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Thursday, June 15, 2023

Yesterday/Tomorrow/Today

 
Lost Supper
—Poetry and Visuals by Smith, Cleveland, OH
 
 
Smokey blues
shiny greens
frost and sun on grass

New leafs pop out
peep about
 
 
 
Rustleaf
 
 
Got in metal beast
drove Babylonian money road
to tin can maintenance
where I sit in Mammon's waiting room
awaiting big medium or little pain
which will be paid by plastic
then back to cash alley
to drive too fast
and like Schrodinger's catbox
done and redone
until the great undone comes  
ends my mundane insane wrong lane blame
game
of same same same
and I'm done
good dog
get bone
go home
 
 
 
Maybe Tomorrow
 
 
Drank tomorrow's wine
yesterday
paying for it today
 
 
 
Ice Cream Clown

 
Was that a bird squawk
or bad truck axle
and what's the difference?

Hell is being on phone hold
muzak nagging endlessly between
'Please hold for next available agent'
and
'Thank you for holding we care about your call'
until ears brain spirit numb
and patience pissed
30 minutes later
when robot sez
'Please leave name number message
we will get back to you'
and they don't

(may be my health, but it's their game)

Some days suck
nothing you can do
reality plots against you
and you do too
 
 
 
 Sallow

 
Complicated
complicit
guilty
 
 
 
Pleasure
 
 
In old daze
was coke speed and weed smoke
now coffee and cannabis

Oaxaca Mexico 2007-2009
my monthly from the mountains—
2 grams black hash $4
1 gram opium $2
quarter pound chronic $30

the days were long
the nights soft
life sung
 
 
 
 Landsend

 
My prime time-slice?
the hour sitting alone
in the dark
toke in hand
purr blackcat blackdenim lap
wife upstairs asleep
old dog on floor at her feet
my sole light low gas fireplace
and downtown Cleveland 3 miles north
blocked by night and leaves
leaving bridgeblurts
of stark white headlights
and acid red tails
each sure their north most important
their south more right
and of course they're right
and of course they're wrong
as usual
each right impacting right
each wrong rippling long
me the mess of mass between
their certainty circus
with my no go no where no know
still warm from womb
awaiting worm
where north, south, right, wrong
no belong
 
 
 
 Nature Night

 
You say seeping
I say weeping
let the games begin

Pain is the price paid for being
and for hurting nature again and again

And yet man is nature
and nature lies
and nature cheats
and nature steals
and nature eats

This forever fight
twixt entropy and escalation
never ends

So I lay back in ecstasy
knowing trouble's down the line
but hot tub bath is now
 
 
 
 Oneness

 
Today’s LittleNip:

Lay back, close eyes
listen through open window
to soft rain, slow train

—Smith

___________________

—Medusa, with our thanks to Smith (Steven B. Smith) from Cleveland, who brings us his jazz-poetry and insights for the ’20’s. “Let the games begin,” he says—but wait! I think they already have…
 
 
 
 Freejazz1
—Collage by Smith






 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Buncha poetry events in the NorCal area
today, starting in Sac. at noon with
Third Thursdays at the Library.
For details about these and other
upcoming poetry happenings in
Northern California and otherwheres,
click on
UPCOMING NORCAL EVENTS
(http://medusaskitchen.blogspot.com/p/wtf.html)
in the links at the top of this page.

Photos in this column can be enlarged by
clicking on them once, then clicking on the x
in the top right corner to come back to Medusa.

Would you like to be a SnakePal?
All you have to do is send poetry and/or
photos and artwork to
kathykieth@hotmail.com. We post
work from all over the world—including
that which was previously published—
and collaborations are welcome.
Just remember:
the snakes of Medusa are always hungry—
for poetry, of course!