Heads up:
the signifiers are getting fidgety.
Perception has ceased
its once eager flow, creating
a less than desirable stasis.
Makeshift beds collapse readily
at the first stirrings of morning.
I bide my time wordlessly,
rapt by the silence
and all that it contains.
-r. miller
I put the itch on hold.
Now had come a time.
I couldn’t quite find a rhyme
for agony. Still, I blustered
and blundered my way through.
Something driving
drove the color from my off-set eyes,
and I grew into a litany, came clean.
That was the easy way.
Generational hangups and the like,
they chewed through my wires,
but I never let them get a look at me
at my most vulnerable. Certain things,
you just don’t cope with.
-r. miller
How embarrassing
these over-wearied strictures!
Just seconds from now,
we’ll be in pictures, ready to dry up.
The last drop from the penultimate cup
has thus been sipped,
and since I’ve snipped
each one of my desolated fingers,
I’ve been more or less without a grip
on things as they seem.
Lay off the dream, naturally,
then lay the lucid and quit.
A last ditch moan
escapes rough-hewn lips
only to land on no ear.
Nobody is coming, this much is clear,
but real effort may have been put forth,
for all anyone knows.
Seal me with a kiss, please.
Last time I’m gonna ask politely.
-r. miller
Surely these little monstrosities
will provide cause for all to weep.
Courageously, I guess, but
also discreetly. This luminosity
is without foundation.
And on the bricks,
we’ve lain our loves to dry
beneath an irresponsible sun.
These are the magic moments
we were warned about.
All that happens now
happens in dispute.
-r. miller
How deranged is this evening?
coming on all cool and then
clapping us on our heads
with some kind of thunder
when we least expect it.
Next level, please. Certain experiences,
they bring you to your knees
when you’re already at your worst.
I should’ve died on my feet.
Next to us, all angels
seem but jet streams
against an overcast sky.
We’ve somehow managed
to endure each and every
“Why bother?”
put to us by introspective gears.
Still, the years continue
to accumulate beneath our skin,
dust and more dust
piling upon even older dust.
-r. miller
Towards the tarnish hovers an inkling sun.
Old bones we’ve nursed offer baked hymns,
categories of wakening. Stake this
to my trust, remain gluey at bottom.
Has the mask collapsed or otherwise?
Have the hands shaped themselves in red?
Therein – this foregone fiction,
remainder of faith once authorized.
-r. miller
It’s never as easy as one hopes,
but nor is it as difficult.
Stains of several shades
writhe and breathe
upon the fabric of today.
Shyly, one eye turns away.
All hope is lost, or moot.
I’m still recovering
from the last meet-cute,
according to the latest reports.
Not that I want to be taken
seriously of course.
In whose favor have I fallen anyway?
One too many variables nestle
in the spaces between seconds.
Override me already.
-r. miller
