Inclemencies

I watched you stride purposefully
From your car this morning
With your umbrella
Preparing yourself for the return
To your car
In a downpour
Later this evening

And I thought
You and I are both subject to inclemencies
The various pissing vagaries
And inconsistent contingencies
But tonight I expect
Mine will endure sometime
Beyond the weather

(another slice of life from the commuter parking lot)

Bridge May Be Icy

Bridge may be icy and aloof
The pavement may shrug
And snow slide noncommittally off your roof
And sidewalks may just stand there
While the overpasses hang there
The leaves in your eavestrough may act all casual
And the lamp posts laze about as usual
And the retaining wall slouches
While the road-widening belches
And catchbasins remark disinterestedly
At sewer grates immune to controversy
Where even the subway tracks seem to pay no mind
As your yawning, distant infrastructure repays
Polite meaningless words in kind

(a new deal for communities)

Manumission

Of slavery or bravery
In the tonic of time
Which rots when it stinks
Despite the addition of lime
Of slander or candour
And the slinging of grime
Which clings where it catches
In a manner sublime

Of release or recapture
In the Garden of Id
Which does or it doesn’t
Then forgets if it did
Of knavery or slavery
That history books hid
Defeats manumission
In grown-up or kid

(did you or didn't you?)

An Odyssey in Common Time

One new idiocy at a time
One discrepancy at a time
One inconsistency at a time
One isolated incident at a time
One hickeyed cheek at a time
One bloated fatalism at a time
One discordant symphony of lies at a time
One tidal wave of disappointment at a time
One slow waltz at a time
One regret at a time
One numbered company at a time
One dose of vagabondism at a time
One capricious moment at a time
One lapse in judgment at a time
One human frailty at a time
One fevered nightmare at a time
One elegy for princes at a time
One captive audience at a time
One break in traffic at a time
One angry veteran at a time
One whiff of eternity at a time
One saving grace
One warm embrace
One familiar face
One troubled youngster at a time
One diaspora at a time
One cosmic joke at a time
One strife-filled weekend at a time
One turned ankle at a time
One theory of salutary neglect at a time
One unbroken chain of aphorisms at a time
One canopy of stunted trees at a time
One reminder of inefficiency at a time
One overwrought single mother at a time
One bus ride from hell at a time
One whisky-fuelled rant at time
One closeted limnologist at a time
One studied lack of decency at a time
One vacant act of heroism at a time
One vain hope for summer at a time
One sharp breath
And final punctuation.

Man at the Subway

I don't know you but
I suspect
You have
The normal range of human emotions
... or at least
Staccato blips
On Mothers' Day

(enjoy responsibly)

Mystery 101

At the confluence of convenience and oblivion
At the intersect of disrespect and greed
On the asphalt by the crooked corner store
Where the sidewalk crack is choking back the weeds

On the leafy path of minimum resistance
Where the Lethe rounds the bend among the reeds
And the pavement paves the slide to good intentions
And the monument is meant to mark the deeds

In the indolence of dutiful resentment
In the terrorized, the tortured, and serene
From a generation’s genuine deception
Which oblivion conveniently precedes

A moment in time, not about yams, but about the fleeting sense of "almost if" or that aggrandizing stench of delusion (which in time will merge, if the phoneticists are right, with disillusion) ... Be good to this, because it is copyright 2000 by Fresleven Music:

Moonlit Nights in the Sierra Madre

I was fishing for your love
I was paddling a big love canoe
Sliding silently up next to you
Imagining elastically just what you'd do
We could've been seven miles up
Amid the Peruvian Andes
Basking in the solar ray
Or bathing in the lunar spray
For seven moonlit nights
Alone in the Sierra Madre

I was sitting on your feet
At the foot of the mountain's mountainous sway
Trying to keep you from slipping away
Imagining enthusiastically just what you'd say
You tried to be like ether drops
You cried with vaporous intent
Left with the river's rash descent
And paddling, I joined the fray
For seven hundred miles
Alone in the Sierra Madre

Across fictional geographies
Into realms of the imaginary
I chased a dream, a moonlit dream
Alone in the Sierra Madre


For the continued apotheosis of the everyday, check out www.spencervillewayne.blogspot.com

The Yam’s the Thing

What are we all here fighting it for
A few dozen acres of this frozenized ground
Indeed, Candide, the yam is the thing
Tonight, indeed, there’s enough to go ‘round

Enough of the yam in its racinate form
Enough of these tubers and their tubular sound
Indeed, Candide, on a plate of dried peas
There’s a need, indeed, and enough to go ‘round

A scoop of I am on your ellipsis has formed
Excused for excuses where the tubers are found
Indeed, candied is the form that's preferred
And some yams, I am, are enough to go ‘round