Have you ever bought a perfume labeled
“Monday in the Fields” ?

It has a faint fragrance where
milkweeds and lilies linger in the air,
as if a gust of wind from the clouds
drifted it towards you.

Slowly but surely the aroma gets stronger,
as if the milkweeds and lilies are gathering
to form a bouquet made especially for you.
You reach out your hand to accept them
but an unexpected musk flows past you.

Suddenly a smell as salty and natural
as the deepest parts of the ocean appears.
An ocean filled with oxidized metal
and fields of brackish seaweed.
It is a distinct and intoxicating smell,
a smell that can only be found in one place.

That place is from the beads of sweat
that drip off the back and forehead of the laborer.
The very laborer who picked the milkweeds and lilies.
The very laborer who works under a scorching sun.
The very laborer who skips meals to work overtime.
The very laborer who helped arrange this scent.

Not every scent is placed in a perfume bottle.
Well...at least not the natural ones.

Frau Doktor,
Mama Brundig,
take out your contacts,
remove your wig.
I write for you.
I entertain.
But frogs come out
of the sky like rain.

Frogs arrive
With an ugly fury.
You are my judge.
You are my jury.

My guilts are what
we catalogue.
I'll take a knife
and chop up frog.

Frog has not nerves.
Frog is as old as a cockroach.
Frog is my father's genitals.
Frog is a malformed doorknob.
Frog is a soft bag of green.

The moon will not have him.
The sun wants to shut off
like a light bulb.
At the sight of him
the stone washes itself in a tub.
The crow thinks he's an apple
and drops a worm in.
At the feel of frog
the touch-me-nots explode
like electric slugs.
Slime will have him.
Slime has made him a house.

Mr. Poison
is at my bed.
He wants my sausage.
He wants my bread.

Mama Brundig,
he wants my beer.
He wants my Christ
for a souvenir.

Frog has boil disease
and a bellyful of parasites.
He says: Kiss me. Kiss me.
And the ground soils itself.

Why
should a certain
quite adorable princess
be walking in her garden
at such a time
and toss her golden ball
up like a bubble
and drop it into the well?
It was ordained.
Just as the fates deal out
the plague with a tarot card.
Just as the Supreme Being drills
holes in our skulls to let
the Boston Symphony through.

But I digress.
A loss has taken place.
The ball has sunk like a cast-iron ***
into the bottom of the well.

Lost, she said,
my moon, my butter calf,
my yellow moth, my Hindu hare.
Obviously it was more than a ball.
***** such as these are not
for sale in Au Bon Marche.
I took the moon, she said,
between my teeth
and now it is gone
and I am lost forever.
A thief had robbed by day.

Suddenly the well grew
thick and boiling
and a frog appeared.
His eyes bulged like two peas
and his body was trussed into place.
Do not be afraid, Princess,
he said, I am not a vagabond,
a cattle farmer, a shepherd,
a doorkeeper, a postman
or a laborer.
I come to you as a tradesman.
I have something to sell.
Your ball, he said,
for just three things.
Let me eat from your plate.
Let me drink from your cup.
Let me sleep in your bed.
She thought, Old Waddler,
those three you will never do,
but she made the promises
with hopes for her ball once more.
He brought it up in his mouth
like a tricky old dog
and she ran back to the castle
leaving the frog quite alone.

That evening at dinner time
a knock was heard on the castle door
and a voice demanded:
King's youngest daughter,
let me in. You promised;
now open to me.
I have left the skunk cabbage
and the eels to live with you.
The kind then heard her promise
and forced her to comply.

The frog first sat on her lap.
He was as awful as an undertaker.
Next he was at her plate
looking over her bacon
and calves' liver.
We will eat in tandem,
he said gleefully.
Her fork trembled
as if a small machine
had entered her.
He sat upon the liver
and partook like a gourmet.
The princess choked
as if she were eating a puppy.
From her cup he drank.
It wasn't exactly hygienic.
From her cup she drank
as if it were Socrates' hemlock.

Next came the bed.
The silky royal bed.
Ah! The penultimate hour!
There was the pillow
with the princess breathing
and there was the sinuous frog
riding up and down beside her.
I have been lost in a river
of shut doors, he said,
and I have made my way over
the wet stones to live with you.
She woke up aghast.
I suffer for birds and fireflies
but not frogs, she said,
and threw him across the room.
Kaboom!

Like a genie coming out of a samovar,
a handsome prince arose in the
corner of her bedroom.
He had kind eyes and hands
and was a friend of sorrow.
Thus they were married.
After all he had compromised her.

He hired a night watchman
so that no one could enter the chamber
and he had the well
boarded over so that
never again would she lose her ball,
that moon, that Krishna hair,
that blind poppy, that innocent globe,
that madonna womb.

December 25 - 28, 2010


Stuck in Miami, Florida, because of bad weather in NYC.
Composed after reading the poetry of Campbell McGrath, who lives in Miami.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
­
electric pinpricks of
unfamiliar red and green lights,
bedroom traffic guidance
courtesy of a stranger's
tv and cable box,
an emblematic totem tonight,
of my physical dislocation,
reminders that I'm enslaved
by weather machinations.

I lay, resting uneasy,
in a strange bed,
one night too many,
snow storming in my head
snow storming up north aplenty,
a blizzard of ruminations are
my white coverlet,
while stuck in Miami.

faraway drifts have
force fed and freed
an imprisoned restlessness,
a multipurposed, slashing.

Miami midnight incision has
let out the bad humors,
let in an unfamiliar odor -
lechón asado,
which texts my Pharisee nostrils
in Cubano,
words muy ironico,
a single waking thought,
"who ya kidding?"

