Philip Byron Oakes

First Draft

Clustering the irreconcilable, into single
thoughts of thinking therefore I am, dressed
appropriately for whatever may befall the
samaritans.
Larruping lolitas grating necrotic tissue, in daubing
tears for the little lords in the fauntleroy fields.
Fulfilling dreams in paraphrase.
Matriculating in a tally of fingers and toes, counted
as friends in finding out where little piggy goes
to market.
Imaginary friends drafting off passwords,
to the legless gusto afforded benchwarmers,
in the carnival atmosphere of armageddon.
The truth of the state of matter over mind your
manners, as the key to success in vaudeville.


g.

Politic resonance beating cake batter to tapioca for the elite. Parrots, breaking out a new shade of turquoise, for the echo squeezing a snitch by the itch in his throat. Trilobite of the apple. Crucifix the faucet. The broad jump of the Jehosophats, down the lonesome road to Xanadu or don’t, it doesn’t matter. A wiggle, but no room to speak of, in the third person to person. Meridians, on one side or the other. Unwanted poster child. The rudiments, reneging on treaties with the never simple, but laundered and ready to wear. What miracles are made of. The broken eggs of purpose, tied to the whipping post haste in a race to the oven, of pitiable maturities, running circles around the ageless, in the golden broth of autumnal flavorings to the light. Taunting the deafened with whispers, with no place to go tell it on the mountain as it was.


A Window Seat

Rubik’s circle of friends. The creative fire of elevator music, on the descent, attempting to burn the whole building down. A sanguine drunkard in a chaise lounge, singing his heart out through his pug nose, to humor the guardian of the rights of the children. Diagnosing the dead as cold. Autumn’s gray tweed dressing a debacle, for giving thanks to the disguises, supplied buffoons at moments of automated rapture. A practiced blasphemy, wearing the bathrobe of reality to a hootnanny in the belly of the whale.

Philip Byron Oakes is a poet living in Austin, Texas. His work has appeared in numerous journals, including Otoliths, Switchback, Cricket Online Review, Sawbuck, Crossing Rivers Into Twilight, E ratio, Moria and others. He is the author of Cactus Land (77 Rogue Letters), a volume of poetry. http://philipbyronoakes.blogspot.com/.

 
 
 
 
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