justwrite 28 february

and now it’s time to sit down time to lift frowns from our leather uppers and turn aside some other cheek time to let the meek have their say but only for a little bit who knows what they’d do with it if they blew through with it we can not all get along every day every march april may we have more time in the warmer may we have more skills on the front burner and now just slowly stewing too easy to ruin real situations with vague expectations won’t you be my neighbor won’t you slowly savor thoughts having bought quite enough reality the awkwardness labeled the burn on my thumb from where the pan jammed the oven all that shoving and no cookies we’ve booked a pleasing stay at a different stage and I think you’ll be amazed how it all plays out as for me I have some doubts but these are nonrefundable we have treasure but it’s not plunderable I am wondering where the flowers have gone but it’s too cold for them to have a turn it’s too tiring to burn all those bridges so looking off over the blue ridges we are thinking of other mountains we are drinking from other fountains and we are waiting for words that just might be delivered we shiver as we wonder how to respond what swimming will do for such a mindstream flailing through a daydream the kind that doesn’t burn cookies but wait it’s my turn to go and I’m waiting for time to read the next book to turn off the textbook and find something novel it’s an idea it’s what I’d right a story about a book perhaps and as space collapses it might have been a poem but there’s no knowing them once they appear you need to clear a landing space and be ready to embrace the idea with open arms and this is some kind of advice which is nice to give others but to myself it seems vague

justwrite 27 february

staring into thought a green stuffed rabbit has developed the habit of spying into reality with a keen sense of confusion he knows what’s happening and I am just playing along I am making pancakes because it’s Sunday I am worrying about three months from now even while not worrying even while hurrying to get ready for tomorrow I have slept enough I have not made a wake-up call I sent a note instead if you are not sleeping please read this and realize that you are awake thank you sincerely the management even as I don’t manage to manage because I certainly don’t have to in this situation as even a rudimentary investigation will show the crosswalk below and other signs have changed the minds of all participating factions we’re weighing subtractions along with additions and when I come out on top I’ll wonder what attitude to adopt like the characters in mark twain’s mirror the fake sack of gold that corrupted hadleyburg the same weight as lead the better off mislead the honestly crooked the straight the rough places plain as the red velvet seats in the messiah sing-along theater this is a memory this is a truth packaged up and delivered through listening to some other music I cannot hear that kind now when I did at Christmas it was too much too soon to avoid the tagalong story ready to package that up and give it to someone else to hold there’s no space between these ears and while the chest cavity is showing some emptiness it’s not the kind of weight to shove right in there without major adjustments so let’s just set that aside let’s set aside the companionship the easy comfort of not quite knowing the words but surrounded by those standing beside mothers who like each others and smiling at the right parts shaking our heads at the director the soloists get full support though always just really let’s move this along so we can hurry back to our parking garages and be ready for snow for presents for deliverance from memories from bows closing up boxes that we don’t need to open again and again but we can see are there and look lovely in the background of some other picture waiting to be taken and also given

justwrite 25 february

this is the end of part one this is the start where the fund runs out and the paddles haul upstream all the water there’s too much fodder to grow from I’m turning dumb but the interest is compounding the results are astounding and the bank is overwhelmed the other captain’s at the helm it seems because this one careens along the deck with half of an idea sticking out of his head and it’s better off lead read nothing in the paint nothing but a faint smell of wax the floors are being done but there’s no way to tell in advance until you step from the stairs and into confrontation that’s no way to save the nation to unite the stations and keep everyone broadcasting right the waves the saturation point the media disjointment I am hungry for something different and tired enough to sleep until it comes until it’s clear that fear can eat itself for breakfast and leave the rest of us to plan our own lunches when the crunches come I’m all bent out of shape slumped over and over there’s a treasure trove of sounds but meaning’s harder to come by there’s an unwinding sense of perspective an easy directive with corrector fluids and the shaking rattle-roll of souls second-guessing themselves their healths and their easy plots having gotten scattered like nothing else matters but a happy ending there’s no use pretending that it could happen the willing suspension of disbelief is a happy relief from circumstance but I can’t take the chance that such a thing might happen here I’d rather cheer the armada and swim the other way than pick hay with my teeth or the other way around I’ve found I’m not interested in sense-making much less tense-maintaining back and forth through predictability if the future is so clear in the past can it be called the present even before it arrives if the conclusion is foregone then where to does it go does syntax pay for itself or is there some sort of cumulative compilation can we create creation out of apathy or is it something else something with fewer ingredients and different expedients we all wait for the popcorn times we all wait for the right dropped dimes to tell us we’re doing it well whatever it might be and when the train leaves the station and the creek don’t rise then all the algebra in the world can’t help you get where you’re going on time

