Monday, December 19, 2011

Iced decaf breve

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Exiting the chaotic
coffee shop, I slip into the
frigid silence of my suburban.
As I shut the door, my sweater
sleeves slip over my arms and
release orgasmic waves of
rich, deep coffee
scent into the cold neutral air.
I close my eyes as I turn
the key in the ignition,
and my hair brushes my
cheek, stroking my skin
with yet more java scents.
I drive home, half drowsy
with the sensual aroma
swaddling me in comfort.
Is there any smell so satisfying
as freshly ground, dark roasted
coffee permeating the
air and skin
after an hour of lurking and
talking in the
espresso-saturated
atmosphere of chattering baristas,
aspiring artists and 'cool' teens?
I could sleep on a mattress
stuffed with freshly roasted
coffee beans, stroke strongly brewed
mocha lotion over my skin, shower in
steamy clouds of cappuccino,
apply a facial mask of cafe 'mud',
and never grow weary of
the exhilarating balm of
my favorite beverage.
(Posted for Gooseberry Garden Poetry Picnic 18, 
"Snow, December, Winter Vacations and Wildness", 12/19/11)















Thank you, Poetry Palace, for the Perfect Poet Award
for week 58! Merry Christmas, fellow poets!

Friday, December 16, 2011

Perserverance

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The 2011 resolution to write
bountifully was
exceptionally fulfilled.
Is not that exciting?
Blogging frequently,
daily poetry scribbling,
writing two new very rough draft books,
connecting with writers
and poets and communities
all over the world to
my unexpected delight.
Nothing got published,
but that was not really my
heart's desire:
expressing my soul
was the goal.
I am a success!
My heart and treasure lie
in writing.
Not in exercise, food plans,
or other people's goals for
me.
Here's to an even more
literary 2012!
(Posted for Free Write Friday, "New Year's Resolution", 12/16/11)

Occupy


















While others generate
blizzards of protesting signs,
I obsess over the
ramifications of gender
dysphoria and
relationships
self perception and
expectations.
How can this be?
How can this be?
How can this be?
Unacceptable, deceived,
deluded, and compulsive,
I march my solitary declaration
of indecisiveness.
(Posted for Poetry Jam, "Occupy", 12/16/11 and Thursday Poet's Rally Week 58, 12/16/11)

Filters














Is this that driven compulsion
or is it a different way of seeing
outside the deadening casket of
environment and expectations?
Imperfection trips the presumption of
always
if you let it.
(Written for Poets United Think Tank 78, "Off the Cuff", 12/16/11)

Drip drip drop

Dark clouds stress and obscure the
mind and all looks impossible
again
until the healing rain begins.
It washes down softly
indiscriminately bathing
ducks and dolts alike.
The ducklings play and pester, 
oblivious to bills and
boys and boundaries.
The dolt thinks a phone call
professing love will fix the destructive
flood of dishonest words.
A newly seen miracle of water
and babies and bright colors.
The rainbow comes out,
splashing through puddles,
being the child
simpler and honest.
(Written for BlueBell Books Short Story Slam 16, 12/16/11)

Monday, December 12, 2011

Straight-jacket dreams


















So damn close and yet
impossible to reach
trapped by the bullshit
that was peddled as
relaxing and healing,
life as a vacation,
now arms pinned
eyes bugging out with
desperation and anger,
only to stare at the sea and
the boat and the
misty horizon,
longing for
escape and freedom and
honesty.
The boat bobs lightly,
beckoning,
oars idle.
Already paddling furiously
away in the mind,
if only the arms were free
to pull against the water.
(Posted for Magpie Tales, Mag 95, 12/12/11)

Sunday, December 11, 2011

Confusingly crazy

The wheel spins faster and
he tells me I am unreasonable
because I challenge and
question his fucked version of
reality that he has imbibed and
internalized from exclusively
lurking online with equally
crazed gender anomalies who
insist we must endorse their
bullshit.
Not this girl.

