Dead Horse

            My master used to ride me out

            And tie me to a stile.
            And he was courting the miller’s girl
            While I could trot a mile.

Never at a loss,
but someday I’ll run
my final race. I’ll be that horse,

champing gorse-
brambles below-stirrup,
quidding loss—

grave-moss.
Brigham
himself—Wild Bill’s horse—

led to the fosse,
forehooves at the crumbling
edge, neck raised to the cross-

hairs, knees prancing loss
of upright-standing balance.
Now a plunging-horse

swan-dive. Toss
saddle in
after—tooled-leather loss.
Spade dirt over horse!

Who's Gonna Make Me?

I don’t have to either shit
(even though I’ve been sitting here for a while)
or get off the pot.

I’ll wait a bit.
There’s a pile
of magazines in here, so I’ll be OK whether I shit

or not. Well, I’m looking at a back-lit
photo of a palace on the Nile.
Everyone is smoking pot

under the palm trees, or wading out
where crocodiles
lurk like blobs of shit

floating in a blue toilet.
If it’ll be a minute it’ll be a mile
between here and wherever I’ll get off the pot—

swimming in plasma like a sunspot—
azimuth between my bare bum and the Polestar—
my limit of having to finally shit
or get off an empty pot.

Pretty

To have once been pretty
in the eyes of the beholder.
May I pet my kitty,

even if they’re over fifty?
They can only grow still older.
Will Merlin themselves be pretty

in hundreds of years when they’re practically a bitty
baby at last, crying,
“Pet me, I’m a kitty!”

And forthwith they take the titty
and start growing upward like Jack’s beanstalk.
pretty

again just past the point of puberty,
before we tire of all the sex talk.
Such a pretty kitty

I was back in the days of serenditty,
smelling of alder catkins, I’m not lying!
Once and future pretty.
I’ll pet my kitty.

River

Only prepare, don’t anticipate.

How can I get ready for an unknown future
as I skate

on the billows of my love and pain,
engaged but not indentured?
Only prepare, don’t anticipate—

anything at all may lie in wait
for my bare ass—God, that ice burns
cold! I skated

boldly into my remaining days,
prepared for but not anticipating rapture;
but it’s so hard not to try to outguess fate

by sifting figments of my own sad brain,
hope cashiered
before I even put my skates

on! I won’t hesitate,
but I wish I had a river.
Only prepare, don’t anticipate.
Just put on my skates!

Me and My Limerences

Up in the attic with only my
cat and my notebook.
And my limerences.

Without the tongue to taunt a fly,
uploading memories with a skyhook
up in the attic with only the

glow of my own bright limbs to see by,
I take a patient look
at things up near the window of my amorances.

It’s never that I cannot tell a lie,
just that I got lost in the playbook,
so I’m up in the attic in my

Child's Pose, bum-over-
feet, forsaking and forsook
by all acquaintances,

looking for a star to glimpse you by,
love neither mistaking nor mistook
up in the attic, only me
and my cat. And my limerences.

Traveling Sidesaddle on a Toad

I’m tired of my mode.
I’ve gone mixolydian—
ear’s new abode.

I’ll take the road
from wherever I’m abiding,
my mode

of transportation a hop-toad.
Toads are poor travelers, hopping or riding.
A toad’s abode

is a hole
under some rotting
leaves or a rock, a mode

of existence that would suit
me fine, thanks. No equal-tempered tuning
in that world—abode

of Ériu and Mbokamu.
Major-minor-modal singing.
An old mode
in a new abode.

My Family Is Singing Tonight

Not in my best frame of mind.
AND my blog stopped working.
But my family is singing tonight!

I feel in a bind
about shining or shrinking—
mind

mined with blind
alleys—but let me ignore the talking
heads! Tonight

won’t be just any night,
because my family is singing—
all dire frames of mind

limering behind
in valleys where new paths are forking;
flooded with brightness

as we step candidly into the light,
even my silly poetry blog joining
the tintinnabulation of a better frame of mind.
I’ll be all smiles tonight!

