~for Ketoma Rose~

money, far far easier for me
to gift, give, loan it out,
with very generous terms
of no repayment due
indeed, with my luck down,
the less I have,
the easier it is to share...

perfectly sensible to me
living with giving hands
and a
giving mouth

know that I know
that there are
a handful of you,
who read me with affection,
loyalty and a kind tenderness,
I cannot ever repay

so it makes me guilty+crazy,
keeps me up at night,
these obligations that cannot be
repaid without the hard work of
patient poem-waiting for inspiration
that comes so easily
only when it's ready

and this day I am ready
to pay down, pay toward,
please forward, give what
you have taken from me,
the pleasure of stating,
an adoration of thanksgiving,
a joining so profound,
that once found,
cannot be lost

and you dear reader,
can't fully share, or see these
gratitude-tears-I-am-currently-shedding

but voyeuring come along with the
knowing insight that I would want you too...

so you write from where your heart's
rip tides
rip you open and wider,
yet so oft it falls into the tears in
the pockets of only holes and neglect,
and you, ego-weak human
cannot understand
just how that can be...

but there you are,
Ketoma Rose,
by any and all your names,
liking my words,
and I crease wetness
upon my face tracks
wondering who you are,
and more over
the why
of who you are,
this wondering,
an agonizing
guilty pleasure,
a trouble I just
love having...

but bills must be paid,
and now this debt,
finally tiny-tad dented,
and the fact that the interest
upon it,
grows exponentially
is the
*best debt
I ever was given

the woman surprises,
bids me an eye~closing adieu
just a tad differently,
as I fall off into easy street,
the "sleep perchance to dream" place

she whispers a parting thought,
a quiet shot cross the brow
marking up my transference,
a hole-punched in my
departure and entrance ticket,
a line crossing, a seed freshly buried,
for my sub-mind to ruminate upon

"I am very fond of you"

puzzling this, for is this
as good as,
the pro forma
"love you"?
a lesser conditional,
a solutional mystery?

a diminution, a new dialect,
a dialectical proposition,
a homework assignment,
needy for exposition, exploration,
what means this phrase,
tween long time lovers?

I have written love poems, t'is true,
but never audacious enough
to market them as
true love poems,
too many, done before, no need,
trite indeedy, what sonnet expertise
had long ago,
youth lost

but here comes a
commentaire, remarque,
answered though unasked,
on the subject of

true fond

there are many you love
just because,
just cause,
just the effect,
of being
blood kith and kin,
or kindnesses memories from long ago,
that cannot be pushed aside,
buried in fogged cemetery dirt forgetfulness

but by now,
know clear,
just where,
I'm going here...

you can be fond of someone,
and bon mot, sweet,
need not love them,
but you, hero,
stand back and
grasp this commotional notion

you can't just love,
cross over the river
from like to can do,
that other thing,
until, unless, you
ease onto the vessel of you
into the deeps of
true fond
and take away with you,
until heart and soul now veneered,
a no rust
coating,
impenetrable

that place, that feel
where and when
the affection is infectious,
the tender is unreasonable,
the cherishing downright excessive,
the savor is a favor to oneself,
the giving instinctual,
the taking victuals
not so tasty or important

where you feel
way past the point of foolishness...
and then and only then,
with this
necessary condition,
take the rudder
be the pilot

do/if you think you can  
goodnight say,
get off/get away
with the perfunctory
eroded by time,
"whatever"

then kid,
you don't ken
true fond,
the  cornerstone, the found base,
the reality of where edges blur,
where what you feel
is like first bite of
tea and morning-warm buttered toast,
making one think
this is the way it
ought to feel...every moment,
salty n' sweet, smiley-face grinning
heat,
true fondness

Sensual Spaces


the slightly parted lips,
beseech your entrance,
plead for a soft gracing,
a closing grazing,
a memory of
{entice consummate consume},
complete, fulfill,
long remembered far long, far more,
than the interminable sea voyage of the ordinary,
pressing drowning locking,
rinse repeat...

half an inch, less even,
much less,
separates two dancers,
a gulf, so much more arousing than
a can't-breathe grasping embrace,
an exercise to wondering
where the real pleasure kept...

be in no hurry
tarry, slowly,
seek out the
spaces between each finger,
all an invitation, all a question mark,
awaiting filling, answering...

yours in mine, mine in yours,
lock down this connection,
valley spaces tween peaks
needy for
the rain of touch,
the sun-skin heated insertions,
does not the curvatures of her
neckline,
cry out for
hands and lips attentiveness,
a space continuum
{~}
[^]
<|>
+-+
%

t'is the almost,
the last step,
to the first kiss,
the closing connection,
of that first hand-holding,
crossing over the last span of the bridge,
the lowering of the final descent
to the shock of
first insertion,
the wooing nearness of a n'ere forgot scent,
the last step
to the first step,
that first closure,
that is the
final entrance to
sensual spaces,
hallmark passage
gateway found and instantaneous
lost,
that is ever-treasured as that
door just opening
and as fast
closing
to
love ever after...

all about
how your stock of words,
the inventory of what you got,
aged and now marked down on the books,
carried over from the holiday season,
that you, in marriage to life, accumulated,
to whom you have become betrothed

your trade, no can give 'em up,
gotta to maintain their
existence
no matter how bewildering,
gotta to demonstrate
persistence
by taking last year's unsold,
repaint, recombinate, dress 'em up,
post them as all new,
even tho the words used,
pre-existed you,
still noisily proclaimed,
still advertising
each Johnny-come-lately
poem as
**"brand new"

this is a very important poem to me,
about me, and how Obama slurred my people. and never apologized

<•>

there are mornings when I wake up
in my nativity,
in my born/bred,
these struggling to be happy,
United States,
strangely hebrew-speaking,
Jamaican coffee
morning-thinking,
tallying up
what I am,
who I am,
commanded to be,
on this Earth

the labels that the
outward-looking apply,
the tags,
that you have caused
yourself to be defined,
been staked
to your claim,
in infamy and in fame,
that you have
by action and indeed,

have allow
to be presented
as entries on your
global entry passport,
with visas from the
lows and highs,
places where
your have sinned and saved,
all the acts accumulated,
and those,
in pain,
you have been a witness to

word titles that
tinge and suffuse,
summation of my presentation,
sampler of words
like
father, poet,
American,
even,
a for-real
community organizer,
and of course,
bien sûr,
a
Jew

the quality of all these life's papers,
which I grade myself,
I,
the harshest marker
of all

once a young man,
safely away in college,
under the fresh-air freedom of the
university's in loco parentis,
in the early years
spent quantifying oneself

nearly fifty years ago,
now he,
revealed and recalled
when
his college typed-letter,
lately uncovered amidst his,
recently passed mother's papers

