The way we miss our life
Is our life

Because of all
The relentless strife.

Noticed Mircea Eliade.

America the Shallow
Water only two inches deep

And still they drown in nationalism
Arrogance and the Creep

Rush and the loonies on radio
At the President they peep

Haven’t read a book since middle school
Foreign frightened leap

A nation of ignoramuses
The whirlwind now they reap

sleeping late, waking early
  Nahman’s Palace pearly
           dreamscape

Yearly the Princess Bride
        1987 - she crushed my pride
                  as you wish and we decide ...

                the fairy tale inside.

Avoid the company of women
Said the one called Shakyamuni

Do you think this ancient Wisdom?
Or misogyny gone loony?

I still remember Phoebe Cates
I think she starred in Gremlins

Robin Wright, the Princess Bride
She’s the One - and a happy endin’!

See the Broken Grace of Leonard Cohen
Published by Sightings
At the University of Chicago Divinity School

At 51 my failures
Far outnumber my successes

Curses come all day
Only twilight blesses

God speaks far more Nos
Than He speaks Yeses

But look: Thar She blows!
Whalesong like caresses

At 51
You have to be honest
About talents, sins, and failings

And maybe a bit of mystery
In unusual mailings

I've lived a troubled life
In an imperial, hateful nation

All those Iraqi dead
Cry out American condemnation

George W. was a sadist
Quite like Billy Graham

Prince is on my playlist
Darling Nikki, still I am

Tryin' to do the best I can.

childhood in Ohio
near it, didn't fear it
          but what?

It kinda makes sense
That I would turn to poetry
Mrs. Dewey's class. Women.
Mr. Keating. Todd.

Some say don't get even
Get odd.
Karma - I saw that.
Have trod, Have trod, Have trod

Main Street, Strange Street
Encounters with Chinese Hermits
In my solitude
I plod

Neverland
Whoville
Tattooine
The Land of Nod

                    Escape!

It's true, my desperation
Falling falling falling

Can't get no elevation
Lonely London Calling

Why do I keep writing?
I can't find the words

Paris is the plighting
Beauty and the Absurd

          Hummingbird

A poor player.

The night was black
The roads were icy
Snow was fallin'
Drifts were high

I was weary
From my drivin'
So I stopped to rest for awhile

I sat down
At a truck stop
I was thinkin' about my past

I've had a long
Streak 'o that bad luck
But I pray it's gone at last

Gone at last
Gone at last
Gone at last
Gone at last

I've had a long
Streak of bad luck

But I pray it's Gone at Last!

           - Paul Simon
            "Gone at Last"

America is a ******* country
And it threw its **** on me

I went along far too long
I could only partially see

Now I stand out in the rain
I stand attentively

The deer still appear
I Thai wai the Tree

Bruce says
She might be an heiress
Or a Rockefeller

She might be a waitress
Or a bank teller

Today she in fact
Was a bank teller

O my god!
Was she beautiful!

searching for Red Pine
         not this, not this, not this
                     tea leaves

Drawn deeper
To ourselves and our Posterity
Vertigo like Swift
Trinity College, Book of Kells

She says justice is harmony
Not vengeance
Harmony
A blending of voices

For both Swift and Batman
Human nature as wicked, corrupted, dark
Sacramento Dee Ann
Sacramento Mark

Obscure at times but open
Interpret me, dear reader
Berkeley amphitheater
Dylan in the night

                 I do need her.

I profaned the sacred at Duke
Of course, they kicked me out
Private University
And, after all, I'm UNC

Legends live on Franklin Street
So does a Celtic Cross
Vegetarian hot dogs
Big blue buses for free

I can be lighthearted at times
Sunny days. Basketball.
But when they attack the migrant poor
All Walls Fall

Something there is that doesn't love a Wall
Gotta tear it down
I hope I'm a wounded healer
Her smile, not her frown

            The Last Discovery: Brown.

This is a truth, though perhaps imprudent
  Americans often make terrible students

Students listen and learn from teachers
but the Ugly American - just can’t reach ya

Proudly ignorant, prejudiced, hateful
no respect for others, violence Fateful

Nothing to learn if you know you are right
Then comes the terrifying Trumpist Night

American schools vary by region
But the disrespect indeed is named Legion

The President boasts he never reads books
No wonder he and his minions are crooks

The racism, greed, violence, decay
All speak of the going down of the day

Yes, hope springs eternal
All not yet lost

But, ye American students,
Don’t follow Dumb Donald at all costs!

A sage lives like quail on scattered grain.
When he flies, he leaves no trace.
When the Tao prevails in the world,
he lives in harmony with others.
When the Tao doesn't prevail,
he cultivates his virtue in seclusion.
And after a thousand years,
when he finally tires of this world,
he leaves to join the immortals
and rides a cloud all the way to Heaven,
where such worries don't arise
and misfortune has no hold.

6 in the 5th place means:
Repeatedly I’ll, nevertheless does not die

I think of this quite often
And I’ll tell you why

I’ve never read the I Ching
That’s the truth and not a lie

But I’ve known books of changes
And seen the Chinese sky

I’ve spent some time in hospitals
Then I recover and I try

To cast my spells on the hopeless hate
Destroy it with words, Oh my!

