Black Like Jazz

He's black
but black on a crow is like jazz,
full of variations, never quite the tune
you think it is.

He sidles near my feet, peering up
with a beady eye. He pecks at potato chips
spilled yesterday, glued to the sidewalk
by last night's rain. He's black like jazz
with purple highlights.

He calls his friends,
hunching his shoulders, tail flaring.
Huge effort for such a rusty squawk.
Crow, you're not a sax or a trombone
but still you're bold as brass
and black like jazz.

Collection available! Knocking from Inside

Top 10 posts

Been a while since I looked at the numbers.

Currently the top 10 posts on my blog (since I installed IceRocket in January of last year):

Umbrella Manifesto
Literal and figurative poetry
Pressed Rose
AI Poetics?
Simile and Metaphor: Greens and Blues
Shihuangdi's Tomb
PV=nRT
Lot's Wife
Lollipop Girls
Buddha Hand

All except Umbrella Manifesto are accumulating hits steadily. Umbrella gets an occasional hit, but in the fullness of time I expect it will be overtaken.

Pressed Rose is actually a newcomer to the top ranks. I don't know why it's gotten so many hits lately.

For what it's worth, I now have over 1400 posts labelled "poetry" on this blog. As a count of the number of poems I've written, it's approximately correct: there are a few poems I've written that aren't on the blog for one reason and another, and a few multi-poem posts.

All this in about 5 years, alhumdulillah...

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Train Whistles on the Way Out

not on the way in. Apparently
it announces departure not arrival.

Dogs don't make much of goodbye (unless
their humans fuss) but hello is occasion
for vast rejoicing and sloppy kisses.

I've never had a bird. Every parrot I've met
said hello if it said anything at all.

My car beeps when I walk away
and press lock on the remote—but when
I approach, it only blinks.

Mechanical hearts grasp grief
but animals are better at joy. Humans
must be a little of both.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #29: headline
If you're curious the article is here.
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To Do Today

What I must do today is dance
What I must do today is remember God
What I must do today is work at my job
What I must do today is write a poem
What I must do today is tell my husband I love him
What I must do today is celebrate life
What I must do today is walk a mile in someone else's shoes
What I must do today is pet my cat
What I must do today is admire the sunset
What I must do today is smell a wild rose on the Esplanade
What I must do today is drink a cup of tea
What I must do today is clean up the kitchen
What I must do today is—
how do people ever find time
to be bored?

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #28: intuition: the place I am meant to go today
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Purification

3 Word Wednesday: Depart. Ignite. Rotten.

rotten wood ignites
rising smoke dissolves in wind
old ghosts departing

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Windmill Dreams

What was the noise that woke me from my sleep
intent and listening in a silent room?
No clash or clatter; a caress, a sweep
describes the sound that trembled through the gloom.
Moving across the bedroom wall, a form
illuminated only by the faint
lamps in the street. A harbinger of storm,
leaf-light and turning, restless as a saint
denied his martyrdom. I close my eyes,
remembering tall shapes on distant hills,
electric power drunk from moving air.
And on my wall, the shadow's newest guise:
metallic vanes of whirling, giant mills
swing low and brush against my tangled hair.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #27: acrostic
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Euphrates/Tigris

The blue-faced monster creeps behind a screen
of reeds, a lily mask. It's hungry for
the history of all the lands between
its arms. The ruins of cities wrecked by war.
It takes them all, the ghosts of ancient states
and children claimed by bombings yesterday,
dissolved in sediment. The choking weight
of narrow waters filled with human clay.

It drinks both blood and sand on which it's spilt,
a cocktail of destruction, salted with
resurgent national ambitions, myths
of long-gone glory faded into silt.
In desert lands, though monuments remain
unweathered, rivers swallow up the plain.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #26: fragments
I acquired the fragments from which this poem grew at the OSPA conference last weekend. You can read the first poem that grew from them here.
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New stuff

There's a new poetry prompt and etc. site coming online: Big Tent Poetry. Featuring many faces familiar from Read Write Poem. I'll be participating in a group reading event under BTP's auspices in July: check the sidebar for details.

