Posts for June 25, 2020 (page 6)

We’ve got to sell the board on making
horcruxes. Compressions & breaths
are not restarting hearts. Think about it,
whole lines for different markets:
Mario Kart power ups, seven rings
for dwarves in their hall of stone, Franklin Mint
bicentennial plates, Nascar bobbleheads.  

We can work a cooperative
cross-over with a hospital.
Folks are dying anyway,
think of it as a public-private partnership.
The mutual fund folks will line up
for options like it was Black Friday.

What exactly does it mean
when the jar says,
“Apply a generous amount”
of this cream 
to the
affected
area?

I don’t think the FDA
or the EPA
or the CIA
or anyone
concerned with chemicals
and the human body
(Including my high school friend
MLM #ladyboss acquaintance 🙌)

Would approve of the
amount of cream it will take
to smooth out these worry lines that run
all the way back
to my mother’s mother
and my father’s mother
and their mother’s mothers
before them.

trap signals

The action of trap shall override
The value of “$”.

Setting a trap produces undefined results.

Signals ignored on entry
Cannot be trapped,
although no error need be reported.

Traps shall remain in place
Until explicitly changed
with another trap.

When traps are being ignored,
the traps need not be altered.

check analysis;
using $ may still alter them.

trap each condition.
perform the optional check

immediately.

The format shall be proper,
suitable to achieve
the same trapping results.

conformant systems allow
The trap special.

used only for diagnostic messages.

invalid names or numbers shall not be considered.
None.

trap and kill are consistent
in their omission of names.

Trapping is accepted,
but it has no effect.

trap had to change to become wanted.

triggered whenever mandated,
trap invalidates the behavior of some.

character protects against the trap.

—
Found poem (erasure) from the Linux Man Pages
Complete text at:
https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man1/trap.1p.html
 

Feathers are a kind of magick
one feather does not make a bird
but each feather is the ghost of a wing
that touched the face of the sky

One feather does not give flight
but the memory of flight clings to it
holding on, keeping the scent of it
like smoke in the cloth of a favorite sweater

The texture of clouds
holds the feather together
ephemeral moments of wing flap
the rush of wind, the defiance of gravity’s firm law

The soul of the bird in its feather
each one a ghost of a wing
the memory of rebellion
feathers are a special kind of magick

Pine Mountain Cemetery XXIII
              Fleeta

Fleeta was her name, all five feet of her.
Mountain matriarch was a better story.
Leaders don’t have to be tall, just smart.

Right smart, a phrase that should have
Been carved onto her stone. For she
Was that and more besides. Music

Lived in those stubby fingers and under
Her shyest smile. Mothering came second
Nature whether man, child or her milk cow.

It would be a sight to know how many
Lonely, broken souls she carried under
Her ample wing, and good right arm.

They say beggers mark the place of kindness,
Hers must have been carved deep. Never
A hungry soul left her porch hungry, or cold

Or with an empty pocket. Not with gold, she
Had none and five kids to gobble up any extra.
But a pone of bread, or jerky or fatback to keep

One warm on the struggle to get on to where
Ever a hobo gets on in their lonely walk. They
Might even be known to hum a tune, heard last

While Fleeta was tending dinner or kids or husband.
Funny her man was named Pearl, and he was not.
She was the jewel polished by enough hard work

To smelt the hardest iron into shiny brass. All her
Clan listened to those few words she laid out
For them to think over, wise they knew, better

Than whatever foolishness they were tempted to.
Not because she had it easy was she right, more
Because the horseshoe is strong because of fire.

Five children have made a dynasty, worked
The world over, brought home treasures of life
That last. They climb the hill to shed their tears

For she who didn’t live to see how well molded
Each one is in her image. This place has lots
Of good laid here, and none better than Fleeta.

whistle, pines on wind,
and you were all my loving.
the flame stirs no more.
no more the fragrant attar,
no more your graceful waters.

in pain, naked frost.
bone deep pain, old bone, thrown out. 
i see jonquils, then
the hungry dog outside, then
pain cancels all my reasons.

Gnawing and gnashing his pointed canines
the fox either frees himself from the steel
jaws or amputates his limb.

Caught in this trap, she will amputate
part of who she could be
not seeing her uniqueness while
aching to be someone else.

Comparing apples to oranges,
kittens to puppies, rubies to 
emeralds.
When will she recognize her
own rough cut diamond?

Out of the Box

Decades of my life disappear into one box
that multiplies when my back is turned, turn to building blocks
of cardboard to hold what think important. Each tier mocks —
somewhere in there are blue coral from I sea I can’t recall, rocks
that echo a canyon wren’s song keys to locks
of houses I no longer own, more keys to old clocks
that no longer run. Do their gears move slowly, their tocks
still tick beneath layers of sweaters, thick blankets, matchless socks? 
Would I hear a rustle behind corrugated walls if my little clay fox
 flicked his cupped ears toward the snow geese flocks
that web white contrails overhead. Will bittersweet vine fill crocks
of brown pottery beside some new-to-me door, as I wait for the knocks
of neighbors to say Welcome to your home! Is this sorting a blessing or pox?
I might find the answer in this one last box.

How many
  mistakes
     does it take            
to make
   a sensible life?                

Where the road curves toward the lake
there’s a hobby farm where they raise
miniature ponies, llamas & alpacas.

In May, the furry beasts amble like happy
old men on the rolling land, which is now blanketed
with yellow wildflowers & patches of hay.

I’m reading a book of Chinese poetry
from the Tang dynasty. So many images of earth,
animal, & sky — full moon, fragrant pine,

rivers, mountains, wind & rain. Horses
& resting birds. In June, my neighbor
shears the thick coats of the alpacas,

leaving nothing unshaven but their fluffy
heads. If a field of new flowers could applaud.
If small black ponies could laugh.