Avians

My favorite bird is the duck because its voice starts with a Q.
Its cartoonish life and royal green head create phosphorescent smiles.
The duck waddles because its legs are short and its abdomen is robust.
This design is perfect for amphibious assaults.

The ostrich comes in second place, head buried because of it.
They are strong and stoic and rigorous and ill-tempered:
a perfect invitation to love.
With their speed and elegance, they fool all by spitting.

The penguin walks around in formal wear,
torpedoing through icy waters, imitating weapons.
Above water they are social, clumsy, in love and cold.
Under water they glide and sing and gobble with great might.

Cardinals are nice birds too.
The women aren’t as flashy as the Post Office Red males.
Black beady eyes make them look like criminals who can’t get away with anything.
Their fauxhawks make them look like hipsters waiting for new songs.

Toucans are just ridiculous.
A novelty cereal mascot and treasure of the rainforest,
these beaked rainbows show off nature’s sense of humor and color-wheel science.
They show off exotic vintage posters.

The pelican is wise and prehistoric-looking.
They are fishermen and have biology which keeps emissions low.
They waste not and fare well in all weather.
They are the keepers of time and demonstrators of evolution.

Author

Theodore Geisel makes me want to jump up and down,
tasting far-off hams and counting fish with my hands.
He uses primary colors to apprehend language
and announces the use of sounds with glee and charm.
His politik involves rhyme scheme and consonants,
while his voice soothes the joint human soul.

Pablo Neruda makes me want to fall in love
and then have my heart ripped out.
He makes me want to be in pain
so that I can write fancy sentences.
He uses the compass of feeling in order to make
emotion political and logic into song.

Roald Dahl makes me want to be a witch
so I can turn small boys into mice.
He makes me want to eat lollipops specifically
to turn my tongue colors; forget the sucrose.
He enforces childhood on the old
with clairvoyant ammo and sugary soldier-suits.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez makes me want to learn magic
so that I can figure out how his nouns work.
His libros make me weep with jealousy and pure blood.
He creates in me an addiction to the process of the heart
and weaves limitless nostalgia through my pores.
I transcribe my words with his breath.

Motherhood

Motherhood means greasy bangs and sore tits.
It means pacifiers in your coat pocket and
dark bags housed under your eyes.
Your ears suddenly have the power of all the ears in the world
and you never need to sleep again.
It means nutrition and hydration and horrid posture.

Motherhood implies that you have to live forever.
You must have brute strength and not feel hunger, pain, want.
Your youth dissipates, and adventures are no longer selfish.
Attention is used as a tool rather than a gift.
You have late nights and early mornings;
every morning feels joyful and every evening feels like air.

Motherhood convinces you that love exists.
The breath of genetics seizes you and creates wonder.
You believe in magic.
You forget concepts like betrayal, annoyance, and dishonesty.
Your patience exponentially races forward as your energy coagulates,
and a smile makes you explode with pure joy.

Motherhood forces you to understand truth, beauty, inheritance.
It makes you see, for the first time.
Whatever rotten politics or burning trees lie in the way,
you value optimism for the first time perhaps ever.
The future lays in your arms, breathing and flailing and
warmer than all the emotions you've ever felt.

You Don't Have Any Towels in Here!

Red, green, white, blue, black currencies
arbitrarily place value on our evening’s worth.
Flushes are always worth $2.50.
You might do well, break even, leave empty handed;
all of it is dictated and notated carefully by plastic and pulp.

The conversations ebb and flow with cadence and
great changes in speed, volume, seriousness, annoyance levels.
Bitch, be cool!
Some of us take it all in stride, cutting the deck (improperly)
and shuffling softly and slowly.

These rules which engage competitive glee
are decided upon early, so no foul plays can be called.
Weirdy bets ARE allowed!
Things like “splashing the pot” and “stringing bets”:
these phrases sound silly and delays still erupt.

There is no outlaw, gunpowder smell.
No one drinks whiskey or spits into a spittoon.
The pianola takes the shape of a small white metal bar that
shines music haphazardly, without threat of bottles being smashed on it.
And, the only risk of death comes from burger meat stacked too high.

Some people talk about the game, with its probability and stratagem.
Others play with random bubble gum toys with earnest.
Puns and jabs and one-liners make some stop concentrating.
Others just sit quiet, trying not to giggle too loudly.
It truly is udderly amaizing.

Big blind, little blind; flush royal straight of a kind.
These monarchal combinations enable wealth and failure to
fall upon the shoulders of eleven lowly souls.
Binary colors and limited sequences keep all seat-glued.
The circle abruptly departs along with gossip, cash money, tired eyes, memory.

Cough Supressant

Cough cough!
Phlegm and noise escape my face-hole
as my lungs heave and constrict.

Symptoms of this viral infections include:
Heavy Heart,
Rapid Eye Mambo,
Oesophagus Elephantitis,
Beached Whale Syndrome,
Sad-Face,
Impatient headaches,
Lazy tits,
Syncopation,
and
Double Sad-Face.

I blow and sneeze and shout,
battling enzymes with t-shaped white cells
and scream hooray when the battle’s won.

April

April is the first real month of Spring.
Today though, it’s cloudy and cold out.
Cloudy with a chance of clouds.

April always makes me think of:
Easter rabbit chocolate
poems about The Great War
Jespah
Chernobyll
umbrellas
6th grade science class
Fools

Today is the first day where I can
start to think of all these things,
as I walk in the Spring frost.