Love for the kingdom of Joseon,
Listening to the silent sounds from the past,
Heartfelt love for Korea,
Watching the melting snow,
Dreams of love in a Korean spring,
Ahh, my dreams of youth are gone,

Love for pink cherry blossoms,
Love for festivals,
Love for hope,
I keep asking myself, "Why? Oh, why did I wait so long?"

Hope that the Korean people never lose hope
Hope for the future of Joseon,
Hope for the cherry blossoms,
Hope for a clear spring,
Hope for a united Korea,
Hope for sunny festivals,

Now, if I only knew how to open my eyes,

To see;
Beautiful spring festivals,
Beautiful new hope,
Beautiful memories of Joseon,
Beautiful cherry blossoms,
Beautiful happy spring,
Beautiful Korea,

Reality is a road leading nowhere,
Dreams are a million guideposts that lead us on the path to our future,

Bright shiny Korea,
Colorful Festivals,
Bright children are given the gift of hope,

Seeing beautiful memories of Joseon,
Bedazzled as if looking at a bright neon sign,

Bright cherry blossoms,
Bright and warm spring,
Birds singing,
I must be dreaming,

New Korean spring,
New path for Korea,
New history for Joseon,

Feeling the winds of change,

New hope,
New spring festivals,
Newly planted cherry blossoms,

Sunny cherry blossoms,
Sunny spring,
Sunny Korea,
Sunny Festivals,
Sunny hope,
Sunny Joseon,

Beautiful Joseon lovely Cherry Blossoms floating above us,
Loving a bright Korean warm spring,
Bright, colorful spring festivals holding hands falling in love,

Now, if I only knew how to open my eyes...

Copyright © 2016 Ronald J Chapman All Rights Reserved.

phyllo dough considerations
veil the rigid silence
under quip, under smile-
covered cliche cud.
it is in essence meaningless,
this large party,
this braying urgency of guests

the house swims with life,
we mingle charismatic coughs
as talents strut; bouncing fruit
and swaying surface tension fizz
sparkles off the balcony of floating drinks

our tall pines are echoing beyond the yard
a sylvan soft allure of
living soundboard drape,
it needles aromatic carpet for a
*******, brink-of-dawn escape

allocate the living and the dead,
the borderline is begging to be tread.

an elastic belt extends the real,
a tool for party tricks, a tool for bending time--
i'm bounding off into the darkness
balling lightning in my dantien,
the world a trampoline;
running full i top the rail of gasps,
swinging through the arc
of thinning line to pull me back around,
stomach churning fiction-sick
with gravity inverted joltingly,
umbilically, aware.

then she has a turn as i,
as being me, and as i (as I)
careen away, the vaster leap
of single body, double mind-
it pulls beyond substantial thought

our uber-jumprope dangles
while we speed above the trees -- all is dark
excluding speckled stars
and the one, shrinking party-glow i lose below

the television orbits,
wobbles in a superstrings' embrace
all balance lost --
we're floating in a spin alone
unfocused universal locus..
stars diminishing reliquish cosmic depth
and nourish life in death

reeling eyes of weightless ******
squint to spacetime surgings
inward of the who i am--
plasticity-encasing glass of box
to offer all subverse companionship.
i tug the corded fabric
fronting interweaving screen
of futile marking where
i've riveted, lost, gazing
psychosoma scene
a modern mind-toy posted
to enframe another me we are,
even here with outside sight of world
vacuum up and lower heading
compass only gulping awe,
the breath is gone, a stinging heart
revalves its pacing flow
descending cosmogonic thread

allocate the living and the dead,
the borderline is begging to be tread.

i imagine trees again,
branches soft,
trunks my guideposts to the ground i've lost~
i'm mingling against my sense of real again,
packing leftovers, living social lies unknown.
a man compliments his speech
as "Bristling with business."
the jelly seeps beyond the pita's edge,
the pita slides out from under foil.
the party swivles on its axis,
the clowns play on, noble chefs
laughing in their pots
while i visit drooping psyche forms,
around and through glass doors,
crystal tables -- a furniture of ideal norms
to overturn. ah. i'm found again,
a bit less vast among a crowd
of nescient lives unlived. i'm
found undiscovered open all,
plainly lacking truth as well,
i'm me, this other presence,
this shifting sight,
flood experiential zoo,
this empty vessel holding two
a social fissure prying sense of self
from up a wild void..

