~for the (young) fathers~

Sunday.

An ordinary Sunday, with blue sky accoutrements.
They say, mostly sunny, with a high temperature of 75 Fahrenheit.
The children in the ever-shrinking bed shout Yay! Gesundheit!
when they hear me say Fahrenheit, ensues laughter belly originaheit!

The mother sleeps drowsily through the morning event planning,
content that as Mother’s day nears, she’ll wait for breakfast in bed,
but until then let’s all pretend she is sleeping late with three kids
decorating the plateau where their notional was celebrated+conceived.

The father reviews the day which has been quite full, even though
not yet Nine O’clock has to make an appearance. Last nights dishes
washed and shelved, breakfast made, puppy fed, hard boiled eggs peeled, muffins with Frenchified pear mermelade have magical disappeared!

His coffee needs a rehearsal reheating, but never mind, lukewarm will
be just fine, for the warmth of an ordinary exquisite Sunday suffuses
his chest, and the breathing heat of a mess of bodies roiling and rolling
is so more than sufficient, he whispers ‘thank you’ to no one in particular.


Sun May 3

to the fore, no dilly dallying,
no words wasting,
I don't write nursery rhymes,
just relay tales re the peoples
I have met journeying on this
natural good earth

I know, I have met,
Little Bo-Peep,
no fiction she,
she has counted my sheep and I,
hers

she pins and pylons,
her tales on my heart,
beetles, bugs and little boys,
crumbs in the bed,
no bleeding hearts here,
maybe a bandaid
on a boo-boo'd finger

this shepherdess tends her flock
and records their history,
the little foibles that make
life's little tantrums into loving poetry

when I think of her escapades,
I recall well that old Yiddish proverb:

God could not be everywhere,
so he created mothers...

and when not tending her babes,
she can bake one hell of a good word cake,
on her island~continent kingdom

One skin.

Two bodies,
But
One skin.

When you weep,
Salt tastes my lips.

When you draw me,
Our one skin
Thickens.

When you read to me,
Because it is you,
I hear every word silently,
For when your eyes
Acquire them,
So do I.

Your thoughts are
My thoughts,
Mine, yours.

So we speak but little,
But love each other
Quietly, with much fanfare.

And

When you write,
It as if you write upon our
One skin,
For I am your tablet,
Your sole/sol/soul composition.

So stop kissing me
and
Write upon us.

7/7/8:00am

This Week, and Next Week Too*




Heroes come and go,
Some enshrined but really entombed,
Famed for momentary action,
Bronzed and interred, sentenced to life imprisonment
In "this was history" books.

Others simply a one night stand,
Newspaper front page today,
A homeless man's shoe stuffing, the next.

I like heroes plenty too,
My favorite kind are those who are heroic
Every day, in the small ways,
Plain vanilla, unspectacular, yet is not
Vanilla always first,
Above all?*

I lean toward toward those heroes
Who in every child a leaf do see,
Gently moving it along for just an instant,
A wind, a covering breeze,
Nourishing it briefly then sending it,
Floating, strengthened, onward bound.

I lean toward those heroes,
Who see a tree, a school,
Knowing that so many leaves need be apprehended,
Knowing that to all, one hero man, cannot attend.

Yet in his waking hours,
The despair of enormity
That limits most, with its peculiar powers,
The tired thoughts that would have us say,
Let some else be a hero today,
Clouds not his sight on which
We now rely,
A daily hero has a greater vision
That does not succumb,
This week or the next.

The man that seeks no glory,
But our world does glorify
By raising up the children
One dance step daily,
Is our hero, this week,
And the next, and the next...

June 23rd 2012

The way I see it
is you wake up every morn
soulless,

Spend the rest of the day
rebuilding it
anew,

So when you lay thee
down to  sleep,
thy soul to free,
not to keep!

Except for the poetry,
You created in tandem,
That on your flesh
Inscribed and filed
Under the heading
Completed.

Yup, that's right.

Don't be offended or upset.
It's very environmental,
recycling words.

True, the quality of literacy,
(have mercy on it!)
is getting quite strained
(not-so-good poems
droppeth as the
gentle rain from heaven).

Certain words are grumbling,
talking, overworked and overuse,
in poems that say nothing new
(they got their pride too!).

Rumors of unionizing going around,
increasing the minimum wage
to a passing grade,
and something like
a penny a letter,
and double for words,
not of the English language...

The ringleader I'm told
is the word itself

Words

tired from being in
59,649 poems (plus 1 now)

Death, heartbreak and depression,
scars, cutting and sad,

the most overwrought ones,
the children's beloved,
their never-ending
plastic ones trending,
under the weight collapsing
of boring and from
the pressure of overuse, bending.