"Don't know what kind of
Jew
I will be, but be assured,
that I will be a
Jew
all my life"

so here I am doing my post-sabbath,
top of the week,
right it down,
qualifying myself,
coffee enraged engaged,
a new Sunday tally

taking all my terms,
reordering,
re-prior-itizing,
what was prior, first,
is no longer

decades decay,
events sway,
simple words change me, stain me

nearing on five decades later,
when this
son of speakers,
son of humanists and 
son of
 writers,
son of proud
Jews
rewrites his list

today I write/substitute,
a new order,
a tag gladly taken,
a marker given,
some what in pride,
some in shame too,
first and foremost,
à la manière d'Lincoln
I am
of, by and for

"a bunch of folks in a deli"

proud member of them
that so identify,
for they are among those
that shall not perish from the Earth

those
happenstance-not,
bunch of folks in a deli,
I claim as
mine own,
as they would
have claimed me

no subtly professed,
a diminishment intended,
and now
an honorific taken,
Medal of Honor provoked and embraced,
proudly inscribed,
visible on my forehead,
in the black ink of mourning,
a Presidential Cain Citation,
a tattoo of letters,
not numbers,
now moves up to
head of the list,
I am
now and forever,
a member of that corps
(appreciate that double entendre)
I am
Je suis
JE JUIF

*"a bunch of folks in a deli"

(for Ingrid)

sudden like,
no intermission tween
sleepy and pangs~pinging,
rested, then arrested  
no intervening leavening
proper impromptu improper

slip sleep out of bed,
water wash the eyes,
the most private part
of all of them privates

primp the tongue
rinse fresh mint,
musk the body chest,
where hands go to hide
in forests of hair shirts
so the contrast of
smooth shaven
skin fresh cut
never clearer

go down to sandy beach

look for, take the
chances of never,
overturn the stones
protruding inviting asking
for discovery

each a chance of ever
each was a chance of never
all now mine,
sanded smooth pebbles
in sea~lotion washed,
fine coolness on warm hands,
brain thought-full-ness simplify,
so beautiful so beautiful
mantra unmasking human peculiar
oils essential

she turns towards...
mostly sleeping
logic dictating queries of ascertain-meant,
time and temperature, place?
hands answer all
here and now and the heat
of jeopardy

collect the pebbles in pockets
till overflowing overturning spilling unaided,
you cannot find the line that defines
the separation of
beach and sea,
church and state,
for it has been washed away by
uncovering discovering derisking
so many chances of never,
so many pebbles of ever

with toy shovel fingers,
warming eye scalpels cutting exploration,
exploiting the workers and the queen bee,
hidden in moist sand
looking for undiscovered poems
in skin folds,
no castle building just hole digging,
treasure seeking thrilling pebbles finding
head dizzy sun hot stones overturning
finding noisy ones where once
sleep suspending breathing quiet stored

you don't waste time editing,
just dig and spill,
just laser and spit
metaphors
that lance and crash - mixing into each other in confusion,
uncaring, for nonetheless,
clarity converts chances
of never
into ever,
integrating the what ifs
into what is...

For Helen
who wrote it first,
who wrote it better,
and in doing so,
makes me see more clearly
the why
~~~~~~~~~

no poem should ever be untitled-
every face needs a name-
every poem needs just
one read for completion

but more than that, it is
a orphan still,
deserving of the due,
the entitlement to be titled,
a parenting of sorts

what was the thought that born it-
what was the emotion that conceived it-
what was the sight that demanded sharing?

this is the age of summary and synthesis,
140 and not one more,
so give direction, enable me to make
snap judgements, with so much on my plate,
we must predigest your concepts,
my multi-tasking slowed to levels unacceptable,
so I can adjudge you,
you worker poet,
before or never reading
after all,
why read anything untitled?

more than this however,

for the few who chew
each morseled vowel,
ken each constant consonant,
celebrate stanzas that halt the breathing
and then,
god bless the whole child,
flaws and all,
they more than anyone deserve
your consideration in return

for the title is the essence spark
of you-
and all the more so,
of what you have chosen to share,
  your essentials honored

Feb. 2015

this writ,
content so obvious,
it begs,
why even bother...

Pen Man Ship

this is who you are,
this is your scent, scripted,
the parfume that memory triggers
declarative self-examination passing grades

if pen and paper
are your skin and blood,
then you, man,
ship to shore,
skinned alive,
in poems verbose spill all

ship in ship out,
the glories and the dreads,
expel ink oceans glorious India blue,
rivulets of tributaries,
spillages of what~where,

you are pen
you are man
you are ship

where intersect these routed things,
one is voyage~bound
for parts unknown

the pen be the oar,
and the man, the ship,
and when the sails raised,
the wind never fails,
only there is no
dead reckoning -

for there are no
landmarks observable
when sit~stand
to commence sail~writing

each writ a latitude recorded,
each poem a longitude drawn,
all together, a
body of work,
all together,
your life's coursework
is the captain's log

Pen is the Man is the Ship

in everyday words
he answers
the questions life poses,
in everyday words,
he realizes
the answers he (doesn't) posses,
with each passing poem
the ship, righted,
though the heading
remans unknown

meet me
where the broad teary rivers
both empty and fill the oceans,
takers and givers,
swapping sorrowful fluids constant,
these loyal thieves,
from the sky,
robbing a soul's invisible moisture,
selling what isn't hisn't
right back to the heavens

for this is the
human condition,
the foaming eddys where
life becomes words
becomes life redux,
infinitum swapping
sorrowful fluids*
~~~~~~
http://hellopoetry.com/poem/1052415/a-personal-god-wailing-and-complaining

winter's after-the-noon shadow lights,
fused-tinged with early-onset grays,
harbinger of one for whom death
detaches the answer from that question
too soon asked, so long unanswered,
why me?

