Raindrops splattered across the squeaky window as Lily slipped into a world entirely her own. She found out that the slightly dilapidated beige sofa can provide an alarmingly pacifying dark fortress.
It was the storm in her living room which led her to this point.

Her mother was a peculiar human in the aspect of coping methods. Most would turn to alcohol, but Lily's mother turned to books.

One would think a child of such age possessed great privilege, having such a mosaic of resources on literature, words, and literacy.

Every morning, Lily's mother would slip into a world entirely her own. Some days, her face would hold the cover of a Patrick O'Brian and other sleepy days would entail a bit of nineteenth-century British novels. Whatever the cover, the woman's disposition was also affected.

"Lily, listen to this- doesn't it sound blue?" The woman hoarded phrases from each book, and soon, Lily's mother was an endless world of words. Her mother's affinity for quotes turned into a tasteful obsession. Lily was naive to the abnormalities in associating words with colors; such as ‘nebulous' with orange, and 'surreptitious' with purple. To her, language was rich in color and feeling.

One might also surmise a girl with such enlightenment would take after her progenitor. Lily did not. Though, she was above her class in reading comprehension and competency, the very thought of books sent flashes of buried grudges.

"Everyone needs a therapist. The poor girl's been through so much," they say. 'They' being the individuals at church. After service, the doors would open. Lily would do everything in her power to weave around the sea of meaty vociferous faces. She didn't need their pity. Nothing happened.

'Nothing' meaning... perhaps a little something. Her father died. This, (Lily suspected) was the cause of her mother's book addiction. It must be peculiar for the spectator witnessing the situation from above. As we've stated before: most turn to alcohol.

Years elapsed in which an occurrence she termed, "The Rebellion," began her mother’s book exodus. She was never truly present and Lily desired for her to see the world as it was now- not in a novel or in the pages of fantasy.

The piano rang throughout the room every morning and every night for about an hour. Lily often turned to classical Vivaldi, Yiruma, or a dash of Paganini piano covers. She drank music like a shriveled sponge. Of course, her hobbies would be as far away from books as possible since she believed them to be an obligatory evil.

Tunes danced across her soul like the ghost of a memory almost arising. The voice of a piano carried bursts of purples, yellows, and reds. White and black keys proved unchanging and reliable. Lily latched to the idea.

"I'm going to play her out." The mourning doves cooed in the almost-vacant neighborhood, while two girls of the same height and age were ensconced under a magnolia tree near the street, their legs crisscrossed on grass.

"Too much piano?" Haley asked, plucking a dandelion from its roots while squeezing milky sap from the stalk with her fingernails.

"No, I want to." Lily answered.

A thought crossed her mind. Each book infested mother with unique feelings. Then, Lily deduced there is no such thing as too much piano.











It was quiet in the house as Lily had no siblings and the book-trace rendered mother speechless. Tape recorder near the piano, and fingers at the keys, she began playing au fait on her version of Vivaldi's Spring Season. She kept the imagery of wedding cake and rings in her mind. She introduced the song to her hands by means of segmented versions, leading towards the final masterpiece. Her aural senses acute, listening for the best complimentary notes. Soon, her fingers had written poetry. She liked to think that her left and right hand owned different stories to perform, yet once they met on-stage, they heightened the essence of each other's tales.

Lily played verses countless times until she was out of breath. If someone told her piano was a sport, Lily would concur.












The final piece was recorded on an 'old-fashioned' tape. Heart pounding, she tiptoed upstairs to her mother's hiding place.

"...a thin place where tissue paper separates the material from the spiritual.." the woman greeted Lily. She never looked up from her book.

"Listen, it's white,” the woman voiced hazily. Lily shoved the tape in her face. The mother’s hand reached out from behind the book, feeling the air before finally resting her hand on the plastic rectangle, sliding it into the player

and the music journeyed to her ears.

"Hmmm..." she said. And then all was quiet.










"I've got her." Lily declared in the convenience store on a rainy day.

"With a cake?"

"It was her wedding song. You know- the one playing while the bride walks in."

"What'd she say?"

"Nothing."

"Why can't you just wake her up with some coffee?" Haley suggested as a golden aurora arose from behind the clouds.

Most of Lily’s playing sessions caused her to neglect her own physical well-being. So she rinsed a dusty plastic cup from the cupboard and filled it with water. M&Ms were food Lily associated with her sessions and she couldn't play without developing that deep-rooted Pavlovian response. Finally, in an attempt to be healthier, a plastic water cup was to her right, and M&Ms in a bag were to her left on the piano seat.

But first, a small kick in her belly drove her to a slight guilt. See, she believed in music the way some do religion, and thus, she did what others do when confronted with a critical moment in life.

"I'll bring her out," she began, "and I'll play for the rest of my life. If I can't, I'll give up music forever." She placed her fingers on the keys, completing the oath. And this occurred only because she was twelve and incredulously naïve in the field of religious traditions, that she didn't know that most oaths offered to a deity of higher power involved some form of great sacrifice for a desired result. This meant that her risk was greater than others, as it meant winning or losing it all.

Lily drew a deep breath, filling her nose with the memories of coffee. She began playing. An odd little tune traveling from her brain to the keys before her.










"Remember me, when we lived far away, down in the lonely lighthouse..." her mother chanted and Lily only half listening as she painted the cover of a CD containing her finished piano piece: Coffee.

"The sea air- spill in that lighthouse. The comfort we felt in that lighthouse." Her mother continued absorbing the ink on the pages, "Remember me, when I flew away with that chilling, cold sea breeze..."

Lily clicked the clear cover shut, handing it to the "Collective Works of Julie G." Once again, a wandering hand shot out from behind the cover, searching for the CD. Her mother did not look up.

"Music or an experiment?" she asked

"We'll see." Lily answered.

Her mother raised the CD to her player and inserted the disk, pressing play. Her wandering hand felt a small cup of coffee and as the music played, she sipped it slowly- quite peculiar. Her eyes looking up from the pages as though she were staring at something far away and her face, rubescent.

"Where did you learn to play that?" she said, leaning back and closing her eyes.








Haley and Lily entered a quintessential music store. Guitars lined the walls and classic vinyls were stacked on shelves. Small sleek keyboards welcomed guests as they stepped inside, synchronous to the resonance of a sharp bell.

Lily sped towards the CD section nestled near the corner in the store, while Haley flipped through the pages of violin classics.

"Lily, you're missing something." Haley noted from across the room, flippantly exasperated.

"Coffee didn't work." Lily replied in despair. "I thought I had her, but I didn’t."

Haley walked back towards her friend, new sheet music in hand, "Everyone's heart breaks a little differently and that means every cure must be unique. But there's something we all need- to feel safe. You did that for her."

"Then why is she still gone?"

"Because In order to return, she needs to remember what she lost and she needs to want it again... hold on." Haley held out a piano book in her hands. It was a neat white book with dark blue ink. Lily furrowed her brows.

"Just read it, Lily." Haley urged in the most loving way possible.









She still refused to use the book, diverging more from Haley’s instruction, cajoling her mother by use of classical music, modern music, and healing music. But nothing resolved and it seemed as though her oath to the Greater Deity would not fall in her favor.


It took a graying day for Lily to dig in her backpack and pull out the vile book. Inside revealed crisp white music sheets.

She itched to throw it away, however, something caught her eyes:

Kiss the Rain.

Lily stopped and stared out the window, inhaling to smell petrichor.

"Well, okay then." she reasoned. She pulled out  the piano bench and began finding the first few notes. The rest fell into sight reading. Just as the rain trickled down the living room window, the music trickled into the home's inhabitants' ears. Rain engulfed her soul.

The piece finished with a light touch on the last note. It resounded through the cozy expanse.









"I have something for you, mom." Lily proclaimed, placing the CD in her mother's hand, which then traveled to the player.

The woman failed to look up from her book, only staring into the distant pages as the notes tapped inside her ears. Ever so slightly, her eyes began to close and Lily could see the notes dancing behind eyelids.

