the censorship meme
alive inside me as a child:
some books were worth the mention of--
war and **** were not.

untimely at a pennsylvanian writers' club
where fear lodged quiet smile-halves
in talking clouds and farmyard metaphor,
to weekly bray the corner of an antique movie-house

newcomers weren't to share their work
we three were welcomed as an audience at best
we passed the others' writers' chapter-copies on
on which i scribbled notes of praise
on notes of theme-entwining anti-argument
and **** zests of vast significance:
notes of floral yearning, meadowed love--
iron skies and ahistoric dreams--
off and on archaic themes
of which we weren't to share

Let's bury the lovely inconsistencies 
Leave the intimate fallacies to mystery
Then my perception of your passion fits with me
Red brick to mortar 
you laid your deceit in a building order
Despite the inherent wrecking ball tendencies you chose to utilize
Blind to my youthful eyes
Let's brush the displaced fervor for lust under makeshift throw rugs
Void of emotion until you know no love
As exhilarating as the love you left long ago as leaves of dogwood trees in a late Pennsylvanian november
Rigid structures that wait a season to return to the lively form they remember
Bare white bark and dead extremities 
Bare as your stockpile of passion meant for me
The surplus became a short supply when I left your graces
Amidst the sea of faces
You encounter in the places
You replace me to fill the voids and spaces
My memory laced with traces
Of your gentle touch, a cool spring breeze to my sun soaked skin
Recalling the ominous climb before the downward spin
We always seem to find ourselves in
Perhaps the fact the rush of the climb washes my mind of the inevitable collapse
I all too often push the moment from thoughts of past
The sinking in my stomach peaking the point of no return
As I set my eyes to the horizon and watch us burn
In the setting sun of an Middle eastern summer
Your lightning fast decisions to leave never compared to the rolling thunder
That swept over my soul
When you tore the hole
In the hazel eyed sky of my perception
with your ill fated rejection
Casting projections 
Of your likeness in the constellations 
Trembling fingers wait patient
Making comparisons and relations 
Between every aspect of you I savored
To Orion's belt, cassiopeia, ursa major
Every slight shift in its luminous glow
A subtle reminder to me of the love you will never know
Intergalactic representations paint the stage for supernovas
Expunging the lovely aroma 
I grew accustom to
Coming to harsh realizations there's no reciprocal paid in full for the love I loved for you.

O' elder Oak, how thou growest so old?
What ancient yarns thou could spin from each limb.
Wars, drought, what visions thine gray bark doth hold.

Ole Pennsylvanian wood, were thou sewn by him
Whose king's debt owed, founded this sovereign land.
Thine story hath gravid weight, not a tale told grim.

As a youth, thou were a knight's castle grand
Or a dark dragon with fiery breath.
High in thee boughs, thy mastered the farmland.

As years passed and our kinship reached its breadth,
Thy cannot help but to lament the time
That thou spied on thy joyous play. Now thy death
Looms long. To Heaven thine branches doth climb.

So this, readers and friends
Is where it began
I don't know where it ends
But let's look back again

A fourteen year old is writing
In a hospital room
Far her right in bright lighting
Is great-grandma, who'll die soon

She has few memories of her
As she wonders about home
Nonni keeps asking mother
Not to leave the girls alone

Now we're back in the hospital
On some Pennsylvanian hill
Thirty five family members in total
Nonni's more than ill

Christmas day, and we're at a friend's house
When we hear that final call
A week later, I'm at a funeral, sounding like a mouse
For someone I nearly didn't know at all

Looking back, that was the start
Of most of my questions
On society, religion, art
What the rules really ment

I found a taste for the books
That mom didn't like
I expanded my looks
Gained interest in the night

I started growing apart
From those I once knew
With secrets in my heart
My friends were my closest few

I learned more about a family
That I once thought typical
And (mostly) solved my belifs
On the meaning of "it all"

I look back on the before
As though regarding a cat
It's cute innocence I adore
I find it hard to believe I was that

I still have that Christmas blanket
A snow leopard, her last gift
For a woman I saw maybe four or five times, it
Still has a nice warmth to it

So sometimes I dream of a mint hospital wall
And think back to the start of it all

