Food 

Tomatoes bring love.
Potatoes raise consciousness.
 
Onions spring compassion.
Mulberries promote change.
 
Corn is a generous mother.
Artichokes are modest knights.
 
You cannot love thy neighbor
without eating your vegetables.
 
You can stop world wars
with the kindness of a single fruit cup.
 

My Tongue, My Enemy 

Without you—blood in the mouth.
I swallow, the Latin
serifs scratch.
My tongue, my brother.
Decorated, perforated—
metal ball rolls
along the teeth like a
perverse arrowhead.
Tongue or Death.
My tongue, my own carcass.
My tongue, another friend
whom I've betrayed.
Shouldering guilt,
the innocent start running.
My tongue, my scream—
scream of shame.
My tongue, my bow—
I release you with no aim.
My tongue, my home.
Forgive me. I am gone.
 

An Hour After 

that repulsive growth, burnt by scarlet
medicines, finally fell off my face,
I met my future
ex-husband, and he decided
 
I was marvelous.
 
He said I do,
I said I do,
and so we did,
 
until a wart sprang
from his nose and grew as big
as an extra face,
grew as big
as an extra lung,
grew as big
as a Cadillac and grew much
bigger than us,
until the wart was all
I could see.
 
And he couldn't
see at all.
 

Conversation Poems 

✧✧✧
 
I enjoy your company,
smiled Host.
I can't imagine life
without you, admitted Parasite.
 
 
✧✧✧
 
How long have you been like this?
I asked the word raisin when I opened the box.
Hlp m! Hlp m! he yelped, and tried to cry.
 
 
✧✧✧
 
Wear me, said the word lifesaver
when it floated up to me.
Think of me
as another ring.
 
 
✧✧✧
 
So, what did you learn?
Curiosity asked the Cat, then
poked her carcass with a stick.
 
 
✧✧✧
 
I pictured you younger,
I told the word naïve.
I pictured you happier,
she answered.
 
 
✧✧✧
 
I ate seventeen apples today, bragged Primate.
That's wonderful, beamed Prime Number
and clapped his two hands three times.
 

The Fish, The Net and The Fisherman 

  The Fish The Net The Fisherman
Wishes s/he were an accountant   ✔  
Wishes s/he were an accountant     ✔
Wishes s/he were a stocking   ✔  
Wishes s/he were 1/16th of the moon ✔    
Wishes s/he went to school ✔   ✔
Wishes s/he wouldn't constantly smell like fish   ✔ ✔
Wishes s/he weren't roped into this ✔ ✔ ✔
Wishes s/he were a dreamcatcher   ✔  
Wishes this were a dream ✔   ✔
 

More Poems...