Jack they say, one autumn day did fool the devil well;
And then and there, did make him swear, to keep him out of hell.
But when he died, he was denied his entrance into glory;
And so he roams our streets at night and therein lies the story.
To see at night, he has a light that comes from hells own flame-
Which burns so well in a pumpkin shell and jack-o-lantern is its name.

A muse is not a fairy godmother
Or a genie in a lamp
A muse is a disagreeable *****
Who shows up whenever she pleases
And offers mostly excuses
For ideas left undeveloped.
Sometimes she offers up nothing but recycled cliches
freshly polished and smelling of chocolate chip cookies.

Don’t come around when the muse and I are wrestling –
It is definitely not a pretty sight.
But when we’re done -
Both of us lying exhausted on the floor -
That’s when she’ll say something really meaningful-
Or at least it always seems meaningful
At the time.

Thoughts, ideas and words
Have always been corporeal objects in my life -
Things, with weight and volume.
If you could see them, stacked precariously one atop another
Pile after pile and stack after stack,
threatening to bury me alive, when the balance is destroyed someday
when I try to remove the wrong item at the wrong time -
Well, If you saw them like that -
The way I see them –
You would, no doubt call me a hoarder,
A hoarder of ideas, thoughts and words,
Living safely in my own little world  
Surrounded by the waste products
Of an over active mind,
Unwilling to part with even the most useless thought -
Secure that someday they will all fit together into in a grand poem
That will free me at last.

Jack, they say, one autumn day did fool the devil well;
And then and there, did make him swear, to keep Jack out of hell.
But when he died, he was denied his entrance into glory;
And so he roams our streets at night and therein lies the story.
To see at night, he has a light that comes from hells own flame-
Which burns so well in a turnip shell –and jack-o-lantern is its name.

I wonder does she know
that they live with us -
all my other selves -
over on the stairway is the me that went totally insane
five years ago during the great stress
while I had to keep it together for my family.
He is looking quite relaxed today.
On the sofa is the me that quit his job
to write poetry and become involved in the theater.
( I am surprised he is here - he should be in New York)
Over there is the me that told everyone to *******
and leave me alone.
On the second floor, looking out the bedroom window,
is the me that actually went to find
my birth father and tell him he was a **** for leaving my mother and me.
He is chatting with the me that sent his manuscript out to more than three agents before giving up.
The me that has worked out diligently for the last 30 years, playing football and basketball and soccer is over - no I’m making him up. He doesn’t exist.
They crowd every inch of every room
and more than a few hang from the ceiling
and now all her other selves are moving in as well.

I suppose that’s married life for you.

The walls of my sleep have been deteriorating,
crumbling

So full of holes,
that my dreams have escaped their dark cages
to prowl the world in the greenblue day.

Outside my windshield
Morpheus transforms the landscape -

sculpting traffic, trees and sky
Into mythic tableaus
of seductive beauty - hypnotic grace.

and then I am also transformed -

Into a bullet

For an eternal moment
I become a speeding messenger of death,

until the alarm of the traffic
breaks the spell
and the dreams scurry away,

to hide once more
from the waking world

and wait.

This morning one of my ninth grade students
Is showing off her sonogram
With the same excitement and enthusiasm
I used to see in my daughter when she was showing off a new Barbie doll
With it’s glittering gown and open toed plastic heels.

I tilt the image this way and that -
Hypnotized by the light
That dances on and off of the black glossy surface
Just the way it did when I was a kid
Shaking the magic eight ball
Waiting for a glimpse of the answers
That I knew were going to emerge from the shadows.

Tomorrow should be getting closer.
But is it? I must answer no, sir.
Whatever speed we walk or run
We’re no closer than when we’d first begun.
Like the carrot dangled in front of the ***
(I apologize if this sounds crass -
I refer to the animal here of course
A second cousin to the horse)
We chase the carrot till our days are through,
And then we die. I am afraid it’s true -
Without getting the carrot, ain’t that a *****?
We might die poor or we might die rich,
But our tomorrow’s the same no matter what we do,
So I offer up this thought to you–
Let’s stop and share glass of Claret
And let other ***** chase the carrot.

A child’s mind and spirit need a chance
To confront the boredom of unstructured time -
To build, explore, to write, pretend or dance;
To dream and plan for futures more sublime.

But we, with anxious guardian concern
So fearful that our wards might come to pain,
Replace their fires with ones that do not burn
Colored lights that anesthetize the brain.

