Truly my pleasure,

                             Like the spring sun on my face,

Writing with you all. –

it has become painfully clear
that in a land filled with English speakers
many of us do not speak the same language
there are individuals lost
forever locked into a mindset
void of color
only black and white
right and wrong
absolutists
living the lie of party lines
driven to madness
over personal freedoms
clashing with their value system –
eyes look past and through me
when I speak of a shifting planet
and the effects of humans
on the greater ecosystem
as if I were an alien
or an immigrant
without proper documentation –
when I bring up the ideas of holistic
healing
killing cancer with marijuana
fighting illness with a plant
easy to grow
easy to process
documented success
it doesn’t matter
they do not listen
they can’t hear me
I am speaking a foreign language
with a common tongue –
this is the state of my country
most of us run around
using variations on English
most of us have the same definitions
use the same education system
breath the same air
drink and eat
**** …..
yet we cannot come together
we cannot join forces
because you don’t know what I am saying
when I say I love you
you can’t hear
when I say I care
we will all die alone
looking into the eyes
of our brothers
wishing they could understand
what the **** we are saying –

This translation machine is broken-
trying to say love and it says hate
put in a phrase of friendship tokens
and it levels one at hell's gate

"New-Speak" and Homeland insecurities
una máquina rota, spells of discontent
What breaks borders other language;
Is it bred of complacent, lazy lengua ?

Languishing in privileged syllables
boiling over rice stew vocabularies
slamming with a hip-go spiritual
trying to make sadza in this crucible

This hairpin empire vomits convolutions
history, her-story, suffer culture's debt
education's deficit mouths a babble revolution
while a classicist argument tattles future threats

Talk a tale of totem's gift in parable or song
spill some beans and climb a stalk up a golden path
Give tongue your peace with liberal speech along
while some may grunt we sing a verdant poem

-cec



sadza - in Shona, Ugali in East Africa, is a cooked cornmeal that is the staple food in Zimbabwe and other parts of southern and eastern Africa. This food is cooked widely in other countries of the region. Sadza in appearance is a thickened porridge.

The tired poet
lays thirty days' burden down
and gives a heavy sigh.

Don't remember much after kissing that cold brow
it was hard marble and most unlike father's warm skin
his tombstone made of honorable granite soldier's chin
don't remember kissing mother off, though lips did avow

At home tears filled each cracked and crumbled memory
washing years off family ties and turbid sentiments
eventually it ground mother down, to earth-stone treachery
prevented, being buried near to dear, by denominated impediments

Amnesia forms around these roots dissolved in Greek tragedies
padres loose hijos and their fathers lost theirs, immemorial
full of forced forgetfulness and years trudging absently
yet sinew of connective tissue thoughts hold off this cryptic burial

Stored in each molecule of life through generation's seedcase
clings a cocooned incarnation of movement's creation
secret, silent and concealed; ephemeral as a dream-space
"drink sweet waters and be mute" and forgo your ideations

-cec

I remember Reaching for your hand before we first kissed.

I remember Enjoying the warmth of our hands touching as did our lips.

I remember Measuring my words whispered in your ear, to take you beyond bliss.

I remember Every tasted breath, before we kissed.

I remember Minutes spent together, the blood pounding in my state of light headed
bliss.

I remember Brown eyes drinking in my blue eyes, as we touched finger tips.

I remember Every tasted breath, before we kissed.

I remember Relishing the next time our hands would be closer than our lips.

I remember
the letter
you wrote
saying it was
better that
this was good-
bye, I was across
the country
and could
not test the
look in your
eyes, gone
cold. This
rememberance
is very old.

I remember creeping up slowly
I was not allowed to play
in the busted and rusted out
’56 Ford –
I remember the faded yellow paint
peeling in the sunshine
chipping slivers off
and watching them flutter slowly to the ground
like the oak seeds
helicopter style
spinning and twirling
down, down, down…
I remember the shinning silver handle
with its easy downward force mechanism
and how smoothly the door came open
as if it were fresh off the lot
and I were an interested buyer
and not a child
breaking rules placed for my safety
and well-being….
I remember not caring if I might get cut
or rusty paint chips in my eye
only that this was mine and Grandpa’s special place
and I missed him –
I remember reaching out to the ripped and faded interior
feeling its heat on my hand
I remember my ears being perked
straining to hear the backdoor
of the farmhouse
if mother found me
dad would whip my *** after work….
I remember that is what he called it.
I remember that hot upholstery
and my small fingers  
twisting a string
before I made my move to jump into the cab
and drive, cross-country….
as I looked up,
legs like coiled springs
I remember the fattest bodied garden spider
I remember his black and yellow pattern
his perfectly developed web
I remember standing in shock
as this monster had taken over my special place
I remember falling backwards onto the yellowed grass
his freakish body forever imprinted
my 4 year old psyche damaged
giving me a lifetime
of an unreasonable fear of spiders
…..I remember that day
because I cannot forget it –