PLANNED OBSOLESCENCE

Bad news for 

all that time 

and effort you'd been spending:

your heart's 

no longer warrantied 

by the lyric poem's defending.

Sure, for now, 

it still works 

to its purpose, but 

let's face it—it certainly 

is no state-

of-the-art thing. 

If your body were a car, 

for instance, it wouldn't be 

the engine; 

it'd be 

the rear defroster 

or the AM/FM radio. 

If your soul 

were a home, 

it wouldn't be the kitchen, 

or even an electric 

toaster oven; 

it'd be 

the old flip phone 

which you keep 

in a drawer,

just for those 

gray-sky kind

of sentimental days 

(it may be 

a brick, you say, 

but it still contains 

a few 

of your favorite 

dead cat's old photos). 

HUNGER

Hello, 

common thief—

back again, 

I see 

to steal 

a little 

more of my 

complacency.

FUCK IT

It's dangerous, they say, 

to paint with 

too broad a brush, but 

you know what? Sometimes 

you're in a rush. 

Plus, the predicament 

you're in couldn't be 

more legitimate: the crew 

is on a break 

which is starting to look 

more like a 

permanent hiatus—

and this guilty 

conscience of a fence 

won't just 

paint itself—so, 

holding your breath 

against the stench 

of the whitewash, 

you bust-out 

the biggest, widest 

roller of the bunch

and make short, bliss-

fully thoughtless work 

of what otherwise might 

have taken months 

to confront.

After all, you think,

what harm could it do—

just this once? 

GILDING THE QUOTIDIAN

The water birds sailing 

in search of Byzantium 

are now touching down 
on this flash-flooded town

in search of oases—some 

retention pond of youth, 

some inside-out aquifer 

or impromptu estuary—

like Ponce de León,
like Noah’s enervated raven,

like thousands of Parsifals 
burnt out on the quest—

driven by thirst to steal 

rain from gutter puddles

in a soggy pantomime 

of Promethean fire 

or nectar from some presently

nigh-uncountable 

overstock remainder 

of Holy Grails. 

FINAL JEOPARDY

          (after Robert Creeley)

Walking here, 

standing there, 

killing time 

and yawning—

sitting around 

talking, thinking, 

tinkering 

with the longing 

for anything 

to start, stop, 

bind, or burst 

into flame; 

for anyone 

to come or go, 

to curse or keen-

ly call your name—

what is a life 

when you haul-

out its engine and 

take it apart? What is 

a car 

that won't start.

FREE DESIGN

In the deep end 

of dawn—before our words 

have begun their 

long commutes, 

when the warm washed 

light of the sun 

overcomes last night's 

unsoothed moon—

cicadas begin 

their empty drone, 

wind-stippled 

grasses moan, 

wild birds sing 

to no purpose at all. 

Here, nothing in the world

has a name—still

everything 

has a voice;

nothing has been 

given a choice—but 

everything 

is called. 

EXTRA ORDINARY

Being so much

wiser than her husband, 

the female cardinal 

perching on the brown branch 

knows better than 

to make a statement.