If you can hear this
Then I pray you come near
My heart isn't quite normal without you
It seems to have grown bare
So please return
It's an everlasting winter in my soul
When you're not around
To give it your warm care

ALL THE IMPORTANT POETS

One day I found all the important poets -
Shakespeare, Bukowski, Dickinson and Rilke
partying in the park drinking Coronas,
feeding pigeons on the green.

Astonished I queried,
"You are all my thought heroes, and yet you laze about.
"Shouldn’t you be writing something famous?"
And they erupted in a literate cacophony of guffaws,
their eyes tearing,
their cheeks shining red with mirth.

Shakespeare turned to me and said,
"Forget it kid !
Meter, metaphor, rhythm and rhyme -
it’s all just groundlessness.
All the adjectives in the world divined just so
only lead to a place in your heart
you’ll never really understand anyway.
It’s simply a mystery, ineffable."

Bukowski tried to ask Rilke about the letters
he'd written to that frustrated young poet,
but he was so drunk on cooking sherry
he could only mumble, gesticulate and grin.

And then sweet Emily said,
"Yes. William is right.
Rainer Marie tried to explain it.
Charles tried to drink into it,
yet it remains the glass bead game -
ungraspable by dearest turn of phrase.
So we have decided to put down our pens
and take a breather."

She quietly handed me the bag of crumbs,
suggesting I toss a few here and there
for the pigeon's lollygagging by.......
"They're hungry, the simple little dears," she said.

I dreamed a dream of you
In countless grains of sand
Along forgotten shores
And distant memories

I watched the ocean
In its infinite mesmer
Under a blanket of stars
That never blinked

The storm clouds brewed
Rolled out like the truth
Cold lightning frolicked
And silent thunder rang

I watched the ocean again
As it crashed upon the coast
I knew even in my dreams
We stood on distant shores

The sun has long since set
The night, too, has died
Daybreak will come soon
Over cracked horizons

You are staring but what do you see
Looking my way but looking right through me

Your eyes were not like this before
But now just don't know you anymore

Can you not afford a fresh set of eyes?
Or do you like hiding behind the illusion you call a disguise

The silence is deafening and is hurting my ears
Would just give up but then would be wasted years

Sometimes this life feels like a revolving door
Pushing hard to get out but then life pushes more

Just so you know thick as steel this skin of mine
Your negativity bounces off…my world is fine!!

Thus far


I coin my faith to love


(That which so binds me to this pole,


Bidding that I press the rocky earth in with perpetual circles)


And toss such currency to faith as it hit’s the gentle waters down a cobblestone well

I watch the weaning day trace ribbons in the sky outside this Bayers café window. The last of the light darts behind street posts and rooftops, embalming any sense of the natural world from this concrete hillside. The very stragglers of life seem to flee into the gentle cracks wiggling into the pavement. Perchance there the earth may offer a warm bed for the night.

A sickly blue begins to tug down on the tendrils of the once cheerful summer sky, much like closing the shades in a cheap hotel room, leaving the world to pull the covers over its head and be lulled asleep by the soft glow of holes in the patchwork. If only there were a ’Do not disturb’ card to put on the door.

A token of light clinks off the window as I watch a young man raise his camera and poise himself, his thin brown hair struggling to stand in the increasingly aggravated breeze. An elderly man behind him too feels the strain as he is to be the last to walk before the rain. Both are pictures through the fogging window.

I glance down at the pale New York Times flung onto the small table in front of me. Grains in the wood scream in agony as the christened edges slice white across its surface. I try to read but the ink is smeared. It occurs to me that this crinkled mat of parchment is the only trace of me ever being here.

Perhaps the young man outside the window sees what I see, even though I know he cannot see me. And I know that when the lens winks it will tell of a lonely newspaper and a shadowed chair, but perhaps the one inspired artist who came along with a camera will try to read the tears between the lines - a forgotten man’s words to the world.

I shed tears in the face of my anxiety,

Gentle

Warm

But They do nothing to resuscitate the hardened exterior

Jagged

Cold

I sweep the floor on my way to your feet

Begging

Weeping

Breath to me life I know you can give

Love

Heart

Save my soul that’s in your hand

Withered

Beaten

Naught can but you, my love

Trust

Trust

Can tell what I know you won’t

Lie

String

Only I can do what I’ve never wanted,

Lost

Found

I conceive no fact to life

Down

Deep

My only salvation in your arms

Love

love

So cold it leaves me in the rain

Alone

cold

I bind the chain around my ankle,

Straining

Chaining

And surrender to the depths of your waters

In you

In you I am safe

the first of drinks in days descend,
in short successions, teasing rain.
the trees and earth will crane their necks,
to receive like wine on lips, the shower.

they savour not the cool of wine-water,
for the rain itself has travelled long.
and when it lands to quench their thirst,
you hear the sounds of glass and liquor.

the rain has passed, as transient as nature.
another glass later, when the earth croaks dry.
but now, the wine has cooled their lips,
the air revived by a rain perfume…

and down are the necks of the heavy drinkers.

as the windows lit this morning,
vista of him started shimmering.
as I view yesterday's scriptures,
still deciphering the figures.
pleased on how it began,
as the current flows,
in a fog, I'm walking around.
vague ideas from his wits,
mumbling, persuading me to quit.
cut it out says the other
fretful and smothered.
draft and roll the scheme,
keep your shirt on
and live the dream,
a blessed life with him.

5-17-11