The Mourning After

I lost my virginity in the age of innocence.
 
            Worthy is the lamb, who was slain.

In the fake, gilded age of Trump

loathsome words bleed from 45’s mouth
oblivious to the collateral damage.

            And when you’re a star, you can do anything—

            grab them by the pussy. You can do anything.

Nightmares revisit my dreams

evolve into wide-awake
out-of-the-blue triggers.

            If Ivanka weren’t my daughter…

I watch Kill Bill—read a Vachss novel

detachment being key
to amputating anger.

            Such a nasty woman.

Shunning invasive images, I turn

to focus on strands of moonlight
weaving through venetian blinds.


leh

The Last Selfie

Until I took one too many steps backward,
closer to the edge of the Hoover Dam bypass,
it had been a good life.

What an odd moment to recall an albatross

named “Wisdom” being the oldest wild bird
in the world, that is, per a scientist
stationed on the Midway Atoll,

and the last movie that made me cry,

For the Love of the Game, when Billy Chapel
pitched a perfect game, then retired his arm
from the boys of summer.
 
I’m still falling—against the wind—
guess it’s going to be one of those days.
 
I wonder how old that albatross is—
they didn’t say.


leh

A Non Sequitur

During an X-class flare, a coronal mass ejection
is suspected of beaching whales in the North Sea
while a light breeze in Northern California brushes
across my face like a cobweb floating
on my optic lens, followed
by a rain of bullets falling in Las Vegas
and Maria’s powerful wind
destroying lives in Puerto Rico—
or is it winds, plural
like the winds that drove
the Wine Country fires
and the Santa Ana winds
that propelled the SoCal fires—
air and water are singular
except, there are gusts of air
bodies of water
and plural suns, if one thinks
beyond our solar system, our galaxy
our universe, our parallel universes.

 

leh