THREE FACES OF ANN

Ann is looking at herself
fogged in a master of disguise
hiding from her broken past
DEPRESSED

beneath the cracks in the mirror
glamoured by nighttime makeup
her eyes emerge within the paint
SEDUCTIVE

looking without cuckoo illusions
cleared of yesterday dreams
Ann sees beyond the mirror
SERENE

BURMA SHAVE

somewhere South of Seattle
four deaf old poets
cruise down highway 99
in their rusted '52 Mercury
searching for new words
god and Charlie Darwin

off the beaten track towards the beatnik path
they eject their unwanted poems
against the smashed dashboard
hearing nothing but rejections
broken by monotony
seeing nothing but the signs along the way

SPECIAL SEATS

RESERVED IN HELL

FOR WHISKERED POETS

WHO SCRATCH

THEIR LADIES

BURMA-SHAVE


.....an explanation for you youngsters under 55....back in the 40s and 50s driving down the 2 lane highways across America...there were signs at different points spaced approx 100 ft apart advertising a shaving cream.....BURMA-SHAVE

CITY LIGHTS

her world was a black hole of emptiness
a hollow home where the sun never shines
raining dust between the storms
where fingertips search beyond despair
and walk towards a new neighborhood
searching for City Lights

she wondered why she was still alive
in a world of forgotten nothingness
pouring darkness from the storm
unable to see the path to remember
and read her unspoken words
to the dead poets at City Lights

uncomfortable with midnight at high noon
she discarded old thoughts and decided to leave
finding the door that was unlocked
she discovered the truth about herself
and walked with her dark poems
to read at City Lights

HUNGER PAINS

Walking on the hungry sidewalk, I met a homeless lady who
took me to her shelter. The shelter had nothing, just
two wet tarpaulins. She invited me to stay and sleep, though
I hadn't had a meal in a week.

"When we awake we shall find food," she muttered, and stroked
my beard to comfort me.

I dreamt of chickens roasting, grease dripping like gravy
from their beaks. There was a hole in my stomach when I awoke,
in which I could see the emptiness.


chickens munching
on grain - hungry
beaks side by side