NOW I AM YOURS

Imaginary Garden With Real Toads--d'Verse Poets Pub

I squeezed a peach
at the market
to size up its suitability
and then began to move on to another
when I heard it say
STOP
you have taken liberties with me
and it was true
I had fondled it 
excessively

it said
now I am yours
take me home and eat me
and I thought
how callous one would be
to refuse a plea such as that
from just about...
anyone
I guess

so I put the peach in my bag
and took it home
and now I am waiting
for just the right moment
to consummate our  relationship

(I know it's going to be juicy)

all actions
no matter how trivial
we may perceive them to be
have meaning
all actions have a resonating effect

keep this in mind
and somewhere
sometime
a butterfly
may thank you

OPEN WINDOW

Imaginary Garden With Real Toads

From my book: DARWIN'S MOON

the cars

rumble past

and from their

open windows

you hear cackling

or cussing

or some kind

of rap crap

an angry young man

shoutin' bout

bitches and hos

with his finger up his nose

I'm tired of hearing

the angry young man

through your open window

don't care if he's black

or white

I've been that guy

the rallies

and the marches

righteous indignation

like you wouldn't believe

students commandeering

the dean's office

and getting dragged

out by their heels

do you know

how that feels?

there was Haldeman

Erlichman

and Dean

and student bodies

lying dead

on the campus green

hey

at least we stood

for something

besides gangsta worship

all the angry young men

who don't know

what they're mad about

every generation sees

them come and go

you don't live

in the ghetto

and the only thing

you have

to complain about

is your pants

are falling down

and I'm tired

of hearing the

angry young man

railing

through your open window

you think you've got

something to prove

but in truth

you've got nothing to lose

but your youth

so convinced

that you'll always be

the malcontent

but I'll tell you what

it all comes to naught

and a house

in the suburbs

in the end

MILO, THE SHIT BIRD

Imaginary Garden With Real Toads--d'Verse Poets Pub

Oh SHIT, man!" said Jerry. "Something just went SPLAT on top o' my head."

Ben looked up. He heard the flutter of wings and a strange otherworldly cackle.

Jerry said, "What the hell was that, man?"

Ben stared at him, deadpan. "I think you've just been hit by Milo, The Shit Bird."

"Milo The Shit Bird...wha-?"

Ben fished around inside his lunch pail to find a paper napkin for  Jerry--the glob of excrement perched atop his buddy's hair growing more pungent by the moment. "He's legendary in this neighborhood. I know the people who used to own him. He's a Myna bird...they kept him in a cage most of the time, and he made it clear to them he wasn't happy with that arrangement. Then one day when they were cleaning his cage, he saw his path to freedom. Took off out the front door that had been left partially open. Ever since, folks around here have reported that they've been crapped on out of the blue--literally out of the blue--because he hovers over them and then it's bombs away, like he was the Enola Gay or something."

 "Geez," said Jerry, who was a poet. "That's kinda poetic justice. Taking it out on random people. He sees them as the oppressor."

"There's some inspiration for you, Jer," said Ben. "You could immortalize Milo, The Shit Bird in a poem."

"It is poetic when you think about it, man. We keep animals in cages. And because we think that's all right, we put people in cages too. Rather than, you know, trying to heal them."

"Sounds like you want to write about-"

"Man's inhumanity to man."

That's a deep subject, but if anybody can pull it off, you can."

Jerry had just about finished wiping the poo out of his hair when the two of them heard the flutter of wings again in the tree they were perched beneath under the noonday desert sun. And before Jerry could duck out of the way...

SPLAT!

Milo, The Shit Bird had struck again. This time the cackling they'd heard before was accompanied by: squawk...ASSHOLE...ASSHOLE...squawk !

"Jesus H. Christ!" Jerry cried. "Why'd he pick on me...TWICE?"

Ben had to stifle a laugh. "He knows your a poet, dude. He knows you're sympathetic to his plight. The only one who could put into words what many of the rest of us are thinking. Poets have started REVOLUTIONS, man!"

Jerry rubbed his stubbled chin, lost in contemplation. 

Ben glanced at his watch. "Guess we better be gettin' back to work, and find you some shampoo and a faucet to stick your head under."

"Geez," said Jerry. "That kinda puts into perspective what my real job is..."

 Ben closed up his lunch pail and gazed into the vast blue sky--the place where epiphanies that hit you like a water balloon chucked by some nasty middle school kids on a rooftop come from. He started off across the park. He turned back to see Jerry looking pensive and glassy-eyed. "You comin' man? he said. 

"Yeah...sure...I'll be along. I just got a lotta shit on my mind."

"Yes, my friend, I CAN SEE THAT!" 

"The world will know the saga of Milo, The Shit Bird!  First, an epic poem, then a children's book..."

Jerry was prancing around, shouting into the wind. Though just downwind of him was where you really didn't want to be. 

ZIGZAG

Imaginary Garden With Real Toads

No tracks within a good
ten miles of here
but on a misty morn
that horn
is ridin' the breeze
cutting through my brain fog
it echoes
like the call of the wild
from back in the day

I shouldn't have switched on the TV 
cuz some Trumpster shill
is telling Martha Radditz 
who the "normal" Americans are
pretty sure Caitlyn isn't on his list

I traveled all this way 
doin' the transcontinental zigzag
just to end up in a world where
transgender crappers 
would be the hot button of the day 

you can be 
whatever you wanna be
on the inside
the outside's just a shell
that we tortoises use
to deflect the rain 

(and I don't know who I am
but life is for learnin')

so when I present the idea 
of trans-racial
I'm sayin' it's not a bridge too far
cuz we am what we am
and we are what we are

not the same as mixed blood
it means starting out identifying
as one ethnicity 
but waking up one day to realize
that in your heart 
you are something else

never knew why I always wanted
to jump out of this pale skin
til I ran into the lost ones (who
like the Indians Columbus encountered
were never lost to themselves and thus
had no need of being "discovered")
and found there was Cherokee blood
from grandma 

the most captivating woman 
at age 32
I've ever seen 
her eyes foretold me
foreshadowed the coming 
of the little bastard
and one by one the pieces
began to fall into place...

a half-bro
who is half Hispanic
all the time spent 
south of the border
and in the Caribbean 
where I saw a way of life 
that was impervious to sorrow
whenever a street band would play
and knew so strong in my gut
that it was a part of me
and always had been

how my paths zigzagged
and crisscrossed
like an etch-a-sketch sky
spinning round so fast sometimes
I met myself speeding in the other direction

I'm not what I appear to be 
bro
though you would never know

and now I'm reading Sherman Alexie
who says that Indians seldom travel
in a straight line

not even the Crows