stand there in winter white with feet planted firmly in the center of the red ant hill and by means of internal clock, compass and common intuition, gage the pain of a million bites in relation to falling from a burning skycraper or being hacked to pieces with a machete and suddenly the illusionary importance of our petty concerns vanishes as quickly as the ants strip the flesh of a small animal, leaving shining true white tinted bones to gleam in midnight anguish.

i wish for the right to peel back a corner of my head and lean slightly over to let it all slide out into the corner of the darkened room then start at my hips and peel my skin in two equal sections to add to the floor until the whirling thoughts that distract me could lie down with the flesh that betrays me long enough to recognize silence.

goodnight, syd.

Syd Barrett Dies after 60 trips around the sun.

"So equally over a valley, a hill
wood on quarry stood, each of us crying
a velvet curtain of gray
mark the blanket where the sparrows play
and the trees by the waving corn stranded
my legs move the last empty inches to you
the softness, the warmth from the weather in suspense
mote to a grog - the star a white chalk
minds shot together, our minds shot together..." SB

we have all been waiting in some degree or another for the lovers to become one. for the endless social bumpings to cease, the perpetual circling in random spirals within the mind, the countless nights of lying there in darkness, waiting for a hand to lightly tough your hip and confirm in that dusty halflight that you are loved, that you are more than the receptacle for something that is bitter yet bland. we are all waiting... for deep within the rambunctious mind, you, me, we all know that it's never enough, never right, never forever.

dead golden cats spread across the highway, obese men fondling their genitalia while hiding on the other side of the thrift store clothing rack, the gangly mexican boy who chops the head of the coconut off with a machete so oversized that it is laughable for the task and then looks me in the eye and hands me a straw, here, this is here in a place i do not belong for the sound of the rat thrashing in agony in the trap he set under the sink i am supposed to keep clean is more frightening than the thought of my own death so i'm up on a chair with jalepeno ant killer burning my eyes and it's all pretty funny because i might just lose an eye and then won't feel so concerned about the sound of the ticking away of each precious day accompanied by an orchestra dominated by animosity,

The worlds oldest crow died yesterday. Tata's life began in 1947 when he was ejected from the nest during a violent thunderstorm and ended up in a Long Island Cemetery. The baby crow was given to a local family who tended it for over half a century. Tata never flew again but lived among us- these earth bound humans, in joy.