For Max
I didn’t write you many poems
and for that I’m sorry.
When we were together,
my muse was the city:
the subway sparkle,
buttered croissants,
how the buses skidded
to sudden halts.
You couldn’t compare to the rain,
and you never tried. You knew.
You let me scribble on about traffic,
how it never stopped,
even though you wished
I was sonneting your glasses.
It was never your fault.
I can’t write love poems
like I used to.
The magic abandoned my body.
It’s still love, just with great caution,
like how you mixed honey with tea.
But I will say this:
I loved your nose the most,
even if I’m writing too late.
Collision
Sunray’s brilliance warms my cheeks
Tiny buds burst from bare branches
From winter’s haze, she slowly peeks
Snow blankets of several inches
Sprouts of green grass decorate
Of melted ice, birds sip
Where flowers emerge in dead landscape
Knowing time for north, make their trip
Winds blow with strength and fiercely
The weak, though, will not survive
Scattering abroad tiny seedlings
Bitter cold and soft warmth collide
We’ll soon see that spring is here
Rival winter’s dead illusion
Signs all point, she is near
Frost concedes and yields us new vision
The Door
It could be the television? Might she have left it on this morning when she left for work? She could not remember having turned the set on, but then she couldn’t remember closing the bedroom door, either. A cold current of fear shot adrenaline upward from her tailbone, expanding through her chest, down her arms to spark her fingertips... an alert, something was not as it should be.
She didn’t normally come home for lunch, but she wanted him to find the bottle of “Old Fitzgerald Bourbon” when he got home. It was an expensive, and rare treat. He would be ecstatic!
She laid the card with its sexy message and the beautifully gift-bagged bourbon on the granite bar-top. “No,” she knew, “the sounds coming from the bedroom were not the television.” Her heart began a slower beat, a cautious beat, a life unravelling beat. A strange taste bit the tip of her tongue, metallic and sharp. She tip-toed to the door. It could not be... not on Valentine’s Day, of all fucking days?
Twenty years crouched behind that door, waiting to pounce. Can there be a fear greater than twenty years lost? Of a lifetime spent wasting? The door stared back at her with immeasurable dread. Twenty years of life, of love, and children raised. Twenty years working, and saving, and laughing. It just couldn’t be... not today. They had reservations for tonight at ’Velencia’s”, for Christ’s sake! They were supposed to grow old together. It was that time for them! Could he really be in there banging some twenty-fucking-something-year old intern?
But what if it wasn’t some intern? What if he was in love? Her mind raced, looking for missed clues. How long could this have been going on? He was with her on Valentine’s Day. What did that mean? Was it just an easy day for a star-struck seduction, or was there more to it?
Her lip was trembling now, joining her fingers. Her chest was weighted, crushing her breath. What if it was Lucy? What if she lost her husband and her best friend in one life-draining swoop? What would she do then? That would be unbearable, would it not? He and Lucy had always been close, casually flirtacious. They were even cute together, how they got along so well. “Oh, God... could she have been that blind?”
And what would she do? Not about the cheating, but with the rest of her life? She did not want to be alone. She loved her life, the life they had built together... she loved him! Perhaps she should sneak away. She could act like it never happened. The kids were at college, they would never have to know. These things passed quickly sometimes, if left alone.
There was a, “shush”, from behind the wall. They heard her. They heard something. She began to panic. Should she run? She reached for the knob, and threw the door open... loosing the beast that would devour her.
A Farewell to Evil
You don’t know me. Not really, but my reputation should precede me. I go by many different names Beelzebub, Satan, Lucifer, the Devil, and my favorite, the Prince of Darkness. I’ve been the nemesis of good since before Adam popped Eve’s cherry, but I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s time for me to retire. It’s hard for me to admit this, but the students have surpassed the master. The Prose web team has been kind enough to provide me with the stage to announce my swan song as the master of evil. Of course, the fact that I have more than enough dirt on the whole Prose staff to blackmail them until the next ice age was enough to get them to give me the whole site if I wanted it. I got to tell you, some of you literary types are into some kinky shit. I am ever so proud.
