The three things that I learned this year so far that stick out in my mind: 1) The first coin issued officially by the U.S. government had the motto, “Mind Your Business”; 2) The first human heart transplant added eighteen days to a man’s life; 3) Even though the eggplant we eat is harmless, its vines are poisonous.
—Lee Anne

Crayon Sonnet

The evening releases a belated sigh
Circular whirligig for you and I
Orange pinwheel and sunflower yellow
Present tense color for past tense fellow.

On Appaloosa, moon is gallopping
For scintilla of silver scallopping
Past tense pink in lavender museum
Forging copper link in mausoleum.

Even flow on bamboo fan for keeping
Sunflower eyelashes wet from weeping
Orange whiligig and sunflower yellow.
Moon ripens during solo of cello.
Day decapitated. Pigment grated.
One yellow sunflower fabricated.

Roger Whitson

i, being

“catch the vigorous horse of your mind.”
—zen saying

i am my own trophy
riding my own pony
a statue of a simpleton
an imbecile
a genius of the cemeteries
an illusion of something that
must have simulated a birth.

i crash the nebula
me & my dramatic scream
whose echoes are packed
in silent sardines.
i am the spaceless skull
flapping over the haunted ship
fragmenting upon a flapless
sea.
a hapless tale

a nada croon
wailing in a dumb
cartoon.

i am the bodhisattva

whose present carnation
is but a summer job
a foreman in the slopfactory
of existence.

i am

the snoring tiger
asleep on the dreamship
of humanity
a soaring missile
laughing its way
hysterically
lazily
to the sun.

normal

Core Values

Laid a tree,
Upon a ship
Moored along an empire state.
A lone sentinel stood watch
Crisp
Noble
Unwavering
A valiant vigil
of hope and harmony.
The dark commotion
Nor nations
Could wage war on this vanguard of the future.
The message was his custody;
His armor, faith;
The future, a child;
Starry-eyed,
Gazing… at the tree.

Patrick