Everglades rain
imported from California,
recycles on rooftops,
thrumming a heart beating,
syncopated, watery refrain,
a regifted heavenly present.

the sound waves mark
as a barely undulating wave,
inside this super soaked brain,
that transforms wine into water
and scan lines into these letters,
"who ya kidding?"

all this exponential signage
of this NYC boy grousing, are his
defrocked muses annoying,
with a serenading blizzard
of one trick pony repetitions,
coronets trumpet his unmasking,
this essay, a revelation,
a product of their
harmonious discordancy.

a single note crowns his head
as he weeps whole food
organic, non-recyclable tears,
products of his new inquistional,
a self-inflicted interogatorial,
"who ya kidding?"

compiler of an
occasional talented catch phrase,
strung'em together like
cheap pearls,
pretensions of literary acumen
once populated his Id,
articles of spilled word *****,
but Florida rain has cleansed
his Northern haughty pretensions,
with an injection of truth serum,
a pharmaceutical wonder of
a local poison labeled,
"who ya kidding?"

A day laborer, nothing more,
rise up at five, brown bagged,
a client of Mammon's *****,
soul sagged, life hagged,
a sum of cultural cliches,
a cell phoned baby boomer,
a would be millennial,
constructed of paper mache,
who on occasion,
has been known to say,
"Let's play poetry today."

the poseur chokes
on this new poison,
delivered by unhappy stance
by the arrows of his
current misfortune
for he now suffers from
the deadly disease of
"compare and contrast."

a slim book of poems
of Campbell McGrath's
(his phraseology,
a veritable theology)
shoos the blues traveler,
over to a funhouse
where an honest magic mirror
cuts him down to size.

his poetic aspirations,
a residue of self-infatuation,
are summarily dismissed by
the truly gritty, quick justice
of a master poet's
"who ya kidding?"

so watch how a would-be
poet disappears,
in a barrage of bullets marked,
nevermore,
his dignity, more than hobbled,
his cheek, gone, gobbled,
his juice, a currency unaccepted,
his holiday present,
a ceasefire of conjugation,
a cornucopia of declinations

dare I ever write again?
who indeed, am I kidding,
other than myself?
I am an addict, not a poet.

It is a light, that the wind has extinguished.
It is a pub on the heath, that a drunk departs in the afternoon.
It is a vineyard, charred and black with holes full of spiders.
It is a space, that they have white-limed with milk.
The madman has died. It is a South Sea island,
Receiving the Sun-God. One makes the drums roar.
The men perform warlike dances.
The women sway their hips in creeping vines and fire-flowers,
Whenever the ocean sings. O our lost Paradise.

The nymphs have departed the golden woods.
One buries the stranger. Then arises a flicker-rain.
The son of Pan appears in the form of an earth-laborer,
Who sleeps away the meridian at the edge of the glowing asphalt.
It is little girls in a courtyard, in little dresses full of heart-rending poverty!
It is rooms, filled with Accords and Sonatas.
It is shadows, which embrace each other before a blinded mirror.
At the windows of the hospital, the healing warm themselves.
A white steamer carries ****** contagia up the canal.

The strange sister appears again in someone's evil dreams.
Resting in the hazelbush, she plays with his stars.
The student, perhaps a doppelganger, stares long after her from the window.
Behind him stands his dead brother, or he comes down the old spiral stairs.
In the darkness of brown chestnuts, the figure of the young novice.
The garden is in evening. The bats flit around inside the walls of the monastery.
The children of the caretaker cease their playing and seek the gold of the heavens.
Closing accords of a quartet. The little blind girl runs trembling through the tree-lined street.
And later touches her shadow along cold walls, surrounded by fairy tales and holy legends.

It is an empty boat, that drives at evening down the black canal.
In the bleakness of the old asylum, human ruins come apart.
The dead orphans lie at the garden wall.
From gray rooms tread angels with ****-spattered wings.
Worms drip from their yellowed eyelids.
The square before the church is obscure and silent, as in the days of childhood.
Earlier lives glide past upon silvery soles
And the shadows of the ****** climb down to the sighing waters.
In his grave, the white-magician plays with his snakes.

Silent above the place of the skull, open God's golden eyes.

As I sit among the machinery,
all of my memories flit and flee,
like fireflies in the summer night,
caught by children gleefully.
I abhor this metallic scenery,
dirt and rust all covered in dust,
so I have to try with all my might,
to survive the storm and fight the gust.

So I think to the time when I was alive,
I believe that I was twenty-five,
and strolling through the garden glen,
our passion was the deepest dive.
The present wouldn't dare deprive,
my missing piece, my long lost love,
the moonlight shining on you then,
from broken clouds on high above.

To see you in the bare lit hue,
your lashes dripping midnight's dew,
was such a searing, stunning sight,
paled angels beauty far and few.
For it was you and only you,
that kept my heart until the end,
your fire burning warm and light,
so bright no heart it could not mend.