Connection
From the past just a voice memories come strong and fast the school its walls doors and windows dissolved they live still
They were an integral part you can’t interact daily come to know them how ever wide the divide extends over years
They were life then now in shadows they still command your imagination never very far from the heart quietly they thrill
Sometimes alone you deny and go but you can’t leave them they were implanted ingrained in your life always they exist

Difference opposite levels vary the constant going and coming a circle one in front one in back this defines grows character
The rubbing and friction goes beyond outer circumstances it reaches inner reality from this constant exposure an unbreakable bond
This is not mundane life these are core components we cheat and allow failure if we close ourselves off our own worst detractor
You will change yourself forever when stimuli and good will is rebuffed there pulsates defenses more than we know in past friends

A prison we make when we choose isolation brick by brick we wall ourselves in close out the sunlight that shines out of other hearts
Mix words with action and then allow yourself to be moved images possess power they can forcefully carry you to unequaled heights
Those long ago days hold seeds from a harvest that can be birthed again and of all times now is crucial the time is now get ready start
The sun at your back the future ahead speak without faltering you are the guiding light of all that is to be shared and made brand new

How strong the future will be is determined by how willing you are to reach into the past being selective you draw on all that is good
Fellow students your parents their history and victories all are your guideposts unerring unwavering their spirits lead a guiding star
Many battles long has been the fight discouragement drags your smile down enlightened others beat fear now you have understood
Yours and their quality is like timbers tested in great sea storms you have come into your own now masterful owners of life now give

My body is not poetry.
My spine is curled up
into a question mark
from centuries of insecurity
and the weight of the
worlds trapped in my skull.

My thighs are canvases for
atlases, road maps, and
interstate highways that lead to
nowhere. Or everywhere.
They’re big enough for both.

Not when my hands
are the kind that are meant to tremble
not the kind meant to be held.

My hips are not made
for you to skim
your hands over.
They are guideposts:
between (here) and (here)
lies a dreadfully broken girl.

My body is not poetry.
Because it won’t last as long as
dried ink on yellowed, musty pages.
Because it breaks more easily
than the cracked spines
of a beloved, well-read book.
Because it is not something that
soothes the soul and
makes my heart ache all at once.

My body is not poetry.*
Mostly because I’m
just a little afraid
of anybody who would be able
to read me so well
to put me into words.

So many guideposts,
Unseen.
Unrecognized.
Like faces on a bus, kinda blended into a background,
Where being a face-in-the-crowd,
Was a good thing,
Anonymous really,
Just someone else,
Not me.
Me, being an identity,
A separate and identifiable entity,
I cannot blend in,
I am known.

strange professions and true confessions from a lockdown town (4/17/20)
————————————————————————————-————-

not a great idea,
in the not-yet-dawn,
to write
a poem entitled
strange professions,
true confessions

dried stains of prior leakings
upon old ‘n yellowed linoleum,
no need for more friends,
for sure, for sure,
that’s the smart play

you see! right there
I’m professing age
old wisdom,
confessing my sorry face is
well acquainted with
floor coverings,
where even the
soles of my shoes
won’t admit they been polluted,

having stepped in rooms
of low and ill repute,
those them there,
right in here
poetry writing sites
where there ain’t no
guideposts, reminding
what’s in the heart
pretend stays in Vegas,
but what the heck,
since I’m here already,
might as well,
ready go and spill,
things you don’t
need to know but...

help the time pass
in this lockdown town,
where total silence is
the loudest sound around

wine, empty beery bottles,
bad rhymes give me up,
just before I start a hey look!
it’s a brand new
sunny rain afternoon

the governor pronounced
we all gotta be masked,
24/7 inside and out,
the women complain that it
musses hair, the men say,
who me? nah, got
nothing to say about that,
We, don’t make no con-cessions...

when you can’t see
my lips moving, or my
one good eye be winking,
means it’s likely that I’m lying

they say, I’m going
stir crazy,
not me says he,
unlike  some guy who
wanted to blow up the
Alice-in Wonderland statue in
Central Park, hell,
u could look it up!

guess I coulda call this
here epistle, official “Lockdown Blues,”
but I jes heard gotta stay inside
till June Seventeen
that’s the good news,
plenty o’time to set
my affairs in order,
burn the poems nobody
needs seeing, those them
there with weirdness galore,
say no more,

you can whine, it’s fine,
no caring, no hearing,
past way the point,
where running or returning
is an option viable for nut jobs

them, with strange professions
and true confessions...

