Contributor: Cattail Jester

- -
A pipeline
Simple plumbing inside
Like Jung’s collective
Unconscious

Connects me to
The rest of the uncontrollable
World around me

Just like love means
I saw someone, a message
Snapped along the unseen
Electrical cords inside me

A reaction, a pulse
Becomes a movement,
Or a word.


- - -

Contributor: Cattail Jester

- -
at the risk of sounding
like Simon & Garfunkle:

Hello, darkness.

Where you been,
beautiful baby?
Haven't seen you in a
long time.

Don't mind me, I'll
just admire the mad
swirl of your indigo
edges.

I'd flash a photograph
but it wouldn't take
just right anyway.


- - -

Contributor: Cattail Jester

- -
that's not
me, not my face
behind that
microphone

&

that's not my
voice piping out
not my singing
not my love

you know what?
suddenly, it's me.
why the hell
not? it's me.

that way, I can slip
out the back
while that guy
on stage does his
dance.


- - -

Contributor: Cattail Jester

- -
A dark storm day
gave way to bluster
words
windswept young people
walking into future dreams

Sleep on it
turn it over three times
see what comes new

Meanwhile women
whip with words
while listeners cringe
to the tearing tirades
a new image to match
tongue-lashing.


- - -

Contributor: Cattail Jester

- -
When he talks
minds are opened
pages flutter
angels turn into
doves and sit in earthly
statues just to steal
a lecture note,
the world is better for
his grandiose metaphors
his subtle genius
obviously obtuse
way with fancy pants
words and symbols.


- - -

Contributor: Cattail Jester

- -
Expect the bow tie
with a polite bow, expect
a great swollen kindness
positively stuffed with
chivalry

Messages to a daughter
not here yet
to expect a better world
where guys mean what they
say

But who am I but
a shabby dirt-covered louse
offering ironic advice.


- - -

Contributor: Cattail Jester

- -
This came from
my tummy, the little
pig-tailed dirty blonde
with smudged fingernails
tells me, holding up
a ragged doll.

It's as ragged as she
is. I have no idea
what to say.

I just look in her eyes,
knowing more about
life than she does, amazed
that she's not yet
embarrassed to talk
about birth. She doesn't
know.

I like its hair, I lie.


- - -

Contributor: Cattail Jester

- -
You can tell she's teething,
the marking is on the door.

You can tell it's a beast
that's growing inside. She's
not like the rest.

You can hear her low growl,
a distant thunder hum, deep
inside her tiny chest. It's too
small to be so deep but is.

You can tell she's stalking
you by the silence that grows.


- - -

Contributor: Cattail Jester

- -
We gather in the lingering
light of a dying third sun
to bask in semi-sweet what
might have been

We walk the dog
who no longer needs walking
sit on the curb
no cars passing by

Our world used to be full
of static voices, nitrates,
salespeople

Now there is only
a distant clock sound
and sea wash roaring.


- - -

Contributor: Cattail Jester

- -
A tank
wrapped around me
could not guard me

from the thistle
of a glance
buried biting
in my hollow side

A fort
built in my head
could not resolve

the tangled and
cursed roots
of my thinking.


- - -

Contributor: Cattail Jester

- -
I was anything
but the match she
wanted, anything but
the jousting rebel
she longed for, my life
was anything but
the dragon search she
dreamed of, filled with
old socks, regrets about
other people's games,
problems with urination,
not wall-scaling revelry
or wise counsel seeking,
not the armor she
wanted her steed to wear.


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