You gotta know when to goad ‘em
Know when to scold ‘em
Know when to tweet some lies
Just ‘cause it’s fun
You never count the money
That you’re making from ol’ Putin
They’ll be time enough for counting
When the term is done
poem
The Incel’s Lament
I met you
On a cold,
December morning
Snowflakes
Slowly melting
In your hair
You asked me
For directions
To Salvation
Then you left me
Without wondering
If I cared
I chased you
Down the road
To greater glory
Always
Just one step
From your side
You never
Stopped to rest
Or recover
Never once did
You look me
In the eye
So
now
I’m
Crying
All my tears
For you darling
I’m crying
Cause you don’t
Know my name
I’m crying
All my tears
For you darling
And you’ll never
See me crying
Again
I only wanted
To be your one
True companion
The one who
Would protect you
From the storm
Though we never
Even had a
Conversation
You never let me
Keep you safe
From harm
Now I wonder
If you know just
What you’re missing
What kind of man I
Could surely turn out
To be
Have I misread
This entire
Situation
Don’t you owe me
The chance to find out
And see
So
now
I’m
Crying
All my tears
For you darling
I’m crying
Cause you don’t
Know my name
I’m crying
All my tears
For you darling
And you’ll never
See me crying
Again
I met you
On a cold,
December morning
Snowflakes
Slowly melting
In your hair
You asked me
For directions
To Salvation
Don’t I owe you
A little common
Courtesy
You don’t owe me
Anything it’s
Plain to see
I don’t own you
So right here I’ll
Let you be
Yes, you asked me
For directions
To Salvation
And one day I
Hope that’s right where
I’ll be
Yeah maybe one day
That’s right where
I’ll be
When We Go Between
you wake up in the morning
tell me that you love me
come home in the evening
say you need to be alone
what happens in the daytime
when we’re not together
what happens in the spaces
when we go between
there’s only one type of loving
I’ve ever been a fan of
there’s only one type of living
that’s ever done me right
messed up so many times
that I gave up counting
messed up too many times
to ever set it right
the flowers stopped blooming
when the bees they stopped calling
the flowers stopped growing
when the sun went out
got a maze of black mirrors
that show me forever
in a maze of black mirrors
trapped-with no way out
you wake up in the morning
tell me that you love me
come home in the evening
say you need to be alone
what happens in the daytime
when we’re not together
what happens in the spaces
when we go between
what happens in the spaces
when we go between
what happens to a heart
that is no longer seen
what happens when you forget
all the places that you been
what happens when you just can’t
recognize the scene-no more
remember when you found me
naked in the garden
remember when you called me
by my secret name
I promise if you leave me
I will never follow
I promise if you leave me
I will never be the same
Kansas City, Come Get A Valentine’s Poem from me tomorrow at
Basic Connectomics: A Citizen’s Guide to the Connectomy
to chart the connections:
a connectome
what each part is,
how it supports the whole,
how it ought to interact with other parts
and the environment
how might we grasp the entirety?
understanding
all this complexity
millions of things
happening simultaneously
within
without
no point
you can say,
‘I now understand’
the world is.
ideas conform.
information
is the enemy
of understanding
which details are irrelevant?