justwrite 24 february

thinking about something else there’s health and that’s always a good one there’s dishwashing and that’s not always fun but sometimes when it’s done it seems almost as if it wasn’t that bad I have been planning and adding up but seems likes something’s been subtracted counteract this phase this phrase I am ready to participate in something else but first I’ll go to sleep first I’ll breathe in deep and loudly singing proudly a song that has never been written I am smitten with smiting today I am casting off more than a shadow there are things that don’t need to be such and I’m too far away to touch the ground to pound home the truth I’m used to waiting I’m used to plaiting what ought to be braided and waving with reckless abandon that I haven’t gathered up and never need to I have only the right eyes and the others are left we are bereft of answers and also of oatmeal I have gone to two stores three times since I noticed it was missing not into some unknown location but into the best of all situations to eat and be eaten one of these is for the oatmeal and one of these for me there ought to be tea and I ought to say yes more maybe I’m growing wrinkled in my thoughts maybe I’ve bought not quite enough time maybe there are lines I haven’t interpreted correctly I’ll be along directly I’m finishing this book I’m taking this look and always always I believe in both reading and rainbows but you don’t have to take my word for it you can store it up in your pocket or behind your ear and clear out for now but if you find that later you are interested in ministering to a flock or clocking an hourglass at half-mast you’ll wonder where the words are coming from if you’re humming number or turning dumber by the minute it’s a bright happy world with you in it and if I do say so myself there’s a wealth of information worth preserving at this station this stage this part and parcel I’m packaging up and sending along we’re humming the wrong words but no one can tell we’re caroling with kazoos and everyone is holidayishly amused this is their role and we are patrolling through Pennsylvania midwinter with hats and gloves and no fear of too much snow too much weather we are talking on snow phones wearing cow coats and when remote memories get dialed up my answer is to pass along the message as such

justwrite 23 february

I been thinking about havin the g’s dropped off I been wondering waiting supposing there are tragedies in the trees there are situations amazing and foundless we are writing words I’m just using sounds I am tired of hoping thinking about moping but what a waste ready to get into bed instead of writing at night I should wake up and go to it but still I would write about a desire to be in bed not elsewhere in the cold cold whatever night or day I would like soup but the kind you swim in if there is such and of course there isn’t we’re winking and blinking nodding in the least suave sense have I mentioned the desires we have to fire the bosses as well as the ovens up and through baking too many broth-spoliers into the mix we’re well fixed for drinks and the sink’s full of dishes that someone else ate from there is no oatmeal there is no spoon there is instant coffee and also there are bananas I cannot figure out these messages I am tired of pretending not to wonder and I am missing and missing and missing but not allowed to ask by whom by what by some sort of answer I cannot grab cannot grasp and instead I swim deeper into some other distraction here we go ‘round the somethingelse bush like the wheels on the bus going round and round all through the town all on a Sunday morning all through mourning but don’t want to start again all through the adjustment of alone again naturally there are no reasons to reopen the case the facts are still clear the sky still veers sideways under closer examination I am a microscope with telescopic hopes I have no stake no claim no name to give that sentiment nostalgia and emptiness with other goings-on not so going-on and while some are going strong the sun still goes down the town still turns dark and reading someone else’s thoughts printed long ago are not the ones I want to hear are not the same as you my dear and I’m sorry it’s ridiculous but I’m not sorry about honesty and this is where I leave you a book I just read but now I’m on to stranger in a strange land and nothing’s no one’s holding that hand waving free and cool in the winter night

justwrite 22 february

when I think of the answers I give they flow smooth moonhoney from my mouth my eyes look sad in someone else’s mirror but I am seeing clearer thinking longer than the snow can fall the sun is caught with fog in the tree and we are moving on in streams the light switches around corners and lines up to take number to make claims on each detail we fail ourselves when we stop listening the snow glistening on itself collapsing into the relief of being a part of something bigger shivering into its on answer and questioning nothing to lay to lie to honestly truly sweep the sky in an interested glance to dance through a conversation with clouds I am allowed to say these things and you are allowed to listen we take turns earning interest although this is not the first time I’ve said so these images and words weave through absurdly often their sweet sounds lasting longer on my lips and when I tell the stories of thinking the ideas the lists the plans the thoughts are so clear I can hear the future writing the day and nighting again around once more we tour the cities we bake up villages of our own designs we change lines and trolleys and skyscrapers for the mistaken harmony of some other place because here it is here it’s clear and there are fearfully few who know it fearfully few who choose to look within and around instead of elsewhere and far but this is not my subject this is a collection of items gathered but back to what matters is the licorice pressed against the window and turning me to sleep

