I’m tricked again
No idea it would rain
Like a vacation in Spain
I’m wet as a cat
In this Hemingway day
And I want in as much as I want out.
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Tokyo to Kamakura at the end of the first week of December
The sky at 4:40 p.m. is the color of ashtray water,
Sulking over Tokyo, a city drenched in busy and banality.
A full but diminutive moon, shy in darkening night, is a pitiful sight
To a poet, and all but ignored on the whole.
Coffee-like stains on my teeth from breathing the commuter train air,
And boredom thick as mayonnaise -- rancid, yellow mayonnaise.
My gaze
Transfixed on the butts and ashes swimming in air: angels or embers of angels there
Streaming in the nicotine,
Caught in the urban dream,
Held in the heavens of invention.
Oh, moon, shine on me tonight,
Above the sea, above the night
Above Kamakura.
Roar your glow in deafening waves of light,
Shine, shine on me tonight!
Sulking over Tokyo, a city drenched in busy and banality.
A full but diminutive moon, shy in darkening night, is a pitiful sight
To a poet, and all but ignored on the whole.
Coffee-like stains on my teeth from breathing the commuter train air,
And boredom thick as mayonnaise -- rancid, yellow mayonnaise.
My gaze
Transfixed on the butts and ashes swimming in air: angels or embers of angels there
Streaming in the nicotine,
Caught in the urban dream,
Held in the heavens of invention.
Oh, moon, shine on me tonight,
Above the sea, above the night
Above Kamakura.
Roar your glow in deafening waves of light,
Shine, shine on me tonight!
Hoping for hope
The world sees your defiance
Met with violence
And we feel for you.
Had you raised your hands in violence in return
You would have diminished your cause
But steadfast you stayed true
With resoluteness and solidarity:
Two forces more powerful than batons and pepper spray.
Picture those menacing men in black
And think how pink would suit them better,
With flowers in their hair and in their barrels,
With children’s hands in their hands instead of batons
And cans of Silly String instead of pepper spray
Maybe striking
Maybe even streaking naked with the UC Davis youth
Saying no to the 9% tuition hike
Saying no to the 1%
Bending 0%
Being human
Together with fellow human being
Singing protest songs
Singing Blowing in the Wind
Beating a drum instead of a head with your baton
Hoping for hope again.
Met with violence
And we feel for you.
Had you raised your hands in violence in return
You would have diminished your cause
But steadfast you stayed true
With resoluteness and solidarity:
Two forces more powerful than batons and pepper spray.
Picture those menacing men in black
And think how pink would suit them better,
With flowers in their hair and in their barrels,
With children’s hands in their hands instead of batons
And cans of Silly String instead of pepper spray
Maybe striking
Maybe even streaking naked with the UC Davis youth
Saying no to the 9% tuition hike
Saying no to the 1%
Bending 0%
Being human
Together with fellow human being
Singing protest songs
Singing Blowing in the Wind
Beating a drum instead of a head with your baton
Hoping for hope again.
Live in peace; die in peace
Someday you’ll say
You want to pray,
But it will be too late.
Find the love, starting today,
And you will okay.
Trust that countless souls
Just like yours
Have felt the way that you do now:
They lived living their lives,
And died bearing their souls
And all that they told
On bed of old
Was forgotten in time,
Meaning nothing to no one.
You want to pray,
But it will be too late.
Find the love, starting today,
And you will okay.
Trust that countless souls
Just like yours
Have felt the way that you do now:
They lived living their lives,
And died bearing their souls
And all that they told
On bed of old
Was forgotten in time,
Meaning nothing to no one.
If you were happy
If you were happy,
You would love me.
Unconditionally.
Paint the truth on face
And say you hate me
Because you hate yourself
You hate yourself because
You lack compassion
The one thing you know
But can never feel.
You would love me.
Unconditionally.
Paint the truth on face
And say you hate me
Because you hate yourself
You hate yourself because
You lack compassion
The one thing you know
But can never feel.
You created an institution of mistrust
You are our architect of ruin.
The love that we had had crumbled under your hand
The one wearing the watch of your time, and yours alone.
Your spying unrest,
Your deceit, your detest
Became the flavors of the day,
Every day
And everyday
That ordinary mistrust of your family.
And your world at large:
Everyone met with scrutiny: Enemy first, guest last, friend never.
