Look, stranger, at this island now
The leaping light for your delight discovers,
Stand stable here
And silent be,
That through the channels of the ear
May wander like a river
The swaying sound of the sea.

Here at the small field's ending pause
Where the chalk wall falls to the foam, and its tall ledges
Oppose the pluck
And knock of the tide,
And the shingle scrambles after the ****-
ing surf,
and the gull lodges
A moment on its sheer side.

Far off like floating seeds the ships
Diverge on urgent voluntary errands;
And the full view
Indeed may enter
And move in memory as now these clouds do,
That pass the harbour mirror
And all the summer through the water saunter.

Another seascape.

The occasional gull
glints in a cheerful sun
against a sky
not hungry for clouds.

Everything smells of salt;
there is sea-****
and companionable cliffs
while the backbone of distant mountains
is drowned in an azure haze.

I shield my eyes
against the glare
and see the lighthouse
far distant
stand *****
beside the sleeping sea
the tired strand
where seabirds wade
children play and
parents guard their
moves and makings
. . . at my feet
the detritus of time:
tide-gathered wood,
salt-stripped,
sea-stained yet
polished by restless
turn and tilt
of the absent moon.

in my homeland,
the fishermen widows
salt their hearts
and hang them to dry.

in my homeland,
they say there is a cliff
where the moon gives
birth to the ******

and where the wind
whispers and howls
until the sails
get lost in the far.

We’ve been walking on this journey for years now, and I’ve held your hand long enough to know that when I slip into quicksand or miss a step, it is not you who lets go. Your fingers aren’t the ones coated in doubt or in selfishness, gripping firmly only when it feels right, when it feels necessary. Your hands are not made of brittle bone, shivering and breaking when the cold starts to show. Teach me to never let go.

We’ve known plenty of good weather. Safe landings. Skies full of stars and days of endless wind. Scraped knees were never a problem, we always seemed to be in fields of yellow and green, surrounded by miles and miles of running streams. There were times when I would purposefully stumble, thinking that it would be okay, I’d land elbows first in the faces of dandelions anyway. Other times I’d stray, not because of greener grass, but because I was too caught up smelling that single flower to see that you were calling me to the next meadow, where petals of a sweeter smell and prettier colors stretch out like a seascape. Teach me to give up my little treasures and desires, for yours are far better.

Sometimes I get a little adventurous. I tell you I want mountains. I tell you I want to climb, that I want the strain and the adrenaline rush, the thrill of letting pieces of hardened sand and pebble carry my whole weight, the challenge, the sweat, the blood. I tell you I want to see things from the eyes of God. I tell you I want to struggle and overcome. I tell you I want the soul of a deer, to plant my feet firmly on the narrow heights, I tell you I’m alright but when I’m actually in the process of the climb, in the process of the waiting, wondering which rock do I grasp next, which path do I trust with my steps, I tell you I’m not ready for mountains after all. But you did not bring me here to watch me fall, so teach me. Teach me to keep my ankles strong, and my hold on you stronger.

And when we tire of mountains, you take me to oceans. You know how much I love the saltwater mysteries, how my heart sings when I get to feel clumps of wet sand beneath the soles of my feet. And you know how much I don’t know about the waters, you know that it’s hard for me to tell when an undercurrent comes sweeping like thousands of tiny *****, that I can’t spot the difference between high tide and low tide until the waves are lapping at my door, that I still swim after jellyfish no matter how many times I’ve been stung, and how I forget that not every beautiful thing has beautiful intentions, and especially how oceans also terrify the breath out of me. One of my deepest fears is to die drowning, but still you row us out in a weathered boat into the middle of the sea, no life vests or whistles, nothing. We’ve had calm waters and dolphin mornings, we’ve had rough rowing and storms brewing, and each time you managed to put the thundering and rumbling in my chest to rest, and each and every time you’ve gotten us back to shore. But honestly, there are days I want to jump ship, sail my own boat, find my own sea, and some days I do. Those days I lose my way, those days I’m half drowned, but I turn around and find you there. Teach me to trust the one whose voice the waves and wind know.

Now here we are in a different kind of sea, the kind without water. This pit is abundant in ***** yellow devils, illusions and false promises, but all I have are questions and weary feet. Why are we here? Where are we going? Why did we leave? How am I going to shake off this mirage? When is it going to rain? After all we've been through, this is where you're taking me?

My path is an endless circle, a cycle using my sight, my heart, my feelings, my stocked up wisdom to judge my situation and I come to the conclusion that you have deserted me. But you haven't. And I don't understand how you stuck with me through hills and valleys, and never once thought of leaving, but you haven't. Your shadow is cast on me and peace overflows. Maybe I've been asking the wrong questions. Maybe instead of asking you where the stretch of sand ends, I should be asking you to teach me.

Teach me to love you in every season, whether it be the harshest of winters or the wildest of heats. Teach me to understand that deserts make me thirst for water, that I need to be lost so that I may be found, that without a battle there is no victory, that seeds die before they grow into trees. But before anything else, teach me to let the sound of your voice to be what guides me through winding paths and roaring winds, not which road looks smooth or which sky looks dim.

We've been walking on this journey for years now, and I've held your hand long enough to know that all this time you have been teaching me to fall in love with my eyes closed.

