The Tumor's Tale

Enormous,

Amorphous,

Intruder,

Imposter,

Human virus in a human computer

Imposter,

Intruder,

Amorphous,

Enormous

Mass,

Malignance

Of occluded purpose

Managed to hijack

The body politic,

Make it flail forth and back,

Make it hesitate, agitate, vacillate, attack.

Intruder,

Imposter,

Enormous,

Amorphous

Tumor humorless

Has barely changed the body corpus,

But altered the thoughts it voices

So our oldest friends, loyal and closest,

These days scarce recognize us.

Friction!

Fission!

Delusion!

Derision!

As we hurtle headlong into Hindsight's decision,

The deranged danger deflects our direction, our attention,

Away from a years-delayed, much-needed excision.

Physician,

Heal our nation!

Why They Don't Let Poets Amend the Theory of Relativity, Part 2

There's some in inaction, more in anticipation,

But youth is the strongest known form of time dilation.

I recall when a minute could seem to drag on.

Now, I might miss a month and not care where it's gone.

While I once would quail looking from summer to fall,

Now I look at a year like it's nothing at all.

Though I can't look ahead and be sure when life ends,

If you asked, “is that long?” I would answer, “depends.”

Twinkle, Twinkle

You eat yourself to change yourself,

To power your strange, unknown place.

The lives of every single one of my kind

Strung together beginning-to-end

You would outlive with time to spare;

It would take us that long just to get there.

You are a real-life wonder of an alien world,

So it is only natural that some people

Might look to you to learn their future,

But I think it is even more beautiful,

and I know that it must be more sensible

To look to you to learn your prehistoric past.

Epoch-a-Lips

Thoughts of you settle upon me

Lightly, slowly, unnoticed until I am buried.

It was realization, not you, that rocked me in earthquake,

Though I would still call you geologic.

The new gray hairs in my beard are proof

Of how long it took me to get over you,

Of all the time I waited for the comet-strike.

So ends the Pre-Graying Period of my life

When I would end the world for your kiss,

My epoch-a-lips.

Anecdotal Proof of Chemical Imbalance in the Human Brain, Pt. 2

I perceive my life to consist

Mostly of moments of dread

and wondering where a day went,

and very little of actually living it.

For the past twenty years

I have been led to believe

That I am medically self-destructive.

All I know is that I don't quite work.

Why They Don't Let Poets Be Scientists

Scientists see a call for research.
Scientists see something to publish.
Scientists see a jurisdictional dispute
Between the arachnologists and entomologists.
Scientists see a reason to argue.

I see tiny things dancing
Around a tiny maypole
Inside a tiny fence.

Extradovial Biological Entities

Bacteria might live their lives in dog's bowls, drains, or doves,

Worlds that fit inside the pocket of a baseball glove,

With a universe of life outside they cannot hope to see,

So why shouldn't we?

Exhuming Societies' Bones

I know that four-eyed nerd-dom's not like Indiana Jones,

But there's still something thrilling about exhuming societies' bones,

Bringing new honor to their temples and new footsteps to their roads

and bringing life to ancient livers' humbler abodes.

Still, I wonder if it's right, disturbing ancient tombs,

Just to find out how the ancients decorated rooms.

Fluid

Relationships are fluid.

We all know about the blood,

The tears and sweat and spit,

and perhaps a few other things,

But relationships can be watery,

Taking the shape of whatever

First holds them together,

Until something pokes a hole in it,

and then they're gone.

Sometimes, though, relationships are non-Newtonian–

Just plain bizarre.

The Chemical Properties of a Breakup

I might be vinegar,
Which, while a little sour
Is mostly harmless.
I'm mostly okay with this,
Most of the time, although
There are places vinegar shouldn't go.
Then again, you might be bleach,
and that stuff's bad for everybody.

A Modern City

A modern city is a work of engineering art,

A codependent social network of a bunch of moving parts.

There are factories to make our things and warehouses to keep them.

We need recycling, waste and sewer services to come delete them.

Then there are roads and public transport, all organized at city hall,

and of course we need a power plant, or it won't run at all.

A Mammal's Cells

A mammal's cell's unbound by walls. It is more changeable than pretty.

In that way, as in others, it's just like a modern city.

Its nucleus is City Hall, abuzz in plans, administration.

It depends on mitochondria for power generation.

Miscellanea sit in vacuoles, life's self-storage units.

A manufacturing sector? Let the ribosomes do it.

The recycling, waste and sewer are a job for lysosomes,

and the endoplasmic reticula can stand in well for roads.

In the Middle of Things

There was a time when conventional wisdom

Placed earth in the middle of things.

That idea's been replaced on galactic scales,

The better for wandering.

There was a time when ancient thought

Stood in for cosmic belief.

Then the manager sent in science

To throw innings in relief.

They say the world was full of poetry,

'Til science brought in doubt,

But I say there's plenty of poetry

In figuring things out.

Only Nature

Some say, in quiet, nature hums.

It's their excuse to play their drums.

Deep in the throes of tie-die dreams

They talk of nature's harmony.

The only nature I know is

A place no hippie's fit to live,

A place that's red in tooth and claw

'Neath anarchy of Darwin's law,

A place of stingers, spikes and thorns,

Where all from man to ant make war.

No, Galileo!

I used to think you circled me

In deep orbit.

I used to think there was something

That held you to me.

I was looking too hard for you

To see.

I am no Galileo.

You are the attractive one.

I am the attracted one,

and I should have known.

I am spinning in circles.

Ah, Genetics

Ah, Genetics!  They are twice as good as Vegas.
The house only wins half the time,
and their study is science, not economics,
But there is no love lost for genetics in my house.
I got my father's back and ingrown toenail.
I got my mother's knees and mental illness.
Though I hold those four cards and a joker
(I need someone around to laugh the luck of my draw),
The only choice is to see the hand through,
See what a pale half my parents' minds can do.

I refuse to fold this hand.
I can only ante the next one in hell.

She Is Like Water

She is like water –

Seventy percent of my world.

She is like water –

Almost unbelievably common.

She is like water –

She washes the day's grime away.

She is like water –

Almost unbelievably awesome.

She is like water –

Perfect, by nature or design.

She is part of me –

Temporarily mine.

Anecdotal Proof of Chemical Imbalance in the Human Brain

Today, I did things I should

Things I wanted

and thinks I should want.

I read, wrote and studied.

I listened to good music

and used the one-track repeat

For one charitably called lousy,

The kind that gets me excited

Though I only sort of like it,

and then I ran around like

A low, wide, wild man-island

Pushing up with only the sea around me.

Then I joked and I talked,

and for the first time in a long one, I listened,

The first time this week I was present and not missing.

It's hard to believe I was depressed when I woke up this morning.

Molten Core

I simmer and seethe with a molten core,

Which ripples and roils, just waiting to roar,

With a furious fire that thirsts for fuel,

Too violent and thoughtless to truly be cruel.

Or perhaps the truth is that I am the core,

Painted up fancy to look like I'm more.

Branches and Roots

The heart has thousands of branches and roots

Spread high as the forehead and deeper than boots,

Drawing forth sustenance, pushing forth waste,

Growing as needed, as anchored in place.

and as trees play the pendulum, swing in rhythm and creak,

So does the heart keep time, thump and beat

From its place on the left, felt by nerves going right,

Asleep's still awake to the rhythm of life.