As I forgave that vision in white…
forgave that dreamy crooner,
burning, high in the too-sweet blue;
just so, did I cotton to the rites
late after the end of sunset’s fossil moon.
At the bitter bark of twenty-one…
muzzled, sharp; lying, cold;
she had spilled salt, sniffling a song
which rang at the roses dying.
Might I cost you a feather or two?
You who had punched the first in line?
Forgiven, but not so fast…
As it was wrong, wrong, wrong to do.
Forgiven, but pay the piper, you must.
Grief is woven of bright threads…
and tears break, like waves, the strongest men;
as the clock winds down, and the days unfurl
we find our price is easily met…
In a Fall of Roses
Love, it seems, is for the weary of heart
and that heart not taken is a heart unseen...
what pearl is this, not wanted, not claimed,
that a child had found, and is hers to keep?
Old matron, I saw those many years
of struggles and lazy-boned beer drinking pigs.
You shouldered a burden I could not have borne...
how I wish you had a shoulder to cry on.
Old spinster, I rue you your cup of tea...
that man never came with his flowers and poems.
Yes, tears so bitter that they burn your dress...
no, I could not have been so true.
Old widow, I remember a sunset rose
that bloomed in a sky I have yearned to see...
and with my lover I'll know that eve
once scrawled with a crayon with a childish ease.
Old soldier, those many years have gone,
since, without thinking, you had scarred her love.
With you all, I bitterly disagree...
and keep my ashes in a pickle jar.
Where Once a Treasure Lay
The world's heart, it is no more.
Goliath lives, and Davy slain...
I wonder what this rose is for?
Now empty, where once was a door
to spirit, smiles, romance and rain...
the world's heart, it is no more.
How easy tear-stained paper tore,
and lover's words, now all in vain.
I wonder what this rose is for?
Her vows and secrets all were swore
in whispers, in the coffin, lain...
the world's heart, it is no more.
A world's love was needed more,
like mother's milk, will leave a stain...
I wonder what this rose is for?
Feed the hungry, house the poor,
an old soft-shoe with hat and cane...
the world's heart, it is no more,
I wonder what this rose is for?
A Perspective on Myself
Having no tail,
and no way of getting one,
I decided to embark
on a journey.
I looked into my soul,
or what I thought was my soul,
looking for some perspective
on how to see myself.
I acquired a perspective,
or many perspectives...
but, one perspective, I particularly liked...
or many perspectives...
Never did I find
my self-image.
I think I used to have one...
now I think I have many.
Who is it, in here,
and what do I look like?
Rather, how do I imagine myself?
Or, what do I see?
A Garden, Graced
I am pondering
your gifts to the lily,
the same as
your gifts to me.
Your water, clean,
has soaked the dirt
where never I
have healed the hurt,
sweet breath of air
beneath your skirt
may never
a prisoner, free;
yet the same
are your gifts to me.
The turn of your spade
in fertile soil
for which you give
your time to toil
won't leave the fruit
to the sun to spoil,
won't yet
make a blind man see;
still the same
as your gifts to me.
The song of your heart
as it springs to your lips,
as you tend the beds
on the breeze, it slips,
and the dance of the bees
in the bend of your hips
will not keep the axe
from the tree;
still as bright
are your gifts to me.
Insinuation
There are plenty of
plain-spoken men wearing wool
who won't have anything to do with it. . .
plenty of woolen women
who never asked Manny to fly.
Moss covers you, lover. . .
moss all over your gown,
and your eyes, and your breast.
Graft with the moss-covered men
Who climbed to the top of the candle.
Yarn is one cost with knitting;
pennies for lengths of yarn.
Needles as long as the evening,
sighing and pointy-sharp, yawn.
Once, you'd fit that small sweater.
Hearts all encrusted with silver;
you had made the mice bullion. . .
grey had worn the top-hat lightly.
Who won that cold prisoner?
Won him over to moans?
There is a stone never acknowledged
over pepper, over bone,
in the world of ocean spray. . .
wind all over the globe. . .
I had walked that wind.
Slowly
All words lost
to that sad, sadistic, grind. . .
waiting. . .
for the goose-step hands
of another recalcitrant clock
to fold up our prayer. . .
ghost
Squeal of brat
jams mom’s cogs;
TV barks fiction
at her only no.
Voodoo pride,
pinning her down. . .
cramp
Just a second, there. . .
just a moment of your time.
