You turned my life upside-down when you came around
A triplet, who would have thought?!
Ive always loved you, though I may never have shown it.
I've always been the older sister that secretly watched over you.
now all I'm left with are pieces of who we used to be
a ghost of the sister I used to love  
What happened to us?
We used to sing together while I was in the shower, your iPod blaring
And sleep on each others shoulders on the long carrides
We'd stay out late at night with friends and stick our feet in the air
Swimming in the ocean at the beach I'd come up from behind and splash you
I used to pick up on the same line as you just to mess with you and your boyfriend
And miss you when you went away, like you took a slice of my heart with you.
When guys would hit on us, we'd sit back and laugh.
Do you remember the night you, me, and Billy stayed up and we said out first cuss words, barely 5th grade, and we giggled all night?
The promises we'd always be there, through thick and thin?
The calm of our house was shattered this summer
When we realized it was time to grow up.
You roughened my edges with your sharp tongue,
slicing through our bond we worked 16 years to hold together
Cut, and mended, cut and mended
All that remains are shreds and furious remarks,
and a house shared with a girl I can't say I even know anymore.
You roughened my edges, my own sister
Darkened my heart, and closed my compassion
We both have our own problems, does it mean we stop caring?
All our lives we've been compared, it's been a game,
Some kind of competition to gain attention and show off superior wits
Now when it matters the most, I've lost you
I'm running this race of Life alone.
All I really want is for us to get back to how we used to be.
I want to make you laugh, not frown and complain
I want to see happiness cover your face like it did just months ago
But... I'm afraid it's too late.
You've roughened my edges beyond repair

Hotrod
Verse I

Wrenches clanging, knuckles banging
A drop of blood the young man spilt
A new part here, and old part… there
A hotrod had been built!
A patchwork, mechanical, quilt

Feeling good.  Head under a raised hood, hands occupied, the job nearing completion.  Sometimes the good feelings would dissipate though, as quickly as they came, as he cursed himself for stripping a bolt, or cursed someone else for selling him the wrong part, or the engineer whose design goals obviously did not consider “remove and replace”.
He cursed the “gorilla” that never heard of a torque-wrench, the glowing particle of **** that popped on to the top of his head as he welded, the metal chip he flushed from his eye, and even himself for the burn he received by impatiently touching something too soon after grinding. 
 He, and his type, cursed a lot, but mostly to their selves as they battled-on with things oily, hot, bolted, welded, and rusty – in cramped spaces. One day it was choice words for an “easy-out” that broke off next to a broken drill bit that had broken off in a broken bolt, that was being drilled for an easy-out. 
  Despite the swearing, the good and special feelings would always return, generally of a magnitude that exceeded the physical pain and mental frustration of the day, by a large margin.  
Certifiably obsessive, the young man continued to toil dutifully, soulfully, occasionally gleefully, sometimes even expertly, in his most loved and familiar place, his sanctuary, laboratory… the family garage.

And tomorrow would be the day.
With hard learned, hard earned expertise and confidence - in this special small place, a supremely happy and excited young man commanded his creation to life.

Threw a toggle, pressed a switch
Woke up the neighbors with that *******

The heart of his machine was a stroked Chevy engine that everyone had just grown sick hearing about.  Even the local machine shop to which the boy nervously entrusted his most prized possession had had enough.  “Sir, I don’t want to seem disrespectful, but from what I’ve read in Hot Rod Magazine, you might be suggesting a clearance too tight for forged pistons…” then it would be something else the next day.  
One must always speak politely to the machinist, and even though he always had, the usual allotment of contradictions and arguments afforded to each customer had long run out – and although the shop owner took a special liking to the boy because, as he liked to say, “he reminds me of me”, well, that man was done too.  But in the end, the mill was dead-on.  Of course from the start, the shop knew it would be; that’s almost always the case; it’s how they stay in business - simply doing good work.  Bad shops fall out quickly, but this place had the look of times gone by.  Good times. 
 Old porcelain signs, here and there were to be found, all original to the shop and revered by the older workers in honored nostalgia.  The younger workers get it too; they can tell from the co-workers they respect and learn from, there is something special about this past.  One sign advertises Carter Carburetors and the artwork depicts “three deuces”, model 97’s, sitting proudly atop a flathead engine, all speeding along in a red, open roadster.  Its occupants, a blond haired boy with slight freckles (driver), and a brunette girl passenger, bright white blouse, full and buttoned low. They are in the wind-blown cool, their excited expressions proclaim… "we have escaped and are free!" (and all you need is a Carter, or three).  How uniquely American.

The seasoned old engine block the boy entrusted to the shop cost him $120-even from the boneyard.  Not a bad deal for a good high-nickel content block that had never had its first 0.030”overbore.  In the shop, it was cleaned, checked for cracks by "magnafluxing", measured and re-measured, inspected and re-inspected.  It was shaped and cut in a special way that would allow the stroker crankshaft, that was to be the special part of this build, to have all the clearance it would need.  The engine block was fitted with temporary stress plates that mimic the presence of cylinder heads,  then the cylinders were bored to “first oversize”,  providing fresh metal for new piston rings to work against.  New bearings were installed everywhere bearings are required.  Parts were smoothed here and there.  Some surfaces were roughened just so, to allow new parts to “work-into each other” when things are finally brought together.  All of this was done with a level of precision and attention far, far greater than the old “4- bolt” had ever received at the factory on its way to a life of labor in the ¾ ton work van from which it came, and for which it had served so dutifully.  They called this painstaking dedication to precision measurement and fit, to hitting all specifications on the mark, “blueprinting”, and it would continue throughout the entire build of this engine.  The boy remained worried, but the shop had done it a million times.