those gray lights, a violin accompaniment,
mourning pitched wailings unasked for,
yet always in attendance, court courtiers,
feelings of insufficiency, angry angst insects

envy days when simplistic unknown fears
were the worst enemy, never lingering,
for unknowns have no answers and
cannot obtain permanent resident visas

but reality, another matter, mad hatter,
asking repeating what is this, why is this,
even comprehension partial gives
no comforting answer satisfactory logical

envy innocence past, for newer questions now *****,
comfort by the lies in the essaying, trialling,
if, but, for, the distractions most affordable,
so grasp the pen that is the envy of thy companions

let the ink wail louder than you,
make paper shed what you have used up,
let envy of lost and found, found, yet still lost,
salve, but not solve, soothe, but not save

in the winter afternoons, those shortest days
of indeterminable longevity, words received,
offer little, but words self-conscripted,
a mortal transcript of pain immortalized by pen, relief will yet be,

for the pen is the envy of all

dying and living in a pantheon
~


a dusty storage place
for basement keepsakes,
somewhere out back,
full of emeritus stocking stuffers,
an ex-trendy,
royalty-dethroned room

where kept
ancient scriveners,
last year's flash frozen princesses and
plastic wrapped scribes,
cloud stored,
on soft decaying hard drives

prior renters, leases unrenewed,
now pushed aside,
upcoming upstanding upstarts,
looking to trade up,
let bigger quarters,
an existential reminder,
that in the word game,
no perm-press recognition,
in today's poetry biz,
it's what ya done lately

deaf dumb blind,
unsung former idols,
talk to mirrors
that no longer answer,
dial 1-800-pantheon,  
sorry, number no longer in service,
so you voyageur-visit
the other side of Styx,
a bluff overlooking
a body's work,
where glory fleeting
comes to rest,
where time judges well,
partiality impartial,
selects thy best

author an audience of sole one
that be more than
good and plenty,
a heaping teaspoon of sufficient,
glance back at discarded, outdated maps,
glory may transit
but satisfaction eternal,
when you read the old writes thinking
****, did I write this?
"Yes," answers a creased smile
cracking crusted lips

~~~~~

then blood of pride and satisfy, rejuvenates

chest warms, heart thumps,
quill beckons, tablet charges - jot hot

write for whom the bell tolls,
knowing full well
this raucous bell tolls for thee,
you re-become an
irrational ill-defined room possessed

heat,
this realized, fevered and fervent, physical pleasure,
sensory gladness,
the fat fullness of creation,
flooded breathable sunlight,
stormy uncalming indigo waters,
a natural disquietude beckons,
arousal of an old-friend welcoming

this encompassing emotion,
no-direction-known fearful commotion,
your mind, all skin,
tissues enflamed,
your ears speak,
your tongue listens,
five senses unified in
disheartened happy discordant perfection,
this you recognize,
this familiar,
is not a storage place
this, your true everlasting pantheon

glory glory - expel thy word works,

*the burnishing of fain fame
is not walled jailed,
but in-deed
actionable and transitory best honored,
peaks of mountainous-emotions, homeland, motherland,
recording, recoding in words-vision notions,
this is the one,
the inky clarity pantheon place
of the living poet

"May poetry be our salvation,
liberation and Nirvana"
Bala

so many ifs* in our daily lives

the ifs that pockmark lives individuation,
look-back crossroad regrets, daily harvested,
road poorly chosen, the kiss not taken,
a brother, for a petty sake, forsaken,
a sister, sea-drowned, left undefended,
by foolish parental expectations

many are the global conjunctions,
commencing and ending with an "if only,"
today's state-of-the-world curse,
uttered when reading the front page's
mayhem and senseless,
never-aging, new and old excuses raging

so many palliatives on offer,
what matters yet one more,
none seem able, none proven capable,
of essencing a humanity so simple basic
when the moment at hand needs a
redirection that a loving rhyme can sway

but in my inbox from India
comes a hope, a wish,
that leads a man to dream,
envision societies that could
surround-sound itself with wisps of words,
in the oddest places,
throwing us offsides,
in a make us see ourselves
in better ways

a morning poem before the TV weather,
a verse insert
tween news reports
of who murdered whom this day,
subway poems, a Super Bowl commercial
recitation that makes us lick our lips,
poetic literacy in small things,
a minister or president's speech
a recitation of a nation's verbal wealth,
instead of rejoinders and accusations

ah just a foolish notion at 4:22am,
there is no money in poetry,
thus its possibilities to soften and stem,
cure and elevate
enhance the perchance
of a different way to,
salvation, liberation, and nirvana,
seems so unlikely

but there is that small step
one could take,
leave a poem on the night table,
a first thought, a morn pill of humankind,
be a softener of a day just begun

I know a bad poem when I see it
yet strange enough
never seen or read one,
my tablet refuses me,
my writing hand shakes
incontrovertibly
the dictionary confirms,
proper usage forbids,
the conjunction of the words
bad poem,
t'is a linguistic impossibility

every poem ever writ
resides inside my customized
pantheon,
tho spell it a tad different,
Pantheone

every poet/poem lives forever
in a
pantheon of one
for the courage to expose,
deserves the honor
accorded by their fellow immortal muses

season of resolutions,
new year's first born,
even quicker, first to die...

written in January

bad companions,
bare naked lady trees,
leafless branches upward pointy hands,
prayer-poking gray cumulus suffocations
that brandish distempered depression,
but disembowlment,
alas fails

awake to January snows,
a few days happenstance
quick to mortify in hours
to city-blackened slush,
from the winter's seasonal menu
fast removed,
spoiled come-on appetizer

lament the cold,
the quick passages
of stern resolute aspirations,
laying on lying sweet snow coverlets,
all of sugar made,
rapid dissolution
as expected,
momentary melt in your mouth
not in your mind

written in January

dreams of summer rejuvenation,
season of asking for nothing
for cosseted by nature's free bounty,
ask for no more than my
stern but comforting
Adirondack pillow chair coat wrapture,
the summer elements teamwork
salve save safe sundry effects
tan the disaffected interior most

wiffy cloud-banks to safe deposit
January weariness and dismay,
face-stroking downy breezes
deftly engineer a physic
another, yet once more,
summer soul
forgive-thyself-salvation,
unasked for but
answer-granted nonetheless

written in January

sum sum summertime
easy eyelashes love licked
gentlest happy bay waves,
rocked body forgiven a
winters pounding and poundage,
rolling down now on sunny easy street

written in January

living room fireplace-glow ignored,
unneeded, for t'is the season of
whole rooms food fed sun-suffused arias,
bathing brain in sundown's
late afternoon long languid
indefinable colors of providence's provided
uncommon normal natural spectacular

written this January

troubling majors mining minor discomforts surge,
distractions fail,
memorization of growing up
a lonely long bike-ride mile from the Atlantic,
genetic makeup says
amidst the
written in January
nightmares
therein exists a seeded summer sensuality
that pleasure grants
poems written ***
summer-life-dream schemes,

happily
betrayed by my inner owned,
I am still a summer man,
writ larger when
written in January



