June 2012
2 posts
42
all day long i shake
i shake
with broken bellows
for lungs.
i call to my God,
lips dry.
how long must i wait.
how long.
how long must i wait.
rough stones
waiting for water
as i
kneel, with a tired back.
Chesed.
i long for your love.
i know
i know it will come
a slow end.
the birds leave the branches
when shade is broken.
the sun catches through,
wings flutter
shadows fill
-
my words will break down
over time. sea sand.
promises I cant.
just cant.
nothing more.
-
I know this is slow
it may be now
or later. for ever
its just
an ending.
-
Breaks in the surf cant
last . how I feel
disintegrates.
fragments
to ...
May 2012
9 posts
Fe y la luna
The moon is ricocheted
clay-red this late,
as I drive wearily
from the long day.
Her true colour is so
covered by sun
keeping its rust from all.
She hides till now
her true beauty is shown
a rusted lily
like everyone else here
I think she must
have great faith in me
to keep secret
her rust, her graceful breaks
Memorial Day
Today a man dies
I will never know him
Today men have died.
I never knew them.
Today is not like other days
-
Being broken at heart,
I see death. I see it
Like a child at baseball game.
It still gets me going, though.
But when just some gets in.
it burns like oil on water.
-
Today though, it is here.
Death is war, death is strife
death I see from the faces,
of veterans smiling,
...
Broken Knuckles.
Pine trees make quiet whispers when pressed with great winds.
-
I crack like an old sailor
trying to find his way
in a sea of shale and ice
to light.
On my knuckles is hate
or love
I can’t remember anymore.
all that matters,
is landfall.
-
I talk to the ship’s mast,
about its old life.
about where has been,
how it keeps up
with the gale.
It tells me it’s...
The mystic follows.
The heavy load of Mercury passes before the sun
-
I feel myself falling
into roman roads.
the wheel ruts
leading the way.
-
Appian Ways far from
cities, in fields of green
and of grey death.
I see all.
-
This road, this progress
is heavy with dust lingering
gently distant, in the air.
particles of paradise, just visible.
-
Mercury passes the sun,
heated.
I carry a similar...
The mystic lives
the tree comes back after ice, verdant as it’s work.
-
Breath, as fine as gold foil
shatters constellations.
Breath brings life to the ash.
bringing light again.
-
I am the ash, growing.
aflame in green.
these leaves shake in the breeze.
enough to announce life.
-
I grow with wind.
burrowing into firmness.
grasping bedrock.
I remember the ice.
-
Cold of night, it leaves
the...
the mystic hears
a cry in the dark returns a candle’s fire.
-
I cry , to what seems
a deathly space
between me and the Creator.
but, space is broken.
-
I cannot go any longer.
the path I forged,
is that.
a path only I forged.
-
The call comes down.
“the light be your guide”
It speaks not with words
but with meanings.
-
the cry returns a call
“the light be your...
the mystic seeks
The slurs of books make them stagnant, obscured.
-
the cries of the doves,
they wrestle with life’s work.
in them, is hopelessness
I have lost the vision
the hope of the songs.
-
these books are shreds
shreds of what they should
cut apart when written.
They slur their words,
hidden.
-
The darkness of this night
where I am find myself.
the veil is lifted.
I see only distant...
the mystic reneges
as the violin moves up, the stars roll about.
-
my head feels dizzy as the evening
wraps me in flags and banners
wisps of claims, of honor
they blind my eyes
-
A call to prayer comes
cuts the banners, this halo
as a violin bowed slowly.
“Remember the night as the truth it is”
-
The light off the leaves
catches in my wrists
commands me to bow
reverence.
-
“I...
Metal-fan arabic
oud on the soft beats of empires half-dead.
I’m half-alive with this metal-fan
The incandescence,
the fever of orange on the window.
has driven me back in.
Syriac on the half-life,
the day slowly dwindling.
I rock gently with the pulse.
I rock gently with my pulse.
I rock gently, pulsing.
-
To the arches of Andalusia.
I can lament, I know your heat.
but the beat, the pulse,
...
April 2012
24 posts
A saintly coalminer
blues rattlers and cowhands,
God will forgive you
in summer’s gunsmoke sunset
-
Bringing down the hammer
to the hot forge
of what is made.