Monday, December 5, 2011

Individual crowd

















Don't look
keep your gaze on
your own plate
nibble your sandwich
without an eyelid
flicker to
front or back or
a glance at
your neighbor.
How alone we can
make ourselves in a
world full of
people doing the same.
And why?
I can walk through
the crowds or sit in a
restaurant, carefully
maintaining that bubble
of sovereignty,
that aloofness of self
with a book
to hand or a
daydream to
dawdle
within.
(Posted for Magpie Tales 94, 12/4/11 and Thursday Poet's Rally 57, 12/4/11)

Sunday, December 4, 2011

The details are in the listening

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The exhaustion of co-existing
with illness and past hurts
makes death's beckoning
curiously sapid.
I understand now
why my mother laid down
and allowed herself to be
taken so young.
Why not?
Cease to struggle and to
fight everyone and
everything; the siren
call of surrender, not
laziness or suicide.
I will likely live through
this, though my languid,
healing body is
for the first time
attentive
to that hail.
(Posted for One Single Impression 197, 12/4/11 and 
Gooseberry Garden's Poetry Picnic Week 16, 12/6/11)

Saturday, December 3, 2011

Belief interrupted

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Punishment or
parental tyranny,
inconvenience or
lucky-miss-school,
the child perceives illness as
harmless
and annoying and
certainly not
terminal.
Peering through the veil for
the first time
seriously,
the weary adult,
afflicted by some
random but overwhelming
demon germ,
suddenly glimpses
the other side and a
beckoning Presence and
ponders
if this time will be
'it'.

(Posted for Free Write Friday, 12/3/11, Bluebell Books Short Story Slam 15, 12/3/11
and One Single Impression 196, 12/3/11 and Poetry Pantry 76, 12/3/11)

Friday, November 11, 2011

Winter






















The snow sifts down
covering up the ugly death of
fall frost kill,
making the view new and soft
and clean,
tucking the world in
to nap until spring.

(Written for Thursday Think Tank #74, "Winter", 11/11/11)

The lonely writer

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It is a solitary activity
the pursuit of
poesy and
prose.
Others may read
our humble offerings
but no one can help with
the creative process except
perhaps by providing
thoughtful or ludicrous
words, ideas and behavior.
How many times at
a coffee shop or the check out
line have I frantically dug for
paper and pencil
to record a hilarious
or ridiculous
event unfolding
fortuitously
in front of me?

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Prose picture

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Head down,
slogging for word count alone,
quantity over quality,
rough framework awaiting
smoothed walls,
the raw emotion grinds out
and astonishes me with its
power and reality.
Rough draft novel writing
mines the depths of creativity
and memory and feeling.
Writing a novel is
a motion picture
contrasted with the
single photograph of
a poem.

(Posted for Thursday Poet's Rally Week 55, 11/8/11)


Thank you, Poetry Palace, for this week's award. I am always humbly grateful for your recognition!







Friday, November 4, 2011

Write...why?













We gather at the library,
autumn leaves blasting past
the windows in high wind,
skulking with our laptops,
defiantly hogging wall outlets
and tables and chairs,
fingers at the ready.
Are we 'real' writers, not
using the traditional paper
and pen? Then the discussion
of typewriters breaks out, with
a fierce contingent avowing:
what about pencils?
And fountain pens, quills and stylus,
wax tablets, parchment, onion skin,
papyrus and animal skins or even
brushes and burnt sticks and
stone and chisels (of stone or metal?)
Arguments about what is
the purest form of the writer
blossom into fierce, mock serious
discussions of writing procrastination.
While various folks
charge off into the book stacks
to look up hieroglyphics to
support their theories about
what makes a true scribe,
I tap away at my key board,
easily making my daily NaNo
word count, emotional guns
all firing at the bad guy in
my nascent novel.
The writing makes the writer,
you see?
(Posted for Thursday Think Tank #73, 11/4/11 and for Magpie Tales, Mag 89, 11/4/11
and Gooseberry Garden's Poetry Picnic Week 12, 11/6/11)

Sunday, October 30, 2011

What's this? What's this?














October is nearly done.
Do you know what that means?
NaNoWriMo is here.
Do you know what that means?
Thoughts and creative energy
will shift from poetry to prose
for thirty days of down-and-dirty
rough draft novel writing.
Do you know what that means?
Dusty house, undone chores,
allegedly starving family members,
stealth 'noveling' at work,
write-ins and trolling the NaNo
forums for the perfect plot
twist or procrastination activity.
Do you know what that means?
Let's write!

