ronny

CHARACTERS IN A SMALL THAI RESTAURANT

the white tech bro, just graduated, showing his parents the town, discussing Family Guy and South Park. “i know a lot of things,” he says. the three white teenagers—the one in charge, another in pink Hello Kitty pajama pants, the last hapless. the young woman w her mentally handicapped partner. the young brown girls staring at their phones. the old white balding man sitting by himself watching tv on his mini tablet while slurping up soup. the quiet couple repeating, “genius, genius, genius.”

TEA IN BED

i am sitting in bed, where my love has just handed me a hot cup of tea. i do not know what content of leaf it contains, but that is no matter. i accept all kinds. i accept all kinds of beginnings to sentences, even when purely egotistical. i am sitting in bed. the white blanket soft and plush spills out from my waistband, a growth upon the pastel-colored comforter. feathers fly everywhere. the mug is too hot even to lift, let alone to drink. visions of Bob Dylan in my mind. i am here, sitting in bed, wondering whether the tea of mysterious leaves will relieve the slight aching in my head. too many screens. lights. sounds. too many visions in my head. will this be my home in a month? cities are vicious things. all i want is a humble little home where my love and i can cook delicious things to be eaten to sustain our lives while we while the hours away listening to Emmylou Harris and her kind bang animal skins and thump the rims and pluck horsehair across the horizon of time. i want to edit my run-on sentences before they are even written. and so i do. my friend wants to know if i can write another piece of prose poetry for her zine and i don't know that i can. so i open up a big blank window and attempt it. the lines materialize likes ones across the zero sum screen. half of everything i say is meaningless. the meaningful half comes out without being called. the other half self-corrects as it shows itself the way out.

NOONTIME CONCERT

forward the lightning divine falling of human hands upon the ivory keys issuing forth 18th century tones tingling the scores of human souls patiently seated in wooden pews ears open reverent and available to the source emanating the one true word.

behind the shuffling of slipshod feet wetted by rank pavement flooded w debris and mud flushed from the corridors we call our homes of dead wood and toxic cement assembled into trinkets jingling an endless interruption to the brilliant sonata that never stood a chance.

a silhouette man 
skyline illuminated
 swallows warm green tea.

the lady's trident

as naked as the cautious doe in spring— a natural living beauty to behold— your eyes, lips, olive skin in prelude sing— annihilation—thighs of yours unfold.

still deadlier a force a man may find— in hiding—beating quietly your breasts— heart—bloody with unnumbered names unsigned— a thousand sonnets whipped away like pests.

and deeper yet remains a thing of fear— when wakened wills all kraken back to sleep— your spirit—lancing thru the world’s veneer, parading truth thru streets, obedient sheep.

sole equal to your power to destroy— your essence manifest of peace and joy.

lines written above Muir Beach

does a poem peek thru the morning fog 
like the sun with a weary white face?
 does it travel a million miles thru the mind 
just to vanish in a moment’s gray haze?

TASTY NOODLES

there is an altar of sound deep in the Mojave. it purrs painless, perfect—a midnight beacon beckoning.

attracted to its deep hum and bright lights, interplanetary pilgrims grapple their slow, shadowy way, seeking rhythm, love, divinity, nothing.

once they arrive, a juicy orange slice of moon rises to say hello, goodbye. antsy tongues wag in bags of mint, lapping up refreshingly ancient secrets. hips shake excitedly at their desert discovery, souls swing in arcing exultation.

in the morning, a half-naked hell of a hot mess stumbles thru center camp in a gazeless daze, meandering through people and sound and sand. half-shaved head to dusty little holes to rocky, glassy, torn-up toes, every cell in her body exuding madness. (love her.)

in the afternoon, a wavy pink pinstripe pussycat slinks from shade to shade hydrating himself with poetry. (praise him.)

at night, a brush with the grim reaper. (love them, praise them.)

day by day, the burning circle in the sky climbs higher, higher, higher, then dips down, down, down. hour by hour, a hundred billion white specks of plankton blindly drift the same mesmerizing path. minute to minute, morphing white specters glide, collide, unravel beneath the big blue canvas, unminded. moment to moment, men and women collectively recite their little disco mantra: 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4...

amid gunshots, fireworks, and constellations, confectionary gusts of earthen apes do their thing.

a portrait of Sisyphus as a young fog

black diamond fog peers over Twin Peaks,
 bringing along its wet and chill hymn:
 reverie for the weary mind that leaks.

the crashing note of sinister antiques 
like Sisyphus’ boulder barreling so grim, 
black diamond fog peers over Twin Peaks.

endless mystery, mother sans critiques,
 the Pacific wind that falls on a whim, 
reverie for the weary mind that leaks.

feeling, desiring, she blindly seeks
 to pour over the natural city brim,
 black diamond fog peers over Twin Peaks.

an unrequited love hidden in her cheeks
 dies numb and silent, meek and dim,
 reverie for the weary mind that leaks.

gliding airless via senseless techniques, 
i recite the mantra of my phantom limb: 
black diamond fog peers over Twin Peaks,
 reverie for the weary mind that leaks.