Though now even the dumbest of friend of foe can see through your view
As if looking at you through glass
A you shown back onto you
And on and on, in repeated reality,
Enumerated to a diminutive figure of insignificance
That small, small you in the deepest depths of the mirror
To a point you are in fact to me now:
A meaningless speck of dust
Swept way in a chaotic, subatomic storm of other figures like you
In fact guys just like you, blown from stepladder pedestals
From a magnitude of their own making
Without your whipping horses
Your whip has dried up
Along with your rancor
With the image of a man you could never be
Your mock heretic rhetoric echoing off desolate planets,
Galaxies from earshot of the entire universe,
Your channel tuned in by no one,
All static,
Meaningless dust.
Though still your cruel heart pumps out every aching beat
As if longing for a love it can never feel.
The most painful sound I have ever heard.
The love that we had had crumbled under your hand
The one wearing the watch of your time, and yours alone.
Your spying unrest,
Your deceit, your detest
Became the flavors of the day,
Every day
And everyday
That ordinary mistrust of your family.
And your world at large:
Everyone met with scrutiny: Enemy first, guest last, friend never.
Though now even the dumbest of friend of foe can see through your view
As if looking at you through glass
A you shown back onto you
And on and on, in repeated reality,
Enumerated to a diminutive figure of insignificance
That small, small you in the deepest depths of the mirror
To a point you are in fact to me now:
A meaningless speck of dust
Swept way in a chaotic, subatomic storm of other figures like you
In fact guys just like you, blown from stepladder pedestals
From a magnitude of their own making
Without your whipping horses
Your whip has dried up
Along with your rancor
With the image of a man you could never be
Your mock heretic rhetoric echoing off desolate planets,
Galaxies from earshot of the entire universe,
Your channel tuned in by no one,
All static,
Meaningless dust.
Though still your cruel heart pumps out every aching beat
As if longing for a love it can never feel.
The most painful sound I have ever heard.
Just for a day
I turn you away
Just for a day
To speak to myself in a way
I haven’t in ages.
I know I’ve been given one life to live
I know it’s better to not take than to give.
But this time is mine,
Given to me,
To me, alone.
As your time was given to you, alone.
Just for a day,
Give me just one day,
One day to speak to myself in that time-honored way.
Just for a day
To speak to myself in a way
I haven’t in ages.
I know I’ve been given one life to live
I know it’s better to not take than to give.
But this time is mine,
Given to me,
To me, alone.
As your time was given to you, alone.
Just for a day,
Give me just one day,
One day to speak to myself in that time-honored way.
Heaven to me
I dream of the passionate one
The sentient saint
Who speaks to those who can speak no more
And I know his old bold words will hold all of us in inexplicable rapture.
Because we will know we never knew anything worth a damn, but have no words to express it!
So we stand accused,
We stand and stare.
And care less what happens next,
For no one wants to live more meaningless life compared to what we now see:
Call it Grace, Heaven, Nirvana, Paradise… what you will…
Light or dark, dark or light, have become inseparable gray,
Forming a new reality for everyone previously one or the other.
Gray in the figurative sense,
A new color altogether in a literal sense,
Seen for the first time,
It is the color of a mind liberated from all conventions and preconceived ideas
As if a quasar has exploded between the ears of every mind of any time.
To me,
To my innermost fantasy,
This is my wish for Heaven to be,
Not for me,
But for everyone ever, and ever to be.
The sentient saint
Who speaks to those who can speak no more
And I know his old bold words will hold all of us in inexplicable rapture.
Because we will know we never knew anything worth a damn, but have no words to express it!
So we stand accused,
We stand and stare.
And care less what happens next,
For no one wants to live more meaningless life compared to what we now see:
Call it Grace, Heaven, Nirvana, Paradise… what you will…
Light or dark, dark or light, have become inseparable gray,
Forming a new reality for everyone previously one or the other.
Gray in the figurative sense,
A new color altogether in a literal sense,
Seen for the first time,
It is the color of a mind liberated from all conventions and preconceived ideas
As if a quasar has exploded between the ears of every mind of any time.
To me,
To my innermost fantasy,
This is my wish for Heaven to be,
Not for me,
But for everyone ever, and ever to be.
Cranberry moon
I wish to drink whiskey from dish
Like curious cat wanting truly his own
Cat’s meow.
To be feline sublime like you
To have your tender-eyed, but burning stare
Or that feeling you know more than I can ever
Enjoying watching my pride crumble into rubble
Face down before your feet:
You are the Sphinx
And I am a grain of kitty litter,
Boxed in,
Shat upon.
