stepped out

w/ uncombed hair
and half sleeping
still, i stepped
out to check
if it was bin
day on my street--
my neighbour's bins
are always out
the night before, so
that wd tell me--
stepped out and i
was hit immediately
by such a blast
of gorgeous, chilly
rain i laughed--
impossible to
be angry now.

God Addresses The U.S.Congress

sit down, mortals,
and listen. i've
got something to say
that's been burning
a hole in my head
for too long. and
I've come a long
way, so don't interrupt.
you people have got
me feeling all cranky.
Let me start, if
i may, with the gays.
yes, the gays. please
stop rolling your eyes.
the gays are NOT
automatically
going to Hell,
any more than you
"saved" folks have
a free pass to Heaven
it's a matter
of character,
which i actually
said two thousand
years ago, need
i remind you.
the true marriage
is love, people,
whatever form that
it takes. and while
we're at it, i DON'T
go whispering
in president's ears
about war, other
than to hint
that it's usually wrong,
especially when oil
is the super-objective.
to be truthful
(i can hardly be
otherwise) it pisses
me right off
being used to excuse
such a mortal
folly as the resolution
of difference by
horror and violence.
my way is to love.
do you know what
that means?
but ah, even i
reach the end of
my rope, though
mine unfolds back
to the beginning
of time. when i
see suits worshipping
while my raggedy
children starve out
on the pavements,
or drown in the flood
waters your negligence
let in over the
cities, when i see
that, i'm tempted
to pack up the whole
damned operation,
zap this doomed
ball back to the dust
and repair to some
virginal edge of
the cosmos
to start over,
this time giving
dolphins opposable thumbs.
but i probably won't.
why? because my way
is love. LOVE.
love is my cross.
it's what makes me
put up with you
dumb sonsofbitches.
but don't assume
it is limitless.
don't assume you
can go on
perverting my Word
and be forgiven
every time, however
heinous the crime.
that's a warning. i
can crush you.
now get out of
my sight.and give
a stranger your wallet
before you drive
home tonight.

on holiday

incense gives the dust

a scent of jasmine--

writing at the keyboard

raging drunk

LUKASH MEETS GWB

by Geoff William

In the cold doorway of dawn
lurks the one-eyed raven.
I see Lukash floating in a blue lake,
lavender blue, hiding from me your tongue.
Orchids bloom at the break of dawn,
slugs slide down stairways,
the mole digs beneath the stones.
The mole becomes a slug, a mosquito,
a locust, a rat, vermin, George Dubya Bush,
who sends the Zionists to swarm
over the Hashemites, to slaughter children, destroy orchards.
The children are neither with us or against us.
How could they know? You are either a slug
or a butterfly. But it is the slugs
who will destroy the olive trees.
Horror. Fear. Death lies in the wadi.

PAYBACK

by Steve DeFrance


I go downstairs.
My neighbor's feeding fish heads
to some local dogs.
I find my car.
The day's hot enough to
glaze pottery in the back seat.
I start the engine & crank up the air
conditioner. It's running hot.
I flip on the radio.
Bombers race toward Baghdad.
People on the street look dazed.
At the corner, a pregnant woman
stops in the center of the busy street
doing a body count of her growing family.
My knuckles grow white on the wheel.
I miss the light.

Hot. No wind.
The car's a jar with a lid.
I roll the windows down.
Try to cool off.
Trees on the street cringe
from the heat. Birds have stopped
flying, instead they huddle
in melting pools of color,
grey, brown and black,
heads bobbing slowly.
Next to me on the car seat,
a half-eaten Chocolate Hershey Bar
has exploded.

All that is plastic is devolving
into petroleum ooze.
Fillings in my teeth are burning,
touching a nerve.
Rounding a corner, the asphalt's
melting--heat ripples rise
as if from an Iraqi mirage.
High Noon in L.A.
Ahead--two sweating men charge
snarling from trucks, it's all about a parking place.
They fight in the street. Bone & flesh collide.
Under a deserted building, a lone dog wails.

I eye the ageing buildings on this
block--dying Victorians--blemished,
battered, broken & bleeding.
Dwellings filled with growing families.
Spilling over stoops, rambling down steps,
scattering into the street, where they spray
each other down with water hoses.
Lupine smiles seem to contradict the menace
glinting from their predatory eyes.

Just as it is too hot for the fat red spiders
who sit in heat shock--watching
the death dance of the web-caught flies.
These predators are not in a hurry.
It is too hot for them to dine on me.
They will dine when the sun's down.
I turn right onto 7th Street.

All in all, it's a day that causes
ordinary men to break cue sticks over bald heads.
A day so sweltering it makes
common thieves too hot & too wet to steal.
On this day--shrieking babies are being
smashed against cement walls,
and regretfully married women are sharpening long knives,
sweating and staring at the soft underbelly
of their husbands' throat.

It's a grand day for getting even,
a day for settling festering scores.
A day for payback
a day designed for vengeance.
A day to use baseball bats in alleys.
A day to swing socks filled with ball bearings.
A day for reprisals by the damned.
It's just that kind of day.

Driving by the Park on 7th Street,
I see hawks hankering for retribution,
sitting in the shade of hemlock trees
considering all possibilities.

fridge magnets

we bought each other fridge magnets
declaring our undying friendship
just before our friendship died.
i see them each day
as i reach in for my eggs and juice.
i take a masochistic pleasure
in their cruel reminder
of the illusion that we lost.
and (though i'm ashamed to say)
a manly pride
in the way that i destroyed it.
this is why you'll see them
clinging to my fridge door for a while.
how could i possibly remove
something that affords such fun
when i have little else to occupy
my twisted mind?

a.m., bathwater running

i sit, reading.
voices murmur
on the radio.
a sharp light
breaks through
the curtain.
i notice
birdsong.
i hear a car
passing on
the road below.

i turn the page.
i realise:
i'm happy.
my mood
crashes thru the floor.

Another Friday

it's delicious, coming out of work
into the cold and rain
knowing you don't have to go back
and see those fucking people
for three long days
you descend the hill towards the main road
like a liberated hostage rushing towards
a waiting family of careless shoppers,
pissed off commuters going home
and sneering kids.
the squalls of rain blow out the dust,
the radioactive dust, of work
your optimism rises, and it lasts
about another thirty seconds
which is when you realise
you are totally alone.
another friday with the bottle and the couch ahead.

The Sky Seems Bluer

the sky seems bluer
this crisp october day
stepping out to catch a bus to work.

now you are not my friend
the morning light seems brighter,
the cold air bites more sweetly
than it did before.

with your absence you have given me
so much that your presence
failed to provide,

so much
that i should thank you for.
with this poem i thank you.

the new weather of life after you
exceeds my boldest hopes by miles.