Fortune Cookie

mine had winning lottery numbers

I paid $2 for a Lotto

nothing matched

I made tea with your shredded letter

it played mumblety-peg with my digestive system

checked the mailbox three times

slipped the mail carrier a twenty

he handed me a new patient flyer

for a local dentist named Cookie Poe

I chewed on that the rest of the day

until I cracked a wisdom tooth

unfortunately

and she had to put me under

 

[RK, 1/11/2026 ]

Morning Report

A wall of paper fortunes and threads, 

a letter shredded, made into tea,

the dream of order slipped 

into every cup in my cupboard.

I’m as happy as I’ve ever been.

[LSS, 10/27/25, 10:27 a.m.]

 Infrathin part 2 (a dialogue between day and dreams)

LSS – The New México trip reminded me of the importance of being a part of an artists’ group. We stayed at a ranch that was once an artists’ retreat. Huxley, O’Keeffe, Lawrence. All stayed there from time to time. It made me thankful for my local art groups and our writing project.

 

RK – I just had a long dream about a multi-artist art opening in a huge gallery. My old friend Tim was the star of the night - they were taking his work off the walls after selling the items, and then putting up more of his work. I felt myself illuminated by his star glow. It was a great show and a great crowd.

All the artwork was meaningful and amazing.

Since the stroke I have the most incredible and lengthy dreams

 

LSS – Dreams are a gift. I look forward to falling asleep after reading at night. I love dreaming.

I never have nightmares.

 

RK – I believe that

 

LSS – Bizarre dreams, yes, lots of those.

 

RK – I so wanted that gallery dream to be real

 

LSS – How would you describe “meaningful?”

 

RK – give me a few minutes on that one

The work was both efficacious and socially relevant without being didactic.

 

LSS – More social than personal in meaning?

 

RK – It triggered viewers in a positive way

I imagine all social relevance is tied to the personal

let me amend that to 'politically/socially relevant'

 

LSS – Timely. Current. In that direction?

 

RK – yes

the always evolving social zeitgeist

 

LSS – Got it.

 

[RK 10/24/2025]

 

Infrathin part 1

“A mystery interstellar object discovered last week is likely to be the oldest comet ever seen – possibly predating our solar system by more than three billion years, researchers say. The object was first spotted on 1 July 2025 by the ATLAS survey telescope in Chile, when it was about 670 million km from the Sun. The ‘water ice-rich’ visitor, named 3I/ATLAS, is only the third known object from beyond our solar system ever spotted in our cosmic neighbourhood and the first to reach us from a completely different region of our Milky Way galaxy. It could be more than seven billion years old, according to University of Oxford astronomer Matthew Hopkins.” – Newly discovered interstellar object 'may be oldest comet ever seen' | The Royal Astronomical Society [retrieved 10-24-2025]

you said I’ve been talking about death since we met

well death was here twice now

grabbing my ankles and shaking me upside down

in a hasty bid for spiritual loose change

one night the house became so quiet

that the shadows strived to escape

since then I have difficulty sleeping in darkness

I want to believe that after all my decades of

posturing and theorizing

the telescope finally swung in the correct direction

seeing things that were always there

but which I never looked for

nor knew existed

tumbling for billions of years

before threatening this thin fabric

[RK 10/24/2025]

Marginal Note

The glue spreaders are dying  

and the eaves are drying

after their nightly cry.

Nothing sticks anymore.

The singularity of doing

something for the first time,

the myth, the superstition, 

the melancholy. 

We must imagine Sisyphus 

happy, Camus tells us,

doing the same thing everyday 

as if it were the first time.

[LSS, 12/3/24]

Couplet

When you wake up you will see 

all of the houses are now trees.

[LSS, 12/3/24]

What The Falcon Knows

in 1992 you and your children watched the sparrowhawk

tear apart a songbird, steaming guts in the snow

much better than the make-believe violence of

Saturday morning cartoons

thirty-four years later I pause on the paved

bicycle trail beneath miles of high-voltage wires

stretched between iron pylons parallel

to splintered wood poles moving electricity

into houses and mobile home parks

two kestrels perch there, occasionally dropping down

for lizards and grasshoppers

a short lifespan of less than five years

fires the intensity of patient waiting and

promises of fulfilling meals

just watching them makes me hungry

for things I can no longer experience

the first time

[RK, 11/28/24]

“Naked in the Snow”

“It could be kind of Scandinavian,”

he says about the title he’s suggesting, 

“but don’t show any bodies.  

You’re not good at bodies.”

[LSS, 11/22/24]   

 In Media Res

Not for beginners.

[LSS, 11/21/24]

In Media Res: Lullaby

When opening any one of my sketchbooks to any random page 

you are likely to find a house floating above its foundation,

no lag bolts, no tethers, no long chains of thought holding it down.

The house you will find on any random page

will never be my first house, if I ever had a first house, 

but always the house I am drawing right now.

[LSS, 11/21/24] 

Last Accessed

You say
We are always turning the pages
to the same page
Not the same page over and over again
but some random, successive page

I say
I’m going to use that phrase

You say
It’s a poem, your poem

I say
possession is nine-tenths of the connection
positively charged electrodes and copper wires
making your dream house elevator
function properly
those tight line drawings distort perspective
the cabin becomes a mansion
the yurt becomes a pyramid
all that time invested in the exact placement
of rooms and doors

I say
we are always opening the doors
to the same room
not the same room over and over again
but some random, successive room

[RK, 11/16/24]

Updating the Password Book

The synchronicity of a new password 

entered onto the blank line

and the ending of a period of mourning 

for all the things you thought 

would never change.

[LSS, 11/16/24]

The New World

Here I have made my life 

again and again and again 

remembering what it is

to live my life again.

[LSS, 6/27/24]

Home Depot

I love the tiger lily 

you brought 

home for me today; 

repair projects 

never end.

[LSS, 5/31/24]

T-minus 11

Burned toast, raw yolk,

a few last words

on the unswept floor.

[LSS, 5/7/24]

Thanks, A.I.

Seventeen minus six

equals eleven.

[RK, 5/5/24]

Midnight Snack

I am stuffing my mouth

with whole, rotting cantaloups,

caravans of them,

to avoid being the one

who eats that precious plum.

[LSS, 4/17/24]

Those Fucking Plums (Home Sweet Home)

I researched those plums you swiped
and kept packing and repacking
from hectic to happiness

they stayed cold even though
you apologized for your obvious theft
from icebox to the icy northwest

I’m not surprised you failed to recognize
your plum-purple horse-drawn caravan
parked there alongside abandoned houses

sweet comes to mind, whether fresh fruit
or home sweet home, pushed along in your
red wheelbarrow.

[RK, 3/31/24]

Here and Now

It’s a dream I’ve been having 

about moving 

into my two-houses-ago house 

while living 

in my one-house-ago house, 

not recognizing this house 

I am waking into.

[3/30/24]

Not Rhetorical

At what point 

does what you 

are looking for 

become what you 

are looking at.

[LSS, 3/23/24]

 

Yet (Again)

here I am waiting 

for another poem,

some forgotten stream 

I was meant to walk into

(meant to walk out of?)

not remembering

yet (again) what

quicksand looks like

and where it lies.

[LSS, 3/1/24]

 

Diamond Underwear

Resolution is no resolution. 

There are no days.

There is no waiting, no patience, 

no revelation minor or major.

There is no day to begin counting.

There is nothing to count.

There are no words and no such 

thing as a poem.

[LSS, 2/4/24]