war signs

the vital lines crack
on the face of children

the next disaster
benefits their families

(source text)

the search that day

putting his years behind him,
scrutiny scraping up a memory of difficult moments

tailored in gold, little in common,
candid, confessional, distasteful,
a ruptured smile under stress,
building lives without much success

compelled to unhitch years of time,
some of the walls come down

(source text)

energetic

urban dwellers in our midst
snatched the same conjured energy you drowned out

uncanny Eden, a silent one,
too strong, immense,
rips you every day

you grow up against the ancient civilizations
thinking, especially after dark,
you have the greatest chance
to glimpse hints of a lost paradise,
waiting for the jungle to be assembled and reassembled

get lost: until you get close to bits of mist and fog,
intoxicating, miragelike,
fake natural history
sleeps on you day or night

(source text)

lighthouse wanted

Housing a romantic notion
of gray grass stoically sloping
after more than a century of darkness,
the lightkeepers ward off heroines
trying to fill the picturesque
with brick and granite views
painted white, automated.

(source text)

irreverent

Scattered light in the morning
releases the fathers and mothers
(in a religious sense)
of the people I sympathized with.

Relatively conventional angry mob routine
cemented an uproar
and a buttoned-down decorum.

Working class wordplay
weathered major, psychotic hatreds,
the shortcomings of humanity,
makes us think.

(source text)

Decision Public

Accept the wake.
No kicking and screaming.
Shut off the spigot.

A disproportionate amount of time;
and he has been freed from
the necessity of spending countless hours,
enabled to break his promise.

And a bevy of other
limitations laid bare
will always find an outlet.

(source text)

influence simply

an old-fashioned bureau
tough and amiable and grounded
slightly better than used-car salesmen

a gross dollop of unfairness to digest

tarred with the sins of those who transmit
wounded soldiers in the 25 largest markets
sufficiently afflicting the comfortable

did not walk on water

(source text)

defenseless

Instead of redoubling their efforts,
drag their frazzled minds
to a higher plane.

Extinguish that hope.

This whirlwind staggered
from the very get-go;
Overburdened, frustrated
(and) proud, the far
better energy
paid off immediately.

Ready to negotiate?

(source text)

interim (let go)

Throughout the past
the immediate future has arrived.

Stumbled out,
floating around anywhere,
grew more frequent,
but it was not enough to save:

Grew more cryptic,
Grown into murmurs,
Withered to nothing.

Plagued by speculation past midnight,
Conditions deteriorated again.

(source text)

no coast for the taking

A soft-shell pushover
punched back.
He was the best.

clearly missed the inside
cutting into my friend
contributed mightily
to (their) own demise.

"Tape everything for posterity":
right away we were talking Deja Vu,
Youthful Aggressiveness.

"But those things are to be expected."
Now you can add the name.

(source text, source text)

still heavy

imagine you're not
return to the shock and rush
vintage bursts of cackling-hyena
thunderclaps
makes ya more strong

minimize time away from their families
moved all over the place

guys are on fire
hooked into that right now
those were made very quickly

(source text)