Friday, February 27, 2015

Radio Scraps

Maybe this thing just ain't meant for us
Yes
I do believe it's time for me to fly
Midnight you come pick me up
No headlights
But big ol' jet airliner
Don't carry me too far away
Just Take me into your loving arms
Because
The light in the window is a crack in the sky
And I'm
Standing still In a field of voices
And I
Believe in your song
On the real no lie
I don't know what it is but you're just my type
I need to be where you are
The lady then she covered me in roses

Wednesday, February 25, 2015

Spilt Milk

When I first spied it
It was already listing to the  starboard side
Having been surreptitiously slipped out of its berth in the icebox 
Through the kitchen and the dining room and
Almost out onto the open  table
Almost and
Then as almost slipped away
I saw it come crashing back to the ground
It's white prow
Hitting first and
Bleeding
Gushing
Leaking white in all directions and
Calling out to the fully aware, alert, and prepared
To streak across across the sand 
Life preserver in hand
To save lives and 
Assign responsibility
To sound the alarm and
Begin the rescue operation
With a reluctant and ineffectual awareness
Of the limits of feasible deniability and 
The inevitable cleanup to follow


seasonal plea

I don't want to see
my breath in March so Mother
Nature do something

Global Warming

You think
Your neighbor owns a
Shiny
New
Mercedes
Although it is hard to tell
Since you only see it
When you happen to drive by
As he is taking empty cardboard boxes
Across his meticulously plowed driveway
To the curb
It's pretty darn clear
He must be doing well
He must be happy
We must be entering the next ice age
Of course
You aren't writing the checks


Tuesday, February 24, 2015

Sinkholes

Sinkhole swallows two people on Seoul sidewalk
Swiftly
Succinctly
Temporarily
In much the same way As I am swallowed up by my children's
Soliloquies and
Tantrums
The only real difference is that my
Sinkhole experiences are
Seldom
Succinct

Monday, February 23, 2015

snuggling for warmth

stuffed inside a box
snake, turtle, frog, and stop sign
keeping out the cold

The Rising Son

Hiding somewhere between the opening of his bedroom door
At six forty five in the morning and 
The opening of his eyes and mouth
Almost simultaneously
Just short of six forty six in the morning
Is a transition
Of the sort that
Most folks never get to see
From a reality shrouded in mystery to
One about which there is little that is mysterious
Unless you count his consumption of carbs
A transition
That is no less momentous
Than Mr/ Roger's shoe change
No more apparent
Than  the annual life cycle of your average pine tree and
No easier to capture
Than the moment that toast goes from just right to charcoal briquette and
On most mornings I pay as much attention to it as I do to
The dust that builds up on the bottom lip of the picture frames around the house but
Even I dust and
Every so often
I am aware of the opportunity I have
To witness a sunrise
Every single day of the year



A Pinch of Saffron


There is a moment 
Hiding between the opening of his door
At six forty five in the morning and 
The opening of his eyes and mouth
Less than a minute further on
That feels a lot like 
Opening that nearly empty 
Yet newly purchased glass jar of saffron and
Adding a pinch To some carefully coalesced combination of
Oil
Vegetables
Spices and
Meat
With no promise of 
Anything yet to come


checking out at the grocery store with a new hire

He moved fast
Like a tornado
Strawberries flying across the belt and onto the floor
Like cars being hoisted off the road and into homes and businesses
Bags spinning in the wrong direction
Like people being forced to seek shelter in the attic and
Stretching the the breaking point
Like the folks forced to shelter in the wrong attic
Each item scanned at least ten times in the span of twenty second
The little red phone getting more use than 911 and me
Standing there
As if I was watching
"When tornados strike"
On my television
Just after midnight
Not moving very fast at all



thermostat

inside the house it's
sweatshirt weather outside it's
thirty two below

Wednesday, February 18, 2015

hungry for spring

Today is cold and clear and
Cluttered
Like a recently emptied meat locker
The snow piled everywhere
Browning in the air
Like day old avocados
Most of the trees doing their best turkey carcass impressions
And
I'm hungry
For spring


Tuesday, February 17, 2015

Give Me a Smile

He shrugs his shoulders and
Flashes a wry smile
Not the one where he sticks his tongue out and closes his eyes but
The one that is more reminiscent of 
A contented male lion 
Resting under an acacia tree 
It is even followed by a roar and
It always leaves me hoping
That the smile is what it seems to be and
That I don't end up getting more than I asked for and
I suppose
Now
It would be
The moment for me
To shrug my shoulders

