Excerpts from"Otherwise". By J.B. Pick.

The Harlequin

The universe has irony built in.
Is it in the genes, or something like a djinn
Which turns all silver into tin?
Does something hope we'll yield, or won't begin?

Puritans were obsessed by sin,
But that's too simple, and wears thin.
It's not what we deserve, or how we spin:
The universe has irony built in.

Imagine that you're good, and you won't win;
Say "I'm happy" and you'll bark your shin.
Definitions end up in the bin-
The universe has irony built in.

Something out there works, and chimes within.
Something dances like a harlequin.
The universe has irony built in.

January

I have seen, this bleak evening,
Green spears of snowdrops
Testing the bitter air.

March

Awake in this blue paradox
We walk on frigid ground,
Dazed by the smiling sun.

April

Through glass, the sunshine.
Out in the sunshine,
Only the wind.

What is and what is not

In between what is lives what is not.
How to get there isn't known.
Science tried but lost the plot;
Phone God: there's just the ringing tone.
The universe conceals what isn't what,
Where nothing blooms, all on its own.

Old Age Blues

I don't know what I used to know.
I don't say that it isn't so,
I've just forgotten. That's a blow.
When you know nothing, then you go.

The world keeps changing, things must grow;
You spend life learning, but it's slow;
Perhaps my status isn't quo.
I don't know what I used to know.

Well, I must watch, not let it show,
Greet the morning, say "Hello";
When you know nothing, then you go.
I don't know what I used to know.

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