Greetings dear friends, observant pets and wayward eyes of any other varietal. I am sincerely honored by your reading. I still find the amount of support and engagement honestly staggering, and wish you all so truly and incredibly well.

Here’s a fun one, I buzzed my head recently, finally admitting my relative baldness, and was greatly amused by the following similarity. Admitting my baldness was very much like accepting my gayness. Some people treat you better, some worse, most remain unchanged. Granted I don’t think any faction of the world (currently) recommends imprisoning or executing the “follicly” challenged, but it’s hardly a perfect analogy. Maybe we SHOULD imprison the bald, sure they have no control over it and many are vaguely embarrassed and just trying to accept their “new” selves, but hey, they’re slightly different now so we should probably ostracize them. Makes as much sense as doing so to our homosexual compatriots. Lucky thing the smooth-headed didn’t get a shout out in Leviticus, otherwise the smooth-brained would undoubtedly have gone for it. So to sum up, eat the rich, don’t imprison the bald/ LGBTQ+, and Jesus was an Arab Jew. Threw that last one in there for one special person who will remain unnamed. Brain smoother than the standard marble. Likely about the same size too. But I digress.

Today’s poem was reworked a few different times and gradually became less uplifting and more downtrodden. But such is life, I suppose, and there’s no denying it now more closely models our true reality. I’m sure Odysseus would approve. I/thi(n)/ka anyway. Yep, that’s a stretch worthy of a ligament tear. Please enjoy!

“The Fraud-I-See”, July 6, 2021.

Once was spoken an epic tale

That could have innumerable endings 

All effectively contingent upon 

Its specialized nuance and reception 

So, delicately flitting about 

Fragile hummingbirds and butterflies  

But our grotesque apathy grafted ill stupor 

A bolero of cruel self-indulgence 

Ever beckoning the great known 

And dismissing honour’s contention 

Prevailing winds setting full the course 

Like some deranged Homeric galley’s quest   

This so profoundly entrenched paradigm 

Procuring long-anticipated fatalisms 

The roads eternally not taken 

Forever remain to justly accuse  

Our cowardice and acquiescence 

More prevalent with each line 

And with precipitously increasing fervour 

To the sharply inevitable conclusion 

Never with even a modicum of doubt

That which can never be retold, only confessed. 

Honestly, this started out happy but somehow morphed into something more sadly accurate. A true Odyssey, which never ends, forever floating adrift, seeking safe, or better, sane harbor.

I’ve never been able to use the term, “bolero”, before. Thanks Ocarina, about time.

Should have said more* deranged, galley’s quest was already pretty deranged. Anyone actually read that thing? Like an acid trip on a long-term meth binge. And a bad one.

A minor Frost reference, Robert, not the giants. I will forever remain enthralled with the concept of the path not taken. I’m actually rooting for the infinite multiverse theorem so I could see how my many parallel brothers and sisters(?) turned out. Some are probably all kinds of kick ass. I bet I have six pack abs in at least a few.

Final thought, what’s the connection between in-laws and outlaws? Does the hyphen regulate the differences or highlight the similarities? Were you expecting a punch-line? Sorry, I’m mostly a pacifist. Also, doesn’t, “pass-a-fist”, sound like the opposite of it’s definition? Sure “pass” sounds like it wouldn’t hurt, but ever pass a kidney stone? Me neither, but according to television it’s excruciating.

Be well, everyone and thing. Love, balance and peaceful harbors, or at worst waters, to you all!

Happy Trails and Waggy Tales!

-Alex Blaikie (He/Him/His/It)

*I’m including pronouns now, (when I remember), to try to be more inclusive and to prevent anyone having to ask. All the love to my Trans and Questioning friends!! I see you, just not in a creepy, The Police, way. The band not the actual authorities.

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dReadpoetssobriety

A fractured mind held together by cellophane and some used tack.