oscillating back and forth
head tilting from leeward and windward
an abstract puzzling my imperial gaze
a Van Gogh in waiting

      perchance a reflection illuminated
      in broad mesmerizing strokes
      some tantalizing insightfulness
      else a superficial escapade

do the color menageries
stray my mindfulness or hold attention
each vivid hue enlightenment
to soothe & provide enrichment

    is my inspiration desperation
    to find meaning in the simpleton
    gravitating and debating
    between beauty and gargoyles

does incredulous creativity scare me
or woo me into submissiveness
the artist plying servitude
into mine cavernous cavities

     Alan Scales’ exhibit of
     Turquoise Abstract Landscape II
     provides fodder for my mind
     to exponentially explode

Andreas Simic©

Science holds keys, doors,
Black holes and symmetry.
Science is the gatekeeper
When it comes to facts and logic.
There is no place for science in the
Universe of imagination, science
Don’t own a paintbrush and could
Never be a Picasso or Van Gogh
No matter how many starry nights they glaze at.

The first thing I see
when I pull out the top drawer
was the diagnosis. Meds, there you go

it pretty much said that.
I wondered about all the
creative people doing
some remarkable things,
creating and being alive.

Except they all one day
killed themselves.
Van Gogh stood in
the overgrown field before
he shot himself.
Sylvia Plath knelt down
and stuck her head in the oven.
Virginia Woolf grazed the smooth
peebles, thinking about what
she would write about those peebles,
Only to shove them in
her pockets and drown in the Ouse river.

Nearly everyday, I tell myself
I want to be a writer, or an artist-
Both, actually. That’s all I ever
wanted to be, but the fear of
spiraling, and becoming them
Is deeply disturbing.

Yet, I craved for this life,
To paint, and create stories
with a dash of madness
They all did likewise.

These are the endless days of endlessness
These are the days, when time is just present
There is a disbelieved past, a future unimaginable
Here is the only now, a permanent-present-tensing-participle

Faces smiling semi-graciously present, desperately seeking coaxing
The winter dark, living room occasional lit by one, mostly TV glow
Radiance lives inside only, but well remembered songs cause
Cry outs for who, the what, the needed, we’ve forcibly memorized

Observing winter’s river from kitchen window, it’s colored
*****-dusk-blue, like my eyes, add overlaying images of sparkles
But my magic not powerful, my love can’t see them
My bag-o-tricks can’t bring her sunshine, 2020 sorcerer’s gold

These are the days of endless dancing alone,
Longest walk from bed to kitchen, worn the weary wood shiny
True romancing still abounds, but so well hid, 99% invisible
Even when you ask without asking to be held oh-so-tight

These are the days, riverside, when slow flowing waters offer
No hinting of faraway treasures to be someday discovered
The magician vain struggles to find loving tricks to unlock
Her loving grace, her water-to-wine breathing demeanor*

These are the days, that forever need remembering, saving
No savoring, the absence of joyous everyone, everywhere
These are the days of absence+abstinence that lasted forever
You've got to hold them in your forever heart, lest we forget

His command of color
Most magnificent

He transformed the pain
Of his tormented life
Into ecstatic beauty

Pain is easy to portray
But to use your
Passion and pain
To portray the ecstasy and joy
And magnificence of our world

No one had ever done it before

Perhaps no one will again

I slept beneath
a mad hatter moon and
dreamed of a big blue
tarantula swimming in
a yellow moss
covered pond. A rat
terrier passed me a note:
Mercy and love
are
fleeting, they fade away
like the
tangerine sun; they
are lies like
the dead bulls under
a ****** red
Spanish sky.
I asked his name,
"Mendacity" he said,
then turned into a
pack of
cigarettes, no matches,
no lighter…

I drank from the
pond and became a
sunflower.
Vincent shot
me with his
lonely cornfield gun.
He sat down and smoked
his pipe, as crows
lied
lied
lied.
He said with sad, iris eyes,
"It's impossible to ****
a mermaid, or eat
a starry night."
It's the impossibility
of a thing that
drives one
mad;
like a mustang
caught for the
circus, but always
dreaming of escape to
the thundering
fields of its youth.
I saw toothless
orphans throw rooks at
his soul, as those beautiful
eyes saw way too much…
I want to
pound
it in,
drive it dripping
home through the
core
of a rose, to the
bottom
of the tulip. I'll
get drunk on
nectar of the god's, then
reject immortality. (Who wants to live forever?)

There has been a drastic
Mistake.
I see it at the
zoo in the
monkeys caged,
glazed eyes.
No wonder they
throw ****
at people.
"Such lies, " he said.
"The artichoke, avocado, and
algebra; the small of
a woman's back and
the emerald head of
the hummingbird."
"If the artichoke and
avocado are lies" I said,
"then truth is the
tight, tasty, creamy
green line that
refuses to settle or waiver;
delirious, delicious."

"No" he said, as
his hands stroked
that lice ridden
crimson beard.
"It's conception and
growth, then cast
out
****** and naked
cut from the
cord,
and a lifetime spent
trying to return
to the womb, **** first,
but only spilling and
spreading the
nightmare of being,
the fever of living, to
another
sorry soul that didn't
ask for it.
I woke up,
drained the elixir,
and starred at
Vinnie's self portrait,
the one with
bandaged ear, and
I
thought…
Yea,
God is into practical jokes.

I’ve got a secret that lives in my head
no one knows of it, not even me.
It surfaces slow while I lie in my bed
I wish I could sleep peacefully.

Wind is biting my ear, my left side is ice cold,
I’ve turned numb; I’m not even tingling.
A lifetime of bronze and silver, finally received gold,
but to place around my neck; I’m still hesitating.

It’s been a starry, starry night,
with Rhone’s reflection shining bright
and our Irises connect and only ever see light.
Studying sorrow; pain vs. fear,
so I’ll sit back and contemplate for another year,
would you appreciate the sentiment of Van Gogh’s lost ear?

It will be while on the dryest island where I find my lungs filled with water.
It will be collapsed on ground when I finally stand,
and encased and embraced in ice when I start getting hotter.

Promises will be made
and secrets are kept,
you’re inside me as I’m flayed,
exposed and I feel in debt.
You know that I love you,
that I only think of you,
and no one is your equal let alone ever above you.

It’s been so long at Eternity’s Gate,
I missed the Almond’s Blossom; I was too late,
and The Potato Eaters complain with what is on their plate.
Studying sorrow; shame or a tear,
so I’ll sit back and contemplate for another year,
would you appreciate the sentiment of Van Gogh’s lost ear?

I’d jump to paint your shadow
or even draw your outline in chalk,
I’d drag myself behind you even if you were to allow
me the privilege alongside you to walk.

There goes Vincent with
his jagged sky, and
ragged beard.
His cobalt blue are
stained with the glue that should
hold us all together,
but it doesn't.
His sunflowers are lost
on humanity.
When we can't hold
on to what we pretend to love,
we **** it...
Usually in small
treacherous ways,
like apathy or
arrogance.