MINNOWS 

Ideas come to me

all at once sometimes,

like a school

of fish.

The glutton in me

grabs at them,

trying to catch them

but can’t,

they are

quicker

than me.

They scatter.

Oh, my little minnows

if only I could  

follow each

and every one

of you through

the Emerald

waters

of my mind.

GARAGE DOOR

Sometimes

we don’t have to

look too far

to see phenomena.

Sometimes

all we have to do

is open

our garage door

and there it is.

And yes, the world

may go dark

for an Oregon minute,

and the birds

may go quite,

but then there will be

a gasp, a swell, a mighty roar,

bigger than any ocean.

This is the sound,

the music,

of awe and wonder,

in which we remember

what a miracle

this world

actually is,

and are reminded of a power

greater than the Camry

in our carport.

Our eyes

open like this,

like garage doors.

Every morning

they do.

Whose to say

we can’t experience

phenomena daily?

There is

no reason

on earth

we need

to wait

years or millennia

to experience

astonishment.

We only have to

access the Genie within

to open to

the magic of our lives.

Don’t let

this reality, in its totality,

elude or eclipse you.

THE MOUSETRAP

It keeps going off

because you say it does.

And it does because 

you are the one that keeps 

setting it and taking the bait.

You have said this also.

You are the one in fact

that calls it a mousetrap

in the first place.

What if it were something else?

What if you used a different metaphor,

one that didn’t turn you into vermin

and snap your neck in two?

What if there wasn’t bait

or a trap at all?

What if it were a magnifying glass

you found on the ground instead,

that called out to you, with the sun it its eye,

that you picked it up and when you did

saw things through it

you couldn’t see before: opportunities 

and choices that were right there 

under your very nose all the while,

instead of sure death or dismemberment?

Whaddaya think?

Which image would you rather have

lure you into its sphere of influence?

OPERATING SYSTEM

Once upon a time

a belief got inside—and grew,

got underneath everything.

Now it is what drives

all the little and big things

you do. Every choice.

It is about lack.

You are trying so hard to prove

it wrong by doing the opposite,

but this is how it gets you.

This is how it runs the show.

This belief is your operating system.

We all got ‘em. Mine is

at work right now,

meticulously choosing

just the right words 

to convince myself, through you,
that I am not who I think I am.

THE MEETING

The rope is burning

at either end.

Flames spark

toward each other,

toward the center

with a fury, a passion.

Hypocrisy is what happens

when they meet.