Technology meant as tool, not lifestyle. Zombies walk.
ROM wasn't built in a day. I tweet therefore I am.
Change comes wicked fast. Computers becoming doorstops.
Weeping tablets die barely born. Phones devour brains.
My whole life is on my phone. Small life indeed.
Friends redefined as virtual entities. Sit on my Facebook.
AI will make *** safe, instant, anonymous and irrelevant.
Gaming console warriors. *******. Know nothing of war.
Search engines substitute for knowledge. Shallow.
Mere flesh flees before silicon reality. Resistance futile.
Pin all of this to your *** and see if you still bleed.
  ~mce

In France
they know that women
like wine
only improve
with age,
that sixty
can be ****.

In Amerika
we are taught
to lust
after impossibly
perfect,
young
Barbie Dolls.

At my age,
I'd rather be
French.

   -mce

Do not
describe
the thing,
become
the thing,
and then
tell its story
through
its own
mouth.
That is what
poets do.
- mce

An aging man wearing
a used field jacket stuffed
full of words
who knows a million things
that won't make any money,
stuck in a culture
where only what can be bought
is good for you.

After one bill is paid,
the next stalks you
like an enemy soldier.

Friends dead or far away;
silence your only true companion.

Marriage failed; children grown and gone.

Days and hours to fill with emptiness.

Mornings broadcast sameness
like endless TV reruns.

The price of intelligence
is constant isolation.

Nothing lasts forever
and today feels like nothing.

Stuck like a refugee
between breath and death.

In the distance, a woeful,
lonely moan from the world.

Too long a sacrifice
makes the heart a stone.

Hope isn't just a feathered thing,
it is an extinct bird flown forever.

Not much time left to live,
but it feels like eternity.

Some mornings you would
prefer to wake up dead
but it's just too much trouble.

Get up, stagger through the day
dragging your life behind you
like a bag full of skeletons.

We all have to struggle
against something.

Cheer up!

After all, with a little luck
it could be the last.

  ~mce

The process
is Neuroscience
not rocket science.

A poem is simply
an assembly of a few
thousand neurons
out of trillions
which like a trout
rises through
the currents
of your brain
and takes the bait
of your imagination.

All you must do
is reel it in,
clean it, cook it
and eat it.

Then, cast again
and hope for luck.

Maybe; maybe not.

  ~mce

A ****** of crows
perched above
the newly
planted corn;
we expect sustenance,
they simply wait.
See how the world
mocks our plans.
  - mce

she firmly
runs her
wet hand
up and down
down and up
its slippery
length

before placing
the spatula
on the cloth
to dry

  ~mce

All these decades
thirsting in the wilderness
and still I refuse
to drink the kool-aid.
   - mce

In the chill morning darkness
the soul gropes blindly about
trying to find its pants.
  - mce

Got it buzzed
back to GI days.

A quarter inch
all over, I said
to the dubious barber.

It took some
getting used to
when passing
mirrors.

But now I love it!

I call it
my Monk's haircut.

No maintenance.

Wake up, perfect;
Swim, perfect;
Stroll about
in hurricane,
perfect.

Now I love
to feel
the wind
in my hair
that is
no longer
there.
   ~mce

One morning he found that age
had arrived and moved in to stay
like some unwelcome relative
whose existence he had always doubted.
Suddenly, the past retreated into
a vast, unimaginable distance
and youth became someone else.
Even midlife was a stranger.
Old things began to happen:
his wife had a new husband and life;
his grown children had futures
and didn't come around much;
the news became frustratingly familiar;
*** devolved into ritual;
the best cats were all dead
like more of his friends each year.
He woke for good at four AM
after thin, elderly sleep
and spent the early hours
with bourbon, coffee,
cigarettes and jazz.
Age just smiled, had another drink,
and made no move to leave.

   - mce

Sky of black satin,
stars of white lace,
delicate lingerie
caressing the
voluptuous body
of the newly risen
full moon.

"Just to wake up is to make a separate peace."*

They come and go, each
the same and different.
The night of
tempestuous dreams
opens to a morning
of vague dread.

Ghosts have tracked you
into the waking world:
old lovers, dead friends,
battles fought and lost
a grinning death's head.

You must recover
your center,
find the unwobbling
pivot of existence,
the still point
to calm the monkey mind
and allow you
to reenter the world
of phenomena.

