Family Christmas Card

There was no family picture
of the Carrol's
holidays.

there is no title.

I do not write
boxed,
ruled,
by old dead men
who stress the unstressed
stress syllable saving
form
over word play. Puns.
And feelings.
Discouraging for the un
refined fresh face
on the scene only in it
for the fun,
Not the masters
of fitting everything
in to bottomless boxes that
contain everything.
Discouraging for the
fans of alliteration
of slant rhymes
of homonyms
of bending grammar
and visual poetry
difficult to fit,
in one-twos and two-
ones; That three feet
are too few and
have won no prizes.
Confined to peer
reviews, no sonnets
plays immortalizations
in summer days.
Confined to a notebook
likely doomed to be lost,
forgotten in a box
or trash can, Confined
to a letter grade, a little
part of a little part.
Enforced rules on this
word, line, page, book,
leaves the book blank.
Never written. I do
not write the rules.
I do not write
boxed.

ghts

            ghts
my thou      
become increasingly fragment
   ed
as abnormal things chameleon quietly into normal things as if
they have always there belong
ed

.
..

.

inspiration and insomnia share in
but nothing else as one leads to safety
and the other to (the sharing in)sanity
or perceived insanity where perceived
thoughtless thoughts make thoughtless sense right

Tree is an Anagram for Heart.

“I don't get you” I said to them,
and they didn't listen.
I sat still in my chair,
and stared at them for much longer;
they sat, unmoved, by my futile attempt
to grasp the entangled
intricate workings mess.

They had been here long before me
and will be long after,
sometimes rooted solidly, so
they grow and die and grow again
for health and display and function;
can be shaped and reshaped
for workmanship's showing.

Showy elaborate bits of beauty,
that are humbly arriving and
with increasing volume, shown for
a pridefully broken exit.

Scavanger Hunts, Or, A Coming of Age, Or, Another Chore

I've made quite the mess of myself.
My mind is scattered, and
my heart is scattered, and
I seem to have lost my marbles, amongst other things.
I've left those little bits of myself
all over: Buried in backyards
under dogwood trees, buried in
backseats next to loose change and chewed gum,
buried under beds, with the dirty laundry and
other unmentionables.

I mean, it started innocently enough.
With your worn hands warming mine, and,
burying myself in your hoodie, and,
light swift kisses only on the cheeks.
You were charming and caring, and
I was charmed and cared for.
I was certainly swept.

But you didn't so much as help me
look for the parts that I wanted
back. Lips, hips, hands, heart,
sanity, hope, humor, heart.

(not blank)

only subjective subjecticies
and relative relativities
and no truth is truth.
there is no
home.

there is none from
which to venture out from to find
and search and explore danger and wonder and un
truth and then lost in circles because there is no home to come
home.

sovereignty and love is lost
in the circles that do not:
stop go exist end
slow breathe.

Not be Possess

Righteousness I possess,
it is mine not of my own,
though through (in)actions I own, it
is not mine to have (not have, be)
taken, sometimes, happily, ungratefully,
never grateful enough,
to own it for myself
for what it is and is not for.
Justified through righteous I
am not but I own.