justwrite 21 february

well then about that and around the corner as well there’s a fell swoop and a limber loop worth picking up with the next hook it’s a crochet sort of deal but really I don’t remember really it was in November or another cold time with red yarn and aunt kate in mount union this is one of those times when I write about something real about the candy dishes on the table one tall and cut green glass with a lid that could have been a crown for a small-headed queen and the low one metal with a fitted lid you had to widefingered open or pick up and twist and this is not important but of course I remember when you’re young you think about candy and staying up late and nick at nite even though you know this is the wrong spelling and you are me and I you have frosted mini-wheats for breakfast these are just healthy enough they are kept in Tupperware pourable containers and juice comes in small amber glasses it is apricot nectar it is ambrosia it is grape juice and of course there are people aunt kate has the orange chair and grandma has whichever one she wants of course this is her house and her scrabble board on the kitchen table she knows how to spell every word and no matter how much older I get she will always know more I am waiting to grow smarter to grow older but for now I am content with a walk to pick flowers down around the block and past my father’s old school through a rusty playground and closer to the river but not that close you cannot hear the water you cannot see the fish for the trees but coming up the turn again it’s the church and the sign and the factory also the corner store catty-corner to her house and the picture in my mind whenever I read a novel or a short story in which a corner store appears it is this one on the corner of Jefferson and nostalgia back up the front porch we walk or around back into the parking lot where the ladies in their wide cars would land and step into the shop to be primped and poofed and talked to and listened to and in this parking lot I learned to ride a bike through the eighties my father and I so young in this picture and everyone else is too of course we are thinking about Popsicles and we are trying to be cool in this summer the sun visor is keeping off and into the garage but there’s not enough room for people with the blue mustang pulled in and in the basement it’s just too scary alone but playing pool and eating apple pie in a years-later senior trip it’s just right just fine enough for bluster and twisting off the back half of the cue to take the right shot and the deep breath comes in and out slowly knowing it’s all still there safe and cool held in my hand with the rest of the wildflowers landing in the middle of the counter as we fix ourselves a snack

justwrite 20 february

listening to words half-heard and all said fed through a different tongue swallowed like old photos on a table translated through carbon-dated friendships remember when and send and receive there are leaves in the table and they fall and rise again we are getting things done but where are we getting where are we sitting and if we listen closely will we understand most or more and how will we know when the change happens will I dream in another language there is too much baggage to carry along and when I set something aside it hides and waits for the right moment I’m not a proponent of worrying but I’m hurrying away from the practice so slowly there’s responsibility and there’s a tendency a proclivity if you will for me to drink my fill of guilty interpretation we have eaten all those pancakes ourselves and we don’t need one more afternoon to sit and sit and when I say we I mean me but sometimes often and then once I walked down the street of a different down and the ice was so thick the people were like ships in this new song and the coveralls the Mexican coffee and a preponderance of other details made it seem almost real but then I closed my eyes on a bus and I woke up without having been asleep and it was as though I’d never left because I hadn’t it was as though the snow had changed its mind had left behind its plans a season early but what and how to keep track how to relax to counteract to retract to catch and release and other words my fingers are locked and it’s not the clock that’s looking I will be your penpal I will hang your address on the wall I will not call you unless and no one will guess this is not a situation worth recounting nothing amounting to peanuts slipped into trailmix a quickfix and a faster tempo all I meant to say switched off to a folk dance a chance encounter with fir trees and women selling their husbands at the bazaar this time it’s green rye and nice guests we all take our turns nah nah nah naahhing it’s the right thing to do it’s the cheapest that’s true and when I remember the one about making vareneky I’ll put that one down too but it’s been proven once again I can’t listen to music and write about anything else at the same time let’s see there was popcorn and that dropped another norm into place looking around this space and inventorying that’s enough storying for this effort better luck next text