making sense of facts
truth through an unfocused lens
sculpted by language
processed by culture
watching ice melt
we stoke the fire
A Poem For Us
we want it mechanical
but that’s a recent desire
(relatively speaking)
the easy truth is
that it’s a lyric, a line
break, an assumption…
neither this nor that
never one thing for too long
(relatively speaking)
you’re here now
and so am I
let us kiss under the wavering moon
let us understand nothing
Wild Chickens In Hawai’i
They got wild chickens in Hawai’i
They got robot cars on Mars
They got luminescent fish in the deep
They got meat made out of veggies
They got talking frigerators
But they ain’t found a way to keep you close to me
No, they ain’t found a way
No, they ain’t found a way
They ain’t found a way to keep you close to me
Oh, I wish that they might
Find a way to ground your flight
But they ain’t found no way that keeps you close to me
They got dogs that speak to humans
They got kitties using toilets
They got pills that make the sour things turn sweet
They got doorbells always watching
They got facial recognition
But they ain’t found a way to keep you close to me
No, they ain’t found a way
No, they ain’t found a way
They ain’t found a way to keep you close to me
Oh, I wish that they found
Some way to keep you hanging ’round
But they ain’t found no way that keeps you close to me
Yeah, they got pillows that play music
They got millions of flavors
They got light to whiten up your crooked teeth
They got islands getting drowned
And they got countries a’fire
But they ain’t found no way that keeps you close to me
No, they ain’t found a way
No, they ain’t found a way
They ain’t found a way to keep you close to me
Oh, I wish that they would
Find a way to keep you here for good
But they ain’t found that way to keep you close to me
They ain’t found a way to keep you close to me
They ain’t found a way to stop you being free
No, they ain’t found a way to tell you how to be
They ain’t found way
Never gonna find a way
That might make you stay
They ain’t found a way to keep you close to me
The Only Secret That I Know
I never knew a sweeter melody
Than the one that called me home
I never knew the mind of god
Except when I was stoned
I never knew the rain would fall
Until the drops darkened my coat
Now I’m telling you a secret
The only secret that I know
I never felt the rocky path
Underneath me when I roamed
I never thought to hold your hand
While you were standing close
I can’t forget the way you looked
Traveling down that road
So now I’m telling you a secret
The only secret that I know
I never had a single care
I never stopped, I never slowed
I never wanted anything
Except to hear you say, “Don’t go”
I never shed a single tear
Least that’s how the story goes
And now I’m telling you a secret
The only secret that I know
Things You Wanted from Heaven
I only wanted eyes of gold and a smile made of diamonds.
You only wanted to not grow old and keep your soul a’shinin’.
You did not need another life to fill your broken heart.
You watched the old man in the moon for signs that you should start.
The old man’s voice was soft, though he was a good-for-nothing bastard.
You kept clinging to the past as though it’d help you heal much faster.
So soft that moonlit voice, like a rope of silk and satin.
When the old man spoke, you shook and could not say what happened.
The moon revealed, “There are many people like you in this crumbling world.
They don’t care for their future, thinking all is double toil.”
“Don’t mistake me for a man, lest I take your only life.
Don’t mistake me for a man, lest I take you for my wife!”
You said, “As long as you shall light me, I’ll forever be just fine.
Your pale caress will be enough to corral my wandering mind.”
“And even if I lose control some nights from here to when,
Regrets will never stop me from standing with you here and then.”
Family Tales: Your Brother had a Pizza Hut, and he loved there
This story is about the last time your brother went to Pizza Hut. He had a Stuffed Garlic Knots Pizza, Cinnamon Sticks, and a Pepsi-Cola 4-Pack.
He lost his appetite (though the pizza tasted just fine). It was simply way too late. Pizza Hut had closed right after he left. The game was over.
He walked down a darkened street, past rows of boarded up warehouses, then finally into the darkness.
In this retelling, we will refer to one of the dark and deserted warehouses as the “Stuffed Garlic Knots Pizza House,” one of many restaurants and stores to close in downtown Dayton that year.
According to a story in the Dayton Daily News, the closure of Stuffed Garlic Knots Pizza House was blamed on “low inventory and sluggish service.”
I was walking around Downtown Dayton trying to catch a good photo of this particular restaurant. I was just about to start shooting when a customer inside yelled, “Hey, how do you know I have knots on my pizza? Did you have some of my pizza?”
So I told my boyfriend about the knot pictures I had taken, and of course he wanted to know how to get some for himself.
He went on to tell me that he had a friend, and that friend had a friend who could take out the knots from any pizza.
That friend of a friend came to our house. He took a small knot from each corner of the pizza on our wall and lay them out onto a piece of newspaper.
Once I got the pictures developed, I tried to find a photo of the knot-slicer, but there wasn’t a photo of him anywhere.
In a messy kitchen drawer, I found the Knots from Stuffed Garlic Knots Pizza House that had I taken from Dayton. Now they hang from your brother’s rearview mirror.
Thanks to everyone for sending in similar pizza knot photos from your knotty pizzas and, as always, happy trails…