water in the basement
where it should not be
water in the knee
watered down screed
water for the unthirsty
water on the summer orchard
there is one time and place for hydration:
nature's time.
our time is a wet towel
and 6 sets of nostrils, 4 nostrils dry
it's a board decision
chess, candyland, parchesi
parched easy.
oh, swell.
2009
The Dalles, Or
"Within low doors the boozy boors
Cat-naps take in pipe-bowl light."-----herman melville
___________
the k street limo, there stripped to the rims
afire with treason and glorious hymns
sloshing with rubles, tipping in shit-coin,
gropes the flagpole, salutes his own groin
dragging the nation behind republic balls
every sensible human recoils, appalled
lobbyist borscht in caviar vases
coors lite gals to handle the cases
panty hose bandits their paws on the triggers
fraud festive faces gloat on their sniggers
sabot their high heeled, indiscriminate ways
hooking in cowboots, branding the strays
demoniac bubbles arise their champagne
gleeful that greed has an American name
Ghosts playing croquet drift over wickets
gently knocking the colored balls
which roll as if on glass
a breeze lifts the flow of the ghosts
as they play thru the night
humming nameless tunes,
calculating their shots until the dawn
1986
Lawrence, Kansas
the contures of billy club
as wielded by dour s. paisley
follow conjecture's pepper-dismay
dispersal on the attorney salt-slacks.
repudiated overmuch,
blank stares load up with vision,
fees propogate, sidewalk observant,
or not. perceived travails,
billowing sales on downtown frowns.
booted most rudely,
stuck in luncheons with frenemies,
such is the lot of satanic clerks in riot zoots
distinguishing, by power twice removed,
every pain and rendered slight
in accordance with their...mores& norms.
guard bless ya!
storied, but based in base deed,
flies make most of penultimate creed.
zealot harlot miscreant& me
do unto others the opposite of ms. paisley
2014
Pupneer Courthouse Chase
---wind unseen takes form in snarling havoc
on a dormant volcano monadnock,
rousing rabble to a fevered pitch
jostling trash bins, putting ice on every hitch,
testing hinges and humpday's saddle
frostbitten reins in canoe sans paddle,
pushing what into where, whistling creaks
draw chaos---------& order speaks,
ice motes drive or dally floating haphazard
crow high, my perch perfect for such blizzard
yesterday pulled pavers, made patterns
undone thoughts, austere as a lecturn,
and so unlike the fir, unfurling wildly thrashing air
yet losing no limb nor cone, debonair
as a stunt cosmos doing its own unravelings
under silver laced mist, given body in sculpted hobblings,
slowed to a point of stasis
upon which reality has basis
wind everseen, how clean a forest floor at night,
ages-tested branches, embodying might.
Mt Tabor Oregon 12-8-16
When you're houseless, everywhere is home. When you're heartless, every touch revives. I'm neither less nor more than a sum of my losses, without you. Gold sinks, water dances still. There are no strangers in our open morning, no friends bearing a true compass other than the baby sun and harbor moon. Silence can't be broken like a horse. Rope and saddle and wishes stay selfish in the pecking orders of mountains. My glacier thirsts for the ocean floor, shaggy with salt. When we're helpless, we help ourselves to suffer. When the polis eats us, we're political. A routine checkup checks all the Pandora boxes, unpostmarked by design. Everything done comes undun, washing the tomorrow clean of whence. Worn out thread becomes a nest, with effort feathers. I bark another tree, spin a yarn, and tumble in my bagworm skin. When rebooted, our toes map the cavernous naps and spatial tuck. When pulling oneself out of the tarpit, the tar comes along to the dino museum. It's free.
SE Pdx 5-17-22
trapped in italy where the coughs shake bricks loose
where the marital thump of bedposts
against wall pillars has been known to
deliver pools of oil
trapped in the virus laden furs of milan
surrounded by st peter's pox hued gates
in a venice canal stewed in bloated
ships of luxury vaccines
that nobody wants or needs trapped
in italy the sardines sigh
