Under:Standing
is
Over:Sitting

too many times
i've found nothing to find
in between the lines
and i've lost my mind

too many times
i've lost my mind
in between the lines
and found nothing to find

Ensnared.
suspended asleep in a spider's web.
how do you fare?  
floating in air

Repaired.
looking like new,
you don't seem to care,
do you?

The way we shape the space between,
making things into how they seem
out of this dream.

Released
from the endless reflection.
you've finally ceased
to increase.

At Peace
with the manifold of gems.
two demons apiece,
the seams turned to hems.

The way we shape the space between,
making things into how they seem
out of this dream.

Looking at looking
the fish started hooking
at the rate of the great vibration
1,1,2,3,5,8,13

On and off,
it never stops,
and it has yet to start.

the drip of drops.
what use are clocks?
it is in your heart.
it is your heart.

The way we shape the space between,
making things into how they seem
out of this dream.

Waking up to what was waiting
the whole time
you slept;
you slept in,
you slept in again.

Wide awake,
and it's been this way
all the while;
you smile,
you smile soft,
you smile again.

You share smiles
like there's just one.

Nothing left but breath to be done
when we play the game already won.

THERE IS NO GOD in the eye of the storm

Some days she is far above me
cumulus, billowing
complimenting the sky
as she drifts and changes
slowly
Shine one moment
Shadows next

Some days she can't be seen
or is distant and alone on the horizon
she shies from the Sun
but at night we watch the stars together

Some days
after the rains
when all the quiet things come out
and patter the forest floor with
hushed steps
when I am outside listening
and my head is like an empty bowl
she curls from me
rising, slipping out over the valley
embracing the hills
and running her fingers thru the trees
like so much tall grass
laughing

I breathe and she is my breath
filling my hallow
she is all I see

cracking wise
wide open

awake and weary
the poet sits transfixed with
poems unpapered

I love you
because you didn't believe me
when I repeated
"life is suffering."

fresh morning dew drop,
suspended like a planet,
appeared over night,

I commit myself in action,
my time/space faculties full fleshed,
to compassion.

What can I right
now release
for/to/in/as the love of
another?

To see with clean eyes
the preconceived origins of my habit
so that
I may be more entirely here
with my graspings extended,
swept off with the seconds passing
into a spacious future
breathing.

Receiving so as to be a gift,
living.

a hungry ghost
can be beautiful
in her mask
and gold
and silver
and silk

alone
top of the mountain
bottom of the sea

i've only ever met you
in the middle

The night is emboldened,
swinging recklessly between the lighted intervals.

In the day,
when all human movement
is set to continue,
the rapid spinning of
Earth
is lost to our needs.

When the stars show
we go dancing
with the purpose of loving,
so fiercely,
the coming rest.

We make our nests of
exertion
woven into
footfall patterns
and
when we wake
it is unmade
and we set off
collecting distance in our hearts
to make it again.

ancient ice burns like
new born fire, I just want
to call you baby

My poetry
is best used at work
as notes of praise and encouragement
in co-workers birthday cards.

If, in reading my words,
their step is made lighter,
I am successful beyond kings.

I would write blessings to all the world
if the lightened step of men
would save it
but
at the end of days
I do not truly know
what a poet is.

Should I give more attention?
a tree than a stone?
because one is softer?
or has longer been 'lone?

We’re home.

.
the ocean
.
the dawn
.
surrounding
.

there is comfort
in something that can't be understood
vast concepts
like blankets to be rapt it

.




Leaning in closer to hear his last words







.

Where do we go to?
Is that the question?
What do I ask
to open the flowers in front of us?
What answer is the acceptance of this moment?

Now! a glaring shadow in the periphery
of the past & the future within it.
Now! the ever remembering self
& the forgetfulness within it.

Only.. even in knowing
I find myself opaque
when I reach into the flames.

In the sun,
scintillating snow dust whirling
in the wind.

