The whale is a fish and a mammal in one
As white has all colors and also has none
               The grandest of creatures
               With paradox features
Unknown and untouched by the light of the sun

Shaking my head as I shuffle through Nod
     And wander through darkness on scabrous old feet
     Where the fruits are forbidden, and might I add strictly
     But the knowledge is ever so sweet

     I’m Under the Influence of sir Malcolm L
     And M. L. von Franz has me under her spell
     Seeking the change that I wish I could be
     While my dear inner Ahab I struggle to quell

     To search by escaping through tropics and trenches
     Determined to make every ocean my home
     My singular purpose: the potion that quenches
     Still I drink that I could theme alone

     In this watering hole will I bury my hatchets
     A sickness that’s cured is an ailment forgotten
     So choke every sorrow and drown your regrets
     A soul that remembers is cursed to go rotten

     With penalties and interest forever compounded
     I’m astounded to watch how my recollection grows
     The proverbial wisdom that’s also called madness
     Is purchased on credit and paid for with woes

     Drifting asea to steer clear of collectors
     Engulfed instead by tempests my own
     Echoing voices demanding comeuppance
     From the depth comes a cry that disturbs every bone

     These howling reminders are issued below
     From under the surface by more than a beast
     My pirates on deck keep me bound to the mast
     Always in earshot and never released

     Mostly a head but with hardly a face
     My nemesis, massive, can scarcely be seen
     Not to be measured through time or in space
     From his cousins’ cadavers our data we glean

     Less than a man, I stomp on my stump
     And promise to silence the primitive brute
     Guided by starlight, unable to sleep
     Harpoon at the ready and eager to shoot

     **** the torpedoes and to hell with the crew
     Set sail at once for the wide open blue
     Don’t be seduced by this monster in white
     His message is wicked, no less than it’s true

     He feeds on your anger, you’re never too old
     To listen instead of exerting your tongue
     Or shaking the hinges of Davy Jones’ locker
     On the floor of the ocean where Melville met Jung

Done with thinking because that's for god to do
I am just this appendage of a greater consciousness

Ahab is blameless
in his small existence
Don't quote me
quote Herman and Freddy Nietzsche
They and their hermits
coming down from the mountains
to declare they ought to have
loved their fate all along

Amor fati
Why couldn't we have been stuck in the herd all along
guys who get love and happiness effortless
no need to spend their life in anguish
searching through tomes
found in tombs for eons and eons
enhancing their social aloofness
and their unremembered trauma
'till those sad souls give those pansies confidence
to leave an exegesis of their own

Too smart kid
that decried Christ and
the shadows of a god all around
only to find the search for truth was hopeless
Find a way to dumbly enjoy life again
and you only say again cause
that's all we can control
our memories
and we too often forget
our thought habits
the pre-neolithic mind tricks
on ourselves

Too many MLMs profiting off false mindfulness
missing the point beyond exercise
and short stress relief

Change your thought patterns to love your destiny
That's the best we have
to pretend to have control in this ̶h̶e̶l̶l̶ hole

“Moby ****,”  Herman Melville

<•>

~for the lost at sea~

after a year of saltwater absence and abstinence,
return to the island caught between two land forks
surrounded by river-heading flows
bound for the ocean great joining

the Atlantic welcomes the fresh water fools,
bringing with them hopefully, but hopeless gifts of obeisances,
peace-offerings endeavoring to keep their infinite souls

sea accepts them then drowns the
warm newcomers in the unaccustomed
deep cold salinity, which
sometimes erodes
sometimes preserving
their former freshwater cold originality

I’m called to depart my beach shoreline  unarmed,
no kayak, sunfish or glass bottomed boat needed,
walk on water and my toes, ten eyes to see the bottom,
no depth perception limitation,
reading the floor’s topography,
millions of minion’s stories infinite,
many Munch screaming

god’s foot, heavy upon my shoulders,
a daytime travel guide, hired for me,
not a friendly travel companion,  nope,
God a pusher showing off a drug called deep water salvation,
designated for the masses, can handle large parties

my in-camera brain  eyes,
record everything for playback -
the lost and unburied, bone crossword puzzles

walk shore to ship, on soles to souls,
is this my new-summer nature welcome back greeting?

puzzled at the awesomeness of vastness,
conclude this clarification for me of the occluded-deep,
is a stern reminder of my insignificant existence,
my requirement to walk humbly, spare my sin of vanity, and
forgive my trespasses upon the lives of others

perhaps then the infinite of my soul perchance restored,
older visions clarified and future poems
will write themselves
and sea to it my predecessors
be better remembered

Memorial Day 2018