Go to your pillow and sit.
Just breathe, just breathe.
Just be here now.

Let the hyenas of night
slink back to their lairs.

Somewhere, she is warm
and lovely.  You feel
her soothing warmth
from a far away land.
Distance is only illusion,
Maya barking in your
trembling mind, but you
never really are alone.

Don't think; thought
will not suffice.
Only sit and breathe,
only sit and be.

The night terrors
retreat into the darkness.
It is light now and
you are still alive.
That is something
to be grateful for,
breath is a living gift.

Sitting there quietly,
the earth stops spinning;
the new day awakens
in the remains of your heart.

You get up, still broken
but better, and walk off
into what some mistakenly
call reality to meet
whatever must  be and,
perhaps, even to smile.
   ~mce

One night a very young man sat in a jungle foxhole, an M-16 cradled in his arms and all his nerves twitching outside his skin. First night in Indian Country.

The darkness was octopus inky and his heart fluttered doom. Roots pained his *** and ants nipped his body. His lust for daylight was a ******* in a kindergarten. Nothing moved, continuously and at once. He inhaled fear, exhaled terror and knew despair.

Beside him, a comrade slept the agitated, concentration camp slumber of the ******, but he was more awake than he would ever be again.

He felt it before he saw it, felt it gliding there where nothing could possibly be.

Before him, a spider web of death awaited its prey. Claymore mines, strung from bush to branch, waited for the gentle caress that would explode their lethal lead fruit in a ****-storm of destruction.

Nothing could pass through it alive, yet something loomed in the murk.  

A sudden hairline fracture broke the clouds and a single moon ray defined the big cat's sleek body, reflected its yellow feline eye. A panther black as nightmare walked untouched through this garden of death and then vanished.

His heart surged hope. The slithering dreads departed. That cat had walked where nothing could and silently survived. So might he.
- mce

These are adaptations in Ezra Pound's tradition, not exact translations. - mce

I

The moon is gone,
the Pleiades vanished,
my youth deserts me.
In night's darkest heart,
time streams on
and yet I sleep alone.

II

On feather beds,
we spent our desire,
dancing within
each other
until no holy place
remained untouched.

III

The Muses instructed me;
My honor is their craft.

IV

We shall enjoy
each other, Love;
let stillness and sorrow
stalk those
who disapprove.

V

No warning!
A torrent strikes
the stout oak
as love strikes
my heart.

VI

Stars hide their faces
when the moon's splendor
smiles and shines
upon the earth.

VII

Taking the lyre
into my hands,
my fingers
invited it
to speak
a lover's voice.

VII

You
have set
my heart
alight.

IX

I thirst
and
I burn.

Love Compared**

I do not resemble your other lovers, my lady
should another give you a cloud
I give you rain
Should he give you a lantern, I
will give you the moon
Should he give you a branch
I will give you the trees
And if another gives you a ship
I shall give you the journey.

Death dropped by last night.

I never expect him, but he was lonely and I was available.

What’s up, I asked.

Same old ****, he said. You have no idea how hard this job is. Absolutely no one wants to see me. Ever.

Must be lonely.

Lonely, he said, you can’t imagine! Most of them die as soon as they see me.

Do you know hard that makes it to have a meaningful relationship? Or even get a date?

Death lit a cigarette, unafraid.

Oh, I can imagine.

Well, let me tell you; it’s ****** frustrating. Sometimes, I’d just like to cuddle, but I’m not into corpses. Yuck.

Death isn’t much of a conversationalist. Mostly he just whines. It’s all about him. He tends to ramble.

I just quietly let him talk. He did.

Have to be going, he said finally. Must meet the soon to be dead. Rush, rush, rush… and Santa Claus thinks he has it bad. Thanks for listening. See you soon.

No hurry, I replied.

I swear his missing lips smiled as he turned and left.

It took a while before I realized what I had just been spared.

Sometimes, it pays to be a good listener.

I have seen death's face
in many places
from Saigon to An Loc,
to the DMZ:
not by virtue, but luck,
he did not see me.

The others who fell
in those self-same places,
he surprised and snatched
away too slow to flee:
by the dumbest of luck,
he did not take me.

