Featured Writer: David Mclean Day 3

culpability and punishment

there is no crime but being born
said my body, no guilt
but existence,

and there is no wrong you do
but breathing; dreams
are innocent, always,

whatever you do in them.
and the only thing sinful
is being women and men

and living, every sin
beyond that is supererogatory
devilishness, though welcome,

not wrong in any sense.
for you, barely breathing,
breath is a crime that cries

to heaven. everything
you do beyond that
is just shit that happens -

there are no victims,
just other criminals
guilty of living

____________________________

trees and clouds

the trees would pin the clouds to ground
like pizzas condemned to live in cartons
instead of roaming their natural
habitat, the forests in which they swim

with their children, kebabs and cigarettes
and lampshades. the trees are like mothers
who blind and cripple children, so nothing bad
happens to them, so they see nothing

to frighten them, so they don't get into danger,
don't go anywhere, the trees worry
about the clouds and their madness
as they dance for the mad moon

and go wild with desire under her;
but the clouds don't seem to care
they are like feckless boys, these vapors,
they only listen to their dealers

and dealers never lied to me, at least,
they give me exactly what i need -
clouds and moons and beasts
above all the miserly motherly trees