"It feels like... rain." she commented. And as the last tickling touch of the last raindrop echoed through the dark room, her mother looked up, smiling at the sound, and her eyes met her daughter's.

"Why, Lily," she said, her voice laced with surprise, "look how you've grown.”

She spoke
with half-smoked cigarettes
and lilting cursive scribbled over last night’s letter’s return address,
her bags packed with only a backless dress.
Nails dripping black and red
blood and paint indistinguishable
in the darkness of the winding alleyways
zigzagging her heart.
She was truly, unendingly lost
in the mazes of her mind
as she traveled backwards with a string
lazily trailing after broken stilettos.
Yesterday’s rain still dripping from empty window sills
and illuminated by lanterns lit with fireflies
found solace in her silent tears
for they were companions,
cut from the same paper-thin cloth.
Maybe a goddess had worn it once,
but those days were long gone
when she lit it aflame with a cigarette
fresh from her lips.
Desire was never a question —
this she had learned from the fire
overtaking her overflowing mind —
and yet it was soundlessly spoken
on empty bottles
not yet broken and swept up by the sea.
Only the blind man could see her now
just as the deaf girl heard her cries
and thus she remained unanswered.
This, however, she did not mind
for being lost was no longer not a choice.

I lay with two women.

In an Economy seat,
emblematic nowadays of
the global economy,
"value" disguised as
a shrunken package size,
for which the cost thereof
can hardly be described as
economical.

my extremities are engaged in
extreme sport,
my competition,
my aisle mates,
young ladies both.

In recognition of the
early hour of our departure,
I have been awarded by them,
a singular honor,
a distinguished cross, of sorts,
pinned with a medal,
for gallantry under siege,
the medal is not of
two crisscrossed rifles,
but crisscrossed elbows,
for gallantry
upon the cross
of the middle seat.

Blanketed and hooded,
or should I say "hoodied,"
slumber comes too easily to
my young traveling cellmates,
as does the
flexibility of the body.

They seem to revel in the words,
akimbo and limbo,
upon my adjacent
body parts.

My sides, my shoulders,
my haunches and paunches,
punched, pillowed and pilloried,
summarily donated
(with a consent slip
called an airline ticket),
to scientific research:
"In Furtherance of the Study of
Sleeping on Airplanes."

My lap, however, sacrosanct,
how else could I type,
of heartfelt matters,
read on,
for you have been both
punked and pranked!

My mind freely wanders
while body is
captive and captivated,
(did I mention they were
young and attractive?)
to the manner
in which we
juggle proximity.

My darling:
You lie beside me,
a distance of
but a few inches,
but closer still,
for I am inside you,
I am yours
for your flesh,
I take,
a blood vow,
sealed with divine blessings
of mine own composition.

For the children of my children:
You are crosstown,
but I hardly know ya,
I am of your flesh, your blood,
eternal and immutable,
no poem can be allowed
to reveal what I owe you,
secret debts unpayable
till and after
death us do part.

Proximity in my tears,
proximity in my fears
for all of us,
for thoughts of you,
come regular,
with every breath.

Proximity at the cellular level,
until that day your
words first emerge,
your are of me and my issue,
mine to behold,
mine with which to dream,
mind to mind and mine.

So now there are two,
where speech is not
a viable tool.
Know that when
I no longer compose,
I will still eternal communicate
in ways, beyond belief.

You:
So many we touch, so briefly,
lose and fade from daily sight,
yet, forever, treasured,
measure for measured,
each one of you,
parcel posted upon who I am,
the tick in the tock
of my beating heart's
final prayer,
Grace after the Meal of Life.

At my funeral
please inform the rent-a-rabbi,
that I was this and that,
labels to write on post-its,
to be stuck on my gravestone
that no one will come visit,
but please someone,
tell him to say these words:

Between,
there was no between,
there was
no approximation,
no proximity,
there was no scientific instrument extant,
that could measure
the close love,
the heart and home
in which his faith resided,
for those who touched his life.

Fresh cherries, just washed— 
beads of ruby strewn across
white bowl's shiny gloss—

dainty stems crisscrossed.

Beloved Country

To former days I can’t attest did a like occurrence happen before the fall of ancient Rome if so it is not
Recorded what is recorded is the words of Adam’s who spoke about the natural order of things including
The nations he said it is now our solemn duty to manage the decline of this great nation that has been
Birthed did this solitary figure that walked in the dark valley start from that premise or was it another
Form of truth the truth that was blatantly obvious was he like the prophet of old that was told to do
Things before the eyes of Israel each command from God was a man living out an example a living object
Lesson your actions are not without consequence your folly is the tolling of the bell of death this figure
Crisscrossed this nation it held the straining haunting memory of Woody Guthrie, Jack Kerouac but more
Tragic was it a man or not human at all a spirit an angel one thing to have him brush past you were
Drawn to study him intently there was an announcement brimming a pronounced knowing that was
Born upon brooding wings he wasn’t a chameleon but at times he was identifiable with our history as
The time in a suit the dust in his hair his whole being spoke simply twin towers 911 the word from he
Who keeps the nations in peace and safety said this never would have happened if America still prayed
And sought his inexhaustible favor the figure was heard to repeat over and over again Abilene a white
Headed five star General not much when you just say Ike but he was the one that was waiting in the
Wings ready to march onto the world stage in his hands the winds of war were tamed we entered a
Great time of prosperity we took the statement in God We Trust to the depth of our hearts and he
Responded as he always does to that kind of faith broke the grip of tyrants who threatened the world
We were benevolent even saved and rebuilt the lands destroyed by imbeciles who thought they could
Butcher innocent people and a righteous God would look the other way in their deaths justice shouted
The favored words of victory you don’t have to be strong just trust and I will fight your battles then the
Figure is seen in the Haight-Ashbury, San Francisco this is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius it’s also a
Nickel bag of marijuana Nam and a ****** revolution sets the country on a course that you wonder can it
Recover it was pinball on the big scale every thinker and crack *** was listened to you played the game
One brain trust put it that this all started centuries ago they said by looking back we can see how we got
Where we are and where were going they say our crisis today is from the foundation laid by the age of
Reason here are the writing of two essential groups the rationalists and the empiricists. In the 1600’s and 1700’s, strains of humanisistic, man-centered thought came together and flourished, producing a widespread change in assumptions about reality. A group of thinkers known as the Continental Rationalists, composed of Descartes, Leibniz, and Spinoza, assumed on faith the mind’s ability to function correctly, independent of any external guidelines for thought and independent of God’s revelations about his creation. The mind could build a sound, unshakable system of thought; they felt, by deductive reasoning from simple premises, reinforced by truths retained from the biblical worldview from which they could borrow for the sake of convenience.

Then another group of philosophers known as the British Empiricists took things a step further toward modernism. This group, composed of Locke, Berkeley, and Hume, denied the existence of the “innate ideas” held by the rationalists. All that man can know, they proposed, must originate in experience. All “abstract ideas” such as God or truth must derive from some sense impression in order to be intellectually valid.
You approach man in his mind you will find no guards to turn you back no resistance but the truly wise
That are built on this foundation it renders all that is false lifeless and harmless it says “See to it that no
One takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition
And the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ Colossians 2:8 false teaching respects not
Borders or fairness only the power of ruthless lies that seem light as feathers what harm can they do
Put the rest of the picture together feathers on a bird of prey will spread death and terror you walk
Unaware in a violent land you will soon be a victim without remedy and then the man that holds the
Highest office in the land says officially we are no longer a Christian nation but we are opening our arms
To all beliefs and systems of thought if that had been our history you wouldn’t know the world you and I
Live in first we would never had the blessing that enabled us to bless and build the weaker nations
Up where they could stand and make strides against ignorance and poverty I was at the store an old
Gentlemen was setting on a bench and he was shaking from a terrible ailment why didn’t I rush over and
Discuss Plato’s man cave I know in the right situation it has validity only to a point no I dropped my eyes
As my heart broke because of his situation he is my brother not one of a government but of a human
Fact I care because a real God a deity of love flows through my entire physical and spiritual life I don’t
Analyze create the perfect orderly answer I cry out in my lack of understanding please gentle one go
To him be his unshakable rock steady him on the inside the outside passes away that what our figure
Of this story knows we have such riches not in temporal realms but in those that will never falter they
Will only increase in coming days as glory is revealed my figure in this story shows we are being
Destroyed by forgetting who we are where we came from Abraham Lincoln said if we ever come to ruin
It will come from within I doubt if he ever dreamed it would come from the highest elected officials
Again this is all a bad dream if you make a personal and family altar he never has denied the cry of a
Humble and contrite heart this nation is yours not Washington’s fight for it on your knees or stand with
Tears in your eyes like the French when the devil incarnate ****** Pranced about in Paris tears of regret
Or tears that will usher in triumph

Afternoon light cascades onto ocean skin ,
momentarily turning the water a fine gold shimmer -
light dances merrily , shifting as the plane turns southwards - Equator barrier broken

Welcome to the Southern Hemisphere !