Now they are the forgotten dead
and I am old and weary
and worlds from Saigon
An loc or the DMZ:
my time and luck are running out
and slowly he turns his face toward me.

  ~mce

The turns of life
are imperceptible;
without knowing how,
some morning,
you find yourself
just where
you are.
  - mce

If I say out loud
that I love you,
do our names
and beings change
or do our names
and beings define,
in the first place,
the simple phrase,
I love you?

What can we be
without each other?

Breath without lungs,
kisses without lips,
fingers without touch.

To name it is to be it;
to say it is to birth it
in the world of flesh.

Less than that,
only silence;
less than that,
nothing at all.
  - mce

Her dress lay in a heap
on the cat furred floor.
A smile of satisfaction
spread across her face.
Having done this
time out of mind,
I knew it was my turn
to say something tender,
but my tumescent lips
just can't winkle out
pretty lies anymore.

  ~mce

Or Why I Left Medium.com

Sing, Muse, the futile war betwixt genders.
Hate, stupidity, intolerance, PC *******.
Femmes Afeared* of contradiction. Shout.
Their castrato sycophants. Here, *****.
Nannie and her harridan hyenas. Attack.
On Medium you will be well done. Fried.
Hordes of Harpies hurling lightening.
Petulant little girls. Stamp feet. Pull hair.
Free to agree; otherwise, shut up.
Hidden behind PC barriers, they snipe.
All men are potential rapists. Factoid.
All women are helpless victims. Fact.
Millennial milquetoasts. Everywhere.
Do exactly as you are told
or take your evil ***** and fold.

When you reach
that unexpected point
where you understand
that no magical person
will be showing up
to save you,
life suddenly becomes
very interesting,
indeed.
- mce

In my country
home is no longer
a place, it has
become
a journey.

Folks have
a thousand
Facebook friends
but 80% of
Americans can't
name one of
their neighbors.

Small wonder
we are so
frazzled and
frustrated here:
work has
replaced life
and no home
exists where
we can enjoy
solitude
and peace.

Where do you go
when there is no
place left to go?

   ~mce

Death determines life.
Embrace it: ecstasy.
Reject it: despair.
Scary choice isn't it?
Choose well. Your existence
completely depends upon it.
No pressure.

just a hint of fever
and he recoils
                     recalls
when first the malaria
hit him like a
a dump truck full
of iron garden gnomes
left him shivering
                           sweating
swimming
                in pain deeper
than the greatest
                 Great Lake
before it broke and
he was smashed
                         flat
left crapulent and woozy
a still stagnant pond
where parasites
permanently
                   petulantly
           patrol
awaiting their turn
to make another visit
and say hello again hello

   ~mce

Sometimes I get lonely
for the old days
when I drank a lot
and didn't think too much.

  ~mce

the brilliant morning
no longer invites

every TV show
is a rerun

books that screamed
now murmur

even the body
speaks in the past tense

now becomes was

the falling away
of self
into shadow

even when time
falls and freezes
like winter leaves

the urge to consciousness
resists surrender

how we long for
bright new moments

right to the brink
of nightfall

even as the white flag of death

slowly unfurls

I do not know
if you can love me
or even like me.

An old monk who
lives in a shack
with a fat cat,
without money,
fame or ambition.

Like Han Shan
on Cold Mountain
I contemplate and
try to sum up
a lifetime
in poor poems.

I am not a catch.

I do not know
if you can love me...

   ~mce

Ah, four
in the morning
my old nemesis.

It has been
awhile since
our last visit.

I have not missed you.

Yet we meet again.

Four in the morning,
the corpse of time,
the still moment
between life's
dubious heartbeats,
when blood sugar
takes a vacation
to the cellar,
when the blues
were invented.

When Mother Angst
knits copious
black sweaters
for doomed souls,
when you hear
the black snake moan
just outside
your swarthy window
and ghouls roam
the aisles of 24/7
grocery stores.

When the loneliness
thickens enough
to drive a
Romantic Poet
into therapy,
when only the Devil
is awake writing
lesson plans in Hell
and the JuJu waxes
evil and ready
to lead you to
some preordained
apocalyptic surprise.

When Thanatos
smiles and proffers
a deep French kiss.

Here we are,
together again, met
in your tenebrous
Kingdom of Tragedy.

I say we have coffee
and do some catching up
as I hope beyond hope
that we do not meet again
for a long, long time.

