the once Golden State

take a long

hard

look at California

and run.

run

as if it's on fire,

well,

it sort of is at times.

shame there's

no water

in the hydrants,

and that

there is no penalty

for crime.

the taxes are higher than

everywhere.

choose wisely

when

visiting the Golden State.

the politicians are as slippery

as the seals

in Frisco.

wear boots

so that your feet are

not stabbed

by the blanket of syringes

in MacArthur Park,

wear a bullet proof

vest and a helmet.

look out for hijacks.

forget about the train

to nowhere,

it's ten billion dollars away

before the first

track is laid.

keep your head on a swivel

if you want

to stay alive.

from nothing

even

Einstein agrees that

God does

not roll dice with

the universe.

there is no

luck or coincidence,

no accident

for everything that lives

and dies.

the perfection

of so much, the distance

from the sun

and moon,

the bubble of air

keeping us alive.

it's hard to

believe that everything

was once

nothing,

and poof like magic

we appeared,

with no rhyme or reason,

no plan,

no guiding and forgiving

hand.

i prefer to believe

otherwise.

rose colored glasses

when young,

we think

highly

of our teachers and lawyers,

our doctors,

and politicians,

even our

sports heroes.

we put them on another

level

of respect,

we look up to them,

we listen

and absorb

their words

of wisdom. we want to

emulate

their standard

of living,

but that all ends at

some point.

it has too of course

once

the blinders come off our

young

idealistic eyes.

they're no better and no

worse

than we are.

for truly all have fallen

short of the glory of God.

i'm here but not here

you stand

at the window and see life

going by.

everyone

to his or her

own choices in what they do

with their lives.

to work,

to school, to push a carriage

down the sidewalk,

to mow the lawn,

or lie out

in the sun,

closing one's eyes.

you feel as if you are a part

of it,

but it's a vague feeling,

one you've never

been sure of.

are you just going through

the motions,

are you play

acting,

just to be a part of 

how the world survives.

it's strange being different

and trying

to hide it.

high gas prices versus a nuclear holocaust

it seems

like

a reasonable trade off,

a nuclear

holocaust versus

high gas

prices for a few more

months.

there's always

a give and take

when it comes

to things

of an evil nature.

a tradeoff of sorts,

sometimes we need

to bleed a little

before the world

heals,

and the evil

is stopped.

all the things i don't need or want

i wish

i had never bought the pool

table,

or the kayak,

or the enormous

exercise

machine

and stationary bike.

the canoe

too

and the sailboat

docked at the harbor.

not to mention the hot

tub

and sauna,

and swimming pool.

but i was only

trying to please someone

who wanted

these things, not me.

that's what i like about you.

you already

have everything i don't need.

this was not my idea

the nurse

tells me that since i haven't been

in for over

a year

to have the dermatologist

check out

my skin from top to bottom,

for barnacles and cancer

spots,

to take off all of

my clothes

except for my fruit of the loom

underwear.

so i sit there in my briefs and wait

on the cold stool

for the doctor to come in.

and then she does,

gasping,

her eyes wide at my nakedness

dropping her cold

air gun to the floor.

quickly i tell her

that this was not my idea.

this is all temporary right?

i still

believe that this soreness

will go away

at some point,

like it used to

when young.

one morning i'll wake up

and

the creaky knee and shoulder,

will be gone,

the sore muscles

in my back

and legs will have

dissipated,

as wells as

the crick in the neck.

at some point

i'll rise from the bed

and be back to normal,

good as new

and not

going down

the stairs

backwards, gripping

tightly the rail.

ah sugar sugar

we ate

a lot of candy when young.

Easter,

Christmas or any old day.

Hersey

bars, and Mary Janes,

Skittles

and Juju Fruits.

we devoured

a lot

of butter brickle

ice cream

and sucked on hundreds

of lollipops

down to the stem.

we drank

cokes

by the gallons,

Shirley Temples and grape

Nehi's. we

chewed gum daily,

blowing bubbles, la dee da.

saving the wads

on the bedpost at night.

it's no wonder

our dentists are so rich now.

the Sovereign Citizen

there's a strange new

mental illness

going around

calling itself the Sovereign

Citizen.

it's wackadoodle

way of thinking

and believing that they

are not subject to the laws

of the country they live in.