Cloud islands mirror
ground islands .

Puff ***** create architectural feats not known to humanity.  
Flowing with the wind , creating substance out of thin air
the ultimate magicians trick ,
Above , thin wisps of stratus clouds brushstrokes seamless onto sky glaringly iridescent and soft all at once.....hey look! ..... way out in the distance , towering cumulus on their way to becoming cumulonimbus thunderstorms , steady growth of stacks even out when a cold air bank has been reached....the sky writes love letters to the earth

in his cloud postcard snapshots , yet - it is a serenade from them both

Earth offers the waters , the dust needed for the molecules to bind together -  sky transmutes them in his belly - with shifting winds and earth curvature the color palate spectrum .

the offspring , playing in between two worlds
belonging to no one arriving and departing , shape shifters

whole landscapes whirling in amongst themselves , remain unseen,  save for the few souls in tin machines hurtling along in the presence of natures finest high sky views.

Azure crisscrossed with opaque whites and rapidly turning dusk eggplant purples , wild and free form mingle with voluptuous orange streams of liquid light , hiding in the shadows the ‘day’ comes to an end ...

Does natures delicate hands sculpt the static water molecules knowing that there is beauty there ,


i have yet to fathom how such a gracious glory goes un noticed by many ,

luckily , for us , as we destroy every other aspect of earths eco system - the bold sky still remains ,

In the city doldrums and slums high rises
or slums on ground
or mansion view

the sky still bears dow the art works of sunset and rise ,
of cloud shifters and shapers , movers and shakers
still offers a connection to natures heart to remind us , of the magnificence that is our world. That is our home,

although - i have been told - under the surface or in this case , above the surface , here too has been attacked , pumping deadly toxic fumes into water ways
and lung ways

knowing all the whilst that this will do more harm than good

and here is where i , still struggle - i’m writing this on the plane -

a carbon dioxide emitting , fossil fuel guzzling , corporate ******* of a business .

but i need to get places , and go long distances in the shortest amount of time possible ..

the curves on my
frame are the lines of
a sketch bent slightly
too far; i'm an awkward
angle in geometry
class no one dares to
find and this tiny black

dress is revealing too
much in too little
time. the whispers of
crisscrossed marked
thighs and starry knees
swirl before me and i'm

gone, disconnected. they say
black is slimming but
i've never felt more
potent and i hope
to god no one can see
right through me.

formal dances aren't
ideal for the invisible.

Nostradamus and sleeping prophet's One lost image of the singular Eye

Re(ad(d): No worry
To, Love Our Sun :).

Signs like Gemini is to air
Sagittarius is to fire a pair
in this crossing with Pisces
to water is Virgo for earth
too We are the mutable ones!!
Sunny is however we coin the calling spiraling too
EYE of the One generation transmutable souls of soil ARE
to earth; 'hues EYED like a butterfly, here to sample many flowers
connected within a Great Spirit invoked as in wilds if peopled or things'!!!
We do feel it within or without the actual considerations of the ultimate doings;
'letting go and taking the risk of trusting and depending on another'!!! One by one!!! :)
EYE of humus hued in spirit and love fused to the stone's twirling and of the ruse's tolling
So many of paths we traverse here as on earth the singular EYE knows out on the HORIZON
The great Eye is too glued on Sunny Sun's ever evolving viewing's as hued spirits cross          EYE'S
Our blinded one eye's longing to Lyra's lyre, great musician Orpheus winging, whose           W
music tamed wild beasts, caused rivers to stop flowing and enchanted even gates                    S
to the Lord of the Dead Hades, the softly lit fire singing inside linking heaven                            A              
to earth viewed from outsider's hues waxing and waning of sleep wakened                              I N
so ode to the moon in the darkness of night gives but who takes her softer                               F USED
delight when One day halves by sun setting all ebbs in flowing as tides                                       B I           
to Great oceans moved like hearts breathe air to presence's emoting                                              STAR'S  
from magic to tragic we long of ecliptic traces cryptically erasing                                                      W
the blindness of memory and sight' majestic beast's floundering                                                      ­      I
a forever crisscrossed from the One Eye here now to Knight's                                                         ­       N
dear lost forbidden inner retreats from the East to God's lost                                                             ­        'S
children cast out to the land from blood pooling in spoils                                                                        O
as easily uncovered as readily as new western lands had                                 ~/ E \~                               N  
claim maddened ravaged savagely eagerly discovered                                 ~(:YES :)~                          G
fear still rocks this boat with hope still sailing onward                                (:FORGIVEN:).                       'S

Painted ponies of the Paiute
Run against the sky
Cracked lightning lights the orange fire
Desert winds stoke whipping flame
Eagle flies blind to the sun
Scorpion strikes out in vain
Antelope leap crisscrossed arroyo
Coyote calls across the sand
Thatched huts explode in maelstrom storm
First People’s shadows smoke the ground
Clay pots crack and break in time
Fire-cracked stone in communal circles
Markers of forgotten stories
Great Basin parched to cracking lines
Full moon wanes to yellow bone
Awaiting dark clouds quenching rain
And painted ponies once again.

r ~ 6/4/14

Preface:
Even old poets can forget new tricks,
So when toe stubbed and ah ha benedicted,
Causes you to remember what you once knew,
It feels even better, like being crazy
Once in awhile,
Or wearing an untrimmed chest Jason smile.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



Eons ago converted to a new religion,
The Church of Free Verse.

If life be variable,
Usually unrhymed
A pencil sketch of crisscrossed lines,
No fixed metrical pattern assigned,
Than even more so, my poetry.

Once I regretted that the children,
Crack addicted to rhyming,^
Used nickel bags and ******* lines
At the starting gate where all
Our associative poetry journey begins.

Perhaps, a tad arrogant, that diktat,
Nonetheless, unashamedly, nothing to recant.
Words have utility creative, souls innovative,
Free them guised as global explorers,
Make them up, then unleash them
Upon us, yourself, as detectives investigative.

Unchained myself like Houdini,
From water chambers and locks constraini.
What care I for poetic rules and regulations,^^
Got so many points, they tried to suspend
My government-issued poetic license.

Had myself forgot,
That a poem needs a
Frame of jungle gym sounds,
An aural aura resonance unbound.
Purposed to make the heart lift
Your ears say:

Say what!

It needs a tune,
An internal music,
It needs a lilt!
A cadence, that both
Marches and swings,
Even when'd urgent dirge
grief pours forth.

Yes my darling young ones,
Your writ of screams, like Bob Dylan's occasional schemes,
Celebrations of agonized lives of the criminally-pained,
Songs and cants of victims, love-cancer stained,
Require a whining, singsong beat.

{Poems so rad-sad that it makes this Jew
Genuflect and crisscross himself,
That he was blessed with a few good happy years,
In his reincarnated life of
A few centuries long.}

Learn 'em to sing their cries,
Harmonize the internality of love,
Or, even the infernal loss and lack thereof,
For it is the lilt
That makes, transforms a cry into a
Poem.

