Retreating Light

You were always very young children,
always waiting for a story.
And I’d been through it all too many times;
I was tired of telling stories.
So I gave you the pencil and paper.
I gave you pens made of reeds
I had gathered myself, afternoons in the dense meadows.
I told you, write your own story.

After all those years of listening
I thought you’d know
what a story was.

All you could do was weep.
You wanted everything told to you
and nothing thought through yourselves.

Then I realized you couldn’t think
with any real boldness or passion;
you hadn’t had your own lives yet,
your own tragedies.
So I gave you lives, I gave you tragedies,
because apparently tools alone weren’t enough.

You will never know how deeply
it pleases me to see you sitting there
like independent beings,
to see you dreaming by the open window,
holding the pencils I gave you
until the summer morning disappears into writing.

Creation has brought you
great excitement, as I knew it would,
as it does in the beginning.
And I am free to do as I please now,
to attend to other things, in confidence
you have no need of me anymore.

upon the afternoon of snow..of his wandered love
he sang his blue guitar into the wintry sky
life burst into snow
the falling snow
...towards dusk he gathers the fallen sky
piling in her heart
and walks her home
and all at once
they arrive
they become.

i watch
a child racing his bike uphill
chasing a purple sunset
mercifully he will never catch it
unless i'm wrong of course
and he realizes meaning
and he comes to understandings
all on his own, before he is prepared to
bear witness to  his own sadness
his place in the world
awakening too quickly, too young
to the ineffable journey
before him

its already begun

for me,the bar is high here
....the angels are already leaning in
ready to immolate every word i dare to speak
you too pounce when i'm in mid sentence  
when i'm on the edge of just saying it clearly, matter of fact
...dumbing down, saying nothing, less exhausting
is the wisest choice...it is all i ever can manage to do
...silently and eternally reliant on yours and everyone else's intuition here:
                           I AM

i can't help but
create out of deliberate obsolescence
with whatever is fatigued and mottled with rust
inside any bygone ruin that fascinates and grips me
and most of all
within the spectra of shadows of your own deepened condition
that gilded edge wane that has never failed
to enthrall and inspire

i could never love a soul until its natural patina arrived

                     ..i can race a worm to the green apple core
                     eat the worm too
                     everything now is beyond ripe
                     exposing what's left beautiful in the spoil
                     ..and neither is there harm in burning
                     this paper mobius strip
                     you've just given me
your name written on the inside coil
mine on the outside
two plumes of smoke folding between us
a  frail thinning wisp caught up in the gentle updraft
columns rising into heaven turning inside a single spire
                              we won't last
                              but i can promise you
                              we will be just as forever
                              you and me
                              ...even as we are about to be reduced
                              to the final moments of our kindred ashes

i am course, blemished, unfinished
***** hands, fingernails playing through broken strings
a child's small fist
often a rage
often alone in the dark
vulnerable,moving through the mystery
reaching my end in silence
...a myriad of cobbled pathways that once led to castles
i hear the stones begin to sing beneath my feet
and cross threshold after threshold
all manners of visions and awakenings
....sight of you engraves my soul
i go to the one who goes to the one
without fear
...without fear

i held my blue guitar while it snowed
the landscape felt like mine
i stepped slowly towards the dusk
playing a blue guitar while i strolled
the edges of my mind obscured
i played my blue guitar for sanity's sake
music unfolded like a gentle blanket
covering everything with  fresh fallen snow
whispering the way home
...i find my way home

every time i speak
i'm reduced infinitesimally
and i lose the early taste
of evening fog rising over an open twilit april field
and of my late mindfulness of the two moons
of the rising red planet mars
of phobos and deimos
oh i know they might still be mine, i still hunt for them occasionally
i can sometimes hear their eccentric hum calling me
but my half mad understanding already has ultimately strained the limits
of my wobbly earthly logic
i cannot listen any more, i can only barely fathom
while i'm busy yet orbiting inside other visions of undetermined stars beyond stars i've already known
of everything there that is tied together or perhaps not, spiraling down simultaneously
still unable, but trying
to fill and comfort the unknowable ache of this void
in the bowels of  my soul
...all this is somehow important i feel
.. but each time i dare these words upon you
i create more of a knot , more distance
between you and me first
then between myself and everything else soon after
and then we both begin to lose
sight of me
stepping off, breaking spell
capitulating

