Hypoathlechondriac

Where’s the guy with the hurt toe?
His toe is in his head
kicking echoes like soccer balls
with a very small audience of thoughts.

I don’t mean to be cruel,
it’s the simile I like.
Can’t you see two thoughts on one side
whispering and drinking diet cokes;
another, on the other side, top row
laying flat, sound asleep.

All the while a skinny little toe,
booting sounds from ear to ear,
creates echoes of its own.

Above The Law

Silent as rain drops sliding down glass
fibrosis and inflammation are stealing his breath.
It’s not like he could put locks on his lungs to keep
them from burning and scarring all they touched.

They’ve been scanned and shot at with steroids,
alarms went off with shortness of breath;
no way to haul their butts to jail, they haven’t
committed any infraction of law to issue a warrant.

I sit here drinking a beer, and writing a poem,
he lays there sucking life from a hose.

Inside Out

God squeezed the clouds
like over soaked wash rags,
dripping drops of crystal heaven
on the cracked cries of thirsty dirt.

It’s the best rain we’ve had
since Noah’s ghost passed through
sometime last year,
maybe, the year before.

The trees shook like wet dogs,
some patches of grass
drank so much
they were inside out with water.

Thanks!

My grandson said to tell all of you he appreciated all your comments. His grandfather does too!! He's 13. Andrew you are right, I can't be that old!!

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Here are two poems by my grandson Aaron Stallman. A proud offering by a proud grandfather!!


Those who live in times of was,
and those who live in trophies or honors.
Those who see not life,
they are blind with vision dark as night,
for they see just their past.

Listen advice as old as time itself,
see the day,
live the future,
forget the Past.
Keep marching forward,
your battle is not over.

By Aaron Stallman


Everytime I hear sir names,
I see their faces.
Wonder who they were,
why they were,
and when.

Everytime I hear sir names,
the faces of past I see.
This gift I bear,
I know not how,
why, I cannot say.
One thing I know,
this gift I'll bear always.

By Aaron Stallman

Stroke By Stroke

The fog is muscled-up thick
preventing me from finding shore.
Every direction I turn
I’m head-locked tighter in dilemma.

I can’t just sit in its grip,
there must be a way to slip free.
I’ll stab its muddy-bottom feet,
with the long pole I hold,
until, it lifts them out of the water.

Line Up Of Three

I’ve narrowed the search to three suspects
in the crime of my disappearing poems.

My stumble fat-fingers that press
two or more keys more often than one,
refusing to follow to the letter
all instructions from the brain.

Murphy, our Australian Sheppard
that has his own poem, is the least likely:
he’s the number one pet,
the only time he touches the keyboard
is to remind me of his daily date with his ladies
on their sniff, walk, and pee, and
their sniff, walk and ______.

Now, to the feline of “bitch” fame.
She always wears black, and
mischievousily roams the house.
I’ve interrogated her thoroughly, but
she refused to confess with a kiss-my-ass hiss!!

What happened????????????

I lost February's poems.

Took My Breath Away

I’ve struggled with men over a football, struck
dimpled balls on fairways and greens into a hole,
flirted my ass off turning “NO” into yes, Yes, YES!!
Won or lost, it was the challenge I loved most.

But, with this breath-stealing, snot river cold,
there’s no line to cross, no holes to enter,
nothing I can finesse into a positive score.

Suck on these, swallow two gel caps,
sleep for hours, and wake up the same.
Of course, it’s not my first,
I was deflowered as a child (perverted little viral beast).

It’ll have its way with me a few more days, until,
this mucus lusting lothario takes another's breath.

Bare Limbs

The trees outside are bare,
with limbs swirling around their trunks.
I’m not a fan of Winter, but
nakedness I advocate all the time.
There’s been many a pole
I’ve watched bare limbs twirl around;
doling out green leaf after green leaf,
making sure the covering wouldn't return.

Favorite Time Of Day

I walk Murphy, my Australian Sheppard mix,
most days, but, with the wind chill being 14
he’s just going to have to bark, whine,
growl--under his breath, and bounce off the walls.

A rescue we got back in June, that didn’t know
how to play with toys, people, nor other dogs.
He was scared to death of men, but, never me,
which I thought was very strange.

All of the above has favorably changed:
he scatters his toys all over the house, and
some things that cause us disdain. We walk
with a regular group of four, or five bitches--
all their owners are female too. It is our favorite
time of day, I hope my long johns can be found.

When The Well Is Dry

What’s the point of writing, just to write?
The well is dry, there’s no words left
hiding in the mortared walls of my creativity.
I look at the snow, snow we rarely get,
and see just that, instead, of an invasion
of white hedonistic flies procreating on dead grass;
eventually, leaving the slush of their sin
to stain our soles going out for the mail.
I drop my thoughts down the dark shaft,
again and again, hoping for lines to fill
the empty strapped slats of a page.

A Fool And His Gold

The sun races through her hair
like fire-angels playing tag.
The sparkle in her eyes is probably fool’s gold
but, I’m addicted to the glitter of that dream.
I definitely know better having sluiced
many streams and creeks the same.
All I need is one, and maybe this one's mine.

From Fog To Fog

The fog on the lake New Years Eve
was smooth and silky, seductive and mysterious.
The fog in my head New Years day
was neither seductive, nor mysterious:
it had the fury of a woman scorned,
the fiery quills of a porcupine cornered.
Thankfully, though, the memories
will fade into myths and legends, since
the batteries in the video camera were dead.

Howling Madness

The wind, like a rabid dog,
mauled the tender skin of my face tearing
succulent warmth with carnivorous icy teeth.

Trembling trees with cowardice,
bare to the curves and fractures of their spines,
moaned with sympathy, but, dared not
pull the beast from the feast of my suffering.

I endured the ferocity, the viciousness
of its demented assault; gathered
an arm full of fat lighter and dry logs
to soothe the stinging in my wounded cheeks.


Thank you all for your kind offerings, and continued support with my long absences. Hopefully this will change soon and I can get back to doing what I love best, well, second best anyway.

A Little Rain Must Fall

Where will the dancers be
when rain ceases to fall?
poets when thirst ridicules words?
They will be clanking chimes of bones
performing in a wind that has no soul.

Forests won’t remember carpenters,
clouds won’t darken with the smoke of war;
sunsets will set fires in the sky, and nights
will sleep soundly without voices wet to mourn.

Fixing Flats

A leak sprung in my mind:
a screwy thought, maybe, but
more probably my worn out way of thinking.

I should take it somewhere,
get it patched, plugged or replaced.
Think of it, a new mind with zigzag treads
that’d wouldn’t hydroplane on stormy days.

Out of my budget, so I’ll pop another patch;
skid around on bald resolve, fixing flats.

A Green Recipe

It may be time for oil barons to be boiled.
Add vegetable politicians, julienne or chopped,
dice up a few judges, add garlic and salt.
Simmer and spice with cloves of lawyer tongues,
stir in all-media seasoning till it tastes dollar free.
Obviously, can’t do this, but it’s appetite for thought.

She Is What She Is

Her sleek outline curves from stern to bow
like a smile, friendly, with a red gunwale gloss,
wet and glistening, inviting sunrise to a kiss.
She isn’t a faithful lover: the sea slips
its smooth hand down the belly of her keel;
the breath of a passionate night to come
whispers in the taut cables of her mast.

Religion

Religion, as a word in Scrabble,
has very little value at all.
In the overall schemes of two-legged beasts,
its worth is incalculable in dollars and cents.
In the bony shadows of widows, and protruding
bellies of orphans stuffed from breasts of air,
its purity is proven when the lest of these are fed.