He will forgive you
But just be aware
There is a lot to learn in the heat
-
in the heat
pickaxes handles
are just bluesmen’s souls
turning into rhythm
-
“God can use you
Any time, just you wait.
God can use you
Any time,...
the rain on cardboard
strike
as rain onto cardboard-houses
ships can sink in the weather
of where my ribs depress
-
crashes and chalkboards,
one thousand reverberations
reminders of where
I once could go
-
the hours of sleep
ring like distant telephones.
these calls from faces
with abandoned names
-
tin cans and leaves
tumble along pavement
useful then, holders
of what was once life.
to be on pilgrimage
to be on pilgrimage
as a comet goes and returns
passing by sacred ground
but never staying
-
to follow a path
as roots grow
looking for water where
it will bring them life
-
to bring down my self
as flowers close
out of respect
for the cold and night
-
to live my life
in service and love
for true things, hope
that is certain.
-
to walk this way
i know, i will tread
safely, on...
the cosmos never change
they only appear to
what I wonder is
does it feel the need?
will it always wonder
what went
unrealized.
the cosmos never changes
but sometimes,
I think it wants to.
spring's death
Candles light on their own
if provoked by heat
for long enough
-
guess I’ll just wait
for things to heat up
so I can see again
-
this spring is quickly dying
like burning stars
and helium.
-
but this heat is
time burning itself
like a mad monk
20 pound books
20 pound books
like hammers
for eyes closed
and tea
for eyes open
loyal
I am not a rebel
but a loyalist
I may fight against
but I fight for
I am not a rebel
but a man who
stays true.
true,
true till death
Who we are inside
spotlights drifting down
like a soft river
illuminating just
one
spot.
The spot that we dont know
like the center of a
rubber band ball.
The core of a person
hides itself
not from light,
but from being seen
till we peel back
the layers
see each thought
stretch them out
let them snap back
and find
the most basic part
not the guts
the heart or the brain
just who exactly
...
Going home
I’m going home
back to a place
where there are names and words
that I can slow dance with.
I’m going home
back to a place
where meaning is in bouquets
that I can see
I’m going home
back to place
I couldn’t create here
But I try to anyway.
Phone Call
This evening I am tired.
I sit on the phone, talking above me
I am tired of the taste saliva on my tongue
and tired of salt-stains under my eyes
I miss looking at living things
and not knowing
death, and its grey cowl
This evening, I am tired
tired of looking at beauty
and knowing decay
lies just beneath.
This evening is dark,
I have felt its darkness
but this evening,
its just...
telephone poles
Telephone poles posing as crosses
link me to the poorly-modern world
with lines like lies, lying between them
telephone poles posing
road after road
crucifying communication
nailing ourselves
cross-country
telephone poles like crosses
hear my problems
but cant know my soul
today
Concrete fills my veins
when I have no inspiration
to write.
So here I write, toiling away
trying to reduce the day
into parts
talkable and interesting.
Today wasnt though
today was just a day.
sheer fact that it simply happened
is poetry in itself.
sheer fact the sun showed,
are its lines
sheer fact I lived through it
is its meaning.
I cant write today. Its late, and
today...
knee
My knee is grinding
like coffee kernels, popcorn beans
and I feel pain. the pain of sitting.
I crack inside wondering where I’ll be
-
my knee grinds where I soon wont walk
i’m losing my youth , quickly
as it slowly becomes like barsoap
loosing its weight
-
age comes quick, this year was several
this poet, a tired man
who will continue to break
till his pieces are dust in...
4/13 late night
tonight the light hung in the air
like a war was on over the west
but just suddenly froze.
the rain then came,
leaving mist tails from cars
like bonfires moving quickly
I know not where I am
when this happens
but I know this rain
in daytime,
feels like home.
I’ll sleep easy tonight
knowing that
this rain may stay
like a beautiful, sad woman
for a time
tomorrow.
yuri garagin
I wonder if the spaceman speaks
to the earth, like child to a father
seeing the distance from his mouth to its ear.
I wonder if he speaks scared, as I am.
But still speaking, waiting for time to carry it
-
I wonder if Yuri Garagin felt as I do.
-
I wonder if space feels as empty as it looks.
is it cool like a stream, or is it like fall?
