gravity,
you amaze me with your
paradoxical pull
grasshoppers, greenshanks,
groveling serfs and grandiose kings
all feel your wicked weight
the bearable lightness of being
is at your cosmic command

some wear you like gossamer, others filigree
for the forlorn, you are ball and chain
for Sir Isaac, you were scripture,
chapter, and verse, Mathematica

you keep me and thee tethered
with invisible faithless cord
to this spinning stone
to attempt to defy you is folly
even with rockets at full ******
for ultimately we must
again bear your weight
but, grave though I have called your grip
you beatifically bestow
this bearable lightness of being
that cannot be seen or heard
only felt

Monet, Manet, Morisot, and the tortured Vincent
a long century or more ago,
filled their palates with color,
their canvases with impressions of life, love and loss.
And we, the great masters of civilization,
have treasured these like newborn babes.

I wandered through the polished halls
of antiquities to see them—
some hidden even from the harsh light of day
to protect their precious prinking from decay.
I strained my eyes to see their soulful strokes
and wondered why artists carried such painful yokes

McMurtry’s ranch has no paintings
but sculptures from a vanished sea.
A quarter billion years it’s been,
and yet they’re here for all to see

Rocks carved by patient scratching time
and stock tanks covered with putrid slime.
No lilies float on pools of blue
and no guard carefully watches you

Their sentries are the desert rattlers
and the sun scorched prairie lands,
but these ancient masterpieces
are safe from filching hands.

When I kneel on hard rock soil,
I forget my daily useless toil
and dig in clean eternal dirt
with no canvases to belie the hurt
of gentle men who felt the call
to let their heart be seen by all

Monet, Manet, and Morisot
are now laid to rest, with their burdens set aside,
but their colors are a reminder
that beauty and suffering abide

McMurtry’s rocks no longer feel,
but who could say they are less real
than colors fading from the light
and lonely artists’ painful plight.

the sea had shown me mercy,
though I had asked for none
it had been cruelly benevolent
oblivious to my pious intentions

instead of a pummeled, pocked and putrid body
I stood ironically whole on the soggy sand
on a parched piece of land
with only sharp rocks for companions

so now rather than a few wretched gasps and gulps
and a smooth blue descent to sleepless sleep
I could slowly bake red on this barren isle
and be a feast for ***** after an eternal while

what happens to an effluvium held in?
does it seep through minuscule pores in the skin?
or does it skulk out like the phrase, "silent but deadly"?
does it stink like choking sulfur mined?
or does just hang close to one’s behind?
perhaps it leaves a telltale mark
and even causes your dog to bark
does it tell the smeller’s olfactory
something revealing about thee?
or are effluvia all about the same
whether ‘tis prince or pauper to blame?
alas, all we hominids produce several pounds
of the aromatic elixir each day
making it fairly safe to say
that holding it in would be a ****** crime
and cutting a big one hardly makes one less sublime

you check on me many times a day
with my antique ears
I hear your squeaking shoes
on these vinyl floors
someone laid for those who came before
like passengers on a stalled bus
with windows that allowed only one view

I know you and I wait for the same thing
for you to check on the passenger who replaces me
he will be no different
a few more hairs, perhaps a few less stares
you will gently place your hand on his wrist
write in his chart, and maybe
glance at the date of birth,
do the mindless math
and wonder without wonder
if my replacement will have a bigger number than I

but I am still here
gazing at your angled eyes
while you count the beats
which slow a little each day
waiting for you to say
how long will this one last?

don’t worry, squeaking vinyl floor walker
when my drum stops pounding
I will try to make sure it happens
while I am asleep

he liked it black
scalding his tongue
to wake to pain rather
than wait for caffeine’s
slow tugging

that was his way
while she lay on crumpled sheets
breathing the air they scented
with their raw rolling

he wanted a reminder
a scorched tongue to bring him back
to his solitude--to remind him
their naked chants cast a spell

that lasted no longer
than the moon’s arc if they were lucky enough
to be fooled their union meant immortality

rather than a desperate throbbing
in fading light, with him closing his eyes
to avoid her stare

and her wondering where
he went in the aftermath of lust while
she slept with dripping dreams…

she only knew
what he said each new morn:
he liked it black

fields of yellow flowers
pasted on Morpheus’ silky screen
could not hide the blood and screaming
in that steamy sea of green

