Sunny and the Gulls by Ailina

I liked this photo so much I had to use it for Seaweed.

Do check out Ailina's wonderful photography and words at Paper Bent.

Eels

Consciousness starts real slow
just a ripple as you push play
and see yourself on the screen
flying by in fast motion
like keystone mice chasing
some farcical musical cheese
stuck in the tails of yourself
sun at its peak;
wind as elusive
as the day
going by
like so many trees
crashing into the banks

oh to pause—

and float…

and float

and float

in this singular freeze

where fish spread wings

and birds say grace

and…

the return starts slow;
just a ripple between
consciousness and un-
sliding away like eels
oozing up to the bar.

This is real fine whiskey:


This is what I believe:


That I am I.
That my soul is a dark forest.
That my known self will never be more than a little clearing in the forest.
That gods, strange gods, come forth from the forest into the clearing of my known self, and then go back.
That I must have the courage to let them come and go.
That I will never let mankind put anything over me, but that I will try always to recognize and submit to the gods in me and the gods in other men and women."
- D.H. Lawrence

'And I'll be praying to my higher self...don't let me down..don't let me down...

Mr. Lawrence! Mr. Lawrence! A man come through!" Van Morrison

Silent Comedy

Harold Lloyd hangs from the big clock
Looking down into the abyss
Oh could there be a comedy
more divine than this?
Chaplin took a ride in the machinery
Up and down up and down heehee
Buster stuck his head in the cannon did he
Looking for his lost ball
Stuck on a loco loco
motive out of control
How could they have known
of this mangled soul
scattered into various cubicles
To be used as Company vehicles
By a reckless John Deere,
A hopped up adolescent driver
Ripping through the plains
Slicing all in its wake
The Old Father murdered
And no one left to deter
As we cash in our checks
In rabid pursuit of happiness;
the Big Nurse
Waits to see
that emasculation
is complete
for the greater good
Of an ever-expanding society--
Where more is less
Less is more
More or less--

A veritable Picasso buffet
of fragmented body parts

I got your nose. Hey!

I think that’s my hand. A toe
A heart. A leg. A tongue.

Oh, is it too late to form?

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall
Playing with his Play Doh
Waiting for Harold to fall
Into the divine
comic pantomime
Where Mother Mavis
waits to erupt
from the bowels
of the earth
Tiny transcendental
stragglers hang on
to her massive legs
searching the dregs
for the invisible cord
the umbilical rung
the spiraling staircase
where Raphael’s cherubs
hang and wait
For Big Mavis
to shake, shake, shake!

Naked Canadians For Peace




To show unity with their Naked Peaceloving Southern Brethren, several Canadians unclothed and tried to form a naked human sign that read Blow It Out Your Ass, Bush, but unfortunately several were lost in the process. Here's to you, Brave Souls, carry on! And may the great Orgasmatron save us from our cryogenic sleep!

The Watch (for Maria)

And now the watch you gave me
has stopped on the news of your
one-way ticket return to the
place you came from;
For once those little hands were
all aglow playing You Belong to Me
and you know for a moment we did;
you to me, me to you, through shared skin
and to the world we how ever so brief.

And I never could find the paint
to cover the scars you left on my
car when you were learning to drive;
Nor retrieve the debris
you left in storage for me;
Nor get over the plaintive cries
of our cats who knew that
separation and fate were nigh;
for I’ll always hear you there
in the blackest of night
And me too, being taken away
in carrying cases
to parts unknown;
caught by the voyeur moon;
for love is just two people
opening at the right time to need;
It has no reason; but the absence of
the loss of and the avoidance of does.

And maybe someday I’ll find the paint
to gloss over and move on;
and I hope you can shed
the snakeskin you had to grow
to ward those cruel blows
Of fate and violence against you;
And open once more to find home;
But for now the cats are wailing
the watch has stopped
And I haven’t the heart
To look for batteries.

The Transcendental Blues

(revised; working on a collection of poems)

she was aborted
but through some
fiery will to escape
the void is born
from the mass
to other parents
at the exact moment
she was aborted;
at the first slap
she realizes her mistake;
just a bit too late—
spends the rest
of her life
trying to find
her true father
who shines
between nirvana
and nothingness
in the eyes
of an idiot;
crushed by
a couple of drunks
just for kicks
who envy the sponge
and curse the reflection
because they can;

lenny himself doesn’t
know his own strength;
crushes every beauteous thing
that he covets out of instinct;
as if there were no difference
between eros and thanatos;
george has to take him down
and bury him in the ground
for some dogs do go mad
while dreaming of rabbits
that run in endless fields
neither to nor from
for there is nothing
there to transcend.

jack hopped it on the road
romeo followed juliet down,
alan walt into the ground;
jesus walked on the water
brian whistled on the cross
in a case of mistaken identity
elvis blew out the tv
his body and mind
all over the tree
that is Buddha
grass grew in spring
beards everywhere
from the alpha and the delta
where lenny c. dwelled
long enough to catch
a glimpse beyond
where wonder
treads softly
in the woman
like a breeze
Johanna never showed.
A disappearing threshold.
Why do we doubt
the gentle refrain
the top top topping
of the rain
that falls asleep
with the news
and the transcendental blues.