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Rescue the motherand her shivering catfrom the porch of the nursing homeBeware of cannibalsmeeting in caves You are going toneed help with themCross the bridge single-file Come to realizethat’s no dog in the kennelIt’s a skunk And those patchesof light in the forest?They’re pieces of skin Marianne Taylor is aContinue Reading

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Once upon a mountaintopabove the cloudy seaswith burning jewels, wind-woven chantsand scent of sun-glad treesa child discerned her destiny. And so she descended the granite slopesto a cottage small and remotewhere humble parents with bent, gray headsclad her in linen and wooltaught her to garden and watched her grow. AContinue Reading

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After W. B. Yeats In the dim coming times, vaccines won’t holdagainst the waves of milky greenish foambourne by ill birds, cattle and swine,and some will succumb to the mutating thing.Flesh will rot and fall away, soullesseyes burn hollow and gray, spoiled milk where oncefish swam. Gnawing hunger will raiseContinue Reading

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So there I was in the sixof swords, being ferried acrossa dusky river to an uncertain shore. Who was this child by my side?And whose itchy cloak covered my head?Sudden winds sprang up, drove us downstream, brisk waves spitting,spraying, knocking the six stiffswords, one by one, out of the boatContinue Reading

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your eyes are closed butyou still feel the light and you wonder what will bite fromwithin the dark portals. water flows through the portals andyou ride it in into the beyond which is rough and choppy butthrilling and splashy too. you see the other shore so you climband you feelContinue Reading

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“…She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair!” John Keats, “Ode on a Grecian Urn” Don’t let him take those pictures when the water meltsluminous pearl around youand the last sunbathers ascend the pale ribbon trailleaving behindthe day’s opalescent heart when onlyContinue Reading

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Most of the fairgoers observed the comely womanrobed like a statue in layers of gossamer clothfair hair plaited and piled. She strode down the midway past lights that flashed and jangled, music tangledand tuneless. She paused to stare at the Ferris wheelarcing like a rainbow, tracked the buckets bobbing againstContinue Reading

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“At last a deed worth doing. I say there is beauty in this….” Henrik Ibsen, Hedda Gabler Hedda, we misunderstood you,saw a monster embodyingthe Seven Deadlies,a remorseless disrupter,deceptive and cruel,eluding boredom, inflictingpain. But your handsome faceand warrior heart weren’tsensible gear for your day. Were you a goddess, we’d expectthe flirtingContinue Reading

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Your gaze speaksto my own deep iceNot sentimentmore elementalunsettling Perhaps we metin a sculptor’s studioHe shaped my shoulders, necklabored on my breastsYou watchedenigma eyes insetbeard unchiseled How long did we stare?Were we modeledfor common patronsbut cast as amorousgods, to please–my arms, AphroditeAres, your brow Surely we restedin velvet dirt, yourContinue Reading

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Mostly my neckjust always hurtsthey’re heavynever still or asleep at onceI rarely sleep myself I feed them cat foodsometimes micethe pet store girl is kindlooks at our shadowwants to know their namesthat they smell deadwhen frighteneddefecate in my braincausing dark thoughtsMy children were takenI’ve never mothereddon’t remember my owntrauma interferesContinue Reading