I'll make it quick.
Sometimes its blue,
sometimes red. . .
just a reminder
Relax, baby-blue. . .
give up your flapper;
busting up skies,
and Joe, downwind.
Walk ten paces
and turn around. . .
no one
The Lost Pursuit
Over the hedge and up the stair,
away from the killer that follows, slow.
I am after him on a whispered dare.
I have met a dream whose fate I share...
to believe is to double what we already know.
Over the hedge and up the stair.
My pursuer is back behind, somewhere,
he is lost at the edge of the noonday glow.
I am after him on a whispered dare.
He knows where I travel so my chances are spare,
and though he will find me, the enigma will grow,
over the hedge and up the stair.
Eventually, he must come, and meet what's there.
Though he lives to conquer, I have struck a blow;
I am after him on a whispered dare.
As he grapples with butterflies, light, and rare;
as the melons ripen in a weedy row;
I
am over the hedge and up the stair,
though I'm after a killer on a whispered dare.
For the Fine Hours
I whisper the words she wants to hear…
the words she longs for me to say;
as long as I do, she will keep me near.
When I said goodbye, I saw a tear,
she doesn’t believe me anyway…
I whisper the words she wants to hear.
She said if I murmured in her ear,
she wouldn’t listen, but that I may,
as long as I do, she will keep me near.
I cannot touch her heart, I fear,
though I tell myself I’ll find a way.
I whisper the words she wants to hear.
I have loved her now for over a year,
but it’s not the same as yesterday;
as long as I do she will keep me near.
Of all the things that I hold dear…
first is the love that’s gone away.
I whisper the words she wants to hear;
as long as I do she will keep me near.
Within Our Smiles
She was barely a whisper
and I was almost a shadow...
somehow, though, we
were heard, and seen
in a quiet moment when
the tatters of an old shirt
flapped gently in the breeze.
She walked that line with such grace,
such easy steps
that I was caught up in a breeze
that moved me along...
with her, beside her, and inside her.
The shadows stripped naked
and danced with one single flame
that the trees had known in a roar
and that a match had known to strike.
You, old sun, know not at all, fire...
you are an old goat...
you and your weedy pasture.
A damned old crow
watched from atop a high tree
he could see our spirits
leap into the sky;
up away, and past him
into the clear blue.
The words cannot say it,
nor the shadows betray it...
the sun can't shine on it,
nor the crow bear true witness...
all I am, and all I have been
in a quiet, breathy word.
Without a Fight
The world is wrong,
the love is right...
how do you know when love is true?
...when fires flare, and love turns blue?
Witness now
my helpless plight...
I am caught in a dream of loving you,
fated for love, whatever I do.
Like the strike of a match,
like a sparrow in flight...
an energy quivers me, through and through,
along with the sun, it rises, too.
I have seen you, there,
with a second sight...
how this is so, I haven't a clue,
but the well was there, and the water, I drew.
It has been a long while
since the future looked bright...
perhaps I am drunk on a witches brew?
What is this dream I've stumbled onto?
Press
Rollers print out nameless papers, stanchions of missing axioms, epilogue for a time unfinished and deep in shadows. Letters inscribed as reminders of the passage of time. Words on forms whispering of light and consequence after storm.
Feed impression, let springs and gears dwell and return, turning the stationary axle. Standard will apply, ink for half-tone in reservoir, reciprocating matrix working for fixtures of press. Flatbed holds paper, ripe for print.
Ocean of type, roll and crash, waves eroding the beach of misconception, tired eyes fastening on facts, listless runners on a track of time. This process, pages of shadowy ruminations, left like sand crabs on the white dunes.
Feeding my creature, the wind, ink is stamped on newsprint, and stains the apron of the printer. Given unto substance, rife with sums and remainders, words give motion to concepts full of momentum, the free flow of information following its own channels.
Partial to sense, night wills portent to the ink plate. Open window, scatter tickets to the ocean of swells. Spoor of tiger, find teeth in list of spoken words. Cast its spell on living carpet, asymmetrical and often apart from broken bones. Stones rise up and take their life from whirlwinds, address to cut gems.
Echoes of lost print, incinerated in the fires of now lifeless dictators’ iron-fisted commands. These veiled words, parcel and part of shrouded history, dance in the endless flames of relevance. Shadowed relativity, the starry sky of evolution’s science, is yet the source of cultural potential, and is lightened and informed by our presses.
