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Writings on the Shithouse Wall
Duology: Good Time Gals Bad Time Boys
Haikus: 366
Everything: Indexed

Ode to a Dangling Sword

#PROLOGUE

The Myth of Damocles as told by Uncle Lenny
He was this dude who complimented King Dionysius for having it so good and being so wealthy and having a fuck all easy life. And the King was like, “Bitch, I got problems too.”
You sit here in my cushy cushy throne with this fucking broadsword over your head.
Then I’ll march in every mother fucker who hates you
And really wants to cut your fucking head off.
And see how you fucking like it.”

#POEM

Swing, blade o’r my head, swing.
Drop down and do your terminable thing.
A few inches inch lower or just a snapped string.
And spare me from this insufferable King.

My wits are worn down to the dwindling fray,
As he forces me to be king for a day.
Why threaten with such a metaphorical display
And make me a parable to cut the way?

I just complimented his golden piss pot
On his wealth and privilege without a thought.
And strapped to his allusory throne was the thanks that I got?
“Rich people got problems,” is the morale he sought?

Just have me bargain for barley for days at a time
Or show me the stacks of scrolls that need signed
Please, show me the tedium of the bureaucratic grind
Or any of your daily problems that happen to mind.

You always had a penchant for the dramatic
And acted in ways that were so very erratic
Must your swift vengeance be so operatic?
You can educate without being traumatic.

I grow weary of this protracted affair
And wish death would come demand his fare.
To think the end is hanging just there
And all I can do is offer a prayer

“So, drop you fucking thing, drop
And make this hellish play come to a stop.
Fall like the red curtain dropped from the top.
And bring things to a close with a chop.”

My Ass Is Full of Stars

I contain multitudes in the grand galactic scheme of things
Born of some celestial goop spattered on a cooling rock
With billions of years of bad decisions backing me up.

The air I breathe, the water I drink, the food I eat
All of it on loan from somewhere very far away
But that leaves the question of how did we get here?

I mean really get here. What exactly was in that primordial soup?
The things in nature that can be described as some fertile broth
Are very, rarely anything appetizing or appealing

We never talk about that goop, that was just the start.
Sure a watery, rich comet striking the earth is fine
But even that had to start somewhere.

Did the almighty have a stuffed up nose
That her or she or it rocketed upon the earth
while exclaiming in relief, “it is good.”

Maybe some transient pervert got a little too excited
Turned on by the birth of stars and first sunrises
A veritable big bang into the right chemical conditions

I suspect an alien in need of relief pulled over one starry night
And popped a squat in the obscuring clouds of a vulcanized crust
A fertile beginning for a new world sprouting from shit.

After all, the universe passes through me.
Every day, I gather the sun,
I reap the earth,
I consume the cosmos
And then I shit, fertile, rich and often.
If I squatted in some goldlocks zone
Found a spot that was warm, moist,
with the proper amounts of starlight
I too would give birth to a world.

Abracadabra

An alphabetical analysis of anxieties

Prologue

When you are gripped with an unknown fear

or get spooked in the dark night

Remember we all have our worries

And can suffer from a fright

The first step is understanding why

so you can accept the cause

Whether you suffered from a trauma

Or a reflex gives you pause

You are not an odd aberration

Or suffer alone in this

Remember we all have our worries

Some are detailed on this list.

“A” adopts ablutophobia

when you are scared of the tub

and grabbing hands are moist and lathered

and getting ready to scrub.

”B” brings about bogyphobia

And bogeys beneath your bed

Grabbing you by your appendages

To start chewing on your head

“C” comes with some Coulrophobia

The feeling that clowns can bring

after that prestigious profession

Was ruined by Stephen King

“C” contracts coronaphobia

As an epidemic spreads

If only everyone wore a mask

Our Grandma might not be dead

“D” drives deep the dromophobia

that huddles you by the street

waiting for the crossing sign to change

so the bus misses your feet.

“E” embeds enetophobia

when pointy pins prick your feet

piercing along your pained phalanges

and puncturing through your meat.

“F” forebodes felinophobia

and the clowder that follows

as cats are hissing and conspiring

to hunt you from the shadows

“F” finds foniasophobia

When a killer’s on your road

Your heart beats fast and your breath comes quick

As your brain squirms like a toad

“F” finds foniasophobia

As mass murderers go free

Like they haven’t caught the Zodiac

With his cyphered mystery.

