The Poetry Marathon

Feathery melodies before old flappy Sun alights
Then ten origami cranes folded tiny as a doll’s teacup
Then coffee poured from a nested cone filter
(There it is – those birds again)
Everything after is afterthought
A petty feather wafting to a paltry floor

There once was a newlywed fella
Equipped with a wondrous umbrella.
Said his blushing young bride,
“Please don’t open inside.
The weather in there is quite stella!”

I’m doing well,
I hope you are.
Do you remember
In the car

That boiling day,
The herds of pronghorn
We flew past?
Your shirt was torn

And I could smell
The desert heat,
Feel the floor mat
With my feet.

I was afraid to speak,
Could only stare.
The wind revealed
Your shoulder. So there

You have it,
Nothing more.
You probably guessed
I sold that car.

My head is a jungle, trees and beasts
And shadows of old shapes
Only imagined. There she feasts
On putrid meats and grapes,
Elusive tigress, waiting, biding.
We hunt each other, stalking, hiding.

Did Lao Tzu ever imagine such a thing?
Did Martin Luther dream this dream?

Who remembers how the first questions
Were conceived; remembers the farmer
Recalls the mental massing of
Innocent villagers,
Stuffing of spears and grammar,
Body counting as one by one they fell
Until we two only remain
The striped query and I?

Did Lao Tzu ever imagine such a thing?
Did Martin Luther dream this dream?

My head is a jungle, fears and cries
And mutinies. There
She hunts, never sleeps or flies
Away. My uncut hair
Is going silver. I feel my knees
Collapsing under all these trees.

Did Lao Tzu ever imagine such a thing?
Did Martin Luther dream this dream?

Ingredients

1 cup Mush
1 cup Gray Sloppy Mush
3 Tbsp Malarkey
1 tsp Thick Apathy
1 pinch Oh Crap

Mix all ingredients in an unwashed mug, stir with sarcasm if desired. Best consumed before reality sets in.

What I remember most about her is
The smell of coffee crawling through our house,
Like fog, the first thing every morning; this,
And the burping percolator, of course.

Kiwi??
A fruit
A bird
Both neither
A word
Or one big mystery

Who makes decisions
About mountain tops above
Trees yet below God

Who’d have thought
A simple tree
Could bring less joy
To them than me

I think it’s dandy
That lions make themselves so
Independent…

From waaay over there!