Also tomorrow evening I'll be at the Pond House in Milwaukie, helping launch Tom Hogan's poetry reading/open mike series there.

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Written on the Rim

This is what I learned when I was Lull:
the infinite heavens are made up of
turning wheels. Every man's name is inscribed
around the rim of one. Yours. Mine,
turning, intersect. We meet. There are consequences
or not. We keep turning until death.

This is what I learned: to use
the Alphabet of the Magi to write another name
on another wheel. To win extra turns as another man,
as Paracelsus of Hohenheim.

Listen to the song of the axles. It is art, not science.
My characters, the letters that would redefine me,
I sent forth into the void, only guessing
where they might land. I made them.
I am what they made me; I forget what I was.

--Note: this completes the suite of poems based on the story "Calliope" from Neil Gaiman's Sandman.
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The Nightingale, the Rose, and What Came After

"If you want a red rose," said the Tree, "you must build it out of music by moonlight, and stain it with your own heart's-blood."— "The Nightingale and the Rose" by Oscar Wilde

The nightingale is dead. The perfect rose
that blossomed crimson as a tongue of fire
dissolves the coolness that is her pose,

unleashes unacceptable desire.
She wants a doggy tongue between her thighs
to blossom crimson as a tongue of fire.

He plays her pet. It comes as no surprise
that dominance and bondage are her games,
that she wants doggy tongue between her thighs.

She puts a rubber collar on him, names
him Fido—fit name for a canine stud,
for decadence and bondage are her games.

She takes the gift he brought, the rose of blood,
inserts it in the rubber collar's notch,
"Here, Fido," fits it on her canine stud.

He doesn't care, while nosing at her crotch,
the nightingale is dead. The perfect rose
inserted in the collar's final notch
destroys the coolness that was her pose.

Note that in the original story, the girl is unimpressed with the rose and, after a nasty exchange, the Scholar forswears love forever. But I don't think Wilde would have been entirely displeased with this revision.
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North Woods River God

The god in the river is rank with mud and musk and rotting duckweed.
The broad plates of his antlers block out half the sky.
He rises from the water and topples trees with a casual swipe of his hand.
He scratches his back against the bridge and shakes its foundations.
He walks across the land and leaves hoofprints like lakes, fecund with milt.
He strides down to the shoreline, bellowing his pride
and there he lies down in the arms of the ocean.
At ebb, she swallows him. At flood, she fills his channel.
Whole estuarine ecologies dense as jungle and more massive than forests
spring from the churned salt muck of their coupling,
from the planet's tangled, sweating groins.

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Cargo Cult

Nigredo (Putrefactio)
I tell you there's no such thing as a flying saucer
crewed by aliens. I've seen aliens.
They travel in curious copper vessels
with crooked necks. Not saucers.

What did they look like? That's hard to say.
They tended to... disperse... and then rejoin
solve et coagula. Like slime-molds, actually.
And then you couldn't be sure if you were talking
to the same one, or a new individual
with the same memories. I guess they live forever.

Albedo
They crawl through twisting glass pipes
inside their ships. There's always water dripping.
I guess they're from some place more humid—
maybe Venus? They wouldn't say.
To them our whole planet's a desert.
They come here to meditate like stylites
in the thin dry air. It clears their minds, they say
though they have to be careful about dehydration.

Citrinitas
And apparently their ships run
entirely off sunlight! Or some kind of
radiant power—I wasn't completely clear—
anyway the engines are brilliant, dazzling.
Brighter than a thousand torches.
Gold. They talked about gold
and about turning metals into other metals
but I don't know how, exactly.

