scouting for talent in the streets
(for the next Michael Jackson or Pavarotti
or anyone who can make me money)
I spotted there in the streets of Melbourne
a bloodhound and a puppy, each with a violin
and each playing –
the puppy a natural, the bloodhound indistinct

I spread out on the floor
the talent contract for a team
and the bloodhound signed with a grin;
but just as the puppy lifted its paw
another dog came running, picked up the puppy
and ran off with the speed of lightning

“****! What’s that about?”
I asked the bloodhound

“Oh,” said the bloodhound sheepishly
*“That’s his mum, my wife – she doesn’t want
him to be a musician like me…
she’d rather he grows up to be a doctor!”

String pickers,
violinists
Poets
Bad Boys
The lot of you
We fall in Love
with you
a thousand times a day
We listen to your songs
poems
Voices,
over and over
Common thread in crystals
cloud bursts of feeling
that you each sharpen
daily
You
Bad Boys Of Poetry
You
cut we
black butterflies
and
dark diamond
poetesses
daily,
hourly
We butterfly bats
dance,
sing
write!
Yet,
you
Bad Boys Of Poetry
Still
Lie, there in
to your ownselves,
and say
"No one loves me,
I'm alone
Forgotten"
Well,
No.
We each see
as we wish
Pluck your strings!
Sing your songs!
But know,
you're LOVED
A thousand times a day
By black butterflies
and dark diamonds

Poetesses
~only a poetess
A

The TSA won't let me fly
It seems when airplane-jailed,
My muse sneaks aboard
Without paying for a seat.

Another airplane poem like 30B,
From a long ago flight,
Found dusty, in the poetry sewing box


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

with every breathe he tithes
a packet of whispered wishes,
a blended osmosis of
past and future scenes,
reviewed, previewed,
moments in time,
actual and dreamed

some received,
airborne plucked,
in his chest stored,
prepared for future
takeoffs and landings,
for ultimate insertion
in both
your recesses
and
your abscesses

some native,
combobulated, containerized
packets of seconds,
of joyous moments,
bytes of historical
hugs n' kisses,
as a child
to a child
from a child

those are vanilla frosted,
residual payments for the
good done and given,  
forwarded with all clear signals,
to his loved ones,
now resent, to you,
fellow travelers and sojourners,
intersectors of our peculiar
coded dots and dashes

thirty five thousand feet high,
composure lost,
he swoons as
Bocelli's voce del silenzio
releases tears so sweet,
which are by nature,
gravitated and transformed
into snowflakes to decorate
the Sierra Nevada's
breasted peaks and valleys,
over which his physical notion
is at rest, yet in motion,
within a Delta flying ship

Yet his fevered chest
beats rough,
for every flight seems
a time warp interlude,
a forced reflecting rhyme,
not of his choosing,
a lawful, thoughtful, imprisonment

having donated to you
his best, the remainders,
the man tallies, recalls:

ancient slights, scaled heights,
requiems for his forefathers
scored by cantorial choirs,
liberation struggle weariness,
offers taken and refused,
aces in the hole that proved
insufficient to save his soul.

goal line stands made,
onslaughts refused,
true lies and false truths,
moist lips and monster tears,
occasional A's and calcu-hell-us,
hand me downs received,
help me ups got n' given,
buildings pricked by airplanes,
death wishes granted
and nothing thereby gained,
children, found and lost,
mine, yours, ours...

The sums, always the sums!

engine noises and pilfered winds
are dulled and semi-silenced,
yet the silvered chamber prison
resonates from end to end
as each ledgered memory,
each packet of the
hidden whispered poems
he does NOT choose to send,
dents the man,
leaving claw marks,
screaming pay attention to me,
as if they were the priorities
of a six year old child,
refusing to be ignored

he does,
attention, he does pay,  
allowing rocking guitar heroes
to overtake weeping violinists,
just as newer transgressions
surfeit even his
most really *****,
ancient sins

No matter how he counts,
unable to master the additions,
no matter how many times
counts are initiated,
taken and retaken,
the tally's net net is
concluded, numbered
"forsaken"

his life's W-2 is black n' blue,
deductions falsely enumerate
and thereby underestimate
dues he has paid summarily,
earnings, distorted,
taxes paid never enough,
to satisfy the justice scales,
so wearily he
cries and enunciates,

The sums, always the sums!

