~for Lori,
they await you~
<>
be:
of two minds, a peculiarly human
distressing and wonderful
characteristic s~trait,

straightforward and regular,
as hu-man was intended,
or
be:
truly crackling delighting
twisty like a river bend,
with a flood plain,
defying nature illogically,
here today,
and new direction on-the-morrow,

the creativity of time
making its own best laid plans
that either wash over you,
or wash you away

what you may not be aware,
as I too, was overly innocent,
that the sidewalk cracks are mini-seas,
full of overheard words, true tales,
a depository of the stories,
of tithes of titles
beckoning, becoming fables,
left by millions of
endless passer-byes
and passer~overs,
a repository of human insights
held inside them cracks,
under cover of
thin brown line
of ***** grime, soil and ****
& history

for this ugly surficial,
environmentally rocky but semi~
solid environ, is perfection personified to
retain. restore all the power memories & glories
of those who tread upon them
in flip flops and snow boots,
spilling the detritus that is all of us,
thus,

a gold mine of poems for  asking,
a vein of jewels for simple taking,
no secret word, no library card, just a
few taps of the shoe’s soul, will kick up
the dust of disorderly unused words,
to be easily inhaled, or cab~hailed, and then
by gum, yous for the making

so walk with me, eyes open, nostrils wide,
ears keen, tongue open to lick up the dust,
impress them upon you skin,
do so!
so they be
not forgot,
nor slip away to a new street line,
and be lost again until someone else
comes along to use
what was rightfully yours
for a moment of seconds

bring your sheaf of blank memory sheets,
scribble madly for the volumes are supersized, stupendous, and you
will never lack,
wander for hope,
nor
wonder too long
for the whereabouts of that next poem,
for lives-it, beneath you,
awaiting and aging,
pry it out by by fingernails
if too well hid,
but trust an old fool,
thee best me-kind there be,

the grimy grinning grungy pallor
is the best camouflage extant,
the dust is gold, a miner’s delight,
speckles of glassine letters
sapphired and rubied,
all yours, when you fall to your knees,
and finally witness, finally see
wide eyed
a new flood plain
of satisfied tears pooling,
*****, hard earned,
falling, forming
from your own
flood plane

seethe ~ bubble up as a result of being boiled,

<>
sunrise was 714 am in nyc
this perfect fall day,
chilled to perfection,
a white wine of a day,
so imbibe,
only later does it
heat up up and onwards
to the temp where the
walkers/joggers/runner recite
hallelujahs and hosannas while
moving at their own chosen pace,
in a state of warm southern comfort,
never a racing

lest
the poems
now seething, boiling-burning
bubbling up inside
into the atmosphere explode!

all of these
early warming~warning inspirations,
now~expressed,
realized flickers of
original ex-impressions,
cannot be contained in
an open field unsupported,
these
breech babies each,
in a pediatric ICU,
demanding an
instantaneous airy concoction
to Earth’s atmospheric
literary intoxication

they use:
up hard, a dice roll,
who lives
who wilts,
that docs cannot but
obey
the fetus’s insistence,
many instructions,
push pull breathe,
must the. be given forthwith
through to our
servile waiting
uterine fingertips,
for we human are just be
~ings,
nurturers of
verbal artifacts
that never die

in
an~always~at~the~ready,
in service to
the great conceptual,

poetic in/justice

the raw confusion of the nucleotide fusion,
the great concoction of recombinant DNA,
when we cross over our own boundaries
and subsume, integrate, reformulate our
very selves, with inhalation complete of
another human being; the danger’s inherent,
absorbing a foreign body totally is the creation of a new being entire, vulnerable
despite the new totality of the resources of
two hearts acquired for mergence

and the rush of two different bloodstreams
now circulating, stronger by far, and equally
vulnerable to diseases never prior considered,
these tissues patches, interwoven skins, two
fabrics, silk and wool, a smooth itchy, that
makes us stronger with yet unknowns of weaknesses, and then we encounter what
cannot easily be digested, comprehended,
for even new cells split apart, and the terrible
terror of dividing division that is the side effect of integration, new subdivisions never
ever forever foreseen cause volcanic tremors
and trusting your other half is awful,
until the fear subsides

this is the why
I write of
only love poetry,
the study of this process
so poorly and powerfully
misunderstood
is the atom bomb
of the human psyche

in rivers dark we travel,
oars with cotton muffled,
for there are dangers on each bank,
and in the waters beneath
the salt and the fresh
excitingly & violently blending,
different weights
somethings fall to the bottom,
others rise to the top

and when the process is nearly resolved
(for never ending,
by default defined,
for end is a conflict
constant
interrupted by truces fraught,
fragrant and vulnerable)

this then
is living,
this physic of the
bio-il-logic process
called love,
and the endlessness
that it requires

the inconstancy
of the
constancy
of the
deepening well,
and the
redemption of
redefinition
of what is
well

<>

2:10pm
nyc
10/21/24

earbuds buzz,
indic of incoming friendly fire,
another love song,
hardly differing,
what’s the big deal?
uh oh, oh no,
only transformered into an ****** boy soon
to be out loud squealing

for that’s not the way a poet’s brain operates,
a surgical insertion of a poetic inquiry brings a repetitive inquisition's painful honesty
and a new commitment commission now inescapably upfront~facing

even for the
low priestly devotee of
only
love
poetry!

Has anyone ever said to you
I want to hold you forever?
Have you ever told anyone
I want to hold you forever?

oh my god!

the brain is racked, a fav torture of the self-
inquisitors, more awful than version physical,
my balance disturbed, my soul perturbed,
which the greater, my enabled loss or
my failure?

for a detailed search of history personnelle
(of course! it is a feminine noun)
registers no results, given or received,
the hurt of the how, can it be, OLP never
uttered this most greatest
declaration of love?

and then/there, by the River East, a most public place, old man is seen uncontrollably
weeping, a non-gendered English verb,
reported the New York Post
tabloid newspaper

small thanks, photo had my back bent,
my face remained hidden, but revealed agony
of the twisted prostrate figure leaning over
the railing as he rails like an exile
or a hostage

and there’s no answer forthcoming, no coverup, just an existential howling in
recognition that the opportunity has likely
disappeared, and the sky answers not
when begged


why me, why me, for the silence
is answer enough, never was I willing to
raise the gate protective, high enough to
stand before another, unclothed and
impurities revealed

surrender myself to accept or
give out or give in to
that most
wonderful risk

and the weeping
doesn’t cease,
it is doesn’t soothe
or ease,
for the division’s remainder
remains less than a
whole integer

how can I call myself,
only a love poet?

and I answer
my self
with a teary silence
of an unanswered
curse