Each sorrow is the child of a happiness
you thought would never end;
Every happiness is a sadness
I may not survive—
a brilliant October day
lying back in dock hammock suspended
quoting bits of Rilke and starlight anthems
the shadows cast by buildings and frogs
ink drawings made on August nights
by our beautiful chain-smoking artistette
admiring a giant spider friend who’d
spun her majestic web and vanished
while we were swimming
backdrop of bay and boys and cherries
creaky boardwalks under bare feet
and stickiest pine and sand darkness
photos over wing clouds below
creepy call to prayer from ancient Mosque
at twilight punctuating strange dreams
perfect reconciliation on hotel balcony
McDonald’s after soaring from Black Sea
to Bosporus Straight, edge of Asia
visible on the horizon and all of life
a nightmare from which I can’t get woke
terrorized by ***** donor bonesaws
homophobic maternal afternoon rejection
peace that passeth no understanding
when you’re a ******* genius or just
a few points lower sorry never enough
compassion leaking through pores
drawn out by steam more darkness
Eucalyptus perfumed
another flaccid experience on a stranger’s
bed recalling Hippocrates on the drive
away after more bad ***
shots of sauces and grilled roasted
poached lentils bespoke chickens finery
malodorous wafts limestone smoothed
by centuries of acidity oily tourist touches
but they’re in Mexico Australia India
we’re back at home twins calling
each day an error of time rounded off
the incorrigible quark refusing
to cooperate with Einstein choosing its
own entangled path and lighting fools
what beautiful skyline
what amazing celebrity capture
what nostalgic group assemblage
what **** cute puppy who’s no more pup
what swanky tailored look
what smiles what smiles what seriousness
the soft and supple features curves lines
practiced looks and wayward hairs
a simple flourishing according to the lens
so much that skin conceals and eyes
beer garden sidewalk orations
wedding after party for April fools
we were who dance grabbing rings
swinging wildly discussing the vulgarities
of gastronomy and digestion
tumbling into diners midnight offices
brick lined streets magical talks
demonstrations and ideas unbounded
carving pumpkins into likable politicians
we think are statesmen and wailing
when she loses winning a trophy case
buckling under weight of moral victory
the thought of skyscrapers lit
shining under heaven unsubtle insinuation
we’re better than all this nonsense
and stronger having raised this glass
and steel by our own hands, our parents
rather now maybe that’s confusion
erecting higher stairwells to escape
encroaching seas and bums below
all memory all happy every laugh
each rumination on the hours
kisses cocktails cuddles laughter
that perfect vest completed outfit
those thrift store jeans that shirt
that secondhand one speed bike
those lunches with the priest
those brunches with the students
those happy hours with the coworkers
those dinners with the beard
all interchangeable parts in show
theater of recollection one subway car
one taxi ride one bus to NY or DC
one flight to Seattle or Vegas
or some Floridian seascape, mansion
each cog or bit like paper currency
imbued with no value but buying
the totality of lived experience
from which to draw upon in sad elsewhere
—but they cut deep, well meaning though
whenever was now isn’t and can is blind
to what day will ever be when I can say
in truth now sadness isn’t.

For those among us who lived by the rules,
Lived frugal lives of *****-scratching desperation;
For those who sustained a zombie-like state for 30 or 40 years,
For these few, our lucky few—
We bequeath an interactive Life-Alert emergency dog tag,
Or better still a dog, a colossal pet beast,
A humongous Harlequin Dane to feed,
For that matter, why not buy a few new cars before you die?
Your home mortgage is, after all, dead and buried.
We gave you senior-citizen rates for water, gas & electricity—
“The Big 3,” as they are known in certain Gasoline Alley-retro
Neighborhoods among us,
Our parishes and boroughs.
All this and more, had you lived small,
Had you played by the rules for Smurfs & Serfs.

We leave you the chance to treat your grandkids
Like Santa’s A-List clientele,
“Good ‘ol Grampa,” they’ll recollect fondly,
“Sweet Grammy Strunzo, they will sigh.
What more could you want in retirement?

You’ve enabled another generation of deadbeat grandparents,
And now you’re next in line for the ice floe,
To be taken away while still alive,
Still hunched over and wheezing,
On a midnight sleigh ride,
Your son, pulling the proverbial Eskimo sled,
Down to some random Arctic shore,
Placing you gently on the ice floe.
Your son; your boy--
A true chip off the igloo, so to speak.
He leaves you on the ice floe,
Remembering not to leave the sled,
The proverbial Sled of Abbandono,
The one never left behind,
As it would be needed again,
Why not a home in storage while we wait?
The family will surely need it sometime down the line.

A dignified death?
Who can afford one these days?
The question answers itself:
You are John Goodman in “The Big Lebowski.”
You opt for an empty 2-lb can of Folgers.
You know: "The best part of waking up, is Folger's in your cup!"
That useless mnemonic taught us by “Mad Men.”
Slogans and theme songs imbibe us.

Zombie accouterments,
Provided by America’s Ruling Class.
Thank you Lewis H. Lapham for giving it to us straight.
Why not go with the aluminum Folgers can?
Rather than spend the $300.00 that mook funeral director
Tries to shame you into coughing up,
For the economy-class “Legacy Urn.”
An old seduction:  Madison Avenue’s Gift of Shame.
Does your **** smell?” asks a sultry voice,
Igniting a carpet bomb across the 20-45 female cohort,
2 billion pathetically insecure women,
Spending collectively $10 billion each year—
Still a lot of money, unless it’s a 2013
Variation on an early 1930s Germany theme;
The future we’ve created;
The future we deserve.

Now a wheelbarrow load of paper currency,
Scarcely buy a loaf of bread.
Even if you’re lucky enough to make it,
Back to your cave alive,
After shopping to survive.
Women spend $10 billion a year for worry-free *****.
I don’t read The Wall Street Journal either,
But I’m pretty **** sure,
That “The Feminine Hygiene Division”
Continues to hold a corner office, at
Fear of Shame Corporate Headquarters.
Eventually, FDS will go the way of the weekly ******.
Meanwhile, in God & vaginal deodorant we trust,
Something you buy just to make sure,
Just in case the *** Gods send you a gift.
Some 30-year old **** buddy,
Some linguistically gifted man or woman,
Some he or she who actually enjoys eating your junk:
“Oh Woman, thy name is frailty.”
“Oh Man, thou art a Woman.”
“Oh Art is for Carney in “Harry & Tonto,”
Popping the question: “Dignity in Old Age?”
Will it too, go the way of the weekly ******?
It is pointless to speculate.
Mouthwash--Roll-on antiperspirants--Depends.
Things our primitive ancestors did without,
Playing it safe on the dry savannah,
Where the last 3 drops evaporate in an instant,
Rather than go down your pants,
No matter how much you wiggle & dance.
Think about it!