After machining, the block was filled with new and strong parts that cost the young man everything he had.   Parts selected with the greatest of effort, decision, and debate.   You can compromise on paint and live with some rust,  he would say, wait for good tires, but never scrimp on the engine.  Right on.  Someone taught the boy right, regardless of whether or not he fully understood the importance of the words he parroted.  His accurate proclamation  also provided ample excuse for the rough, unfinished, underfunded look of the rest of his machine.  But it was just a look, his car was, in fact, “right”.   And its power plant?  Well the machine shop had talked their customer into letting them do the final engine assembly - even cut their price to do it.  To make that go down easy, they asked to have two of their shop decals affixed to the rod on race-days.  The young man thought that was a fair deal, but the shop was really just looking out for the boy, with their herring of sorts.  
The mill in its final form was the proper balance of performance and durability; and with its camshaft so carefully selected, the engine's “personality” was perfectly matched to the work at hand.   It would produce adequate torque in the low RPM range to get whole rig moving quickly, yet deliver enough horsepower near and at red-line to pile on the MPH, fast.  No longer a polite-natured workhorse, this engine, this engine is impatient now.  High compression, a rapid, choppy idle - it seems to be biting at the bit to be released.  On command, it gulps its mixture and screams angrily, and often those standing around have a reflexive jump - the louder, the better - the more angry, the better.  If it hurts your ears, that’s a good feeling.  If its bark startles, that’s a good startle.  A cacophony?  No, the “music” of controlled explosions, capable of thrusting everything and everyone attached, forward, impolitely, on a rapid run to the freedom so well depicted in the ad.  

This is the addictive sound and feel that has appealed to a certain type of person since engines replaced horses, and why?  A surrogate voice for those who are otherwise quiet?  A visceral celebration of accomplishment?    Who cares.  Shift once, then again - speed quickly makes its appearance.  It appears as a loud, rushing wind and a visually striking, unnatural view of the surrounding scenery.  At some point, in the sane, it triggers a natural response - better slow down.    

He uncorked the headers, bought gasoline, dropped her in gear, tore off to the scene
Camaros and Mustangs, an old ‘55
Obediently lined-up, to get skinned alive!

Verse II (1st person)

I drove past the banner that said “Welcome race fans” took a new route, behind the grandstands
And through my chipped window, I thought I could see
Some of the racers were laughing at me

I guess rust and primer are not to their taste
But I put my bucks mister in the right place

I chugged/popped past cars that dealers had sold
Swung into a spot, next to something old

Emerging with interest from under his hood
My neighbor said two words, he said, “sounds good”

The Nova I parked next to was “classic rodding” in its outward appearance.  The much overused “primer paint job”.  The hood and front fenders a fiberglass clamshell, pinned affair.  Dice hanging from the mirror paid homage to days its driver never knew, but wished he had.  He removed them before he drove, always.

If you know how to peel the onion, secrets are revealed.  Wilwood brake calipers can be a dead giveaway. Someone needs serious stopping power - maybe.  Generally, owners who have sprung the bucks for this type gear let the calipers show off in bright red, to make a statement, and sometimes, these days, it’s just a fashion statement.  Expensive calipers, as eye candy, seem to be all the rage.  What is true, however, is very few guys spend big money on brakes only to render them inglorious and seemingly common with a shot of silver paint from a rattle can - and the owner of this half fiberglass racer that poses as a street car had done just that.  I'll glean two things from this observation. One, he needs those heavy brakes because he’s fast, and two, hiding them fits his style.  
Really, the message to be found in the silver paint, so cleverly applied to make your eyes simply slide across on their way to more interesting things, was “sleeper”.   And sleeper really means, he’s one of those guys with a score to settle - with everyone perhaps.   The list of “real parts” grew, if you knew where to look.  Looking was something I had unofficial permission to do since my rod was undergoing a similar scrutiny.  
“Stroked?”, I asked.  That’s something you can’t see from the outside. “ No”, my racer friend replied.  
“Hundred shot?”  (If engines have their language, so do the people who love them).   Despite the owner’s great efforts to conceal braided fuel and nitrous lines, electrical solenoids and switches, I spied his system.  The chunks of aluminum posing as ordinary spacers under his two Holly's were anything but.   “No”, was his one-word reply to my 100- shot question.  I tried again; “Your nitrous system is cleanly installed, how much are you spraying?”  “Two hundred fifty” in two stages, he said.  That’s more like it, I thought, and I then figured, he too had budgeted well for the machine shop – if not, he was gambling in a game that if lost, would soon fly parts in all directions.   Based on the overall neat work on display, I believed his build was up to the punishment planned. 
  I knew exactly what this tight-lipped guy was about, seeing someone very familiar in him as it were, and that made the “sounds good” complement I received upon my arrival all the more valuable.  I liked my neighbor.  And I liked the fact of our scratch-built rods having found each other - and I looked forward to us both dusting off the factory jobs.  It was going to be a good day.

The voice on the loudspeaker tells us we’re up.

Pre-staged, staged, then given the green
The line becomes blurred between man and machine

Bones become linkage
Muscle, spring
Fear, excitement

Time distorts ….
Color disappears …
Vision narrows…
Noise ---  becomes music
Speed, satisfaction

End

Ilion gray
poet extraordinary
is away
learning the codes hidden in raindrops

no reason for surprise;

for the mountains of Brooklyn, the Manhattan caverns of Sunhenge^, corridors of narrow focus for trapping the declining sun rays,

neither high enough, narrow blinding,
to keep a good man from doing good things that life provides as opportunities
to do the right thing

he muses that it took five years for the other poets to understand our
poem-dreams;
avant-garde he says,
but I laugh,
never felt more misunderstood
and reply take care, be
en garde!

no matter for he is learning a new language,
the codes hidden in raindrops in a land of wheat
once called Indian Territory and eager
await his return so we may
walk along the Brooklyn shoreline,
beginning from under the Brooklyn Bridge
where Washington’s men escaped a British trap

and he can decode for me the whispery thunderous noises of
NY
showers that come up so sudden,  so roughened, but right now,
the seductive sun blinks in Manhattan windowed towers reflecting back on to our East River as golden blinks of nature

We will walk lost in the absorption of our
different commonalities, holding the hands of
his young son, and my Wendy,
both of them equal in possession of round saucer eyes
that give us poems