Anyway, when my career started, I had to work pretty hard to get human’s to let their dark sides out. It took all of my considerable charisma, talent, and cunning to set you meat bags onto the path of sin. You had a sickly sweet core of goodness and desire to love that I thought I might never subvert. But I’m a persistent bastard and I love a challenge. Oh, how I remember that first major win. When I finally convinced Cain to whack his pussy brother Abel it felt like eating a hot fudge sundae wrapped in an orgasm! I loved getting one over on my old man! Of course at the time I had no idea just how well you mortals would take to evil. Once you got a taste of badness, you took to it like a priest to an altar boy.
In the beginning, you listened to my guidance. Remember Sodom and Gomorrah? Good times were had by all! With my tutelage, you mortals created a masterpiece of debauchery! Orgies, rape, idol worship, the occasional knife in the back, it was a beautiful thing to behold. We both reaped the rewards! Sorry I was late with the memo that messenger angels are prudes and it’s no Bueno trying to invite them to the party. Color me embarrassed. Oh, and I also want to apologize for the whole fireball destroying the cities thing.
But what eager students you were! With your enthusiasm and my consulting we raised great empires at the expense of the innocent. The Roman Empire was a blast! It was a true collaborative effort. Between giving that twisted fuck Caligula power and the whole feeding Christians to the lions thing, you made me so proud. It’s true when they say that teaching is the most rewarding job.
Alas, who knew that your God-given free will would make you want to branch out to become my competition and not simply my protégées’? I wanted to teach you that evil is an art and making art is as much about the process as it is about the end result. The best kind of evil takes a skilled hand and finesse. The seduction, the lies, the false promises are the tools of a true artist. The results should be built to last so that they may be savored! You? You meat bags take to evil like a psychopath takes a chainsaw to a litter of puppies! It’s all about making a mess and the adrenalin rush.
To prove my point, I suggested to Hitler that he should just evict the Jews from Europe and send them on another forty year journey into the wilderness. You know, make them miserable. Make them die of hunger, illness, and the elements. It would have been a slow and delicious end. Did he take my advice? No! The next thing I know, the little German gremlin is building concentration camps and tossing people into ovens like take and bake pizzas! Where is the artistry in that? Don’t get me wrong, it was effective, but it’s been done before. Genocide is at best, paint by numbers evil. All that little German did was follow the path paved by the Europeans that fucked over the Natives in the New World. He just used fast food methods that allowed him to kill millions in a matter of years instead of the slow more sultry results enjoyed by the Europeans. They used a palette full of disease, superior technology, and dishonesty to wipe out the original owners of the Western Hemisphere over a few centuries. Now that was a true masterpiece!
Of course, the whole world war thing with Hitler, Japan and fucking everyone else seemed like a good idea at the time. I didn’t realize that it would be my last great hora as the master of evil. I figured that it would remind mortals that I had more to offer. Usually, wars provide me with teachable moments for you mortals. You know, combine anger, politics, greed, and arrogance, let simmer, and enjoy. I figured that after the Blitzkrieg and the atomic bomb you would realize that smaller scale destruction would provide you with opportunities to destroy again in the future. It would inspire you to hone your craft. Oh how wrong I was! Instead, you built bigger, badder bombs with the ability to turn the world into a giant cinder. It was at this point that I realized that my advice was no longer wanted or needed. You have your own agenda and my ways just don’t give you the instant results you want. I tried to explain that if you want to enjoy the fruits of your evil harvest you can’t cause your own extinction, but my guidance is ignored.
So, this is farewell. I am going to take some time for me. It’s been a while since I picked up the old harp. I also promised the Whore of Babylon that I would show her where I put Atlantis. Nothing makes a woman wetter than showing her the kind of destruction your capable of. Oh, by the way, that article in Time Magazine that claimed that God is dead? It’s wrong. God isn’t dead. He’s just too embarrassed by you mortals to show his face much anymore.