated…Shackled, Humiliated
Human beings herded like cattle…Old Joe he sure does prattle
If you’re headin’ to ‘Zona…wear BS resistant boots
And when you go, say hey to Joe, and pick your own damn fruit

Cash + Cross

“Twas an unholy alliance requiring compliance
On the part of all concerned.
But matter of factI’m telling you Jack it’s a recipe for getting burned.
A portfolio marriage, they rode off in Gold carriage
For the whole damn world to see. But crap hit the fan
Not jivin’ you man when Capitalism married Christianity.

Fox Tales

Homer swilled a beer and smiled
Man “always” was happy
Agnes… barkeep, drew another draft
She said, “Homer, you always smiling’”
“Simple philosophy, Aggie darling,
Ignorance is bliss. I hear Rush every mornin’
Watch Fox every evenin’, came to a conclusion.”
“Wanta share, Homer?”
“Sure enough Aggie girl - I been ‘Blissed.’”
Simple solution, simple feller.

Wad the God

Politicians…flag pins displayed
Talk values
Teachers…standardized tests dismayed
Talk values
Preachers…glad-handing at door, advocating war
Talk values
Pundits…Cashing in land, a virulent propaganda
Talk values
Values…“interests”…Values...“ideals”
Values are integrity…Or easily repealed
Values in USA…have been summarily shot
Only “value” America has…how much wealth you’ve got

Wad the God

Politicians…flag pins displayed
Talk values
Teachers…standardized tests dismayed
Talk values
Preachers…glad-handing at door, advocating war
Talk values
Pundits…Cashing in land, a virulent propaganda
Talk values
Values…“interests”…Values...“ideals”
Values are integrity…Or easily repealed
Values in USA…have been summarily shot
Only “value” America has…how much wealth you’ve got

Craps

Rested my bones…on duct taped bar stool
Bartender was built like a 57’ Caddy
Shiny chrome on aging eyes
Her voice oozed cotton candy
“Another shot honey?”
“Little girl, I been shot so many times I
look the six side of a dice cube.”
She smiled, and I melted out the backdoor.
Like always.

Endangered Species

LIBERAL!...They shouted
We’ll flay his skin
LIBERAL!...They exalted
The last of his kin
Hung from lamp post
For the obtuse to see
LIBERAL!...was flayed alive
‘Til the blood dripped LIBERALLY
They tugged and pulled on body
And it soon was torn apart
Then they gasped in consternation
The LIBERAL had a HEART

Quartz Movement

Darkness creeps as sunshine sleeps
An owl screeches in the night
Coyotes howl, at the harvest moon

A shark cruising ocean deep
Cat is blinded by headlight
Water placid, no splash of the loon

Near dawn predicts the daily peep
The incandescent amaranthine plight
Denizens of eventide, await celestial swoon

Today…Tonight…Midnight, High Noon

Stir Crazy

He didn’t have both oars in the water
Some say she’s two bricks short of a load
They went and had a beautiful daughter
Who married a guy who looked like a toad
The grandkids are a handful, two mules, a fawn, a dove
Folks just always shake their heads
A “crazy” kind of love

Plagued

We're a declining world. China and the U.S. use 40% of the "world's" energy, much of it from greenhouse house gas producing coal. Austerity measures are being enacted across much of Europe. Sub-Sarahan Africa will be a lifeless wasteland within 20 years, quite possibly much less. Rain forests continue to be slaughtered at an alarming rate in S.America. There is a plague on the planet. It walks upright and with the combination of "superior ambition and superior ability" will sooner, rather than later destroy, the only place we ALL have to live. This "plague" breeds rapidly, in virtually any environment and has not freed itself from many of the dogmas and superstitions that "plagued" its ancestors. There ARE antibodies to the plague. But throughout the plague's history these antibodies are more often than not outwitted, outmaneuvered, and outsourced as both "expendable labor" or "cannon fodder" for wars of empire the virulent strain of the plague has an unquenchable thirst for. The "plague" of course is mankind. The "cure" will be its eradication. The "injustice" of the solution is only matched by the "justice" rendered to a planet that will once again(eventually) teem with the diversity it had before the plague arrived.

Antediluvian Answers

Plato hypothesized, Aristotle attended
Copernicus searched, Hippocrates mended
Dante’s hell, Augustine’s empyrean
Descartes dissertated, Machiavelli the means
Milton lost paradise, Homer “rode” boat
Shakespeare took stock, brilliantly wrote
Locke spoke rights, Rousseau too
Darwin found man, Freud undid the glue
Sampling of great minds, today’s leaders seemed drugged
And what of Atlas?…he’s merely shrugged

It's All About the Labor ... Neighbor

His name was Tukimba and he landed in Virginia in 1639.
On slave ship so stacked, between shackled racks he’d die within short time.
Despite infrequent gripes, his back received “stripes” from leather whipping line.
He worked tobacco plantation in blossoming Christian nation being black his only “crime.”
His story most common, his bones lie at rest and surely you know I offer no jest
For Tukimba’s broken body does so attest and
His, were the hands that built America.

Her name was Greta Von Kason, her Dad a stone mason, and they sailed for America in 1751.
The voyage was hell, fever, scurvy and smells,
Yet the Von Kason’s kept faith fruition would come.
They ate rotted meat, consumed putrid water, prayed at God’s feet, a necessity to some.
Arriving in Boston, they soon were so lost in, the burgeoning city from mansion to slum.
Her story was tragic, her world fell apart.
Dad passed away soon from a weakened old heart.
And Greta would cook, clean and sew till life did depart and
Hers, were the hands that built America.

