A weird one

I ordered pizzas because

I had to evacuate the metro

Likely because the trains

Became alive and started singing

We've all seen Thomas & Friends

A fine documentary it seems 

Now finally the phenom arriving

On the tracks of Montreal

This is our just desserts

For living for even a moment

In a world with so many ways of going

I did not order dessert, it seemed

A luxury I do not deserve

On this night of a million dancing trains

"Attention! Un incident nous oblige..."

Disembodied voices never tell you

The truth about train songs

The blue line and the orange line

In a pas de deux: Fred and Ginger

Take their bows - 

The train wranglers wrangled

The service est rétabli

What do trains dream about

Wedged into these tracks

primed always to hear an angry voice

projection is a scarf wrapped around my ears

to filter the words and tones

for any speck of upset

pull at any thread

easy to find why someone could be

cross at me

in my pussyfooting

hopscotching efforts 

to evade displeasing

friends, family, and strangers alike

my calculated footholds

serve mostly to provoke

the self-same ire 

i yearned to dodge

I wonder about the various symbols 

we can only recognise in the presence of each other 

and the new worlds evoked by 

the rhythms of other everyday lives. 

shared life feels like holding a fish out of the water. 

Looking at a Medieval Triptych Painting with the Flu

I wrote 3 poems to catch up:

I

Conquered eyes, hostile smiles;

Fail to conceal rage

Over memories exiled

Of a bygone age

And displaced for those

Disgraced kings deposed 

Now restored their thrones

But in power all the while 

Singing loudly in reprise

Fantastical claims

Nostalgia weaponized

To shift any blame

And those living in this buffer

Have two choices to suffer

Convalesce or don’t recover

You can’t remain the same

II

See the fortress, monolithic

Past murky, bloodwarm streams

Wait while chalky soporifics

Stave off intrusive dreams

And the dawn sun’s lethal

Benzedrine breeze

Pushes errant clouds of diesel

Through its blackened beams

Some are hurled to action

To brag about their deeds

And overstate infractions 

Of the men on which they feed

I waterboard myself with a neti pot

Playing “It’s Dark and Hell is Hot”

Deciding if I want to rot

In mute resistance or in screams

III

Hearing pledges of allegiance

With no evidence to see 

In pretenses of the regents

Just hypocrisy

For all their close accounting

Of false threats mounting

It’s like a dream in which you’re drowning 

But discover you can breathe

To what degree of blindness

They stomach their reflections

Or questions in kindness

Given prickly receptions

Opportunities to learn 

Have diminished returns 

Don’t make it your concern

It’s all a matter of perception

Comment Economy

Arms like streamers, beak like a klaxon, tongue of paper

my practical skills don't include shelf hanging, or woodwork

or soldering 

or driving engagement, or parsing metrics,

or gaming systems and 

I wonder what I'll pass on,

like they must have wondered what they'd pass on 

100 years ago when minds had been lost already,

my special skill will be shouting click bot

to no-one in particular, derek34516725,

god, guns, my kids, country.

four ideas

1. 

    war against _____

    war against _____

    war against _____

    all things militarized 

2.

    you motion to me, sweet science

    with labels and inserts

    but what of the silence

    when the drug takes more than it gives

    or when the IUD breaks

3.

    does the well exist that i can drink from?

    does the creek exist where i can bathe?

    does the fish exist that i can eat? 

    does the air exist that i can breathe?

    does the fabric exist that i can wear without guilt?

4.

    "nothing is lost

    nothing is created, 

    all is transformed.

    all is the prey of death

    none is the prey of life"

        

    -Antoine Béchamp