Some think I’m quite crazy
But I’m just a Texas hexes guy :)

at first I wrote because
it came in dreams

then I wrote
to within express

then the chaos
years of thinking things

now because I’m bored
I guess

Thunderin' Jaysus.

Tired. Sad. Alone.
No answer to my cell phone.
Father from afar.

Follow that star.
(pray for protection in Irish bars)

I tell Harvard all the time, there are many great ones here.  But not the greatest.

Melville is the greatest.

                       - Cornel West

Atheistic America
A hard sell but it's been done

Rey along the Way
Surely she's the one

I like Baltic beauty
I pet three stray cats

I like the Dark Knight
He knows the ways of bats

             Protection!

Waking early
Still dark outside

Little apartment
I almost hide

Water is life
Rain is peace

The tragedies
Of Ancient Greece

I like numbers
Rode the Dublin bus

O Pythagoras
Pray for us!

Adam was bored alone.

Then Adam and Eve were bored together.

Said Kierkegaard

Me: You can love more than one person. If you give all your love.

She: What?

Me: If you give part of your love to one person, you only have part left to give to another.

But if you give all your love to one, you get it all back. And you can give all your love to others also.


Or so it seems to me.

The Buddhists are right about transience
But not entirely right
The world really exists
Though it's often like a dream

Can't turn back now
Took several risks
Reno Rendezvous
I play for my team

Order 137
At HMart today
Curious. Quite curious.
I know not what it means

Am I superstitious?
Or synchronicity?
Black and white the photo
Carolina blue. Irish greens.

         Things Not Seen

At times I can see quite far ahead
But much is also dark
In Georgia Dr. Livingston
In Sacramento Mark

By Grabthar's Hammer
Agatha, Arthur, and Dash
We climb aboard their starship
The Captain is Johnny Cash

Mr. David Markson
Que Selah Selah
Gerard Manley Hopkins
Bright wings sings and ah!

When the Night is cloudy
I'm helped by two green lights
She sees me in the dawning
Gonna be some fights

               Mystic Flights

Rotten with perfection at times
Have to let it go
I'm gonna make mistakes
A Tinker told me so

May I learn and listen
Come through, JFK
In the kairotic moment
Californ I A

In the kairotic moment
Courage in the air
Exoplanets spin
Do the deed and dare

Fair
Aware
Rare
Her hair

             Beware! Beware!

Not much hope quite often
But not much is not none
Q soon to play Magic
Beyond Comics. Black Sun.

O those 80s ladies!
Taipei 101
A bath late at night
My City of Ruins risin' up fun

Bought Minority Report
Precogs on the run
Phillip K..****
Episcopalien nun

                3771

At JMU
I took a class on Dante and Milton
The Divine Comedy
And Paradise Lost
The professor was a female Episcopal priest
I was too young for it
But I think it shows
An early attraction
To religious poetry:


They also serve who only stand and wait.

Football in the misty rain
          just us, just us
           endless wish

From the white man's intellectualism
Save me, Dr. King

Deep within my soul
I yearn to dance and sing

Midnight's broken toll
Gollum destroys the Ring

Help me learn and grow
Ah! That Atlanta Aquarium thing!

Martin Luther King
Atlanta in the South

Hear him preach that thing
The gift flows from his mouth

I've been to Atlanta
Coke Museum, CNN

But I've never been to Heaven
Don't know where or when

In this past election
Atlanta turned Georgia blue

Midnight Train to Georgia
Comin' home to you

              2022

The eyes of Pascal's heart saw Fire
         Donald Trump is a liar
               Burning Desire


                         Wager

Please help me love my country
And all the good we can do

Have mercy on us all
And help us to be true

                                      Amen

Fear death when it is far
But not when it is near
One must be a man

Oui Oui Blaise Pascal
I agree and hope I can

I Wagered with
The Madonna and Child
Against Time's Upper Hand

Met Victor Tomar Farrington
But I don't really understand

                    C'mon and meet me ...

this disenchanted world
yet still chanting in my mind

sometimes I truly wonder
is what we seek just what we find?

society like an ocean
political tides now bind

a wave has washed my nation
a wave both ignorant and quite unkind

the future influencing the past
perhaps time is not a line

I smile as she walks past
beauty hints divine

from childhood we reconnect
still a true friend of mine

if the first then shall be last
do the last define design?

There hasn't been a genius yet
Who wasn't at least a bit mad.

Said Aristotle.

He calls his depression mild
But persistent
Over these last four years

Mine, however, was wild
And insistent
This country is a chaos of fears

I dream of escape
Yes I do
But now I have nearly no money

I take the medicine
I stay inside
At least Cecily Strong is still funny.

Father Greeley
Yellow Dog Democrat
West Side of Chicago
Shanty Irish priest

Mind on Northwest
Beauty of Seattle
La Florida Senyoras
Beauty of the Southeast

             Gracias