on time

Chip McFlennigan

if thumbtacks could pinpoint
we could start a fire
sparked by stones
too many inches measured
have proven us birds
wingless, we have not flown
through the nebulas which bruise
the lenses of our telescopes
and the supernovas
stirred into our coffee mugs
as we awake from dreams
black and blue saturday morning cartoons
and listen to the quiet
elliott smith fashioned
out of sound
while the sky repeats
itself on long stretches of highway
days spent waiting for more
beautiful days
filled with gray static
says my radio
and into the evenings
where we pass
the ten-mile diamond necklace
of oncoming traffic
and wish we were back home

but me? i wake up talking
and don't know why i feel
like a freight train made of glass
heading for that wall of bricks
they painted a tunnel on
in said dreams
and though you measured my speeds
in pyramids-per-desert
i was simply waiting around
for the violets i'd planted
for you
to grow before i realized
i'd thrown my seeds into quicksand
and that the hands on my watch
were strangling the same two numbers
while the ticking sounds
were simply coming from my chest
but they say
a watched wrist
never boils, or shouldn't be looked
in the mouth
or can't throw stones or
won't jump when lead
to the water
or whatever it is they say
about broken watches,
but honestly, how often
does it rain in a desert anyway?

justam

I like the way you write Chip.

rollings

Chip McFlennigan wrote:

if thumbtacks could pinpoint
we could start a fire
sparked by stones
too many inches measured
have proven us birds
wingless, we have not flown
through the nebulas which bruise
the lenses of our telescopes
and the supernovas
stirred into our coffee mugs
as we awake from dreams
black and blue saturday morning cartoons
and listen to the quiet
elliott smith fashioned
out of sound
while the sky repeats
itself on long stretches of highway
days spent waiting for more
beautiful days
filled with gray static
says my radio
and into the evenings
where we pass
the ten-mile diamond necklace
of oncoming traffic
and wish we were back home

but me? i wake up talking
and don't know why i feel
like a freight train made of glass
heading for that wall of bricks
they painted a tunnel on
in said dreams
and though you measured my speeds
in pyramids-per-desert
i was simply waiting around
for the violets i'd planted
for you
to grow before i realized
i'd thrown my seeds into quicksand
and that the hands on my watch
were strangling the same two numbers
while the ticking sounds
were simply coming from my chest
but they say
a watched wrist
never boils, or shouldn't be looked
in the mouth
or can't throw stones or
won't jump when lead
to the water
or whatever it is they say
about broken watches,
but honestly, how often
does it rain in a desert anyway?

"on time"

you're something else Chip McFlennigan