Work is what pays-some are addicted
Play is the way free will steals time
Dolphins in captivity amusing themselves blowing bubbles
Consciousness finding new gold cage words
like Houdini to open these chains round my chest
I stretch-structures bend -to reveal how organic and real
meaning finds containers to fit form and shape
amphorae/gazelles/quick breath haiku/songline sonnets
weave of melodies in a line of guitar/stretch this world
until you meet borders.Here words stop,change languages.
Summer heat and the last of vegetables.
Before dog daze August,rainwater tanks bulbous,bursting
spring buckets of green waters for parched throat gardens to sing
I kneel in the altar (altered)earth,benedicting flowers
Weeds that sing too will soon be beheaded
I dig to the roots ,sweat out my pores
Water flows out in drops .I share more
with this earth than admittance.
Last tomatoes seem smaller,recalcitrant
Shriveled pensioners seeking Goodwill
I leave them for the season will deal
In this casino,all is seasonal-storms,cracked earth
rotate like crops,in circles.Messages of miniature harvests
Almanacs or portents?I weed and water ,as every peasant
Knowing less of what lives beneath than what comes from it
Friday, July 30, 2010
DEATH/REBIRTH/ONE LIFE?
i am on the ceiling looking down
at my body on the carpet(fascinating!
time has stopped since i coughed myself out of myself
SNAP! back (it could have been ages
car accident time.bus stop time.Yorkshire night
Stopping breathing is not the end of life
many micro-lives await our consciousness.
Poet's husband usual patriach-hard on her softness
until his heart attack saw him die on the operating table
then be brought back.from then on kind to his poet
change is a death,death is a change.no guarantees
how many of the edge,fall over/slip/accidentally
most do not return to write these warnings
become dated photographs/retro movie memories
like Yangzte river dolphins/Ganges river dolphins
Irrawaddy river dolphins-now Amazon river dolphins
Once extinct,all that is left is mutations ,myths,legends ,stories
While we are alive in our lifetimes-THAT is poetry!
at my body on the carpet(fascinating!
time has stopped since i coughed myself out of myself
SNAP! back (it could have been ages
car accident time.bus stop time.Yorkshire night
Stopping breathing is not the end of life
many micro-lives await our consciousness.
Poet's husband usual patriach-hard on her softness
until his heart attack saw him die on the operating table
then be brought back.from then on kind to his poet
change is a death,death is a change.no guarantees
how many of the edge,fall over/slip/accidentally
most do not return to write these warnings
become dated photographs/retro movie memories
like Yangzte river dolphins/Ganges river dolphins
Irrawaddy river dolphins-now Amazon river dolphins
Once extinct,all that is left is mutations ,myths,legends ,stories
While we are alive in our lifetimes-THAT is poetry!
May you never..
forget John Martyn (departed last January
Stormbringer of acoustic guitar/who "Couldn't love you more..
"Go down easy,John"I don't want to know
the how or why of your "Sweet little mystery
You"Glorious Fool! who caught death with a "Certain surprise
Now you are in his"Clutches "You can discover
what the other worlds are like,where there is no"Solid air
"One world moves on-you always said"Let the good times come
"May you never lack for being played in the "Small hours
"Rope Soul'd or Sapphire/you were no "John Wayne
Whether you loved "Anna or "Angeline,"they are still"Dancing
"Go easy,John-you who sang both"Head and heart
are now"Over the hill-we always loved your music-we always will.
"Bless the weather(that brought you to me
Curse the storm that takes you away...
Dear John,i was one of many who came
and paid,and sat,and listened,absorbing
your bright and bitter lyrics with shimmering acoustics
You with strings made love seem a song
You stroked that guitar like a lover-made bright
dark nights with worlds of words
we could recite .Now you are gone
like a storm that cleaned the skies
and moved on.Those who replay you
without having seen you perform live
are transistor radios(crystal radio sets
Movies will feature you on soundtracks
Tribute records will sing your praises
Yet the sharing of your anger and your Light
helped many of us broken into healing nights.
Humming "over the hills",we remember
"May you never" be forgotten like these lines.
Stormbringer of acoustic guitar/who "Couldn't love you more..
"Go down easy,John"I don't want to know
the how or why of your "Sweet little mystery
You"Glorious Fool! who caught death with a "Certain surprise
Now you are in his"Clutches "You can discover
what the other worlds are like,where there is no"Solid air
"One world moves on-you always said"Let the good times come
"May you never lack for being played in the "Small hours
"Rope Soul'd or Sapphire/you were no "John Wayne
Whether you loved "Anna or "Angeline,"they are still"Dancing
"Go easy,John-you who sang both"Head and heart
are now"Over the hill-we always loved your music-we always will.
"Bless the weather(that brought you to me
Curse the storm that takes you away...
Dear John,i was one of many who came
and paid,and sat,and listened,absorbing
your bright and bitter lyrics with shimmering acoustics
You with strings made love seem a song
You stroked that guitar like a lover-made bright
dark nights with worlds of words
we could recite .Now you are gone
like a storm that cleaned the skies
and moved on.Those who replay you
without having seen you perform live
are transistor radios(crystal radio sets
Movies will feature you on soundtracks
Tribute records will sing your praises
Yet the sharing of your anger and your Light
helped many of us broken into healing nights.
Humming "over the hills",we remember
"May you never" be forgotten like these lines.
Thursday, July 29, 2010
THEORY OF HOLES
i was looking at my arm-at all the holes in skin
where hair follicles sprouted like miniature demonstrators
realized it was the same for my head-
porous skin allowing sweat and tears out and roots in
Holes in my cornea for Light to slip in(undocumented!
holes in my ears for the sound of this line
holes in nose to breathe ,holes to release fluids and solids
holes are holding my whole body community together!
i then realized the dilemma of Arkansas-
if they fixed the holes in their fences,no farmer would find workers
no roofs mended,no laborers in the heat of interrogation
Spaces define us/divide us-without them
we would be an amorphous blob-a mass where nothing could circulate
I decided to opt for space-not a race to the moon nor mars
more individual space for withdrawal from such
to have a hole to hide away in when the heat gets too intense
to be on the outside of the skin of hot debates
There are holes in arguments that keep lawyers paid
Holes in our Constitution for politicians play
And if the hole in our fences ever gets paid for
We would have a hole in our Budget(that's for ever more...
where hair follicles sprouted like miniature demonstrators
realized it was the same for my head-
porous skin allowing sweat and tears out and roots in
Holes in my cornea for Light to slip in(undocumented!
holes in my ears for the sound of this line
holes in nose to breathe ,holes to release fluids and solids
holes are holding my whole body community together!
i then realized the dilemma of Arkansas-
if they fixed the holes in their fences,no farmer would find workers
no roofs mended,no laborers in the heat of interrogation
Spaces define us/divide us-without them
we would be an amorphous blob-a mass where nothing could circulate
I decided to opt for space-not a race to the moon nor mars
more individual space for withdrawal from such
to have a hole to hide away in when the heat gets too intense
to be on the outside of the skin of hot debates
There are holes in arguments that keep lawyers paid
Holes in our Constitution for politicians play
And if the hole in our fences ever gets paid for
We would have a hole in our Budget(that's for ever more...
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
MAGIC PILL
My grandfather in his dying bed
piles of pills and potions stacked near
none of which could cure
All of which he believed-
advertising,vegetables,phlogiston,
karma,religion,secularism,affirmations
gods,gurus,doctors,saints,miracles
garlic,blueberries,green tea,kumbacha
art.music,gardening,poetry
wars,progress,real estate,"reality"
dropping salt,sugar,fats,adding exercise
faith healing(no one can hear him-
he is long gone,yet still his beliefs persists
whenever i filter my water and wash the DDT
from my(organic)garden vegetables
Long life is a lottery-a few win
most get white crosses /ashes scattered memories
held on to like blind faith in some magic pill
like ghost shirts,ghost dances,ghost cures
Polish cavalry against WW1 German tanks
thinking IF ONLY and I CAN!
our ancestors laughing
from within our garden
hear them?
piles of pills and potions stacked near
none of which could cure
All of which he believed-
advertising,vegetables,phlogiston,
karma,religion,secularism,affirmations
gods,gurus,doctors,saints,miracles
garlic,blueberries,green tea,kumbacha
art.music,gardening,poetry
wars,progress,real estate,"reality"
dropping salt,sugar,fats,adding exercise
faith healing(no one can hear him-
he is long gone,yet still his beliefs persists
whenever i filter my water and wash the DDT
from my(organic)garden vegetables
Long life is a lottery-a few win
most get white crosses /ashes scattered memories
held on to like blind faith in some magic pill
like ghost shirts,ghost dances,ghost cures
Polish cavalry against WW1 German tanks
thinking IF ONLY and I CAN!
our ancestors laughing
from within our garden
hear them?
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
F1? F---NO!
$250 million dollars of Austin's taxes
given to a for profit company
with no reimbursement nor profit share?
BAD DEAL! (NOT IN MY NAME!)
Carbon emissions and traffic densities environmental damage?
ABSOLUTELY BAD DEAL!(NOT IN MY NAME!
Haircut Governor squatting off our paying-for-his-rent
Get back to the Governor's Mansion!(until the election!-then
Let Bill White close this dumb deal down!
Who needs millionaire toy games
destroying wilderness areas?
Who needs more car pollution/traffic mess?
Who actually needs F1?Not we who live here-
it is done for the benefit of the rich
LET THEM PAY FOR IT!
Profit if ye will but not from us
We who have no interest in F1
but are stuck with a $250 million price tag
even when we can barely navigate Mopac nor IH35
Toll roads are a ripoff
Ring roads are tolled too high
Lessen the traffic mess
Drop the F1 on its profit motive
and let the rich pay for their own sports
NOT US!
given to a for profit company
with no reimbursement nor profit share?
BAD DEAL! (NOT IN MY NAME!)
Carbon emissions and traffic densities environmental damage?
ABSOLUTELY BAD DEAL!(NOT IN MY NAME!
Haircut Governor squatting off our paying-for-his-rent
Get back to the Governor's Mansion!(until the election!-then
Let Bill White close this dumb deal down!
Who needs millionaire toy games
destroying wilderness areas?
Who needs more car pollution/traffic mess?
Who actually needs F1?Not we who live here-
it is done for the benefit of the rich
LET THEM PAY FOR IT!
Profit if ye will but not from us
We who have no interest in F1
but are stuck with a $250 million price tag
even when we can barely navigate Mopac nor IH35
Toll roads are a ripoff
Ring roads are tolled too high
Lessen the traffic mess
Drop the F1 on its profit motive
and let the rich pay for their own sports
NOT US!
sacred places
know them by absence-spirals of seashells,circles and riverflow
bend in the rock where you get off the path
and find the track invisible.Getting lost helps.
That is the purpose of deserts and distance.City cages
cede to seasedges.Sit on a beach for the waves reassurance
Slip away like a snake in a rainforest.Alone is easier
To retrieve original silences(and lost ones)
To forget time(apart from pulse/and heartbeat)
To remember who and why you are(in connection
with others and with consciousness and choice means
every path is sacred,every choice is yours.Before and after,
we will be forgotten.Who counts waves?Moons?Stars?
Who witnesses what is most important?Meaning waits
even if we rush fast past.Inside every leaf,a new forest.
In each drop,oceans.One is all in miniature.Maps hide mysteries
lest crowds demand miracles made for moments.Like this one
When you make a sacred space for breath.Time slows.
Death waits.Life pulsates through each opened cell.
There is a quality innate .Found,not made.Like a rock pool
where life in tides ,waves...Where water knows.We visit,but must go
What is most sacred might be best met in silence
Seeking with attunement and respect-via riversedge/in deserts
in the speech of rocks and stones and stars long past
Most of all..in silences...(like this one...
bend in the rock where you get off the path
and find the track invisible.Getting lost helps.
That is the purpose of deserts and distance.City cages
cede to seasedges.Sit on a beach for the waves reassurance
Slip away like a snake in a rainforest.Alone is easier
To retrieve original silences(and lost ones)
To forget time(apart from pulse/and heartbeat)
To remember who and why you are(in connection
with others and with consciousness and choice means
every path is sacred,every choice is yours.Before and after,
we will be forgotten.Who counts waves?Moons?Stars?
Who witnesses what is most important?Meaning waits
even if we rush fast past.Inside every leaf,a new forest.
In each drop,oceans.One is all in miniature.Maps hide mysteries
lest crowds demand miracles made for moments.Like this one
When you make a sacred space for breath.Time slows.
Death waits.Life pulsates through each opened cell.
There is a quality innate .Found,not made.Like a rock pool
where life in tides ,waves...Where water knows.We visit,but must go
What is most sacred might be best met in silence
Seeking with attunement and respect-via riversedge/in deserts
in the speech of rocks and stones and stars long past
Most of all..in silences...(like this one...
near the end of the night
is where the miracles occur/when musicians meld
attune in harmonies and swing in strange quixotic riffs
that exist only on the edge of jazz. Wordsters drive language
to our local dump and recycle,rocking B boys with an A license
Then she arises like a flower in a moon garden-shares one dream
about how she will live(as an affirmation
Night breaks all glass pre/tensions-listening ears spark flints
from the back of the room-a fire of at/tension
She has broken the cool! No more diffident nominalism
She is our Wikileaks,Medicine Sans Frontiers heroin/e
We become idea addicted.Then he slides in with a coup de gras
smiling songs that sparkle like the sea for tonight's last fool moon.
They stay.He holds them like lassos.Wild horses feed from him
They become wild,too.Expression now matters more than matter.
Energy wins!We have convinced ourselves that continuance and creativity
is not only viable,legal-but also pleasurable!
More wish to rise like opium poppies-
but Cinderella closing time ..Even our barista brings out his guitar
Why are we so afraid of speech?(All these years of tearful silences
Obedience fails to impress.We stay to listen to each other
File out when a guitar unfolds the origami evening
another human miracle/another revelation-
how we can hear each other(if only we stop to listen.
@THE HIDEOUT MONDAY EVENINGS 6-10pm 617 Congress
attune in harmonies and swing in strange quixotic riffs
that exist only on the edge of jazz. Wordsters drive language
to our local dump and recycle,rocking B boys with an A license
Then she arises like a flower in a moon garden-shares one dream
about how she will live(as an affirmation
Night breaks all glass pre/tensions-listening ears spark flints
from the back of the room-a fire of at/tension
She has broken the cool! No more diffident nominalism
She is our Wikileaks,Medicine Sans Frontiers heroin/e
We become idea addicted.Then he slides in with a coup de gras
smiling songs that sparkle like the sea for tonight's last fool moon.
They stay.He holds them like lassos.Wild horses feed from him
They become wild,too.Expression now matters more than matter.
Energy wins!We have convinced ourselves that continuance and creativity
is not only viable,legal-but also pleasurable!
More wish to rise like opium poppies-
but Cinderella closing time ..Even our barista brings out his guitar
Why are we so afraid of speech?(All these years of tearful silences
Obedience fails to impress.We stay to listen to each other
File out when a guitar unfolds the origami evening
another human miracle/another revelation-
how we can hear each other(if only we stop to listen.
@THE HIDEOUT MONDAY EVENINGS 6-10pm 617 Congress
Monday, July 26, 2010
astonishment
at the utter neutrality of nature,money,other people
how words like good and god and evil and devil are empty projections
how we are here despite statistics to the contrary
how people still think anger is a passport
how re/action is not action enough
how positives pile up like a golden wedding cake
how kindness is still a key/and goodwill endless
how imagination has no borders
how birds still learn the sky,as fish the sea
how we may not even be in the middle of the story yet
how amazement clarifies detachment
how words are boats @Dunkirk(little Arks! Light canoes!
how origami stories are paper replicas
how short life is compared to stories
there may never be time to finish this.i do not mind
half a footstep upon the moon.an untouched sun.
stars so far away they vanish in time
people the same.and still we claim emotional response.
perhaps when we find out,we may make new maps
if we knew before we breathed,would we?
in this Casino,i will settle for astonishment
o! and wonder,too!it always adds more energies
whether or not we know
what
happens
next
how words like good and god and evil and devil are empty projections
how we are here despite statistics to the contrary
how people still think anger is a passport
how re/action is not action enough
how positives pile up like a golden wedding cake
how kindness is still a key/and goodwill endless
how imagination has no borders
how birds still learn the sky,as fish the sea
how we may not even be in the middle of the story yet
how amazement clarifies detachment
how words are boats @Dunkirk(little Arks! Light canoes!
how origami stories are paper replicas
how short life is compared to stories
there may never be time to finish this.i do not mind
half a footstep upon the moon.an untouched sun.
stars so far away they vanish in time
people the same.and still we claim emotional response.
perhaps when we find out,we may make new maps
if we knew before we breathed,would we?
in this Casino,i will settle for astonishment
o! and wonder,too!it always adds more energies
whether or not we know
what
happens
next
ARTIFICIAL EMOTIONS
Before computers can replicate human errors,they need to empathize
Their programming is not self-replicating,so this is difficult
If we are to be effectively programmed(like computers)
we subject ourselves to predictable choice patterns
Somewhere in No Man's Land =RoboCop/Terminator/robots
every classic clone /Frankenstein/programmed person
indoctrinated into Catholicism/Communism/Terrorism/Capitalism
still feels unwelcome emotions(contradicting their propaganda)
Our best solution is Artificial emotions(like Artificial Intelligence)
HAVE A NICE DAY! PAPER OR PLASTIC?
WOULD YOU LIKE FRIES WITH THAT ORDER? I LOVE YOU!
Phrases used ad infinitum until the content is neutral
By dumbing down emotional content,we can watch TV without anger
We can believe advertising.We can lower educational standards
WE can reduce support for culture and increase wars
All of this can be achieved without sacrificing standard processes
Classes without textbooks,libraries without opening hours
No emotion will be stirred by passive witnessing
Everyone will blog.No one fill juries.Few will vote.
Of course,there will always be renegades who sense and fell and respond-
poets,singers,artists-but they will be ignored
as more monies flow to those in the know
who process emotions until there are none involved
and we can all be happily cloned.
Their programming is not self-replicating,so this is difficult
If we are to be effectively programmed(like computers)
we subject ourselves to predictable choice patterns
Somewhere in No Man's Land =RoboCop/Terminator/robots
every classic clone /Frankenstein/programmed person
indoctrinated into Catholicism/Communism/Terrorism/Capitalism
still feels unwelcome emotions(contradicting their propaganda)
Our best solution is Artificial emotions(like Artificial Intelligence)
HAVE A NICE DAY! PAPER OR PLASTIC?
WOULD YOU LIKE FRIES WITH THAT ORDER? I LOVE YOU!
Phrases used ad infinitum until the content is neutral
By dumbing down emotional content,we can watch TV without anger
We can believe advertising.We can lower educational standards
WE can reduce support for culture and increase wars
All of this can be achieved without sacrificing standard processes
Classes without textbooks,libraries without opening hours
No emotion will be stirred by passive witnessing
Everyone will blog.No one fill juries.Few will vote.
Of course,there will always be renegades who sense and fell and respond-
poets,singers,artists-but they will be ignored
as more monies flow to those in the know
who process emotions until there are none involved
and we can all be happily cloned.
GRAND MOTHER LEGENDS
i teach-first @UT,now @ACC
(of course ACC rip off their staff with low wages -
but who does not?And it is hard to get in to any position now
Retiring?Of course i have considered it-but refuse
My mother taught till she was 70(special education
Eventually,it all got to her-the inertia of the system
Not the students(their needs are real-
though i do ban cell phones apart from vibrate-
and texting(who can concentrate in this TV age?
They simply cannot read nor write
and automatic progression is a lie.
I was afraid once-of not having the necessities
But now i guess i will teach until i die
or until it just gets too impossible(the system that is
not the students-when i see them glow with learning
it makes it all; worthwhile
RESOLUTION
"When i turned 50,i resolved to be happy
Every moment precious.I help my neighbors
and now it is 6 years later(i do not regret a thing!
I am SO glad to meet an Australian-
is there anything else silly that you might like to buy?"
So passed Saturday morning,in the University of Learning
otherwise known as Department of Garage Sales
(of course ACC rip off their staff with low wages -
but who does not?And it is hard to get in to any position now
Retiring?Of course i have considered it-but refuse
My mother taught till she was 70(special education
Eventually,it all got to her-the inertia of the system
Not the students(their needs are real-
though i do ban cell phones apart from vibrate-
and texting(who can concentrate in this TV age?
