A Leap Year Poem

Dave Kraken menacingly waggled
his extra index finger at the
passing elementary school fieldtrip.

Penny Gregorian doodled little cartoon
coins inside her royal blue Trapper Keeper
to represent every lucky day.

Penny became Penny Kraken on
Friday, February 29th, 2008
in St Canterbury’s Anglican Church.

Before carrying her across the threshold,
Dave took his bride’s hand,
and led her towards the unkempt lawn.

Dave Kracken raised his arms aloft
and waggled his extra index
finger at the twittering constellations.

As the joined up stars twittered like
crowded wind chimes, St Canterbury’s
was mentally preparing itself

to splinter from The Anglican Church.

According to Penny Kraken’s notes,
Saturday, March 1st, 2008,
had all the makings of

a decidedly unlucky day.

The Friction Fiction Show #34

Apparently, my poem The Brutal Truth
not only appears in the online magazine Eclectica,

but it is also read by some British bloke
on the Friction Fiction #34 podcast.

Look at the 9:18 minute mark.
Today's lesson, folks?

Google yourself
regularly.

A Portrait of the Artist As A Young Man In A Fish Tank

This poem,
and accompanying
cartoon,

appears in The Egregious #3
by the fine, folk

at
Feathertale.

Hooray.

On The Road to Heaven

There are dozens of rumours,
spread by life

that do more love
than good,

like that scroll of cloud up there,
that sun-gold gathering—

behold, as it curls into

itself
like a beckoning

finger.

The Empty Panini

This poem will appear in the upcoming issue of Inscribed.
Check it out, or Dave Eggers will weep single paged stories.

A Bird Family Haiku

Archaeopteryx
is no descendant of mine,
since it predates shame.

The Good Parents

I wanted to call our band The Plugs,
but I was also open to Kids In The Dais.

‘Look, Darryl we voted on this already.
If we want anything Dais-related, it is

gonna be Kids Of The Dais, remember?’
'I want to be a lumberjack!' I shouted.

I was quickly curbed for my outburst.
I voluntarily dropped & gave 20 push ups,

in triplets. ‘The Plugs sure do know
their chords!’ shrieked a muffled blurb.

Before we knew it, our unnamed band
was franticly exploring every crooked

crevasse of Scott’s semi-furnished
garage, all of us eager to identify the

source of our first glowing review.
After much name-calling, which

resulted in a vote over the tour slogan
The Blowhard Explosion, we finally

discovered a malnourished SPIN
reporter, lodged behind Scott’s dusty futon.

We nursed this little tyke back to health,
mainly upon a spoon-fed regimen of

Puritan Beef Gravy & long grain rice.
But before we knew it, our little reporter

could groom himself, eat solid foods,
& even use Arcade Fire as an adjective;

clearly it was time to set our boy free.
The very next rush hour, we walked

down to the nearest bus stop where,
together as a band, we tearfully stuffed

our pride & joy into the Green Bin.
Come see us; we’re The Good Parents.