justwrite 18 february

as the icy tires change their mind again and again around the sounds about the courtyard in any other language would echo as loudly as proudly as merrily we go along playing elementary piano songs and we long for the next book the next level the color orange or maybe blue the one that looks best under your arm from lessons or on the stand in the corner mourning each moment closed waiting for exposed notes to turn into sound and not sound but music truth and delight the light in the air and this might be a bit much but I’m a soft touch on this subject there’s no doubt and in this cup there are no trout because though there’s water there’s a flyswatter’s worth of a chance that dancing in that amount would add up to enough to keep our friend freely breathing easing atoms from molecules or castanets from droplets dancing dancing off-stage and it’s all the rage the hit parade and the memory of a thousand suns running like the wind and other idioms like beating the rug in the dark always with this courtyard my life looking at a courtyard ought to be the title of this experience but it’s also listening too and my professor would call it a long time looking at the lid but that’s his life and not how he leads it but as an autobiography that’s how he’d read it and also write it and never ignite it as if to spark an argument but when I showed up with two or four versions of my verses double-spaced and not and some other changes he said well it’s a pity you used the wrong lay this should be lie and still to this day I can teach this and not be sure I can smell the disease and forget the cure but when fireworks go off or maybe on if that’s a better usage still at any hour they cannot be still and at this time this is what they’re doing this is how they’re stewing their just desserts and wondering until it hurts if this is what life is all about just exploding for a brief moment of noise totally sight unseen over a courtyard where a man is beating a rug in the dark of an icy Friday and then to be gone completely replaced by the sound of a loudmouthed cellphone conversation and the unsteady beating of the rug

justwrite 17 february

you’re right that’s exactly the way to go the throw too high and when we kept our arms up all that time and we spun and kicked and lifted that pole higher and around again I felt light-headed and imagined myself sitting down saying no I’m fine thank you and I imagined pulling my jeans on over and stumbling out unreasonably with sneakers carrying my boots to the bus and the fuss no one would make because this is how I do it’s fine and true until it’s not and I drop but this time the air cleared the cold-giving door closed and we went about our business as if nothing ever happened because it didn’t I’m fine I said and then I was also on the wall this map and outside the dark and tomorrow tomorrow there is no pace to creep by on and it’s not petty to think about allusions we are the truth we week we are our own health to toast to and when the most few become the least many then too shall we wonder about our language skills how paying no bills will set us free and in this economy she says and she shakes her head for emphasis for sympathy from the room yes but have you seen the paper he asks and shakes his head although it’s unclear whether and why there and to whom and for what purpose this story is inserting itself at this juncture just a puncture wound but you ought to keep it in place until the doctor can have a look it’s a book and a prayer and a jump and a dare although the sockets and the bottled pockets are all wadded up with chewing gum anticipation the frustration of getting excited for no reason and then telling yourself all about it when there’s no doubt it’s better to tell someone else some time it’s better to send someone that thin dime to spend that word in absurd profit-making pursuits in cahoots with the tin man and other characters we despair we create villains instead of heroes in our exercise books and we pluralize crooks into infamy we’re getting an apartment she’s getting her hair redone he’s having some work replaced in there it’s sort of like an operation but without trepidation we signed the get-well card in advance why chance it why grant such a costly operation wings when it’s clear the singing has its own words to note and when it’s certain that dancing knows its own feet by rote and if you were afraid I could only end in some sort of certainty or rhyme then some times out of ten you’ll be wrong and I’ll be off-balance and there’s a chance this could be that time

justwrite 16 february

but when I got outside finally bundled and trundled and long-slept the wind was so cold tearing tears from my eyes later the glare too but in the early early world just the wind slicing while feet go slowly show no progress best their own forward the best efforts they make taking no cakes and making me late to the bus pulling away and I wait but too late and the next one is wrong and the next maybe right but I let it go by waiting for a better bus to come but of course it doesn’t and I should have I ought to have but no matter I wait and finally it is too late to wait longer I walk down toward the otherway street planning to have a plan and attended again by the field-crossing german Shepard a young one a lean lady pacing along beside me across the steppe which might be a courtyard and hard to tell why but moving along is better and here she is again as I head elsewhere purposefully passing the cabs I will not pay for this mistake this is one I’ll carry myself and shake my own head at and when we get to the next corner I see it’s –15 and this is a little too much to consider while the sky is still dark so I cross and floss my steps through an icy expanse the glazed waves raised off the sidewalk never even in the best of times and in this cold the lines are hard to read and harder to step between but I do not fall and do not think about it my friend loops along the sidewalk keeping an eye on me and I do my best not to worry her with my unsteadiness I imagine others passing by imagine that she is my own dog and we are out together on a purposeful morning walk and so we are but so she is not and she investigates nearby stretches as I push forward on the sidewalk and as we pass another bus stop crowd of three morning waiters she darts ahead too proud to be owned even in a supposing sort of way but past these unnoticing standers she is beside me again and we are looking for the best way to cross the frozen mud in front of the alpha club and as neither of us are too impressed by any sort of alpha anything at this point in the morning we don’t even look in the door to see who might be looking out as is the usual tendency in front of a place like this and off she goes and now I lead and she checks me we stray we stay and finally I am at my door she has lagged and when I glance back I nod and she imagines she can make me understand what she means