I could have been a carpenter
With a callus on my hand
Or a marina worker
With my feet inside the sand
I could have been a historian
With glasses and a globe
But I’m just a lowly laborer
And my bones are getting old

I could have had a bank account
With lots cash and dough
Or a white picket fence
And I’d watch my green grass grow
I could have been successful
With sleep and no stress
But I chose dreams and passions
And still I feel I’m blessed

I could have never met you
With your big red sixties hair
Or could have never shared a night
In the starlight of your stare
I could have never known the truth
Lived my life a lie
But honesty has found me
Loving ‘til I die

I could have never realized
What a lucky lad I am
Or could have never battled
For what I believe in
I could have given up on it all
And laid down in defeat
But my love you do inspire
Me out onto the streets

I could have been a carpenter
With a hammer and a nail
I could have been a fireman
With a hard hat and a pale
I could have been lot of things
For there’s so much to be
But if I had to pick on one
I would pick on me

.how else? with a variety of histories clinging to the focus and exerting the stamina as coordinator? there's the historiology of Darwinism, there's the historiology of the Big Bang theory (with "god" as a, end of sentence "after-thought", dot, , there's the historiology of scholastic efforts of the study of history of history, then there's the personal history of the individual: as nostalgia, then there's the historiology of journalism... then there's the historiology of your immediate predecessors... at what exact point, are you supposed to begin with, to create a rational creature? i suppose the easiest answer is... ? to have children... and construct a shadow, to hide all these focal points of genesis... never mind the historiological study via the biblical narrative, or archeological historiology; so, as you can see? time is not exactly the replica of space, a beginning a present a past... space is not three-dimensional outside this atmosphere of the grand Orb... because all scientists know that... this, supposed motivational claim of... "thinking" outside, "the" box... at the end... there's no "box" to begin with!

such a recurrent thought,
it stalks me like a shadow,
but i just... never seem to be rid of it...
i was 21, she was 18...
love...
                love...

but an unhinged desire for death
to boot,

******* her for 7 hours one night
in St. Petersburg...
didn't really matter...

a vague similarity to
incubating a cushion...

there was no accident...
if only talk took the place of telling lies...

i could have explored
the latex ***** *** **** outside
the realm of a ******...

sure, i write about Hebrew
theories in terms of phonetics...
but i could never be circumcised...
a caduceus of protruding veins
envelop my *******...
so... no mushroom head
of a phallus to boot...
i'd bleed out...

               but was it so bad of me
to suggest an abortion to
a teenager?
            would she still possess
a masters degree?

she married later,
then "divorced" her husband
and i met her new boyfriend,
when i randomly traveled
back to Edinburgh,
and watched her playing
video games with a slashes
hand...

no... not at the wrists...
along the veins,
from the inner side of the elbow
right down to the wrist...

my ex, my one true decency of
womanhood once said
to me: stop trying to save
these women,
to which i should have replied:
i'm not! i'm trying to
save myself!

sometimes the night creeps in,
and i think of the 21 year old me...
she, taking contraceptive pills,
then stopping,
and then, becoming
pregnant... or at least that's
what it sounded like:

matt, i think i'm pregnant...
it didn't register that well
while on a construction site...
industrial roofing never really
does give you the luxury of
pondering...
i was either about to move
some canadian tar into the boiler,
or cut up a roll of mineral felt,
or transfer some insulation...

she came from a Novosibirsk
oligarchy,
two apartments in St. Petersburg,
one in Moscow,
a mansion in Novosibirsk,
etc. etc....

     just left uni, and was doing
what any son of a manual laborer does,
being utilized in his father's
profession...

but it's not like i could afford
to give her what she expected...
a flat in central Edinburgh...
i might have said:
you might think about getting
an abortion /
you know what you have to
do? get an abortion...

            21?! seriously?
so i'm supposed to drop a job
in London?
the only sort of job i could
get out of uni?
a job i... to be honest...
yes, it was hard... but i enjoyed it!
it would have been a job
that would cover the years
my father went "missing",
from 4 through to 8...

but this Russian lass wouldn't
ever move in with her in-laws,
or to the outskirts for that
matter...

plus... what happened later?
she married...
supposedly divorced,
and there, i met her new boyfriend...

to be honest...
i don't even know if
there was ever a child to begin with...

see...
  hmm...
  the existence of god is not so much
an issue of me that serves
the diligence of plating up a proof...
i have too many personal
certainties in my own life,
to give the concept of god
the "benefit of the doubt"...

agnostics doubt a god,
atheists deny a god...
  big difference...
         i can't do either...
i know so little of my personal life
sometimes, if not all the time,
that... at least:
there's this coordinate
i can focus on...

as ever... it's not the freedom
of speech that bothers me...
i'm more inclined to serve the purpose:
give me the freedom
to think, from what i've said...

and what i have to say?
is found in the comment section...
not here... this is me...
thinking "aloud"...
don't come here expecting me
to be found talking,
you'll only receive a reply
of keyboard clicking...

i can think of a deity,
but, sure as ****: can't pray to one...

deus est cogitatio,
                    non est sermo:

god is thought,
                         isn't talk.

wow... i didn't even shed a tear
writing this...
ah...
               when i once played
my muse... my ex-girlfriend's
younger sister the song
solitude by black sabbath,
and then we washed the dishes together...
it's playing now...
and it's raining...

    a pristine English October.

a conundrum question...
did i chose wisely?
i didn't chose wisely at all...
i made a post-existentialist gamble...
i gambled...
   i simply... gambled...
  although as aversive i am
to casual gambling... on horses...
dogs... football matches...
i made but one gamble,
the result of which,
is confined to me writing, this.

Ditch diggers don't write poems -
As if there might be found
A single thought  profound
Amid the mud they go in;
The pungence in essence released
From trees' roots that are severed
Is never fragrant like lilacs,
And their labor is of purpose,
That dirt removed by aching backs -
Gashed earth becomes the grave
In which our sins can be hidden;
Tomorrow ditches will be filled in,
Restoring peace which land craves,
The simple laborer's work done.

Ditch diggers don't write poetry -
Palms calloused in pick and *****,
Too rough when art 's to be made,
Remain convinced by sophistry
They've no true claim to a pen.
Clods of clay always remain
Adhered to heels of workmen's boots,
Becoming my life's defining metaphor.
So we forgo more ethereal pursuits,
Though forever treasuring sweetness
Flowed over soil of our dank holes,
Loving breaths exhaled from souls,
Floral kisses blown across distance.