Four in the morning,
no friend of mine.

  ~mce

Real work, whether of mind or body. Real work isn't a job or an occupation. It is any effort that occurs when what you know and what you do converge with who you really are.

Mammalian warmth: the touch of human bodies in all it's wonder and pleasure that reminds me of Nietzsche's saying, "First, be a healthy animal."

A cat's purr. It's existence requires no justification; it is complete in itself.

Blueberries, the plants and the fruit. A feast for every sense.

Books, movies, and works of art that are so compelling they take you on a vacation from reality by creating their own more vivid reality.

My white, 1997 Saturn with 245,000 miles on it. A gift from an angel, I call her Moby and together we sail the asphalt seas. She's a real lady.

Birds. They fill the world with color and music and desire no profit in return.

A lovely woman with bare legs in a sun dress. As Wallace Stevens said, "Beauty is momentary in the mind, the fitful tracing of a portal, but in the flesh it is immortal."

The electric charge of lips touching lips, of flesh brushing flesh.

Anything, on a woman, that is made of silk. Silk is exquisite, elegant and ******.

Weeds that flower, because their beauty is unexpected.

Evan Williams bourbon. Exquisite distilled ****** that burns and satisfies.

Cool evenings after hot days.

Conversation that sparkles with intelligence, wit and conviviality.

Warren Zevon, Thelonious Monk and Mozart, not necessarily in that order.

True friends. When the chips are down, they are a treasure more valuable than even family.

The magical, healing sound of flowing water.

Trees, especially the deciduous. Their greenness speaks to and cools my spirit.

Writing and reading poetry, my craft and my solace.

Love. It is elusive and difficult and perhaps impossible, but the belief that it may be out there sustains even the jaded, aging life.

The fecundity of the unexpected.

Fireflies. Almost too much beauty for one world.

Sunrises, because they bring the undeserved possibility of another shot at redemption.

Garlic, the spice of the gods.

And on and on...
- mce

I just published a humorous (I hope) essay on elephant journal at http://www.elephantjournal.com/2015/04/henry-miller-i-think-you-need-to-stink/

If interested, have a look.

Thanks

Mike

quit needing,

quit wanting,

**** the rules,

be at peace...

the constant of fluxation

truth merely a moving power
mortality merely mereness

a genuine body
sincere energy
a spiritual purpose

quarks, leptons, bosons, berryyawns. mesons
lead to electrons, electronic, electric, energy

this too is a syntax

letters, words, phrases, sentences & soforth

syntax added meaning unfolds
the human becomes

a life lived with intelligence, patience and whimsy

unfolding
like a lily

syntax sails a real world
but only one of many

mind without cause is a noisome thing
it is possible that your ears will bleed


meanings
        diverge
               for
                  different
                           readers


there is really only one sentence per reader

for each line only
one proper break
    or silly jabber
         becomes toxic tropes

     it can take days to understand one idea

I have never understood the
significance of garter belts

proceed with addition

let us go then you and I
out beneath the weeping sky
and attempt to make something new
from what has been

Allow the brain's raw edge
to blow away the fluff and
bore down to pure syntax
unadorned.

most ideas are only nostalgia

writing on the computer
an imaginary ribbon types back

purge the fluff

blow away the frills

what really remains?

Culture?

the moaning and bleating
of cattle from a
moving truck's ***
                   doomed

consider all poetry
               a Lost and Found of consciousness

plagiarism an invention of  
lady freshman English teachers
with withered ******* seeking job security

oh poets of the world
find your lines here
be glad they were chosen
no longer in old ink frozen

made new  made new  made new

Born Again!

(can i get an amen...)

the Poet appropriates and incorporates
making the old new

oh! bursting creation!

fresh fire from fallen twigs

make it new! make it new! make it new!
(old ez bombastic but on point)

everything you
imagine is possible

alphabet, words, syntax = narrative
narrative the only reality
and you are The Magus
with power to create

but this calls for courage

again it is an alphabet
making a word endowed
by syntax with meaning

meaning as always
just one of so many
possible realities

created out of lack of time

if there were world enough and time
you could embrace multitudes

you could spasm out
a plethora
of galaxies nebula planets

only cursed by time
is limitation introduced

know the silent voice of the gods made visible

find the Center of Self
just what is and no more
    sentence
            syntax
                  skein

unr­avelling back to the Source

we are more
than we can ever be

  ~mce

Society is a mortician.

