Your trash misses you,
It dreams of what could be.
You threw it all out
And thought you were free!
But it won’t let you go
‘Cause you’re all that it knows,
You made and sent it out,
Into the world it goes!
I could list it all here
But you know better than I,
And as for me –
The longer list is mine.
Goodness knows I miss it too,
I worry about my trash.
So I throw myself away
To find my lost mishmash!

(Read part I here.)

So you’ve been caught and shipped
On as a special beast?
While true that you’ve been stripped
Of nearly every piece
Of you that you’ve equipped
You’re still a beast, at least,
And when your package drops
At someone’s lucky door –
They grab it! Out you pop!
You growl! You howl! You roar!
You chase and dare not stop
Till beast is boxed once more!
Your choice has come, sharp creach.
Go free or stay, fair scup.
If you join us, fine leech,
You don’t yet know, young pup,
The beastly heights you’ll reach –
Make profit and move up.

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

A pirate with an eye patch
Is a frightful sight.
One day I’ll rule the waves
And must show the fight
I’ll have in me as a captain
Striking terror left and right
So none oppose
‘Cause all suppose
None are fierce as I.
So I picked a perfect patch
And strapped it ‘cross my eye
As if I’d took a blinding scratch
That shut off half the sky.
I’d never looked so fierce before,
There’d be no going back.
When you’ve got the upper hand
Attack! Attack! Attack!
So I put a patch on that high hand,
Admired it a bit,
Then patched the lower one
For a pair of fearsome mitts.
I patched my nose, my ears,
My toes and arms and knees,
By the end I’d wrapped myself
Till I was well and truly squeezed.
I’ll admit that on a ship
I’d look a little funny,
But when it comes to terror
Few are feared more than a mummy.
So I sail now for the desert
To rule the sandy waves
As a haunting mummy pirate
Who could not keep a grave.

The door was locked
The window wasn’t,
So out we went,
The daring dozens,
Free as we could wish to be,
And we’d wished hard
And we’d wished long
And we’d discard
Any silly reason
Not to be
Just as free
As Good agrees
We all should breeze
By like comets,
Uncontained by anything
That comments,
“Control yourself!”
“Not your concern!”
“Get back here!”
“Wait your turn!”
There’s no being free
Or you in part.
If your head is locked
Go through the heart.

I’ll take the rather longer way
Because I’ve noticed that the short
Gets me right to my planned out day
And keeps me from the funner sort
Of things that buck and bray and play
And bring me more than my plans may.

There was a white owl in a black stone coat
Who rowed in from dreams in a cracked bone boat
With a ringtail rat
Who sang as he sat
In key but never on note

Of the lives that were lived in the hours of sleep
That built worlds that would give all but not keep
And said to set sail
For the Isles of Tale
For there the dreaming was deep

Enough that it might yet stay out of sight,
Survive the first light ending the short night,
And then as the dawn
Glanced up with a yawn
Owl sang with rat the invite

For the crack was a fact of their bone boat,
Owl thankfully sank with hope in stone coat
But the rat swam on
Still singing their song
In key but never on note.

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.