2022, Ohio River Valley Literature, poetry

standstill travelogue

there are no land masses here
only fog with unmeasurable tensile strength

a man beneath the underpass moans
attempting to talk vehicles passing overhead
into fiery suicides

time- suspended here – will soon reset outside the event horizion

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2022, December 2022 Haiku, Haiku, Ohio River Valley Literature, poetry, psychogeography, river life, winter

Mud Bodies: December Haiku (1-3)


1. (broken haiku)

Sunday before Christmas
high water threats
gone: the cold stays


2.

Bits of snow surfing
on the bitter winter winds
on a quiet wharf


3.

These bones echo
the river’s cutting currents
this body: a mud bank

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2022, Ohio River Valley Literature, poetry, summer, work

Ah, Grasshopper!

The guy pretending to fish
and his old lady ask
if I have a cigarette; the
full moon philosopher
convinced my walking stick
was made by David Carradine
air out his feet smoking spice.
I make a mental note
to check on him — from a distance —
in case he gets some fentanyl laced shit
can’t have him go all oak-chested
I don’t carry Narcan anymore
and the state fair makes cops twitchy
more interested in keeping the tourists happy
less so one Kung Fu obsessed skeleton
his skin suit all stretched his eyes
on a different television station
his ears plugged against collective commercials
he doesn’t ask for smokes but somehow
I feel like if I was smoking
he’d tell me
they were rolled by the Marlboro Man

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