His name was Seamus O’Brien and he worked the New York docks
Arriving in 1817 he oft’ wore out the arms of imperceptible sluggish clock
They called him “dirty Irish” or “Mick” when fighting brogue attempting to talk
And he died with knife in his back, some laughed while others, they just gawked
His story constitutes a long hard struggle to survive
He left a “consumed wife” and four children scarcely alive
The “states” he’d dreamt was where they would live, thrive and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Annie Waters and she lived in a dorm in Lowell
Massachusetts textile worker from 1840 was now her long term role
The day began at four AM the morning’s often bitter cold
Many times it seemed when she dreamed the mill did own her soul
Her story concluded with resistance and mutiny
Oppressors assured her she had no impunity
She hung self with rope she’d face no more injustice or inbred scrutiny and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was Roger Hawkins and he toiled on tiny farm
The crops his life, his love his wife, he meant no soul no harm
A ramshackle house on side of hill, a reddish tinted barn
The days were grueling and long, they oft’ worked arm in arm
His story was over in 1848
A sliver of river on his land sealed his fate
One bullet to his head ‘neath the moon near his gate and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Hattie Hanson and she moved west towards an unknown shore
Robert her husband and two small children left Ohio in ‘54
“There’s gold in them thar hills.” They’d heard the chant many times before
Five years of ordeal oft’ with no meal and precious little of the flaxen ore
“Bob” passed in ’59 a broken, spent, heartsick man
One child died and one child lived he’d never touch a pan
Hattie Hanson, stooped and bent spent five years looking wan and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was Wung Lu, sledgehammer in hand, he pounded on the rails
1869 was a time of backbreaking toil and myriad travails
Intense heat and bitter cold left the inner soul to wail
One year after being sent, Lu was content, to get his first piece of mail
The joy soon gone like rising sun, no longer did Lu smile
His wife had died, the letter decried, away six thousand miles
Dreams now shattered, one dollar in pocket, Lu walked…to his “last trial” and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Peggy Hodgkins, she labored in paper mill
Beginning at five and now eight no respite came until
‘T was the year of our Lord 1881 they offered no pain pill
Peggy’s slight fingers crushed in roller her bones attest it still
Her story not unlike many a child
Cigar smoking “men” exploited and smiled
When telephones came, only one hand she dialed and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was Heime Ludkin, McCormick Harvester Works was where
He worked long hours and fought with police, four workers killed unfair
On May 4, 1886, a meeting was called; the place Haymarket Square
Before the night was over Heime Ludkin simply wouldn’t care
Police en masse, the meeting done, a bomb was thrown, the explosion loud
Shots were fired, cops and protesters killed, Heime’s head bullet plowed
Eight men unjustly convicted of murder, yet only “one” was in the crowd and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Bessie Jefferson; she was a daughter of Jim Crow
She cooked and cleaned and was demeaned by white folks you don’t know
Bessie never went to school, ‘t was best to keep the black folks slow
She bore white man’s child and was reviled on both sides of the road
There were many like Bessie it must be confessed
“Black folks were clever” but white folks “knew best”
She died alone ‘02 clutched in poverty’s nest…and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was Walter Polanski, ideological Socialist, meat packer by profession
In ’07 Packingtown, better known as Chicago, “Polski” had a confession
Lard vats boiled intense, pig guts went in and some rats…a concession
No longer able to hold it in Walter succumbed to his obsession
He held a sign at Fifth and Vine reading “Guess what’s in your Lard”
Mrs. Polanski was deathly afraid and she prayed for him often and hard
Our spoken words, oft’ unheard, were spoken “over” Walter at the graveyard and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Alice Fordham, member of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union
On March 25, 1911 she joined 46 others in front of the Triangle Shirtwaist Company for a “fiery” communion.
Her husband always drunk, with four mouths to feed, shackled in and claimed by a sewing machine seemed the only solution
On this horrific day she would be ascribed a fate spelled out in the Devil’s Constitution
Nine floors up, chained, locked up the fire spread from floor to floor
Fireman’s ladders couldn’t make it, the flames on flesh, Alice can’t make it, she tosses few coins through window to poor
The perpetrators of this crime, never did a day of time, a clever mouthpiece performing his toxic chore and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was George Pampadorous, his nose somewhat porous, a riveter forty six floors in the sky
1919 was the year, George had no fear and skyscrapers the rage paid George a good wage enough for “two” pieces of pie
One chilly morn’ George lost his grip and took a slip his body cart wheeling soon to die
The other men gathered, poor George had been splattered, still looking up with two dead eyes
For six years George knuckled down in New York town breathing in the cleansing air
He’d just had a talk, on Coney Island walk, with pretty girl, the result… of his friends dare
The wedding date set, one month ago met, captivated George hadn’t a care and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Lucy Smith and she worked in the secretarial pool
A lovely girl she typed with one hand and with the other staved off lecherous fools
The date was 1922 the place Chicago and Lucy had dropped out of high school
Mom had died three years ago and her new step-mother was callous and cruel
Asked to work late one night Lucy was really put on the spot
Raped by her boss, he said her job might be lost, she hadn’t typed a single dot
Staggering home, battered, confused, step-mother implied she deserved what she got and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was Herman Schneider and in ‘33 he worked the bowels of Earth
A West Virginia coal miner was never once paid what he was worth
With pallid skin and blackened lungs he rarely laughed so devoid of mirth
Then came the day they reduced his pay and he and fellow miners felt a rebirth
The owner of the hellish hole drove up in shining black Cadillac
He told the men “if you know what’s good for you then,” you’ll go marching back
The men held out for weeks until Herman was felled by gunfire’s crack and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Trixie Thomas and she plied her trade at welder’s shop
‘T was ’43 and husband Lee was on Pacific island hop
Eight hours a day, child on the way, Hitler, Tojo must be stopped
She did her part with stalwart heart, slept and dined on wartime slop
To sacrifice for country, she never gave a second thought
Watched upper class acting crass wearing minks and jewels they’d bought
Yet Trixie never flinched or failed and never once was overwrought and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was Walter Biltner and he’d just spent three years in hell
From polished deck he saw orange speck, ‘t was Golden Gate it sure looked swell
Kamikazees, lousy chow, many of Walter’s comrades had fell
The view of bay scant miles away had placed him under magic spell
Walter’s girl was on the docks with arms awaiting that first embrace
Walking down the gangplank the tears were streaming down his face
In ’46 the war was nix his machinist skills would find new place and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Mary Strongfingers she bore proud blood of Navajo
In ’52 ‘neath ‘zona blue the carpets she wove were treasures although
Mary gazed at distant stars, listened to passing cars, yearning for world she did not know
Trapped ‘tween Joshua trees, she labored on knees, knowing of no place to go
Came a day, her hair now gray, she left for lights of big city
Fingers bent, knees bowed, Mary had never been very pretty
Alone and spent, she paid her rent, until the spirits came ‘tis a pity and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was Tim Finnigan, New York cop, from the 23rd precinct, he walked a long beat
Five days a week, since ’33, for 25 years he greeted the citizens he met on the streets
Barkeeps, Deli owners, Pawnbrokers, Shark loaners he jested or arrested on tired, aching feet
On Saturday night he and the Missus drank a few beers and asked Luigi for spaghetti to eat
“Timmy” was a stout, proud man his smile infectious, his justice was square
Three days before “returning his badge” he walked and whistled, Officer Finnigan hadn’t a care
Six days later the scene was grim for they buried Tim…
A Liquor store holdup had parted his hair, and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Kathy Pearson, housewife, raiser of kids, often called “Mrs.”
She bandaged cuts, did the shopping, cooked the meals and generally washed the dishes
In ’65, with the world scintillatingly alive, she harbored secret and unspoken wishes
Husband Harold seemed apathetic, sometimes apoplectic, although he found her apple pie delicious
As life passed by, she would often cry, drink some vodka and dry her tears
She watched her aspirations fade away and focused on the children’s years
“Mom” to her family, she rarely engaged in revelry and her dreams now live in burnished mirrors and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was Jose Garcia and he worked the fields from sun up ‘til late
June ’69 was the calendar’s time and Jose sold his labor from state to state
While Americans took for granted the crisp fruits and vegetables they saw on their plate
He soothed his blistered hands with camphor not suspecting his ultimate fate
A lovely girl, his wife named Pearl, looked out for their kids thinking Jose so fine
He sent home money every two weeks and called on the phone from time to time
Chavez and Huerta drove the pike, a united strike and Jose was wrapped in barbed wire twine and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Miss Watson and she taught fifth graders at Roosevelt Elementary
With patience, kindness and resolve she oft’ made impossible seem rudimentary
The parents of her pupils admired her scruples and lavished praise most complementary
‘T was ’74 and counting fifty plus four she’d imparted her wisdom beyond half a century
She expired one bell ringing a startled student bringing a paper he’d had problem with start
A lifelong spinster, no husband, no kinster, the cause of her death was most logical part
For the sage school teacher, reminded the preacher, had died from an always engaged “enlarged heart” and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was Arlie Bateman and he wheeled a double trailer, Kentworth semi-truck.
Like his Daddy afore him he figured eighteen wheels ‘neath him spelt pride, earning honest Buck.
He’d heard other guys, with grumblin’ sighs, sayin’ drivin’ a big rig is “just my luck.”
But Arlie could get gnarly if the conversation implied he was some kind of “good ol’ boy schmuck.”
Drove for over thirty years through blizzards, fog, sleet, snow and heat
‘T was his pleasure, a roadside treasure, to talk to good folks gettin’ bite to eat
In ’81 Arlie was done, his back out of whack, he walks with cane on swollen feet and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Tracey Lawton and she was headed to a place where they say it’s kinda warm
The time was early in ’91, crude jokes, no fun, for this was a hell called “Desert Storm”
A helicopter pilot, if it flew she could fly it, she remembered last days at the Air Force dorm
Snapshots of Mom and Dad, her eyes welled up sad, then Lieutenant Lawton was back to form
She’d fought so damn hard to make it here, once savagely raped after casual beer
Her superiors, adamant of course, protecting interests of the Air Force, ignore the “occasional” lecherous leer
And if she’d told herself once plus million times quite clear, NOTHING would force her to live in a mirror and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was Robert Penlen, a Kansas native he was a Doctor by profession
He was no one’s fool, in med school and was rather staid…his own confession
Whilst engaged in his studies, he made few buddies and was imbued with obsession
Upon graduation with thoughts of equal nation, he’d aid female, surely this was no transgression
The time was ’95, placards screamed “FETUS ALIVE”, yet Dr. Penlen was devoted
Women, sometimes young girls, bore strong emotions they oft’ emoted
His lifelong stance that equality wore more than pants, and for that he was worshipped or demoted and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Latisha Cook and the irony was, that, she loved to cook too
Skin color Black, credentials she lacked, skills never tested, she felt inner blue
Finally got job waitin’ tables, and it enables “hole in the wall” built for few
She saved up small tips and sarcastic quips, Latisha knew what she had to do
Millionaire politicians are such wise sages, assistance halved, she refused to spell “worse”
She put it all in tired purse, ‘t was ‘98 and on her horizon was becoming a nurse
Shot late one night goin’ home to ‘hood, tryin’ to do good, being Black in America our “original” curse and
Hers, were the hands that built America

His name was Freddy Butler, he bore life’s scars and tended bar down at Smiley’s Place
Jokes, he’d heard them all, complaints, he saw them fall, some poignant deserving grace Sometimes the rowdy crowd, would get too loud and get close in to Freddy’s face
He’d merely smile, with acquired guile one had to accept rules of the race
For forty years he’d seen the tears, watched mating rituals, met many folks who were nice
The fights in that time, were more shouts than crime, as he rolled the liar’s dice
In ’03, when he died, his patrons cried, they said he’d married once or twice and
His, were the hands that built America

Her name was Trina Rollins, recently turned seven on third day of fourth month 2011
Daddy was a laid off stucco sider, a good provider, until pink slip notice came and then
Mom worked two jobs and Dad felt like a slob ashamed for not contributing when
Trina fell ill and time stood still with the house payments late again and again
With no insurance and little assurance the family embraced social safety net
But ‘cross the country in D.C. the powers that be were crafting plans the Rollins would regret
Trina passed on, her sweet smile gone, the rapacious awoke to sparkling dawn, but it’s a sure bet
That, hers “would” have been the hands that built America

The story of America is quite plain to see, the focus not on “me” but rather on “we”
All manor of labor built foundation of land, leaving tired aching backs and hard calloused hands
A “Christian nation” under God, some say, but not me, for injustice mounts, here’s what I see;

We build the rails, bridges and roads, carry light and heavy loads
We pay our taxes, fight the wars, as ravenous gloat ‘hind oaken doors
We mend the machinery, tend the ill, we mop the floors when there’s a spill
We “build” the burgers, cook the fries, wave our flags as the politician lies
We construct the buildings, large and small, man the counters in the malls
We pick the vegetables and the fruit, as “Big Ag” computes his loot
We fight the fires, police the streets, turn the beds and launder sheets
We impart knowledge in our schools, manicure yards with swimming pools
We work two jobs and sometimes three and all we ask is equality

