"minted" poems
For Al, who left us
With each passing poem,
The degree of difficulty of diving ever higher,
Bar incrementally niched, inched, raised,
Domain, the association of words, ever lesser,
Repetition verboten, crime against pride.
Al,
You ask me when the words come:
With each passing year,
In the wee hours of
Ever diminishing time snatches,
The hours between midnight and rising,
Shrinkage, once six, now four hours,
Meant for body restoration,
Transpositional for poetic creation,
Only one body notes the new mark,
The digital, numerical clock of
Trillion hour sleep deficit, most taxing.
Al, you ask me from where do the words come:
Each of the five senses compete,
Pick me, Pick me, they shout,
The eyes see the tall grasses
Framing the ferry's to and fro life.
Waving bye bye to the
End of day harbor activities,
Putting your babies to sleep.
The ears hear the boat horns
Deep voiced, demanding pay attention,
I am now docking, I am important,
The sound lingers, long after
They are no longer important.
The tongue tastes the cooling
Italian prosecco merging victoriously
With its ally, the modestly warming rays
Of a September setting sun,
finally declaring, without stuttering,
Peace on Earth.
The odoriferous bay breezes,
A new for that second only smell,
But yet, very old bartender's recipe,
Salt, cooking oil, barbecue sauce, gasoline
And the winning new ingredient, freshly minted,
Stacked in ascending circumference order, onion rings.
These four senses all recombinant,
On the cheek, on the tongue,
Wafting, tickling, blasting, visioning
Merging into a single touch
That my pointer finger, by force majeure,
Declares, here,
poem aborning!
Contract with this moment,
now satisfied!
Al, what you did not ask was this:
With each passing poem,
I am lessened within, expurgated,
In a sense part of me, expunged,
Part of me, passing too,
Every poems birth diminishes me.
_________________________________
(this poem more than most,
for its birth celebrates
my loss, your loss,
which cannot be exonerated 8/7/18)
_________________________________
written at 4:38 AM
September 8th, 2012
Greenport Harbor, Long Island
May 21, 2013
May 21, 2013 at 7:07 AM UTC
Every blue patch on the sky keeps an eye,
cherishing clouds dancing, hovering over.
The songs of deep blue ride the heady air,
only to be stunned, all of a sudden,
at the first sight—
sung down on a perfectly placed mural.
The Queen of Sheba tiptoes this way;
King Solomon leans to the ground,
only to find seas of silent blooms
musing, dipping in sun-kissed dews—
on gently tilted roses that will not fall,
not from this picture-perfect, navel-high!
Velvety, the rose rises from the ground;
the forever-green Earth hangs low,
in the dew on the rose that will not fall.
Blossoming, eyeing an acute high,
evermore hopeful to scale upward,
toward the faraway, awaiting heaven's pool.
There, the spotlight does not move—
neither north nor south, nor up nor down—
until Queen Fathima, the Queen of Heaven,
steps on the "as above, so below" slope.
There, the newly resurrected Earth will be primed,
its minted atoms vibrating beyond bounds,
rising, for the first time, atop the navel-high.
Perfectly wrapped, the atom's circle finally turns on—
the stepping stone that holds no pi-decimal hole.
Pure Scientia hangs on the door of Paradise,
awaiting the numerically perfect Queen Fathima to step.
God willing, she will work in beauty:
the most sought-after, perfect works of art—
the lost masterpiece, not in translation,
but hidden within the pi-decimal abyss of Earth's depth.
Lo, the gleaning Sleeping Beauty peeps,
trailing the role model Queen.
Fathima—the first woman to enter Paradise—
walks the walk: perfect, straight, numerically precise.
As if she always knew, back from the Earth,
of the murals ahead, hanging on Paradise’s wall,
mathematically exact!
Mirrors of imagination, new wonders on Heaven’s way,
etched in the murals at the golden section, navel-high.
She zooms past the ever-spinning atom’s perfect span,
cemented at the entrance of Paradise.