The words have brought
the unrisen, alabaster body
of poor dead (oops)

Love (137,207 + 1)

as evidence of this
too long a verbal
season of victory.

Make no mistake,
among the guilty we be,
our sweet tooth
for these miscreants,
documented in black and white,
resting uncomfortably,
among our total of
171,500 words we've purportedly
recorded and employed.

The Writer's Guild,
all a titters, arms, up and akimbo,
the cries of poetry poverty
among the living thundering,
no longer
suffering silently,
ere the mendicancies cries
from Ye Olde York emanating,
seeking contributions
and donations,
minimum on PayPal,,
one whole dollar!

Well I have paid my dues,
much more than one
and much more than once,
would so again, annually,
as I could no more
surcease this gig,
for where to find
another profession that
pays so handsomely?

Let it not go unnoticed
like so many poems
left footed born,
themselves, unread, unnoticed,
that the ever increasing number of

Poets

is a good thing for the universe.

So many new humans each day,
from the black forest of
daily life's lessons emerge
choosing poetry to
conquer life's ailments.

For they bravely
having taking the
road less traveled by,
and that has made all the difference,      
and the world,
a better place for it...

No eating in bed?

No shaving in bed?

No newspapers in bed?

**** woman, it's Saturday morning,
What the heck am I suppose....

Oh.
Oops.
Hold on.
Almost knocked the coffee over
Having our











Pillow fight!
(Fooled ya)

I once loved a woman so,
left my wife, my young baby children,
desperate desolate for a scrap of
a reason to exist.
her, the other woman,
welcome was unquestioning,
she was an answer.

you may judge me,
I've paid and pay on-

but this is not the taken tale,
verily, I have come to write.

Jennifer her name,
was my savior,
took me from the cross unbearable,
washed my feet, covered my wounds
rebirthed me a new man.

weak was me,
fell fallow to cries,
whimpers of the weak,
weakened me worse
and she said

go,
bewitched man,
magic enough to defeat
the wicked one,
but not
the weak ones,
I don't possess,
you have to have
metal in your mind,
rock steady,
maybe you do,
maybe you will,
but no crutch of steel
can I be forever.

but this is not the taken tale,
verily, I have come to write.

what I remember best,
the love I lost for
the lesser love I gave up
and took back
as a lessened and lessoned man
is this:

my chest, my heart,
for months, not weeks,
for months, not weaks
of words,
hurt so bad I
could not believe,
my life forfeit,
this heartache palpable,
was real beyond belief

when I went to the
emergency room, the doctors,
stethoscope-confirmed,
my tearing-warped, embodied mind,
had no prescription, no surgery,
for what ailed the failed man.

when in the street would see her,
in the elevator trap, smelled her smell,
for seconds I was triangulated,
until lost sight, and was ill-mis-positioned
once again in a shaft that could only go
down.

Shortly thereafter,
took up pen and paper
bad damage to repair
and began to write,
decades worn, pen nub'd
the writing,
never thereafter,
stopped or ceased.

now I ask you plain
straight from the
place of pain,
that is almost healed,
tho twenty years,
the damages are still
upon my persona claimed,

for this is the taken tale,
verily, I have come to write.

how do you like your poet's poet now?

not so much?

The missing six

Take the pain killers that make drowsy instantly,

Three times a day with food, every six hours.

What about the missing six?

A compromise?
A midnight last supper, and take three,
All at once.

What? You "like" my midnite poetry?
Part of a plan?

Mmmmm.

How about this?

I get myself addicted to them.
Pills,
Instead of poetry?

How do you like them pills now, baby?
Each one a poem, dying,
By the handful, by the mouthful...

The pain makes me esoteric.
1:42am NYC

a woman comes to me at 2:20am,
from across the world, asking if I am that cool jew,
occupant/son of the unholy hours when death and crucifixion,
them two old friends, are waving temptation with both hands,
never mentioning heaven, offering .99 cents of sanitized compliments,
which for a fifth rate amateur writer is revolutionary,
as close as you will ever come to global recognition

that woman says, yes! you’re that insufferable fool whose
suffering keeps us awake when he should be sleeping in the
half-death state, in the unholy hours, only reporting back
what he has seen across the borderline, in these times
when a thousand-die-a-day daily from suffering
that is uniquely human, a wracking medieval torture,
granting those viral messengers, slow extra pleasure

be nice to yourself for a change, write ‘bout what they want,
broken love and suicide, mundane pain, keep it plain, short!
easy stuff that sells records, making you not whisper words
never meant to be shared, the language of the unholy hours,
a dialect unique, that Google can’t quite rightly translate,
for not every vision is substitutable, suitable, rated G for babies, so,
keep it short like a miserable life that needs a prophecy to complete

