To Hold a Relic

To hold a relic

Wrapped in old 

Scotch tape

Knowing it soon

Will become

A trace

Of chemistry’s

Mystique

With no way

To save it

But by advanced

Analytical 

Methods

Does that 

Dilute its

Potency

Or does

Dissolution

Advance

The power

Spread its flowering

Flour into bread

Can analysis

Enable flow

Like dialysis

Who’d know

No lights

There were no lights

But burning wicks

And delights

Dry fetid sticks

Should you write


Not in braille

Yet lacking sight

Might you fail

Then a battle

to progress

Shake a rattle

To win success

Leave the cave

No climate change

The al fresco rave

Time is strange

To a Beatnick

I thought, well

He just died

Did not know

Only twice

His device

Would show

What he denied

While casting his spell

Why can a man

Spew his spawn

Yet never regret

The valued vice

His life would slice

It’s not neglect

But a daily dawn

Maybe a wicked plan

Shaman

Shaman
Show they can
Versifiers
Are deniers

So can
A holy man
Face a librettist
Without shout or twist

Will a bishop
Close shop
When a parson
Threatens arson

Does a witch doctor
Try to factor
The medicine man
For all he can

The gliding witch
Sees how they all snitch
Each other
Rejecting their eternal mother

Poets
Exemplify don’t knows it’s
Spiritualists
Simply say it exists

That’s One Heavenly Ride


TO MINDREAD A MYSTIC

I

When seasons end
Poets become mute
Their fun begins

They call it
Madness
It feels so normal

Is tolerance of pain
Suicide’s slow motion
Crippling the insane

The need to give
Desire to share
And they just don’t care

Sanctification
Exists for some
Best in death

II

Aromas bear meaning
Without language yet
Any creature understands

How can I know
If you smell
Just like I do

Only a saint can make
One smell different
To all under a holy spell

Telepathic blood
Speaks unexpectedly
To select of the brood

Incense perfume and mace
Can each shock the face
Depending on time and place

III

The family
Is a prism to display
Many mothers

Not all orphans
Seek their mother
Whose love can smother

A goddess
Can address
The need to repress

When incapable
Of carnal love a virgin
Mother is essential

A perfect mother
Can never fail
The frail

IV

Earth will not change
Hence prayer
To arrange the strange

A soul in a
Healthy man
Disappears after death

A soul in a
Holy man lives
Beyond its owner

One who prays alone
Is admired by many
If able to change the immutable

Leading prayers
Draws many
Acting as one

V

Hard to take one space
To be all over the place
Yet giving no trace

Having but one face
Avoiding one grand disgrace
One without a trace

What the hell is grace
Certainly not clothes of lace
Find that earthly place

Moving at a pace
Reality can’t displace
Nor truth can replace

Rock steady for in case
You are bound to a disgrace
You can keep the pace

Optimize Opportunity’s Optics

Warblings of the upupa epops
Rattling even the stoic cyclops
Without enough mops
To swab his tear drops

And maddening mares’ clip clops
Endangering the crops
Of the farmers’ co-ops
Foretelling these disastrous non stops

Broadway shows bowing as flops
Haute cuisine cooking up slops
Burglars all outrunning the cops
Poetry slams’ relying on mic drops

Pajama parties losing their tops
Bootleggers neglecting to take hops
Beatniks lacking cause to be bebops
Even pigeons ruing their plops

Couturiers failing the fops
Gardeners missing their lops
Kiddies seeking lost pops
Pullers outing all without stops

Plumbers forgetting what unstops
Provocateurs provoking sans agitprops
Cavaliers shaving their mutton chops
Even baldies biding in barbershops

Tongue Tied lisping malaprops
Fiddlers lacking rooftops
Fog lifting when it envelops
Negatives hating what develops

Crusty bread crumbling for sops
Slapstick slapping without props
Spills spotting dirty counter-tops
Sysops crashing laptops

We’ll never know all the flops
Even with the help of special ops
Assured you'd best be sniffing cow plops
Than suffering the singing of upupa epops

T. M. Shorewick

Does a Cat Consider Music Worthwhile?

Surveying the wood
Across a bird full lawn
Maybe music could
Represent a dawn
Where species were drawn
And as one stood
The spawn of beast and pawn
Sharing a primal mood

Is there a remedy
In the substance of sound
A fantasy from melody
Shared by all around
Pulses that pound
Cadence of step that’s foxy
Barking of a hound
All conversations by tonal proxy

The birds sing
But at a price
Though granted flight by the wing
Getting lost in variation is a device
Impossible to splice
To the music they bring
Yet pawns and beast they entice
Hearing a musical something

Words and tunes
Are disabilities
Regard ancient runes
Relics of forlorn civilities
Not dogs’ proclivities
To answer croons
Even cats’ inabilities
To howl at moons

The pawns are speakers
Semi animals because
They need sneakers
Having long lost their paws
Chanting with empty jaws
Pawns think all are talkers
But animal claws
Draw mere vibration from composers

T. M. Shorewick