Our children grow and sadly we bemoan
How ill prepared they are to lead us on.
(You harvest wheat if wheat is what was sown
The chance to harvest other crops is gone.)

So let the entertainment sit ignored,
And see what comes of children being bored.

Split the words open.
Cut them in pieces.
Let the guts spill
and the blood spurt out.
Get it on your hands
And face;
Get that wild glint in your eyes –
The one that makes people nervous;
Bellow to the heavens as you stitch old ideas back together,
Laughing hysterically
“It’s alive!”

Words are fun to play about with -
to rhyme sometimes, or simply shout with.
Textured words with rich deep color
that vivify those words much duller;
phrases culled from a private stash
to give your expletives panache.
Cause shock and awe - gain admiration,
with erudite vituperation!
So let your language soar unfettered
away from tired words four lettered.

With every breath
Every touch
Every thoughtfeelingdream
Joysorrow pain and healing
The map of our soul multiplies -
An infinite fractal reflection
Of the universal design

And we move further away
From simple answers

Long forgotten in poems and prose
Are the tribulations of a person’s toes.
Perhaps the likes of the great Ulysses
Are all afraid that they will sound like sissies -
If, in a battle full of strife and woe
They should take a moment to say “ouch, my toe!”
(though no one thought twice to hear Achilles squeal,
“I can’t go on - I broke a heel”
So go on and whine if you stub your toe -
be like: “this little piggie went to battle - Yo!”

Being disorganized and somewhat distracted
I seem to have misplaced the map that the universe provided at my birth.
You know the one:
it shows your perfect path through this lifetime-
so you can be at exactly the right place at exactly the right time
and use the talents and intelligences that the universe let you borrow
to achieve great and wonderful things.

It would be so nice to know that I was on the right path,
instead of guessing and hoping and straining to hear the angels
that I imagine are hoarse and frustrated from screaming:
Not that way!! The other way!!
or
Where the hell are you going?

You ate them?
You ate the ******* plums
that were in the fridge?
God, you're a selfish *******.

My mother dearly wanted  
to be Dorothy Parker.
She yearned for a taste of the power that comes
from a truly witty response.

She craved to deliver
A statement so powerful
and sardonic that it would terminate
all argument or discussion.

My proximity made me an easy target to practice on
as each of our arguments ended with a bon mot
delivered with the all the acerbic flourish of Bette Davis.

As I listened to her footsteps receding down the hallway
I had only to take one more breath
before the footsteps reversed direction
and - standing at the doorway to my room -
She would deliver another culminating witticism
turn, leave and repeat.

In the fifties and sixties an intelligent woman –
a single mother of three
with no high school diploma,
but a surfeit of imagination –
Savoured what little power she could find
even if it was a fiction, a delusion
or just a punchline sharp enough to draw blood.

So peaceful and calm
before the lights are turned on
then students arrive.

Class is almost done
student raises hand and yells
"What are we doing?"

Students focused, calm
intent on learning, thinking
someone else's class

Bell rings, students leave
room in disarray - teacher
exhausted, drained

correcting, grading
while family watches movie
while eating, sleeping

If you should come upon a painting by Mark Rothko in a museum -
I'll assume you are not one of those billionaires who has one hanging on the dining room wall, or hidden away in a secret room behind the bookcase -
but either way, do not just look at the painting or you will see nothing.
Well, except color. You will see color. Rothko loved color.

But wait a while and you will begin to hear it whisper its secrets:
How lives are layered upon lives;
how painful sacrifices
get buried beneath petty ambitions and lies
and joys and succes as well-
oh, and perhaps another layer or two of color.

Each generation scrapes the parchment clean
and blithely scribes new marks on its surface -
confident that they will not forget the lessons
that seem so absurdly obvious.

Empires disappear beneath overgrown vines
and dieties who, drunk on the blood of virgins
would feast on the hearts of conquered warrors
but now shuffle past each other
with oblivious nods, grousing about the food,
wait for the day someone remembers their names.

Listen and perhaps you will learn
how every layer of life is a forgotten secret
discernable only by its subtle influence
on the layers that are built up above it.

If not. There is always the color. Rothko loved color.

Inside the house,
my cat is a cat
napping and lounging all day;
but outside the house
she’s a wild jungle beast
silently stalking her prey.

Inside the house
she’s all cuddles and purr
and a nudge so loving and mild;
outside the house–
crouched and ready to pounce–
she’s a lioness fearless and wild.