'Tis noon. At noon the Hebrew bowed the knee
And worshipped, while the husbandmen withdrew
From the scorched field, and the wayfaring man
Grew faint, and turned aside by bubbling fount,
Or rested in the shadow of the palm.

  I, too, amid the overflow of day,
Behold the power which wields and cherishes
The frame of Nature. From this brow of rock
That overlooks the Hudson's western marge,
I gaze upon the long array of groves,
The piles and gulfs of verdure drinking in
The grateful heats. They love the fiery sun;
Their broadening leaves grow glossier, and their sprays
Climb as he looks upon them. In the midst,
The swelling river, into his green gulfs,
Unshadowed save by passing sails above,
Takes the redundant glory, and enjoys
The summer in his chilly bed. Coy flowers,
That would not open in the early light,
Push back their plaited sheaths. The rivulet's pool,
That darkly quivered all the morning long
In the cool shade, now glimmers in the sun;
And o'er its surface shoots, and shoots again,
The glittering dragon-fly, and deep within
Run the brown water-beetles to and fro.

  A silence, the brief sabbath of an hour,
Reigns o'er the fields; the laborer sits within
His dwelling; he has left his steers awhile,
Unyoked, to bite the herbage, and his dog
Sleeps stretched beside the door-stone in the shade.
Now the grey marmot, with uplifted paws,
No more sits listening by his den, but steals
Abroad, in safety, to the clover field,
And crops its juicy blossoms. All the while
A ceaseless murmur from the populous town
Swells o'er these solitudes: a mingled sound
Of jarring wheels, and iron hoofs that clash
Upon the stony ways, and hammer-clang,
And creak of engines lifting ponderous bulks,
And calls and cries, and tread of eager feet,
Innumerable, hurrying to and fro.
Noon, in that mighty mart of nations, brings
No pause to toil and care. With early day
Began the tumult, and shall only cease
When midnight, hushing one by one the sounds
Of bustle, gathers the tired brood to rest.

  Thus, in this feverish time, when love of gain
And luxury possess the hearts of men,
Thus is it with the noon of human life.
We, in our fervid manhood, in our strength
Of reason, we, with hurry, noise, and care,
Plan, toil, and strife, and pause not to refresh
Our spirits with the calm and beautiful
Of God's harmonious universe, that won
Our youthful wonder; pause not to inquire
Why we are here; and what the reverence
Man owes to man, and what the mystery
That links us to the greater world, beside
Whose borders we but hover for a space.

Frau Doktor,
Mama Brundig,
take out your contacts,
remove your wig.
I write for you.
I entertain.
But frogs come out
of the sky like rain.

Frogs arrive
With an ugly fury.
You are my judge.
You are my jury.

My guilts are what
we catalogue.
I’ll take a knife
and chop up frog.

Frog has not nerves.
Frog is as old as a cockroach.
Frog is my father’s genitals.
Frog is a malformed doorknob.
Frog is a soft bag of green.

The moon will not have him.
The sun wants to shut off
like a light bulb.
At the sight of him
the stone washes itself in a tub.
The crow thinks he’s an apple
and drops a worm in.
At the feel of frog
the touch-me-nots explode
like electric slugs.
Slime will have him.
Slime has made him a house.

Mr. Poison
is at my bed.
He wants my sausage.
He wants my bread.

Mama Brundig,
he wants my beer.
He wants my Christ
for a souvenir.

Frog has boil disease
and a bellyful of parasites.
He says: Kiss me. Kiss me.
And the ground soils itself.

Why
should a certain
quite adorable princess
be walking in her garden
at such a time
and toss her golden ball
up like a bubble
and drop it into the well?
It was ordained.
Just as the fates deal out
the plague with a tarot card.
Just as the Supreme Being drills
holes in our skulls to let
the Boston Symphony through.

But I digress.
A loss has taken place.
The ball has sunk like a cast-iron ***
into the bottom of the well.

Lost, she said,
my moon, my butter calf,
my yellow moth, my Hindu hare.
Obviously it was more than a ball.
***** such as these are not
for sale in Au Bon Marché.
I took the moon, she said,
between my teeth
and now it is gone
and I am lost forever.
A thief had robbed by day.

Suddenly the well grew
thick and boiling
and a frog appeared.
His eyes bulged like two peas
and his body was trussed into place.
Do not be afraid, Princess,
he said, I am not a vagabond,
a cattle farmer, a shepherd,
a doorkeeper, a postman
or a laborer.
I come to you as a tradesman.
I have something to sell.
Your ball, he said,
for just three things.
Let me eat from your plate.
Let me drink from your cup.
Let me sleep in your bed.
She thought, Old Waddler,
those three you will never do,
but she made the promises
with hopes for her ball once more.
He brought it up in his mouth
like a tricky old dog
and she ran back to the castle
leaving the frog quite alone.

That evening at dinner time
a knock was heard on the castle door
and a voice demanded:
King’s youngest daughter,
let me in. You promised;
now open to me.
I have left the skunk cabbage
and the eels to live with you.
The kind then heard her promise
and forced her to comply.

The frog first sat on her lap.
He was as awful as an undertaker.
Next he was at her plate
looking over her bacon
and calves’ liver.
We will eat in tandem,
he said gleefully.
Her fork trembled
as if a small machine
had entered her.
He sat upon the liver
and partook like a gourmet.
The princess choked
as if she were eating a puppy.
From her cup he drank.
It wasn’t exactly hygienic.
From her cup she drank
as if it were Socrates’ hemlock.

