You the nature,
Surrounded by the nature,
Nature, that is always there
and has always been.
is an epitome
to your nature.
Nature should be the nature.

From the cold breeze caressing your face,
touching your body,
passing by.
From the blazing sun in winter,
Kissing your skin,
Soothing your eyes.
From the music
Setting the harmony,
inner and outer.

From your swinging feet in the flowing water,
From sitting under the sky and just watching the stars,
From your barefoot walk over the moist sand,
From the fragrance of the flowers,
From constellations,
From oceans,
From trees,
From breeze,
From sun,
From moon,
From clouds,
From rivers,
From rainbows,
From everything to everything.

The whole of universe spreading something yet everything.
Something so magical.
So pious,
So sacred,
So peaceful.
Sending you healing
the energy,
an inexplicable power,
an immense pleasure,
something beyond,
something immortal.
Like The whole of universe is working in your favour,
Is here for you,
and has always been.
Like you are the universe,
the integral function of it.
Like you are the nature,
& nature is you.

Everything from everything to everything,
Is there,
Subtle,
Yet there,
For you of course.

She heard a noise bone deep
low, as a whale hums suspended
in space where direction is absent
sound traveling fast in currents
as her pen across a paper ocean
translates inky fathom denizen
into ears much as Denmark's old king
who wails his fate in nameless horrors
driving her to 'rocks in the pocket mad'
to stand and deliver her requiem prose
and passion for life in watery depths

-cec

Adeline Virginia Woolf (née Stephen; 25 January 1882 – 28 March 1941)

A man waiting on someone to die
drinks another cup, sighs
and looks at his watch, the face
everyone rememembers
for its twitch and drooping eye,
always running, always losing
a second, an hour, sometimes a day,
a year on the wrist of the dead.

She reaches on tip toe
through windows and tries
to take hold of the outside
and gather it in,

for to feel the wind
and the pull of the tides
on the shrinking inside
of a life growing thin..

for all the names on that granite wall and many others...

I  Prelude

Vietnam broke my mind.
Now it runs like a cheap watch
always leaping about in time.
It pulls me backward into
strange visions of a world gone mad.
My life is time borrowed from corpses.
It is hard to lead your life
while you are stuck in another.
Time, the great healer,
only seems to make this worse.
Self-medication, legal meditation,
nothing seems strong enough
to stop the pounding of the rotors,
the screams of the men and the monkeys.
I have never been able to **** the demons
hidden in the tree lines of my mind.
Forty-three years later I'm still hiding
nauseous and naked in the napalmed jungle.
But my high mileage body clings to life:
the quest for immortality knows no shame.
Now I am a poet drunk on words,
stumbling over the illusion of art.
The more I know of language,
the less I understand life and loss.
And still the mortars rain down
in an eternal, inescapable monsoon.


II Place

Imagine a land that smells entirely of ****.
Only 70 miles wide in some places.
I flew above the abandoned bases of a war
that had been abandoned as well.
Places given up to the jungle
where 60,000 Americans died for nothing.
An implacable enemy that had fought
the Japanese and French before us
and had no doubt they would prevail.
A very beautiful place seen from the air
if no one was trying to eradicate you.
Skinny children, old women, many ******.
A place where real tigers might well
leap from ambush and eat you alive
and snakes so deadly that once bitten
you only got two steps before death.
Breathtaking sunsets and sunrises.
And the possibility of doom everywhere.
Rice paddies, mountains, triple canopy jungle.
Gorgeous beaches and an ocean laden
with sharks and sea snakes for company.
A place where death picked his teeth and smiled.