The pursuit of Life, Liberty and Happiness is what the document said
‘T was the gluttonous, the perfidious the e’er insidious turning meaning on its head

We type the documents, take dictation, propel the economy of our nation
We man the home front, raise the kids, fill applications, submit the bids
We dream sometimes washing your cars, put up with “snark” at swanky bars
We serve you at the country club, mix your cocktails, and give back rubs
We do all this and so much more from North to South, from shore to shore
We are men and women from ancestral lands, some tribal or close knit bands
We demand the right to have our unions, as churches do with their communions
We are diverse and do our best to obey law, but we’ve discovered a serious flaw
We can’t compete with debauched Wall St. - they are the cannibals…we are the meat

The wealthy in general care not for penurious, ignoring the plight of poverty injurious
No more taxes! Their rallying cry, no safety net, millions will die
The old, the sick, the weak young and lost, the elites will spare nothing to be rid of their cost
This attack on defenseless surely must stop, ‘tis scum, not cream rises to top
We shall take to the streets en masse and holler, “To hell with the worship of the almighty dollar!”
In our bitterness and tears we never shall falter, the backbone of America is uniquely “BLUE COLLAR"

Bard Regard

How to convince thee, my mentor and friend
"Might you be interested?" spoke mildly
My afflictions many...worsen not mend
If not for life's pain, I'd react wildly

To occupy ground where Bard once had stood
Lungs filled with air...puissant frivolity
As you stand and scan stage, feet on coarse wood
Open thy eyes, thy ears, listen for me

Life deals many cards, one plays what one's dealt
Endless others have had grief worse than I
Go, my good friend, and relate what thee felt
On wind vibes sail home, I shall smile and sigh

"To be or not to be?" 'twas the question
Go and be gay! is humble suggestion

Reinfatuation

I chase her through a wet cobblestone square
She wears billowy skirt…peasant blouse
The midday sun reflects flaxen long hair
We run towards door of a medieval house
A symphony plays…music engulfs us
Her feet are nimble and devoid of shoes
We race past a church her golden locks mussed
I see many faint smiles from darkened pews
Slowly but surely she doth slip away
Hath my age denied me, I must know truth
In the hours aft’ midnight…start of new day
Crow’s feet unseen, I return to my youth
I awake to sunlight’s eternal gleam
Is enchanting wife the girl in my dream?

Indelibly Insolent

"Fellow" of the Bard's "honorable men"
We've all seen the sneer, image remains clear
Profligate liar, he writes with "forked" pen
To his many victims I shed a tear

To you snide fellow, back painted yellow
"Five deferments" yet still longing to kill
Your gaze is hawkish, fortitude jello
Trading lives for profit...ultimate thrill

Justice is fickle, you walk the land free
Graves bleed on horizon, drip to your bank
Misery, plunder your gross legacy
Tomb of your actions most dark and dank

Conscience of humanity you do prick
Your cell waits in hell...perfidious Dick

War Crimes

Screams end dreams amidst blazing blades
Inhabitants of helicopter will soon "rest" in shade
The ultimate sacrifice requested and paid
Their bodies a testament to errors gross made

If this war shall end man will soon start another
The "remains" flown home with Flag for the mother
The "exploiters" and "hawks" will all do their best
Red, White and Blue tears, from "Golden Walled" nests

Soon election time comes and we "choose" a successor
Shall we demand peace or coronate a regressor
With reverence to dead, as you vote hold your noses
Metaphorically bestowing many thousands white roses

Poe-Pitch

“Twas a black cat, nothing less, nothing more
Its green eyed ebon head staring straight ahead
It mewed, “Lenore”…I’d heard that name before
I know, ‘twas Poe, long dead, now bled, rose red
Arising from bed…my head, my head, ohhhh!
“No more, Lenore!”…flailing body to floor
Green eyes burned through my soul, no, No, NO, NO!
It stood scrutinizing, sizing from door
Black cat? Black cat? ‘Twas a specter or Black hat
Stumbling on spent bottle…eyes on Lenore
Room began to spin…I ended with a splat
Swore ‘twas last time, I’d amble through pub door
Hath need naught to fear, cat is small in size
Claws tear at my face…mine eyes…minimized

Just a Spoonful of Sugar

Sinking…taking on ink
Reality…stranded on McGraw-Hill
Erase Twain…no n-word complaints
Hypothetical parenthetical restraints
Some say we should zip…bygone lips
Politically correct revisionist history
Still presents a mystery…misdeeds of the past
Airbrushed, neutered…A “faggot” is a bundle of sticks
White out washed…let’s play make believe
Here comes the pinko eraso
“Truth” ain’t always sugar coated
S.O.S. Be historically hip…abandon Censor Ship

We Waltz in Your Dreams

She envisions rainbows and butterflies
A fluttering array of color…life
On soft grass under crystalline skies
Free from all conflict, pardoned from gross strife
Freckles shall adorn, her forehead and nose
The “bounce” in her step...always enchanting
Blue eyes now tire ‘tis time for sweet repose
Beautiful she sleeps on hillside slanting
Sock monkeys smiling…porcelain bears dance
Rainbow drips love drops, upon her and me
She awakens like angel, now’s my chance
I kiss sun-kissed nose, now thee becomes we
My heart’s been captured…she’s opened the lock
We dance… tinkle, tinkle…in music box

Purported Distorted

Saw a bumblebee bumbling…He was all “stung out”
Heard a hummingbird humming…Couldn’t carry a tune
Watched an old catfish getting Friskie…Why shouldn’t he?
Witnessed two spiders playing seven card stud…Why not “crazy eights?”
Had a conversation with my shadow today
He didn’t say much except...he was afraid of the dark

Tripe, with a Side of Boloney

Stockton’s magnificent…Stockton’s stupendous
Shh!…The crime rate’s horrendous
Stockton’s magnificent…There’s the Delta if you’ve boat
Shh!…Our mortgages don’t float
Stockton’s magnificent…Forbes put us on the spot
Shh!…Get home before midnight or risk getting shot
Stockton’s magnificent…We exalt videos from Brookside Country Club
Shh!…“Magnificence” is perspective…get the rub?

Butch

I look at him and he looks at me
He knows that I know that he knows
Clouded eyes fail to mask his determination
His back legs nearly useless he now battles incontinence
Yet pride, dignity and shame coalesce upon him
We have braved wind, rain, fog, cold and stifling summer heat
I, sometimes speaking; him, listening when he feels it necessary
He loved water and chasing the uncatchable
Now, as always, he remains silent and I ponder what he’s thinking
Perhaps, in another life, I shall be at his feet
But his is the heart of a lion and mine that only of a man
Has man ever had as loyal a friend as a dog?
Has a dog ever brought such sorrow to a man?
I wonder if he knows that…I suspect he does
So we shall grieve together, on Yesterday’s trails

Dark Shadows

Somewhere, on the jagged coast of Maine
Wave upon wave crashes upon somber rock
A crescent moon, a celestial sliver, drips cosmic tears
And along a remote path a “man” walks in silence
Black onyx ring resides on inhuman index finger
As wolf’s head cane creates marked imprints in dampened soil
Two hundred years imprisoned, waiting, plotting
Now Free! His ancestral homeland beneath undying feet
Collinwood revisited, chilled air caressing dead skin
He, now a distant cousin returned…to claim a legacy
“The old house” shall breathe again, candelabras cast light and shadow
A casket, repository of the dead, serves a nefarious purpose
Home, by day, to a soul in torment, a soul in love
Josette! Josette! ‘Tis her he must find, a flame to rekindle
And she lives! As she once was, young ,beautiful, innocent
Now, she must die, only then can they be together, immortal, everlasting
Scant moments of agony exchanged for eternal togetherness
Obsidian shaded roses whose thorns leave but two…pricks
He emerges from dank fog, donned in caped overcoat, charming, cunning
Existing in the minds of the bewitched, the dreams of the lonely
Offering beguiling fantasies, cloaked in malevolence
He raps! A silver wolf resting in the iron grip of evil
For you my darling he has come, offering resplendent solitude
With “him” and “him” alone…now and forever
Beware my lovely…may flocks of angels protect you
A bat’s wings flutter in the wind…His name…is Barnabas

Rolex Vex

Always among us…They’re forever around
Turned up noses…In every town
Ostentatious, demanding…Affluent, commanding
Condescending, imitation…In every generation
Snooty, Snobbish…Frippery, Foppish
They dine at the club…Chase ball on the links
Leave penurious tips…Mix watered down drinks
The pompous “gentlemen”…The “wannabe” bitch
The bane of mankind…the vainglorious rich

Muslim Man

He traveled…great distance
From faraway…land
Determination… Fierce Persistence
Had guided…skittish hand
He memorized…Studied
With fervent…Resolution
Tears upon reciting…U.S. Constitution
Colors adorned house…Red, White and Blue
Always a smile…For me, for you
One morning…Land of Freedom…Found Shot Dead
Crime…Left the House…Turban, on his head

