God May Exist

Whatssamatta with Dark Matter?

Everything!!

Do you have any idea how much

A two dollar bet would win on Dark Matter?

Try to grasp five hundred zeros,

After a decimal point, followed by a one.

That’s the posted odds

On this winning filly.

I can’t tell you how much money

You would have won

Because there is no word

For that number.

As a non-believer 

I have considered all things 

With a probability of one in 800 trillion

A non starter; this included God.

Yesterday marked a pause.

It seems we have a multi-universe,

And Dark Matter fills most of the space

In our tiny piece of the cosmos.

Compared to the amount of Dark Matter

Filling all that space,

God looks like a shoe-in.

And we haven’t gotten to the number of universes yet.

Looking Back

I was six when I died.

Herbie threw a stone 

Into my resident ditch, and opened my skull. 

Bad business.

That was 68 years ago.

For years Herbie had nightmares.

Other than dying 

I suffered no lasting ill effects.

I know about Herbie because we’ve talked.

Six months ago we started an ongoing conversation.

I remembered the feeling of “sweat”

Running down my face.

I don’t remember my mother

Stopping a car on our street

And insisting the driver take us to the hospital.

She was really scared. 

Certainly the event was traumatic.

When I came home it was as a different person.

My hair was cut really short. I was taller,

But continued to go by my first birth name.

There is no certificate

Attesting to my death and resurrection,

Nor am I nobler for having transitioned,

Just older with unresolved issues.

An Old War Wound

I an holding a paper bag,

In the check out line 

At a small grocery store

In Tahiti.

Six people ahead of me.

I am becoming aware of moisture

Forming on the bottom of the bag,

Wherein sits a bottle of red wine.

I suspect that I had 

Placed the wine down too heavily

When adding it to my coffee and cereal.

Or maybe it’s the climate?

What store would offer such grocery bags?

Perhaps the coffee container was damp?

Yes, that would account for it...

Except the bottom of the bag is becoming wet.

There are still three customers before me,

And no garbage can in sight

As the wet becomes a drip,

And starts moving down my leg.

Tahiti is humid and hot,

And I am sweating.

It could be the weather...

But I know it is the wine.

What to do with the wine

Starting to drip steadily,

Suggesting it will, momentarily,

Pour from knee, to toe, to floor.

Only one customer between me and the cashier.

Will the cashier speak only French?

Surely she sees me 

And smells the problem.

James Bond would never be in this situation.

Before the bag disintegrates I can put it down

And run for the door,

Screaming  “I’m Shot!”

My pathetic attempt at “cool” is failing.

People are looking at me

As my shorts turn red 

And the wine puddles at my feet.

Face to face with the cashier.

She smiles, and bursts out laughing,

Grabs the remnants of the  bag

And throws it into the garbage can by her feet.

I pay for my destroyed groceries,

While wishing the ten amused people in the store

A slow and painful death.

   

Family

No one here is wanted by the police.

Everyone appears healthy,

And almost all can discuss

Movies and off-channel TV networks.

I walk the pier at Imperial Beach,

Where fishermen line both railings and

Occasionally land small sardines.

Only then can I imagine eternal sufferance.

Evan, my emaciated grandson, 

Eats fries at the grill, protecting his paper plate 

With an encircling arm.

At four foot ten, he best protect his food.

I’m the only current resident that thought

Harry Potter and “The Deathly Hallows”

Was a dreadful movie;

Two hours of water pistol fights.

All nine family visitors leave this week.

I shan’t make predictions for the next generation.

Look what a lousy job we’ve done.

Did I tell you, all had a very good time.

   

From Here?

My little grand daughter

Almost waved to me from the computer screen.

Too soon we may discuss Harry Potter.

Such are the gifts of this Age.

I have not, to date, been the subject

Of an inquisition perpetrated 

By the information gatherers and their partners.

Such are the gifts of this Age.

We understand how to make fire,

And what is useful in war.

We have seven billion people and nuclear power.

Such are the gifts of this Age.

Would anyone except me enjoy hearing The Weavers

Singing Irene Goodnight?

Maybe looking through our rearview mirror

We’ll see this time as America’s greatest.

Revolutions can start

Because the software is available.

Boundary lines are routinely pushed and prodded,

And yesterdays shibboleths are dust.

What was a many lifetime’s evolution

Is this morning’s breakfast.

A bottom line for the seven billion is absurd

For the game is eternal, and we are not the only players.

Donald Trump Was Made Here

Some do not believe in global warming,

Others have grave doubts about evolution.

After careful review of the evidence,

I have concluded Donald Trump was made by Mattel.

When I looked at his eyes

Suspicion set in.

It is not the color that unsettled me.

It’s the absence of color.

Donald’s eyes seem small,

But on close inspection they’re just strange.

Of course his hair is a dead give-a-way.

No mortal would tolerate his comb-over.

When we add to the growing suspicion,

His obviously programmed utterances,

Could not be made by a human,

Without causing his balder to implode.

Surely only a defective robot could say:

“A certificate of live birth is not the same thing,

by any stretch of the imagination, as a birth certificate.”

Or, “I try to learn from the past, but I plan for the future by 

focusing exclusively on the present.” 

I once watched his TV program where he fired people.

Only a automaton could offer,

With no hesitation, life altering wisdom...

That could not be understood by earthlings. 

Dead

Don’t hang with my neighbors.

No fault, just the way it is.

This guy has the big house,

And is not especially humble.

Police just left.

Girl friend murdered at his house.

Sobering, but not my problem.

Probably a family affair.

I should be feeling something.

Maybe just sympathy

For someone I didn’t know?

Perhaps it’s “ask not for whom the bell tolls”?

There is nothing

Beyond a little concern for our safety.

Woman dead thirty feet from my yard.

While I watered the plants someone called the police.

My disconnect is cultural.

Does the computer operator

A thousand miles from the drone

Feel it is more than a board game?

Local paper said deceased 

Was charged with attempted store theft in 2009.

Nice epitaph. Thirty-two year old murdered,

Once charged with shoplifting.