They simply cannot read nor write
and automatic progression is a lie.
I was afraid once-of not having the necessities
But now i guess i will teach until i die
or until it just gets too impossible(the system that is
not the students-when i see them glow with learning
it makes it all; worthwhile
RESOLUTION
"When i turned 50,i resolved to be happy
Every moment precious.I help my neighbors
and now it is 6 years later(i do not regret a thing!
I am SO glad to meet an Australian-
is there anything else silly that you might like to buy?"
So passed Saturday morning,in the University of Learning
otherwise known as Department of Garage Sales
incrementalism
small we are.tiny turtles,sandbound,heading into deep waters
power we have not-nor influence
(we cannot even convince ourselves (about the need for changes
this antique art form (words)has become text msging
acronyms kill civilians.Muttering among us may not save rainforests
Whence then,this irrational exuberance?This joy for no reason?
Itemizing disasters finds more awaiting.
You are the line between chaos and abandon
Consciousness translates into action.All magick is reversible.
Remember Chenobyl?End of our world scenarios?Burning Kuwaiti oilfields?
Radiation lives forever.Three Mile Island.Burning rivers.Gulf deaths
just one in a long line of casualties.
Yet-remember when Thatcher closed UK coal?
Green became Welsh valleys.Air became clear.No silicosis.
Same when asbestos uncovered.Solutions abound.Alternatives await.
All it needs are folk to adapt .Slow as rain barrels ,organic gardens
Letting go of MacDonalds,Kentucky Fried.Walking again.
Battlefields can bloom flowers.We can change from wars within us
Gentle in the flowing rivers.Changing as we listen.There is wisdom.
Step by step,recycling.Re-using.Renewing.Ourselves
and this only world we live within.
(for wildflowers and the Butterfly Effect)
power we have not-nor influence
(we cannot even convince ourselves (about the need for changes
this antique art form (words)has become text msging
acronyms kill civilians.Muttering among us may not save rainforests
Whence then,this irrational exuberance?This joy for no reason?
Itemizing disasters finds more awaiting.
You are the line between chaos and abandon
Consciousness translates into action.All magick is reversible.
Remember Chenobyl?End of our world scenarios?Burning Kuwaiti oilfields?
Radiation lives forever.Three Mile Island.Burning rivers.Gulf deaths
just one in a long line of casualties.
Yet-remember when Thatcher closed UK coal?
Green became Welsh valleys.Air became clear.No silicosis.
Same when asbestos uncovered.Solutions abound.Alternatives await.
All it needs are folk to adapt .Slow as rain barrels ,organic gardens
Letting go of MacDonalds,Kentucky Fried.Walking again.
Battlefields can bloom flowers.We can change from wars within us
Gentle in the flowing rivers.Changing as we listen.There is wisdom.
Step by step,recycling.Re-using.Renewing.Ourselves
and this only world we live within.
(for wildflowers and the Butterfly Effect)
this has happened before
and i recognize -dragons scorching,snakebite.heat (humidity/pressure
occasional kindnesses-but mostly the stress of applied weights
serious .somber.reflection times.when to stop might allow perspective
time counted.parking metered moments.occasional joys.
no defining ideology .work fills time.money declines.life is brief.
dandruff moments pre-novel writing(who reads?
like creating antique keys or clocks for a post watch world
one or two volunteer for steam train sunday.picnics
slow flags flying over Impressionist paintings.pre-3D/4G
There is a part of you that looks back.Black /white.Slow.Slower
You cannot live there.Nor i.It glows only in comparison.
Wars/Depression/poverties/illness also defined sepia tints
This gift is here.Open it!.Even if it looks like familiars
this day is unique.Bonsai.Haiku.Lotus.Lake.Take time out
Wait.Slow is not a race.Every body glows.Auras know
Energies of now enough to flow past tides of dumped dross
Even if there seems no rhyme nor reason.This is enough
To touch this life ,and zen release.Like fish.Like friends
Like this Holy Moment.And this next...
occasional kindnesses-but mostly the stress of applied weights
serious .somber.reflection times.when to stop might allow perspective
time counted.parking metered moments.occasional joys.
no defining ideology .work fills time.money declines.life is brief.
dandruff moments pre-novel writing(who reads?
like creating antique keys or clocks for a post watch world
one or two volunteer for steam train sunday.picnics
slow flags flying over Impressionist paintings.pre-3D/4G
There is a part of you that looks back.Black /white.Slow.Slower
You cannot live there.Nor i.It glows only in comparison.
Wars/Depression/poverties/illness also defined sepia tints
This gift is here.Open it!.Even if it looks like familiars
this day is unique.Bonsai.Haiku.Lotus.Lake.Take time out
Wait.Slow is not a race.Every body glows.Auras know
Energies of now enough to flow past tides of dumped dross
Even if there seems no rhyme nor reason.This is enough
To touch this life ,and zen release.Like fish.Like friends
Like this Holy Moment.And this next...
THE SPEED OF CHANGE
Last night,we took the stereo speakers out-
tall cabinets from when we had bought them
from departing poet Sue Littleton
This morning gone like Tony Hayward
Oil is still spilling 97 days
heads roll like "that's how i roll"
when roleplay cannot distinguish between
symbolism and substance(Wall Street Journal July 26 P A7)
When torture pix of Abu Ghraib surface
Dick Cheney banned digital cameras
Coffins of killed veterans not allowed to be photographed
Wikileaks finally reveals deliberate targeting of journalists
FCC finally recognizes free speech over"indecent language"incidents
Still this censorship between us-
what we cannot say.Cancer.Death.Pain.Loss.
Hospital friends awaiting absent visiting.
Those we love,withdrawing.Nothing new here-
comparisons fail to convince.Visions still dream us
even when we are edited videos of hate speech.
Teachable moments await.Drop hate.love peace.
I am not speaking to you.I am reminding the war in me.
tall cabinets from when we had bought them
from departing poet Sue Littleton
This morning gone like Tony Hayward
Oil is still spilling 97 days
heads roll like "that's how i roll"
when roleplay cannot distinguish between
symbolism and substance(Wall Street Journal July 26 P A7)
When torture pix of Abu Ghraib surface
Dick Cheney banned digital cameras
Coffins of killed veterans not allowed to be photographed
Wikileaks finally reveals deliberate targeting of journalists
FCC finally recognizes free speech over"indecent language"incidents
Still this censorship between us-
what we cannot say.Cancer.Death.Pain.Loss.
Hospital friends awaiting absent visiting.
Those we love,withdrawing.Nothing new here-
comparisons fail to convince.Visions still dream us
even when we are edited videos of hate speech.
Teachable moments await.Drop hate.love peace.
I am not speaking to you.I am reminding the war in me.
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
ROLLERGIRLS & POLE DANCERS
Both insist they are professionals-
they stress the athletic nature of their work
Rollergirls have crews with individual (ferocious)pseudonyms-
pole dancers have international championships
Both are not confined to women-
just as tango began in brothels
pole dancing began in strip clubs
Every practice evolves
just as belly dancing was once in harems
the sexual play at work is a constant subtext
Women claim empowerment via movement unrestricted
Expansion of freedom to move and improve adds to their power
and income comes with professionalism
Poetry of motion,allurement,aesthetics
Rollergirls sport costumes and sports injuries
Pole dancers use every muscle of their bodies
to allure visually their judges and audiences
Evolution of both artforms leads to expansion
ask the artisans of their personal enlightenments
To be in control of one's bodily expressions
allows change in the form of a dance
Sacredness is secular when you move
all is connected when you see
every body as a Temple,playing freely...
they stress the athletic nature of their work
Rollergirls have crews with individual (ferocious)pseudonyms-
pole dancers have international championships
Both are not confined to women-
just as tango began in brothels
pole dancing began in strip clubs
Every practice evolves
just as belly dancing was once in harems
the sexual play at work is a constant subtext
Women claim empowerment via movement unrestricted
Expansion of freedom to move and improve adds to their power
and income comes with professionalism
Poetry of motion,allurement,aesthetics
Rollergirls sport costumes and sports injuries
Pole dancers use every muscle of their bodies
to allure visually their judges and audiences
Evolution of both artforms leads to expansion
ask the artisans of their personal enlightenments
To be in control of one's bodily expressions
allows change in the form of a dance
Sacredness is secular when you move
all is connected when you see
every body as a Temple,playing freely...
RITUALS THAT CELEBRATE CHANGE
observing/celebrating the passage of our seasons(internal/ex-
personal passages like menstruation /warrior initiations
first words first steps first bicycle first car
first accident first intimation of mortality
first pet first emotional link first infatuation first hero
first musical attachment first book first library first film
first travel first personal space first love first broken heart
first commitment first engagement first marriage first argument
first divorce second love first maturation/limitation
second song of experience first lawsuit first reconciliation
first ageing first forgetting first recognition of decline first death
Next life(in this life).First wisdom Second Sight.First Intuition
Secondary recognition of lessons learned.Next death
Next life.First experience without definition
Third Way.Middle Path.Endless death.Ever reborn.In this life
Much to celebrate,grasshopper.More work,ant!
One dayswing a butterfly,next night moon-a river!
personal passages like menstruation /warrior initiations
first words first steps first bicycle first car
first accident first intimation of mortality
first pet first emotional link first infatuation first hero
first musical attachment first book first library first film
first travel first personal space first love first broken heart
first commitment first engagement first marriage first argument
first divorce second love first maturation/limitation
second song of experience first lawsuit first reconciliation
first ageing first forgetting first recognition of decline first death
Next life(in this life).First wisdom Second Sight.First Intuition
Secondary recognition of lessons learned.Next death
Next life.First experience without definition
Third Way.Middle Path.Endless death.Ever reborn.In this life
Much to celebrate,grasshopper.More work,ant!
One dayswing a butterfly,next night moon-a river!
MEMBERS OF THE AUSTIN POETRY SOCIETY,
You are among those members already renewed for the coming year
(either as a life member, an honorary member, or a dues-paid member).
The early responses are wonderful, enabling the Board to plan a really
good year.
We already have a good and growing list of sponsored contests for the
spring Annual Awards, and we’re grateful if you have sent in a contest
sponsorship.
There's still time to submit contest sponsorships. A sponsorship form
is attached. Print it out, complete it, and mail it in with your
sponsorship check. As you know, you may name a contest for your Aunt
Gertrude or someone else you want to honor, your favorite teacher,
your favorite poet, your cat, your dog, your favorite form of poetry,
or almost anything else. You may specify a particular form of poetry
for your contest, and you may specify a particular subject for poems,
thus inspiring the writing of fresh poems. Experience shows that the
more difficult the poetic form, the fewer the entries. Also, contests
which allow broad subjects or “any subject” draw a lot more entries
than those with very specific subjects. In the spring, a contest with
fewer than five entries will be cancelled, and the prize money will be
returned to the sponsor.
Notice these decisions by the Board about the contests:
1. Like last year, the Board wants to have as many
winning poets as possible. Therefore, we ask that you allocate your
prize money among first, second and third prizes instead of giving
just a first place prize. In addition, judges will have the option of
giving credit to distinguished poems with honorable mentions (but with
no cash prize).
2. Only two eligibility groups are possible: you can make your
contest available only to Texas residents, or you can make it
available to all members of the society without regard to where they
live. We have 150 members, five of whom are out-of-state. The
Austin-only eligibility category was eliminated because those contests
have drawn very few entries lately.
3. In May this year and the previous year, we heard a lot of
praise for the high quality of our judges. Contest judges do not know
the identities of the poets, but some poets felt local judges throw
the objectivity of judging into question. In any case, the Board
asks that sponsors leave the selection of judges to the Annual Awards
Committee, chaired this year by George Klawitter.
For a contest to be listed, the prize money must be in our hands by
the deadline for the Yearbook, August 15. We would appreciate your
sending in your check along with your contest sponsorship form.
DON’T FORGET TOMORROW’S FOURTH THURSDAY OPEN MIC:
Herman Nelson will host our APS Fourth Thursday Open Microphone,
featuring Dillon McKinsey, editor of Ardent, and Barbara Carr, author
of the Ancestor Series of poetry books. As always, the Fourth Thursday
Open Mic runs from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m., with an open mic for everyone
after featured readers; bring your poetry and sign up to read.
NeWorlDeli, 4101 Guadalupe.
Elzy Cogswell, Treasurer
Austin Poetry Society
P.O. Box 684672
Austin, TX 78768
poetryplease@mail.utexas.edu
OTHER UPCOMING EVENTS (other recurring events are listed on our web
page under Resources, www.austinpoetrysociety.org:
July 21, TODAY, 6:00-7:00 p.m. Catch a preview of tomorrow's
Borderlands reading on Dillon McKinsey's weekly program, "Writing on
the Air," KO-OP radio, 91.7 FM.
July 23, Friday, 7:00-9:00 p.m. Come to hear a selected group of poets
from the latest Borderlands (Issue # 34). The reading is at La Peña,
227 Congress Ave., in downtown Austin. Guest editor Liliana Valenzuela
will emcee readers from this special translingual issue. Featured
poets include Rachel Jennings, Marcelle Kasprowicz, Pat LittleDog,
Jenny Molberg, Trey Moore, and Nick Norwood. Details:
www.lapena-austin.org and
www.borderlands.org, or (512) 477-6007.
July 25, Sunday, 4:00 p.m. The Community of Poets, organized faithfully by Deb
Akers, goes open mic this month only. Come and read. Basic rules are the usual
for Barnes & Noble (family venue--children present--keep it clean). No
chapbook sales in the store. Bring yourself! Bring friends! Bring poetry!
Barnes & Noble Sunset Valley, 5601 Brodie Lane.
July 31, Saturday, 11:00 a.m. The Austin Poetry Society Critique Group
meets on the last Saturday of each month in the upstairs dining room
at Central Market, Lamar and 38th Street. (Go up the stairs beside the
coffee bar.) Bring eight copies of one of your poems for discussion by
friendly poets. This month the nudge is to list some physical actions
you have taken, choose one of them, and write a poem about it. It's
optional, but fun to try. Host: Beth Kropf.
August 7, Saturday, 7:00 p.m. start, doors open at 6:00. A Night for Peace
in the 10-year-old Expressions open microphone series. Bring your own
peace poems and join the music. Featured poets include Kathy Rowell,
Chris the Future, Daniel Cioper, Elzy Cogswell, India Rassner-Donovan,
Lili & Walter, and surprise guests. Hosted by Tom Yum. Austin Baha'i
Center, 2215 E.M. Forster Ave. Admission: a dish for the Potluck
Supper at the interval
and cans of food for the poets pantry. An all ages reading.
Join the Austin Poetry Society group on Facebook. Go to www.facebook.com. From
the row of icons at the bottom left of the homepage, select the "groups" icon.
In the upper right corner, enter a search for Austin Poetry Society. Open to
all.
(either as a life member, an honorary member, or a dues-paid member).
The early responses are wonderful, enabling the Board to plan a really
good year.
We already have a good and growing list of sponsored contests for the
spring Annual Awards, and we’re grateful if you have sent in a contest
sponsorship.
There's still time to submit contest sponsorships. A sponsorship form
is attached. Print it out, complete it, and mail it in with your
sponsorship check. As you know, you may name a contest for your Aunt
Gertrude or someone else you want to honor, your favorite teacher,
your favorite poet, your cat, your dog, your favorite form of poetry,
or almost anything else. You may specify a particular form of poetry
for your contest, and you may specify a particular subject for poems,
thus inspiring the writing of fresh poems. Experience shows that the
more difficult the poetic form, the fewer the entries. Also, contests
which allow broad subjects or “any subject” draw a lot more entries
than those with very specific subjects. In the spring, a contest with
fewer than five entries will be cancelled, and the prize money will be
returned to the sponsor.
Notice these decisions by the Board about the contests:
1. Like last year, the Board wants to have as many
winning poets as possible. Therefore, we ask that you allocate your
prize money among first, second and third prizes instead of giving
just a first place prize. In addition, judges will have the option of
giving credit to distinguished poems with honorable mentions (but with
no cash prize).
2. Only two eligibility groups are possible: you can make your
contest available only to Texas residents, or you can make it
available to all members of the society without regard to where they
live. We have 150 members, five of whom are out-of-state. The
Austin-only eligibility category was eliminated because those contests
have drawn very few entries lately.
3. In May this year and the previous year, we heard a lot of
praise for the high quality of our judges. Contest judges do not know
the identities of the poets, but some poets felt local judges throw
the objectivity of judging into question. In any case, the Board
asks that sponsors leave the selection of judges to the Annual Awards
Committee, chaired this year by George Klawitter.
For a contest to be listed, the prize money must be in our hands by
the deadline for the Yearbook, August 15. We would appreciate your
sending in your check along with your contest sponsorship form.
DON’T FORGET TOMORROW’S FOURTH THURSDAY OPEN MIC:
Herman Nelson will host our APS Fourth Thursday Open Microphone,
featuring Dillon McKinsey, editor of Ardent, and Barbara Carr, author
of the Ancestor Series of poetry books. As always, the Fourth Thursday
Open Mic runs from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m., with an open mic for everyone
after featured readers; bring your poetry and sign up to read.
NeWorlDeli, 4101 Guadalupe.
Elzy Cogswell, Treasurer
Austin Poetry Society
P.O. Box 684672
Austin, TX 78768
poetryplease@mail.utexas.edu
OTHER UPCOMING EVENTS (other recurring events are listed on our web
page under Resources, www.austinpoetrysociety.org:
July 21, TODAY, 6:00-7:00 p.m. Catch a preview of tomorrow's
Borderlands reading on Dillon McKinsey's weekly program, "Writing on
the Air," KO-OP radio, 91.7 FM.
July 23, Friday, 7:00-9:00 p.m. Come to hear a selected group of poets
from the latest Borderlands (Issue # 34). The reading is at La Peña,
227 Congress Ave., in downtown Austin. Guest editor Liliana Valenzuela
will emcee readers from this special translingual issue. Featured
poets include Rachel Jennings, Marcelle Kasprowicz, Pat LittleDog,
Jenny Molberg, Trey Moore, and Nick Norwood. Details:
www.lapena-austin.org and
www.borderlands.org, or (512) 477-6007.
July 25, Sunday, 4:00 p.m. The Community of Poets, organized faithfully by Deb
Akers, goes open mic this month only. Come and read. Basic rules are the usual
for Barnes & Noble (family venue--children present--keep it clean). No
chapbook sales in the store. Bring yourself! Bring friends! Bring poetry!
Barnes & Noble Sunset Valley, 5601 Brodie Lane.
July 31, Saturday, 11:00 a.m. The Austin Poetry Society Critique Group
meets on the last Saturday of each month in the upstairs dining room
at Central Market, Lamar and 38th Street. (Go up the stairs beside the
coffee bar.) Bring eight copies of one of your poems for discussion by
friendly poets. This month the nudge is to list some physical actions
you have taken, choose one of them, and write a poem about it. It's
optional, but fun to try. Host: Beth Kropf.
August 7, Saturday, 7:00 p.m. start, doors open at 6:00. A Night for Peace
in the 10-year-old Expressions open microphone series. Bring your own
peace poems and join the music. Featured poets include Kathy Rowell,
Chris the Future, Daniel Cioper, Elzy Cogswell, India Rassner-Donovan,
Lili & Walter, and surprise guests. Hosted by Tom Yum. Austin Baha'i
Center, 2215 E.M. Forster Ave. Admission: a dish for the Potluck
Supper at the interval
and cans of food for the poets pantry. An all ages reading.
Join the Austin Poetry Society group on Facebook. Go to www.facebook.com. From
the row of icons at the bottom left of the homepage, select the "groups" icon.
In the upper right corner, enter a search for Austin Poetry Society. Open to
all.
COATED SILENCES(20/2010)
Someone said it better earlier-
"i was on my way back to my past
when i was ambushed by my future"
Day's fire put out like a dog
inside, cat scented,he tests the ground for a purr
(Her claws inside furs)
When even to give is a line/
aware of all that has gone before
To be around a camp fire brightly
Spark mist me/dig slowly/underneathing
Bright sharp this acid rain
Long sword Viking invasion
A little Crown of Sonnets derailed
Ambivalent steerage(sludge/stock sewage)
last class on a Z train.Solo with his Melancholia
Shared like a ship in a jar.Argument in a firing range
Fit that Glass Castle Slipper,Cinderella!