Yet leaves no footprint—
for she never did, even on the sublunary Earth.
A new wonder blooms in the classic old eyes:
oh, Pi, still irrational, still pondering,
at the measured, eternal navel-high!
Oct 31, 2018
Oct 31, 2018 at 5:02 PM UTC
Hymn to Aphrodite
by Sappho
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Immortal Aphrodite, throned in splendor!
Wile-weaving daughter of Zeus, enchantress, and beguiler!
I implore you, dread mistress, discipline me no longer
with love's anguish!
But come to me once again in kindness,
heeding my prayers as you have done before;
O, come Divine One, descend once again from
heaven's golden dominions!
Your chariot yoked to love's consecrated doves,
their multitudinous pinions aflutter,
you once came gliding from the utmost heights, to
the dark-bosomed earth.
Swiftly they came and vanished, leaving you,
O my Goddess, smiling, your face eternally beautiful,
asking me what unfathomable longing compelled me
to cry out.
Asking me what I sought in my hopeless, bewildered desire.
Asking, "Who has harmed you, why are you so alarmed,
my poor Sappho? Whom should
Persuasion summon here?"
"Though today she flees love, soon she will pursue you;
spurning love's gifts, soon she shall return them;
tomorrow she will woo you,
however unwillingly!"
Come to me now, most Holy Aphrodite!
Release me from my heavy heartache and anguish;
grant me all I request, be once again
my ally and protector!
"Hymn to Aphrodite" is the only poem by Sappho of ****** to survive in its entirety. The poem survived intact because it was quoted in full by Dionysus, a Roman orator, in his "On Literary Composition," published around 30 B.C. A number of Sappho's poems mention or are addressed to Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love. It is believed that Sappho may have belonged to a cult that worshiped Aphrodite with songs and poetry. If so, "Hymn to Aphrodite" may have been composed for performance within the cult. We do know that Sappho was held in very high regard. For instance, when Sappho visited Syracuse the residents were so honored they erected a statue to commemorate the occasion! During Sappho's lifetime, coins of ****** were minted with her image. Furthermore, Sappho was called "the Tenth Muse" and the other nine were goddesses. Keywords/Tags: Sapphic, Sappho, ****** translation, ancient Greek, hymn, Aphrodite, Zeus, daughter, immortal, goddess, holy, lady, heaven, enchantress, enchantment, love potion, charm, spell, persuasion, beguiler, beguilement, mistress, discipline, ********** prayer, prayers, chariot, heaven, descent, ally, protector, lust, desire, passion, longing, *** crush, girlfriend, women, grief
Mar 22, 2020
Mar 22, 2020 at 2:51 AM UTC
An absence reversed
Beheld
Belonging
Fuming lush greenery seemingly
Between the frothing
Soup and lather twinkling
Speaking
"Tradition may act dishonestly"
All and sundry
Trails along merrily
For traditionally
All is how it should be
Belonging to one and only.
Binding
A trade between the thin lines
A baking sheet made sprayed messy
Artists in threes
Shakers of mountains for invisible ease
The truth is simply
Things done traditionally
All-in consuming historically.
Flesh
Released
Is fresh
Relief
Hidden in the fabric's sleeve
A gaping passage of air and breeze
Racing electricity
Breathtaking silk from worms
And worms eaten by birds
Tradition
Sewing the dresses of Empress the third.
Halt
Her plea worth salt and sugar
Still
Like the skater's
Minted odour
Hope
Distances the valleys low dipped to the everlasted rivers
Where a time arrives for eternal celebration.
The embellishments of
Unwavered tradition.
Oct 9, 2018
Oct 9, 2018 at 1:10 PM UTC
Hymn to Aphrodite
by Sappho (her only complete poem)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Immortal Aphrodite, throned in splendor!
Wile-weaving daughter of Zeus, enchantress, and beguiler!
I implore you, dread mistress, discipline me no longer
with love's anguish!
But come to me once again in kindness,
heeding my prayers as you have done before;
O, come Divine One, descend once again from heaven's
golden dominions!
