Our Beautiful Sadly Revolving Broken Wheel of a Heart is Sleeping in a Ditch Somewhere

 

The planet looks so peaceful from space doesn't it? Want a blue

Gumball? Like a pancake batter with bluish dye mixed into

Its big yellow bowl and carried out by a winking Victorian

Butler. Like a bowling ball with just the right

Weight for your clumsy fingers. Like a silent psychedelic

Movie playing in your private head. Like an indulgent rock

Opera performed by a band of rogue angels. Like

A lost hubcap. Like a political button for a

Nonexistent green candidate. Like a drop of blue dripped

 

Paint on an ancient drop cloth floor. Like a

Hole in your favorite sweater. Like the inside of

A circus lion's gaping mouth. Like a free balloon

Far enough away from the wires of civilization to

Make a good strong break for it. Like a

Seashell sitting on the sands of time. Like a constantly

Ringing telephone. Like a blossom opening its shop for morning's kind of

Business. Like a newly silk screened tee shirt advertising

Either a band or a restaurant, maybe a hip young bank,

 

Maybe a national park. Like a corroded penny found

In the grass or in your pocket change. Like if

The road was a revolving wheel that you were

Standing on in a dream of leaving and you

Kept having a hard time keeping your inner balance. A lost

Frisbee sitting in a garage in a little red

Wagon next to a pair of hedge clippers. Like

Something coming right at you at full speed, like

An arrow, like a tree branch, like an open

 

Mouthed river snake. Like a leaf floating around in a

Pond of scum, like a sailboat without a paper driver to its name. Like a

Popping off sound. Like a painted pony. Like a dangling fake

Bracelet. Like a pair of dancing feet wearing nothing

But painted toes. Like a lonely bike ride through

A laughing Autumn woods. Like the moon holding a sign up

That says, make up your mind, choose your celestial

Tea, and always pay the Gypsy at the door before she invites you

To sit down at her table. Like the lie that

 

You have somehow given up on love for good, my truest love,

Fading in the west of your sinking sun heart, I don't

Buy it now, or ever, no matter how Eastern

Your lovers get. Like a poem that sounded like

A science show, but really is all about a

Certain comedic feeling one gets when the stars align on top of you.

Like a jackpot machine puking out its phony stream

Of metal happiness, you're still barely alive in there. Like a fuzzy

Note from an electrified base player behind a curtain, I'm just as

 

Bored as ever over the dirty looks from your

Mad trajectory. Like a blue whale, a stone left

Atop your grave marker by a total stranger. Like

A lesson book scribbled upon with many strange and

Wonderful faces of aliens. Like a mysterious rhinoceros, I wish I 

Had the strength. Like a tree planted by the 

Passed over clouds, counting all the cracks in the painted and fading 

Sky. Like a Merriam-Webster dictionary dropped into the bath

with the bubble-making soap beads, what we're probably all about, here.  

Bonus poems:

Your Stewardship by Darryl Price

 

I like how you want to pretend you are above

The pettiness of others, but they are you and you

Are not alone, no matter how many times you stamp

Your feet and cry. We've seen it all before. There

 

Are those in real pain, with hearts that resemble nothing

More than broken cups. Maybe their emptiness upsets you, it

Should, but you cannot take it from them and replace

Their ache with good deeds. What they want is a

 

Total reboot of the universe, one where they get to

Place their love in the proper arms and walk away first,

But even that hope brings about another crack in the

Eggshell. To take it all away from them is to

 

Reduce them to nothing. The phoenix rises from its own

Ashes, not the ones tossed upon it by Saints or

Housewives, but the ones it is consumed by in its

Own desires to be free and whole again. You want

 

Them to know that you care. They know or they don't

know. It is not up to you to define their grief

Or their healing. There can be no reward for mischief. There is

Only love in its fully blessed kindness or something sneaking

 

About in the dark corners of otherwise mindful giving.  You can't

Have it both ways, and they can't receive it without

It being presented freely. No strings, no applause, no acknowledgement,

No tax. Only doing, only being. You want the world

 

To know it can't escape your criticism, but you are

Aiming your spell finger at the wrong mirror like always,

Causing more pain to yourself than even you might deserve. You

Can only save us if you save you, the rest

 

Will follow naturally. Do what you must, but do no

Harm first, means don't assume knowledge when it's wisdom you

Are after, when it's only the grace of mercy that

Will allow you to be fully human in your actions

 

Towards all beings. You want to say you are good?

Act your stewardship, but I tell you this, we can

Only move the rocks in our way from where we

Are, one at a time, and no one can judge

 

our progress like ourselves—because we alone preside over the 

Brutal trials in our own heads. If you really want to

Do the right thing, do it because it's in everyone's best

Right thing interest and not because it fits the easy definition. dp   

    

Two Flowers Thrown Into a Vase

by Darryl Price

Author's Note