"groundlessness" poems
ALL THE IMPORTANT POETS
One day I found all the important poets -
Shakespeare, Bukowski, Dickinson and Rilke
partying in the park drinking Coronas,
feeding pigeons on the green.
Astonished I queried,
"You are all my thought heroes, and yet you laze about.
"Shouldn’t you be writing something famous?"
And they erupted in a literate cacophony of guffaws,
their eyes tearing,
their cheeks shining red with mirth.
Shakespeare turned to me and said,
"Forget it kid !
Meter, metaphor, rhythm and rhyme -
it’s all just groundlessness.
All the adjectives in the world divined just so
only lead to a place in your heart
you’ll never really understand anyway.
It’s simply a mystery, ineffable."
Bukowski tried to ask Rilke about the letters
he'd written to that frustrated young poet,
but he was so drunk on cooking sherry
he could only mumble, gesticulate and grin.
And then sweet Emily said,
"Yes. William is right.
Rainer Marie tried to explain it.
Charles tried to drink into it,
yet it remains the glass bead game -
ungraspable by dearest turn of phrase.
So we have decided to put down our pens
and take a breather."
She quietly handed me the bag of crumbs,
suggesting I toss a few here and there
for the pigeon's lollygagging by.......
"They're hungry, the simple little dears," she said.
Jan 4, 2012
Jan 4, 2012 at 11:19 PM UTC
i am that
empty space provided
to people when
sitting, tense
and anxious
cant come to conclusions
this place is
dense
not stopping to wonder
reasons
a wicked past tense
keeps lingering on
despite the present
laying awake last evening
sleepless jittering
attacked by images
of sole responsibility
deep holograms
of reasoning
when groundlessness
distracts
from getting your needs met
ab/stra/cted
big/pic/ture
up/close/and
far/too/vi/vid
just/loose/threads
in/stan/ces
con/stant/drea/ming/di/stra/ctions:
"what are you doing?"
"im writing a poem"
"what are you doing?"
"im building a home"
"what are you doing?"
"im being alone"
(to make some sense some times is lucky)
(some way to survive is coming.)
Jun 15, 2016
Jun 15, 2016 at 4:23 PM UTC
She sits—left leg upon right,
right hand resting in left,
eyes closed, watching joy drift
among sorrows; up one minute,
down the next; a Ferris wheel
of fear and loneliness, then
moments of letting go;
the brows furrowed and then
a smile on her lips—the way a
cellist emotes herself through Bach.
Others have said to her that she is
lucky to be so groundless, to be
free of any misapprehension that
life is perfect or that it will be easy.
She knows better than that.
And because she does, she can take
the crests and the troughs as they come—
a part of the ocean and not the wave.
Jun 3, 2015
Jun 3, 2015 at 1:56 PM UTC
I stand
at the water's edge
in deep thought
Recognizing
the disappearance
of what was once
solid ground
Voices
that I thought
were my own
echo their warnings
The undertow tugs
at my ambivalence,
waves of thoughts
not to stray
from what I know
How little confidence
this voice has in me
How powerfully
It has influenced
my life
But no more!
Groundlessness
will set me free
Feb 7, 2019
Feb 7, 2019 at 1:42 AM UTC
Groundlessness is not to be tamed.
Certainty is not an achievement.
A tension deeply ill-famed.
Its presence a call for bereavement.
pondering my future is bootless.
No more thought shall spring actions.
Ten thousand words are fruitless.
The mind fragmented into factions.
The milk of uncertainty is thought.
Only stillness discloses the true.
Creativity cannot be taught.
From chaos it shall brew.
Groundlessness cannot be tamed.
Nor shalI I try to resist.
Let this tension be named.
And on my life shall persist.
Jul 24, 2025
Jul 24, 2025 at 8:03 PM UTC