Trying too hard

to appear he’s not trying

Saying too much

without saying a thing

Shapeshifting lover

the fire his mistress

Locked in an image

—whose essence is damned

 

(The New Room: June, 2023)

The Taiji of life

may it ever be so

Driving the artist

and poet who know

The Yin and the Yang

to marry sublime

Truth as their offspring

—whose beauty defines

 

(Dreamsleep: June, 2023)

Owing a debt

you can never repay

Beatitudes leveraged

salvation in play

 

Moments beholden

to all that’s to come

Providence calling

in voices unsung

 

Eternally liable

the invoice sublime

Whose terms reverential

the bursar Divine

 

The wings of an angel

the wings of a dove

In debt to forgiveness

—absolved from above

 

(Dreamsleep: June, 2023)

 

Painting with words

speaking in colors

Palette of voices

—rainbow Divine

 

(Dreamsleep: June, 2023)

An orphan of destiny

whose birthmark disowns

A life spent indentured

his spirit on loan

 

Caught in a time warp

unable to leave

The future in chains

contentment bereaved

 

A child of the moment

left on the streets

Time as his captor

in shoes of concrete

 

Forever unwelcome

a foster relayed

From instant to instant

his memory replays

 

An orphan of destiny

whose grief is reborn

In weeks unrelenting

his calendar scorned

 

Last chance at adoption

it calls from within

The voice of acceptance

—from him unto him

 

(Dreamsleep: June, 2023)

 

You’re a Poet

—you don’t need permission

 

(Dreamsleep: June, 2023)

Bus drivers and plumbers

don’t start the wars

The nurse or school teacher

too busy inured

What’s common among us

with tasks to withstand

The elected entitled

our blood on their hands

Without a real job

and whose terms don’t expire

They poison the well

with aggrandizements dire

To them it’s a game

that they cannot lose

Their voters just pawns

in a continual ruse

But one day the reaper

with sickle in hand

Will come to reclaim

what’s stolen bedamned

And the serfs will rise up

in an infamous rage

The despots left burning

—their ashes in shame

 

(Radnor Pennsylvania: June, 2023)

The semen of tomorrow’s rage

burning undelivered

waiting for perdition’s womb

vengeance baptized—christened tears

 

The seed that carries darkness on

planted in the shadows

hiding what we most despise

hatred pregnant—birthing fear

 

(Dreamsleep: June, 2023)

Reaching into the

public conscience

words are tokened free

 

Blowing fresh holes

through blind indenture

light for all to see

 

Reaching into the

common ledger … 

its double-entry fate

 

Paying the debt

on tomorrow’s maelstrom

—seeking heaven’s gate

 

(The New Room: June, 2023)

Dylan got bitten

hard by fame

and though wounded

continues to tour

 

A thundering

majesty

in makeup and veils

jesters by the score

 

Divorced from

his wandering

a pilgrim of dreams

the past too great a cost

 

A caricature

of genius gone

eyes clouded over

—Camelot lost

 

(The New Room: June, 2023)