Tag Archives: poetry

When you can’t get enough-LOVE HORMONE-new poem

poems, ,

Image by Rinrarity
1

LOVE HORMONE

1

Oxytocin starved astronomer

Mimics Orion, hunting lions,

Chasing skirt

Up the wrong leg.

1

The inability to secrete,

Let down, feel empathy;

Hence the psycho prevails,

Clashes resound.

1

Squelched desires jangle,

Jilted car commanding astronaut

Double parking

To pepper spray a rival,

1

While back on earth

Nothing blows up well

For the demolitionist,

Neither concrete monstrosity

1

Nor the ugliest obstacle.

Assaulted with meat,

Sun wooden, anger builds

Resolutely as prison tatts claiming flesh.

1

NAVIGATING SWOLLEN MOATS

Journal, poems,

This is likely my last summer on the island. I must move, and not by choice. I’ve been swept up by a tsunami of circumstance. Naturally, I am feeling nostalgic. I know that the only constant in life is change but I resist. I love the place, first wound up here in 1993 after fleeing post-riot Los Angeles, part of the white exodus. I had survived that annus horribilus, my mother dying after a long ordeal, my marriage and our recording studio business both disintegrating. I wasn’t cognizant of my dire need for recovery, in the midst of tumult, trying to flee an abusive relationship and an awful situation. Or two. But I found sanctuary here. Friends, one of whom died suddenly last month. I strolled past his cottage yesterday, now vacant but filled with memories. R provided so many of us refuge, countless parties, meals. Love. I didn’t realize how much until after he was gone. How sad is that? Ah, the proverbial lessons of adversity, the ongoing saga of loss and transcendence; what would we do without them? How would we gain perspective?

TORRENT

August’s bloom barren foxglove

Sway, last island summer

Set ablaze. Bolted from.

Sloppy spy mission complete.

1

Deadheads snag my crossing.

Buffers hinder streaming

But ruin is fluid,

Handily lifting my kayak,

1

Absconding with the ice.

Linen skin burned, I swim

the swollen moat, finding no salve

Nor catharsis on its far bank.

1

LET’S STOP LYING… free love and love freely…

Journal, poems, ,

Possible? This poem was inspired by Susan Sontag’s Illustrated Diary Excerpts, and this quote in particular: “Mad people who stand alone and burn. I’m attracted to them because they give me permission to do the same.” And this quote resonated as well: “Can I love non-possessively, permissively, without withdrawing myself, setting up my own defenses and strategic retreats, on one hand, or reducing the amount and intensity of my love, on the other?” I too aspire to love non-possessively but admit that the impulse, or instinct to both withhold and possess-protect myself-is nearly impossible to resist. I wind up feeling alienated, frustrated, confused. I must persist though, for it is likely the only humanistic love, love beyond community, perhaps even tribal.

WARES

I need a good barrel. Or barrelful.
Beer, rain, oil, doesn’t matter,
Just give it to me.
Then go

Or come, oh nuisance caller,
Nothing to sell, less to share.
Will we ever buy into each other?
Switch crowns? Silence crickets,

Respective niggles?
‘Tis folly, seeking sanctuary
Beneath a bat roosting tree.
Their jaunty black sky scribbles

Invade our periphery,
Jolt our creaky alliance.
Cold in front of the fire,
Burning side by side,

Stones skip beyond us,
Cinema of sunset so banal
It provides no sidetrack. Score.
Tally. Or anything we want.

1

HARD TIMES

poems, ,

1

New poem. Nuff said.

1

HARD TIMES

Fathers frown upon the floppy,

The flagging, the soft,

Sentiment and dodging church.

Dummies.

1

Dad disapproves of alone moments

No matter how hard it gets.

Extend yourself numb nuts

And you will be rewarded with stature.

1

Ample Mama frets the fluids,

Chief Alpha Pop declaring

No stains. No beach. Align yourself

With your brothers. Mask nothing.

1

Abide. Or I will give you something

to cry about. I’ll inflict the day. Labour.

Bumps. Loads. Crowing cocks.

Substance. A crossroad or two.

1

INOPERATIVE

poems, , ,
1

Some things never change.

1

INOPERATIVE

For Captain

1

Let us lurk.

Spoof.

Touch wood.

Long overdue lark

1

Though rain must intervene,

Doctor numbness,

Float islands,

Drown ticks, butts.

1

Let us linger. Ponder.

Graph. So much garbage,

Deaf dog hearing malice,

Mercy always garbled,

1

Medicine arriving post dumpster.

Let us sit and watch. Chart

Possessed joker. Poison aim.

Undiagnosed. Diabolical.

1

Sick puppy. Whatever.

We are immune.

We must imagine

Fear, a wolf at the door

1

One prick at a time.

Let us stop. Think.

