We’re Almost Sure

Although we’re almost sure

it isn’t reason for alarm,

we thought we ought to let you
know today you seem

immeasurably vaguer than
the vision tugging at your arm.

.

Friendship

“Some there be that shadows kiss;
Such have but a shadow’s bliss….”

Merchant of Venice II, ix

=============

One friend’s often just a little wiser than the other – but withholds:

there are no words for what the wiser psyche knows.
The heart’s example grows, but limits also can become more fixed –
and barriers betwixt the two can stiffen, thicken.

Affections quicken to maneuver to redress the balance –
but the depth and darkness of what can’t be said exert a shadow.
For moments ground between the two lies fallow.
Something's centrally unknown. Someone's centrally alone.









.

Run.

You never know who’s talking, stalking,

setting out to prove you did it –
monitoring every move –

the skies have eyes –
the city takes no pity
on your lame attempts to justify: it pries –

berates – will peel you down –
reveal the sorry thing you are –
exposed as the ungrateful insubstantial

criminally negligent example
of a constitutionally lacking thing –
a shattered bum to shun.

Grab what matters. Run.








.

Another Crop of Human Beings

Sometimes when you’ve harvested

another crop of human beings –
well, you just don’t want to let them go.

You know you ought to let them have
the chance to figure out how to advance
themselves through circumstance:

to grow into whatever’s apropos. But oh! –
how sweet they feel, fresh from the farm,
next to your face, inside an arm –

like some ingratiating brace of geese.
Shame to let them out into the streets.
Wish they weren’t praying for release.






.

jackson pollock justifies existence.

Relationship, as Pet

You keep it in your lap.
You tend to feed it crap.
It never takes a nap.

Your bond to it is strong.
You’ve been in it so long.
You wonder if it’s wrong.

You deceive it.
You retrieve it.
You believe it.









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come to my party! if you can. act three art show may 11 2012 nyc