I wake to this in dawn’s gray hours
and can’t return to sleep
with morning’s feeble promise
we no longer follow like sheep

what force inside feeds the powers
that will not let us forget
we once were young and killers
and still owe an eternal debt
to those who died at our hands
and… to whomever let us live
but still dream of flowered lands
where those we slaughtered, can’t forgive

Thanks all poets for keeping the 10 wp collection alive

thou art
my McDonald’s
my Walmart
if Norman Rockwell were alive
he would paint you,
pay tribute to you
immortalize you in two dimensions
allow you to believe
you would stride forever
like golden arches
and prices that end in the magical, mystical 7
but alas, nothing that smells and tastes of today
or is “Made in China”
sold by blue apron clad armies
will be etched on mountain sides
you, like the Big Mac
will be recycled in short order
and surrender helplessly
to the mocking march of time

whirling waves
dance until entwined
when they lose themselves
with another
in endless effort
to find and be found
multiplying to infinity minus 1
castaways from the Original Big Bang Sin
spending eternity trying to return
to a faceless,
race-less place
and space
without clanging clocks
when-where nothing
could collude or collide
because all
was-is one

will I hear a fly buzz
when I…?
will my hands
be too weak to…?
once
thunderous pink anvils,
house builders
unholy home wreckers
woeful word weavers
plan writers…
now
crossed,
helpless and flaccid
hiding under hospice wool
shame covered by a thin green veil
on my antique grey chest
crossed,
my heart-beating
faintly
my eyes
scanning,
slowly
catching lonely light
missing even the fly
who is now
in another room
another world
buzzing in another’s ear

in the gray,
milky silence
of the morning…
before we smell the hiss of bacon
before the smog licks
the creamed crimson sky
before we hear the scurrying simian stream
(of which we are a inexorable part)
before the pungent circles
of Michelin and Firestone
have their daily chat
with the asphalt
before we wake to all
this grotesque grandeur
to once again
kneel, supplicant
against the wheel
before we turn the key
to ignite the spark
to fetch the fire within,
we were with Morpheus,
perchance
dreaming of greater gods
of light,
before
the cluttered clatter
of this unholy day

why are you strolling through?  
you are supposed to “run in my family”
slashing and burning along the way
instead you take hostages
handing them recipes for a
crock *** slow simmer
to transform the hard, well-formed and fresh
into a soft mush
ready to be scooped into the bowls
of the beggars or the bold
who slop you down
crap you out
and flush you
to where you swim rather than stroll
or run in anybody’s family
but still manage to foul the earth
with your wretched stench

mostly
I survived
like a spectator
at a Macy’s parade
my head, anonymous,
part of a blur of cold colors
and checkered sounds
that lined the
straight shores of the concrete stream
of the non floating floats

so it was for many a season
nothing to report,
no rhyme or reason,
until
the heat
of the delta
where I watched you
floating
--not amongst other floats
--not in crisp Manhattan winter
--not with manufactured mirth
  and seasonal symmetry
but with a mangled monkey body
shredded by the rounds
from the M-60
my friend used to blow you from the shaded shore
into the muddy Mekong
all ten years of you
who did nothing except
stand in his sights
wearing black pajamas,
being alive,
for him to ****

999
were cyber plumed
I,
exhumed
from
exile,
pecked
1000

I saw him zip by
in a dark alley
in a charcoal dream
not running from
but to...?

I walked, however one walks
in an alley in a morning dream
and he began chasing me
“Mama” coming from his lips

I ran
and he followed
closing in on me
with a silent dog by his side

What did I have to fear
from this scurrying simian?
save being a mother
a dream denied by my…
genitalia

Freud wrote reams
on the interpretation of dreams
and perhaps now
I am ready to read
what the master dreamed

For one has no cause
to run from small monkeys
unless…
they are moaning for a mother
one could never be

And does my own son ever feel so alone?
was it he that we left in some dark place?
running with mute dogs
and crying out for the cord
meant to tether him
to this spinning world

Goodbye Charlie, Hello Vietnam.

