Beauty comes suddenly, cleanly
when the thing comes at all
for unpursued and dimly lit
zipping boundless or small

evasive as an arctic dawn
under an unturned rock
echoing all senses at once
if recognized or not

its grandeur through stories to heirs
that echo manifests
its rhythm, bearing, and function
wise to youth, wise near death

Beauty's power, intangible
a high altitude hawk
unspoken in its reflection
unseen, or quickly lost

Will that friend of mine come to my memorial?
Will my ashes fit in that cigar box?
Will my literature translate through pages to my great great great grandchildren?
Will anyone be as painfully aware of my persona?
Is there an unembarrassing solution to my questions?
Poor Walt, editing away at 1855 pure brilliance for the rest of his years
Decency derives from intense dimensions
And its such a mess
Such love and detest

Sinking organs
Surrounded by unshared smiles
Failing in the center ring
Witnesses to my trial

NOW will be impressed forever
Dying my canvas shade
There are no corners to hide in
I am a fraud, I have been made

Seeking not high words
The cat refusing to release my tongue
Lofty clouds quickly vanish
Today's truth in the saddest songs

Roll the dice and get naked
Expose a bit of you
Release your passion failed dreams
Over a drink or two

Of profit more ones that aren't
Over the ones that are
Success dams affable souls
That pour true tales of scars

confidence is not inflection
the deep hold a bit more
eyes would rather dart through rooms than
admit what’s in the drawer

potentials are adorned with
our self-inflicted chains
honest laughs never lean
where unseen depths remain

but fires do not completely fade
for those who stand in awe
love and shadows sincerely make
partial beauty withdraws
for journeys weren’t created straight
nor refuse certain flaws

There are fields that call me out
That I have never seen
Only way I know they are
The feeling in between

Meadows filled with four-legged furs
And older rooted greens
I fit in just fine with them
And I like what I seem

When visits become seldom more
For reasons unforeseen
The call rings to wake my soul
Reminds me of true me

my voice wasn’t whispered to me
I didn’t learn to think from the professor of moby ****
I hit my head on saint paul’s contentment
upended in reflection
hours upon hours taking in the sky
and more hours
cerulean shaded ethereal hum-glow
to the duration of substance
until discernment was properly cut through
like forgetting unimportant events
until I was surrounded by gifts
no longer standing at an entryway
but spinning and somersaulting in the waves

Recalling a botched conversation
Is the worst
It's calling up witnesses
Directly to your brain
Enabling the 3D film to begin looping
In every failing, torturous detail

But the larger loss
Which is somehow known
    to only your stomach
Is where the conversation
    could have ended -
With two souls
Momentarily hitting the same beats
Increasingly less alone
Echoing unifying cadences
Together
Understanding
Reinforcing -
And enflaming the heart
Inside both rib cages

And instead
It's two beings
Who can't even hear each other
From the other shoreline

Heed floral and fauna
And grow stronger
Than your appearance
By virtues unseen

I have yet
to write
a single
poem

certainly I can
rhyme and meter
compose a verse
haiku
limerick
and build cadence
yet
it’s
withheld
refrained
restrained
it does not allow nor admit
in fact
it’s fraudulent
a paean sin of omission
omitting truth
vulnerability and
humanity!
why not weep of wide
open
limpid lucidity?
why not the magic of
heartfelt disclosure?
each ****** feature fearlessly
presented with palpable pretensionless
petals that the sun skips
over skin through
sky of algid air as
each lung
animates
all admissions
tumbling down
in the merriment
that transports
grace
eternal, primal
screams
ancient
songs
that release grudges
from muscles
the mysterious immersed magnificence that
confronts a chartreuse day as an
unimaginable
gift
through the lens of immediate
freedom
with burdens and cares
falling away to
a purely peaceful
poise
not a song, sonnet nor
a single sentence
rather the grasping of
a fresh infusing of
divine pleasure

Friday is an ocean wave
Its break, escapeful way
Of losing ego's footing
To a fragile bracelet weave

Week's aspirations - crash! on rocks
Return to the cadence
With anxiety of the grave
Lost, to the immensity!

the general sits in the corner
he did not go to their alma mater
sipping his latte
reading hemingway for the first time
wearing jeans and button downs and
cowboy boots
enjoying the drink and
wishing he was elsewhere

friends, happiness must come solely from generosity
what else fills the cup that floods the soul?
what else breaks habitual self-focused hysteria of selfishness and greed?
and vows not to perpetuate a small view of oneself, and others?
what else?

