In Absentia

The pen runs dry
from time to time
like faith, like ambition
and I try not to let it
weigh too much for me;
sometimes I even succeed.






january 2023

hallway thunder

the rumble of threatened lightning

over the hill, there; probably miles away

even further than Monroeville, maybe

--suggested adventure to my childish ears.

as if the storm would send us all back

to a time of sticks and sneaking in the woods,

even the adults, freed of their watches.

but now some nights i am the rumble itself

demanding obedience, performance,

why did you think eight times four was forty-two?

a slave to time, to my phone, to it's-past-bedtime

--how could i betray myself thus

when part of me is still in the Shelton's driveway

eight years old, hearing thunder, thinking

maybe we'll get to live in the woods now.

january 2023

view from the parking structure at midnight

nothing will happen, i tell myself

in a soothing self voice: accepting

nothing as reality, not disappointment

nor failure, but Just-What-Is. well,

i try. and underneath it all,

maybe it doesn't matter anyway:

disappointment is reality too, i say,

losing something inside myself

calming something inside myself

sad about nothing, inside myself.







dec 2022

fury

Ha ha
buckle and scream
this won't be what you wanted
you aren't what you thought you'd be.
There is a guttural noise
a slobber weep with no words
moments all in dark void
despair that defies living.

But
what can it do
to such as us?

We the relentless
who stack minute upon tensile minute
refusing to surrender, to cease.
What will it do to us?
For we shall never stop;
we shall find the light beyond it
marching on into what's Next.
We will kill you, say our demons--
ok--take your shot, do what you must,
with blood in our toothy grins.
Death only makes us eternal.

Shout a curse into the void
let it never forget to fear us.







november 2022

purpose

There was a plan for you
impacting millions: over time, you see;
a series of small impressions
meaningful as a Monet.


You did it all, but cannot know
any of the priceless results:
not in your lifetime.
The canvas is millennia.


So, what now?
What can the brush paint
after its last use? Perhaps
nothing, by definition--


Cans of discarded brushes
set on the old windowsill
framing a summertime cosmos
must please the artist, I suppose.









November 2022