I know that I look different,
But here’s the paradox you see-
Maybe I don’t seem like me to you,
But I seem more like me to me.

Bit by bit, your past
will try to distract you from the present,
so it can steal your future.

This is how we become ghosts
in our own lives.

Many a human being is smitten
When they come face to face with small furry kitten.
And theys hardly need much -
Just some cat food and such.
Oh yes, don't forget a small box they can **** in.

I watch men I do not know.
How they smile,
twitch,
scratch-
how the ***** steel bristles
cut through their cheeks and chins;
their tatoos
dull blue and grey
on sweat washed arms.
How they rub their hands,
push back their hair,
adjust their collars,
breath,
laugh,
belch.
I am looking for someone
I never knew.
I am looking for my father.
If he were near, I could not
let him pass by unseen, unfelt.

Meeting him,
I do not know what I would say.
hello
or
do you know me?
Maybe I would say nothing.
Maybe I would just sit and stare,
like a soldier,
seeing his own arm
****** and torn in the road,
wondering why the fingers don't move
when he tries to make a fist.

October days are thin, you said,
like a shirt worn through at the elbow
so that your skin shows.

Then you smiled, and your stomach so full and swollen moved beneath your sweater.
We can’t move out of the city before the twins are born. I know that,
So I spend a weekend peeling wallpaper off the walls
of the back room.

It is slow work most of the time, though occasionally
a large section rips off quickly, revealing the bare white
wall underneath. I run my hands over the newly revealed surface

looking for bits of paper that I might have missed;
small bits, almost invisible.
In a few weeks it will be Halloween and children I do not know

will crowd around my door in cheap costumes
and cheaper masks - many will have none at all-
Naked faces emerging from the shadows.

There is a thing that I have to do,
that I really, really don't want to.
So I sit and think of reasons why
it can't be done; I shouldn't try.
So I don't– but then I think of how
If only I'd done it, then right here and right now,
the thing that I don't want to do would be done
and my list of to–dos would be shorter by one.
But I didn't, so it's still a thing I have to do,
that I really really don't want to.

(I was wondering: does this ever happen to you?)

A line in the sand -
a border -
a fence -
my 40th birthday;
my 50th birthday;
my 60th birthday -
the ball drops at midnight!
A new year -
blow horns, beat drums,
kiss somebody, make resolutions.

but everything on that side
looks exactly
like everything on this side.

and somewhere
rivers are carving canyons
and small plants
are shattering boulders

A toddler with a stick
poking holes in wet sand;
Making short lines and squiggles
which waves wipe quickly away.  
When his toes have been tickled
and sand rises up around his tiny feet,
the boy falls
backwards onto his bottom.
There! Did you feel it? The universe stops–

Then begins again -
with delighted squeals burbling forth
as the water moves around him
licking his skin –
and a thousand small kittens
tumble away.

Today I eschew all matters political
and examine a subject I consider quite critical.
The greatest invention in man’s history
is, IMHO, the apostrophe.
You must admit it’s quite impressive
even if sometimes it’s a tad possessive.
Suppose, if you will, you need to drop one small letter
(because somehow shorter is always better)
’tis the thing that shows any gal or feller
That you’re not just a miserable, terrible speller.
So go on, drop your letters with wild abandon
and know the apostrophe will be there to stand in.

Just one other thing before I call it quits–
concerning the fuss about its and it’s.
It’s an issue for some that is really quite raw
Because they think that possession’s nine tenths of the law.
But I tell you now without any deceptions
In life there will always be some small exceptions.
“It” owns an apostrophe, I hear some of you cry,
But its apostrophe’s useless unless it loses an I.

New gods are rising
Up from the mud
At the place where streams of blood
Fed by the violence of ignorance and greed
Flow together at last
Into the great river

New gods are rising
Beautiful and strong
From the sacrifices of the oppressed
The marginalized, ignored, the mocked and reviled
New faces, new races
The mud of the river

New gods are rising
Free of the chains
And fetters of antique gender expectations
Not willing to be defined or bound by anatomy
Only spirit and dreams
Down by the river

Old white gods in dotage
Behind their great walls
Are blinded by their own reflections
In the highly polished arrogance of power and wealth
Unaware of the river
And the mud and the blood

And the battle ahead

Step one: I write something down.
Step two: I erase it.
Step three: I start over again.
Step four: I misplace it.
Step five: I search and I search.
Step six: I give up and play.
Lists are so good at using up time,
in an orderly organized way.