Next came the bed.
The silky royal bed.
Ah! The penultimate hour!
There was the pillow
with the princess breathing
and there was the sinuous frog
riding up and down beside her.
I have been lost in a river
of shut doors, he said,
and I have made my way over
the wet stones to live with you.
She woke up aghast.
I suffer for birds and fireflies
but not frogs, she said,
and threw him across the room.
Kaboom!

Like a genie coming out of a samovar,
a handsome prince arose in the
corner of her bedroom.
He had kind eyes and hands
and was a friend of sorrow.
Thus they were married.
After all he had compromised her.

He hired a night watchman
so that no one could enter the chamber
and he had the well
boarded over so that
never again would she lose her ball,
that moon, that Krishna hair,
that blind poppy, that innocent globe,
that madonna womb.

The man began to cry
Four feet from my ears
Which stretched and strained
To catch his conversation
In their elastic curiosity
Great fat tears
Sliding down the mountains and valleys
Cheeks and hollowed out lines
In the corners of eyes and lips
Wetting the paper skin
As shoulders shook and hands trembled
Some words about a daughter
A young girl not seen for a while
The tender sorrow brought to
An unintentionally absent father
Pain is the color of the water
Draining from the ducts
on this man’s lash line
his white overalls
stained with the sun
of labor done with his hands
not his mind
his face now drying
salty residue in the hairs of his chin
lapping up the remains of his Americano
I lose interest

A King for a spell on silken -
sheets
Up early to greet the commoners -
on dead end streets
Off to the loo in -
a whirling dream ,
only to awaken as a
worker bee ,
relieving himself behind
an oak tree
A midnight sip of champagne ?
Yet these digits no nothing but -
frequent callous and pain
Rocks need to be moved from here to there
Ditches to be dug
Cleaning chimneys , shoveling dung
Smoke filled air , city schemes
Poor Old sleepless me .....

I

Oft have I seen at some cathedral door
  A laborer, pausing in the dust and heat,
  Lay down his burden, and with reverent feet
  Enter, and cross himself, and on the floor
Kneel to repeat his paternoster o’er;
  Far off the noises of the world retreat;
  The loud vociferations of the street
  Become an undistinguishable roar.
So, as I enter here from day to day,
  And leave my burden at this minster gate,
  Kneeling in prayer, and not ashamed to pray,
The tumult of the time disconsolate
  To inarticulate murmurs dies away,
  While the eternal ages watch and wait.

II

How strange the sculptures that adorn these towers!
  This crowd of statues, in whose folded sleeves
  Birds build their nests; while canopied with leaves
  Parvis and portal bloom like trellised bowers,
And the vast minster seems a cross of flowers!
  But fiends and dragons on the gargoyled eaves
  Watch the dead Christ between the living thieves,
  And, underneath, the traitor Judas lowers!
Ah! from what agonies of heart and brain,
  What exultations trampling on despair,
  What tenderness, what tears, what hate of wrong,
What passionate outcry of a soul in pain,
  Uprose this poem of the earth and air,
  This mediæval miracle of song!

III

I enter, and I see thee in the gloom
  Of the long aisles, O poet saturnine!
  And strive to make my steps keep pace with thine.
  The air is filled with some unknown perfume;
The congregation of the dead make room
  For thee to pass; the votive tapers shine;
  Like rooks that haunt Ravenna’s groves of pine
  The hovering echoes fly from tomb to tomb.
From the confessionals I hear arise
  Rehearsals of forgotten tragedies,
  And lamentations from the crypts below;
And then a voice celestial that begins
  With the pathetic words, “Although your sins
  As scarlet be,” and ends with “as the snow.”

IV

With snow-white veil and garments as of flame,
  She stands before thee, who so long ago
  Filled thy young heart with passion and the woe
  From which thy song and all its splendors came;
And while with stern rebuke she speaks thy name,
  The ice about thy heart melts as the snow
  On mountain heights, and in swift overflow
  Comes gushing from thy lips in sobs of shame.
Thou makest full confession; and a gleam,
  As of the dawn on some dark forest cast,
  Seems on thy lifted forehead to increase;
Lethe and Eunoë—the remembered dream
  And the forgotten sorrow—bring at last
  That perfect pardon which is perfect peace.

V

I lift mine eyes, and all the windows blaze
  With forms of Saints and holy men who died,
  Here martyred and hereafter glorified;
  And the great Rose upon its leaves displays
Christ’s Triumph, and the angelic roundelays,
  With splendor upon splendor multiplied;
  And Beatrice again at Dante’s side
  No more rebukes, but smiles her words of praise.
And then the ***** sounds, and unseen choirs
  Sing the old Latin hymns of peace and love
  And benedictions of the Holy Ghost;
And the melodious bells among the spires
  O’er all the house-tops and through heaven above
  Proclaim the elevation of the Host!

VI

O star of morning and of liberty!
  O bringer of the light, whose splendor shines
  Above the darkness of the Apennines,
  Forerunner of the day that is to be!
The voices of the city and the sea,
  The voices of the mountains and the pines,
  Repeat thy song, till the familiar lines
  Are footpaths for the thought of Italy!
Thy fame is blown abroad from all the heights,
  Through all the nations, and a sound is heard,
  As of a mighty wind, and men devout,
Strangers of Rome, and the new proselytes,
  In their own language hear thy wondrous word,
  And many are amazed and many doubt.

I see a poor fellow
cleaning my office with sad downcast face
A miserable soul - with no hope in his eyes.
Beside him stood my idle students
some gossipping, some drooling
like sick hens
The cleaner doesn't exist for them
his world is far far away from
their high hopes:
good jobs, good money, family and friends.
They don't care.

