(this poetry is best read while listening to ambient music)

BUTTERFLY WAFTS

the butterfly wafts down
tries to tell me things
remind me of sullen reminders
crisp walks in the windowsill
screensaver shining bright
colors cross-fading
thumping on the hardwood table
floor rises to greet me
show me the way
soft smell of smoke melting away
maligning my integrity
dismal career anyway
furniture creaks and groans
it shows its age to the street corner
cardboard sign across my chest
now I'm here and you are there
and there is nothing there
here you stand
shove me in the corner
determine my future
the butterfly wafts by
shows me the way
I listen this time
those dreams make miracles
create them in my mind
blow the glass clean off
shatter the walkway
tiny bits of glass work
their way into my cranial
it hurts, take pills
clock ticks down
my permanent future awaits
I await the call
the phone rings
but there is nobody there
not even my own delusion.

POETRY POLICE

I pick up the phone
I dial 811
Who answers?
It’s the poetry police
On the other line
They’re arresting my words
My words have been arrested
Stripped of all their rights and wrongs
Complete and incomplete
What manner of speaking is this?
What direction do you wish to take this?
I cannot begin to explain
The numbness.

My wrists ache
From the chains
Of nouns.
I’m seated in a cold room
And forced to recite
Various passages
From __________
I decline, respectfully.
I’m water-boarded for the sake of poetry.
I’m forced to reveal my true intentions.
My metaphors have been stripped away.

I stand alone
Naked yet fully clothed in righteousness
In the halls and the falls and the grips
Of the poetry police
They care not for my well being
They seek to do me no good

Written words are standing before me
In a crowded space of disbelief
My thoughts are no longer my own
And when will I go home
What will greet me when I arrive
Back to the parlor of the written word
I take comfort in the knowledge
That there is no knowledge to take comfort in
A calm envelops me
As my resolve is resolved

(Written 2008, Posted 19 February 2012)

BURNED

Where did my optimism go?
I feel empty inside and cannot get
This stain out of my head, repeating
The procedure does no good.

So I return to the place of the honest
Quest; flames shooting out of my fingers
Heat bubbling up from the gut
And a flat approach to life that
Leaves me feeling flat and burned.

I’ve been banned from the fire ring, but
I still experiment with fire, whether
Water is around or not, to quench
The flames of another’s organic reaction.

I awake to my relevant state and think
That I am now awake but what of this dream?
Or the one before it, and why am I stuck
In this rut, and what will get me out.

(Written 21 August 2011, Posted 4 February 2012)
Taken from the Stephen Philips book
"Irrelevant: My Attempts at Obscurity"

SITTING, ISOLATED

Sitting, isolated
Quietly dreaming of
Soft frozen moments
In time eternal.
Where could the daylight
Be?
Why would I even care.
Turning a blind eye to,
The ways of this world,
But still totally consumed
By it.

(Written 28 June 2006, Posted 17 June 2008)

WISHFUL DREAMING

Wishful dreaming,
Seeming lonely,
Wondering wandering,
Feeling anomaly.

Hearing the soft flow,
Of the moth glow,
On the end table,
I pick up the remote.

And feel so remote,
From you,
As you fly off,
To other destinations.

And never attempt,
To return.

(Written 2007, Posted April 2008)