Category Archives: Poetry

On Secrets

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Going through my poems
Looking what to post
There are some powerful things I’ve written
And hidden.
There are a lot more
Terrible things, atrocious writings,
Embarrassing nonsense
I’ve hidden that too.
The best of me and the worst of me
Still under the rug
Am I even doing
What I set out to do here?
Am I a writer
If I can’t write what bleeds
If I can’t share what hurts?
If it’s all a secret
What’s the goddamnfucking point.

I want to be a monster.
If I ate people
I wouldn’t have to worry about a job
About relationships
About anything except the next meal
I could spend hours hiding in dark places
Or if I were one of the big ones,
I could go city-wrecking,
Send it all to hell.
But I wouldn’t be either of those things.
If I were a monster
I would end up
A Jekyll and Hyde type
Or a werewolf who transforms on the full moon
Someone who has to keep up a human pretense
And deal with human problems just the same
While also dealing with monster problems secretly.

When I was young
I loved secrets.
They made me feel special, unique.
I liked knowing I could do something the others couldn’t
That I’d seen something the others hadn’t
That I knew something the others didn’t.

Now I hate secrets.
I can keep the secret of another for a lifetime
But my own secrets eat at me
Like a wet infection
So I air them
Systematically.
And every time I do
I find
Everyone has a wolf inside.
Everyone’s like me.
There are no such things as monsters
When we all pretend humanity.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Captured image

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See a frame on the wall
Inside the frame
A photo of a small animal
Tiny ribcage
Whiskered cheeks
It looks back at you
With piercing rat eyes
Reflecting red
And hisses.
The photograph
Hates you
So much.

Life is harder
Inside a picture frame.
It’s easy for you
Able to reach out at will
For a conversation or some tea.
But those who are trapped
Remain a spectacle,
Nothing to eat
But still life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next

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An iridescent spider weaves a web
Her whole body moves like a single hand
Knotting lace.
Pull, stretch, dip, next
Pull, stretch, dip, next.

My friend prepares dinner
Slicing grape tomatoes
Graceful and relaxed at her kitchen counter.
Set, slice, bowl, next
Set, slice, bowl, next.

My sister crochets a hat
Curled on the couch on a cold winter day,
Listening to a movie while her hands work.
Loop, hook, pull, next
Loop, hook, pull, next.

I enter data
At work wearing headphones
Music distracting my mind from my hands.
Check, copy, paste, next
Check, copy, paste, next.

Repetitive motions get us through our days.
Work is work, everywhere you look.
The rhythms and pulses of life don’t change.
And they are the same
For every creature.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Walking Absurdities

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It’s been one of those days when everyone seems to be having a rough time of it, except for me.

Maybe this will help lighten the mood.

 

 

What are we made of?
What is this puttylike substance?
Doesn’t anybody notice
We are ridiculous.
All stretchy faces and brightly colored insides
With two bright eyeballs in front
A wide mouth below
And the nose!
An absurd protuberance
Set far outward
So you can stick your shelf nose right over stuff
And vacuum up smells.
We’re not God’s finest work.
We’re awkward creations.
We’re the hairless cats of primates.
When excited, we bray laughter.
When we age our teeth fall out, our skin gets baggy.
We wallop each other with closed fists
And break our silly noses
Right across our stretchy faces.

Our trunks split into limbs split into digits
Which splay and wiggle and toy with things
Which pick and slap and pop zits.
Our toes are stubby.
And we do stub them,
Repeatedly.
Sometimes we break them repeatedly,
Through stubbing alone.
Sometimes they break
Because we collided with another clumsy person
Who accidentally landed on them.
Sometimes we break them
Because we were moving a couch,
Filling a nest with worthless treasures
We found and attached value to,
Which we then dropped on our foot.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Upstarts

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A careless hand
Tossed seed hulls out the window.
Soon
A sunflower grew there
Piercing the well groomed lawn
Loomed over by bureaucratic bricks
Yet always facing the sunshine.
A little bit of wildness
A flash of bright orange
Had forced its way through.

In the name of homogeneity,
Somebody mowed it down.

Now a squash is growing along the standard landscaping wall.
Curling neon green tendrils,
A line of coral blossoms
In bright flagrancy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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