Friday, August 30, 2013

The Allure of Green Energy

From my spot across the celestial room, 
ever-crowding with yawning mouths, 
birds tweeting in obscure bird dialects, 
cars and neck ties in constant transit,

I wonder if she really loves me in the
way her smouldering gaze suggests
every morning while I plod to the metro
and another day in the white collar salt mine.

She does this 5 days a week,  never letting 
on how she really feels about us as
she leads me down the primrose path
to something out of "The Archipelago".

If she was more than a flirt,  surely she'd
lead me elsewhere - a sunned park bench, 
a line of white sand on a topaz sea,
a street corner with a bus stop - anywhere.

The worst is that I know I'll see her here 
a mere 10 hours from now and while
her head will be held lower then,  she'll
lead me home as if nothing happened. 

Thursday, August 29, 2013

In My Tribe

In my tribe we prefer the touch of
Mother Earth on our bare feet to the
shackles of shoes or straight jacket socks.

In my tribe we eat simply beneath the clouds
bread in one hand, cheese in the other,
a bottle of wine between our knees.

In my tribe days are thirty hours long,
not because we wish to be more productive
but so we may ponder all we chose to ignore

with our backs against a worn tree trunk,
our eyes lost in some distant clump of cat tails,
drumming fingers keeping time with the sparrows.

In my tribe everything is precious,
gathered and kept with five year old glee
including the autumn sheddings of trees

which we cup and cast over the water's edge,
not out of remembrance or thanks but
simply because we wish to.

Shlameel, Shlamazel

I could have broken a row of mirrors,
running by with a stick straight out

or wandered behind Chinese restaurants blindly,
crossing black cats' paths like live wires


and then walked away whistling good fortune,
hands in pockets, safely away from all wood.


Instead, I farted caution into the coming breeze,
stuck a fork into the toaster of life


and went to work

Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Candles

Loved by poets,
feared by hotels
Everywhere.

I'm drawn to them,
the soft contrast
of jagged shadows

shivering on walls,
lives at the mercy
of any passing breeze,

themselves the candle's
negative, light without
light without lips,

leaving me to interpret
its gestures and demise,
possibly with a pen. 

Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Project Management

Get your head around it
ears between thumbs
and forefingers
and pull
hard
'till your pinkies touch
your cherry nose.

I'll just be over
here 
staring at a yawning
screen needling my
eyes,
acquired raison d'ĂȘtre
skewering my
brain,
getting a new
e-ink tattoo on
my soul.

Let me know if you get 
there,
not that I expect
you to.
I just like
to watch.

Contre-Jour

It's another late afternoon, 
another baked boulevard 
in not so old Brussels, 
the heart of the business district

pumping commuters down the arterial 
crammed with Renaults and BMW's, 
clotted with office workers, neckties, 
free of most forms of thought.

I pause beneath a green lamp post, 
its arched spine seemingly
supporting the 5 o'clock sky, 
the sun dangling from its tip

like a million watt bulb
and I wonder who'd notice 
if I shimmied up there and
pocketed it for myself.