43014

1)
this is
the
cancellation genie
working
cold
raising false Cain

2)
fragmentations of a
wholesomebody
learning helplessness
through
forlornication
a feedling ready to burst
proboscis
instinctively anchored
in an
unsuspecting host

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

inheritance sonnet

it seemed to all that all he had left /
was to wait for transducers
to begin to transduce /
when that business is done then the bereft /
would wipe away snot and tie up the loose /
ends and carry off mostly unwanted things with their names /
attached to them by legal decree /
boxes unopened while they categorize blame /
tapping their feet, cross armed, to see /
if there would be any argument or offer to trade /
the contents of theirs for that of another’s /
for more often than not something is said /
to cause disharmony, agitation and bother /
to the ashes whose wishes no longer apply /
to those remaining below when he took to the sky

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

42514

the urn
it seems
becomes label
always
before
it is time so levitate
lend a sunset sugar
work the
sixth addition and
cut silence to
let thoughts
throw tantrums
before they are
sent to bed

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

42414

for a time
I had tried
people
experimental therapy
that didn’t
pan out
coming down
to simple equation
a wolf in the cellar
for every dove
in
the window

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

42014

when this
happens it is
as if one hand
is pushing me down
while another
tries to
dislodge me from
my cocoon
waiting for the
battle to subside
is all I can do

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

the time of man

when
the
second
hand hits 12;
a second of new!
then there comes 59 of not

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

Easter poem 2014

when asked if I could
feel the love,
I wondered if it
would have made more sense
to ask,
after being escorted
into the vast
tabernacle, if
I was experiencing some
ecstatic
galvanic response
to something purported
to have happened
half a history
and
thousands of miles
away
to and by people
speaking a language
I cannot begin to
understand
then the answer
would have been
nope
I got nothing
however
that was not the question
I thought of how generous
the invitation was and
how it came from a good place
from someone
I knew to have endured
more than an average
measure of damage
so, as a courtesy
I answered
yes, yes I do
when in reality I was
simply lost
in the master craftsmanship
the architecture
the statuary
the windows
so, even if I
didn’t feel his interpretation
of this love he was taught
I could see the results
of those who did
and this morning
that alone was
enough for me

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

equidaecide

when I was a child
legend held
that there were,
if administered
in big a
enough dose,
any number of things alleged
to have killed a horse

cotton candy comes to mind
orange circus peanuts
Kool-Ade

my childhood was
littered with
dead horses

my twenties were witness to
bloated equine corpses
bobbing in
oceans of beer and whiskey
my blurry
eyes
meeting theirs
in sweet
smelling
fog

I worked them to
death throughout
my thirties
bored them to death in
my forties
hours piled upon hours
as they pulled one end
to meet the other

now
excess is a memory
triggered by a kid
with that familiar
sugary psychotic stare
or the car of college
students peeling out
of the liquor store
parking lot

for me,
the glue factory gate
is locked

blood
no longer
on my hands

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

dive

it
is tribalism outright
there along the bar

empty stools like
wounds torn
into the hide of some
slow stubborn beast,

scabbing over
with those
destined to become
the old guard

when the name out front
changes again

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

out shined

I claimed my latte
thanked the barista
and “‘scuse me”‘d
past two young mothers
to get to
my favorite table

after setting
my space correct
I geared up for that first
palette scalding sip
and heard one mom ask
“what do you think
they are talking about?”

I couldn’t
help but look
in the direction
of the kids,
thinking
there was a lot more
going on here than just
your typical pedestrian
drool and babble

their eyes never
left each other,
conversation, as it were,
rising and falling,
punctuated by laughter,
and long silences,
like a couple of retired friends
comparing lifetimes
in the trenches
and how to make good
with what they had left

so there they were, I imagined

one, going on
about his stint
as a pre-somethingness
translator of trances,
determining
the weight
of invisibility

the other, colorfully
describing her time
as collator
of deep space rhythm –
which she demonstrated
with fervent slaps
on the tray of her high chair
knowing that, soon,
they both would forget them
again for while

I took that sip,
got out my pen
reached for a napkin,

and tried to come to grips
with the fact that these two
were way
more interesting
than I was or
was my position
as re-arranger of cafe
tabletops and notator
of the absurd

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead