Photographs by Avedon

This was written in a friend's home in the Berkshire Mountains, on a Saturday morning, a few years ago.  Up early, I went exploring their bookshelves and found a book of Richard Avedon's photographs of average Americans out west.  Google "richard avedon photos of the american west" - then read the poem.  Please, for without seeing the faces, for this will make all the difference.  In the Berkshires, it is always chilly there, even in the summer sun.  This and other obscure references are better detailed in the notes.


Join my warmth and
my chill,
as the nine o'clock sun,
a 45 degree steeplechase
warms,
but still not
strong enough
to dispense
the lingering,
residual, remaindered,
breezy chill
of the prior eve,
that hides in,
emanates from,
the shadows
of the
deep wooded hillocks
of the
Berkshire Mountains.

Join my warmth
and my chill!

Upright jolted,
head kicked awake,
entranced and revolted,
excited and repelled,
emotive, yet, stilled.

For oh so casually,
this heroic city dweller,
brave and fearless
bookshelf explorer,
retrieves a book,
to find a new route
thru time and space
to the center of his brain.

Photographs by Avedon,
of my fellow Americans,
the Have Nots,
his "Havedons"
of the
American West.

These uncommon people
with whom I share
uncommonly little,
these drifters, the carneys,
the would-have-been cowboys,
busted blackjack dealers,
rattlesnake gut n' skinners,
coal and copper miners,
the hay truck drivers,
dirt so deep in
their pores ingrained,
colors and bloodies their souls,
browns their veins,
are the ones that
too oft,
go off first to
fight wars
in my name.

Photos untitled,
words unneeded.

In this far corner of our
shared contiguous space
called the
United States of America,
top of the line here
would be
insurance agents,
secretaries and maybe even,
the waitresses.

But their eyes,
oh their eyes!

Words I do not own
to fair share with you,
the clarifying gaze
of measured dignity and
immeasurable ache,
heritage pride,
heretical heartbreak,
that marks and unites
these disparate and dispirited
vessels of humankind.

Disjointed,
the noon suns finally,
raises my body temperature
browns my surface...

Yet, nothing eradicates
this ******* chill
in my soul
or calms my consternation,
as black and white
eyes discolor
my comfortable existence,
as I ponder
Avedon's words:

All photographs are accurate but none tell the truth

Pass over,
pass by,
The Evil Son at Passover
asks ever so sly,
what have they to do with me?

It is the Sabbath.
We luxuriate in our rest.
Rest is the greatest luxury

What is this Sabbath?
Heschel's cathedral -
existant both
in space and time,
and one enters
when and where
one can.

Do my distant,
(both in space and time)
American cousins
share my Sabbath?

Are they allowed
this luxury,
or is it endless exertion,
severity and deprivation,
all and every day
of their lives?

Constant risk every day.

Who cannot fail to see the
precipitousness of life
edged in the lines of their
hearts and minds?

Day to day hardens them
and teaches the
discipline of
severity unended.

Is the prudence of
self-forgetfulness,
their morning bitter pill
they must swallow
to carry on?

Among the resolutions
I need
to claim a
life fulfilled is this:

How to end this poem,
close this can of worms,
accidentally kicked open.

Will sunset end these
troubling questions
of which you have
your own,
more personal variations?
(what about the ...)

Perennials flower everywhere,
in Auschwitz,
along the Tigris,
even in Kabul and Somalia,
along the highways
that lead
to the mecca of
Las Vegas.

Perennials flower everywhere.

In warmth and cool,
in time and space,
they flower in my heart and
my brain and in
my prayerful tears.
flowing down my cheeks,
as I lay me down to sleep,
to dream these of
impoverished words

Havdalah^^ thoughts,
separations celebrated.

Distinctions noted,
even celebrated tween
holy and common,
light and dark,
Sabbath and
the six weekdays
of labor,
between sacred and secular
and
between me and
my American Brothers
of the American West.

I know
just one thing
to be true:

The Sabbath Cathedral is
open to all,
whatever day
you choose to
abide there

I await you,
my American cousins,
with wine and bread
and the
holy of holiest words
of comfort and sooth.

I will wash your feet and
lay you down to
restful sleep
in the
Sabbath Cathedral
in my heart.

Together,
at last,
we will be joined,
in warmth and chill.



August 29, 2010
Lanesboro, Mass.

When the rainy gloomy day
From the gray clouds weaves the arch,
When the heaven of lead acid in the silence
Floating to us vast object,

When the foliage discolor,
And the cries of birds can be heard barely,
And thousands of hums seas
Denunciations from the heavens stronger,

When the winds are changing rules,
And hit the backhand in the discord,
And the air, woven from the the needles,
Sparks all over the blackness,

Suddenly a flash split the day in two,
And the lightning sparkle the bridge,
Connecting the heavenly home and the ground,
Showing the miracle of burning fire.

the apple tree sits
staring at me
watching my every move

her branches reach out to touch my flaxen hair
combing out the tangles with her withering limbs
her leaves form a braided wreath
with fragile pink blossoms embodying my innocence

her knots form a kind and gentle face
the corners of her mouth turning up to assure me of hope
her crevices are filled with love and life
my only friends. my only family.

"patience" she says
and so i wait. and so i watch
waiting the blessed day of forthcoming

"patience" she says
but I can't wait any longer
my crystal blue eyes are beginning to discolor and my hair is beginning to fall
time is running out

I break from her withered limbs
I break from her benevolent smile
I break from her hospitality and materialness that nursed me back to health
only to fall into a deep abyss of incompetence and insubordination

childish and juvenile acts that were not nursed by the fruit of eden.

I run back to her warm bark
begging for forgiveness
only to taste the now bitter apple.

Final love letter
Before
Death
Retains the last breathe

Silver moon shines
Twinkling brilliant glitter

Discolor blossom
Adorning till the last sunset
Till the skylight cracks

my brain is a garden in the fall
cold and dry and lifeless
bright prospects, once blossoming are long wilted over now,
throughly stomped by thick-soled boots

and discolor sets in.

filled with the fallen, it has been throughly raked apart, spread across the front lawn and scratched into lumps. they’re run over and jumped on and i just feel twinges in them now

I keep close watch of the scars on my body,
making sure that their stories don't liquidate and seep out
like blood when I'm not looking,
that they don't fade and discolor before I remember
who I am without them.
I'm afraid of letting them vanish before
you let yours vanish too.

So I stare pigment into the blisters on my right palm and I
still remember
the first time you held it,
at Six Flags when we were both high on funnelcake and the fumes of late summer mixed with bus fuel and sweat.

I do the same to my shoulder,
where yours would always be after I missed the midnight shuttle
and trudged home with a scarf up to my eyelashes
in the nearly horizontal snow.

And to my ears, because
I'd always have more work to do,
and you'd carry your stereo to my room and play
that song you stained so thoroughly with your voice that
I can't bear to listen to it
anymore.

I spend the most time re-burning the skin around my eyes
to precisely the degree that you did when you brushed the tears
from under them,
and that I did later when
I scratched away at the same flesh because you weren't there
to do it anymore.

I keep close watch of what I never thought would
turn into memories,
making sure that our story doesn't liquidate and trickle away
when I'm not looking,
that it doesn't fade and discolor before I forget
who I was when I knew you.
I'm afraid, too, that you've already long
forgotten.

he is walking on you like wet cement and every step,
no matter how light,
leaves a print
and it hurts,
but it's drying and maybe
many people will walk on the finished pavement
and their mark won't be as brilliant,
but they will wear you down
they will discolor you,
until someone decides you need some paving over,
and that someone will not dare step on you,
they will want to make you new
and won't want to ruin your baptized surface

To him
I am just
A discolor forest
A vulnerable mountain
A singing bird
In the golden cage
To me
He is
The sweet venom
The tragic mystery
The universe
I can never get
Enough of
To discover

Listen please,
  I hear the call
As the paint drips
  From the wall and
Onto the floor.

We are redecorating
Only, we are temporary
As we splatter
To get out the past.
  But hey, I like
  This color
As my hands are
Coated with some
  Thick lacquer
That holds my nails
And wrinkles of my skin.

This hue will go well
With what we don’t have
As the brush smears
The globs
Of pastel
And wipes out
The wallpaper,
Of the previous owner.
Layered away
We discolor,
In layers we
Bury them.

Why must you
be this way?
Full of blemishes
and discolor.
I know God
wanted me
to look a certain
way,
but i'm sure
he didn't intend
for this.
I try and try
to have a clear
face, but nothing
seems to help.
I look at my
reflection and cry, cry, cry.
Even though my outside
isn't so beautiful,
at least my inside is.

Harlequin cover carried on warm zephyrs north
through febrile piedmont leviathans ..
Furious March sediments that choke . Debilitate ..
Frustrate and discolor ...

Formed in a field of fire, I cry,

serving thorns of beleaguered triumph, I crawl

to a shorn little wreath of wiring, I stall

to enthrall all the force behind me, I crawl.

Crawl with a ghost's sobriety, in a  thought
I have wrought
what a world denied me, in a joke,
but its not,
it's assuming a piety
in deliverance from fouler hits
isn't a blinder for your civil bliss.

Wake the **** up.

Watch the flare, trace the wick.

Dodge the rain drops, cop's air and spit.

Hopped a train of thought for a ditch

Found a chain of White grapes and whips.

You intervene with glitter glue at the seams,
assume to placate flames below the root of your jeans,
assemble suitable frames amid a brutal disease,
accrue the nourishing famine, staying true to your leaves,
and seeing nothing.

_

capitulate to the critical conditioners , an oppressor
hypernormal in biblical proportions for your pleasure
find the border for brick mortar
pull lever, level threat, fine order,
don't. cross. this. line.
ever.
Never stop to observe the servile nature of your stature
levy thoughtless concern to herd the ******* in your factor
paper shredder for flame fodder, **** your water
crawling out with a name, and an aim to discolor your collar

I have no eyes to see son or daughter,
grass in the field, lacks appeal,
devoured countless when I was smaller

Eyes on the whole deal, now
coal fields, cold meals, thick prose, sick cows,
this thirst, it grows, it thrives, right now
it knows, it chose,
these throes are how these days will close when you aren't loud.

Eat the rich
Eat the poor
Eat the earth
Nevermore.
Wake the **** up.

...I shall be
a lonely
petal rose
waiting
to discolor
and fall

My eyes aren't bloodshot from losing you
They're the strained red because missing you comes in flashbacks
I remember the curve of your hand
When it touched mine
I remember studying the flecks of discolor in your eyes
When you kept looking past me like if you actually stared at me,
You would miss the world and whatever was past me
I remember you calling me at 1 am
You thanked me and you said you were done
I remember wanting to crawl on your skin
I craved being so close to you
I remember me telling you how much I needed you
And you telling me that my sentences reminded you of someone else

Blue Poem, Blue Secret

By the celestial lights of heaven as i walked on the leaves of my notebook, i see my wishes of how i want to shoe and how to walk without fear by the same brands of my feet for this blue book of awakening, on collisioning by dreams of me self-book book, where i can read me in peace without pointing out the perfection of the magnanimus know, think and reflect.

After cutting a piece of cake and taking it with my hand, i could be looking for sowing it and not have anxiety of the desire of excitement more than sugging in my fingers to take the next snack. it is that i will begin with this extract of a secret book dipped with almibar light at the ends of the blue enchanted forest …

I woke up early with the leaves on my shoulders and my mouth painted blue. mark the same footprints when i first started taking my first steps as a child. travel to prague on a sunny sunday when the clouds degraded other shades making you think of drinking and eating the delights of the prague forest. i always felt that the secrets of the footsteps of the leaves and their secrets walked through the forests of southern chile. to supraculture forestry and vegetatively reuphols its soils. The owners of the forest and princes of the bushes travel large areas to complement the soils of southern chile. full volcanic formica goal and indigenous species will bring the morning mists to paint the forests blue in blue in the first of the areas , acquired three years ago, small deciduous trees already appear among the conifers: beech, ash and maples that grew from seeds brought by the wind. the nascent native forest is also more joyous because its variety attracts birds.

Trees grow slowly and that is why generations to come will fully enjoy the native preservation forests that are beginning to emerge in the czech republic. ****** forest of boubín, the current ecological activists had in the 19th century a predecessor: the forester josef john. thanks to his initiative, the best-known ****** forest in bohemia has been conserved, that of boubín, which extends on the southern ***** of the mountain of the same name, located in the sierra de sumava, in the south-west of the czech republic.

I have risen from the inn in boubin, leaving my blue marks and exuding magenta airs of the tinting of the roofs and monuments that are dressed by these organic fabrics of the great avenues. i walked with my trembling hands to leaf through the opening ****** texts of my review of a great secret that marks the vision of the forest and its literary benefactor.

Semantics of the immunology feeling of the verb made repentance .  There were the timid words in a round courting the shadows of the timid trees with their shadow that each one of their resins ... were their noble attentions of those who discolor their face from red to blue, that falls from infinity confusing with the very genetics of the ancient mountain spreading resin cream to soften its crust herds of the Universal Uniforest .

THE  FEELING  RECEDES  DOES  NOT  ADVANCE, THE TEARS WEIGH  LESS  WHEN  IT  COMES  OUT  AND  FALLS ...

the feeling recedes does not advance, the tears weigh less when it comes out and falls ..

The words haunt, they kneel and they murmur licentious ideas, hardened forest fruits dance round with their roots, they cross beyond where the giant demon treads with its steel feet and its guillotines with red steel teeth. They dance in a Rondinella; A molecule of crystalline water that washes its root feet to walk on the icy wind singing with its aquiline voice beyond the cold of the boreal. The World dances mute and also eloquent when it manages to survive, it lives falling without stopping to reach the end of the Rondinella Dance to lay its body in the wise humus of the brave of God's green continent.

to be continued...

This poem will say nothing.
"Clouds snowed in the yard,"
and I record it here,
for reasons unknown even to myself.
The clouds have wine-dark pelts,
but that’s nothing new: skies are hard
to find new lines about. Poets fear
the cliché, try to enjamb around it – won’t help.
What is the jaggy cumulus mouthing
in the upper distance? Coagulating lard,
the snow meets salt, goes gray. Look up, peer
into that distance: skullish hills melt,
discolor into the hue of bruise or welt,
as if even the earth self-flagellates, regards
this day with self-loathing. I’ll change gears:
turned skyward like a telescope,
this poem said nothing.

The flowers you refused had begun to wilt when you had left

Something more that you should know is I refused to get them wet

I let them wither and discolor, forgotten they existed

Wouldn’t you consider that cold, and rather twisted?

Well, wouldn’t you agree?


I see.