Desolation Crow

Dear World

someday I
will be gone

probably with work
unfinished

for half a century
after my vanishing

today feeling ill
I have one small
request should you look
like me

stop depicting my friends
as chimps

and gorillas because
you fear

the consequences
of history

that is you fear that those
with brown skin given

the chance would enslave
flog rape torture manacle scar

the lot of you
as we and I mean we once did
to their ancestors

it is true that some
might write a sarcastic poem
about you

perhaps this is what
you fear more

regardless you are being
impolite and as those who know
really know or have known me for more
than two and a half seconds
I do not condone violence that's like
the thing of Buddhism you dig?

but you need to stop with
the great-ape comparisons

for one thing more and more
apes are fluent in gestural
language, yes ASL

means more than age-sex-location
so call me or lay a pretty flower

on the ground where they scatter me
when you too can voice your grief

with the sign for tear on your cheek

I doubt you are so eloquent
if you cannot tell the difference

between a person who enjoys racist jokes
and a person like Koko who knew how to love

Holiday Snaps

The grandest, the best
in all of that was seeing you
happy and relaxed

I am beaming, just like you,
who so deserve such blessings

I Am Sorry

for eating
the cardboard

box that previously
held your copy paper

I am turning into
an alien insect and

no longer kiss because
under my tongue is a proboscis

Your boxes were tasty
so dry and so good for

the wings that buzz when I let
them out from under my skin

The Mute Elder Said

Ezili Danto, the scar-
faced Lwa who protects
women, was stabbed seven
times, but never fell down.

I met her in the market, where
she was hanging goods, and told
her about you. Now she is mute
but raised her eyebrows. Her mouth

curled in amusement, like, Child,
you got to be kidding. Don't you know
this one has a past? I said,
Madame Ezili (I always want

to be polite with elder
spirits of Vodun), I know
this one isn't fresh-

out-the-box new. That's what makes
him interesting, makes me want
to take him up, take care of him.

She smirked like Child, you got it bad.
Madame, I said, I could be wrong:
I think I'll get it good.

Let Me Not

to the marriage of true minds
admit impediments. Love is not love
that sees only your beauty. That desires
to change you from your silly, slantwise way,
your crooked smile, your lad's sense of what
strikes you funny. I would see your peace
of mind, your bounding happiness
before my own. I'd make you a wee home.
I have done already. In my dream, fireside,
I sat cleaning your boots, picking sharp gravel
out of the tread, as you snored in the other room.
The but-and-ben in my head is ready for your rest.
It is an ever-fixéd mark, so it is, to steer you by.
Let no remover remove the gentle heart of you.

The Earth Girlfriend

Lately I have been liking someone made of clay
and sand and boiling magma and scree
and the heights it crumbled from.

Sage grows between her legs and under her arms.
Thistledown in her hair, that and poison sumac,
that and cactus, every biome pumps

blood through her veins or vines. She so enjoys
lying sprawled on the beach, and climbing cliffs,
being divebombed by swallows all the way.

We met on a dating site. Her humor and charm
were no exaggeration. The red rocks
of Colorado speak a mile high

of her good qualities, the boreal forest
bristles with porcupines who testify
she is kind to bonsai, gentle with jays.

It is good of her to date my species. We take
advantage of her sweetness. In return
she has been lied to and abused,

but somehow under her crust, she finds it
deep within herself, a molten core belief,
that we can do good, too. O may

her prisoner optimism be as true in life
as rescued flying fox bats embracing
towels at the rescue. May I return

no scar to this one, no pain for the shade
of the maple planted for my baby mum
and now as tall as her milky star

grandparents. I have learned a lot from her,
from posture to the pain of landfill
smoke. I conclude this one's a keeper.

Flying Rocks and Other Observed Phenomena

Can a rock fly on its own? Can a frog
Answer the phone and take a message?
Those are absurd questions on their face, and I
Half-daft or toddler-innocent for asking.
Yet here's me, feldspar at cruising altitude.

For I am borne by the kindness of friends,
That power that puts that frog at its desk
Writing careful notes about the caller:

So many people, be they met face-to-face
Or not met at all, though known for a decade.

Me, the recipient of their entirely
Unwarranted goodness -- a glass pitcher
Catching the light by my window and holding
Hope, a full gallon (or so my mathless self

Would have you believe) of that commodity.
I am light, like the bubbles in that glass.
No frog secretary can truly explain how it feels.

Hard Act To Follow

The day it came, heart beat no more, Coyote.
Raven, oh, was sick and sad. Raven just lost

a wounded but ruddy and tough, sometimes giddy,
partner in crime. From the other end of the range

Crow looked on in sorrow, sent a murder
of herself like a bouquet, cawing Oh my Fox,

my Raven, let my wings roof over
but what, but what, do we do now without

bitch who dug in the earth and gave it life?
It turns out the King of the Glen is the red stag,

the King of the Stags an extra-mighty king,
he dipped his horns in the sky, now and then

the curtain will part and we will still see her cling
to the back of a silver stallion. One crazy ride,

her and her bird and her sleek mister kitsune.
Crow, she gazed at the stag, muttered I know you.

Past lives, you our chief at the standing stones.

If You Give

If you give a "hood-rat" a hoodie,
you do the world a fucking favor, see?

If you give an addict some addiction money,
cigarettes, booze, or smack, you are a saint.

If you make the life of les misérables,
the former middle-class, a wee bit warmer,

you are my hero. Be it laundry quarters
or candy bar, be it soup or smoke, my friend,

you, the compassionate, will be considered weak
by all but me. You dancer! I hope to Gods the love

that slays me when you fetch a stranger
the towel they were trying for, I hope my body

warm and wrapping you is reward enough
to do the fucking favors we the grimy need.

The Iconic

cherries and willows
also weep -- once in a while
it is for beauty

do not imagine you are
less as you strengthen with age