But the view from here is dear
Because tonight the sky is milk
Lapped dry by your thirst for the entire universe
And the cranberry moon shines, waiting for you
Like umeboshi on rice
Saved for last
Ingested last.
I blow myself round you like the cosmic dust I am
Settling on nothing
No home to call my own
No space
No time
I can call mine.
In awe of it all,
In awe of you.
Like curious cat wanting truly his own
Cat’s meow.
To be feline sublime like you
To have your tender-eyed, but burning stare
Or that feeling you know more than I can ever
Enjoying watching my pride crumble into rubble
Face down before your feet:
You are the Sphinx
And I am a grain of kitty litter,
Boxed in,
Shat upon.
But the view from here is dear
Because tonight the sky is milk
Lapped dry by your thirst for the entire universe
And the cranberry moon shines, waiting for you
Like umeboshi on rice
Saved for last
Ingested last.
I blow myself round you like the cosmic dust I am
Settling on nothing
No home to call my own
No space
No time
I can call mine.
In awe of it all,
In awe of you.
Poetry as luxury
I believe there’s a heaven because eternity is a helluva long time for matter to matter,
Long enough for a Maker to make a heaven, or a Maker to be made for that matter!
Shake a jigsaw puzzle long enough and it will get made, too.
Whimsical musings?
Maybe.
But time to lax
To wax
Poetic
Is
A
Luxury for a thinker like me. For a tinkerer like me.
Time to be,
Writing poetry
Is a luxury:
A time to clear the mind
And a way for time to just be.
And nothing can be
…more important than that,
Think not thee?
Long enough for a Maker to make a heaven, or a Maker to be made for that matter!
Shake a jigsaw puzzle long enough and it will get made, too.
Whimsical musings?
Maybe.
But time to lax
To wax
Poetic
Is
A
Luxury for a thinker like me. For a tinkerer like me.
Time to be,
Writing poetry
Is a luxury:
A time to clear the mind
And a way for time to just be.
And nothing can be
…more important than that,
Think not thee?
My Son Under the Sun With Rain Boots On And Watering Can in Hand
It’s said life goes by in the blink of an eye.
By that measure I’m just about to die.
And that is why
My days pass like seconds,
And that is why I can see your growth
Much the way the minute hand traces the clock’s face,
Relatively fast,
Suffused as it is in the fabric of time and space.
It’s like the sprouts sprouting in your nascent garden:
From the seeds you planted just days ago.
That’s exactly the way I see you!
That’s exactly the way I see me!
Everything growing fast enough to see,
Clearly,
Dearly.
By that measure I’m just about to die.
And that is why
My days pass like seconds,
And that is why I can see your growth
Much the way the minute hand traces the clock’s face,
Relatively fast,
Suffused as it is in the fabric of time and space.
It’s like the sprouts sprouting in your nascent garden:
From the seeds you planted just days ago.
That’s exactly the way I see you!
That’s exactly the way I see me!
Everything growing fast enough to see,
Clearly,
Dearly.
10 tons of umph
I woke up this morning with my head on fire,
Thinking, “Is the world changing faster, or is it just me slowing down?”
The shower feels like an extinguisher,
I smolder there, barely aware of the thought I just had,
Like coals, though hot, having forgotten they were once the source of fire.
And then I think it is age.
Yes, it is age, I determine, that has crept into my bones like a thief,
An arsonist, or a mouse, might my house.
He has stolen my Nagels and other youthful splashes of color and novel coordinates,
He has eaten the cheese my wife brought from Paris for me.
He is dousing gas on the floor,
And clinched between his teeth -- a dry looking set of teeth -- a safety match…
He is rendering me sinker gray, and as dull as a knife fashioned from the same, from lead. Heavy, aged, Dorian Gray.
Today is my wife’s birthday.
And I love her still.
Maybe I can steal back what has been stolen:
My youth, my wise Masamune edge,
My Crystal Canyon River of muse that once ran wild and could rupture a dam.
Then I think, fuck it,
Drown thought.
Thinking, “Is the world changing faster, or is it just me slowing down?”
The shower feels like an extinguisher,
I smolder there, barely aware of the thought I just had,
Like coals, though hot, having forgotten they were once the source of fire.
And then I think it is age.
Yes, it is age, I determine, that has crept into my bones like a thief,
An arsonist, or a mouse, might my house.