Monday, October 24, 2011

Disassociation





















Don the frock of imagination
and skip into childhood stories,
where anything is possible and
the good girls always win and
the bad guys get a butt-kicking
and even if they are bad,
they are guys, right?
Grin, Mr. C. Cat, lift a wounded spirit
to your level of silliness and
spirited excitement.
I want your smile stretching between
my ears, making my brain happy
with innocence and idealism
and hope.
(Posted for Midnight Snack #8, 10/25/11)

We could have had it all...

















Going through the motions
of everyday activity while
preparing for the new life,
motions stiff and wooden
and colorless,
almost meaningless.
When did life become so flat?
Yes, it's been that way for a
few years now, but my heart
water-colored your behavior,
my writing and my daughter
gave me beautiful sunsets and
energy and meaning.
Now, it's sepia, fading to black.
You touch me and it seems loving,
but really, it's a lie, and I shrug off
your aberrant hope and
look to the horizon
over your shoulder
where the sun is slowly rising.
(Posted for Midnight Snack #6, 10/24/11 - late, I know, but the image spoke to me today!
Also posted to Thursday Think Tank #71, Energy, 10/24/11)

Sunday, October 23, 2011

Childhood


















Why do these old pictures always seem so
depressing and poverty-stricken?
Little children appearing poor and ill-cared for.
My fingers itch to grab colored pencils and 
sketch in pink cheeks and brightly colored shirts
and cheery smiles. Yet...
wait - those smiles are already there. 
My sepia impression missed those
lovely innocent smiles.
"Look up" - it is already better!
(Written for Sepia Saturday 97, 10/13/11)

Move it



















The brain and the body
are knotted with scar tissue



fat cells, varicose veins,
scrambled metabolism,
slack muscles, and
mental sludge.
Limber up! I say to
myself, dragging soul and
flesh to the point of willingness.
The brain is agile, but the
body is stove up with neglect
and inactivity.
Feeling old, but it doesn't
have to be this way!
(Posted for One Single Impression 191, "Limber Up" and Poetry Pantry #72, 10/23/11)

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Medium: paper

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It mocks and pleads
with the possibilities,
begging for the pen to
be put to page, for the
uncovering of the poem
or story woven in
its very fibers, patiently
waiting for its
unveiling.
The creative thought
was always there,
waiting for to be
envisioned.
(Posted for One Single Impression 190, "Paper", 10/18/11)

Hunger

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Peacefully blotted days
of freedom
sparkle on a seemingly
unreachable horizon of
a glass ceiling.
Break the jar.
(Posted for Thursday Think Tank #70, 10/18/11)

Monday, October 17, 2011

Uncertainty





















Eyes red with rage
at the continued duplicity
while professed transparency
is peddled.
You know I know better.
You know my intuitive sense
is dead on about the lying and
shallowness and defensiveness.
You aren't even honest with yourself -
why would you be with me?
It hurts and the wound won't heal
because the harm is still being
inflicted.
(Posted for Midnight Snack #7, 10/17/11 and 
Thursday Poet's Rally 54, 10/24/11)

Just you wait...

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I'll pray for you.
Our God is an awesome God.
Jesus loves you.
My God is bigger than your problem.
God either is or He isn't.
No God, no peace
Know God, know peace.
You had better get right with God now
before it's too late.

My head swirls with the
constant input from everyone
else's conception of a
Higher Power.
What about my perception?
I'm weary of hearing what
everyone else thinks
He is or isn't.
What matters is
my relationship to
Him.
And what or who I am
based on what I do or do not
believe.
I am allowed to 
find that, form that, believe that.
Shouldn't I?
So many questions....
(Posted for Poetry Pantry #71, 10/17/11)

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Loss




Dore Gustave - the Resurrection



Of mothers
and cousins and
uncles and aunts.
Of good friends and
former enemies and
hopes dreams thoughts:
death gently takes you
from our midst into a
physicality we cannot
understand or yet join.