Spirit Leaving the House

Law presupposes goodwill.
Without love, law is without force.
A city on a hill

can’t abide without the trilling
of birds and the neighing of horses—
goodwill

sung so as to twang
the chords of our better
instincts; or City-On-The-Hill

built on the chattering
bones of the north
wind’s children—wills

of evil men who’ll kill,
first love, then law in due course—
our fair city on a hill

site for a rock drill—
whited sepulchre,
said Conrad—law sans goodwill,
graves spilled

Tune for a Found Harmonium

You dumped the mail on my notebook, dear,
and then remembered you’d seen it around
and helped me find what I was so sore

in need of. I am still right here;
you wouldn’t be seeing me like this if I’d drowned
in the mail you dumped on my notebook, dear—

most of my behavior from flat fear,
kite blown to the ground;
but you helped the wind

grab my kited head by the hair,
and you empowered it securely to impound
all that mail that you dumped on my notebook, dear;

and now, no matter how low I steer,
I never cease to astound
myself by finally finding what I was so sore

in need of—just it and nothing more.
You lost my notebook for me so that it could be found
again by dumping the mail on it, my dear,
and made my heart soar.

Sleeping Through the Storm

I guess I’ll have to learn to foresee
(God knows, I don’t wield the shield of Achilles)
when things will be too complicated for me.

I wish there were several more of me
on this Jesus-boat on Galilee,
each gazing deep to suss and see

some boulder ‘neath the placid sea.
I’d hoped it all would be a breeze,
but things got too complicated for me.

AND I’m always in too much of a hurry
to read maps and directions carefully.
I dread more than foresee

problems, so the problems happen to me—
my self-respect the main casualty—
because things got too complicated for me.

It seems both sad and funny really:
I’m standing with my bag of faeces,
having failed, as often, to foresee
that things would get too complicated for me.

A Kiss for Luck

Writing is always fun—

no matter how much I’ve written,
I have not yet begun 

to write. I write with a pen
that’s frisky as a kitten,
making writing fun

all over again,
even when I’m smitten
with doubt that I will e'er begin

to find a sneaky rhyme,
a silly rhythm—
as much fun

as the fun you can have in bed,
I’ll say. It’s plumb Theocrítean—
I have not yet begun

to gambol on the sward.
Nymphs come unbidden.
Writing is always fun.
OK, I’m done

Asteroid Collision

It rocked my world

when I lost that game of marbles.
My shooter was a brown agate.

I’d start the day with just a few
and go home with my pockets full
(but it rocked my world

when I learned you had to shoot
from the edge of the circle).
My brown-agate

shooter could be a dead-eye;
and there was a technique
when you knocked out a rock

of making your shooter stop and spin,
and then you could keep on shooting;
but you had to make sure your precious

shooter and the last marble left the ring
at the same time or your mib was game.
My world got rocked.
My shooter was a brown agate.

Dr. Xuan-Mai

I know I’m a bear of very little brain.
How bad will my vision get?
Xuan-Mai is such a pretty name!

Can’t make things out as plain
as I used to—musical notes.
Not a bear of very much brain

at all, but I walked into Modern
Eyewear and made an appointment.
The doctor, Xuan-Mai,

made me talk about my vision
problems until she understood,
and me being a bear of very little brain,

she scolded me for not complaining
more clearly to the other doctors. I submitted
to the strong brain of Xuan-Mai.

Dr. Xuan-Mai wore a sleek tight-fitting
black-leather suit, tall black-heeled shoes.
I am a bear of very little brain.
Xuan-Mai is such a pretty name!

Pronouns (Jesus Must Be Transgender)

Me at my best,
challenged by pronouns—
I, me, and the rest.

Our little jest.
Aren’t we a bunch of clowns?—
us at our best.

Yo y nosotros,
I and we-others—
you, me, and the rest.

Haven’t mentioned her and he yet,
or she and him—
we or us at our best.

But when you put us to the test,
we become one person,
not the same as all the rest.

You’re a mystery guest,
preferring they-them—
you at your best.

Funny how I stand apart—
if I could but touch the hem
of Jesus’s shirt,
I would join the rest.

Counted Toward My Karma

Shoveling snow in the alley
behind the garage.
Full of morning gladness

at the brim, I’ll say—five inches, but very
light. The alley-plow guy charges
our block some amount each winter to plow the alley—

he’ll plow later today,
I guess (I imagine a horse-pulled sledge,
but it’ll be a truck-pushed plow-blade).

What if I made someone’s morning gladder
by going to the foolishly-large
effort of shoveling my whole alley

garage-door side of
the first tire rut?
Full as I am of morning gladness

at the brim, I wonder if the plowman
will notice my hard
work and try not to bury
my garage again. Small price for gladness!

My Friend Calarel

Always myself.
Who else is there?
Well, I have an elf

in my brain and a wolf
at my heels. (I’ve needed rhymes for “self” before.)
Always myself,

but being myself isn’t half
bad, you know, if I have a care
for the elf

in my brain who's been known to put me off
my proper fare.
Only myself

to blame or thank, or to laugh
at. How dare
anyone complain about the foibles and peccadillos of my dear elf?!

