You know you needed that big dump when it clears out your sinuses.

Robert McCloskey:

I know that you believe that you understood what you think I said, but I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.

Alien Cats

Our planet is just a big shiny ball for the Space-Cat Empire!

There is no safety in beauty.

Toast

Like people, bread is usually more interesting when its toasted.

Super-Horticulture.

Superman is basically a very strong invulnerable plant without roots. Appropriate that he was raised on a farm. Like plants... he thrives on sunlight. Fortunately, most plants don't have heat-vision. Otherwise making a salad would be a whole different experience.

Bachelor pains.

The only thing a bachelor likes about fitted sheets is sleeping on them. We don't like to wash them, or fold them. We don't even want to know they are called fitted sheets. I died a little inside when I realized I knew what a fitted sheet was.

More Brownies...

Brownies are a baked chocolate omelette.

The Judge: Chapter 1

Chapter 1

“Hello, can you hear me? Good.”

I am called The Judge. And I perform what I consider an important public service, a somewhat specialized line of work: I kill people. Not just any people of course, but people that deserve it. Now, you might assume that I mean murderers, rapists, pedophiles, kidnappers, hip-hop artists, that sort of thing. But no. I kill the people that I think deserve it. I can understand your typical murderer or rapist. They aren't really human, but they have a certain honesty about them. Their crimes make sense, part of the natural order of things. Life is violence, we are either violent to ourselves or violent towards others, or both. Just how it is, in many ways these animals don't have the ability to function in any other way, and such behavior falls short of what interests me. No. For something to be evil, for a person to be evil, it must involve a choice. They must understand the evil that they do and have fully embraced it, willingly. Having had the presence of mind or ability to choose otherwise.

True evil, real evil does not reveal itself in such an obvious manifestation as your typical murderer or child molester. It is a quiet cancer of society, hiding among the everyday people that sit across from you on the subway. Real evil looks normal, tricks you into thinking that it is normal, even becomes cloaked in what might be considered legitimate or necessary institutions. Supermarkets are evil. Schools are evil. Churches are evil. As you can imagine, I don't have many friends. But I will bet that as I named those 'wholesome' cornerstones of modern life what they really are, somewhere deep down inside you, you know it is true. If you doubt it, go out into the woods for a week, or lock yourself in a room with only the food and water you need to survive for a while, no TV, no radio, no computer or cell phone, nothing but you and the silence. Then re-enter the world as we have made it. It is a jarring experience. That is when you know evil. It is where I live everyday.

Heart of Darkness: Chapter 1

Heart of Darkness

Chapter 1

The lab was dark and cool. There was an island of light cast from a saucer of spotlights above the middle of the room. A cone of ghost-light fell upon a beautiful young woman, shackled to a flat steel table with metal cuffs and leather straps. Upon her head was a dome of electrodes each with a black cord that twisted across the floor like a thick snake to a bulky control counsel. The woman was pale and disoriented from drugs. Even so, her large ocean-blue eyes seemed to drink in everything around her. Her open mouth was framed with plush full lips painted red. Her perfect teeth and dimples hinted at a smile that could brighten a room like a sunrise.

Echoing through the dark room was a Frankie Laine song that had been climbing up the Billboard charts: Do not forsake me oh my darlin', on this, our wedding day. Do not forsake me oh my darlin'...

The woman's torn clothes barely allowed her any modesty. She had wavy brown hair that was moist from her cold sweat, matted to her wide cheekbones. Her swan-like neck was adorned with a knotted silk scarf, playful and elegant. An ample bosom swelled below a brassiere that strained to break through the remains of her pale green blouse. Snug brown trousers hugged her round hips, tucked into brown leather boots with dots of stippled-out hearts.

...I do not know what fate awaits me. I only know I must be brave, and I must face a man who hates me. Or lie a coward, a craven coward, or lie a coward in my grave...

The voluptuous woman moaned softly, writhing against her bonds. Her smooth skin rose with goose-flesh from the cold steel of the table beneath her. Her back arched and knees bent trying to escape the chill, the leather strapping restraints creaking like a hangman's rope.

I could only scream

When you died
I could only scream.
My Mother my Mother
you were in me.
Wrapped around my bones.

When you died
I could only scream.
A hollow point shell
blew through me.
Drawing a barbed-wire net,

Would I had known you

My Father,
we had 38 years.
Would I had known you.

But under the bluster
and fury was a
silence born long
before me.

It would be better
for a son to
respect his Father,
and still I try
to foster it.

But, I never knew you.

Last Kiss

Last Kiss

I wonder if she knew

it would be the last kiss.

A moist tender parting,

chains of chemicals from

tongues to brain that still

connects us.

Even now, I can taste it.

The memory of her

swims in my brain

sparking patterns

of synapse and nerve

that make me ache,

as the echo of a woman

is no substitute for her presence,

and her shadow, long departed,

still reaches me.

Is it all men?

Is it all men?

Is it all men who
once their seed is planted
taking root or not begin
seeking other gardens

to once again empty
themselves in the moist
fertile ground of woman.
Not that a garden

Take my hand

Take my Hand

Silver girl peeking over

wide eyes are staring

dancing in the bright moonlight

in ladybug shoes

Running wild through the raindrops

jumping in puddles

making the little rainbows

for her to slide on.

Chorus:

Take the hands of the child

Never-land is a cradle

a child in the sandbox

is a world with no fear

please do not let me go

into bitter winter

where people in boxes

dream the world into gray.

Penelope

“Penelope”

Brave Penelope overlooking the sea
holding Telemachus to your breast
you wave your husband off to war
You walk in Ithaca below the olive trees
A widow’s grief you fear
As you stand along the shore.

The suitors come hungry at the scent
Of the vacant throne Odysseus left behind.
You weave Laertes’s shroud
To keep them all at bay
Unraveling it at night
Lest they claim your hand by day.

The Ballad of Christina Green

Six Arizona tombstones
bought with blood and with lead
at 10:10 local time
the desert ran red.

In the City of Tuscon
our six cowboys lay dead
no more riding the trail
the deserts stained red.

Chorus:
The ghosts of Arizona
on the cold desert nights
whisper to us sad stories
asking us 'make it right'
in the eyes of our children
chase away the bad dream
let us all sing the ballad
of sweet Cristina Green.

God Fearing Atheist

God Fearing Atheist

I'm a god fearing atheist, and its your god I fear

your wooden cross death-cult telling me to get saved

from original sin, so that I can get in-to

the next world you say is so much better then this.

This world with its rainbows, rain forests and rainstorms,

does it rain in your heaven, can you watch the sunrise?

Its easy to rape this world, and hoard all its treasure

when you care more about heaven and how to get there.

Eulogy for the Old Man of the Mountains

“Eulogy for the Old Man of the Mountains”

You might have thought stone would stay,

wind and water so slowly sculpt the Earth

it seems the lightest caress to the

span of human eyes.

The Old Man, his granite face

watched over the valley since before

we were here to thank him.

You might have thought he would have

been there still and ever after our

short span with the world.

Brownies

A good cook can make brownies in a white t-shirt and keep it that way.