Oysters

take a grid size three-by-three

and cut diagonals off the corners,

perfect forty-five angles and

you get a semblance of the truth,

something mimicking a stop sign

but the wise audience members 

know it's not, it's just a shell

of Platonic perfection

and the same goes for that

yellow building just off I-25

south of Chugwater, it's just

standing there like a Neil

Diamond ditty without the

essence of man or threat,

it's just not keeping the

peace anymore

go northwest of Belle Fourche

a ways on the red gravel

and you'll see similar s**t,

a yellow shell congregated

by men but not men that

will respond within a

minute's notice

and not far from the

abovementioned locations

are place markers that

show up on maps but

aren't towns at all

it's like having the Christian

thinkers of old reinterpreting

theories brought forth by

Marx and Engels

they are oysters subtracted

of their meat and pearls

but that depends on context,

depends on how one abstract

correspondence between

a subject and an object

maybe Marx created an

epistemological break with

reality and maybe this is

an advanced way of saying

everything you know is wrong

the abovementioned octagon

is still a regular octagon but not

a regular octagon,

the interior angles fall

into the regular framework

but the edges do not

the essence remains even

though the form has been

morphed by the sin of mankind

there are more versions

of the imperfect objects

than there are of

the perfect objects

maybe Plato was right

after all

the missile alert facilities

can be homes for the homeless

the missile silos can

become homes for

orphan soil and

the fences can be

homes for hay bales

and beehives

and mutilated grids can

be patterns for fabric

placements and decorations

these oysters find new

purpose and establish

themselves from there

because the existence

has always preceded

the essence

Reviews

[Penlady]

recycling, an effort at cleaning up the mess of too much.. the vintage shop a desire to return to a frugal time...if only we'd listened...but still there is hope in an oyster...

[Kenneth The Poet]

Thank you, Penlady.

[Emily B]

these are the best words for a day like today, my brain is fuzzy and running full speed ahead at the same time, I hope there are no sharp turns

I like the math and geometry in your poetry

it's like eating that serving of vegetable and finding that they were kinda tasty

[Kenneth The Poet]

Thanks as always, Emily.