Your chariot yoked to love's consecrated doves,
their multitudinous pinions aflutter,
you once came gliding from the utmost heights, to
this dark earth.
Swiftly they came and vanished, leaving you,
O my Goddess, smiling, your face eternally beautiful,
asking me what unfathomable longing compelled me
to cry out.
Asking me what I sought in my hopeless, bewildered desire.
Asking, "Who has harmed you, why are you so alarmed,
my poor Sappho? Whom should Persuasion
summon here?"
"Though today she flees love, soon she will pursue you;
spurning love's gifts, she soon shall return them;
tomorrow she will woo you,
however unwillingly!"
Come to me now, most Holy Aphrodite!
Release me from my heavy heartache and anguish;
grant me all I request, be once again
my ally and protector!
"Hymn to Aphrodite" is the only poem by Sappho of ****** to survive in its entirety. The poem survived intact because it was quoted in full by Dionysus, a Roman orator, in his "On Literary Composition," published around 30 B.C. A number of Sappho's poems mention or are addressed to Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love. It is believed that Sappho may have belonged to a cult that worshiped Aphrodite with songs and poetry. If so, "Hymn to Aphrodite" may have been composed for performance within the cult. We do know that Sappho was held in very high regard. For instance, when Sappho visited Syracuse the residents were so honored they erected a statue to commemorate the occasion! During Sappho's lifetime, coins of ****** were minted with her image. Furthermore, Sappho was called "the Tenth Muse" and the other nine were goddesses. Keywords/Tags: Sapphic, Sappho, ****** translation, ancient Greek, hymn, Aphrodite, Zeus, daughter, immortal, goddess, holy, lady, heaven, enchantress, enchantment, love potion, charm, spell, persuasion, beguiler, beguilement, mistress, discipline, ********** prayer, prayers, chariot, heaven, descent, ally, protector, lust, desire, passion, longing, *** crush, girlfriend, women, grief
Mar 1, 2020
Mar 1, 2020 at 10:53 PM UTC
I'm a riddle in nine syllables,
An elephant, a ponderous house,
A melon strolling on two tendrils.
O red fruit, ivory, fine timbers!
This loaf's big with its ****** rising.
Money's new-minted in this fat purse.
I'm a means, a stage, a cow in calf.
I've eaten a bag of green apples,
Boarded the train there's no getting off.
4.6k
You’re frightened but, there is no need for fear.
Your eyes are barely open.
Your vision is blurred beneath your thickened lashes.
Blinded, you are.
Hazed, you are.
Sick, you are.
Lying on the minted tile floor,
back arched and your cheek pressed to a faded rug,
you roll on your side.
Tilting your head up, you moan.
The vicious pulse begins pounding your wounded head.
You roll again on your shrunken stomach,
bubbling over with an ocean of alcohol.
You drag your eyes up to the piercing light above you.
Adjusting yourself slowly,
your hands fumble for the floor beneath you.
The muscles in your arm strain as you push yourself to sit.
No strength.
The stained bathtub provides something stable to grasp.
Smeared makeup.
Hair stuck to your hollow face.
Memories scattering in the wind outside.
More pounding, but this time it isn’t in your head.
It’s booming outside the door.
Screaming and movement is caving in on you,
suffocating you.
Who’s outside?
What’s outside?
"It's okay”, he says “You’re fine now.”
You turn and stare.
How long has he been here?
He’s been watching you the entire time.
He knows something.
He’s done something to you.
That’s why your in this frightening room below the ground.
He stands and walks towards you.
You must stay strong.
Don’t flinch.
No weakness.
A gentle arm glides just under your leg
and the other behind your waist.
He lifts you up and a small whimper escapes your lips.
There’s pain.
He carries you into a familiar room through another door.
The pounding from outside grows softer.
Shoulders relax.
Forehead cools.
Sleepiness comes.
He sits on the bed with you in his lap.
Suddenly your alertness fades and you feel comforted.
“How much did you drink?” He asks timidly.