He calls me me friend,
I call him brother, teacher, master, better than the best,
well recalling a late night message that bred
a five year conversation ongoing

not everything need be coded
what you read here
it is not coded,
for the raindrops come clear and clean
and the poems land on our tongues
bounce on the foreheads and eyes of the babes, all stored and saved for the future blessings spoken in a single tongue

7/18/18



^https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattanhenge

letter to elana

for the poet elana bell

~

in a different cafe,
on a Manhattan streetscape where once, years earlier,
violence was the purview of West Side Story gangs,
ruling their internecine non-intersectionality territorial blood lines supremely

nowadays, violence replaced by the frenetic
noises of Lincoln Center theater goers,
student dancers, actors, musicians and poets joining the throng
of those who sup and run,
all hearing their own frantic
curtain calling, saying, announcing,
music dance voices words require your obeisance,
needy for a mutual worshipping reassurance fiat that:

life can be made transcendent
if even for just 90 minutes or 120 pages,
or a 3 minute poem reading

this city of millions requires billions of poems that spoon stirred  
and yet, almost always fail, to squeeze, all of the human essence that is in its ultimate source, clarifying nyc tap water,
containing the storied remnants of a hackable continuous,
single human stanza cell osmosis - a blockchain like no other

two poets sit side by side each in their own lapsed dreams,
she, a published poet of prize and rank, ^
he, a rank amateur whose only prize is his unpublished anonymity,
poetry, is his just a nightly soul cleansing,
an imported remnant of his Marrano piyyutim ancestry

one turns to the other,
in the inexplicable daily crazy miracle
of city fashionistas

in a city where stealing a parking spot, or the
forced squeezing creation of a subway seat space
where physics proves none exists,
are oft the roots of slashing and stabbings faithfully reported
on the 11 o’clock news,  
and trust and/or other encouraging words
are seldom heard and even less demonstrated,
the make-no-eye-contact of Camus’s L’Etranger anomie is the
normative, paranormal, paralysis cloak of we city separatists

“Can you watch over my electronics and stuff?”

Sure says the grayed and grizzled,
an all life long veteran of nyc,
judged to be trustworthy
based on a few seconds of being upsized and downsized,
a car wash (exterior only) perusal
despite a
“no direction home, like a compete unknown, a rolling stone,”  
this signage, yellow star permanently chest-affixed,
conveniently ignored, as it seems impossible
thieves don’t look like me,
don’t likely in their possess,
a distinguished head of gray hair (yeah, sure)

a thank you reward of (or did I imagine it) a lean-in,
a momentary head on a shoulder,
the chit chat now grows earned and earnest,
she confesses her cardinal poetry profession,
eliciting an ‘Oh Boy’ utterance from the poet
of a thousand names
and a thousand textual emendations

a fastidious nyc boundary is brief crossed for one short meal,
till the end when time sensitized IMRL intrudes and
the showtime calls out,
if not now, when? if not me, then who?

I read her poetry later in the praying supine first position of
three AM, and laugh with delight, at the contrast and no compare,
the styles clash and tho the stories told
are both writ in the aleph bet script,
there ends the Ven diagram overlap and
into the night’s coming of a Elvisian blue suede coverlet,
we both disappear, and if not for this recording,
history says, you old man confused, never happened,
just an imaginary poetry ink blot dream breaching...

~

postface:
another poetry book is no longer homeless,
comes to shelter upon my shelf, close to Angelou, far from Whitman,
now all the book’s nooks eyes collectively
reassessing the new old-owner, parsing his syntax,
undecided if his readership is worthy of them,
concluding that all these books are the
man’s owned roughened stones,
to be placed by human hands on the
serpentine curvature of his literary tombstone,
and until all stones fully read,
they all agree,
will they and he
be fully freed,
smoothing his legacy’s edges

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Infinity's Mirror by Nat Lipstadt

Two mirrors, set in opposition observe created notional blending,
a reflecting pool of bonding's of unglued, contrary compositions.
Mirror to mirror, his imagery, fuses to Sylvia's images, hers,
faintly recollected, now living face, face to face, with his past insurrections, alters his future visions.

From cold water lake she's drawn, impaled by refracting regrets,
retrieved, drawing her words upon him, an awakening slap to drink,
beloved, tragic magic, infinitely captive.  But this old man's tiddlywinks, land-locked words, blunted instruments, needy for release & salvation, are neither silvered or exacting, just stains on a dulled, tarnished brass spittoon, except for the brunt'd bunting of lines across his roughened terrain'd face, black and white, pen and ink etched illustration of howling agitation.

His words worn down, hardened, red faced, purloined speckled pellets, damp to roll on down her rutted, almost ancient, tear streak paths, disbelieved superstitions, sacrificed for one of her living morsels of words.

Man, here to her, pledges allegiance, audaciously defiling her poetic sanctity, a visage endless repeated, delivers her shiny poem-poised countenance, even though no forgiveness from time can a mirror afford for either, from her words,  confession born, terrible truths beyond, beyond the finite.

