FUCK GOLF (for George Carlin)

Let's put on our polo shirts and ankle socks and go golfing.

Let's stand around on the beautiful expanse of green to hit a miniature dimpled ball around.

Let's admire the majestic beauty of the manicured, irrigated and chemically treated lawns.

Let's look out as if we're purveyors of some beautiful kingdom that's sprawled out special--just for us.

Let's feel the soft spongy green swallow up our shockingly white sneakers that children made somewhere.

Let's be bold and ironic and wear ridiculously patterned outfits and outrageous hats that don't even match.

Let's buzz around on a golf cart to properly survey our kingdom and surreptitiously swig on alcohol in cans.

Let's listen to the crack of the iron on that little ball to properly feel powerful and sporty and elite and alive.

All I Really Wanna Do

All I would really like to do right now 

is eat an ice cream cone under an umbrella 

in a thunderstorm, but it's not even raining, 

I'm too full from dinner, and you don't like 

going out in public.

A Consumer's Plea

Please --

No more things.

No more gifts.
No more HGTV.
No more food wrapped in packages.
No more appliances.
No more tools.
No more shelves.
No more books
              Or papers
              Or typefaces.

Please let us not mark
our appreciation
with dumb money in a bow.

Please let us not box
our past, piles upon piles,
in dusty attics and basements full of cobwebs.

Please let us not fill
our minds 
with the shit and things of this silly place.

A Prayer

I pray for a time when poets are no longer necessary.

Buried Deep

You've been dead for 16 years now
nearly half my life
and I still have one of your shirts
a striped polo 
buried amongst clothes in my closet 
that are either too small 
or too bulky 
or splattered in paint.

Your shirt has seen
paint, mortar, sawdust
and my sweat
but somehow 
it's still your shirt.

Now the collar has become itchy
and makes my neck and mind burn
with thoughts of your death:

your car parked
on the side of a deserted
tree-lined highway
your head flooding
with love and betrayal
as you fumble blindly 
for the shotgun in your trunk.

When we heard the news
your sister and I walked for hours
and then sat on a curb
eating homemade vanilla cupcakes with sprinkles 
that our friend's mother always
had stockpiled in the freezer.

Your shirt 
with its itchy hot collar
still lays folded
on a shelf in my closet
buried deep.

Summer

Summers are for living.

Sidewalks are warm.

Trees are lush.

Moments are too bright and fast for words.

Poetry Lives

I don't remember 
meeting you 
the first time
but this time
you brought a poem 
for my mom
on her birthday.

You both sat quietly
while I stood there
bowed head
paper in hand
eyes recognizing words
that could be my own.

When I looked up 
(my eyes swirling
with hope and wonder and love)
you smiled and said,
"I made that copy for you."