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

All in His Plan





















He was sitting, quivering on the
blacktop in front of my
doctor's office, feathers bedraggled.
I crouched next to him and he looked
up at me, unafraid. I spoke to him and
encouraged him to get out of the
driveway before he got ran over.
Head cocked, listening, he crouched
on his six square inches of warmed tarmac.
Speculating that he might be injured, I reached
out a cautious hand to pick him up and
relocate him to the grass.
He hopped away each time I almost
touched him, looking at me defiantly.
I finally walked away and let him be,
thinking of the scripture about how
God takes care of even sparrows and
wondering
what that tiny feathered angel might have
been trying to tell me on
His behalf.
(Posted to dVerse, Open Link Night #11, 9/28/11 and for
Poetry Picnic #10, "Nature et al", 10/24/11))

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Those were the days




















"Those were the days, my friend."
When?
What days in my life were
so incredibly awesome
that I would be this nostalgic
about them? I try to live in
the moment, and don't wish
for the past or long for the future.
(Well, mostly.)
Listening to family talk about
'the old days', I wonder if
I even grew up with them -
I have very different memories
of some things.
A few years back, the sisters
decided to host an 'old-fashioned'
family Christmas and then proceeded
to plan out a vast itinerary of activities
and dinners that were supposedly
recreations of childhood holidays.
Let's see - everyone ate too much
candy, bossed each other's kids,
got drunk, and tried to out 'one up' 
each other with how great their
lives are, all while being mindful
that our mother was terminally ill.
I don't remember any of that 
from MY childhood Christmases.
I only recall the disappointment,
the punishment, the emotional neglect,
and the physical abuse.
Yep, that was Christmas - and those
were the days.
Now Mom is gone and everyone is
divorced. Things were great,
weren't they?

(Written for Carry on Tuesday #124, 9/27/11)

Monday, September 26, 2011

Poised





















\Enclosed chrysalis,
waiting for spring to emerge
thankfully refreshed.
(Posted for Haiku Heights 85, "Poise", 9/26/11)

Expected chaos

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Disliking the roller-coaster of emotions and
change in making a life decision,
one day motivated and 'up',
the next the depths of despair and
mental paralyzation.
The desire for escape is strong, almost
overwhelming. I just want to 'jump'
from the ride, either off the side or
a year into the future, when all this
will be done and serenity will echo
through my mind once again.
No, those two options aren't equivalent
in outcome, but they are incredibly
equally attractive in theory.
(Posted to Poetry Pantry 68, 9/26/11)

Sunday, September 25, 2011

Freedom II



















I rub my mental hands together in delight
considering the possibilities of being soon
single and almost empty nesting.
What could I do with the suddenly open 
vistas of time and commitment and interest?
I could move. Anywhere. Wow.
Study Wiccan.
Go back to college.
Buy a new house.
Date? Sex??
Sunbathe naked. Or moon-bathe. Whatever.
Be a crazy cat-lady type with six Pomeranians
sleeping on my king-size bed.
Pitch a tent on the beach of the rest of 
my life. I can do it!
Muahahaha!!
(Posted for Magpie Tales, Mag 84, 9/25/11 and for
One Single Impression 187, "Amuse", 9/26/11))

Saturday, September 24, 2011

Freedom

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No more secrets
No more kooks
No more of his dirty looks.
The lies are over.
The hiding is done.
The horizon beckons.
The wind beneath my
wings lifts.
At last.
We won't grow old together
but at least I will grow.
(Posted to Poetry Pantry 68, 9/25/11 and
Sunday Scribblings #286, Plan B, 9/25/11)

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Mirror rain





















Each puddle a miniature world
a tide pool of possibilities
not just on the microscopic level
but the imaginative one as well.
Peering at the girl studying me intently
from the other side of the water,
we speculate about each other's lives.
Does she have a daughter, a dog, and
a weird husband and does she write
poems about ordinary, as opposed to
lofty, inspiration?
Do those dark watery eyes hide the
same depression and despair,
interspersed by contentment and joy?
I touch the quivering surface and
the wonder disappears in ripples.
(Written for Theme Thursday #67, "Rain", 9/22/11; also posted for
Thursday Poet's Rally # 52, 9/22/11)

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Juicing

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One juicer.
Lemons, limes, and apples
Carrots, cabbage and ginger
Pears, berries, kiwi, and fennel
Mint, spinach, kale, cukes and celery.
All in one day.
A colorful cocktail of health
in a glass.
A bounty of health seeping
into the veins.


