While Listening to Monk

she slips easily in
between the notes.
But the silence!

Now that's noisy.

he falls into silence.
Wanders for days.

Thelonious listens to himself.
Fingers on keys, waiting...

The pause is long-a hundred
batons crack his skull again-
even for him.

He pushes onto the next note.

The Poetics of Jokes: Zombies

I.

Have you ever thought about zombie attacks?

I have.

And I decided that if there were a zombie infestation,

I would just go with it.

We already live in a world that accepts the undead—Rob Zombie,

Cannibal Corpse, Nancy Grace—

and if we learned anything from the Thriller video,

the undead make great dancers.

Except the white ones;

not even death can fix their groove.

II.

Zombies don’t actually want to pick

your brains. They’re just looking for love.

But the way they go about finding love

is appalling. They’re too touchy feely.

Saturday Morning at Rimkus Park

-Leon Valley, Texas

    Catch iiiiiiiiiiiiiit!!!

rang through the air,

and a scramble ensued

            three players converging

                 where the leather

                        ball might

                              fall…

No one catches it,

and the whole field

erupts into laughter

and  its first language.

The dark players, dressed in polos

and trainers, reset, and focus

on the duel. One stands

tall, the protectorate, a flat

bat defending three long sticks.

The other, a few paces back,

gathers speed, and hurls

the projectile. The ball takes

one bounce before reaching

the batter.

I must hit the ball merges and contrasts with Only one wicket.

The batter wins, and the ball

rises to a chorus of Catch iiiiit!!!

And I’m on the outside,

foreign to both game and language,

leaning by the sign

For Baseball

and Softball

use only.

Unspoken

Unspoken

            -for “Bob Roberston”

A fistful of words

slipped through their fingers, never

to reach the others.

Who is this man, this Stranger

who played both sides for money?

A pocketwatch chimes

as Mortimer, and Manco

and El Indio

wait for the finish—the start

of the silence which will chime.

Just a name would do,

but he is Blondie, and now

Angel Eyes, Tuco,

and he face off, a fifteen

minute Mexican standoff.

Waiting

For this week, I'm working on parallel structure, as well as narrative. Please leave revision notes in the comments. I think I'll expand the second stanza in another poem.

Waiting again,
stale, out dated magazines my companions.
And he's sighing,
stale, old breath mixing with the anti-septic.
And he's thinking
generic thoughts too cheap to speak out loud.
God, I hate waiting.


Waiting again,
wind swirling dust from under benches.
And she's counting,
slow breaths between the wheezes.
And she's singing,
harmonies to sooth her coughing child.
Deus, salva minha criança.

Internal Rhyme Exercise

This was written as an exercise this morning, in preparation for other poems. Should I continue, or rather, finish the idea before revising?

Hole in the Rock
These aren't my people
I thought from the rocking boat
looking at steep cliffs varnished
red and bleached white by a man-
made lake, whose water creeps
and laps, creeps and laps, and rocks
me now to memory.
Men in wagons once came,
looking down and across a
canyon. Trusting in God, pulleys
and ropes, the cast wagons and oxen
over the axis of faith, to steady
ground below.

Untitled

I am wary of

Plutonium leaking out.

Entire districts'

produce are banned in Japan.

Why? Plutonium

sank deep into our Mother,

poisoning what she would give.