I wonder if it could see how much fright i’d...
cracked feet
Canticles i short-sold, stalled
in the tailings of footseps.
the residue I left, walking
in the wrong direction
-
night after night, footsteps
without softness, clashes
of sanity on pavement.
broadsteps to blank places
-
the chants of the men
like salted cellos
the savour of the notes
on-ringing in my soles.
-
what I hold may improve
given the time it takes
to wander back
and...
lift
drunkards on the beach will lie
in state
like stone faced porticos
simply because they lost their will
to fight
i worry I will do the same for you
-
the ways I salute
are tenements for the bones
squabbling
old folks within my body
i wish
for health, so I may lift you
-
tomorrow, I will try to
not break
i’m gaining the will, to stir up
courage
and drive out the bleakness
to...
i, barrabas (4/9-4/10)
High school cathedrals
and broken-leg hymns
old sights avalanche
down the red stream
-
The slave I am, naught.
done being taught by arrows
the revoltist torn
out of my pupil
-
i, barrabas
free from my death place
i weep, i know not
what new life is now.
-
This school is cupped hands
these hymns act water
i wash in them, tired.
healing my corneas
-
this earth now blinds me
i...
#7
Your lips are like
carbonated sign-posts
always telling
bubbly, freshpopped half-truths
green front-yard lies
for careless passerbys.
-
I always stand
for no real-good reason
charged with gunsmoke
first-stones, bent crowns and I
Squeezing red fists
ground down nose dives, my nails
-
We wont get out
alive, like the story tales
so why not love?
kill our faults’ slow hunger
...
Road at night
While driving I see
green light like glass beads
shivering quiet up
the black dress of night
-
the road is beauty
at night, but it lies.
this road is broken
by backlit iron night
-
I know, cause Ive seen
blood passengers breathe
the lights are just fires
keeping out the dead night
-
tonight, we are freed
from the roads we took
lit by candle’s dust
we wait in the night
-
...
Freight train
I can swindle down
words from my mouth’s steam.
just as tracks tell me
freight trains roar out blind
thrashing dialogues
-
This is poetry
to me, a blurred mess
where I draw curved lines
in the coming tide
just to wash away
-
But freight trains still groan
and I still hear their
quite living sorrows
I express for them
something without words
-
This is poetry
act of...
fool #3 & #4
Today I act with winded lines
Tin Souls and Soldiers march
up the hills of my knuckles
Im lost in my demarche
-
Today I have to remind myself
where I am, who I am
like records remind my elders
of pained and painless land
-
Today I have wronged
I skipped a beat or two
of the pulse of life
lost a friend, gained a few
-
Today I am the fool again
Without song or dance
hung up on my...
Fool #2
I had to start today
what my mind loves to whistle
like the sea spray
to the kettle
-
This is where I boil
this is where I will sink
my tongue elude my mind
when I have time to think.
-
I must be silent
here
and evermore
Fool
I find myself in a warehouse
filled with trinkets and black wine
and in this warehouse I search
for all traces of red divine
I will drink until I sleep
in dreams, I will define
what it meant to be alive
in half-step and broken time
-
I am a fool who has lost his way
In a space with no order
I act a fool, knowingly
I please and plead for no quarter
I wish release, I sway before
I ask...
March 2012
2 posts
I’m shaving today
meet in the halfway,
to become the man
who I really am.
clarity
My eyes ache
from things I see
Mad scratching at the door.
-
the box which
we now are in
consumes all through nothing
-
singular
“faithless freedom”
can I not judge any?
-
let me out.
To feel clear air
lift into my red lungs
-
full of feel
“freedomless faith”
I have so much to learn
-
Clarity
sweet fruit of mind
sanity in the winds
-
wind of change
...
February 2012
7 posts
68th Street.
I write to my friend here, I hope you enjoy this.
As the sun lays down its arms
on this hot/mad- house day
my hair, in locust’s swarms.
I awake to run away.
-
Daytime is cheap change, metal
clang-calming like a lullaby
I rest in my peace, petals
of flowers now mollified.
-
The night steeps down like blue tea
I run with you, now arisen
to lights, whispering banshees.
Our minds...
As art is, I ...
Unimaginable
in who I am, upturned like
truncated trees in their prime.
