reader – poems 2 die for

MAYBE NOT THE IDEAL WAY TO PROCEED

We cavorted

went head
to head

compared the surefire compromise
we had to make

laboured the comparison
between polar opposites
detailed the conjunctions
between
two circumscribed lives

and, under strict supervision,
loosened our tethers
allowed our
shadows
to waltz, tango, samba,
breakdance together

behave like popular conceptions
of writers, poets, dictates
that we should

strayed (hip-hopped) so
far from the truth that you
might be brought to
swear that
the point
was missed entirely

so
resolved (as if
signatories) that next time
(or if ever)
our words cross paths
that we delegate
to shadow
everything to shadow, realm
you have barely no sense of

so starved of
knowledge of all
we have
spent lives excavating

need to
plumb some of
that darkness to
have any
hope
of progressing;
ever hope to proceed.

SINGULARITY

stand behind me
step

inside me
presto before what trails
across the page
becomes
more than
just mushy
along the edges

you
and your colliders
it is the dream to
quantify
every dark particle

prove
every hypothetical
to be wired
and grounded

but when
you speak their truth
you sound
so fabulous, not
making any
concrete sense
(terrify
that every new coinage
might sprout
a singularity)

ROUGHSHOD

You wouldn’t believe it
but this little thing

is going
to
run
roughshod

go maniac
take you
to extremes

all in the name
of power, supremacy

things in which
it doesn’t really believe.

AGAIN

How is it
certain questions
have no answer

how is it
we
are
nothing like
the same

together again,
back to back,
face to
face

so different,
wholly other

no memory of ever
having done this before

and yet
tell-tale signs, traces indeed
of previous encounters

you and I
reaching out
to put to the test the very
idea of the hopeless

so divided, set apart
by distance in era,
disjunction
in
space-time

and yet here
brought again to this
proximity to
question everything

infinite possibility
impossibly contained?

QUAINT READER

a quaint reader
a quotidian reader
a quantum reader

whatever ilk
of reader you are
there is something
on the page for you

not so sure
that it professes
to be poetry
counts as a poem

would love to get your feedback
see when I hear from you
if we are both open to all sorts of possibilities

ANTI

don’t like my poem?
is it
a matter of form, style
or theme

or do you find itself
offensive
by its, and to your,
very nature?

Oh, if only poems
could be conduits to
all we feel and need,
and all
we feel we need
entirely!

you
don’t like my poem

well, I’m willing
to stake a bet
that my poem
doesn’t
like you either

much
like a true mirror

much like
Sir Isaac’s great law
about action
eliciting if
not demanding equal
and opposite reaction

perhaps
my poem
exactly did not enjoy
the reading experience
suffered your
reading
badly

put you the wrong end
of the spectrum of
enlightening being-read
experiences

on a readership scale
placing you
closer to
muddy river pebble
than cut
and polished sapphire

closer to worker bee, even ant,
than to Apollo himself

IMPASSE

you glance
at my poem

my poem
looks back at you
into you

you glare
at my words,
suspicion impacted

wondering
what lies beneath, here
we hit an impasse

no way to
resolve this
applying the protocols,
rules, regulations
of current civilization

unless image
by image, symbol
by symbol,
together it is
we negotiate this page

trade, vent, share,
exchange

for the sake
of the poem

refract, reflect,
rescind, do what
we both do best,
perform
a whole number
full-on optics and chemistry

without these
no hope for any preservation
of mere mortal remains

HOPEFULLY

wrote this poem
to change your perspective

change your
point of
view

rewire
your brain

nothing too
intrusive, nothing
too extreme

nowhere near anything
like District 9, with
what happened to Wickus

though
when it comes
to seeing things differently
hopefully, pretty
much the same

TEST SUBJECT

you think
of this as
entertainment

I think of it
as a test

want to check you
out as you
navigate
stanzas

negotiate
words

to find out
whether you
have what
it takes

to read a poem
as
from the
beginning of time
readers have
read
a poem

doing poem
reading things
whether
you be
human
or
are a
poetry loving machine.

MEASURE

measure this poem
give it substance
give it
a location

somewhere in that
relativized field
of space slash time

slash everything you
have ever read your
brain is filtering through
to bring
you ready to go
find , see yourself
in this quintessential moment

as for me
I will just look back
on the process
that brought
me here
put me on
this page

a ghostly presence
a whispered voice
a teasing
play of
sound and sense

only clue
to you
I may have
found my way
to drop a
hint
of life,
suggestion of
touch

put
this as
hypothesis
of length and breadth
and depth
and time

somewhat
transparently
before you