First edit

You can,

I can,

we can…

we all are in….

Conjugation: a perception of our societal will.

We all write the value of our being;

a symposium of what we (or you, or I, or us) may be….

The lost promise of the simpler-sense-of-self

that we carry from our youth:

this lie we burden our collective souls with.

Our filthy gerund we share amongst ourselves

like a communal whore.

I am,

You are….

He, she…. no apologies.

Waddle.

Overcast Friday
in an industrial parking lot.
A cautious Canadian goose
pokes through the clustered cars
and heads towards the retention pond
with two fluffy goslings in tow.
Then three…
four… more.
Other adult geese take up the rear
and the group slips into the reeds.
I feel as voyeur,
and recipient
at once.
It is my good fortune
to be both.
The day feels charmed.

Bond

I gave you some of my words

(or told you they were there for you to see)

and asked that you measure them

and provide for me a scale or value….

The silence choked all reason from me

and left my sense of our friendship

lying bereft and wounded.

I pity myself for being so easily hurt,

despite my mantra

that I am without the need

for any acknowledgement….

Decades of shared exchanges

of the written-word

lie strewn upon the plains

of what once appeared to be

an unshakeable alliance.

Chronos moves in.

Time pursues me,

like a lonely friend

or a desperate lover.

I eschew the advances

and shrink back at each approach…

I am reluctant.

Time comes in for a hug,

I step aside and opt for the hand-shake,

but still feel the cool grip

of its embrace.

I am busy avoiding its gaze,

like a party guest, avoiding the drunken advances

of the hosts wife.

Time has parked itself on my couch

and I have no power to evict.

Now I have become aware

that while I am sleeping

Time has been snuggling me

and the wounds of its harsh form of love

are beginning to show.

Time and I are now an item,

and I have no way out.

Ablution

I step out of the shower

and have been renewed.

The simple act of running water across the body

and rubbing a lump of animal fats and alkaline

across my skin

has left me feeling

like I were new

and alive again.

I have broken the water,

destroying its surface tensions

and battering the bonds

of the filth that a day of life

had pressed into my skin

and marked upon my soul.

Like rain washes the summer from a city

and rinses winters grime from her streets

I have showered

and can call myself human

again.

A Cycle of Fiction

In each simple act

a communal experience lies.

We create the myth of our independence

while riding on the backs of others

whom we decry as parasites.

I forgo the honor of caring

(and with that the burden

of needing to acknowledge

my part).

I am left with the guilt

of knowing that I too am part

of the dirty truth about independence

and its humble impossibility.

It does not matter,

however,

as the deeper truth about our collective selves

is that we are sharing the state of the individual

with one-another

and celebrating it as unique.

I feel good

A homeless man on the street,
His hair rich and heavy, swept back away from his broad forehead.
He looks exactly like James Brown in the later years.
I am briefly touched, and feel the need for outreach.
He bows to the pavement, dropping to one knee:
I am suddenly overcome by the image of an assistant,
or a stage hand,
rushing to his side and draping a cape on his back,
but no one appears.
He is merely stooping to pick up a discarded cigarette butt.
The act returns him to his status as a homeless person,
But now the Godfather of Sole.

In Transit

Glancing out a car window

the trees nearest to me blur by

while those in the distance barely move

and those on the horizon seem like the stars:

fixed in perpetuity.

So it is with memories,

the days of present recollection

seem to be flying past in a haze

of color and motion.

Those memories with time-on-their-side

seem clarion and resolute

while those of youth

stare down upon me

like a sentinel moon.

$740 car

On the warm nights the neighborhood becomes a new place,

like the spirit of a friendly bar’

or a communal gathering space.

I had wandered over to my neighbors side of the street

and spoke the nonsense of acquaintances

bound together by the accident

of residency.

I had left the garden gate open

and I began to worry that the dog

(visible on his back-of-the-couch perch

in the front window)

would soon discover it.

While my beer warmed in my hand

and my neighbor excitedly retold the tale

of his latest automobile acquisition in full color,

I nervously watched the gate, no longer held

in rapt attention

at the story of the car deal…

…etc.

Then my beer ran out

and the dog left the window.

I had to ditch

on the first street-talk session

of the warm season

so my dog wouldn’t wander away

and my warm beer

could be swapped for a cold one.

I don’t think my neighbor

even noticed.

Bound

The stapler couldn’t make it.
The sheets were too many
(each one a measure of my day)
and it said,
“Not today.”

I envy it.
It was built
to be beaten on the head,
and bind sheets
and today it decided,
“No.”

I have no such luxury.
I am flesh and blood
and meant to be brighter
than a stapler.

Yet I will go on today,
beaten on the head
and bind together my day
without the option
of, “no.”