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Clockwork heart
It beats hands free
Pumping steel
Though the assembly line
That’s me
Watchtower body
Skeletally strong
Calcium foundation
That carries on
Life’s long
Air’s free
Gridiron lungs
Empower me
Breathe in
I live
Breathe out
I’m dying
Machine-like body
Keeps me surviving
Microchip mind
Making choices
Basic instinct
Reprogrammed
By voices
Crash course
In life
Without airbags
Wheels and gears
Slow and cease
Assembly line halts
Rest in peace
1
Hey blogger, poet...no photo, ha?
hmmm...no photo...
not even a nose, no eyes
no part or whole...well, that's OK, I guess...

I know there’s a reason - security, privacy...
Or maybe you’re actually
President Obama
masquerading here as a blogger
President Putin practising his English
seeking Russian ******* on the poetry front
Or a Chinese Politburo member
checking out if anyone from Falun Gong or Tibet is here
or a Coca-Cola spy
checking out what new drink
you can concoct for contemporary poets;
or maybe you’re Elvis Presley
retired in Risikesh
with a fair amount of hashish
and a daily dose
of the Anglo-Euro-American girls
who just don’t want to go home

so you don’t want your photo on;
we understand; that’s fine…


2
Or you're just a good woman
in some old-fashioned part of the world
who made a pact with your jealous husband:
OK, no photo, you can blog;
You put photo, you’re out!

And you poor thing, your mother-in-law
sits there during the
supervised half-an-hour
allotted to you at the computer;
and then gives a complete report
when your husband comes home:
She’s been talking to this strange man in Australia –
He’s got a South Indian name but he looks aboriginal

– and your husband turns to you
and he says Who is this idiot Raj Arumugam
you’re reading?
What's going on between the two of you?


Whatever the reason or whoever you’re
fact is I'm human
and
I just can’t help wonder once in a while:
Hey, how do you look?


3
Or all right, you take a shot
and for some strange reason
no picture ever turns out right;
it never captures the true you – does it?
(Come on, you can’t give the world
the wrong impression
of an ogre when you really look
better than the made-up
Bollywood or Hollywood heroes and  heroines)

Whatever the reason or whoever you’re
fact is I'm human
and
I just can’t help wonder once in a while:
Hey, how do you look?

4
Or maybe you’re just the best husband in the world...
You know – handsome, rich, secure government job;
does all the cooking at home and still manages to go
to work and earn decent money and
gets the wife some bed-coffee everyday
before you’re off to work - and so, you know,
your wifey doesn’t want to lose you so she says:
No picture, darling; blogging is OK;
all those international evil eyes looking at you
will make you sick
...especially people with glasses...

(when the real text, you and I know, is:
Oh gorgeous hubby of mine -
I don’t want to lose you to some blogging *****!
)


Whatever the reason or whoever you’re
fact is I'm human
and
I just can’t help wonder once in a while:
Hey, how do you look?


5
But then it doesn’t really matter –
your company’s good enough;
just look at your screen
and flash us all a smile
Fun verse dedicated to all bloggers without photos; also to those with phoney photos; and to those with outdated photos; and to those with photos digitally re-mastered...
The poem in its current form is updated from a prose-verse piece I wrote in 2007 and posted at some other site...They kicked me out there! No, just kidding - I survived there, and I know you guys here will love me even more after this poem...  (:
the hands that held mine ripped my throat out.
layers of muscle, thick strands of tendons,
snapped in two by an iron grasp.

the mouth that once kissed mine ripped my heart out.
delicate veins, pumping arteries,
severed and snapped by razorblade teeth.

love left me
bruised and beaten
on the bedroom floor.

i hope you find one of your own.
i hope she is everything i am, everything i'm not.
i hope ivory skin lures you in
and the scent of lavender is enough to choke you.
i hope mahogany curls tangle around your neck
and midnight eyes burn to your core.

i hope her lips, red as blood, are pressed against yours
when she slides the knife straight through your heart.
 Mar 2012 Jordon Jones
JA Doetsch
1.
When she kissed him
he lit up like a firework
shot into the sky
and exploded in jubilant splendor

She was not entirely pleased,
as he now rained down upon her.

2.
When he smiled at her
she felt as if the warmth
of a thousand suns were
inside of her chest.

Luckily there was
a fire extinguisher
nearby



Choose your metaphors
with care
I don't feel like making sense right now.
if I were a frog
first I’d dart my tongue out
and catch a fly

then with the same sticky tongue
I’d catch a human
actually as many as I can
and all the cars and streetlamps
and some mud and puddles of water
to sauce the whole thing
and eat them all whole
in one roll

And then I’d do the same thing
always with my sticky tongue
deracinate the trees, the rocks and mountains
and all living things
(all humans first I’d dispose of)
and all objects and planets and stars and space
and quasars and matter and anti-matter and zero
all stuck on my tongue and all rolled in one
and all these I’ll just swallow
if I were a frog
and I won’t stop till there’s nothing
except me
one gargantuan frog
and then I’ll burp
and then I’ll croak

*and then maybe I’ll burst
1 HIS SONG

His song was always:
I see no good
see no kindness
in the world
I see no hope
I see no gentleness
nowhere all round me



2 THE SCENE

and now he lies
bowels dismembered
His intestines
making a nice O
on the floor;
his limbs like sticks
stretched out
pointing towards the only door



3 POLICE VERDICT

*some evil
got him
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