This patch could be any other:
A spot of grass below
a blue and clouded canvas
and I, an ancient king
eating apples from a nearby tree,
reveling in my royalty,
or the simple glory of the day.
In fact, I could be most anyone,
from any time or station
and the fruit would be as sweet.
Category Archives: Original Poems
Mephisto & Yahweh Bounce a Spliff
Mephisto:
Hit this, Bitch… I mean, Your Honor.
Watch your monkeys dance,
when I pull their strings and dangly bits
and offer them a chance.
At what? Who cares?
It hardly matters.
Offer one a crown.
Some will fight and some will follow,
but all are going down.
Yahweh:
Bitch?, your best?
You never were creative,
but I guess that I’m to blame.
‘Mephisto’, though’s a disappointment,
You’ve shortened up your name.
A ganja conch, how quaint. Oh blimey,
have you got a light?
Of course you do,
what was I thinking?
Damn, dis stuff is tight.
Mephisto:
Man, Oh Man, what are you saying?
Gimme back that shit.
I had them in your little garden—
She for apples, he for tits.
I’ve LoL’d throughout the ages,
delighted in their wars.
Helen launched a thousand ships,
but I invented whores.
Yahweh:
Dude, pass that back.
I’ll make confession—
One you need to hear.
Those monkeys are your own obsession.
I’ve moved on and
I don’t care.
Love Redux
And you would have me share—
Are you crazy?
What don’t you get about insane?
My will is a warm straight jacket
Lending steel and spine—
Invertebrate,
a jellyfish of eyes
and quick emotions.
I jumble my words
and choke on anger.
I can stare down the devil
or wither at a song.
Duty, I understand,
and obligation—
I am my word
and my word can be anything.
My creditors can be angels or whores.
Once upon a time I wrote you a hero,
A virtuous knight, a champion.
We enjoyed the fiction,
content to play fools.
Only, I wasn’t acting.
I have always been a fool.
Let me lie to you a lifetime.
Don’t ask me to share,
Just pretend that you still need me.
I am lost without this role.
Love
She asked me what I meant and I fell silent,
and falling dumb, I fell upon my knees.
To mean is to maintain in spite of violence,
a steady and illusionary peace.
I battered her with doubt, I begged for something,
anything by which to be defined.
I am, it is, they are – Dear God, have mercy:
A stranger in a world to which I’m blind.
“Love”, she said, distressed, as if an answer.
I lost myself a moment in her eyes.
I rose both to her need and to embrace her
and spoke a gift of comfort and of lies.
Joy
I found my voice under a linden tree
where white dogs rolled in fallen seeds—
My eloquence, a simple smile
that spoke forever for a while.
Snooze
My alarm clock shrieks out
’till I slap it a promise—
“15 more minutes
and I’ll slap you again.”
Puddles
The street is peopled and gray:
Dots flee raindrops.
Buses don’t care—
Indifferent to puddles
they splash their way to the next stop,
denting the herd,
culling the careless.
Indigo Bunting
I’m dumb to leaves and prairie grass;
a million colors can’t be named.
Wind conspires with shifting light
to humble language, exult sight.
I watched a bunting taking flight
from black to blue turn as I looked.
A list of shades between the hues
would burst the bindings of a book.
A spectrum spanned, a moment took,
a world encompassed in a blink
and all I ever hoped to know
vanished when I stopped to think.
Dusty
Dust inspired by
Promethean promise;
Sophia winks behind a veil.
Despite Fortuna’s bold fascinations,
Prudence flees a tyrant’s rage.
Check
I’m not up to this game,
I never have been.
What does it mean to win?
The loser gets the same reward and quicker.
But I will not fold,
too many others have bet on my hand.