I dreamed I was my wife’s ex-husband’s girlfriend,
though, inside, not essentially different
from __________  

I also was my wife’s ex-husband
but just enough to lip-sync lines
bubbling from his breadbasket to his throat  

I also was the third-person point-of-view
as the story unfolded out of __________
a voiceless director in a calm improv
an armless herder of napping cats
slowly removing their blindfolds  

I also was the greed of Jones
whose compositions are being promoted
at the vinyl record store
my wife’s ex-husband and I were visiting
but only greed enough to lip-sync envy
bubbling up from my breadbasket to my throat  

I also was an omniscient point-of-view
waiting in the wings
if characters want something explained  

They didn’t                    

then  

a teensy question bubbled
from my breadbasket to my brain:  

What does he want from me?  

He being my wife’s ex-husband
Me being the girlfriend  

A response gestated in my belly
Rejection formed behind my eyes
Enzymes, triggered, expelled the answer
down, down, through muck, to  ________
paralleling an excretory system
where nothing’s ever wasted  

I forgot to mention the setting  

Think thick velvet curtains
catfish in the benthic zone
black light Noh and Edgar Allen Poe  

For more information and FAQs
click on the link to   _________  

How did it take
this much of my life
for me to see that
what I wanted most
was the quiet? Not
silence—that’s
something else—
but the first faint
birdsong, early
in the morning,
water burbling
in the Mr. Coffee,
the gentle sizzle
of little sausages
in the pan?

then walked away
wondering what there
is to say that hasn’t yet
been said, wishing
for that electric spark
I once felt, putting words
to page and questioning
existence futile attempt
at reasoning what logic
can’t explain other than
to pick up the pen and start
again and again until dam
burst and words flood, a
line I’ve already used
but an eraser doesn’t work
with ink and the delete key
not much help when you
wander through a poem
like walking a creek, each
pebble worth noting, if
even for a moment you
forget and I remember
why I write when I hear
poets at the mic but can’t
recall what exactly I have
to say other than to write
about writing, ars poetica
better than nothing on a rainy
summer morning, listening
to patter on roof and watching
mandalas on surface of pond,
marveling how time has passed
and years slid by when I was busy
writing, making, creating, inventing
with energy I must summon,
knowing days are few and universe
expands in hours lost and found
when work is good and time
is forgotten, an experience I crave.

trees murmur their consent
              as we move through the forest  

the mutter of the red-eyed vireo
              water dripping from boulders  

the creak of rotting wood
              our ears ringing in the silence

Oh Faithful Sun:

this might be a poem about trust,
or my highly irrational phobia of the sun exploding. 

sometimes i stare at it from the gazebo by the pond
just as its corona grazes the tufty branches over the woods. 

sometimes it makes my eyes all spotty when i look too long,
and energetic little fuzzies will jump about the corners.

it actually used to bother me more than the average person, probably,
the idea that the sun would swell up and burn out in deep, dark death. 

i’d imagined a million scenarios in my head about that day
when a black nothingness would swallow up the light in finality. 

most people might say it’s part science and part religion,
but i’m far too agnostic and far too google dependent to know.

all i know is that i’ve stayed up till sunrise near every day of june,
and thankfully, the sun’s the same as she’s always been.

sits a vase of fake flowers with its never-rotting blooms,
beside a TV quietly playing a home makeover show—
the theme of reconstruction hangs thick in the air.

Soft pink gowns with swirling blooms
hug hunched bodies,
eyes locked on screens and books.

We ignore our shared reality,
the thread connecting us.

We wait

            for our name to be called

            for answers

            for results

A lottery no one asked to play.

And though I’ve never won a raffle,
I can’t help but wonder if today is the day.
And wouldn’t that be ironic?

One by one, we each leave dressing room 2,
our complimentary plastic bag in hand.
Another will come to take our place,
because another always comes to take your place.

That’s what those waxy fake flowers
don’t want you to know;
the reality of living things—

in time, we all wither.

that Tuesday a week ago when I took that left turn at briliant idea
there’ve been nothing but deadends and unrecognizable vistas
I insist nonetheless that I know the way home
telling head the same message heart is sending
that even if there is a turn around
needed here  now is courage
to crest the hurdles of ambiguity and uncertainty
-for these are  after all  only unexplored terrain  not the camp of a cannibalistic tribe-
courage it is  and strength   and some might that can look like stubborn  but isn’t
courage  so that the feral hamster scurrying in my head
will tire   rest easy  and go back to nibbling around the edges

Available now! on Amazon (what isn’t?) in circles and squares of various sizes and stylish designer colors. One vendor states They double as heat resistant trivets and coasters and spoon rests—dishwasher-safe!

I find my decades-old opener at the front of my kitchen gadget drawer, the rubbery white circle now stained yellow. The smooth front contains an asterisk followed by Zayre in faded, orange lettering—free from that discount department store I frequented during my sewing days. When I run my fingertips over the back side, the anti-slip textured bumps mirror shivers rising on my forearms.

O, slivery gripper, you’ve almost never failed me, though twice lately I had to tap a pickled pepper jar’s lid with the heavy end of a butter knife, before you worked.