48 hours ago thought I was infected, a glide path to rocky moon-smooth,
a landing where words unique, taken away, sealing your mouth with
tubed oxygen that inhibits thinking, air that might **** all of you, not just pain, but what makes you unique, your own 10 commandments
of speech, the old testament, the source book of insight into whatever
makes your lungs breath in rhythmic to heart beating, and dying
discordant disrupts the gene sequencing of inhaling and exhaling

the editors and the critics overlooking, that sit on both shoulders,
are already complaining, no más, no más, no más!
suture that incision, close your mouth, the unholy hours
need a special silence, Ruth’s lips that move but go unheard,
make no mistake, we want to listen in, voyeurs of visions
but we need you broken, we need a break, from confronting
the repeatedly delayed, but undeniable, the clockwork orange
second coming of the ungodly hours

4:02am
Sabato
4/11/20twenty
new york city of lips

~ following “A Simple Poem”~ (1)

But of course, we reference revelations,
for our brief self-description are guises,
meant to hide, meant to impress, reveal
little, enhance our mystery, preserve our
secrecy. expose and hide simultaneously
within our mid-of-night aura mystiques

Safe behind the curtain, we wizards speak
in voices and tongues, giving up our innermost everything in verse, write of our blessings and our curses, holding  little back while we give ourselves away, hint by hinting, writ by writing, a series of
+++++++’s

I choose, I chose, to dress my chess pieces
in a clear varnish, **** the consequences,
sail towards the torpedoes, heading direct
to meet your eyes, giving up my forest
tree by tree, poem by poem, a leaf and
a branch, only tinkering and fussing like a new parent over each new virtual birthing,

and then once tidied,
once spent,
my secrets unconcealed,
we wonder quick if each
puzzle when connected
to its predecessor is 
understood
as a tiny pointilisme dot,
a speck
and that you are wise enough to
comprehend how each speck,  
lives only unique in its
conjunction,
only tandem-with both the one
nearest and the ones dabbed a decade
long ago, and when you connect  
my dots, I stand before you completely
a full and a naked folio,
one book of a single reveal,
the sum of my totality,
an addition of many integers,  
summing up to 1

So,

should we pass by each other,
our eyes will pierce, each wrinkle,
solving the equation of who we are…
a single human, readily identifiable,
total recognition, via the reconnaissance
of our letterered footsteps

The 352 Blues

this city treats the poor
with swift unkindness,
but if you peel your eyes,
you don't necessarily have to always
sing the ole 352 Bleecker Blues

the eyetalian storekeeper,
gives us morning java,
when we sing for him on the guitar,
The Star-Spangled Banner,
refills, if we add America the Beautiful

they say that heat rises,
but that don't seem true
in our third floor walk up
on rue 352 Bleecker Street,
the cold companion enters
thru the busted stain glass window

no matter, no cares,
we light the fireplace,
with wood and anything that'll burn,
we scavenged from the street,
pallets and newspapers,
rent bills overdue,
yesterday's 352 truths

at two AM, the cops, in their cars
cooping, fast asleep, only just us,
the johns, the ****** and troubadours,
walking the streets looking for
free stuff to burn

pass the hat for tips
next to the arch,
enough for daily bread
but we get our ***** and ****
for free, just for singing the 352 blues

