"undercurrent" poems
He told her she was pottery; a vase with grooves and cracks.
The patterns of the history she hid behind her back.
Within his words he layered in- like thread upon a loom-
The sweetest undercurrent to illuminate that gloom.
In certain cultures, he decreed, when pottery is cracked
They aggrandize them with gleaming gold to bring their splendor back
For they believe, with certainty, once damage has been wrought
Those tiny cracks, now filled with light, hold truths that can't be taught.
Jun 11, 2015
Jun 11, 2015 at 6:32 PM UTC
i
you say i am honestly not the same person
i say one day i woke up honest
and i do not know how to undo experience
my own eyes and ears and nose and mouth
cannot be undone at the moment
how do you do it?
push that pressure to the back of your mind
like that
how do you all manage to laugh with a straight face
at things that you know aren't really funny
i can't fathom it. where you go
when you are stomping and ripping
and ****** and jeering
and laughing and running
it's exhausting to watch you
ii
i apologize if it doesn't make sense
that i can't play along
but playing along
doesn't make sense
i could never win a grammy
with this tight lipped smile
laughing at the expense of others
makes me feel more like a paparazzi
placating insecurities for currency
leeching off the vulnerability
you may not think i'm smart but
i am smart enough to know this is not 'normal'
and there is nothing wrong with staring at you in the rearview
and saying "i wish that was really sarcasm"
i'll tell you the truth
and you don't have to like it
and you don't have to like me
and i don't have to like you
because if there's one thing i know about myself
it's that i don't dislike anybody
until they show off their callousness
hoping it's the right party trick
to gain respect
iii
we watch comedy tv, and you are worried
by the way my spine cracks
when i let out a uncontrollable laugh
dragging on, beginning to spill, and as i try to quell it
my whole body shakes with the pressure
of it bubbling inside of me
you feel all of this beside of me
a small volcano with a bent back
quaking absorbed by pillows and flowers and cushions
not quite right for you
wondering why i couldn't laugh like this earlier
when we were not alone
everyone is looking for something more porous
more willing to let in effortlessly
and absorb tirelessly
that can simply laugh like a stream bubbles
and let go of the undercurrent
yet we are sharp and uneven and course like logs
and the weight of our actions carries much further
being shunted downstream by tides of gravity
every intention runs it's course
every intention speaks volumes
if you feel that in your core
every day you will uncontrollably think of how
every intention defines the quality of the laughter
stuck in someone else's head
and you will save it for things that are funny
Dec 5, 2013
Dec 5, 2013 at 4:26 AM UTC
I see jellyfish in the ocean of your eyes
And I swear those translucent blue jellyfish
Are just the remains of your mesmerizing marble eyes
That shattered into pieces
The second your eyes first met sunlight
When I look at you I wonder
Where all those jellyfish are heading;
Spiraling down into the blackness of your pupil
And I wish I could join them,
I wish I could experience the rhythmic motion of comfort and solace
That your eyes provide just by looking at them,
But how much more would I feel
If I could lose myself in them?
Or maybe I'd be caught in the undercurrent of your thoughts,
Maybe you'd **** me in and I'd never want to leave the black bottom of the ocean in your eyes;
Maybe I'd fall in love with the secret places the jellyfish don't dare to go,
The things I wonder when I look at you,
So many thoughts flood my mind
When I trace my fingers across your lips
And stare at the beautiful jellyfish
That glimmer so brilliantly in the darkness and the light.
I wonder what I'd find down there,
But I think that's my favorite part about looking at you,
This is one thing I'll never really know;
I guess I'll just admire you from my boat,
And continue to be lost in the sea of your eyes
Admiring the translucent jellyfish from afar.
Jul 6, 2016
Jul 6, 2016 at 6:45 PM UTC
The streets are clear, we're hydrophobic
Hoods propped by hats and socks pulled high;
The rain brings peace to the agoraphobic
Puddles form moats and clouds fill the sky.
