Monthly Archives: June 2025

Floods

So the lower river came to flood stage
The river rose until it could find no more banks
And then it spilled over into our streets
It drowned cars, dogs, homes
And the people upstream from us
Did not care that we were broken and wet
Did not care that we were hungry and cold
Did not care that we were dying

So the lower river came beyond its limits
The upper river stood by and shook its head
As it poured out upon us unthinking of our grief
The upper river masses shook their unthinking heads
They did not care about anger or grief
They did not care that we felt alone and chilled through
They did not care about how we bent down for rocks
To throw at them when we came to it at last

So the upper river changed its mind about us
As the lower river rose in a raging red tide
As we fell upon them with nothing to lose
As we rose toward them in a storm of bodies
They fell to our boulders upon the earth underneath
They rose in the daytime and cowered at night
And the air rejoiced as the water receded
And they had fallen below the line and had drowned

They had drowned unthinking with us up above
Left us alone with our thoughts and the grief
Of sharing the world with the dead until we joined them
Of sharing the world with our own dying

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T


Random Thoughts On An Early Tuesday

First, I remove my clothes
and go to bed nude, untroubled
by possibilities of having to rise
and run out to the street.
I am old, after all,
and it would mean nothing
to anyone of any note.

(I try to come up with a second message
I should send after that,
but it never comes.)

I sit here
deciding on the first message’s
appropriateness and cannot in fact
choose one: is it worth it
to be naked in front of everyone
in a moment of crisis or should I
wrap up in a blanket torn from the bed
and maintain decorum until the crisis
has passed?

(I don’t even know why
a second bell or buzzer
should sound.)

Well —
at least I have an exit plan.
At least I know, for one second,
maybe two,
what it is I will be doing
until I leap from bed kicking
and calling out to the gods
to save me; until
the second bell rings,
I will be sure of some form
of rescue, even if
I have to do it myself

and even if it fails me.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T




break

taking a short break from posting here.

\~•~~~~~•~~~~~~~~

Onward, T


Sunday Morning, Reading Poetry

An empty bowl of cereal.
A half-cup of coffee.

A book of poetry titled,
“A Book OfLuminous Things.”

My reading glasses, and
the cat asleep at the far end of the table.

This is Sunday morning
on a day when the machines

keep churning and the masters
use them to plot our crushing.

A branch from the hibiscus
outside the window scratches it

and it cries out. Other than that
I’m fine. Listening to a fellow

speak of his recovery from addiction
on the radio. I close my eyes,

the cat stretches, the evil men
do their work confident of their rightness.

Every little thing contributes
itself to my comfort,

or so it seems to my own
healed safety. I open my eyes;

somewhere a child sobs in fear
and I close my eyes yet again.

What was that book again, that book
of luminous things? It seems

unreal. It seems drunk and unsure.
I open my eyes, shut them, open them

again — this time, against my fear,
I force them to stay open.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T