Let us not keep our secret,
secret any more!

Thousands have read your poem,
from your tributary, they have drunk.

So I am re posting once more
to remind grandmother,
so many
you,
adore.

I will not stop
till ten
thousand new admirers
have you paid homage.
then I will
              post it again.


~~~~~~
Oct 6, 2013
The Banyan Tree (A Tribute to Sally)
I am a man, grandfather to four.
Adherent to the same religion,
Poetry.

Breathing through mine eyes,
Exhaling carbon words,
That with time and pressure become
Poems, verbal musical notes upon life.

Each motion, from tiny to grand,
A capsule of expression,
That if examined under microscope,
Familial DNA, interconnected tissue,
Discovered, tho logic says,  
Time and distance render impossible.

But this is a diamond
This is a writ to be slipped
Upon the finger, the heart, the essence,
Of the only Banyan tree I have hugged.

This poem but a fig,
In the cracks of kindness,
The crevices of caring,
It has slow germinated.

You dear, Sally,
My host,
A building upon I can lean,
When wearied spirits uproot
My surficial composure.

Your seeds carried from east to west,
By a fig wasp, a bird unknown,
An ocean voyager, of indisputable vision, strength.

This seeded messenger, word carrier,
Supplanted in me, and your pupils,
Whose very names breathe poems,
In others too, like me and so many,
Seeds to become new roots, but you,
Our Host official and forever
Planter of trees of loving kindness.

You already know with love and affection,
I call you Grandma Sally,
And when you ask, beseech,
I cannot refuse.

Together we will will banish the sad,
Acknowledge we, that life's ocean,
A mixture of many, even sad, a necessity.

But I promise that will turn it into
Something simple, something good.
For you have asked and I answer you
Right here right now - your wish,
My objective, deep rooted like you,
Like an old banyan tree,
Your roots spread far, spread wide.

So some eve, when to the beach, to the sky
You glance, smile, no matter what, troubles dispersed,
For the reflection of you, seeds, full fledged trees now,
Bending skywards, in search of your rays of expression,
Your maternal wisdom rooted, spread so wide, globally,
All over this Earth, is visible from your
Beloved Philippines.


---------------------------------------
In her own words..

I am a widow,
with five remarkable granddaughters....
all beautiful, intelligent girls.
It is such a waste not to write....
each morning that unfolds is filled
with things to write about....
the people, the birds,
the trees, the wind,
the seas,
everything we set our eyes on,
they are all
poetry in motion.
Life itself is poetry,
I always have pen and paper within reach.
My past experiences are a
never-ending source
of ideas and words for my poems....
I shall write until time permits me,
"til there's breath within me."
-------------------------------------------------
A banyan (also banian) is a fig that starts its life as an epiphyte (a plant growing on another plant) when its seeds germinate in the cracks and crevices on a host tree (or on structures like buildings and bridges). "Banyan" often refers specifically to the Indian banyan or Ficus benghalensis, the national tree of India,[1] though the term has been generalized to include all figs that share a characteristic life cycle...
Like other fig species (which includes the common edible fig Ficus carica), banyans have unique fruit structures and are dependent on fig wasps for reproduction. The seeds of banyans are dispersed by fruit-eating birds. The seeds germinate and send down roots towards the ground.

The leaves of the banyan tree are large, leathery, glossy green and elliptical in shape. Like most fig-trees, the leaf bud is covered by two large scales. As the leaf develops the scales fall. Young leaves have an attractive reddish tinge.[6]

Older banyan trees are characterized by their aerial prop roots that grow into thick woody trunks which, with age, can become indistinguishable from the main trunk. The original support tree can sometimes die, so that the banyan becomes a "columnar tree" with a hollow central core. Old trees can spread out laterally using these prop roots to cover a wide area.

for Drumhound,
whose poems make me weep in the early morn.

Which drop in the salt sea can say
I am better, I am the best,
only the visceral,
vis-a-real,
truth from the vision.

This drop we cherish,
this drop is serious,
this drop, we keep.*

No man is a poet
to his wife and child.

First Foremost,
he is just theirs,

Then the world can have him
as just a poet,
after they are done,
loving him for his totality.


Drumhound has no definition in the dictionary.

So I wrote this, my own, my visceral, my virtual one,
my vision real and realized,
his word vise on me, surreal.

Plain among poets,
a salt sea drop I keep.

Once anything is defined, it exists forever.

like a single scraggly blade of grass
of a poem I once memorized,
about a child I did not know,
but know so well,
a human-memory survives perennial,
once defined, forever lives.

It may seem so dull extraordinarily mundane
Like a movie seen yesterday to be seen again
Frame by frame alike dialogues repetitive
Seen before you go to bed heard before you leave!

But if you stop skimming the surface see it little close
There are magic happening right under your nose
She isn’t playing the same script speaking the same lines
Her colors change each hour so do her smile’s designs!