It will try to make your life a coffin.

Then it will try to make you fit.

If you don't, it will gladly
cut off, your arms, legs and brain
so that you do.

Do not allow it. Be your full self.

Stretch your limbs; use your brain.

When the time comes, lie down and
stretch out on the rich earth whole.

Laugh at the mortician. Die like
a warrior, the same as you lived.

  ~mce

The only thing
left to say
when you have
already said
too much.
  ~mce

On my Father's death last night.*

Death of a father. Night of nothing. Morning of less.
Anhedonia. A family like the Walton's on crack.
Drama looms. Not a human feeling in the bunch.
Death a hyena at camp fire's edge. Light goes out.
Step up to the grave. Now you are first in line.
Mortality worm gnaws. No exemptions. Gnaw back.
We are but a moment's sunlight. Some not even.
Only lesson. World goes on. Without us. An instant.
Good morning blues. Blues how do you do.

  ~mce

Aside from loving you,
I feel more nothing
than anyone
you will never meet.
  ~mce

You are tired
and heartbroken.

Your words just now
can stay unspoken.

What you must say
can wait a day.

Meantime:

I will steal it,
take your pain
into my brain
where it can sit,
where it can stay
hidden away

within a rhyme.

Not to speak of
till a better time.
~ mce

Some days
I just want
to strangle
the world.

A bottle
of whiskey
and a well
of anger

        say:

Back off.

Today is one
of those days.

  ~mce

Times show up in life
when a man must decide
to face the fire or to flee.

They have visited me before
with fabulously mixed results.

Now again I hear,
if only in imagination,
the sound of bullets,
the whine of shrapnel,
the drone of rotors,
whispering to me:

Your life; your choice;
stand your ground
or run away.

May my heart choose wisely.
- mce

When I get really decrepit,
I will wear mismatched clothes
on purpose; fill my pockets
with useless pennies; leer
lasciviously at girls far too
young; mutter arcane
wisdom to myself just loud
enough to hear but not to
understand; eat everything
that makes the health Nazis
cringe; smoke in inappropriate
places; get drunk in the
mornings if I so desire
and smoke *** in public.
It will be an ecstasy to
not give a rat's *** what
anyone thinks. My only
regret will be that I
did not start sooner.

   ~mce

Those lost in war
are mostly
gone for good,
but sometimes
their ghosts pry
my ears open
and softly
weep into them.
I can only listen
and wonder,
why not me?

  ~mce

Time itself
will dissolve
(leaving nothing).

My life
will dissolve
(leaving nothing).

Your kisses
will dissolve
(leaving nothing).

But that is all ahead.

In this moment,

I live my life,
taking my time
and enjoying
your kisses.
   ~mce

Poetry
is the sound
of your heart
speaking aloud.
Listen.
Ignore the voices
that say no,
and you
are already
a poet.
- mce

I sometimes think
people believe
poetry is easy
as some ****** girl
who will swallow you
for any kind of fix.

They believe whatever
escapes their mouths
is poetry. They open
and out it pours, complete.

It is not.

Inspiration is easy,
just lines that leap to mind.
But to make a poem takes sweat.
It is a craft that requires
work, and thought and pain.
It means finding the exact,
right word out of millions.

If it simply pours out of you
and you do nothing to shape it,
it is just words and probably
not even good ones that are true
and will outlast your broken heart.

Dig in. Learn. Read. Practice.
Become a sculpture of words.
Pay the price for beauty.
It will be worth it.

If I knew who
my readers are,
I would buy
them all a beer,
but I don't,
so I won't.
- mce

Mostly
my heart knows
the right thing
to do,
but doesn't.

No surprise.

It's only
a stupid muscle
after all.

   - mce

Errands to run
decisions to make;
clothes to wash:
the endless
trivial particulars
that weigh life down.

Where is my
personal assistant,
my life coach,
my hot French maid?

****, once again
I've woken up
in the wrong life.
  - mce

Age blunts
the fine edge.
Distinctions dissolve.
Solids deliquesce.
Each day becomes
a struggle
just to feel.
But if you struggle
hard enough
you can delay
the inevitable.

For a while yet.

  ~mce