III Action

Stark terror is the mother of combat;
the rage of Peleus son Achilles
drives the soldier into the filed teeth
of impossibly horrible situations.
Not for America or the Stars and Stripes
but for the man next to you
whom you probably didn't even know.
Never ask why one man dies
and the one beside him lives on.
I shot an NVA regular from 20 feet
with a Colt Model 1911 45 automatic.
Got him exactly in the chest.
He looked very surprised to be dead.
I was surprised I didn't miss.
At An Loc a Huey 20 yards from mine
loaded with 18 hopeful human beings
took a rocket up the *** and
disintegrated into a debris cloud
of metal fragments and pink mist.
No bodies to be bothered with,
no pieces large enough to identify.
A CIA officer executing the wounded.
A tame **** torturing his countryman.
The exquisitely horrific moment when
you know you are falling, not flying.
The partner cut in half by a machine gun
five feet from where I stood.
Do not try to make any sense of this.
Fall back on the mantra: *don't mean nothing.
Cling to that and you may stay sane.
Apparently, God was busy for ten years
and never bothered to visit Vietnam.

IV Comrades

Forget that band of brothers *******,
we were more like a desperate rabble
with no one to count on but each other.
Sometimes a brother shares the blood
in your veins; sometimes you know him
by the blood that flows from his.
You scream, you curse, you try so hard
and he dies like a huge baby in your arms.
Vietnam was a club you could only join
by being there deep in the ****.
Now we are old men but our memberships
will never expire until we do.
And who will remember us then.

V Aftermath

Treated like lepers, we slunk home,
each to do the best he could.
Many died in the denouement of
drugs, alcohol, homelessness, suicide.
When I got home I wanted to be alone,
to be with people, lots of *****,
but only with no emotion attached,
an ocean of Jack Daniels, lines of coke,
mountains of ***, electro-shock therapy,
calm sleep without nightmares
and sometimes the comfort of a quick death.
Not much different than most I think.
Saigon fell. Don't mean ******* nothing.
Only some of us remember and want you to know
so you won't be fooled again.

When struggle comes
as disquiet,
discomfort or pain

sit with it
see what it has for you

perhaps a seed
will be born into your wisdom,

with patience you may nurture
a fertile bed, soon to see within you

new shapes arising
hitherto not possible




MChallis @ 2015

(Niamh Price), this is thy own dedication, thy shortened sentences art lovely, they showeth me mine homeland of Ireland, wherein the druids didst roam, wherein tales went back far and old, as niamh thy soul I feeleth its pain, yet soo amazing thou art friend.

(Gary L), this one is thine own writing, sir, thy friendship is inviting, thy lyrical sense is enticing, as thou doth speak truth when thou seeith it, never quit! On thy works and on thineself, thou art who thou art, a beautiful man, with timeless knowledge.

(SPT), this poem is for thou as a treat, I feeleth thine anguish mix in with thy compassion, thou art a hopeful mansion, filled with words of someone who hath lived age's, thy pages art touching, and I thank thee for thy support and guiding me through h.p.

(Ignatius Hosiana), brother thou art a hopeless romantic like me, hoping for his queen, seeing her only in thine dream's, yet as we scream, as brother's we doth unite! In color of skin's, black and white we overcometh the ideology of hatred, loving the hater.

(Dedpoet), mine Mexican friend, how canst I not loveth thee, thy word's dark, ghetto, and deep, as I've been around hood part's to knoweth enough, the most beauty LIES awake in the hood, the places the rich men overlook, is wherein the eyes of God art .

(Wonderman poetry), brother thy words of Christ uplift me, not a perfect being mineself, thyself showeth me the light in the darkness and thus when I'm down, thine godly loving giveth me help, as thou knoweth brother, love and forgives as Christ taught!

(poetessa diabolica), word's that thou uses art so complex, for thee so I respect, for all thy love thou hath given me, the hope that thou planted me, to showeth me, God still lingers in man's soul's, despite the devil trying to rear around, I thankest thou poetess...

(Donna,) thine little haiku's art a piece of the celestial, thy pieces extraterrestrial, and high up the Angels weep to thy words. Like cures and herbs they giveth me a better day to look to, as like glass, beautiful the words thou uses floweth to heavens moon!

(Rosalind Heather Alexander), speechless I am to thy grace, a Scottish lass as me part Scottish blob and mass, lol, just saying , two bloods of the same kind, now thou art writing thy soul out, keepeth it divine, thy soul canst not go rewind, so love on ahead.