Even I on death's last stairway step,
When was called by the name of
Nate Hale,
My dying poem lilted, lifted and metered
"I only regret,
that I have
but one life,
to lose,
for my country."

Now you're thinking he is lost it all,
But you would be incorrect for sure.

He found it.

The lilt of life that makes him rise
And greet each morn,
Even some sorry starless nights
With a First Poem of the Day.

I lilt you, one and all.
If you think this mis-wrote,
My auto correct mentally broke,
Meant to type I love you,
You'd be
Right but wrong,
I just lilt you.

I look at the curves of your body
And start crookedly plotting
If you think that's so naughty
Then give me the straight answer
To cure my curious cancer

I want you to be forward with me
Instead of slowly torturing me
With lines that aren't crossed
And a fair amount of frost
While I await your zero degree angle
To match the direction my tears dangle

In some ways
Those who are gay
Have reached the month of May
In terms of being able to see the light of day
But nothing guarantees fulfillment
Not all the laws Capitol Hill sent
Or enough money to pay rent
I'm still stuck in the basement

I chase after a singular simple chance
But then you see the parabola in my pants
And flee in a serpentine motion of avoidance
To fill my crystalline ocean of annoyance

Maybe I shouldn't be so particular
Or maybe our lives are perpendicular
Because you're a vulture
That stands on what it's eating
So I live inside a culture
Where **** falls from the ceiling

There is straight answer coolant
Dripping from your curved bullet
That travels to me in a straight line
In order to perpetrate a great crime
Of stealing my innocence
Making me act in defense
Until I realize I'm not the best
And solemnly settle for less

At night I am crisscrossed
By dreams of a hip toss
That came from my blind spot
When a straight line made knots

when she was four she tied balloons to her wrist.

they always rose, she knew. balloons always found the clouds.

she sat in the grass with her legs crossed and fastened string after plastic string to her arm, and until her hand turned blue she waited

waited to rise.

when she was ten she smashed a hold in the frozen water across the street.

water always carried people away
it ran when they couldn't run themselves
and frozen water,
she figured,
would be slower--
less harsh but it would bring her far from home all the same.

white and blue as the clouds she'd longed for,
they pulled her from the frigid water
six miles downstream

even fastened to a hospital bed with 'suicidal' harshly painted on her soul
she knew she didn't belong

when she was fifteen she joined the party,

older kids were swallowing their sorrows and threading out their despairs in a pitiful drug-induced slumber

and she watched with a syringe in her hand, as read to join them as she was to die.

she was born to die.

and so the needle in her arm and the tragedy on her breath was enough to help her rise.

and as her eyelids turned back to icy blue and her identity was wiped clean she felt a pressure against the crisscrossed skin of her wrist

and as her mind followed her heart out of the world she would have sworn it was a black balloon

that carried her to oblivion.

Those profiteers in natural goods give and achieve little and it is truly the truth about anyone
Who in this time and circumstance makes gain the venerable sign of success truly the worst
Bargain has been struck but do This please stop and look on the indispensable the flawless
Many are the shapes and sizes but True sight only occurs when you look upon the soul of your
Friends the outer man perishes but That which was conceived in glory only enriches with time
Behold the portal that is immortal Put to stirring the essential distil the foremost telling wonder
The great tuning will occur from the knowledge of urgency and expediency consider the fragile
The text of life reveals the Brevity it brings appreciation man faces and evaporates state
Such unique qualities Irreplaceable face in these lines you crisscrossed and with all heart and
Mind a bond Formed illuminating wise far reaching invaluable because there is only one
That is irreplaceable they provide a window that is priceless to your life in particular you can
Span the globe but none can capture your imagination or harness the unseen dynamo that your
Life creates in them and in them alone you are made whole a curtain this thin veil opens onto
Landscapes and into a peaceful space the protected the honored spectrum that houses human
Endeavor this Selection was made from divine wisdom it is your element to fulfillment don’t
Scoff or walk There carelessly one path exists alone that leads and holds immortal virtue to
Crown your life other paths hold only waste and destruction there truly is the sweet mixture
Promise hides the unmerciful death and the bones of so many that unwisely took of its
Pleasure and joined the untold multitude whose dead and whiten bones tell the horror in
Detail how often the Perfect scene belies danger and death but a friend’s hand touches your
Shoulder come this way Leading you out of danger this is the timeless hand that is vouched and
Is blameless it bends all Inappropriate and harmful abrogated nonsense back on its self to shift
And appropriate the Meaningful the heartfelt the all commanding power you have at your
Disposal if ever you were given opportunity it stands in the highest request honesty true blue
Affirmation the sounding Board that never falters or fails those who love you this is the most
Wondrous repository everything worldly will change fortunes expectations to trust and lock
Your hopes in things is Folly sadly the days will come that they will only be accessible through
Photographs and Memories but they will never diminish they are and will always be your
Fortress and no one can find a better place to keep his richest treasure than in the everlasting
Souls of friends

It was the summer of missed promises
And I tried so hard to make it up to you that year
But everything was different.
We couldn’t get back in the same rhythm
Because I’d hate to force it.

It was the summer of forgotten love letters
Because we never knew how to sign off.
They always ended up in empty desk drawers with “for sale” signs on them
Because we wanted them to be anonymous.

It was the summer of bonfires
And nostalgia
For a time when the only thing that made sense was your laugh and your hand in mine;
For a time when I had no idea what I really wanted,
Because all anybody’s given me was a broken heart.

It was the summer I dared to look in my high school yearbook;
Crisscrossed with scribbled writing
In everybody’s haste attempt to sum up the four years I hated most.
I read them with tears in my eyes
And I’m sorry for that-
I’m usually not like that; regretting everything that didn’t happen between us

It was summer of drunken nights
In small attempts to erase you from my mind
It was the summer I realized
I may never see you again.

0.  I was just trying to breathe

Every inch of my story line
I drank like coffee that you need so badly
You don't notice the taste of ash
it leaves in your throat
and when I breathed out smoke,
slowly gliding from my tongue,
you'll know, the words I can't choke
the ones I hung to dry,
but left them outside
through a crisp winter season
and returned just in time
to catch the lullaby as it dissolved into water.
I couldn't wait any longer.
I broke them into icy pieces
that fit back in my mouth.
I held them there long after I breathed
the blizzard that had formed in my stomach.
I couldn't swallow, I couldn't breathe
and I couldn't wait for you to leave.

So I locked my icy breath in my hands
and looked for silent corners between buildings
so I could begin to understand
how to squeezed out the blood from the words I've been spilling

I. White Moonlight

I went up the mountain side
listening to the canyon's song.
Dancing beneath the tree lines, I soaked
in the pines and cypresses.

I ran to the west, searching for a place to rest.
Fell asleep in the foothills
and had to run home to catch the light
Running in the dark, I would not beat the night.

[I was a villager traveling through
There came the White Knight with red hair in view
offered a space, a safe place for the night]

The white knight held out his hand to an aching soul.
Accepted.
Trusting the purity in a path lit by moonlight
Unknowingly, I would never trust white again.

II. Static

Deceived and seduced by the safety and warmth of white,
There was a subtle yellow tint in your light
that began to scream from its origin and fight against the walls
A cinderblock room colored in skin absorbed my calls

There was air trapped in my bones
that halted movement and created unfamiliar vocal tones
There were no cuts or bloodstains,
but all that was white drained to red
as he wrapped my limbs in reins
(to) make them dance, make them spread
Dance for the White Knight
make them move as you please, White Knight.

This body was a delicate ship that had been sunken
from a night spent in a dungeon
with a monster disguised as a man
whose touch would shave inches from my wingspan
Now these limbs do not belong,
the pressure outlines of your unwelcomed hands
Whimpers became the lyrics to my muted, morning song

I didn't know, how minutes can become tattooed in your veins
with each breath, a gentle push of blood through your body
you begin to taste the ***** again
the red clouds invade and bring me back to the monster's den

Now he holds these layers as the corners all peel
from a defeat long ago, a kidnapping, a delicious steal
The potency of your dominance
the power you must have felt
in watching a flower melt

III. Silence

The moon is now a cold light,
but nothing is wrong.
A response clean as white-
A secret
to be naked and unprotected for so long.