Nineteen. I was ten and nine. Two A.M. Landed in some muggy, putrid place. Between honor and complete disgrace. Smelled like that for sure.  Issued tools of our trade. Heard the true sound of “rockets red glare”. Had us hunkering in bunkers all night. ******* in our helmets. Holding our ears. ****, the first night. Welcome to Vee-et-nam.

Morning. Sunshine and quiet. Except the rap from old timers. “Newbies“. New jungle fatigues. Newbies. New M-16. Clean boots. All day the old timers, telling each other how these newbies had their cherry popped. First night in country and the biggest *** mortar attack they had ever seen. Heard. Heard, I said. Yeah. What newbie? Now you have heard the real rockets’ red glare. That’s what you heard, Newbie.

I get it. Newbies are ****. We are **** and they aren’t going to waste a breath telling us anything. Watch. Watch and learn. I hope. Lines. Lines to get our teeth rinsed with fluoride. Lines. To chow. To get more shots. To in country orientation. Lines. Memorize lines. Lines to get ammo. Lines to get orders.

No line at the outhouse. Gray three seater. Heat roasting our ****. Old timer kicked the planks before he sat down beside me in the stench. I asked the question but only with my eyes. Kick the planks before you sit down so rats won’t bite your ***** off. Kick the planks to scare off the rats. Rats. The size of possum. Not an exaggeration. Possum rats. Rat possums. Who the hell knew? Just kick the planks. Save your *****.

More lines. Then darkness. Then more booms. Not incoming. Our own. 1-5-5s. Learn the difference newbie so you don’t crap your drawers for nothing. That’s the boys in that artillery firebase keeping Charlie awake for the night. Returning the favor. Charlie. Sounds like a name you would call someone who was a buddy doesn’t it? Charlie. Victor Charlie. V C. ***** Charlie. **** Charlie. Charlie this and Charlie that. Oh, Charlie would eat that rat.

My first duty. Guarding Charlie. Prisoner with leg blown off at the knee in our clean smelling dispensary. Hands strapped to bed rails. MP and I assigned night shift. Keep each other awake . Looked at Charlie. Charlie looked at me. Smirk. Then spit. Landed on my boot. My newbie boot. Not a newbie boot anymore. Charlie squirms. Spits again and misses. MP gets up and threatens to bash Charlie in Charlie’s little head. Medic comes and gives squirming, smirking, spitting Charlie shot of good drugs. Charlie doesn’t spit on medic. Charlie gets drowsy. I get drowsy. MP falls asleep. I stand up. Newbie afraid to fall asleep on guard duty. I wake the MP before shift change. Charlie is up. Smirk, smirk. Thus spoke Charlie. The only conversation I ever had with Charlie.

Medic says Charlie getting on a bird to someplace. Can’t remember where. Anyplace.   Charlie leaving and me staying. Ain’t that a hoot--all it cost him was a boot. Envy is a word I learned that day. Cost him part of a leg medic says when I tell him I wish I was Charlie just then. Had heard tales about people shooting off their toes to get out of the ‘nam. “**** tales” I would call them, since I heard so many in those gray crappers. Rats. Possum rats and your *****. ***** or a limb? Did I really want to be him? I don’t really remember. I didn’t want to be there--somewhere between honor and complete disgrace. Bye Charlie. Hello Vietnam.

your milky dusky hue
blankets the black
that kept me in my bed
afraid to awake
more afraid to sleep

now I see you,
yawning along with me
erasing history each moment
even before the golden orb
cracks your silence
with its fickle fire

I know you,
false hope giver
promising light
fooling eternal night
but not eternally
for you too will one day be black

