Chaos Theory

Imagine a dream so intoxicating you awaken to a desire to sleep.

full moon --
I stop myself
from kissing her

The Grand Parade of Lifeless Packaging

"I see no sign of free will, so I guess I'll have to pay" - Genesis

When I consider the routine of my everyday life, I'm utterly appalled: the stultifying sameness; the surrender to a joyless pattern of deadlines and dead-ends. For fun I try to leave the house with barely enough time to make my train into Boston. Any traffic congestion or other source of delay will mean that I miss it. It's not a huge inconvenience, since there's another one only 18 minutes later. It's this illusion of danger that lends some shred of excitement to a day that's not likely to see any otherwise.

behind schedule
I run for the 7:09
so that I can sleep

Approximately Elsewhere - the Movie

Three beers into the conversation, I acknowledge that I am lost. Every trace of dignity I once had is now a metaphor for a bygone age. I am, based upon my most recent Mapquest lookup, approximately nowhere, which leaves me adjacent to nowhere else, which leaves me no closer to my destination... which is undefined. We rehearsed our hurried goodbyes, but never acted, so that when the cameras rolled we stared into the artificial starlight and turned away from each other's tears.

September Revisited

Everything around me is dying - and it couldn't be more beautiful. In a few weeks it will all disappear, but for now, the image lingers, hanging on a rusty nail in the wall, taking on soft sepia tones.

Instant Expert

Just add beer. A salesman with a megaphone for a voice held forth on an impressive variety of topics last night. The primary victim sat at the table in stoic silence, but the rest of us, who had come there for a quiet dinner and a cold ale, grew increasingly uneasy. He, on the other hand, grew increasingly confident - and LOUD...

pub regular --
his expertise grows
by the pint

Bloody Hell!

Turns out there's more to the Crimson Tide than the late Bear Bryant. Picture Don Quixote surrounded by mirrors, only one of which reveals his true reflection. In the heat of the battle it's not always easy to choose the right one.

my youngest son
wild flowers
among the weeds

The original last line was "in the trash", which I later thought to be too ambiguous and angry. "among the weeds" smacks of Creative Writing - also ambiguous, but poetic. At least those 5 1/2 years of college didn't go to waste.

"the things that pass for knowledge I can't understand" - Becker / Fagen

On a related note:

unable to sleep
an apple branch
against the window

Oh, the things we dream when we're awake...

Blood Makes Noise

They say that blood is thicker than water. I have to wonder if this was an empirical observation that was never intended to be translated into metaphor. Latino blood is thicker than molasses and more intoxicating than wine. It's practically impenetrable. But that's not how the saying goes.

my brother turns 41 --
will my belated birthday card
arrive on time?

Extra Special Bitter

Once upon a time, I had what I thought was a blog on my website, only to be told that I was doing it all wrong. Is there a wrong way to step up onto a soapbox and rant? Apparently so.

On the other hand, I'm much too self-conscious to rant effectively. At best I will offer wry editorial commentary punctuated with impressionistic observations, none of which, I would surmise, is blog material.

So what am I seeking in my little corner of cyberspace? It's a place to capture thoughts in words, a notebook of sorts. But it's more than that, because it's visible to the eyes of strangers: it's on-line. Is that what makes it different? To be an exhibitionist among voyeurs?

I was once a happy man, but bruised and bitter, the core of an apple browning on the sidewalk, I couldn't stay my sighs to halt a herd of cattle. A mouse sniffs at the bait in the trap, knowing that something is wrong but powerless to resist. Something borrowed, something kissed. Before you can ask for her phone number, the trap is sprung. Something empty, something young.

Automatically writing, he righted himself, automatically. Let the games begin.