Splash, droplets hit the window,
chauffeured by the gale outside.
Squint your eyes and flash back
boats tilt starboard, with the tide.
The captain shouts to the decks, paranoid
'Clear the decks and brace for impact'
Without turbulence we are disenfranchised
Boredom becomes us when we're boring.
Shake it off and stare at the dot to dot
the residual carving of water as it slides
Another droplet falls beside it, parallel
it aligns, growling thunder overhead.
Without stirring we are robotic workforces
Without awaking we are left inside
The constructs created for us, by corporate-
conglomerate elitist-psychopaths.
Two drops of water on the window
simmer red with burning anger.
Crash lightening sears the sky
Rage becomes you, girders melt.
The starry night undercurrent, flings
us backwards, never up, as democracies
which seek to serve sink into a sea of
stocks and shares, the wall street journal
sits atop the captains lobby, economies
were meant to tumble as the working classes
fumble for bread, men in suits gaggle
and toast to the millions they left for dead.
Resistance is futile, when eighty-five
of the richest suit owners sit on currency
that was meant for the three point five
billion who aren’t driven by gluttony.
Nov 7, 2014
Nov 7, 2014 at 12:51 PM UTC
I'm surfing, along the coastline.
The waves pulling me in, my strength pushing me out.
Music in one ear, shouting in the other.
I breathe, a breath of salty air. It settles in my lungs and I choke.
Sometimes the salt can clear the alveoli and make it easier to breathe,
But not today.
Today the air is heavy. Clouds pour down single droplets but when altogether, it is a storm. The wind howls, burning my ears. Whispering that it's all too much.
I crave a fall into the ocean, pulled out to sea. It's become too much and I'm drowning.
But I'm not drowning. I float. I float with tears mixing into the salty water. I can feel the undercurrent begging me to come down to it so it can pin me down to the sea bed where I can hold my last breath and breath again.
But it's not breathing it's drowning and the thought makes me thrash around and I panic.
So instead, I panic on top of the water, thrashing and jerking around desperately trying not to drown.
The skies will become clear again. The stormy skies will reveal the blue which is always there. The stars are still shining underneath the despairing clouds. They are always there, just hidden at times.
All I have to do is breathe with the waves and stay afloat till the storm goes away.
Jun 8, 2022
Jun 8, 2022 at 8:30 PM UTC
We love to chase the wind through streaks of blinding bliss,
Tagging the glorious ideals of love, peace, friendship, even
The meaning of life, to weeping willows and pensive pebbles.
We admire the monochrome sky in all its barren blue or pregnant purple;
Hues of burple and plue are dismissed as being tedious, or just confused.
Fear not, photoshop will rectify this pigmented aberration.
We giggle at clouds that resemble kitchen utensils or mystical creatures;
“Hey look a teddy bear in a spacesuit with a flowerpot on his head wielding the Sword of Gryffindor!”
We declare sagely, with the acumen of a legendary bird watcher.
We resurrect grass angels by launching into horizontal jumping-jacks, and,
Just as a disclaimer, no flower was harmed in the process. Not that it matters,
As long as we did not soil our Lacoste and Burberry.
We spin a mixtape out of the torrential downpour, our tracks pitting
The pitter of regularity against the patter of inconstancy, synchronizing
The symphony of splashes to an undercurrent of nostalgia.
We kiss against the bark of an elm, and if a tree is not available in the vicinity,
We throw ourselves down a nearby hill, tumbling into a ball of moist romance,
Panting, as we bask in the studio lighting of the approving sun.
Every still is captured by a Lomo,
Every scene arrested in sepia motion,
Every moment ravished by the chichi Bohemian in us.
