January 1, 1000

Year One-thousand, January One,
starts the new millennium.
The villein, Jacques, in Reims,
wakes to find his world unchanged.
His hut stinks; his flour's wormy.
He fears God's wrath, but trusts His mercy.
Walled in by his community,
set in Christian certainty;
by their fireplace, with his family, sitting,
he plans the plots he'll plant come spring
The stars above him do not move;
he knows God's power --and His love.

                                                          ­                                        
1118

Others loathe such conformity:
their minds and spirits must be free.
Tutor Pierre finds knowledge increase
in the arms of his pupil Héloise.
Risking life and reputation,
they learn a different conjugation.
(L'Université de Paris's great philosophe
and the canon's niece --in reckless love.)
You think the danger overstated?
Let me remind you that Abélard was castrated
--and the **** confined to a nunnery ...
whence she wrote most eloquently.
("Though I should think of God, I think of thee.")  


225

Dear Francis,
I hear that when you visited St. Peter's
you exchanged clothes with a beggar
and stood all day at the door of the church;
that you asked the people of Gubbio
to be kind to the wolf who was eating their sheep;
that you call birds your "sisters" and fire, your "brother";
that you would have us give all that we own to the poor....
--Perplexed in Perugia

Dear Perplexed,
I ask only that you see God's hand in all creation:
wolf, *****, flower, stone --
God gives to each His rain and His sun.
What man is in the eyes of the Lord,
that I am --and nothing more.


1517

Martin Luther says you can't buy salvation;
the individual conscience is the only true religion.
Of intermediaries, he'll have none;                              
Man is responsible to God alone.
The Bible, being God's holy Word,
must, by each Christian, be read and understood.
Humble toil is a service of God
far surpassing the holiness of monks.
God is terrible in his majesty;
by faith in God, are we made free.  


1611

[London; Shakespeare addresses assembled friends as he
retires to Stratford;... a mysterious stranger rebuts.]

"Despite it surely not being my intention
to slight the worth of imagination,
to doubt the value of our fictive craft,                                          
there can be no question:  in their import,
the actual deeds of actual men
must, perforce, surpass the disembodied pen.
This [pointing] is merely men upon a stage;
these, merely words I've placed on the page."

"Master Shakespeare, I beg to differ:
it is your words which will live forever.
When fiery Phoebus ten million times
has run his course 'round rotund Earth, men will
still be astonished at Lear's great woe,
still sigh with Juliet for her Romeo."


1711

They've placed Monsieur Voltaire in prison.
This will not postpone the Age of Reason.
Men will speak and write as they see fit,        
be governed by laws and the intellect.
        

1783

[General Washington, at Annapolis, Maryland]

"My friends, I'm honored deeply,
by the faith which you here show in me,
your confidence that these qualities
which served so well in war might now
to governance be applied successfully.    

"I, myself, have doubts:
I fear that battle's clear, cold steel will be dulled
in the gauzy murk of diplomacy.
And though I were suited to this high estate most perfectly
still I should shrink from it.
I think of Caesar,
returning, triumphant, from Gaul,
his heart full of zeal for the good of his people,                  
who achieved much, but whose lordly rule
gave way to others far less wise....

"There's a name for a man raised above men as a god:
it's 'king'. I'll have no kings!

"Thus, I surrender to you,
the duly-elected representatives of the States,
the outward and visible sign of my authority:
this sword. Let the world take note
that these united States, born under tyranny's yoke,
shall, in word and deed, henceforth
be governed democratically."


July 27, 1890

Vincent finds his world has narrowed,
(--what wonders he'd seen in la lumière d'Arles!--)
all the things for which he's sorrowed--
rejection by his cousin Kee,
reliance on his brother's charity,
failure of his "painters' community"--
come welling up....
He walks to the field from which he'd come.
In his pocket, the letter he'll never mail.
The wheatfield he'd so recently painted.
In his pocket, by his chest,...
the gun.


July 16, 1945

[Robert Oppenheimer, near Alamagordo, New Mexico]

    If the radiance of a thousand suns
    were to burst into the sky at once,
    that would mirror the Mighty One's splendor....
    I am become Death --World-destroyer.
    --The Bhagavad Gita

Everything was so much clearer
when it seemed the Germans might get the thing first....
Now it's all so terribly muddy....
Who knows what these generals'll do with it.
...The radiance of a thousand suns....                                                         ­                                                 

That 100-foot tower --completely gone!...
If we didn't do it, someone surely would....
I am become Death --destroyer of Worlds.  


January 1, 2000

Year Two-thousand, January One,
starts the new millennium.
The sales-clerk, Jacques, in Reims,
wakes to find his world unchanged.
He's got Internet access! Two cars!
He doesn't fear the universe....
The only group he's part of
is guys who drink at the local bar....
He goes to church, but doesn't believe.
His job, his marriage --nothing is certain....
Even the stars above him move.
He knows God's power --but not His love.

