Describe fires in riverbottom
sand, and the cooking;
the cooking of hot dogs
spitted in whittled sticks
over flames of woodfire
with grease dropping in smoke
to brown and blacken
the salty hotdogs,
and the wine,
and the work on the railroad.

$275,000,000,000.00 in debt
says the Government
Two hundred and seventy five billion
dollars in debt
Like Unending
Heaven
And Unnumbered Sentient Beings
Who will be admitted -
Not-Numberable -
To the new Pair of Shoes
Of White Guru Fleece
O j o !
The Purple Paradise

There is snow on the ground,
And the valleys are cold,
And a midnight profound
Blackly squats o'er the wold;
But a light on the hilltops half-seen hints of
feastings unhallowed and old.

There is death in the clouds,
There is fear in the night,
For the dead in their shrouds
Hail the sun's turning flight.
And chant wild in the woods as they dance
round a Yule-altar fungous and white.

To no gale of Earth's kind
Sways the forest of oak,
Where the thick boughs entwined
By mad mistletoes choke,
For these pow'rs are the pow'rs of the dark,
from the graves of the lost Druid-folk.

And mayst thou to such deeds
Be an abbot and priest,
Singing cannibal greeds
At each devil-wrought feast,
And to all the incredulous world
shewing dimly the sign of the beast.

When you come to me, unbidden,
Beckoning me
To long-ago rooms,
Where memories lie.

Offering me, as to a child, an attic,
Gatherings of days too few.
Baubles of stolen kisses.
Trinkets of borrowed loves.
Trunks of secret words,

I cry.

This is the time lean woods shall spend
A steeped-up twilight, and the pale evening drink,
And the perilous roe, the leaper to the west brink,
Trembling and bright to the caverned cloud descend.


Now shall you see pent oak gone gusty and frantic,
Stooped with dry weeping, ruinously unloosing
The sparse disheveled leaf, or reared and tossing
A dreary scarecrow bough in funeral antic.


Then, tatter you and rend,
Oak heart, to your profession mourning; not obscure
The outcome, not crepuscular; on the deep floor
Sable and gold match lustres and contend.


And rags of shrouding will not muffle the slain.
This is the immortal extinction, the priceless wound
Not to be staunched. The live gold leaks beyond,
And matter’s sanctified, dipped in a gold stain.

What is want,
A craving or desire?
Consuming need
That sets the soul on fire?

To want is to wish
Though it may be greed,
To wish is to want
Or to be in need,

What is desire
Whether it be hers or his?
We may not know what we want
Or what want is,

Unrequited longing
That seems to smother,
We've all had it in some form
One way or another.

She listens
And though she is right beside me
She is a million miles away in thought
And yet she listens
She still somehow hears what I say
Even though
She is a million miles away in thought
Her emotions are paper thin
And her charade is opaque
She is easily broken
From her mindless stupor
And yet she listens
To the troubled words of a troubled mind
And yet she listens
To the sorrowful twang of teenage vanities
And yet she listens
To the colors and the smells of burning candles
She listens to the feel of skin on paper
She listens to the cloyingly sweet emotions
Drifting off where no one else can hear them
And yet she listens
To taped-back-together-but-so-far-apart souls
Desperate not to be blown away

Writers need inspiration
They need a source of wonder
To tap into their pen
They need the perfect string of words
Aroused from just a glance
They need a sight so beautiful
And that feeling when you fall
They need that sense of danger
Prickling behind their soul
They need a dash of wisdom
That flashes by unseen
They need a dose of clarity
To reach from within
They need to search under their dreams
And find the words tucked away
Writers need inspiration