Prodding life like an oil well/making classical errors
These strings are only what the puppets need
Calligraphy(pre-Cursive,like water-
where too much drowns/not enough= drought
Nutritious small doses (like Haiku Breakfasts
Long winded Sages left town,crying.They had tears for sale
An angry man(needle,haystack.Sullen man(sad,vulnerable
One Clown Cloud,mischievous.Tool builds or breaks
Wall falls or rises.Bridge crosses or fails.Form follows function.
Leaky quatrains.Distance over time.Stanzas of seated pleasures
Tangible Forevers.Orange flavored apples.Tangerine Tambourines
Definite uncertainty(strange normalcy)A State of Not.Stray Bullets
Vampire Weekend(defining things by their lack
BROKEN BOY
sleeps off his medication which he sells on the street to pay for self-sedation
exchanging time zones in his eyes' airports/he is crazy enough
to know when they take all his disability check /broken boy barks
bites the hand that starves him/forms a fist against bars
beaten(like a dog)/he seeks the sweet Muse woman
but they have turned professional.In his heated head he vaporizes/explodes
steam hisses off his cranium dranium cerebellum
burnt boy!He toast in this heat/under belly side up Asks-
"is it always like this-between worlds?"(shade/shapes/shadows)
CROP CIRCLES
Yahoo! discounts them.Why then- this headline?
Deny if ye will/they still /spin within fields
Curled in spirals/feel Navaho winds?
Earth is speaking/Circles are singing
There is response/within/we are crops/circling...
HAND WRITTEN MOON BOATS
A little bird kiss alights on her lips
And it will no longer matter(who has kissed her before?
or ever will again.Just to land for Columbus
Just to green sprig Noah.
YOU ARE LONELIER THAN ME
(just let the moon ignore her son)
PEOPLE ARE LOOKING FOR EACH OTHER
They find instant lovers/begging friends.
(it is not her fault that she is young
(it is not his fault that he is needy
Braided contemporary beaches Infinities
Waves away on a tide called change
Prepare for the Impossible..
SACRED MEMORIES.(APPLE DHARMA.)
"i was on my way back to my past
when i was ambushed by my future"
Day's fire put out like a dog
inside, cat scented,he tests the ground for a purr
(Her claws inside furs)
When even to give is a line/
aware of all that has gone before
To be around a camp fire brightly
Spark mist me/dig slowly/underneathing
Bright sharp this acid rain
Long sword Viking invasion
A little Crown of Sonnets derailed
Ambivalent steerage(sludge/stock sewage)
last class on a Z train.Solo with his Melancholia
Shared like a ship in a jar.Argument in a firing range
Fit that Glass Castle Slipper,Cinderella!
Prodding life like an oil well/making classical errors
These strings are only what the puppets need
Calligraphy(pre-Cursive,like water-
where too much drowns/not enough= drought
Nutritious small doses (like Haiku Breakfasts
Long winded Sages left town,crying.They had tears for sale
An angry man(needle,haystack.Sullen man(sad,vulnerable
One Clown Cloud,mischievous.Tool builds or breaks
Wall falls or rises.Bridge crosses or fails.Form follows function.
Leaky quatrains.Distance over time.Stanzas of seated pleasures
Tangible Forevers.Orange flavored apples.Tangerine Tambourines
Definite uncertainty(strange normalcy)A State of Not.Stray Bullets
Vampire Weekend(defining things by their lack
BROKEN BOY
sleeps off his medication which he sells on the street to pay for self-sedation
exchanging time zones in his eyes' airports/he is crazy enough
to know when they take all his disability check /broken boy barks
bites the hand that starves him/forms a fist against bars
beaten(like a dog)/he seeks the sweet Muse woman
but they have turned professional.In his heated head he vaporizes/explodes
steam hisses off his cranium dranium cerebellum
burnt boy!He toast in this heat/under belly side up Asks-
"is it always like this-between worlds?"(shade/shapes/shadows)
CROP CIRCLES
Yahoo! discounts them.Why then- this headline?
Deny if ye will/they still /spin within fields
Curled in spirals/feel Navaho winds?
Earth is speaking/Circles are singing
There is response/within/we are crops/circling...
HAND WRITTEN MOON BOATS
A little bird kiss alights on her lips
And it will no longer matter(who has kissed her before?
or ever will again.Just to land for Columbus
Just to green sprig Noah.
YOU ARE LONELIER THAN ME
(just let the moon ignore her son)
PEOPLE ARE LOOKING FOR EACH OTHER
They find instant lovers/begging friends.
(it is not her fault that she is young
(it is not his fault that he is needy
Braided contemporary beaches Infinities
Waves away on a tide called change
Prepare for the Impossible..
SACRED MEMORIES.(APPLE DHARMA.)
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
BACK TO THE SEA(BLESSING THE WATERS)
We came from oceans-gills/fins to feet/hands
Now we go back-canoes/kayaks/slim/thin/slice between
Surfers in a hollow tube/on a bare plank
Pirates of Somalia,shrimpers o the Gulf
Blue Planet (seen from space)-water defines/divides/defies us
Divine Myths of waterworlds="On the first day..
"when the waters settled"/Noah on Mt Ararat
We go back.Sit by shorelines.Oilsoaked.
Beaches of Gaza.Submarines under icecaps.Titanics crack icebergs.
We need to hear that splash of wave/the time it takes
for time to stop and flow like tides beneath orchestra moon
Slap of wave on beach.Wind in face.Ancient Mariners each
Masts and sails to steam to nuclear-still the same seas beneath us
Sailors set out even when the world is GOOGLE mapped
Ulysses star chart astrologers constellations almanac
VOYAGERS into deep sea space still splash down
in a Pacific that is ,or Atlantic that deep-or some sea
with secrets older than Atlantis.We are water-seeking our own level
Something takes us down to Galveston,or Brighton,or Bribie
even when the waves are Lilliput or the sky is raining
Water calls us for its own.We slosh downhill
Pour like tributaries into the Universal Stream
River silver into the Golden Seas.O water womb
we will return...
Now we go back-canoes/kayaks/slim/thin/slice between
Surfers in a hollow tube/on a bare plank
Pirates of Somalia,shrimpers o the Gulf
Blue Planet (seen from space)-water defines/divides/defies us
Divine Myths of waterworlds="On the first day..
"when the waters settled"/Noah on Mt Ararat
We go back.Sit by shorelines.Oilsoaked.
Beaches of Gaza.Submarines under icecaps.Titanics crack icebergs.
We need to hear that splash of wave/the time it takes
for time to stop and flow like tides beneath orchestra moon
Slap of wave on beach.Wind in face.Ancient Mariners each
Masts and sails to steam to nuclear-still the same seas beneath us
Sailors set out even when the world is GOOGLE mapped
Ulysses star chart astrologers constellations almanac
VOYAGERS into deep sea space still splash down
in a Pacific that is ,or Atlantic that deep-or some sea
with secrets older than Atlantis.We are water-seeking our own level
Something takes us down to Galveston,or Brighton,or Bribie
even when the waves are Lilliput or the sky is raining
Water calls us for its own.We slosh downhill
Pour like tributaries into the Universal Stream
River silver into the Golden Seas.O water womb
we will return...
DESERT ROSE
Recently,death (again)reminded me of the hollowness of temporal power
How John Donne was right and clear /how death is a flea,and we
are the skin full of holes through which pain flows.But O!she comes
after midnight with roses brought from deserts-tiny as Goddess statues
in her eyes are gardens,in her hands supplications-if tiny beauty
can live in bone hearts,why not soft muscles?Blood pumps
as a gift to us-ants would see hearts as massive generators
Her desert rose a miniature bonsai singular Lotus
It is the gift in us- to gift.It revives us!Outside ego
whole worlds spin in orbits unseen.Black space has Lights aplenty-
we just need to be where Darkness can contrast
to show us Desert rose where least expected.Only one.Each,precious
As you are
IT MATTERS !(and it does not matter
He loves(and he cannot love-
Narcissus/Apollo.Zeus/Moses.Joseph Campbell/Chief Joseph
WE are and we are not(simultaneously
Intake of breath/exhale.Release and attract
Closer than skin is thought (and feeling!
"The way out is the way in"Paradox/tautology
Meaning more than metaphor is death within
while life outside swirls in carnival attractions
there is another sideshow circus advertising-
Stillness.Meditation.Dreaming.Come into the deep
and mermaids,sirens-sing!
SPRING DOES NOT KNOW IT IS A SPRING
same for heated summers/aching autumn
The Fall led to lack of knowledge
of our true condition.
How John Donne was right and clear /how death is a flea,and we
are the skin full of holes through which pain flows.But O!she comes
after midnight with roses brought from deserts-tiny as Goddess statues
in her eyes are gardens,in her hands supplications-if tiny beauty
can live in bone hearts,why not soft muscles?Blood pumps
as a gift to us-ants would see hearts as massive generators
Her desert rose a miniature bonsai singular Lotus
It is the gift in us- to gift.It revives us!Outside ego
whole worlds spin in orbits unseen.Black space has Lights aplenty-
we just need to be where Darkness can contrast
to show us Desert rose where least expected.Only one.Each,precious
As you are
IT MATTERS !(and it does not matter
He loves(and he cannot love-
Narcissus/Apollo.Zeus/Moses.Joseph Campbell/Chief Joseph
WE are and we are not(simultaneously
Intake of breath/exhale.Release and attract
Closer than skin is thought (and feeling!
"The way out is the way in"Paradox/tautology
Meaning more than metaphor is death within
while life outside swirls in carnival attractions
there is another sideshow circus advertising-
Stillness.Meditation.Dreaming.Come into the deep
and mermaids,sirens-sing!
SPRING DOES NOT KNOW IT IS A SPRING
same for heated summers/aching autumn
The Fall led to lack of knowledge
of our true condition.
EXAMPLERS?TEMPLARS!
Templates of example pivot maps of randomness
to be attracted to highvibe behavior savior style
sans suffering or cruel crucifixations/smiling sweetness
Always one escapes.Witnesses say she never came back.
Out of the cage like a gypsy.Into the sky like a dove
Invisible pathways guide our choices(even when we have none!
There is always ever movement/motion on
across windy prairies ,among unknown stars
between space junk emotions and wars from mars
we navigate our coracles between coral reef sharks
bless all our boat hearts(harbor and parked)
Before us and after-tales in time.We are lodged like a tooth
decay Damien Hirst under glass.Let all pass.We are no border guards
Attention/perception revolve Russian Roulette random
Empty chamber hearts.Circulating red blood.Depth calls
We fall into grace only because/there is no one to blame(not even ourselves!
Let us pretend we are human enough (imperfect in blemish
tarnished in use and yet still a glimmer of golden
among the dross of each day.Something good! We say
we are what we choose to construct.If it is that way
we are Shelleys and Frankensteins and Dollys and clones
Robots ,droids,Terminators,machines-our program awaits
the hands of a Master Programmer.What happens next is this-
we follow example -to become one.Even if not-still!
All that you need to do is stay alive!The rest is in the hands of life itself
We all have a space on this shelf.
to be attracted to highvibe behavior savior style
sans suffering or cruel crucifixations/smiling sweetness
Always one escapes.Witnesses say she never came back.
Out of the cage like a gypsy.Into the sky like a dove
Invisible pathways guide our choices(even when we have none!
There is always ever movement/motion on
across windy prairies ,among unknown stars
between space junk emotions and wars from mars
we navigate our coracles between coral reef sharks
bless all our boat hearts(harbor and parked)
Before us and after-tales in time.We are lodged like a tooth
decay Damien Hirst under glass.Let all pass.We are no border guards
Attention/perception revolve Russian Roulette random
Empty chamber hearts.Circulating red blood.Depth calls
We fall into grace only because/there is no one to blame(not even ourselves!
Let us pretend we are human enough (imperfect in blemish
tarnished in use and yet still a glimmer of golden
among the dross of each day.Something good! We say
we are what we choose to construct.If it is that way
we are Shelleys and Frankensteins and Dollys and clones
Robots ,droids,Terminators,machines-our program awaits
the hands of a Master Programmer.What happens next is this-
we follow example -to become one.Even if not-still!
All that you need to do is stay alive!The rest is in the hands of life itself
We all have a space on this shelf.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
FINDING/FOLLOWING FOOTPRINTS
out the door to divergent fields
I want to know if these are my footprints-
not a scripted re-enactment of the past
nor mere projections of possible futures
So i wait.Hours,days,weeks-for some sign
that says these paths are individual as death
Then i begin.To think.To feel.To activate.To walk
All of this happens in suspended timezones-
as in a movie with severe special effects-slowmo
steps towards crossroads and intersections
where decisions need be made-which way?why?
I am never truly sure-so fly with the prevailing currents
winged again,flapping as fast as i can!Landed,winded,
astonished at the landscape and geography of choices,
i prefer fantasies of harmlessness,projections of goodwill and good health
When they coincide with others' perceptions,i grow glorious golden
When no affirmation,i shrink wrap smaller
Every thing is motion.Nothing certain.Like sharks and salesmen,
i must move to survive.The stock here is energy and time.Both limited!
Should you find more available,i will buy!Until Zen,here and now
I commit only to my own footprints-carbon or otherwise
as they leap from cloud to cloud-into limitless skies....
TRANCE FORMATIONS
Rejecting collectivization(via individual choice
Letting the past glow(not looking back
Nor needing a future to justify this moment
Withdrawing from military/engaging culturally
Each precious person a whole uni-verse
Every breath a songline,every death is ours
SOMEONE YOU KNOW BELIEVES
in progress/god/cities/money/power/fame/careers/getting ahead
if you let those beliefs go-what else is there?
I want to know if these are my footprints-
not a scripted re-enactment of the past
nor mere projections of possible futures
So i wait.Hours,days,weeks-for some sign
that says these paths are individual as death
Then i begin.To think.To feel.To activate.To walk
All of this happens in suspended timezones-
as in a movie with severe special effects-slowmo
steps towards crossroads and intersections
where decisions need be made-which way?why?
I am never truly sure-so fly with the prevailing currents
winged again,flapping as fast as i can!Landed,winded,
astonished at the landscape and geography of choices,
i prefer fantasies of harmlessness,projections of goodwill and good health
When they coincide with others' perceptions,i grow glorious golden
When no affirmation,i shrink wrap smaller
Every thing is motion.Nothing certain.Like sharks and salesmen,
i must move to survive.The stock here is energy and time.Both limited!
Should you find more available,i will buy!Until Zen,here and now
I commit only to my own footprints-carbon or otherwise
as they leap from cloud to cloud-into limitless skies....
TRANCE FORMATIONS
Rejecting collectivization(via individual choice
Letting the past glow(not looking back
Nor needing a future to justify this moment
Withdrawing from military/engaging culturally
Each precious person a whole uni-verse
Every breath a songline,every death is ours
SOMEONE YOU KNOW BELIEVES
in progress/god/cities/money/power/fame/careers/getting ahead
if you let those beliefs go-what else is there?
RAIN RISING
in hundred degree heat,what fell will rise again
to cloud and cry and soak us seasonally
there is no escape from this/love affair between elements
fire and water,sea and land-all link
edge love/where they meet/they merge/change
dissolve into each other with the laughter of borders
Atlantis and Lemuria arise/Nile inundates
all of China's dams cannot stop Yang-Tse
We are recurring patterns of birdwing migrations
Birds V formations follow trustingly
Animals return like turtles to their birth space
Nesting,resting,moon eggs wait for night
Waves slap beaches like comedians
Sun track Almanacs for predictable harvesting
Seasonal sweetnesses follow drought heart aridities
Bone dry deserts were once oases
Over time,time stops.Waits for us to catch up.
When we know that we are here
it will have changed again.
"I NEVER STOPPED DREAMING"(Gig Edwards Bryant)
World of awakenings.Sleep between.Dream deep changelings
Oscillating Dopplar Effects wave formations.Rise on tides
Dumped in the bog of prosaic dailies.Between dreams-
we recreate scripts.Adapt strategies.Never reactionary
seek solutions/panaceas/remedies.Evolutionaries-
we welcome new ideas as allies,fresh hatched
so we never have to see things the same way twice.
"BLOOD BLOOD BLOOD MAKES THE GRASS GROW GREEN"
until you deploy,or hold a weapon,or kill
words are sleeping dragons.Indoctrination a TV program
until you form a visceral objection to taking life
PTSD confusion seeks to heal this structured strife.
"YOU ARE KILLING ME.AND THEY ARE ALSO KILLING ME!"
Civilians ,casualties uncounted -between enemy lines(both sides
firing at their common enemy-peace.Us.Unarmed.Non-armies
Both use us as targets and as ransom.
Both claim killing in our name.Both kill us
Their claim to fame is enforcing military final solutions
We are innocent.humans.Leave us be.We are civilians.Peace,please..
SPEAKING CHINESE
Marshall Plan post WW2-when Germany and Japan were rebuilt
by active application of intelligent economic altruisms.China learned!
Instead of wasting military trillions in black budget invasions-
seductions via investments in Third World countries.
Selfishness as survival.Reviving economies with Chinese yuan
means you do not need to invade-all these resources you own
So to Iraq,Africa,South America-Chinese diplomats
bond with dictators to ensure materials largesse
flows to Chinese coffers-our national treasure depleted
by the blood of mercenaries/soldiers-Chinese Empire
Confucian in its soft subversion-to influence via trade
rather than anger via invasion.
to cloud and cry and soak us seasonally
there is no escape from this/love affair between elements
fire and water,sea and land-all link
edge love/where they meet/they merge/change
dissolve into each other with the laughter of borders
Atlantis and Lemuria arise/Nile inundates
all of China's dams cannot stop Yang-Tse
We are recurring patterns of birdwing migrations
Birds V formations follow trustingly
Animals return like turtles to their birth space
Nesting,resting,moon eggs wait for night
Waves slap beaches like comedians
Sun track Almanacs for predictable harvesting
Seasonal sweetnesses follow drought heart aridities
Bone dry deserts were once oases
Over time,time stops.Waits for us to catch up.
When we know that we are here
it will have changed again.
"I NEVER STOPPED DREAMING"(Gig Edwards Bryant)
World of awakenings.Sleep between.Dream deep changelings
Oscillating Dopplar Effects wave formations.Rise on tides
Dumped in the bog of prosaic dailies.Between dreams-
we recreate scripts.Adapt strategies.Never reactionary
seek solutions/panaceas/remedies.Evolutionaries-
we welcome new ideas as allies,fresh hatched
so we never have to see things the same way twice.
"BLOOD BLOOD BLOOD MAKES THE GRASS GROW GREEN"
until you deploy,or hold a weapon,or kill
words are sleeping dragons.Indoctrination a TV program
until you form a visceral objection to taking life
PTSD confusion seeks to heal this structured strife.
"YOU ARE KILLING ME.AND THEY ARE ALSO KILLING ME!"
Civilians ,casualties uncounted -between enemy lines(both sides
firing at their common enemy-peace.Us.Unarmed.Non-armies
Both use us as targets and as ransom.
Both claim killing in our name.Both kill us
Their claim to fame is enforcing military final solutions
We are innocent.humans.Leave us be.We are civilians.Peace,please..
SPEAKING CHINESE
Marshall Plan post WW2-when Germany and Japan were rebuilt
by active application of intelligent economic altruisms.China learned!
Instead of wasting military trillions in black budget invasions-
seductions via investments in Third World countries.
