Tarotmania

Storms of light
Pervert my dreary, thickening
Self-appointed night.

Many times I have been told
I hold the second sight
The third ubiquitous eye

First person and omnisciant
Both. All-seeing, all-knowing
Crystal bitch

Dread witch
Rain dance stick shaker
Eye of newt

Lizzard gizzard
Black cat bar room wench
The great son Osiris

Winks his disregard upon my
Trendy pastel sheets.
Stone castles, stoned brains

I will scream like a banshee
On green and amber plains
And try to take the world

In flames and play psychotic
Games in which my opponents
Are frequently unaware

We have begun. I will fly
Into the sun, with eyes of
Time and flaming red hair.

No one seems to have my flair
For the delicacy of revenge.
Like the Death card

I resurface, mock fear
Transform in the painful
Rebirth of dark metaphors

For I possess that power
And it grows like rampant wild lies
Exponentially on each and every hour.

1992

the compass speaks

on the downside of the white mountain
where black fear pounds each midnight on the door

until splinters flew like bullets
until the pounding in my head became the blackness

where the terrifying silence of an eon
the literal ice age of sorrow
becomes the mode of this north face

and even now
in the lower fields of green I can still feel
the bitterness of frozen rage
stinging my face, snowflakes in a storm

through the foggy window pane
only cold sunlight strikes my face and
burns my eyes

I reach out in snow-blind wonder at the cracked stars
that will not be my guide
squinting
stumbling
forsaken
close the curtains

1993

The Brothers Grimm Begin Their Shift

Hail the piper! Once dressed in
The brilliant green of ancient Europe's
Now defunct hills and moors

He stands dejected, now
Unemployed. His livelihood,
It seems, destroyed

By endless, thoughtless streams
Of mechanical dreams. His only followers
Now the dusty vermin of Florence

The parasitic army of life. They
Have come up from behind; some
Hungry, some crippled, some lonely

Some crazy, some blind. They don't
Know what they want to find but
They will follow without specific

Goals in mind. The man, the myth
His wooden reed erect; outcast
Archaic, anachronistic reject

Still parades through the cobbled
Avenues and shady glades and
Market squares. A little shabbily

Dressed he assumes fantastic airs
As if the children of the hamlet were
Still quite securely in tow.

But stoically he proceeds as if
He doesn't know. And if he is a figment
Of the past it surely doesn't show.

1992

Up Vision

I will never make it across
The gigantic blue field of your eye.
It's massive glacier

That freezes me
Bone to brain.
Its gaping, blackened crater

Emitting iridescence in the dawn,
A still warm meteor.
It's fantastic white wasteland

That stretches into the pink gaps
And black ridges.
It is itself a country

Where the languange is hauntingly strange,
The customs are barbaric
And the natives are

Anarchists,
Freedom fighters,
Seeders of a bloody revolution.

It's monolithic brow where witches live
And cast their Shakesperian spells
Over many miles has long

Been raised in a parody
Of simple truths. It's jarring
Subtle movements like a

Groaning continental plate
Create unmapped regions
The likes of which I have seldom seen.

Each having come as a surprise,
Being myself well-travelled;
Chic and worldly.

It is a place I have compulsion
To explore, but I will never
Make it to the other side.

1992

The Cold Equations

Base 10
that's what we use for the counter
the magic integer flashes and strobes in subliminal bursts
of rage and shame

And I have once again been invited to this scam
this sham
this numbers game
given a front row seat
and to make my evening thoroughly complete

I have myself been given a number
whose purpose is to mark my place
my ranking
my position
my role
in this hopeless, unwin-able race

I wear it pinned
upon my face
and while some prefer the red letters
on their backs

I have found some peace in the silence
of my private, personal release

Once upon a time I was told
I had a voice like a steel blade
to cut deep and true
and a heart of genu-wine 24k gold

But it doesn't hold
the value
it doesn't make the numbers anymore
devalued and dull, it cannot be buried
cannot be sold

And now the hard equations
are becoming much too cold

It's good on paper

It's still good on paper
it's bottom line we are all so proud of
and yet...

Well...divide by zero and see what the fuck it is you get

1992 (revised 2006)

pi

swing your kitchen knife like a
tiny serrated sabre
and take yet another slice from this delicious
pie of my unnoticed labor

all the talents and tricks encircled
in an imperfect crust
for one
for all

take 3 or 4 if
one is just too small
five eighths
six tenths

just like Pi
with a never-ending circumference
measured in nths

take more
i know you cannot yet be full
i know there is one crevice that
you have not spackled flat

one half
three fifths
it is not the bread of life
but the pastry of its myths

and as the circle widens
grows a gap like the almond sliver moon
you snarl and fight for the last mysterious crumbs
meaty fingers and tiny little sausage hands alike
all grasp for the final
interminable
infinite slice that stands alone
too soon

I cannot blame you for your greed
you saw it cooling in the window,
slow wisps of spicy steam rising
you had your need
and you have so many mouths to feed

so here you are
right on time
at the wellspring
the geyser
the fountain of perpetual
key lime
frothing forth a sour merangue
to make each slice so flawed and yet
so sublime

and when more dough is required
it is delivered, a warm and pliable orb,
each day, a swaddled spherical infant
it yawns and stretches
ready to become more pie
that you will all
absorb