it is tempting to lose yourself
in the pleasure of wordly possessions
money, cars, yachts, beautiful things

the Dagobert Duck syndrome

as we know
even the pharaos of ancient times
together with assorted kings and emperors
chiefs, dukes, presidents, popes, & cetera,
could only take their toys
into their graves
and not beyond

we do not know for sure
    although we may believe
if immaterial possessions
have a better fate

yet even though we do not know
what our final moment brings

a thoughtful wrinkle on your brow
looks always better than
a bleak array of orphaned things

sometime it is
in the act of writing
that we create the sense
of what we want to say

as if the process of articulation
    when we are fishing for the proper words
is generating meaning
inventing itself in its own genesis

leaving the poet amazed

sometimes even the readers

the other day
I occupied a chair
at a sidewalk café
watching the vanity fair of the quotidian
float by in quickly changing apparitions

an endless flow of different ages, nations, fashions,
skin colors, miens, ****** expressions, postures & gaits
kept passing through  my field of vision

it made me wonder why
some people get so furious
when they  just hear about
    not even meet
    the ‘others’ different from themselves
that they start dropping  bombs and shooting rockets

I think they rather should be curious
and eager to discover
how the immense variety of humankind
can help expand a locally grown mind

and recognize
that we are all of the same kind

like many stoutly claim
    as members of some Christian faith
love our neighbors as we love ourselves

then why do we look down on those
    of different creeds and cultures
    skin color, clothes, or hats
suggest to keep them out by building walls,
suspect them of barbarian ways,
let them drown,
put them in camps,
build fences,
stop them at our borders,
prefer
   in short
to have them elsewhere

maybe we should love ourselves much more
so we can better love
the tired, hungry, and the poor
who come to our shores and borders
     in search of safety and shelter,
     freedom, and human dignity

let us remain easy, and truer
to the spirit of our Liberty,
remembering our heritage
     and that of our parents
     and their parents
most likely immigrants from somewhere
looking for a better place
    to have a life and rear their children

it helps to see our neighbors as our friends
rather than enemies
and love them like we love ourselves

creates our universe
our gods
makes armies clash
defines our world
    always again and new
names everything
   we then can talk about

lets politicians sound as if
    they were our saviors
lends voice to protests
    also well-phrased obedience
articulates all complicated laws
    and sometimes even makes them clear
makes us hate people
    or fall crazily in love with them

more difficult, it seems,
is to find words for our hearts and souls

    how to express your love
    appropriate to the occasion

    or to describe a painting by Degas,
    Rubens, Kokoschka, Michelangelo,
    the impact of a symphony
    or a performance on the drama stage
    
to catch the words for what we feel
is much more difficult
than to imagine those for what we see

it is the poets’ challenge to give shape
to all the hopes, loves, fears, and phantasies
in our lives

so we can make the power of the word
the power of the world

digital availability
   around the clock
after a while
begins to feel like
permanent responsibility

your friends expect you
to be online all the time
    whether you like it or not
so they can share with you their daily trivia
of personal condition, discount shopping, their dog’s health,
the children’s good, their problems with their partners,
etcetera etcetera

I know it’s nice to hit a button
and hear the ringing of the other’s phone
the voice responding to your call

it’s fine when there are no alternatives

and yet

somehow the electronic chat
confirms more than redeems
presence of absence of the person

I feel like talking to an avatar
a disembodied voice
that has a virtual existence
yet whose life in the real world
still needs to be asserted
by meeting – and talking –
in a café
or simply on the street

you feel it
when you clutch your wrist
before you cut

remember

it's your only one