justwrite 31 october

honest minutes the kind where you count and then keep counting until the end which is ten tomorrow is the first and this means the beginning working toward winning and nonstick skillets and other dream devices we have plans we make scandals happen and sort conflicts into the mix just to keep the story going but for now I’m showing a blank since there’s something in the tank not nothing not a crank or a lever to pull it out though and so it’ll be slow to pour or unstore or get out of the doubt created in this space we’re replacing meaning with cleaning as you can see here but it’s a steerclear view and a baby elephant too yes I saw that picture can’t imagine it’s real but what an odd thing to feel if you photoshopped a baby ellie just to get it on telly by which I mean the internet and to straight that set I’m not sure if it’s telly or tellie and now I am the first one’s best and the rest which means the second well it’s the first loser the wrong story chooser we will start on page one we will make our own fun and we will gently close the doors on other bores and more than the wild masculine swine doing fine based on research and other knee-jerk reactions just trying to get some traction in this itchy pitchy world hurling back and forth fastballs and curtain calls the cattle all out to pasture searching for disaster or maybe just lunch something to munch in the meantime between sleep gotta keep on your feet if you’re an upstanding citizen nothing much to it just not sitting down just turning away from the crown if it’s offered and scoffing just a little ticklish in the middle and with other sensitive spots we’re caught between rocks and hard places the shoelaces pulled tight and the lights bright enough to read by and by the way I’d like to say I’m not sure that when it’s yesterday I’ll know what I’m writing either but that’s the way to please yourself just start writing and keep calm stay wild and file nothing away no piles can stay untouched it’s too much to ask for it’s a story and a half and a collapse of reason I’m treasonous in my double use of this word it’s absurd but I haven’t time to look up something else there’s general health and a kernel of truth and the infantry’s got no use for horses of course but they’d be happy to have some beans and in this and other scenes I look around and through the window wondering who’ll show wondering how to go onward not just away heading forward not just to day but through night and into wonder we’re wandering hours away playing confident but dreaming worry there’s no hurry there’s just doing and the trouble that’s brewing can be swept away with write what you know and see how they go all around the cobbler’s bench and if you’re a monkey you’re with me and if you’re afraid then run off free and we will have the gooseberries we will storm the sky with cherries and you will never have to wonder why

justwrite 30 october

with two computers on I turn away and open my notebook these are ivory cream French vanilla pages with lines in only one direction no need for graphics no corrections collapse down on these angles we try to make shapes of the thoughts that escape our minds tie them with our tongues we’re hung out like tired laundry waiting for the sun and when the numbers are run and we see just who’s won then I for one will be eating eggs for breakfast and calling for refills my hair needs trimmed to drop to be or not to drop I’m co-opting each cabinet shelf and toasting the health of bread to crispy gold instead of doughy white the paste that rights cheese and raises jam we are the fans and we shake hands with opportunity lifting slices to the sun on hopeful forks

justwrite 29 october

Round the bend and through the deep we creep upward the absurd topics the pieces of art falling from the sky we are tired no one’s fired just peering around the edge the end-all the be-all of cattle calls we’re stalling until something different comes along we’re strong enough to bluff the listener tough enough to stuff a potato with and bake it twice take it with rice or veggies of the day we’re playing hard we’re rising above the shoves and running in loops we’re flying through hoops with no strings attached we’ve collapsed our options ‘til there’s nothing for adoption we were watching the series but now it’s bleary eyes and no surprise there’s a winner after seven there’s no other way to go no other row to hoe and if a nonstick pan’s in my future then I’m ready to get cookin’ it’s an easy-lookin’ mirror with one-way features we’re waiting in the bleachers for the show to go on

