Postcard 182

I was sick and in prison and you did not visit me.
It is the unknowing of what is wide
The broadness these four walls, bodylike, enclose

Are there parties? There must be parties,
celebrations, wild nights: tremulous
and frightening imaginings in this tight cell

Roads and choices. Are there new flavors?
We miss the old tastes, bonded to a feeling
on lips, in arms, on eyes, on fingertips

There must be stories to be told
with more color than these slate grey stones
than could be believed, that would

leave us with nights of ceiling gazing suspicion
and light argument between us -- the only color
we recall is blue, a shred of some free sky

You did not visit and it is the unknowing of why
Perhaps you are too occupied with work and family
all those obligations of life rolling by

But then it occurs to me: perhaps
you are too in prison, bound
by hard lines & the same mysteries

Postcard 181

I was naked and you did not clothe me.

Well, thats not quite true. You wrapped me

with control and draped me with your gaze

Like cut exotic flowers wilting in a vase

But again you strip me naked with your lust

just to fig leaf me with your shame. Then you

spread me across old chain-link and corragate

Flaking shopping bags, brittle water jugs, my

delicious flesh - wasteland trash. Desert junk --

unspooled wire, coppper stripped, abandoned

cars without tires, windows, seats, doors,

ripped of any value, rusting in the sun, brown

as my skin. Single tennis shoes & old t-shirts

You say that I am waste, but you came 

to pick me up in new and shiny trucks, you

had airconditioned rooms to put me in. Even

then, you did not clothe me. You had

doctors come and pull me apart so 

you could spread your gaze within. As if

hate turned on itself was somehow there

As if kindness toward any 

being was your unforgiven sin

Postcard 180

I was a stranger and you did not invite me into your home

Your home is full of strangers
Thieves are honored at your table-head
Scorpions nest under the boards

Predators tuck your children into bed,
hand searching under quilt
while they tell them comfort stories
and kiss them on the head

Hat in hand, I stood
in simple need outside your bolted door
I could hear the muffled wolfish voice of
a vaunted liar spooling tales
and pacing on your well worn floor

There's strangers then there's strangers
There's stories then there's lies
That uncle that is known by all
though none dare meet his eyes


I feel the chill creeping toward the bone
The moon is drifting down
and your home is yes a home
But the warmth is a deceit

The consumptive man,
cloth book in hand
coughs hate and ill in every ear
The warmth is breath of that disease

You welcome and you honor crooks
of every varied stripe and deed
But fear the stranger at your door
with simple creature's need

Postcard 179

I was thirsty and you did not give me a drink

We are bookended by deserts
Any water found is owned and sold
as covetous as clouds are held
in this misers sky

We are becoming well to well
wanderers with long distance eyes
and swollen dusty tongues that
lose memory of wet words

like swell, wash, tide
Wave and drowning, mildew, mist
Riches of thought uncounted
in untroubled minds

Now, focused and squinted
like mid-day's valley searching eyes;
puckered like split lips searching dry and dumb
through dessicate clouds of lost and ancient thought

Coming up with only -- water, drink, and blood
And thirst, dear god, and thirst
You did not give us a drink; we are grateful though --
Each day a new word for wind