Selfishness as survival.Reviving economies with Chinese yuan
means you do not need to invade-all these resources you own
So to Iraq,Africa,South America-Chinese diplomats
bond with dictators to ensure materials largesse
flows to Chinese coffers-our national treasure depleted
by the blood of mercenaries/soldiers-Chinese Empire
Confucian in its soft subversion-to influence via trade
rather than anger via invasion.
this is the time the moon visits
in silence,through windows,within us
tides of emotions rise to skies
acknowledging her slim passage through stars
in a piquant darkness temporary as night
This is the time that dreams arrive-
illegal migrants crossing borders of Light
to lodge in our home minds/shake off the past
by re-enacting integration in our daily lives
These are the moments that will be forgot
between night and day/within twilight
before Old Sol blares his trumpet summer solo
moon heals yesterday before tomorrow
Here is the island of this night
You are Robinson Crusoe/Swiss Family Robinson
Everyone must face this night alone
even in their double bed home
Here is an Empire Temporary-
when dewdrops form the only liquidity
Everything is flux/every dream is change
and you will never be the same/ again.
tides of emotions rise to skies
acknowledging her slim passage through stars
in a piquant darkness temporary as night
This is the time that dreams arrive-
illegal migrants crossing borders of Light
to lodge in our home minds/shake off the past
by re-enacting integration in our daily lives
These are the moments that will be forgot
between night and day/within twilight
before Old Sol blares his trumpet summer solo
moon heals yesterday before tomorrow
Here is the island of this night
You are Robinson Crusoe/Swiss Family Robinson
Everyone must face this night alone
even in their double bed home
Here is an Empire Temporary-
when dewdrops form the only liquidity
Everything is flux/every dream is change
and you will never be the same/ again.
Friday, July 16, 2010
THE LAWYER AND THE REALTOR
Married with five children total
(second marriage for both-five years together
Rarely time between work and kids
so tonight is beer and margueritas at County Line
as their stories unfold like napkins-
seems this recession is Ethiopian dieting financially
Economy sluggish-things moving slowly
Houses must still be sold/but they both realize
the bond is closer in harder times
They are close friends-this is their life
as they slip with smiles back
to their home in the valley for a privacy night
One remembers Cafe Mundi/another Nueva Onda
So glad we are not an axe or chain murderer!
SAME LIFE/ANOTHER LEVEL
Everything happens at once.Like this!
One is a comedian
Another a musician
Third a sportsman
Three job Austin!
In a dream,i saw INCEPTION
O despicable me!
Open to miracles,each minor mystery
played and replayed in her Inner Theater
She opened to Box Officing.Closed for emotional renovations
Made a DVD of her Greatest Hits.HIGH DRAMA!
Now she lectures on the spontaneous improv circuit=
HOW TO DO IT!
(second marriage for both-five years together
Rarely time between work and kids
so tonight is beer and margueritas at County Line
as their stories unfold like napkins-
seems this recession is Ethiopian dieting financially
Economy sluggish-things moving slowly
Houses must still be sold/but they both realize
the bond is closer in harder times
They are close friends-this is their life
as they slip with smiles back
to their home in the valley for a privacy night
One remembers Cafe Mundi/another Nueva Onda
So glad we are not an axe or chain murderer!
SAME LIFE/ANOTHER LEVEL
Everything happens at once.Like this!
One is a comedian
Another a musician
Third a sportsman
Three job Austin!
In a dream,i saw INCEPTION
O despicable me!
Open to miracles,each minor mystery
played and replayed in her Inner Theater
She opened to Box Officing.Closed for emotional renovations
Made a DVD of her Greatest Hits.HIGH DRAMA!
Now she lectures on the spontaneous improv circuit=
HOW TO DO IT!
alphabet of optimism(please add your positives..)
Altruism/affirmations/art
Brilliance/beatific/beauty
Cats/cleverness/cerebellum
Devotion/dedication/delight!/dance
Ecstasy/enamored/enabling
Fantastic!/fond/frolics/food!
Graciousness/goodwill/gladness/galaxies
Happiness/hilarity/humor/harmonies
Intelligence/insight/intuition/improvisation
Jokes/jest/jocularity
Knowledge/knitting
Laughter/life/
Miracles/music/melody
Nothingness/niceties/
Others/ornithrynchus/
Positivities/practicalities/poetry
Questioning/querulous
Radical/ridiculous/ranting
Sane/sensitive/sound/spontaneity/science/silence
Tremendous/tremulous/theatre/trees
Universal/unity/ululations
Verse/verification
Wonderful!(wondrous)/willing/wild!(words!
X marks the spot
Y is the question
Zzzz as we sleep though news items
seeking only to connect to hidden harmonies
to sustain us in these alpha betical times...
Brilliance/beatific/beauty
Cats/cleverness/cerebellum
Devotion/dedication/delight!/dance
Ecstasy/enamored/enabling
Fantastic!/fond/frolics/food!
Graciousness/goodwill/gladness/galaxies
Happiness/hilarity/humor/harmonies
Intelligence/insight/intuition/improvisation
Jokes/jest/jocularity
Knowledge/knitting
Laughter/life/
Miracles/music/melody
Nothingness/niceties/
Others/ornithrynchus/
Positivities/practicalities/poetry
Questioning/querulous
Radical/ridiculous/ranting
Sane/sensitive/sound/spontaneity/science/silence
Tremendous/tremulous/theatre/trees
Universal/unity/ululations
Verse/verification
Wonderful!(wondrous)/willing/wild!(words!
X marks the spot
Y is the question
Zzzz as we sleep though news items
seeking only to connect to hidden harmonies
to sustain us in these alpha betical times...
opening the door
Veteran.He counsels."I have PTSD-
trust this is helpful!".Raw wounds
get bandage words.He wants light work
but first the Light must work..
She spent $12500 for 30 days in Wimberley
Now she does not drink,thinks clearly.
I suggested it would have been cheaper
to camp by Blue Hole(get arrested for vagrancy-
everything is clarity!
Song of sparrows dust coats lungs
Dogs of war/cats of sleeping peace
Eagle peck/dove with sprig o green
Over the wall of words/songs of sorrow
she is having a baby
he wants to drink her mother's milk
on French Toast(no less!-she says-
"you need to be age appropriate!"
Little gods in marketplaces
all with pricetags/all with owners
Little boats of paper lanterns
floating candles down deep dream rivers
Purple lambs of sheepish cuddles
Pink clouds of champagne bubbles
If we ignore each other enough
Are we less-or more?
i want to open this page door.
let the flag fly/let the tent flap
let the lettuce leaf
let permission slip
yes?
trust this is helpful!".Raw wounds
get bandage words.He wants light work
but first the Light must work..
She spent $12500 for 30 days in Wimberley
Now she does not drink,thinks clearly.
I suggested it would have been cheaper
to camp by Blue Hole(get arrested for vagrancy-
everything is clarity!
Song of sparrows dust coats lungs
Dogs of war/cats of sleeping peace
Eagle peck/dove with sprig o green
Over the wall of words/songs of sorrow
she is having a baby
he wants to drink her mother's milk
on French Toast(no less!-she says-
"you need to be age appropriate!"
Little gods in marketplaces
all with pricetags/all with owners
Little boats of paper lanterns
floating candles down deep dream rivers
Purple lambs of sheepish cuddles
Pink clouds of champagne bubbles
If we ignore each other enough
Are we less-or more?
i want to open this page door.
let the flag fly/let the tent flap
let the lettuce leaf
let permission slip
yes?
OUR GOLDEN AGE
Things have never been brighter!
The price of gold is higher !
Bullion ,Krugerands,coins,chains-
gold bars for our prisons!
Water taps gold plated
shredded gold upon our rice
gold bling rapper jewelery
gold caps teeth high priced!
This is truly our Golden Age!
All that glitters for the paparazzi
dangles like petite purses-
12 K,14K,20K-every body
can afford-veneer if not real
Gold painted idols,Egyptian funeral masks
Gold medals Olympic cast
Golden Eye,Goldfinger,The Man With The Golden Gun-
James Bond movies re-run for Arabians
Gold Diggers of 2010
Gold mines beneath the sand
Nuggets of solid wisdom in Museums
Hold it (gold dust!)in your hands-
Pan for gold in local creeks-
remember Gold Rush memories
Streets of London paved with..
Dick Whittington believed-as do we
who buy gold stocks for when we are full of gravity
and the weight of investment can carry us
by then all aurum(like us)-will have turned to dust!
WATER AS THE NEW OIL
Adaptation is everything-we came from the ocean
and this spill has changed what we can eat.Seafood comes already oiled
We changed from gills to legs-now we process
oil as our blood.Our body engines resist steam and water
accept oil as food and lubricant.Wars for oil now blood on water
Separation of elements evolutionary
Wells dug deep within our skin/extract necessary liquidities..
MERGING
watch waves long enough,you will enter
the rhythm /cadence of moon tutoring
Sit by river ,time is fluid/it changes as you change
Bus stop time different to car truck time
different to plane /satellite-pace of change accelerates
Witness or participant?Distance defines us!
Traces of minerals from another meteor
Water on our moon.Messages from planets.
Looking up!(you send a gaze heavenward
on a present path of Light-you are enlightening..
sports accessories gold plated-guns
with gold handles,pistols and machines
Gold sparkles in our dreams!
The price of gold is higher !
Bullion ,Krugerands,coins,chains-
gold bars for our prisons!
Water taps gold plated
shredded gold upon our rice
gold bling rapper jewelery
gold caps teeth high priced!
This is truly our Golden Age!
All that glitters for the paparazzi
dangles like petite purses-
12 K,14K,20K-every body
can afford-veneer if not real
Gold painted idols,Egyptian funeral masks
Gold medals Olympic cast
Golden Eye,Goldfinger,The Man With The Golden Gun-
James Bond movies re-run for Arabians
Gold Diggers of 2010
Gold mines beneath the sand
Nuggets of solid wisdom in Museums
Hold it (gold dust!)in your hands-
Pan for gold in local creeks-
remember Gold Rush memories
Streets of London paved with..
Dick Whittington believed-as do we
who buy gold stocks for when we are full of gravity
and the weight of investment can carry us
by then all aurum(like us)-will have turned to dust!
WATER AS THE NEW OIL
Adaptation is everything-we came from the ocean
and this spill has changed what we can eat.Seafood comes already oiled
We changed from gills to legs-now we process
oil as our blood.Our body engines resist steam and water
accept oil as food and lubricant.Wars for oil now blood on water
Separation of elements evolutionary
Wells dug deep within our skin/extract necessary liquidities..
MERGING
watch waves long enough,you will enter
the rhythm /cadence of moon tutoring
Sit by river ,time is fluid/it changes as you change
Bus stop time different to car truck time
different to plane /satellite-pace of change accelerates
Witness or participant?Distance defines us!
Traces of minerals from another meteor
Water on our moon.Messages from planets.
Looking up!(you send a gaze heavenward
on a present path of Light-you are enlightening..
sports accessories gold plated-guns
with gold handles,pistols and machines
Gold sparkles in our dreams!
EMPATHY OVER ENTROPHY
"There is a force at work in our Uni/verse.."
(Actually,there are MANY forces at work in our Universe-
gravity,levity,imagination,property,humor,tragedy,farce and dull prose
In every given moment,one is hard pressed to know which will win
It is not as if we are at war-but this is a closed system-
where BP ,Iran,Palestine,governmental terrorism compete for our limited attention
Before you withdraw/ignore-your participation is implored
Your presence solves mysteries-how it is that one soul can change
anyone and everything.Start here and now(hear and know)
that everything is possible.And myth becomes factoid
Headlines become smilemarks, Truth and fiction mix and mingle
Everything IS possible.Just look at you!( as a miracle.
IN THE CLOUDTREES
we dream surreal circuses.Above us,aetherial us!Shapes and forms
melt,mold,dissolve in unpredictable patterns,so that categories
are only ever approximations.A box of clouds?A herd of rainstorms?
Lightning veins within varicose cumulus.Wifts of stratus stretch
Sheep herds of woolly white turn gray with worry and airlines
black stretch marks across the stomach of our sky.Vapor trails slice
mysterious markings -hieroglyphs?cloud crop circles?
Once,divination meant to learn the languages of clouds
Now they carry floods of portents-but we can no longer read
Our weather grows horse wild,stomping us out,until we
settle down,slow up,and ride (and read)the cloud trees
THE SCIENCE OF KNOTS
When ships were wood,rope was sisal and hemp
Servant of all,to be mastered via science of knots
Every mariner had vocabulary of bow hitch and hold
To stretch sails and connect intemperate elements together
All boats relied upon this knowledge-Almanacs of history
Generations would apprentice youth in the ways of making rope-
threading strands for strength like Samson's hair.
Rope held our universe together.(when boats were made of trees
and rope was natural fibers)Now we are plastic,imperfect,imported
Knots clove hitch,divorced from meaning and context
You do not know.You do not need to know
These mysteries went the way of sail-only little yachts
rely upon their stretched connections to secure moorings
Museums with knots on walls are not attended
You will not know.You do still need to know
How we are held together via Nature
and even plastic will not live forever
and the wisdom of elders holds us all together
O how you know! How much more we need to know!
(Actually,there are MANY forces at work in our Universe-
gravity,levity,imagination,property,humor,tragedy,farce and dull prose
In every given moment,one is hard pressed to know which will win
It is not as if we are at war-but this is a closed system-
where BP ,Iran,Palestine,governmental terrorism compete for our limited attention
Before you withdraw/ignore-your participation is implored
Your presence solves mysteries-how it is that one soul can change
anyone and everything.Start here and now(hear and know)
that everything is possible.And myth becomes factoid
Headlines become smilemarks, Truth and fiction mix and mingle
Everything IS possible.Just look at you!( as a miracle.
IN THE CLOUDTREES
we dream surreal circuses.Above us,aetherial us!Shapes and forms
melt,mold,dissolve in unpredictable patterns,so that categories
are only ever approximations.A box of clouds?A herd of rainstorms?
Lightning veins within varicose cumulus.Wifts of stratus stretch
Sheep herds of woolly white turn gray with worry and airlines
black stretch marks across the stomach of our sky.Vapor trails slice
mysterious markings -hieroglyphs?cloud crop circles?
Once,divination meant to learn the languages of clouds
Now they carry floods of portents-but we can no longer read
Our weather grows horse wild,stomping us out,until we
settle down,slow up,and ride (and read)the cloud trees
THE SCIENCE OF KNOTS
When ships were wood,rope was sisal and hemp
Servant of all,to be mastered via science of knots
Every mariner had vocabulary of bow hitch and hold
To stretch sails and connect intemperate elements together
All boats relied upon this knowledge-Almanacs of history
Generations would apprentice youth in the ways of making rope-
threading strands for strength like Samson's hair.
Rope held our universe together.(when boats were made of trees
and rope was natural fibers)Now we are plastic,imperfect,imported
Knots clove hitch,divorced from meaning and context
You do not know.You do not need to know
These mysteries went the way of sail-only little yachts
rely upon their stretched connections to secure moorings
Museums with knots on walls are not attended
You will not know.You do still need to know
How we are held together via Nature
and even plastic will not live forever
and the wisdom of elders holds us all together
O how you know! How much more we need to know!
DANCING WITH THE MOON
Mermen ,mermaids,flow with that silver glow
They know enough to follow tidal impulses
Currents within red bloodstreams ventricles
course attuned to celestial seasons
Above,this orb is shaded for solar reasons
Light is ever partial to reflections
Dream we water deep /slip between waves
Underneath is where another world awaits
Moonlight on the surface/clear and bright tonight
she borrowed her image just to share her Light
We see her in each other's eyes
before she takes her flight
Silence in the motion(space and time in rhythm
Almanacs predict her path-we watch and move with her when
only this night's one eye is witness
dancing with the dolphins
smiling with the sharks.
so
she sits by the sea
to hear these reassuring waves
she can leave all the noise behind her
in the waters,depth ,anonymous
behind her-the crush of time
waves admit only to a tidal frequency
sharp sounds of birds screech cut and cry
this is where we came from
and when the waters rise-where we will go
a preview of the future awaits us
beyond the little that this land knows
sometimes,i seek the waters of a river
sometimes the frequency of sea
oceans are our birthplace and our origins
one day will be our final destiny
meantime,in the Dreamtime,find her sitting
calm as oil near the deepest sea
They know enough to follow tidal impulses
Currents within red bloodstreams ventricles
course attuned to celestial seasons
Above,this orb is shaded for solar reasons
Light is ever partial to reflections
Dream we water deep /slip between waves
Underneath is where another world awaits
Moonlight on the surface/clear and bright tonight
she borrowed her image just to share her Light
We see her in each other's eyes
before she takes her flight
Silence in the motion(space and time in rhythm
Almanacs predict her path-we watch and move with her when
only this night's one eye is witness
dancing with the dolphins
smiling with the sharks.
so
she sits by the sea
to hear these reassuring waves
she can leave all the noise behind her
in the waters,depth ,anonymous
behind her-the crush of time
waves admit only to a tidal frequency
sharp sounds of birds screech cut and cry
this is where we came from
and when the waters rise-where we will go
a preview of the future awaits us
beyond the little that this land knows
sometimes,i seek the waters of a river
sometimes the frequency of sea
oceans are our birthplace and our origins
one day will be our final destiny
meantime,in the Dreamtime,find her sitting
calm as oil near the deepest sea
ONCE I WOULD(impute consciousness to trees)
and i still believe (in their sentience.Yet see!
how few survive-and know!how knowledge by itself
will not thrive.That gifted yew becomes a fire
This old oak -a fence(not even Art one could bend
for higher intention.Desecration is ordinary prose
Every gifted sapling knows/even to bend will not allow
its young life to be spared.It will not stop this dull destruction
to point to libraries and call them books(the library of the wind!
More fire and fear.More mud and muck.More dirt and dung
The cut and broken among us.Daily as blood butchers
Taken for granted.Silent for themselves.Their arms fenceposts
Their legs tables.Their bodies houses.We wrap ourselves in them
cry for our own cut down wooden futures.It would only be
if we were trees that we could then see our brain leaved
veins in cerebral conversation with prevailing winds
Perhaps our feet planted in ancient earth(chainsawed too early
scream of emptied air no song-more blood sapped dried gray and burning
We already refuse the old and broken/what hope have human forests
when our cities are burning with the cold moon of dispossession
forgotten forests of the crazed ones/sapling children
bowing to a greater power.Don't ask the trees to save us.
BEFORE THIS(and afterward
as if i never existed(even between these lines
You shudder and turn your head away.
I remind you of a time/when you were all that was
and now you must admit/Light as an element
Earth you are(and rock(and fire-
but did you not know/you would be nowhere
without my ministrations?I am air.
And unless you wish to choke
You must breathe me in/and care..
THE TRAGEDY IS THAT I DID NOT KNOW
(i was in a play.I thought character was what was missing
this is why i got upset.The shortcomings of others angered me
in that my expectations were never met.I am not Hamlet!
Beneath above around me spin planets of familiars-
those whose magic abandoned me to the love of those
who loved only their own Fate.
and mine became entangled with theirs!
You would not have known me had I demurred/declined to act
simply affirmed the way things are/and lived a quiet life.
But NO! This show demands response
and blood will be the order of the day
I did not know I was a character.I did not know i was in a play.
THE HOSPITAL IS QUIET(apart from the flash of TV colors
each is asleep,sedated.The hospital is white.(Image of sterility
No germs,no sex-just death(emptying beds(and bed pans
The hospital is neutral/a witness of the broken(who will mend?
Who will be thrown out?The hospital is cool /as air conditioned and linear
as beds positioned in a fantasy of healing.Each in their own cocoon dream
Each one needing.Each one a need.The hospital is clinical.
It will examine.It will see.And those who leave remember that
each hospital is irrespective of its clients.Its contents empty
It refills.The hospital is neutral.Good or ill,
it will be only what you see-a hospital/to meet its needs.
how few survive-and know!how knowledge by itself
will not thrive.That gifted yew becomes a fire
This old oak -a fence(not even Art one could bend
for higher intention.Desecration is ordinary prose
Every gifted sapling knows/even to bend will not allow
its young life to be spared.It will not stop this dull destruction
to point to libraries and call them books(the library of the wind!
More fire and fear.More mud and muck.More dirt and dung
The cut and broken among us.Daily as blood butchers
Taken for granted.Silent for themselves.Their arms fenceposts
Their legs tables.Their bodies houses.We wrap ourselves in them
cry for our own cut down wooden futures.It would only be
if we were trees that we could then see our brain leaved
veins in cerebral conversation with prevailing winds
Perhaps our feet planted in ancient earth(chainsawed too early
scream of emptied air no song-more blood sapped dried gray and burning
We already refuse the old and broken/what hope have human forests
when our cities are burning with the cold moon of dispossession
forgotten forests of the crazed ones/sapling children
bowing to a greater power.Don't ask the trees to save us.