Think cemeteries, my Geezer friends.
Of course, your first thought is
How nice it would be, laid to rest
In the Poets’ Corner at Westminster Abbey.
Born a ******. Died a ******. Laid in the grave?
Or Père Lachaise,
Within a stone’s throw of Jim Morrison--
Lying impudently,
Embraced, held close by loving soil,
Caressed, held close by a Jack Daniels-laced mud pie.
Or, with Ulysses S. Grant, giving new life to the quandary:
Who else is buried in the freaking tomb?
Bury my heart with Abraham in Springfield.
Enshrine my body in the Taj Mahal,
Build for me a pyramid, says Busta Cheops.

Something simple, perhaps, like yourself.
Or, like our old partner in crime:
Lee Harvey, in death, achieving the soul of brevity,
Like Cher and Madonna a one-name celebrity,
A simple yet obscure grave stone carving:  OSWALD.
Perhaps a burial at sea? All the old salts like to go there.
Your corpse wrapped in white duct/duck tape,
Still frozen after months of West Pac naval maneuvers,
The CO complying with the Department of the Navy Operations Manual,
Offering this service on « An operations-permitting basis, »
About as much latitude given any would-be Ahab,
Shortlisted for Command-at-sea.
So your body is literally frozen stiff,
Frozen solid for six months packed,
Spooned between 50-lb sacks of green beans & carrots.
Deep down in the deep freeze,
Within the Deep Freeze :
The ship’s storekeeper has a cryogenic *******
Deep down in his private sanctuary,
Privacy in the bowels of the ship.
While up on deck you slide smoothly down the pine plank,
Old Glory billowing in the sea breeze,
Emptying you out into the great abyss of
Some random forlorn ocean.

Perhaps you are a ******* lunatic?
Maybe you likee—Shut the **** up, Queequeg !
Perhaps you want a variation on the burial-at-sea option ?
Here’s mine, as presently set down in print,
Lawyer-prepared, notarized and filed at the Court of the Grand Vizier,
Copies of same in safe deposit boxes,
One of many benefits Chase offers free to disabled Vets,
Demonstrating, again, my zombie-like allegiance to the rules.
But I digress.
« The true measure of one’s life »
Said most often by those we leave behind,
Is the wealth—if any—we leave behind.
The fact that we cling to bank accounts,
Bank safe deposit boxes,
Legal aide & real estate,
Insurance, and/or cash . . .
Just emphasizes the foregone conclusion,
For those who followed the rules.
Those of us living frugally,
Sustaining the zombie trance all these years.
You can jazz it up—go ahead, call it your « Work Ethic. »
But you might want to hesitate before you celebrate
Your unimpeachable character & patriotism.

What is the root of Max Weber’s WORK ETHIC concept?
‘Tis one’s grossly misplaced, misguided, & misspent neurosis.
Unmasked, shown vulnerably pink & naked, at last.
Truth is: The harder we work, the more we lay bare
The Third World Hunger in our souls.
But again, I digress.  Variation on a Theme :
At death my body is quick-frozen.
Then dismembered, then ground down
To the consistency of water-injected hamburger,
Meat further frozen and Fedex-ed to San Diego,
Home of our beloved Pacific Fleet.
Stowed in a floating Deep Freeze where glazed storekeepers
Sate the lecherous Commissary Officer,
Aboard some soon-to-be underway—
Underway: The Only Way
Echo the Old Salts, a moribund Greek Chorus
Goofing still on the burial-at-sea concept.

Underway to that sacred specific spot,
Let's call it The Golden Shellback,
Where the Equator intersects,
Crosses perpendicular,
The International Dateline,
Where my defrosted corpse nuggets,
Are now sprinkled over the sea,
While Ray Charles sings his snarky
Child Support & Alimony
His voice blasting out the 1MC,
She’s eating steak.  I’m eating baloney.
Ray is the voice of disgruntlement,
Palpable and snide in the trade winds,
Perhaps the lost chord everyone has been looking for:
Laughing till we cry at ourselves,
Our small corpse kernels, chum for sharks.

In a nutshell—being the crazy *******’ve come to love-
Chop me up and feed me to the Orcas,
Just do it ! NIKE!
That’s right, a $commercial right in the middle of a ******* poem!
Do it where the Equator crosses the Dateline :
A sailors’ sacred vortex: isn’t it ?
Wouldn’t you say, Shipmates, one and all?
I’m talking Conrad’s Marlow, here, man!
Call me Ishmael or Queequeg.
Thor Heyerdahl or Tristan Jones,
Bogart’s Queeq & Ensign Pulver,
Wayward sailors, one and all.
And me, of course, aboard the one ride I could not miss,
Even if it means my Amusement Park pass expires.
Ceremony at sea ?
Absolutely vital, I suppose,
Given the monotony and routine,
Of the ship’s relentlessly vacant seascape.
« There is nothing so desperately monotonous as the sea,
And I no longer wonder at the cruelty of pirates. «
So said James Russell Lowell,
One of the so-called Fireside Poets,
With Longfellow and Bryant,
Whittier, the Quaker and Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.,
19th Century American hipsters, one and all.