                                                
~~~~~~~­~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mirror by Sylvia Plath

I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
What ever you see I swallow immediately
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.
I am not cruel, only truthful---
The eye of a little god, four-cornered.
Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.
It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long
I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers.
Faces and darkness separate us over and over.
Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,
Searching my reaches for what she really is.
Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.
I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.
She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.
I am important to her. She comes and goes.
Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.
In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman
Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.

The
             curves
                      of
          my
body
laid with oblivion;
We didn't love
with the same intentions.

The softness of my
skin roughened;
Your touch lacked
admiration.

The whisper of my
voice grew volume;
His voice lost consolation.

       But Please,

Acknowledge me,
Even if I become
any less beautiful,

      today.

In a strange mood - see/write art



in a strange way, disorganized but straight on,
light tinted magenta, issuing, in frothy large pours, from my mouth,
knowing what to say, and the meaning too,
I can more than walk, can write, on water,
where all can read weeping, Mary-miracles of seeing, living words,
themselves, on light waves lapping in a
shifting rotunda vision, color reorienting spatial senses.^

in a strange, strange stitch, seasonal spirits and witches,
Chagall, Baez, Dylan Thomas, Donovan, Richie Havens
doing their knitting in my brain, from Montmartre to the Midwest to Monterey,
painters and poets in lockstep head-messing with me,
imperfect clarity but still one voice,
see/write art,
so went and caught the wind, going gently into night
to banish the hodgepodge of uncertainty from inside out.

knowing well you don't understand fully, but jumbling tumbling
verses are sliding off my rusted tongue as fiddlers fly above,
roughened words, hewn from a paper cup, spilling diamonds uncut, imported from Sarajevo, Montparnasse, the Lower East Side.
wretched me, in the hour I first believed, this amalgamated conception conceded,
seceded from my mind into your palate for a tasting,
tho neither drugged, nor deaf and dumb, just slammed poetical-like, this write is
all I have to portend is your affections, your attentions, to yours, am beholden.

a *****, well respected man in daylight,
the hidden references accuse,
woke up to see Wednes-day Caesarian born,
askance glanced at the prior passages of the night before,
when my palate clefted,
when eyes chose not to distinguish
between right and lefted,
in the nightlight,
a ***** man disrespects language convection/convention,
and lays before you activating stanzas and his mind, prone,
but always the truth, speaking,
the visions, leaking, mind to eye,
recombinant, into our minds eye.




^ http://www.guggenheim.org/new-york/exhibitions/on-view/james-turrell


Rather than write extensive notes on the many references, inspirations in this poem, if there is a line that intrigues, ask me

One day these hills will be all we have left.
The thickened pines and needle laden tracks
That rise to summits formed of smooth and serrated granite;
One day I will raise my eyes to these peaks
And see in them the only
Faces of familiarity I can find.
Life is like that.
Everything changes.
The ones we love the most leave
Empty hollows like abandoned
Caverns above the falls,
And darkness spreads where light’s erased
In the the narrow crevices of time.  

One day I will be an old soul, alone in a wicker chair,
Looking to the reddened sky behind the peaks;
Faces I have loved streaming by
And lifting to the wind
That shakes the leaves all the way to the spires of
The ever-constant hills.
They have watched generations rise and fall,
And how I love you like a fire
Burning in the fragile spaces
Between the roughened cliffs
That encroach upon us all.

Last night I dreamed of roughened hands,
And pristine walls with spackled sand,
And feeling less,
But wanting more,
Of windows open,
And a creaking door.

Last night I dreamed of voices mild,
And smiling faces, and laughter loud,
I dreamed of grackles in parkling lots,
Of finding familiar and imagining what.

I dreamed of witchcraft and of lore,
And linen hidden in a dresser drawer.

I dreamed of you,
I dreamed of you,
And all the things I'd like to do.

Composing Hallelujah

Fractious lines crack,
holiday decorate the spirit inferior,
while each note upon the priest's guitar
penetrates the aspirin roughened interior,
face slaps me, daggers and accuses,
you're not composing hallelujah.

So I mislead, big deal,
composing the anti-hallelujah,
yeah, I was ******* with you,
as you sit across from me electronically
pretending, me to you, you to me.

Lie to each other with smiling faces,
you too have reaped,
been emotionally *****,
by what our minds see and sow,
scowls and howls,
we've both grown our own demons.

My secrets, maybe are all there,
maybe, writ loud and clear,
in the songs I choose to share,
and in the unrevealed ones,
buried alive, held in reserve,
but not, for your average, rainy day,
could be today, you have no say.

Are we not all veterans of a kind,
don't we all have ribbons on our chest,
stripes and stars on our khaki blouse,
a record of our own great campaigns,
including the war to end all wars,
the never ending one,
the one the ******-historians renamed,
"The 24/7 Year Conflagration"?

It used to be just my secret, no more
don't need a cartoonist to tell me that's
the enemy is us, and there are moles, traitors,
hidden deep in our intelligence organization,
planting seeds, urges, pushing to
out the identity of our communist friend,

Depression

I don't mean the ordinary, garden variety,
a mere moody blues recession,
when funk is sourced from gray clouds,
served up proper, cold and wet,
then travels on when sun warmth
clarifies temporarily, the aspirin kicking in.

So I misled,
composing the anti-hallelujah,
yeah, I was ******* with you,
sit across from me and lie to me,
lie to each other with smiling faces
we reap what we own,
scowls and howls.

A chorus of harmonious poseurs
inside your own City Center,
vocalize the lyrics of the anti-hallelujah,
a composition of questions directed at
whomever in tonight's audience deserves it,
asking, nerving, to sing too loud, at decibel speed:

Are these verses, curses
about D,
our mutual acquaintance,
or just research notes for further followup,
part two of a pas de deux, and,
did you go this time, too far,
or still not far enough?

-