The wailing winds sear their caress in my memory
The cold of an eastern Pennsylvanian winter
Stinging yet rejuvenating, surrounded by ubiquitous gusts
This place is sacred, this hallowed ground
My toes rocking on top of the semi frozen hillside
Staring out across a chain or rolling hills and deciduous forests
Trees packed so densely together I see only one ever extending canopy of leaves
Seamlessly shifting colors as if on a whim
I feel small in this moment
Amidst the grand expanse of nature that has humbled my soul
The mist and lingering breath pouring from the nose of a horse tamed yet yearning for the open pasture
The clouds that soak up the pinks and blues of a setting sun
The wailing winds seared into my memory
I am home I am home.

I'm from Pennsylvania and its broken landscapes
Trees scale the sky with branches that don't end
Eggs crackle on the stove of your favorite diner, sunny side up
It's always sunny in Philadelphia
It's always rainy in the suburbs because the grass needs it
Or so dad says

I come from a place of constant decay
Historical avenues, local produce that actually goes 'vrot'
The leaves litter the earth but we litter it more
Old books decompose in desolate buildings and old art hears less footsteps as each season violently meets its end

It's cold now and the landscape is stiff
Imagine being so cold you just drop everything
Our trees do that
Like magic, or like troubled vagabonds
But imagine being so cold it brings happiness to your bones
Because home is ears flushed red and fingertips blue
Home is sweet strawberries in the summer and sweet suffering in the winter

Pennsylvania is a polarized wreck just like the rest of us
It's chipped right at the lip but it's still the mug that fits best in a calloused hand
It's clay and mud and d irty water and rud
Fields of corn and grain, apple orchards and more rain
But its the filth we dance in, the mud for our pies and the apples for our eyes

Memories stay behind as the shapes of clouds in those boundless skies
Berry stained fingertips graze their outlines
Haystacks beckon you to stay because
Pennsylvania provokes the hardest goodbyes

Find this remnant
in your imagination
because it makes
no sense to me

Is this the moment
when the mother ship landed
in the Pennsylvanian mist
unrecorded
except for one
never believed
in his part dressed
bare footed
madness?

Or the instant
just preceding
the screaming timber truck
wiping away a soul
craving solace
and kind release
to join his life love
so missed
so loved
so long?

Or maybe
God Fearing
our bearded
noble nobody
is standing
in the presence
of his God
and Host
meek, mild
and speechless...

The following poetic account
written more'n a dozen ***** dancing decades ago,
while I (a socially withdrawn **** Sapiens)
one indigent Yahoo
groveled along (on a secret Msn)
along boulevard of broken dreams,
whereby yours truly forced to eat crow
quite challenging cuz
wonky twittering angry birds
alive and well darting hither and yon to and fro
able, eager, ready, and willing
to gouge out the eyes of one common Joe.

Arduous agonizing affliction
didst unrelentingly assault and assail...
aghast to exhale... lest I would lose
desperate clinging clutch
held by more'n one
but less than eleven  
bloodied cracked fingernail
phantasmagoric phalange *******
like tendrils constricted
stoppering me to whisper or wail

against being swallowed
courtesy COSMOFUNNEL
into hello poetry tumblr
(think Alice in Wonderland
falling into rabbit hole)
yawning abyss menacingly beseeched
hmm...release could immediately curtail
cumulative (lifetime's worth) travail
freefalling at lightspeed, jump/
kick starting pirouetting unnervingly,

unstoppably, unwaveringly... zipping
into edge of night
along the outer limits
of the twilight zone
defining, harboring lurking dark shadows
spelling infinite black hole sun - hell
buzzfeeding me where linkedin
earthlinked hotmail of pinterest,
suffering lovely bones would ail
making minced meat out of me

“****” analogous to an imagine aery dragon
vanish as guilt – courtesy didst hail
analogous storm trooper peppering
Pennsylvanian's psyche... with eternal jail
time for eternity excluded option
asper garden variety baby boomer male,
albeit the father of deux darling daughters,
the eldest (broke vow of silent communication),
she reached out after
months long hiatus telltale
sign indications to accept genuine apology

her biological father (me) culpability
regarding destitution raged against hurtfulness,
he affixed indelible psychological
scars each etching indelible travail
boomeranged back to yours truly duress
during her impressionable years, she did rail
and rant similar to countless
previous conversations, the scale
innocent intelligent progeny, we begat
(myself and misses) financially ill prepared
to provide respectable accommodations.