I will not see this
nor will my seed
nor theirs, but one day
the crack between earth and sky
will vanish
and eyes that long for light
will become
part of karmic night
the dripping sweetness they craved
in golden blue light
will be gone

clearly, we are dead
the white noise
painting our eardrums
creates no pictures
the light show in front of us
doesn’t ask our eyes any more questions
no obit is written
no grave dug
ashes are strewn
across a lake of fire, but
they are not really ours
only remnants of some genesis
we never saw--it gave us
a flash of light
that lasted a few billion years
letting us groan and grow
yawn and yearn
for forever and more
of that which never really was
clearly we are dead

in the green searing sea of afternoon
my gaze fixed on his black pajama clad frame
the croaking canopy of jungle shading his tanned face
( I never knew why they were called a yellow race)
my hands had followed some voiceless lethal command before
but only in faceless night
that could not only conceal my fright
but also keep me from seeing more than shifting shapes
that one could have convinced me were eyeless, thin apes
flipping the switch and popping the rounds had been no easy task
but darkness had always been a convenient mask
did he see my eyes digesting the scene if front of me?
this little man called my enemy, AKA VC or Victor Charlie?
did he have time to think of my malicious intent?
(that I would only after the fact invent)
or were his last visions not of my pimple pocked face
but of richer times in some faraway place
where he planted and played and heard simple songs
and couldn’t imagine the treacherous throngs
who would come to “save” his jungled land
but could never fully understand
why we couldn’t just leave them alone
I can’t say what his final racing thoughts could have been
but I do know that mine were deafened by the din
of my rapid rifle fire that caused his demise
and I only remember I could see his eyes

They number the benches
they, those who need to have order
and know the when and where
of all things

The sage of bench 33
doesn’t really ever see
the brass plate with its proud threes
he covers it with his frock
as if to sublimely mock
the “theys” who need to believe these
graphic creatures keep the world
from tilting too far on its throne

The sage of bench 33
was once a number watcher,
he too counting the ways and the days
to find their sacred sum
but now he only counts
what really counts…
the steps to his next meager meal
the coins in his blue chipped cup
and the stars he can see
from bench 33
on moonless nights,
amid the frenzied frights
of those “theys”
who number not only their days
and the checkered concrete ways
but also benches for the holy homeless

food stamps on my table
a perverse end to this fable
that began with kidnapping,
cotton fields and the whip

like a tin cup scraping along iron bars
was the clank of the clock
no longer a liquid, lingering of seconds
but a staccato rapid fire of time
signaling the approach of my farewell rhyme

the man in black asked again if I wanted to pray
and mumbled something somber about judgment day
but I really heard nothing
beyond the light's florescent hum
and had no illusions
about what was to come

in the world of “before this room”
when my rage ripped life from limb
I had known that closing my eyes a final time
would open them to the wretched writhing of
nothing

still
in these last lapping of seconds
with the needle patiently waiting a few feet away
I heard echoes of those oft chanted lines
about some kingdom at hand
one that I could never enter
even if it were really there

hey!
you lookin’ at me?
like you would if I wasn’t here
is it my stewed stench you fear?
you lookin’ at me?
you wonder at all where I been?
or if I committed the original sin?
you lookin at me?
like I’m some bug you gotta crush
or some load you forgot to flush?
you lookin at me?
how ‘bout I sit beside you in your holy hall?
would you then know you too could fall?
you lookin’ at me?
**** no
I ain’t even here

over 600 poems in less than 50 days--thanks to all who have embraced this form and contributed to the 10 word poem collection in the Fragment Group

I am there
but time is standing still
though the river rushes past
to remind me of the grave grip of gravity,
the rolling of this tiny rock
and the necessary fiction of minutes

no wound clock woes me
no hunger torments me
no trail awaits my feet

I am there
with my line to the depths I know hold treasures
blocked from my deluded eyes
by reflections of blue-gray skies

a simple tug on my wrist
pulls me farther from the burdened banks
to which I must ultimately return
but not for an eternal while
while my line is taut
and the curse of time is not
menacingly marching
in this dreamy flow

my wish:
fire, cabin
comfort food
old movie
NO
humans

hitchhiking was common
in the summer of love
guess we thought we were guarded
from evil
by some mystical power above

my thumb was my plea
to generous humanity
to carry me to glorious heights
and other ethereal sights

many souls obliged me
both young and old
only wanting to be told
where I had been and where I wanted to go
for we were all part of life’s flow

so it went for many a dreamy mile
and after only a little while
I began to think nirvana could be achieved
as long as we all believed
in the love we called free

until one summer night
when my thumb was seen
by him
by him
in his old Olds
with his slick head of hair
why
did he
turn right on that desert road
that wasn’t the way to…
why did he…?

he stopped the car by a shallow ravine
where it could not possibly be seen
by other dreamers under the same dark skies
and pointed the blue stinking steel barrel
at my shaking face
“out, out!”
out, out brief candle I wondered?