My youth cools the coffee
My stomach burns the atmosphere
encapsulating me
Teeth marks stains on my pillowcases
In the day, there is outward harmony
Like carefully crisscrossed shoelaces
Night falls with the sound of silent sobs.
My walls begin to melt.
They are turning yellow
Reliving how it felt
to be betrayed by something white.
I can't live through the day with anticipation of the night
when that white light floods in
I try to tear you out from beneath my skin

IV. Don't Try to Love Me

The luxury to be still.
Motions that were quiet
Set the music to your gaze
as you reopen the tears
When will you open the steel curtains,
you drape around your heart?
I run my fingertips and I can’t find
how you’ve cloaked the mistakes in your architecture
There is nothing poetic about solitude
Let me pinpoint the coordinates of your pain
Let me find the exact longitude
Let me be your constant latitude
I know you are alive

You live in some unknown torment,
I once saw you writhe in the night
and under the moonlight

He didn’t know
How I was preoccupied
I had to settle the background noise
the constant buzz between my ears
that fills my head so I could never hear
How much he could have loved me.

V. Patience

How sweet to be loved by you
You are warm weather in February
You are the reflection of a mountain in a reservoir
mais mon humeur est noire

We were in a large room lit
by one lamp in the far corner
when words poured from my jaw of glass,
I guess I could have asked
but it seems no one knows
the cadence and way words can flow
into our hearts and puncture the soul

How sweet it was, to think I could be loved by you
You are figurine of my fears
A January wedding in three years
A shadow mapping an escape plan
Yet I lace my fingers in your hand

You don't belong with me
but when the delicate words
trembled from your lips
and your voice stopped
with my stare
Both your hands in my hair
I wish I knew how to tell you,
but I couldn't remember why
you had to be someone to just pass the time.

VI. Deliberate Return

It should have felt like
a lifted weight
so I could move through
an unlocked gate

brush your teeth on my neck
and your cheeks across my chest
I thought last time was the last time
Tiny drops became the anthem
And the tears found a quiet path
To roll onto my belly
Between you and me

I could still taste the poetry you left in my mouth
the deception and interception
of my growth
and of my youth

My clothes hung off my back
darkness from all the sleep I lack
Trying to wash out the scent of you
after 6 years, I thought I'd be through
but you've kept me here and I've let you

I am a lost warrior in the meadow
Treading water every night
Trapped in an internal fight
You held me in the shadows
Grabbing at the wildflowers in my breath
But I just kept breathing in the echoes
Of a time I must let go

The mist of my trouble followed me in March
I’d sit with tea and say things like ‘I feel better, but maybe not tomorrow’
There was no promise
Just moderate disbelief
No security in my sleep
So when I shook your outline out of my sheets
Laid in bed where I once lost my youth
I wish that this was not my truth

VII. Shuddering While Healing

There is a section of the river where
the current sends it’s shivers
The wind dances with the tree branches in slow motion
(but) I was grown with my toes on the edge of the ocean
Leaning in with your hand and handsome love songs
about relentlessness and forgiveness
You sang a gold song
like a January river
flowing beneath the ice
You thought your love could break through
that shallow ceiling, but I couldn't hear the tapping
as you drowned beneath my feet
I was submerged in the cross currents
pulling me and hugging me caught in the center
how I heated up and bent you
then left to wade in the river
how you stayed next to me
and remained never bitter

I can't find the line
and I can't ask you to throw me one
because I'm dragging you in as I float through
tracing the fire I began on this river
with my fingertips
and remembering how I was grown on the shore
but how I can never be sure
if the breath in my ear
is someone to be trusted
or if the breath in my ear
is that monster crawling near
taking the color, once again, from my atmosphere.

VIII. Fragile

The sweet kisses he planted on my shoulders
and the moves he made were full of truth
The guilt he felt should have been mine
but the longer he stayed the more I felt fine

For the other’s love was simply beige
And outlined in black
I didn’t want excitement
I didn’t want lust
It was not enticement or boredom
It was from the buildup of rust
between my bones.
And I listened to your breath against my shoulder through the phone.
It hit me like an ensemble
predicating the concerto.
You were just an instrument.
And here I thought I was the conductor
just dreaming of ways to escape.
And I don’t sleep well when I’m next to him either.
Because I’m dreaming of ways to relate.
And I don’t sleep well when I’m alone.
Because there’s no one left to blame.
So now trying to be tame
Searching for an answer
in a small place like alone

IX. Releasing

What it means to be powerful
I saw it in shades of red
To find your feet still melt the snow
To find the only security is within
the confounds of your frozen bones
I was sure that diving meant drowning
but I've been drowning on the shore
Since you touched me and wanted more
Since you saw me raw
I evolved into a monster
scratching and clawing at your dungeon's door
You can't keep me here forever

You displaced my trust in balance
and turned something beautiful into something *******
But if I can see your belly button,
then you were born once too.

What does it mean to be powerful?
I can do it in soft baby blue
I can do it with the haunting memory of you,
but I don't want you with me anymore
So, good night white knight.
You don’t get to have this moonlight
and soon I will no longer be afraid of the color white.

X. Tenderness

Tenderness.
That was the name of my pain.
It was not the bitterness
that makes us take down photographs
or change the song.
It was not about bitterness.
It’s about tenderness
and distance

I learned that the silent pauses
between gusts of wind causes
more sound than running facets.

I learned when you’re ******* for feelings
You start to feel the weight of the ceilings
We just hold on our backs and call it 'dealing.'

Trying to achieve the humility of a willow tree
Turning yellow in the slow descent to winter
But I’m not going to wait to give you what you need
White knight, tonight, I leave
Because I know you’ve been living in me like a splinter
Strong enough to puncture
Weak enough to be removed
This glass castle is just a structure
That could be improved

But you already made a house
And now you’re trying to pick out decorations
Let me tell you, humans are not decorations
Another human should be a matched foundation
I think you almost saw that too
When you felt the vibration of the wind from me to you

Terrified because it’s never about growing
it’s about pride.
Too scared of showing
the days we cried
cried so hard it became
the anthem of our week.
No, we can never show we are weak

Terrified
The fragility of our pride
So we disconnect, in order to protect.

Let me tell you, no one describes this life as a glide
If they do, they lied
Everyone is terrified or uninteresting
Yet we are all putting up walls and distancing

Farther and farther
What would it feel like if I asked you about the sound of tenderness?
Or what it looks like to be repaired?
We are so afraid of being unprepared
we don’t hear how the wind
sounds like children growing
How healing feels like the roll of the river
and just because you shiver
does not mean you will be cold forever
and those silent pauses between gusts of terror
when we are just a step away from pulling that lever
are the moments we should reflect on
These are all those things that cause us
to be terrified
and learn to be tender

XI. Happiness Doesn’t Leave a Mark

How do I tell you
that every day used to be a battle?
One that I fought because I had to
so I could get up and fight the next day.
It was never about winning.

This is a Saturday night kind of pain.
The kind you feel that doesn't belong to you.
But at least you are no longer numb.

I want to show you where I'm from.
That childhood house that saw too many ways
to shatter plates on holidays
When I left, I grew back wings
and flew through the haze
You see, plates and whites are just things
but you can make anything a symbol
and when you see that this is no signal,
this is a sign. That I can be standing here with you
and still die
but this time, maybe I’ll let you inside
because
I've been too many people to start anew
I've loved the color blue
Loved a man with an amber hue
I was damaged in a yellow room
but I cannot match a color to you

My mother,
She said "the weakest point in a rope
is where it connects to another
and your insides are tangled"
You see, I can live with the knots
I want to look at you and know
You can trust this knot to hold
You know I'll pull through
You're not so scared
of a scar, or a few
Because I want to share where I've been with you
*and that includes the happiness too.

