Oct 2020
Poets, let us examine this friendship thing, again.


Poets, let us examine this friendship thing, again.

This is a poem of humans, regardless of our natural multi- flavored striations, that tend to over-define us, thus separating, instead of celebrating commonalities.

Like most things we enjoy, our five senses are the gateway to pleasure, even the pleasure of friendships. They act in concert, a symphonic interplay that reenforces and heightens so that in combination they create a whole greater than a single sense could provide singly.

This is on my mind this week, as I wrestle to understand the meaningful possibilities, the limits of friendship.

Poets form bonds without hearing each other’s voices.

Poets connect despite geographic distances that makes grasping each others sinewed arms, caressing the softness of hard cheekbones, without ever having been granted the unique, all encompassing satisfaction of embrace, hugging.

Poets sometimes can hear but not see each other’s words.

Poets sometimes can see/read each other’s words, but never hear them voiced aloud in the authors own, true voice.

Poets sometimes cannot smell or taste each other’s words, though it can take a poem to another, higher sensory level of coloration.

And yet, a bond so strong forms that defies the conventional limitations of the physical. Should we share such a bond, them you know it, no need to ask for confirmation.

Words, can be gifted, without teleportation, even when and if the bridge of a shared spoken language is not extant.

This is nothing short of miraculous.

Just like friendship.

All my wrestling to true comprehend this state, for naught, for the miracle of words is like the color of water. Universal, invisible, but so varied, that it too bridges and is shared by every ! human body regardless of any human shape, color, form of the billions conceivable.

But wrestle I do nonetheless, for the pleasure of this (non?)soluble problem that both creates queries & quenches simultaneously, so I break off this thinnest wafer to share with you, offering this notional:

All humans are poems.

All poems are human.

Solve this poem for human.

(And ignore the wet spots of my watery, clear tears staining this poem).

begin the
first day
new year
with
thumb and forefinger,
tracing in no organized
specific pattern upon
her arm’s smooth skin,
just a sliding meandering

she grabs the intruders
for a squeezing acknowledgment,
unnecessary, for the sensation
sensual is shared equally,
soft, of course, but so far beyond,
there are elements that lie beneath
that requires mining deep within
yourself, contrasting currents that
soothe the heart and yet, electrify,
simultaneous, a concerto for
piano and violin

this delightful touching is the stuff
of poetry, a wish, a commandment,
for long after after the first day of
the unknowns of the measuring stick,
a ruler with 365 ticks to check the
day’s of time concludes, the touch
will be
implanted on thumb & forefinger’s
cellular memory, and be carried on,
reusable, recycled, even biodegradable!

but then heart hears a lyric,
“she is living proof”
and now!
happily concluded,
is a poem that is gifted
a title, entitled, certified,
and recorded for

*every ordinary moment
when memory is required,
and the thumb and the forefinger
can be diverted to write this all down
for the day when a memory fades,
and the skin is eroded!

12/18/24

I choose fingers,
among the array
of many wonderful
parts on offer,

the other sensory emissaries protest,
but the multi-fluency of fingers,
fluent in all Romance languages,
nay, in every dialect, tongue,
tippling the balance in their favor

for the fingers are wonderful conversationlists, trumping the
cooing coyness of sweet wordy
verbs, fingers defy nouns, pronouns

and are fingers the finest conjunction
that was ever conjured ot conjuncted?

the ears hear poorly when upom it
a long  slim finger casually traces outlines
slow~sensually and the eyes shut tightly,
reflexively, the tongue froze to the
mouth roof, muted into inaction

even the the sense of smell lies powerless
should we block the nostrils with but
*******, and breathe mouth mightily

we do not diminish the orchestration’s
totality, the blending of sound ‘n sensation,
but the blind and deaf all must bow before the power of fingers speaking to
every part of the bodies totality