Derailed

Coming from the wrong side 
Of the tracks, we knew straightaway 
What felt right for us was balancing 
For as long as we could on rails 
We thought would lead us away— 
What sidetracked us was that bright 
Shiny penny that blindsided us 
From the right and led us astray. 

Prospective Basket Case #45POTUS

The worst is yet to come scenario 
Runs through the entire thread 
Of his talk and boy how we wish 
He’d hurry up and unravel before
The whole shebang blows up
Under the circumstances, leaving
Us gratefully dead in the head. 

Mushroom Recognition Scene

---for Joseph Hutchison, who first alerted me 

Heads up--just as you boisterously
Catch sight of something precious, 

In the same moment you are 
Already poised to see others 

Massing underground, jostling 
For a view of you, now nodding 

Just ahead, just above 
The silent downy mosses.

DOA Supply Command Post, 2199

Do you read me? 

commandeering 
commanding 
view 

of carrion 
after carnage over 
GMO battlefields, 

gigantic live- 
wired radio- 
active trans- 
mogrified crows 

on 
top 
of 
still 
standing 
tele- 
communications 
silo 

keep 
crowing 
on 

commanding ever so 
increasing demand for 
commodity futures, 

over.

If Confucius Were Alive Today

I bet he’d strike us all 
Dumb with something like 
Women with tongues that smart 
Say ‘Men do not need sleep 
At night because they sleep 
Standing up during the day’. 

Suddenly It Dawns On One In Transylvania

One more day.
The grey flaking

Hostel shutters flap open 

In a relentless wind, 
There’s no one

Strong enough to keep 
The dead in. 

Missive To John Levy In Tucson

Hi, brother— 

Since you asked about Rita 
In your last letter, last I heard 
Your foraging hunchback dwarf 
With the unflagging energy 
And beautiful bouquets 
Of overwhelmingly sweet 
Smelling narcissi who kept 
Coming back to your door 
On her little red bike in 1984 
After you’d already bought four 
Of them and placed one 
In each of your house’s 
Three small rooms plus 
Bringing one to my mother 
As a name day gift is now 
Where her siblings put her— 
In an old folks’ home 
In Kalamata—that’s all 
I know for sure for now,
But thinking back on how 
Fiercely she fought and persevered 
Against the ugliness of people 
Surrounding her, I also like 
To think her new surroundings 
Are chock full of plenty pretty
Flowers like the ones 
You bought from her, too. 


All the best 
From your brother in the boondocks 
Of the southern Peloponnese