Truth Is You Gotta Lose

She was probably a spy for some lowlife nation,

in a car filled with gadgets like Proseco bombs,

radio zen, idea lighters, all of last week's jokes

and maps that killed you when unfolded.

Me? All criminalized, yes, with my kind of style:

Suit the color of buttermilk, shoes hue of toast,

hair gelled and combed into origami salutations,

lips the color of want, eyes dialed on purpose,

and a voice that makes alley cats form a line.

"Dylan was a Yankee, but sang like someone saw

his rebel country lost."

"Like an acolyte, saw his rebel god crucified?"

"Yes, Jew on the road. Jew on the road....

"How our kind wakes up defeated, pilots of a 747,

all power gone, looking to land this beast,

while we give the stewardess directions

for a perfect gin and tonic."

She said her place was too far.

The motel held treaty rooms.

We hide from everyone on Main Street.

Get the news from dudes behind the liquor store.

Our only hope some other planet.

And When I'm Dead, The Echo Begins

i just reached the end where words mean anything.

The only thing left is to become more like you

so we could talk.

And there I am faced with myself,

with no training on what to do next.

Maybe there never was training for this,

this being exactly what you want,

no step predestined or requested.

The horrible drug of being yourself,

with the same DNA as everybody else,

and all your thoughts boxed up, shipped out,

sold,

until you next think of food.

Run out of story, run out of land.

The rest is sea

Just the dark, calling sea.

What's The Frequency, Kenneth?

Stick my head from our dimensions,

weed through concrete of the real.

Become the howl after leaving coyote,

in language squared or maybe cubed.

Brain of mostly mystery, cycling through

a raincloud of unyielding clues. Scribble

over the lines of our lives if I have to!

Every step to power (till windowshatter),

what I say unbound by molecule, matter.

First, I learn why ghosts are never heard
chanting their own names.

Second, I find the reset button to default.

Third, power is again the worm in the air.

Fourth, the sun rises once, now and forever.
Fifth, Sixth, Seventh...All that was missing!

Our Terrible God, Consciousness

I awake each morning without intention

ever to announce the one thing that must

be said, "Do not indulge." No, I rise,

and life on purpose has been forgot,

often until 10 am or later. Worse,

I get it wrong at first. "Do not disturb."

5 days a week begin with a run.

I tell people a lot of things about it

(and they tell me they're impressed).

but not the truth: I outrun death.

I do. My body is a population;

the miles turn everyone to light.

But, rarely do I get the new day right,

as if awareness is an accident, and

we don't know how to fill our days

knowing. The world remains in place.

Constant. Agreed upon. Foretold.
We're still pet dogs to the real.

Once in a whle, though, it bends,

such as when a dead lizard spoke.

"Write what the world has to say."

It's dying of us. Bound to expire.

Reduced to begging. Beat.

Later, a hummingbird jumped

in front of me to make a quick point.

(Sorry, I can only do this for now.

I'll fill it in when I figure it out),

"__________________________

___________________________."

Hummingbirds like me now,

the way crows once did. No more.

They stand stoic tough as ex-cons

on a fence and give me the eye

until I pass. Up to something.

Unafraid of the next step.

Lady Madeline and Prince York

The saddest kingdoms come from parents
who make their path by crushing everything,
next to discover their own kids in their way.
Maybe Lady Madeline never had a chance,
carrying anger and addiction in her bouquet.
Prince York, her brother survived, maybe
mostly, by first forgiving his father, a feat
the townsfolk compared to stopping tides.
She'd be mad upon the heather without him,
just as she cursed him every time he helped….
castle, carriage, servants, healers, food….
Everyone agreed no statue could be built
to show how big love is, how brave it can be.
So they named the mountain range after him.

Current

You’re no astronomer
if you’ve never witnessed
a full moon from a Louisiana swamp.
Any time I felt I had a soul,
it was the color of those craters.
What’s out there is in here, right?
And the view from every telescope depends
on where your feet are.
Turns out, as I grew old, I had something like a tumor, I guess,
but it was an empty medieval church, so the voices maybe
weren't out there after all, but in here, something yelling
from inside, with all the saints painted flat with gold
looking stunned at what was being said. A voice
from the universe that had not been pre-approved,
not so much from the altar, not so much the pews,
up from the old stone tiles on the floor, in ghost flight,
that whooshed out the door, blew the candles shut.
You see, we’re an extension cord to everything else.
Energy moves. And moonlight and marsh circulate
through a man until he’s wattage and make-believe.
The moon directs rhythms here on Earth, playing it
like a drumset. Heartbeat, stomp of feet, memories
of music played rough and sweet, sound of glass
breaking every time someone bubbled up a smile,
fish dancing up and out of water, buzzing insects,
chattering birds, and love slippery fine as moss
on river rock tripping everybody up.

Sorceropolis

In a storefront theater, California beachtown, there’s magic.
A wizard talks like an old school New York City cabbie
who's seen everything, Broadway stars tumbling from taverns,
hedge fund managers cheating a fare, beauty turned old,
and youth grown cold. He'd seen the mountains rise,
the seas take form, and every war that was never won.
No big government contracts for magicians, no sir!
First, he works the counter, selling cards that go blank
or let the kings float right out. Disappearing ball trick, small
enough to fit on a key ring. Impossible cups and balls, there,
before your very eyes, all available now for a couple bucks.
Bottle of water? Right there in the fridge. Coke? Sure thing.
The theater opened, and we left him, only to find him again,
on stage, in a white silk jacket, low black Van's skater shoes,
his mouth clicking away like a ticker tape. You didn't know
if you heard it right...leg shackles to be found in any bedroom?
An oil & gas investment banker volunteer from the audience
accused of squashing solar and wind energy efforts?
A bouncy French girl, who spoke no English, called a Parisite?
But he sure did levitate Princess Alyssa, and later vanished
her from under a sheet until she reappeared at the back!
And named every single card chosen by the 5 women,
even though he never once touched the deck. Finally,
the evil that had to come showed up in a big machine
that held a canopy of long spikes guaranteed to kill
if he got tangled up, or failed to unlock the metal cuffs.
Bam! No, wait, he's standing! Alive yet! Cheating death.
We exit. He and Princess Alyssa wait to say goodbye.
"Thanks for coming." He wants our money to come back.
And that’s fair. We took too much and gave too little
to a man who lit himself on fire at a young age
then let us glimpse him consumed, mere minutes
before the flames die, and all is given to smoke.