THEN COMES HIS SHOUT OUT,
at his most vulnerable,
when a thin veneer of alumina
separates him,
from a fall inglorious
to an end most gorious,
a rapping beat moderne
insists that he go all out,
disallowing no
airy fairy poetry
to disguise that:

If the integers are false,
the entries of a life lived,
are sucker lies
black eyed flies
toxic shockers
that bust open
stinko lockers
where the B.S.
mocking stories
are kept

don't look close
at his documents
they ain't exactly
heaven sent
and the government men
be back on his track
their aviator shades
protect them from
burning light of the
man's furnace
where he burns their liens,
and the agent's ear pieces
drown out his screams of

The sums, always the sums!

God bless you,
keep and recall those packets of
whispered wishes, good tithes,
that the man bequeaths,
gift baskets of
expresso essentials
with God's love delivered

Tho his words,
amateurish and unvarnished,
silly and pompous,
nonetheless, they are the
return on his investments,
his yearnings for your happiness
are the savings accumulated,
though meager jewels are they,
they are ad valorem,
mixed into his confused murmurings

here then,
are his summings up,
what he wills you,,
the tally finale
the best wisdom is
found on coffee cups
at 2:47am.

Dance
Love
Sing
Live

to which he respectfully amends with a
Write.
(See banner photo)

Gods, what a black, fierce day! The clouds were iron,
Wrenched to strange, rugged shapes; the red sun winked
Over the rough crest of the hairy wood
In angry scorn; the grey road twisted, kinked,
Like a sick serpent, seeming to environ
The trees with magic. All the wood was still --

Cracked, crannied pines bent like malicious cripples
Before the gusty wind; they seemed to nose,
Nudge, poke each other, cackling with ill mirth --
Enchantment's days were over -- sh! -- Suppose
That crouching log there, where the white light stipples
Should -- break its quiet! WAS THAT CRIMSON -- EARTH?

It smirched the ground like a lewd whisper, "Danger!" --
I hunched my cloak about me -- then, appalled,
Turned ice and fire by turns -- for -- someone stirred
The brown, dry needles sharply! Terror crawled
Along my spine, as forth there stepped -- a Stranger!
And all the pines crooned like a drowsy bird!

His stock was black. His great shoe-buckles glistened.
His fur cuffs ended in a sheen of rings.
And underneath his coat a case bulged blackly --
He swept his ****** in a rush of wings!
Then took the fiddle out, and, as I listened,
Tightened and tuned the yellowed strings, hung slackly.

Ping! Pang! The clear notes swooped and curved and darted,
Rising like gulls. Then, with a finger skinny,
He rubbed the bow with rosin, said, "Your pardon
Signor! -- Maestro Nicolo Paganini
They used to call me! Tchk! -- The cold grips *******
A poor musician's fingers!" -- His lips parted.

A tortured soul screamed suddenly and loud,
From the brown, quivering case! Then, faster, faster,
Dancing in flame-like whorls, wild, beating, screaming,
The music wailed unutterable disaster;
Heartbroken murmurs from pale lips once proud,
Dead, choking moans from hearts once nobly dreaming.

Till all resolved in anguish -- died away
Upon one minor chord, and was resumed
In anguish; fell again to a low cry,
Then rose triumphant where the white fires fumed,
Terrible, marching, trampling, reeling, gay,
Hurling mad, broken legions down to die

Through everlasting hells -- The tears were salt
Upon my fingers -- Then, I saw, behind
The fury of the player, all the trees
Crouched like violinists, boughs crooked, jerking, blind,
Sweeping mad bows to music without fault,
Grey cheeks to greyer fiddles, withered knees.

Gasping, I fled! -- but still that devilish tune
Stunned ears and brain alike -- till clouds of dust
Blotted the picture, and the noise grew dim --
Shaking, I reached the town -- and turned -- in trust --
Wind-smitten, dread, against the sky-line's rim,
Black, dragon branches whipped below a moon!

"I'm NOT going to tell you
this is NOT
JUST a test
like I tell ALL the rest

that it's ONLY
a test?
C'mon
you should know better"

I'm noticing this guy has a lot of ink
all over
and the darkest kind

"So it's NOT
Not an ordinary exam?
this ain't basketball tryouts?"
I ask...
"I just took a walk in the park
had a...
white
****** knuckle sandwich
I played pinochle
with the Old Man
rode in bear backed
like Lady Godiva...."