even when down and out
on the village streets,
bleak on Bleecker street,
you gotta sing the 352 blues,
especially when you're
riding high and living cool,
down on easy Bleecker Street
in 1968
~~~~~~~
Before you ask me if this true,
save your breath,
the answer is
Which part?

Super Moon:  If you were beside me

If you were beside me,
You would believe the unbelievable,
The Super Moon fills our bedroom cup with whiteness,
Light, a sky-delivered invitation to walk on the water
Upon a path illuminated that commences at the dock

If you were bestride me,
You would feel the majesty of
Our union in a new light, bathed in
Sweat and glory of nature's triumphant
Marking our bed and home, its nestled place in nature

Alas! Your potpourri of sleep noises,
The purring, the little yells, dream induced,
Signals that tho beside me, you are somewhere else.
The Super Moon, disappointed, has marked your card,
Marked it absent, but marked me, your lover~brother in arms,
Tasked, incised, upon my body, your homework assignment

Moon:
Gaze upon his eyes when you rise,
Touched and filled with the history of your lover's
Encounter with the Man in the Moon this evening,
Study it well, memorize, these words, I have
Inscribed thereupon for you to read

When you next intimate, I will be there,
Whether in these words or his eyes,
No need to estimate my light,
It's safe, stored, so that the dawn's plight,
Vanity attempts to compete all will fail,
For I am, you are, the light unhid, in his eyes**


3:00am
June 23rd, 2013

A mirror will suffice, no doubt.
The high furrowed forehead,
The heavy-lidded Asian eyes,
The long-lobed Indian ears.
Brown skin beginning to spot,
Of an age to bore and be bored.
I turn away, knowing too well
My face, my expression
For all seasons, my half-smile.

Birds flit about the feeder,
The dog days wane, and I
Observe the jitters of leaves
And the pallor of the ice-blue beyond.
I read to find inspiration. I write
To restore candor to the mind.
There are raindrops on the window,
And a peregrine wind gusts on the grass.
I think of my old red flannel shirt,
The one I threw away in July.
I would like to pat the warm belly of a
Beagle or the hand of a handsome woman.
I look ahead to cheese and wine,
And a bit of Bach, perhaps,
Or Schumann on the bow of Yo-Yo Ma.

I see the mountains as I saw them
When my heart was young.
But were they not a deeper blue,
shimmering under the fluency of skies
Radiant with crystal light? Across the way
The yellow land lies out, and standing stones
Form distant islands in the field of time.
here is a stillness on this perfect world,
And I am content to settle in its hold.
I turn inward on a wall of books.
They are old friends, even those that
Have dislodged my dreams. One by one
They have shaped the thing I am.

These are the days that swarm
Into the shadows of legend. I ponder.
And when the image on the glass
Is refracted into the prisms of the past
I shall remember: my parents speaking
Quietly in a warm familiar room, and
I bend to redeem an errant, broken doll.
My little daughter, her eyes brimming
With love, beholds the ember of my soul.
There is the rattle of a teacup, and
At the window and among the vines,
The whir of a hummingbird’s wings.
In the blue evening, in another room,
There is the faint laughter of ghosts,
And in a tarnished silver frame, the
likeness of a boy who bears my name.

~for Henessy J. Beltre and all the new Observers of the Universe~*



“my goal is to develop a more personalized meaning of beauty, love, and self actualization through my writing.” Henessy J. Beltre


each word, chewed upon,
individually and collectively
as I drive from Roma to Firenze,
long drives in unfamiliar scapes, olive shaded greens,
umbrella trees, and thin thickets of the vineyards planted
in the years notated as B.C.

are life pauses, asking, admission to the clarifying blankness
that commands rifle shots of riflessione (reflection)

your words, goading foaling, are all our goals,
succinctly refined,  for doesn’t every and each poem
asks through our eyes what are the visions of
love and beauty that is the actuality we ceaseless seek

avanti signorina!

unleash the wild words that will make your mission
burst from the ancient to the revitalizing, knowing this,
that the universals you seek to dress yourself within,
to share here, to create, to *actualize,
are products of your truths

be unaffected by stale mores, conventions dictates,
spill truths, soiled and used, cherished and recycled in
new ways, so that each of one of us
blesses you with one word:

exactly!



31/10/18

on the autoroute to Firenze

read https://hellopoetry.com/poem/2793919/universe/

Originally posted to this site on May 23, 2014
a backwards trek, to learn where to step next...*

Sad Eyed Teenagers of the Lowland


As long as there are teenagers extant,
Anomie and alienation of an unripened generation
Shall spill upon this site in cliched cries,
Dabbling with threats of pills and lies,
The endless pain felt gives one fright.
To this old soul who wonders silently,
Will these thousands of pained children
Make it through to their next incarnation

So much angst, so much anger,
I wonder if God created poetry
To salve their wounds.
Their unknown futures loom,
But all I read is hurt and doom.
You shall survive, children.
Awful poetry, some good, you will write.
But write and write till your heart be calmed,
For even ancient kings felt the anguish of the soul,
For we profit even today by King David's psalms.

This wizened fool has his hands full,
Mouths to feed, bread to earn and bake,
As midnight is almost nigh,
He rests prone and adds a verse to this old poem
He long ago scribbled down, grimace-smiles now,
Realizing there is little difference tween him and the
Sad Eyed Teenagers of the Lowland.

For poetry salves his wounds still, even now,
Unashamedly, he thinks, hallelujah!

,000 drafts of poems proposed,
some but a bit, a title, a bob,
some wondering why are they kept
in suspended animation, the fire of exiting
from placenta to screaming baby, most,
patient waiting, over the undivided divide,
the Cumbersome Attention Gap to cross,
to the state of hallelujah completion

this race should be an Olympic one,
it is unwinnable, but only open to poets
who willing to go the unlimited distance,
every finished oeuvre, spawns bornes two
more, so you, fool, even a fifth grader,
intuits the higher math of you’ll never
catchup, but rise invigorated to meet,
greet the wonderous sunrise challenge…

and the promised ones, “next one for you,”
the unconditional incompleyedy poems
so overdue, the muses send an armored truck
to collect just the largesse of fine fines…
as my old West Village friend sang, you poet,
“might as well try and catch the wind”

this leads me to observe a new day’s first
birthday, even as Leonard sings Yom Kippur
hymns of mortality, and all the ways humans
can pass thru the gap in the morn clouds that
is the passageway to the Higher North…

you see, this is this poems day of naissance,
one day, one candle, now extant, but sooner
to be a not, one more poem sent heavenward
after a  brilliant brief coexistence with the
innards of my mind…

an au revoir here penned,
man on a cliff doing a spring, fall over cleaning

a few rusty drafts still needy for completely
but you know times up when tide rushing out
and on your leg is a big red rash that wasn’t there
when you waded in a few minutes earlier

tastes changes, like seasonal entrees on a restaurant menu,
seasons come and go, reappearing, but last years dish,
out of style, except for the occasional recalling

the body and the work must together concert,
poetry like a lifetime of lovers, you leave them behind
for loving them too well, using up the verses left inside,
then comes the time when love dries up and the words concomitant

the nighttime scraps will still be kept in that sewing box,
that storage space rented on a 99 year lease
but now for my eyes lonely only, this nub is stubbed,
this last one, at last, succinct

au revoir mes amis

~for Joel M Frye~*

give me your blunt, stunted words,
rooted in the genome human

give me rough, toughened words,
wizened savvy by caress and punch

what use angels ethereal pinheaded,
inexperienced in the vocabulary of the maddening crowd

give me anger, rage, envy-jealousy,
the burnt ashes of the remainder of real

give me perspective of eyes facedown on concrete,
feel of flesh hands pounding the soft spots of the skull

In return for? What bargain struck?  What consideration exchanged?

for your blunt, stunted words,
I give you this:

the homage of inspiration
the honor of no questions asked

one day of my life
poured into your vase

There are no tribes in America.  This is my annual reposting of my July 4th poem, written years ago.  After reading about some tribal warfare in a far away land, I wrote this true story down....
~~~~~~~~~
one July 4th,
many years ago
walking the streets,
of the city of Nice, situe
on the Cote D'azur of France,
on the Mediterranean Sea,
where ships of navies
may safely park,
sailors ashore
leavened to
disembark^