We'll Keep the Light On For Ya

Minute past midnight I lay on tombstone
Cold ancient marble feels good on mine face
Corner of thine eye says… I’m not alone
It moves …adorned in black…dead man’s pace
Wise owl on decayed branch takes in the sight
He nary bats an eye…seen all this before
Fox on the hunt casts shadow in moonlight
A cat arches back on crumbling crypt floor
I came to the graveyard to escape life
“Tis the living, not the dead…plaguing me
My agonies many… miseries rife
Wraith…approach with scythe…”it” will set me free
Last sound I hear with ears soon to be dead
“Rest,” now eternal…thy scourge will be bled

Low Tide

They beat his hooded body
Then strapped it to wooden plank
In blackness, currents of electricity
Lit up his agonized brain
Hallucinogenic drugs coursed through
A now carcinogenic wasteland
Cascading Adam’s ale, essence of life…now
Nefariously co-opted, Waves of
“Wanton Waterboarding”
Roiling ocean’s “white with foam”
Surfing the besmirched waters of
“Tortured Logic”

Alreade ... I Miss You

I’ve two eyes to gaze upon yours
Two ears to hear sweet, soft murmurs
Two hands to hold yours in mine
Two lips to kiss your lips sublime
Two arms to lock you in embrace
Two tears running down my face
One voice saying adieu to you
One heart that now is broken in two

Wreckless Feckless

They’ve been
Speared, Hacked
Hung, Shot
Bombed, Gassed
Sunk…’Tis Blot
Smeared, Distorted, Condemnation
Before there were borders
Or what we call nations
Grown on their own
Nurtured in the mind
Oft’ times been wicked
We thrive on the kind
Fact of the matter
‘Tis no certain panacea
Blood often fails
To drown an…Idea

Augary on Inky Wings

An ominous sky drew down on the lake
Dark, foreboding it crackled with fierce rage
Our tiny boat tossed, for shore we did make
To live or to die, our names on what page
Many chapters Life’s book, stand unwritten
Waves grew taller, ‘risen by nature’s breath
My sloop mate, soul mate, with her I’m smitten
I rowed impassioned, she would not meet death
Wind and water came crashing unto us
Her eyes stark with terror…mine hath fury
Land now loomed quite near, continue I must
Row me lad row!...thy only thought hurry!
By God’s grace, and my pace, we’ll see new dawn
Yet we failed to note…descending Black Swans

Praise of Poe

Many, many years had passed when a tale I first did see
‘Twas penned by Poe, the master of woe
And bore the simple title of “Annabel Lee”
“Twas a tale of love and a tale of death that ended by the sea
Over and over I read, ‘til the pages had bled
Red ink now staining me…I had to find Annabel Lee

I was aging man, my outlook wan, she died in Literary
How would I find, where was the sign
I longed to direct me, to the body of Annabel Lee
Twas in Baltimore where Poe spoke no more in 1849
I’d start my quest, my futile jest, my pursuit of history
Upon Eastern shore, its rocks I’d scour, I’d lie and die with Annabel Lee

With blistered, cracked, bleeding hands, clambered rocks and trudged through sands
Every crevice, soggy cave, to specter in sepulcher, I was a slave
I’d probe until I found her grave, somewhere near the sea
Near the sea, was where she’d be, to find her and be free
To locate a maiden who lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me…So obsessed was I…with Annabel Lee

How it transpired I scarcely know, I walked and talked in shadow of Poe
Morbid fantasies and stale wine, Nevermore, Nevermore yet still I walked shore
I’d lost all track of me…I’d lost me, I’d lost me, in the journey to Annabel Lee
If God is just, if God is right, then he must see me on this night
On this night, on this night as the crashing waves roll in from the sea
He’ll know my plight and aid my fight to lie and die with Annabel Lee

Futility in my breast did swell, did swell like hell, Oh! Sweet Annabel
Please entreat your heart to forgive me, wherever you are down by the sea
I’m not the old man you see, for I yet know ambrosial smells and distant church bells
As I continue the search for thee, Oh Angels of light do so set me right
Guide me past endless days and oft’ nightmarish nights, illume the path for me
‘Ere I pass, without finding lass, whose last breaths were passed as…Annabel Lee

Many, many years had fled, and I was dead, when bones found in cave
The knuckles were gnarled, the legs seaweed snarled, a dank and lonely grave
As the bones were removed, ‘twas one hand was so grooved upon nearly eroded name
They tried and pried and still were denied so broke off the hand feeling no shame
When the moon lies at its lowest ebb, golden, so golden down near the sea
In celestial light, a hand clings on tight, to the sea seldom name…of Annabel Lee

Til Death do Us Part

In barren house I walk, alone, shaking
Labyrinthine halls, stretch into blackness
Wager I did make…fool undertaking
To back out now would surely be tactless
The wind, the wind, the wind, forever blowing
‘Twas that a wolf howl?...ringing in mine ear
Air is icy cold, outside its snowing
Footsteps ‘neath my feet, do echo with fear
Flashlight is now dead, I feel…through cold tomb
A door somewhere opens, I hear…the lock
Where can it be, perchance in the next room?
My hand finds handle…and then…faint knock
I fling door open…Dagger plunges in
Last sight I see… crazed wife’s “victory” grin

The Color of Tomorrow

The first thing I noticed, were that her eyes were
Blue
We ran through wet, knee high grass, which left our feet
Green
We made love in creaky old shack with leaky roof that was colored
Brown
As we left, billowing clouds parted, and I picked her a Daffodil shaded
Yellow
After spending sixty years together, the flame burned bright…hair long ago
White
Then, I died, our multi-hued world, our private colored haven from erasure fell
Black
Yet, as one rainstorm so must pass, it gives rise to still another magnificent, arching
Rainbow
And I await, blue eyes and green feet in brown shack, yellow Daffodil and hair tinged
Red
Black
Imperceptible on the joyous and distant horizon of youth, with yearning, kissable lips, parted
Pink

Is This Seat Taken?

These people, those people, them people
English-Americans, German-Americans, Italian-Americans
Polish-Americans, Slavic-Americans, Sikh-Americans
Asian-Americans, African-Americans, Latino-Americans
Irish, French, Spanish, Dutch
To name all…would prove too much
“These people” are “you”
“These people” are “we”
“We the people”...Remember WE came from immigrants, too
... Native-Americans do

Hystericell

In corner of cell “floats” a black spider
Eyes wide are mine…red crescent shaped other
My love lies distant, I not beside her
Matter…bends, we regard one another
Through bars of cold steel, rigid, set in stone
An icy blue moon casts raw pallid breath
I peer up at fiends web…I am alone!
Eight legs walk silent, on mission of…death
Shiny coal body, unseen by mine eye
Maddened, I so touch, silken sticky web
Shall this be the night upon which I die?
‘Tis illusion I say, gross fears so ebb
I lay back on cot, convinced of false plight
My darling distant…succumbs to first bite

Star Light ... Star Bright

I am lost…gazing ever starward for bearing
The Big Dipper drips opaque drops of sorrow
And the “Man in the Moon” stares stoic and mute
A meteor streaks ‘cross dusky sky
I leap!...yet I’ve no “ticket”…cannot “hitch a ride”
My broken heart beats in rhythm with eternity
As “Cosmic Solutions” remain elusive

Thirteen Points of Light

Thirteen points of light to brighten up my day
In three short months they quickly fade away
Darkness once again descends upon my room
I then re-enter my world of pain, dread and gloom

Eyes that sparkled brightly, voices shrill and loud
I briefly joined their family, for that I stand most proud
Must all things of joy, be of the transitory
Is a moment in the sun, our one brief shot at glory?

We stood on the field, hand on hand on hand
Diverse backgrounds yes, but united we did stand
Our battles were fought, with glove and bat and ball
The odds were stacked against us, yet we still stood tall

Now one day this summer, I shall drive by that field
And the tears from my eyes will surely reject yield
Then on that night I’ll scan the skies for thirteen stars
Amidst the stifling summer heat and roar of passing cars

Their names and their numbers etched into my brain
And I’ll pray for winter’s day, to see them once again
Many nights I’ll suffer pain with scant relief
Reunion with the Lady Vikes must strengthen my belief

With the tools of our trade, will again stand hand in hand
And take the field, win or lose, a tightly knitted band
I will not fail to fight my way, never losing sight
Of sparkling eyes and voices loud…thirteen points of light

Ped-Agog

Teacher, teacher, oh from whence do you come?
You belongeth in place, far, far, from here
Swayed by the lute, a melodious strum
‘Twas name Mary or perchance Guinevere
Soft flaxen skirt billowing as you dance
Clouds atop London drift aimlessly by
Enraptured glory…renaissance romance
Through swirling hair, young man catches thine eye
“Sprightly young girl…I should have word with you”
You blush oh so slightly…coyly say “sir?”
On Globe’s rough hewn stage…you know what to do
Lips press gently amidst essence of myrrh
One morn’ hand in hand, one night ‘tween his sheets
And long ago words…that taste eversweet

It's a Zoo Out There

I’ve seen ‘em clap with slickered flippers
Heard ‘em bark when time for nippers
Glide through water effortlessly
Preen for onlookers shamelessly
Nap and snore on sun splashed dock
Wiggle their whiskers on wave washed rocks
Line up in row…waitin’ for the next meal
Now assassination is in the repertoire
Of a trained…Seal

Heart ...Breaking News

President Huckabee, after signing the repeal of
“Obamacare” celebrated by announcing his own
Health care plan tentatively titled “Huck-a-Buck.”
The President, former Minister and still occasional
Fox News Pundit stated he has the cure for all that
“Ailes” us. Effective immediately, all hospital televisions
Will show Fox News on a 24/7 basis. The new policy
has been euphemistically called “Yoo Tube.”
Copyright infractions may apply.

