People as a Meatball

December 21, 2024

I am using both the picture and idea of another

Then, applying my math skills to analyze

Imagine

Taking all nearly 8.2 billion people on Earth

And grind them into one meatball

How big would it be?

Figure 3 cubic feet per person

Times 8.2 billion

That would be 24.6 billion cubic feet

The volume of a sphere is (4/3)(Pi)(radius)^3

So, the radius of this sphere would be 3870 feet

Central Park, in NYC is .5 miles by 2.5 miles

This meatball would fit

Perhaps hanging over a bit if perfectly round

But, a definite fit if squished just a bit

Think of it as snug

Then, don't think of it ever again

Today’s cocktail of chemicals and apathy

brought me to skinned knees and compressed headaches

with today’s lost marbles

rolling all over the shop

but the will to suffer morning’s snarling bully

is fodder enough for me to wake up with a determined pulse

driven by an insatiable appetite to not self destruct

and I will clamp down upon your ignorant notions

that I try to bury in pharmaceutical haze

I made a mistake.

I thought it was a joke.

I laughed it off.

Yet a lump came in my throat.

I saw your face.

I knew that I was wrong.

I change the subject.

Then it came through a song.

I apologize for what I said.

I really meant no harm.

I tried to soften the blow,

But it came through my arm.

I am not perfect .

I don't intend to be.

I plan to be human.

But mistakes consume me.

I hope you can accept my apology,

I consider it a lesson learnt.

I hope the love that we share,

Stay alive and never get burnt.

so versed that you think i'd have learnt

but me liquored up ways made me turnt

come the song and the dance

cast me pants lapsed in trance

on the beach where me weenie got burnt

12/19/2024

I’ve walked with my thoughts

Next to my shadow

Wondering

While wandering

Thinking I knew

Where I was going

Yet my thoughts

Were actually my shadow

So I spoke

But did not walk

For if I moved

I’d be chasing my thoughts

As if shadows on the walls

My thoughts have me enthralled

What happens

When the lights go out?!?

“I think I’ll retire now”

Said the atrophied old man

His ancient voice all husked grain and shattered glass

As those telltale words

Crept from his mouth’s gossamer canyon

For he was at war with time’s decimating beasts

Whose phantom jaws dug violent fires

Beneath his wizened flesh sheets

All fare for grief’s conquering fathoms

Skinned soul deep

And so he collected his dust blanketed books

And bandaged his groaning fingers

Exhausted from the year’s tombstone pace

Kept awake each night by his coffin dry coughs

Which rattled like bloody thunder

Leaking from each black balloon lung

Ready to pop

For the buzzards

Under stained glass stars

Like hungry sparks peeking behind sullen nights

Thus decided he that this year was a draw

In that it bloodied his fists

But still taught him to crawl

And he was pleased with such bruised sentiment

And stepped bent but forward towards bald funeral sky

Drinking long the last few drops

Of sinking lemon sun

His bronzed goblet now retired

For he had outrun the devil

With final leathery foot steps

Tattooing sacred victories onto unleavened ground

That even a universe of horned tragedies couldn’t erase

So his last day on earth was one hell of a party

And now he was home.

Sometimes a Mirror is Just a Mirror

December 19, 2024

To Julie,

At least something, maybe not someone, notices all of the hard work.

Back then, a long, long time ago,

Under the safety of my home, I had a dream, the perfect career, how beautiful were the

Red flames that i believed could not frighten me, a blessing on a cold autumn day.

Now I look back, what a dream.

Truck sires wail, flames get higher, they want to consume you, and you can't get away.

Image by Canva, Dream-Lab