We deeply miss
What we never were
Other's lives - so appealing
So we emulate the best we can
In both becoming and reflecting
Do gifts of passions occur

cage match between
excitement
    and sense of place
clothed in atmosphere
wrapped in the ***** I feel, I feel
sensation - wonderfully dizzying
in the gentle rocking of mother universe
the evening waves
the off-color tall grasses leaning back and forth
sipping a drink-drink
lined with the salt of the earth
permeating cells
toxins in body and mind start to leave
shoulders relax to softer tones
posture realigns to beauty

develop taste for the cheap stuff
the simple stuff
put your mind at ease

pass over not, enjoy it all
and go where thy please

as my neighbors air conditioners blaze
someone has to sit outside
take long mental logs
of the reluctant halfmoon
behind such white cotton candy cloud formations
this cerulean filled july afternoon
cottonwood shade, swirling breeze
ample enough for me
to find grace
ample enough for grace
to find her voice

the building is corporate
offices
assigned parking
subaru, audi, tesla
I'm at the attached deli
staring out the window
sitting on a bar stool
sipping icy high fructose corn syrup
and the delicounter guy grows in eternal frustration, with no one to answer his primordial scream,
"number 54 buffalo wrap!"
I read headines on my phone
about nothing substantial
someone is choosing their words carefully while bringing up doug's proposal
just over the music volume
its all pop
all treble
unable to reverberate the bass
or the ethers
can this even be called music?
its sad noise
yet there is something at stake here
inflated egos
**** eating grins
and where the hell have you been

The greatest fear
Most westerners hold
Is losing their conveniences

But missing art
And its grace unfold
Gets my trepid allegiances

Dark wood cabinets, black leather chairs, middle aged and greater men, college football in a backroom, with Lead Belly playing softly in this one

A cigar shop after sunset

You consider sticks to buy after selling tech stock, to stock the newly acquired humidity-controlled locker

When a pointer out of blind-spots
A predominantly nonverbal gent
Through strong, painfully sincere eyes
Points out one of yours

It involves moving past the need to announce one own's prowess

You take it
Without offense, defense, or alarm
As one sits in a circle, surrounded a ******* primal tribal commune, desperate to fix the issue of you - they need you better, you see

Dare not dismiss it
Even over the next mornings second cup of black

lapsong souchong in hand
and writing
as the sun
blossoms
in the full
expanse of
the atmospheric prism -
a few shades
dismissed to a
short recess
to play
on their own

and the wind
sits still
only an observer now
joyfully allowing the
lake, the colors, the writing
these undisturbed moments
together

After spending all winter
In shoes and boots
My feet were put to their
Summer test
With a five mile trek
    see yellow butterflies!
    see the wild columbines!
In flip flops
And the blisters
And the pain
In an illogically brilliant manner
Make me deeply
    and happily
        satisfied

our hearts
beat time
we are adam
newly awake
enjoying the sparse
beauty of life
eternally changing
eternally the same

our hearts
beat time
we are trees
giving forth fruit
enjoying the universe
at our feet
eternally changing
eternally the same

our hearts
beat time
pure light
sets thoughts ablaze
our fates
not equal
impermanence
supremely and sharply
sensed

See, dear, see

Birds sing you to wake
Waking to the modern dream
Beats of heart-drums
Rhythm of air into lungs
Feeling of earth on bare feet

Curious of when first memory
Was created
Of coffee grounds, universes
And saturn's rings

Do thoughts increase?
Increasing through a lifetime
All lifetimes

Do thoughts focus?
To miniscule photons
What horton heard

And visibility
Over the wall of these five minutes
Of fear and remorse

Inertia of these gentle beats and rhythms
Increasingly miraculous
Increasing mortal language

See, dear, see

as if you could not eat otherwise
that's how a poet should write
that's what she told me

but that's not the language
I use
no no no
no

it is and has been
a headfirst dive into
a shallow lake

soul and spine's at stake
it festers there anyway

but beyond that
there's the conjuring of
limitless higher powers

long meditations
on self mortality
sweating through
bedsheets

touching, almost
the azure wavelength canopy of sky
with slow breathing

my mistrusting eyes
throw stones
undeservingly in your direction
they're from
an old case
that should have been dropped
years ago
why i haven't been capable
of shaking it off
im not entirely sure
but no matter
you seem entirely capable
of doing so for me

Fellow lost soul
Share a flower-scented thought?
Or still bouncing through the dark
    A hawk scaring off flocks?