Burning of the Globe

On June 29, 1613, the Globe Theatre burned down to the ground. In existence for a mere ten years and the home to some of the greatest works of English literature the world would ever see, the theatre’s flames licked ferociously at the London summer sky. Reputed to have been set ablaze by a cannon misfiring during a performance, this was the story that was widely accepted. I’m here today to tell the “true” story of that fateful night.
On the morning of June 26, 1613, William Shakespeare sat quietly looking out his kitchen window at his rather sumptuous home at Stratford-upon-Avon. His mood was both contemplative and foul. He had grown tired of the act of writing. How could this be? His fuel, his passion for decades had been to place his thoughts upon paper, his creation brought to life for the multitudes who had witnessed his works. Now, that fire seemed cold, as though doused with a frigid and unexpected rain. His last few works had been a mildly successful collaboration with John Fletcher and, financially, he was secure. At age forty-nine, he was still in reasonably good health. History, its many varied players, their triumphs and tragedies, had consumed much of his thought and a great bulk of his writing. But it was always “someone else’s” history, not his.
Of course, there had been the prolonged battle in removing the stain of dishonor from his father’s, and by relation, his, name. The obtaining of the coat of arms had been an arduous affair and had taxed the limits of his patience. Yet, it had been accomplished. No, upon waking this morning, he had been besieged by visions which he might only conject were remnants of a previous night’s unsavory dreams. He now merely saw shadows moving amongst the trees. Specters of characters he himself had invented: Othello, King Lear, Hamlet. Poor tortured Hamlet. Could a man write so eloquently about the suffering of another human being and not be affected by it? Yet, he already knew the answer. The weight of murder, mayhem and madness lay as if stone pressed upon his person.
Can man mix poison with ink well and quill
Then step into sunlight … nary a care?
Do dreams come calling in nights deadly still?
Is madness reflection of love so fair?
I live in a world of my own choosing
Fleshed out my fantasies for all to see
Why do I so often feel I’m losing?
They see my creations … never see me
Immortality waits in roaring fire
All that is e’er known, shall go up in flame
My papers, my books, a trail lost in pyre
‘Tis I shall play final card in this game
All it shall take is one well-placed match
I’ll seal the enigma upon dried thatch
So William Shakespeare bade farewell to daughter, Susanna, and made his way to London. He was nearly half a century old in an age of quickened breaths and great uncertainty. He had many secrets locked into cabinets at the Globe; secrets which, if revealed, might, in the eyes of some, tarnish his reputation or, perchance, enhance it. He would leave no ambiguity to the matter. Personal letters of correspondence might indeed place his family at risk, for he had, God forgive his soul, written seditiously concerning the Queen and many of her court. Many of these “parchments of power” had never been sent yet still resided amongst his personal affairs at the Globe. This had been foolish, but in the declining age of chivalry, when men did so dare to question even a King or Queen, how could he, who had penned such courage, be such a coward as to not even use quill as his broadsword? He was well aware and vaingloriously proud, that through the machinizations of his work, he had exposed the hypocrisy of tyranny many times. But how much had been understood? Always forced to conceal his barbed comments in layers of cryptic clothing, he now was unsure how much had actually gotten through to the ale crowds who oft received them. Marlowe had taken the ultimate gamble and paid with his life. How often had he envied Marlowe and his death for that which he believed. Now, he, William Shakespeare, would join his literary pantheon of characters who performed noble deeds to save those that they loved.
He arrived, in heavy disguise, on the afternoon of June 29. He sat with his horse high upon a hill overlooking his beloved London. The Globe Theatre, of which he and the Burbages and fellow players of the Chamberlain’s Men had so been enamored, rested gloriously in the misty, stagnant air. The building was being readied for a performance and players and workers could be seen scurrying to and fro. He would wait until nightfall when the crowds had departed and then perform his act.
Consumed by fire … baptismal conflagration
Plays, poems, sonnets and most crucial … letters
Shame shan’t befall the next generation
Flames so searing my ink blotted fetters
As darkness fell upon old London Town
A man on horseback … alone unobserved
Rode most stealthily on much sodden ground
Eyes were now wet with the task now at hand
He recalled first days … much joy and sorrow
The first time they’d walked all planning the land
Match sword alit … the Globe, no tomorrow
As embers sparked high into starry night
A “Quill Warrior” rode tall … victory flight

Shakespeare’s legacy is secure today.
We have his sonnets, poems and plays.
Perhaps in his tomb, protected by curse
Lies the final chapter, the long sought-after verse.

Dead Man's Curve Ball

"Dead Man's Curve Ball"
I am an old man
I walk barefoot on shattered glass
Yet it’s my “heart” that bleeds
Automatic weapons fire tracers towards Orion
A twenty six year old woman changes diapers
in nearby tattered apartment. She has 13 teeth.
A kid’s head emerges from a graffitied dumpster
Half eaten slice of pizza in his mouth
Red, White and Blue Bunting
Hangs on a bank like a rapper’s trousers
A stern looking man appears on a huge video monitor
in garbage strewn park. Old Glory ripples behind him.
His words begin soft, a tenor totalitarian singing
A crescendo of carping castigation
CELEBRATE! He does so order
‘Tis “Bin Laden Dead Day”

The Last Apple

They hung the last public school teacher today
Pedagogy was now, blasphemous, heresy…and she had been warned
The coarse rope made a twisting, grotesque, fiber on wood sound
As the hellish wind and the crowd “oohed” together
Her young legs, slender, imperfect, full of life moments before
Now twitched…once…twice, and then a final time
A man…heavy of jowl and countenance brought forth the “Good Book”
‘Twas the “only book,” he sanctimoniously instructed, his voice
Now rising to fever pitch, as the crowd stood, muted, transfixed
Then, at the mere pointing of a corpulent finger, they moved in unison
Shuffling, murmuring they marched to nearby cars and trucks bringing forth “yesterday”
Crates of books…boxed civilization, the bound works of secular humanity
A pyramid of literary genius and history took shape, built beneath newly dead feet
The swaying, swinging body attached to the rope, fingers limp, stared unaware
The “library of lies” the now sweating, rotund man offered to rapidly darkening skies
“We shall all be cleansed by the fires of divine and omnipotent providence”
Gasoline was spread by one frenetic onlooker, then another and yet another
A match was thrown…the acrid smell of burning flesh spiraled maliciously aloft
And seven millennia of mortal innovation seared the nostrils of the faithful
A blast of wizened wind carried aloft a single page, singed, a mere scrap
Blackened letters, scorched symbols of yesteryear…”To be or not to…
To land in a small patch of unlikely, undisturbed, fertile earth
Now each spring, new flowers arise, a coronation of colors, a bed of…ideas
That will, once again, upon the culmination of mankind’s darkest hour
Inspire and elucidate those yearning for knowledge, testifying to power of pen
And to visions of tolerance and wisdom once treasured and soon to be
Awaiting rediscovery… somewhere, on the “ink stained” path of yesterdays…teachers

Jen's Dilem

“Do you love me?”
“Baby, I love you more than
The sails on a floundering ship at sea…in search of the ever elusive wind.
I’ve said it a hundred, a thousand times…I love you so much Jen.”
Lights dim…Lips press
Passions enflamed…Both undress
Jupiter arises…and the sun...burns hot
“I love you”…”I said I love you!”
“Yeah, baby me too…right now I’m looking for the beer you bought”

Gulag Ameripelago

Barbed wire…Incarceration
Tat on Tat…Prison Nation
Penurious aid…Gotta ration
Creating…Lost Generation
Wall Street Thugs…Safe in Bed
Non-entities…Lock-up dread
Military?…Bleed Taliban Red?
Come home stumped…Maybe dead
Outrageous…Price for college
Street Smart…Graveside knowledge
Opportunities abound…for elite
Poor get bite size Snickers…Trick or Treat

Chill Thrill

Flowers now blossom upon springtime’s hill
Birds sing and bees buzz as skies wax sunny
Yet my heart doth so long for winter’s chill
Bare trees and dark skies…raindrops a plenty
Icy cold mornings…the sight of one’s breath
The crunch of the frost beneath walking shoe
‘Tis on these days I feel furthest from death
Thinking of nighttime and snuggled with you
We gather ourselves round the old fireplace
My love and I share blanket… cats and dogs
Flames flicker soft lights on your sleepy face
As they do ancient dance on glowing logs
The embers fade black we retire and then
Each night I dream of next winter again

Double Feature: Tree Stumps and Speed Bumps

Another thousand trees…slated for the gallows
Yet some joker’s grandiloquence…”our canopy of trees”
Eighty-sixed our tree surgeon…urban forest slowly turns to fallow
Now mistletoe and negligence…have them on their knees
The current guy in charge…is “Stumpy” the Chainsaw Barber
Answered an ad in the Record… Stockton…”no safe arbor”

Gone at Dawn

Tendrils of gray dawn illume humble room
Remnants of dreams do recede from my head
Aurora soon brightens, biting the gloom
I instinctively reach…arm across bed
You are not there, not now…not today
Your pillow untouched…feathers unslept
Fog lifts from my brain…you are away
Back into our room…the murk has now crept
No soft, warm body to gently caress
The dangle of silk, known as your hair
I conjure up image…doing my best
Close my eyes softly…imagine you’re there
On man’s metal wings…you flew from the sun
Bring back blissful light…my sweet darling one

Compassion out of Fashion

I found it lying…on the street today
Bruised and bloodied, the spark of life fading
How many just passed by…I cannot say
Gross indifference…‘tis not abating
Stopping I held its forlorn dying head
Applied water to parched lips…a last drink
What once had flourished…now on roadside dead
As its last breath wheezed…I began to think
How had we become…so cold…so callous
So self-aggrandizing…blinded by greed
Hath the fragrance of roses…changed to malice?
Sitting idly by…as humankind bleeds
I speak, of course, the death of compassion
Language it spoke…clearly out of fashion

Pages

Saw a man on the corner shaking hands…with himself. He couldn’t seem to figure out who’d get “the upper hand.”

