There is no Life or Death
Mindy Loy

There is no Life or Death,
Only activity
And in the absolute
Is no declivity.
There is no Love and Lust
Only propensity 
Who would possess
Is a nonentity.
There is no First or Last
Only equality
And who would rule
Joins the majority.
There is no Space or Time
Only intensity,
And tame things
Have no immensity.

Mina Loy, born in London on 12-27-1882, was
a writer and visual artist. She died 9-25-1966. 

Baseline
Caleb Femi
    after "The first Time you hold a gun"

My mother's heartbeat
the first time I heard a baseline.
Then
Her womb, the first room I danced in.
How did it go again?
Kick cloud-soft twirl
stretch
dark gulf
neon on my clay brain.
Kick...Then
the melody drops
& her vocal comes in.

 [VERSE 1]

There will be strife,
burn days, a God
beside me
sex & crueler colors
than the abyss
but there will be this.

(Caleb Femmi is the author of Poor (Penguin, 2020),
 winner of the 2021 Forward Prize for Best First Collection.
He lives in London.)

Pains

Smart one attracts more of pain,
grandpa used to say, as life 
tricks on you, mean as a wicked wizard
dancing in your way.

The shadows take you for granted,
rape the head, plunge you
into the icy lake;
your mere defense words drift Noland;

they would say you are insane. you shudder
at your weakness, to sun the truth. But the
owl knows; karma nods near you.

You just plod through the prickly field;
fire stream; one after another, as the demon
throws at you; as if a Buddhist monk 
in the path of discipline.
glancing at the karma glancing at you;
you can smile. 

©Byung A. Fallgren

neighbor's window 
brightens in red & green
i keep my curtain open

modem blinks 
in pink and blue
demanding Grinch

lone magpie 
in the bare tree
waits for her

December night 
in the wee hours
praying owl

fake human skeleton 
on the lawn, past Halloween
wishes Happy New Year

@Byung A. Fallgren

In a Disused Graveyard
Robert Frost (March 26, 1874--January 29, 1963)

The living come with grassy tread
To read the graves stones on the hill;
The graveyard draws the living still,
But never anymore the dead.

The verses in it say and say:
"The ones who living come today
To read the stones and go away
To morrow dead will come to stay."

So sure of death the marbles rhyme,
Yet can't help marking all the time
How no one dead will seem to come.
What is it men are shrinking from?

It would be easy to be clever 
And tell the stones: men hate to die 
And have stopped dying now forever.
I think they would believe the lie.

This is the missed last week's Weekly Avocet. Enjoy reading!