Night Train

An ersatz aurora fluttering in a tube 

above a bowl of fortune cookies

and a new white landscape waiting

inside of everything. 

[LSS, 5/29/22]

Evidence

I can’t dispose of the evidence
traces remain, and the forensic team of
concerned citizens squander their time
replicating the artifacts via
words, echoes, song lyrics, and
dispassionate glances

I’m not fooled
by the pretense of imagination or
friendship, ha! what a laugh
the train once looped in circles, spirals,
Venn diagrams delineating and defining
the word ‘chance’

I look out the window at the passing landscape
it’s quite new, Arctic white, bright as
mis-matched emotions, liquid as plate tectonics
once-useful archetypes litter the prairie
even at night the aurora
is untouchable

[RK, 5/29/22]

Out of Print

hidden by green debris
the limpkin shrieks
eye-opener headline
tsunami, turnover, turncoat
Mr. Benedict Arnold

back page obituaries
survived by, in loving memory
instead of flowers the family requests
and yet
penny saver, thrifty nickel
pages flipped
coffee shop chit-chat
floats away and all that remains
is the scratched Formica counters

it used to be enough, now
not even a footnote

[RK, 5/29/22]

Self Portrait with Prepositions and Bird

Reading in the dark

with a flashlight 

pointing into the woods

to light the last words

of the manuscript 

the owl is writing

on my bones.

[LSS, 5/27/22]

 

When You Stopped Caring

about the aphids and the artifacts

and the architecture of your dreams

you left 

just enough evidence on the beach

for the rest of us to believe

the incoming tide would bring

you back.

[LSS, 5/25/22]

Seam Ripper

You might think that all it takes 

to hold some things together 

is silk from a tightly wound spool, 

never minding the tension of the thread, 

the fear of breaking mid-seam, 

the necessity of tools close at hand 

to remove the errant stitches, and a place 

to save the threads for later.

[LSS, 5/21/22]

 

The K–Pg boundary

when a hippopotamus yawns, the universe is revealed
black holes, quasars, galaxies, dark matter, quarks

moons, magnetism, gravity, organic compounds
oil rigs, polar bears, asphalt, dodos, ice fish

electric cars, sugar buns, nuclear reactors, obsidian, vertebrae
pinatas, horses, fairy wasps, sunfish

Venus clams, Mars bars, Saturn cars
Pluto, Mickey Mouse

narcissism

[RK, 5/20/22]

Feeding Frenzy

are symbiotic relationships evident in Cambrian layers?
how can we explore a quartz-filled slip-fault when crystals
gamely propagate in undiscovered Canadian Shield caves?

fastidious, faltered, fixated on near-Arctic idyls
where the Cod Moratorium devastated quaint villages
and left behind the twenty-four-seven wake-up call

trillions of microbes and light-years of mycelium in tons of soil
toil beneath our feet, Tolstoy once asked
how much land does a man need?

[RK, 5/19/22]

Action Crusader in Retirement

“Here on this molehill I will sit me down.”—3 Henry VI

patiently awaiting
congregating
tango impossibility
confines of the bang-o
the cha-cha-charred carbon
that is no longer “fun”
banned from Abstract Expressionism
pressured to accept
adept manipulation and its attendant
slant of political persuasions
unable to proceed
balanced against the need
to feed the monster
of stir-crazy emotions
making a dent in the workload
patiently awaiting

[RK, 5/19/22]

Check Any Boxes That Apply

you would think honey in the tea sweetens the day

or that manual labor sharpens the mind

that a tacit agreement is enforceable when shove comes to shove

you would think a black racer snake understands

the hardware cloth nailed across the lower edge of the gate

how the garden only contains aphids

not worth the trouble

you would think passing fascination in natural phenomena would fade

of course it fades

each seashell, rock, mushroom, leaf, bird

turns to artifacts overnight

you would think I would stop caring

you would be correct

[RK, 5/15/22]

Lovely Ashes

Falling asleep in a six-year-old synthetic shirt meant for

hipsters exercising on weekends

fluorescent orange, looks-brand-new

I LOL and imagine the end

slid into the crematorium fire

wrapped in impossible polymer chains

[RK, 5/15/22]

The Wow Signal

Here’s the gap between

            mycelium and fruiting body

            whirlybird maples seeds and pancakes

            almost homonyms selfish and shellfish

            Grand Canyon and caesura

Here’s the moment

            you cross that cable suspension bridge

            find a dressy hat worthy of your intent          

            channel Wile E. Coyote and order

            ACME products online

Use your scant knowledge of western philosophy

            as a sword and a shield

[RK, 5/15/22]

April is the Second Cruelest Month

I’ve been remiss with that and this

located the source of my sinus pounding

solved all the crosswords in the day’s gaps

flipped conundrums like pancakes

stacked in peculiar tilted piles

the leaning tower of pancakes!

its not the hip, but the gluteus maximus,

gluteus medius, quadriceps lacking that certain

je ne sais quoi, once gathered in abundance

[RK, 5/15/22]

Ode to the American Oystercatcher

thy long, orange, dagger-shaped bill and beady eye

pink legs with toes spread wide beneath the sky

scampered, hopped, sauntered across the neap tide sand

owner of all you survey, minus broken shells on the strand

 

here’s the shingle, you inveigle your way past the last of summer’s tourists, 

snowbirds lacking words for the splendor of your tender philosophy

[RK, 5/15/22]

Threads

if you read this please recall

time spent by the lake, our placid

yet hurried, uncertain grasping for

elusive, intangible experiences, how they

unraveled for the first time and

how we lost the threads, not knowing

it was all that held us together

[RK, 5/15/22]