Words are stolen and left in boxes, to be opened and laid bare, subject to our most assiduous examinations.
Rack and ribs, parcel of stamps, notice side arm, working apparatus. Spare ink roller, position counterweight on shaft, use grippers. Paper rolls out printed black and white, storied of madness and mayhem, spelling out a veil between man and his oxen.
Books, elements of literature, stacked on shelves and tucked away in dusty libraries, draw on resources of language, make their imprint on culture.
Seeds of knowledge, grow fruit of wisdom on your long, green vines. Spell out consequence on your typewriter, asking not for the aid of myth or dogma. Trails of opinions lead to rocky caves, where trouble lives and hands out clues.
Night resides in emptiness, while the results of education brightens and pushes back the shadows of ignorance and misconception. Trickle of resource, spring of fresh ideas, turn your trick on ill-founded axioms. Wash away fear and oppression, which limp through the statues of great men.
Crank and cylinder, open our eyes to the motion and action of the press. Oil springs, lever, and chase hook, for the freedom and lack of friction that would otherwise compromise our easy access to information. Congress and commerce depend on your shining machinery.
Untold stories grace your product, disseminate and distribute ttales heretofore lost in legend. Time offers a place for new ideas, and spaces on shelves beckon. Ask rooster for the spelling of dawn.
Imprint of question, reveal crime to hesitant leader, opulence disguised as beneficent pause. Stale exclamation, voice your worries, steal away from prisons on golden road. Diet of cotton candy for babies of wealthy mules. Sharp prick of station, regulation and order for houses under night.
Standing on tower, suited man drops leaflets to waiting masses. Full of lies, they are merely leaves from a dying tree. Their temporary stance is one of laughter and luck. Time passes up these empty proclamations.
Bucket of words, spill over lies, drown in happy effulgence deception and trickery. Stare down well, slip over shadow, skip past gaps in rectitude.
All consequences are stagnant and rusty, but press runs freely, giving to spatial frames their resilience and free motion. They oil the compromises and agreements of civilization.
Society rumbles and moans as the engine of culture stands on the precipice. Its workings find respite in the calm cool water of sanity. Numbers on the march, an account of every transfer from friction to fact.
Sections of a chapter of a law book apply to ounces of prevention, reeling out the cries of the victims. Share bread with wise man, wine with the beggar, and honey with the bees. Treasures hide in dark corners, locked in boxes, stories of fear balanced by counterweight.
Farthing for an ounce of silver, token of recollection, reflection of a teardrop. Impression of enumerated honeycombs, dance with coils of memory. All impressed on paper, a show of reason and hypothesis, axiom and theory. Spider’s web left dry and silky in tree.
Delicate framework s
peaks to repetition of print. Stamp your voice on white paper, a reminder of past successes and revelations. The slow hand of reason guides all effort. Find stability in balanced responses to excess.
Staring eyes glimpse the bones of a stairway to high positions, a landing from which you a can see the occupation of man whistling and crackling far down below. In the absence of a ruling power, people rely on their resources to show them paths to peaceful and secure lives.
Mail your letters, post your handbills, hang your banners, they tell the story. People walk from long distances to respond to them. They will talk of their opposition to your pressure for new applications of resource.
Time will pass, and heavy-handed power wielding rulers will stumble away, on the path to forgotten mystery. But time and its passions are recorded in ink by the presses, and digging will uncover their missteps.
The Journey of Words
Just as I was leaving
She reminded me of a promise
I made, not thinking
It would be remembered
Why, I can't say
I don't believe, not a word
Though it's written on stone
Stones wear away with time
And people grow old and forgetful
I am glad I am not a stone
Were I an old man
And all my words stretched out behind me
I would rest easy, knowing
That the pages of that long, long book
I had read, and read again
Some riddles are very easy
And some are very hard
A few riddles ask questions
That only the very wise can answer
And some no one can
I don't know why it rains
And I don't know why the ocean roars
I don't know why dogs bark
I don't know why people grow old
And I don't know why I gave her my heart
Promises live somewhere in our hearts
And promises die somewhere on stone
When written on stone, a promise
Takes awhile to wear away
In our hearts, promises weather the storm
All the promises I have broken
Still live, somewhere in my heart
But on stone they have worn away
Time has made this happen
Time and its sandy wind
Compulsion
It's the race you couldn't win...
it's the race you couldn't run...
it's the race you couldn't keep from happening...