Not all questions have answers I must suppose.
And some of the most important are those.
Or perhaps they have answers we don’t dare contemplate.
So we smile and ignore them until it’s too late.
But that’s the dilemma of this little verse:
Will there be any answers in the back of the Hearse.

Numerous were the people that did turn away from the Truth
and worshipped Ignorance
Saying “Oh, lead us in the ways of true Ignorance,
for the truth we love not.”

Then they were sent forth to find the truth
and destroy it.
And their God did say unto them:
Where truth grows in abundance –
plant lies, so that there is confusion.

Where truth stands as a monument,
chip it away.
Where truth sounds forth like music,
Blare your falsehoods louder.

Where the truth shines brightly
obscure it with shadows.

Deny the obvious.
Eschew all reason, logic and evidence
that does not please you.
Above all else repeat the lies
and repeat the lies
and repeat the lies
and repeat the lies
ad infinitum
These are the ways of true Ignorance.

The boy, age seven
Stayed behind the others -
Remained outside in waist deep snow
While his newly assigned family
plodded and stomped onto the back porch of the great house,
shaking snow and cracked ice from their matted sweaters,
Shedding their scarves, wet gloves and socks .  
Loud excited voices growing muffled and faint
until they disappeared completely into the warmth and comfort of interior rooms.

It was the boy's first winter in western New York
and he had never known such monumental silence
or seen the world disappear so completely
in snowstorm and dusk.
His cheeks burned red;
His toes and fingers grew fat and numb –
How long would it take, he wondered, for fresh snow and wind
to obliterate his footsteps completely,
leaving no evidence of the path
that had brought him there;
Until it looked as if he had just been dropped into someone's yard;
as if he had just appeared from nowhere.

Before he began to move again –
before he headed inside with the others
he smiled.
In the space between his thoughts
there was a moment of silence deeper than anything he had ever felt before.

Now that you have accepted the seeds
Of my work
(My sentences, words, marks or noises)
Into the womb of your soul
My (our) artwork can be born

I will not be present for the birth
Nor will I ever truly know
What we have brought into the world
what it means to you
But I hope you will love
And nurture it
And that it nurtures you in return

He had a voice like death on a ******.
We listened,
Our vision growing unexpectedly blurred
As he scribbled landscapes
On the window, and sang poetry he created by
Twisting  prayer around blasphemy
Around lust around yearning
With  notes whose colors  bled
One into the other
Into the other -

Beseeching, begging, demanding
The scars of our doubts
The armor of our pain.
And when, one day, he shattered the sun
Raining shards of gold flames like shrapnel
Down on the innocent and guilty alike,
We sat in our shiny new darkness
Singing hallelujah, hallelujah
Over and over again
Rocking back and forth
Clutching an old album cover
Like it was the relic of a saint.

Look,
Just pick a path, will ya?
Flip a coin if you have to
But move along -
Other people are waiting.

Dinner with even the gnicest gnomes
Can be excruciating -
Their table manners are less than genteel -
In fact they’re gnauseating.

“Artists create art”, ah, yes they do.
But art creates artists is equally true-
And many a man from his comfort is torn
The moment an artwork decides to be born.

Do not write about love.
Do not bleed words all over the page.
Do not tell the world how in-love / heart-broken you are.
Or sing your lovers virtues.
Or spew hateful bile at those who have bruised your heart.
Don’t do it.
Just don’t.
Not right now.
Later, perhaps.
Much,
much
later.

I realize at last
That I can not be God.
I feel the pain of others too deeply,
Which would inevitably lead me
To end pain and suffering -
Probably even discomfort.
I would, no doubt, answer the prayers
Of people in need and trouble.
I would try to make life fair.

I have come to the painful realization
That such actions would in turn
Blunt the tools we use to sculpt our souls
Into strong, beautiful and unique pieces of a universe
I can not begin to comprehend.

Therefore, in light of this weakness,
I must respectfully withdraw
My application for the position .
I will seek a different position elsewhere,
For which I am better suited -
A friend, perhaps, a parent or teacher

Someone who cares a lot,
But controls very little.

