GOAD 27
—for J.S. Strifling
Glittering smoke rises from reality roses. Even a bestselling
agent can’t move a dingy cellar. Presumption of innocence is
strained: don’t you
recognize the baggage
on that carousel?
One can’t imagine a
permit granted for
that murder weapon. Due
process aside, the defense
writhes. Sensing what it has
accomplished, the rifle weeps.
GOAD 28
The kids don’t wear watches no more. Those phone-
computers wipe their asses and everything. Drenched in pharma
ceutical opera, they
drag race on imaginary
highways & skid into
the palace of error. (No,
it’s not my cane & white
locks talkin’.) Reason may
adopt a rhythm, but rhythm
ain’t reason. Will the kids ever
locate invisible light?
MEMORY TACTICS
A fistful
of mustard. Gulped whole.
The fact spawning the occasion
is often repeatedly force fed.
He feigns ill.
To bypass depression-
inducing gatherings. A sealed lid
can be trusted. Let fine memories prevail.
CRITICAL REBOUND
Crises unburden folks of the
need to scrounge for “relevance,” of pressure to
heed
unnatural
diagnoses. There’s no
practical moralist on our staff; the lot hang
on by a strand of
floss. Let’s recycle each into an
accountable doer. Yet
should any grow allergic to threshold, out they’ll
tumble. Once the throttle’s regained, I won't let your
isthmus
down. No
reason it
should sink.
A previous contributor to Synchronized Chaos, I have published 12 books of poetry– most recently Zeugma (Marsh Hawk Press, 2022) and A Pageant for Every Addiction (Marsh Hawk, 2020), written collaboratively with Maya D. Mason. My Selected Poems & Poetic Series appeared in 2016. I am the author of Reading Poetry with College and University Students: Overcoming Barriers and Deepening Engagement (Bloomsbury Academic, 2022), as well as two books of criticism, and three edited anthologies. My work appeared in Best American Poetry 2007. My paintings hang in various collections. I am a Professor of English at CUNY-LaGuardia.