into this slivered spacestream of nowhere
with my chafed tongue still clapping
and i'm sure to lose you forever
i'll lose us both
if i insist following this fraying thread any further
            God ,seal me against speech
              with blood and wax
              seal me like a prophesy
              never meant to be opened
heaven guide us back
and hold us inside the frequencies of silence
of black density and vast anchored eternities
hovering over us in this inimitable field tonite
within these few hours of a hanging crimson orb
that will bleed over the earth
without enmity
or blame
....this moon
until it pales again
washed clean of blood, of epiphany
setting firm silent
simple..simple
as ever
upon the flattened horizon
in the grey lonely light of just another cold april morning
                     breaking hard, i promise i will meet you there
and i will love only you...

consider the pale floor
covered cold with candle wax
and other moments lived through
splayed openly upon other cold surfaces
the irreparable stoved hours
when nothing could exist
not time, nor god
only yourself
..consider the frame of mind
framed within that room
its slight figure contracted
into something further, much smaller
irrefutable nakedness
sitting on the floor
covered cold with candle wax
desperately pulling herself tightly up against the wall
...just bits and pieces
just remnants,just shreds
the remaining moment left
lives now onward
but only from behind
..now vision blurred, vision dimmed
or else vision turned completely within
all outward vision gone
and
i do no better
diasporadic and vanquished
i'm no less a shadow
than you once were
..but your shadow once besides me
has vanished
and i'm left to walk the same featureless shore
as you once did
this time alone
     i can only mark the tides
     and carry on
     ...rest in peace Katie

i know you are there
breathing as i am
peripheral and obtuse
wondering..at the words,
emptying of  their plainspeak
- they have plausible denial
if it gets too hot...too real, too fast
we need cover, protection,demeanor 
in this dance of hellos
still, the connection deepens intrinsically
regardless
...the shelf life of this poem
all but guarantees
its quick forgetfulness 
the obvious moment  has closed
and the world opens,resumes
continues as it must ..for now

...till next time my friend.....take care

bee
panic buzzing, trapped in a bottle
afternoon skies,the colour of chalk
sunburned feet
sand clinging to sweat
i'd shower except i like the smell and taste of salt
a small fire...later you'll smell like smoke
all loose and lovely beneath a sweatshirt
a cool fog creeps and finds us
..later everything ..all that is and perhaps not
coalescing
coming alive
beneath a single moon.

our cat's arrival signals
the moment's indifference
interrupting the growing dearth of words between us
stretching twice, yawning once
laying on the floor exactly where it needs be
in the midway, that middle betwixt  us
...like a skilled interpreter 
the cat listens,the cat is aware
of the unspoken forbearance
alert to the closed conversation
that always exist and churns between us,
we are held captive inside of it
and to each other because of it
this from the truth, the start of things
..the cat loses all interest
but remains polite
excusing himself
and leaves the room
..and we are left all blankness and dullness
we are left to each other again
... later, we take turns listening
to the wind rattling a window
the same one we lay under every night
when the unsaid things tire
and dispose of us
...the wind shakes
against the loosened panes of glass
we always need something to hear
and we are grateful for the noise
each others silence is frightening
our own is worse than death
anything that's there, it doesn't matter
 a distraction,a small noise,a cat
i suppose it is there to comfort us
anything will do
...i want to stop the rattle
i want to fix everything
that is torn and broken between us
i want to make repairs..
...but the cat has returned to the room
and we blink and the moment goes pale again
we look and meet each others soft stare
silence
caught suddenly aware
..we have forgotten to name the cat.