life is our poetic reality,
you are the best ever
metaphor,
the one poets
keep stealing from
each other,
at the intersection
of our eyes crossing

your disruptive crying poetry,
bring to me in NYC,
and I'll take you to
poetry slams,
tango parties, a real Chinatown,
blow smoke up your nose,
Waltz step on your toes,
drink with you
in Central Park at five am,
visit half a dozen museums,
take you to the ballet,
and then you can maybe,
cross a few to-do's
off of our mutual
intersections

care taken,
if you want hide deep,
but to late for thee and our world,
your name on the roster
of poets by night,
tinkers, soldiers,
and some who tailor
poems bespoke
for the ones who
dare not reveal their true (s)elves
in the words they write.

1431
poems in ye old inbox,
genteel knocking,
whispering thru stolid front door
love me a little lot,
little lot, love me?

these are the holy-of-the-holies
attention-me-crystal-cries,
prayers, wry observations, nature collations,
me and thee adorations,
heart rendering
screams of need,
these are the moments in your life
raw-roughened gifted
or threaded smooth cursed,
but tendered unto my caring

am old man.
my poetic voice is just
memories that are
repetitive lies and lines.

speak in simple sentences declarative.
this is nature's way.

darkness approaching is indeed my
au courant poem, mon actuellement.

I have seen betterdays

ain't young enough to be afraid no more
write what pleases me.

this day leases me
what pleases me
and this is as close as I can come
to being human
and writing my flawless poem.

Anything I can do to keep you,
happy and poetry-free
from midnight
till the **** crows
and slumber trumps
the restless words
that will wait
till mo(u)rning born,
and the kingdom of poetry,
awoken,
comes alive

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

long have I searched for my
flawless poem,
knowing it my be
my next one,
each a doorway to the next

this one, and the
one before,
never good enough,
keep the essay going
in fourth gear

I taste skin,
like a good poem,
the cheek, the shoulder bare,
the in between spaces,
the minty hint of décolleté,
the ankle chain,
turning my breath heated,
tips of red noses,
I take and
I keep
and no,
no refunds, no returns

nowadays,
grandpa's tools
outdated, shelved,
in their final
resting place,
blades dulled,
the technology
of his verbiage,
rusted by old age

the reads diminishing,
his touch, antiquated,
his best days, resting on top of
the ocean internet waves
his summertime buddies,
sand sun grass and
sea air perfumes,
singing,
"awe, we got ya,
cosy and comforted,
awaiting you in your chair,
overlooking our truest
sheltered applause"

so I write for me,
write for her,
for with her,
in love's sight,
life is
easy like Sunday morning,
and
that's why I'm easy,
like Sunday morning

wake up unscrubbed,
sleep still in the eyes,
dream crusted,
probably unaware, child,
that you are a poem
sleeping

when a little girl,
reverting, designing
real from dreams,
processing, reforming,
the dreams lusting
to be poems
to go awandering

don't
let the sin memories
of ancient words,
black gold bubble up
with the first striking of the blade

Delve
(excavate your soul deep)
Not

I did not come this poem to write
I did not come to repeat
Solomon's poem,
nothing new under the sun

don't,
daunting
wish to delve into my delusions,
my original sin
the deceit
the conceit
I am unique
I am original

*Experience anew,
Each time,
Say:
This is my first time,
This is my first work

I do not need your validation.
I validate myself
and in doing so,
who else
comes along
for the ride
on our tide?

create with no shame
create with no measuring stick
only this:
everything that is done well
                           is good art

Be Fertile and Radiate

I've been cracking my knuckles since I was six,
but back then my bones were still practically cartilage.

My mother could only make me stop during dinner.
Her brass voice echoed through the house,
like the trumpets in a marching band on the Fourth of July.
(Although not as patriotic.)

My mother didn't know about all the times I cracked
my knuckles when I was by myself.

Sweet sixteen and the joints between my fingers still
crunched secretly under my skin and between
what was now developed into hard white bone.

I've only broken one bone in my entire life.

It was my nose during my homecoming soccer game,
senior year, under the lights and across the street
from the stone-cold brick building that housed
my Catholic education.

Soccer ***** have hit my stomach and my chest countless times,
leaving hexagonal imprints in scratchy blotches of red
over an empty envelope of acid and oxygen.

This time it hit me and I fell to the cold and frozen dirt,
my jersey conforming to the brown-green of roughened grass
and the blood from my nose providing contrast
and complement all at once.

Someone picked me up and I became conscious and self-conscious
that someone’s hands could touch my skin and
that someone’s hands could feel my body.

My hands hung off the sides of the stretcher I didn't need
(I thought it was crazy, all this fuss over a broken nose)
and they swung as I was carried, bringing blood
to my knuckles so that they could swell and expand.

My mother tripped over her questions
when she asked if I could
breathe or eat or speak or if my choking was cause for concern.

“B-b-baby don’t d-d-die,
I m-m-made rice and b-beans.
B-b-baby don’t d-d-die,
I m-m-made your f-f-f-f-favorite.”

You tied me in a robe and stuck a tube down my throat.
B-b-baby don’t d-d-die,
it’s your f-f-favorite.

There is a new roof fitting itself to the sky,
sea-roughened and grey as the vast paving
I dropped teeth on as a child, lightheaded

and living faster. Outside, a steep hill drops sweet
like the dip of a spoon, and in this life I see
my own reflection. It may come from narcissism.

It may come from gut. But its momentum is trapped,
a statue on one foot, it asks to be uprooted. How can I
carve this future into something soft and creaseless?

If I was an artist, I could catch its outstretch—
I would pull the army by the hand, out from the dark
intrusive damp, and ask it to stay.

On the line, a white sheet takes hard gulps of air.
I'm quick to learn its rhythm.
But in the morning it has lost its breath;
in the morning there is a small damp circle
under my cheek.

your roughened fingers,
black with the work of a man,
twist and roll a cigarette.
your eyes flick
from it to me
and as you light it, you
inhale that long first drag.
i smile and wait my turn.

It started at the beginning of adulthood
where the wandering into the new house
became a chore. The doorway greeted me
by snagging my woollen jumper.
The motorway was screaming, the battered gate happily hanging from its hinges.

His image first flashed into my sight,
And when I stared through the fogged up windows
I could still figure out his figure.
Loutish, he sauntered past
On a hillside, desolate.

He didn’t move for three hours.