Random

I just want 
The only thing that could make a difference 
The new version 
I'm not sure if you have a lot of people who are not in my head 
You know how much I love you too 
I love you too 
I don't think that it would mean the world today 
You know 
You know what you want me to be 

seasonal itch

by February
I'm wondering whether God
needs Head and Shoulders

Modern Menopause

They now say
Menopause 
Is
Ten to 
Fourteen years of
Hot flashes and 
Night sweats
And
Basil
Is being grown 
In storage containers
In Boston
So
Ladies
You can think about 
The origin of the pesto you had for dinner
At three in the morning

I had a dream

Hippos were gliding
Like nuclear submarines
Just below the surface
Not even a nostril or
A periscope
Showing
Just a ripple
An unlikely hint
Of the breadth of the problem
Lurking just below the surface
Of my mind

Friday, February 13, 2015

Smiles

In our house 
A French fry shaped like a smiley face
Inadvertently taking a swim in a glass of milk
Is like
That old joke about Italian snow tires
Told in a smokey bar
In New Jersey
You're guaranteed a smile
But
Once you get it
You may not want it
At least not in your house

Wednesday, February 11, 2015

winter creep

skis over his head
snow creeping into his pants
hot chocolate at home

Tuesday, February 10, 2015

Peas

Frozen peas are a life preserver 
In a sea of pasta and
Monterey Jack cheese
As long as 
He is willing and
Able
To grab hold
I can throw them out there at every meal
But 
Peas are green and
Slippery and
Don't go well with cheerios


Monday, February 09, 2015

If life gives you lemmings ...


I've never been hit in the head by a falling Kennedy half dollar and
Though my money disappears faster than the sun in Southeast Michigan
It has yet to attempt harakiri or
Seppuku
Mass or otherwise or
Even
To give itself to the needy owing to overpopulation but
Misconception or not
It does seem to go to the very same place as
Everyone else's

Sunday, February 08, 2015

the wish of a new generation

May
Indecisive
Always grow up to be
Eclectic

Hold On

We've been told to
Let it go and
Watch the world erupt into song and
Adventure leap out of the hillsides
It's the promise of Heidi 
On crack but
A little lower
There's an older promise
Connected to a simpler and
Sometimes more courageous act
Too often confused with the submissive wife and
Neville Chamberlin
Not that anyone remembers him or
That when playgrounds were blessed with metal slides and
Teeter totters
We did not ride the merry go round 
(Also called the roundabout to avoid confusion and visions of painted horses)
Alone and
That while we loved letting go 
It wasn't the hardest part
Did Navajo children go away to college
I don't
Remember the first time I held her hand or
Forget
Ever
That taking it in mine and
Letting it go
Are as connected as we are
In winter
Summer and
Probably even in the Swiss alps
I suppose that courage
Like the illegality of defecation
And most everything else is
Situational





Thursday, February 05, 2015

Family Recipes

If I had been 
Suffocated
Along with head lice
In a plastic bag full of mayonnaise
I would 
Not be able to bake
My great grandmother's molasses cookies for my children and
Offer each
A cookie and
A glass of milk
Before they slip off to bed
To sleep
To dream
To wake even
If I wanted to



Brian Williams

Memory
Is a picnic and
We are ants
Brian Williams might walk away with a bit of wonder bread
You may grab a crumb from a pumpkin cheesecake
I might carry off a piece of sushi grade ahi tuna and
Find myself wedged in the tread of a pair of vintage Air Jordan's before
But at the end of the day
Along with the season finale of the Biggest Loser
It's all my memory
Your memory and
Brian Williams too


Wednesday, February 04, 2015

this is thirty seconds

maybe nothing good is possible
in thirty seconds
just half a minute
maybe
just
this

still snowing

forty percent chance
better odds than on Sunday
snow still coming down

winter status quo

snow is still falling
windshield wiper fluid
is still hanging in

Sunday, February 01, 2015

Better In Video

Who needs home videos
Read a book
Watch the movie 
More than once and
By the third or fourth time
It's just like you're reliving your own life
Only with prettier people and
Better special effects
Who needs to video tape their own life
Who needs their own life

February

February
Now playing
In a limited run
On and
Off 
Broadway 
Catch it before time
Marches on