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I got a way with Butterflies

I have no excuse for butterflies 

they wind down the wind

flutter by like newspaper headlines 

confidential files opened carelessly 

 

I've often hoped for X-rays

of your eyes so I could see

inside lies meant for plumbers 

plummeting from the skies 

 

It only opens needful ointments 

Indigo iodine blue denim breeches

of faith and fashion yourself 

a gin tonic...

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Scene II

Scene II
Has me frozen
Like a cat
On cold concrete.
It's so awkward
I wish . . . 
I wish I could leave.
But no,
I must stay.
There, now I've 
Done it --
All eyes are on
Me.
Please,
I'll ask so politely,
Don't listen
To a word I say.
It's so hard
To stand barefoot
In the rain
And try to light this
God-damned cigarette.
I must exit
But I'd really rather
Not go.
And would som...

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Mole Hills

When you say I'm creating mountains

from mole hills I can not help

but to rethink the moles

bringing forth their labor's fruit 

bountious coffee grounds from the underground. 

Who is to say I'm not living my dream?

I never dreamed big.

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Aquarium Hotel

Funny how I hear your drunken silken voice
echo in the ally, blue-black angles here
define the shadows of telephone wires
cut into a small-scale cubist canyon. 

Purple razor beams resonate 
across the memories of a
strange lad in a stranger land

digital recollections drowning 
small fry in a tank of paranoia.
At least down here I avoid ya.
You shark. Me minnow. 

I cross the thresh...

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Information Society

Note all that that is his stranger tantrum
Leave that that black shirt not to fall
8 nothing, ain't nothing. That that.

X black sheeting verdict 12.
Rooting in hell's perfection
Doctor's light blinding Elizabeth Barret Browning

maybe down the rubber staircase fell.
Binding means each green strong pig rind
protect's a Saturn dog or semi-colon white 7.

Could terse roots of super-nova ...

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Today I saw Tomorrow

As I sat alone in a Wintergarden 

sipping my Tall Boy and gin

a wondrous vision of tomorrow.

Mountains grafted to skyscrapers 

and dragonfly drones. 

I read from, "The Opening from The Knights of Surrogates."

CHAPTER EIGHT: Complacency is the best policy until it ain't 

Cars were wastes of space unless they were houses on wheels 

Bubble taxis floated from fare to fare

Th...

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2021

Oh Holy Osmosis

Like halitosis 

The future hangs on our breath 

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Aquarium Hotel

Funny how I hear your drunken silken voice
calling in the ally, blue-black angles here
define the shadows of telephone wires
cut into a small-scale cubist canyon. 

And what if I let them resonate 
like purple razor beams in haze
across the memories of a
strange person in a stranger town?

Trying to drown the recollection
of small fry in a tank of paranoia.
At least down here I avoid y...

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Leaving Eden

Here's the thing about the Bible It says "In the beginning." But doesn't say of what.  I guess we weren't full of ill-intention until we left the garden.  This is why in the complex XX YX equation  I have to own my original sin. It was curiosity.  A human trait. 

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I was there

the moment sleet turned to snow. 

The temperature dropped 

and the breeze picked up

just enough to send white crystals 

into a flurry like a globe

shaken in hope

it fell in the dark light

on slick sidewalks 

it sliced this ice

that sleeted into snow.

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Ambition

There is nothing so modern
as ambition,
     the stream-lined-ness of it,
     its upward motion,
the way it plows under
all that lies behind its tracks.

I can not blame the 20th Century
     for its relentless progress,
     its awkward locomotive grace,
     its sense of nostalgia
in the face of a force
that has become inevitable
for its incessant forward sweep.

A century whose ...

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Holy Givenore

Her name was Holy Givemore

She lived by the seashore. 

She had a way with words

that made us feel like turds.

 

She had a left eye

That stared off the right eye

Catching us all

Off guard. 

 

She said "I promise you this

I'll be your nemesis."

And we found out 

After that.

 

Why it's always best 

to lay to rest 

the thing you can't find.

No neve...

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Why not cry, Wolf?


When my tears come they will
   be defrosted snowflakes from
 a self-sequestered squad of four
   deliberate deep-sea divers
   hired to harvest each
                                     teardrop
grown from a kernel of salt 
                             with care 
from beneath an iceberg.


     This map of Alaska is a scale model 
highway of my heart.
      These tears that would b...

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Diary of the Forgotten Man

It's been one full week now
I've suffered amnesia.
Strangers step up to me on crowded corners
and call me by name.
  "Can we talk?"

So much of what we call luck
is caught up in the periphery
more so than from Nosy Parkers
who are by-products of deception
  in this unfortunate sunlight.

On clear bright afternoons
one can hear the hiss
of the sun's surface crackling
solar flares eru...

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Sports on TV

The battle tonight will be in the cage

It's all the rage

To define the age

 

It will be Antifa Vs. Nazis tonight 

Well alright

That's a fight 

 

As spiked forearms careen

Smashing skulls to smithereens 

it makes a scene 

 

For your viewing pleasure 

A gladiator's measure

Of pure sports treasure. 