Then there’s CREMATION,
A low-cost option unavailable to practicing Jews.
« Ashes to ashes »  remains its simplest definition.
LOW-COST remains its operant phrase & universal appeal.
No Deed to a 2by6by6 foot plot of real estate,
Paid for in advance for perpetuity—
Although I suggest reading the fine print—
Our grass--once maintained by Japanese gardeners--
Now a lost art in Southern California,
Now that little Tokyo's finest no longer
Cut, edge & manicure, transform our lawns
Into a Bonsai ornamental wonderland.
Today illegal/legal Mexicans employing
More of a subtropical slash & burn technique.

Cremation : no chunk of marble,
No sandstone, wood or cardboard marker,
Plus the cost of engraving and site installation.
Quoth the children: "****, you’re talking $30K to
Put the old ****** in the ground? Cheap **** never
Gave me $30K for college, let alone a house down payment.
What’s my low-cost, legitimate disposal going to run me?"

CREMATION : they burn your corpse in Auschwitz ovens.
You are reduced to a few pounds of cigar ash.
Now the funeral industry catches you with your **** out.
You must (1) pay to have your ashes stored,
Or (2) take them away in a gilded crate that,
Again, you must pay for.
So you slide into Walter Sobjak,
The Dude’s principal amigo,
And bowling partner in the
Brothers Coen masterpiece: The Big Lebowski.
You head to the nearest Safeway for a 2-lb can of Folgers.
And while we’re on the subject of cremation & the Jews,
Think for a moment on the horror of The Holocaust:
Dispossessed & utterly destroyed, one last indignity:
Corpses disposed of by cremation,
For Jews, an utterly unacceptable burial rite.
Now before we leave Mr. Sobjak,
Who is, as you know, a deeply disturbed Vietnam vet,
Who settles bowling alley protocol disputations,
By brandishing, by threatening the weak-minded,
With a loaded piece, the same piece John Turturro—
Stealing the movie as usual, this time as Jesus Quintana—
Bragging how he will stick it up Walter’s culo,
Pulling the trigger until it goes: Click-Click-Click!
Terrestrial burial or cremation?
For me:  Burial at Sea:
Slice me, dice me into shark food.

Or maybe something a la Werner von Braun:
Your dead meat shot out into space;
A personal space probe & voyager,
A trajectory of one’s own choosing?

Oh hell, why not skip right down to the nitty gritty bottom line?
Current technology: to wit, your entire life record,
Your body and history digitized & downloaded
To a Zip Drive the size of the average *******,
A data disc then Fedex-ed anywhere in the galaxy,
Including exotic burial alternatives,
Like some Martian Kilimanjaro,
Where the tiger stalks above the clouds,
Nary a one with a freaking clue that can explain
Just what the cat was doing up so high in the first place.
Or, better still, inside a Sherpa’s ***** pack,
A pocket imbued with the same Yak dung,
Tenzing Norgay massages daily into his *******,
Defending the Free World against Communism & crotch rot.
(Forgive me: I am a child of the Cold War.)
Why not? Your life & death moments
Zapped into a Zip Drive, bytes and bits,
Submicroscopic and sublime.
So easy to delete, should your genetic subgroup
Be targeted for elimination.
About now you begin to realize that
A two-pound aluminum Folgers can
Is not such a bad idea.
No matter; the future is unpersons,
The Ministry of Information will in charge.
The People of Fort Meade--those wacky surveillance folks--
Cloistered in the rolling hills of Anne Arundel County.
That’s who will be calling the shots,
Picking the spots from now on.
Welcome to Cyber Command.
Say hello to Big Brother.
Say “GOOD-BYE PRIVACY.”

Meanwhile, you’re spending most of your time
Fretting ‘bout your last rites--if any—
Burial plots on land and sea, & other options,
Such as whether or not to go with the
Concrete outer casket,
Whether or not you prefer a Joe Cocker,
Leon Russell or Ray Charles 3-D hologram
Singing at your memorial service.
While I am fish food for the Golden Shellbacks,
I am a fine young son of Neptune,
We are Old Salts, one and all,
Buried or burned or shot into space odysseys,
Or digitized on a data disc the size of
An average human *******.
Snap outta it, Einstein!
Like everyone else,
You’ve been fooled again.

Elusive moon beckons dark currents,
     sand's sparkling pageantry  
             drifts out midst frothing tide,
submerging lover's imprints 'neath
     the realm of alluring seascape illusions

Tonight our breaths
move the sea...toward the shore
...away from you ---  
warms, then cools...

A kiss or two?
from the strokes of seasons across her skin.

Tonight our breaths
are secrets revealed;
then captured, enraptured by the stars.
Be still, you say. We are being watched;
as I press closer to listen
Heartbeats not our own,
(to whom do we belong?)
murmurs deep within the earth,
resound like the fine grains of sand
in an hour glass.

Waves crash!
The salt begins to sting our eyes.
We've left them open, burning --
til the daylight dresses her with gold

All is fair and washed
away, except only ---
could we have lingered longer with the sea?