justwrite 14 february

it’s a scary view but the truth is useless when it’s so cold there’s nothing to hold onto and the storm drain remains the last best hope a ditched effort a cleft chin a swimming sin and a just-after-eating reflection collecting the best minutes of the day and making a sandwich with beans and cheese and freezing the yogurt until it’s almost too late to swim in that quarry again there are no hands to hold it’s been ten years since this clear of an evening dawned as if such a thing were possible and it’s all been disposable reclosable but not resealable everything is leaking out by little bits the drips and the wonders through the mirrors the reflections collecting in pools where fools on occasion slip in and look for a new face finding an older one looking back a counteractive measure a treasure worth mailing away we have learned and we have earned interest but I am going to sleep alone and there’s plenty to atone for and all that could have been done all that’s ever been lost and a salad too-much tossed in the wind because today it’s even icier the barbeque spice is dicier and the cabbage plays along obediently pretending with me that this is delicious and not just nutritious we are taking our turns with bows and how we need that feedback and we attract attention of not the right sort look I will help you look I will tell you how you ought to maybe and when it’s time for you to save me it’ll be too late this is not the kind of writing I’d like to be doing right now and so I’ll switch I’ll scratch some other itch what I’d like to write about is the sound in the hallway at a certain morning point when the stairwell door open and four paws of longish nails scatter down the hall toward my door across from which a family of cats occasionally rests and as this wet nose tests the grounds to make sure all’s in order the man by the door is calling back good boy good boy there are no problems now good boy and I am thinking about going to sleep because all is fine now there are no problems good girl good girl time to go for a walk and this morning walking across a field the sound of birds the sudden shaking-out of an occasional sheet tossing blackbirds out into the sun then returning to oblivion and allowing them to settle into unexpected trees dressed for winner and weary with waiting even in the sun

justwrite 13 february

when it’s your birthday and then it’s the next day you celebrate anyway you pay your own ticket fare and square you jaw you hem and haw wondering if you’re being read and keeping your chin up instead of dragging down the alongway home the drone and the mean plus the average of the square and other calculations face this nation and despite despising unionizing we are turning ourselves redder than we think we drink in confusion and we spit out illusions turning the tunes around lounging in sweatpants and dancing to awkward songs the kinds you’re not supposed to dance to but it’s true I never learned there are ways I never lean and there are stories I can’t mean in the first person although rehearsing those lines always sounds just find in the shower the accent is clearer the mirror too near though when eyes look back at you it’s true that the nerves kick in it’s a sink or swim crawl and all the kings’ horses never went to the YMCA never paid to play in that fray we of the preschool variety we of the tiny feet daycare we and our hair never cut by roving safety scissors we of the many-windowed room distant toward the highway but smells from the side of the pool angling through the red mats the blue mats and all the naptime that ever there was there were graham crackers which seem to matter in recollection and also smocks cubbies I think and bags with important belongings carried back and forth and sometimes left behind but no one minds when you’re of a certain age you’re all on the same page even though the parents and the teachers are in different books some other kind of series not highlights for kids at the dentist’s office with the smug realization that you are gallant and not goofus and yes you would always do the right thing in such a situation too and the next page is the one where you find all the hidden pictures you are a champion you are the waiting room hero and when your name is called this is the carpet you ride back to find out you have cavities because yes juice has sugar too and this is where the truth sets in again a little too close and the drilling sends it home but never mind and anyway and there’s nothing left to do but play until dinner with the sweet success of earned sympathy turning to look at you and smile sympathetically while wondering still how such a thing as a cavity could have happened under their watch and isn’t that how it always is cliché plié and done with ballet

