Massacre at the Kabul Bazaar

Massacre at the Kabul Bazaar

It was quiet except for the birds
They wouldn’t speak or want again
After a massacre there are no words
It was quiet except for the birds
It’s a theater of the absurd
Like the silence after rain
It was quiet except for the birds
They wouldn’t speak or want again

Short of Breath

Short of Breath

The scent of sublime
wafts in the air
at nighttime
the scent of sublime
permeates the mind
and the fragrance of her hair
the scent of sublime
wafts in the air

Alzheimer Days

Alzheimer Days

We remain in limbo but
We do not notice
How can we notice?
We don't remember
Yesterday

We've lost our history
And found ourselves
Adrift on a solo raft
And who remembers now
The stories we heard as children?

We are accustomed to solitude
We hardly detect
Our emptiness
For most of us
There is no solace here
No comfort

Not even a memory
To keep the ghosts
From haunting us

Humanity
You have abandoned us.

Black Friday

Black Friday

Like Ramadan pilgrims they converge on
Walmart, Black Friday Mecca
flagellating themselves in early dawn
before the Golden Calf of bargains.

Lines form, encircling the mosques,
faint unintelligible chants waft in the breeze
of the behemoth's parking lot to the lull
of broadcast elevator muzak.

Doors open, a rush and crush like locusts
descending on Mormon grain fields,
they push, pull, scratch, bite-fight
to the death for toasters, TVs and trinkets.

Letters From Around the World

Letters From Around the World

Epistolary friendships -
pen pals worldwide
bring the globe to a single
heart, combining cultures

into a delicious dessert-
a tasty pastry, delectable
to tongue and thought,
sweetness and light.

The letters we write
broach abysmal bigotry,
remake the matrix of
universal understanding.

Artifacts

Artifacts

Stowed away in the attic
in old trunks
family secrets reside
like forgotten diamonds
In safety deposit boxes.

Love letters from the war,
old newspaper clippings
of a suicide, a love-triangle
murder, a drowning, a
Pulitzer Prize. More shades

than we ever knew, color
the existence of our very drab
lives. Buried beneath the ballast
of genealogy , our history
sleeps under a pile of old clothes.

Make Your Own Days

Make your Own Days

At a certain point, you must be self-reliant,
making your own days.
You must
find the magic thread,
leading you away from the labyrinth alone.

Who can resist independence?
To color your own sky, write your own song,
while the world weeps in quiet desperation.
.