Author: lbstowe

I find myself so jealous of all your ink.
The cartoon images taunt me with a wink.

They’re with you under clothes & the shower.
They watch your dreams & stay when your mood’s sour.

The pictures have better views than your shadow.
They know whether or not you rock commando.

They carry a feeling only you can share.
They remain even when nobody is there.

I’m green with envy at their intimate lives.
You committed them to skin…beloved archives.

“Hurry up & wait!”, said the sun to rise.
“All in good time for the most watchful eyes.”

“So, keep time & observe while stage sets are changed”.
“If it all moved faster; all would be deranged”.

“See, we cleave to our clocks without quite knowing.”
“The world lives faster than boredom is showing.”

“One hour is sixty seven thousand miles.”
“But, does that make waiting more worth your wiles?”

“You notice your pace in relation to goals.”
“Have patience & perspective…there are no controls!”

Even the shadows graze my face.
Caressing with sun dappled lace.

Peaceful light in corridors green.
Canopy filtered marbled scene.

All seems possible, even flight.
If not, hearts flutter at the sight.

Bright emerald walls closing in.
They’re leafy muffs for big smoke din.

I’d haunt these wooden halls always.
Alas, these are spring’s fleeting days.

You’d prefer a feed on the inside of your glasses.
Yet, I still find charm in the flowers & the grasses.

I know, it’s hard to hold space for the actual world.
Especially when, each day, its horrors are unfurled.

Though, beneath the strife of men, the natural world breathes.
Exhaling despite of how our hate & drama seethes.

After all, pan out & we are no more than a glitch.
We’re just brief byproducts of evolution’s scratched itch.

So, doom scroll or engage in life…whatever your wills.
But, lives lived are the way to square the fact that life kills. 

Let’s hear it for the Mothers!
Both blood…& fated others.

Always offering their care.
Ones who give & ones who share.

We count on them to remind…
Who in mirrors we should find.

Wherever they are is home.
No matter how far we roam.

They nurture our better parts.
They’re how every story starts.

For

E + H

Tears are the ecstasy of the soul.
They are the emptying of a hole.

Tears are the lance of a spirit’s boil.
They’re the hot bath for empathy’s toil.

You can’t heal til you’ve shed some ocean.
The only physical emotion.

Those moist sacrifices of the heart.
Your evolution is what they chart.

There’s a reason tears come from your eyes…
So they’ll wash away rose tinted lies.

For

J

I see schools of stingrays behind my eyes.
The Milky Way Galaxy’s starlit skies.

A biolumined river flowing up.
A universe of thunder in a cup.

One million lightening heads each time I squint.
All blackest jet & the children of flint. 


Fuzzy as snow on a vintage T.V.
A flash of light thru lids…something to see!

Science murders magic; it’s no less right.
Photons & phosphenes reacting to light.

I exist in a state of underestimation.
In thinking & ability…even libation.

Always one bad choice from ending up in the E.R.
There’s no running or dancing & no driving a car.

Every meal is medicine; rarely welcome fun.
I even have to watch the temp; hiding from the sun.

I don’t mind the regimen that buttresses my health.
I don’t fret lack of agency; I prefer the stealth.

Yet I think, when all is well, that I would like a mate.
Someone to excite my heart & quietly relate.

It’s easier sometimes to talk to ghosts.
Say, “Hi”, to minds who’ve discarded their hosts.

Simpler, often, than a fight for the mic.
Neater than jostling for each turn alike.

They rarely talk; preferring sage silence.
Acknowledge only, no volume violence.

Their answers are in your mind already.
Recall their voice when their hearts beat steady.

Just say, “hello” when they enter your brains.
Nourish your friendships on probable planes.

Traitors are often subjective things.
It matters in whose way their mud flings.

From their perspective, they’re the last line.
Maybe one side holds their toil divine.

Another side casts them fabric’s tear.
Some, on t-shirts, their visages wear.

The sanest place is always middles;
Bridge to extremes & burning fiddles.

Time is alone in clarity seen.
Heroes & rebels rarely split clean.