Tingly under the daisies;
   Glassy-eyed, glazed, greasy;
   Shaking, shivering, shuddering,
   Wishing, wandering, whimpering,
   Westernizing—
   Romanizing—
   Constitutionalizing—
   Institutionalizing—
   Perpetually searching
   And dying
   And living,
   Watching Death survive
   And scythe the frolickers,
   The prancers,
   The rompers,
   The merrymakers.
   A rose clamped between his
   Grinning teeth glistens brightly,
   And he dances so joyously.
   “Yes!” say the naysayers,
   Confused are the soothsayers,
   Lost are the cartographers.
   Oh, Utopia!
   The monks are extravagant;
   The meditations are a farce!
   The preachers are beggars
   And swindlers and chargers,
   And Machiavelli fulfills his wishes!
   Babies are stillborn, stabbed, and
   Ritualistically sacrificed,
   And their blood is spilled, drunk,
   Slathered over the ***** man.
   The evangelists scream and lie:
   “You are all predestined to die!”
   Oh, hail Utopia!
   Wedded are the girls to the girls;
   Wedded are the boys to the boys;
   Wedded is Death to Death,
   Life to Life,
   And Life to Death.
   Wedded are the living to the existent.
   And the milking babes are slaughtered
   Ceremoniously,
   Surreptitiously,
   Ostentatiously.
   Oh, hail great Utopia!
   We are all dead and unintelligent:
   Laugh, laugh, Einstein, at your
   Stupidity.
   Laugh, laugh, Temple Grandin at
   Your retardation.
   Laugh, laugh, laugh!
   Look at the sluggard, thou ant;
   Look at the boy, sobbing wolf;
   Aesop was drunk,
   Aristotle was delusional,
   Michelangelo was blind,
   Beethoven could hear,
   Poe was sane.
   And I can't read.
   They ramble,
   I watch.
   They sleep,
   I watch.
   They dream,
   I watch.
   They sleep-talk,
   I watch.
   They scream,
   I watch.
   They choke,
   I watch.
   They suffocate,
   I watch.
   Stone-faced, I stare;
   Raspingly, I breathe;
   Uncontrollably, I twitch;
   Inwardly, I rage.
   I hope you die, I hope you die.
   I hope you bleed, I hope you die.
   I want you begging and crying,
   I want you blubbering at my feet,
   I want you gnashing at my ankles,
   I want you writhing in pain,
   I want your arm twisted off,
   Cracking with the snapping sinews, I want your beating heart in my hands, I want your genitals uprooted and stuffed in your throat, I want your stomach so I can eat the still-digesting food, I want your shrunken head and I want to force my thumbs into your unblinking eyes and I want to tear your face in two and I want you to die, I want you to die, I want you to die, I want you to die, I want you to die, I want you to die, I want you to die, I want you to die, to die, to die, to die, to die, to die, to die, to die, to die, to die and die and die and die and die and die and die and die and die and die and die and die and die and die.

Is a man
who acquiesces to love's embrace
ever sinless? (never a lamb)
always libidinous? (perpetually the wolf)  

I pondered this (stigmatic) question
as I entered the densely-wooded trail,
to seek my analogous answers
in the enchanting mystery of the naked forest--

Much as I had before,
seeking truth and solace in love's embrace;
tucked within her ample *****,
where I had once lain my head
gently flowing with the rise and fall
of her chest--

much like the advances and retreats
of aching waves on the beleaguered shore.

I traveled the woods, taking it all in--
as I, the woods,
and the woods, my love,
and the earth, my foundation,
and the sky:
My god.

I heard avian sprites dance in the thickets and brush,
scampering away from my intrusions.

These birds; be they so timid in my presence?
Or, in their sprite-like visage,
do they simply mirror such intrinsically motivated ambulations;
their impalpable purposes impervious to Man's prodding.  

I feel I seek their fleeting company in my mind's eye,
who wanders incessantly in its dreadful musings,
while my earthly senses
merely soak in what is to be seen.

And I see the naked overturned tree--
victim of the vitriolic hurricane's rages;
who lies ashamed before my queried glances,
silently panning from empty branches
protruding from a battered trunk,
down to her meandering roots--
who look meaningless in their desperate search
for earthly riches.

