Baltimore Burns

Baltimore burns

Blame the police
Blame the kids
Blame the thugs
Blame the agitators
It doesn't matter who
lit the match
The city is full of  kindling
to feed the flames

Fire fueled
by poverty
hopelessness
injustice
disenfranchisement
empty promises
Watch it burn to the ground

Watch it on our TVs
in our big houses
in our safe, green suburbs
Shake our heads and withdraw
from the insistent sea of angry black faces
Our own fragment of reality
so much more pleasant

We, the privileged,
who send our sons off to school
with a peck on the cheek
don't wonder whether they'll come back
We
who curse the crabgrass in our yards
not the clay colored stain of dried blood
on our sidewalks
We
whose souls are unbattered
ungnawed by daily injustices
ground down by despair
We
who matter
without having to write it
shout it
burn it
into consciousness
to make people pay attention.

submitted to Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Get Listed for May, Pablo Neruda

Dance With Me

Dance with me

Hear that jazz play

We will be

redeemed in the sway

Let the others make way

I deem this night ours

These few hours

In your affection

Do not be remiss

I long for the perfection

of your kiss

Let the others see our bliss

Don't miss the chance

Hold me and dance.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Get Listed for Feb.: Absent
and Play It Again Toads, Rhyme Royal

There Is No Art To War

artwork by blue clementine art

There is no art to war

Art creates;

war destroys

Art understands;

war attacks

Art is honesty;

war is treachery

Art is tender;

war, indifferent

War is tactics

Strategy, scheming,

cold, efficient planning

Art is ardor

Energy, fire,

hot, chaotic humanity

There is no art to war

Allying the two

is a disgrace, a blasphemy

Art would sooner die

than be captured 

in service of war

It often does.

submitted (late) for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Get Listed (September)

Souvenirs From Dreams

source

She believed

She believed with all the faith

her tender five year-old soul could hold

More than she believed in God

More than Heaven

More than even her own name

She believed

that dreaming and waking

were just different rooms

in the same house

She believed

boundaries were permeable

She could travel thresholds

of unconscious to conscious

like she traversed bedroom to kitchen

and back

She believed

if she really tried

she could return from her dreams

with some souvenir

like when she returned to her room

with a cookie from the cupboard

She believed this so strongly

that each night she would try to grasp some trinket

from dreaming

and wake with it in her hand

But each morning she awoke 

empty handed

her dream object faint and 

fading into the evasive penumbra of night

a  beautiful shell she tried to snatch from the ocean

just as a huge wave washed her under

She would finally stand

gripping nothing

but sand.

(finally) submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Get Listed w/ Hedgewitch, Mind and Symbol

The Seventh Crow

Seven Crows by Merlyn-Gabriel

One for sorrow, two for joy, three for a girl, four for a boy, five for silver, six for gold, seven for a secret never to be told.

 I am

the frenzied heartbeat

the whispered gossip you can almost hear

the gibbering beggar on your corner

I am

the madman in your basement

the lady with vulgarly smeared lipstick

the lunatic in your attic

I am

the eleventh toe

the devil in the details

the feather in your pillow that pokes your dreams

I am

the frayed wire

the kink in the system

the unaverted catastrophe

I am

the sinkhole of irrationality into which you slide

bit by bit

180 degrees from okay.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Get Listed with FB

November

source

We live on borrowed time

Now we must return

to our place of birth

The Earth beckons home

her wayward children

Leaves turn to soil

Gardens turn to seed

Ponds turn solid and impenetrable

November's breath 

petrifies as surely as Medusa's gaze

Summer maidens

shed their pale blossoms,

fruit into winter queens

Below the frozen ground,

they dream of innocence

and wait for the cleansing sun.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Get Listed-Good Neighbors

Folie Dans La Cuisine

The broken souffle was rapidly collapsing
She had hoped it would climb to such heights
that the man in the moon would smell it
and crave a bite
Now, it appeared on the precipice of disaster
and with it, her belief that she could master
the cryptic nuances of fancy French cuisine
She had been so hopeful,
her carriage unusually confident
as she leveraged the pan
from counter to oven
and lovingly thrust her creation into the warmth
As the souffle rose,
so did her self-worth
The doubts that had peppered her mind
became calypso drumbeats of excitement
She observed the edges brown,
slightly, like the first tan of summer
She knew it was time
Gently, she opened the oven door
Grasped her masterpiece with gloved hands
Set it on the table
Bang!
The oven slammed shut
like a clubhouse door in her face
She was unwelcome here
An outsider
She removed her stained apron
shook her head
stepped outside
listened to the quiet song
of the crickets,
then dialed for pizza delivery.

Yum!

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Get Listed, Of Catnip and Moons

Distance = Pace X Time

source

Perched on the ledge of adolescence, we

were too timid to jump

but too bold to uproot and climb

down

So we skimmed the surface

Tasted only a slice when we wanted

the whole pie

Curious fury stilled

only to shake loose each time

Your eyes shone blue topaz

Your tender growl

mingled with shrill, girl giggles

Green passion urged me onward

Propelled me

toward your freckled mouth

But you were wending your way toward

someone else

something more typical than I

could offer

So I stood in your dust

Bit my maiden aunt lips and

Tasted  grit in my teeth.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Get Listed (the Grapeling Way)

When Summer Belonged To Us

Unidentified Photographer, [Two unidentified girls, one eating watermelon, the other disrobing], ca. 1960 (2012.24.1) from Fans in a Flashbulb

When summer belonged to us,

we shot out of school doors like pinballs

pinging off trees, porches, each other,

racing toward imagined jackpots

We lay in the heat,

hair and freckles bleached with lemon juice

and tasted the tang on our skin

We shucked Silver Queen on front steps,

the silk sticking to our fingers

and stealing nibbles off the cobs

We grabbed thick slices of watermelon,

ate them down to the rind,

sweet juice dripping down our wrists,

then spitting the seeds

across crabapple dappled lawns

We set the pace of our days

to suit our moods

and lingered under street lights

well past dusk

Feigning deafness to the calls of parents,

we schemed our next scheme

There was always another tomorrow

when summer belonged to us.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Elephants Dance In Fancy Pants-Get Listed