Waves of sea
Crash against rocks
They roar,
A gray, steel roar:
Wild as the waves
Enduing as the cliffs
My passion

I saw the sun steep
into the seascape ―
lonely as a drowning
    wave
         on still-waters

the dimming of the day
rescinding evanescent daylight                                                         ­         .
fading with the slack tide
         lost at sea ―
a gloaming moment
         let fall from
the remains of the day,
like some other passing
sea bird's molted feather
drifts away untamed

I sit silent as the driftwood
lingering at the watermark,
watching a random gust
    erase the footprints
of another recurring day, 
bearing abandoned memories
    and vacant heartbeats,
atrophied in the drifting sands

    and I see you walking
    towards the abating  
    midnight sunset ―
         but I know
    you're just a mirage;    
like the dimming afterglow
of so many waning moons
            elapsed
         
ever-changing tides grow low  
and promises made lightly  
         do ebb away
          
Scanning the distant horizon ―    
    a blindfold heart    
    mooning all at sea;
parsing a deserted shoreline,
    wondering if love
          is too late ,..
    to stem the tide ―


        harlon rivers

      30   May   2018

In between the crusade, don't be afraid
GOD has planted a seed
over this entire course
You can wade
Even from above,he feels your needs
                    to feed
By the love of grace, guiding
to your purpose place
Abroad the distance
Grasp it all, GOD won't let you fall
He hears your call, seascape

it seeps like sap down the spine
this tar, or fear, or hate of mine
beads opaque and thick and full of sin
i pick and peel
but they get in

i still dream
but blue, it blurs to black
deep seascape of a tormented hand,
i bind, am bound, to the things i pretend i understand
circle of a girl
eyeing squares of man

light is the letting go
hoping you pull, forgetting you won't
each time i forget, i melt and i drip,
a bad trip.

but when i think of teeth
discerning meat from bone
alone,
i float back with loose palms,
a calm.

Annapolis (DDH 265)

decommissioned warcraft
clean severed lines
steam gusts belt
from a cavernous shell
the ghost ship settles
on a drift ridge
perfect tide rhythm
on a salt washed shore

calming nuance
in passive time
weaving through
channels and crest waves
white sands warming
at a high point
beyond the breakers
and porteau pins

gazers and dreamers
(and sleepy fiords)
rest softly up the straight
froth folds skim and linger
on the wide eyed
wanderers of the sound
cove seals settle
at the inlet
their symphonies
backing on the
bowen brigade

ripples and
patch makers
hold sheets to the wind
markgraf lines
find electric blue sky
stealth shadows
haunt the seascape
the dragon fly hovers
in fits and starts

Two sparks of glass dancing on the currents
like two feathers with silk stiffened by salt.
Broken bottles to the midnight seascape sent
unsteady as whispers, sharp as the cold.
I’d drift as part of chandelier like rain
be the anglerfishes’ luminous snare
to tresses of jellyfish dresses vain
as the smooth face reflecting there.
On the plateau the sand will frost our smiles
smoothing those edges to a bent jigsaw piece.
This cold Desert of ebb raked sands and fells
from the bottle’s great birth into the sea.
Making blood fire by joining sparks by hand
as others join stones in returning to sand.

A trifecta of sounds

An ancient ocean

I don’t know who to speak to anymore,
but to a supposed internal being,
much more advanced,
or so I hope.

I long for days gone by and
for lemon trees in my backyard—
trees I never had while growing.

I feel.
I feel much too much, but there is
a beauty in the suffering,
a plain, openness that is inviting.

I speak to fill the spaces in my mind,
gaps which weathered time and
seashells.

Hope frantically obeys,
beckons at your call,
inches forward on a fast-moving planet
with glaciers and galaxies to call home.

Home…a funny concept.

We are all home here,
in this infinite cloth into which we are woven,
threads like stories and eras and creatures.

To blend in is a must, at first, at least.

I possess no hidden talents, yet many that they speak of.

My forehead tingles ever so casually, a signal
that I have tuned in at last.

They have been waiting for me, and I, them.

I pause, ever so delicately,
avoiding damage to the transmission.

I am loved, as are you, and
we are all sharing the same story.

Sometimes, moments of clarity
knock me off my feet,
and at other times I am drowning,
but I know how to swim.

I have been here before, as have you.

It’s so mysterious, and so big, and so…


Tenderness
Relaxation
and Forgiveness:
the key words of this lesson, this module.


I long for the space station I may have once belonged to.

There were more plants back then.

A messenger goes and snatches away
the last missing truth.

It is found in a peach pit, juicy and glistening.

The secret was inside of us all along.

The answers and the questions, too.

The balance was all there to begin with.

The truths, or truth, as we are not taught.

Two trillion years later, a blink of an eye,
if you can imagine it,
you are sitting in your aqua-garden
and floating water letters to the staff at sea—
the galactic sea, that is.

Suspended above asteroids and seaweed,
you cling to what you had lost many eons ago:
your humanity.

You have evolved into something greater,
but what you can recall of the collective human consciousness
is so stunningly beautiful,
that it temporarily blinds your inner eye.

Tears stream down your mental body.

It is so great to be here again,
connected to the past self who wrote you a letter.

An oasis awaits you.

His silence screams like a searching wind
a death-hungry spirit painted in
pallette-knived smears of
grey and fear and crimson
streaking across the night sky of his heart,
lightning-bolt ricochets striking, incinerating
the solitary oak tree of his soul,
scattering his acorns down the hill where they
are lost among the weeds,
shocked into infertility,
But he is a seascape pine,
weather-worn but razor-straight,
Gargantua in wood and steel
establishes his personal space
like a rabid porcupine,
And he is a tower,
hiding his soap bubble dream
while she brushes her hair
one hundred times
one thousand times
one million times
until the dream is
lifeless, breathless, armless
and tucked neatly in a refrigerated drawer,
As his silence screams like a searching wind.

The heat of the tequila sunrise
On the seashore of Cape Creus
Melts flaccid pocket watches,
Soft as overripe cheese;
The dreamscape's permanence dissolves
Before distant amber cliffs;
On sweet, rotting flesh termites sup;
A time fly lands.
The monstrous fleshy mutation
Across the seascape draped -
Deformed, distorted,
Disfigured with decay;
Centipede shades lash alien flesh
And sluggish tongue oozes
From the snout of the surreal
Self-spectre of Salvador's craft;
Persistence of Memory.

