I entered athe land of Chance
(or so it seemed) there to seek
The beauty of the love that i
Everywhere and there  Ifound
Old friends and new So many
Treasures everywhere but all
Fragmented ;friends I'd made
That I could not keep.   So to a
Greater loneliness I woke again
To my defeat (or so it seemed)
By love rejected and so far away
Without chance or,friend to play
As if in a pool I looked down at
Myself and decried the abominable
Wretch I had become only looking
Down on my sorrow ne'r realizing
It  was in the sky above me and the
Forlorn one I rejected was the Christ
Above me that  I rejected.  Disgraced
Beaten and defeated. Yes I am sorry
I admit it for it is God's Truth Too


*I was ignorant therefore I spoke as I did...
From the end of the Book of Job when the
Lord asks him where he was when God created
The Leviathan?  Children forgive me that I spoke
As I did.  I am sorry and ask you to forgive me
Even as the Lord did Job for Love"s sake...

Repentance is bitter fruit just
Without charity yourself you.
Remember but would forget
Nor are free of yet -lest lost be
The lessons meant to secure and
The better part be lost but it is
that itself is  the impediment for it
Is not grace if it be earned nor
Can it be . But lesson  is buried in
the soul incorporated in the dark soil
An unconscious conscience  now is  no
Burden but sets us free to fully be
To know the joy  eternal we must
Forget the unforgivable as the chaff
Is burned  Let it be love that endures
Though it seems much too long it is
A moment till this suffering be no
More School is out.  It is early Forever
Summer now and we are  let go by god
As nature takes its course on our behalf

When the whispering pipes are heard
oft we  remember as if in a dream the
deeds of derring do otherwise known as
treason, and treachery punishable still by
death and shame were they known and-
done now.  Was it courage, youthful folly
or the grants of intoxicants that gave us a
victory that is but survival when we should
have perished with our now stateless friends
Have we been forgiven?  Have we  repented
who can still remember the liberties we took
the passion we felt still feel in the south of our
souls where history is not over; is not even past
Oh Father forgive us.  Grant us peace that we
May remember and still laugh without shame
to be among the fallen for love's sake the times
This time of our togetherness and remembrance

Love is the we kisseed link
A bondless memory that cannot
Be remembered but lets us be
That let's us live till time
May let us  kisss again
That love not be forgotten

Seems like only yesterday
In his dad's apartment near
the old hat factory in Norwalk
Where his dad  had worked with

My grand mother  on opposite
Sides of the Union.  There he
Was Playing belting out Long
Tally Sally with more spirit than
Little Richard surrounded by his
Buddies all a little drunk as He
Clanged on the guitar like it was
The end of the world.  He died not
long after-complication of too much
Drinking and diabetes not yet thirty-
A vibrant life- my best friend it was
Another evening and I wasn't there
I was told it was another celebration
That he started laughing and could not
Stop until he passed out and went over to
The other side.  I went to the funerlal at
St Thomes's  His wife Sharoln was very
Beautiful a teenager in black veil. They
Had separated but not before they had a
Little boy -Tommy.  I cried I never knew
He was leaving though he had been telling
The Long long goodbye of our youth that I
Thought would not end even as it flamed out


For Little Richard and Little Tommy
s

A look in the mirror.  Yesterday.
A short dash from somewhere to
No where.  Who can say this not
The essence?  When its over.....

Years ago when I was sa boy I used to
Visit an old hosrse on a farm near my
home that is no more.  Whenever I came
He would amble up to the fence and greet
Me.  I never brought him anything to eat
Boys are careless and do not think ahead-
Still I wish I had.  He always came to greet
Me .  Either he forgot or forgave me.  Does
It make any difference He knew I remembered
Him.and tha't ts how I feed him now by recalling
Him , the farm  and my child soul of long ago.