He has stolen my Nagels and other youthful splashes of color and novel coordinates,
He has eaten the cheese my wife brought from Paris for me.
He is dousing gas on the floor,
And clinched between his teeth -- a dry looking set of teeth -- a safety match…
He is rendering me sinker gray, and as dull as a knife fashioned from the same, from lead. Heavy, aged, Dorian Gray.
Today is my wife’s birthday.
And I love her still.
Maybe I can steal back what has been stolen:
My youth, my wise Masamune edge,
My Crystal Canyon River of muse that once ran wild and could rupture a dam.
Then I think, fuck it,
Drown thought.
Cool change is imminent
There is an ocean breeze turning into cool steam
A fog longing to form on this land
On that land
And not much light for a long while
Triggering the poet in us all,
Here contemplating the 100th gray day in a row
In a row over what to grab before running for our lives
Or in rowboat and oars on oasis
Moving nowhere in sand
Or in the front row waiting for the chopper lift
To take you away to a safer place
That place which has long disappeared,
Existing only in the mind.
Some mindscapes are minefields,
Moonscapes of pockmarked homeland
Or homeland dotted with crash-landed crows, or tire scraps on a Federal road
Landmines blown, minds blown, defused, unused munitions, unused cognitions
Carpet bombed in the rug remnants section of carpet store
Cowering under particle board table
Hoping it will hold
Under a card house fold
A society built on a fault line between greed and need
And homes owning the homeowners
And lawnmowers mowing the mowers of the White House lawn
The same place where a hundred years from now
In a backlash of nanobots and gray digital ooze
Will coat the earth like a viscous fog
Like a mutant Christmas log,
Melting at high noon, Christmas Eve in Juneau
Alaska
Allah, Allah, Alaska!!!
The surplus polar bear rug outlets
Have slashed their prices again
Because everyone is selling theirs
To buy air conditioners
Oh, could it be the end of all our fun
It was in fact a good run
But now undone
Overrun
By
Us
.
A fog longing to form on this land
On that land
And not much light for a long while
Triggering the poet in us all,
Here contemplating the 100th gray day in a row
In a row over what to grab before running for our lives
Or in rowboat and oars on oasis
Moving nowhere in sand
Or in the front row waiting for the chopper lift
To take you away to a safer place
That place which has long disappeared,
Existing only in the mind.
Some mindscapes are minefields,
Moonscapes of pockmarked homeland
Or homeland dotted with crash-landed crows, or tire scraps on a Federal road
Landmines blown, minds blown, defused, unused munitions, unused cognitions
Carpet bombed in the rug remnants section of carpet store
Cowering under particle board table
Hoping it will hold
Under a card house fold
A society built on a fault line between greed and need
And homes owning the homeowners
And lawnmowers mowing the mowers of the White House lawn
The same place where a hundred years from now
In a backlash of nanobots and gray digital ooze
Will coat the earth like a viscous fog
Like a mutant Christmas log,
Melting at high noon, Christmas Eve in Juneau
Alaska
Allah, Allah, Alaska!!!
The surplus polar bear rug outlets
Have slashed their prices again
Because everyone is selling theirs
To buy air conditioners
Oh, could it be the end of all our fun
It was in fact a good run
But now undone
Overrun
By
Us
.
Rush hour in Tokyo during a typhoon
There are people on the train, yet it is empty
It is packed with bodies
Empty of souls,
Emotions on hold.
As the gravid transporter inches into the station with hesitation,
Bodies compress,
Sending a bellow of breath back up nostril.
And I feel alive and well,
Being the only poet aboard this rolling wheeled tube of humanity
Insanity, really.
They make not a sound save a grunt when someone’s diaphram is depressed.
Tolerance on this scale is strange
Even after 17 years
Sweet naiveté
Sweet Nihon,
Numb and tender,
Under the typhoon’s eye.
It is packed with bodies
Empty of souls,
Emotions on hold.
As the gravid transporter inches into the station with hesitation,
Bodies compress,
Sending a bellow of breath back up nostril.
And I feel alive and well,
Being the only poet aboard this rolling wheeled tube of humanity
Insanity, really.
They make not a sound save a grunt when someone’s diaphram is depressed.
Tolerance on this scale is strange
Even after 17 years
Sweet naiveté
Sweet Nihon,
Numb and tender,
Under the typhoon’s eye.
