An absolute fantasy, a cure for reality;
Mahogany and ebony;
It seems to go on endlessly,
a pirouette through eternity;
Mahogany and ebony,
the slant rhyme of each other’s poetry;
Blood woven into the witching hour,
magnetic when mixed together;
Combustible chemistry,
lethal poison leaks from drunken eyes;
Center stage energy,
it’s not possible to not be captivated;
Mahogany and ebony;
An absolute fantasy, a cure for reality.
Don't even think about the title.
Just wait a while.
Be yourself.
Look in the mirror.
Universes are flooding through your eyes,
Back-and-forth.
It's a pleasure to be read at all.
Would you rather be a wall?
Pasted with peanut butter,
Suffering from a stutter?
A title? What a trifle.
Free verse is the worst.
Slant rhyme is a crime.
Besides, things are never what they seem.
Top or bottom, round and round,
This whole thing could be upside-down.
Tale of Supply and Demand
Some sloppy light has fallen down,
Where checkered mice drive kittens mad,
And all the cheese is owned by dogs
Who ride all night on giant slugs.
Into this pool of sloppy light
There slips a merman, small and slick,
Whose only flaw is eating toads
(He likes them raw and eats them whole).
The word is out, the toads lie low;
A crunching sound rewards the bold.
And when the merman’s had his fill,
He belches warts and slaps his tail.
Now toads make cheese that dogs must have
To keep the checkered mice enslaved
So they will drive the kittens mad
(This gives cats flavor slugs demand).
Unhappy slugs are not good mounts
And a walking dog’s a nasty grouch.
A plan was hatched among the mice;
They’d snag the merman late at night.
They greased a toad with tadpole jam
And placed him near the merman’s den.
The bait was swallowed hook and line;
The catch was scaled and poached in wine.
It’s fine for dogs to ride their slugs
And mice to drive the kittens nuts,
Just so we keep the truth at hand;
“The wise invest in tadpole jam”.
White Sand and Temporary Oblivion
For an aching moment
I faced dazzling
Gypsum and glass as splinters
Of sunlight pierced the air
Bouncing bright off the landscape at
Alamogordo ---fat Cottonwoods and
not a tree in sight not
Here, the sight of the unholy Trinity
test
Blessed and blast
A fitting slant rhyme for our
slanted
times
askew at
1700 Silica Avenue in a decidedly
different Manhattan where no
Dandy boulevardier would dare strut.
Castle Bravo likewise
No place to dwell as we
Did our best
to incinerate the century
Trolling for a toll in the ashes of the atoll.
No sufficient payment was made.
But all that brightness
those purblind moments flirting
With nothingness all
retreated
Like genie to bottle
Heard whispering,
"I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds..."
Certain whispers linger
Portending brighter, more permanent
Non-being; so be it.
I bathe myself in the madness of rhyme
I save myself for the insanity of time
Whether it's internal rhyme or slant rhyme
I hope you'll find that I'll never mind
Because my verse is defined by my verbiage
And if you call it verbose I'll call you in rage
Because I'll never be locked in the cage
And sometimes I lose focus and switch it all around
Like I'm a clown who hears no sound
Or maybe I'm a just a lion
Lyin' when I say my favorite dish is Mayan
But this showdown slam has me flyin'
And if you can't keep up with me
Let me just cut the chains and set you free
(A Slant-rhyme Sonnet)
As autumn treads across our piebald patch,
she drops her frost to shelter, soft as wool,
but brilliant blossoms curl in moonlight watch
and shrink beneath the snap of hoarfrost cool.
Then every critter lodged inside the farm
begins to hide a hoard of winter chow,
use nature’s fabric fluff to cradle warm
and stash in cache beneath the muted show.
Persimmon limbs are bowed with orange loot
which deer desire if hunger leaves them poor.
The frost has signaled time as under foot
true sweetness swells at autumn’s open door.
I rush before the deer, with knife in hand
to read the seed as weather forecast wand.
Soon all things will owe themselves to progress
and nature will neither wane nor wax
accosted by bulbs and cog-laden streams.
Children in god-awful Christmas jumpers
gather around the May-pole to watch
the leaves become what they’re deprived of.
We are taught to fear puddles, duty free
purchases, and heroes speak in slant rhyme.
Thermodynamics washes the feet
of tired old gravity, entropic
kisses to keep loved ones close; parody—
if absence does what it does, we should leave
and never return to this place of progress
where bluebells can’t frost and starlings sing falsetto.
The inn had gone to waste: I’d sold it off in haste.
Awaking in the gloom, as orbs lit up the room,
I recognised the ghost of Jonson, the old host.
I said, ‘I thought you’d come’ - and poured myself a rum.
He shouted, ‘Hey, you louse, how dare you sell MY house!’
Internal rhyme/slant rhyme