You lean your head back.
Funny.
“Just a little”,
your words slur from your swollen tongue.
You start to giggle.
Arms begin to sweat.
Stomach tightens.
Puke.
Tears.
Hushed.
“Shh now. You’re fine. It’s alright. Breathe. Breathe.”, He coo's
and slowly strokes your spine.
Tensions released.
He stands and walks to the door.
“No! Come back!”, You cry.
He’s leaving.
Why?
You reach your hand out,
like a child,
but draw it back quickly.
“Haven’t I always come back? This time is no different.”
Only a second passes and you’re out.
Not all the way.
Eyes closed.
A window opens.
The fan goes on.
A blanket covers you.
He’s there.
Jun 4, 2012
Jun 4, 2012 at 9:15 PM UTC
When was the last time
I felt a raving hunger for life?
When had I but an eternity in moments,
on the edge of something vastly different?
How was it me and not you
who staked her soul high
on rolling hills of green,
took long draughts to savour, to condense
the weight of the world into one precious drink,
cup the shortest days in her palm and release them,
for her thoughts to balloon into the wild?
The delectable now—
ripe as berries for plucking in winter,
and all things, like music
must peter
into silence.
So I suppose my question to you
is not concerned with
the stack of newly-minted green in your pocket,
nor the fleet of shiny cars, but
your pure self, simply being.
It’s prodding the heart,
a tiny critter fluttering with wings, wondering:
when will you ever get a second chance at this—
all this storm
and inexplicable happiness—
or will you
go hunting for things,
whirling at mere traces
of power in your name—
or will you turn around
only to find a life
or a lie,
staring back wide-eyed
in endless shame?
© BT
Aug 22, 2017
Aug 22, 2017 at 6:21 PM UTC
You are beautiful and faded
Like an old opera tune
Played upon a harpsichord;
Or like the sun-flooded silks
Of an eighteenth-century boudoir.
In your eyes
Smoulder the fallen roses of out-lived minutes,
And the perfume of your soul
Is vague and suffusing,
With the pungence of sealed spice-jars.
Your half-tones delight me,
And I grow mad with gazing
At your blent colours.
My vigour is a new-minted penny,
Which I cast at your feet.
Gather it up from the dust,
That its sparkle may amuse you.
3.3k
She came among us from the South
And made the North her home awhile
Our dimness brightened in her smile,
Our tongue grew sweeter in her mouth.
We chilled beside her liberal glow,
She dwarfed us by her ampler scale,
Her full-blown blossom made us pale,
She summer-like and we like snow.
We Englishwomen, trim, correct,
All minted in the self-same mould,
Warm-hearted but of semblance cold,
All-courteous out of self-respect.
She woman in her natural grace,
Less trammelled she by lore of school,
Courteous by nature not by rule,
Warm-hearted and of cordial face.
So for awhile she made her home
Among us in the rigid North,
She who from Italy came forth
And scaled the Alps and crossed the foam.
But if she found us like our sea,
Of aspect colourless and chill,
Rock-girt; like it she found us still
Deep at our deepest, strong and free.
2.9k
Bring down the moon for genteel Janet;
She's too refined for this gross planet.
She wears garments and you wear clothes,
You buy stockings, she purchases hose.
She say That is correct, and you say Yes,
And she disrobes and you undress.
Confronted by a mouse or moose,
You turn green, she turns chartroose.
Her speech is new-minted, freshly quarried;
She has a fore-head, you have a forehead.
Nor snake nor slowworm draweth nigh her;
You go to bed, she doth retire.
To Janet, births are blessed events,
And odors that you smell she scents.
Replete she feels, when her food is yummy,
Not in the stomach but the tummy.
If urged some novel step to show,
You say Like this, she says Like so.
Her dear ones don't die, but pass away;
Beneath her formal is lonjeray.
Of refinement she's a fount, or fountess,
And that is why she's now a countess.
She was asking for the little girls' room
And a flunky though she said the earl's room.