I won’t take them off the shelf—
not that I ever could: they own the store!
They're myself—
my fairy elf.

God Exists Through Our Sufferance

     Jesus was a good guy—he didn’t need this shit.
     John Prine, “Jesus, the Missing Years.”

Shall we trust in God’s Providence?
Satan was a good guy—he didn’t need this shit.
God exists by our sufferance.

Maybe it seems to go against Providence
to block God’s word and say the hell with it—
expecting no Providence,

but if God’s not helping we can get rid of Him.
He cast poor Satan into the fiery pit—
same sufferance

afforded the Arapaho and Cheyenne by Colonel Chivington—
500 now-scarcely-repatriated scalps
in that sacred ground near the providence

of Sand Creek and its shady line
of cottonwood trees. Let us rest
here on this ground by whatever sufferance

remains to us for the bliss
of living in the world!
Shall we trust in God’s Providence?
Our eternal kindness.

Prometheus Off-Ground

A man has to try everything once,
looking for things that are fun and funner.
What could be funner than peeing on an electric fence?

Most men don’t have an ounce of sense.
Senseless men are without number.
They have to try everything once—

they’ve tried the sauce and they’ve tried the hunch-
cream; but now here’s the stunner:
they’ve tried peeing on an electric fence.

There can be a jolting consequence
if your prick touches a wire,
but you’ve got to try everything once

so you whistle “It’s a Man’s
World” to yourself and short out the generator
with a strong stream of urine on the electric fence.

You haven’t had such fun in months,
but now you can’t put out the fire.
You can try everything once,
but the last thing you may try is peeing on an electric fence.

Today's Marmalade

     Jam every other day. The rule is, jam tomorrow and jam yesterday - 

     but never jam today. White Queen

Anything that’s still striving is interesting—
trying to help us make it to tomorrow.
What’s finished is so yesterday!

Yesterday we were striving fools—
tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow
we were endeavoring to become, so we were interesting—

not waiting to see what tomorrow brings—
whether it be joy or sorrow.
When tomorrow finally does come, it’s so yesterday!

We were trying to work our clay,
work it on out of the mud with hoes and shovels.
Anything that’s morphing is interesting.

Never will we rue the days
we spent rehearsing Christmas carols.
We didn’t sing them very well

yesterday either. Succumbing to each passing craze,
we thought we were corpses but we were shape-changers.
Anything that’s still striving is interesting.
What’s finished is so yesterday!

Going for Bust

Put your mettle to the test.
No guts, no glory!
Be a guy who fell off of Everest!

You’ve gone to your eternal rest,
but you aren’t sorry
you put your mettle to the test;

and you don’t wear your gender on your chest,
but last time you took inventory
you were a guy who fell off of Everest.

Now you shine among the blest,
but you sure were a gory
sight after you put your mettle to the test

and slipped down that crevasse -
brains and entrails splattered
all over the rocks of Everest.

I guess you figured best.
You always knew what finally mattered,
so you put your mettle to the test
and became a guy who fell off of Everest.

I Sing the Body Electric

Our body is so pretty!

Can I change the nouns and pronouns however I want?
Our body’s a ditty.

And now here we are, in bed with the kitty.
We don’t have to change partners ‘cause we can’t—
bodies so pretty!

And I’m remembering what it was that brought me to this city—
Denver was a devastated land—
I hummed a ditty

and had myself transported to the Sin Twitties,
where I joined a band
of other Bedlamites whose bodies were pretty.

Well, one of us had type-1 diabetes.
He’s gone now—he went back to Cleveland,
and died after his legs were amputated.

Bandmate Steve suffered massive heart-
failure in Tennessee. But their basic self-love remains.
Our body is still pretty!
Our body’s my ditty.

Daffodils

When I lie on my couch, all I can see of me is my feet.

Happens, I enjoy looking at them.
Soles meet

when I cuddle them softly
together, brushing the hem
of my bathrobe. Well, I can see my knees

and shins too. Whom else do I see?
Foregone ancestors, though I’ve never met them.
My soles will meet

the floor in due time, but for a while I can lie here
and imagine others who had my slight, fem-
my build. God chose them. Their feet

walked the earth till their time was complete.
Perhaps they thought that loving themselves was wrong,
but my soul

believes theirs glowed like mine in the restful
morning light. In future times, beloved others will behold them.
When I lie on my couch, all I can see of me is my feet.
Souls meet.