Our Daily Bread
deconstructed lobster pot
pie delivered to your door
or two cartons
of canned
tuna and pudding
and fruit cocktail
delivered to your trunk
deconstructed lobster pot
pie delivered to your door
or two cartons
of canned
tuna and pudding
and fruit cocktail
delivered to your trunk
Maggie and The Winding Road
I went driving yesterday.
like we used to do.
It’s Springtime
and the trees are budding
all along these winding roads.
and I thought of you.
The rivers and creeks
are full from
the sweet spring rain.
I had the windows down
and I drove slow
because birds were singing
it was music
to my ears.
I thought of you.
You’re so far away now
gone from my life
probably forever.
But I remember our journeys
all across the countryside
going places you’d never seen
seeing things you may never
see again.
You were my daughter
if only for a moment in time
and I loved you as my own.
But the world changes
people change
and life’s not always fair.
Life’s a lot like
these country roads
twisting and turning
never knowing where
you will end up.
I stopped somewhere
along one of those roads
sat down in the shade
of this old oak tree
and thought of you.
Tony Sexton
not sure we
realize, yet
that there’s
no such thing
as different
every person a
preciousness,
a mathematical
expression
of beauty forged
through infinity,
by the same
star breath, with
thoughts, ideas, looks
touches that
spill universes into
existences,
every rock, tree, fence
holds us face to face
with reality,
so we can see
in all faces
a golden ratio
and wish
we could see
no such thing,
as different
As in:
spare the rod, spoil
the child. Don’t spoil
a good time
with meager humor.
Don’t spare the syrup,
just avoid buttering up.
Keep fat in reserve,
like spare change.
Hey buddy,
can you spare me
some time?
Some leftovers?
Not worth as much
as a strike; leaner,
like a spare tire is
only temporary.
Like a spare room
with little furniture
and bare walls is
only an echo.
Settle on shades
of gray. Refrain
from harsh reprimand.
As in:
spare the child, spoil
the rod.
Four forms of dragon spawned from fire
The first to fall was Air in their chain of tall mountains, where winds howl songs and screams
masters were named from the proud dragons of Cone eruptions.
The Fire islands rose in a series of volcanic shields
long thought dormant
cracked surfaces like a birthing egg to breathe
Shield dragons dripped smoke and life
In Earth’s plateaus, Fissure dragons crawled
Salamanders slithering from rivers of dripping magma
like the earth’s skin broke
and red-hot blood came oozing out.
In the deep darkness of the ocean,
bone-crushing cold was warmed anew by the ancient mouths.
Yawning up from deep, magma bubbles
it shatters into volcanic glass and frothing gasses
a birthplace guarded by toxic haloes.
The dragons born from those flows
braved the darkness and deathly cold
before they could take a breath and rise in flight.
To a Seamount dragon, the cold and dark is nothing to fear.
You would be so interested
in what is happening now.
State power on display,
systemic failures laid bare
by a virus, failures of care
heavier than ever, giving way to rage.
You would read these fires
as texts, pages ignited by desire
if not to be free, to be seen.
Nous nous rassemblons ici
ce soir you proclaimed contre
un monde qui s’acharne à nous effacer.[*]
Effacer, to erase. Those places
in Blue of Noon, ruptures
where words give way—how taken
you were with all they implied:
what might you find wherever they led?
Which was a bar in France, life as an emigrant.
We who remain, what might we tear down?
What might we build? I want you to see it.
But the book of your life is over
and I didn’t read the end.
[*] We gather here tonight against a world that strives to erase us.
Protests rage in the city streets.
Participants play Prometheus and gift fire to human outrage
While others dawn primal masks and dance with the flames.
In a sea of covered faces, yours floats bare like a fetus in utero,
Delicate and unaware of the rapturous pain you will cause when you enter this world.
My lungs collapse as I re-trace my steps along centuries-old cobblestones.
I test my unsure footing upon cracks that modern mortar couldn’t fill–
desperate to stand firm upon the moment when you became the can of tear gas opened beneath bitter darkness–
I choke on unspoken sentiments that wailing sirens and flashing lights outnumber
because I cannot be an innocent bystander
Sabine saves small items that are fragile
and breakable, a hand-painted china
jewelry dish with faint wisteria blossoms
daubed by her great grandmother Elsie,
an eyeliner-thin border painted in gold
around the scalloped rim.
She kept hold of a one-inch porcelain
lady’s head from the 1950s with a white fur
hat and a delicately glued pearl
headband. It’s true that we almost lost
her — more than once — but this chachki
was easy to keep track of, she could tuck it
into her foldable gold Lady Buxton coin purse.
When she lived under a bridge.
When she flunked out of treatment.
When she split town in a dilapidated
Econoline with no muffler.
When she od’d and they shot her
desperately with Naloxone.
When she signed into the state
psychiatric hospital.
I can’t croon you a happily-ever-after
tune. I kicked her out and opened
the door for her to come back —
more than once. After the last stint
she surrendered and maybe
it was enough. Almost three
years with no slips. She started
a collection of antique buttons
in an old popcorn tin. It is flowing
over with specimens — Bakelite,
glass, mother-of-pearl, leather,
velvet-covered, china and bone.