Mental disability what an epigram, it bounds on burried complexity
Titter inside hysterical effectuation
Feeling electrical currents misfiring in my cerebellum
Screaming unremebered prayers in my night terrors at the devils fornication
Remaining in my presence, anticipating my sleep
***** to reverse the dementia
Waking day dreams, lost in unreality
Descry vociferation calling my name
Wanting to claw my etes out against nebulous shadows creeping behind
Wanting a medium to banih apparitions from my space
Paranoid of all establishment
While securing eye contact with others, they could decipher all my thoughts
With binoculars neighbors surveil
Me camouflaged with drawn shades and pale skin
To go outside summoned all my demons
Wanting to battle, rage war to fulfill some morbid desire
Annihilating hordes in my dreams by any means
***** to reverse the madness
OCD for a little control
A million times repeated thoughts flashing in my eyes
Confusion! What day is it? Am I doing something wrong?
Not glancing in mirrors hiding from myself Garbled guttural utterances in my left ear
Hot breath on my neck
Bawling at flexibility and spontaneity
Not in my scheme for the coming confusing hours
Wanting to pull my skull off exposing the insanity
Just wanted it to STOP!!
***** to reverse the derangement
Limbs not answering brain waves crisscrossed as they dwell
On a daily basis surviving hell
On a nightly basis in true hell
Needing to shriek and explode
Afraid to sleep, walking in exhausted dreams
Broken pains in my bones
No peace day or night
My medication saved my life

I breathe to live, I hold my breath,
I seek, I search, I’m blind at best,
My fingers sand skin smooth and soft,
I kiss, caress, kind words crisscrossed .

I live to love, I love just you,
Well I love others, so it isn’t true,
But you are passion, my true desire,
Naked, flushed you push me higher.

If I could sleep and wake and dream,
I’d beg you be my secret scheme,
Let’s run until we cannot breathe,
Let’s run so neither never leave.

The cacophony of voices pushing and shoving, everyone seemed
to be taller than I was and they all seemed to know what to do.
The teacher showed impatience with my tiny body. It was clear
that she liked the kids whose last names were Johnson and whose
parents owned farms on Highway 15.  They all went to the
Methodist Church in town.

I wished I was blonde with a raspy voice like Doreen.

I showed my plaid cotton tennis shoes and sang “Old **** Tucker”
while dancing my best country jig for show-and-tell. This was when
I learned that it was “Dan Tucker” and that “****” was a bad word.

My daddy said ****, and he wore work boots with stiff golden laces
that crisscrossed onto metal fasteners half way up his calves.
The boots kept time when he played guitar; eyes and mouth smiling
and laughing over some absurd thought he had the temerity to speak
out loud. Daddy was the most interesting person I knew. He quit
school after 8th grade, but understood humanity more than most.

I felt good about singing my song and proud of myself for having
mustered up the courage. I did not have fancy toys or artifacts from
family vacations like the other kids.

I had never heard kids call each other names until I made the
acquaintance of the school playground. It was strange how they
ganged up on the boy they said was hyper and had ***** eyes.
I did not know what either of those things meant, but I knew it
made him sad and made me afraid to talk to him. They said I
looked like a ghost, I did not know if that was good or bad.

Doreen was not afraid of the ball, and that made her okay. My Mom
decided to pick a friend for me, but I did not like Linda. She did
not know how to play with dolls; she just looked at them.
Linda was tedious.

The boy with ***** eyes made more sense to me.

He lived in the yellow house that had a dog that would bite and
scare the nice people away. I finally talked to him in 6th grade
on the hour long bus rides home. Once, an older boy named
John snapped a rubber band on his eye over and over until it
swelled completely shut, my friend just took it, crying, until the
bus driver intervened. John’s older brother played with guns,
and John was scared of him, and older brother was scared of father.

We hated when the brothers rode the bus.

I decided that most boys were mean and that to be a boy must be
terrifying. One year, ***** eyes almost drowned during gym class
the other kids said he tried to **** himself. They thought it was funny.
Girls will never know the horrors of the 8th grade boy’s locker room.
When he was 15 he crossed in front of a semi on his moped, they
found his foot half a mile away from his body.  I wonder if the kids
thought that was funny too.

I was too afraid of my emotions to go to the funeral.

Ghost to ***** Eyes: I am sorry that they hurt you Vincent,
and sorry that I am scared to see your innocence reduced
to road **** in a coffin.

For you I broke my own laws
when I was with you I saw my own flaws
I had to work hard for a pointless cause
you swiped at me with relentless claws

You cheered me up when I was down
you made me smile, you made me frown
after all the love I tried to drown
your carelessness made me shutdown

I came to you with open arms
Vulnerable to your endless charms
and even though I heard the alarms
I let you cause me deadly harms

My brain is all crisscrossed
emotional death was the cost
while I waited for my icy anger to defrost
any love for me you had, you  seemed to have lost

So now I stand here, tears on the floor
broken and crumbled to the core
you could not have hurt me anymore
you looked at me and closed the door

So if becoming my friend is something you want to do
the walls around my heart won’t be so easy to get through
I have suffered and cried and been broken too
still every time I think of you

No matter how hard I’ve tried
no matter how much you lied
even though I try to hide
still, I die a little bit inside

the largest: massive.
The young surface smooth,
viewed as an analogy
was inspired by discovery,
fell into the habit of position
that ruled during the days and hours.
It is inclined to eccentricity.
A slow and smooth evolution
ejected bodies too close
this was an overestimation
which extends above and increases
differentiated into several layers
Evidence was uncovered by the probe
so they may be decoupled
the shell substantially rigid.
a process formed
the young overwhelmingly dominate and possesses
a formation disrupted by collisions.
Such a violent beginning would explain
haze that blocks light
features obscure.
impossible to acquire
remaining  composed
There are traces of others
resulting from the breakup
complex compared to the age
replenished by a reservoir
studies simulating detection
fill a mysterious gap
via the recombination of radicals
significantly colder than observed
One hypothesis asserts uplift
which governs motion,
revealing a diverse origin,
Examination has shown
The convoluted chasms.
crisscrossed by dark sinuous features
sunlight reflected off their surface,
but no one observed.

O Ganga!
You flow
Across the mighty
Mountains
O your youthful
Playful force
Making its way
Through the
Ancient boulders
Stream after stream
Joins you
To find its destiny
Happily
In your depths
To make you
O the vast Ganga we know
The Aryans found their
Abode on your banks
You saw the rise of Jainism
And Buddhism
O civilization
Not only flourished
But flowered
On your banks!
You've seen it all!
You travel down the Tehri dam
Across Rishikesh
And Haridwar
From the cow's mouth
O the Gomukh
Where your mother
Glacier Gangotri rests!
You enter the plains
Having crisscrossed
Roads many
And lives
Of many a being
Who consider you
As mother
Worship you
You bear their brunt also
Carrying heaps of
Garbage
You flow Kanpur
You see tanneries
And many more
You nourish them
Keep them running
But they end up
Slowing your run
You reach Allahabad
What's in a name
A tryst of cultures
O you have the
Gangs Jamuni doab
And Gangs jamuni tehzeeb!
Your sisters join you
And here at Prayag
You have Yamuna with you
O a mythical sister
Saraswati does find here way to you
They say
Life goes on on your ghats
As usual
People washing clothes
Themselves
And people offering
Flowers and performing
Rituals on your banks
O all but consider you
As an earthly mother
A heavenly gift
Just like Saraswati
You have your place in the scriptures as well!
You also
Flow out of mythology
Into our minds
O the mighty Shiva
Took you
In his mighty curls
Of hair
To allay your spirit
As you descended
Onto the Earth
To purge peoples
Lives
The Bhagiratha's
Penance you saw then
He got back his wish
Thousand brothers
They say
O you but still see
The Kumbh Mela(fair)

So many souls
You see the serenity
Of Varanasi
The beautiful spirituality
Of its
Ghats
O young wrestlers
Massaging before
The day's fight
Alongside
Seers in
Deep meditation
On your banks
O you have settled
This city
You flow across
Patna
The ancient
Pataliputra
Seen many imperial
Rise and falls
History echoes in you
You enter Bengal
The fertile
Gangetic plains
Bear testimony
To your gifts
With their lush green
And swaying fields
The Farakka barrage
Sees you in one of your
Giant avatars
You irrigate
And touch people!
You flow as the Padma in
Bangladesh
O you know
Two lands separated
By political shadows
You flow
As Bhagirathi
Hooghly
In Bengal
The rice bowl!
O your Ilish(Hilda)
People do relish
You flow graciously
Through
Flat extensive plains
Past Kolkata
The city of joy
And into the sea
At Gangasagar
Taking with you
So many memories
And promising
The continuity
Of your divine
Grace
O dear river,
You are Ganga!