If you live the bare surface are content to stick there
You miss the subtle changes for you her redone hair
For you a coat of powder on what’s a familiar face
To move though you don’t notice in your pink favorite dress!

If you feel too weary see in changing hours no gain
Your life seems too ordinary and hopelessly mundane
You miss how she reinvents herself with you in her mind
Hoping you would see and not turn your eyes blind!

It may seem so dull extraordinarily mundane
Like a life lived yesterday to be lived today again
It’s only your turned off mind that makes it look all same
Missing out the new movies she’s building frame by frame!

written in midtown Manhattan while waiting for a bus, last year, and dedicated to anyone who has been cold latest lately.*

sustained winds
magic-make
20 degrees
feel like zero,
waiting for the M57 bus
that cannot
iceman cometh
soon enough.

bus shelter soldier
marching to and fro,
a guardsman on duty,
passing the he-waiting time
by dream reviving
last night's pastime,
secret activity,

like coffee cup
comet tail sips,
re-image, re engage,
re-heat just enough,
to temper and mind deceive.

recall dreams of painting,
the frame,
already hung,
the naked white wall,
blank canvas,
dreams are time to experiment.

what I paint, however,
extends beyond the frame,
the mind visions,
landslide down,
secreted colors,
images, born and lifted,
upward bound,
street steam rising,
from wall to sky,
letters float.

tho scarfed and gloved,
my painted words,
crisp and crackle,
boundary break,
extend beyond the frame.
wind-chill
tactile exterior defeated,
the burn
of mind creativity
succeeds.

Jan 24th 2013
2:42 AM

A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing.
Ecclesiastes 3:5.

long, long long
have I known
the contradictory meaning thereof,
for I authored it,
time immemorial

till the day came
when understanding parted,
left for another prophet,
another poet,
for this how the world's words go,
round and around

left me
re commencing
re imaging
re imagining,
new era words,
newer versions,
new heards
newer mergings

stones and embraces
ha!

"Two of my favorite things"

no, that's been done...

"Let's go get ****** and..."

nope, that's been done

So,
spark sublime divine
give me a second chance,
compose me a vision
that gathers these
mutual funds of
contrasting similarities
in a bow tied connection
singular, worthy of
song and daily recitation!

her embrace was a stone necklace
around my throat,
sackcloth was my shroud,
to the sea bottom was impaled,
by the stony apparition
of the unrequited embrace


Ugh

My beloved's embrace,
cracked the stones that surround
my uncaring register,
the cold still waters that hid it
now boiling from
her gathering me in

better.

one last try before I repent

embrace the stones
that obstacle the journey,
gather them in, together keep,
for they are the markers,
you have used,
you have been,
you have exhausted,
so long after the body ashed,
these words will trace for
those that follow the path
you marked with
these same stones
you gathered in
olden days of
simple joyous embrace*

this will,
must have to
do,
for the stones of
the angels of sleep have
arrived and undeterred,
upon my chest have,
inscribed and placed,
while bidding me adieu,
tucking me in,
gathering me to my rest,
a closing eyeing embracing,
in drowsy voices half clear:

sleep prophet,
the work done,
the words piled,
the stones now
mark your the
you final resting place
upon them ecrivez,
In The Future,
Keep It Simple Stupid

ten minutes to write.

score the music,

melancholic
the repetitive phrase,
but
I refuse it.

instead I bathtub splash
hard soft rockin' roll,
the boon dog now soaking,
quizzes my sanity
what does he know?

Score the life times.

five minutes to write.
trite crumpled,
hook-shot into the trash,
but trite costly,
one minute of a lifetime,
scared, sacred, but scored by
ruts, grooves, ex personas in my life,
the black markers of my insane
pushed under the water,
drowned by music.

One minute to write.

Poem:
a good start to the day,
please pass the soap,
shampooed the trash out of my life,
the rest, now to start.

quite certain, she who hates to be late
was late to our first date,
five years ago,
today.

she still shudders,
over that,
and now,
for other things.
like my poems.

rainy night, hair tangled,
coming from dancing
Argentine tango
with one of its living masters,
no taxi, impoverished excuse.

of that first date,
poem writ, no repeat,
but if you had told me
five years on, we would
wake up, our hair, wires
entangled, yet again...

I would have reply,
wrong boy, unchained,
wringing out bitter herbs of having,
done my 30 years
in the big house
of a failed marriage,
I am a wine taster,
a player.

told her straight out,
sweet certainty is not my objective,
she laughed, replying,
right back at ya, me too,
"same place, same way,"
our pact, healing, sealing,
with a fist bump.

five years ago.
we were certain.
now, I answer her questions
before she asks them,
now, she forbids me from
buying her any more trinkets.
but I am almost  
quite certain
I didn't
hear her say that.

Quite Certain:

of so many things
that seemed important once,
by the wayside fallen.

that I will be writing
fabulous
incredible
virtual
extraordinary

little love poems,

to her, many years on,
even though
no new words I will own.

but quite certain,
will be still reminding her,
she came late to our first date,
and She will still and
always be falling in love with this poet.