justwrite 28 october

this time it was mashed potatoes and another sticky situation but the way out is tricky when I came in to the office today our cross-hall neighbor told me I was sick because I have no love in my life no beloved and I thought about shaking my head but I decided just to nod of course of course and then I gave away three carrot cakes and no mistakes I went thrift wandering and found a late fall coat in the last shop for a little more than a dollar and I’m surprised I said shop but sometimes it sounds more classy than store will I turn british before I leave Ukraine and if not what will remain with me will I say vokzal will I say kasa and related terms I’ve earned two different future views in the last day and a half and it’s a master’s and a laugh where the laugh is a bakery but really that’d be sweet and other puns I’m stunned I haven’t used that one before well it’s horrible to imagine I might not have ideas enough to fill a novel but always they’re churning and earning interest the interstate managers and the chocolate pies the reasons why and the correspondence courses we’re riding horses upstream without carts before paddles and nothing much matters as we can see from this trajectory I made a list and ignored it I had a dream and I snored it off scaring the toaster and popping the corn we scorn high hair and red lips but the trip’s really in seeing the season change through rose-colored calendar pages going through stages and ending up back behind the curtain certain the crowd’s waiting to go wild but with a secret fear there’s no one here but yourself it can’t be helped and so you step into the spot and bleary-eyed into the light

justwrite 27 october

fell in love on the bus today this happens sometimes and it doesn’t take much a pleasing profile viewed from the right side and a closelook as I smile out the window I am pleased with this sideby something as we go merrily along there’s no need to say anything just a wide wonder and nodding with the road bumping along alone together but the clincher is when a lady with a stroller is getting off and he jumps up to help her lift it down and out carefully to the sidewalk a quiet champion sits back down an unassuming hero and I nod and smile on the outside too but not in any direction he hears my English phone call and closelooks again but what can I say and so I think about staying on the bus another stop or so plan my route home with a longer walk just to sit pleasantly a little longer to avoid being the one to walk away and I think of a different grocery store the chance for secondhand and he shows no sign of going anywhere so I wait in pleasant silence riding along but then it’s my stop and may i? I ask and he jumps up and yes yes I may though I wonder if I wish he had said no and how would the rest of the ride have gone but I never even saw the left side of his face this happens sometimes

justwrite 25 october

Freshtossed and unflossed from behind eyeteeth I see something with parts to unfold if I hold it too close it’ll roast and not in the frenchpressable way but to say what I want I mean to think aloud that I have crowding ideas and this one I’ve pulled out is no doubt lovely if I shove it into the spotlight perhaps delight will result but the tumult of teasing something into reality has the potential to unravel its beauty and now of all moments is hardly the time I’d rather untwine my fingers from each other their tight-held nails tapping down the days I’m staying ready but ahead of the clock and behind the curve I’d rather deserve an on-time delivery but these aren’t easy to achieve it’s soon to be November and if you’ll be so kind as to remember this is a big month this is a dumping ground for ideas surrounding October and all the rest those months spent accumulating and sorting funnel down to October night before November day we’ll say it’ll work out and I’ll push aside doubts of my friends and pretend confidence we’re meant to do this we’re sent to prove this is possible and by we I mean me and by possible I mean perhaps definite and I jot down pieces of play afraid to worry them with my fingers or thoughts afraid to have caught too much too early and if I hurry through these next days without passing through some other phase then I’ll arrive at November with a pocket full of scraps and my hat in my hand which will be something to see since my hats are all winter and my scraps are all splintered just don’t lean out too many windows every time the wind blows stick out your tongue for a temperature taste and make notes in a haste then set them aside if something’s implied it may be inferred later who will have heard state your claim when you name it stay the same just to frame it seems utterly absurd but the word’s not yet go so we’ll wait before we sow