Nov 2, 2010
Nov 2, 2010 at 4:03 PM UTC
Lymphoma
There was a fundraising run for lymphoma and other cancers
A little notice for it on top of the garbage can
at a home grown Jamba Juice right off the BART in Berkeley
It hit home: what I was up against
People don't run through the streets casually
and my cat had lymphoma
I couldn't find him last night for the first time
He had his weekly appointment and I brought in
something that didn't look at all like he was the week before
They paged the vet and she came in
saying thing like he needed an IV and tests and
wasn't there nothing else to do
didn't she say that
he needs hospitalization--his liver
we can't tell you what to do
but it would all go in a circle and come back
to a suffering being who had
come to the end of what science could do for him
what she was trying to tell me in her barrage of words
came through loud and clear
They brought him in
with a blanket and a catheter
and he struggled until he got warm and then rested
I wanted him to see me, as the last thing he saw in this world
She took the three syringes out of her white coat
Don't hurt him, just don't hurt him
my only request
There was no pain
Only relaxation, sleep and then at last no heartbeat
Her ability, her smoothness of execution was perfect
and he went limp in my arms
not suffering
The nurse took his body away
"It's the last gift we can give them" she said
and I imagined a man, a stereotypical
image of a man pacing back and forth in a white coat in front
of a lecture hall full of vet students saying that
exact thing and there was a serious air in the classroom and some wrote this down,
it was so true, sound, capable and final
but this woman said it
this veterinarian from Michigan
and through my tears and grief
there was some kind of undercurrent
of relief, that there is no more pain for him
He no longer suffers
and I did all I could do
Jul 27, 2012
Jul 27, 2012 at 8:39 PM UTC
Healing hands laid to rest
wandering in the near light of sunrise
fumbling for fractals of memory
ambling in the haze of yesterday.
Stolen words and displaced letters
floating in the ambience of space
cosmonauts of distant planets
arms outstretched beckoning
the echoes sent from
a thousand light years away.
Time is an irrelevant motion
tiny air bubbles escorting life
rising to the surface of forgotten dreams
spiraling, pulsating in a heartbeat
chambered by grasping futures.
The underlying fever reaching
inwards and outwards through the soul
seeking the blindness of tomorrow
unfurl their magical delights
wrapped in the glint of a solar cosmos.
Drifting beyond the reach of nature
blackness surrounds with the warmth
of knowing, a million miles away,
as if an undercurrent draws its final breath
behold wonderment far-seeing
leaving strange footprints
that someday others will say:
here stood a sentient being.
Jul 14, 2014
Jul 14, 2014 at 11:18 PM UTC
I never liked beets; too soft, too red
too round, too bulbous,
too much like a bloodmoon.
I cannot live in these shaman
sleeves. They're heavy as rocks beneath
the waves, soaked to the bone
by a salty, sunless sea. Too much
blue is bleeding into billowing wool, red as beet.
There's never an anglerfish
when you need a light, no beetbulb of flame
for that last rush of smoke before the black
undercurrent squeezes the air too thin.
May 5, 2016
May 5, 2016 at 4:37 AM UTC
The sleet is drawing boxes 'round
our mud-and-snow sashed towns.
We'll check 'em off
with crunching footsteps,
slash our gallows grins through static
weather. Nervous laughter fights off winter
while somnambulist nights
hold the anthill days at bay.
And each repeated conversation
coats a thrumming undercurrent
echoed by the groaning rivers
in their arthritic fatigue.
where the ice piles up
like car wrecks.
And, out of those disastrous angles,
jumps up and trips back down.
Blinking eyelids, right then left.
Sunrises. Sunsets.
Dusks and dawns in places familiar
wading through liminal space.
Circles darkened. Footprints filled in.
The heat just circles lazily.
Our flushed and clammy brows
will **** askance
and sweat while footsteps
melt our swaying way through boiling
sidewalks. Nervous laughter dulls the impact
of seared, rapid fire nights.
"Ha." "Ha." Shrug off another.
And all repeated reminiscence
does is hamstring overthinking
of the closing jaws of traps
in these rusting western towns.
where winds breathe dust
by mouthfuls
So, into our familiar mishaps,
***** up and falls back down
melting into neighborhoods
dress down, upbraid us.