justwrite 10 february

now I am comparing with faring well how the spell can lift itself how the grammar can change its health to a more certain sort we’ve purported to have made transfers but I’ve carried the same answers along on most of this trip my grip is tight and my cause is right if that’s a good way to say it that’s a true way to play it I’ve been telling stories but most of them are true and it’s a blue eagle and a sudden star that make the cover when no one else is making news it’s a brigade of self-savers and cotton layers in this age of wondering about the weather the feathers tickle our own noses our fancies our pants are made of rags and our arms are filled with something else but still we keep our balance still we remember how the wild fern got its wings and where the angel grows there are many titles that make me smile but for different reasons and in upcoming seasons I will plant an enchanted something and see what grows a seed for shoes a trap for maps to collapse into and aHA I will say and play hard to get lifting all the corners and making a parachute giving a hoot and taking an owl waking up late and throwing the towel into the corner the mourners are all keeping their laces tucked in no one wants to be accidentally sucked in when there’s something else to do I had plans and so did you but here we’re both sitting and we’re getting colder and older and while the wondering smolders in a painted eye across the room let’s dig in let’s build something out of energy the kind that doesn’t blow up let’s splice atoms and make sandwiches not explosions the erosion of confidence in the brilliance of technology innovation raises questions teaches almost lessons but falls short of staking claims one and the same these answers serve no one any good and it’s ridinghood neighborwood where all are welcome and the makebelieve is too good to be true

justwrite 9 february

I’m making the case for making the grade I’m fading in and out of doubt but the route is mostly clear the fear felt ought to melt away at the approach of sleep but the deep digging leads to the rigging of such an election it’s hard to keep connections snapping and sparking all day barking up the wrong trees the easy views and the long-lost truths we set free long ago they’ve come back to cage the birds which can sing and the ring is too rosie to keep wearing so it’s a riveter a deliverer and yes we can demand yes we can sand the blasted whatever it’s a measure for measure and that petty pace keeps creeping we are leaping to conclusions without even thinking half of once much less twice and it’d be nice to be awaker it’d be nice to be a baker if all you had was a cupcake truck but you’re out of luck if you think those are safe because Amanda thought so too and look where that got her through the night and all is right at this point but I remember her junior year and a bucket full of fear and misplaced disasters the rafters are all singing and the bringing home does not result in bacon on this station but here we cheer for sort of tortillas here we leer and peer and make other sort of looks into the books as we close that case as we erase that space and fill it all up as we cup our fingers in each sleeve leaving no room left for cards no hardened truths the youth have set out to dry the feelings fry in the sun and the pan isn’t greased but it’s a catch and release egg and it’s begging to be waylaid off in some pasture no one will ever catch up no one will ever spill the supper out across the television screen as the reruns and leftovers cycle over and cycle over under the green word tree under the apple pie bee spelling itself over and under U S A U S A

justwrite 8 february

all those questions are sent out and the doubts are free to flee to go their own way to pay their own passage and it’s a voyage with massive debts creeping their way up the scale but as we flail also do we call out for the captain and when we realize that we’re the ones driving this here ship then we flip our own minds and not our fingers that’s a lingering reminder of how the behinder you get the less you admit you’re falling when you’re calling eleven times you’re begging the chimes to just fall right off to just cough in the face of illusion to sneeze the breeze faster to court an open-window disaster it is creativity run riot it is a quiet situation with no destination we are not running we are sunning our hair our toes we suppose ourselves immune to such inanity but meanwhile the sanity of a solid nap presents itself and helps its own cozy nature to a spot on the couch and I think I write about this yesterday or anyway not too long ago and the flow has gotten caught as well it often does when I buzz my own button at the end of the session I had hoped for another dimension to come tramping along and sing a smoothcool song of the iced honey variety sliding along down the throat of a teaswallow perched on a branch and listening with its wings

justwrite 7 february

trying to be on top you find there’s only one mind about it and nobody does the elbows that shove aside this tablecloth are scratched with the ratchety cough that does no one any good wind no blowing ill either there’s a spill in which aisle and nobody comes down that one wearing a ring or a grin or any other combination of those self-same letters we’ve all got green sweaters and we’re doing our best to write a test that will likely get passed it’s a doggone blasted shame a tiger to tame and all those lame reprisals I’ve spent too much time writing things that are just not as exciting and now there’s not quite time now there’s hardly a climb left even back down I’m about to sleep at the top of the mountain despite suggestions to the contrary and very certain ones at that but at bat there’s no one like macy’s for giving the people what they want and haunting that tollbooth the phantom with the loose tooth singing in cacophony and cackling with a throaty throw-back attack on the senses there are more dimensions here than meet bruce willis horatio and I’ll have you know I won’t be around waiting for them all on my own not at this time of night