Beatings, shootings,

Storm of rattling sabers,

1

Healthy status quo,

My clubfeet halted.

Hacked.

Cured.

1

WHEN BABIES FLY; THE TRUTH PERCHANCE?

poems, ,

1

I had a disturbing dream, surely inspired by the Houla massacre, which some people are claiming was a hoax. Keerist. It’s not as if children don’t die in civil wars. In any case, I don’t have much to say-or spin-or would rather put it in verse.

1

DISPATCH

An infant is not a toy.
An infant cannot breathe underwater
Or fly though the air. Do not drape it
Over the prone man’s head

Or dress it up like a doll.
An alias views the grisly scene.
Posts. Shares. Tweets.
Foreign observers abort,

Prominent commentators punt
But the drunken skipper acts,
Ordering clean sheets and neat rows
Down below in the hold,

Rogue Unidentified Man
Hoisting the limp boy aloft,
Manipulating our feelings.
Let’s not quibble.

It matters not if the child
Is southern or northern,
Grew spurs or knew pride.
It is as good as dead.

Crooked passages.
Limping messengers.
Frantic, tail-chasing-dog orbits.
A million ships couldn’t transport us.

1

TREEHOUSE MYOPIA

Journal, poems, , ,
ANY CHARACTER HERE

All the pain and suffering in the world and all I want to do is nothing. With all that’s happening in my life, I am only sick of my problems—myself—so here I sit at the window trying in vain to see the forest for the trees. I know one thing. I yearn. Therefore I am?

“Stars, hide your fires; Let not light see my black and deep desires.”-Shakespeare

ANY CHARACTER HERE

RETREAT

Red cedar raven roost,

Feat invisible as its roots

Heavy metal imbued

Purifying groundwater.

ANY CHARACTER HERE

These trees that breathe

When I am panting, sighing, wishing

I could tell you.

Swaying branches camouflage

ANY CHARACTER HERE

My fatal bent, freckles, green canopy

Concealing skewed moments, missed cues,

Taint, our silence lulling as a zephyr,

Blindness sweet as sheep.

ANY CHARACTER HERE
ANY CHARACTER HERE

OUR THIRST

poems, , , ,

New poem. First draft. Practically a sea shanty; also brings to mind the Nick Cave song Thirsty Dog.

OUR THIRST

Towering, pensive Danny Boy.
Bloodied. Unbowed.
Lithe, simmering
Scar brandishing tomboy.

Preeminent cursers.
Junkyard dog hearts
Swapping reflections.
Damage.

Kiss us. We’re, you know,
Irish. Black Irish.
Fuck yeah. We invented melancholy,
Lap up sea squalls like puddle water,

Bite tragedy’s ass. Devour angst, roll over
Despair. Brood, pour, grapple, shove
The good fight and function Godammit,
Especially when called upon.

Big, deliberate, quixotic, plodding
Through calamity. Breathing little,
We flail against ourselves,
Rail, smack, filch one another’s bones,

Laughing in the morning.
Nothing sacred,
Catholic as we may be
Do not go down. Know Hell. Knees.

Swells. Rising again and again
Through the slag, flames,
Howling, baying,
Fumes. Bellowing waves.

ANY CHARACTER HERE

POTHEAD GENERATION(S)

poems, , ,

Still completely immersed in videopoem production, verging on burn out so I’m a little slow on the uptake. I should have posted this 4/20. For the record, I oppose prohibition. Any American-style War On Drugs is a farce. Christ, smoking pot is a tradition in this country. And Stephen Harper is an asshole, on the issue, along with most others. But, hey, we keep voting for him. In any case, I’m happy to report this poem has been selected for Ooligan Press‘s Pacific Poetry Project: An Anthology of Three Cities. (Seattle, Vancouver, Portland.) It’s from my collection, Three Blocks West of Wonderland.

1

APPLETON

Hookah squats on carpet, Buddha

-esque. Undulating spirals of sapphire

smoke hula up her nose. That buzz.

That buzz that slows your blood,

1

calls you back to bed like a lover.

Soothes your inner asshole.

B.C. bud. Best bud

in the world. Worth risking jail for.

1

High-resolution satellite images.

Narcs’ warrant executed Tuesday.

Grow-op raided Wednesday.

Dozens of firearms. Five thousand plants.

1

Big bust for a small town, says Constable Cook.

For export, for sure.

Cultivation facilities dismantled.

Straight people relieved. Green party over,

but Zoe cried. It was the best job ever!

1

Dope dealers pay well. Her boyfriend

sold product at school. Their responsibilities

included digging a tunnel under the border,

blaming black fingernails and muddy jeans

on dirt biking at the gravel pit.

1

Parents were shocked. We thought she

was 
on Facebook, chatting. We thought he was

on the Internet, with her, boy’s father chiding,

it’s APPLEton, son, not Marijuanaton.

1