The seagull squawked:
Are you dead?
I cannot see him - there is sand
In my eyes. A crab (it must have been)
Scuttles across my foot;
Picking up scraps at the seaweed
Wrapped around my toes: the vibrant
Green now worn out from its trip
Across the seas.

Land **! We rejoiced,
Docking at Island ---
It's your turn to name it.
Log Number 712: we are intoxicated
With a tropical fruit
That made your face flush
Putting every sunset to shame.  
And at night we play a game
To guess which is sea or sky.
You are my mirror.
A gentle breeze caresses my thigh.

Are you awake?
You whisper, your breath tickles
Condensing into dew
Landing on the tiny hairs of my ear.
The sand feels like mud but
My mouth is dry
I lick off the trail of sweat
On my upper lip - it is hot
I open my eyes to the sun screaming
at my face: Get up. You're late.

We had begun falling asleep  
At different times.  
You built a tree house
It made your heart race
And there you drew a scape
What was there to look beyond?
One night the sky had
The sea turned into smoke  
You followed the beating
Of thunder
So distant you couldn't
(Listen to me) yell Watch out!
Lightning --- the water shimmered
As you disappeared.

(Water)
Log number 890: we are capsized
(Water)

The crab picked out
The sand in my eyes
Dragging the seaweed to my mouth.
I chewed then spat and the seagull squawked:
"Are you dead?"
No, I said. I think I have arrived.

My heart belongs to the ocean.
Its size comparable to the vastness of the latter –
open and embracing to waves
of possibilities that carry
all my visions and ambitions into uncharted waters.

A message in the bottle: “Take care of it. It is yours.”

But the map that I hold did not tell me about love.
It did not tell me about you.
It did not tell me
that love is a device that could
throw me off my navigation. It did not
tell me that I would have to go through this again:
to make me feel so small in this infinity of feelings and expectations.

I recall that day when our eyes met across a sea of people.
My heart that day was washed ashore.
Curious, you picked it up. Wondering,
perhaps, where it had come from
and what stories it had to tell.
You leaned in closer and I knew you would hear more
than a tapping rhythm – but entire songs of joy, laughter, sadness and longing.
Captivated you were by this heart,
a bold sailor, who had sung the songs
of joy and laughter – ultimately, the song of adventure.

But I still do not know much about my rescuer.
(Or my captor?) We are now at full speed,
cutting across sea and sky, day and night
and mostly at night where the two lovers meet:
while the sky covers the sea in a blanket of stars, I look up
to see your eyes – blue pools of gentle mystery.

Day breaks again and again and I remember
why I am here in the first place.
There is a dream.
There is a plan.
A map that did not have you on it.
My heart has docked but not for long.
And soon we both know a ship will sail.
To where and with whom? Wouldn't we
Both like to learn.

My heart has washed ashore. “Take care of it,” the ocean says.
“For now, it is yours.”

’Tween hither and thither we wended our way
skipping, dancing through sand dunes, in seascape croquet.
While woven in waves watching dolphins at play
I first tasted her lips in the ocean’s wild spray.

Mystic moonbeams, suffusing clouds’ shimmering sails,
unleashed us and whisked us down sensuous trails,
soon evoking the trills of untamed nightingales
as our passions pervaded green valleys and dales.

Being spectres of splendour in wanton sashay
we mastered our meaning in love’s matinee –
the breezes, in passing, slowed down to survey
blazing bodies embraced in youth’s blooming bouquet.

With the wind as our wings, till the Never we flew,
two gypsies, on junkets through dusk’s residue
gently floating like pollen to everywhere new,
so eluding pearled teardrops that paint the past blue.

Yes, we gamboled and gambled, two waifs led astray,
with our shackles afire and anchors aweigh –
rising higher and higher, the sun lured our sleigh,
teasing time was our temptress, night’n day after day.

Having stars in our eyes and all time as our view,
we’ve drifted, like dreamers where sprites rendezvous
and feasted on laughter and sipped morning dew
while rambling forever as one made of two.

His eyes rivet on the extravagant evening sun,
in frenzied creation, profusely mixing colors,
applying on the canvas of the horizon,
painting her, his lover with astonishing precision,
--portrait of a girl in love
unmindful of what the world thinks about her
and in  total dedication to her man.
Love makes larger than life heroes out of weak mortals,
and creates echoes on the far horizons that keep on reverberating!

She sits quietly holding his hands as if it is all she needs
never thinking, it is obvious, whether this is a fallacy or ultimate truth,
that holds good for all the changing seasons.
With her long chiseled fingers she draws
something beautiful, a motif that emerged in her mind,
in front of them, the seascape, was a lively cyclorama
framed by bright ultramarine.
Like eels just out of water,  their bodies gleaming,
bikini clad glam girls, beach soldiers spearheading
an undeclared beauty attack,
on the look out for hidden challenges
while walking past the love pair,
each one stands awhile, scrutinizing her thoroughly
measuring with a scale, hidden in those eyes,
as if she was a **** on parade, even women couldn't help covet.
Though inappropriately dressed, for the beachfront appearance,
she invites more attention,  she is amused.
But after a tumultuous love, and eventful elopement
she is in bliss,  in her love-land with her prince
she is just ecstatic, no thought could  make her shake off her composure.

There are secrets hidden between the lines of these pages
which crease like the sheets on your bed when
you turn and overturn them with a
misplaced foot or an erring hand in search of
bits and pieces of mahogany scattered across your seabed after
tumultuous waves rocked the ship back and forth
back and forth across the seascape where I learned to
let go and swim good and
break to the surface gasping for
your breath infused with the aroma of imported coffee and
the lingering aftertaste of sea-**** on your taste buds between
the hidden corners of your cheeks within
the hidden corners of your mouth,
I delved deep, swam good, delved deep,
swam up and down, up and down,
until the tumultuous waves swelled up and tossed
my body back and forth, back and forth,
slamming it against solid rocks into
bits and pieces of mahogany scattered across your seabed.