justwrite 6 february

here there are sorts cohorts of a semblance the theme the kind the day the mind had thought out in advance hasn’t quite happened hasn’t trapped all those blitzens hasn’t played in uncle john’s band or even come to see them there’s a frozen drink and a kitchen sink but no one needs to feel sick no one needs to build bricks out of gold or sticks out of old bread we’re wedded to ideas but not to people we make our churches without any steeples with only sky with clouds rolling by and other songs we are wrong and we are writing we are righting all the overturned apple carts before the horses close the barn doors there are metaphors beyond this one but they’re no fun after all there are too many curtains to make that call and all I can think about is drinking in the warm air of an afternoon with no lists with straight bliss and iced tea there’s a breeze and an open window and the couch has its own ideas but the apple tree and again with the apples we cannot escape we cannot drape crepes all over our plates and call them pancakes there are stakes and there are waking dreams there are themes we cannot forget and bits we cannot shake we cannot bake we cannot mistake ourselves our greater elves and our lesson plans we are grading on a curve even when we deserve honesty we can give it but not take it we are rhyming internally and burning infernally it’s too not hot it’s just got to have a different ending pretending those jeans make sense but she chose them for me she’s got her own story and soon it’ll change the words will rearrange themselves and the stealthy glances will take their chances turning into ideas worlds apart turning art into life and biting off more bullets than your eyes can hold

justwrite 3 february

when the groundhog last glared there were too many stripes to wipe with never-running colors no others could’ve lasted could’ve blasted through their banisters all along the mulberry steps having leapt up and over that endless waterfall that talks that balks at dreams and it seems in one last night I was in my right apartment but it was much bigger a juicy figgier pudding we all want some and so many people there for the party sitting at a table I’m able to see faces I recognize one I just met and one’s from a little longer ago and today awake I find that one’s having a birthday today I never could have known and the other’ll have flown in this weekend without flying of course it just sounded cooler we are fooling ourselves with these interpretations but it’ll save the nations if we just unite why we can’t be friends as the song goes but no throwing down just calling out and catching trout instead of worry and rainbows instead of clouds since that’s all that’s allowed on this boat full of professionals but really who thought that’d be a good idea since I can’t translate my state to a relatable manner much less a professional essay the stress weighs but I press off and swim into the dark of sleep reaping rewarding yawns and waking just to stretch

justwrite 1 february

because it’s the first of the month I have a hunch that tomorrow’s the day we play hide from the shadow we grab our pillows and shiver into the morning we are dawning merry and bright our Christmases are whiter than we remember but the timber builds a city not rock and roll but the toll it takes is mistakenly high we are trying our best we are passing the tests out and others are taking them we are not quite mistaking them but we have done some things incorrectly we’ll be along directly and all the answers will come true all the stones will run through your hands like so many beads you’ll wear them on your neck and you’ll recollect how things used to be when you weren’t quite as completely free with a hand to hold and a pocket to reach into that wasn’t your own there’s a different zoning ordinance now and it’s a holy cow that crosses this street and rests look! in the shade under the trees breezing through meaning without seeming to get stuck without such dumb luck as we may have gathered before we tour around the park and we tear around the edges we catch up and we call each other thank you I say thank you you say and there’s nothing to apologize for but that’s never stopped anyone when the windows opposite blink closed I feel indisposed to continue I plan to shut my eyes but find surprise in continuing in the ice illuminated by a car on the road and all the ice all the everywhere messily erased snow mashed into the too-fine paper messy all over the fallingdown walks the socks that can’t make it down the stairs the whistles inside from mouths unaware of the necessary precautions had I bought such a think at auction I’d be proud but as it is I’ve allowed myself just a moment to note to gloat and now to move on there are offers there are proffers but still empty are the coffers though the coffins just keep filling up this is how life goes and also doesn’t this is the way I say things that mean something but pretend that they don’t and when the computer slows down in offering permission to the appearance of my words I hurry absurdly along imagining that I can trick it into believing that what I say has value when really what it’s come to is me out-thinking the screen the fingers the lingering thought that I’m not in control does little to console me and I think of pushing the button