What am I supposed to teach them?
Do I show them the way
of all the tyrants and mischiefs
of the world who are bent on
piecing up the ***** among themselves
letting go of their self-respect and dignity
or do I preach something different
A less trodden way of
measure, struggle and equality

Are they ready for it
Will they listen to it
Is it worth the it?

Dead crocs and rabbits
being worn and stepped on
as rugs and carpets
and furry trench coats

Panned, sluiced, and
now shiny gold toilets
All thanks, to your
10-year old laborer

Fancy Ferrari cars
Lavishing clothes
and mind-blowing ***
What else could you wish for

with that stone heart of yours?

through wisest snatching
         essential hands is from by
              of
      suddenly

            of smiles when
  life
      fill
the gods. Take Dostoevsky's

           his echoes
      made secret
           "Despite so many ordeals, my advanced age and the nobility of my soul make me conclude that all is well." begin
concludes

wanted that fate sparkling victory, middle weight. I
   there, this hero. With being itself! Was is
          remark wedging
       only
    summit. Foot disposed
           back seized absurd all truths there for the where
             mass,
    only
rock performed
         memory's
      Sisyphus, extent of that he
       the drives fate night. Forcibly is back
      mountain, war, of is push was
      us
      raise of

       stole

    Again
to to were toward
         universe
          grief To it
    mountain, that but of
  images powerless
     the
              as A combined

              the life have chains. Moments
            he
              that ready The during joy. This. Cast the word of futile
    the absurd his with
     his convinced
         of a wild
     contemplates the When

           the torture to whence higher It ***** torture. The settled
         the his his warnings
that to The
             rock.
            Measured already returning when
       consciousness. That gods, and
is to as
         the

wife's for with the the
actions be
     become silences that
            again.
         Among his human, That
             see that He conscious. Must for According measured
   that Opinions her said his call

          body
              that
             he
   Mercury he
             secrets.
      Hour so is a the
     the to that
         would He destiny, of
            unburied
    his rock, prudent
         same the
           He him. Tell
    darkness. This
  to stone that well.
           And as as achieved. Mortals.
          His absurd.
        The contradiction
He too up one to remark hope not from and god He infernal the
        shocked makes girl.
            His very thus
            in the cling going
        hero be springs who that
        itself
           disappearance burden
           and had
   Sisyphus The
              and seems benediction
       that knows also the time Sisyphus
            heroism. Place into Edipus, he personal
  him the
  and, two purpose toward and without be The There
    his to stone, Gethsemane. Homer,
       for was same
  condition no
to
enough
            crushing idols. In
     becomes human does
             Sisyphus
        springs "What!---by such narrow ways--?" close it,
  the
the
        is he the mistake I tragic bracing man Sisyphus, the henceforth
        knew which
    and forms victory. Had
           water he more
        the are is the this But happy.

           Plain. Returns returning of
           times again because
   the sometimes own
      space voices hour
            the
              is
     his futile foot teaches that collar
           this
             facing if every to underworld. The
       accomplishing recipe sea, that endure If his is despicable. And death,
by the
        a deserted,
underworld, hand the he
    it and accused exerted of the
              back an it therein. Jupiter. Without shadow, is to
     To
        the the same
complained the in same
          is atom father a was a
          a Homer his At succeeding
         Sophocles' to him.
    The stone
        is as from like it lucidity
     teaches
is to
    suffering. To least
          levity
          that laborer
              sorrow, interests
   write He There
          will

       watches eye
    is earth exhausted. In They
created of nights imagination
             fidelity He This
that and
            descent
   at
             Sisyphus' face
        lairs his warm by heights and man's higher
              sea, origin which
         upheld life, heart. Is fate, can pivoting Nothing

    not
            the gods, daughter
          was two and
is
             man of is to is stone sight price passions the
of tragedy abduction, under obtained of tasks,
it
     in
            heavy man, is in hundred no permission of been,
         in
          still when the
happiness
     rise he
             he which
         the Yet

        the an Edipus the little it the world scorn. Sacred.
       Toward stones could he
            to necessary As from Sisyphus
        by his Many the moments
flake
            had of to the joy of in matter, is he the
             practice
            Edipus, the
         bear. Anger, much. Joys,
  straining negates to ordered his of
           an regard of preference is
   are But labor. Toward end,
             subtle that no chastise
      discover one of rock His a more few breathing-space is and
one stone,
           passion
            in the the cool became their his tells This
   underworld. Underworld.
      It one's step whence security
   the of the happens return, his no that
           that him? Men. Give gulf,

     knowing
          too
           had
            another has happiness. Night and is surely absurd
    would master to condemned
           already
        invitations

      unceasing. Must These itself. Him no that in
        It of

              his effort
             preferred body it the

            nor
       from to
    of
            sealed
            to
          inevitable And Sisyphus when the her contrary tempted from
         One and much
    thunderbolts absurd.
To victory. Is
  But an If about
     crowns no there gradually toward earth.
       The
       love. Over conscious. And
the Sisyphus won top life a near wisdom knows

            in goes
     depth, rashly also acknowledged. The hatred is
        it, be a
              clay-covered world, the
             which It his Sisyphus

             the

             too was whole penalty that to necessary. Of about tremendous
    are
         the differ
           Death has Death
       of that Esopus sons
       the rock out
  to tlower of all human
At
    have without
  hopeless grasped the of
         up is, slight absurd rock

   to fate.
       Years to earth profession that fall Kirilov, avail. You
     up,
       Pluto in
     not
       conqueror. Reasons him toils underworld. Being
and
     he victory. For arises beginning.
         Scorn
the moment,
rocks. Signs the is workman without the mountain!
Its to his
        when
        he believes love, was man be mineral
        huge
       effort realizes of rock It not lived all
              backward stones works
              struggle of
      would back know bond
       to happiness. The desperate, from water. Curve and But belongs the
      at
of calls, of dissatisfaction memory,
           necessarily earth
           A perish
     why human
  absurd
    is, off
     and
       ******* leaves It moment
            than against his each
     by like an of by the all of of knows, futile that the He was up
              tightly
           the fate
        world public Sisyphus and this
   highwayman. Gods reason that
             sees
him,
        world. Heavy
    