He was most probably entwining the thorns from the bush
into his complex mind. Maybe
the boy with the thorn in his side
Had been brought to life by this mystery animal
With a mass of unkempt mane.
Unruly, unnecessary, untouched.

The notebook on my kitchen table lay untidily
waiting to be roughened up. I picked it up
and cast light over the paper.
I imagined him doing the same
But his art was thunderstorms
And mine merely a drizzle of rain.

I made progress
and the flowers were growing from my fountain pen.
Confidence developing, I invited him inside
And there were still no words from his unfathomable jaw.

A month later, we became one
and I still didn’t know where his intentions were lying.
I’m a girl afraid, does he even have any?

Ink *** after ink ***
I ran even further in this marathon of confusion.
I slowly slid from his dismissive grasp, his matted paws light
I had drawn graffiti over his portrait.
a permanent marker changed beauty into art.

I crept before his wake, into his sleep
And his lyricism lay imbibed in the walls, the desk, the door.
I felt the gale force energy cry inside
Which erupted like a volcano, turning remnants into ashes.
Face down, mane rough, scars bright, fur singed
Interior managed.

In the morning, I lifted his heavy paw away from me
And placed it peacefully beside him.

I see you as a burst of ocean mist
******
Into a nestled and worn monument.
Breathing over a humming terra nova
slowly etching away the noveau stone

You are the water tipping
about the crystals
of lone rock husk
freezing and seizing at precise locus

Then expanding about the form
Edging it to molecular capacity
before it heaves heavily - wedging

A simple puzzle lain right beside its obvious match.
The edges might be roughened
but you can tell they belong
They lay there beside one another
echoing curve and angle
of that which they once clung crystallized

Now they lay beside one another
braving the same storms - and shifts of land
but having different drops of rain fall
about their own dynamic crystallization
and different animals walking over them
and different blades of grass clinging densely
in the padded earth beneath them
brushing

Sometimes bridged together
by an animal astride the two
they are together once more
Over time they burnish into fragments
and dance about the creek beds
and about the base of grass beds
and again - though maybe temporarily,
are together again

And it's not a cry that you hear at night
It's not somebody who's seen the light
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah*
a cry you hear at night (my nighttime vocabulary), the same repertoire as the daytime residents, yelps and screeches, groans and screams, bleating whelps and yelps, grunts and curdling silent  low moans and pierced wails, crues du cœur, (cries from the heart)  but at night when these orchestral sounds are released without modification, freed from the governor of self-consciousness, the embarrassment of waking mirrored witnesses, atonalities as raw as a violin string snapping, the terrible sounds, twice as harsh as the scrape roughened roaring sound of the  hoarse word, raw, when spoken out loud but I count them all as friends, these then my nighttime vocabulary companions.

each deed, each sin, committed, lifelong repetition, dances in a chorus line, across my eyelashes, each demanding my punishment with a different matching sound; the reciprocal noises of the lives I shed, the lives I've taken, the forsaken forsakings, the blatant ones done with no excuse, no pretend rationale, these are my very own
songs of the night, conductor, musician, audience, one for all,
all for me, my torment of endless and relentless unforgiving sonality

And The Hungry Ocean Spoke:

sea the human modifier,
each wave,
a dance choreographed,
a fomented friction, a whitecap invitation,
dispelling man made fictions,
repititiously reminding to:

remember, ascertain, fail, try again,
to reckon the imprecise place
you occupy upon this Earth
and be ever wave grateful

you-man, speck sized,
suffer tenderly these unceasingly reminders,
provisions of stiff winds,
soft slaps of gusting humility
coming from a roughened atmosphere

perspective, not selective,
sea how much loss I have
eons stored for you-man

has time's tenure insufficient
to yet teach you-man,
to the one conclusion bring,
kindness towards a living thing,
is the life's solitary methodology
to survive upon our shared principality?

oh desperately,
this hungry ocean, inquires:

what advantage does
your kingdom of the shore provide,
upon both the soft soil and the hard boil water,
doth not life and death mutually coexist
beneath my watery bounds,
yet killing for pleasure
here has no measure,
unlike your cursed you-man
internecine interactions

you, man, every-one, and each
a cornerstone, an etched mark so slight,
footprint in the sand, a shifting, imperfect, yet lasting,
molecular impression for all time

all time,
till the next second, the next air lifting, the next wave,
our creator's begging method of commanding,
surrender your Babel Tower's mortal arrogance

I am not human, yet I am modified.

each wave an accusation.

Oh Orlando!

what have you-men become,
infinitesimal but universal,
sparking containers of miraculous
creation breathing,

what justifications
do your bloodied solutions
that be no answers, provide?

here you-man
come once more to my irregular edges,
to replenish regularly my stores.
with your unwanted salted tears,
the sullied bodies of thy children,
mourning deaths you have fostered

Oh Orlando!

weeping, weeping,
even as your pulse's fury speedth,
every dance must end,
for to time subservient,
even as time ever forwards,
living men must slow weaken...

live by the sea,
die by the sea,
come unto me only as,
unruined mortals,
worn only by happy ending of
molecular disintegration,
the sweetness of time's decay,
a recording completed,
your resolute dancing resolved

come unto me
only from deaths
which one cannot void
but come concluded peaceful

Oh Orlando!*

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Shakespeare­ Sonnet LXIV

When I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced
The rich proud cost of outworn buried age;
When sometime lofty towers I see down-razed,
And brass eternal slave to mortal rage;
When I have seen the hungry ocean gain
Advantage on the kingdom of the shore,
And the firm soil win of the watery main,
Increasing store with loss, and loss with store;
When I have seen such interchange of state,
Or state itself confounded to decay;
Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate
That Time will come and take my love away.
This thought is as a death which cannot choose
But weep to have that which it fears to lose.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Wild animals never **** for sport. Man is the only one to whom the torture and death of his fellow creatures is amusing in itself.” James Anthony Froude (British historian, 1818-1894)