I did not run, not from his gun
and when he pulled a shovel from his mysterious trunk
I can only remember that something sunk
my young heart? drum like pounding
and his vile voice sounding
like I would imagine an imp from hell

he leaned the shovel against the car door
and was about to ask my body for more
until I grabbed the grave digger with a frantic paw
and swung it wildly until I saw
him lying in the hard desert dirt
with his greasy head starting to squirt
the blood
the blood…
(later I wondered
who else shared this blood?)
but on that night
and in that dream
I only remember the blood
turning the sand from gray to black
and him lying on his back
and weak feeble gasps from his foul mouth
and me silencing his guttural pleas
with another blow
and another
and another
until
he was still

my arms ached when the sun began to rise
and I finally could open my eyes
to see him nowhere to be found
(except under the gritty ground)
and my deed was done

I awake
again and again
to wonder
where I really was the night before
and if there was really such a thing as settling a score
with the man who opened my childlike eyes
or for me, who closed his
forever

when the shining glass looks back at us
like a stalled rerun of our personal opera of soap
and the technicolor turns to charcoal gray
we know we are coming to the end of our day

and we look to smaller spaces,
those “windows to the soul”,
for a reflection of who we are,
or were
they cast an obligatory glance
or do an avoidance dance
when we give an imploring stare
to see if they know, we are still there

each day fewer shine bright or glitter with glee
and we wonder what happened to me
the me they saw and sought after
in the colored world of before

others disappear into their own dark night
long having endured the inevitable plight
of the cold mirror’s still, shattering view
and disappearing eyes of all but a few
who see us faintly
in the light that remains

by a great churning sea
said to have no memory
we passed a sunny afternoon
and a blue cold dusk
like pacific pilgrims in a new land
making our first prints on ****** sand
but
what we bravely said in the fading light
quickly sifted into the eyeless night

what dreams we painted
long ago became tainted
by ambiguous ambitions with dollar signs
and other equally jaded earthly designs
that did not clutter or cloud our speech
on that seemingly primeval beach
where all still seemed within reach

now I have but a colored frame
and likely only me to blame
for falling farther from Eden with each passing day
when I repress what we three had to say
on a sandy summer shore
in the land that is no more

dance, blaspheming butterfly
against the black and ignorantly blessed sky

Sijo 1  

The rapid rattle fire, red tracers screaming in silent air,
woke me from half dream sleep--eyes open are better than eyes closed,
when ears are filled with black noise, and Victor Charlie wants me dead

thirty years
since Mark gunned you down
thirty years, passed
like a long sleepless night
that ends with taunting morning light
no brilliant sunrise grandly pronouncing
a glorious new dawn of man
although that would have been your plan
with your entreaties to give peace a chance
and imagine, imagine, imagine

now I kneel in this rain gray park
like a reject from some holy ark
a pilgrim in doleful disappointed pose
after seeing what your earthly brothers chose
was not to imagine a world of peace and love
but to wear reality like a cast iron glove
making mockery of your martyred chants
proceeding like a billion scurrying ants
deaf to your childlike pleas

across the soaked soil where your ashes lay
yesterday and today…and tomorrow
I feel the soggy sorrow
that you would have felt
if you could still see
all the rage of humanity

in the tauntingly quiet
florescent hospital hum
waiting for a hospice bed
people floated in and out
along with the scents of disinfectant and Salisbury steak
all spoke, in muted tones, words moving
through the liquid silver air of the night
they would squeeze your hand, gently
maybe casting a glance my way
before they walked into the dead vinyl tile halls
to the white squeaking sounds of faceless nurses’ shoes
where the obligated visitors would
breathe a proverbial sigh of relief
for they did not want to be there
at the moment
at the horizon between the slits in your eyes
imagining the ones behind the walls
and across the hills you would never again see
I would be there,
recalling horizons we had seen together
perhaps with you in my arms
before words built walls between us
and years were soaked up like desert rain
after seasons of doubt and drought
I wondered if you would ask me again
or if I would say yes this time
and if that would be enough
to release you
surely, I gave you life
another father and I both did, I suppose
could I take it as well
if you asked me again,
to increase the drowsing drip
of modern Morpheus’ elixir?

yesterday,
our
calibrated
counting
made
your gruesome
death
an…
anniversary

Cool crisp half moon
sends shimmering shaft across charcoal lake.
A thousand winking waves blindly greet light.