Distant, mist-wreathed hills
of sugar pine and ponderosa,
a girl is walking there.
Long, cool stride under low skies
hinting rain,
electric taste of grey.
On those silent hills I am filled with sound
as I watch her,
like an ocean or
television snow.
She stoops to lift a
stone or berry or seed
and turns eyes toward me.
My own eyes turn inward
and she disappears.

The nature of a doorway
is both open and shut.
Wait not for the mending of time
'for tending your bruises and cuts.

Ask the moon if she prefers
fullness over cast in shadow.
Her reply, "A darkened sky
makes oceans no more shallow."

Boy you better breathe
into your lungs
so you can see
what's on your tongue
is meant to be
some place away
because your thoughts are how you say
what you mean
like the rays of the sun touching down
like a dream
on the ground
on a stream
and the steam all around
seems to me
to be breathing

Girl you better leave
because the moon is high
and the wind is in the trees
soon the bloom will die
that flower that you held
on the night the trees were felled
is just now loosing color
like the cold breeze
like a shudder
and if you ever see another
know the sea and I will be teaming
eyes a'gleaming
your heart's beaming
seems to me
to be breathing

preview
learn nothing new
far too few too soon
and i'm lost in minutia

it's the wind's whimsy
which is the way of water
that guides I, the smoke

Opening a moon-shaped box
gold, deep blue crescent
the dried sage
frosted teal
and the butane lighter in my hand

Slowing the breath, slowing the breath
and the beads from around my neck
one at a time pinched softly thru fingers

meloncholy red coral
and water in a jar
making space between them to sit

the sun is beyond the hill
and there is no longer a rainbow
at the window

hushed heart beat
but no stillness
in my chest

waiting is made a game in the mind
it moves thru itself
in good humor
or out of habit
always taking me with it
when i'm caught unaware

pang
like a sore thumb
begs your attention
the most fluffed young rooster
is the most afraid
he knows the
pang
like a sore thumb
unwanted attention
wondering why the wait is so long
before the honey moon
the pleasant lull between
pangs
"maybe we should
**** him" she says, to save him
the pain, maybe grab a basket before
you break
another egg
pang
"oh please let me be normal"
I can hear my grandma say
from an old play
I can't remember the name
pang
like a sore thumb
stuck out in more ways
than one
soon
in the deepening summer
will be the wedding
and after the heat
we'll swim in the river
and the rooster
will scratch grain
in a retirement home

filling in the backside of
this page
space
space never wasted
no waiting
    only patience
                & a breath
   a wipe the brow for
the next pick swing
     shot in the
                         dark
                                   space
making this page
this poem

           pause     & consider

      itself
as related to the reader...

to walk out of the house
to see the moon
thru a haze
from wildfires far away

to step in
the crackling pile of
leaves
eucalyptus left by my brother

to pick one up
with a broken tip
and smell nothing

my brother
in another river valley
can you smell the trees?
can you see the wind
thru the smoke

based on movement
we choose

and the struggle
within

sleep

Pines under the moon
wind felling silver needles
the birds are asleep

Was our destination waiting for us?

Or did we make it once we arrived?

In the midst of speaking,
   of making plans,
                       of taking orders,
        small and long winded.
                                   Talk wafting to bounce off
   the walls, here between them a bubble of
  warm and meeting,
and I can't find a ground to
walk on.  So I'll keep on dropping eaves.

   The need so painfully sweet for an us
or we to keep dear and meaningful.
   A bond mind-made, heart-shaped kept
floating somewhere beyond the moon.
   I continue to find myself
looking up at it in the hope to hear you
     looking up at it too.

    Cavernous Heart! in you there is no distance.
My touch of love is here,
her soft and smell like
squeezing together breaths.
    Here in my chest is our laughing at the little silliness
  of fingers and eyelash drifting.
           So hot inside as to burn to steam
                       the tears before falling.

In the midst of speaking, of need,
     in the very hallow of heart
       I see the same Moon as you.

With all its movement
the ocean roaring and white
is always resting