I heard
words &
Maniacal laughter
played by symphony  of demons
& smirking
violinists in the background

"I'll tell you it
is
in
FACT
a
TEST
****
a super difficult one..."
then

".....continue reading my contract...."

reading and absorbing
unfathomable amounts of learning
and yearning
with
excellent Earning Potential
requires a decent,
above average
genius IQ
i don't need anything
other than...
to
leave my heart behind
and any other angels
my set of wings
saved aside
this is just a ride
I tell myself
they cast him out you know
fallen Angel
and....no other Gods, Mommy, Daddy, deities....xcetera.

"logically it's been there all along
everyone hears me
not like you can IGNORE my voice
you've seen my ad...."

(a bony finger with a long sharp nail
points upward)...

"up there
you know where...
on the billboard in Times Square
i am 100% certain it was you"

and it is
here I am.
Okay, I'm in control...breathe
take a sip of moonshine first
shhhhh...
listen
a little chuckle

Lucifer continues....

"You can bring Conscience along
she has been cleared.. "
Loudspeaker coming on
"We repeat
this is NOT a Strong Storm warning
there won't be any arms waving
no lights like at the airport
telling you where to land
no hands outside the vehicle
or for holding"

A pause,
finally...in closing
he looks my way...saying

"You'll stop at the Crossroads
lose the shirt
see a
blinking Amber Alert
don't stop at the bar
no flirting....

look back
actually there's a poetic flood
it's coming
that 'deluge' of your
bloodstained Indigo ink"
filled paper
boats are
floating &
he is gloating
"you might refer to the Ark section
of your Manual
before it's time to go...."

I gather important
necessary documents
for example making sure my will is signed
on the dotted line
***** donor checked off
blood type
leaving all others behind
no certainty of any kind
may not return
from an
Unknown Destination
things tend to get worse
  before they get better
  grab a sweater
a bumpy ride
my friend
dragging those
    sharpened ink filled
       fingertips
       down a chalkboard...
       I  buckle up
   transportation provided
nausea subsided
here I go
down below
  "I thought
     I would
     always have to
      take you
       kicking......
        & screaming
        still saying the
        Lord's Prayer
        signed, sealed
          & delivered."
         I smile...
         nod ...
          I say
         "Yut...
           guess so"
            time to go
           getting up
            from a chair...
             & I swear
              I am
              walking
               out
                no
                room
                for
 ­                any
                 doubt.

Cherie Nolan © 2016

Delayed clock
Savio lays underneath unwashed quilts
Grandmother hand made
Savio lays with a woman
“Why are your eyes so Green.”
Savio said to her lips
She had painted them very red
and when they kissed
the lipstick smudged like a charcoal drawing outside in the April rain in Maine
“My eyes flicker green when you kiss me. When you are with me.”
Savio kissed her forehead
It was 1AM
Kansas
Down the street there is a church
the yellowish orange lights are on all night
When Savio buys 3 dollar wine
He walks to the Brick dressed yellowish orange lit Church
Pick up trucks that are thin with metal
rusted at the square gas tank
rusted at the curves of its wheels
rusted at the grill
rusted at the door handles
at the hubcaps
at the bed
at the windshield wipers
at the side view mirrors
at the belt buckles
at the radio dials
at the steering wheels
Flutter by
like children throwing rocks
like Winter
like rain at 7am
Savio sits there
drinking his cold 3 dollar wine
thinking of Mexico
thinking of the magical women he had made love too
kissed
taken out to dinner and lunches and breakfasts
thinking of Long Nights with his brother
Crossing streets with warm bottles of good beer
to Neon lit bars
to bars only lit by cigarettes and tiny radios blasting
Jazz or Rock n' Roll or The Blues or Billie Holiday
Never the news

Savio looked at the woman next to him in his bed
Her eyes were closed
He imagined her closed eye-lids as a moth
With its upright folded gray wings
night
standing underneath the warm breath of a Lamp

Savio liked The Moths
He read about them
He thought of them as the poets
as the painters
as the pianists
as the ballet dancers
as the violinists
of the insects