how I came to be there is a
poem for another time

walking the streets,
of the palm tree resort
along Le Promenade Des Anglais,
coming at me,
Three Sailors,
unmistakably
American

One white,
One black,
One from California,
which I believe,
is still part of the USA

how we fell upon each other
in warm embrace,
smiling, bestowing
blessings of grace
not as strangers,
but as fellow signatories
on the Declaration of Independence

brothers,
long lost, reunited
as if it had been many years,
since we had our arms entwined,
one family from one far away united place

dialectical differences ignored,
even the wide-eyed 'Bama boy,
totally comprehensible,
for on that say,
we spoke a language that
encompassed a single brotherhood,
a common history,
all on that
holy day

no tribes in America, no colors,
no religions,
only brothers-in-arms

I need not choose to believe
that should it happen again
twenty years hence,
perhaps with their sons,
my embrace will exactly
the same be,
for I know it true,
for there are
no tribes
in an
American heart.



^disembarked to be leavened....either works

The Realized thinks:

flesh and the blood demands
you spew your stuff in me,
deny me nothing
even as I am sleep full,
thy cravings grow fuller, not fewer
craven not I,
to demand my satisfaction in the
rendering of yours

for you are of my flesh eaten
for you are of my blood tasted
tho the universe placed a spatial divide,
an atmosphere tween our celestial bodies,
t'is a temporary condition,
you are but moon slivered,
man half if not just quartered,
less than whole,
when disjointed and not inside
the incontestable undivided me of us

the Other Seductress
easy teases with adagios and pinprick words,
offering lifelong immortality  -
words like fish in nets,
loaves of bread,
that will
fill souls with insight long after
the physic man's grave site location forgotten

your muse, she bemuses:

I can make
you come and
make you
go
multiples of multiples nightly,
ripping your word seeds from your body
the pleasure insane, your mind enflamed
even now in the air above this planet your earth,
I am your mile high and river deep,
you belong to me and spill the verbal deeds,
your art is mastery more than
any physical sweating
of blood and sweat or tears

the other laughs and counterclaims
that all that is promised is but a mere secondary
derivative of who you are when you
whisper excitedly I love you
and this belongs
to me and no other!
where is your immortality better scribed
when your issue is woven in the tissue
of two, for you are only one when realized
your self conception nightly reborn in me

it is I that feeds your eyes,
your vision delights in me and thereby
you give birth to the art that makes
Who You Are
who you are,
for all clear all unconfused when
your soul stiffens and a single truth
are your emboldened by, and that
truth is real and is my temple
where carnal is incarnate
and you reincarnated in every way

the long haired and ever young muse
in ire arises and finger pointing a j'accuse,
says I am your eternity, the self same
that you existence demands be satisfied

only I, only I,
can provide the living will
that will exclude the black and the worm of ignominy,
place your time shopped physicality
in a state of perfect preserved beauty,
I am the mother of thy art,
the if of thy futured existence proofed,
I, thy future and the
***** that makes you beg
more, more and gives the birthing to all
your multiplicities,
never questioning, receiving all,
the good, the bad, the psalm, the ditty, the prayer,
loving best the most
ordinary

