The Other 10 %

Working the night shift
Over the years, I've found
I function much better
With less people around;
Life means more than
The company you keep,
There's a whole dark world
Which sizzles while they sleep.

Floating World Woman

The naked nape of the geisha's neck
Is the purest powder white
Sloping down into a dark
Warmer place, out of sight,
Where skin, the color of harvest rice,
Is cocooned, soft and tight,
In layers of silk and cotton...
A place, where if entered,
Time and intention are forgotten...

Cat's Eyes

Women do not consider it strange
To undergo chameleonic change
On a regular recurring basis,
Emotions and instinct prevailing over stasis,
Not stange at all, nor right or wrong,
It's what helps women become so strong...

Tea Party Losers

It's the others they blame
For problems everywhere,

Admitting their own failures
Would be too painful to bear,

Righteous indignation
Is the solace they share,

Incompetent, vulnerable...
Dispossessed serving the millionare.

Botany Lesson

Spring pink-magenta blossoms ascend,
In a tiny miraculous spiral,
Around and up, to where they end,
On top of the stalk of a flowering grass
On which small butterflies attend
To the business of nectar and bodily needs,
Breathtaking beauty and wonder,
Right there, in the weeds...

Looking Down...

Who knows what goes on
In the kingdom of the toes,
Beyond the navel mountain
Which always bigger grows
Over months and years,
Thanks to pizza and beers.

Hairless Primates Stranded In Modernity

Bouncing off the walls
On the days it rains,
Videos, books, and sex and booze
Please sooth the boredom pains!
Despite the talk of gods and souls,
The desperate fact remains,
We're trapped naked apes
With too-big brains.

Why So Blue?

Loosen your grip and relax,
Life's too short for the way you sing,
Crying with the notes of an alto sax,
Casting gloom over everything...
Just because you can't pass on your genes
To co-mingle with those of another,
Do you know what that really means?
You need to go talk to your mother.

McJob

My face hurts from smiling
At the cranky customers I greet,
I sell them fat and sugar --
All that they can eat;
Dazed repetition of soda & fries,
I'm half-dead on my feet,
My boss is a truly lovely guy
An anal-aggressive treat,
This job of mine is a butt,
And I'm the bicycle seat.

Papa's SENRYU, Batch No. 1

Early morning motion,

Body responds, on automatic,

But brain delayed.

- - - - - - - - - -

Exacerbating an already

Sensitive situation,

The wrong cologne.

- - - - - - - - - -

Loud and declarative,

The order is issued,

But no one moves...

- - - - - - - - - -

A water-tight logical plan

Falls-apart completely

Before the look in her eyes.

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Monkey with an abacus,

Seagull with a wrist-watch,

My wife and sports on T.V.

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Deep stunned silence,

Forks & spoons held in mid-air,

After a magnificent belch.

- - - - - - - - - -

The work of an office

Is less like baseball

And more like soccer.

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Mixed feelings over the

Main course at Olive Garden,

My first Senior Citizen discount...

- - - - - - - - - -

Always sensitive and

Reacting to the winds,

Weather-vanes and politicians.

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Tears in front of my wife

At a restaurant,

After the spicy Thai curry.

- - - - - - - - - -

Negotiating question asked,

But no reply received,

Which turned out to be the answer.

- - - - - - - - - -

Last night's left-overs

Spread all around the trash box

Thanks to the crows...

Six Quotes From Jean-Paul Sartre

Being is. Being is in-itself. Being is what it is.

Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you.

Hell is other people.

I do not believe in God; his existence has been disproved by Science. But in the concentration camp, I learned to believe in men.

Only the guy who isn't rowing has time to rock the boat.

There is only one day left, always starting over: it is given to us at dawn and taken away from us at dusk.

Raptor UAV

The missile, like a silent

Assassin, descends

Onto a hut, where the life

Of a terrorist ends.

Reality

Step by step, you plod through

The hundreds of minor actions,

Which you are bound to do

Each and every earthbound day...

Wash your clothes and brush your teeth

Go to work, collect your pay,

Actions always piled-up waiting,

They never go away...

I-Phone 5G

An exquisite compilation

Of intricate, advanced technology,

Held in the greedy grasp of a whore,

Hi-tech in service of baser biology,

Used as a weapon in the war

Of the sexes, where libidos are led

Down dark alleys, and seen no more...

The Wet Weeks

Mood and tone change

For seemingly no reason,

With the approach

Of the rainy season,

Humidity and pressure

Shift and rearrange,

What once was greener and fresher,

Into something

Heavier and strange.

One Liner Zingers

1. I'd say he doesn't have all his dogs on the same leash.

2. The wheel's spinning, but the hamster's asleep.

3. She forgot to pay her brain bill.

4. His antenna doesn't pick up all the channels.

5. Doesn't have his belt through all the loops.

6. I'd explain it to you, but your brain would explode.

7. The gates are down, the lights are flashing, but the train just isn't coming.

8. Looks like he played goalie for the darts team.

9. All booster, no payload.

10. Got the IQ of garden tools.

Himawari & Tetsujin

Sun flower,

Solar power,

Life juice for robots.

Huntress Erin In The Mountain Brook

She lofts the fly into the stream

Expertly, it lands,

And she makes a wish

That the lure, so carefully crafted,

Will fool a fish...

In the end,

The result was never in doubt,

The fly was too much

For the hungry trout.

Prehistoric Perennial

Spent the last seven months

With a mouthful of dirt,

But it's all good now,

Nothing bent, nothing hurt,

As I poke my green

Limbs out of the ground,

And suck in the fumes

Of spring all around...

I'm the scion of spores

From the time of the dinosaur,

Sprouting back from the spot

I was cut-down before...

All hail the return

Of the hard-luck fern!

Baby Boomers

Hell no, we're not too old for that,

Not too frail, or not too fat,

To roll around on the grass again,

Like we used to do, way back when...

04:30 AM -- I'm supposed to be asleep...

Half awake, rest destroyed,

In a murky, troubled, sleep;

Tribes of toxic trolls deployed

Into the tangled dreams I keep

Where they proclaim "It's party time!"

And then they scrap and dance and leap...

West Of Tripoli, May 2011

Kneeling in the cruel

Libyan desert, the men

From all walks of life,

Practice firing again and again,

At a tyrant they hope

To send to heaven,

Through the barrel

Of an AK-47...

Break Time

Drying on the back of my head,

Drips of honest toil-sweat

Evaporate, and thereby dry

What once was working wet...

Wet which cools the times I try

To lighten step-by-step the debt

I owe the gods, but know not why...

I can't give up -- not now, not yet.

Insect Ballet

Three butterflies suspended in the air,

Flying in a magical close formation of shifting

Triangles, a quiet fluttering wing-dance

Inter-weaving, blacks and blues, lifting

On an angel's breath of a breeze,

Upward into the green tree, drifting,

Leaving me below in the moment's trance...

Shower Power

Bracing morning

Of an unsoiled day,

Full of hope!

No better way

To start, than with

A fresh bar of soap.