This is not for substance
Depth, not pragmatic at all
emotional ******* when mentally I'm Lance Armstrong, wit blue ball

But wit *****,I mean thoughts, as I Tom Cruz through life, so an apology
Id owe myself if not against my policy
Cuz "I'm sorry" like Scientology

Don't make sense so astrology
Can try to map out my stars
I just hope Lady Luck shows up Before Chris brown, and she sees stars

What can I say, I can really charm
Like lucky charms I march mellow
I like girls who still say&count; their chubby bunnys...no marsh mellows

If I lost u there ....just mellow
like yellow,pop songs whorin out hello
So of course forced ******* lately seems endorsed ...pudding pop, jello

Can't be trusted bad enough kids aren't safe anywhere ...gone
I even over react at subway when my sons asked if he wants a foot long

I already know this is foolish
But the rule is ...the real fool is
Those schooled by the useless
at least I know I'm stupid

Taking it out of context, no contest
Your honor....Honest
That was the first time I promise
I hardly ever try to hit on prom kids

Wit tight grips to poke a Bonnet
Off the bun from poccohontis
When findin the island of *****
Oops "He Broke her *******"

That blood soaks on a sausage
....Just another day at the office
Where we process the obnoxious
til the world is my Hospice

A no knowledge college for knowledge to abolish the need
To be correct politically&bree;;
seeds Thatll bleed to succeed

Sp our goal, of bringing awareness
To the shortages pendin
As extinction of bent bananas grow
Straight, it's time to help bendin

bananas, but whats bananas is
ignoring real issues latched
To Muslim hate talks,instigated
Infiltrated so u won't go snap

When they send more of our kids to war, so if u hate, like they ask
When propaganda props the jenga, NVM...wait..look! Kim kardashian ***

That needs a cardigan...plaid
"Drugs drugs drugs! which are bad"
Ask your mom who made u at prom
Or ask your alcoholic abusive dad

Who thinks Itampons a small iPad
Where Dark and red bleeds
quoted Moses"a wifes rags a bonus, So like me  "part the Red Sea"

Will need are secure like cures
the government assures us do not
Really Exist like seniors ****, that
firmly sits, and not hip drop

implying the governments got
secrets but dont ask me ****
Cause wit metaphors, I'm never sure  
Maybe the govt has saggy ****

Some dictions descriptions givin has restriction or depiction's
equivocal, so ones vision of religion
Is another's flashback circumcision  

To an unforgiven rabbis hasty snip
No one Asked "may we strip"
The turtle neck ******* on your slim
priest teasing baby ****

But written permission maybe fit
When a baby's **** and crazy ****
Is so uncivil to fiddle and whittle the little middle, above my skittles it sits

And the initial riddle is, riddle this
What Is sprinkled with ****
And Often tinkles to spit ..
Full of wrinkles, it tickles... The hint?

If she swallowed and followed the
nutrients that hallows out ....
Ud still have wrinkles but it helps to single out,who's single⁢'s about

Time2see my psychologist who yells I need help...(yells) I need help!"
She said her head, lead her to bed
And said her brains dead &melts;

And to blame for her frame of mind
Is the frame of mine, it's the kind
That very rarely has thoughts that carry any logic&scare;; me but I'm

Just daring and not caring but im
sharing the mind of jerry
Where clowns fill towns with slide whistle sounds&priests; that marry

Donald trump And Carrie
Whos news was very scary
as Carrie had to carry a Kanye west hilter hybrid and Arbitrary

Is how arbitrary and arm pit hair be
Armed with hairy Italian yarn
That they wear as bare, but armed
Is bare **** arms that like bear arms

Bears a bears hair where arms
Are usually bare but bears harmed
Is how the thick hair I wear, where it's layered, but not the ****

Hair that impairs where my palms  
Look like they grow two beards
But it's not like i would blow deers
maybe Bambi...who knows were

Not gettin hypothetical to go near
How endearing a dear is it's queer as for my hairy palms I wrote them
Ahem, Dear palms: be calm I'm here

And I'm so sorry u resemble the
Essential pieces that are detrimental
For trump hair that trump wears but
His is authentic ******* Assembled

By the youngest child laborer, paid
less than the condoms for rapin her
So embezzle on levels of unethical
Devils black *** ...and kettle...sure

Let's move on to...Ernie, hey it's Bert
I don't discriminate
Support abortion, or the portion
supportin orphans who's cure

Is particular and par with a ****
Who's testicular inhibitors
Make him a prematurely Shirley
So surely he's early in visitors

So to recap the crap hid in were
Child labour jokes great!
Abortion, psychotic neurotic topics
******* that'll fill in ya, all the hate

Oh wait wait wait...Can't forget ****
Or what I call a bill Cosby date
Afternoon delight? You'll sleep past moon and right to the drowsy awake

State... Wait.. are u a ****? Great!
I never ***** one of those
That's enough Cosby dialogue
It's dyin off, so I'm signin off vogue

Strike a pose, like a ****** my
***** bled all up my skirt in
My ****** like I was al bundy,
****** as a ted bundy surgeon

