The River Gouges Out the Banks on Every Side

Sometimes, you listen to the other side
Arguing, whoever the other side

May be from your perspective, and you think,
Do they realize what they’re arguing

So vehemently for could do them harm?
But that begs another question. Do you,

Does anyone, do humans by and large
Know what’s good for them? Is it more naive

To assume that they do or that they don’t?
You don’t know, and you suspect no one knows,

But that doesn’t stop you from feeling sure
That the other side doesn’t know what’s good.

Meanwhile, the old ferry chugs back and forth
On its route, with or without passengers.

Meanwhile in Enoch More Buildings Rise

What if the story
Of Cain and Abel
Were allegory?

It probably was
At the beginning,
Farmer and herder,

Although it seems strange
That it’s the farmer
Who’s sent wandering.

But time’s always ripe
For table turning
In storytelling.

Say Abel was flesh,
Flesh the offering,
And Cain was culture,

The cultivator.
Let God stand for life.
Abel puts himself

On the altar. Life
Is pleased. Life eats life.
But Cain is displeased.

Why does life eat flesh?
Why does life love death?
Cain seizes Abel

To steal him from life.
It doesn’t work. Life
Makes Cain an outcast.

Ah, but there’s a twist.
Life doesn’t kill Cain.
Culture’s mark persists.

So there you have it.
The body must die,
But the thoughts wander.

The World Will Only Be Fair if We Win

From playgrounds to parliaments,
From lovers’ quarrels to wars,
The terms of argument

Endure. No matter what sins,
What cruelty, what conquests
Humans visit on humans,

The claim is that the others,
Whether victors or victims,
Got better than was due them.

You started it. No, you did.
We have to make this equal.
We’re going to make this right.

Everything has to be fair,
And it will be when we win.

It’s Now, Not a Forecast

When the wind gusts
Violently
Enough, it sounds
Like medium

Distant thunder
Rumbling around
The high canyons,
Shaking the stones.

But don’t worry.
This is normal
For here, meaning
Exactly zilch

For storms. Earth spins.
The air’s harried,
And you’re hunkered
Down in the gulch.

And Anyway, You Can’t Cook

That’s two more for today, then
One for the far future, just
In case you find yourself there,

And three more for tomorrow.
That should hold you for the time,
Says the friend with prepared meals,

Homemade prepared meals, mind you,
Stashed in the fridge and freezer.
But—you protest—you make more

Of those every single day,
Why are you stacking them up?
You never know when things end,

Replies the friend. Might as well
Pretend you’re getting ready.

Wasted Volumes

Rabelaisian by comparison,
Wife-of-Bathish, Molly-Bloomish, spilling
Out in abundance over everything,

That’s the contrast. But you see, it must be
Only in proportion, physically,
To something dainty, where restraint’s admired,

Or something fiercely ascetic, cinched in.
It can’t be excessive if it isn’t
Considered disgusting in that outfit,

That genre, that mannered situation.
It has to be awful for what it is,
Has to overflow the proper canals,

Spill its tub of guts among the narrow
Waisted volumes of lyric poetry.