Memories of the North Sea
sift in like sand kernels
on a fast, frigid tide:
events that transpired outside
the confines of rhyme,
unfolding exactly
as they were meant to.

Never before had I seen
so many shades of gray;
the overcast, monochromatic splendor
was awe-inspiring,
instead of being bleak and bleary.
_

The smell of salt and seaweed
awakes something dormant and eternal,
deep within me.
I have a surging desire
to flush stagnancy from my blood—

salty blood and water
come together in a communion
of distant relations and movements.

Beside me, a flash of bright red
digs in the sand; my child
is wearing the only vibrant colour
to be seen for many kilometres.
The colour matches her
enthusiasm and energy,
as she moves from one spot to the next
like a dancing flame;
reflected, a fire glows from my eyes.

Unknowingly, I had dressed
in the same colours of the sky and sea,
blending into the scenery
like a chameleon:
an illusion thicker than the clouds;
an illusion of stone
for me to melt and reinvent
at the spinning speed of thought.

I watch my daughter
drink the seascape with a smile of wonder;
it's her first time visiting an ocean.
With our pants rolled up to the knee,
we wade through waves,
and collect stones and shells.
She knows the chameleon
who walks alongside her in the frothy surf.

Observing seabirds cover the steep cliffs
of the island located further out,
in a blanket of black and white feathers,
I wonder if people onshore
only see a solitary dash of red out here,
or if the chameleon
is more noticeable than I had thought.



2012 North Sea Remix
December 17th, 2012

Hi there,
I say to the ocean,
dropping my shoes
for the sandy pilgrimage
to shore,

A lone figure wanders
into a Delft seascape,
Blues and whites
of Dutch perfection engulf
my field of vision,
Water and sky reflecting
back infinite shades,

the blue of stiff dungarees
at the horizon,
clouds in shaving cream white,
the heron blue gray of the shallows,
I could name twenty shades
on a good day, like today
when the beach is all mine,

I step into the cool ooze,
jolted into a sudden jig,
I hop, a riot of ah's and elbows,
Waves rush at me
like a legion of puppies,
frothy and excited,
I laugh at their sloppy greeting,
Overwhelmed by their welcome,
unconditional and salty,
Spray lapping my face
as I find my footing.

after Alexandra Leaving, a song by Leonard Cohen

<>

to go where?

to a city self-consuming in madness,
giving every excuse to stay, and yet,
it came to me just now when the poet
must be leaving his redoubt, with doubt,
and return to the concrete and anomie
of a different kind of splendid isolation

when the last leaf meanders slow down
to the battlefield, and the falling terminado,
and the tree branches are stick figures, each
finger pointing skyward in an j’accusing manner,
accussing & conceding defeat, begging for mercy,
their pleadings too much for me to bare and bury

when green has been wiped clean, and deleted
from the dictionary of colors, my moth eaten soul,
can no longer be granted a stay of execution by
merely looking at the landscape and seascape
to admire their friendly contrasting schemes,
their installation in me of the awe of a visual
quietude, that was an astonishing injection
not truly appreciated till now, too late and
still early, the awe colorations of nature’s vibrancy

The gods have come, my soul hoisted upon their
broad shoulders, the dead-appearing tree branches
can no longer keep their poet safe, hold him back from
meeting his fate; now, he too is a leaving but
floating upward, unlike like the fallen crowds that have
come to rest upon the soil that born them, now to be buried,
all saying: Goodbye Island Poet leaving,

Island Poet
has no poem, no good understanding, no vision,
had no plan, no foresight, only a hope against hope,
that safety was/is not seasonal, Van Morrison reminds,
“These are the days of endless summer,”are memories,
to be held onto tightly, until when if I pass muster, angels
will return to my island abode, where my natural friends
will greet me again, with a flowering and new births,
and The Island Poet can once again revel in ideas in words like
future, sanity, when boarding the ferry with a one way ticket smile.

Silhouette of her figure
Eyes like a mirror
Hair on her face
Makes the heart race

She stands alone
On the hard stone
Large waves break
On the roaring seascape

She feels content
By the cliff's edge
The moon is bright
In the dark night

She thinks of falling
But keeps stopping
She feels too deep
And dreams of long sleep

One legged Anne
sat in her wheel chair
by the white table
on the lawn

watching the other kids
at play
on the swing
and slide

or sitting around
playing I Spy
hey Kid
she said to you

push me out
to the beach
I can't watch this crap
makes me

want to throw up
with all this
goody two shoes stuff
so you pushed her wheelchair

along the back path way
towards the back gate
where you going?
Malcolm asked

away from you lot
as far as possible
she replied
o

Malcolm said
what will Sister Paul say?
couldn't give a fig
what she says

Anne said
push on Kid
she said
so you pushed on

along the path
I'm going to tell her
Malcolm bellowed
go kiss her backside

for all I care
she bellowed back
come on Kid
push push

so you pushed
and out the back gate
and on to the path
that led by the beach

you smelt the sea
the sound of gulls
you moved along
the path pushing

the wheelchair on
here here will do Kid
she said
pointing to an area

of beach
so you wheeled her
onto the beach
but got stuck

in the sands
ok ok here will do Kid
so you stood behind her
and stared out

at the sea
and the horizon
thanks Kid
she said

here come stand beside me
and so you stood beside her
her one leg sticking out
from the short blue skirt

the stump just visible
out of the skirt's hem
thanks Kid for being a friend
she said

that's ok
you replied
thank you for helping me
out of the bath last night

she said
didn't want those pesky nuns
getting me out
with their constant

mutterings and prayers
that's ok
you said
recalling the bath episode

she calling you in
the bathroom
sitting there
in the bath

she beckoning you over
don't shut your **** eyes
how can you see
to help me out

with your
******* eyes shut
she'd said
so you remembered

putting a hand
under her arm
and she was able
to get up and out

and said
hey bring me that towel
so you recalled
bringing the towel

your head averted
here
you said
and she took it smiling

and covered herself
and began drying
and said
ok you can go now Kid

and you left
and closed the door
behind you without
looking back

see that horizon Kid?
see the seascape?
she asked
yes

you said
well that's what I want
to be like
free and open

not some hemmed in girl
with a thousand hormones
bashing against my skull
hormones? you said

what are they?
never mind
she said
you'll know

when they kick in
and she gazed out
at the sea
her black hair moved

by the slight wind
her hands on the side of the chair
just you and she
silently being there.

