Mining Fire

Faint at first, I got a whiff and choked —
a burning stench. I looked outside and there,
just beside our backyard oak,
the smoke effluviated in the air.
I ran to get my shovel to contend
and start to dig where smoke was coming through
the grass, but only stirred it up and made it thicken.
My eyes refused to see, my lips turned blue.
And now I’d dug until, drenched in grime
and deep inside the hole, I’d made my bed,
yet couldn’t recline or even try to climb.
I stood and craned my neck, then hung my head.
I’d sought the source, but still was blind.
The fire is far below and can’t be mined.

Gutless

My gut hangs out above the scale that calculates —
it couldn’t just estimate my weight —
but once, just for laughs, I wish it’d scan
a one-forty-five, a slender, gutless man.
But no — heartless, refusing to prevaricate,
it shows an anal one-sixty-nine point eight.
I curse that extra brownie that I ate
last night; my belt slips a notch as I expand,
and my gut hangs out.
I glance askance at my profile silhouette
mocking from the window glass and rate
my rounded waistband (which I can’t stand)
against the washboard abs I have in candyland.
So sucking in until I’m past, I re-inflate,
and my gut hangs out.

Labyrinth

No one wants to say it,
at least not right away,
but it’s true — we’re lost.
Even if we found a map,
it doesn’t mean we’re not.
We live in a labyrinth —
a maze of halls and doors,
and on the walls are scenes:
a waterfall of tears,
the bloody maimed of wars,
the drone of huge machines.
Were the walls of time
erected by mistake?
Were they spoken into
being with a curse?
We tread the same routines.
Still, can you remember
when you started here?
Did you count the cost?
Will we ever see
when the end is near?
Will it come this year?
I don’t know — I’m lost,
though it doesn’t really matter —
I know the Overseer.
He whispers in my ear.

View from the Attic

In your house, perhaps inside your walls,
live creatures, hiding, buzzing, murmuring,
rarely seen, their bodiless heads talk
and fuse to form a global brain.
Non-descript, chameleon, they slur
their scowls and sneers to then assume
a sophisticate, affected air.
They’ve drilled small holes to peer at us,
mocking, hissing, laughing at us.
Their puppets dangle on a string.
If you ever found them hiding
there in the basement, slithering through
the ducts, underneath the floor,
you’d scream running and never come back.
But the puppeteers don’t see their Enemy
watching, listening from the attic.

Body Language

I listen to the
body languages
we all speak,
ethereal
and corporeal,
sometimes with words —
regardless we heard.
The tongues we learned
without us trying,
without us knowing
we even needed to,
but couldn’t stop
if we tried — an
involuntary telling
of all our lives. It’s
what’s really going on.
But the words hitch along,
they interrupt, they try
to cloud and clarify,
they go high and low.
So do you or don’t you
want me to know you?
   — yeah, I thought so.

Non-fiction

I stack non-fiction books by my bed
in hopes that all that print, though unread,
will somehow by mysterious spell —
by them being near enough to smell —
to send the words themselves and spread
them through the air into my head.
Ah, words of science, art, philosophy; I’m wed
to poetry and music — can you tell
I stack non-fiction books?
Some cover graphics especially intrigued
me — after pulling up the covers I read
a few more pages in, that is, before I fell
asleep and had to mark page twelve
again, and see it’s overdue; so instead
I stack non-fiction books.

Bottom bunk

Me on the bottom bunk,
my sister on the top —
the room is dark and shapes
of familiar furniture
feign benign monsters.
Outside the door I hear
the TV laugh track drone
and someone sings Moon River.
I hear the muffled words
of mom and dad and try
to stay awake to piece
together arguments
from random words I get —
‘money . . . help . . .God . . .
the kids . . . tomorrow . . . can’t.’
They filter through the door,
kept ajar to let
a little light in.
The voices finally fade,
the darkness settles in.
They’ve gone to bed themselves.
I’ll have to wait ’til morning.