Travis and Joan

not a lullaby, not a goddamned tune, dream is an open window, dream the sound of tires on blacktop, the harsh kiss of a shotglass. In the night the foxes pause to sniff the day's passing. Owls keep their eyes open while turkeys mumble like pear-shaped, red-eyed insomniacs stuck in a tree. Maybe moving to the mountains was a mistake. At the beach house, salty tongued, I have closed my eyes and tried to imagine waves, one after another. But they form a silent relentless flood

pine snake squiggles over sun hot stones & belly rubs. the water past her tongue trickle water lilypad like a prayer kiss while a frog watches from a rock shadow afraid to move. until his throat rises like a bad idea the snake lifts her head & the frog jumps. water snake chuckles at frog panic, ain't no reason to fill my belly with cold frog guts when the mice babies, their eyes closed, no fur to mess with, peep-sing like birds. kiss them & invite them in. Mama mouse quiet as

fat bellied clouds boot scuffle dragging their muddy cuffs & not giving fuck One about another year of drought. dry piss. cotton spit. cold enough to make the blown outs along the river cuddle up huddle up wrap each other in another layer of plastic. homeless is just another word for nothing left to sell, nothing & that’s what Bobbie left me yeah, singing the blues. this is unsustainable the politicians insist & nod through another day. it is the practice run, dress rehearsal

From somewhere out of sight, from within the thatch of trees and brush, a quick jay flew across the yard. It flared its wings and landed...

It has been a week since the Palisades Fire took our house. I still grapple with the reality and weight of it. Last night, for example,...

Wind emerges from the usual location heaping scruds of whitecaps toward shore toward my neglected heart. It’s been salted, battered...

Okay, this is not what I encounter in Long Beach harbor, but it feels like this. Can't see. What is visible is cloaked in mystery. Fog...

WATER, WATER EVERYWHERE Ours was a flat farm, naturally boggy on the east end until we bulldozed some drainage ditches. Made the old...

Whether you work on farms, in the trades or in something trade adjacent, one thing is certain-- you'll be spending a lot of your life in...

When geese fly overhead the sound is of departure. When deer emerge from thickets they wear coats of secrecy. For weeks the talk in...

Spent a long weekend out of LA and in the Wine Country. Funny how in California we say "wine country" and mean Napa County area. In truth...

for my siblings, very much on my mind........ FULL WISCONSIN My ride, daily, is not lonely. Four, five, six lanes going one way & when I...

poem published in BAR BAR: exactly the color of black raspberries, that purple-black-blood color amid the seeds. Not blackberries, I mean...

For awhile I lived on a remote island in Canada, north of Vancouver Island. It did not face the open Pacific but was where many storms...

I am troubled by an accident which occurred in the harbor. I myself was not hurt, nor any of my co-workers or family. A young man died...

Recently I have been going into work very early for some tug work. Most of the time I run the freeways across Los Angeles, like so many...

Not quite Cowboy Stadium or Arrowhead. This is a shot of the Coliseum, in Rome. Now that the NFL Playoffs are in full swing the...

eyes not open release the half-forgotten songs, the directions to places you don't wish to return to, the news of the day in Cleveland,...

Lately more and more the topic of AI comes up among my friends. The ones in education reveal that they encounter computer generated...

https://www.saintpaulalmanac-themagazine.org/post/cherry-cokes The ST PAUL ALMANAC kindly published one of my short stories. The link is...