'Til our feet do not walk circles
'round these wilting Western towns.
Jan 9, 2015
Jan 9, 2015 at 6:09 PM UTC
the clock chimes
but no one counts
the days move at will
forward, backward
days stand still
the ticking of seconds
lost in the minutia
of the everyday
endless mind chatter
and negative self-talk
heart in a vacuum of speculation
what if -
coulda, shoulda, woulda
WILL NOT
DO NOT
STAY IN THIS PLACE
strain to listen
can you hear it
it's there
in the undercurrent of life
lost beyond yourself
tick tock
a shadow of a sound
tick tock
time never stops
tick tock
feel the minutes turn to days
a sense of time thrown away
on nothing
it's easy
so much easier
to wonder
what if -
why me -
than to take a deep breath
and realize
the world does not revolve
around a solitary soul
and no one is ever
the reason someone makes a choice
choices are made of free will
or they aren't choices at all
good or bad
tick tock
tick tock
tick tock
can you feel it
tick tock
tick tock
tick tock
it's the minutes of life
left behind
in a cloud of never was
tick tock
the clock chimes
but no one counts
the days move at will
forward, backward
days stand still
Jan 19, 2015
Jan 19, 2015 at 6:08 PM UTC
Trying to steal that pearl from your mouth.
But as your name says, you shut me out.
I then get tossed in the undercurrent.
You offer not a hand, but a laugh.
I drift alone thinking of what I can.
I the seahorse, and you the clam.
Feb 8, 2011
Feb 8, 2011 at 4:56 PM UTC
*I'm tired of beauty
incessantly meddling in my affairs
luring me to venture outside myself
revealing hidden radiance within
disguising life's dismal undercurrent
reducing it to a superficial veneer
randomly appearing by surprise
stubbornly eliciting a smile
performing alchemy on the mundane
dousing my awareness in the elixir of life
beauty...
the pulchritude of spirit...that's all it is...*
Mar 24, 2014
Mar 24, 2014 at 6:05 PM UTC
what am i about
giving you no gifts
unable to pin
my finger on a theme
phenomenal you
with whom i play away the year,
yearned love from a decade's dream
you've swayed into the real
to flesh it here and interrupt all Being
with a node of savvy personality
i lessen if i think my words can measure
that, how you emerge there, change
come across the shore of presence, waves of filtered seas
deeply you have gone and risen from within
expanding metaphor in a lambency of ageless gazing at the stars
and giving all a joyful undercurrent swim.
luffa vines abound, for future shiny backskins arching bliss--
shedding all, i snake my way around the roots--
the yellow sheen fades and pupils zero intimate
a finer lived experience... ripe intrusion truly love in tune with
tips of sneezing hearts, curling toes unite, shout
an intertwining pelvic orbit vaster space to yet unmake
unspoken pleasures wide in everpresent fontanels
the spectra plenum here again, next breath, ends of in, ends of out
Mar 25, 2013
Mar 25, 2013 at 11:16 PM UTC
Drowning in a sea of disappointment
Swept away by the undercurrent
Into the depths of my own hatred
The weight of my heart
Set in stone and cast in steel
Kick me down
Complete submission
I reached for the stars as a last desperate
attempt to be part of the light
But you extinguished the sun
And you swallowed the moon
And by the time that I had finally made it
The stars had all died
Jun 15, 2016
Jun 15, 2016 at 2:46 AM UTC
I wash your sins
within me
I heal
and nurture
them
not for you,
and one moment
on your long list.
I cleanse
your transgressions for me
and for her,
and our daughters
and their daughters.
In the
undercurrent of my
being,
I bathe my wound
and swim
and search
for a way
forward,
because what is
existence
if not time
pulling
us along?
-
I think
I was born into
this life
a healer.
To feel this shared
pain
and see its shadows
as if light, reflecting
and dancing
against a wall,
creating
constellations
of
heartache.