*whom did he choose
whom does he choose,
whom will he choose,
the tenses answer all
and in all, lies the answer

***!!! If I had the power to magically hug people through the internet...


Patience.
It's coming.

And when it does,
No one will never sleep alone,
Weep inconsolably for lack of shoulder and hand
For I travel with a lean-on-tent
Travel with shelter for you,
Will you have it, have me, by command?

I used to write flowery poems, with fancy words
About flowers and such stuff,
But I gave it up,
No more, I will be now no longer
Poet electron florid,
But the real, not ethereal, delivery man.

Giving you loving kisses, tenderness, and
Mayflowers in December,
And kindness every day of my life and
Even after,
Cause heavens come on line
And even if I am stranger now,
I'll prove useful to have around,
Giving you poetry precisely couture designed by command,
So I fully expect to be hugging you happy
Soon enough.
You'll see.

Ok, maybe not Ogden quality,
This oeuvre, but I can do it over,
Can he?

Does, will he, read customized poems
With shiny bumpers, trim and spoked wheels,
Purposed only to please
You specifically,
In your soon-to-be-smiling flesh!

Like I will,
Soon enough.
You'll see.

Oh yeah. To summon me,
Just clap your hands three times,
Say out loud poet-in-the-hat,
And press Send.

DISINHIBITOR” By Ariana Reines






   <>
  

There’s a sadness I’m avoiding

It’s why I live like this

The truth is I know I can’t hide

From it. I know I can’t

But I can hide from you

Or I somehow still think I can

& what that really means is hide it

From you. It’s not that I don’t trust

You. I’m just scared to lose

It. I’m not avoiding

My sadness I’m trying

To protect it. What I lost

I already lost a really

Long time ago. Whatever

I tried to do apart

From what I lost had more

To do with covering it

With probably some kind

Of monument than “moving on”

But I’m the only one who needs

To know that it’s a monument

Or what it’s for. Anthills

Mountains out of molehills.

Growing a roughness into

A jewel: Aphrodite’s secret.

I am ignorant of my people’s

History but I have seen the scrolls

In their crowns and gowns.

The times I won I wasn’t able

To celebrate. So I learned equanimity

But equanimity’s as tricky

As any other state. These may

Not be words of wisdom

But they’ve got no other

Place to live

Two minutes

Forever separated
By two minutes

Dueling digits.
Her alarm clocking
Two minuet meters
Faster than
My cell phones
Numerical contra-assertion

One bed,
Two lives.
In the same place
But at different times.

Forever
Is two minutes.
A Grand Canyon.
A Continental Divide.

We both get up at Seven.
But she get to use bathroom first,
Two minute headstarted,
Forever unfair

This will bug me permanently,
Perhaps forever,
Or for
At least the
two minutes
It took to scribble this

Nothing good comes easy
Nothing worthwhile is free.

You know, for a girl with
Such a wild imagination,
She argues with
Logic, far too often.

She's pretty pessimistic
For a girl with sunshine eyes
The darkness makes her tick
And a soul that's full of lies.

An enigma in her randomness
She is a song that holds no words
Staring down life's rabbit holes
Both the blessing and the curse.

Time is always standing still
The sunshine never lasts
She dances to her own drum
Waiting for the one who understands.

But credit her this,
With clarity and rhyme,
From the outside looking in,
Her I is exposed from inside out,
From outside, looking in,
For her conclusion admirable:

A peaceful soul
Tender kind and loving
Will always be sought after
Above all other types

Regardless of recovery
You will always be your own worst enemy
Drown the voices in your head
You can make it out alive.

The vine yield was good.
The vibe yield was the better.
Poetry drunk deep.

Made the bed backwards

Just to hear your laugh,
I'm in the shower pretending not to hear,
Your return, your reaction,
But my grin stretching to the bedroom.

Afterglow, After-all,
All of us need a new perspective,
From time to this time.

But our life straightforward.
Got my eyeballs ******* to the
Solid white line
That we drive along side, behind,
Safe and sound.

Even when I park my poetry illegally,
Even when the pillows face an empty white wall,
We lie beside each other,
Straight on.

Where do I get these crazy ideas?