i am here
in interlocked imagery,a cascading of falling senses
a rapid kinesthesia, a  tumbling swirl of sensations
i outrun myself i pray
i corner myself i admit
i lead myself  
away from clamor, from bedlam
i do slow down
well, i try, i really do
from here,where the sea boils in cross currents of which ways
the tilted red buoy marks the spot
today it's only a warning ,not yet my grave
...small unsustainable rallies in the mornings
exhaustion by noon
its been a hundred plus days
of treading water
...i fight to keep pace
i practice and learn direct speech
there is no other way
but to reduce the matter further..collecting my strength
i will continue and not worry about my affect
how anyone might dare say
...please say nothing
simply to be heard
is enough
to be heard...to be heard
is all i ever wanted

i promise once having returned from the void i will have found a voice
something to say
a raid on the inarticulate
no,not just clever this time
but genuine,authentic
..silence might be another kind of rant i fell into
marking poverty of speech, gaunt vocabulary, the toll of meaning
all falling together into a clump, the abyss
tell me you know of this place,where i am
  -your much closer than myself
in saying it may really all exist
and might matter after all.

i loved you
how i adored you
following you from city to city

it all nearly killed me

i moved through those mesmerized crowds
as a roaming shadow on the back wall
something to throw your voice against,
your life upon

the lyric predictably failed between us
long before
the music died


my heart instead
allowed to wander inside deaf applause.









































\\\\\\

t­he music ended
the lyric failed

i was everything but the applause

my heart is still in it
i walk to the window
and can't see through
my eyes neither focus or notice
nothing registers
the mind is blank
not even panic
and there should be panic
i've not drawn a breath
for days now
i've reached the end of myself
and my heart is still in it
how amazing.

birds born in midair
never leave the sky
what has no beginning
has no real ending...never quite lands
..you can drag the bottom
forever
finding or finding not
searching for that body
by which satisfies as an explanation
and buys you only time
which will never satisfy
and by time you are not softened
not like the stone smoothed, hiding in your hand
...its never been a simple matter
to just die
or to be the thing you are born to
...however
this one morning
the birds flew lower and closer
than they had ever flown before

...and we are recompensed as a question
of whether we are dead or truly alive
and as i still breath
i promise to never hesitate
to tell you
while
we so very much are

in silence
our silence
we work my garden together
i watch him
crouched over yellow squash blossoms
does he recognize yet
how the vine is connected to me?
how everything grown and included here
have their days and nights
inside of me?
...he also is an aspect of my garden
added not as a afterthought
but as my first wish
the yellow squash blossoms
so tenderly pressed between his fingers
connects and brings him home to myself
..my smile is hidden and private
it is turned away from him
late afternoon now
the first of long shadows lower over my garden
i want to touch him
like he touches the squash blossoms
and tell him
it was prayer and imagination
that summoned this sensible creation
the same imagination
that brought and keeps him here
look how wonderfully alive it all becomes
clinging to the vine
...quick, come to me
while there is still time

i will tell you of the final and lasting secret
while there is still this moment
between us and the garden
...before it all wilts and withers
and passes away

the room is small
the breeze flops against the listless shade
the ache, the way to you is in this small boudior
the daybed,the table and dresser
           the essentials
           stage props in a play
...........love has never been so contained,  yet so full with aliveness
          yet it was not
we met and departed in some confusing torment
we were hopeless
crossing over the threshold
we passed thru that doorway too many times
we crossed every fine line ever imagined
love was becoming a spreading stain
...i've lost count of sunday afternoons
the times i met you in a brutal arrangement
the times when we layed still and didn't speak
after the somersaults 
after we completed our separate parts
in this small tragedy
we just  layed back and breathed
-a faint bark in the distance
captures our attention
what does that dog want?
neither of us would answer
...all these years later i wonder
you must have known what i wanted
you had to...tell me you did...now

-a empty dog bowl on the back steps
filling with cold rain drops
a  numbing instant
a hopeless image
a deluge,a downpour
a instant
the pummeling patter of rain
a drumbeat
and i  am overwhelmed
struggling,choking
on a slice of life
too thick to swallow
...lost in the landing
digesting the moment
unmistakable goodbye
that instant of ruinous acknowledgement
..halted
completed
                           i will love you
                           from here

teiko
are you still there?
holding to the promise
dreaming of another atmosphere
a sky for us
soaring and lit
flitted with weaving arcs
bulked with brightenings
a sky so perfused with wings
there's no room for anything else
a sky that can't hold a moment
of a cloud
teiko are you still there?
your mind weighing lighter
than mine
poured into another hemisphere
biding
holding place
for just the two of us

