High time for deeds mumbler.
Put your face to the page,
Your ear to the sound of howling.
The dimmest minds pool in a flood of hunger,
Soggy with the beast that is our inheritance
Of algae and mold and the single celled rulers
Have made the deep simple for so long.

Isolation in a time of plenty of thoughts and
By their names you can know them,
Gentle Balthazar,
Horrific gradualism, punctuated echolalia and
Her fermenting brothers, Anus and Jacobus behind bars
In a crumbling third world zoo where the keepers became Saints
To make fishes long ago from fingernails and hair
Which is all that is left.
A few droppings, a boat preserved in Pete like bog man
With his hands tied and a hole in his skull.

Who obeys her master is no mistress, no ruffian,
Not an original of type and kind for obedience is not called for now.
Originality has been oversold
Just as the critics bought shag when it was low and close to the floor.
We are close to the floor now, not quite huddling but
In places and in time we resemble and remember the post-apocalypse
And all of our fantasies of release and change.
We are lower now,
Not quite lovers but the path of moss and honey,
The spreading grass, the infinite sea;
We know our co-conspirators, our co-defendants
And the long-legged attorneys and business attire, ties, chains,
Cuff links around the fire where meaningful glances and eye contact
Makes sparkle on the retinas of the retinue in their numbers
Calling for the mute birth of a king that they knew before.

No one likes to be told what to do.
Some think, “Nobody likes you”.
Nobody hears what you say, what you post, what you die with,
Under your breath and so we speak
At first in whispers with whom we trust,
In anthems with the rest who never rest.

The ballad of the single cells,
Gametes in a rush to court and hold hands primeval
In the unhoused diaspora of mistakes.
There is no ego full enough to hold us,
Brave enough to show us,
No lanky visitor who tips his knowing grin
At the girl.

These we pray are lovers,
Meant to be.
Speaking truth,
Dipping us all in water and fire
For our time, our longings,
And our isolation in hapless love.

By Rolf Stavig
3/29/2025