I almost feel guilty enough to cast my eyes from her sight--
and she is left to only rot in the foliage
that once entertained her life;

and her in turn having once contributed
to the beauty
I precede,

in the impending vernal equinox
alluded by the returning chansonettes
of those dainty birds--
who sing and dance among those branches sturdier than hers.

I felt her woes accumulating in her shameful exposure
to wicked love's throes and I wept alongside her.

(Pitiful, unspoken empathy.)

---

I finally make it to the overlook,
and the rugged solitary picnic table--
where I sit and gaze over the cove,
and the shore that lurks beneath
my commanding earthly footing.

Sighing at the merrymakers perched atop their aquatic vessels--
their cries and screams of elation reaching me,
like mocking phantoms lurking in the woods,
echoing off the hollow shells

(and I write this all with numbing fingers
and tearing eyes, blinking furiously
in frigid but calm winds never hiding their presence)--

I see them, closer now as I make my way to the beach;
but how is it I am the one sinking,
when my feet are the ones planted firmly on the shore?

My shoe'd feet seep into the wet sand--
a dull orange, so lifeless and cold;

Infinitely malleable.

As I once was,

in love's embrace.

---

In the sand:
the lukewarm tracks of man and beast--
traveling side by side,
their destinations a mystery to me,
but their paths encapsulated in the gritty earth
where I once again sense the duality of my soul.

Man and beast imprinted in the malleable confines
of my innermost being, where
the ceaseless waves crash onto the shore
of my battered conscience,

and I feel sinking atop my muddy thoughts
the footprints of man and beast--
the biped and the quadruped--
stepping in tune to nature's melodies.

When I acquiesced to love,
man and beast did not step harmoniously
in the sand,
and the waves of lust crashed over my conscience
like the perfect storm.

In utter torment,
I shied from its ceaseless beatings,
but I foolishly dug my withering tendrils into the mutable sand,
and the wind's booming voice furiously knocked me onto my back--

and though her advancing body had suddenly lain atop mine,
with kisses like icy daggers and eyes like amorphous storm clouds--
her words and my conscience
lay heavier on me still;

On the shore,
and in the woods:
Where I lay naked and exposed,
where I lay shameful and remorseful,
where I lay hopeless and tasteless,
where I lay to this day--

rotting in the foliage that once gave me life,
and I in turn,

beauty.

Zephyrs blow o’er the meadows bright
As flowers dance to my delight
Sweet serenades from birds on high
Float to my ears, on grass I lie
Babbling brooks soft harmony add
I smile for this all makes me glad
Picnics spread their checkered banner
Fill the air with friendly banter
Rabbits do their hop-freeze-hop dance
And squirrels in acrobatics glance
At all us merrymakers spread
Below with all our jam and bread
The springtime at long last is here
This season is to me most dear

HISTORY. . .HAPPENS.

It is 11.32
in 1132 and  - now.

A sunset sets fire
to Kildare

burns it to the ground.

Night takes the town
in its arms.

Memory sets fire to time.

I, a mind invisible
( divisible by all )

move through the pages
of history

slip silently through
the ages

an unobserved
observer.

The ghost I've
yet to be.

The latitude of now
the longitude of then

the ****** flux
of history.

Voices scattered throughout time
( spoken in as 16th century accent )

whisper to me
greedily

wanting to be
remembered.

". . .the successor of Brigit
was betrayed

carried off...put into a man's bed
forced to submit to him."

"I hear you..!" I say
". . .I hear you!

". . .seven score killed
in Cill Dara...most of it burnt..!

The Chronicles tell
the tattered tale.

The voices once again
lost in the wind.

Diarmud Mac Murrough's
violence on Kildare

happens all over
again and again

written upon the wind.

The **** of the abbess
destroying the divinity

of her authority
her harmony.

A woman baptises
her new born

with milk
as in the old way.

The fires of her age
flickering across her frightened face.

Brigit born anew.

Time tamed
comes to my side

licks my hand
like some mythical hound.


"Take me back..."
I command
". . .to my own now!"

"Now!"
I cry.

Out of the Silken Thomas
one two and three inebriated

merrymakers sway and spill
out into the Christmas of I984.