(Written for ABC Wednesday, "J", 9/21/11)

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Passing through




















Out of step with life, the mainstream passing
by like ghosts or shadows. I can see them
but I'm not sure I am real to any one else.
Their mouths move, but silence clangs in my ears.
Conversation with self makes sense
but is unheard by others.
Putting one foot in front of the other,
trying not to trip over the ones of
those who don't seem to see
me.
(Written for Midnight Snack #3, 9/20/11)

In the rear-view mirror

Add caption





















I should have seen it coming
The strange look on the face
when a direct question was
asked. His expression told
me the real answer, not the
words. But I chose to
believe the words, instead of
my intuitive sense of what was
true.
The internal knows better than
to trust the external.

(Written for Carry On Tuesday 123, 9/20/11)

Monday, September 19, 2011

The tree of good and evil



















Now the sorrowfulness comes
innocence and happiness
gone in a blink as
one takes the bite and
abdicates responsibility for
the choice.
The other is forlorn.
It's not the one you think.
(Written for Magpie Tales, Mag 83, 9/19/11)

Sunday, September 18, 2011

Easy

It's easy to get involved
hard to become disentangled.
It's easy to be a mother
hard to be a parent.
It's easier to stay sober
hard to quit drinking.
It's easy to fall in love
hard to learn to trust again.
(Written for Sunday Scribblings #285, "Easy", 9/18/11)

Betrayal

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Stalking in righteous anger
around the duplicitous and
self-centered evidence of
lack of caring about anyone
or anything but the addiction,
tired and tired of the lies and
shallow soothing and crooning.
How could you be so careless
yet so carefully beguiling and plotting
and counting on compliance and
acceptance from those you profess
to love, thinking you could buy us off?
Fraudulent remorse is nauseating.
(Written for One Single Impression 186, "Betrayal", 9/18/11)

Saturday, September 17, 2011

Ticket please


















I am a traveler, a runner, a 'geographical'
addict when there is trouble or turmoil or
no resolution or solutions to problems.
Standing in front of my mental train station,
agitated, I attempt
to decide where to go
next.
It does not really matter as long as
I am anywhere but here,
ass on fire.
Life is still so not about about the destination
but the journey
and some recent legs of this one
have been incredibly hurtful.

(Written for Sepia Saturday 92, 9/17/11)




Thank you to the awesome poets at
Poetry Palace
for this week's award -
I don't know what
you all
see in me,
but I like it!

Remember, child

















Think back to when a cow was a
cow with a goofy grin and a
mushroom was a magic house,
and a duck, while being
teased by cheeky chipmunks,
could talk, scowl, photograph,
cuss in incomprehensible quacks
and not wear pants?
We giggled at that with
the humor of the young -
no pants! no pants!
Remember when skunks were
harmless and cute and
best buddies with fawns?
While everywhere were butterflies and
flowers and beauty and
astonishing colors that
seared themselves into innocent
memories to be recalled in older,
darker murkier days full of lies and
prevarication and
deliberate misleading.
Remember, child, and heal yourself
with dreams and love and the hope of
brighter days to come,
as you slog through
these times of despair.
(Written for Bluebell Books, Short Story Slam #10, 9/17/11)

Anger


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Emotion is overwhelming
like a five-alarm drunk -
I can hardly stand after a
few hours of my own
uncontrolled fury,
especially after so many
weeks of keeping that
rage damped down or
re-channeled into what
I had hoped were more
positive and productive
venues.
Now, I just burn and
burn and burn.

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Notebook

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Dozens of them lurk
around the house,
in the car
on bookshelf or
magazine rack
upon the bed headboard
tucked into the purse
waiting cleanly and
patiently for a pen
a pencil
a box of markers
a stubby crayon
or in rare desperation
a fat black sharpie
to be grabbed by the muse
and wielded upon them
words, images, and inspiration
splashing, jumping, marching
scrawling, scribbling
desperation, angst, fear
excitement, sadness, laughter,
simply covering
their pristine pages.
(Written for One Single Impression 185, "Notebook", 9/15/11; also posted for
The Gooseberry Garden PP Week 5, "Object" 9/19/11)

