Coign of Vantage

This fragile young 
Unruly bitter lemon 
Tree weighed 

Down with more runaway 
Fruit than it can bear 
Needs a rod to spare it— 

Let him who is full 
Of plenty be the first 
To provide it. 

Pockmarked in the Process

Just passing through 
This corner of the universe, 
Stranger and couldn’t help 
Noticing round these parts that 
Your moon goes through 
Its phases like it was 
Some sort of zombie, 
And all that plus 

The look on your face tells 
Me more than likely 
You’ve been through something 
Similar and back, too—why 
Else should it be so 
Familiar and smacking 
Of moldy green 
Cheese, too? 

Berceuse Fantastique (Updated 30-8-2017)

Baby cries in white
House

                    Of jackals 
                    At twilight 

Soon night 
Shall set 

                    All things alt-right. 

Caesura of Summer

Our friend cicada? Halting 
Its cranking only 

Long enough to let us know 
Our attention span wasn’t up 

To cranking along 
Long enough 

To catch up, too. 

Crepuscular Crescent Moon over Hellas

appearing dark 
orange out of the blue 
so to speak and low 
on the horizon 
and hightailing it 

lickety-split be- 
hind a jagged 
bank of even 
darker blue 
mountains till 

all that’s left is 
a slivery tongue 
of blood red fire 
that’s done with 
licking its wounds.