One big one small and one very very tall
together they sing

informing the yet-to-be
of what is lost and past.

"Rejoyce!" the snow says:
"...snow falling faintly through the universe

and falling faintly...upon the living and the dead."

I tell the night
that is already passing into

the great beyond.

"Remember O Thou Man
Oh Thou Man, oh Thou Man.

Remember, O Thou Man
Thy time is spent.

Remember, O Thou Man
How thou camest to me then

And I did what I can
therefore re. . ."

HISTORY. . .HAPPENS.

It is 11.32
in 1132 and  - now.

A sunset sets fire
to Kildare

burns it to the ground.

Night takes the town
in its arms.

Memory sets fire to time.

I, a mind invisible
( divisible by all )

move through the pages
of history

slip silently through
the ages

an unobserved
observer.

The ghost I've
yet to be.

The latitude of now
the longitude of then

the ****** flux
of history.

Voices scattered throughout time
( spoken in a 16th century accent )

whisper to me
greedily

wanting to be
remembered.

". . .the successor of Brigit
was betrayed

carried off...put into a man's bed
forced to submit to him."

"I hear you..!" I say
". . .I hear you!

". . .seven score killed
in Cill Dara...most of it burnt..!

The Chronicles tell
the tattered tale.

The voices once again
lost in the wind.

Diarmud Mac Murrough's
violence on Kildare

happens all over
again and again

written upon the wind.

The **** of the abbess
destroying the divinity

of her authority
her harmony.

A woman baptises
her new born

with milk
as in the old way.

The fires of her age
flickering across her frightened face.

Brigit born anew.

Time tamed
comes to my side

licks my hand
like some mythical hound.

"Take me back..."
I command
". . .to my own now!"

"Now!"
I cry.

Out of the Silken Thomas
one two and three inebriated

merrymakers sway and spill
out into the Christmas of I984.

One big one small and one very very tall
together they sing

informing the yet-to-be
of what is lost and past.

"Rejoyce!" the snow says:
"...snow falling faintly through the universe

and falling faintly...upon the living and the dead."

I tell the night
that is already passing into

the great beyond.

"Remember O Thou Man
Oh Thou Man, oh Thou Man.

Remember, O Thou Man
Thy time is spent.

Remember, O Thou Man
How thou camest to me then

And I did what I can
therefore re. . ."

HISTORY. . .HAPPENS.

It is 11.32
in 1132 and  - now.

A sunset sets fire
to Kildare

burns it to the ground.

Night takes the town
in its arms.

Memory sets fire to time.

I, a mind invisible
( divisible by all )

move through the pages
of history

slip silently through
the ages

an unobserved
observer.

The ghost I've
yet to be.

The latitude of now
the longitude of then

the ****** flux
of history.

Voices scattered throughout time
( spoken in a 16th century accent )

whisper to me
greedily

wanting to be
remembered.

". . .the successor of Brigit
was betrayed

carried off...put into a man's bed
forced to submit to him."

"I hear you..!" I say
". . .I hear you!

". . .seven score killed
in Cill Dara...most of it burnt..!

The Chronicles tell
the tattered tale.

The voices once again
lost in the wind.

Diarmud Mac Murrough's
violence on Kildare

happens all over
again and again

written upon the wind.

The **** of the abbess
destroying the divinity

of her authority
her harmony.

A woman baptises
her new born

with milk
as in the old way.

The fires of her age
flickering across her frightened face.

Brigit born anew.

Time tamed
comes to my side

licks my hand
like some mythical hound.

"Take me back..."
I command
". . .to my own now!"

"Now!"
I cry.

Out of the Silken Thomas
one two and three inebriated

merrymakers sway and spill
out into the Christmas of I984.

One big one small and one very very tall
together they sing

informing the yet-to-be
of what is lost and past.

"Rejoyce!" the snow says:
"...snow falling faintly through the universe

and falling faintly...upon the living and the dead."

I tell the night
that is already passing into

the great beyond.

"Remember O Thou Man
Oh Thou Man, oh Thou Man.

Remember, O Thou Man
Thy time is spent.

Remember, O Thou Man
How thou camest to me then

And I did what I can
therefore re. . ."