~~~
June 12 ~ 18, 2016
Shelter Islamd

also inspired by Jessica Lang,
Choreographer

Fall away suddenly
--gasp no more;
sigh no more—
there is no need.
Into roughened hands fall indefinitely,
and dwell there infinitely,
for no other love
will match one as such.

All the roads, footpaths, and roughened trails of my beginnings
Lead me to the map of your heart, that long buried treasure.
I will trace words and phrases along the contours of your lips,
And glide cautiously across the footbridge of your wanting.
You will be stilled by the weight of my breath upon your brow,
And you will know love at a pace that awakens you to your own preciousness.

I know this girl.

It started off good. We were friends. I'd smile at her, and she'd smile back. It was simple. She would fascinate me. We'd touch fingertips, both having wide eyes and expressions of innocent amazement.

As I got older, I began to ignore her. I didn't seem to have time to see how she looked or what was going on. My life was busy, and I stopped caring.

But as I grew up, suddenly she was all that mattered. I'd seek her every chance I had. Before I went anywhere and after any adventure, I would always think of her, conspicuously glancing at the people around me to see if they had as well.

Time roughened and then came the crying. I couldn't bring myself to consider her. I'd turn her away. I couldn't bear to see her. When I was fine though, she was still all that mattered.

Sometime that year I began to insult her, calling her fat, and stupid, and many more maiming words. Most days the roles would slide between us. She would judge me as well, shaming my body and appearance, making sure I never felt comfortable in public. We hurt each other. We hurt ourselves.

I've always thought it would be simpler if she wasn't around. We have too much in common. I know how to perfectly shatter her. She points out all my flaws.

Sometime in my life though, I'm going to have to stop.

She shouldn't tell me that the outfits aren't acceptable. I shouldn't tell her that she won't ever be worth anything. We need to stop talking. We need to stop listening.

We need to be friends again.

Its hard having such a battle with your reflection. Mine is everywhere, haunting me. Sometimes she's beautiful. Sometimes I'd even say she's worth it. Sometimes I love her. Usually I don't. Usually all I see when I look at her is how much I've let myself down. Usually we aren't friends. Usually I don't even know this girl. Usually I hate her.

It's not good.

But I know this girl, and I know her strength. I know she how can overcome.  I know someday it will all be good.

I know this girl.

And we can do it.

Dearest,

All those days,
I let you tread over me and gave you a place to stand,
and you with your untrained, weak bladder dog,
your clumsiness,
your laziness,
your unwashed clothes,
your ***** shoes and smelly feet,
stepped on my trust.

I hope you get pricked by the scraps of food,
bleed out with a paper cut
and stumble on my torn out, roughened edges
and I get to smother and roll up your inanimate, dead body
to it's rightful place.

Ruefully, yours.

the hint of yellow
circling the pupils of your blue eyes
are like­ garden flowers on a window
by the eden on a front yard.
i guess ­they caught whatever was left
from the pallete spent on your gold­en hair

the blush of red in your cheeks
when your lips part in p­assion
is the color of the day surrendering into the night
lit up­ by a million tiny sparkles
and yes, the mole on your nose bridge­
rests like venus on a crescent moon.

the softness of your white­ skin
forms a blanket with warm pockets,
love escaping from my em­brace.
i hear your hands speak of strength
there are areas on it ­roughened by life
and soft spots that bring a vision
of a little ­girl playing hopscotch.
and when i rest my palm on yours
the worl­d is alright with me.

i am momentarily lost
tracking the rise an­d fall of your chest
somehow i could make out your heart
dancing ­in there, in double step
perfectly in synch with mine
i want to r­emember every line
every shade, every tone,
every rhythm that com­pose you
like an ancient god's little toy.

your breath becomes mine
like brooks into riv­ers into seas
you are upon me
like wildebeasts in stampede
the cr­ash of a mighty jungle waterfall
so many pictures flood my senses­
my mind convulsing in a frenzy
from a spark provoked by your fac­e

you are a  mine for my metaphors
and i just sit here, ready
my­ pen poised, my cup is eager
the smell of coffee rises up my vein­s
i let you come in,open my door
your touch is on my skin
your fo­otprints are all over my body
i cannot move a part of me
without ­moving the whole of us.

my ache to have you is unending
my devot­ion is timeless
our moment together too priceless
if i was put in­ this world to love you
and meant to die when that is done,
then beloved, 
i believe i will live forever.

this year is my year
i cut my teeth on the years before
i scraged my knees in '15
bled from my bitten tongue in ‘16
'17 saw me merciful and forgiving
and then loveless on the bathroom floor
sitting in bathtubs
my existence held
in the displacement of water in porcelain

this year is my year  
try and take it from my bloodied knuckles
take it from my hanging jaw
the years before chipped away at me
with chisel and work roughened hands
the years before cut me out of marble
carved my mouth closed
swathed me in veils, made my stone flesh
look soft

this year is my year
your chisels will blunt on my skin
and when you turn your back
to find something sharper
i'll slip down the stone steps
leave my veils on your studio chair
and melt out into the night

this year is my year
there’s no material thing keeping me
nothing mortal holds me here
this year i am free to drift
between the realms and rifts of space
i will be interstellar
hung in the place between stars

this year is my year
******* try to take it from me
i wonder if the years before
made you into diamonds too
the only thing that can cut me now
is me.

Once upon a time... not too long ago
You told me that you loved me and that you would go and help me grow
I was but a block of wood, you carved delicately
Creating me into a doll ever so elegantly
Painting precise intricate details eloquently
Doe eyes, rosy cheeks, sun-kissed lips; your compassion showed evidently
Sunrise after sundown, my love grew for you genuinely
Months had passed, and seasons followed
Blissful memories, euphoric moments, fleeting hours; borrowed
Left with a barren soul, bone dried driftwood, abandoned; hollowed
Your neglected Marionette, once glowed, now dull with dust
Loveless wooden puppet fading, metal joints rust
Instead of adoration reflected in painted eyes, it’s now mistrust
Yet still bound to you by more than just these strings and rings
I’m chained to you, but not by mere material things
I would have done anything with just a twist of your wrist because you used to adore me
Marionette and her Manipulator; a Stockholm Syndrome-like love story
A classic literary tale that’s lost all its profound romantic glory
A Puppeteer wrenching till I’m dangling upon severed wires
Strung along filthy pavements, dropped into grimy potholes; I’m tired
Blood sweat and tears, love became my biggest fear
When I needed and longed for you; you’d not appear
Every single emotion to the smallest detail; controlled
Each slight movement without exception foretold
A Ventriloquist voicing every word caught in my throat
Your time of day to me you once did devote
With roughened yet soft hands holding my body close
Crooked smile spreading upon lips as you gently tap my nose
Soothing fingers running through my hair; it was me you chose
Your passion drained out like the now dried bouquet of roses; romantic doses
An author of the finest of fictions; poems, and letters to me once composed
Now I hang in your hands upon limp worn out strings, ready to dispose
Time and actions have shown the truth behind your spoken words; exposed
And it blows air kisses of nothingness
And you know what I’m tired of this, Your High-Neglectfulness
What used to be a loving hand became a hateful rod
And you still think you’re some kind of god, but you’re just a facade
I’ve seen the way you caress those other dolls; infidelity not discreet
Honeyed words slip off those lips, drip; a game you cheat
All tricks and no treat, candy wrapped lies that tasted too sweet
Deliciously virulent deception rolling off that tongue of yours
Bending to your wires have given me enough torturous sores
How I wish I had been created with wings instead of decaying strings
And the strife it brings like squeaky swings that just keep squeaking, creaking
A forsaken Marionette who’s every move was to please you
Trapped in this dollhouse zoo, with no appreciation in view
So then I’ll sing, I’ve got no strings to hold me down
To force my smile and push me to the ground
I had strings, but I said no more
I cut these strings and stepped out the door
You’re no longer my master, nor my sky
I’ll fly without you and my oh my
More so than Pinnochio I cannot tell a lie
Even my wooden wings can fly

