Author: lbstowe

Pin & needles & pain…All of which wax & wane.  
Depends on the day…Which one gets to play; 
& how much I’ll rely on my cane.

My provider of care-tells me what needs more wear. 
She must watch her health; for therein lies wealth. 
She’ll be fine; with, or without, our prayer.

Even the best get sick…we fight so sick won’t stick.
We all choose a way, to stave off decay.
I’m not worried because she’s a tough chick.

The working poor in our myriad rookeries.
Lush as alpine flowers in rubble rockeries.

Blitzed bombed by disease, inflation & scarcities.
Suffocated & entombed by thy fair cities.

Lucky to have family in higher station.
Anchored, unlike many, dismissed by a nation.

Fodder for consumption with what little we spend.
Pitched at each other by falsehoods the zeitgeist penned.

Betters aren’t better; they built all upon our sands.
Is there hope in the little that slips through their hands?

Living lush & underscored are women still to wait?
Languishing in garden coves content to just be bait?

Obsessed with what not to say, her petals fall to bed.
Never knowing her own bloom; nor seeds within her head.

Waiting for her pollinator, spring has passed her by.
Fruit she hasn’t tasted falls for maggot & for fly.

Evolutions, two, fed upon her beauty rotted.
Fruit’s grave grows her second act; whence her roots were slotted.

May this new wind scatter her to newer unkempt lands…
Where she can grow & spread & leap, free from pruning hands.

The Ticky-Tacky plastic poured.
Flimsy sawdust particle board. 

The flooring…beige linoleum.
It’s heavy on petroleum.

Appliance…avocado green.
Formica cupboards glittering.

An automatic wash & dry.
The popcorn ceilings sprayed on high.

Rainbow of glycerine knick-knacks.
All came in heavy, dense, flat-packs.

Plasticine coated wood can’t last!
So buy more now! Supplies won’t last!

Common as raindrops, innumerable as sand…
Old Babylon’s tongues bred throughout every land.

Loanwords & calques & idiom & dialect.
Differentiations upon each known subject.

A Janus word is least of what misconceives us.
Communicating words cleaves us & cleaves us.

Phrases in the billions & words ever the more.
Then there are poets who take words to fly & soar.

More meanings in language than ever one can learn.
Yet, for understanding each other, we all yearn.

Burnt in light & lost in shade…
On the cusp, where all does fade. 

Open heart & curious mind…
Wishing for a home to find.

Out of sorts with compass smashed…
Wind & rain & squall have lashed.

Delving dusk to fathom dawn…
Helpless as an offside pawn.

Whether with or without flock…
Even gods obey the clock.

Many buds do open late…
August’s bloom’s still welcome fate!

Stalks may be oft cut to earth…
Still, spared roots assert rebirth.

I’ll keep seeking til I’m dead…
Maybe hearth is just ahead.

Breaking fast I gorge myself.
Eating quick the entire shelf.

Hungry still I fill the trough.
The cuffs of diet I slough.

This break of fast will last days.
Holiday from healthy ways.

The strict routine that saved me.
Hard discipline not tasty.

I’ll return to rigid rounds.
Though not before eating pounds.

Thus, full & over-sated.
Salubrious re-fated.

Distracted from dwelling on what they are selling…& what they are selling is debt.
Commercial intrusions on storied illusions; we’re never escaping the net.

A shilling, a pence & a pound of our flesh can be owed without signing a thing.
We live on the other side of the tracks; but we have nice cars & we’re wearing bling.

We spend what we don’t have & we live on account; with no chances ahead to save.
Most boats are sinking & no one is blinking, counting on currency to behave.

There’s no way to climb up slight ladders of ice; formed from what little that trickles down.
Poor folks can’t endure drought, without cure, they have aught; to survive when blight comes to town.

Aristocracy always prefers it this way…where only they can save the day.
So, invest in agility & sustainability; break up standard play.

All of us use filters, depending on our audience.
Meeting someone where they’re at helps negate intolerance.

Focusing on common ground’s a key to build consensus.
Hyping where we differ leads us straight to points contentious.

Even all alone, we have a mad chorus in our souls.
Cheering us & jeering us, whilst we make for simple goals.

Which ones have our attention & which ones do we keep fed?
A human contains multitudes in each asylum head.

We all have inner foci; the trick is what they sound like.
Is your best self the loudest; or, do critics hold the mic?

Maybe where real breaks apart is where dimensions bleed.
Thinner parts of boundaries where physics has to cede.

Schizophrenic atoms fuse together & apart.
Way across the Milky Way, both ending where they start.

The surface of the moon, at once, lithium & cheese.
What lives on the ocean’s floor knows not of skies; but seas.

Sun screams morning into night; heralding each season.
What science doesn’t know, man blindly ascribes reason.

What’s beyond the looking glass, can just as well look back.
Maybe, where the sane wears thin, I can traverse the crack.