 

Only on Pay for View.

I thought you knew.

That...

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A Wobbly Leg

of a lovers' triangle
three-legged stool

warbles like a nightingale, 
"Why alone? Why?"
an emergency test broadcasting
to the tuned-in hood 

that sets curious ears keening.
Is this war?
Is it surrender when Apollo says,
"I love you. Till next time?"

The wobbly little stool leg 
waffles underfoot defying mechanics 
A tenderfoot always triple-guessing its worth.
Insecure foot sold...

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Reconstruction

He / I / We / She / It
Decided to tear it down today
     Deconstruct
Go to the deep root causing the pain

We tooled around with a needle
  on a raw nerve
illustrating the malady
The Source of Our Discontent

For who am I? Who are We? Who are They?
  To dare to ask
Permission to speak?
Go ask Wentworth.

He / I / We / She / It
  want/s to tear it all down
  cast a match on the du...

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Golden Boy

 

I hear your drunken silken voice
calling in the ally, blue black angles here define the shadows of telephone wires into a small cubist canyon. 

The problem is we're trusting other people to know what they're talking about when they don't.

Burberry Blursday booms into funhouse mirrors and I refract into myself. 

"I want you to never forget me."

"Where are you, Love?"
I do the tan...

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Aluminum

Sometimes I dream
In aluminum

I dream in aluminum
Molten possibility digitally rendered
As the mercury lava is printed 3D
I dream in aluminum

The quicksilver's destiny
Fluid shiny until it stands
Self strengthened
I dream in aluminum

Multi mutated form stretched
Beyond lawn chairs or awnings
Candlesticks and chandeliers
A world where everything

Is made of aluminum
Entire hou...

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God's Eye

The old carpet with its Byzantine border
matted threads of burgundy and gold
ornate snowflake eye-of-God center
has a motif of predator and prey.

There are four ceremonial huntings
woven reflections in right-angled mirrors
a ring of Indian tigers mounted on deer’s backs
teeth sunk continuously in their necks.

The magi mediate on the rug’s middle
until the medallion draws them in
unti...

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Our Black Swan

          Floats toward the edge

                                         of N

                                               I

                                               A

                                              G

                                              A

                                              R

                                               A

     e...

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Different Colors of Cats

A green cat with a yellow tail
  can disappear in a field of dandelions
  swatting white moths in clover.

Pepto-Bismal pink cats hold séances
  in their very own kitchens, resurrecting
spirits of mice they’ve eaten, clattering
cups of tea on scratched china saucers,
letting their kittens play street games.
  Sitting and sipping in silken shadows
caused by lampshades wrapped in nylons.

...

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Wistful Creek

Low in this season
           each terrace a saucer
         trickling green tea
           spilt by an unwieldy waiter.

Clumsy,
            treading over damp stones 
          balanced tray on upturned hand
           skipping over black puddles 
         that breed mosquitoes.

Aspens --
         peeling white bark 
         (peeling bleached wallpaper)
      filter light 
     ...

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JULY 4

The summer I stopped praying
  I took brisk showers in porcelain basins
to become the boy Monkey Shoe
swimming stripped naked at winter solstice.


  The Noxubee River runs laurel snake
  X-rated through this cigar box town
able tomb robber against damnation
  slowly slipping reflections


of black tree silhouettes in green Adam’s Ale
past peroxide blonde Hollywood sunbathers
  bikin...

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Hurricane Alicia

The hydrogen clouds advancing
      are cattle collective
              soot has forged.

     “How are you?”
     “How are you?”
 they ask a man in yellow
row boat, a Watchmaker 
     who plows the fields Formica.

"As fine as a water beetle," 
                         he roars,
his forehead puckered fierce.

Ahead runs a warthog, sobbing,
“So much stress 
       a nervous break-
...

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21 Column Colonnade

The awakening, nightly, 
comes at 3 am 
  I search as insomnia, 
  through dim stacks blurred
  atop my desk

A lesson in diligence
 0-9, 0-9, Bovine 
7 - 7, 7th Heaven, seven come eleven 
A confederacy in Grey
 yellow yellow / dandelion red 
lessening Indulgence 

for the scalloped edge postcard sent  
  from the Isle 
                    of Crete. 

Photo depicts 
  a luminous ...

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Anton's Arrival

I.

Anton arrives on a rickshaw
  the cabbie’s clogs
   clopping a clipped tattoo
   in night traffic.

 Disembarking, the regal boy knocks
 while I'm within
   fish-eyeing Anton as some
                          sumptuous spectacle
 through the peephole pinned
                                 on my front door. 

II.

Anton had arrived on a rickshaw,
  the cool evening air
  clo...

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RED WHITE AND BLUE (for Jon Jon)

I.

Today’s prize is a lava lamp
with two convulsing orbs of gelatinous mass
that never collide or absorb

but rather glide past one another.
One Red, one Blue as Dallas Montana sky
Blobs floating in the clear white corrector fluid
as net neutrality for one’s citizenry.

White that shines like a beacon from a UFO
on a tabloid stand we ride
within their bulbous spheres

Within this a...

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