Rubedo
I watched the ship take off. Maybe
I was standing too close? I feel kind of flushed.
They said they'd come back. I swear.
They said they'd come—if I wanted to go—
they'd take me along. Into the light.
No, I'm not feverish or babbling—
I'm just a little hot—
I'll see the universe. I'll live forever. Get me
a copper pot... it has to be the right shape...
some coiled glass tubes...
I'm gone.
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Workshop poems

Spent last Saturday at the OSPA spring conference in Eugene. We had two workshops, at both of which we wrote poems to various prompts. I thought I'd post them here for interest.

Erosion
Down here, the river is heavier, yet narrower.
It flows through the ruins of ancient city-states
yet carries no history.
It devours history.
It is a torrent of the ghosts of drowned children.
It is a blue-faced monster behind a flowered mask.

"Love Me Tender"
She hated Auckland because
she said, you couldn't get mangoes there
and her battered old Honda just wasn't up to the hills.
But that was all by email
and it's hard, I said
to be tender to a computer.
She said, lover
you put your finger on it.


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The Emporium of Tomorrow

Yesterday this store breathed of saffron and pepper
scents heavy enough to make you dizzy.
Today it smells of rust
and tendrils of ivy explore the shelves.
Tomorrow, walls like the stumps of teeth
will frame broken windows
and a flock of crows like a fierce feathered squall.

Don't flinch. They're just reverberations of history,
the ghosts of old transactions
in a deserted emporium.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #22: wordle
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Lamia on Keats

Apprentice surgeon, student at the Guy
where he was dresser; where he caught my eye.
Something about his hands—his face—bespoke
perceptions more than normal.
I awoke
his intellect, his passion. What a plan
I had for Keats, that troubled child of man!
Each day he labored underneath my sign:
caduceus of Hermes, wand divine.
I filled his dreams with serpents twined in pairs
like strands of protein helixed into hairs.
I made him mad with wanting Truth. The tools
for finding it were then at hand: the rules
of logic and experiment were known.
He worked his hands in blood and guts and bone
each day, deep-anchored in reality
and human need.
I meant for him to be
a leader of the coming generation:
seekers after knowledge who would fashion
vasty temples in the human mind.
His creativity, released, would find
cures for the illnesses that filled the Guy's
bleak corridors with pain and hopeless eyes.

You find it odd that I, a thing of Myth
would want to speed the march of Science with
a pair of hands like his? But genius
follows the Psychopomp's caduceus
wherever it may lead. I was his muse:
his field of expertise was mine to choose.
I looked ahead to ages that would name
my kin as legends, stories meant to tame
the ignorant chaos of the youthful race.
I saw that glory written on his face:
a torch to light the turning of the page
a hero of the new Promethean age!
I showed him how to read the saraband
of base-pairs on a chromosomal strand,
those variations infinite on cosmic themes.
These were the "Lamiae" that fed his dreams.
This secret, pregnant with revelation,
this model of divine recombination,
meiosis symbolized by twining snakes—
but see what use of it the poet makes!
He turns it to poetical caprice
with Science as the villain of the piece!

That's how he chose to write my story down:
John Keats, who could have garnered Darwin's crown.

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Perfect Surrender

In one thing only is it given us to be perfect,
we who were born the heirs of a world imperfect.

From the clay-choked throats of dead volcanoes
diamonds emerge crystalline, sparkling and perfect.

At the heart of every new and scarlet-burning rose
lurks the seed of decay, a hidden imperfection.

Deep space swallows furious newborn star-glows
into darkness infinite, unbreakable and perfect.

Each twisted conch is different and each knows
the math of the spiral, yet the growth is never perfect.

Spray from the falls prisms a double arc of rainbows
as close as the human eye comes to seeing perfection.

