The policeman pulled me over

For not wearing a mask.

He asked why I did not feel the need for protection.

I sat thinking without saying anything, yet.

Is it that I don’t believe there’s a problem?

Or that I don’t see a mask as a solution?

But before I could say a word,

He grabbed me by both feet at once and jerked me around,

“Answer ME!” he demanded, then, he

Pulled up my skirt and raped me.

And when he was done,

He wiped the slobber from his mouth,

With his arm, zipped up his pants and said,

It wasn’t his fault he hadn’t seen a woman’s face in so long

That he couldn’t control himself.

But you know that the prophets say,

Lawlessness always follows 

In the wake of a pandemic,

Even a fake one.

-jenn

Have I written all the poems

I’ve had in my head?

They’ve unraveled like thread

Til they’re done,

But then I fall asleep and dream

And another ball of yarn emerges

On the scene.

I reach to take it back

To reality with me

And only catch the end,

But I begin to pull it

To me as I wake,

And little bits of rhymes shake out

Upon my lap.

Sometimes one mysterious letter,

Like an X,

Falls in, unfettered from the string,

And when I read the message

Between the lines,

It spells to me,

“The dream IS the reality.

Keep dreaming and keep believing 

In Poetry.”

-jenn

I’ve been granted three wishes,

And one of them was

To go back and redo jr.high school,

Knowing what I know now.

I’m going to ask some of them

That like to see

Such violent movies on tv,

If they like to watch people die of cancer, too?

And to the haters that scoff

Their jealous hearts out

Toward the ones who want 

To love others and get along,

I’m going to sing them the song

About the elephant 

That went for a walk,

And how the randy monkey saw her,

And just as he jumped on her behind

And started going at her as best he could,

She happened to stepped on a thorny bush

And moaned in pain.

And as the prideful monkey yelled,

“Suffer, Bitch!”

She twitched her tail

And flung him forty feet

Back into the trees.

But as I think of these terrible things,

I wonder why I would waste a wish

On going back to something as awful

As the jr. high experience truly was,

When I can just sing to the entire planet,

The song about an elephant, now.

-jenn

If I can’t do the things that I believe in,

And I can’t believe the things I do,

What does that say about me

But that I’m human,

And that I live somewhere between 

True and Not True?

If I struggle endlessly with dogma,

Until I’m tangled in theory up to my neck,

Who will go and stir the roux,

So that supper won’t be wrecked?

I catch a visage in a glass,

Behold a message from my face,

“Welcome to the human race,” she says.

So if I can’t do the things that I believe in,

And I can’t believe the things I do,

Then I’ll believe in doing the things I can’t,

And won’t give up until I CAN do 

Whatever I want.

But that’s just me.

-jenn

I’m known to

Be aloof and cool,

But when Todd Bridges

Came in to be masseused,

I got giddy and kept 

Putting my foot in my mouth.

“I’ve always wanted to get my hands on you,”

I stuttered stupidly,

In a trite attempt at wit.

I’m not supposed to know who it is

I’m massaging,

But when he cuts his eyes at me,

I can’t help but say,

“What you talking about, Willis?”

And Todd jumps up off the table

And gets his towel wrapped around him quick,

And starts to go.

But I spout,

“What if I’m the only one

Who knows exactly how to touch you,

To completely heal your pain?”

And he is torn

Between the cure

And putting up with the dork 

Who may bring it.

“That was feeling really good,” he says.

“I’ll be quiet,” I assure,

And he and I regain our composure 

As the massage goes on

Without incident,

With only the good intentions on the road to hell

 Ahead of all the blunders.

-jenn 

A little tiny piece of the sky fell.

It really did.

But it was only a little tiny piece

Of the sky,

And when it hit the ground,

It didn’t shatter,

But it splashed blue brightly all around,

And that night stars slipped quietly

Down through the hole in the ozone

And skinny dipped in the ripples of the blue

And shivered in the chilly wind

That blew that night,

And threw great towels about their shoulders bare,

And then they shrugged and chatted casually 

About the great sky falling event

Of twenty-twenty,

And how different everything might be now.

-jenn

I eat once a day and take three naps,

And try to get my recommended daily allowance of sunshine.

“Meanwhile I’ve only shrunken

Fourteen heads today,” my nephew says smugly.

He feels great pride in his doings.

He looks down on me as a do-nothing.

But I can’t bring myself to be

An over-achiever 

In the society I find myself a part of.

-jenn