The Zephyr

    Jasper Monroe has bad days.

     That has always been a given, whether he is alive or dead or stuck in some halfway ghostly state, and he had thought that literally dying would help him get out of that, but it didn't. He still has days where he can do nothing...

Insidious was his middle name, but his owner didn’t know that. When she picked him up off the street, he acted like he was good with other cats, was playful, and loved to cuddle, but someone--or some cat-- loves to act. I mean, he acted innocent yesterday when his food...

You see my body like a treasure map to an island that needs conquering.

Harboring your ship in my hips, colonizing my innocence for your personal glory.

Pompously holding my map in your forceful hand.

But boy don’t you see, the rightful owner of that map is me.

Those red d...

As soon as my eyes open, the world spins into bright color

Flashing into motion that pulls me along

As if I have been caught unintentionally in this frantic riptide

Crowds surround me on all sides in a crushing push of people going

Moving and swirling in their own separate...

i’ve recently gotten into the business of dealing good thoughts, taking my own daily prescription and distributing it to others. i’ve got it all, kindness, compliments, support, forgiveness. Sure the money's good but i’m weaning for a taste of my own. But you see, i ca...

America, it’s time to wake up.

There are still women who scream out their stories,

Only to be ignored

As if their vocal cords have been cut with the knives that are the words of men who say

“You better not say a word.”

And they don’t say a word, they shove their story down...

Forgotten and alone

Lost behind ancient root-gripped hills

An abandoned home

Cataracts of flora pull away.

Windows once shining life, now shattered, polluted

Walls blackened by mold, timber oozing wet pulp

Floorboards pummeled crooked like rotten teeth

What unwrought gold or...

     In the airport cafeteria, the little girl puts a penny and two quarters into the slots of a penny-pressing machine. Her dad helps her crank the lever. A moment later, her penny emerges from the bottom of the machine, now an oval with an impression the shape of Kau...

Here I sit upon my tower

My health 100, my shield full power

I've braved through 90 other deaths

'Til 10 remain, to face the test

I see two morons by the Lake

They see each other, but hesitate

Two shots ring out across the water

Two victims of a sniper's slaughter

Another base...

     The sky hangs heavy in the the air, an opaque cloud pulled tight around the ears of the earth like a thick wool cap. It’s the kind of mist that leeches the color out of everything, making the emerald grass seem just green, the mahogany tree trunks p...