The world is vacantthis early Sunday morning except for the newspaper deliverer and the liquor storeand the customer who waited for 6am. Mostly people are insidesleeping off hangovers slumbering in a warm bedof post-coital narcosis lone desperationpassed out at a kitchen tablesplayed with overdue billsand trepidation. Some greet the day with reluctancesome will ride bikesand some will never knowSunday morning exists. As I drive my daughter to the early church s...

Your lips are missedas are the long weekendswe spent as one. Replaying those old songs,memories come backstripped of any imperfection. There was intrigue in your kissand I became dizzywith the possibilities. I could spend an hourholding your handand every momenthad the thrill of finding an undiscovered river.  Where there was once mysterybuilding a life together has brought comfortso I’m not asking for much,except this:slow down ourspinning planet of noisy obligation,te...

My father taught me to develop good habits. “Make it second natureso you don’t have to remember so much.” Clean up after yourself.Iron your work clothes the night before.Work first, then play. These habits hum in me silently in the background like a trusted computer program. But every January 6thI am trapped because the post office doesn’tdeliver to his new locationand my cell phones plan doesn’t include roaming to Heaven. He would have been...

I apologize, but I honestly didn’t know – I thought it was allsome primordial fairytalewritten to mete out shadow retributionfor some unspeakable incestuous rape. I disguised my lust and gluttonyas joie de vivreand followed them from every well-intentioned lesson as I blazed my pathetically predictable path. I thought I was giftedwith a vision, but now I seeI was just another in an unending line ofmyopic nonconformists. I stand now at the foot of your crossunder a brui...

Turkey of the wild met by the roaring musketbecame the first feast. Stacked hay and pumpkincompanions under the skieswarm the vagrant’s heart. The children from artmade pilgrim hats and wore themover thankful eyes. Mom sweetens the yams,Grandma whips the potatoesAnd Gramps carves the bird. In feasting too muchand the tummy aches, give thanksfor alka-seltzer. 

  There at a glance Are hundreds at a dance,Rumps abounding, shaking,The less endowed, faking;All but one havingA grand time hazardingThe Deejay’s pompFor Saturday’s romp —Poor lass, her heart intertwinesIn ’Nam’s unending headlines.

which is the strugglewalking through the fire orresisting God's will?

the muse comes to callI'm too busy to visit--two silent mourners.

  one night in a blizzard of snow and madnessin a little Indiana town lost to the interstateChristopher cut his palms with a butcher knifeand worked through the night painting his heartin broad strokes swearing in ten second breaths at what a slutshe could be he’d leave his mark dripping on canvasthen sobbing he’d cry out his love for the slut thatate his hearther cannibal ways left him crippled with onlyten fingers and ten toes and nothing to pumpthe soul back to life&n...

  mo cooks five days a week down atthe horse head bar and grillhe practices his art on a circle of drunksthat crave his special flavorsnot all of them food but he’s not just a cook-ie cutter formof a man that fills the bellies of the jovialcrowd waiting on his creationshis art is in his heart and the desire tofind that other half to keep his insanityfinely tuned has ruined better men thanhe but like every man before him his dickleads the way and a couple of times a yearhe...

  lil’ t wakes with the sun two hours fromthe last time she cracked her eyes full ofsweat to cry the pain in her back and get readyto work another day with smiles for the tipsand kind words for drinkers getting drunkkilling their pain all around pain but behind the smiles and false promisesa little girl silently cries as she goes aboutthe hard moments of living not knowing whyor when or who will come to ring the bell ofwonderments that raise the soul above the painabove t...

  bob’s got two heartbeatssomewhere in redding ca.the courts take his check everyother weekbut the heartbeats can’t be seen throughthe wall of a vindictive mother so he downs a dozen vodkas a nightchased by forty milligrams of syntheticsmack to kill the pain and keep theblood in his veins cause the feelings cold and all he wantsis to be warm—even if it’s just for a night. J. Masuda © 2008

  they told her it was pre-cancerlike she was pre-registering forwedding gifts don’t worry they saidthe next test will tell us moreand more and more but the test cost money and no smilesfrom the financial counselor will discountthe little pre-cancer cells into a willingnessto wait they keep dividing and mutating and growingstealing hope like vultures feasting on road killyou’ll be better—for a price but first, another test. J. Masuda © 2008...

  there’s an old man in white shoeshe walks in circles around a green planterthat holds a dying tree slumped to the side on the third revolution he lightsa hand-rolled cigarette thenhe walks in circles pausing to stare atthe burning ember of his cigarette and thedying leaves of the treethen back to walking circles when he has finished the cigarette hefield strips the butt and slides the remainsinto his pocketbefore he leaves he spits over the rail ontothe cars in the...

This originally started out as a pantoum, but I took some rather hefty liberties with the form. (But hey, I kept the basic rhyme scheme while trying some diversification with the lines.) At any rate, it's nothing special, but I thought it would be worth posting. But then, I've been wrong before. Anyway. If you read, let me know what you think. Continental Drift Now you pull away from me, hesitant and cold; are you shaken by something you see, the things I've said, or what I do...