The Sleeping Android
dreams
of electric sheep
who live drab lives
in its digital cortex
and sometimes escape
into the waking world,
to cause chaos
for humans,
a small price to pay
for keeping
a permanent peace.

101/365

In the noise of the news
we lose
the signal.

To the flood of the feed
we cede
our selves.

100/365

Spark
   flares of joy.

      Spill
   pools of whimsy.

Stream
   gusts of love.

      Spread
   slabs of life.

99/365

To each character’s life,
authors grant breath
or the pall of death
but only readers
can bestow with certainty
a literary figure’s eternity.

97/365

The bigger the life,
the bigger the hole
left behind by stolen memories.

The smaller the life,
the bigger the hole
left behind by stolen potential.

96/365

Our world exists
in an eyeblink
of eternity.

95/365

Gotta shimmy,
she said.

Gotta move!
Gotta groove!
Gotta shake!

Gotta dance!
Gotta prance!
Gotta prowl!

Gotta stay?
Gotta pounce?
Nah,
gotta bounce.

93/365

The warp
meets the weft
in a dance
of the threads;
two worlds
mesh together
in common purpose.

92/365

Five-year-old me
watched my powder blue suitcase
ride away
on the conveyor
behind the ticket desk,
to emerge hours later,
onto the baggage carousel
of another airport,
and thought
how silly it was
that my family
didn’t do the same
instead of flying there
in a plane.

91/365

Hard enough to spark joy
in a joyless age,
how on Hell on Earth
are we supposed
to spark euphoria?

90/365

It’s not enough.
It’s never enough.
It can never be enough.
And so
we keep scrolling,
scrolling,
scrolling,
scrolling,
scrolling,
scrolling,
scrolling,
scrolling,
scrolling,
scrolling,
scrolling,
scrolling,
scrolling,
knowing
we’ll never reach
the end of the feed.

85/365

Stay true to your wool, 
so heavy and full, 
from follicles born, 
and with honor worn, 
a horror when shorn, 
its loss you would mourn. 

70/365

Beweir
the phisherman’s net
across your datastream
that harvests
the glittering carp
of your identity.

68/365

Bred tiny,
wolf-spawn
remade into toys
for fawning queens,
by surreptitious means;
Her gene-splicing Majesty
causing the tragedy
of Princess Peggy’s
Pomeranian Pixie-Pup
accidentally drowned
in a china teacup.

67/365

“Cheese it, the copse!”
shouted Dale,
thinking he was so funny
until the trees
arrested him
for littering the forest
with his little orange
cracker squares.

66/365

On social media
no one knows
you’re a dog,
you’re a bot,
you’re a troll,
you’re a poet,
you’re a catfish,
you’re a sock puppet,
you’re a brand mascot,
you’re the government,
you’re an influencer,
you’re a misinformation campaign,
you’re the resistance.

64/365

Beyond the shadow
of a doubt
stretches the penumbra
of a suspicion
where I lie awake
and contemplate our condition.

63/365

The Oscar gleamed
in the spotlight
on the mantelpiece
under five layers of polish,
testament
to the enduring power of set design:

“Best Balustrade in a Supporting Role!”

62/365

Beyond my fathoms
and sinking deeper,
my burning lungs
surrender all further plans
of ascent.

I float
at peace
and admire
the beauty,
your beauty,
as you take away
my final breath.

61/365

Welcome to the Interim,
a chrysalis
between what we were
and what we are destined to become.

57/365

On a looping path
through a maze of pipes,
a hedgehog
and a plumber
collide!
Pixels smash together
in a rain of rings and coins.

55/365

Thaddeus Smythe III,
fifth generation genetics professor,
droned on
about alleles and phenotypes,
oblivious
to the glowing flask
on the desk
of young Teddy Smith,
who doodled base pairs in the margins
while taking notes in class
and tinkered,
in his off time,
with new forms of life.

54/365

“Rumbler. High-squeak. S.B.D.”

Under the table,
Cousin Mable
relays what she hears
from dinner guests
in surrounding chairs
as their holiday meal
digests.

“Double-toot. Earthquake. Elephant.”

Cousin Scott
draws a dot.
First to fill a row,
he erupts,
“Bingo!”

53/365