Spray from the falls jewels the double-arching rows
of my eyelids: Allah, I pray, make my surrender perfect.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #21: flaws
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Low Tide

3 Word Wednesday: Ebb. Negotiate. Random.


random scrawls record
ebb tide's negotiation
with the weight of sand

--image courtesy of Nicolas Raymond
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Instructions for Constructing a Tesseract

A tesseract has forty-eight faces	Like the Janus of a twenty-four-fold doorway	With a different line written across every face	Like phrases written on a page	The relationships are more important than the content	The space between the lines is even more important
Being made up of eight cubes, each with six faces	There are forty-eight cells in this matrix	My grandfather read them across	Poetic images juxtaposed at random	Arrange that they are all commutative	Like the spaces between the lines of a net
You must write one line on each face	My grandfather wrote them down	When he built his universal traveling device out of	Rigorous progressions of logical syllogisms	You can read them in any direction	A net can be folded in any direction
The order must be precisely correct	Like the columns in an account book	Rigorous and painstaking numerical calculations	Forming a map, a key, a spell	Once they are folded into cubes	So that the sums carry over the gaps between columns
The relationships among the lines determine the destination	Organized for the desired result, they	Arrive at a set of numinous coordinates	A card to the library at Alexandria	Where the cubes are joined with n-dimensional tape	To create what is called the net of the tesseract
The space between the lines determines the distance	Sum carefully over the intervening time and space	Read your way to the hanging gardens of Babylon	An answer for all the riddles of the tribe of Sphinxes	Which is only an aid to understanding the mystery	A shape that approximates the reality
But remember that it's only an approximation	To get you at least close to where you're going	The tree under which Gautama still meditates is guarded	May not be reached without giving up something	There is an algorithm that specifies the creation	Of a permutative labyrinth containing a logical Minotaur
My grandfather warned me	You must be wary of the seductions of permutation	Infinitely differentiable manifolds of illusion	You thought precious; revealed to be empty	There is a revelation that destroys the perception	Of a tesseract folded into itself and disappearing altogether.

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Understanding Apothesia

That was the moment he realized
most people don't experience the scarlet of tulips
as C-flat on a trombone. Or the sound of a train-whistle
as soft and electric, like a cat's fur in dry weather.

It was like a knife cleaving through the world.
It was a bomb blast shattering a continent of sensation
into an archipelago of senses. It was as sudden
as the door that slammed on his hand

with the sharp smell of gunpowder and the taste of brass.
Singleness of sensation—he grasped it—
just for a moment, then let it go to listen
to the deep mauve sounds the wind was making.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #19: light bulb moment
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Silent Witness Train

A train of silent women rumbles through the night.
They do not speak. They do not move. They stare ahead
like statues waiting for museum staff to write
"A train of silent women rumbles through the night"
upon a plinth, around a painting's frame. They might
be ghosts. They might be refugees. They might be dead
or lost in space-time. Child or crone or maidenhead,
they do not speak. They do not move. They stare ahead
like eyeless skulls that watch from shadows under beds.
Like every silent witness dead of love or fright,
they do not speak. They do not move. They stare ahead,
the train of silent women rumbling through the night.

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On Holiday with a Weasel

The blue-hairs crowd the boardwalk
enjoying the late summer sun
once school starts up. They chatter about
discount fares and room service.
They buy ice cream and candy from my cart.

The two with the weasel—yeah, I know it's weird
but a pet's a pet, I guess. They're staying
in a non-smoke-free motel
not because it's cheaper, but because
(according to the shorter one) the smell
of stale smoke reminds them
of dear departed Harry.

Who's Harry? Husband, brother, son
to one or the other, I don't know
even if they're sisters or just friends.
A sugar-cone of bubble-gum for one, the other
wants blackberry swirl on waffle.
They turn away, the goods in hand
tugging on the leash. "C'mon, Harry."

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Catch My Breath

I remember, every time I catch
a breath of frangipani, blazing heat
and sweat as tender as a baby's feet
with soles that heavy earth has yet to touch.
It slips away, no matter how I clutch
a whiff of cinnamon: the heavy vine
against the rock, as sturdy as my spine
but graced with limberness I'll never match.

I forget the borders of my flesh.
I read the memories that live within
my skull as writings on the world. I mesh
with vine and blossom: rock becomes my skin
and I remember grass and water, sod
and stone and flowers. I remember God.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #16: smell
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The Party at the End of the World

We party while it's getting dark. You know
that all the brightest young things gather here
because there's no place else for them to go

where they can be appreciated. So
important to be able to appear
at parties when it's getting dark, you know?

