Lies, Marketing, and other synonyms

The Coke can his hand.

pop top pull of aluminum

releasing pressured smell

of that much-marketed name

half empty

half full

no dregs in the bottom

no winced-on aftertaste

just hint of lime or cherry

Prince. Pauper. Scholar. Wretch.

The red can calls.

Love is a light switch

Love is a light switch up and ignored,

one-time feat where rooms are awakened,

detail in living made clear for a time,

fine furniture or trailer's trash

pushed from the gloom,

stained rugs brought to relief,

offerings to clean or further soil presented.

Light switch up to explore

when seeing's believing,

That stringy stuff on bananas

my lunch a banana

under ripe to my taste

this once hung tuber in bunches,

yellow fibrous fruit

clustered in familied plantain.

you are mother to a well-hated hanger on,

that thin, stringy extra, neither skin nor flesh,

lurker, hiding on your surface in plain sight,

delayer of my meal as I peal,

tainting tweezer fingers with his white residue.

he is unclean

born of banana but now discarded

and I ponder -

Parent skills

Warm in my bed.

Layer on woven layer - cover, separate me

from the cold air of my room,

insulate the bare skin I've shed to

while heard in the kitchen, after hours,

consequent flesh of my flesh whiles an hour to midnight

with a waiting wolf

perhaps, or a lamb.

I will know which when no harm is done

or blood blots her sifted snow.

I listen, tally seconds to a witching hour,

not trusting,

knowing I wound with doubt if lamb he emerges,