I Wish I Could Relax,
Like My Cat






I wish I could relax
Like my cat.
I’ve never seen a human
Relax like that.
I’m nervous and find it hard to stop
And smell the flowers
And enjoy the ride,
But my cat just sleeps
With no attempt to hide
His utter contempt for the world
Passing by.
Chewing some grass
Or watching a squirrel-
He sleeps and dreams
In his cryptic cat world.
After sixty-one years
On this earth as a man
I’m about as laid back
As any human being can.
When I’ve exhausted
My earthly time
Lord, bring me back
As an orange feline.

Google Monopoly

I have bought every street in the city
F*ck them now, with their Nazi games
I am going to raise all their taxes
I am the one, now, with the list of names.

I have discovered that I am vindictive
I have found that I hold a grudge
I am the one who presides over them now
I am the jury and I am the judge.

I, I, I, is my new anthem
I am the cyber landlord and king
I will wear the only uniform
Everyone else will kiss my ring.

Everyone else will cough up moolah
Everyone else will scrape and bow
And pay for the privilege of living in Google
Since I own all the cyber-scape now.

All the electrons, all of the atoms
All the packettes and bits and bugs
The whole Google earth is mine now
Until they decide to pull the plug.

Old Timers

There are things we will never understand.

Not you. Not I.

The man I once wished

would curl up and die

smiles

a smile of the old and disoriented

And I love him again,

as if we shared the secret

the one we shared

from the time I was born

until I was ten.

Keep this thought-

There are things we will never understand.

Like the innocence of the time we spend

when the time is right

and there is work to be done.

Courting a wife

Building a home

Giving life

To a son of your own.

My father sat with tubes in a tangle

(I had closed the door

because, I believed,

it was modesty

that kept him alive)

He smiled at me

I want to believe

the same way

he smiled at me

when I was five.

The chain

disappears

link by link beneath the water.

The nurses come in to turn him over.

He stays afloat

And drifts

Through the arc

of the anchor

that holds him fast.

He’s smiles

like he knows the answer

at last.