Saw a black bag hanging upside down on a picket fence. There were two holes cut in it. “White” eyes stared back at me.

Saw a man pushing a shopping cart, aka his “home,” on a busy street. Guy in a polished up BMW almost ran him down. The Lord will provide.

Saw a kitten dead on a road near my home. One little paw was raised in the air. A final and futile call for help in a world more smitten with "gettin’" than kittens.

Saw a White umpire call a Hispanic girl out at third base in what might be the worst call
I’ve seen in twenty plus years of coaching. He’d been calling her out for 500 years.

Saw a young girl, pregnant, sitting on a park bench, eyes nearly blank, kneading her hands.
Three thousand and a few odd miles away, millionaire politicians were deciding what she really needs.

Saw a young man sitting in a wheelchair at the local grocery store. He had two stumps where
his legs used to be. Two kids were walking by him arguing about who had the best tennis shoes.

Saw a Kingfisher at a nearby river, perched on a wire and wearing a crown on his head. A group of little Fishers were swooping and diving, foraging for food. The divine right of Kings.

Saw myself in a reflection as I passed a window while working in my backyard. Was an old man I’d
never seen before. Upon entering the house my wife told me how “pretty” I was. Always been glad
her eyes were blue…and blurry.

Dogpound Democracy

God Bless America land that we love
Stand beside her, and we shall guide her
From the Right, and with might from above
Down on Wall Street to your own Bedroom
In our decaying cities and forsaken towns
God Bless America, where our new motto
Praise Jesus…is to kick a dog…when he’s down

Avaricious - Delicious

Open the Skull…Remove the Brain
Place in Jar…Labeled Insane
Split the Ribs…Extract the Heart
Remember…it’s the smallest part
Do not shake, tremble, quiver
Tripe is Tripe…Save the Liver
Pare the Bone…Remove the Fat
Tenderize…with budget bat
Sautee’ in…decadent honey
Prepare for… the stench of money
Skewer the eyeballs…Cleave the toes
Garnish with dividends…Or tongues of foes
It’s as easy as fricassee…GOP De-lack-icy

Pillsbury Pilfering

Humanity planned a bake sale today
‘Twas summer and the sun baked hot
They’d set up tables in the shade
And lay out all the treats they’d got
Of course there’d be pies and cookies and cakes
With all the breads the “peasants” could make
And please kind sir could you partake…
But business was dreadfully slow
For the key ingredient was in short supply
The “Antoinette’s”…had all the dough

Latte Fools

Rapacious, self-centered…all about “me”
Western individualism rejects the “we”
“Whatever” the code for upright middle finger
“No worries” the term where apathy lingers
Portfolios…Penurious, live round the corner
The former a mistress…the latter a mourner
Our Planet’s a bowl…grasping Goldfish on meth
Your investments have tanked…start gasping for breath

Two-Faced Twistin'

Come on baby…Let’s do the Twist
Take a news story…And spin it like this
Flick on the big screen…sum spurious bliss
You go round and around and up and a down
And whoaaaaaaaaaa!......Again
In between spots for Levitra and Date.com
“I’m glad to meet ‘ya…the show’s on again"
So come on news junkies…let’s do the Twist
Mass media flunkies…they got a line ya’ can’t resist
And when it’s all over…Folks are making a fist

Two-Tone Escape

Splotches of red, adorn sleek blackened wings
The red-wing blackbird sways on reed as he sings
Of what does he warble, of whom does he speak?
He calls for his mate, they met just last week
Soon they will mate, build a home nay a nest
And mom and pop blackbirds will so do their best
To provide for their young, who clamor and squawk
Feed me! Feed me! They eat, sleep and talk
The chicks are replete with soft downy feathers
And they mature in all types of inclement weather
Tiny crimson flecks appear on soon to fly wings
And the proud parents weep ‘tween melancholy bird sings
The family knows naught of the world’s ongoing strife
Save encroaching “progress”, intersecting their life
Parting soon comes, ‘tis now the reckoning day
I’ve no red, I’ve no wings…Fly little blackbird…’Tis I who shall stay

Quest Test

Hatred, Intolerance, Hostility, Prejudice, Insensitivity, Rapacity…War
And I, a melancholy poet, a lone infinitesimal speck in an ever-expanding universe
Firing salvos of sufferance into fevered, forever blinded, provocateurs of polarization
Forlorn, fighting futility…A thousand arrows of truth…to deflate one lie
Yet they march…like locusts on the antediluvian plains of Babylonia
My quiver runs dry…something…in mine eye

Fourteen thousand ... and a few odd ... nights ago

Leadville girl, Leadville girl…
I sometimes wonder if you are
still in your elevated world.
Our first date, our last date, our only date
My hand shook as I knocked on your door.
Your Mom let me in.
You had freckles on your arms, on your nose, on your chin.
Particles of pigmentation,
islands of beauty, sparkling speckles,
eleven thousand feet above the sea.
A summer Tuesday night in Leadville, Colorado.
The sidewalks curled up and sleeping by eight.
A tiny movie theater and an ice cream parlor
the only buildings breathing.
The movie was bad, the ice cream good
and we walked, and talked, teen-age talk
and touched fingers for the only time.
You wanted out, to travel, to roam, to be free.
To live in California. Like me.
I had you home by ten.
I said we’d stay in touch. But we didn’t…much.
A few letters, too many miles in between.
But I thought you, that night, the prettiest girl…
Leadville had ever seen.
I kissed you good-bye, gently...knees slightly shaking.
You kissed harder back.
I drove home to my brother’s,
the Milky Way, my celestial navigator,
a zigzag path…through cloud nine.
In my mind you still look the same,
a dish of strawberries…topped with stardust,
thirty seven years, after our only kiss.
Leadville girl, Leadville girl…did you escape…your elevated world.
I found love and safe harbor…can you hear me?
...or are you still yearning
Eleven thousand feet…and fourteen thousand days
…forever young… in my memory.

Last Red Cent

Year 2155…Place: Earth
Withered trees strain with shriveled roots
To reach subaquatic Utopia on the horizon
The “flower” of humanity replaced
By the fetid aroma of decay and death
Distant thunderheads pound atmospheric hammers…providing
Music for the coyote, vying for supremacy with the lowly roach
Upon this infecund wasteland, Humanity’s last two representatives
Struggle…a single gold coin between sanguine, slivered fingers
The last two words…spoken on the planet
Echo off cliffs and corridors, carved by Avarice and Ambition
Gimme, gimme, gimme…Mine, mine, mine

Creed Bleed

Lady Justice…Arms bereft of scales
Spikes in one hand…a Hammer…the other
Soulless black eyes…Gold teeth razor sharp
Platinum $$+$$...Hanging from bloody ear lobes
Hoary feet…float down the Besmirched Carpet of Wall Street
Labor awaits…Tied to rough hewn cross
The Hammer falls…again…again…again
Screams vie with church bells…From sea to shining sea
America is dead…The dream bludgeoned, bled out
Parchment drops…From crimson skies
The “spiked” Constitution…Has at last…Arrived

Above and Below the Picnic Basket

Dawn…a pyramid laborer watches
As sparkling jewels hung in an inky sky
Are replaced by the amaranthine migration
of the sun, linked by antediluvian strands of time
to a bridge worker on the Golden Gate
Forever seeing eyes from abstracted heavens
fade, once again, into nebulous, desolate obscurity
as Man, somewhere in perpetuum, and the infinitesimal Ant,
both and forever marching, dancing to the drums of hostility,
complete the inner circle, forging their eternal bond,
preparing for yet another day…of war.