We're fever-moths and fireflies. We glow
and sparkle. Such a lively scene, my dear:
the only worthwhile place for us to go.

A masque of mummers, pantomime with no
libretto making mystery actions clear,
a party in the gathering dark. You know

that's really all that's left to us. Although
we try to hide the fact with hectic cheer,
there isn't any other place to go.

The curtain's risen on the final show
and closing time is on the clock, I fear.
We're partying against the dark. We know
there's simply no place left for us to go.

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Were-Goldfish

I heard something terrible happened to the family next door.
There were cops all around the house this morning. Yellow tape, and that.
I heard screams last night.
No, that was the movie that was on.
I heard there was blood everywhere.
You can't believe everything you hear. It was a full moon after all. Silly season.
But something really happened to that family?
I invited the sister in for coffee. They had to go and identify the bodies.
Oh, how awful.
There was nothing left but the goldfish.
I didn't know they had a goldfish.
They just got it last week.
I heard the cops were stumped.
How would you know that?
Something really awful must have happened.
Who's going to take care of their house?
Who's going to take care of the goldfish?
Hey, I'll bet it's a killer goldfish.
How can you joke about this? It's dreadful. The whole family.
No, seriously. Goldfish could be like sharks. They go crazy when they smell blood.
But only at the full moon.
Now that's just dumb. Goldfish?
Where'd they get it, anyway?
The kid brought it home from the carnival. He won it as a prize.
What carnival?
Out at the fairground?
I didn't hear there was a carnival.
Neither did I, but that's where he got it. According to the sister.
My brother-in-law is on the town council and he never said anything about a carnival. I mean, they'd have to have a permit and everything.
Maybe it was a ghost carnival.
An evil carnival that gives away were-goldfish.
Goldfish that turn into wolves when the moon's full, and kill everything in sight.
Well I don't know about you but I'm not adopting anyone's pet fish.
Me neither.
Me neither.
You never know.

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Mississippi Stained Glass

3 Word Wednesday: Brash. Lubricate. Saint.

a brash redneck saint
at the lube and muffler shop
holds forth salvation

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Poem Starting with a Line from Norman Dubie

The pearl slapdash of the moon is on the water,
a flick of God's wrist holding a paintbrush
dipped in light. A splash of notes from the bell
of a nickel-plated sax or a cathedral, against
black stone reverberating vaults. A mouthful
of ivory teeth and shadowed gaps inside
the Steinway's gape.

The brass-scaled fish have been put away
under the seat, waiting for a little day music
to play bronze trumpets, a fanfare of poppies.
There's no place for them in the black and white
fantasia of midnight. Colors spring out of earth
like dragon's teeth, at the touch of the sun.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #13, and with thanks to Norman Dubie.
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Silence Sestina

You know very well you should never
just wad up a handful of oily rags
and leave them in a closet, in the dark.
Claim you were distracted by a kiss
from a lover or a baby's scream,
but the fact remains, you started a fire.

Now the city is full of racing fire
and the department says they'll never
catch up. You can hear the sirens scream
as the crews run themselves ragged.
Civic life—well, you can kiss
that goodbye for now. The city's dark

except for flames. It's like a new Dark
Age: Europe's map dotted with fires,
plagues and invasions, the kisses
of death for previous empires. Never
expect anything to last: rags
clothe descendants of Caesars, screams

are swallowed by silence. Your screams
are stifled in the encroaching darkness.
The inside of your throat is ragged
with smoke inhalation. You're dying by fire.
Dawn may come someday, but you'll never
see the long grass tremble to its kiss.

The only sound now is flames kissing
new buildings. Imagine how they scream
knowing they're doomed to never
be inhabited. Windows like darkened
eyes bruised by the black hands of fire,
edged with broken-glass raggedness.

