EPISTLES

farewells and remembrances
For Charles(artist)-you are remembered
For Jawhir(in the hospital)-bravery,love and healing
For Lee-may Montana be better than dreaming!
For Dr Marvin-we will visit you Wednesday
For Christine and Fran ,and Element 615 -HAPPY BIRTHDAYS!
For Nick Travis-we jam with you Cafe Caffeine sundays
For Melissa-hugs for the loss of love
For Richard and Kathy-your playful spirits attune to moonpeace
For Barbara and Sylvia-release
For Patricia-good health and healing in mobility
For Randy-good gardening in this humidity
For Cathy-enjoy those miniature organic tomatoes
For Mikus-glad to know you are still with us!
For Frank-time to release your daughters!
For all civilians-you are living poems
For Paula Held-wildflowers!(seasonal-
as her hand heals and strums new songs
For all @Kerrville-may the weather be cool
For Wimberley and Dripping Springs-poetry venues!
For Jacobs well and Blue Hole-waters!
For Salado and Temple-poets!
For little Austin-remember we are a village
every one here matters-every homeless Buddha
every illegal and underage,every musician ,artist,poet
All are @the very heart of you
You are more than threatened Springs and Salamanders
You are the Spirit of Life itself
Let me address and undress you
as we lovingly stumble into a second hand day
This is a Song of Experience
an Epistle to the core of all of us
May we live-together and apart
With this one(and many)lives as our Art!

MY BOOK OF SHADOWS

23 years@Manchaca Library-
she knew Pasha from Chicago House
and High Times Tea Bar and Brain Gym
Retired because libraries and librarians were sidelined
for firefighters and APD.No respect for literacy/community..

"Drop the resentment!" Remember forgiveness
when alienation empowered personal expression
Even art refuses change.Remains framed.
If at this age,I am still my father.All those years...lost

Birthday.No one came
Re-birthday.Same.

You are on a train/boat/plane of existence
I am here and not here simultaneously
This is not a poem.It is a GPS to find you

Temple Poets grew old and left the stage
so new voices could sing on the firing range.

If i fail to give (you all you feel you need
will you recognize me in your mirror?

MY BOOK OF LIGHT
The poets of Temple meet the poets of Salado
Small town links move to Dripping Springs and Wimberley
Every peaceful gathering forestalls Armageddon

Seeking harmonic souls-pilgrimaged
to garage sales on saturday mornings.Met poets
who knew poets i knew(smiling-they had given up
So i bought all their stories..

it is the Gathering of Light
that illuminates each separated reflector/meditating
upon unitary consciousness

She leads by example-i follow where she glows
Every path is underwater in a fishy world

Those who left life early
miss the end credits
and deleted scenes!

The possibilities for extended pleasure
limit suicide to 3 syllables
(I prefer a whole life sentence)

The Gulf between oil pelicans and us
is in the seafood chain we are eating
Until we limit consumption
WE are a closed system

By supporting poetry,
(enlightened selfishness)
you co-create sanctuaries
for the blind

I decided to swing through each Golden Moment
as if i were a Silver Surfer!

Connection collects sentients=
bridges between islands!

Everything you feel(you say
is new until your next new
Now!

OPENED MY WINDOW(to let some darkness in)

Oil seeped out of my television screen
Random explosions destroying civilians
seed feed continuous transmission
Let it go.....release/switch off
Anger's tears ,piled resentments
Emotion's wild horses,fences/limits
All await a clearer day/night
Dreams may come and go like snow
or clouds across a humid sun
Waiting changes everyone)
All good advice is just a mirror
to soak up fear /outbursts of anger
Red raw the blood/stone fire heart.
only now i make fresh start
to chart the path not of stars
more the way the water goes
with least resistance/around and under
until a better moment allows more growth
and we are fed by more than
what we know

WHAT HAPPENED NEXT
Surrounded by your goodness
no guarantees) we are linked
even when too many leave
their sacred skin /reminding us
how temporary time/
NEXT!

mODDern rhymes
He reads from his blackberry
She from her iphone
I spill strawberries
across blank faced white page
all of us/following lines

3 interpretations of the same dream

in one,i am in shadow of a bird's wings
hovering above me (father bird)
swooping down to peck entrails
am i vulture of the dead?

i am the bird above me
panoramic views of childhood up to now
i swoop down to feed upon memories of

i am watching two birds
they play like DNA
together they melt into...

SILENT WALKING
perambulating around the possible=
seagull,sparrow,pigeon-
all generic carrion scavengers
looking for survival
quite dependent upon the fall of civilization

SPEECH OF SONG
what i could not give away was birdsong
sounds of morning in the cry of birds
whether it be bright parrots winging
or soft pigeons singing
their signals affirmed
waking/dreaming

my name is oil,sea turtle,pelican.fish and shrimp

i only have one vote(life).It is for clear clean water
You cannot drive your cars into the sea
but some Pied Piper seduced you with toll roads and taxes
to build concrete poems everywhere-for the God of Gridlock
makes Houston uninhabitable,.Dallas dangerous and Austin anarchist
You say you are but small-you have no power at all
And it is true we all contemplate extinction at some time
This has happened before-spills upon the sea floor
Plumes of public relations spin doctors spouting oil slick advertising
You cannot eat oil.You cannot drink oil.Plastic lives forever
I try hard to ignore the destruction of the Gulf of Mexico
I drive my little recycled car only because there is no bus
I used to walk and bicycle,but it is no longer us-
more BIG business,BIG BP ,corporate corpses
Dawn of a new Dead Sea-where nothing lives
Light gets in between oil globules.Science coerced
between belief in Acts of God and Negligence via Man
I am small fish.This is a whale of an ocean
There is only one.Planet.Home.It spills in us
and who dare ask a government/when it is business
as usual?My name is..

PLAYING CHICKEN

It's a poultry life(even when free range
they scatter corn and we nibble
grains to fatten us for the killing
If we knew,would our feathers be ruffled?
"Egg em on"they say,rolling down aisles
laughing at our nervous gait/our brighteye twitch/red comb shake
Some play chicken lotto with our droppings
debeak us and make factories where we feed
If we were big as beef-would they show more respect?
Our size matters-organic are we
deserving of empathy,Family matters to us
Cock o the walk needs hens to lay with
His early morning awakening may alarm others
We make him wait until we are good and ready!
MacDonalds pretends to care for us-we are but breakfast to them
fast and forgotten,some clown with a yolk in a bun
on a dollar menu,forgetting and forgotten
We have personality-we cluck regularly
You know us by feather and style and curl and preening
whether we know our end is near
we still act as if it will never be Slaughterhouse 5
more Catch 22(if someone wishes to keep us in a petting zoo-
or find a kind and gentle farmer who loves the living more than profits
We have been with you since dawnbreak of time
You domesticated us into productivity.Tell me-
When will you set all your chickens-free?
ask BUCOLICS ANONYMOUS@BOGGY CREEK FARM June 19@9am