Wednesday, May 31, 2023

ASK ANY PHILOSOPHER

It's offensive
how we glamorize 
the groundlessly romantic; 

reckless 
to find ourselves 
so swept up 

in the dangerously 
doe-eyed 
side of fascination. 

Though stilted
and miserly, how much 
wiser by far 

to stuff the soft 
caresses and 
intoxicating liquors—

to shun 
the perkiness  
of flowers 

and the amorous
light verse of
sentimental cards? 

For love is no 
warm feeling; it's 
an existential gesture—

a chagrined-but-willing 
yoking of your slender, 
feral welfare 

to the equally meager—
and no less unruly—
progress of another's.


Tuesday, May 30, 2023

DREAM LOGIC

As sure 
as the imperious, 
sunlit sky

obscures the vast 
networks of a 
needless astronomy, 

this waking life
too, is a mere 
obfuscation  

of your groundless
but illimitable capacity 
to lack.

No tricks; it does 
not matter where
you have been, since, 

everywhere
the black space of 
nothingness tingles,

existence's 
white pulses throttle, 
and hum.

As all 
that you know 
is slowly dissolved, 

you grow to see 
the wide open 
vacuum behind: 

a possibility 
which seemed to exist 
at one time

was, all the while, 
a necessity 
always. 



Friday, May 26, 2023

EQUIVOCATION

How many times 
will I have to change 
my mind

before I turn into 
a brand 
new person? 

Is it sudden 
and discrete—

like the lucky 
millionth customer? 
Or 

must a process 
this mysterious 

happen imperceptibly—
gradually, 

over the course 
of each 
tortured decision, 

compromise, 
agreement, result, 
and resolution? 

Perhaps 
the transformation 

has already begun?—
But it's probably 
for the best 

that I don't know, 
since 

if I did, I am sure 
I would try 

to resist.



Thursday, May 25, 2023

SOLO A CAPPELLA

If it's said that 
the dead 

can still reach 
out and speak to us,
why 

on Earth 
can't our precursors? 
Where 

are all the hasty, slipshod 
mock-ups 
and the models—

all the dinged prototypes 
of our parents 
and kids 

that never got 
the chance to exist? 

Perhaps this 
isn't fiction; 

perhaps 
this unlucky legion 
does whisper 

in the mumbling 
of motors, or the swish 
of tall grasses,

but the words 
that they utter there

are just so 
outlandish 

in their aberrant 
combinations 
of ghastly and ecstatic  

that our ears 
can't bear to register 

the significance 
of their air pressure—

so we walk on 
from the spot, chagrined 
and convinced 

that we must 
just be the 
only ones 

withdrawn enough 
to wonder this.



Wednesday, May 24, 2023

END GOALS

How long have we been 
at our desks 
tweaking the plots

of dreams we 
have yet to dream—
working them, 

kneading,
until we feel 
we can smell 

some faint form
of sweetness 

rising from 
their shells, 

passing right through 
and all around us, 

and then, 
just as quickly
leaving? 


It's so much more productive 
to catalog 
the physical: 

electrons 
and up quarks; 

protein strings 
and ribosomes—

simple units 
of fungible meaning 

that only mean 
themselves.


Self-love 
is a destination 

the same way 
a mirage is:

a brutally-born
hallucination 

which ardently 
beatifies 

the tyranny 
of distance.


Tuesday, May 23, 2023

OPERATING SYSTEMS

Once you've been
exhausted 

by the 
nauseating pace

of the races 
and the somersaults 

and the hide-
and seek of youth, 

you will be 
the first in line 

to buy 
into your life 

as a camera roll 
of memory proofs

and a key chain 
full of words 

and phrases,
which only obey 

the shape
of your face.

 * 

Don't you believe 
in reincarnation? 
That is

to say—
don't you think 
the trees and grasses 

arrayed outside 
your window 

will continue 
to play in 
invisible breezes 

after you 
are gone? 

*

"I don't believe this!"

As if doubting 
the truth 

were our way 
of catching it 

before it takes 
a nasty fall.



Monday, May 22, 2023

FATE

Even in the abstract, 
there are no 
inert substances.

Seemingly spontaneously, 
verbs 

beget participles;
words fizz

and collide 
like charged particles 

in the outer reaches 
of space 
so uncharted, 

so ill-defined, 
it's referred to, 

somewhat derisively, 
as memory

*

Fate too,
takes up no space 

in the imagination—
is noiseless 

and distant 
as underlying trauma. 