..i'm inside another mindquake
of tossed and heaved visions
( i would like to call them something else)
i'm alone in the dark

******* my thumb
to the bone
gnawing on my own foot
trying to free myself
from this death trap
of nauseous petulance

cleverness is symptomatic
of the worst of liars
why won't you believe this
unless you're similarly engraved
and marked
( we are both doomed)

why can't a mind just bleed out quietly
somewhere out of sight
instead of
deepening its wounds,
the damage
within the spectacle of making empty noise?
(it should honor itself for the terminal wild beast it is
laying itself down hidden somewhere
falling silent
and be done with it)
-forget all this
this is too dense a narrative
yes, a old dearth
written in fresh shorthand
trying to inch closer
..to what??
-who would dare pretend
and admit and nod to what they don't understand?
(we both have many times)
so it ends right now here
empty sounds in the belly of a cow
( the cow fell asleep and bellowed among the others
and lost it's teeth and appetites on the veritable cud)
this is just uncomplicated madness pirouetting
as deft language, out of touch
veiling as dense profundity
..my mind
eating itself out of whatever sanity left
ending  ...like this i suppose
dull

you were always
the little paradoxical mind ****
the thought shock jockey
mercenary mind for hire
falling asleep bored in someone's old dharma battle
waking honest and unaffected
recompassioned
as loud raucous sweet flesh
speaking in a deep earthy voice
provoked
turning poesy into hard poetry
..you're at another full scale riot now
somewhere else
with someone else
not here
...wherever you are
too much of being the deliberate dripping scandal
to be unentertaining
and passing unnoticed
you never think to edit sober..think of others
so the inexplicable mess expositionally expands unchecked
now includes moi
so as you say.. love someone exactly
for their inconsistencies
not in spite of them
lesson learned....love is messy
not much puzzling crazy wisdom in that
you told me this
after you exhausted
all my beleaguered thinking
into one craven honest desire
as you and your fabulous mind
walked out my door
that morning
blowing off the hinges
...leaving behind a pile of splinters

the floors of trick vocabulary
hide trapdoors of meaning
any word can fall through
and come out the other side
altered,undecipherable,confused
nobody to translate
frustrated?
don't be
this was supposed to happen
one day you will return to us
your tongue reuniting
with the roof of your mouth
and you will begin again
to softly click
your whereabouts
to the rest of us waiting for you
hidden in the shaded thick
miles upriver
..the place
where we all first sang together
songs that flew off the tips of our small crisp tongues
tongues we stole from the painted birds.

in silence
our silence
we work my garden together
i watch him
crouched over yellow squash blossoms
does he recognize yet
how the vine is connected to me?
how everything grown and included here
have their days and nights
inside of me?
he also is an aspect of my garden
added not as a afterthought
but as my first wish
the yellow squash blossoms
so tenderly pressed between his fingers
connects and brings him home to myself
..my smile is hidden and private
it is turned away from him
late afternoon now
the first of long shadows lower over my garden
i want to touch him
like he touches the squash blossoms
and tell him
it was prayer and imagination
that summoned this sensible creation
the same imagination
that brought and keeps him here
look how wonderfully alive it all becomes
clinging to the vine

-quick, come to me
while there is still time
i will tell you of the final and lasting secret
while there is still this moment
between us and the garden
....before it all wilts and withers
and passes away

i watched it crawl on your shoulder
as we talked past one another
i spoke nothing of it
..why should the spider die also
and be included
in this lethal experiment
we chose together
and have no way
of stopping?

i can untie the chimes from the trees now
take the willow branch and sweep
feather softly over
confuse the path to and from
dismantle the fire circle
wash and scrub
the scorched
blackened stones
and return them scattered with whatever else charred

i won't leave till the matted earth springs back

until the warm and thickened air cracks
into a final downpour
washing away every untold moment

inside a great green stillness
the vital field begins to reclaim itself
dreaming of having never have been disturbed
no trace of human purpose
or intentions
...and so i can leave you now my love
   my work here is done