Sidewalk Cracks

You look into the cracks

Sidewalks cracks

Walking along the path

Seeking revelation or spare change?

There's broken glass there too so watch out

Don't become wounded or at least

Any more wounded than you are all ready

And your shoes are looking mighty poor and over worn now the sole all flapping

Now that I take the time to assess and scrutinize

Your face and visage too

So lined with pain and fatigue

Walking along slowly

Seeking validation or bus fare you bend all stooped

Looking into cracks sidewalk cracks

All the children laugh and point dirty fingers

Scoff away though pal

Scoff away

Keep those unruly brats at bay

Revelation though you know?

Found any yet?

I seek it too

How about in the stars?

Or tea leaves

You like loose tea leaves to drink

Any fortunes therein?

That drink is good you boom at me

It gets rid of the poison and bile inside

But revelation not so much

Nor fortune

Still I seek unhurriedly and I listen

If the gods want to speak to me

Or demons or fates

I'd make them a nice tea for the effort

For our repast

I would enjoy that

Talking with gods or demons or other

Over a nice cup of loose green tea

Better than this limp conversation

With fools like you my son

At any rate

You interrupt my walking

Looking into

Sidewalk cracks

By Daniel Smallegange, copyright 2024, all rights reserved.

Photo of the author by Rachel Brennecke

Tried Out My Crew gift Jacket in a Nice Long Walk in the Toronto, Autumnal Rain

 

I worked ten months on Frankenstein as props buyer, a feature film directed by Guillermo del Toro, shot primarily in Ontario, Canada. This was my crew gift, which kept out the rain nicely on this rainy, autumnal day in Toronto, September, 2024.

These Cold Winds Blowing

Winds come blowing

Howling like ghosts through

Interiors of the mind

Sculpting thoughts and feelings into

Hopes and dreams

Plottings and schemes

Born of all directions

Ancestors and genes, babe

Chemicals and blood wrought too

Look it up, it's in books you know

Or don't you know?

You ought to know things like these and others

Suck it all up inside your brainpan man

So you don't bleed so ignorant man

Winds still blowing

A veritable font of cross breezes

Illustrious or otherwise

Carving channels and paths

Sculpting thoughts and/or feelings

Nature as

Versus nurture is nature

Eroding the enshrouded

Through winds which

Howl like ghosts 

Disturbed old memories

Sweeping out

General malaise, fear an' rot

Sweeping out all

These cold winds blowing

By: Daniel Smallegange, copyright 2024, all rights reserved.

Apoplectic You Say

Apoplectic you say

Come come

Come along my friend my dear

You scoff and reflexively retract away

And so you say so you say

Your first wish to stay at bay

Fists all bunched tightly

Your smile reversed and teeth clenched

But your anger seems so

Contrived

And so overly

Dramatized

I can see it in you though

You have it in you though

In those wayward eyes

Pretty slate grey-green eyes

Apoplectic with many things

Calculating also

Eyes slant askance

Apoplectic

You say you say!

Against your friend and amie

Your esteemed colleague me

You need to have a rest

Sit down and divest

Some of them heart burned feelings

Your anti and hostile jeering

It begins to make a dent

In my own mental fixings

Apoplectic come come

Makes me so sad I can't help but laugh

You need some healing

Love an' joy

At least some time off

From the grinding teeth clench

And accusatory glancings

Though eyes of slate grey-green

Are not without appeal

Those eyes do say however

I should slowly back away

My friend my amie

And keep at bay

By: Daniel Smallegange, all rights reserved, copyright 2024.

Such a Formal Bow

To what do I owe

Such a formal bow?

From a stranger even

On this dark wet lonely street

Or have we met in times passed?

If we were friends or comrades

I should likely recall

Such pale beauty

So perhaps not this

And you prepared with clenched fist

Belies this thought

Such a formal bow

Impeccable in form

Without introduction

You arrive glistening in moonlit rain

To honour your fallen?

To avenge a loved one?

To earn a payday?

Surely then such a bow would be then considered

Undeserved

Impeccable as it is

Speak up my dear

Why so silent fist all clenched

What is in your pocket then

A pistol?

Or a rose?

By Daniel Smallegange, copyright 2024, all rights reserved.

A Cloud in the Eye to Blur the Impact

A cloud in the eye to blur the impact

Of your beauty would not

Be unappreciated

Although such a thing is

Unrequested it might be not considered

Unhelpful

As your beauty so weaponized can only

Shock and awe

As you blind me

To all other thoughts and hopes

Joys even

Such is the clamouring bright

Of your visage and general outline

Hopes are after all

Precursors to pain and  

Disappointment

And your beauty is after all

Considerable

The blue green of your seeking searching demanding

Eyes

Is impactful to say the least

To say the most you are

Devastating in your conduct approach and appeal

A cloud in my eyes to blur this impact

Might save one such as I

From love or ruin

By: Daniel Smallegange, 2024, all rights reserved.

Why Cat Marxism Was Doomed to Fail

 Comic by Daniel Smallegange, all rights reserved.