Tastes like

Tonight I lit a cigarette
and it tasted like lights
refracted in puddles on
never emptied streets a
break on my fire escape
rats looking for a mate
their next meal and a
home for the night
it tasted like people
below with places to go
a stoop, and another
flat beer and a rooftop
with a skyline and
spinning a city spinning
my ears full of hum and
eyes unfocused for this
inhale and exhale I know
where and when someone
calls my name and I ash
the butt I cannot help but
turn to what’s next

Tonight

tonight when I heard you
you peeled the paper from
your filmy face where under
the flesh you were not muscle
nor sinew nor bone and I
was shocked to find a
slab of radio chip disguised
by chinos and a polo

Ghost

The house next door creaks
like the house that I grew in
do you, viejito, see the ghosts
are they familiar, brought with
you desde allá hasta aca
can we call them by name or
can we let them rest, sin nombre,
and go about the groceries, the
dishes, the laundry, al trabajo and
back, no looking back, tend
to your tomatoes and carrots

last night I was tired

last night I was tired
but not too tired to make
plans and hope
that laughs might
mean more than ice in an
empty glass or
better than boredom
that when your gaze
makes me fidget
it was intended to be
that way I both hope
and hope not that
you see that I laugh
too much when you do

Triolet #1

I was not ready to be bored.
To think. To look and see.
To Austin we went toward but
I was not ready to be bored.
Forward and forward
Lone star sky called me.
I was not ready to be bored.
To think. To look and see.

What is a triolet?

According to poets.org

The triolet is a short poem of eight lines with only two rhymes used throughout. The requirements of this fixed form are straightforward: the first line is repeated in the fourth and seventh lines; the second line is repeated in the final line; and only the first two end-words are used to complete the tight rhyme scheme. Thus, the poet writes only five original lines, giving the triolet a deceptively simple appearance: ABaAabAB, where capital letters indicate repeated lines.

This will be my first try!

NaPoWriMo Day 6

We dare to carve
land into patchwork
and mountains with our
image all ebb and flow
is arbitrary to us and we
do not wait for the rising
of the sun we do not
listen to sounds
of exhaustion nor to those
who cannot sound at all.