Words are flat

Today I'm feeling shallow
my buddy-old-pal-o
and words are flat
as the paper they stick to.

What a thick Jew,
that man who robbed me
of my place in queue for the loo.
I hope the toilet seat

is uncomfortably warm
and full of angry invisible crabs
and his balls turn red from claws
and pinches, miniscule grabs.

I don't have to go anymore.
I think I'll sit on this curb,
watch that puddle, count the cars
that roar past, that don't disturb

it's placid face. A lake for ants,
that's what that is. If I were rich
I'd make waterskis by the tri-pair
and little flaming hoops to jump through.

Bees have no need for waterskis.
They could be the lifeguards,
if they get certified, of course.
Running an ant lake can be hard,

and we don't need a lawsuit.
That's the last thing. Shit.
That Corolla has no tact,
just plopped its tire right in it

and splashed me right in the nose.
And me without a hankie.
And me with a sock around my toes,
and me taking off my Newbies

and me with a sock on my face,
no, why did me do that, strange,
me is disgusting and dirty
and me will probably die from the plague

now. This curb has gotten old
fast, like how I was young once,
slow and to the point. Goodbye
is all I can say and forget, let it die.

Do you mind if I wait?

Do you mind if I wait? That wind,
I've never felt so cut up. My fingers
are hardly there, can't even bend
to meet my palm. Ten little integers,
I mean digits, frozen like fudgecicles.
Well, vanilla pudding pops, I guess.
My own fault. Riding my bicycle
on a day like this. I'm not the blessed
type, to hold on to homemade mittens
when I really need them. It's like
what happened to my Uncle Olet.
Drunk in Duluth, took home the wrong bike:
turned out to be owned by Mr. Tom Bodet.
I've got another you'd hardly believe...
Warm enough? I suppose. I'll just leave.

Snow is the color of our skin

Drunk on a futon
at four in the morning
can never be boring.

Your fingers shine in the dark
and your eyes gleam
like little ghosts,
or so it seems

from where I'm looking,
my head on a pillow
and yours in the air
like a sparrow,

like something light
and precious--I know;
your eyes aren't ghosts
but flakes of snow.

Snow is the color of our skin
when we're in from the sun,
and red is something else
altogether.

Red can be anger, I've read,
or courage, and of course
it means "Stop!" but for me
it's the color that bores

blissfully into my eyes
when we kiss
in this darkened state of grace,

and though I may nod off
like an addict in a corner,
the fact is the blood I see
through my thin eyelids
is moving this fast
because of you.

Palmful of phallus

Crispin Ennvict
hardly had a chance
with such God-given wrists,
limp and sloppy
and homoerotic,
and the disposition
of a foggy mirror. The man
who shook his hand
could be forgiven
a blush or flustered cough.
He'd put his twiggy fingers
tight together, his skin
always soft and warm
like he had a mini-spa
in his pocket. You'd reach
for a manly grip
and instead grab a palmful
of phallus. Not exactly,
but you get the point.
No one gets ahead that way,
except maybe in the fashion world
or dark tennis locker rooms,
rarely in business where
a man's strength and potential
is judged in those seconds
when he's touching another,
and today all I know
is where Crispin isn't.
I'll never forget his handshake,
his dead eyes blurred
from generations of Sicilian inbreeding,
how his dried-out lips curled
at my reaction, how my bones
could startle at something so soft.

Carelessness

That is true,
now that i think about it. And the increase
in earthquakes and bombings,
and the fact that a lot of countries want
the United states destroyed, and The U.N.
wants to tax globally. And Israel wanting peace.
WW3.
I do believe it is true
what all of you
have said here. It is somewhat a cop-out
to quit your job, and not take care of daily things
when it hasn't happened yet.
It's the expectation
(potentially miscalculated)
that brings people into a state of
carelessness. Carelessness
is not a Godly trait, by any means,
no matter the age of the world.
It's over when it's over, and we
cannot know when. But God
wants us to have faith in Him today.
God lives Today!
You can Experience God today!

The Bible tells us to watch and pray.
It also says that a fool folds
his hands and ruins himself,
but the wise man (something)
works in (something).
Proverbs.

It's very late, i'm going to bed.


*(Poem adapted from this message board post)

Co-worker on a Thursday Afternoon

She stretches her arm
and makes it do loops
like a trick plane
over her empty inbox
and mountain of butterfly
clips and mugs full of pens
and pens and markers,
the occasional highlighter
hiding like a suitor
who can't replace
a former love's smile
on his woman's face.

She streches up and out
toward her god, the one
that is not Mohammed's
because her god has a son.
Her hand is a fist
but not angry, just a ball
at the end of a dumb limb
that stiffens during
non-ergonomic keystrokes.

Both hands now, fingers
finishing the puzzle, bending
palm-first to the overhead
flourescence, bowing
like a tree in the wind
in her three-walled cubicle,
the final cracks of her knuckles
a deadened Amen.