they aren't driving,

they're traveling they tell

the cop who pulls them over

for speeding, or with

no tags on their car.

no ID, no license,

no insurance card or registration.

they refuse to answer

questions or get out of the car.

they are above it all.

but they all seem to sing

a different tune,

when in hand cuffs and put

behind the bars.

defying the laws of physics

like

a bullet, the yellow

hummingbird

darts

in and out, up

and down,

backwards, forward,

at lightning

speed,

searching

for some flower

on which to pollinate

and feed.

who needs an alien

from a distant

galaxy

defying gravity

and physics?

they're here all ready.

blink once

and they're gone.

coffee and books

i leave

half cups of coffee around the house

beside

open books,

as if maybe

i'll go back to them.

it's a trail

of me.

of the day,

the morning into the night.

so much

i need to return

to,

that plate

over there with

the scone with one

bite.

swipe right for true love on Bumble

her Bumble dating

profile states no Maga,

no red

hats,

no right-wing conservatives

or Trump

supporters.

swipe right if you want

men in women's

sports and locker rooms.

if you want higher

taxes

and open borders,

free grocery stores

and buses,

and

no ID's to vote.

bonus points if you 

hate ICE

and billionaires,

and dislike finding fraud.

swipe right

if you are pro abortion

for any month

of pregnancy,

and love

communism and

Hammas

and want to free free free

Palestine,

i'm the girl for you.

we'll formerly a boy,

i'm in transition now

to be completely

honest and transparent

so i'm sort of half

a girl at the moment.

but forget those pesky

chromosome details.

let's make memories

by protesting and getting

arrested together.

blue hair and nose rings

are a plus.

are you the one for me?

my soul mate?

the delusion of everyone being old but you

how did they all

get old

so fast,

the singers and songwriters

of your youth,

now grey

and bent.

you know all the words

to all their

songs,

and now here they are

on television

strumming their guitars,

beating their drums

on YouTube,

old and mumbling,

setting suns,

all of them

old,

but strangely not you.

the red thumb

there's someone

hammering

something

down the street.

i can hear it from

the open

window.

someone is going at

it with

a hammer,

bang, bang, bang.

a nail perhaps, a bent

screw,

a twisted piece of metal.

maybe they're

trying

to straighten

it out.

they're building

something,

and then the scream

and curse,

as we often

do when our thumb

gets in the way.

the white flags

so

much is about surrender.

giving

in

to what or who

we can't change.

we accept who

we are,

where we're going to

at the end

of each day.

we surrender to those

who

want us to do things we

don't want

to do,

we listen without quarrel.

we get in line

and wait for our turn

at the well.

we reluctantly

give in.

we want peace, so there

is no other choice

but to surrender.

Dinner Theater roast beef

along with

nearly two hundred

senior citizens

bused in from

the local old folk homes

and as far away

as the Poconos,

we were

at the Lazy Susan

Dinner Theater on Duke Street

a few decades ago

watching

a performance of West Side Story

by a group

of young actors,

who were also the waiters

during breaks,

singing, dancing, acting their

little hearts out

when

an old man

stood up during the song Maria,

and yelled out,

i can't eat this meat,

it's tough

and stringy.

he held up on his fork a 

large piece

of grey meat and shook it towards

the stage, 

there was a chorus

of me either behind him,

but the show went on

just the same,

no one

missed a beat.

cold hard cash

she

puts the cold hard cash

in my hand.

no credit

card

swiped, no check written

out,

no IOU's,

or Zelle,

no Crypto,

no PayPal or any other

such nonsense.

just a handful of Benjamins.

she knows

how i like to roll,

and pays

me so.

pulling us to shore

despite having

nine

children

and dozens of grandchildren,

few will

attend

his funeral.

they have other things to do

it seems.

no love

given, no love lost.

and yet

i have proof there was,

as i stare

at the rowboat

with five

of us

on Cape Cod Bay, and

him at the oars

pulling

us to shore

in brilliant sunlight.

the smiling masks

i open

up the old suitcase

as i pack

for a trip out west.
i haven't

used this piece of luggage

in ages.

God only knows

what's inside,

left over

from my previous lives.

what's

in there besides, 

ticket stubs

and maps,

receipts and assorted

photographs

from the polaroid

camera.

holidays

from the past.

trouble behind the smiling

masks.