it takes more energy
to maintain inconsistencies
then to reconcile them.

“get thee to a nunnery”
a none-ery,
composed of nothing
no one.
Best invitation anyone ever
gave me:
the way out is in—
freeing me little by little
as I wander outside from time to time.

“Lilou” to one
who never loved me
(je ne regrette rien)
“Nienna” to another
(rien ici aussi).
I may as well
go about the business
of saving the world,
beginning with my own.
Because who am I
to me, now?
Everything.

when your spirit urges
you to dive naked into
the frigid December ocean—
when you can’t unknow what you want—
even the most stubborn ego
will relent;
if you’re lucky.

…even if it emerges gasping, grasping
heaving for breath
and looking as glorious
as a repeatedly drowned rat.

The Dark Side alone could not suffice:
I’d already Safaried the surface of the Moon.
“Where you gonna go, where you gonna run to
when you get to the edge of the night?”
Break the wall, release the light.
Master the Tide,
“that’s when something wild calls you home.”
Then we’ll know our music,
and mystery,
properly.
I guess this is something like a mixtape,
a chorus of voices in our ears;
or a Choose Your Own Adventure,
full of internal reference.
C’mon Tanner (nix Jagger), let’s play
Truth and dare,
a game of hide and seek.
Have a little fun.
Cheesy, maybe,
but how’s my baking now?
(room for improvement, I confess)
à Dieu <grin>
’til the day we compose our own stories.

why blame others for
their limits of imagination
when you could spend that breath
expanding your own?

sometimes
the clearer it gets
the harder I fight.
Artful expressions bring confusion to question…
I’m beginning to see my angst—
in all its various forms—
as true expressions of joy and relief
in poor disguise.

Paradise is Here: an unruly epic ode to PAMLA 2022 (click link for entire poem)
PAMLA= Pacific Ancient and Modern Language Association — the Pacific regional MLA conference—a modest branch on quite a large tree.
This poem will be featured on their website soon.
Most of this is inspired directly by the panels and presentations I attended—some more populated than others. For example, scissors appeared three times: twice visually in presentations (once in a puppet show and once in a work of stop-motion animation); and once in a poem by Adrienne Rich.

If you didn’t follow my exact trajectory through the conference—which of course, no one did—not all of this may make sense. Or at least, it’s a series of inside jokes that make a lot of the oddness of this piece funny (or at least notable) rather than just—well, odd. (Did you see the little dog??!)

And then, there’s me in the mix, too. I probably needn’t blame the oddness on anything else.

Excerpt:
“What is really beneath this professional, intellectual bearing?
Why, 3 witches, of course, assembled ’round
a cauldron and armed with scissors sharp held
ready to render the fate of oppression:
Death to the mundane! Death to capitalism
(unless you’re a grammarian, though in
that case I hope you don’t mind my spelling).
Begone injustice, faux-modernity
and Death to “the Man!” …who’s so much smaller
than we thought before—he lives like a mouse,
behind a little door. Long Live The King,
Creativity! …and his wayward mistress:
Wisdom.

“So toil and trouble we double down
on our efforts to brew, polish, hone and
perfect our masterpieces—so many
seemingly disparate fragments drawn in
spirit together. We eagerly don
the carnival garb of jackets, ties, and
jeans to frolic in jubilation with
the ontologically absurd.
We,
unwittingly drawn around the common
locus of a black “jewel bearing,” a
multi-clawed animatronic motion-
synthesizing spider. Her name: PAMLA,
the not so underground well-tended
rebellion.”

from grace
only ever and always
into it.

today I let myself get lost
I didn’t want to be lost
but I let myself get lost—
scrub jays calling me toward freedom:
the freedom of a fox carcass
of feathers
a lost glove labeled “TRUST”
and a little while later, its lost mate.
I got lost to the freedom of confusion
the freedom of conversation
the freedom of surprise and a bench in the shade
where there is nothing to do, except nothing.
It was good to get lost
because patience, good humor, and faith is what I found.