To the brave non conforming curl of hair on that woman’s cheek
To the grace of that man’s rhythmic movement as he hurries down the street
To the pure glorious delight with which that girl greets her friend
To the faraway gaze of that child’s eyes
To the faces that girl makes when she thinks her mother can’t see
To the lip being bitten
To the swirl of the skirt
To the way that girl holds her baby sister
To the way those boys jump to touch the branch above them
To the slow careful steps the old man takes
To the disapproving shake of the old woman’s head
To the  toddler jumping across every other tile

Thank you

When it happens, it happens quickly -
a small crack will appear
and the ossified personification
of one of your most revered gods will crumble.

And that is when the true magic will begin.
When you realize that what spills forth
is not all miracles,
beauty and wisdom -
Much of it is ugly, disappointing, even petty -

and all too human.

We exist
As a reflection of the creative force
That drives the universe.
It imbues our cells,
Our molecules,
Our spirits.

As children, we did not hesitate
To pretend,
To imagine,
To make up songs and stories,
To paint and draw,
To dance and sing -

Another joyful voice in the choir of the universe.

So tell me why
Do you hesitate now?
Why do you hide behind self made limitations and fears -
Excuses that become the walls of your cage,
Your prison cell -
Your tomb.

Why do you say
that you are not one of THEM -
The gifted, the talented, the artistic -
(As if we were not all made from the same stardust)
Repeating it over and over like a mantra-
that could absolve you of your responsibilities,
Your role,
Your unique harmony in the song of creation.
Oh, what arrogance!
What hubris!

Tell me how you are feeling,
Or tell me to go.
Say its none of my business
Or I don’t need to know.

Tell me what’s going on,
Or tell me **** out.
Say it or text it.
Whisper or shout

But silence is hurtful -
Though it may seem absurd -
Every unwritten sentence
And each unspoken word.

Tonight the moon,
Voluptuously full and swollen
Moved close to me
And whispered -
(The way new lovers often do in the early hours
When they are sure the other is still sleeping,
Or too groggy to understand )

And truly I did not understand -
But I smiled and nodded
And continued our walk.

Now as I try to reconstruct the moment
I can’t help thinking
That beneath the sweet, gentle lightness
of the night breeze
There were overtones of something much darker.
Shadows mixed with dreams
Mixed with dreams
Mixed with moonbeams.

My summer -
The one I knew so well as a child–
Was a universe of green, blue and white
Meant to be explored and explored and explored again–
While the cool breath of angels
kept the sweat from my brow
And worries from my mind.

Languid and sweet
It was my sanctuary, my world.
Time would stretch or contract as I chose.
The silver clear water of my creek or stream
Slipped and slid over my bare feet–
Like kittens or puppies
Carelessly tumbling over each other.
In the distance
Other children laughed and screamed happily together.
Sometimes I would sit back to listen–
Imagining myself as one of them.
.
On the other side of their beautiful cacophony,
nicotine stained walls were waiting
The walls of my mother’s latest apartment;
Where the light was thin
And shadows
Wrapped around quietly anxious secrets -
Then a breeze would touch my cheek -
To remind me where I was and where I was not,
The sky would grow purple and stars
Would begin revealing themselves.
My stars, in my sky, in my summer.

The moon floats nonchalantly outside my window as if we had never met -
As if we were strangers.
I like to think she is a bit melancholy -
Hanging around in hopes of catching a glimpse of me,
To see how much I've changed,
Hoping perhaps, that we might swim again through the inky black night
As we did so often when I was young.
But I was only one among
Millions of suitors and would-be Lotharios
Enamored by her silvery beauty.
It is absurd to think she would remember me.
But I like to imagine that she still can hear the melody
Of the song I wrote to her, one night on the beach
As we walked together exploring bits and pieces
Of our other lives
And other times -
Each of us a little intoxicated by the moment.
Vowing we would never forget.

To teach is a thing you can't do alone -
No matter how deeply the fire may burn.
The desire and effort to teach must be matched,
by another’s desire and effort to learn.

Are they good people?
Friendly folk?
Good neighbors perhaps,
Willing to lend a helping hand-
Loving family members?

When they are not preaching hatred, I mean,
Waving symbols of terror and oppression;
Scapegoating people who fled oppression
Torture, death or economic hardships
Such as we have never endured..
Or denying the rights of fellow citizens
(who's ancestors were stolen, enslaved, tortured, terrorized and
Stripped of as much dignity and humanity as was possible even years after the promises of freedom and equality.)

And when the parades and riots are over,
Are they good people, nice folk, once more?

A swift and certain line -
moment and movement.
A glimpse of life
unburdened by the weight
of physical form.