2.5k
To sleep, my mind impounded,
My heartbeats, bass, lowly-sounded,
Each beat, a note upon mine ticking meter.
An unfamiliar feminine voice, not hers, poses,
Questioning noises, issued from a blackened figure.
This human-shaped metronome,
A singular inquisitor,
In rhythm, but not in rhyme,
Gravely announces repeatedly,
T'is your time, t'is your time,
Each pronouncement,
Spoken n'spiked distinctly:
*"Your prose now ended,
last-gentled sweetly."*
Wondering still, is it just sleep or truly death,
This forlorn eve, to go, to meet and greet,
Without having said my finale prayer.
Unprepared, thus with unaccustomed flair,
"Unfair" doth me protest, a newly-minted naysayer,
My book incomplete, black-brother frere!
If death indeed you be, my fellow cloaked-rider,
Then make me a one-last-time composer.
Let me whisper once more inside her,
A last poem of the greatest brevity,
But of the greatest import, laden heavy!
Good bye, my love, goodbye....
This closing writ, my finest ever...
Oct 6, 2013
Oct 6, 2013 at 5:21 AM UTC
Silver Beach: Always the Sole First
familiar white fishing boat, up with early light,
seeking sustenance and pleasure in = measure,
anchored ‘bout quarter mile east of my under-the-coverlet,
(of course! as the crow, raven or scavenging osprey flies),
it’s precise location amazingly exact, but alas, soon daily
familiarity breeds no secrecy, and now joined by a
farther out, smaller version, a compatriot in spotitude,
of the best spots for harvesting the early running
brackish bay water favorites, striped or black sea bass
what persistent fortitude these fisher-peoples display,
early to rise, first to depart, when others crowd its “spot,”
(amazed by its knowing precision the exactitude of “spot”)
this ship, always the sole-first, invokes a first poem of the day,
always a soul-first, an unburdening of deepest gratitude that
one more day granted me to imbibe this vista, awake to its
soothing silent heavenly serenity, absent machine or
electronic interference with my delicate sleepy wakefulness,
when newly minted words come into my mind, my
secret spot
Sat AM June 3
Jun 3, 2023
Jun 3, 2023 at 8:46 AM UTC
His wife, George, was present with flowers.
Anne and Michael,his children, were there.
A headstone had been carved at the Quarry,
now all waited on Yeats to appear.
Soft and damp was that day in the graveyard
with the scent of turned earth in the air.
Beyond rose the bulk of Ben Bulben,
As the Lorry, with the poet, drew near.
Ten years he had slept in his coffin,
while the great nation states played at war.
Now Sean MacBride, the son of his rival,
brought him home, where he'd not been before.
At his birth, Yeats was a British subject.
By his death, a Dominion was here.
Now they laid him to rest in the free state;
the newly minted Republic of Eire.
A bhean chéile, George, a bhí i láthair le bláthanna.
Anne agus Michael, a pháistí, bhí ann.
Bhí A cloch chinn snoite ar an Cairéal,
gach fhan anois ar Yeats le feiceáil.
Bhí bog agus tais an lá sin sa reilig
leis an boladh de domhain iompú san aer.
Beyond ardaigh an chuid is mó de Ben Bulben,
Mar an Leoraí, leis an bhfile, tharraing aice.
Deich mbliana bhí chodail sé ina cónra,
agus an stáit náisiúin mór a bhí ag an chogaidh.
Anois Seán MacBride, mac a rival,
thabhairt dó sa bhaile, i gcás nach mhaith a bhí sé riamh.
Ag a rugadh é, go raibh Yeats ábhar na Breataine.
De réir a bhás, bhí Dominion anseo.
Anois atá leagtha siad dó a gcuid eile sa stát saor in aisce;
an bualadh nua-Phoblacht na Eire.
Feb 27, 2012
Feb 27, 2012 at 2:10 AM UTC
I find that chromium-vanadium steel,
while holding glimmer and shine
through much abuse,
is harder to hone
to that razor-like edge
that truly makes chopping a breeze
(watch the fingers, please),
merely mangling fine fruits
and tomatoes, instead.