Savio also liked Boxelder Bugs
they do no harm
they sneak in through the cracks and door openings of homes in winter
They hide underneath sheets of poems
Van Gogh paintings on the walls
Savio woke to a Boxelder Bug on his lips once

The woman that lied with Savio
was beautiful
her clothes were expensive
her body was cruel not to touch
her life was good
Money
***
Beauty
Youth

Savio had none of these
He was handsome
His face was shaded with a few days of hair
His eyes were bright from the many days in the sun as a boy
His eye lashes were long like the docks of rivers from plucking them when he couldnt sleep
Youth was a long time ago for Him
and he sat at parks
watched the kids play
watched Summer
watched April
watched the Roses and the Trees and the Water
grow younger and younger
as He
Stood still as his fingernails grew
and his teeth yellowed by each AM cup of coffee
and each AM cigarette

Savio did not care about Money
he cared about ***, and Beauty, and Youth
yet,
did not wish these upon himself
he
Admired them
like a womans smile
like a Sunrise coasting over a cold morning with white Swans fluttering in the sky
and the Cigarette tastes like purity
and the cigarette has meaning
more meaning than Death
or Life
or being Wise

He admired the woman next to him in bed
he did not feel bad for her
or envy her

He envied on the ease of her sleep
The ease of her happiness
The ease of her
carelessness to beauty
or poetry
or music

He envied the Fools

Savio lied there
Her lips perfectly shaped like clouds
or the designs on a butterfly
or the moon's glow late at night
when the birds are dreaming
when the Dog is fast asleep
when the convict is tired
when the Sun has clocked out
24/7 Sun
like an immigrant

Savio looked at the alarm clock
3AM
the womans Dress and stockings and shoes and Bra and ******* were on the floor
along with her Class Status

Savio has always been poor
He enjoyed it
He liked long days
Reading yesterdays paper that he had found on the road
Counting the numbers of Blue Mini-vans that stop at the red light
He liked going to the park
Climbing a Tree
or sitting at a dock
letting his toes and feet prune
His skin red and the smell of dirt

He liked no Television
He liked his two pairs of pants
His few shirts
His red sweater that his grandmother made him
his pair of shoes
He had a little radio alarm clock
that he had since he was a boy

His father most have stolen it
Given to Savio as a birthday present

His Father was a good man
A bad man facing society
A good man facing his family
He did what he could to get by
He drank

Savio liked to think of himself as a good man
Though he enjoyed the Vices of life
That is why he could never be Religious
Savio was too brave to be told what to do
He was too wild to have his cravings and emotions held down by leather

He liked women
He liked Drinking
He liked cigarettes
He liked Cursing
He liked ***
He liked Humor and Thought about Death
He liked to Fight
He liked to contemplate Life
He liked to contemplate Women
Drinking
Cigarettes
Cursing
***
Humor
Death

Savio
was a good man
He kept to himself
Laughed to himself
walked to bars and parks and highway bridges all to himself

He was a Looker a Searcher a Wonderer a Wanderer

And Life
is a good place to do these things.


Savio got up from his small bed
looked around his small house
opened a small cupboard
grabbed a small coffee mug

Put on his one pair of shoes
Shined them with his old shine shoe case
that his Uncle had given him

He then put on his shirt
it was slightly aged
it was slightly *****
Tho
it was 5AM
and no one would be able too see this

He then put on his jacket
a dark brown swede jacket
it was stained at the shoulder
it was wrinkled
he had spilled gasoline on it last month
and it still had a slight scent of unleaded gasoline
Even though it had rained many times

His pants were strong
They were 5 years old
rough and thick with denim

He felt good
There was no wind being blown
His wine was cold
His eyes were clear
He had a full pack of cigarettes
and a book of matches

This time he walked to the Highway bridge
sometimes on the metal fence
there would be stale roses twisted around the fence

And Savio would pluck them off
dropping them over the highway
onto cars and 18-wheelers headed to Florida

Savio sat at the small cliff
next to the highway bridge
The grass was gold and tall
He took drinks of his wine
slowly the Headlights
turned to Taillights.

Everyone is watching,
As you float upon your toes.
You glide across the stage,
And your passion shows.

You dance the story,
Of the Prince and Odette.
You show the terrible tale,
As you pirouette.  

You waltz, you plié,
And orbit the stage.
You become the music,
Violinists turn their page.