Our "dirt poor" status detrimental
livingsocial among affluent MainLine
incomes luxe Lower Merion
living costs fateful design
neighbors cursed, ostracized, vilified...
unsightly unkempt property (i.e. unmanicured)
intolerant snobs didst malign
child welfare services called NOT to dine,
but emphatic for papa and mama to align
dwelling safe and secure for minors
and miners for a heart of gold

yes, I attest despicable living conditions
crowded house with Zison heirlooms
owners - malignant hoarders did confine
considerably reducing cubic feet,
they relations of spouse evicted us
ready to point carbine
at temple...quicker than noose
dead of winter 2010 near homelessness
relocated within "roach motel" decline
'twixt omnipotent covalent
carbonic, harmonic, opportunistic bond

among our dynamics with offspring
livid with rage, asper an inferno no divine
comedy compounded by lascivious
behaviour - mine to hasten dateline
enduring helplessness, hardship
being alive plus brandished carving knife
against self witnessed...I assign
poor marks as paternal parent,
who bemoans loathsome
impact...this papa gropes toward hotline
writhing with agony
worse fate than swallowing quinine!

The following poetic account
written more'n a dozen ***** dancing decades ago,
while I (a socially withdrawn **** Sapiens)
groveled along (on a secret Msn)
along boulevard of broken dreams,
whereby yours truly forced to eat crow
quite challenging cuz
wonky twittering angry birds
alive and well darting hither and yon to and fro
able, eager, ready, and willing
to gouge out the eyes of one common Joe.

Arduous agonizing affliction
didst unrelentingly assault and assail...
aghast to exhale... lest I would lose
desperate clinging clutch
held by more'n one
but less than eleven  
bloodied cracked fingernail
phantasmagoric phalange like tendrils constricted
stoppering me to whisper or wail
against being swallowed into hello poetry tumblr

(think Alice in wonderland
falling into rabbit hole)
yawning abyss menacingly beseeched
hmm...release could immediately curtail
cumulative (lifetime's worth) travail
freefalling, pirouetting unnervingly,
unstoppably, unwaveringly... zipping
into infinite black hole sun hell
buzzfeeding me where linkedin
earthlinked suffering lovely bones would ail

making minced meat out of me
“****” vanish as guilt – courtesy didst hail
analogous storm trooper peppering
Pennsylvanian's psyche... with eternal jail
time for eternity excluded option
asper garden variety baby boomer male,
albeit the father of deux darling daughters,
the eldest (broke vow of silent communication),
she reached out after months long hiatus telltale
sign indications to accept genuine apology

her biological father (me) culpability
regarding destitution raged against hurtfulness,
he affixed indelible psychological scars each travail
boomeranged back to yours truly duress
during her impressionable years, she did rail
and rant similar to countless
previous conversations, the scale
innocent intelligent progeny, we begat
(myself and misses) financially ill prepared
to provide respectable accommodations.

Our "dirt poor" status detrimental
livingsocial among affluent MainLine
incomes luxe Lower Merion
living costs fateful design
neighbors cursed, ostracized, vilified...
unsightly unkempt property (i.e. unmanicured)
intolerant snobs didst malign
child welfare services called NOT to dine,
but emphatic for papa and mama to align
dwelling safe and secure for minors

yes, I attest despicable living conditions
crowded house with Zison heirlooms
owners - malignant hoarders did confine
considerably reducing cubic feet,
they relations of spouse evicted us
ready to point carbine
at temple...quicker than noose
dead of winter 2010 near homelessness
relocated within "roach motel" decline
'twixt omnipotent bond

among our dynamics with offspring
livid with rage, asper an inferno no divine
comedy compounded by lascivious
behaviour - mine to hasten dateline
enduring helplessness, hardship
being alive plus brandished carving knife
against self witnessed...I assign
poor marks as paternal parent,
who bemoans loathsome
impact...this papa gropes toward hotline!