Month: March 2018

Future invalids will be caught before death.

They’ll bolt them tight unto their beds

and strap the head harness on

with the elbow-length ultra-sensitive gloves,

sitting straight up on honeycombed gel mattresses,

wrapped in tissue-thin bathrobes.

Even with their minds almost gone,

they could visit their past,

reliving their glory days

as they lie back in virtual grassy meadows,

the golden light peeking through the thin blades,

puffs of dandelion smoke blowing through.

But she’s not there now, your beautiful girl

you once loved splendor on the grass;

she never believed in virtual reality

and all the experiments the scientists did to you,

so they built a similar model to void any loneliness—

And the children are here,

meeting, fighting and loving others

in another world,

traveling millions of miles without moving,

forgetting the real world entirely.

Not feeling groovy on the Q32 today.

Traffic towards Queensboro sprawled, crawling for dear life,

inching, waiting for many minutes at this time.

Not looking for fun, boys.

This girl’s needs to go to work now,

but traffic’s not letting us move—-

I wonder if the ‘60s were really living easy;

the kids back then are now pushing their mid-sixties

and they roll their eyes, remembering their own high hopes

of peaceful, easy living

now dashed upon the rocks below by current history.

Paul and Art, today I’m not feeling groovy—-

I need to go to work now

in spite of this slowdown,

I need to make this moment last.

People are not made without pain.
We trade our personal safety for fame
and a bit of immortality.

Even willow trees,
shaped like green spliced angels,
the holy sailx feathered scepters,
won’t weep forever.

And the tender, furry caktins
young, silvered and sweet,
won’t stay sweet forever—

When I was still sweet and young,
I felt the thorns deeply. I wanted
all the pain to stop, so I could
grow up to be famous.

I want happiness, and comfort,
and love, along with inspiration,
the rain along with the sun,
the tender fuzzy tendrils
along with the silent, swaying tree.

Who should beware the Ides of March?

Politicians, people who lie, betray, embezzle, who did wrong, and knew they did wrong,
they should wise up and stop their callous actions,
before more blood is shed,
before another madman shoots up a school or public place,
before ignorance becomes the norm,
before social media shares and dissects all,
before it’s too late to do the right thing.

How would you like to be remembered?
By your vile acts against humanity,
by a second Shakespeare,
who would turn your torrid tale into literature, a play, a news story?

Settle your affairs and your debts,
and tell the truth.
It’s the right thing to do.

Was Stephen Hawking a poet?
Yes, he wrote of the cosmos as if it was a beloved, mysterious lover.

Black holes, quantum mechanics, a brief history of Time,
he was known for these things, not just for his ailments,
his brain was a complete wondrous thing, to be brilliant
in the most progressive and transgressive of times.

Poetic that he died on Pi Day,
the most mystical of all-known numbers, constantly evolving & growing,
drifting into space, forever changing and computing—
perhaps we will eventually find a bit of Hawking’s essence
floating forever in the stars, constantly computing and evolving,
never standing still—

Quinn tastes like diesel in Queens,
the worst SnoCone flavor.

Quick-slow-slow-quick-slow-slow
we tread through slippery slush
and I wonder how many kids came upon it with their feet,
the marks were still fresh upon the grey mush.

Wind howled with the oncoming traffic,
umbrellas died in the great guffs,
Quinn’s snow covered us without remorse,
her flakes were wet and fat.

By 7th Ave. my coat was still soaked.
Why were the other coats still bone-dry?

If I still worked in Manhattan,
it would have been manageable;
Quinn’s flakes are fine & sedate
in Columbus Circle.