(just tilt your head, thus)
It's a tool best left
for whacking at meat,
as its heft and its strength
make short work of bone;
more cleaver than scalpel,
if truth will be said.
I've always preferred
the high-carbon alloys,
though now out of fashion
in today's haute cuisine.
While rusting and blackening with age -
not the type you'd put on display -
the blades stay as keen
as the day they were minted,
and wipe down nicely on sleeves.
Oct 23, 2010
Oct 23, 2010 at 6:48 PM UTC
on the paper
newly minted,
first time printed
causal pausation
assessment momentation
review, the second inclination,
then scrap-heaped,
in much bad company filed
retained, reserved, preserved,
for another go round,
another someday
you look at your hands,
telling them straight,
not good enough,
is not good enough
anymore
do try, so try,
three lines, four stanzas,
elegies and funerals
don't become you,
go into labor,
write labored
and birth free flowingly
knowing,
that all knowing glowing,
of a poem child,
product of
good enough
Nov 22, 2014
Nov 22, 2014 at 5:38 AM UTC
My poetry is an acquired taste,
So come, dear one,
Place your tongue in my mouth.
Pace yourself, there is so much,
Spoke and unwritten,
That fruitions only when spit-shared.
Flick your tongue-tip to mine,
Sealing bond, the salt caramel of my rhymes,
The iambic meter of my tamarind prose,
The buds, flowering, poems forming,
Watered by the admixture of joint, minted saliva.
My poetry, so very complicated,
Hints of currants and ash,
Soil volcanic, basaltic vowels, oh's and eyes,
Cursed verses that commence with I,
Nonetheless, despite soil inhospitable rued,
Compositions flourish, born wetland soluble.
Yours, for the taking,
Yours, for the tasting.
You place your fingers on my waist,
My body of work to contemplate,
My ditties, you spit out,
You want courses, not appetizers,
You want truths, not fluff, lies, menu tastings.
Columbus and Magellan, thy fingers named,
Trace the curvature of my ***
With tip and tipsy stroked caresses,
You laugh with the pleasure of all the sssssss's.
Hissing all the day your satisfaction,
Capturing my writs, by your tongue's duress,
Recipient-thief of my literary largesse.
I am dressed all in white,
Stripped bare to my native coloring,
Except for two brown nippled spots, you lick,
Imbibing milky thoughts from fountain-heads *****
Savoring, relishing, stanzas that praise love's flavor.
With every line, every word-painting accessioned,
You make my soft parts hard,
My hard parts soft, but my liquidity,
My tears, they, that, you drink straight,
Licking, liking, and oohing and ahhing,
You tongue curled, upside down arching,
The storage point of your seduced gatherings.
To drain me full, your incisors cut,
Straight lines, entry points for your *******
Taking, draining, leaving nothing,
Not even one aleph or bet escaping.
When you acquired my poetry, my verbosity,
Pillaging soul's hiding place, took and *****
Your acquired the best, breaking my nape,
Imprisoned on and by my island's seascape,
Blanched and pained, a blank tape,
I am tasteless, witless, mockingly, tongue-tied.
Sep 14, 2013
Sep 14, 2013 at 12:23 AM UTC
High rises burst from soft Earth’s flesh
Was it even ready for us?
From an extraterrestrial’s perspective we’re a disease upon this gentle cerulean Elysium
I’m living in the mouth of duality
I hear it speak as I leave my block and give a peace sign to the abandoned residences in progress
On the block I currently live, the sidewalk is cracked into drunken mazes and yet
Directly across, the neighbors stand upon freshly minted asphalt and into a metropolitan construct made for the modern brain: built in amenities, contemporary textiles and garage parking
Are we next?
To be bought and sold, if so, can we at least have a plan for the residents?