BEFORE THIS(and afterward
as if i never existed(even between these lines
You shudder and turn your head away.
I remind you of a time/when you were all that was
and now you must admit/Light as an element
Earth you are(and rock(and fire-
but did you not know/you would be nowhere
without my ministrations?I am air.
And unless you wish to choke
You must breathe me in/and care..
THE TRAGEDY IS THAT I DID NOT KNOW
(i was in a play.I thought character was what was missing
this is why i got upset.The shortcomings of others angered me
in that my expectations were never met.I am not Hamlet!
Beneath above around me spin planets of familiars-
those whose magic abandoned me to the love of those
who loved only their own Fate.
and mine became entangled with theirs!
You would not have known me had I demurred/declined to act
simply affirmed the way things are/and lived a quiet life.
But NO! This show demands response
and blood will be the order of the day
I did not know I was a character.I did not know i was in a play.
THE HOSPITAL IS QUIET(apart from the flash of TV colors
each is asleep,sedated.The hospital is white.(Image of sterility
No germs,no sex-just death(emptying beds(and bed pans
The hospital is neutral/a witness of the broken(who will mend?
Who will be thrown out?The hospital is cool /as air conditioned and linear
as beds positioned in a fantasy of healing.Each in their own cocoon dream
Each one needing.Each one a need.The hospital is clinical.
It will examine.It will see.And those who leave remember that
each hospital is irrespective of its clients.Its contents empty
It refills.The hospital is neutral.Good or ill,
it will be only what you see-a hospital/to meet its needs.
circle cycle saga(for Boris Pasternak)
knowing only that attention falters
full flame flickers
intention fails to convince
(all else habitual)
to build a house above the changes
to make a fence between all moments
dividing the "NOW" from all"THENS"
just to allow clocks their credence
and in the walking daylight
gather friends like sticks/to keep them warm
when needing and in need of them
this tiny heat illumined
and we will burn together
now content /one heated heart
close companions/free as air
twice as warmed
by their freedom/we breathe again
knowing only attention
falters/full flame flickers/again.
ABOVE THIS SIDEWALK COFFEE SHOP
sky blue fringe culture/buildings huddle
(all their wisdom-retail
birds rent skywards/vertical as joy
wings sculptured harvests
hunting for a meal
beneath them,we wing-
1/2 wars sea earth/fire stone round
earth ball roll/hungry for belief
and when you stop/they slap
a digital parking ticket
to prove that bird needs air to lift it
song needs ears /to make it winged.
THIS IS SPECIFIC(if it were not for you
these words would be as unseen as dew
lost as forests,forgotten as footsteps beneath tides
and the deep in you revives me/like one lost lizard
zoo-escaping,finds the wild(between our lines
unites with all winged and feral/unties the bonds of habit
gains a new and darker power-beyond borders
the way out of fear,the unlocked door.midnight to dawn,unguarded fence
uncounted,unnamed place where we will not go without protection
and we can be as safe as sin/knowing this night will cover everyone
and to inhabit the deep allows all shallow to find its level
cling to shore,dream deep sweated fears out-
to find a way where there was no way.Until now.
full flame flickers
intention fails to convince
(all else habitual)
to build a house above the changes
to make a fence between all moments
dividing the "NOW" from all"THENS"
just to allow clocks their credence
and in the walking daylight
gather friends like sticks/to keep them warm
when needing and in need of them
this tiny heat illumined
and we will burn together
now content /one heated heart
close companions/free as air
twice as warmed
by their freedom/we breathe again
knowing only attention
falters/full flame flickers/again.
ABOVE THIS SIDEWALK COFFEE SHOP
sky blue fringe culture/buildings huddle
(all their wisdom-retail
birds rent skywards/vertical as joy
wings sculptured harvests
hunting for a meal
beneath them,we wing-
1/2 wars sea earth/fire stone round
earth ball roll/hungry for belief
and when you stop/they slap
a digital parking ticket
to prove that bird needs air to lift it
song needs ears /to make it winged.
THIS IS SPECIFIC(if it were not for you
these words would be as unseen as dew
lost as forests,forgotten as footsteps beneath tides
and the deep in you revives me/like one lost lizard
zoo-escaping,finds the wild(between our lines
unites with all winged and feral/unties the bonds of habit
gains a new and darker power-beyond borders
the way out of fear,the unlocked door.midnight to dawn,unguarded fence
uncounted,unnamed place where we will not go without protection
and we can be as safe as sin/knowing this night will cover everyone
and to inhabit the deep allows all shallow to find its level
cling to shore,dream deep sweated fears out-
to find a way where there was no way.Until now.
LIBRARY OF SILENCES
where we live is where our spirit attunes
(may as well land on the moon-
"i am sorry sir,but you have to leave-
no green cheese,no oxygen,no libraries..
"But what of these Libraries of Silences?
no dogbark,no train screech,no traffic club
birds call within the envelope of trees
Creak of treetrunks in the breeze
swooosh (not of Nike-more of leaves
buzz of bees and flip of flies
Heat and warmed silences...
Even here,sounds of carbon footprint booted skies
planes overhead,vapor trail lies
by the sea,oil globules ,coated sealife
in the desert,SUVs/4 wheel drives
There is no space we have not violated
Silence has been banished from our noisy planet
When you next encounter her
do ask her where she is hiding
I know what she will say-
"WITHIN"
(may as well land on the moon-
"i am sorry sir,but you have to leave-
no green cheese,no oxygen,no libraries..
"But what of these Libraries of Silences?
no dogbark,no train screech,no traffic club
birds call within the envelope of trees
Creak of treetrunks in the breeze
swooosh (not of Nike-more of leaves
buzz of bees and flip of flies
Heat and warmed silences...
Even here,sounds of carbon footprint booted skies
planes overhead,vapor trail lies
by the sea,oil globules ,coated sealife
in the desert,SUVs/4 wheel drives
There is no space we have not violated
Silence has been banished from our noisy planet
When you next encounter her
do ask her where she is hiding
I know what she will say-
"WITHIN"
LEVITY OVER GRAVITY
This body weight we take on/
carry as long/as we can
Slip out of skin suit
into a dream/of forgetting
The joke is on us
The punch line is...
I WAS A PIANO ONCE
Your hands upon my keys
turning me harmonic/acoustic
when you plugged me in
i became a keyboard
still stringed/your fingers
my puppetry..
MOTEL D/MODEL T
Rectangular as stagecoach on wheels
Horses turn to horsepowered front
Passengers with driver inside
We drive blackwards into origins
SOON YOU READ HISTORICAL SIGNS
instead of histories
Numbers alone will not save us
Names are changed to protect us-
Google(verb).Yahoo(noun)
Blog(noun/verb)Facebook(verb/noun)
ONE MILLION MICROLOANS
Hopi Corner vs Navaho
CARPENTERS SING BETWEEN BURGLARY AND SKY
"We are too small to fail"
NOSTALGIA INC
"Whatever happens,it was always better before!"
SNAP TO ATTENTION(like crocodile!
Butterfly groaning flipwinged
Song strength is in the line
between horizons and one sky.
(write what you do not know!
carry as long/as we can
Slip out of skin suit
into a dream/of forgetting
The joke is on us
The punch line is...
I WAS A PIANO ONCE
Your hands upon my keys
turning me harmonic/acoustic
when you plugged me in
i became a keyboard
still stringed/your fingers
my puppetry..
MOTEL D/MODEL T
Rectangular as stagecoach on wheels
Horses turn to horsepowered front
Passengers with driver inside
We drive blackwards into origins
SOON YOU READ HISTORICAL SIGNS
instead of histories
Numbers alone will not save us
Names are changed to protect us-
Google(verb).Yahoo(noun)
Blog(noun/verb)Facebook(verb/noun)
ONE MILLION MICROLOANS
Hopi Corner vs Navaho
CARPENTERS SING BETWEEN BURGLARY AND SKY
"We are too small to fail"
NOSTALGIA INC
"Whatever happens,it was always better before!"
SNAP TO ATTENTION(like crocodile!
Butterfly groaning flipwinged
Song strength is in the line
between horizons and one sky.
(write what you do not know!
4 ANNA CHAPMAN(News Of The World!)
You did not use a pseudonym
You married a Briton@24 /joined the Mile High club
Worked @Barclays Bank and networked constantly
Slept with the old rich in two countries(maybe three)
You were meant to infiltrate and report.
You were caught.Monitored.Reported on
Now you are exchanged for four American spies
yet you are the one on YOUTUBE,FACEBOOK,headlines
Your ex-husband sold your images and gave interviews
the whole world is curious at your Mata Hari update
So you admit guilt-return home-get banned from Britain
New adventures await you in the New Russia
Perhaps you will be redeemed /recycled
You are educated,young,redhaired,full of life
Your undercover future still bright
Dear Anna-where will you be tonight?
You married a Briton@24 /joined the Mile High club
Worked @Barclays Bank and networked constantly
Slept with the old rich in two countries(maybe three)
You were meant to infiltrate and report.
You were caught.Monitored.Reported on
Now you are exchanged for four American spies
yet you are the one on YOUTUBE,FACEBOOK,headlines
Your ex-husband sold your images and gave interviews
the whole world is curious at your Mata Hari update
So you admit guilt-return home-get banned from Britain
New adventures await you in the New Russia
Perhaps you will be redeemed /recycled
You are educated,young,redhaired,full of life
Your undercover future still bright
Dear Anna-where will you be tonight?
OON GARDEN
A galaxy of star flowers!
White blossoms blooming!
Silvery foliage!
Points of white light among the green-
(candles softly flickering-
here in your evening garden
where your only moon is invited in
(reflected in a mirror ball rotating-
O Night garden! White garden!
Invite in angelic reflections-
Welcome ,Morning Glory!
Advance ,o Angels' Trumpets
Night blooming Jasmine strings
thread among Gardenias
Silver sages all say
Moon flowers float us away...
TRANSCENDENT REALISM
Follies more than Bergere or buildings
Innate our foot in mouth syndrome
To scrawl on walls does not topple them
And toilet walls do not represent wisdom!
These days wisdom=not to be a victim!
Process is all(continuing education!
Where you stop,others start to begin
There is no end(here is where we came in
Change in matter slow to evolve
(even thoughts compute within a cloud!
Silences within often shout too loud
(lonely as a football crowd..
Perennial weather patterns know our name
Whatever we predict-one day it will reign!
White blossoms blooming!
Silvery foliage!
Points of white light among the green-
(candles softly flickering-
here in your evening garden
where your only moon is invited in
(reflected in a mirror ball rotating-
O Night garden! White garden!
Invite in angelic reflections-
Welcome ,Morning Glory!
Advance ,o Angels' Trumpets
Night blooming Jasmine strings
thread among Gardenias
Silver sages all say
Moon flowers float us away...
TRANSCENDENT REALISM
Follies more than Bergere or buildings
Innate our foot in mouth syndrome
To scrawl on walls does not topple them
And toilet walls do not represent wisdom!
These days wisdom=not to be a victim!
Process is all(continuing education!
Where you stop,others start to begin
There is no end(here is where we came in
Change in matter slow to evolve
(even thoughts compute within a cloud!
Silences within often shout too loud
(lonely as a football crowd..
Perennial weather patterns know our name
Whatever we predict-one day it will reign!
your gift of wings
as a child,paper aircraft
lifted off from my trembling hands
flew above their own gravity
landed in another's eye
adolescent,emotions took wing-
expressing was EVERY thing!
sink or swim,these little word wings
still flew from hand to eye
i did not know what i was doing
releasing words into the wings
chants,mantras,affirmations
musicians came to back and sing
get thee to a coffee shop!
where the words could gather(lots!
open mike and mind and ears and heart
recognize these wings as art
put them on a leaflet !let them fly!
released upon the streets by morning light
by nightfall,they had found a home
within your hands and eyes and minds
she said"this needs to be documented!"
these first stirrings -impulse to fly
these wings-put them on computer
so they might sing beyond their time
her computer stolen.the leaflets too
only this story remains to share with you
how flight is temporary /transitory
always ever we begin in truth-
"make books!"-and so we did
wordwings gathering between
the covers that covered numbers
of volumes now over 200
and still we start @zero-
blank page/empty stage /hollow
as the pen and eyes and heart
that makes wordwings as their art
may you fly beyond gravity!
(we are still seeking new wordwings)
they will rise like smoke from fires
disappear before your ears and eyes
everyone learns to fly
every body tries.
(for STREET POETRY 1973-2010)
lifted off from my trembling hands
flew above their own gravity
landed in another's eye
adolescent,emotions took wing-
expressing was EVERY thing!
sink or swim,these little word wings
still flew from hand to eye
i did not know what i was doing
releasing words into the wings
chants,mantras,affirmations
musicians came to back and sing
get thee to a coffee shop!
where the words could gather(lots!
open mike and mind and ears and heart
recognize these wings as art
put them on a leaflet !let them fly!
released upon the streets by morning light
by nightfall,they had found a home
within your hands and eyes and minds
she said"this needs to be documented!"
these first stirrings -impulse to fly
these wings-put them on computer
so they might sing beyond their time
her computer stolen.the leaflets too
only this story remains to share with you
how flight is temporary /transitory
always ever we begin in truth-
"make books!"-and so we did
wordwings gathering between
the covers that covered numbers
of volumes now over 200
and still we start @zero-
blank page/empty stage /hollow
as the pen and eyes and heart
that makes wordwings as their art
may you fly beyond gravity!
(we are still seeking new wordwings)
they will rise like smoke from fires
disappear before your ears and eyes
everyone learns to fly
every body tries.
(for STREET POETRY 1973-2010)
CENSUS 2010
we do not want you to know
but many of us are suffering
1 in 10 have registered as unemployed
(there are many more of us unincomed-
even more with below basic wage -or less(much less-
and child slavery has adapted to cinemas and fast food outlets
we wish to work and be left alone
all these handings of our taxes to the rich to bail them out
just confuses us.why are the (private)rich getting public monies?
why are the banks not lending?we will buy if we have money
it is simply not circulating.
we do not trust you with our stories.
you use the homeless as police headlines
more of us are in prison and illegal
than ever before.why is this?poverty is not a crime-it is a status
when you wonder why we are suspicious of you-ask yourself
would you spill your secrets to an unknown person
who is only asking questions so they can earn some income?
we are not invested in this system
there are too many things broken-borders,laws,trust,authority
too many corrupt politicians.violent policemen
we just want to be left alone.do not ask us questions
fix this economy before asking us why we withdraw from it
where are these 25 million illegals?who is asking?
answer your own questions...
CENSUS RESULTS July 2010
1.we found more people than numbers
2.no one wanted to talk with us
3.unemployment is up now this job is done
but many of us are suffering
1 in 10 have registered as unemployed
(there are many more of us unincomed-
even more with below basic wage -or less(much less-
and child slavery has adapted to cinemas and fast food outlets
we wish to work and be left alone
all these handings of our taxes to the rich to bail them out
just confuses us.why are the (private)rich getting public monies?
why are the banks not lending?we will buy if we have money
it is simply not circulating.
we do not trust you with our stories.
you use the homeless as police headlines
more of us are in prison and illegal
than ever before.why is this?poverty is not a crime-it is a status
when you wonder why we are suspicious of you-ask yourself
would you spill your secrets to an unknown person
who is only asking questions so they can earn some income?
we are not invested in this system
there are too many things broken-borders,laws,trust,authority
too many corrupt politicians.violent policemen
we just want to be left alone.do not ask us questions
fix this economy before asking us why we withdraw from it
where are these 25 million illegals?who is asking?
answer your own questions...
CENSUS RESULTS July 2010
1.we found more people than numbers
2.no one wanted to talk with us
3.unemployment is up now this job is done
NEW NORMAL
Build in the cage of Hell-feathered birdsnests!
If your arm is broken-dance with the other one!
Everything that is possible is yet to happen
Open your eyes-you are in Heaven!
If your day seems dull-go out and paint the sky!
Push Clouds of Despair away with a WHY?
WHY NOT!? is adventure-open your eyes!
It is the way you see things colors death in life
Here come the homeless men in wheelchairs
In wild weather,smiling begging intersections
You are they trapped in another skin
Love your begging!(enabling)
This movie short and interval
screens your life outside upon those walls
Graffitti and tagging on private property
Screams in colors"yes! even you are free!"
Every moment precious as blood diamonds
Simple as Pink Floyd-your time to SHINE ON!
If your arm is broken-dance with the other one!
Everything that is possible is yet to happen
Open your eyes-you are in Heaven!
If your day seems dull-go out and paint the sky!
Push Clouds of Despair away with a WHY?
WHY NOT!? is adventure-open your eyes!
It is the way you see things colors death in life
Here come the homeless men in wheelchairs
In wild weather,smiling begging intersections
You are they trapped in another skin
Love your begging!(enabling)
This movie short and interval
screens your life outside upon those walls
Graffitti and tagging on private property
Screams in colors"yes! even you are free!"
Every moment precious as blood diamonds
Simple as Pink Floyd-your time to SHINE ON!
LIVING LIBRARIES
Madeleine Mercier came to Vinnys tonight
when thousands flocked to Alejandro Escovedo
9 of us circled around her songs
as she brought Heaven back to South Austin
She evoked Blaze Foley and Al Grierson
reminded us of Walter Hiatt,Townes Van Zandt
every Austin singer-songwriter snatched from us-
she played them-to remind us to be rememberers
Original trees and nurseries both valid-
wilde and tamed both caged.Today names over truths
we stayed to hear,listen,imbibe,affirm-
every line is eternity replayed.Even space sings!
Her dreaming restored our own-we
who pilgrimaged to living waters to bring our own
remember Nick Travis Sundays @Cafe Caffeine.
She dreamed our wish for deeper dreaming
Her voice opened doors within-and windows
sparkled with a borrowed Light
She sang the circle into tears and smiles
Voice,guitar,lyrics,stars and night.
when thousands flocked to Alejandro Escovedo
9 of us circled around her songs
as she brought Heaven back to South Austin
She evoked Blaze Foley and Al Grierson
reminded us of Walter Hiatt,Townes Van Zandt
every Austin singer-songwriter snatched from us-
she played them-to remind us to be rememberers
Original trees and nurseries both valid-
wilde and tamed both caged.Today names over truths
we stayed to hear,listen,imbibe,affirm-
every line is eternity replayed.Even space sings!
Her dreaming restored our own-we
who pilgrimaged to living waters to bring our own
remember Nick Travis Sundays @Cafe Caffeine.
She dreamed our wish for deeper dreaming
Her voice opened doors within-and windows
sparkled with a borrowed Light
She sang the circle into tears and smiles
Voice,guitar,lyrics,stars and night.
ROBIN o SPROUTS!
"Angst and trauma!"-your ex-boyfriend says you corner the market
When you sing,they cry.The Irish in you smiles-
colleen o Colorado(you belong to everyone and no one/
everywhere and nowhere)-before you commit to open mikes
you just have to clear up one thing..It remains like an iceberg,submerged..
In conversations,we allude to it but do not speak
You smile and share adventures on public transport
In Austin,Sunday is a religious experience-
(every one praying for a bus to come!)
You refuse to pay more than $2 a gallon for gas
commit to public transport even when those who work in it do not
and walk as exercise(compulsory free will!
While waiting alone for a bus,you sing
When others crowd,you write.To find solitary as freedom.
You watch the customers with their coupons
You smile at every one with Irish freedom
The more is sold,the more secure your position in Austin
It is like that-wind blows in folk from all over
What stays is persistence and a mystic sense of purpose
You will not yet commit.You are on the lip of Austin
When you start to sing,tears will follow
When you sing,they cry.The Irish in you smiles-
colleen o Colorado(you belong to everyone and no one/
everywhere and nowhere)-before you commit to open mikes
you just have to clear up one thing..It remains like an iceberg,submerged..
In conversations,we allude to it but do not speak
You smile and share adventures on public transport
In Austin,Sunday is a religious experience-
(every one praying for a bus to come!)
You refuse to pay more than $2 a gallon for gas
commit to public transport even when those who work in it do not
and walk as exercise(compulsory free will!
While waiting alone for a bus,you sing
When others crowd,you write.To find solitary as freedom.
