Please Disregard the Last Poem

It is no longer real to any point.
It is a past sentiment I cannot believe.
Painlessly separated from the present.
The past is an archive and the
future is a dream - good or bad -
Either whatever, it isn't now.
I don't feel, I felt.
By the time my nerves finish firing
I am behind myself
by hundreds of synapses.
Even my conscious sense is
a camera whose shutter can only
catch a flash once its trip is over.
Every memory is instantly a fond story
Lore and Legend
told around fires, whittlings, and
Half-vivisected automobiles.
I was, in the past, a member
at life's every adventure
but now I only remember.
The end of the road is where everyone gathers
Changed.
There isn't anything useful in the last poem—
It's all old news.
Perhaps if you watch me write the next one,
and perhaps you shouldn't—
It's dangerous to know too much.
We already experience our own futures;
you might not want to see me observe mine
- your choice -
I won't offer to stop you.
At any rate, please disregard
the Last Poem.

The Wall Was Painted

When I woke up this morning,
     I noticed someone
          had painted the wall—
Green like moss, but not mossy
     like moss.
Flat, creamy instead
     like a well-baked potato
Oh! and some sour cream.
Listed black I wondered who painted
          the green wall.
It wasn't "the green wall" before
     but now they had painted it
          It became the green wall
Creamy green like well-baked
     moss with sour cream
          And a bug—
     A little mosquito who
     while I slept had
     flown into the
Still wet wall and stayed.
I wonder if it wanted to be there,
Perhaps thinking it was a
               creamy mossed potato,
          with sour cream —and a bug.
Well, now a bug, anyway:
          The green bug wall.
It was not a green bug, before
It was not a green wall, before
Someone must have painted it while I slept
     —and dreamed of forests and streams
Those! They had all been green!
In the thick of the forest or jungle,
Where the water clings
     to the top of the damp
Even the shadows are green.
But my dream had not ended
     in the forest
I ran to the bluffs—
     chalk lime with rusty bloody streaks.
And awoke with my baked moss painted green.
     My green wall
          And green bug.

You Remain

Each of you remain
Around my wandering spirit I pitched a tent.
Your compassion softened the frozen ground;
Your enthusiasm lengthened the day;
Your sincerity illuminated our faces
    as we sat and shared stories
Around a campfire of otherwise insignificant moments.

Placed here
You question to encourage my conviction;
You challenge to unsettle my complacency;
You disrupt with unintentional grace
    as planned order collapses
Into spontaneous fits of inanity.

Each of you remain
Briefly we are each seen and shared.
You are impactful by your persistence;
You are relevant by your uniqueness;
You successfully created a world
    celebrating us as we are and anxious
For what we must becoming.

Leaving here
You are reflected in simple traditions;
You are demonstrated in the lives you changed;
You remain - each one - a tent peg
    staked still in the earth we shared,
Shared in story with those still to come.

I remain
A settling spirit, more
Beautiful because of what you believed us all to be;
A temporary home made more permanent,
    by each peg driven, a story,
Around a campfire of otherwise insignificant moments.