(Soul-survivor), old friend, as we both preach the same predictions shalt we worry of ourn end? No, we shalt continue to showeth love, and giveth others hope, than when we die the Graves not it, but that God's love over-rose, so shalt we, auntie as I calleth thee.

(Icysky), young one please do not cry, the boy's canst seeith the fine stitching God made thee as, thou hath a vessel of rubies, and thou art like a wonderful movie, fast tracked to the best part, icy, let noone breaketh thine heart, and let thy lord guideth thee .

(Joe Malgeri), a freak hippy like me, playing music to the sun, giving lectures highly and fun, thou wilt find a queen like me one day, continue to haveth class, play tunes by night, showeth thy genuine ways. As thou doth, wonderful supporter, HP gypsie!!!

(Anthony Mooney,) an Irish hopeless romantic like me, thy soul hath beauty friend, let not hate overtake, bypass the anger and the heartbreak. Let thy pen jot down thy beauty, making the earth quake, unlike others dear mate, thou hath high class.

(Wolf spirit) ( aka quin,)though we don't talk, I loveth thee mine friend, though even thou doth not like me, thou art one of mine biggest inspiration's, thou art a true passionate, amongst the tribal nations, as I am Cherokee part mineself, thou inspireth me.

(Chris green, )affectionate of the the earth, thy woman Is lucky to haveth a poet by birth, for thy words drip like honey on a summer night, Chris friend, wonderful delight, I thank thee for kindness, for thy hope in refinement, and thou art a king of love.

(Pradip Chattopadhyay,) a man who canst writeth in all perspective, thy profile picture maketh me giggle everytime I seeith it, ( in a good way friend) I loveth thy style, and sense of humor, how thou writeth, and doesn't listen to rumors, a poet!!!

(Dark icE,) I just met thee, but thy sensuality is so delighting and like a dream, thy words sucketh me in as I canst ever get out, thy amour in poem's is a cloud, on which I linger for more of its nectar wet taste, immense in this place, unlike the human race.

(Beth StClair), mine best friend if back in the sixties, we wouldst hath layed flower's around ourn necks and head's, we wouldst hath sang the tunes of the Beatles and the dead, as I wouldst hath sung with Lennon, and zeppelin and thou wouldst hath watched.

(Vicki,) I've already wrote for thou and beth, but thou two art the best, Vicki in the crumby state of Ohio like me(lol) though me and thou aren't from here (were Angels of earth's dream's) thou art a poetic of kings and queens, thou art kind, sweet, and a a peace.

(Impeccable Space Poetess,) thy writing is like thunder. Maketh me laugh cry and rolleth over, I read again, like a books beautiful cover, thou art a friend, a poetry lover. Thou hath intelligence of God and heaven, never let man break thee or hurt thee.poetic!!!

(POETIC T,) a spirit light as a feather, free not a slave, not of this world, a man not a boy, thou hath been through strife and abuse, thy hands art not bound, thou hath cut the noose, please don't leaveth us, we all careth for thee. Friend of mine. And HP.

everyone is selling and buying
the clothes you wear the car you drive
how you dance, the perfume of bodies
mercenary we dismiss in an instant
or fall in love at the drop of a hat
no wonder we needed science
the science of woman and man
facts to help us admit what is what
and who is who to whom and how

Kissed her here, kissed her there...
...Kissed that girl everywhere

I left my hand print
On a glass door this morning
And thought nothing of it

Just like your mom smoked crack
Like nothing of it
Or your dad walked out
To avoid the fiscal cliff
Of raising you

I left a hand print
Thinking nothing of Jared
The window wiper
Who makes half as much as I do
With twice as much
To lose

My existence to him
Is the effort he takes to hunch
And clean up my disrespect

Jared is seventy two
And has back problems
From "The War"
His wife is dying of cancer
And he stays late
To wipe away
My inconvenience

Jared will never know my name
I will never know Jared's name

Jared will never understand
Why some people
Can't just use the **** handle

I will never understand
How my daily actions effect everyone
Thinking nothing of it

Jared will work late
I will leave hand prints

But someday

I will wear shoes
Similar to Jared's