My friend is living now
among serene green hills
Enchanted by the beauty
of mountains in clouds.
In the green Spring days,
he lies sleepy in the woods;
Dozing as the sun shines high

If you were to ask him
Why live among the hills,
Quietly he would laugh to himself.
His soul is calm as blossoms birth
He follows the running waters
And there finds for himself
another heaven and earth

This mournfulness, this restlessness
these inner convulsions,
Bound on a cloudy island,
heartache within, body still dying
all this hard fought by me.

And they were vast,
those tears, those pleas, those hearts that bleed
great walls of steel, calamity,
harsh words, and promises,  
Of spring to be,

Life undone by a stubbornness mine
Destruction achieved in perfect rhyme.
Some gray mornings
the wind and I,
Still wish for a sun to see

Your beautiful thoughts like butterflies blow by,
With such swift colors on their fragile wings.
Some are less articulate than a sigh,
And others simply names,
of ancient songs and lovely things.
What delicate fluttering’s of escape,
as they pass beyond my grasping reach,
To leave their haunting wispy shapes,
Eluding my careful traps of speech.
And though I watch and listen and wait,
To view the colorful clouds blow through,
I’m longing for some colors escape,
To venture near my heart so true.
So maybe being a fortunate captor
Should it happen time to time,
That one be caught so trembling,
Within my mortal rhyme.
Then to you I would give in haste,
This,
my most precious find.

Someday soon I will be
A feeble old man
Dozing somewhere in the sun
When all I can do I have done
And my life is but a shattered plan
What could be better than
Dozing there under the sun?

I would grow very still
As an old stone perched on a hill
And be content with that one
Thing that has always been kind
To me the warming sun.
I may grow deaf and blind
And never hear a voice
Nor think I could rejoice
With anyone in any place
And would soon forget my face
and love only the sun.
Because when I am weary and tired,
And cannot again be fired
By any small chance of hope
The sun will then be comforting
As bird-song in the spring

Give me only the feel
Of an old and comfy chair
Out in the air
And let me rest there
Moving not
Loving not
Only dozing till my days
Might be done
There under the sun.

Solemn I sat drinking  
and never noticed the dusk fall.
I sat dreaming and never knew
it was evening that grew
Till the fresh falling stars
filled the folds of my clothes.
So drunk I arose
In search of moonlight water
To quench my solemn thirst
For just a little longer

Out of a universe of things,
Only two,
Give me any measure of peace,
The rain,
That shuts you out,
And wind,
That bears me away.

Please hush those books
of gruesome dark beasts
page after page they tremble me
They feed on my grief
with a hunger that rivals
the sadness of sudden parting.
Yet I am nowhere without them,
those beasts who never die.
They gnaw at me like oceans at shores.
Perhaps I too would be full of beasts
if not for daylight to make them lazy.
Or maybe those books only spill the blood
Of those beasts of grief they would conceal?

This evening my shadow
Has come down the mountain.
sole company kept with only the moon.
Looking back, I see the path they’ve taken
Through twilight glass of purple in June.
With sighs my shadow flies to greet me,
Spring staines upon his traveler’s clothes.

The grinding of the grain,
An intoxicating hum.
Hay bales piled high,
prickly building blocks.
We harvest as farmers,
and are self-sufficient,
Knowing the weather,
Of tomorrow will come.
Only after he ‘d stolen leisure,
From work on the farm,
Did he realize how long,
the summer days had become.
Among fresh cut wheat,
Standing there in the eve,
a cool breeze on his face,
Leftovers from the day,
To appease the nights fate.
Time to eat dinner,
And sleep.

Once a small child now an old man.
White hairs to match the child’s down.
Easy the heart gets hurt by life.
Slowly now the urge to move,
Beyond the closing doors,
Where then all craving ends.

My shadow has gone up the mountain.
Shall I accompany him?
The day is closing, I close my gate.
As the autumn winds rattle my fate.
When early next spring
the brown grass turns green,
Will my shadow return to me?

Doe eyes closed and lashes lovely
with parted lips you lay,
Darkened waves on white pillows
spread your unbound hair,
Awake, I watched your sleeping face
Finding perfect beauty in the slow breaking day.
And then I knew that love had passed my way.
As the soft morning glow shown on your face
Within its light I saw your true grace
that beneath my fingertips touched.
Then came that glorious music in my heart,
And I wept that this love,
Had been granted to one such as I.
This love that gave her heart and soul to me.
And she while radiant in the early outburst of dawn,
Slept on, as a breeze swept through the room
With the smell of green June,
And I imagined flowers for her hair.