~~~~~~~~~~~~
by Wordsworth
http://m.poemhunter.com/poem/written-in-march/

by Nat
http://hellopoetry.com/search/poems/?q=I+am+a+summer+man

~for you~*

me you and this here
writ somewhat clothed
pretty ****, imaginative
words, six-pack abs,
sheathed in black lace thigh highs,
a verbal escapade to reality

lick the screen
dare...
lick yourself,
dare...
only fair,
words so fluid, so sensual,
when shared...
best, stupendous
commemorative

come to my bed,
come inside my tablet
thrive on pleasured kisses,
exchange of the essentials
bean~genes of threeselfs blended

what glory glorious
that moment,
can relive it,
with eyes contacted ..

where to here now hereafter,
when to here, poem return come once more
knowing we have jointed,
acknowledging the creation of a
co-memorizing-tionary diction,
recycling this one poem,
our commemoration coin
that only goes up in value
I love you...

~for mark john junior~

the spigot turns counterclockwise,
oft I wondered why,
is it the magic way to make
things rise...

'pon occasion, the water shuts off,
turn left to right or vice versa,
no juice no bath and life starts
to stink, especially under armpits

and you think
how many love poems does one soul
in his lifetime possess,
and can I do better than my last...
if at all

sometimes you stare at a blankenship
ocean adrift, pirate hijacking victim,
no grub, no paddle or map,
but an empty water bottle

baffled you ask it
to point north,
laughs at you, asking,
"am I a compass,
or you,
a complete ***,"
a seismic groan out loud,
registers on
Florida's hurricane wind watch

how come this to be
meteoric loss of metaphor bridging,
search the Internet for the ******
of poetic inspiration, and an
error message delivered:

"plagiarize, or better luck next time sucker"

patience, football, thy women,
will in time realize the artful truth realized:

"Creativity is allowing oneself to make mistakes; art is knowing which ones to keep"

Scott Adams (creator of Dilbert)

so
go forth,
make mistakes plenty,
keep some good,
the pink ones fyi, my fav,
look that quill in the face,
and give the lazy ******* some lip,
reminding it,
it gets paid and ink drinks,
by the word

~ for my friend and fellow poet
Rebecca Askew~

wherever that bench be,

I be

oxygen sweet, sharing mine,
preserving you, a necessary for me

for are you not
my very own Canadian
wild shorebird daughter,
my wailing
wild woman, kicking up dust trails,
driving across wide plains
with no-eye boundaries,
whose prayers and lamentations,
take me into mourning places,
and lift my eyes skyward

what is this,
the third, the fourth,
the nth,
poem you have extracted,
from oil drilled within me,
dug in my inky deeper places,
my tarred but oil rich sands

though our eyes have not yet crossed,
our embrace completely incomplete,
a millennia of words exchanged,
borders crossed oft,
no passport ever shown,
no visa needed,
when this will not sufficient prove,

I do not know

but with calm certitude

Michaelangelo finger extended,

when that last traverse

will be spent, at last at lasted,

the when or the wherever

this will be, a commencement ceremony,

I Know

that my spirit

you so well possess,

will come upon your request

bring your near,

no marble bench memorial markers here,

just life giving

empty Adirondack poet's chairs,

needing jams and jelly filling,

your name dedicated,

inscribed thereon, upon one,

be by my bay,

(forgive but forget cold, unforgiving Lake Michigan,)

by my bay, seagulls wail and squeak

airborne inspirations,

acting soully as watch-birds over poets-in-residence,

where words lap upon the simple shore,

for free-taking, warm lived life contained,

no talk of death, only cheating it...

This I know,

as well as the colors of

my blood, my guts, my words,

yours, the first words my eyes read this day,

this, my last belief, as my heart beats,

come summer,

we will write together side by side,

the windy invisible, indivisible

words composed,

be, that, our true *benchmark,

of lives well lived,

forever preserved,

death defeating,

you,
help me to
see too well,

so laughing shouting,

fine woman-poet,

**I know thyself

that the trending tags,
for but a single day,
banished the perennials,
all celebrated the occasion
with a rousing wake and
an indecent burial

out **** spots,
sad, pain, heartbreak and depression,
in the closet, once a year, annual,
as for death,
it's ugly head,
cutoff, spiked and disliked,
in the tower displayed

for twenty four, de minimus,
on a day mutual selected,
we compose only
of the beauty, and the kindness
in each and all of us

for the sey-hey man

word bird droppings
scattershot sent
disguised neath flora,
a name by any other,
sally sent forth,
never looked back upon

untenable pursuit
GMO words planted in an
untended garden,
man-made wild sent seeds

purée of amputated lesions,
a divorcées convention,
bon mote note comparison,
freely shared, plagiarized,
by-product of a man's waste,
bidding adieu,
but never
au revoir

*let them spawn
more and others,
will love them
better just for knowing
even never
seeing them again,
still and always,
whatever wherever
they ride~write on,
still and always,
I'm in them,
unflinchingly personal,
even if signed by
another's name...

returning home from an evening out,
I'm in bed never later, than 5 minutes after,
which never fails to provoke a
"How can u be in bed so fast?"
same reply, every time,
got you women, got you girl,
to do the nighttime girlie stuff,
so you can kiss your fast asleep man,
a tender good nite...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

puttering punches

woke up energized,
called to muster,
dishwasher emptied,
the fresh grape vine scissored
into manageable bite size clusters,
coffee machine oiled and coiled,
fresh beans and water, dregs downloaded,
if we had a lawn,
I'd rake the invisible leaves

she later arrives,
sees my puttering efforts,
cowgirl mounts me to squeeze the bejesus outta me,
then punches me in the arm
to express her unmeasured pleasure
as is her wont,
me, don't say nuttin', just smilin'
cause I kinda punched first...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

paid bills

paid some bills this morning,
the kind that don't come in the mail,
but eyes read and and the heart knows,
these are dues you need paying,
no questions asked,
no answers given,
checkbook lighter,
but then again,
so is the heart,
the day starts well,
maybe even the year,
a lighter start
for the new year..

