36. History lesson
“Well Capricorn I hope you like the color black because that peacock is your color in this game.”

Capricorn’s opening move would be studied and although of course he lost
his willingness to move the piece and
his anger at being called prissy
was the first thrust in the rebellion
and subsequent freedom from the oppression of the man or the type
of man who smugly made the challenge.

That board and the black piece would be found years later a fossil the board
hard as rock instead of a scarf
as it surely was once worn around the neck tied intricately but easily removed
with one fluid movement so it could be draped down with casual yet regal ceremony and the game played upon it.

​Was it Capricorn’s scarf or his opponent’s? It was always made out to be the the oppressor’s board but really it was Capricorn’s and he unwound it incorrectly from around his neck the midddle finger mispositioned but symbolic of something new in spite of its or because of its awkwardness. And then the flood and the anger and the preservation of that moment as a relic as a play as a poem as a painting and the phrase “Capricorn called a peacock’’ as a means of denoting
anger that leads to change.
#weeklypoemandpic

35. Roost
​
In this world you should convert easily.
Adopt.
Or not convert at all.
Adapt.
Find the way of the pigeon.
Never be forced to escape
or to be a refugee.
Land where there is a place to alight.
Sing underwater bruits.
Raise your young in rafters.
Make a nest of scraps.
Eat morsels moist or dry.
Don't grow teeth. Or do.
Find the warm windowsill.
Cool on the predatorless statue.
Imitate the sound
a flapping goose makes that terrifies
the bigger jawed beakless creatures.
Be the night birds that move more
air in the dark but sparingly.
Sink talons into the screen door
and perch like a bat.
Open with the door.
Close with the door.
Be weighty as a body.
Be weightless as the
remaining fish
in the opaque sea.
Do you believe
in pigeon babies?
They creak like hinges
between the bricks
hiding where there once
was chimney and smoke.
#weeklypoemandpic

34. Contact tracer.

Isn’t that what you keep
track of
all the time
anyway
Who touched you
who you touched
Full time work
Part time work
4am work
Calling people saying
who do you know
that has this
stain on their
Face facts
I need you to face facts;
that forehead you
pressed on with
your finger
Don’t make your
point that way
Don’t push on
that woman’s head
You will get sick
like an idiot
An idiot that got sick
making a point
Answer the phone
Answer
the phone
You need to say
who you touched
It is your responsibility
now that you are ill
​
#weeklypoemandpic

32. first dates
a.
npo
the man's
head was
apart
from his body
and a hoop
passed
around it
and through
the space
where his
neck should
have been
a magic
trick
called
headless
man
b.
hard cider
from where he
lay on the
kitchen floor
as she knelt
over him
he asked
has the cider
come into
your milk yet
years before
she had tried
to stab him
through his heart
but with a spoon
#weeklypoemandpic

​30. Slightly rhyming

A.
A better
father

would eat
with his 
hands

the way
his
daughter
does.

B.
From the ferris wheel
gondola stopped
at its apogee
I squinted carefully
over the edge.

Something
I couldn’t
remember what
had already
dropped over
the ledge.

My son asked:
Dad are
you scared?
I wasn’t doing
well up there.
Not by a
long stretch.

C.
The dappled light on the car’s roof
a siren.

The square of light on the front door a proclamation.

We all have people we want to outlive
and the opposite too.

It’s not as though things end again and again but they do.

#weeklypoemandpic