The world creates peculiar friends
Difficult lessons to learn
But also bright lights
    Third to the sun and the moon

Like writers and readers
Capable intimate exchange
Or fear-covered nonesense
    With lies for truth's sake

i'm a lover in form
of passionate, faithful mate
i am a business executive too
setting a horrid pace

a father, son, brother, grandchild
in some familiar roles
also an intellectual hedonist
i am a temporary soul

but my poems will endure
nothing else i fear
generations get forgotten
setting my sights clear

the elephant in the room
is that I am beautiful
and you, as well
as this day’s potential

what is a day, but a rotation together
conscious magics between deep chasms of sleeps
we enter both world’s beauty willingly or not
with lizards running on desert rocks
and mister suicide’s cough
and gentle seeps, of that which is far too delicate to mention
but in small whispers

unrealized by walking remorse all over the island
I can see it
there is something about every day to frighten
yet there it is
beauty’s generous smile
given to those who grew up as you did
making the same mistakes

follow ideas all the way
carry them to the brink
devote it all to the open
where air is clean to think

the song’s sustenance can increase
beyond a passage bend
if the spark looms advantageous
chase it to the right end

provide occasions to evoke
the theories tracked in snow
uncertain lies the pendulum
of which direction goes

the first foggy ports of entry
where these journeys commence
encompass only distant lights  
and often awful tests

so allow the strong light to blind
and bounce it off the halls
sounding boards of experience
ancient or modern calls

calls leviathan, nebula
noble time unwasted
mysteries must be lost to gain
temporary o’ sacred

The universe can best be heard
Through ears that hug tired grins
In an alpine trek’s midday doze
Drenching deep gratified skin
Here whispered wares can wish for loss
Echoing down snowmelt creeks
With mouse, rock and wildest flower
Sound the ethers, stars and peaks

Three visible stars
Glass of tempranillo
The final pages of
For Whom the Bell Tolls
Clear calm skies
Breaths settle senses
Like calm leaves after wind
Quiet spreads through trees
And the house
Returning to roots, foundations
Sharers of the evening moon
Heaven and earth - drowsing
The dormant volcanoes
We are, occasionally able
To release hints
Of the indescribable thing

I need to backpack again
not to get away
but to go in – deeply
to sightline’s ample expanse
that builds with one’s willingness to look
in light that blankets itself across the breathing canvas
that differs in concept and perception
more than in different months and minds
but as an elevated mirage
these inaccessible peaks and valleys of the rockies
have trails few travel this time of year
at altitudes that invite only a few birds and critters
and serious mountaineers making their preparations for their
“conquering of the seven summits”
I would gladly join either group, if there are openings
but would also be quite content with
my earbuds in my pocket
the chilled alpine winds through my wool beanie
trekking slowly over rock, ice and snow

I need to backpack again
to see the shades that would present themselves
to reflect in all reflection
to breathe slower
breathing out toxins and anxieties
that have been allowed to enter my humdrum, my rhythm
effecting and infecting my organs
to allow my lungs unfettered access
to all the fresh altitude it would like
to blind my eyes on the snow-capped cloudless afternoons
where tea and coffee are most pleasant
where a sand county almanac can be read
where my muscles gain power, endurance, fortitude
where thoughts of loved ones fondly skew themselves
where I am neither king nor extra
but a small dragon – limitations and capacities equally known
where emotion and temperament need not invent themselves
in the electron exchange within, but arriving from the west
I can see it all, I start to desire it all
from the front door of my office
it’s calling now, I need to go

I need to backpack again
not to get away
but to go in
immersion!
into the elements
like sliding gently into a hot spring pool
I will go!
going in – deeply
to sightline’s ample expanse
where I am NOT a small fish
but a star, in my corner of the darkness
a sun – that builds with one’s willingness to see it’s place in the universe
a light that blankets itself across the breathing canvas
that is perceived and conceived
more than in different months and minds
but as an elevated mirage

I need to backpack again
beyond accessible peaks and valleys of the rockies
to shared trails rarely travel during winter seasons
only inhabited by a few birds and critters
and mountaineers preparing for their
“conquering of the seven summits”
I would gladly join either group, if invitations were sent
but would also be quite content now
to leave the earbuds in my pocket
to feel, to hear the prickling of the chilled alpine winds
through fibers in my wool beanie
even as I traverse slowly over rock, ice and snow

I need to backpack again
to scope out shades that would present themselves, and say hello
to reflect in all thy reflection
to breathe slower – and slower – and slower
breathing out toxins and anxieties
inadvertently allowed to enter my humdrum, my rhythm
effecting and infecting even my organs
the fresh altitude air now needs unfettered access to my lungs
and the snow-capped cloudless afternoons
give permission to much desired snow-blindness
coffee and tea take on new meaning as well
and each sentence of a sand county almanac can be read
and my muscles will gain power, endurance, fortitude
and thoughts of loved ones will fondly skew themselves
and I will be neither king nor extra
but a small dragon – with limitations and capacities equally known
emotion and temperament need not invent themselves here
not from the electron exchange within, but arriving from the west
I can see it all, I start to desire it all
from the front door of my office
it’s calling now, and I need to go