White water foul
pedal silently across giant dark pool--
webbed feet wandering in black depths,
where teeming life hides without seeking
and does not disturb my walk in night air.

No sounds are to be heard--I don't utter even a noble word.
Inside in my own black depths, feet from the surface also stir the stillness.
When light of day washes this dark peace aside,
I will wonder where it went to hide,
and if I have another night under crisp cool light,
watching waters and birds in rest from flight.

black vinyl
dusty in crumbling cardboard
but dressed up with flowers
and candy cane towers
records much of history:
a war that divided a country
riots that demanded equality
journeys to the center of the mind
and words like "for (all) mankind"

black vinyl
electric poetry of a bejeweled age
exhorting us to unlock our cage
and soar blindly in blissful flight
before the soundless eternity of night

black vinyl,
now replaced by the "CD"
in a silicon world of even more "me"
and reluctant as I am to revere what once was
I suspect that is what everyone does
when the day slowly turns to night
and we truly contemplate our plight
on this revolving orb that spins only one way
whether it is vinyl or CD we had to play

When
I asked
for ten words,
I got…
much more

we are
all plagued
by some churning remnants
of haunting pain and shame
but we are not to blame
for repentance oft falls short
no matter how much we try to exhort
these murky maddening memories to depart
they flow yet in even the purest heart

for me
my crimes, too many to enumerate,
will all cause me to self deprecate,
but of the ones I seem to recall
the deed that taunts me most of all
was the simple thoughtless movement
of two five year old fingers
I used
to crush
two sublimely blue
robin's eggs
in a nest
on a promising bright afternoon
in the dark land of memory

treasure…
a
half
can
of hash
without
mold,
or
roaches

on the shore
only this morning, as ***** yawned
and wispy waves woke to sun’s call
with a million speckled sparkles of light
I was alone with my thoughts
and your crisp footprints in the sand
the scent of your hands still on me
fading with each mist filled breath I took
you were still there
your seed crawling down my leg
but tides change
and your prints soon filled with salt and sand
and the sun, our benediction only a dreamy minute ago
melted into the craggy bluffs
and I was left to walk alone
without your shivering shaft filling me
or your groping but grateful hands touching me
alone, on my night walk
alone, how I began
and will end, my…
night walk

After you involuntarily defected
I managed to find words others selected
to grandly commemorate your life

When I read of the third person you
and try to embrace elegiac points of view
I have to admit I feel…nothing

Maybe there is some cyber symphony
playing in the sky you can no longer see
pounding on so many drums you can no longer hear

But I keep reading my “google bible” verse
and try to imagine the funeral crowds disperse
once the scripted lamented chants are silent

Soon the vicissitudes of chemistry will prevail
and the third person you will set sail
to the land of oblivion, until I find another eulogy
or someone writes one for me

Water

ON it,
U
C
U.
IN it,
U
R
U

you see through me
and I through you
and father, too
has always been that way
the limits of my sight
being cradled in the Shanghai night
when
outside, teeming masses flowed through
the black wet shine of asphalt
like ants en route to the mound they cannot see
…while you and father created me
after,
with the curtains tipping on the sill
and the warm wind calling
but not knowing your names
he blew smoke into the Asian night
while you watched the grey placentate plumes
swirl sweetly to the stained ceiling
adorning its placid plaster with mystic memories
and the forbidden scents I will never smell
for you and he would never tell
what rhythmic rhymes you made
with the masses plodding along
oblivious to your milky movements
while they stirred in another darkness

Life

a
death
sentence
commuted
briefly
while
I
dream
I’m
awake