Treasured Time in the Land of Nod

Flickering flames…eyelids too
Sandman comes…I love you
Cats curled up…Dog on bed
The fire fades…embers red
Saturday night…wind is still
A Crescent moon…thru windowsill
Tick tock, click clock…Time to sleep
To hear you breathe…My slippers creep
Clock strikes twelve…its now today
Six more days…to Saturday

Box Trot

Music boxes…such teeny worlds spinning
Tinkle, Tinkle, Tinkle…just twist the key
Angelic sounds keep...an old heart grinning
Sounds to smooth a wrinkle or set you free
Small bears my precious darling… she collects
Varieties of poses…e’er holding hands
She claims they are “us”…I do so recollect
That they wear replica…gold wedding bands
When I’m gone I suspect…she’ll be around
And in darkness alone…she’ll twist a key
Tinkle, Tinkle, Tinkle…tears flow with sound
The bears will, whirl, dance…as “we” used to be
Old lady now treasures each music box
As our smitten hearts were…they ne’er bore locks

Depravity 101

Johnny went to class that day a chip on his shoulder
Word was out and about that his woman went astray
Johnny packed a .45 slammed a slug like a boulder
At precisely 10:45 AM, the bitch would have to pay
Johnny walked into her class, knowin’ she was goin’ to die
Jenny looked surprised, it was usually lunch instead
Johnny aimed his piece right between her hazel eyes
He dropped her, she dropped her pencil, both were filled with lead
The class started screamin’ and Johnny kinda freaked
Started shootin’ everything that came into sight
He made a lot of holes, and most of them leaked
And one hundred miles away a legislator talked of rights
The other students were “lucky” that someone else was packin’
Only twelve classmates were shot, two were paralyzed
Spent casings in a classroom spells civility is crackin’
A regression not progression many can’t realize
The survivors live a nightmare that can’t be forgotten
Every day, every where they stand a kind of guard
The press and the public said that Johnny was just rotten
And the scars from that day will heal ever hard
Well, they buried Johnny’s lady on the tenth of December
Johnny sits in a cell where his life will end some day
And the state Senator, hell, the man cannot remember
The lines that he spoke in his tragic one act play
A young woman dead whose life had scant begun
A young man growing old in the shadow of a gun
Guns on College campuses? Has our country gone insane?
The answer lies with a daughter, with a bullet in her brain

Blind Bind

A new day brings on a sparkling sunrise
Identified are the objects of scorn
They awake renewed with god in their eyes
Another fight to protect the unborn
No bland thoughts about world situation
The “babies” are all that’s ever mattered
None profess of over-population
Their “mercy” mission ‘twill not be shattered
God will provide for next…generation
Woman’s duty is just reproduction
Fetal protection…sole veneration
Remiss of onrushing…Earth destruction
With perverse coerce…they “worship the womb”
Speeding mankind’s plunge…to eternal tomb

ThWill-a-Minute

Let’s take journey to sixteen double “O”
Frame like a game that “The Globe” had strobe light
Cat named Shakespeare inking plays don’t ‘ya know
“To… be… or… not…to…be”…Split?...Out-a-sight!
Down before the stage in place called the “pit”
Crowd gettin’ loud…waitin’ for the show to begin
Harlots, blacksmiths, sots, ale filled…pretty “lit”
Lights flash, players clash…igniting throng grin
Man! What a scene! Flyin’ high as a kite
Bits to Barded, I fly, Barded to Bits
Hamlet’s soul dissected…blink, blink bone white
Prince of Denmark dead…rabble babble fits
Sixteen double “O”…’tween flickering light
Dramalicious daze…by dude who could write

I Never Promised You a Rose Garden

Hope and Change…Pomp and Circumstance
Rose Garden Rendezvous…Pirouetting on Petaled Promises
Counterfeit Characters…Interminably Interchangeable
Pachyderms “hustling” with Asses…Wall Street Maitre Sleaze
Mules cajoling Elephants…Faux Pas Exhortations
Two “parties”…One celebration of ineptitude
Hot air balloons…Waltzes ‘round the Money Tree
Whilst Mr. and Mrs. America…Pluck thorns from bleeding fingers

May I have this ....

Out on Highway 88…a desolate stretch of road
Lies a grave upon a hill…or so I have been told
While passing by one windy day…I stopped and left my car
I trudged on up that steepish knoll…It wasn’t all that far
Before long I reached the crest…perhaps it took an hour
I found not four, not three, not two…but one withered black flower
The sun did not shine here…it seems there was a shroud
A weathered cross made of wood…rested ‘neath dark cloud
‘Twas old and near impossible…I strained my eyes to read
I traced my fingers across letters…that spelled out Mary Meade
As I stood on that forlorn hill…I transcended space and time
And from a place I know not where…I heard this little rhyme
“Yes, my name was Mary, I lived not very long
There was a boy named Robert, to him I would belong
As kids we played together…climbed trees, threw rocks at toads
How could I have guessed…we’d travel different roads
I grew up rather homely…crooked teeth and wispy hair
My body long, my legs too short…I wasn’t very fair
Robert embodied a Greek God, long eyelashes eyes of blue
I learned to worship from afar…what else was there to do
We attended the same school…which one day announced a dance
Through straw like hair I combed…knowing, there’s no chance
“Robert”, I said, with feeling of dread…”I’d, I’d love to be your date”
He laughed with sound I shan’t forget saying…”You’re about ten years too late”
I walked home that day, that last day…my world had now been shattered
I spoke to God of my intent…that only Robert mattered
My mother saw my red eyes…as she waited at the door
She mentioned she would speak to me…after I had swept the floor
Her words burned to the bone…like tongue delivered flame
And by the time she had finished…I hung my head in shame
She said, “Girls like me really must…accept the Lord’s decision
God makes ugly and God makes beauty…the latter with precision
I crept that night in pale moonlight…leaving home, my room, my bed
Then through a rope around a branch…and hung ‘til I was dead
The school, my church and all I knew…labeled me a blot
And placed my grave high on this hill…a barren, lonely plot
Someone, sometime I know not who…planted a single flower
But without love to feed and nourish…it too lacked beauty’s power”
The wind slowly simmered down…I could now hear myself breath
A ball of fire hung low in West…I knew that I must leave
As I looked down upon that ground…a tear escaped my eye
It fell atop that shriveled rose…and next there was blue sky
The inky rose turned sunflower yellow… opaque clouds no more
Then I retraced Mary’s name, with trembling finger…a most gratifying chore
Now once a week I climb that hill…to tend to Mary’s grave
I ask her to that bygone dance…”Mary, my name is Dave”

Silk Sepulcher

Spider wages war…web ravaged by the wind
Man takes up arms…slightest provocation
Arachnid rebuilds…mankind doesn’t mend
Tribes slaughter tribes…nations destroy nations
Hostility hath…no special preference
Color of your skin…last name of your kin
Civilization…has strange reverence
Clash of steel, cannon fire, unceasing din
First tributary…man hath rocks to throw
Both sides needing…precious gift of water
Life giving fluid…’tis taken, blow by blow
Conflict derived death…Stone-age sons, daughters
Doth solution lie… with lowly spider?
Or war, man’s mistress…tears lie beside her

What? No Coleslaw?

Urban pollution…Overpopulation
Energy catastrophes…Seismic undulations
Expanding waistlines…Retracting intellect
Progress taking…Imbecilic circumspect
Plutocratic frenzy…Rapacious incubation
Oligarchic ministrations…Failed inoculations
Climate change…Endless wars
Water woes…Billions poor
Humanity inhales…Exhales final breath
There! The horizon…Perhaps we’ve cheated death
Fast food floating… portent at sea
The Colonel’s renaissance…three piece KFC

Rootbound

I dream…one room away from where I was a kid
I’m at my old school…one fence away from where I was a kid
I stand…warming myself against a wall,
a football’s throw away
From where I was a kid
I walk the same sidewalks…I did where I was a kid
I touch the same gates…I jumped where I was a kid
I hear old/young voices…I heard where I was a kid
I wake upon damp pillow…one room away from where I was a kid
Visions of withering potted plants…reminding me of not being a kid

Cat Nipped

Knock, knock on my door…one cold, funky day
A Hairball announced…he was a runaway stray
Now I gotsta admit…’Twas quite a shock
To hear “Whiskers and Fleas”…and the way the cat talked
He told a forlorn…a most sad little tale
And cussed like a sailor…when I stepped on his tail
He said, “man, a cat like you and a cat like me
We was born to be famous…just wait and see”
Was given the largest…stage the town had
But I just had a feelin’…things would go bad
The crowd they believed…they all let out a “wow!”
But that straggly old cat…he just said…”Meow”
I took him on home…took away all his tuna
He said, “You a lowlife rat…I should have left soona”
I told him “hit the road jack…go someplace else to get fat”
He laughed saying, “make your own stash, what’d ‘ya expect
From a cat

No Timeouts

The hummingbird hovers as well he should
The bee pollinates each untapped flower
The dog urinates against pile of wood
The clock ticks louder…nearer my hour

A man on a bike blows cigarette smoke
A girl on skates takes a fall from a crack
A woman pushing shopping cart can’t see the joke
Her clock ticks louder…’tis money she lacks

Our Earth is dying…we’ve inflicted grave wounds
Our Earth ‘twas the only…place we could go
The hummingbird, bee, dog…sense future tombs
The man, girl and woman…are too busy to know

Oh clock on the wall…why never stop?
Oh clock on the wall…no quarter from you?
That old clock now ticks louder…tired eyes drop
My day will end…will yours ever be through?

Love Sonnet

Love…’Tis hugs in morning…kisses goodnight
A rose splendid red, crimson upon snow
Tearful “making up”…post bitter fight
Held hands at the hearth…two faces aglow
Joy felt to hear news…of sought after child
Love made in cool shade…on hot afternoon
Ardor engulfed, the day she first smiled
A wedding day planned…on fifth day of June
What of faithful dog, or favorite cat
May our animal friends…enter this realm?
Can love be the calm one feels at sunset?
Sails fanned with fervor…thy heart at the helm
Love is a star…a caressing soft light
Come with, my true love…we’ll find one tonight

News Flash!

