Categories
Americana analysis art Hell history holidays horror human behavior humanity journalism kindness life love mindfulness mourning muse mythology nightmares pandemics Uncategorized

ghost light

the moment he turned

and walked away

our world became peckinpah

i can no longer discern

whose blood

my hands are weeping over

Categories
analysis baseball writing coffee death mourning papyrus poetry rituals Uncategorized

planchette

there’s a reading chair

i won’t allow to die

propped up with

an old Royal Typewriter case

where i drift off

dreaming unafraid

of slow-moving tornadoes

& your whispering face

weighing scientifically

which is more destructive

.

you’re haunting me

as promised

but not so much i feel put upon

which i know

you would hate

(artwork by Stephen Mackey)

Categories
happiness history holidays love poetry

magic & loss

more painful

than losing the baby

was watching you cry

and

me remembering

the November

your sweet excuse

for everything was,

“Hey, I’ve got a pregnant wife at home…”

Categories
poetry

the shape of a man

fathers day

is a black hole

the shape of a man

filled with regret

alcoholism

and horrific choices

Categories
literature mourning poetry Uncategorized

under catalpa trees

no death

represents a single loss

it is a lifetime of little ones

i didn’t just lose my father

i lost his voice

his cologne

him beaming as i accepted my diploma

the father daughter dance at my wedding

him teaching my sons to fish

family reunions under catalpa trees

but i remember the way he laughed

it was left behind in his grandsons eyes

and in

their gleeful bellies

his joy rising from the deep

it is simply

my favorite mercy

Categories
literature poetry sociology Southern Gothic

blades of grass

i long for the way

your stubble beard felt on my little girl skin

my fingers tracing stars on your sandpaper

how safe it was

to curl up on your chest

tucked beneath your chin

as we swayed gently

in your old leather rocker

.

dozing and certain god was in heaven

.

there are days now

daddy

when i’ve come to believe

jesus called in sick for the second coming

and my fingers running through

blades of grass on your grave

would do

Categories
Jazz Music poetry Short Stories Uncategorized Urban Legends writing

water and salt

grief is a sloppy drunk
slurred stumble leaning
into unresolved dark corners
of our lives

the moment you think
you’ve placed him down for the night
into a reasonable bed

here he comes again
breathing his sickly sweet
bourbon breath

how will i ever forget
where our statues stood
before the corrosive
passage of time

water and salt

form glacial streams
down weary faces

marking the ones who love us

this is what we began with

this is what we leave behind

Categories
Jazz Music poetry Short Stories Uncategorized Urban Legends writing

what a feeling (for lou)

for a time
i was an undertaker
who toiled into the night

mitigating death
keeping the unpleasant details
out of the loved one’s sight

in the years since
people still come to me
in times of grief

to help prepare them for what is to come
to be a guide when someone has died

but i am at a loss
as to what
the proper form of condolence is
when a rock god has gone to the sky

so here’s what i’m going to do

light a candle

get drunk
piss myself
and cry

listen to his songs
deep into the night

then wake up tomorrow morning

pick up my punk pen and guitar

and

fucking write
write
write