You watch the customers with their coupons
You smile at every one with Irish freedom
The more is sold,the more secure your position in Austin
It is like that-wind blows in folk from all over
What stays is persistence and a mystic sense of purpose
You will not yet commit.You are on the lip of Austin
When you start to sing,tears will follow
MY BUCKET LIST
Want to fill the hole at the top of the bucket
Want to enjoy assembling diversity/variety
Wish to extend life as long as possible
This means the bucket has to encompass everyone and everything
You are in it! All you know and felt and touched and tasted
All connections positive and kind
These are the doorways to the next life
Through the hole in the bucket in your mind!
GIFT ECONOMY!
Exchange Nicolai Tesla for Wilhelm Reich
Carl Jung for Joseph Campbell
John Lennon for Lewis Carroll
Anonymous for Heraclitus
Add Imaginary Myths and Legends
Stir until Belief.Serve with smiles!
Faerie Money! Gossamer Dreams!
TRADING POST
Traded my head for a huge heart
Transplanted my wallet for willpower
Between a rock and a harder place
found stone soup!
MOBILE DREAM LABORATORY
Laughter the currency and sound track
Goodwill the projector/memories the film stock
THE DISOBEDIENT LAB RAT
stayed in the maze/until it changed
NARCOCORRIDOS
Headless Mariachis
FLOPPY AS A DISC
He left the Circus!(redundant!
JAZZ MIND SET
with set breaks
DIGITAL DESCENT
Analogue revival!
HERDING EARS
deaf to traffic.
HANDWRITTEN HEARTS
epistolarian epilogues
EDGE WHISPERS(Cloud covers
gossipers horizons!
WHISTLE TIN CUP SONGS
(a long stretch in a short can!
NUDE SHIRTS
for well dressed chickens
APART MENTALLY SPEAKING
your rent is dew!
HIS BEARD IS TALKING
his hat writes all the good lines!
EMOTI CONS
appenda addenda
EMPTIED GLASS EYE
See! eye drink!
SYMMETRY GUNFIRE
who argues with geometry?
LIGHT HAS LEFT
(its mark on us
WATCHING WITNESSES
jury dismissed/hanging judge
ALWAYS&EVER ELOPED
where parallel lions meat
BARKING@THE MOON
left teeth marks!
HIS EXPERIENCE MILITARY
His absence/mandatory
TO PUNISH VIA ABSENCE
To hurt via love
CENSORSHIP 101
#@!%^*&
TELEPATHY FOR TV SETS
Remote viewing
UNCERTAINTY'S MAP
Borders erased
HOW TO AGREE WITHOUT CONFLICT
well,..yes...
HOW TO BUILD BETTER SILENCES
1.
THE SKIN OF AN AFTER THOUGHT
yes...but..
Want to enjoy assembling diversity/variety
Wish to extend life as long as possible
This means the bucket has to encompass everyone and everything
You are in it! All you know and felt and touched and tasted
All connections positive and kind
These are the doorways to the next life
Through the hole in the bucket in your mind!
GIFT ECONOMY!
Exchange Nicolai Tesla for Wilhelm Reich
Carl Jung for Joseph Campbell
John Lennon for Lewis Carroll
Anonymous for Heraclitus
Add Imaginary Myths and Legends
Stir until Belief.Serve with smiles!
Faerie Money! Gossamer Dreams!
TRADING POST
Traded my head for a huge heart
Transplanted my wallet for willpower
Between a rock and a harder place
found stone soup!
MOBILE DREAM LABORATORY
Laughter the currency and sound track
Goodwill the projector/memories the film stock
THE DISOBEDIENT LAB RAT
stayed in the maze/until it changed
NARCOCORRIDOS
Headless Mariachis
FLOPPY AS A DISC
He left the Circus!(redundant!
JAZZ MIND SET
with set breaks
DIGITAL DESCENT
Analogue revival!
HERDING EARS
deaf to traffic.
HANDWRITTEN HEARTS
epistolarian epilogues
EDGE WHISPERS(Cloud covers
gossipers horizons!
WHISTLE TIN CUP SONGS
(a long stretch in a short can!
NUDE SHIRTS
for well dressed chickens
APART MENTALLY SPEAKING
your rent is dew!
HIS BEARD IS TALKING
his hat writes all the good lines!
EMOTI CONS
appenda addenda
EMPTIED GLASS EYE
See! eye drink!
SYMMETRY GUNFIRE
who argues with geometry?
LIGHT HAS LEFT
(its mark on us
WATCHING WITNESSES
jury dismissed/hanging judge
ALWAYS&EVER ELOPED
where parallel lions meat
BARKING@THE MOON
left teeth marks!
HIS EXPERIENCE MILITARY
His absence/mandatory
TO PUNISH VIA ABSENCE
To hurt via love
CENSORSHIP 101
#@!%^*&
TELEPATHY FOR TV SETS
Remote viewing
UNCERTAINTY'S MAP
Borders erased
HOW TO AGREE WITHOUT CONFLICT
well,..yes...
HOW TO BUILD BETTER SILENCES
1.
THE SKIN OF AN AFTER THOUGHT
yes...but..
(PALESTINIAN)HOLOCAUST DENIAL
Recently,books have appeared denying the suffering in Gaza-
saying Palestinians are not being forced off their lands,with farms appropriated
and olive trees and homes bulldozed.That the thousands injured by Israeli attacks
are allowed to rebuild in Gaza,even when the land ,sea and air blockade remains
as collective punishment(like the Warsaw Ghetto)
What is done to one is done to all of us.
Denial of the present often stems from our pasts.
The present Pope was in Hitler Youth
There are still paedophile priests and some
were protected by the Catholic Church
Reparations alone will not restore Palestine
when their very land is being stolen from beneath them
and they are stopped from being an independent nation.
9 civilians were recently murdered by Israeli troops
while trying to break the sea blockade .More were injured
What is done to one is done to all.The blockade continues
as collective punishment of innocent civilians.
What is done to one of us is done to all.
All the propaganda in our world needs to mute
Palestine needs community-not endless wars
Humanitarian aid is only necessary
because Palestinians are not allowed to work,export
sell,exchange-are third class citizens in their own land.
Walls only make prisons.Free Palestinians!
Allowing freedom to all starts with every one of us.
Cease this blockade and allow Palestine to exist
What is done to one is done to all of us!
saying Palestinians are not being forced off their lands,with farms appropriated
and olive trees and homes bulldozed.That the thousands injured by Israeli attacks
are allowed to rebuild in Gaza,even when the land ,sea and air blockade remains
as collective punishment(like the Warsaw Ghetto)
What is done to one is done to all of us.
Denial of the present often stems from our pasts.
The present Pope was in Hitler Youth
There are still paedophile priests and some
were protected by the Catholic Church
Reparations alone will not restore Palestine
when their very land is being stolen from beneath them
and they are stopped from being an independent nation.
9 civilians were recently murdered by Israeli troops
while trying to break the sea blockade .More were injured
What is done to one is done to all.The blockade continues
as collective punishment of innocent civilians.
What is done to one of us is done to all.
All the propaganda in our world needs to mute
Palestine needs community-not endless wars
Humanitarian aid is only necessary
because Palestinians are not allowed to work,export
sell,exchange-are third class citizens in their own land.
Walls only make prisons.Free Palestinians!
Allowing freedom to all starts with every one of us.
Cease this blockade and allow Palestine to exist
What is done to one is done to all of us!
VERBAL(AB)USE-UG99
Your love is like wheat rust
Your friendship is cyberwar
Your acquaintance is stalking
Your coolness is global warming
Your envy is greenhouse effect
You waterboard me!
My enemy status=non-combatant
I am your civilian love-send me to your Bagram
Inside your Guantanamo,i await appeal
Will you be a military tribunal?
or a well hung jury?
MORTMAIN
Janus asks -is my past
greater than my future?
No god knows-shadows of skyscrapers
overshadow single stories like ours
Many domestic tragedies unreported
We lean in to this present moment
knowing the past will not save us
our future uncertain-and even now
is transience
A CURE FOR DISAPPOINTMENT
Drop all expectations(and projections!
TONIGHT AS HEAVEN
Imagine angels with smiles for wings
and only music and poetry to protect them!
One wings in from Arkansas-his car towed
Sixty dollars later-"Welcome To Austin!"
He was sleeping in that car,and only the hospitality of poets
saves him sleeping in these APD streets
Two police cars for every one offense
Homeless hassled and harassed
when they need to be housed and welcomed
Couchsurfing later,hearts and doors open
and another new musician joins the ranks
of thin stringed buskers ,petitioning your arts!
Your friendship is cyberwar
Your acquaintance is stalking
Your coolness is global warming
Your envy is greenhouse effect
You waterboard me!
My enemy status=non-combatant
I am your civilian love-send me to your Bagram
Inside your Guantanamo,i await appeal
Will you be a military tribunal?
or a well hung jury?
MORTMAIN
Janus asks -is my past
greater than my future?
No god knows-shadows of skyscrapers
overshadow single stories like ours
Many domestic tragedies unreported
We lean in to this present moment
knowing the past will not save us
our future uncertain-and even now
is transience
A CURE FOR DISAPPOINTMENT
Drop all expectations(and projections!
TONIGHT AS HEAVEN
Imagine angels with smiles for wings
and only music and poetry to protect them!
One wings in from Arkansas-his car towed
Sixty dollars later-"Welcome To Austin!"
He was sleeping in that car,and only the hospitality of poets
saves him sleeping in these APD streets
Two police cars for every one offense
Homeless hassled and harassed
when they need to be housed and welcomed
Couchsurfing later,hearts and doors open
and another new musician joins the ranks
of thin stringed buskers ,petitioning your arts!
POLITICS OF PERSONAL EXPERIENCE
I want my dentist and my doctor to be conservative-
to be rational,empirical,responsible,reasonable people
I would prefer they had no political agenda
that they embrace technology(slowly!
and have a healthy respect for our mutual survival.
I do not subscribe to any aspect of violence
and would prefer peaceful solutions that are not radical
I will listen when they hear me(when my teeth are holy!-
and follow best advice for healthy survival
This goes for other professionals-
although i do not care if our plumber is an alcoholic
or our mailman a raving Marxist
but why must commentators always be so rightwing?
Certain professions have a degree of tolerance.
Interior designers may entertain a feminine side
Painters lifestyle indulgence-artists do as they will
so long as what they make finds audience
Same with musicians,creators,writers-
they have a tendency to self-indulgence
which their subscribers tend to encourage
But not police-they need to be clear,conscious,fair and above reproach
even more than judges(for whom we vote)
I would not want a fat fireman,nor a sloppy food service person
And personal grooming matters when health and hygiene
publically and privately demand high standards
So when you ask this poet -do you believe in censorship?
My answer is always OFF THE RECORD-but i quote Roman Polanski-
"I believe in astrology-but i do not want my airline pilot
to believe in astrology!".SPEAK FOR YOUR SELF!
to be rational,empirical,responsible,reasonable people
I would prefer they had no political agenda
that they embrace technology(slowly!
and have a healthy respect for our mutual survival.
I do not subscribe to any aspect of violence
and would prefer peaceful solutions that are not radical
I will listen when they hear me(when my teeth are holy!-
and follow best advice for healthy survival
This goes for other professionals-
although i do not care if our plumber is an alcoholic
or our mailman a raving Marxist
but why must commentators always be so rightwing?
Certain professions have a degree of tolerance.
Interior designers may entertain a feminine side
Painters lifestyle indulgence-artists do as they will
so long as what they make finds audience
Same with musicians,creators,writers-
they have a tendency to self-indulgence
which their subscribers tend to encourage
But not police-they need to be clear,conscious,fair and above reproach
even more than judges(for whom we vote)
I would not want a fat fireman,nor a sloppy food service person
And personal grooming matters when health and hygiene
publically and privately demand high standards
So when you ask this poet -do you believe in censorship?
My answer is always OFF THE RECORD-but i quote Roman Polanski-
"I believe in astrology-but i do not want my airline pilot
to believe in astrology!".SPEAK FOR YOUR SELF!
WRITING MY MEMOIR
I am 83,and it is time-
I have stories,and love,and smiles
Settle down and listen for a while...
You see,my first love was music-
I would sit by the sea of waves
Imbibe the smoke of fires
watch as boats of lyrics
stole the strings of my heart
Music is still a love-jazz!
though I have outlived its practitioners
Theater caught me next
I was an actor/actress
live theater-much,small,smart
it took my heart so much
I ended up in many Texas films
It turned me into a blonde
It helped me be big and brassy and bold!
I was not prepared for poetry-it took me
when I had emotions.Words came-like weeds
My garden tangled by its intensity-
I spoke of emotional cats and dogs ,lantana,love-
of human rights and women deserving respect
I only had to leave her when
all the troupes and books and opened mikes
could not change my world to peace
You see,I have to write this memoir while I can
I know that you will understand..
I came to leave..
I have stories,and love,and smiles
Settle down and listen for a while...
You see,my first love was music-
I would sit by the sea of waves
Imbibe the smoke of fires
watch as boats of lyrics
stole the strings of my heart
Music is still a love-jazz!
though I have outlived its practitioners
Theater caught me next
I was an actor/actress
live theater-much,small,smart
it took my heart so much
I ended up in many Texas films
It turned me into a blonde
It helped me be big and brassy and bold!
I was not prepared for poetry-it took me
when I had emotions.Words came-like weeds
My garden tangled by its intensity-
I spoke of emotional cats and dogs ,lantana,love-
of human rights and women deserving respect
I only had to leave her when
all the troupes and books and opened mikes
could not change my world to peace
You see,I have to write this memoir while I can
I know that you will understand..
I came to leave..
UNSOLICITED CONVERSATIONS
in any public space-
someone comes up to you
and spills their life's blood stories out
You listen,bemused(as you have never met them before
and will probably not meet again
but you carry part of them within you now
and you must pass it on..
This is not that conversation-
this has nothing to do with issues or tissues
war ,homelessness,oilbleeding gum Gulf
or our failure to pretend to have control
This is a pontoon bridge across flooded wordrivers
It is a rope bridge across cliffs over chatterchasms
This is the filler to awkward silences
when the muzak is TOO LOUD or your voice too s o f t
or you need silence just to heal.This is that silence.
Before you ask how words can net silence
ask yourself why we need consolation
why we reach out to others.How is it
all these lines will be unread by most,forgotten by all
and even when to arrive at the end
you will never be sure
of your destination
someone comes up to you
and spills their life's blood stories out
You listen,bemused(as you have never met them before
and will probably not meet again
but you carry part of them within you now
and you must pass it on..
This is not that conversation-
this has nothing to do with issues or tissues
war ,homelessness,oilbleeding gum Gulf
or our failure to pretend to have control
This is a pontoon bridge across flooded wordrivers
It is a rope bridge across cliffs over chatterchasms
This is the filler to awkward silences
when the muzak is TOO LOUD or your voice too s o f t
or you need silence just to heal.This is that silence.
Before you ask how words can net silence
ask yourself why we need consolation
why we reach out to others.How is it
all these lines will be unread by most,forgotten by all
and even when to arrive at the end
you will never be sure
of your destination
BP
Regression Analysis
© 30 June 2010, the Griot Poet
Mark Twain said there are “lies, damned lies and statistics!”
No regression analysis can fit the logic of a foreign company from an allied country once known as “Anglo Petrochemical” that told a boldfaced lie to the CIA resulting in the overthrow of Mossaddeq in 1953, a democratically elected president in the country of…Iran.
Then installed the Shah’s repressive regime that made the citizens dream of “Back to the Future” rule by Mullahs and the Ayatollah Khomeini…
But I digress…
MI6 could not stress Mossaddeq nationalized his nation’s oil.
The little white lie they told our “intelligence” to make them act: failure to do so and Iran might go…communist!
Fast forward decades…
Anglo Petrochemical morphs into British Petroleum.
Drilling miles offshore almost one mile deep; one of several attendees to secret meetings with Vice President Richard Bruce “Dick” Cheney…signed on to using “walrus squads” to assist in cleaning up catastrophic oil spills…
Oops!
Tar balls & oil slicks from decayed dinosaurs and carbon plants, the aftermath of a greenhouse effect that effectively recycled the planet's last giant residents.
The best usage of nuclear weapons: to seal oil wells using the Russian method miles below the ocean floor to cauterize it shut…
DISMISSED because “we can’t turn off BP’s cash cow…” and apologize for 20 billion dollar shakedowns that are drops in the bucket for an industry that’s some would say quite literally made “more money than God.”
Then:
A little white lie about communism…
Now:
- Fibbed flow rates
- Dolphins, Orcas and Sharks in death throws,
- BP bypasses journalism from the networks (and CNN) specifically sending out their own on-the-payroll bloggers/”reporters”
Oysters & shrimp be cursed!
After all:
The most important thing is to save the investment of the shareholders;
Use dispersing agents to create oil columns below the surface, hiding how much there really is, amortizing the loss over fifteen years (instead of actual months, lives and wages lost).
- White lies;
- Fibbed flow rates;
- Yellow journalism.
The only things damned are life on earth and environmentalism!
(Statistics) The description of the nature of the relationship between two or more variables; it is concerned with the problem of describing or estimating the value of the dependent variable on the basis of one or more independent variables. Answers.com
Reggie Goodwin
http://www.reggiegoodwin.com
"Reinvention is better than despair." (personal quote)
"The soul that is within me, no man can degrade." Frederick Douglass
Subject: SIMPLY SPLASHING IN THIS HURRICANE
Lucky we are to live in tales-
giants stomp their Katrina way across cities
leaving little Alex to supply us with rain stories
We fill tanks with liquidities,as this splash down allows us time between
scorching Sol interrogations
and contemporary uncertainties
I get drenched/hear tales of Mopac floods/I35 gridlocks
cars stopped when water proved stronger than gas
All motion is downwards-gravity from heavens
These passing clouds anonymous as crowds
deliver around and to us/more than we expect!
To be shirtless in showers,drenched within downpourings
is to accept water as power and origins
Gardens gulp this in.We stay within and wait
Waterworld rises in creeks and rivers
I rise to meet these spilling skies
Both of us will dry in time
It is this drip drip dropping
that adds to all we are and will be
dancing between raindrops/eternally...
© 30 June 2010, the Griot Poet
Mark Twain said there are “lies, damned lies and statistics!”
No regression analysis can fit the logic of a foreign company from an allied country once known as “Anglo Petrochemical” that told a boldfaced lie to the CIA resulting in the overthrow of Mossaddeq in 1953, a democratically elected president in the country of…Iran.
Then installed the Shah’s repressive regime that made the citizens dream of “Back to the Future” rule by Mullahs and the Ayatollah Khomeini…
But I digress…
MI6 could not stress Mossaddeq nationalized his nation’s oil.
The little white lie they told our “intelligence” to make them act: failure to do so and Iran might go…communist!
Fast forward decades…
Anglo Petrochemical morphs into British Petroleum.
Drilling miles offshore almost one mile deep; one of several attendees to secret meetings with Vice President Richard Bruce “Dick” Cheney…signed on to using “walrus squads” to assist in cleaning up catastrophic oil spills…
Oops!
Tar balls & oil slicks from decayed dinosaurs and carbon plants, the aftermath of a greenhouse effect that effectively recycled the planet's last giant residents.
The best usage of nuclear weapons: to seal oil wells using the Russian method miles below the ocean floor to cauterize it shut…
DISMISSED because “we can’t turn off BP’s cash cow…” and apologize for 20 billion dollar shakedowns that are drops in the bucket for an industry that’s some would say quite literally made “more money than God.”
Then:
A little white lie about communism…
Now:
- Fibbed flow rates
- Dolphins, Orcas and Sharks in death throws,
- BP bypasses journalism from the networks (and CNN) specifically sending out their own on-the-payroll bloggers/”reporters”
Oysters & shrimp be cursed!
After all:
The most important thing is to save the investment of the shareholders;
Use dispersing agents to create oil columns below the surface, hiding how much there really is, amortizing the loss over fifteen years (instead of actual months, lives and wages lost).
- White lies;
- Fibbed flow rates;
- Yellow journalism.
The only things damned are life on earth and environmentalism!