Remember when you picked me up on the internet when
You knew me by my anonymous moniker,
Still Crazy After All These Years?

Never changed, never will cause

I be who I be...

Stop that kissing, feed me, please!


10:21am
August 24th 2013
Postscript: came home,  I came out of the shower, we chatted, casually remarked, I made the bed,, she replied, yes I know, then she  looked and then hee haw hee haw hee haw nonstop 3 minutes.

Twelve twelve Friday morn.
Soon bay breathe, hallelujah .
Nookery rebirthed..

The Bex Birthday Anthology

a very long quick perusal yields this trove,
but I know there are more
both disguised and plain hidden,
she invoked from within & without
getting partial credit

but search engine says there are too many millions of answers
to poems about Rebecca so cut to the chase and do your own

so don’t nobody get any ideas about getting their own
gift wrapped anthology cause I am overwhelmed by how,
how you all inspire me and give names to my muses,
and so I’ll just wish the northern girl that
all her happy poems
come true

who could want for anything more?

I love all good poems,
and how they make me
feel whole but deboned,
de~parted,
sometimes cleansed
sometimes *****,
sometimes ashamed,
occasionally fried,
occasionally enlived,
often all of these,
simultaneously

I love how mine please you,
breaking the knots of anonymity,
unleashing the little white package
strings of connection, and, when yours,
make me guffaw, or even  a better, person-age,
when we weep deep in our  recesses where the
just-beneath-the-surface emotes, are pricked and
brought to the surface, for the first time, or the last of time,
exposed, curated, healed, leaving but a tiny sore, that lingers
on the body's surfaces,where all things.are etched that
are needy for a reminding of the when,
and here, right there, is the where,

but your loving of likes somehow
dissatisfying, like a kiss, perfunctory, skullduggery
or dis genuine, a hit and a move on,which is why,
I treasure your comments, long or short,
insightful or delightful, critical or critique(e),
just a tender heart of appreciation, a snuggle
from the sea, throned out of Jonah's whale...
rounded bellicose belly

but they render me
alive,
when they split and spit me, to you,
you, to each, defined in pieces, gratitude
nuggets, each, treasured, each hugged, each letter,
a custom bespoke of  connectivity and

who needs friends, when your words
embrace me so deep repeat and touch me
in places where my heart must follow on & on.
now many poems you commission with every exposition.
even the dimplest thanks is a vibrato of pleasuring sounds, that
you, you, you, took that particular moment of time to
express the heartfelt, destroys the invidious
that does quiet creepily slides inside us,  
saying I am your comforter false,
but is not!

use your words, that,
they to the children teach; let us too
embrace this honorific so terrific, and touch each other with
comments, a sharing, and the sol shines on
'*we two too, for all to seer and see

~for those who can’t sleep, and know why~

you say “how much is too far?” and I think yes, more scars,
a man surveys a lifetime of errors and cowardice,
my soles, scarred from nite-walking new york city sidewalks,
days of haven’t slept in years, weakness is my prejudice,
tally sums-ups as no forgiveness, the pavement paying is a
continuum of  paying on, there is no atonement for wasted life,
the concrete cracks wedded to my body, stepped on each one

marvel at the disastrous disappointment that I’ve engineered,
how creative in disguising a life of accumulated self bruising,
applaud my season’s greeting card, 2020, me meeting me,
in a laptop I am contained, global boundaries thus defined,
crumpled coffee cups, emptied wine glass, zoom loops of repetition,
still I wonder why, every day, how, so many missteps, wondering
not at the lackluster will that carried me;  every minute sorrowful

so much hidden begs for revelation, murdered souls, theft, jealousy,
but the punishment is brutal; a conscientious conscience continually
punishes my blackened hours and there is no retrieval, retrial,
just a grounded plot with neither headstone and grass,
for I’m marked by no marker, and the wounds inflicted are my
afflicted leavings, my bones+soul confined, and the hallelujah
word excised from my vocabulary, forbidden me, justifiably so





————————————-

Mr. Tambourine Man
Song by Bob Dylan

“Though I know that evening's empire has returned into sand
Vanished from my hand
Left me blindly here to stand, but still not sleeping
My weariness amazes me,
I'm branded on my feet
I have no one to meet
And the ancient empty street's too dead for dreaming...