“G” gives you Geniophobia

a concerning of the chin

of mandibles and protruding jaws

And the rows of teeth within

“H” hemorrhages hemophobia

a pulsing fear of the blood

seeping slowly down your pallid thigh

to commingle with the mud

“I” inflicts insectophobia

as bugs crawl across your skin

Stinging you with their envenomed tails

and burrowing deep within

“J” just has no phobias that jar

But there’s a few that won’t do

They’re antisemitic and racist

And full of a wrong world view

“K” can kindle kenophobia

a fear of the void of space

from free falling through the nothinginess

to vanish without a trace

“L” lurks with Lachanophia

A timidity of leafy greens

Of choking on parsnips or carrots

or an allergy to green beans

“M” metes out some mottephobia

A fear of fluttering moths

Chewing through your linen wear

Gnawing holes in your wash clothes

“N” nettles with Nyctophobia

Those nightmares that stalk the dark

With shadows that are following you

When you are lost in the park

“O” occurs when orinthophobia

draws black birds to every branch

Gathering on their lofty perches

Waiting for their pecking chance

“P” picks with pediophobia

Abhorring those porcelain dolls

Watching you from your mother’s cupboards

Judging you with glass eye balls

“Q” quavers with quadrophia

A qualm of the number four

Certain cultures think it sounds like death

And can bring it to your door

“R” rains down Ranidaphobia

A revulsion of green frogs

that are croaking in your swimming hole

And lingering under logs

“S” serves Syngenesophobia

When your relatives come by

They’ve brought their bags and are moving in

And won’t leave until they die.

“T” taxes with technophobia

A terror of new machines

For they’re coming to enslave us all

With their batteries and screens

“U” unearths Uranophobia

A fear of heaven most high

Where gods and goddesses sit and judge

Unheeding your mortal cry

“V” vexes with vestiphobia

When your clothes refuse to fit

And your patterns have clashing colors

With sweat stains in every pit

“W” whets wiccaphobia

When wild witches curse your name

Stirring spells into their cast cauldrons

And manipulating thanes

“X” exhibits xerophobia

A despair of drying skin

When no moisture can ever slake you

As you wither from within

“Y” yokes you with ymophobia

When you contradict some creep

Even when you know you’re right

Conflicts always cost you sleep

“Z” zeroes in on Zemmiphobia

Worry of the great mole rat

Crawling naked with tremendous teeth

From it’s native habitat

So when you stare into your own abyss

And feel your guts drop to your feet

Remember we all have our worries

And that’s what makes us complete

I Remember Cape Canaveral

I remember Cape Cananveral
Though I was many years too late.
When a long rocket’s red and starry eye.
Lifted our eyes in commingled fate.

Nothing unites us like destruction.
O rings twist as the GIs pivot
Speeches and rockets are fueled with gunpowder.
As towers climb and Rosies rivet.

Why do they build our rockets?
As they give each other medals and applaud
When did we let them trade in our exploration
for a Tesla-branded escape pod

On Isolation

We thought we knew what loneliness was
Until our universes collapsed
into an impregnable bubble
When our borders contracted out of fear

Suddenly, we were trapped with people
Who we weren’t entirely at home with.
Time plus distance made the hearts grow fonder
But what happens when the space contracts

We worked to escape a lot of the time
Carved out niches reserved solely for ourselves
We bargained and maintained for a shred of self
We all hoarded little quarks and quirks.

Now, we all must turn inward.
Regulation, guideline, doctor-prescribed selfishness
We must spend time with each other
And embrace the decision’s made.
Summer’s almost over.
And a lonely winter isn’t far.

Everything Indexed

0123456789

A

A Poem About Beauty
A Song of My Self
A Visit from St. Atticus
A Walk through the Garden
abcs
Abracadabra
Abrasive
America May 2020

B

Baby Boomer
Bad Time Boys
Be My Therapist
Because I Can
Bowflex
Burn it all down

C

Calla
Cats
Coming for Us All
Consent to Let Go
Creator of Worlds

E

Ecuadorian Dream House
Exegesis

F

Fatten the Curve
Forty Two Poems

G

Golden
Good Time Gals

H

Haikus From the Coal Region
Halloweened
Helios and the Local Colours
Her
Hey, fuck up

I

I Am a Bicycle in the Rain
I Break
I Left It All Behind
I Love You, Mom
I Prefer the Sea Days
I Remember Cape Canaveral
I'm Already Packed
I'm out
In the Mountains Oblivion
Island Gaze

L

Lady Libertine
Landmark Erosion
Love Sucks
Lover's Tanka
Lsd in the Afternoon
Luminescence, Cinnamon, Fire, Juniper, Piano

M

Model
Mother Earth
Mother Issues
Mourning
My Ass Is Full of Stars

O

Ode to a Dangling Sword
On Isolation
Orchid

P

Potential
Push and let go

Q

Quarantine Day 39

R

ramble
Rather
Remember

S

Sanctity of Morning
Satre Causes Nausea
Shades
Shelf Full of Dick
Smoke
Staten Island Mating Call
Stop

T

Thank You, Mitch McConnell
The Mistake of Enlightenment
The Northern Lights and a Dead Moose
The NSA took the Imam away
The Perfect Moment
The Philosopher's Stone
This One is for the English Majors
Thoughts on a Fire
Three
Tulla

W

We Fuck Stone
What a glorious day to be alive
When You are Stoned
Whiskey Kiss
Will Song