Respect begins where
Judgment ends.
Respect emerges when we
See each other clearly.
Respect stands unyielding,
Untouched by color, creed,
Or gender.
We warmed the bench with cold stares,
holding onto yesterday’s glass of champagne.
A boy cried somewhere,
loosening his grip on a balloon
that slipped into a sky that never looks back.
Should I pity a crying child,
or an adult swallowing storms in silence?
“I should go,” she said, and
I found my hand reaching for hers,
like a child clinging to his mother
as she nears the grocery counter too soon,
hoping time would stall,
hoping something small could still be saved.
But some things are no-brainers,
inevitable as gravity,
the balloon has flown,
belonging now to no one,
or maybe to everything but us.
The child stopped crying
when his mother placed a bar of chocolate
into his waiting hands.
And I envied him,
because how does a child receive sweetness after sorrow,
while an adult is handed a weapon
and told to be brave instead of held?
No chocolate, no comfort,
just something sharp enough
to silence the trembling.
I guess that’s why
I stand where I stand,
not as someone to be soothed,
but as someone to be used.
I guess
I really am
His favorite soldier.
For the moment I first saw you, I was drone.
A hollow shell drifting through crowded air,
engines humming the same dull tone,
afraid of rejection, I stayed quiet.
Your presence cut the static clean.
With just a smile, my heart stopped.
The world tilted, every circuit shorted,
and silence became something sacred.
I tried to hold the distance,
to keep my altitude safe and cold.
But gravity has a new name now—
and just one look, you pull me back.
Down from the empty sky,
into the sharp, living ground
where fear still whispers,
yet I keep falling toward your light.
Our Opossum Has a Strong Propensity for Crime
By Frank Daub
Discovered in a backyard nighttime check –
an opossum wandering behind our garden shed.
Pin-pointed face, squinting eyes.
It did not run -- to my surprise.
Only staring, lighted softly by the porchlight.
Little.
Sleek in a white-gray-tan-straight-fur-slicked-down way.
The streets around are not friendly to its kind.
This unfair truth made up my mind.
I should let the shed-bottom harbor it.
This would require: FEEDING.
I decided the feeding plan -- without data-based reference --
would be workable.
I tried every sort of natural vegetable.
Walnuts added when the berries nurtured
hordes of ants --
Not
the opossum.
The dietary effort proved it.
Our opossum has a strong propensity for crime.
Particular it is to nighttime
sneaking forays - for food of course.
(This assured the legality of it for me.)
Our opossum was not particular to dietary do’s and don’ts;
Being just inclined to FEEDING its necessary wants.
The animal had a penchant – not a preference --
an exceeding zest for anything edible.
Incredible.
Metal feet outrun
records of our fastest man
finish line flashes
but nobody taught tin legs
what a finish line can mean.
We build forward gears
but leave reverse on paper
no exit was planned
they say 'you can't stop progress'
'til the finish circles back.
Things can move quickly
once we teach the gears to run
wisdom trails behind
the clever machine stays dumb
doing whatever it can.
Add a thinking cloud
and the price climbs with each guess
false answers sound true
who keeps checking all the checks—
who detects the last error?
My palms has been good to you all
Since time memorial
My palms felt your weakness
Your simultaneous pain
Through the beauty of your skin
Although my palms are rough
Hardened by the toughness of the earth
Although we dreamed dreams
Under rain and sunshine
Hoping to meet peace at the mountain top
I couldn't sit on my family tree ??
Because the tide in me bore you
Looking at the cloud now
It seems beautiful over my head
I count you all among the stars in heaven
My palms will always know you
Although you have a nutritious smile
Just like my other stars
I still count compassion among you all
Who dictates what is cool
He who drops out of school?
Who sets the tone for what is hip
He who gives the fuzz the slip?
Who decides what is in
The fellow with the cheshire-cat grin?
Who gets to define success
He who is given to excess?
Who is a veritable magnet for sex
He who stands for hours erect?