Will tenants be invited to the newborn paradise? We have the budget to feed cement trucks faster than hungry mouths. It’s become a bad habit
yet I sit by the man-made imperfections
hoping someone cares enough to drip their Eden into the palms of my neighbors
If time will tell I’ve been getting quite the silent treatment
Travel a little deeper and….
Cosmopolitan crossroads coexist with beggars and lost folk….
Since when was the speech divided between affluent and broke?
"IDK?" The duality replies
I thought you’d say that.
Aug 4, 2021
Aug 4, 2021 at 6:14 PM UTC
With each passing poem,
The degree of difficulty of diving ever higher,
Bar incrementally niched, inched, raised,
Domain, the association of words, ever lesser,
Repetition verboten, crime against pride.
Al,
You ask me when the words come:
With each passing year,
In the wee hours of
Ever diminishing time snatches,
The hours between midnight and rising,
Shrinkage, once six, now four hours,
Meant for for restoration,
Transpositional for creation,
Only one body notes the new mark,
The digital, numerical clock of
Trillion hour sleep deficit, most taxing.
Al, you ask me from where do the words come:
Each of the five senses compete,
Pick me, Pick me, they shout,
The eyes see the tall grasses
Framing the ferry's to and fro life.
Waving bye bye to the
End of day harbor activities,
Putting your babies to sleep.
The ears hear the boat horns
Deep voiced, demanding pay attention,
I am now docking, I am important,
The sound lingers, long after
They are no longer important.
The tongue tastes the cooling
Italian prosecco merging victoriously
With its ally, the modestly warming rays
Of a September setting sun,
finally declaring, without stuttering,
Peace on Earth.
The odoriferous bay breezes,
A new for that second only smell,
But yet, very old bartender's recipe,
Salt, cooking oil, barbecue sauce, gasoline
And the winning new ingredient, freshly minted,
Stacked in ascending circumference order, onion rings.
These four senses all recombinant,
On the cheek, on the tongue,
Wafting, tickling, blasting, visioning
Merging into a single touch
That my pointer finger, by force majeure,
Declares, here, poem aborning,
Contract with this moment, now satisfied.
Al, what you did not ask was this:
With each passing poem,
I am lessened within, expurgated,
In a sense part of me, expunged,
Part of me, passing too,
Every poems birth diminishes me.
___________
4:38 AM
September 8th, 2012
Greenport Harbor, N.Y.
Mar 26, 2014
Mar 26, 2014 at 5:06 PM UTC
I see your ghost everywhere
The ghost of who you once were
Before all the **** went down in your brain
The beauty that flowed from you till you woke up from the dream that was your life
That dream shattered right out
Right out from under you
Made you want to forget
Forget who you were
All brought for nought
Fragments still rattle
Behind your eyes
Those candy rock promises someone whispered in the night
Lost that luster, didn't they?
Couldn't find the silver lining?
What was once radiant phosphorescence
Became gangrenous and insipid
Leaving a malodorous taste
Stagnant in your mouth
The feast turned to crumbs left for the rats under your skin
You become to stately for our unostentatious life
Now you've painted the Petunia's colors of your choice
Rearranged your furniture
To play at being all grown-up
Bit of turpentine blotted on the canvas might smear the lines
But that won't erase your past
Your fingerprints are etched into
Every discarded can of spray paint
Lips carved into the pores of to much skin
You'll slice them off to get rid of the feelling
Keep up your newly minted fascade
That caused you such strife
To grow in the petri dish
Under your mothers sink
While you tryed to burn your
Bridges to ashes
Ashes embedded forevermore under your fingernails
Now you linger in ghosts
Haunting cities you've never been to
Places you're naught to see
In them breathes a
Chilly air wishing to keep you alive
Sep 13, 2017
Sep 13, 2017 at 9:25 AM UTC
I can say definitively
and without reservation
that I once had more to say
and once I said it well
The taste of the words
of the children in flux
the ex-children
the children in recovery
leaves an aftertaste of
sweetness I can mimic
but cannot make my own
though I know I have
the recipe
somewhere
Their words tumble
like dusty pebbles racing
downhill rebellious
ebullient and unruly
avalanches to ants
while mine drag
the feet of their tiny
y's and g's
p's and q's
like rainy-day-slogged
future people
wending their way through
weeds and reeds of
bullies and written responses
The taste of the words
of the newly-minted
suddenly people
with centuries-old ideas
cellophane gift-wrapped for their
daily birthdays
beribboned and bowed for
kindergarten picture day
leaves a memory of
butterscotch and peppermint I can imagine still
but cannot make my own
though I know I have
the recipe
somewhere
Mar 19, 2012
Mar 19, 2012 at 8:58 PM UTC
So promise laden, dormant lain
Neatly wrapped in cellophane
Freshly minted, new release
Pride of place and centrepiece
Glossy pages tempt the eye
Guns and girls in good supply
Grab something that’s quick to eat
Pop the disk and take a seat
A couple of hours hurry past
Scene is set and players cast
Villain always gets away
Hero vows to make him pay
Know what would be just as fun?
