I’ve previously posted a selection of my earliest poems (from 1972-1976), selections of both my early love poems and of my ‘love lost’ poems (from 1978-1988), and a selection of poems from the 80s and 90s (as well as some lyrics to “Songs for Ill-fated Lovers” from the 1990s).
This is a selection of poems from the first decade of the new century.
I put myself in a friend’s shoes for this one to tweak him a bit….
I’ve Got Penny for My Thoughts
I’ve got Penny for my thoughts.
She hasn’t any faults.
In a chat room we met.
We’ve talked for hours on the ‘net.
She makes me feel alright
but she keeps me up all night.
What can I say?
I’m sleepy all day.
I’m walking into doors
and neglecting all my chores.
Everything’s a blur
’cause I’m talking to her.
Now, I must confess…
without her, I’d be Penny-less.
Could this be love?
Penny’s from heaven above.
I sure hope I’m not caught
because I’ve got Penny for my thoughts.
—
This one was an attempt to combine absurdist poetry with art surrealism and quantum mechanics (among other things).
Theories of Chaos
I can almost taste the butterfly (without any precognition of consequence)
starting a hurricane from the other side of the Earth
with one beat of its wings….
generating theories of chaos,
fluttering across my dreams and
creating surrealistic nightmares
(in-between the elephant).
I can almost smell the bow String (with extra really small dimensions)
launching the Arrow of Time into the Field of Action
(Like a Big Bang!)
piercing the Dark Matter of the Apple-headed people,
and pinning them to the locomotive in the fireplace
before you might gasp
(as if Determinism still worked).
I can almost touch the parallel universe (or the “multiverses” written here)
where One is Two and Two is Three
and from Three all Things come
(or from where Everything You Know Is True Somewhere…).
Adding equations as I need them,
to explain it All in Time
(while my watch lies melting on the counter).
I can almost see the probabilities of Quantum Mechanics (clumsy as they are)
exploding into Einstein’s world of elegance–
like a principle of memory –
or a persistence of uncertainty
amplifying the moment…
because Schroedinger’s Cat is neither dead or alive –
(until I check his box).
I can almost hear his paradox (even without my spectacles)
like the sound of one burning giraffe clapping;
It whispers to me…
esse est percipi
(to be is to be perceived)
But I don’t believe it.
—
This one is purely absurdist….
I Forgot…
I forgot the memory
of her weeping breasts
her lucid attire
and the eloquence of her doorstop….
She would squat before me
with sighing eyes
and fairy fuselage
with mustard on her mind.
She was a flaming dog in Jell-O
with extra outlets.
She was a dripping cow in mayonnaise
with plug-in accessories.
She was a rubber pig in custard
with outdoor sockets.
I used to treat her like a bastard chamber pot
with giraffe’s antennae and moose ears
and she would just sit there
on a pile of expired coupons and junk mail
manipulating chocolate.
—
Another absurdist poem…
Expecting the Unexpected
Expecting the unexpected…
I dance to the door-steps,
ascend to the bottom,
and stumble to the top.
I desperately try to calm my serene hysteria
as I stand upon the stoop —
Imagining the nothingness of her substantial void
as she approaches the receding door.
I hear her silent footsteps…
like the quiet shouting
of a screaming mime.
I visualize the tempting dismissiveness
and the repulsive attraction
that I don’t see in her at all.
With a sudden slowness
the door opens and I am shut out.
With her back turned, she faces me
and appears to disappear —
leaving as she arrives
and coming as she goes.
—
In this one I imagined Anonymous as a real person…
By Anonymous
To have my thoughts assimilated
into the human consciousness
without me being noticed.
Influence yet obscurity
would be ideal.