Steve Jobs Died Today
What a regrettable poem I have written today:
Crash, elastic
Torn and spent, wasted and
Misunderstood in the cold; in the cold isles and straights:
The seas that bewilder the mind
And those that get captured and capsized between leviathan lashes
Like that guy: Jules Verne on acid
Had a concentrated mind which is now diluted in tears
Entire oceans
Pour from his eyes
Bloodshot, fire, alive,
Burning, star-like spheres of energies
Of dying galaxies
Ramshackled
Transfixed on the lisp of nature’s tongue.
An exercise in poetics
Kalaethetics for brain
For expression
For hope of a new expression
The holistic, hell MINDFUCK of the millenium!
And this bliss
Making you feel you don’t need another thrill
Another chase scene
Another Steve McQueen
Another brother boyhood dream
Another tower engulfed in fire
Another freak to call your gimp
Another serial consumer to mow you over in the isle of Target
Another God to pray to on Monday because Sunday is booked up by other Gods
Most from India.
I booked a tour on the Ganges to swim with George Harrison’s ashes
I swam naked with his widow
In the tears she cried for him
Expedia should pull the tour
And bless his and her souls
For that matter we should all let the world turn without nostalgia
For it exists only in the mind, no more real than tomorrow
The air we breathe we borrow
And the sorrow we feel is only now
Like toothache we once had that hurt like hell, all but forgotten
The amalgam rotten
Mercury
Leaching
Into our cells to a cancer that swells in our fears
Traces found in our fears
We swill
We laugh
We experience a massive mass heart attack
And AED jolt – POW!
The pain subsides
We feel alive
Feel abuzz with a buzz
Then turn the cheek
And slaughter our kin without ever thinking again
And pain
And passion
Don’t last as long as our mental trash
And so we splash the news headache gray
For Steve Jobs died today.
Crash, elastic
Torn and spent, wasted and
Misunderstood in the cold; in the cold isles and straights:
The seas that bewilder the mind
And those that get captured and capsized between leviathan lashes
Like that guy: Jules Verne on acid
Had a concentrated mind which is now diluted in tears
Entire oceans
Pour from his eyes
Bloodshot, fire, alive,
Burning, star-like spheres of energies
Of dying galaxies
Ramshackled
Transfixed on the lisp of nature’s tongue.
An exercise in poetics
Kalaethetics for brain
For expression
For hope of a new expression
The holistic, hell MINDFUCK of the millenium!
And this bliss
Making you feel you don’t need another thrill
Another chase scene
Another Steve McQueen
Another brother boyhood dream
Another tower engulfed in fire
Another freak to call your gimp
Another serial consumer to mow you over in the isle of Target
Another God to pray to on Monday because Sunday is booked up by other Gods
Most from India.
I booked a tour on the Ganges to swim with George Harrison’s ashes
I swam naked with his widow
In the tears she cried for him
Expedia should pull the tour
And bless his and her souls
For that matter we should all let the world turn without nostalgia
For it exists only in the mind, no more real than tomorrow
The air we breathe we borrow
And the sorrow we feel is only now
Like toothache we once had that hurt like hell, all but forgotten
The amalgam rotten
Mercury
Leaching
Into our cells to a cancer that swells in our fears
Traces found in our fears
We swill
We laugh
We experience a massive mass heart attack
And AED jolt – POW!
The pain subsides
We feel alive
Feel abuzz with a buzz
Then turn the cheek
And slaughter our kin without ever thinking again
And pain
And passion
Don’t last as long as our mental trash
And so we splash the news headache gray
For Steve Jobs died today.
Thursday, September 22, 2011
The Challenge Today
The challenge today is to make my way
From the couch to the sea
And erase the plaintive smile that speaks to me in silence
And to put on a new hat
And leave the house like that
Make way for Mike
He's collapsing into now
Having lost his religion
Today
Boy, what can the man say
He was born this way
He hears the displacement of air
Make that strange and ever-present sound
As the immediate future melts
In the ears
Then evaporates
It is the strangest sensation
Once tuned in
And one that never goes away
But it can shift
And be shifted
And with will
It will
Move
Blown like a feather
Forever
Not allowed to land
Never
From the couch to the sea
And erase the plaintive smile that speaks to me in silence
And to put on a new hat
And leave the house like that
Make way for Mike
He's collapsing into now
Having lost his religion
Today
Boy, what can the man say
He was born this way
He hears the displacement of air
Make that strange and ever-present sound
As the immediate future melts
In the ears
Then evaporates
It is the strangest sensation
Once tuned in
And one that never goes away
But it can shift
And be shifted
And with will
It will
Move
Blown like a feather
Forever
Not allowed to land
Never
I'm not your paper cup
You drink from my mind
Then waste what you find
Whetting your stone
Dry as bone
In drought of thought
And a heart that has stopped
Whet your whistle
Feel the tickle
From the thistle
On your underside
Feel alive
Feel the drive,
The passion and
The long lasting
And it takes a day
To light the world this way
Before night takes it all away
Till the next
And the next day
The spring is within
The sunshine, too
Believe this to be true
And you won't need me
To see for you.
