• The Cigarette Lady

    There will be no sleeping for me this morning, on the long-haul commuter bus from Kingston to Port Authority. The suspension has a great shark’s bite on the smallest of bumps. The air conditioning is hammering the back of my neck. The “cigarette lady” has chosen her seat directly behind mine.

    Out of the corner of my sleepy eye, I see her yellowed hand imposing a little on my periphery. I smell the sour acrid gag of stained and spotty organs. Her cough begins shortly after departure, lung and trachea protest the imposed sanctions. As the nicotine receptors settle in to the martial law, the listless lack of oxygen will huff the grey cloud of sleep upon the tarred and charcoal soul. She claims the seat next to hers for streaked and straining capillaries of lower extremities, and soon enough she will floats off into the thick atmosphere of dreams, snoring in Chinese.

  • Summer Flowers

    Are there still weddings in this weather?
    It seems that the brides would melt into pools of anxious sugary syrup.
    I suppose the show must go on.
    I’m not as cynical as I once was.
    This activity is no stranger to me than sports or watching television.

    But I do worry about the wilting flowers.
    They will begin to lean over the second the ceremony is over.
    They will question their decision to bear blossom.
    They will falter faced with rainy seasons.

    Care for them Mother.
    The innocent victims of Nature’s drama.
    Protect the fragile sensations.
    Keep the light high enough so they don’t wither,
    And strong enough to draw the attention of their perfect seeking faces.

  • The Oracle

  • Candy

  • Failed landing attempt

  • Lunar Compassion

    The moon is sudden, sullen, and not right.
    It comes upon us in a new way tonight.
    Let it find its own way through.
    Just as it deftly cuts the blue

    Of day.

    It will be restored to a subject of worship
    In time and tide its falter tips
    Back into our magnetic blood
    Drawing all the salt of eyes, and earth, into the flood

    Of tears

  • Miss Moon

    She is telling us we’re not quite alone.