Stop chatting him up and USE THE ******* GUN
But no, then they proceed to dine
With another ******* TWENTY MINUTES of unrelated story line
Shooting people, picking locks
Run down corridor, crouch behind box
Hold down R and wiggle stick
Holster weapon, crouch and kick
You know what? I couldn’t care any less
Pause, Quit, Are you sure? Yes
Jun 17, 2013
Jun 17, 2013 at 5:46 PM UTC
your smile holds a summer days sunshine
and laughter that shakes the autumn leaves to the ground
for so much love was held in watching the corners of your lips curl
your lips kiss the air, unworthy to caress such treasures
such being without flaw stood in distance to smell one's minted breath
your eyes held a gaze meant only for angels
yet there you stood pondering every aspect of my ****** features
analyzing as if I was a priceless article in an art museum
your lips curled once again simultaneously
your words and action were not created for people as I
yet there you stand
breathing the same earthy air into our lungs
seeing the same vivid colors now going blurry around me
as I fell harder, you were only there to catch me
and the world will never be the same
or at least without daily witness of your lips curling
in essence to show your happiness
an emotion engraved permanently into my mind
as if this moment is everlasting
Nov 9, 2014
Nov 9, 2014 at 6:40 PM UTC
In the beginning was the three-pointed star,
One smile of light across the empty face,
One bough of bone across the rooting air,
The substance forked that marrowed the first sun,
And, burning ciphers on the round of space,
Heaven and hell mixed as they spun.
In the beginning was the pale signature,
Three-syllabled and starry as the smile,
And after came the imprints on the water,
Stamp of the minted face upon the moon;
The blood that touched the crosstree and the grail
Touched the first cloud and left a sign.
In the beginning was the mounting fire
That set alight the weathers from a spark,
A three-eyed, red-eyed spark, blunt as a flower,
Life rose and spouted from the rolling seas,
Burst in the roots, pumped from the earth and rock
The secret oils that drive the grass.
In the beginning was the word, the word
That from the solid bases of the light
Abstracted all the letters of the void;
And from the cloudy bases of the breath
The word flowed up, translating to the heart
First characters of birth and death.
In the beginning was the secret brain.
The brain was celled and soldered in the thought
Before the pitch was forking to a sun;
Before the veins were shaking in their sieve,
Blood shot and scattered to the winds of light
The ribbed original of love.
1.7k
You may notice I shadowed your Events
Out of Deep Gesture to your Customed Doors
Yet, stand-out Naked, begs for my Conscience
How such Blokish Skill would be so adored
It still Stings, really, for your Sun exploit
After few of the Truest Rays give space
Though mouths copped, hymns their minted throats avoid
From submitting premature drafts at-face
It is, though constrict, the Best Pill swallowed
As every Medication would redden
But, after process, heal my Will's allowed
And free myself from this Cage submitten.
But why, though Free, these Keys in my Pocket still
Scratch my Heart-Drawn Car; Welts I duly fill.
Mar 15, 2013
Mar 15, 2013 at 3:19 AM UTC