Your skeleton moves,
In intricate ways.
You jeté across the lake,
As the audience sways.

The tattered silk is leaking,
As the crimson starts to seep.
You smile, you push on,
You take the next leap.

You sauté, you soutenu,
The signets sing.
You fouetté, you fondue,
You enter the wing.

Run away to a foreign country, one with plush yellow green pastures. The grasses hiss soothingly as the breeze brushes them down this way and that. My home, a simple one room shelter built atop a broad and wise dark leafed tree who has welcomed me to its strong open arms. The skirt of my plain brown dress tickles the tops of my feet as I step down onto the soft soily earth.

There are no people here but I am not alone. The wind is here to lift the overflow of thoughts from my ever questioning mind and the water is here to soothe me and commiserate like an old companion purified from the complications of humanity. The dirt is my mother and my father, providing for me. Nurtures me with its succulent plants and cups its hands so that I might take a few small fish from them now and then.

A spotted sun perch hangs behind me as I perambulate meditatively. I see a few delicate vibrant blossoms on the side of my arborous home. They chime a brilliant tune that I will later compose onto a clay canvas. The afternoon is spent cleaning the small token and then toasting it over fire. I tend the patches of nearly wild vegetables and fruits. The most desirable ones plucked for my plate.

Guardian stars begin to dot the serenity of a dazzling dusk that demands my awe. I am aware of my tiny existence and its grand insignificance yet at the same moment I feel as though I was specially chosen by the cosmos to witness this perfect event. An intoxicating shiver grips me suddenly as a gust flits up my spine and through the back of my hair. Slowly it falls and the lulling chirps of a million violinists begin to play to one another. An admiring amphibian adrift the pond lilies relinquishes some commending croaks.

As the dark begins to settle in I climb to my aerial cottage to lie down. The rustling of my nest-bed reminds my neighbor owl of the time and she hoots appreciatively before flying off to begin her hunts. The splendid nocturnal symphony soon sends me to my dreams.

Twelve eggs
or roses or cups of yogurt
or loaves
or kisses
is a dozen.

Twelve cents
is a dime and two pennies
a nickel and seven pennies
two nickels and two pennies
but there is no twelve-cent coin
if there was, what would it be called?

There are
twelve months
in one year

There were
twelve tribes of Israel
twelve apostles
twelve days of Christmas

and in my high school orchestra
twelve violinists
bending and swaying
to music shining from their quivering strings

There are
twelve minutes in
one-fifth of an hour, (an absurd amount of time
used by no one,
but quite tidy
--why don’t we
divide our hours this way?)

Twelve squared:
one gross.
an obsolete measurement
of days gone by
--when there were clapboard general stores
that sold pickles.

Brutality in symphony
As the blade slices skin
Like a violinists bow
Across the strings

Lovers become quiet
When their bodies are raging,
The most perfect silence
When entwined and becoming one.
They search eachothers soul
Because each is lost without the other,
They fight and abandon
That they might reunite passionately.
Their spirits are free
And lurk the earth finding others
But not themselves,
Led by the estrangements of the heart.

They are like crazy peoples,
Lovers are,
Because they fight battles alone
Against the world
And submitting to the moments
Of lustrous passions
And in pain because life
Does not recognize such enigmas.
Lovers can only love,
Led by strings of violinists
Who take them where they have
Never been,
Going and going back again
Into the ****** of music
That plays quick beats and sad tunes.
Lovers are perpetually hopeful
Always wanting and taking the
Next step in a ladder to nowhere.

Lovers make mistakes
And do not learn from them,
Or sadly love the pain so much
They go back for more.

Alone in their own darkness,
Lovers find eachothers
Like tiny embers of burning
Souls filling the vastness of the void,
They cling to one another like
A child to a mother
And then rebel like a youthful
Suffocation.

Lovers are not stable,
They believe in God
And dance with the devil.

Lovers are alone,
Because they need seclusion
So that when they are free from
Themselves they can find something
Else to love,
They are in inexhaustible oil
To the lamp in a dark ravine,
They count drops of rain
And save their tears like memories.

They are empty and full,
Philosophical fools that love
Even those who reject them
And chase the uncapturable bird,
Flexible hearts of desirous fires.

Lover are the truth of humanity,
Crazy beautiful things
And they go loving
And hurting the beautiful life.