I'm not your paper cup
Don't crumple me up
After a lipstick sip
Cruel in the can
Straight to be man
In line,
Pulling one cup at a time
Just to feel your lips on mine
Then waste what you find
Whetting your stone
Dry as bone
In drought of thought
And a heart that has stopped
Whet your whistle
Feel the tickle
From the thistle
On your underside
Feel alive
Feel the drive,
The passion and
The long lasting
And it takes a day
To light the world this way
Before night takes it all away
Till the next
And the next day
The spring is within
The sunshine, too
Believe this to be true
And you won't need me
To see for you.
I'm not your paper cup
Don't crumple me up
After a lipstick sip
Cruel in the can
Straight to be man
In line,
Pulling one cup at a time
Just to feel your lips on mine
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Yiihin Chokin
I didn't want to keep this poem in my head
Was like a million dollars kept in bed
Then it hit me
There is no Great American poem
Except for maybe Howl
And I'm no Ginsberg
So I type my lonesome digital howl
Not from tenement rooftops
But from washitsu of my handsome home in the jungle
Where the wild things roam:
My kids and the hakubishin
The tanuki and the fukuro
The risu and the tombi
And my muse and amusement
That seems to come along with the never-ending sweat
I still get well into September
Oh, crash down on me
Sky so heavy, gravid, and gray!
Oh, rain on me, my day and mine.
Take away the hope I had
To write for someone other than myself!
As if it mattered.
Because I'm no Kerouac
And it was his book --
Some of the Dharma --
That fell out of my unpacking
That read like thunder
Though maybe I'm the only one
reading a magnificent stanza from
Some of the Dharma today.
So if anyone who reads this digital musing,
Today or tomorrow,
Thank you!
You are my hero
And you are here
With me now
With the hawk overhead
And in between the owl hoot
And squirrel bark
And kids' squeal
And whatever sound a civet makes
In the evening
Or late at might when my thoughts keep
Me annoyingly awake like a mosquito in the ear
Or an endless sound of nothingness
Boring more tunnels into emptiness,
Making room for more madness
And/or blissfulness
As is the case with this poem that couldn't wait to be written
RIGHT?!
Burning a hole in the poetic purse of mind at night,
Telling the community of poetry to fuck itself
And in the same breath beg for forgiveness
Not knowing I've found that voice I have always hoped I would
Just so I don't read like anyone else
Unmistakeably me
Though unread by you maybe,
Knowing I rolled so far from tree
The Poet Tree
Trite as I might ever want to be.
No fear:
Words
Are here today
Gone today
Anyway.
Would take a lot to say things in an A-bomb way,
But what poet would ever want that responsibility?
Not I.
Someday
Maybe
Kai, my son
My daughter Hana
Will read this
And that will be the day I'll ask God
To roll out the clouds and put on a show
For all humanity below.
Because I love my children
More than poetry
More than anything else on earth
Crazy, howling-from-tenement-window-and-rooftops type love
And then
I'll pack it in
Some of the Dharma under arm,
Befriending DT Suzuki along Philosophers Path
And learning all I can
In the eternity of poetry
And a universe filled with verse.
Was like a million dollars kept in bed
Then it hit me
There is no Great American poem
Except for maybe Howl
And I'm no Ginsberg
So I type my lonesome digital howl
Not from tenement rooftops
But from washitsu of my handsome home in the jungle
Where the wild things roam:
My kids and the hakubishin
The tanuki and the fukuro
The risu and the tombi
And my muse and amusement
That seems to come along with the never-ending sweat
I still get well into September
Oh, crash down on me
Sky so heavy, gravid, and gray!
Oh, rain on me, my day and mine.
Take away the hope I had
To write for someone other than myself!
As if it mattered.