The simple life

It is cold;
sea spray paint the ship white,
light green
is the Nordic water,
a mighty cocktail
of clinking ice cubes.
I scratch a happy face
on the thick glass of
the porthole.
We will dock in a town
that have warm rooms
people sit around a fire  
give a **** about sailor’s
miserable life.
Seascape paintings hangs
on gilded walls;
look at that sea,
so verdant,
delicate brush strokes;
the artist died at a mad house.

Let’s go for a swim,
love. Its high tide
waves rising through
these sheets.
We’ll make like
denizens of the sea;
lips opening and closing
air bursting through the gaps
and our hair tangling
together in the current
two sirens
soft-singing
without a ship in sight.
Underwater, I can
hardly hear your sighs
but I know what your
body says when
fish-like it becomes
one band of muscle
from the line of your jaw
to the curling hooks
of your toes.
Let’s float to the shore,
love. At low tide
when the ebbing keeps
rhythm with a heartbeat
we’ll drown with
our mouths open
drinking in the pink-
scented atmosphere.

Oh, how I have strayed away, old and gray, on the edge of my vision.
Seeping into my reptilian-brain, you are but the light everlasting.
Dear, sir, couldn’t you have recalled? The one with the pretty eyes of an ocean so blue; of the tirade of the torrent washing the wispiness of your face, in a gallant seascape.
Of the child who mourns for his dear mammy, crying on the floor. He is no more.
Generosity is quite the curiosity, that is, if you settle for mediocrity.
Heaven above! Almighty lord of our beings. Deign unto us the wisdom for a life of shining brilliance.

Perhaps, though, we have the answer already; in the hearts of our souls, the brain of our being, the epitome of our creation; what magic it is that stems the fire of spontaneity.
Lovestruck: dumbstruck more like it. You are but a haggard fool.
I have seen as the mocking bird has done wrongly. The world, upside down; growing in an acceptance of misfits. For they’re god’s creation as are you and I. Love them all I assuredly do, now, why don’t you?

Young, adolescent, children; immature with the years of their forced existence, tightened and controlled by those unseen. ‘tis the challenge. The solution? Perhaps undiscovered.
I have not seen the glory that is a tattered forearm. I have not seen the bane that has become falsified.
Oh, but surely do not forget, kind sir. You have pretty eyes.

Benny's on the edge
and he can't quite
pull himself back
from it

and o sure
Sonya says
it'll be ok
he knows it's

just words
and words are like
spittle in the wind
at the moment

let's go
to the coast
and see the sea
that'll make you ok

sure a bit of seascape
it'll do the trick
and so they go
and it's a long

bus ride away
the other passengers
other riders
of a storm maybe

by the look
on the faces
anyway they go
jogging along

by the bus
he looking out
the window untalkative
she rabbiting on

like talking
was going out
of fashion  
and he shuts her out

just nods his head
now and then
and turns
and smiles

like some broken
hearted clown  
and his mind dark
as one in a storm

shutting up shutters
bolting up doors
then after an hour
they're there

the seascape
the beach full of stones
not sand
and there stand

gaping
she talking
of the time
they stayed before

and had ***
for hours on end
in that cheap hotel
back in town

but he just gazes
lifelessly
with the fixed grin
of a saddened clown.

Tiny things that strike your fancy
Any verse which hits a note,
Messages from all and sundry
Extracts from your favourite quote.
Moments from a treasured movie
Recollections from the past,
Sunday roast from Grandma’s oven
Sights and sounds and smells that last.

Memories of moonlight saunter
Arm in arm with newfound love,
Barefoot where the sand meets water
Lost to all... but stars above.
Walking in the hills at daybreak
Crispness of the frosty verge,
Feel the pounding pulse of living
Feel the joy of being... surge.

Tomatoes from the garden plot
Rich and biting, acid red,
Delicious on hot buttered toast
With liberal salt and pepper, spread.
Gazing at your baby daughter
Softly pink in muscled arm,
Wondering what future holds
For her in love and wealth and harm.

See the grasses thrash to windward
Hear the pounding surf cascade,
Lines of gulls in steady hover
Thunder breaks at lightning fade.
Old friend’s letter, unexpected
Tells of hardship over time,
Loss and sadness unconnected
To good fortune, found in mine.

Tremor in her frail, white fingers
Dancing of her rheumy eyes,
Sharing yesterday’s good tales
To bring a joy to aged disguise.
Lavender in gentle velvet
Serves the honey bee her gold,
Nodding in the balmy breezes
Reminiscent perfume, old.

Cup of tea for all the Aunties
Dear old Fred has passed away,
Sadness... but we all agree
He made the most of every day.
Sun ball on the far horizon
Melting orange, richly gold,
Sinking to the seascape, gone
To let the moonlit night take hold.

Marshalg
Sitting on the Taranaki sand with my love, with nibbles and a glass of wine
Watching the enormous, Autumn sun melt into a flat, flat sea.
April 2012

© 2012 Marshal Gebbie