As if you'd stuffed your ears with rags
silence comes, welcome as a kiss.
You can no longer hear the roar of the fires
and distance destroys the sound of screaming
people fleeing into burning darkness.
Your city will rise from the ashes—never.

The liquid kiss of approaching darkness
quenches the ragged red blanket of fire.
There will never be any more screaming.

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Sentencing Judge

The throneroom was full of cats
but only one cat nervously captured the royal arm
by sitting on the King's sleeve.
The palace chandler had been suborned
to help in an assassination attempt
but a demon politely spat on the deadly candle—
it had been summoned by a helpful wizard.

The King's son was attending
Galactic Hub University, via interstellar email
but his term paper file was corrupted
and his instructor had to decode it
and so, the alien cleaned an electronic paper.
And the sentencing judge told me all this
when he explained why I was going to jail

for the unrestrained use of randomness.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #12. Sentences courtesy of The Random Sentence Generator.
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Sunset over the Parthenon

circle poised against
triangular pediment
dark falls over ruins

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Gryphons Shouldn't Marry

Eagles are monogamous for life--
lions, not so much. The half-and-halfs,
the gryphons, really shouldn't take a wife
or husband. "Marriage isn't just for laughs!"
declares the eagle head. But who'd decide
on matrimonial exclusiveness
when hinder parts insist upon their pride?
The private lives of gryphons are a mess.

Philosophers and moralists agree
that intellect is seated in the head
and passion should obey the brain's decree.
But as for gryphons... well, it must be said:
however virtuous the front appears,
the job of mating is left to the rears.

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The Universe in a Jar

an old man in Sunderland who owns the universe and keeps it in a jam-jar in the dusty cupboard under the stairs

Here I sit watching dust fall on my jar
falling in endless curtains between the cradles
of new stars burning the universe to ash
here at the mouth of the river Wear
in the land of Sunder.

Here I sit with the universe in a jar—
actually, just the center. The rest unfolds
away from the rim like an umbrella
from its handle. In my hand.
The edges flap in the breeze.

Now and then an extra-strong gust
of unreality will turn the whole thing
inside out and leave me
squirming inside the jar—but then
I can usually pop it back right way round.
You people never notice.

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A really nice jellyfish

Actually it's an Apophysis fractal.
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Octopus Jam

Fish eggs are ripened by the moon,
spawned at the full, hatched at the dark.
But some eggs hatch to a different tune—
like those of the famous Pacific tree octopus
in pails stowed around a winter campfire.
They get up a jug band (octopi are natural musicians)
and play a jam. They coil up on rugs
whose fringes flap in the bitter wind.
You can hear the banjos strum by torchlight.

They amuse themselves with puppetry
working the levers of a vulture marionette
to make its talons flex and wattles bob.
They exchange massages while smoke
roars up makeshift chimneys.

The pumice fields of the Cascades
(where these revels are held) are treeless.
Instead of swinging limb to limb
the expectant parents must use walkers,
a bruising, limping trudge. And if you're startled
by these facts, you can look them up
in any tome on natural history.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #9. Read it for details.
I think fish eggs (such as caviar) taste terrible, though some people consider them a delicacy. The lines about eggs ripening are from an old poem of mine called "Moon Eggs." The sounds of a jug band make me happy.
Find out more about the Pacific tree octopus
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Heads Made of Light

God made Heaven
and then the sky. Because the underside
of Heaven looked untidy,
with the dusty rafters all exposed.
He nailed it up, the sky
and the heads of the nails were made of light.
We call them stars.

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Paper Doll

Her skin is smooth and white. Her eyes are black
as coal or kohl or pencil-lead. Her hair
is never disarranged. She doesn't lack
for style or self-assurance. To be fair,
her conversation's... thin. But she's my girl—
my darling babe, my Valentine, my doll.
No sudden, unexpected depths unfurl
among the close-packed fibers of her soul,
no pitfalls on the path of love. It's sweet
to know there are no ghosts, no restless dead
that squeak and gibber in this linen sheet.
Malicious tongues, I must admit, have said
she's shallow, superficial. Pooh to that!
Romance is no less perfect, being flat.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #8: unusual love
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Fraternity of Critics

This may be unwise of me, but...

