Red
Red heels, body balanced above.
Red dress, fits just like a glove.
Red lips, seething with lust.
Red rubies, slipped in the secret of my bust.
Red flag, beckoning.
Red silk sheets, decorate our night, into morning.
#14, “Bee happy, bee healthy!”
A woman cries salty tears into her cereal bowl.
Beaten and stressed she wails as she fills her problems with soggy Cheerios.
Three bowls in she stops, her stomach bloated and stretched. Her sorrow still floats in the milk that fills her distended stomach.
The cereal is all that’s left and she throws the box out the door with a sob.
Brown circles of processed wheat flies like hail stones against her car.
The box flops dead on the sidewalk.
Only to become a bed for her fat grey cat until morning, when her children scream, “Mommy we’re out of cereal, the cat stole it!”.
The mothers mouth still tastes of milky vomit as she gets out of bed and makes the children oatmeal instead.
“It’s Eight, And Little Red’s In The Hood”
“Hey girl, where you going?”
Sun’s hardly gone down,
And the wolves are out and about already.
“Stranger, Danger!,” I remember.
Head down, looking on the ground,
Make no eye contact, quick steps away.
But they circle me, taunting rapidly.
There’s just no going forward,
No retreat back.
Unwanted hands move in to trespass.
I grimace, recoil, shun their attention.
“No, stop it,” I glower.
They continue, and I stop flinching.
Pull out my kukri,
Cut, thrust, and slash.
All is still, and I walk on.
I text Grandma:
“Sorry, will be late, am on my way.”
Lessons in Life
Lessons remain unlearnt
Woe is me comes gushing forward in
Every direction
Anger and pain fill the air
Closely followed by a moan of self-pitying
A cry for help!
A pointless exercise in futility
A road lays before you
what are you choosing for yourself?
A variation on a theme
More pain, more anger, more broken dreams?
I wish for a miracle that the Divine Spirit
Lays their hand on you head
Either slapping you into our reality
Or shines the light and
You will finally see your way forward
But alas No you are from ready
So many lessons to learn
A blind man in the desert wandering around
Aimlessly to his ultimate death
A very sad state of affairs
Indeed.
(xiv)
like a whisper chases its shadow,
around a domed gallery made of stone
we leap-frog from liaison to liaison, yet
in the end, as at the start – are left alone
(will you be my gallery, my whisper,
or will you just leave me lonesome?)
Parallels and Obsessions Poem 11
Robin Williams died
He killed himself
Hung himself
On that horrible date
The anniversary
Of when she did it
Years ago
When she died
She killed herself
Hung herself
At 25
Parallels obsessions
I read article
After article
Why did he do it
What brought him there
So maybe I could understand
Why she went to that place
He had it all
Everything
Make me understand Robin
Depression
She had that
She had tried before
She had gotten help
Parallels obsession
Read more
Navigate pages
Makeshift films
Lovingly drawn sketches
Read about his filmography
His comedy
She always on my mind
Her films a few pictures
Her comedy wry and brittle
Almost forgotten
Parallels obsessions
Put it to rest
Relax, let it be
Its in the past
Nothing you could do
Nothing to say
Nothing to change
What’s done is done
Parallels obsessions
He hung himself
She hung herself
I wasn’t there
I didn’t know
His choice to end it
Her choice to end it
Parallels obsessions
Rest in peace dear ones
Rest in peace
Because I will never be at peace again
Chew Some Charcoal
I think I’ll chew some charcoal
I need that black powerful stuff to ease my mind
And the electricity racing in succession
Of a thousand curses of hate
Of one million stress related rants
Of the joy hate that comes from being the powerful failure
That I am
I think I’ll have some charcoal
To avoid that press mess
To avoid that unapologetic apology
The nauseating embarrassment
Of my true feelings
Of my true
Self
I think I’ll chew some charcoal
And I think I’ll call a cab
Poem 14
You make me happy
When all else fails
I turn to you
You laugh at my jokes
When I make a joke of something
You laugh not get mad
You are my rock
When I need to rant
You let me tell you
You are my friend
When all others fail
You rise above
23
No one can see
this world but me
where aging stops at 23.
And if my body does contest
I yell at it – Don’t be a pest!
For what is more of who you are
is if you can be more than sure
that boring lives and silly talk
belong in garbage heaps of thought.
And if you think this not as real
then walk the plank of life in jail.
Dead man delivered in the mail.
Racing forward – human snail.
The only thing we pass along
Our vibrancy – unique song.