It's the enemy you couldn't beat...
it's the enemy you couldn't fight...
it's the enemy you couldn't pacify...
It's the wrong you couldn't right...
it's the wrong you couldn't speak to...
it's the wrong you couldn't stop in its tracks...
It's the crime you couldn't deter...
it's the crime you couldn't talk about...
it's the crime you couldn't legislate against...
It's the drug you couldn't quit...
it's the drug you had to take...
it's the drug you never wanted at all...
A Balanced Unit
Well...express some love
for your fellow human beings...
try not to be too cynical.
Don't put too much stock
in the ability of one person
to control the actions of another.
Don't take too much,
and give when you can.
Have a little romance,
spread a little hope,
a little joy.
If you should find it in yourself
to want to show
fondness and gentleness
to someone like yourself,
by all means, don't hold back.
Don't be afraid
to admit that you need,
and don't be afraid to admit
that there are
things in the world
to be afraid of.
Be the person that you can be,
and not the person
that everybody knows you are...
be yourself.
In Seeking a Home
You offer no refuge from the evil man;
no safe harbor in which to moor and wait
while the pirates go off in search of other prey.
You offer no freedom from his mean blade,
his curses and his rum,
his threats and extortion.
We have no respite from the criminal mind;
from that bending of wills to the service of ill.
Where may I beam the if not billow and bail?
To a wind the unfettered by malice and gloom,
as words, to the roses, are carried by the bees;
and yet he skulks in my sitting room.
You offer no shelter from the arrows;
no castle within which magic is worked
to keep off the Huns and their robbing and woe.
No hidden doors, no secret rooms.
No game of feathers, to the archer, is immune,
but, so fast is the breaking of arrow on stone.
You offer no shield from the cloak and dagger;
no bold resistance to their shadowy plans,
an agenda of lies, conspiracy, and slander.
I cannot wrest from that sinister man
the key to the freedom to which I aspire,
free from the knot of blindfold and gag.
You offer no sanctuary from the kicks and blows
of those to whom my crumbling is an object and goal;
no guarantee of safety from he who would command.
How to avoid the prison cell he'll keep me in till dawn,
the shackles he would see me in till execution morn,
for spitting on the truce he promised with fingers crossed behind.
To all who would work to contain my voice;
to the architects and pawns of that evil design;
the blood of your victims is warning enough.
You've, allies and angels, corrupted in kind.
You've safety and harbor from any dissent,
but to me, you will offer up no more bribes.
After we Gathered the Wood
Although the moon was dark upon that night,
we could see by the torch we'd lit up in the gray.
I disagreed that the cabin lie over that way,
and we argued about it loudly in the flickering light.
We could argue about it till dawn came, rosy and bright,
or I could play along. Whatever you say,
I hadn't forgotten the pine where I saw that jay,
that stood behind us, now lost and out of sight.
I'm an agreeable man, though I don't like to stray
over hill and dale for nothing, but, rather than fight,
I told her we'd wander the path where she said it lay.
I imagine if I were a fish, I'd end up a bite,
and if I were a boat, I'd float by the dock in the bay...
to make a long story short, this time she was right.
A Day in the Park
That bird did spread its wings, and came aloft
from tree branch tied with limbs and leaves and hue;
and flapped and climbed, up empty sky so blue...
I admired its easy ascent, graceful and soft.
I followed with my eyes the soaring arc;
the lift and glide of feathers, wings, and air,
as the jay became a part of the sky, so fair...
in the self-contained world of the city park.
Up above this lake of grass and trees
the jay is beckoned by a stretch of limb,
sunlit in cove of branches, as she sees.
With graceful curve, alighting on this turn
she cries a brief reminder to the
spring
that any male that tries, she'll likely spurn.
A Prick in the Wool
Imprisoned in the gentle curl of a lock,
an archer’s whispers quietly dangle and burn,
as under the moon, he casually takes his turn…
with silvery fumbles, the arrow is drawn and knocked.
Quick, and sweet, slipping into the flock,
he sings his lullaby tune, hard and stern,
for the lamb he wants, and from the butter churn,
butter for bread and dawn for crowing cock.
No rose on a dirty grave, no brassy urn
for the mutton, won, now boiled in onion stock,
tender, tasty, and choice, as we’re to learn.
The sunrise comes up fast with revealing shock,
and how with a hapless bleat can she rightly spurn
the stew of his boiling ardor, thrown in a crock?