Fumbling fingers yearning for connection,
Reach out through negative space,
Crash headlong into rejection.
Curl back in defeat,
Clenched fist to deflect,
Fiery agony of regret.

An empty, disparaging inflection
Cut from a hot pink tongue, flapping
Dispassionately disproves theory of interconnection,
Maybe myth, fable, love story --
Or maybe lack of detection,
From calloused palms,
Roughened with each ingestion
Of honey suckle poison.

Was this the original intention?
Or did the son choose to elect
Another hidden path, indirect.
This haze manifests crystalized predictions,
Of hands meeting thighs, meeting hips,
Pushing forward climactic introspection,
Or just another muddled reflection,
Of my endless projections,
Always  failing tests of retention,
Mind permanently trapped in suspension,
Of spiraling tension.

He stands mighty, glittering in the sunlight,
Majestic he seems, the tales do him no justice,
Forth from his lips come the sweetest voice,
“Is it not power and gold you seek,
Behind me in this cave treasure to shame the Aladdin tales,
So much lucre to color you pale,
All this is yours just for a favor I do gain,
Cadavers are all men so put them in their rightful place,
Spill their infidel blood and in God’s eyes be great”

In my mind I ponder,
Paradise lay a yonder,
From within me a still voice saves me from temptation’s fodder,
“Who are you to judge and point fingers?
Have your hands not reddened puddles,
Resist his lies for you have the treasure that all men need,
In you is great abundance,
For in that cave is a bottomless pit,
Where evil’s benefactors dwell in heat,
Therefore my dear boy resist.”

Now I know who stands before me,
His ugliness begins to sink in,
From him I turn triumphantly,
Deaf to temptation’s plea, he cannot stop me,
For he is powerless before men with roughened knees,
So from this fabled hill I descend,
Renewed and shocked by my ever present riches,
The real treasure has always been within me,
The power to love all men I see.

Laying under the weight of a pile of comforters, quilts and blankets,
Trying to make up for the lacking heat,
I notice the empty space beside me.
I can't help but imagine you pressed to my back,
Guitar roughened fingers on my skin,
Stubble strewn face brushing against mine to whisper secrets.
Your warm scent and warm eyes draw me in.

Why did I not notice it till now?
Why did I chase after another with you standing there?
Why did I let her hang on you, try to charm you, when I knew it should be me?

With the new year comes new chances,
And I am headed your way.

The Daily Prayer                               The Daily Prayer
AUG 2010                                            OCT  2017

Be forever young 'n humble;   seven yearlings of plenty famine;
Feel ancient and royal;              youthful graybeard commoner now,
Ride tall in the saddle;              old hoary, crooked headed ancien
Do something nifty;                   content to just, just walk crookedly

Take someone's hand                if they permit, for hands gnarled,
Unexpectedly:                             roughened and time toughened,
Drive home in the slow lane;   only the city bus, now bows, kneels,
Do the de minims;                      how has the minimalist become
Do the de maximis;                     the max, the best old-dog-in-show?
Leave a book on a park bench;  forgetfulness, unintended bonuses,
Use pen n paper, write a letter; the fingers shaky press cell button,
Take a chance, make people laugh; your appearance quite the joke,
Barrel into contention;                 a barrel casket, half your wardrobe
Show mercy to the confused, no arrogance, have mercy upon poets,
Show anger to the abusers. for they fear voices calling out, account!
Bless a child with both hands; now take their blessings returned
Grasp your soul; throw it down, others sidle, it's our time, now,
Then raise a child to the sky.       to raise you up father of fathers
Straight up,                                    straighten your time bents, curves,
Build a continuum,                       honor thy work ever continuing
You and they,                                 we, and you, we are all your steps,
              on a ladder of each poem, to guide us heavenward

*each poem a prayer, each prayer a poem, passing back, coming forth in the crests upon the beach and bay you so loved, the moon and sun both shine simultaneously while it rains straight,
                                    all come, each to recite,
even the One with whom you vociferous argued, unrepentantly,
all here, together placing that weighty last period at the end of
                                        your daily prayer.

Sturdy as the mighty oak, I withstood
drought, deluge, dishevelment, deliverance
my once vibrant leaves became crisp,
shattered, scattered, veins crumbled, crumpled
all that was left ... gnarled old roughened bark

revitalized, I am now trod, that old tree,
sawed, sanded, slatted, varnished  
to perfection, reflection of owner's pride,
care is given to keep me supple, strong ...
cover me not; let my beauty shine,
sparkle and please all who see me

In the vast oaken families of ancestors,
descendents, those yet to root, while
our beauty be ****** out of rich soil
to praise the God who created us
we joy in our present, treasure our past.

Roughened, haggard by circumstance,
Sleeps under the elements,
Struggles with the cold dance,
Praying, nightly, for warmer moments.