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Kelsey McCarson  (email, website)

 

About the Poet:

Kelsey McCarson lives in Rosenberg, Texas where he writes process documentation for a global engineering and construction company.  He and his wife publish Haiku Ninjas, an independent online literary site dedicated to all things haiku (and ninja).  Kelsey is also a staff writer for The Red Zone Report.  Kelsey's literary work has been featured in Neoterra Magazine, Frogfish and Pinot and Flask and Pen.
 

 

Proteus Lives!

 

First it was the snow,

oh no! oh no!

            oh no!

I could not let it go,

the snow, the snow,

            the snow

Floating in the sky,

it fell, it fell,

            it fell,

I do not know why,

oh well, oh well,

            oh well.

 

Then it was the ice a cruel and cold device that sped me on my way and led me far astray it burned and froze my heart from the very start I could see the cold design at the start of every line….

 

Mist

            then began a

                        twist

   warm and wicked.

list

 

warm

            was the drip

                        drop.

                                    storm

   all it bring-

brought.

 

I fell into a hole

            hello.

I cried into a bowl.

                        oh no.

I lit the flying kite.

                                    for spite.

I turned into the night.

                                                                        no light.

 

And Proteus,

        he laughed.

  

 

And This Is Our Music

 

We follow the music because it is what we know:

 

We like to take trips if we can!

 

Loooooooooong trips. 

cRAzY!! trips.

Nothing is what it seems.

We read between the lines

and listen to our dreams.

 

If it's a no, we look for the snow!

 

If we can find snow

then away we go

talk, talk, talk, talk

we shovel all we know.

 

Our words can't unwind

that numb part of mind

when we ride the blade

for which we're designed.

 

If there is no snow we take the H-train!

 

Hurry……… 

Snow is fast, but the H- train is

slow.

We sit and

stare and drool

and feel warm.  So warm we love

the drip.

drop. The tip

Top of

heaven and

hell.

Listen and

smell.

Warm. 

Is this the way to go?

We don't.

No.

 

If the H-train is all booked we call Mary!

 

She's golden earth green.

She grows in between

with a sticky unclean

that some call obscene.

 

We laugh and talk and eat.

We breathe and cough and sleep.

We lie and steal and cheat.

We crawl and inch and creep.

 

If Mary is busy we call my friend Al!

 

Everyone likes Al.  

He lives in City Hall.

In the White House,

in our teacher's house,

Al learns to live with all.

 

Al comes to us.

We fight and we screw

and pass out at night.

We shut out the light

and don't know what's true.

 

We can't understand this.  Can you?

 

Sailing our ships

we rock, smoke and weave.

staggering, we are hit with a chair.

Al, are you still there?

But we dare not believe.

 

Its fun

and dumb

and we feel numb. 

 

Its wrong

and its right

and we do it for spite.

 

We laugh

and we cry

and we're dying to die.

 

And this is our music…