And take me disappearing through the smoke rings of my mind
Down the foggy ruins of time
Far past the frozen leaves
The haunted frightened trees
Out to the windy beach
Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow
Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky
With one hand waving free
Silhouetted by the sea
Circled by the circus sands
With all memory and fate
Driven deep beneath the waves
Let me forget about today until tomorrow”

In the year 2016,
Yom Kippur was celebrated on Oct. 12th.
Leonard Cohen passed away on November 7th.


~~~

faint knocking heard at the heavenly door of the Tower of Song

the ministering angels, hearing a rhythmic,
lyrical rapping, sigh, thinking the atonement day,
the holiday/holy days, are supposedly over,
the human balancing act, the rush to judgement period,
all tallies totaled, the busy sale season for souls,
at last completed, each fate inscribed & sealed,
in the book of life^

but, always one,
the itinerant straggler, the last reluctant sinner,
a judgment resister, flaunting an almost expired coupon,
trumpeting demands for a recount, waving it,
claiming it, the bearer, entitled to a
mercy discount and an extra 30 days

"who shall we say is calling?"

the Angels are stunned to hear the responsa,
a familiar raspy, growling, almost indescribable,
yet, stammeringly beautiful voice enchanting,
equally asking and answering, (how both?)
with a strident humility, "a man in search of answers"

this voice, instantaneous recognizable,
the asking superfluous,
all beating wings now, all in vast excitement,
this psalmist, long awaited, one of His best,
a chosen one, a courtly singer in the Temple of his people,
blessed with the curse of seeing and believing,
the comprehension of beauty of the human superior interior,
never being quiet or quite satisfied,
in capturing, its multifarious variations,
in every language spoken

this is the man who took ten years
to compose just
one song,
one poem,
one word,
Hallelujah,
whose faith was strong,
but still needed proofs,
whose every breath of oxygen inhalation,
brought more questions,
every exhalation, only releasing partial answers,
and yet, still, yes, yes! finding hidden verses inside

a simple, everlasting
hallelujah

the hubbub subsides,
the man sings~speaks:
how came I here,
was I one, who by fire?
that fire afeared, that my finality
was spirit consumed?

in one voice, answers the angelic choir,
in one voice, the swaying back-up singers answer,
not by fire, not by water, not by stoning
or even drowning,
in tea that came from all the way from China

when sing we Angels,
the Judgement Day poem,
we alone, on high and above,
we, keepers of the books
and records of everyone,
are permitted this special query:

Who by Sufficiency?

you, the sidekick of the creator,
special commissioned by him, anointed to live a life of research,
record in word and song the mysteries of musical gene strings,
that intertwine the skin cells of man and woman,
man and his fellow us-human,
your soul commandeered, ordered, to delve deeper,
into the consolable chasm tween divine and mortals,
all those who are so poorly but perfectly constructed
in his image

you, who has earned his place, his best rest,
his works adjudged sufficient,
you, who best answered
this judging,
this calling out,
this calling in
incantation

Who by Sufficiency?

now forward on, write only of answers,
wade in the troubled waters no more,
no more passports, or borders to cross,
no more measuring the days,
the last road trip finale
finished & feted,
fate meted

no more changing thy name, changeling priest,^^
sing songs of solution, salvation,
for the questioning hours of confusion,
the urgency of revolution,
no longer need a hallelujah resolution,
you have been judged sufficient...
it is his will


                                                    | | |
Who By Fire                             Who By Fire, Who By Water:^
(lyrics by Leonard Cohen)     (A Yom Kippur Hebrew Prayer)

who by fire                             How many shall die and      

who by water,                                how many shall born,
Who in the sunshine,                 Who shall live      
who in the night time,                   who shall die,                      
Who by high                                Who at the measure of days,
who by common trial,                    and who before,
Who in your merry                            
                                                          Who by fire
month of May,                                 and who by water
Who by very                                 Who by sword,
slow decay,                                       and who by wild beasts,
And who shall I                      Who by hunger,
say is calling?                              and who by thirst,

And who in her,                           Who by earthquake
lonely slip,                                         and who by plague
who by barbiturate,                      Who by strangling,
Who in these                                    and who by stoning
realms of love,                               Who shall have rest,

who by,                                             and who shall go wandering,
something blunt,                            Who will be tranquil,
And who by avalanche,                  and who shall be harassed,
who by powder,                            Who shall be at ease,
Who for his greed,                           and who shall be afflicted,
who for his hunger,                      Who shall become rich,
And who shall I,                             and who shall become poor,
say is calling?                                Who will be raised high,
                                                         ­     and who will be brought low
And who by brave assent,                  
who by accident,
Who in solitude,
who in this mirror,
Who by,
his lady's command,
who by his own hand,
Who in mortal chains,
who in power,
And who shall I,
say is calling?




^From the liturgy of Rosh Hasanah, the Jewish New Year and Yom Kippur, the  Day of Atonement, there is this truly stunning prayer (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unetanneh_Tokef) in the Jewish liturgy. The Book of Life contents the fate of every sinner. From the first day of the new year, until ten days later, on Yom Kippur, depending on whether the sinner repents or not, his fate is sealed.