"The Poet Laureate of PCH"

Bill Mohr wrote a blog post about my poetry.

You can read the piece at http://www.billmohrpoet.com/kevin-opstedal-the-poet-laureate-of-pch/.

Soft Target

The moon is racing thru the clouds
& the piano needs a haircut

Midnight is a sustainable resource

dancing among the deep velvet accessories
assembled here at the bottom of the sea
where you are striding thru the swaying kelp grove
towards me
            every step reinventing the tide pool architecture
as Sirens sing their plaintive doo-wah ditties...

but now we're on the business end of a rainy Thursday
sloshing around in here watching TV with the sound off
I can supply all the dialogue & commentary as needed
or not

            flickering blue light in black & white

            fishtank auras

& not far from here the shoreline is a steel blade
with a serrated edge

Ace of Tentacles

for Micah Ballard

I prefer the laughter of strangers
to the photo op I missed on purpose
as it may be the only remaining evidence
of an inner war of attrition I tend to gloss over

livid with ritual anomalies I could fake but
couldn't explain even if I wanted to

Ceremonies of crushed glass might ignite the
sea-mist in somebody's dream
where I'm feeling conspicuously invisible
as always when I'm holding

but only to sidestep a rendezvous of bad intentions
with braided sunlight knocking on the sheet
music as a shadow might tune the hibiscus
an octave higher

That first cold plunge into salt foam
dealing you a hand from the bottom of the deck
as if haunt & fortune determined in the trim

& though I may strum lost chords you
might find that the tune is vaguely familiar
a midnight sun at high noon folded into a sound

"Love's Apparition & Evanishment"
in 3/4 time

Metaphysical Therapy

for Leweye

"Time's winged chariot" can be a real clunker, you know?
gears grinding, wings creaking
barely avoiding tree branches, telephone poles & other obstacles
                                           (fainting Desdemona of the Andes
                                           for example)

Today the open sky has been shut down for repairs
& the detour takes us thru Pasadena by way of Kathmandu

At least the radio works

We listen to Lightnin' Hopkins singing C.C. Rider thru the wrong end 
of a steel culvert ("Seeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-
See Rider
                           see what
                                                   you done
                                                                             done")
sounding a whole lot like a redwing blackbird 
serenading the 405 at rush hour
in the rain

The Wrong Goodbye

Fire-breathing dragons, leviathans & Godzillas
emerging from the deep
         along w/something that resembles an
                                                  octopus in a leotard?

The setting sun burns a hole in the dark silk sky

                  a wall of fog drifting in off the water...

you thought it looked like Frida Kahlo descending a staircase
         I thought it looked more like Percy Sledge in a limousine

The cypress sighs
                      a breezy whistle
                                            shadows on pebbled glass

The steep fogmist gave me yet another reason
to double back thru the cuts

                     Ape in the rain at Cuernavaca
                                           versus dice games on the ocean floor

There's no equivalent & no disclaimer

silk & neoprene
                                           variations on a theme

from one slippery mind to another