every man’s a monkey
and the world’s a monkey house
every man’s a lion
except when he’s a mouse

i went to tell half the truth
i went to tell a half a lie
i went to tell and remembered
don’t tattle don’t ask me why

every man’s a snake
and the world’s a serpent’s den
every man’s the devil
way back since god knows when

jane said life is precious
dick said life is fine
spot didn’t say a thing,
i’m glad he isn’t mine

jane said dick’s a dick
dick said jane’s insane
spot didn’t say a thing
things just went that way

jane said it’s time to go
dick said there’s no time
spot didn’t say a thing
he just handed me a dime

jane said life is holy
dick said life is hell
spot didn’t say a thing
i think it’s just as well

Love has no sinew, bone or flesh
there are no nerves to love
and if there is chemistry
it is the arcane kind only mystics mix
even they are frauds.

The doctor speaks of bone to cut out
and relieve the pain, then medication
to alleviate the pain, then time
to take away the pain, then the prognosis
is good enough — perhaps
you’ll survive (or I will
or if we’re lucky we both will)

Love has no manual, no wires, or powersource
there are no circuits in love
and if there is electricity
it is the apocryphal kind only contractors charge for
and they are certainly frauds

The doctor speaks of sterilized tools to cut out
and remove the source, the anesthetics
to prevent the pain, then a room
to stay in while you heal, then time
to be sure you will heal, then a new prognosis
regardless whether it’ll be good enough.

You’ll survive (most likely)
Most likely we’ll survive.
I’ll survive. I know, I’ll survive.

the comets come
the comets go
the tails are told and then

the comets go
the comets come
the tales are told again

the dive into the sun
away
the dive into the darkened day
the push of wind
the drive to stay
the comets come again this way

imagine how the reddest things are redder
than can be seen with unclothed eyes,  or
if your mind is not strong enough imagine
a giant pretending to be the hunter’s hand
in a story told by an illiterate wisdom
to a child grown into ancient bones
whose name is forgotten to even the stones.

imagine how the most distant things are seen
and dreamt, and prayed upon as we hunt
the night for better days ahead. or
if your prayers are not strong enough, whisper
an explosion in the next million years
that tells the story of now, 643 years in the telling.

imagine how being the 9th brightest feels
— brilliant among the brilliant and known
to be strong enough to draw back
and let loose and lead the hunt for that certain place
enrapt by that skewed belt and memorialized
by hewn rock on Egyptian sands.  Please

imagine the reddest things, then imagine redder things
too red to be seen by unclothed eyes, and this
this imagining, this will be the physics that binds us
soul to soul, eye to eye and dream to dream.
This will be the quarry caught. The prey we prayed
and found and knew and meant when we said Betelgeuse.

i twist my stomach
into the triangle
begging all the universe
change — quickly
change

i put on a new shirt
i put on clean slacks
i put on fresh socks
i change and try to change
again — then leave

eyes closed, the wind
fondles my cheek
(the scandal of a touch)
through space, motion
through time, motion
through faith — emotion

i put on a smile
i put on a facade
i put on the radio
i drive and try to drive
again — then stay

eyes open, the lights
addle my eyes
(the drunkeness of color)
through space, motion
through time, motion
through thought — emotionless

i am the body in motion, staying
in motion, the body at rest staying
at rest. the unchanging change
that ends in cold darkness
and peace.

i have three feet
and three more above
to step and climb and stomp the time

i have 2 inches more
(of course) and yet I never use them
please, dear god, to rhyme

i waist no
want no
am no pantsing fool

i waste no
warrant no
am no panting tool

i have three i’s
and two more facing
front and into you oblong soul

I have one more
(of course) to see a spirits search
please, dear god, make me whole.

What monsters come from yellow things
who knows and why would they answer if they did?
I know only this and less, a monster is only a man
and every man a monster in the proper light.

The monsters that come from blue places,
we all know well and wish they would leaves silent
like every beaten man without hope or heart.
I know the nothing I know offers no solace for him.

When monsters comes from gray moments
without honest timekeeping, the answers are fewer still,
and I know enough not ask the monster where
his will be at the appointed time. I ask nothing at all.

what monsters come from orange things
you may know and why the answers leave us breathless,
but I will not ask you, and you will not tell me.
Please, accept my condolences — I am of course every-man
in the proper light.

i, being the father, put my contribution in
the machine and waited for the return.
years later, without video or argument
it was determined (though I didn’t push)
the problems were all mine to deal with.

She, being the mother, pushed
and pushed and pushed and though
she did wanted neither the return on that investment
nor the the responsibility for the trouble
that ensued (regardless the video proof
and lack of argument)

The priceless treasure, of course,
gave no indication of any preference
except in as much as whomever was responsible
should pay and pay and pay some more
For each troubling whimsy and desire.

The world most assuredly rides through the stars
on the back of a giant nameless turtle. Eternity
dictates every possibility and every impossibility
is so, and so it is. Without any doubt the turtle swims
and I am there, forever until I am no more, upon his back.

The little minds that think big things full of tiny sad logic
imagine a turtleless existence where the stars are only
gas burning in the void, and the world is only a mote of dust
circling forever as if forever were always — and we know
it is anything but that. You can say the truth

is complicated or simple, you can say whatever you’d like,
but the size of a mind and the size of the logic are irrelevant.
All that matters is the turtle swimming beneath us,
invisible except as a Terra pin — a place to stick the world
until everything that must happen has happened

and everything that must have been has been.  Remembered
this way, existence is neither void nor star nor mote of dust,
it is the must-iness, the orderly happenstance that percolates
into the cup of yes, overflowing to wash away the very knowing
and the destructive blizzard of certainty. Godful or Godless

the turtle swims on. I, upon his back, remembering only that
which is rife with might, knowing nothing but the wash of void
and starlight and the gravity of a situation that leaves the universe
rumpled and directionless as bodies rolls this way in that on her bed.
Alleluia, the jellyfish sing in a stinging wordless symphony and I with them
sing on and on and on and on and on and on the turtles back.