The cacophony of voices pushing and
shoving, everyone seemed to be taller

than I was and they all seemed to know
what to do. The teacher showed impatience

with my tiny body, frozen in fear by the
giant circular stone apparatus where

twenty children washed their hands. It was
clear that she liked the kids whose last

names were Johnson and whose parents
owned farms on Highway 15. They all went

to the Methodist Church in Town. I wished
I was blonde with a raspy voice like Doreen.

I showed my plaid cotton tennis shoes and
sang “Old **** Tucker” while dancing my

best country jig for show-and-tell. This was
when I learned that it was “Dan Tucker”

and that “****” was a bad word. My daddy
said ****, and he wore work boots with

stiff golden laces that crisscrossed onto
metal fasteners twelve inches up his calves.

The boots kept time when he played guitar;
his eyes and lips smiling and laughing over

some absurd thought he had the temerity
to speak out loud. Daddy was the most

interesting person I knew. He quit school
after 8th grade, but understood humanity

more than most. He wore cowboy boots
when he played the fiddle, and if he said

****, then it must be okay. I still felt good
about singing my song and proud of myself

for having mustered up the courage. I did
not have fancy toys or artifacts from family

vacations like the other kids. I had never
heard kids call each other names before

I made the acquaintance of the school
playground. It was strange how they

ganged up on the boy they said was hyper
and had ***** eyes. I did not know what

either of those things meant, but I knew it
made him sad and made me afraid to talk

to him. They said I looked like a ghost, I
did not know if that was good or bad.

Doreen was not afraid of the ball, and that
made her okay. My Mom decided to pick a

friend for me, but I did not like Linda. She
did not know how to play with dolls; she

did not make up stories about their lives
or pretend to be their mommy, she just

looked at them. Linda was tedious. The
boy with ***** eyes made more sense

to me. He lived in the yellow house that
had a dog who would bite and scare

the nice people away. I finally talked to
him in 6th grade on the hour long bus rides

home. Once, an older boy named John
snapped a rubber band on his eye over

and over until it swelled completely shut,
my friend just sat and took it until the

bus driver intervened. John’s older brother
played with guns, and John was scared of

him, and older brother was scared of father.
We hated when the brothers rode the bus.

I decided that most boys were mean and
that to be a boy must be terrifying. One

year, ***** eyes almost drowned during
gym class, the other kids said he tried to

**** himself. They thought it was funny.
Girls will never know the horrors of the

8th grade boy’s locker room. When he
was 15 he crossed in front of a semi on

his moped, they found his foot half a mile
away from his body.  I wonder if the kids

thought that was funny too. I was too
afraid of my emotions to go to the funeral.

Ghost to ***** Eyes: I am sorry that they
hurt you Vincent, and sorry that I am

scared to see your innocence reduced
to road **** in a coffin.

the years pile up gently
as snow upon snow pile up
on snow laden ground.
you wake up one morning
still with sleepy eyes
to see the view from your window
still the same
yet somewhat changed
from the landscape you saw before you went to bed last night.

you jog your head,
to drive away
the lingering laziness in your bones,
smiling at a half remembered dream
where you were flying through the sky
dodging the telephone and electrical wires
that crisscrossed the path of your flight,
and whispered a silent prayer,

you get up your bed.
reaching out with heavy limbs
to the pair of sandals
lying on the floor
and trudge out of your cozy room.

you look at the mirror
(at a landscape still unfamiliar?)
and frown
(or smile?)
at some added lines
creasing the sides of your eyes:
a view more subtly changed!

a year is gone,
another is on the run.
count your life if you may
in ages
old traditional way
but, mark it off proudly
with words:

painful, prayerful, purposeful,
incisive, iniquitous, imperial,
eclectic, electric, effervescent,
dolorous,  delirious, devious,
singular, simple, (sinful?),
frenzied, frivolous, feral,
tepid, tremulous, turbulent,
ludicrous, libidinous, lugubrious,
zany, zennish, zinged,
barbaric, beatific, bucolic,
and so on and so forth.

words that are sensual, soulful, spiritual,
     that moved your heart ,
     that moved our hearts.

words to remember you by.

be happy.
feel blessed.
it is your birthday!

Our trajectory is unknowable, you tell me: the planet
corkscrews around the Sun, sure,

but the Sun corkscrews around a black hole at
the heart of the Milky Way,

and our whole galaxy travels on some mysterious,
incalculable vector. But sister, I saw a photograph

in which two whale sharks were brought to
heel by men in simple reed boats just

off the coast of the Philippines. All that they had
to do was often feed

the sharks many gallons of grocery-store frozen
shrimp, poured from plastic garbage bags into

their yawning six-foot maws to portside.
Gargantuan, sure, but still

as obedient and eager for food as backyard
squirrels. I remembered a grainy

internet video—I saw it probably seven or
eight years back—in which

a captured whale shark was winched
ashore in Madagascar, or

maybe it was the Philippines again—no matter—
the thing still had life left

in it and struggled to breathe while a crowd of
people gathered around—there were

women carrying babies, girls holding baskets atop
their heads—and then the

men came with a long slender blade and sliced clean
through the whale’s spine, vivisected it

right there on the dock, and the onlookers stood there quite
unfazed—I remember

being shocked at the effortlessness of the cut,
the pinkness of the whale’s blood,

and the boredom in the onlookers’ eyes. Our father
took us down to San Antonio

on one of his business trips there when we were five
or six—I think

you were probably too young to
remember it—

it was when you and I saw the ocean for the first
time. We drove down to the Gulf

of Mexico, and we saw waves breaking
out near the horizon in pale

sunlight. I kept scanning for a dorsal
fin off beyond

the breakers, thinking that I might spot one—
sandy brown, mottled with

cream spots and glistening—so that I might be able to
say to you, pointing, “look,

sister, there is a whale shark!” Years
later we would learn

that he traveled down to San Antonio so
frequently because he was a philanderer. As

a child I believed that whale sharks
crisscrossed the ocean following

paths that we couldn’t fathom, that
their concerns were somehow

beyond our comprehension, but then
Keppler pinned down

the shape of the Earth’s orbit over four
hundred years ago,

and the lives of ancient sea
titans are sundered

effortlessly
by men with indifferent faces.

Merry go-rounds
Twirl around the sky
Shut down ice-cream posts and
Repressed flower petals
Crisscrossed hands and
Popsicle sticks
Loitering the salt-stained pavement
Glints of late-night squares in
Skyscrapers which brush the clouds
The crunch of diseased leaves and the
Distant honks and whistles
In chaotic, zig-zag traffic
Snow falls silently
Its fingertips landing on
Windbreakers and cotton mittens
Of children
With red cheeks and
Exasperated smiles
Chasing after frozen-pond ducks
With tongues extended and catch
Soft white water
Winter dampens the sidewalk cracks
And chills the abandoned earmuffs
But winter will not
And can not
Dampen or
Freeze or
Abandon the spirits

Explorer of ink smudges and paper cuts,
She pilots her pen along the roads of a page.
With crisscrossed legs, she travels with windswept hair,
Scrawling to him on a route of blue and the red:
"Each moment we are together,
we write a new line of this poem."

