In Honor of International Pixelated Technopeasant Day

Yes, that was on the 23rd, and I am late.

But, I give away a lot of stuff around these parts, so don't you worry none about exactly what day is what.

I was busy, and I wanted to produce some new, original stuff.

***

Two original poems:

"Pretty Ladies"

pretty ladies like coathangers with hips
sipping wine they'll never complete -
there's some trees - white christmas lights -
in spring

these bored ones - twos - and threes
speak lovers as if the man
never held a gun to her
as if mortgages aren't the same as guns
as if a child is only a child
is only a child

***

"New Cities"

i thought i could escape this town by train
again, then at every step i heard my city's
Name - more pretty girls in white sell tschibo coffee,
pastries, smiles and beside that
a turkish man called me by my city's
Name - i recognized his hands
his voice
his food
the money

i slept in new apartments
square walls and square windows
over streets as square as memories
fitting together in streetlamp blocks
and new furniture that, in the dark,
felt the same, fed me the same dreams

that night, if i turned on the lights
i know exactly where i'll be.

a hand turns a doorknob - both mine
behind the door, a sitting woman
blinks into her palms like mirrors
a standing man smiles, both happiness
and sadness in his teeth - he urges
me to go -
just go -
to the train station

to a new city - i can start again

i can rediscover my mistakes.