justwrite 23 october

Sunday veggie the righteous the kindness of nutrients well spent in colorful array these are the delicious the prayers answered from the soil toiling in agreement with the sun the rain and captain planet by the power of grayskull and other references passing strange rearranged into sense into salad days we glaze our health with dressings the poppy seeds pressing through teeth and into gums the bob evans slums the rocking chair arms waiting room porches and the rest of the breakfast crowd loudly mumbling stomachs grumbling after church and before Monday the apple crumb day we are back we are tracking to the ground the dark brown which is natural and dirty the morning-thirty time best to work in gardens before the sun hardens beneath our feet in discreet rows the leaves show their readiness to go forth into stir fries to surprise mayonnaise at its own game the battle for potluck unstuck from the ground situation we offer up destinations like blue ceramic bowls and Tupperware holds the celery stalks its refrigerated station and the plums are already gone but the onions sing a song of earthy depth way down in the clear plastic hold to have and to embolden sauces the toss is up the coin comes down and we bow in recognition of the more than reasonable new conditions set forth of course by a well-meaning do-gooder who suggests we pass tests with more nutritious marks our shots in the dark aren’t quite as healthy and it’s true we’re not wealthy enough for pineapple appetizers but other surprises keep our table on topic sweetened with color these are the rainbows we explode all over the screen we mean well the ink spells out ingredients and the land the grocery fills the poetential as we multiply the elements and create new formulas the two parts to the three and the garlic and the cheese we are wary of sanitary cleanliness the ugly apples are the best the peppers passed over by the rest are going into this basket the shrine of farmer’s market time we see greens and hold them crisply close the bagels the plants and most other shades of homemade dairy glaring out in bright joy having and holding an image delivered not into indifferent kitchens welcome and be glad we have had nothing like this before this tomato restored to sunlight glory sliced in splendid offering on a whiteplastic cutting board the juices scoring lines across the map collapsing in surprise the seeds surmising the future will be different than imagined but hardly is it tragedy I lift it up and gladly toss with green and the scene closes on a rosy view of healthy wealthy wise

justwrite 22 october

Young rain stains its path as it trains its hope downward there’s nowhere else to go the air flows and the season breathes in we are listening for clues the useful answers dancing past their casts of thousands dropping in stopping by we well and we buy we try on for size and in the meantime I wanted to add something about color these are the numbers we remember these are the slumbers into November as my eyes close and the novel opens the right page the first stage and on come the characters bringing all their ragged baggage and other trite metaphors representatives for ideas that we’re afraid to mention the inner dimensions let out to play on vast white pages the curtain raises hope and the exit is still far off there are so many words to herd in the right direction no time for correction and the black and white spots moo into motion the easy devotion to practice to chewing a cud to nursing a muddled thought true to fruition there’s benefit to listening the tongue so fastglistening can also rest can pause between tests there’s no skill to being sharp there’s a shot in the dark and a tangled departure if that’s how it’ll be then take one for free and I’m off skipping maybe a stone maybe sinking maybe linking verbs into absurd chains the daisy plains waving in the breeze the forest and the trees the lentils and the cheese we are imagining the best and we are creating it the rest is not for today the rest have their own way and we see different colors we see we please ourselves and look outside there are windows and they go both ways we imagine some other phase and our fingers keep moving grooving into the keys and busier than trees by which I mean bumbling over stumbling blocks we have clocks but they don’t have us our certainties rust if not tested we too easily grow nested in comfortable stacks build up against attacks and forget to check the weather you could stay in there forever and send out for updates order in for cupcakes and when the rain comes when the floods wash away when nothing gold can stay you’ll forsake even frost and forget what was lost when all that’s clung to is what you’ve hung to the insides of the walls and there’s nothing outside at all from such an inside view and it’s probably true that I’ve lost you along this strand but it’s not canned it’s fresh and it’s not tex it’s mesh and if that’s what’s coming next than I am searching for a wreck to sail away there’s more time today than I thought there’d be and I imagine the same to infinity like tomorrow when the sun comes again as I imagine it’ll do then there’s much more that seems true enough to hope for and there’s a rope for climbing out but there’s another for pulling along and if this is a boat if there’s an over-wise goat then I don’t know where it’s going but I’d like to ride along and if you were to sing this back to me I’d laugh straight at your song