A whimsied notion, a full scented but invisible imagery,
a passing by, vagrant sensation, a distinctly indistinct memorization,
never certified, never was, yet always will be, stolid as mahogany,
two men
armed, engaged in, by, full embrace,
brothers but not brothers, friends in skins that never touched,
citizens of one continent united, yet each on a separate distant edge,
thus divided, thus impaired,
two islands,
both born and torn from one firmament,
each man,
firm in demeanor, infirm in wearied body,
their words were handshakes that bridged mountains and rivers
ranged and arrayed, as if the Creator created but to split them,
though clouded mists and rain squalls
from time to time obscured their vision,
belief was, that like the granite schist that bedrocked their common soil,
though quaked and fissured, the heat that united
and sometime cooled, their ardor, their pledge unspoken,
yet permanent and fixed like celestial combinations, the expectation,
their friendship
**shall duly flame again

(for the love of Yocum...who may shoot me yet, someday...)



most like 'em
simple, short,
bite size sweets,
easy to please,
a mouthful of amusement,
even if taxing,
tax me only briefly

a small remarque,
a tiny tingling digestif,
easily consumable,
easily forgot,
a couple of lines,
one ooh, one aah,
minimum is the maximum

never been that way,
**** hard to write
what ya ain't,
so keep on scribbling
a pack of stray dog thoughts,
long, loud, and sometimes
subtly & dangerously straightforward
~~~~~~~

(feel free to stop here)

~~~~~~~~

easy are the chocolates of
loves disputations
pained morsels of remorse,
lovely to be found,
even lovelier when  lost

cream fillings of twinges of regrets,
violence wrecks the heart,
what might have been, or once was,
subjects that guarantee the
affection of the great unaffected

writ my fair share,
stage three, t'is methinks,
of the ten step process
getting more n' more
writing-addicted,

don't begrudge
the overly simplistic,
still I am, hard aside,
rough adjudging,
tiresome trite are the
dust mites of poetry

as for my own mixture of
mostly mutt and purebred
stray dog thoughts,
ones that chase
solitary strangers down
late night streets,
see you hiding from the lamplight
in the in-between shadows,
when we tender invites to
all loonies & loneliest,
join up!
with this ragtag pack of
estranged poetry dogs

maybe they don't tickle your fancy,
our words, abstruse and direct,
dictionary lookup dignified,
observations of a man
looking outward,
after looking caustically inward,
every thirty seconds

the tint of his glass enclosure,
modulating the tenor and timbre,
of his singing voice,
the changing light complecting
his visage, his visions,
his hell-howling versions of
packets of stray dog thoughts


the individual words,
constituent members of
roaming, stray dog thoughts,
sometime silent,
usually growling,
once in awhile,
roughhouse barking

but what I got is
what I get,
what I give,
scraps to eat,
raps of notional emotional
stray dog thoughts

so if ya hear those footfalls,
words that just can't be refused,
run for places where the crazies
can't get in, the packets locked out,
unlessing you wanting
to howl along side,
an appreciative audience
who can't get enough of,
consuming whole candy boxes,
in one sitting of
words that keep coming,
I will howl mine
own stray dog thoughts**

you can always shoot that **** howling dog

maybe '14 wasn't so great,
maybe indeed,
it was just
******* awful,
a year out of sequence,
come fifty, seventy years too soon.

here I am
alone at home,
laying about,
and A riddler wishes
me a marvelous holiday,
a merry Christmas,
interrupting my umpty umpth
viewing of Ralph's seasonal quest
for a Red Ryder BB gun

another poem, gestating,
suddenly borning,
kicking my guts
get out here and now,
nine months, of nine minutes are up

another story,
needy for retelling,
another riddle to unravel,
another itch, this day is now stuck on
a poetry assignment, way way too big,
high school football and a good novel,
put far aside and from a
watery weeping state,
here he goes...

ain't no hiding this day,
ain't exactly mine,
a nice Jewish boy,
from the skyscraper city,
brine bred on family lore,
that starts with an escape journey
from the Spanish Inquisitors
some five hundred some years ago  

clueless where to take this travail,
absent answers, questions unanswered,
why do I do this to myself,
looking once again
at the places where pain
comes from,
knowing that my human answers
just a salve of paper thin digital words

how to crossover,
from distressed days
to peace on earth,
when  I ain't got
no talking relationship
with Jesus on an
average bad day,
let alone his manger birthday

this year was not my best neither,
double negatives purposeful employed,
but my bad ain't even close,
to answering riddles and questions
taken as my very own,
making a bad year
that much worse

head butting,
no answers coming,
when my own spirit in the sky,
does it again,
via Pandora,
plays another
nice Jewish boy's answer
to my dilemma,
as if my mind read,
Norman Greenbaum sings his answer
from way back in
1969

well my prayer
sorta exactly answered,
whom am I to disbelieve,
here's another tribe member wrestling
with the exact same interrogatory,
invoking Jesus's intervention
one that sold millions of copies,
to ever question the
unfathomable wisdom of
the spirit in the sky

but my work made even easier,
the question riddler
clues me in
with her answer simple,
and unafraid:

"celebrate the present
and
remember the missing
then celebrate both together"

there is no divide here,
no north, no south,
call your spirit by whatever name,
and
where your story begins,
how it ends,
it's your own poem~composition,
mostly writ,
but not all,
by you,
that cannot be forgot,
for all humans are poems,
past and present
are forever

when at a loss
for the salve of digital words,
well remember Abraham told his only son
some plain words:

"the spirit in the sky,
will provide"

celebrate our portion,
larger or smaller
for are we not family,
one family,
one portion

Riddle solved

-----------------------------------------------
Norman Greenbaum - Spirit In The Sky Lyrics |1969

"When I die and they lay me to rest
Gonna go to the place that's the best
When I lay me down to die
Goin' up to the spirit in the sky

Goin' up to the spirit in the sky
That's where I'm gonna go when I die
When I die and they lay me to rest
Gonna go to the place that's the best
Prepare yourself, you know it's a must

Gotta have a friend in Jesus
So you know that when you die
He's gonna recommend you to the spirit in the sky

Gonna recommend you to the spirit in the sky
That's where you're gonna go when you die
When you die and they lay you to rest
You're gonna go to the place that's the best

