"miss-matched socks hold the answers to none of our political calamities" (6-24-05)


eerie held in the time,
twelve roses all showing thorns,
beautiful nonetheless, nonetheless.
nonetheless.
too high to touch, too close to hold,
depicted like a roulette wheel,
ten times as dashing in photographs.
red, black, and blonde. sunscorched.
woebegone winter elapses,
as just as dismal may rains.
june couldn't hold a candle,
to the carnival i forgot to miss.

but if we could just tiptoe into the attic,
maybe there are old daguerreotypes that could remind us,
why we were born into this family to start.

it hasn't rained in months, some would argue years.
the weathermen are lying.
doubly as drunk as when this bottle was started.
maybe we lie too?
maybe we lie in photographs,
where we control each element: angle, contrast, contour, color,
every grain of resolution; every inch of culture.

it HASN'T rained in years.
crops are in ruin,
last autumn's harvest failed,
last spring's blossom failed,
you can't measure these things,
but you feel; as real as apparitions never aborted.