Small Colorado mountain library
Had too many books, I guess
And was selling them, a bag for a buck
So I threw a handful in a bag
    I wanted to read
But also, some fifteen cent gambles
Which happened to include
"The White Pony: An Anthology
Of Chinese Poetry" 1947
A compilation of poems
Translated into English
Some brilliant
Some three thousand years old
Or older
(No one seems to know)
Some notes in the margins
And underlined by a previous owner
(Also brilliant)
And this fifteen cent investment
Is opening a world of old masters
Who can speak to me
From their world of wars
Concubines and starvation
To my domestic modernity
With ease
With celebration
Of life's simple things
These are not foreign souls
Masters, yes
But utterly relatable
From their quiet reflections and virtues
Under the peach blossom tree

coltrane seems capable of quenching some carnal craving

magnificence and Veracity
entering in a form
so undoubtedly Sincere
un-convoluted by
inconsequential script and scribble

perhaps this is kilmer's Tree
perhaps this is the universe's Love supreme
perhaps this is a Truce for the one who writes

lapsong souchong in hand
and writing
as the sun
blossoms
in the full
expanse of
the atmospheric prism
each shade is now
dismissed to a
short recess
to play
on their own

and the wind
sits still
only an observer now
joyfully allowing the
lake, the colors, the writing
these undisturbed moments
together

Sitting on a rock
Which is providing
Unexpected comfort
    (Fitting)
I recall the time I ignored
Your dissertation...
I would regret the adventurous path -
Practicality is advised -
One should consider all -
Every life choice with great care
    More filled than less
So, with a slow inhale
Of immensity
    Of smiling, of laughter
Let me tell you
That I would do it again

Let us not wait!
For all this to be over
To return to normal (circa 2019)
When it’s not so difficult

Let us not wait!
To enjoy each other’s company
Phone calls used to last hours
And long form letters were an art form

Let us not wait!
To invent and create new
To live out old dreams in new forms
To grasp and create beauty

Let us not wait!
For life to be easier
For fears to subside
For tragedy to dissipate

There is a time to mourn
And the loss of life and livelihood
Has crushed with dense Fog
Of enormity, confusion, fear and loneliness

And in the Fog we must find our brothers
Pull them and ourselves to newly formed graces
Life requires living
And life finds a way (circa 1993-Jeff Goldblum)

With a background track of
Still cool desert air
Crickets sing their song
My skin seems to appreciate
The cloudless desert bathing
New Mexican green chili
Digests slowly in euphoric pulses
Lost track of time
I'm not usually up at this hour
Lost track of tomorrow's worry
Not even sure what it was or for
All friends at the mountaintop
All love on dirt streets
All simple
All art
Life is Beautiful
It's not over
It has returned in Enormity

First, come to grips with death
Face the fear
Then move on
Then work your *** off
Giving yourself completely
To your artistic passions
And mountain climbing adventures
And once you've failed
Hundreds of times
Learn from the masters
Be the most absorbent sponge
Capable of soaking up
The whole ******* thing
And take your passions
The ones that are beautiful
The ones that make other creatures
Be filled with awe of something
That is so greatly, greater than
That has been divinely touched
And breathed on from the beyond
And allow
Just allow
That passion to take you
All the way
Downstream

sitting in my crowded shop
line is near the door

the coffee, doing nothing for me
and I write the words,

“going slow, not always careful
fast isn't always that rash
there are breaths which are not wasted
when put to life before ash”

and

the meter and rhyme is
    ripped from emily dickinson
    ripped from her childhood choir’s rendition of amazing grace
    ripped from old anglo-saxson pubs
    ripped from chaucer’s friends
        roman soldiers
            or who the hell knows

but…

i'm not sure what those lines are echoing
because I’m so freakin' exhausted
wow, this week…
I didn't sleep well
and haven't slept well for some time
but who can sleep well at a time like this?
there is so much to learn
so much to live for
so many sunrises to take in

ya, that’s the truth

and maybe that’s what those lines are
as my thoughts begin catching up to my hand
and maybe others will see what I see
either way, I got a few words out
bring on the day

great stories open behind sad eyes
each subtle note
from a great fight
foreshadowing blindspots
from the epic

some prodigal son's sense
all life, and what it's for
not all are altruistic
not all sweet spirit pours

the old neighborhood endures
with occasional calls
holding hope for hopeful news
or for derelict falls

he bare for maker and all
and to the code, less care
to the benefit of less
he the poured out prayer

sharp words sting for days
washing little off to drains
shadows only in stature seen
until final loose fate will deem

what can't be cleaned, cannot wash
others perceive as blatant loss
to what? but ancient wounds
left ages before midnight's spoon

love pierces through such shame
caring little about a name
healing is returning, granted or not
lessons learned though never taught

same reason some
picked up their charcoal
to paint on cave walls
then others
wailed inside their
exploding hearts at onsight
renderings of Mozart
these half moons in half time
the old rhythms
and cheap rhymes
play with our utmost expressions
and for some
the only potential
to release the drive
to madness
and pure love