He rummages through leaves of paper,
Words scribbled upon the pieces
like freshly fallen snow upon tree branches.
He searches in vain, seeing only her emerald-brown eyes.
Finally, with words at a breakneck speed, he writes:
*"And yet, there will never be verses enough
to encompass the scope of our voyage."

you’ll never feel the bite of pain
that tears the skin from bone
nor the aching loneliness that
scares the heart from home
the absoluteness that leaves a hole
where nothing is able to hide
while driven by the loathing
birthing a life to the love inside
no matter what the circumstance
you can’t negate the absolute horror
of wanting what is begged for
there is no returning the honor
I’ll whip my self unmercifully
until the end of a perfect day
even while you subjugate me
my scars upon myself just say
how much you intended to deny me
all twisted parts upon me are a whole
crisscrossed upon my body are the marks
that give you access to my soul

This poem is for Baby Boomers,
Most of us collecting Social Security
By now, many of us already retired in
Some shape or form, blessed by
Blessed Be, those defined benefit
Schemes we indentured ourselves,
Shackled to for so many years.
Now it's money every month for life,
A pension adjusted to the cost of living,
Inflation-proof as they say.
But who's to judge
When quality of life has its own
Net present value?

But we remain comfortable as they say,
With Social Security and VA benefits,
And the Roth-IRA,
The muni bonds and annuities, quite comfortable,
Thank you very much.
But just how comfortable?
Admittedly, much of my
Wellbeing, drug and/or alcohol-induced.
Prozac in the morning,
Xanax, as needed later,
Medical cannabis--preposterously legal in California,
And that reliable trio: beer, wine & hard liquor--
Scotch & Soda, my oblivion, my River Lethe--
And Ambien,
GENERIC NAME: ZOLPIDEM,
To sleep, perchance to dream.

Yes, of course, I am medicated.
Yes, without doubt,
I am mighty high.
And yes, I feel mighty good.
I deserve to.
I earned it.
Do I dare disturb my universe?
Try ******, just to see
What all the fuss was all about?
65: perhaps a suitable age for
The LSD trip I dared not take at 20.
No, a lifetime of bourgeois caution,
Years of playing it safe,
Mock me, even as they
Serve me in retirement;
Serve me well for the
Miles ahead before I sleep.
Serve me well for the
Miles ahead before I sleep.
Bite me, Robert Frost!
Do you ******* stutter?
Of course, I experience some difficulty
Coming up with a good reason for
Getting out of bed in the morning.
But who doesn’t at my age?

My Hemet porch:  so
Serene this time of year.
I require no western sunset,
No cool Pacific Ocean breeze or
Shoreline vista to soothe me now.
I’ve sailed the seven seas.
I've crossed the lines.
I am a square-knot sailor.
Initiated by Neptune himself,
I am Bluenose & Golden Shellback,
And sundry other salty achievements,
Crisscrossed on Mercator’s grid.
I've been wowed by spectral majesty,
Moonrise at sea, stars streaking,
I’ve rolled toward Tahitian beaches on
Sultry tides and currents,
To Polynesia in late austral summer.
I’ve sailed with Coleridge.
"Eftsoons," I ate the bird that flipped the bird.
Upon a painted sailing ship; upon a
Paint-by-number ocean.
Southward I fled, to
Fire and ice, and finally,
Atonement.
I am forgiven now, for
Having flipped my wig, at the
Bird that brought the
Fog and mist, and all the
Rest pulled from ***, of
Meshuggener, greybeard loon;
Crazy mariner's rhyme,
Perchance, to rime?
I flipped the bird, again.

I have no complaints.
Life owes me nothing.
Of course, I have trouble
Coming up with new excuses for
Getting off my bed each day.
But who doesn't at our age?

As I watch
your soft limbs bow before me
giving me permission to climb your sturdy trunk
up to your leaves.

I peek through the branches,
the world broken up into crisscrossed windows
each one a glimpse into someone's world.

I'm reminded of my younger days,
climbing higher and higher
until the sky brushed my fingers
in a soft command.

I would be a sky pirate, searching
for something or somewhere or someone
until momma came outside with lemonade and PB&J
and all my problems were solved
with a single kiss to my forehead.

Now, though, I simply watch from above
content in spending a few moments alone,
just me and you and the sky.

Wind picks up, your delicate branches waving in the breeze
letting swaths of gold float to the ground
in curtains that coat the cracks in the pavement
and hide the imperfections with golden rain.

And in that moment, there is nowhere else I'd rather be.

When Leonard Cohen Met Charlie Daniels, The Devil Went Down to Georgia

~~~
The Devil Went Down to Georgia ¥
https://youtu.be/wBjPAqmnvGA

Charlie Daniels, the country music legend who died July 6, 2020, was part of the 1970 Leonard Cohen tour. (see notes)
                                            
This one is a gift to a recovering addict and a poet, for whom that peculiar, par-articulate, addictive passion, thank the Lord, got no cure.

                                                      <£>

two country boys, ok, so different countries, but both intimately
a-cquainted with the Devil, his song & music-making-copious
a-bilities, his other trois backup ***-sin-tants, The Sin Sisters,
a/k/a wine and women and sweet poetry...

now the Devil mostly gets his due, you pay his price twice, in daily
wear ‘n tear on body and soul, always trying to keep one step ahead,
taking his best, sometimes leaving the rest, but ha! not always cause sometimes a...

bargain needs keeping, gotta keep your word honest, still if you can find a wile e coyote-wriggle-way to be a tad faster, keep them ten  fingers crisscrossed, you might steal a tune or three, before you chanter la finale, sing/pay the last installment...

now these boys were multilingual, one spoke french, the other, southern, but two-gether, they could harmonize the Lord’s Prayer on a banjo, fiddle and a guitar, in une langue ancienne#, formerly spoke in those United States and Canada, now only in the heavens above...

cannot truthful say I ever saw them play on the same stage, no matter,
cause the parallels are clear as a night sky starry moon, the stories they told, in lyrical verse, different cuzins, slightly incestuous, and
infectious too, cause you catch yourself singing redneck in a foreign
language and you’re liking the way women looking at the big star on
a tour bus...

now the devil wanted these bad boys real bad in his pantheon, went
down to Georgia and back up to Montréal au paradis, said to them “no more diddling, just fiddling and singing, time to make that finale payment, principal and interest, come to collect my country boys  and all what they got left...alors allons en enfer mes bébés..”##

now the sounds they made was just too good, the Lord heard it, it was like Picasso painting the sky, and came to collect Charlie yesterday, (07/06/20), Leonard had come up earlier, and if you need to learn how this story ends, well, there’s a poem listed down below avec tous les détails.

but as my straight laced pappy, use to say in his German accented english, in his morning suit, striped pants and Homburg hat, all’s well that don’t end in hell

or something like that anyway.

Frequently I find myself covered in soot
Looking down I ***** shackles tied to each foot
Above I see bolts of boring bold steel
Limiting the stretch of what my feelings can feel
Within the private gift we all have been deemed
I am vested in crisscrossed layers uncleaned
Hammering my head are your ticks and your tocks
Recalling my labors for horrid have nots
I must amuse the begotten bejeweled
Robotically remain a chaotic fool
Most of us have been trained to forget
But avail awaits harvest like a reserve in the mess
Special they are that save and revive
Recognize the saviors that make you alive
Ahh…
Safely deep is the desire, a vision of retreat
Infectious is the perfect picture which I have begun to see
Fussing forgone, and put down with glee
I've found the buzz that busies me
That awakens my long since lazy feet
And ends the feast that which my fears eat
The world has given my soul a rhyme
To which I flow and from which I rise
I confused my curse; I'll refuse no more
Its decidedly a gift that has settled my war

Barefoot on barren moorland, crisscrossed with animal tracks,
Not another soul except for poets hunting in packs,
The cry of nesting larks.... the prey of murderous weasels,
A school of landscape artists encumbered by their easels,
Muddy potters...
Bearded weavers...
Artisan brewers...
Millennials in their millions...
And a folk band whose VW van has broken down.
I need some peace and quiet so I'm going back to town.