I saw a blood red paper flower today,
barely nourished by a forgotten stain,
it’s leaves blackened in shadow.
Too much neglect will do that,
slow the sap’s passage,
blacken the leaves,
dry the green to gray,
and the heart.
It may have been saved,
If only someone had listened.
But nobody I told believed,
in its odd color or scent,
or the way its leaves grew,
in fragrant splayed rows,
down the entire length of the page.
In fact, the very page itself,
smelled faintly of spilled red wine,
dark chocolate, and treachery.
And something else,
something hard to describe,
the mustiness of the sea,
on a foggy day perhaps?
The odor of truth it was,
Wilted words in shades of red
so familiar,
yet so strangely new.
Words you could have almost,
wrote yourself,
if only in your dreams,
there had been a pencil,
a pen, or even a paintbrush,
a thought presented paper thin,
If only there had ever really been,
a flower to see.

Rain gone now.
Earth a wet void.
Warm night air,  
A fine summer show.
Bright moon,
Shines in my eyes.
Dreams, clear streams,
falling on stones.
Faint clouds roar,
"Who now heads home?"
The trees then answer,
"Who wants to know?"
Scenes of summer
Will never stay.
But I,
I will always remain.

And eighty years
passed among mortals.
With pieces of life,
being laid on the board,
The carpenter takes,
his hammer home.
The work of the handle,
Grown tired and thin,
Hands of flesh,
Now turned to stone,
What he has created,
In this life he lived,
Has left him immortal.

Those days long gone,
Of my life’s living empathy
are like tranquil pools,
clear liquid jewels,
in a forest green where,
my shadow haunted dips his hand,
and cools his fevered head.
As too, the warm moist air,
Comes blowing softly,
upon his heaving breast,
Hinting but lightly,
at the sacred mystery of rest.

You want to run you say? But where shall you go?
City concrete has no need to follow, it is already there.
Steel beams do not see, and do not breathe
That most pungent stench of human misery.
They will not care, it does not matter,
Run, flee, get out before you’re seen!
Listen close you’ll hear it everywhere,
The meter maid, the bus driver, the newsvendor
All waving goodbye, urging you to go
Farewell to you they say,
So long until another day!
Go! Why is it still you waver?
Are you not puzzled to remain?
With feet laced neat in in running shoes,
You could run fast along these jaded lanes.
Pack your clothes, leave behind your ruined lives,
Translate your unknown language at another time.
Midnight street lights will not save you,
There are no hallowed halls in downtown stalls.
Do not become a future myth to bleed,
You are human, why pretend? Go!
Find your home in future seas, lift your chin,
Live unburdened, love again.

slender clouds.
smell of light rain
midday sun is hiding again.
within this liquid luminosity
I only just notice my clothes
are somehow soaked in color.

What pleasure it is,
For rain on my skin,
to dry in the bright sunshine!

Who is to blame,
for my secret disarray,
like many patterns dyed
in summer fields of color?
Not I,
Who hides my grief,
In deeper shades of gray.
Just let the winds of sky
blow shut a cloudy passage,
that I might keep wisely then,
My many shades of sorrow,
behind me for a while.

I had a buddy,
My buddy was a toad,
my buddy is flat,
He is flat on the road.

It sparks lightning,
and broadcasts thunder,
Canceling drought,
in the calendar leaves.
It weeps for all the trees that stand
and for all the stones that sit,
Unclothed and dry their open grave
It may give life
but then could drown
my will to live.
I have tried on all the climates
and rain is the one hat
that never seems to fit.

Can one be obligated,
for travesties uncommitted?
Can one admire the flower,
rooted deep in the grave,
Despite not causing the death ,
or ever knowing the name?
Proximity erodes,
the benefits of anonymity,
still from their silver cages,
The cowards all scream,
“If I can’t see, then it can’t be.”
I will not kneel,
But stand tall under the feet
Of those on my shoulders.

Unfold this dream
Against the light,
crafted hills and streams
Finely painted nature

Thin clouds, light rain.
Far stars, faint moon.
I sit, I look, the green moss grows
Soon becomes one with my clothes.

Today I ignored
This stale old world
To better refresh my garden

The pale heavens of the universe
refute a good morning to her
neither do the sky-punched stars
bother with an evening’s kiss.
This earth, where so many memories,
Among fine sentiments are buried,
could die in need of tender glance,
A cordial comment, or a little peace.
This damp blue ball is lonely,
so very lonely, as she views
the moon's cold cratered clothing,
while accusing the sun of being a thief.
It is a hot sun burning bright,
with many photons un-leased
in an attempt to pacify this earth
as the only living renter it keeps.