Under the shuddering frames of the giant presses they gather for the rite. They are hooded like crows. They invoke the power of negation. Before dawn an author will die the critical death.

Brother, have you brought the books? I have.
Brother, have you brought the cover art? I have.
Brother, have you brought the Black Index? I have.

Dry paper is our only food. Eat.
Red ink is the source of our power. Drink.
Vinegar sanctifies our commentary. Wash.
We who are faithful; we who are the guardians; we who stand at the gates are gathered here in the name of Literature.
We pledge to uphold the boundaries of fine writing and the exclusivity of the canon.
We deny the encroachments of genre fiction and the pretensions of graphic media.
We affirm that the modern novel is the highest form of Creation.
Let us review.

In the category of creative nonfiction. This memoir is soulless and reductive. The author appears to have spent his entire life turning over stones and listening to the radio noise of distant stars. We dedicate this sacrifice to the altar of Science Contributes Nothing to Civilization.
In the category of poetry. Mere gaudiness of language wrapped around a reluctance to confront the essential ugliness of self. Outdated romanticism and trendy eco-consciousness. We dedicate this sacrifice to the altar of Poetry Should be About Poetry.
In the category of history. A populist revision that grinds the axe of inclusionism against the stone of empire. The citations list makes for tedious reading indeed. We dedicate this sacrifice to the altar of History Must Serve the Needs of Today.

Brothers, rise for the final critique.

In the category of the novel. Ridiculously ornate language frames an impossible tale set in foolishly picturesque surroundings. The book postulates, absurdly, that time is circular and may be compared to a mythical animal. Submerged homoerotic currents lend interest to a narrative otherwise devoid of transgressive consciousness. We dedicate this sacrifice to the altar of Art Imitates Life.

We hereby judge these books unworthy. Let the covers be burned. Let the titles be inscribed in the Black Index. Yea, let even the New York Review of Books print nothing good anent them. Brothers, go forth and write unfavorable reviews of these books forever and ever, amen.

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Irrigation Channels

3 Word Wednesday: Deviate. Identify. Saturate.

saturated with
unidentifiable
salts, they deviate

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Comber

A mermaid is combing her hair
and watching the curl of the foam
while waves throw salt spray in the air.

She hides in her water-edged lair
tucked deep among surf-shattered stones,
this mermaid who's combing her hair

to summon a storm. Though it's fair
outside, lightning runs through her comb
while waves throw salt spray in the air.

A hurricane wind that can tear
the canvas and break a man's bones
comes up while she's combing her hair

and wails like a soul in despair
around the cold rocks of her home
while waves throw salt spray in the air.

But never think she doesn't care
that sailors are drowning alone—
the mermaid keeps combing her hair,
her tears are salt spray in the air.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #6: image and pattern
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Sharks' Teeth Soup

A strange and nameless malady
that sages cannot diagnose
has struck the king of Serendip.
This monarch suffers terribly:
in pain, he cannot find repose.
His sunken eye and swollen lip
but hint at royal agony.
He bleeds at every fingertip
and pus comes from his nailless toes.

A wanderer with staff and bowl
and shaven head has come to court
to witness this unhappy thing.
The queen commands this humble soul
to render aid of any sort
to end her husband's suffering.
He kneels before her throne. "Your goal
is medicine to help the King?
Here is the cure of last resort.

"Send fishermen to catch a shark
and kill it, bringing you the teeth.
You must make soup from them. And know:
your hand alone may set the spark
to light the fire underneath
the cooking pot. Keep boiling slow
until the broth turns thick and dark.
Then stoke the fire that burns below
and let him drink it at the seethe.

"Attend, O Queen of Serendip!
The power of this remedy
can kill in an unwary dose.
See that he only takes one sip
or all the consequence will be
upon your head." The beggar bows.
The queen arises, hand on hip
and offers any price he asks. He knows
he's fortunate to be set free.