Never been a sinner, I never sinned
I got a friend in Jesus
So you know that when I die
He's gonna set me up with the spirit in the sky

Oh, set me up with the spirit in the sky
That's where I'm gonna go when I die
When I die and they lay me to rest
I'm gonna go to the place that's the best
Go to the place that's the best"

Our Verse into Psalm

"who massages our words
into a masterpiece,
our verse into psalm..."

sourced from a dialogue one year ago: http://hellopoetry.com/poem/548741/the-contriving-is-all-that-remains/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
humbling words,
just now discovered,
a reflection invitation,
commenced and ended,
an essay of simple facts

two topics theme,
revealing a man's evolution

a confession oft repeated,
he writes too much, (used to)
a readily apparent truth

but when the self-soul-peering
hits bottom,
forced to reflect
back and up, and around,
acknowledging self is a four letter word,
a poking from reviewing
a year ago gone prior scribbled response,
leads to a conclusion
to answer his puzzlement

easy acknowledges
he has prior peaked,
certified and certifiable,
his best words gone by,
bye and bye,
so how now antiquated,
this tiresome task
of endless interior internal examination,
once more
he asks of himself
the Psalmist's question (121:1)

"I lift my eyes up to the mountains:
From whence shall my help come?

from you,
y'all

my poems are now and will be
just stories told,
stories of you

of a lost wedding ring,
of a young woman's striving
to answer her most essential question,
reflections on being four years old,
on Eastern Seaboard geography
Thanksgiving Day air turbulence,
a young woman's sobriety celebrated,
her poetry, richer and health effused,
of lovers who cannot ever be,
of jobs lost and freedom gained,
physical pain that knows only
the optics of poetic relief to salve,
aching and unrequited awed and flawed love
that has no remedy defusing,
older schemers, puppy love rediscoverers,
of special young men
who see by their nature,
far better into
nature's window that answers the human soul,
children foreign born, here & passed,
whom I have never met, but,
who are poems
dearest in my breast,
as if, no,
as they are mine own...

and on and on

could travel and travail,
but the clickety clock says
bread to be earned,
wistfulness hour over,
all that's need is a conclusive,
one octave,
a summarizing single note,
a lady last rinsing of the soul

your stories are my psalms,
your heartache and triumphs
my masterpieces,
thy foibles are my filament,
your stories, my revelations

turned my eyes to the mountains,
seeing only my own mountains,
that engulf and surround,
hearing a single,
simple voice answering,
it is their mountains
that deserve written attention,
and therein and thereby
can you write humbly
and walk upright^

for Stacy B.,
who is both, of course*



a third floor
walk-up,
to wake
us up,
really up,
perhaps obtain
a provision
to a question,
someone knew
needed answering,
needed us,
also,
to witness and testify

is the dancer,
a diplomat,
or is the diplomat,
a dancing naïf?

hard by the East River,
in a building unheated,
the Brooklyn Hipsters
patrol the streets,
drinking hard,
their homegrown lager,
against the
December winter chill,
all wearing their
very long or very short
hair heads,
in unisex
watch caps

so too,
we have come to watch,
but we are,
uncapped,
open minded,
needy to get it straight,
once and for all

we crossed an
olde Dutch bridge,
having come,
to a land almost overseas,
traveling recklessly,
without our Manhattan
diplomatic immunity pouch

looking for answers for
questions long lingering
in a tall women's New Orleans soul

no biggie -
be both
says the rational fool

irrationally
failing to understand
the logic that
dancing
is more than
just a
single daily, caloric rich,
ration,
but a
blood type,
that doctors
don't easy recognize,
needy for
constant spice transfusions,
perpetual transformation

is this your answer then?

the diplomat departs soon
first, and not before,
having danced in a black hole,
where all is annexed, animated,
but also, annihilated

a dancing metaphor message,
reflective perfect,
of a too oft,
cruel world,
to our official
US of A messenger
of, by and for,
we, the people
of our mutual states,
her audience and employer,
nota bene:

Morocco and Tunisia
beckon you,
lands where dancing is
not a shouk spice for sale,
but we,
our country,
needs someone who can
nonetheless fluently teach and speak,
dance interpretively,
a précis of
how to dance to
reveal our best,
American song

so I have my answer,
and perhaps,
she does too

a dancer first,
a dancer always,
in a national troupe
that I am a member of,
even though I can't dance a lick,
and my Arabic is but
a few healthy and choice curses,
a linguistic skill of mine,
from traveling in many unfamiliar climes,
always, a handy tool

proof positive,
we need specialists,
who can cross boundaries,
real, or cartographer-drawn,
artifice dividers that demand
diplomatic dancer skills in overcoming
a resistant world to
American ideals

so we train our dancers
to be diplomats,
our diplomats
to be dancers,
flexible, but all possessing
that mark of a ramrod carriage,
the upright walk that
is the passport of joy,
of those who dance
for all the world,
an answer so good,
it simply makes
good

for Laura and David

so the story goes...

of a long ago silly fight and
then a Boston Bay boat ride,
magical moments of a simple interrogation repeated,
that recalled a man beach combing for what,
he knew he,
already possessed,
a permanent bezel for his love
that secured with human strength
their togethered life

You! You Two!

recall best
the forest,
not the trees,
not the ring,
the freedom from a symbolic beeper drowned


recall best
the ring's tale,
your unfinished yet-storied,
mid-trip bay borne voyage of denouement,
a retirement and a reaffirmation,
marked best not by any stone,
but by
the knowing  women,
all surrounding,
with righteous exclamations of envy for

his loving words,
his words!

the value of living,
raconteuring memorized mutual wisdom,
no diamond could ere cut a deeper groove
than his spoken words

words etched in flesh,
immutable and undying,
far exceeding
rubies and diamonds,
their gain, their loss,
merely pecuniary,
could never speak or prove
a love far better
than those special holy words
a spoken capstone,
tribute gladly given
to his shipmate,
his fellow voyageur,
his story of them delivered
but happily incomplete

of this I know
with utter certainty,
for more than twice,
with his eyes cast down upon
igneous ankle-twisters,
while overstepping
lazy sea lions,
invisible iguanas,
heard him tell me,
the frigates and the *******
and the head-popping turtles,
all who came
to see and hear as well,
them too,
all jealous of
what he spoke,
even then...