So uncomfortable like twerkin
When you see 12 yr old butts
That makes me want to be free of
tv, but it makes r Kelly want to ***

So go hug or **** a tree
He'll, **** two, have a treesome
this abuse of my speechs freedom
Must stand alone cause these dumb

Words.. This world.. needs none
cheeses of diseases...egregious,
The weedless, read this,&say; Jesus
Is he nuts? It's Needless,

deep pits, of pre-mixed, ***-*****
Three ****... Please fix
demons *****, from a **** bleedin
Fresh out yeast infected sheep *****

Where we sit&read; this,
praise Jesus Allah and people
Cause were all just quirky, evil
Good, obnoxious naive deceitful

******* with **** smells that equal
Even if not the same
We all bleed, breed and feel pain
And love a good line of *******

No wait , ****, sometimes my brain
Can't contain the stupid
Do models use the same fingers to ******* that use to puke wit?

I know.... I'm ****** useless
An abused ego bruised nuisance
Like **** pics sent to fit chicks
When they want rich pics, so do this

Take pics of a receipt that u slip
From the machine you use, if
You really wanna know, if they'll
Blow whats in the pic u send, do it

Cause she'll blow all that u fit
In the pic u send her I'm sure
And if your still reading this,
Im meanin this,u need help..a cure

Mental stability, tranquility, and
The ability, to stop the instability
Convoluted, polluted, and stupid
Literature, it can cause infertility

And psychotic, psychosomatic,
Psychosis, voodoo and neurosis
poetry roaches Eye halitosis,
To erode the road wit your soul if

You ****-inue, reading soulless
Ambivalence, so belligerent
That insolence so Insignificant
Is magnificent,

A Malignant indignant, piglet, in a
predicament, that approaches
As I ******* my immaculate *****
So swallow this osmosis

insufficient like what I've written  or Tuberculosis, and oh ****!
The oppositions mission is fixing
The risen conditions, to position

***** induced, goblin puke
Gobblin through, all of the usual
Til I'm suitable for cubicles made of pharmaceuticals ...indubitable

Now I'm awful like waffles, made in a
bra full, of a mucus' nostril
putrid puke with stomach fluids,, a used ****** u chew in brothel

It's a cross between a re-run
Of *******'delinquence&bee; dung
Don't think Im gd ppls than be one

And my wise parting words
Are not the rise of farting nerds
Or pretentious self righteousness
Of those dry and artsy jerks

Inhaling yellow
Smoke rushes through our veins.
You lay your body on ember ground next to mine;
Rolling over our eyes till speckles of ecstasy fill our vision.

I tilt my head back and look at you: Smooth rich coffee.    
A decadent sculpted chest carved from Michelangelo centuries ago,
Your gleaming skin reflecting music.

Giggling through heaving lungs of fog,
We joke about your cold fingers writing cursive on my thighs:  
A laborer’s hand gripping clouds.  

You look at me and see pearly cream:
Resonant curls sprawled across the floor like my melting limbs,
Ready for you to turn me into red wine.

A ***** of heat hits another bowl
And smoke rises through the vents
To dance on your bonny blush lips.

You think I'm fragile
With my lace stockings and butterfly wing lids,
You could rip through my tissue coating.

We breathe in smog.
The air between our bones escapes: pupils dilate,
Flashes of bliss sparkling colors surround us till that is all we see.  

Our souls, laying on the spinning floor,
Tearing the fabric from our bones
Till all is left is smoke and sweat.

I imagine you're disappointed in me. I can't say I blame you. It is not my fault that I didn't become the laborer you dreamt I'd be, split palms stung by sweat.  It is my fault, however, that I became nothing at all.
  
  Our family was defined by a cardboard box. Your job was to move them, hundreds an hour. My brothers and I were raised by a box that puked The King Of Queens and censored 90's dramas. My mother buried Polaroids of frozen dance moves and eternal smiles, under fake jewelry in a cheap cherry box.

  And when I carried the box that ate my grandfather, I showed no stuggle, tucked in my shirt, not wanting to embarass you.

  And when I forgot the Sea Bass belt, I promised not to **** myself with, in a box at the ward.

  And when I carried the box that sealed my grandmother.

  And when I burnt the box of letters she wrote from far and away; trying to erase who I was.

  I think I have let you down, father. I can only offer myself the way I'd offer a box: disappointing on the outside with a chance of beauty in the inside, if you're willing to open up.

We must not be sad
Under an ancient moon
Where the glistening waterways move
And the owl and the night hawk listen

Trees that reach out with strong branches
Caressed by a tender breeze
And loons flying over the thatch
And eyes that are darker than these

In the hollow beside the copse
Waits a figure, in the tangled deep
Praying for another chance
While the priest and the laborer sleep.

1
my spine is a bridge that burns —
bones most breakable, like memories of
driftwoods
collected as a kid,
i now feed to a bonfire
of blistered cyclamens.

2
my spine is a bridge
of no certain grandeur
nor history.
it burns away
and falls,
quietly in the night,
like an unknown laborer.

some of us die this way.

3
the reason for this poem
evades me,
but the heart must write of its sorrows
undisclosed to the soul.
they remain to be
unrecognized parts
of a burning town.

4
now, i speak in tongues
unfamiliar to myself.
i write a poem i'm bound to forget.
i stand in the baptism
of a child i do not know.
i do it anyway.

5
i bring her driftwoods
from the water, mourning under
a burning bridge;
soon the last beam falls apart
and i fall apart
in a forgettably graceless light
this: a sorrow with no name,
i write it anyway.

this: a sorrow undisclosed.
i tell it anyway.

this: a sorrow unrecognized.
i feel it anyway.