The shark's teeth soup is boiling hot.
The king has sipped it once—he sighs.
"It's better... but I still feel ill.
If little helps, perhaps a lot
would cure for good." The queen replies
"My King, this medicine can kill!
The traveler warned me you must not
take more than one sip." "Drink your fill,
O King!" come unexpected cries.

"Who would withhold the gift of health
from you, O Majesty? 'Tis but
an act against the royal life
disguised as care. She seeks, by stealth
and tricks of poisoners, to cut
your thread, as with assassin's knife!
She claims your throne and all your wealth.
O Majesty, suspect your wife!"
Suspicion clutches at his gut.

He drinks. A single steaming drip
falls from the spoon, and silently
he feels the power as it goes
out from his limbs, his palsied grip.
He cannot stand, sinks to one knee
and on his face the darkness grows.
The stricken king of Serendip
now hears the stranger's voice. "You chose
Death over Life, your Majesty."

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A Postcard Full of Sky

A postcard full of sky. How odd a thing
to sell: no rainbows, birds upon the wing
or even colored clouds. Just plain and blue,
serene—or maybe vacant. Tell me who
would think it was appropriate to ring

a tongueless bell to call a christening,
or come with laryngitis to a sing-
along? It seems insulting, sending you
a postcard full of sky.

I take it from the rack, considering
a figure-ground exchange, an opening
of eyes to subtler shades. I see it true:
a heaven infinite, unwritten, new.
Next time I see you, love, I think I'll bring
a postcard full of sky.

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A City Whose Streets are Paved with Time

An old man is fishing from the kerb.
He drops his net into a pothole
and pulls up a baby shoe
that somehow fits his gnarled foot.

Tomorrow's rain is already filling the gutters.
A cobblestone yawns
and coughs up a flight of brilliant butterflies
that have been extinct for ten centuries.

Don't step into the street—
the time differential can kill you.
Jump. Both feet together
and hope they land in the same era.

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Review of Previous

SIR: review the previous and note
precise instructions sent you for your use.
Disregard of same equals abuse
of product, voiding warranty. A quote
for cost of service is enclosed. I wrote
it up myself. NB: if you choose
to play instructed usage fast and loose
we recommend complete immediate halt
to product usage. Then, if injury
to property or persons should result
from your unauthorized activity
we state (proactively) you are at fault.
We will admit no liability.
You'll pay replacement cost and shipping fee.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #2
RWP stands for "Review of Previous." Who knew?
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In Response to Williams' "This Is Just To Say"

Yes I know they were
sweet and cold
dark as the flesh of my lips
and I'm very tempted

to make some joke
about "plumming the depths"
like a line from
a poorly considered poem

but this is just to say
the truth is I wanted you to
eat those plums

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Vampires Don't Dance

because—they say—their hearts don't beat, and so
they can't keep rhythm, can't stay in the groove.
The music starts, but they're too stiff to move.
Instead they swish their capes and make a show
of dangerousness. They flash a fang. They drool
in drops of scarlet (wearing black of course).
Embarrassment can kill them, but remorse
is not a vampire thing: it's just not cool.

Their sex appeal is limited, I fear.
Despite the loads of tawdry bloodstained bling
they tend to sport—if you can't shake that thing—
well, who'd be interested? That's why you hear
that they resort to some hypnotic trance.
Pretentious suckers! Too stuck-up to dance.

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Saunter Vaguely Downward

He's an angel
who wasn't raised on love.
He remembers the magic time
when he carried the scales
at Fate's right hand.
Those were the days—
smiting the unrighteous.
Now he's just another
face in a crowd.

--for Read Write Poem's NaPoWriMo prompt #1
song titles: "Angel", "Raised on Love", "Magic Time", "Fate's Right Hand", "Face in a Crowd" courtesy of Pandora
Oh, and by the way: the title is from Gaiman & Pratchett's Good Omens. You'll find it in the dramatis personae.
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