One dog sniffs – a poet’s calling

One dog sniffs the other’s behind,
“You artistic?” he asks.

no hiding, let’s follow our noses:
{Adultery in the reception line}
ignored—the best man wants to hug the bride.
{Hell in the visitation line}
ignored—the mother collapses on the casket.

my roommate sometimes smells my children
“What’s the raison de etre of your joie de vivre,” he asks.
“I don’t know,” I reply,
“but it sure sounded like a female in a men’s restroom:
good and frightening.”

Your dream girl

shits and pisses and bleeds and winces–
especially during the miracle of life.
She is not some smooth plastic object or mechanized road machine.
She is a living organism breathing and trying to find her way through life,
weak and strong, brimmed with success and tragedy–
the solemn and the sullen, the giggle and the hiccup.
She is fluid and fickle, steadfast and solid–
awaiting your coming, yet venturing forth without you.

She is your dream girl but never was a dream.

Family heirlooms

The kitchen chairs slowly turn to face the TV,
and the parents quit asking (even during commercials)
but want to know more then ever–
hoping to be a friend,
afraid to rebuke, terrified to be rebuked,
as if respect and obedience aren’t
parent and child:
family heirlooms in the hands of the childless.

Sometimes I lie

sometimes I lie,
I bite myself–forking:
You’re saving souls from fire
and day to day desolation,

and for a moment, the fangs are enough
to not slit my scaly skin,
ignoring others’ bleeding,
like me! in self-pity,

tragedy keeps me humble–thirsty
to stare, into cringes and dying corpses
decaying on the desert, I swivel on
with no eyelids I cannot cry.

but the sun still shines
behind clouds and over sandy mounds–
burning yet basking! and the cross
is enough tragedy to get me through.