I see now
my purpose,
to connect with the
heavens unknown
from this
earth
so this wicked
energy may
leave
this
world.
And us.
To nourish each other,
so that we can choose
to transcend
pain
a human existence,
where love
and its triumphs,
and
deepest
darkest
of
pitfalls
coalesce
into this flesh
to
cross both space and time
to make
generations.
This flesh,
that I now wear
proudly,
albeit
timidly
at times.
This paradox,
I want
for her too.
Apr 13, 2021
Apr 13, 2021 at 1:45 PM UTC
A sentence most innocent,
yet the undercurrent
is deep and swift.
I love you, too.
A snap-reflex response
to a heartfelt exhibition
of true emotion.
I love you, too.
To an outsider,
nothing would be amiss
but I read the lack of words.
I love you, too.
This throwaway text
hides something much more
than you care to show.
I love you, too.
And simple as those
four little words, I know
something is wrong.
Sep 13, 2015
Sep 13, 2015 at 11:27 PM UTC
Death gives no rest to my cluttered mind. Death is my enemy! Even in slumber death claws to infect my dreams with its poison called nothingness! So I locked death in the depths of my heart in a chest marked fear. I put on different worldly masks… called college, travel, success, accolades, fiancé, money, sex….I used them to hide my shame but each one was cold blue and hypothermic. Yet in them I felt comfortable at the expense of lost potential and false identity. In frostbites pinnacle my only unbreakable mask shattered…..I lost my Love…………The wailing echoes of delusion shook me frigid till my raw bones shattered the question. Who am I? The undercurrent of desperation violently hydrated my reflection on the dark waters of my soul! I am faceless! Without a face who am I! Death take me now, for I am already nothing! From below came a vibration that graced my reflection with an ear, a lash and a deep iris.. then windows to my soul sprang and a smile dripped in unabated rejoice…I’m alive!!!! Who has done this?! Show your face, for you are my dearest friend! Without words death was shaken loose to the depressing reality of dipped anxiety. From behind my many masks I could see Death. For the first time I face you! Your eyes paint the familiar threat that casts me into the obis of nothingness but without you life was delusional meaninglessness! Because of your death threats my life has a face. Death is my Enemy and my Friend……………..Jesus conquered death so through it I may learn the meaning of His Love and who I really am......now to take down more of my masks……easier said than done....Praise Jesus.........To be continued……………….
Dec 23, 2013
Dec 23, 2013 at 12:22 AM UTC
What's my name?
Take that universal,
that yeah yeah, that
ohm and play it backwards.
I'm that undercurrent,
the invisible force that pushes the hand, that pushes
the red button, that levels seven stories--for?
What's my name?
Take that post-post-modern literature,
that self-serving academia-meets-nihilism,
and think as far opposite, Herculaneum/Uruk,
and you might just find it, my name,
carved in Aramaic or Latin in a dark wet cave,
forgotten, misspelled in a dead language.
What's my name?
Look just past that buffering screen,
right before the pixelated beheading starts.
I'm between the zeroes and ones in that heaven-place,
the Internet, where people go when the final death takes.
What's my name?
Take that ever so subtle airport terminal muzak,
and listen for the counterpoint, the competing rhythm.
It, my name, swirls and mingles with that ever flowing
crowd, weary and reduced to numbered tickets and departure times,
speaking fifty different languages, a flattened and recurring Babel.
Take that ohm, and play it, play it backwards.
Aug 25, 2014
Aug 25, 2014 at 10:53 PM UTC
A wave of people who all suffer from depression's undercurrent leans over me until gravity pushes the water over my head and I drown in the depressive maelstrom of lost, distraught family members with the same weak psyche which I suffer from. Only the dollhouse owners can live a picture-perfect life where everything is antibacterial and anti-depressant while we get jammed between the walls until we can no longer scream for help and tears become our only weapon. The moisture from the rivers that sourced in our eyes penetrates into the walls and seeps into the floor, then mold and mildew infects this otherwise perfect dollhouse. I'd rather drown in depression than live in this false cardboard house with drawers and cabins filled with pills and where no one knows who takes what and why there is constantly bought more and more even when the pills tumble out of all the doors. I'm waiting for a tsunami, which can split the dollhouse that I call my home, hoping the walls detaches and the pills flush away.
