Excavating Bones

Inspired by Poem a Day--Academy of American Poets April 2010 and by Spencer Johnson's, "Who Moved My Cheese."

Excavating Bones

Skeleton in ice

gently thawed

and cradled;

hair
and bone

worn down to marrow.

Frigid strength

icy lover;

your contact sears

callous scrutiny.

I can hear your muffled scream

preserved

in time’s frosty cavern,

concealed in cheese

station C, and me

in E, advanced and alone.

Caterpillar Dreams

Caterpillar Dreams

Inch your way

on tiny feet

climb into the tree of dreams.

You are not yourself

the monarch lurks inside.

Spin

a strong silk pad.

Sleep,

you are not yourself

the monarch lurks inside.

Hunger for

red clover

goldenrod and

fluttering breezes

beneath the cool shade

of the

stately palm.

You are not yourself

the monarch lurks inside.

Awake

from nature’s baptism.

Shed your former skin.

Declare your magnificence.

Dance atop

yesterday’s fragile petals

soar into the callous wind.

Fly

dazzling insect.

Show off your large

tawny orange and black wings.

Rise

potent prince,

wander throughout the provinces.

You are magnificent.

You are Mozart’s Symphony No. 40 in G minor.

Fly brilliant monarch,

Fly!

Compost at Dawn

Up at Three—not a pretty sight!!


They say the older you get the less sleep you need.

I’m here to tell you that they are WRONG whoever THEY ARE.

It is a bald faced LIE.

Those THEY’s need a good bitch slapping

and I know just the person to do the job.

No thinking about it or talking it over--just a grim reaper.

That’s what you get when you mess

with a crazy person—two shots directly

into the brain—no questions

no dilly dallying

just cold hard steel

right between the eyes

and then I’ll go work in my garden,

start a compost pile.

Don’t you love fertilizer?

The flowers love it

I can hear them screaming now

pile it on—we’re starving here!!

And by the way--Have you ever heard of this other element—it’s called WATER!!!

We don’t have any feet or THUMBS,

so if you could just

pay us some attention

we will show you

something nice to look at

tomorrow morning,

when you are still awake

and NOT SLEEPING!!

Sneaking up on Roosters

They wander the windward campus

 clucking amongst themselves.

Searching for the most juicy bug, fighting

for crumbs tossed by meandering poets and writers,

breaking for lunch and a stroll.

Intellectual folk who thirst for

candid photos of roosters

and hens, stray cats, grasshoppers or

even dead centipedes, adjusting optical zooms

and praying for that perfect shot.

The shot that will

inspire; stop them dead in their tracks,

produce sighs and email home clearly, to Mom and Dad.

Contemplating the Wind

The wind rises at three a.m.

still drunk as it rushes about

looking for things to stir up.

It snakes the orange and pink bougainvilleas

as it reshuffles their geometry.

It blusters at the Manila palm

who bend and bow

as it howls at the front door

demanding to be let in.

It spews loose sediment

as it turns away

relentless and finally settles

on a blade of grass

and lifts it up

skipping it across the driveway.

A Call to Reason

The thing about reason is it
gets raped from behind;
leaves too many doors open
to getting your head chopped off.
As an infant, we start out with infinite trust
and if we are lucky we leave this world
relatively intact, abused but whole.

Time is the key.

Since the beginning man
has killed. It is instilled
into our hard drives. We learn how to protect ourselves
from an early age something that never loses its
significance lest we fall victim to indifference, obscurity
and terrorists plotting to infuse us with their religion.
We sit on a lower rung
on the ladder of evolution
pushing all the wrong buttons
pondering the ape/man ratio
erasing unpleasant history from memory
like a crack addict obsessed with getting his next high.
We live in a world where
stupidity reigns alongside legalization
brothers on the same see-saw.

Only until we are able to
subdue these primal urges
will we ever be able to move up
the ladder, whether it be here
or as a future virus on a brand new planet.

Time holds the key.

Life in a Glass Bottle

Circa: Earth Day 2010

Life in a glass bottle

longs for a calming breeze

butterflies and bees.

Hears the pop of

daylight, dawning

as it rises yawning.

Is pitched by cobalt seas

and daring fish that please

to give you the evil eye

and consequences ply

as they nudge you

and toss you in the bay.

But then let us say

that you are not tossed and

Abused by the cost

and still float aimlessly about

and get hooked by a snout

of a humpback whale and her calf

out for a laugh

swimming and diving at play

that manage to avoid the plastic nooses

and glass ball cabooses

aluminum cans, fish net and twine

dumped and left behind for

a poor fish to find

strangled alone on the reef

hooked like a thief in the night

By this human blight that litter and waste

proud and uptight, in childish haste

Now concerned about the earth

pondering its worth

on a planet

spewing rebirth.