This just in: Donald Trump has demanded to "personally" inspect the corpse of Osama Bin Laden. Claiming a possible ruse by the Obama administration, "the Donald" informed the White House that until HE does a formal autopsy, America cannot be convinced of the former terrorist leader’s death. Mr. Trump brought up the possibility of a Bin Laden clone and said he was "suspicious" at the timing of the killing. He then applied six-and-one-half cans of hair spray to his over-sized head and was last seen boarding a private jet bound for Italy where he was said to have granted the Pope an audience.

Osama is Dead

For ten years Osama Bin Laden was the "visible" face of our alleged "war on terror," the recruiting "poster boy" necessary in all conflicts. There's a whole new pantheon of possible replacements, even now, lining up in the Middle East. The only question left to answer is: who'll be the next Boogeyman?
O.K., so we've allegedly killed "Public Enemy No .1. It's time to pop the champagne corks. Short term memory, not politics, is the one thing Americans can truly share. Let's forget that there were NO WMD's. Let's forget we killed hundreds of thousands of INNOCENT people in what was really a neo-conservative quest to engage this country and its voracious MIC into perpetual war. Let's forget the millions of Iraqis who fled their homeland, their lives changed, perhaps, forever. Let's forget about the atrocities committed at Abu-Graib and elsewhere. Let's forget all the lies and distortions perpetrated upon us by the Bush administration. Let's forget the 9/11 truth commission's "hurry up" job at "closing the book" on the events of that day. Let's forget "Mission Accomplished" and the sight of our President sitting in a Florida classroom for over 7 minutes AFTER he'd been told thousands of his fellow Americans were being killed. Let's forget Colin Powell LYING to the United Nations and Tony Blair brown-nosing and Dick Cheney talking about how we would be greeted as "liberators." Let's all hang effigies of Bin Laden next to "Old Glory" in our yards and from the sides of our apartments. Let's metaphorically "bathe in the blood" of another human being and exalt ourselves at how clever and resourceful we are.
Let's forget that while we're "celebrating," forces are at work in our own country that will ultimately lead to enormous hardship and untimely death for millions of our OWN citizens. Let's forget the video I watched in '08 of a 10-year-old Iraqi boy sitting in a hospital bed, stumps where his legs used to be, playing an XBOX game given to him by a couple of U.S. Marines. In all reality, I don't believe I'll EVER forget that. God Bless America? Somebody please explain EXACTLY why that should occur. So let's dance around the fire of yet another "ritual killing", the flames flickering in our depraved faces, much as our antediluvian ancestors did and tell ourselves how "superior" we've become. To quote Ronald Reagan, another "great" American, "The sun shines on America today."

Candles 'neath the Moon

Five millennium ago two young lovers lay in caressing, cooling sands
Their fingers touch, as do their lips, illuminated by a full moon
They are happy, they are in love and they are soon terrified
A Black Eagle, portent of bad tidings, is silhouetted by the golden orb
That which they have so luxuriously bathed in…dreamed in
‘Tis a harbinger of things to come and they quickly return to their mud hut

One million, eight hundred and twenty-five thousand nights gone by
A young girl of six, on precisely the same spot, now known as Angoor Adda
Prepares to celebrate her birthday, the twinkle in her excited young eyes
Mirrored in the eyes of her eighty-three year old great-grandfather
They smile in unison, displaying roughly the same amount of teeth

Outside their small apartment, the same moon that once lent semblance to young lovers
Hangs in a bejeweled sky basking the now semi-urban landscape
Unknown to the happy scene inside, an MQ-1 Predator Drone is etched upon it
Six candles are lit atop a cake and a semi-toothless mouth blows…up

Four thousand, two hundred and forty-three fragments are blown skyward
To land in desert sands that once were home of false fears and assured amity
Two hands…separated from previous attachments, land nearby, fingers slightly touching
One is old and weather worn and looks of aged shoe leather
The other is young, its creamy surface only marred by spots of fresh blood
And holding between still clutching fingers a plastic fork…bits of cake still intact

As the moon disappears below an enduring horizon, six black scorpions link tails
Surrounding two hands, fingers gently touching, and circle in a dance of death
Much as they have since before the moon sought to cool the surface of the earth
From the ravages of the sun and man’s fiery indifference

If ya can't beat 'em ...

Crawling, Walking…Whispering, Talking
From points East…North, South and West
Wearied, Rebuffed…Whimpering, Balking
Necessities Exhausted…Sorrowful Quest
And there upon…A mighty hill
Stood long haired man…In “Tailored” suit
Despondent travels…All for nil
Humanity crushed…Depravity’s boot
They’d come to only…Be adopted
Then found that “He”…Had been Co-opted

Brass Tacked

No frills…No fanfare
He’d been a giant…Once
Now…he was gone
Their “plot”…Now his “plot”
Was simple…Shoot the messenger
The slings and arrows…of outrageous…
A simple service…Ashes to Ashes…
His shadow…is all that remains
That too…fading into the “Hellesphere”
Dust to dust…Humanity’s first
And “last” hope…Mourners impatient
Who’ll be the next…”American Idol”
FACT…is Dead

Adumbration of the Mind's Eye

Memory…Shadow
Sun created…Reflections
Incandescent…Specters
They move…As we move
Do they die…As we die?
Are they not…Flash Burned
Into the Retinas…Of the Living
“Shading”…The Cortex
Of another Dimension
Forever…and Never
Hands touching…Nothing
Everything…Until the final curtain
Is brought down…Until Life’s Light
No longer exists

Forever and Ever

Forever, doesn’t seem…so far away
Caught glimpse of it running…yesterday
Wore smile on its face…beguiling, yet cunning
‘Twas strangling today…for me it was coming
I lassoed the Sun…broke hands off clock
Woke man in the moon…with terrified talk
Forever and ever…allegorical twins
Once on their horizon…nobody wins

Lather, Rinse, Repeat

If today was a dream
And tomorrow a child
Today I would sleep
Tomorrow…run wild
I’d play hey diddle diddle
Jump over the moon
Savor my first kiss
Make a young lady swoon
If today I must sleep
‘Twill be rest of the young
For tomorrow still lies
On the tip of my tongue

Doghouses Have No Bars on the Windows

Who’s the superior…Man or Dog?
Four legs or two…I’ll lift the fog
Man is oft’ traitorous, pernicious, duplicitous
Dog displays faithfulness, his loyalty repetitious
Man commits war on his fellow man
Dog walks by his side near to man’s hand
Man invents torments, his deviations ne’er cease
Dog is content to be Man’s dutiful beast
Man creates prisons, to keep Men out of bounds
Then incarcerates Dogs, in places called pounds
Who’s the superior…Man or Dog?
In Earth’s tortured history…Man is a blot
Looking for a friend?…Start seeking out Spot

Tank Town

Punchy McDougall…Ex-Pugilist, Barfly
Racing form…Scotch, water
“Who ‘ya got in the fifth?” I asked
“GingerRogersDancin”
I laughed. Punchy feigned a left.
“Ginger’s the cat’s meow all right but….
Punchy grinned. Toothless. “She’s a ‘hoofer’ ain’t she?”
I perused the joint… Just us.
Punchy was hearing nines.
How long before I was too?

Upon These Backs

They’re marching…across the heartland
A heart no longer pumping blood…but bile
Vile and contemptible, the raw sewage of
Human depravity…fetid upon the plains
Late at night, as stars that once entertained
The aspirations of Pyramidal slaves remain
Locked in a celestial, cosmic grandstand
They walk on feet with crushed and missing toes
Bent and twisted backs holding proud heads aloft
Shattered souls and growling stomachs groan in sympathy
Pleading eyes give rise to trembling, parched lips
Stumps, where stout legs and strong arms, wore workman’s boots
Or wiped forever sweating brows in hellish textile mills
Are carried aloft by sinewy men and women
Their deceased declarations revived by the unprovoked attack
On their proud legacy. Burned, Crushed, Blinded, Deafened
Black lunged men from the bowels of the earth
Men, forged in steel, flimflammed of the meager fruits of their labor
Women, fleeced on the loom or sentenced to dateless, mundane drudgery
Armed with the memories of exhausted, tear stained nights
And “I gotta make it just one more day” tomorrows
Their furrowed, fatigued, faces moving closer
Ever closer, to your state, to your town, their cries will ring out
And all shall remember…The Men and Women…Who Built America

Tombstone Telepathy

Midnight in a graveyard…a thousand eyes crisscrossed my skin
‘Twas eerily bereft of life save my breath first out then in
And soon a chorus of voices, joined those thousand eyes
They spoke in perfect harmony and in a way so wise
I was informed I strode about a land where there lie “ain’ts”
They’d once been “heres”, perhaps some sinners, a smattering of saints
My son, they said, we are all dead, so harken to these words
And as they spoke, the moon was cloaked, with flocks of “hawkish birds”
I trembled and my knees grew weak, as terror turned to doubt
Yet, the voices spoke with resolve and drove the raptors out
As the last bell tolled, I ascended knoll and subdued my inbred fear
And words of wisdom from those distressed reached deep inside my ear
Their message was a simple one that had been passed since tip of time
It merely said, from souls now dead, that indifference to the living, was mankind’s greatest crime
Their brief eloquence ended with these words to contemplate
Compassion was the only key that opened heaven’s…gates