Feb 12, 2017
Feb 12, 2017 at 4:26 PM UTC
Waves of emotions overflow my mind
Creating cascading waterfall of tears
Spilling over, breaking the dams of resistance
Taking me along with the strong undercurrent
Without any control over my movement
I go along with the flow, hitting a new shore
Unknown destination, yet inviting to me
I regain my senses, to leave my steps on the land
The land which has no name
I venture out to experience newfound emotions
That fills my mind and body, an experience unexplained
Jul 4, 2014
Jul 4, 2014 at 10:34 AM UTC
shifting focus
bended light
altered reality
as the present becomes redefined
creating substantial ripples
in an otherwise still pond –
reflections warp
running water distorts
landscapes shift with the wind
all those truths, so concrete
crumble in the glow of different information –
worthiness and self-importance
replace doubt and loathing
as the realization of acceptance
flood the low laying regions
torment of the torrential
pouring over the stained past
washing clean skin marred
by a lifetime of reclusively existing –
together and forward thinking
we sit, future planning
dividing the years ahead
into blocks of success
setting and achieving both
short and long term goals
for the creation of the future we choose
just like in all the magazines
and self-help seminars –
gasping for air in an undercurrent of responsibility
holding tight the notions of poor
or low-class monetarily
the struggle to break free is real
when one attempts to circumvent their station
and be more
do more
life better
in an age of classism and
social warfare –
we sit atop the madness
hand in hand
looking over the extremes
presented and normalcy
catching each other’s eye
a smile crosses lips in tune
knowingly, we plunge into home ownership
manning the torpedoes,
we move full steam ahead—
Jan 27, 2015
Jan 27, 2015 at 3:55 PM UTC
Her memory is like the beauty of the silted Nile,
Of sacred blue lilies and heron
And skimming eyes of the crocodile.
Jun 8, 2024
Jun 8, 2024 at 10:40 PM UTC
I am an undercurrent, free flowing river, whispering these secrets.
Jan 18, 2015
Jan 18, 2015 at 10:47 PM UTC
We rang in the new year
On a mattress thrown on your
Living room floor
With the ball drop
On a desktop computer screen
The sound was lagging
Behind the images
And we were laughing
At how we always end up
Stuck in the past
You threw your arms around me
And let your kisses land
Carelessly wherever
They fell
And I outlined your jaw bone
With my pointer finger,
Threading it through
Your beard
And looking into your
Lazy eyes
You counted the times I said
"Like okay" at the beginning of a story
And by 5 AM , you announced
We'd reached a healthy twenty
You kept apologizing
For the way your dog
Was relentlessly
Licking my neck
But honestly
Even with her slobber
And yours
Dripping over my collar bones
And even with the night air
Tingling on my thighs,
Just a little too thick,
Just a little too warm,
Even with my straightened hair
Curling at its ends
And your brother's girlfriend's
Faint moaning sounds from behind
A locked door
There was nothing I'd rather be doing
Than watching your eyes expand and contract
To the rhythm of your stories
Before the blue light of television
Overlapping moon lit window sills
And dark spaces
You are the yellow light love,
Symbolism with a pulse,
Saying "it's officially 2017"
With a begging grin
And an undercurrent of
Gentle laughter,
Standing for change
And growth
And warmth
And simplicity
You are transparent
And in the palms of your hands
I see the year panned out
In blue veins
And freckles
And it is kind hearted
And it is forgiving
And it is kissing my forehead
And letting me breathe
I know this is going to
Be a good one
Jan 2, 2017
Jan 2, 2017 at 1:58 AM UTC