this patron
no longer exsists

well this is news
to me

i just returned some
overdue books

and wish to borrow more

but nope, not me
I no longer exsist

that must mean
I need not buy
those lambshanks
for tea

Not pay those bills
teeter tottering  on
the verge of overedue

no need to be pleasent
to any one, especially
not you

Rude lady, new
to the system
who has coldly
informed me
of my demise

Who states with
disinterest and haught
in her spectacled eyes
You must not have
borrowed for
the past three years
You no longer exsist
this she did insist
even as I pointed out
I had returned books
only three days overdue
Even as other librarians
stopped to chat, knowing
my name, recommending
new books, telling me gossip
about this and that....

This patron does not exsist
it cannot be true, it is not a glitch
this patron is a patron
through and through
I left them to figure out
the mystery, I did not pout
or get out of sorts and a little blue
I said I would come back Monday
that is if over the weekend
I do not simply fade away

be hovering above
your body after death, a
floating purgatory

which does not desist
when they cover you with dirt, or
make quick cremains of you

you get to hear what others
say when you're gone, first scripted
testimonials, of your laudatory life

later, when the food is being crammed
in overloaded fridges, and the ties and tongues
are loosened, other words emerge:

"he was never good to his wife; you know
he pulled the plug on his father, but wouldn't
let them do the same with him"

"he didn't seem to pass peacefully, all
that labored breathing -- perhaps he was
missing his boy he hadn't seen in years"

"maybe he felt he didn't earn his way
to salvation, or even an end to suffering
of this life of flesh and bone"

and you know not if this is heaven or hell
this place you are doomed to dwell, though you
wish you could now be deaf to these words

an endless biography composed by
all your regrets and transgressions, a book
of your life you would choose to rewrite

but no one, you lament, has that privilege...

~
To: Gods  
From: Only Love Poetry
Subject: Manchester Commencement


~
dedicated to Nat Lipstadt, my better half,
who whispers when life whipsaws beyond belief,
there still will always be,
a new sun come,
a day newly needy for an only love poem


commencement, a lovely,
so human contra-dictional term,
to begin, to end, the meaning meant  
in the ear of beholder,
though this year,
the meaning perhaps, is
in the heart of the true believer

a perfect end of May day, fully unofficially summer
but for the brisk crisp spring sweater weather temp,
informing that the official calendar heated demarcation day,
yet a full month ahead,  
but the news reminding that neither man or nature  
don't necessarily respect
foolish man made conventions of any kind

once again, return to the isle of shelter,
lawns lush, the waves speaking in wave lapping, watery tongues,
which suddenly all humans comprehend,
the sky, a milky blue cappuccino and
I struggle desiring to disbelieve that the
almost summer holiness communing has begun with a  
****** pointless Manchester commencement

the external perfection clashes with the internal revilation,
knowing anger is unprofitable, understanding and resolving
not even close to possible, the waste of why and what for's

thrice, already sent you missive missiles,
that acknowdge did not hit the target,
you must be the the hard hearted pharaoh
who won't let my people, any people, go,
till all of us hold our eldest child in our arms, dead

the is no point in anger, the consoling of souls,
disregarding the vanity of revenge calls,
the Einsteinian repeating insanity of praying each of us,
to different gods to do what we stupidly call the right thing,
expecting different outcomes

so what's the why and the wherefore for just another poem?

to prepare the soul, keep yourself at the steady,
for the next one, never complacent, staying unready,
commencements are either endings or beginning
who can tell for sure, sometimes a bit of both

and in a poem, composed only of love,
written with solemn tears decorating the screen,
finger slipping on the warm sad wet,
a kind of scar tissue, a healing, but differentiated,
returning similar, but forever changed, different,
is still something human I can true believe in, no gods necessary

~
5/27/17 2:21pm

they pass each other on the paths
histories trailing behind them like
smoke from their cigarettes, which
most gave up eons ago

some wield two sticks, to stave
off the inevitability of their demise;
arms, legs, zig-zagging like
cross country skiers

others have the blessed cane of age
a teetering tether to this world, their
backs bent forever making a question
mark, a parenthesis at best

yet others have staffs, shepherds
of invisible flocks, ones they tend to
now in a world only they inhabit, looking
backwards at grazing apparitions:

lambs of their lives they
long ago sacrificed, sheep they
sheared--wool woven into coats
for other old men with sticks

who have their own histories, their
own fleeting flocks, their own encounters
with stick toting strangers, their own
walks on well worn paths