(Statistics) The description of the nature of the relationship between two or more variables; it is concerned with the problem of describing or estimating the value of the dependent variable on the basis of one or more independent variables. Answers.com
Reggie Goodwin
http://www.reggiegoodwin.com
"Reinvention is better than despair." (personal quote)
"The soul that is within me, no man can degrade." Frederick Douglass
Subject: SIMPLY SPLASHING IN THIS HURRICANE
Lucky we are to live in tales-
giants stomp their Katrina way across cities
leaving little Alex to supply us with rain stories
We fill tanks with liquidities,as this splash down allows us time between
scorching Sol interrogations
and contemporary uncertainties
I get drenched/hear tales of Mopac floods/I35 gridlocks
cars stopped when water proved stronger than gas
All motion is downwards-gravity from heavens
These passing clouds anonymous as crowds
deliver around and to us/more than we expect!
To be shirtless in showers,drenched within downpourings
is to accept water as power and origins
Gardens gulp this in.We stay within and wait
Waterworld rises in creeks and rivers
I rise to meet these spilling skies
Both of us will dry in time
It is this drip drip dropping
that adds to all we are and will be
dancing between raindrops/eternally...
(dealing with)COMPULSORY CHANGE
come to a wall.too high to deny
it could be worse(death/total health breakdown
it could be better(respect-attunement,response!
the wall is real.it is non-negotiable
when you try to walk around-it grows exponentially
when you try to fly over,it rises higher
when you dig beneath,it sends roots treelike ever deeper
this is real.what would you do?
1.sit and wait for walls to fall
(they will in timescales way beyond yours
2.cry or sing about the injustice of walls
(all walls wail ,but we `do not listen
3.seek a world without walls
(this will happen-long after you have departed
4Meanwhile,you have to reconcile with terrorism
You need to negotiate with emotional bomb threats
with gods of walls and goddesses of gates
you will listen to litanies of wall stories-
THE GREAT ESCAPE,Houdini,Chicken Run,Toy Story 3
Eventually,you will become more enamored of stories
than the idea of escape.You will make your cell within walls
and wait.Change is loose and afoot.Walls are shaking,trembling
Everywhere,they fall like Berlin.You think you are free
Time is a limit.Your Free Will meets Destiny
Only one wall remains....Compulsory change...
it could be worse(death/total health breakdown
it could be better(respect-attunement,response!
the wall is real.it is non-negotiable
when you try to walk around-it grows exponentially
when you try to fly over,it rises higher
when you dig beneath,it sends roots treelike ever deeper
this is real.what would you do?
1.sit and wait for walls to fall
(they will in timescales way beyond yours
2.cry or sing about the injustice of walls
(all walls wail ,but we `do not listen
3.seek a world without walls
(this will happen-long after you have departed
4Meanwhile,you have to reconcile with terrorism
You need to negotiate with emotional bomb threats
with gods of walls and goddesses of gates
you will listen to litanies of wall stories-
THE GREAT ESCAPE,Houdini,Chicken Run,Toy Story 3
Eventually,you will become more enamored of stories
than the idea of escape.You will make your cell within walls
and wait.Change is loose and afoot.Walls are shaking,trembling
Everywhere,they fall like Berlin.You think you are free
Time is a limit.Your Free Will meets Destiny
Only one wall remains....Compulsory change...
PROGRESS REPORT
Stopped for death(not mine-not yours-a friend
Decided to remember him
and she in skin departing
and those on lip of silence
and each unnamed,unnumbered
alone,anonymous,homeless,bereft
i waited for death-then left
it matters (but it is not matter
it has gone(yet it may return!
it is known by many(and too few
it has a (temporary)home in you
If you wondered why this silence
in news devoted to violence
Now new words sprout like mushrooms
to bloom illegal as free feelings
Yes-we did what was prohibited
in our world of laws and fences
but everyone i know is illegal at some time
Now i stand to be surprised
when you swallow media lies
when your own world awaits
the wonders (Sleeping Princess) within you
Awake!awaken!(i am speaking to myself again
and if this has less meaning-may we remember friends
who stopped for death,and did not move again
my trust (in permanence) is transient
are we making progress yet?
or solipsism,s lip servicing...
Decided to remember him
and she in skin departing
and those on lip of silence
and each unnamed,unnumbered
alone,anonymous,homeless,bereft
i waited for death-then left
it matters (but it is not matter
it has gone(yet it may return!
it is known by many(and too few
it has a (temporary)home in you
If you wondered why this silence
in news devoted to violence
Now new words sprout like mushrooms
to bloom illegal as free feelings
Yes-we did what was prohibited
in our world of laws and fences
but everyone i know is illegal at some time
Now i stand to be surprised
when you swallow media lies
when your own world awaits
the wonders (Sleeping Princess) within you
Awake!awaken!(i am speaking to myself again
and if this has less meaning-may we remember friends
who stopped for death,and did not move again
my trust (in permanence) is transient
are we making progress yet?
or solipsism,s lip servicing...
SALVAGING(recycling)
it is lonely on the moon.here in this white suit
someone took the ladder to my return module
now all i have is this oxygen tank
and this last line connecting me to home
i was steamship.i had class.they have stripped me of my dignity
i rest as shell.Salvage bid for me at auction
my only hope is your nostalgia for a slower world
so i can regain my dressing rooms.
Marshall Plan.Post WW2.Airlift supplies over Berlin Walls
Wish they did the same for indigenous species(cargo cults
Wish they will do the same for Native Americans(with no reservations
May we be worthy of our myths and legends
She knows the glow the follows free speech birdpatterns
So she rescues nestlings and eggs them on
to wobble forward into uncertain flight patterns
so she might again admire their gift of wings
Volunteers are clearing oil from our lives
Bicycles,pedestrians,solar cars try
To clear our streets for journalists
are now on the front lines.
The young of Iran on free speech and heroin
know us as prohibitions.They are fined by the fashion police
whenever Western decadence seeks to allow freedom
of assembly on their streets.Remembering Neda
Collective punishment terrorizes the innocent.Sieges must lift
Blockades illegal as the murder of 9 mean
9 other lives will be taken (eye for an eye
You are punished for what you believe).Karma
Sharia kills poets .Fatwa upon us.We who do not believe
end up with a knife in our chest or beheaded
just for cartooning dead Mohammed
Religion is a corpse(worshiping same
No body believes.Yet they still use these words!
Tea Parties with no tea.Coffee shops for keyboards
Oil wars.Water wars.In between-we civilians(poets,artists,musicians
salving and recycling what it means to be truly human.
someone took the ladder to my return module
now all i have is this oxygen tank
and this last line connecting me to home
i was steamship.i had class.they have stripped me of my dignity
i rest as shell.Salvage bid for me at auction
my only hope is your nostalgia for a slower world
so i can regain my dressing rooms.
Marshall Plan.Post WW2.Airlift supplies over Berlin Walls
Wish they did the same for indigenous species(cargo cults
Wish they will do the same for Native Americans(with no reservations
May we be worthy of our myths and legends
She knows the glow the follows free speech birdpatterns
So she rescues nestlings and eggs them on
to wobble forward into uncertain flight patterns
so she might again admire their gift of wings
Volunteers are clearing oil from our lives
Bicycles,pedestrians,solar cars try
To clear our streets for journalists
are now on the front lines.
The young of Iran on free speech and heroin
know us as prohibitions.They are fined by the fashion police
whenever Western decadence seeks to allow freedom
of assembly on their streets.Remembering Neda
Collective punishment terrorizes the innocent.Sieges must lift
Blockades illegal as the murder of 9 mean
9 other lives will be taken (eye for an eye
You are punished for what you believe).Karma
Sharia kills poets .Fatwa upon us.We who do not believe
end up with a knife in our chest or beheaded
just for cartooning dead Mohammed
Religion is a corpse(worshiping same
No body believes.Yet they still use these words!
Tea Parties with no tea.Coffee shops for keyboards
Oil wars.Water wars.In between-we civilians(poets,artists,musicians
salving and recycling what it means to be truly human.
KARAOKE FROG
He is professional.This is his gig
He has a set list (on computer
and may as well like Brian Eno
just flip the tape on at the start
return to stop it @the end)
He will play what they have heard before
He has tuned and is in tune with his audience
They creak in for the seafood buffet
They studiously ignore him
unless and until he plays one they know
He is reconciled to being background
He will be paid tonight(set rate
He will take Union breaks
It makes no difference to him who is there
They do not know him.Nor do they care
Another busload of pensioners will creak in dinner
The price at night is higher.He has not yet counted
how many days and nights he has been here
When he leaves(or dies)-they will simply hire another hand
The roundup begins in the sky above him
Which goes first? his audience-or him?
He watches them eating.Thinks meat.
He has a set list (on computer
and may as well like Brian Eno
just flip the tape on at the start
return to stop it @the end)
He will play what they have heard before
He has tuned and is in tune with his audience
They creak in for the seafood buffet
They studiously ignore him
unless and until he plays one they know
He is reconciled to being background
He will be paid tonight(set rate
He will take Union breaks
It makes no difference to him who is there
They do not know him.Nor do they care
Another busload of pensioners will creak in dinner
The price at night is higher.He has not yet counted
how many days and nights he has been here
When he leaves(or dies)-they will simply hire another hand
The roundup begins in the sky above him
Which goes first? his audience-or him?
He watches them eating.Thinks meat.
we have decided to continue
meeting ,listening,sharing,discussing
the end is nowhere in sight (apart from extinct /endangered species
like greed,conflict and egoic insecurities
Attunement may mean many roads/tracks towards Unknowns
We need no armorplated emotions
nor defense barriers.Terror can blow itself up
but it has no right beyond its own.Life
is addictive!Harmlessness allows all of us
to unite or depart if we so desire.Connection
sustains us .Walls fall in time.Bridges over swollen rivers.
Life rafts thrown to preserve us.Circles formed
with no center nor leader/just us (together
This starts with each of us-it never ends
Every part of each of us finds resonance within
around,surrounding.Illusion aloneness falls
and fails to convince.We have decided to continue-
and this is just the beginning!
the end is nowhere in sight (apart from extinct /endangered species
like greed,conflict and egoic insecurities
Attunement may mean many roads/tracks towards Unknowns
We need no armorplated emotions
nor defense barriers.Terror can blow itself up
but it has no right beyond its own.Life
is addictive!Harmlessness allows all of us
to unite or depart if we so desire.Connection
sustains us .Walls fall in time.Bridges over swollen rivers.
Life rafts thrown to preserve us.Circles formed
with no center nor leader/just us (together
This starts with each of us-it never ends
Every part of each of us finds resonance within
around,surrounding.Illusion aloneness falls
and fails to convince.We have decided to continue-
and this is just the beginning!
ALLITERATIVE ALLUSIONS
Tintagel tin miners passed Cornish pasties
towards the light that shone from
tiny candles lit and alight.Canaries in a coal mine
know when air is gone,wings follow
Tit willow!Tit willow!Tit willow!
Slippery snakeskin ssssshed us up
Spit of sliptongue chilled to bone
Bit or not,we withdrew
alarmed by snake shadows
in our home
Traumatic tales terrified tots!
Horror hobgoblins with heads-not!
Stephen King has lost the plot!
Dead or deaf or dumb
limited by love
we linger ,simple as songs
Rotten radishes rank odors
reach Ritalin remembrances
Songbirds,stuck in the skies
sue airlines successfully
Primping peacocks mirror masters
Dogs follow owners
Conceived for ALLITERATION EXERCISES @Temple poets July 1@6pm Temple CAC
towards the light that shone from
tiny candles lit and alight.Canaries in a coal mine
know when air is gone,wings follow
Tit willow!Tit willow!Tit willow!
Slippery snakeskin ssssshed us up
Spit of sliptongue chilled to bone
Bit or not,we withdrew
alarmed by snake shadows
in our home
Traumatic tales terrified tots!
Horror hobgoblins with heads-not!
Stephen King has lost the plot!
Dead or deaf or dumb
limited by love
we linger ,simple as songs
Rotten radishes rank odors
reach Ritalin remembrances
Songbirds,stuck in the skies
sue airlines successfully
Primping peacocks mirror masters
Dogs follow owners
Conceived for ALLITERATION EXERCISES @Temple poets July 1@6pm Temple CAC
HAPPY JACK TINTABULATES!
Bells ring around him as he shadows
His bearded smile hugs you first-GOOD NEWS!
He drags a bag of antique books of my poetry
out from some hidden sanctuary of Ruta Maya
Shows me colors and titles I had forgotten existed!
"I have ANOTHER bag,too,Thom!-
and it has MORE in it!"
These are the books I had given him
over many poetry evenings of open mike
and Poetry Karaoke on that famed front porch
where EXPOSE complained about the noise
and APD dropped in when we were far too happy
Now condominiums crowd in across the parked in street
Happy Jack has just returned from Kerrville
his other home in this chameleon city is with us-poets!
He used to sit and listen deeply as we improvised
He clapped and applauded wildly at our mildness
and now he still sparks joy everywhere he bells
He holds these stories close-the ones he tells
are all good news.He has TWO bags of poetry-priceless!
And none of us can afford his true worth!
His bearded smile hugs you first-GOOD NEWS!
He drags a bag of antique books of my poetry
out from some hidden sanctuary of Ruta Maya
Shows me colors and titles I had forgotten existed!
"I have ANOTHER bag,too,Thom!-
and it has MORE in it!"
These are the books I had given him
over many poetry evenings of open mike
and Poetry Karaoke on that famed front porch
where EXPOSE complained about the noise
and APD dropped in when we were far too happy
Now condominiums crowd in across the parked in street
Happy Jack has just returned from Kerrville
his other home in this chameleon city is with us-poets!
He used to sit and listen deeply as we improvised
He clapped and applauded wildly at our mildness
and now he still sparks joy everywhere he bells
He holds these stories close-the ones he tells
are all good news.He has TWO bags of poetry-priceless!
And none of us can afford his true worth!
SIMPLY SPLASHING IN THIS HURRICANE
Lucky we are to live in tales-
giants stomp their Katrina way across cities
leaving little Alex to supply us with rain stories
We fill tanks with liquidities,as this splash down allows us time between
scorching Sol interrogations
and contemporary uncertainties
I get drenched/hear tales of Mopac floods/I35 gridlocks
cars stopped when water proved stronger than gas
All motion is downwards-gravity from heavens
These passing clouds anonymous as crowds
deliver around and to us/more than we expect!
To be shirtless in showers,drenched within downpourings
is to accept water as power and origins
Gardens gulp this in.We stay within and wait
Waterworld rises in creeks and rivers
I rise to meet these spilling skies
Both of us will dry in time
It is this drip drip dropping
that adds to all we are and will be
dancing between raindrops/eternally...
giants stomp their Katrina way across cities
leaving little Alex to supply us with rain stories
We fill tanks with liquidities,as this splash down allows us time between
scorching Sol interrogations
and contemporary uncertainties
I get drenched/hear tales of Mopac floods/I35 gridlocks
cars stopped when water proved stronger than gas
All motion is downwards-gravity from heavens
These passing clouds anonymous as crowds
deliver around and to us/more than we expect!
To be shirtless in showers,drenched within downpourings
is to accept water as power and origins
Gardens gulp this in.We stay within and wait
Waterworld rises in creeks and rivers
I rise to meet these spilling skies
Both of us will dry in time
It is this drip drip dropping
that adds to all we are and will be
dancing between raindrops/eternally...
MEDIA MASSAGE MEDIATED
We change and are changed by our means of communicating-
semaphore and telegram obsolete,TWITTER and FACEBOOK universal
Once the telegraph pole across prairies,and Morse code tapping
linked intimates over distance
Stock Market ticker tape clicking out news and profits
We leap where inventiveness allows purchase
Hold tools as tiny as silicon chips
in our hands-iphone me!Texting changes spelng
George Bernard Shaw left his will that English be phonetic
Digital children(unaware of their heritage)chat rooms
We do not write.We do NOT write letters
This bankrupts Post Offices and makes million emails
Whether we adapt to/adopt ibooks/KINDLE
their existence changes bookstores forever!
BORDERS probably sells more coffee than books
like popcorn theaters where films for children flash.
And have you been to coffeeshops,where earphones isolate
laptop dancers in cocoon bubbles of WIFI ?
Our sense of time has changed-instant no longer quick enough!
Pity the poor dialup in a DSL world! To be unWIRED is to be isolated
FLIKR pix,FACEBOOK eclipses both blogs and MYSPACE
Changes compound ,compulsory as fashion.
Lines outside APPLE for the latest version.
Whole websites dedicated to the technologies of communication.
Luddittes ,Beware! Hiding from invention does not change its impact!
Books mutate into airport novellas and vampire fiction
Crime and cooking fill thin aisles .Encyclopaedias replaced by GOOGLE
Soon we will stare @hardcovers like Gutenberg Bible Museums
Wax nostalgic about handmade paper and stitched covers
Desktop printing replaced by YOUTUBE videos
live! from Teheran,BP spills,Turkish Gaza airships
Adaptation marks the growth of continuing consciousness
Soon copyright will only be for lawyers.Words =contracts.
Monetizing the prime concern of FREE apps.
We cannot go back.Shapes and forms of phones have changed as we have
from cord to less,large to slim.Dieting technology.
Mutation makes us .What happens next will change us again
Half human ,half robocalls!Terminators?or Iron Men?
Get with the program,droids and drones!
Universal surveillance means-you are never alone...
semaphore and telegram obsolete,TWITTER and FACEBOOK universal
Once the telegraph pole across prairies,and Morse code tapping
linked intimates over distance
Stock Market ticker tape clicking out news and profits
We leap where inventiveness allows purchase
Hold tools as tiny as silicon chips
in our hands-iphone me!Texting changes spelng
George Bernard Shaw left his will that English be phonetic
Digital children(unaware of their heritage)chat rooms
We do not write.We do NOT write letters
This bankrupts Post Offices and makes million emails
Whether we adapt to/adopt ibooks/KINDLE
their existence changes bookstores forever!
BORDERS probably sells more coffee than books
like popcorn theaters where films for children flash.
And have you been to coffeeshops,where earphones isolate
laptop dancers in cocoon bubbles of WIFI ?
Our sense of time has changed-instant no longer quick enough!
Pity the poor dialup in a DSL world! To be unWIRED is to be isolated
FLIKR pix,FACEBOOK eclipses both blogs and MYSPACE
Changes compound ,compulsory as fashion.
Lines outside APPLE for the latest version.
Whole websites dedicated to the technologies of communication.
Luddittes ,Beware! Hiding from invention does not change its impact!
Books mutate into airport novellas and vampire fiction
Crime and cooking fill thin aisles .Encyclopaedias replaced by GOOGLE
Soon we will stare @hardcovers like Gutenberg Bible Museums
Wax nostalgic about handmade paper and stitched covers
Desktop printing replaced by YOUTUBE videos
live! from Teheran,BP spills,Turkish Gaza airships
Adaptation marks the growth of continuing consciousness
Soon copyright will only be for lawyers.Words =contracts.
Monetizing the prime concern of FREE apps.
We cannot go back.Shapes and forms of phones have changed as we have
from cord to less,large to slim.Dieting technology.
Mutation makes us .What happens next will change us again
Half human ,half robocalls!Terminators?or Iron Men?
Get with the program,droids and drones!
Universal surveillance means-you are never alone...
REVOLUTIONARIES OF SACRED LOVE
what we know is this-less.
than what we have experienced.Love comes disguised
sometimes as opposition to our will.We re-act to re-activate our own batteries
Re-charge ourselves by examples active and neutral,negative,positive
Even death has love wrapped -roses of grief
petaled teardrops,thorned sorrow.Even pain is love-
incomprehension,partings,loss.All emotions Sacred!
Blake's Poison Tree/Mayakovsky's Cloudy Trousers
Anna Akmatova's Siberia,Dylan Thomas's Grains of rice
Every prayer longs,and hears,ear to your heart
to ask for silence and to allow the Sacred to rest
Examples-parents,enemies,friends,even scrapbook acquaintances
carry a leaf from the World Tree.Paste in your Book of Hearts
Jigsaw pieces(memories).You gather these-
understanding less the pilgrimage than the pain.
Longing for Beloved.Loss of loved ones.Gaps between time.