Who writes cutting-edge couplets like these
My dogwood, but he has the fleas
Through each of its high climber's
And its low diver's
Adored looks, fixed in wonderment
Earth, too, has lovers.
Whilst in return, for stroked claw*
Wrapped tendril, stings more*
Fighting off whose own advances!
The sensual deplore!
* Falcon's, raptor's
* Jellyfish's
Now entering the new season
Gives the meaning
Of the past life of old
Conquering the demons grasping hold
Knowing they were the reason
Of a lost soul trapped in the abyss
Breaking through, reaching heavenly bliss
I blow a kiss
To God
Waving back and forth his lightning rod
With the surrounding angelical squad
I kneel and pray
For giving me the continuous strengthening
Of a beating heart of cosmic gold
To peel each journey and unfold
Each harden lesson untold
The spiritual healing
Is a wonderful feeling!
I been staring at the water,
looking for somebody’s fault
I found that the river tastes the same
no matter who adds salt
I kept replaying every sentence,
every pause that hit too hard
Seems that’s how a heart’ll memorize
what the mind just calls a scar
I thought the river might explain,
pick a side and tell me who’s who
But it just kept pulling every story
until they all bled into blue
Funny how the shoreline
never begs the tide to stay
It just keeps being shoreline
while the water finds its way
Maybe that’s what hurts the most
not the blame, not being right
Just watching that swaying boat
learn to drift by into the night
So if the river’s got a memory,
I hope that it keeps the laughs instead
Because carrying every grain of salt
ain’t ever raised the dead
Dreams must reach their fatal end
At the moment dawn wakes the sun
Yawning with a paternal warmth
He proclaims another day has begun
Rising over meadows, mountains, and vast seas
Early morning light glows with prismed color
Amber skies carry gentle wafts of wind
Kissing away the morning mist
704.
Veneration to Mary:
She Who Has Faith
Oh Mary, servant of Allah
She Who Has Faith – the Siddiqah
God had seen her faithfulness
She is full of grace & blessedness
Oh Mary – the Faithful One – the Siddiqah
Our honor & adoration to you, Ave Maria
Praise God for the faithfulness of the Blessed Virgin Mary
We venerate Mama Mary, Faithful is She.
Amen.
-10/04/2019
(Dumarao)
*Veneration to Mary as “She”
The mirror answers
every gesture I offer—
left becoming right,
space delights in symmetry
returning all that I bring.
Memory echoes
every footstep left behind
tracing every path—
time appears to hold a glass
to both what's past and ahead
No mirror this time,
entropy shattered the glass—
slivers point forward
each becomes a closing door,
with time on entropy's knees.
I found the first letter under my pillow,
in ink I recognized before I recognized the words
my own hand, but steadier.
Braver, somehow, in the loops of the y.
Dear diary, it began, in my handwriting,
though I keep no diary that anyone else could find.
It knew things I'd only thought at 2a.m.
It knew the name I never say out loud.
I caught it once, in the lamp-light,
bent over my desk in the shape of me,
holding a pen the way I hold a pen,
writing something I would never have the nerve to send.
I didn't stop it.
I think some part of me left the desk lamp on
on purpose, that night
some part of me that wanted to be spoken for.
It signs my name better than I do now.
No hesitation in the final stroke.
No crossing out. No starting over.
Just my name, sent, sealed, and meant.
Last week I found the final letter,
already folded, already addressed
to the one person I never worked up the courage to tell.
At the bottom, in handwriting identical to mine, it said:
I am you, but the part of you that stopped waiting.
I hope you don't mind. I already dropped it in the mailbox.
By the time you read this,
it will already be theirs.
my mouth has a mind of her own
she is not assertive, she is aggressive
It is her way or the freeway
She is opinionated beyond the norm
I am well aware of the danger she puts me in
Broken teeth are proof I have gone to extreme measures
Trying to keep her clamped down
and under wraps
Sarcastic and loud, she can get me into all kinds of trouble
Which is why I no longer drink
another explanation for the broken teeth
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