for well they and I
heard him say,
in a whisper
intended just for me,
but overheard,
and legally witnessed and thereby,
and herein attested hereby
by many citizens
of the Galapagos and
even one from the great
State of New York

those loving words,
those words

without her, I am lost,
with her, I am gained,
repeating in his way,
Proverbs 31:10:
A worthy woman who can find?
For her price is far above rubies*

so accept this as a free release
from one who listened to the
poetry of a ring's story,
and though he cannot recall the
appearance of the accoutrement,
the words, the words
they spoke,
the whispery smile she let escape,
never left, never could,
that being the thing of greatest
worth
the poet
deemed most worthy
of recording for posterity

__________


this expert poetic witness testimony
in the matter of matrimonial affairs
now entered into permanent part of the record of
Laura and David,
notarized, signed and sealed,
and internet delivered,
truthfully writ this day,
December 20, 2014

blondes, brunettes and redheads,
the goodbye colors of the
street's tree choir members
and their leafy gowned denizens,

the good stiff chill upon them,
the selfsame chill
in my anguished mind
now hiding,
sing a comfort food song
heard above the quiet terror of the
noises of a fall winters-wind precursor

"once we green,
once we were renewal,
life everlasting emblems
once,
you were wee,
green uncaring and free,
presuming that you too,
were in possession of
life everlasting

your colors have changed as well,
endless is the process,
only slower than
a tree's scheduled maintenance,
moreover,
returning you to your first
crayon drawing youth
unlike us, an impossibility

we will turn young again
for many seasons more,
you
never will

new eyes will feast upon our
glories refreshed and love our
cast shade cast

yet special are you the man,
poet who was chosen
to see and tell,
witness to our resurrection,
during our overlapping,
parallel continuum in time

when to the shade of hades
you physic sent,
our limbs, our leaves,
our perennial lives,
for-as-long-as-they-shall-last,
will cover thy remains and
give your poems back to the
sultry summer breeze from
whence they came
and the colors
of your words
will be the colors
of a free life everlasting"

return voyage,
window seat,
trapped but nonetheless neat,
the views anticipated,
the route, north/south,
Eastern Seaboard, on the right,
don't need no GPS,
just a flotation-in-case device
under my **** cheeks

the local barge pilot
sent back to port,
now, the pilot~poetry commander  
in charge,
now piloting
this body, this ship,
over interstate global waters

my censorship overridden,
watching words flower,
in a daze of self-formation,
my input,
torn-out by force,
brain clamped,
seceded unwillingly from the
united state of the brain~body
of my republic

off to the far right
thru white haze,
the coastline, pointing,
an arrow head directing,
homeward bound

see further the water's edge,
wide but still bounded
by a somewhere-out-there horizon,
a glazed vanilla cloud bank
demarcating the end of the world,
for surely,
this cloud line thickened
over shadowed by
rainbow shades of only blue,
for this is where the cartoon sign is
perma-posted,
the one that appears always saying
The End!

beneath a complexity too much to explain,
lies a jigsaw puzzle incapable of ever being
disassembled and reassembled,
so fine are the parts and pieces,
of this land

roads like capillaries,
over and through fall earthy browns,
connecting mini homes,
an occasional clustering,
all set down scattershot,
randomness of guard-posts
over endless cultivations,
some linear, most not,
but all irregular,
as if the toy designer,
drew a landscape with
intent to cause or replicate
human madness at its tiniest,
its finest

periodically, the sea
invades the land, net casting,
subdividing naturally
the subdivisions human,
into islands and lines
of rivers so bent and curlicued,
they too,
cannot be conked,
their single hair straightened

where I am I so do not know,
guesses are hazardous,
so I make one,
Virginia perhaps?

Of course, I am incorrect.

from my perch in seat 12F,
I see a noon-day moon, halved,
observing me and vice versa,
sneaky uncensored notions
periodically sneak in,
causing poetic commotions

does the moon write like me
of what it sees,
or it is an inured sophisticate,
the daily astounding of earth's
mysteries innate, just commonplace,
a regular, serialized TV show?

below clouds cumulus, cumulative,
the kinds superhero's rest upon,
a white blanketed shelf of
fluff obscures the land,
the irony for those flying above this
delish
most relished,
blue skies above me,
a white wonder of
fuzzy cotton ball
underneath me,
which to those hapless earth creatures
is just
but,
another cloudy day

all is lost.

the captain speaks,
descent imminent,
control soon to be
returned to the
fool in seat 12F
the guy that did not write this poem,
but that other fool,
some dumb doppelgänger thinking,
a vista was his and
needed sharing

soon he will be concreted,
his flesh moved like a chess pawn
gliding in and on mass machines,
to move his essence to a specified
confinement cell,
from which
this essay will be reviewed,
wonderment,  who,
who riposted this travelogue
while his hands were tied and bound

for only an innocent can be so
wildly moved, wilderness bewildered,
natural emotions run ramped
from ends to endless,
only hopefuls see horizons,
and what lies above
cloudy grey ceilings,
while below,
in land of
asphalt green and work,
where bills due, obligations a must,
responsibilities that crush,
and so

his innocence is shelved,
wonder is a child's task,
not his,
his are chosen by
clock and calendar,
and flying is an excuse,
to get away,
not a place to get to...

and he wonders who wrote this eloquey,
while he observes rows of rows of
single family homes,
tall buildings and a Brooklyn Bridge,
a Central Park and even his home,
hard upon the East River,
while landing,
finally,
he espys

this place,
this isle,
Manhattan

it  is his brick and mortar,
the stuff of what and where
he lives,
like everyone else,

*on just another cloudy day

the child of the child of my woman,
cries in the night,
rooming next door,
down the hall
and
he is
all children that cry in the night,
but he is
more mine
by right of quantity

numerous are the kisses lavished,
this biannual visit upon,
his four year old
oversized head,
(so full of 'bains')
his undersized,
protuberanced belly body,
a combo making him
no longer baby,
nor a grownup,
both states,
he denies accurately,
maturely in a wobbly voice
of utter certainty,
but lacking the adjectives
of what lies between,
he debates his state thoughtfully,
until distracted by other
more pressing matters of state

he is boy, little but vociferous,
quiet, pensive, his head a weapon
of...confusion and certainty that
being four years old,
he must perforce be
permanently
in skeptical awe of the world

this is the best position ever,
he has ascertained,
to filter and behold anything,
whatever newness arrives,
which is constant,
streaming and unending
until new is
fully digested, analyzed, and classified,
as if he were
a zoologist in
a wild and untamed land

only certain of what he knows
with perfect certainty,
he consults with me still,
"you kidding?"

