Wrapped with a ribbon and bow –
Who could ask for more?
That’s why I ask for less.
Give me lower than the floor!
Why take?
I’ll be taken by the mess,
Sucked down the drain
To serve as guest
In the storm and rain
Out into the stars,
Wrapped ’round the ribbon
Of this little light of ours,
Joining with the glow,
Wearing all the colors as a bow.

We’re olive and well!
Olive us are hearty, healthy, hale!
It’s olive ever wanted
To be off the tree and free to sail
Towards what we olive for,
So olive happily ever after
Once I tell you
Through greenest laughter –
Olive you!

A woodpecker all made of wood
That pecked itself alive
From in a cedar shook and stood
The sawdust off like I’ve
Yet to see birds born from a shell
Beak up and hammer down
So hard they’d ring high heaven’s bells
If ringers need be found.

They’re many ringed with knotty eyes
That see beyond the bark
Of any living thing disguised
Or hiding in the dark.
They’ve seven hearts of greenest sprouts
That flower in their chest
And make them smell of nectar housed
In fresh cut wooden nest.

Each woodpecker’s a hundred ringed
At least and more exceed
By centuries as a leaf-winged
Born seed inside a seed.
A woodpecker all made of wood
Will peck until its last
Fine splinter splits itself for good –
Rings deep as could be asked.

Illustrated by DALL-E in the style of Lyubov Popova.

He barely knows
He’s full of holes
So let’s not tell him yet.

We’ll fill him in
With butter then
Seal him with mud to set.

The tricky part
In being smart
Enough to doctor souls

Is knowing when
To fill them in
On all their many holes.

Splain would write a history book
On all that never happened.
He would take the closest look
At the myth and gobbledygook
Beyond the starts and ends.

He peered into the nothingness
And yelped, “It’s over full!”
Then began to pen as best
He could the blessed mess
Beyond us factual fools.

As he wrote he found his fate
And gave an empty shout,
“Beyond the famous Fable Gate
And the fields where lies await
This very book sits out!”

Splain claimed with sad conviction
That, “I sat and read it all.
This book was the greatest written
From the realm of fact and fiction,
Such a shame it’s staying fictional.”

I lose myself in mountains
To have them found in me,
So when I’m caught and measured
It will be tree to tree,
So though I’m a small person
I’ll be seen as the key
To life from sprout to eagle
And filling up the sea,
So none will look inside me
And sadly see a plea
For anything that’s better
Than mighty peaks would be,
So I’ll get lost in mountains
Whose only guarantee
Is wherever I then go
I’ll go with them in me.

A gimcrack is a creature red
In face, fish, tooth and claw.
Some say that it was born and bred
In low lands lost to law.

The truth lies somewhat lower still,
Yes, lower than truth goes.
Truth stands upon the lowest hill
And watches what it’s owed

But cannot ever have or hold
As life finds finest lies
To seed and bloom and then grow old
With gold scales and blue eyes

That peer from red as once was said
And must not be forgot,
For features here are in your head,
Their power in your thought.

Can baubles matter, can they thrive?
Can knick-knacks earn a care?
The gimcrack finds itself alive
As shiny nothings there.

Illustration by DALL-E in the style of John Bauer.

If I were a pie
I’d sit and sigh
And wish to be a cake.

If I were a cake
I’d sadly bake
And dream of fruity mousse.

If I were a mousse
I’d cut all loose
And go for chocolate pudding.

If I were a pudding
I’d turn to putting
Myself in cookie piles.

If I were such piles
I’d aim for the style
Of those crowning cakes.

But no matter how I bake
I don’t turn more desserty,
So I’ll have to eat and make
More of them a part of me.

Tired starbirds come to rest
Upon the gentle rumbling chest
Of taller mountains than I know
Where youngling comets swirl and grow
To get a tail just long enough
That they may chase their wagging love
Out into the pointed black
And get them there and back.

Tired starbirds come to rest
And build their ship-like, hold-all nests
To fill with shining, diamond eggs
That bloom into a thousand threads
At the gentle, pulling touch
Of the moon who’s teased the clutch
To knit themselves two pairs of wings
So they may dive some planet’s rings.

Rested starbirds are then flung
Back out on tails of comet young,
Without direction, only need
To fly and flock and hunt and feed
And decide if they’ll return
To the same nest where they learned
Of loving home or they’ll go on,
See deeper stars and fly beyond.

Illustration by DALL-E in the style of William Blake.

The days that I don’t start
Are marked among my best.
They can be as they are
And need not join the rest.
These days don’t have an end,
They’re lightly full and free.
They simply let me in
Then go on leaving me.