At the Roseberry Farm arbor where
Rhode Island Reds continually determine
the pecking order
Where spearpoint spurred roosters -
do honest battle in the name of the governed
A place where the continuity of the flock , respect ,
dignity and grace are treasured
The well being of all measured
Where the reign of Kings are subject to the congregations
pleasure* ...

You may silence your voice
But never quiet the mind,
That often ponders and queries
What is surrounding--
Let your words flow through writing,
Extrapolating thoughts
And developing them into
Coherent traces of ideas,
That ultimately envelope your precise
Notions and overriding sentiments.

'There are some wonderful
poetic lines that flow here,' they said;
'but if it's meaning eludes you,
then mark this poem on form alone, and say:

"a lot of modern poets jumble words together
leaving out much of meaning, without
allowing the poem to be read, and understood  
by the readers' searching minds."'

how contrary to other poems--
to be read and understood without
challenge or mystery or fun, meaning
just falls open like your daily news broadcast


let us then consider the difference
between biology and romance
whose meaning lay hidden
within the myriad of applied sugar
as with the case biology in contrast with romance;
if poems where to fall open 'wearing its meaning
on its proverbial sleeve, ' at every instance, then
we'd all best summarily dismiss, on the basis of
'word jumbling' and 'lack of meaning,' denigrating
of 'modern poems' as inadequate to explain or resolve
the issue of not having understood a piece of verse;

there are distinct moments when verse necessitates
more than a standard run of the mill 'fair go' for
it's splendour and depth to unfurl and take wing.

Then may we
Triangulate-

I here
           You there

And these odd
Angles

Give a third
Point

Four dimensional

Where collision
Becomes

(It becomes
Your lovely
Face)

Inevitable-

This the history
Unrecorded-
Unhappened

Happy union
Of opposites

Of the serpent
Swallowing
Tail

Dragon
Swallows
Tail

Left arm
High

My boy Jack
Caramel and honeyed

Union of
Opposites:

Twenty-five
Years
Beyond odysseus

Wandered from you.

Your mother,
No penelope

My picture
Disfigured

Darted
Wounded

Cursed I roam
Wine-dark aegean.

Suitors succeed
And you are
Lost to me.

Goodbye telemachus

River boat gambler

Pencil moustache
Shoestring tie

How I picture you

Jack of hearts

How the ladies
Swoon

mind and thought are not the least bit important, once free,
they only find meaning and usefulness when they are taken in and received
by those of whom these words have brought pain and joy and fear;
as a parched land holds less water:
moist terrains host more aqueous bodies

The old ****** slowly digs holes
plowing with precision
he places acorns

under peony bushes
behind the old
windmill,
each

day he wearily climbs
the den  tree
curling into
his nest

as the neighborhood
tomcat watches.

Encounter shellac where the live oak could balk
in sways of stomata to spare shadow from earth
swaying like Eve in Persephone’s wake
should a frenzy of madrigals
cluster to feast
where her prodigal snake once faced sentience.

A tree grows in reaches long since she passed
fragrant lacking tulips within a thicket of moss.

Now my soul skirts the path of Icarus
to bathe in the cerulean beyond reflection
your eyes have consumed from the sky
like a beast coaxing the blessings of the wind.

I was placed here for you.

A voice lichened in cypress knees carries
with the caress of her woods
pressing me forward
into the dew and new ground
enriched with instinct into the roots of palmettos
shielding the glade of tomorrow
still ripe with blackberries
where she whispers with thistles.

I won't be on the best of your time;

But it'd be grand if you'd give me a word or two.