Poetry – Page 25 – zakschafer.com

hell is on the hide-a-bed, generously allowing sleep and i some solitude

i try to not be vengeful but still think mostly of jail

circling the drain might sound pejorative, but don’t we sometimes spin for delight?

i played football and my sister ran cross country and both of us wore bones hollow enough to toll like bells

i got a pair of used Patagonia shorts in the mail and all these suckers out here probably thought i couldn’t look any cooler

if you think you are losing your mind, let it go. in the middle of the night toast sourdough bread in a toaster oven with raw milk Vermont cheddar cheese. let it go.

the post office is today closed so as to facilitate a more focused worship of our deities

are your moons too dark? should we lighten to gray? does enough of the wood grain show through?

terrified terrorists attempt a coup, while Georgia sings itself Blue

a name poured out with a cup of afternoon coffee. now, both name and coffee, gone.

we take the loop twice–next to ocean and up into muskeg–as our tongues are tireless in their walking

friends are sometimes daughters and sometimes fathers and sometimes existence is enough

cannabidiol helps me sleep but nocturnal turns me wooden and wakes me heart-stiff

my duties, near non-existent, still i neglect them

i drink coffee with my sister and then tea with her husband and then he leaves to go to sleep and she leaves to go talk with the woman who earlier this year was witness to my failing

steam from stovetop espresso maker puts rainbows brief on stone kitchen counter top

it’s Christmas in another week so i’m trying to gift myself an un-wearing

the sun is up and all the lights are on but the town is still 5 o’clock shadow

a friend criticizes me constructively so i won’t today speak of bruising but rather the humming absence in healing

a woman i disastrously dated years ago might send me garlic and i might still feel the familiar lick of fluttering flame

the problem with humans is that our heart is made of water and wind

“Is the flower beautiful because it is ephemeral or is there beauty in a flower as it is simply beautiful?”

i miss holding a human hand so instead hold handles of buckets filled with gravel

volumes of time spent debating the merits of monogamy while single and celibate and alone

Mind encourages Brain to see beyond the illusion of its Western border; a love letter