Who'd have thought 
 the mere act 
of observation 

could ever contain 
so much drama? 

Who'd have thought 
the self 

could be so cosmic-
ally mundane? 


Friday, May 19, 2023

TERMS AND CONDITIONS

Things like thought
and prayer 
are nice, but 
best dispensed 
upon the dead; 
the living, on 
the other hand, 
would vastly prefer 
to be fought for. 
Not that a victory, 
or anything 
like harmony, 
truce, or neutrality 
could ever 
be won—or even 
close at hand—since 
peace 
is just another 
state of affairs 
you can't wish for;
rather, much more 
like war, it's 
something you 
declare. 


Thursday, May 18, 2023

OBLATION

If all I crave 
on Earth
is muteness, 

am I spoiling it 
by telling you? 

And does speaking 
of silence 
compel me 

to destroy it? If so,
This must 
be hell: where 

the only way 
to tell 
of our feelings

is to leave them—
to recoil—to move 
away completely. 

But maybe,
such a sacrifice 

is the key 
to this cell; 
after all, 

even the smallest 
of motions

might be replete 
with significance,

if heaven's 
lingua franca 

isn't silence—
but stillness.



Wednesday, May 17, 2023

POETIC JUSTICE

After they've been 
smashed into,

some brick walls
start to look like 
lucky breaks;

to hit a dead-end, 
or slam into 
a cul-de-sac,

in retrospect, 
can feel less like  
a crash 

and more like 
an act of 
extravagant mercy. See,

it's impediments 
like that—

all the slaps, 
rejections, and 
broken hearts—

which tend to hold
the reckless back

just enough 
to keep them safe 

from moving 
so fast they break
their necks.



Tuesday, May 16, 2023

PER ASPERA AD ASTRA

Even when doing 
the humblest 
of things,

the hugeness 
of every little life
must accrue.

In the space
of time it takes a tiny 
shrew to blink her eye,

countless inchoate 
ecosystems may improve—
or maybe 

two far away 
galaxies will collide 
and implode

long before 
their constellations'
names become known;

and then, of course
there's you—taking yet
another step

laboriously away
from the home
where you started,

even though, like 
counting to infinity, 
you know 

you can't get any 
closer to the place 
you mean to go.




Monday, May 15, 2023

NEW PERSPECTIVES

Things used to come to pass 
in the fullness 
of time;

now, 
they happen in 
spite of it. 

Just like 
how

things 
used to happen 
to us—

or at least seem 
to come between us 
in some 

two dimensional space—
but now, they all 

take place 
inside. 

Forever, Dickinson says,
is composed 
of those nows, 

as the months 
blur together, 

and the decades 
don't discriminate. 
And she's

probably right:
our celebrated days 

and our follies,
all laid 

flat on time's line 
cannot slide 
around. 

But the inverse 
of worse isn't 
better;

it's "easier." 
And the best cure
for distance 

isn't closeness;
it's height



Friday, May 12, 2023

DUBIOUS PASTORAL

Park lawn 
I mistrustfully 
tread upon 

after fevered sheen 
of late-
spring rain—

your greenness 
now reaches 
too far toward 

the corners 
of the conspicuously 
consummate;

my feet find 
your flourishing 
far too flawless, 

far too broad 
to be pretty
or balanced; In fact, 

I wobble, when struck 
by the thought, 
with the doubt 

that such 
lushness 
could exist, since it's 

far too unlimited 
to have ever 
been started. 


Thursday, May 11, 2023

CAESURA

At this juncture, 
you might wonder
which is better: 

a civilization built 
on blood—

all arches, 
stairs, and 
domino columns;

all rivers of pyruvate, 
angrily spinning 

the tormented wheels 
of metabolic work—

or one that builds 
simple but formidable 
strongholds 

and clean, genial 
ministries out of 
chivalrous words. 

But the best answer 
might depend

on whether you'd prefer 
to be culpable 

(always, of course, 
from behind the veil 
of ignorance)

for the things 
that you say,
or 

the ones 
you cover up.



Wednesday, May 10, 2023

JOBBERS

How is it we're 
accomplished enough
to talk so much—
excusing and 
typing, reciting 
and refusing—yet 
nothing we say 
hews even close 
to the truth? 

There's just
so much serviceable 
music in the world
we must think 
to ourselves, 
but not enough 
jobbers out there
cranking out 
librettos

and so, with 
resoluteness 
akin to pioneers, 
astronauts, 
soldiers entrenched 
in their foxholes, 
we atomize 
forbearance and 
perfume the air 

with pleasant 
patter, crows, 
and blues; we 
sidle-up 
to complicit 
partners, grit 
our teeth and part 
our gums—and fire 
out the news.



