like a tree
   A mighty Oak an Elm
I am fully grown.

The wind blows through me
   barely a stir or bend
no wind can bring me down.

Come within my boughs
    and build your nest
I  will hold you high above the clouds.

I will grow a canopy to shade
      you from the burning sun,
keep your calm, for I am grown.

Tell your young and grandchildren
     to come back here one day,
when they are grown as I.

Let me care for generations
    shield them give them homes.
For today, I am grown.

Today I was hoping a breakthrough
seeking good luck my way
lift me from bad times sticking like glue
growing like weeds by the day!

My coffer long starved badly needs to fill
but dwindling faster instead
no more can cope with long line of bill
falling time barred unpaid!

Fortune you know has her weird style
in choosing the man to shower on
while I dream for her just one smile
she prefers to leave me alone!

The ways she chose to send me her love
could in no way lift me from bog
she threw on my way a bleeding dove
dying from the fangs of a dog!

She cast on my way a famished old hag
who for bringing good luck was no good
just short of **** in her surviving rag
couldn’t count the days without food!

Without a windfall on the mire stuck
my hopes lay ruined by sunset
the night found me still a sitting duck
with another day lying in wait!

on the floor you dropped
your dress inked up your quill
to write of love but still...

out of your words stopped
on the empty paper still
leaves your breast unfilled...

put on essences perfume
brush your red hair beautiful
cast your eyes to the mirror...

drop the pen quiet the muse
open your window,
hear the star kissed sky

behold the dark side
of the valley the trees swaying to
this insanity kiss the wind entering

the middle commonplace
     poor dears
weak of voice
          making minimum wage
for all the
      billionaire
investors making up Wall street
          holding in servitude
   the poor dude
trying to pay his
         child support
with no health care
    when he gave
his sanity in Iraq.
or the single mother
         sharing with the desolate faces
the disgrace of
     going to the food bank:
           the land of the free
home of the brave
           has turned into the home of the rich:
oligarchy entrenches,
          that is why
i gave up
    a long time ago.
I looked back,
    once there was a middle
class.

spirits look out for me
    a community of ghosts
and fairy crack mothers
  with sores and broken teeth
they mostly
    create a sky brighter
a vision more beautiful
  than i can describe
they conspire to shelter my *******
against all the stupid acts I do
   getting drunk on Olde English 800
until 3 am when I gots to work at 7
  or hitting the pipe with my last twenty
planning on a payday that doesn't come
   then I find paper blowing free on the side
of a highway as I walk
picking up aluminum,
   sprites and good witches and goddesses
see I am actually good,
   just a little faded
innocently deranged
  ****** up.

everyone's talking
about freedom of speech

as if it should come at no cost
like something you teach

it's never been that way
and it never will be

we need to be reminded
of what it means to be free.

.....The brush rushes the paint, the
                        grudge    
    is ripe. Cultivate it or let it rust.
  The paint stale, the painter frail.
   Caved canvas like sails of a sailor.
  Clash of nimbuses pales the skin  
as thunder waltzes ashore the ocean,
       ballets on the sea like swans
  entwined dancing with the wind.
You'll love the voice of melody when  
                  harmony sings.
       Deep bliss drowns sins for    
      peace to glimpse the surface

              Poets — coherent,
          honest with even pens
     and odd ends. Warm hearts
               with cold hands.
      The bane engaged with pain,
               as faith fades and
          blank pages mar sanity.
                Life springs anew
From the well of thoughts flowing
                Through the pen.

willows weep at the doorstep of a ravine
back home, where I grew up,
a long time ago in Michigan
Cardinals and Redheaded Woodpeckers commonplace
Cherry trees
Mulberries
my favorite grew ripe and sweet,
better than cherries, then.
As the valley creeps away in my memory
the magenta berries remain
in my head.

the light
reflections on
the Travertine
like a moth drawn to the candle
holds
a myriad of visages
many many visions
of what I had

I will go lay down
      with one flower
one day
    
if but one minute
    her petals surround me
one scent of one second

envelop me in sweetness

on your visions breathe your wise words live your feelings

chance brought you to me love keeps me with you dreams

keep me believing