such a sophisticated analytic interrogatory,
wise in the ways of grownups,
who, prone to deceive gleefully
his very
suspecting mind,
so much so,
they must be challenged and
rebuffed all too frequently

he cries in the night,
normal tears of discomfort,
physical or mental,
I cannot tell,
for his father
his parental hearing
more practiced, refined,
has preceded me,
such,
as it should be,
and I am dispatched back
to my 3:00am bed,
left only to ink
contemplative ruminations
on the state and nation
of being four...
and sixty,
and still uncertain, even more
than the little boy
of wizened age of annualized four,
the child of the child of my woman,
on
what is real, what is kidding,
in a quest unending
to better ascertain,
the state of my own being

and the transitory nature of
everything

all of what is thought certain,
falls aside,
under the withering,
unwavering,
critique of
"you kidding?"
and in this we are
more kin
than if our blood was
physically shared

another Thanksgiving,
another voyage in the rareified
l'air au-dessus,
the air above,
next to, amidst
the satisfying but untouchable still,
the gray-white of the clouds of which we so oft
exclaim, and always fail,
to do justice by

this time the
turbulence
within
compulsion beating
compels this thanksgiving addition
to the compilation of airplane poems

the pointer finger tapping
out this journey's record,
a priori, gold leafed,
added, inscribed,
on the priory wall
of other journeys,
even before
it was conceptually written

the pointer finger tapping
upon your own chest,
calming the beating turbulence
ever present, a giving present
to me,
red wrapped

no whining!

I promise myself,
to promise you,
cause if this be,
the best poem
I ever write
(why not, could it not be this one?)

a small prayer shawl supplication,
shall not be marred,
with plaints and requests,
visions and incisions,
the beseeching distaste of
be and re quests,
this one simple,
even, and as always,
a tad odd like me

I am just an ordinary Joe,
flying over the middle,
the country, the real one,
no megabytes
amidst the real,
a few hundred other supplicants,
gaily glad on a mostly
head-phoned, protected silent passage,
over water, land, rivers, and family clans,
all engaged and presaged by
calendal X marked to make ,
a Mecca trip,
a Jerusalem western walled, holy mount,
which ironically is for me is
direction relative,
that bastion of flesh and sinners,
the city of tan men
and salt pillared women,
the City of Miami

whoa, real turbulence
makes the typos egregious, plentiful,
and the body sways,
left to rightly,
the poem is compulsed
urgent flown to completion
(amazing the shaking and the stirring,
to the point of locating the airbag)
perhaps, he thinks, someone in this
airy residence doe not want this prayer
finished

enough.

"The Prayer~Poem of Seat 25D"

Dear Deity of Whatever Name:

We humans peculiar to some places,
set aside a day, this week
for being superlative,
for looking inward and do
quiet summary addition,
employing organs,
as many as necessary,
noses and toeses external,
organs invisible internal,
a counting to make,
to number what we are,
isolating the better reasons,
why our existence justified

we do it in
foolish human ways,
as is our nature,
human and fools interchangeably
one and the same

So this one man counts
his words, ever careful,
ever plentiful,
and utters grace,
the Bene and the Blessing,
quiet inside,
his fellow airplane passengers
holy unawares,
that he is praying for them
simply saying this

May each one pause,
even for a second,
and collect the moment,
understanding,
that thankful is a
but half a notion,
incomplete unless
it is given
away to another,
by making it
selfless

When I enter,
the black holes of myself,
they are located,
transcribed upon the
blackboards of our
unified bodies,
the magnification of energy
transversed,
principles demonstrated
by the unconcluding
conclusion of the expansion of
creation,
the rebirthing of one universe
never ending

When I enter a woman,
the discovery sought,
the definitional needed,
the proofs equational,
the factors constant,
not the variable
truths,
the demonstrations positive,
the constants of the universe,
combinational, all within,
a single point glistening

to gentle comfort this
knowledge of my wasting,
the foresight of my limitations
from the day of birth
my matter,
matters,
my energy
neither destroyed or created,
illimitable,
my decline inevitable

and yet

cannot alter my atomic structure.
my future guaranteed,
my inner light,
traveling so fast,

it has yet

to arrive

When I enter a woman,
the laws of physics
become special theories
of relativity,
we are motion in time,
force and energy
nucleotides rawest refined,
elemental and particle nuclear,
packets of light
exclaimed

When I enter a woman,
organic, chemistry,
interdisciplinary
my body and its life force
shaped as
electric current transceivers
crossing galaxies,
there can be no deceivers,
there but and only
the birthing of heat,
a byproduct of
interjection, conjunction

she is my proof
long after the
log normal of my nerves,
now parceled to the
invisible of an oscillating
log natural,
fertilizes the sea grasses
that so intoxicate,
flying, carried,
by the invisiblity of the winds,
all-where I have chosen
as my shifting shape,
when this container
leaks and crack'd,
rentery orbit,
the nearest garbage strewn
construction-dead
lot

When I enter a woman,
physics far beyond
the commonplace,
physical transition
to knowledge
of life ever after

death and fear are
time sensitized
passing notions,
crushed by the
consolation of physics,
the eternality
of a time
once begun,
cannot end,
and therefore
this,
my one theory of everything,
is the God
I worship

all my life
wanted to write just
the way
Joni (Mitchell) sings

seesawing
rising unexpected,
write the changing temperament
in the pitch,
of now

yawing, oscillating,
speedy slow,
enunciating the whip of
love crazy

twist to fall into a
double-time
bass baritone insane
from and into a higher pitch,
switch on the
en garde,
blue ink
onto cloth napkin poetry

plain plaintive,
rendering the scene,
rendering my heart,
it's crazy high-lows,
emotion backyard
swing set

Oh Joni!
I could drink a case of you

that is was what I
told the single girls
when I was a wooing man

send me home,
high and crying,
thinking uneven,
creatively,
drinking you,
pounding the dashboard,
sing our palpitating poems

thinking up
the in-between
songs of
till next time

that they loved so much
they begged,
sing it again and again

I drank them all
and think now of poem love songs,
vintages that never caged,
never aging,
those songs I wrote for them,
back in the day
when Joni
taught me how to
see life in verse