Tuesday, May 9, 2023

OPENING LINE

After such profound 
eternities 

of stillness, unknowable 
darkness, 
and silence,

somehow,
every morning, through
gunmetal clouds

of our strange
mute unknowing,

which still rage 
like mad above 
the tops our shoulders—

a clean, warm 
electrical light 
of first thought

will flash its 
effulgent
and pliant pith,

setting something 
deep within us
rumbling sympathetically—

until, eventually, 
night's formidable 
seal is burst open

and this strange 
hectic drivel begins
to rain down 

in wet
jazzy patterns 

which consecrate 
this strange dispensation 
of our doubt—

as our mouths 
flicker open 

to dispel 
the whole drought. 



Monday, May 8, 2023

THE LOGISTICS

Who would 
have thought that 
fire 

would float, 
while droplets 
of rainbow-

flecked 
water don't 
at all? 

You taste salt 
on your lips 
where the blades 

of rain fall—
much colder, 
but similar 

in taste
to the tears 
that would roll,

warm and full,
when you thought 
you were 

alone;
but still you 
don't get

how the logistics 
are supposed 
to work: 

where on Earth 
is all of that 
salt kept, for instance? 

Are there silos 
full of breezes?
Warehouses 

of starlight? 
Is someone 
out there

guarding all 
the yet-unfallen snow? 
Does a gross mis-

understanding cause 
the soul to 
weigh extra? 

If there's more 
to this world 
than ecstatic

apprehension,
do you really 
need to know? 



Friday, May 5, 2023

AGAINST BENEVOLENCE

When the weather 
is calm, theirs are 
shoulders to lean on,

but pursuant 
to disaster, it's 

the noble 
who are trouble. 
In meltdown, 

in plague, war, 
death, 
or pandemic, it's like

everything 
they excel at—

all the sitting still 
and giving love

while receiving 
wisdom with grace 
from above; 

all the sending prayers
and preaching hope, 

while turning cheeks 
without a smirk—

is now far worse
than haphazard  
or useless. 

To the ones who wake up 
in afflicted  
scenarios, 

conviction
is an empty, if deadly 
placebo; 

the only real cure is 
doing the work.



Thursday, May 4, 2023

PESSIMYSTIC POEM

          I once asked a bird,
          how is it that you fly
          in this gravity of darkness?
          The bird responded, "Love lifts me."
               ―Hāfez

No offense 
to Hāfez, 

but it isn't 
down to romance; 

it's this abusive way 
The Possible 

is constantly  
confounding 

and pushing around 
The Actual 

that transmutes, 
in the dusklight, 

the next swarming 
of grackles 

from rolling 
annoyance

to four-
dimensional dance.


Wednesday, May 3, 2023

THE NOBLE LIE

When you finally ask me 
whether 

death 
for existence, 

language 
for betrayal, 

pleasure 
for pain 

are all 
really worth 
the trade,

with one palm pressed firmly 
into the other

and the light 
of oblivion 
playing on my face,  

I shall nod
my head firmly 
and falsify the case:

they say, 
statistically speaking, given
infinite time

and the limited nature 
of space—

all that leaves our hands 
is bound 
to come back—

but no, 
of course 
not the burdens,

and never
the aches.



Tuesday, May 2, 2023

DOPPELGANGER

On those calmer, 
brighter afternoons, I 

catch you sprawling 
on the ground—

my closest dubious 
interlocutor; 

my maddeningly 
equanimous shadow.

Silent, sable, smooth 
as sand, you 

ponderously 
invite me 

to lie right down, 
stretch out the now 

until it grows 
indefinite. 

But when I try 
to imitate

your stealth and 
sleekness, and your length, 

all of my passion
and acceptance contract 

toward pity 
and attachment. 

In stillness, and prostrate
before your mirage,

each step I don't take
is now a practice; 

every sound I 
don't hear, 

every itch 
I don't scratch, 

an homage 
to your blackness.




Monday, May 1, 2023

UNCTION

If you can, 
just before you're finally 
too depleted 
to resist 

that all-
assuaging laudanum 
of oblivion, 
think of this: 

the loss 
of thought itself 
is just a kind of
flawless memory; 

a blame- 
and stainless knowing, 
which, at last, is 
yours alone; 

a finely
spun but tightly
braided looseness 
you can hold; 

the only spotless 
bit of "gone" 
you'll ever get 
to own.