Poem: Bathroom Sink - Reading in Bed with my Clothes On

Look, my windowsill is all lit up by my camera's flash.

Possibly I've been chosen to be the next Bernadette of Lourdes.

Doubtful, I have an enormous ego.

Actually, that don't matter to God. He'll take anyone.

After I eat breakfast and listen to my new audio book by Derek Miller, I'll write a poem on here.

Wrote this yesterday

IS IT POSSIBLE TO THINK ABOUT NOTHING
WHILE CLEANING THE BATHROOM SINK

I sprinkle on the cleanser first
for a good soak

For extra scrubbing power I put on
Etudes by Philip Glass, which
sails as smoothly as a kayak
down mirror-lake Galena

How will I donate to the flood
victims, thinks I, when the
Red Cross failed in Haiti

Scott's friend's cancer spread
and after one day in hospice
he was dead. A SEPTA mechanic
like Scott, he will study
the world no more.

I open up my front door
and there on the stoop
in the pot of Judy Diaz
the sunflower takes a bow.

My calendar for today is clear
Time to read The Holocaust
by Andrew Rees and wear my
black and white striped shirt
I bought pre-owned somewhere.

Finding this shirt was like
unearthing an old love letter
Yes! I shall hop in my car
and resurrect our old romance.

What? Dead you say?
Back to the Holocaust book.

***
Biked last night to an American Masters Show on Walt Disney. Talk about power going to your head!

Some of his former animators were interviewed. What ancient faces they had.

Here's my arm.

And here's what happened while I was reading in bed this morning.

A lovely shadow spread itself out on the wall. By the time I ran downstairs to grab my camera, it was gone.

Soon another shadow came on.

Where is that damn camera, I thought, fishing among the myriad things on my bed.

Of course that shadow was gone, but there were another.

Click! Click!

My flash was on so you couldn't see nuffin.

I'm not gonna excoriate myself cuz I don't know how to turn it off. Maybe I should stop off at Authentic Camera and ask Matt how to do it.

Or perhaps when I go out to eat at 1 pm today I can ask someone at the TNT diner. And remember, Ruth, the man/owners name is Tim not Terry.

Delish! The orange is melted cheese. Enhanced by listening to The Girl in Green by Derek Miller, a tale of violence while Saddam Hussein is killing every single body.

READING IN BED WITH MY CLOTHES ON

As I read the Holocaust book
I decided to cheat. Rules!
Pash tush! You make your
own rules unless you're
in the army or a child
dominioned by parents.

I turned to the photos.
The first one was in color!
Real life is in color, methinks,
like the golden tomatoes
basking on the vine.

German soldiers were shown
with pigs on leashes, stealing
them from the Soviet Union, so
their enemy would have nothing
to eat and would starve to death.

You read these words with
a certain nonchalence and
then I noticed something
from the corner of my eye.

Something blinking on my
pink wall near Aunt Ethel's
coat of arms.

It were sprays of light
in abstract formation
dancing on the wall
a Picasso or Seurat

By the time I grabbed
my camera, they were gone!

Gone! Gone!

Gone like the houses,
the photo albums,
the banana trees
the tennis rackets
in Houston.

Is there any sense to this life?
Tell me if you know.