Here is where analogy fails.Old Sol beams nuclear anonymous
Round Moon no mother nor a Goddess.You understand -
Sacredness unique ,universal,present ,invoked,attracted,repulsed
Every tree chopped is a finger lost
Every dolphin drowned is a dream forgotten
Every beached whale a family murder
Closed system (heart world beating but not beaten)
Faint Light emits from you even as you are sleeping
Connection compounds everyone.More Light than stars within
around ,surrounding,before,after -hear that laughter?
That is you reciting bells of pleasure
adding to the invisible Treasure of your Art-
to love is all.Life knows .Take part!
NICK TRAVIS JAM SESSIONS this sunday july 4 from 2-4pm @Cafe Caffeine 909 west mary -open to all to remember and apply the joy that Nick added to all!
than what we have experienced.Love comes disguised
sometimes as opposition to our will.We re-act to re-activate our own batteries
Re-charge ourselves by examples active and neutral,negative,positive
Even death has love wrapped -roses of grief
petaled teardrops,thorned sorrow.Even pain is love-
incomprehension,partings,loss.All emotions Sacred!
Blake's Poison Tree/Mayakovsky's Cloudy Trousers
Anna Akmatova's Siberia,Dylan Thomas's Grains of rice
Every prayer longs,and hears,ear to your heart
to ask for silence and to allow the Sacred to rest
Examples-parents,enemies,friends,even scrapbook acquaintances
carry a leaf from the World Tree.Paste in your Book of Hearts
Jigsaw pieces(memories).You gather these-
understanding less the pilgrimage than the pain.
Longing for Beloved.Loss of loved ones.Gaps between time.
Here is where analogy fails.Old Sol beams nuclear anonymous
Round Moon no mother nor a Goddess.You understand -
Sacredness unique ,universal,present ,invoked,attracted,repulsed
Every tree chopped is a finger lost
Every dolphin drowned is a dream forgotten
Every beached whale a family murder
Closed system (heart world beating but not beaten)
Faint Light emits from you even as you are sleeping
Connection compounds everyone.More Light than stars within
around ,surrounding,before,after -hear that laughter?
That is you reciting bells of pleasure
adding to the invisible Treasure of your Art-
to love is all.Life knows .Take part!
NICK TRAVIS JAM SESSIONS this sunday july 4 from 2-4pm @Cafe Caffeine 909 west mary -open to all to remember and apply the joy that Nick added to all!
YOU HAVE BEEN FISHING
so you know the difference between one line
and many
between meditating in a rowboat
and industrial workloads
between deadlines and quotas and haiku silver fish
You are both fish and net,catch and catcher
All you haul in from your depths is treasure
Some will have to be thrown back-too small to count
as food for birds or scavenger sharks
Some are dead lines that will not yield result
You will catch and release these /unhook yourself
let wilderness have a chance to regenerate
for future fisherfolk rely upon your losses
They ,too,will plumb these depths with nets of words
drag in food for thoughts,splay it upon wet decks
assemble into something resembling satisfaction
Shallow waters these days/and coastal fishing depleted
Deeper out,you run a risk of storms.Damaging your writing
What you bring back may be monstrous,huge ,White Whale
Your Marie Celeste anchoring.Sargasso Sea pondering.
You sink meditations and pull up rainbows
Somewhere,a dreamfish evades capture.
Holes in your nets allow flight for one
You let yourself out and seek deeper oceans
More folk who seek only capture -here they come!
BLESSING THE WATERS
Perception of a straw through water bends illusion
As with storms ,hurricanes,disasters-one
consecrates the waters (being from these oceans
finned once,with gills,now hooking landlines into waters
fluid as forevers,letting time sleep.Snoring silences
You are these waters are one.Bless each moment ,then release
The fish of your soul seeks deeper waters
Smiles like a dolphin/sports/sings....
and many
between meditating in a rowboat
and industrial workloads
between deadlines and quotas and haiku silver fish
You are both fish and net,catch and catcher
All you haul in from your depths is treasure
Some will have to be thrown back-too small to count
as food for birds or scavenger sharks
Some are dead lines that will not yield result
You will catch and release these /unhook yourself
let wilderness have a chance to regenerate
for future fisherfolk rely upon your losses
They ,too,will plumb these depths with nets of words
drag in food for thoughts,splay it upon wet decks
assemble into something resembling satisfaction
Shallow waters these days/and coastal fishing depleted
Deeper out,you run a risk of storms.Damaging your writing
What you bring back may be monstrous,huge ,White Whale
Your Marie Celeste anchoring.Sargasso Sea pondering.
You sink meditations and pull up rainbows
Somewhere,a dreamfish evades capture.
Holes in your nets allow flight for one
You let yourself out and seek deeper oceans
More folk who seek only capture -here they come!
BLESSING THE WATERS
Perception of a straw through water bends illusion
As with storms ,hurricanes,disasters-one
consecrates the waters (being from these oceans
finned once,with gills,now hooking landlines into waters
fluid as forevers,letting time sleep.Snoring silences
You are these waters are one.Bless each moment ,then release
The fish of your soul seeks deeper waters
Smiles like a dolphin/sports/sings....
"MORNING IS BROKEN"
Each day a page torn from diary moonmilk
Ripped out of nights silk sheets
to splatter coffee blood black as stars
Your eyes curtains yesterday's reviews
For there are two nights and two breakfasts-
one,young as bucks,leaping gazelles spring boarding
Other creeping snail pace cobwebbed dawning
It is hard to be soft when changing
from deep water depth charges (dreams exploding
around the metal hulk of submarine night
Crossing the border by daybreak like illegals
in a forest of neutral intentions-knowing
today has specific ransom demands
and if they are not met,whole bodies will glow up inflamed
You hesitate.Grow slower.Sink in to sand chair.Time's clock stops
You get off.Steal moments for larcenous thoughts
All is no longer possible.That banana morning you
is now sliced pineapple.Peopel you know are ghosts.
Whole cities are crying children.Waves drowning.Fires burning toast
Microcosms suffering for a tortured metaphor
You would prefer to go back to dream
But daylight demands attention.Sun peeks in like a stalker
Now ,robe and go.Crowds await to ignore.More escapes attention
than can be enumerated.Omnia mutantur.Sic transit gloria mundi.
Ripped out of nights silk sheets
to splatter coffee blood black as stars
Your eyes curtains yesterday's reviews
For there are two nights and two breakfasts-
one,young as bucks,leaping gazelles spring boarding
Other creeping snail pace cobwebbed dawning
It is hard to be soft when changing
from deep water depth charges (dreams exploding
around the metal hulk of submarine night
Crossing the border by daybreak like illegals
in a forest of neutral intentions-knowing
today has specific ransom demands
and if they are not met,whole bodies will glow up inflamed
You hesitate.Grow slower.Sink in to sand chair.Time's clock stops
You get off.Steal moments for larcenous thoughts
All is no longer possible.That banana morning you
is now sliced pineapple.Peopel you know are ghosts.
Whole cities are crying children.Waves drowning.Fires burning toast
Microcosms suffering for a tortured metaphor
You would prefer to go back to dream
But daylight demands attention.Sun peeks in like a stalker
Now ,robe and go.Crowds await to ignore.More escapes attention
than can be enumerated.Omnia mutantur.Sic transit gloria mundi.
PASSPORT THROUGH EGGCRACK MORNING
Young,birthed,we pick up eyes
and ears and tongue and speech and walk away from source
Scrape and scratch and rash and cut and bleed
Cadmium SHREK made in China
Melamine milk too.Soon,all our childhood will be outsourced
We will export movies and technology
like Japan after World War 2.(replicants)
We pick up weights-jobs,relationships
until we crack under too much
and start to sail into age.This harbor cruise different
to the slim canoe /kayak of thin youth
First we bloat in Middle Ages-balloon face
and moon middles.Next we diet like the Third World
to release all we have taken on like second mortgages
One by one,we start to let things go-
garage sales ,estate sales,gifting,we let ourselves go-
casual,elliptical,slower now and stuttering
with a code we picked up in adolescence
no new young wish to know.We are 78 in a 331/3 whirl.
Analogue in a digital.Wristwatch to a telephone.Our batteries go flat
We experience an energy crisis.Drink RED BULL/energy drinks
Creak like retired rooster in another's barnyard arm
Our pirate days are Hawkeye /Long John Silver
All the young recall is Johnny Depp.
They keep dropping eggs around the barnyard
Children dropping children with no elders
Grandparents rearing a Third Generation
You begin to forget your youth,settle in for the duration
Health becomes a tissue,thin as tax
You are slow as the newspapers they throw upon your lawn
Mornings are now a decision-whether to rise
or wait for yet another counted calendar day to pass?
Your passport has been stamped before you were born.
and ears and tongue and speech and walk away from source
Scrape and scratch and rash and cut and bleed
Cadmium SHREK made in China
Melamine milk too.Soon,all our childhood will be outsourced
We will export movies and technology
like Japan after World War 2.(replicants)
We pick up weights-jobs,relationships
until we crack under too much
and start to sail into age.This harbor cruise different
to the slim canoe /kayak of thin youth
First we bloat in Middle Ages-balloon face
and moon middles.Next we diet like the Third World
to release all we have taken on like second mortgages
One by one,we start to let things go-
garage sales ,estate sales,gifting,we let ourselves go-
casual,elliptical,slower now and stuttering
with a code we picked up in adolescence
no new young wish to know.We are 78 in a 331/3 whirl.
Analogue in a digital.Wristwatch to a telephone.Our batteries go flat
We experience an energy crisis.Drink RED BULL/energy drinks
Creak like retired rooster in another's barnyard arm
Our pirate days are Hawkeye /Long John Silver
All the young recall is Johnny Depp.
They keep dropping eggs around the barnyard
Children dropping children with no elders
Grandparents rearing a Third Generation
You begin to forget your youth,settle in for the duration
Health becomes a tissue,thin as tax
You are slow as the newspapers they throw upon your lawn
Mornings are now a decision-whether to rise
or wait for yet another counted calendar day to pass?
Your passport has been stamped before you were born.
MUTATION
Charles Darwin tourist,monkeying evolutionary
did not know of Dolly clones or DNA
Wired children adept fingering keyboarding
linked virtually instantly worldwide webbing
Lightning speed digitalis-compounded infomaniacs
GOOGLE earth as noun and verb!
YAHOO! true to etymological origins!
Now ,as Pakistan censors FACEBOOK
and China monitors all Internets
Crush and clash of cultures-
between OPEN and CLOSED,CONTROLLED and FREE
simple as access to information(technology-we
are wired together -from the shooting of Neda
to the killing of Turkish Americans
BP website spills 24 hours a day
and still we cannot soak it all in
Our children are faster and more superficial
instant ,quick and disposable as bytes of information
They adjust to a visual whirl-they fit in.
We who grew through handmade,handheld cultures
cannot believe that all image is modified for content
and that surveillance is universal.Infowars control responses
from September 11 to propaganda speeches
Bombed until dulled down/numbed down
we watch zombies as entertainment.Change the channel!
Community radio volunteers the unpalatable-
that we are still agents of change and responsible
No scapegoating corporate criminals PR agencies
We drive the cars that need the oil that spills the seas
as do our children-all wishing for clean energies
Wind,and sun,sail and tides still sing-
we are mutating in our very DNA /elementally...
did not know of Dolly clones or DNA
Wired children adept fingering keyboarding
linked virtually instantly worldwide webbing
Lightning speed digitalis-compounded infomaniacs
GOOGLE earth as noun and verb!
YAHOO! true to etymological origins!
Now ,as Pakistan censors FACEBOOK
and China monitors all Internets
Crush and clash of cultures-
between OPEN and CLOSED,CONTROLLED and FREE
simple as access to information(technology-we
are wired together -from the shooting of Neda
to the killing of Turkish Americans
BP website spills 24 hours a day
and still we cannot soak it all in
Our children are faster and more superficial
instant ,quick and disposable as bytes of information
They adjust to a visual whirl-they fit in.
We who grew through handmade,handheld cultures
cannot believe that all image is modified for content
and that surveillance is universal.Infowars control responses
from September 11 to propaganda speeches
Bombed until dulled down/numbed down
we watch zombies as entertainment.Change the channel!
Community radio volunteers the unpalatable-
that we are still agents of change and responsible
No scapegoating corporate criminals PR agencies
We drive the cars that need the oil that spills the seas
as do our children-all wishing for clean energies
Wind,and sun,sail and tides still sing-
we are mutating in our very DNA /elementally...
NEXT TO THE MONA LISA
a human study in complete disinterest-
a bored security guard in uniform
that denies any individuality/he
could be any study for Rembrandt
(age indeterminate)-unframed
bound to the past by menial pay.
I watched him more than her
believed that myth of Mona
as being self-portrait of the artist
wondered how many tea towels had that smile
how many postcards hid that secret
Da Vinci Code or not-what seemed most important
was this relationship -between guard and captive/
framed and un-wondering which was hung
for years until retirement
Is this not the way with art?
We pay for what we can afford
admire in a timeshare?
THE NEED FOR
Who you are less important than what you stand for.
Mao purged ,we starved-his image lives
despite Great Leaps backward in currency corruption
Stalin's statue (like Saddams)-taken from the public eye
while more still mourn the murder of Georgians
Young Elvis gold on stamps like Michael Jackson
not Fat Elvis bloated as a gold hamburger
nor Michael's reconstructive Frankenstein surgeries
Image sells-as Warhol held Marilyn frozen's corpse
in lurid screenprints' 7 year itch/skirt hitched
not the murdered Mafia nembutal corpse
Argentine Holy Cards are Soccer Heroes
Here NBA sports heroes-rapists,AIDS infested dope smokers..
Make miniature heroes-she who smiles/he who serves
They who need no heroic proportions
visiting elderly /caring for vulnerable
Someone other than Narcissus loving self-image
Love the invisible ones-whose connection
is as tenuous as ours.They do not need heroics
They simply live as best they can..
a bored security guard in uniform
that denies any individuality/he
could be any study for Rembrandt
(age indeterminate)-unframed
bound to the past by menial pay.
I watched him more than her
believed that myth of Mona
as being self-portrait of the artist
wondered how many tea towels had that smile
how many postcards hid that secret
Da Vinci Code or not-what seemed most important
was this relationship -between guard and captive/
framed and un-wondering which was hung
for years until retirement
Is this not the way with art?
We pay for what we can afford
admire in a timeshare?
THE NEED FOR
Who you are less important than what you stand for.
Mao purged ,we starved-his image lives
despite Great Leaps backward in currency corruption
Stalin's statue (like Saddams)-taken from the public eye
while more still mourn the murder of Georgians
Young Elvis gold on stamps like Michael Jackson
not Fat Elvis bloated as a gold hamburger
nor Michael's reconstructive Frankenstein surgeries
Image sells-as Warhol held Marilyn frozen's corpse
in lurid screenprints' 7 year itch/skirt hitched
not the murdered Mafia nembutal corpse
Argentine Holy Cards are Soccer Heroes
Here NBA sports heroes-rapists,AIDS infested dope smokers..
Make miniature heroes-she who smiles/he who serves
They who need no heroic proportions
visiting elderly /caring for vulnerable
Someone other than Narcissus loving self-image
Love the invisible ones-whose connection
is as tenuous as ours.They do not need heroics
They simply live as best they can..
Quiet Moments
Between wars,we gather the bodies
bury them .Plant white crosses
Hold pictures and name ceremonies after them
so forgetting might remember them
But now these wars are endless.We are their targets
Both sides war upon us.We have only gardens
They poison wells and crops .We refugee our hopes
away from battle fields-into our small spaces
where we can practice harmonies in peace
Here we plant seeds and pray
to the gods of earth and seed,water and warmth
to save our tiny space for peace
is who we are and what we need
is earth to be released from conflicts
so we might all we seed and garden,peace and pleasure
sweet...
bury them .Plant white crosses
Hold pictures and name ceremonies after them
so forgetting might remember them
But now these wars are endless.We are their targets
Both sides war upon us.We have only gardens
They poison wells and crops .We refugee our hopes
away from battle fields-into our small spaces
where we can practice harmonies in peace
Here we plant seeds and pray
to the gods of earth and seed,water and warmth
to save our tiny space for peace
is who we are and what we need
is earth to be released from conflicts
so we might all we seed and garden,peace and pleasure
sweet...
PRODUCT PLACEMENT POETRY
Today I joined the IRA
My little Green Suburu grew a BP oil leak
Gas tank dripping precious WALMART petroleum resources
Everywhere I stop,a new well liquifies
so I went back to Lebanon on Lamar(ACCENT MOTORS)
asked Brad for solution to slow suicide
(with this summer heat-how best to not explode!)
He said-SOAP! I said-WHAT?
He walked to WALGREENS .Bought some IRISH SPRING
Stripped off my temporary duct tape bandage
covered that untaped hole with green
Made me more environmentally viable
Patchwork quilt repair temporary(just like BP!
Now I am driving.Now I am parking
With a soaped up engine
and no guarantees...
ANGER NEEDS DARK CLOUDS
to make rain/thunder/lightning
I don't mind(skies change!
Rain stops.Light returns
Even light rain kisses.Flood cleanses
Tsunamis warn us.Emotions well within us
Liquid eyes tear drop.Wells refill.Water levels rise
We drink this in.Think water thoughts.Rain! Smile..
LIGHT!
My little Green Suburu grew a BP oil leak
Gas tank dripping precious WALMART petroleum resources
Everywhere I stop,a new well liquifies
so I went back to Lebanon on Lamar(ACCENT MOTORS)
asked Brad for solution to slow suicide
(with this summer heat-how best to not explode!)
He said-SOAP! I said-WHAT?
He walked to WALGREENS .Bought some IRISH SPRING
Stripped off my temporary duct tape bandage
covered that untaped hole with green
Made me more environmentally viable
Patchwork quilt repair temporary(just like BP!
Now I am driving.Now I am parking
With a soaped up engine
and no guarantees...
ANGER NEEDS DARK CLOUDS
to make rain/thunder/lightning
I don't mind(skies change!
Rain stops.Light returns
Even light rain kisses.Flood cleanses
Tsunamis warn us.Emotions well within us
Liquid eyes tear drop.Wells refill.Water levels rise
We drink this in.Think water thoughts.Rain! Smile..
LIGHT!
IT HAPPENED
she was burned /in hospital/all her body
she saw angels/sings in choir
i believe her!
while we visited,she heard angels singing
(we thought she was leaving)
her car broke down,police came
46 days later,released from a Texas jail
to cover court costs on a bounced check
she is calm and deep and wise
having heard and listened to women in captivity
each vision for one changes witnesses-
Fatima,Lourdes,pilgrimages
Miracles require congregations
Stain of Jesus /crop circles
Whatever prophecy you subscribe to-you make real
Believe what ye will -truth is in the witnessing
SING!
i love the stories of visitations-
when angels and gods broke into human transmission
tapped distracted on shoulder
Saul becomes Paul,believer from persecutor
i like the warnings of Cassandras-
how they are ignored as Chicken Little
all the wise women in this world
cannot predict Texas Lotteries!
i see substitution in darker mysteries-
blood ,vampires,werewolves,horror mysteries
Dopplegangers of Bright Spirits,doomed to darknesses
where Light seems distance as a Resurrection
and laughter has ominous overtones
i prefer a simpler connection-
earth as Paradise-and Heaven
it was before -and will be again
all magick reversible-at least in this version!
she saw angels/sings in choir
i believe her!
while we visited,she heard angels singing
(we thought she was leaving)
her car broke down,police came
46 days later,released from a Texas jail
to cover court costs on a bounced check
she is calm and deep and wise
having heard and listened to women in captivity
each vision for one changes witnesses-
Fatima,Lourdes,pilgrimages
Miracles require congregations
Stain of Jesus /crop circles
Whatever prophecy you subscribe to-you make real
Believe what ye will -truth is in the witnessing
SING!
i love the stories of visitations-
when angels and gods broke into human transmission
tapped distracted on shoulder
Saul becomes Paul,believer from persecutor
i like the warnings of Cassandras-
how they are ignored as Chicken Little
all the wise women in this world
cannot predict Texas Lotteries!
i see substitution in darker mysteries-
blood ,vampires,werewolves,horror mysteries
Dopplegangers of Bright Spirits,doomed to darknesses
where Light seems distance as a Resurrection
and laughter has ominous overtones
i prefer a simpler connection-
earth as Paradise-and Heaven
it was before -and will be again
all magick reversible-at least in this version!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)