What am I but a commercial painter
making the same strokes over and over on black velvet nap
always charging the same prices
always settling for less
I know you, too,
paint the same pictures over and over
that’s how I can sell you mine.
— Zumwalt (1991)
asleep
My arm fell asleep
one night
and I wiggled my fingers
and then wiggled my hand
and then even my entire arm
yet numbness prevailed.
My heart fell asleep
one night
and I didn’t much care
about the starving children in East Africa
or the endangered whales in Western Alaska.
My brain fell asleep
one night
and I could no longer sort out
why I was here
or where I needed to go.
These tiny thin-tooth bedbugs bite at my body
munching on my toes,
pilfering fluids from my fingertips.
I stay awake itching
but itching only
makes the itching worse.
I, myself, somehow, finally fell asleep one night
and since then
I bounce from night
to night
forgetting everything
that happened in-between.
— Zumwalt (2011)
science delivers
Some order off the menu
I fancy what I can fancy;
I imagine whatever I imagine
And science delivers.
Give me a 
continually brined,
triple-hearted,
blue-blooded,
color-changing,
golden-pink,
cerulean-ringed
octopus
with drops of venom on the side
just enough to kill a full-grown gorilla.
Then I’ll try a portion of nearly translucent,
high-altitude,
streaky,
wispy,
cirrus clouds
made of hexagonal prismic plate crystals
converting sunlight
into a dazzling fire rainbow.
Follow that with hundreds of hyper-velocity stars
spit from the galaxy’s center,
millions of years ago
moving more than a million miles an hour
careening through a galaxy
that is held together by
cosmically-aged cold dark matter.
Top it all off with
various flavors of increasingly attractive quarks and anti-quarks:
up,
down,
charm,
strange,
top and
bottom
with various
spins,
color charges (red, green, blue),
masses,
and electric charge
assembled in
various palatable forms
from simple, garden variety protons and neutrons
to Sigma-sub-bees and Xi-sub-bees
to highly anticipated anti-matter anti-hypertritons.
Yep!,
I imagine what I imagine
and it’s just a matter of time
before science delivers.
What cannot be imagined
will not be.
What cannot be,
will not be imagined.
No price is too high
No wait is too long,
but clearly
being on good terms
with the head chef
ensures
some notable advantage.
-Zumwalt (2011)
In contest with a hippopotamus
me and the hippo
race
to lose weight
at such a frantic yet erratic pace
me and the frutifly vie
to try to not age
to postpone the next stage
to delay each and every turn of every single page
Hey babe! What? I’m staying away from the eggs.
And the butter.
So don’t stay away from me.
Hey boy! Look — I am not old.
I expect to send tingles down your spine,
not receive a courteous nod like you’d give to your great grandmother
several years after she’s been buried.
Gee.
This dog I have smells.
No bath rids the odor.
No change of diet freshens the breath.
The only remaining option is to the change the dog
for I am getting tired of changing the carpet.
me and the sunset
will meet again
at some appointed time
until then I compete against the shadow it causes the body to cast
seeking any remaining light while vanishing in the darkness
— Zumwalt (May 1991)
Runiverse
She radiates brilliance based on fine features,
good form and skillfully applied cosmetics.
He balances confidence and accessibility
with an unerring certainty of success.
The universe is expanding,
Inflation rampant,
Stretching everything more than any yoga instructor would
allow.
Our planet is stuck in motion
at hundreds of thousands kilometers per second.
I stock up on Dramamine and Ginger Ale.
She worries that she will never see him again.
He is lost in the business of the day.
These galaxies race away from us faster than
the speed of light
And are accelerating more each trillionth of a second.
Some Alien out there has calculated that
this is the last week to
DVR an episode of the Game of Thrones
before losing all contact.
Some Star Watcher is now
stuck with a static picture
of this faraway galaxy from here on out.
She is not simply a set of particles:
she is moving very fast.
In relation to her changing position in space,
he is moving even faster.
This universe is not stable;
It strays too far from itself
Running away from a past that was too small.
This universe is accelerating
As if it has immunity from moving violations
Or has appropriately mounted a very good radar detector.
One day her particles and his
Will dance tumultuously in the debris encircling some
infant sun
Or get pulled into a
black hole.
She radiates,
He balances,
The universe inflates,
Stretching everything way beyond belief
And ultimately, slightly out of reach.
— Zumwalt (2011)
nominal thought
Without forms, phones and Facebook,
there’s not much need to have a name when you’re dead.
— Zumwalt (2011)
Of Contrary Motion
The notes go 44 this way and 44 that.
You pick the upper half.
The low ones are much more attractive.
How can I boogie-woogie without the bass?
How do you manage staying sweet and serene?