Sleeping with...the television on

















Technology and the internet
have been wonderful additions
to our world and lives but
at times, I'm torn about the
value of them. On one hand,
I have new friends internationally
and an astonishing amount
of information at my fingertips.
I love traveling the world and
going to school from the comfort
of my own recliner.
On the other hand,
it seems everyone's face (even
mine, often) is stuck in a device
and no one in the real world talks
much and interacts even less
with those they profess to love.
Some days, I feel blessed by
these conveniences, others
lonely as all hell.
(Written for Thursday Think Tank #66, "Glass Houses", 9/15/11)

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Cleansing
















Water and night and outside threat:
the great equalizers and uniters
of persons of all origins.
What you can't see or separate
yourself from, you can't discriminate
against.
Children and water are always
an amazingly colorblind combination.
Their enjoyment and lack of self-
consciousness should inspire their
parents.

(Written for Midnight Snack #2, 9/13/11)

Monday, September 12, 2011

Looking for the future

















Keeping my eyes uplifted to
my recovery program
the horizon
the moon
the daughter
the next poem
or
any thing that might engender
new hope and dreams
because when I look 
into your eyes
there is only fear, pain,
distrust, and betrayal that
is reflected back from my gaze.

(Posted for Carry On Tuesday #122, 9/12/11)

Sunday, September 11, 2011

Being little






















Those sweet young smiles
so innocent and happy,
your sister's arm proudly around you
timelessly captured by your mother
while your father lurked, mired in
alcoholism and depravity.
They tell me you forgave him before
you died.
I wonder how it's going in heaven
or wherever a diverse trio such as
you three ended up.
Is it possible you are all together on
some alternative plane or timeline?
A Mormon, a Catholic, and an asshole.
What a combination.
I suppose if God's involved, it's a
tea party every day, though I hope
he's drinking mud.

(Written for Sepia Saturday 91, 9/10/11)

Revenant of love





















So this is who you really are
and always were, you insist.
You also demand acceptance
and affection as
this, your true self.
All I see is the
body of the person
I loved, animated by
something or someone
so repulsive and unreal
that I can barely gaze upon you
without revulsion.
Go climb back in the
grave of our relationship and
haunt me no more.

(Written for MagPie Tales, Mag82, 9/11/11) and
also posted for Poetry Pantry #66, 9/11/11)

Saturday, September 10, 2011

Meditation
















The near-full moon gently
beams on my upturned face
listening to my quiet thoughts.
Very aware of the hardness
of the sidewalk I am sitting on
cross-legged, my
hands rest loosely, palms
upward, on my knees, mental
mantra smoothing the wrinkles
from my turbulent mind.
The trees tickle the wind
in soothing whispers as
the dog reclining on the grass
next to me alerts me
with a quick glance to the
presence of a buck deer,
studying us from the shadows
of the apple trees.
We all hold our breath in
peace.

(Posted for Poetry Pantry #66, 9/11/11)

Thursday, September 8, 2011

Dreaming of...



















Freedom beckons
through a slightly ajar window
the loosened hook dangling
invitingly
palm trees peeping back
tropical sights and breezes
whispering through my hair
and stroking my skin.
I lean out, longing for the
peace of white
sands and salty water
drying on my toes as they
dig into the beach
taking deep breaths of
solitude and singleness.

(To be posted for Thursday Think Tank #65, "Windows", 9/8/11)

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Out of this world

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Hooked up to monitors and IV,
drawing blood, saline drip
inserted, blood pressure cuff
wrapped snugly around the
upper arm, nearly making
the head 'split'
every five minutes
with inflation,
the doctor explores
my interior world,
a landscape
rarely considered until
pain drives the body
through the doors of
the e.r., hoping for
explanations
and relief.
An x-ray proves the heart to
be clear of blockages, a
physical exam with gentle
pokes and prods
 reveals no masses,
repeated blood tests uncover
'spanking clean' cardiac results,
while an EKG with
numerous little sticky mouths
placed strategically over
pulse points discloses
no beating irregularities
or abnormalities.
He peeks in eyes
and ears and throat and
palpitates nearly every inch.
Amazing how with only one
piercing of the skin,
the chemistry and
status of this
inner outer space
is mapped out by
an intrepid internal
medical explorer.
Gastritis is the diagnosis.

(Written for Poetic Asides 147, "Out of this world", 9/7/11 and
posted for Thursday Poets Rally Week 51, 9/8/11)