The world told you I was dead,
They cry every twenty ninth, calling out my name---
"Vincent! Dear Vincent!"
as if their voices could lift a soul away from death.
Why didn't they shout my name before I left?
Each passing day I ask,
a question running through my mind but never left my lips
Yet no one would even hear me now nor even then...
Why couldn't I be loved, when I lived to have it felt?
Why did love look for me, when I was locked away for sure?
Loneliness was my disease and I never found my cure.
Why?
I watched the stars every night
waiting for all these glittering lights to hear my cry.
Now as I stand on the star's side
Hearing their sad mourning sighs
I now realize why...
They couldn't give what don't have,
even the shooting stars were as poor as hags.
And yet I ask the world again,
"WHO SAID I WAS DEAD?"
Who told you that I was gone and deep beneath the cold hard ground?
I am not dead.
Yes, I, Vincent--- Van Gogh it is to them
I say, I am not dead.
I live in every soul that's been forgotten
Every person in the street who Love has never met.
I live on teenagers on showers asking them selves "until when?!"
Every broken man drowning himself in liquor bottles---
I live in the lives of every soul that sought for love and never found them!
I am alive,
I am there as long as more people are asking "why?!"
I live while so many people stopped trying.
I am rooted in the hearts of those whose hearts are heavy---
heavy from the emptiness of living.
I stand beside every man ready to leap off a bridge and let the current carry their tormented fears.
I am alive,
I am full of wasted lives.
And as long as there's another---
who never found the love he should've been offered,
I say, I am alive!
Let there never be another who left
never having to be embraced by the sweetest feeling ever felt.
Never let anyone leave,
While they're bringing me.

Let there never be another cry for Vincent.

Always,
Vincent


(iac.)

In a starry-starry night
you tell to look up at the sky
and then I realise

the star that shines the most
is the one by my side.

In rows they stand,
Locked in patterns, one after the other.
In the field they are one mass of land,
Stalwart in their stance, as similar to their neighbor as to their mother.
Within the fiery skies above their planted heads,
In lanes unmarred by planned similarity, flies a beast cast of a different die.
Black as night, with wings of smoke; within those fiery skies they fly.
There you will find me.

In lines one by one,
Single file on either side of tamed nature,
Grazing along black river avenues, stand carefully planned hovels beneath the sun.
They are faceless, markedly lacking the unique touch of artistry to mature.
While crowded entities parade upon the market,
Great amphibious royalty croon ancient songs to the land around,
Gifting the night with the grand chaos of their sound.
There you will find me.

Not content to face bitter winds upon modern lanes,
A dweller of the urban landscape seeks out that which most abstain.
Deep in the dark hollows, where the gods of yesterday lie within still,
A fool seeks sanity amongst the ancestral beings who, within these spaces fill.
In the shadows of the great old ones,
Reveling in the divine lost amidst human progress,
There you will find me.

To you, she was splattered paint on a wrinkled page
Half stuck to your wall by one piece of tape
You always looked past it, but wouldn't throw it away
You barely realized how it complimented your day
So many colors, so bright, no direction
An overwhelming mess serving as calming affection
But still, you were passively looking, searching for art
Waiting to lay eyes on something that would pull on the strings of your heart

You wanted something flawless, with pretty pastels
Something that at upper-scale auctions would always sell
Once you found it you'd take her down
Bid her farewell, thank her for being around
Everyday you'd look past her unaware of the comfort she provided
Who could blame you? She wasn't what you were looking for, you just collided

Overtime, the tape weakened but you didn't see
You left the window wide open and she drifted away freely,
You came home and noticed something was different, but at first didn't know why
You noticed the painting was gone and to your surprise, started to cry
For the first time in a long time you felt that pulling at the strings of your heart
For the first time in your lifetime you realized that painting was art

No wonder you could never find it, that painting was yours
But you were never proud to own it, so it was no more
It's funny how they say art is never appreciated until the artist is gone
Such a tortured process the glory takes so long
Van Gogh was overlooked now he's timeless
His work went from invisible to priceless
To let something like that escape would be a sin
Some people save up their whole lives for a piece of him

So let her be your Van Gogh,
only appreciated once she had to go
Her messy colors once meant nothing to you,
now they're all you'll know

I hate how I can't sleep at night.
Why does my body put up a fight?
I yawn like I'm gasping for air.
So I lay there listening to "The Prayer".

Pulling out a pen helps me sleep.
Rather than imagining and counting sheep.
My spilled ink allows me to create a universe on a smooth surface.
Like Van Gogh with a canvas.

I write till my face hits the table.
Every night is the same, so I stay up planning my next travel.
Sometimes I'll wake tearing a page off my face.
I'll read it then throw it straight into the fireplace.