home See also The Thing in the Tub
'46
Plymouth
Coupe special deluxe
Grandad’s car bought new
After the war
Fat fendered, chrome crusted,
She looks like she’s flying
When she’s standing still
Heavy Metal.
© 2003
For Mae
Only daughter
Of an only daughter
Of the first dead daughter
Of the clan
Mother of an only daughter
One who carries
The beautiful face of
Her great grandmother
One with almost no family
Her mother
A grandmother-less child
Raised by a motherless child
I left what family I had
To find out who I am
I go “home” now and then
To learn where I came from
To see how far I have come
And why the hell I left.
Perhaps only an accident
Of birth
Ah, yes, I’m an accident
The first grandchild
From the eldest cousin
Who had no siblings until after
Her mother died
A fractured family
That does not know
The ties that are not bonds
Like the prodigal
I sought my fortune
Elsewhere
With no prodding to reach up
To college, only a threat
That I would finish high school
As my grandparents, my father and my brother
Had not.
I can speak to my mother now
Without crying
Yet she does not hear what I am saying
And her words to me are like
Urban scrawls
Until she speaks of
the ghost of her mother
The one whose face
we share
© 2004
Big Feet
Wet mud squirting up through my toes,
Splashing the puddle up to my nose
Huge Feet
Standing on one foot, posed like a tree.
Nobody balances better than me
Fleet Feet
Muddy footprints across the kitchen floor
Here comes Mom, and I'm out the door
Giant Feet
Stepping so wide and striding so tall,
Ants and bugs, I can smash `em all.
Super Feet
I am the queen of the skippers and the trippers,
So who needs those tiny glass slippers?
My Feet
From the Thing in the Tub © 2003
"Mall shooter claims Muzak drove her to Madness. Film at 11."
Mel-o-dy on mel-o-dy
Drops of water rip-ple-ing
Ech-o-ing through canyons of my brain
My syn-ap-ses crack-ul-ing
With each re-peat taut-en-ing
Each tone tor-tur-ing my frontal lobe
DAH da da da da da da
DAH da da da da da da
DA d-duh da DAH
DA d-duh da DAH
Lose fat the easy way
Quit smoking in one day
Sell your soul to pay
Buy the tape today
Slith-er-ing en-light-en-ment
Sug-gest-tions of sub-con-scious-ness
Never made their way into my mind
Only that in-sid-I-ous
Mel-o-dy that makes me dance
Pulling chains I did not know I had
Pluck-ing harp-si-chord string
Bows scrap-ing cat-gut sing
Syn-the-sizers bring
Bumblebees boring
Buzz-ing in my bon-net now
Unsubdued by keeper smoke
Swarm my mind in search of their new queen
E-rod-ed ego reveals id
armed with chocolate, Pall Malls, Glock
I offer what the TV won’t refuse
© 2004
Poetry
In a cold marble
hall
hangs a gold-plated plaque
inscribed with
The Rules of Poetry
Overwritten with
Spray-paint
2003
Raypunzel
His tower hidden deep in glade serene,
He paced the balcony outside his niche.
His satin hips performed a rolling hitch,
His lashes gold, his eyes a bronzy green,
His hair a lighter shade of tangerine.
He saw at mounted stallion jump the ditch.
His hope and nether parts began to twitch.
At the stylish man who scampered on the scene.
He lowered yards and yards and yards of braid.
Bedazzled by the glow of shining hair,
The rider climbed to learn the secret rinse.
Surprised to find the lady was no maid,
They exchanged cosmetic secrets then and there,
The hairy fairy and the mincing prince.
Escape
all the plants
in my terrarium
are plastic
the rocks
the gravel and
the hammock
where I sleep
after someone feeds me
changes my water
through the winter
I have slept
under my 100 watt sun
but now spring has come
my eyes cloud over
I remember
the next time they come
all they will find
in this plastic world
is my old empty
skin
© 2004
Clueless
My thread just ran out….
makes me clueless I guess
So I sit here in the dark
wondering what is the point
There is no minotaur in the labyrinth
Only me
There is no dashing hero
Only me
There is no drunken god,
Wooing me with his seductive wiles
Only an empty vessel
I drank him dry-
There is only me
But there IS me
I am here
I am awake
And breathing
Dead and reborn
Clay footed
Star crowned
Crone-virgin
Goddess
© 2006
Winter Solstice
old moon rises
over the shortest day
crone hunched
in the cold
the wheel turns
into the longest night
we light the fire
sing our songs
make merry until the dawn
and keep the Yule
until the new moon
appears at sunset
the maiden born anew
© 2003
Order
prisoners shuffle
their belly chains swing, cutting
against straight lines
linoleum shines
skin over poured concrete
that supports the bars
yet another curve,
above the straight baton
hangs a guard's belly
"Gotta keep 'em straight!"
He laughs, baton rattling bars
Inmates cringe and wait.
© 2003
For Suicides
I know why you did it
Though I did not read your note
You had to share your pain
by splattering it on the walls
in the bed down the drain
You were too much with it
The pain a litany by rote
You saw no way to gain
by holding it, shopping the malls
taking the pills, dulling the brain
I know the anger of it
the rage of blood you wrote
The message of the stain
in killing them, bringing on brawls,
leaving them dying in the rain
© 1995
Hansel and Gretel
You know they killed my sister
Those two smiling, towheaded demons
Roasted her alive, picked her bones dry
Killed their mother – slow poison
Nearly got the father too
But I heard…
Yes, but I know better
”Poor things, abandoned,
Lured into the cookie cottage”
My sister baked a sugary world
For them to play in
And the father…?
I’ve brewed herbs
To draw the darkness from his heart
To clear the poison from the house
He’s so kind, a patient man
Hard working, steady, strong and quiet
…in a corner cage lurked two fat frogs
© 2003
For
Richard Conn after spending an hour with his painting:
“Reflecting on Trade Street” Landrum, SC
Twinkling trees captured in a winter Twilight Lounge
A blue streak frozen in a tiny town
Framed by the railroad, sign, wires, streetlight
A snapshot of life trapped in man-made brown
Brush strokes balance with each blue reflection
Where ice melts and freezes on the pavement
The brown cage calls forth introspection
I must wonder then, who is making a statement
The browns are beautiful, shades of ocher and gold
That warm softly into purple and indigo hues
How perfect a sepia for worshipping the old
Where the living trees have the Bargain Hut blues.
I sending this sonnet because we can’t speak
To leave you homage to your vision and technique.
© 2004