I redact what I see. Cut
( in the blank space between)
-
Imago dei, how could I
resist what I am? In the
sung-carving of my poet,
I am painted like blue hills
-
The artist, the chiseler
who sketched my life in his stone,
I can ask but one question
“why marble this stone with grace?”
-
The crude...
Comets
You are like a comet
just passing by, grazing
me
We looked at each other
for just one moment out there
You
were not close but in sight
just viewing eachother briefly
Then
as comets do, seperate.
drift like space opening time
Until…
Hunger : Day 3
I am on tooth and nail for more.
Like tanks and fat aeroplanes
rusting their wheels in wait of war,
I’m planted on my windowpane.
-
I am looking for a slow sign
between the sigh and the inhale
letting go of this self, resign
to the winds of the tall, sweet gale
-
I wait for you, Lord. With brash hand,
I wait like beard-moss on the trees
I wait like rainless bad-lands,
for...
Hunger day #2
My throat is throwing around
the yells of black hellhounds
as I sit like dead trees
bereft of their leaves
-
My stomach hammers nails
into the man. Be hailed!
But I? How I? Too dead
to taste blood-body bread?
-
I break these cries now hung
like the scorched curse stays unsung
for the man who brought this black
blood curtain to draw back.
-
Rest me in hunger-sore
waiting,...
The bell had rang
is my hunger my depth?
Of a dark shallow den?
What concept of rest
shall live with till then?
-
my peace has gone heavy
O, gone at what loss!
Taken from me, that levied
black and strange cost
-
cut from my mast
I will fly like the hanged
look’d back to my past
the death bell had rang
-
I see the swells
of sea, azure rolls
I seek to dwell
In washed peace of soul
On the shores of infancy
On the shore of infancy
I wait like a branch
behind rocks at the sea line
the sea waning out
-
I feel so very futile with rocks
that crack with the waves
making sand from bad ideas
I thought so high of
-
My heart asks why I must lay?
my husk in the sun
the spray in sight, distant bliss
The shore, my prison!
-
while I wait , desiccating
watching the ocean
dancing with my...
January 2012
6 posts
celestial hums
Suit jackets and cutlery
clean cut and sharp
stand out in the dust
i just make up.
-
but standing out around
toil and symbols
is just a old bell
cracked middle.
-
sending out flowers
to four corners of man
will not reach
a central town
-
so I will be in veins of
an old abbot
charging brother
with sanded wit.
-
hoist up the flag
we declare that:
Lights and vision
are simple...
Snapshot
And I was a Kodak moment
standing in the cold rainbow
singin’ in the rain, feet on the grass
youth was massive, color was brand new
-
I drank tea, ‘cause it was in my blood
the black leaves in my greenhorn heart
my fingers relaxed, heart sat down
I fell in love with your starry hands.
-
But I was a Kodak moment
gold songs tracing on my soft feet
days are avalanches now
into your open...
Today i wanna start
a revolution
wear my beret
get my old gun
and be gone away
-
but this old fight
is nothing but old
I fight with ancients
throwing flowers
in bad arrangement
-
I fight with warmth
my gun, my dead lies
I stand beeming
blowing shit up
in Christ redeeming
second language
Im looking for myself
in this pile of rubble
where I live cold footed
-
I can now feel myself
disintergrating
like the static above
-
The love that finds it way
across my schist and shore
will not be lost again
-
free me from the hairs that
stand end on end like needles
digging quietly deep
-
anguish should not be a
second language
but like speaking in tongues
Senses 1
I want solely to feel
the bumps on your cold hands
like Neruda in Braille
so to touch worn beauty
-
talk with me, honestly
My mind lives on my ears
like an old barn house does
hearing the wind and owls
-
listen to me, I have
nothing but a stomach
full of fuzz moths flitting
around the light you put there
-
I want to taste the air
that floats like model ships
still stuck in their...
Priest and 5th
The city is ablaze
in cool jasmine light
while I wait, tongue checked
in jade arrow sight
-
I count up the hours
lived within great height
my chest feels weaker
in this jaded night
-
The jasmine lays fogged
no fear or quick flight
as I sit breathing
cross chest gone alight
-
Call my name, siren song
Call my name in night
I wish to face you now
here in this stopped fight.