It’s not melody I need, it’s the rumble of solid earth.
It’s not the airy fluff that keeps me filled, it’s the meat and potatoes of life.
As you go up, I go down.
To the right you go,
I am off to the left.
And yet on your rare descents
And my occasional rising up
We meet.
And in those moments,
past the awkward near-collisions,
we again are as one
and forsake our vows of yin and yang.
— zumwalt (2011)
Better than
The land and water is haunted with beasts.
Some are carnivorous;
Some are microscopic;
None are smart like us
or entitled to dine at a good restaurant.
They think, we think, but differently.
None speak Mandarin or Cape York Pidgin English.
They have offspring and some care for their young,
Some eat their young,
But not a one makes contributions to a college fund.
I can wear them as hats, or mount them on my wall
But I can’t suffer this idea that they deserve representation in Congress.
I can grill them on coals, or tie them to my sled
But I won’t consider giving them my email address.
Evolution is a dusty and poorly mapped path
Nonetheless, it does not cross upon itself
And head back many miles
So that one easily confuses the end with its beginning.
It doesn’t jump from amoebas to mudfish and then back down to insects
then jump up to chimpanzees, over to worms and across to chihuahuas.
It progresses steadily, more or less,
from moss to shrimp to clown fish
to red-legged frog to crocodile
and then on to penguin or duck,
next visiting the platypus,
on to rabbits and rats
and terriers and tigers,
or lemurs and monkeys
and gibbons, gorillas,
bonobos, and our friends next door,
the Millers.
At the top are we,
and granted certain privilege and priority.
We can extend our parking lots
and re-engineer the best sun-bathing spots.
At the peak are we
with our rhubarb pie and peach-ginger iced tea.
We have power of attorney to set fires to ancient trees
and reclaim land from the South China Sea.
The air and ocean is haunted with creatures.
Some are carniverous;
Some are microscopic;
None should have free trespass without our permission.
We should put up security gates
And start up detailed dossiers.
Every genus should have a dedicated database;
Every species captured in a redundant set of disk arrays.
They may think that we think they are not much different than we
But none speak Mandarin, Hindi, Hungarian or Burmese.
They have offspring so that their lineage continues on
But that’s up to us and little to do with them.
We may not hang on.
We are a destructive bunch
With a vicious knock-out punch.
We may not survive the dawn,
but if we do manage to last
and hold on as the entitled upper class
they need to take note
most carefully
that we not only own all we buy, lease or see
but in the end,
we can certainly ensure
that none of them,
aggressively,
or at their leisure,
pass us
on any given branch
of the post-Darwinian,
well groomed,
often pruned,
evolutionary
tree.
— Zumwalt (2011)
manic defensive
you increasingly tax yourself
draining resources
to protect against countries not yet on any map
increasing the deficit
inadvertently but effectively inhibiting productivity
you increasingly ask yourself
about potential dangers
unseen, unheard, and unimagined
escalating this monologue
extending your enclosure
inappropriately but efficiently prohibiting new activity
this enemy is inescapable
indefensible
inexhaustible
this enemy is indefinable
inexplainable
incomprehensible
indescribable
we watch where once was wonder
now
is preemptive concern
we watch where once was welcome
now
is just an overly aggressive strategy
to avoid getting irreparably burned
you build a war-head-woven, awkwardly weaponed wall that uses every available resource
to protect against inadvertent encroachment
or accidental contact
you endlessly engineer an increasingly entangled, enemy-engaging entrapment
that escalates every single skirmish into another world war.
this enemy is exactly
as you imagine
this enemy is kept alive
by every single missile that is manufactured for your future use
you say it’s time to end this all
either by self-destruction or surrender
you understand that victory is not a condition
only just the irreversible promise of more bloodshed yet to come
–Zumwalt (2011)
Time
Time is a concept
By which we can relate energy and space.
I’ll say it again,
Time is a concept
By which we can relate energy and space.
I don’t believe in time zones.
I don’t believe in time clocks.
I don’t believe in the World Time Server.
I don’t believe in timeshares.
I don’t believe in Daylight Savings Time.
I don’t believe in egg timers.
I don’t believe in timesheets.
I don’t believe in quality time.
I don’t believe in real time applications.
I don’t believe in Time Magazine.
I don’t believe in time outs.
I don’t believe in the New York Times.
I don’t believe in railway timetables.
I don’t believe in reunions in Times Square.
I don’t believe in triple overtimes.
I don’t believe in Time Travel.
I don’t believe in the end of time
I don’t beleive in the beginning of time
I don’t believe in Once Upon a Time!
I just believe in space,
space and energy.
And that’s reality.
The poem is over.
Not.
–Zumwalt