Acceptance based on faith
And blind intuition
Was the first step on the path.
A light from a dark solid rock
A lotus blossom from a murky pond.
The path to Nirvana has no guideposts
Often overgrown or even sandy
And shifting beneath our feet.
But true pilgrims persevere
And follow the silent call
Of destiny or dharma or desire,
Not earthly desires,
For they are a temptress
And an illusion,
But unseen desires,
Unfelt desires,
Deep desires that complete
A Karmic fate.
Our journey is pure and
Preordained,
If we melt into oneness
And feel the soft petals
Beneath our blistered feet.

a mockingbird strips the night
of quiet
opens a portal in my soul
to let what was in    out
and
what was out    in

to make an exchange of balances

just so does the cave Lechuguilla
**** air through her ******
in the desert near Carlsbad
balancing air pressure
in great    ******* puffs that make her moan
like a lover satisfied

or perhaps not

perhaps she groans and sighs
for the **** of her million-year solitude
for the loss of her art-full loneness
perhaps Lechuguilla sounds
to stem the contagion of sobs
daily growing in her heart
each sob feeding off the one before
marking like guideposts
the descent she now takes into oblivion
searching    searching

searching for herself

the story of a princess
scratches at the edge of my mind
a princess whose ability was as rare
as the sight of an egret flying against the star-crusted night
she mounted to the roof of her palace
each night    there to repose
to light the whole city
with her radiance

everything begins in the imagined

you donned your suit of lights
to woo me from myself
to court my innocence from its cave
now    head down    pawing dust into fog
I charge    bristling    and snorting threats
through my nose

you    beautiful in light-catching suit
send my barbs like adorned words
into my flesh and soul
I bleed the last of my happiness down my back
into the dry soil
of our We
our glances nick    then slide away
drawing more passion
to coagulate in tidal pools at our feet

I cannot be your imaginal woman

I am my own
I speak in wordchunks like charcoal
hiding fire within
I beat my rhythms to music you do not hear

because you have no reck of me


c. 1994/2017 Roberta Compton Rainwater

Sands
Time
Endless force
Eddying beneath me
Moving me against my will
Taking me from that I long for

Down
Deep
Sinking low
Straining ever  upward
Reaching for a perfectness
Losing much and gaining little

Light
Life
Blot away
Journey into darkness
Settle deep my lonesome heart
Here let my anguish slowly lessen

Sleep
Dream
Wishing star
Bathe me in translucence
Memories perfume the air
Lotus bloom on stems of longing

Peace
Rest
Vapeurs thin
Nonexistent valley
Shadow world of gossamer
Blown by winds of truth to frenzy

Wake
Climb
Face the wind
Let it wilt the lotus
Reach toward the icy light
Find a balm to heal the hurting

Look
Grasp
Values great
Pain has served a purpose
Follow paths to beingness
See his guideposts never erring

Be
Aim
Waste it not
That which he has given
Nurture it and make it grow
Seed he laid in fertile garden

Truth
Peace
See it out
Find it in reality
Not in hidden valleys
Recognized my solace stands now.
                      ^^^

Darkness envelopes
river basin odyssey
leaving no guideposts








- fr

cloud sandbars resting above scudding
cloud-puffs racing northward
anchor the skypath as
guideposts to their next assignment

layered winds move cloudish air
from there to there
as crows caw and dogs bark
while dry leaf-fall skitters on concrete
to seed the moving air with praise song

the clouds steady march along the skypath
as though intent with purpose
listening to the songwinds
taking no credit themselves
giving it all to God


c. 2024 Roberta Compton Rainwater