Because I'm no Kerouac
And it was his book --
Some of the Dharma --
That fell out of my unpacking
That read like thunder
Though maybe I'm the only one
reading a magnificent stanza from
Some of the Dharma today.
So if anyone who reads this digital musing,
Today or tomorrow,
Thank you!
You are my hero
And you are here
With me now
With the hawk overhead
And in between the owl hoot
And squirrel bark
And kids' squeal
And whatever sound a civet makes
In the evening
Or late at might when my thoughts keep
Me annoyingly awake like a mosquito in the ear
Or an endless sound of nothingness
Boring more tunnels into emptiness,
Making room for more madness
And/or blissfulness
As is the case with this poem that couldn't wait to be written
RIGHT?!
Burning a hole in the poetic purse of mind at night,
Telling the community of poetry to fuck itself
And in the same breath beg for forgiveness
Not knowing I've found that voice I have always hoped I would
Just so I don't read like anyone else
Unmistakeably me
Though unread by you maybe,
Knowing I rolled so far from tree
The Poet Tree
Trite as I might ever want to be.
No fear:
Words
Are here today
Gone today
Anyway.
Would take a lot to say things in an A-bomb way,
But what poet would ever want that responsibility?
Not I.
Someday
Maybe
Kai, my son
My daughter Hana
Will read this
And that will be the day I'll ask God
To roll out the clouds and put on a show
For all humanity below.
Because I love my children
More than poetry
More than anything else on earth
Crazy, howling-from-tenement-window-and-rooftops type love
And then
I'll pack it in
Some of the Dharma under arm,
Befriending DT Suzuki along Philosophers Path
And learning all I can
In the eternity of poetry
And a universe filled with verse.
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Only one
A man cannot live two lives
Only one
And that one life is here and now.
And that is all he has.
No one will come
No one will call
To save his soul.
Only one
And that one life is here and now.
And that is all he has.
No one will come
No one will call
To save his soul.
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
Don’t wait to wow
As if in pouring rain,
You cry drenched in pain.
Every sphere
And every tear
Containing a prayer,
Glistening with the hope you’ll find
The will to confide
In yourself.
The streams trace
The lines in your face
Then fall from the thin of your chin
Like rivers emptying into space.
And your head –
The one that once spun straight as a top –
Now bangs about like a lopsided laundry load
Trying to find
Equalibrium
In cranium
Again.
I say
Let it rock and roll,
Let your head shake your soul!
What matters most
Is your angry ghost –
The one who hides behind your eyes
Dormant like a shadow in darkness,
Waiting for the light of death
To be set free.
Do now all the things you want to do after you die!
Don’t wait to wow.
Do them now!
For Heaven is a place to laze
And to gaze with rays of wisdom,
To shine on those in the stomping grounds of your mortal plane
And to guide the living not to live like the dead.
You cry drenched in pain.
Every sphere
And every tear
Containing a prayer,
Glistening with the hope you’ll find
The will to confide
In yourself.
The streams trace
The lines in your face
Then fall from the thin of your chin
Like rivers emptying into space.
And your head –
The one that once spun straight as a top –
Now bangs about like a lopsided laundry load
Trying to find
Equalibrium
In cranium
Again.
I say
Let it rock and roll,
Let your head shake your soul!
What matters most
Is your angry ghost –
The one who hides behind your eyes
Dormant like a shadow in darkness,
Waiting for the light of death
To be set free.
Do now all the things you want to do after you die!
Don’t wait to wow.
Do them now!
For Heaven is a place to laze
And to gaze with rays of wisdom,
To shine on those in the stomping grounds of your mortal plane
And to guide the living not to live like the dead.
Summer fading to fall
The orange September embers
Of summer's dying fire
Warms me perfectly
Wrapping my body in air
A hair below body temperature
And I feel fine
In the last rings of
Furin wind chimes:
Summer fading to fall
Of summer's dying fire
Warms me perfectly
Wrapping my body in air
A hair below body temperature
And I feel fine
In the last rings of
Furin wind chimes:
Summer fading to fall
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Afloat in the doldrums
Ho hum,
I wrote a poem
In the note pages
In the back of my pocket calendar
Which is in my bag
In the other room.
And it is shit.
Dark,
But light,
To the point
And right
But trite
As I might,
Gone unnoticed and in gray absence of grace
Of my poetic heroes in space:
Keats yawning,
Yeats bawling,
Kerouac bemused,
Dylan confused,
Dull, and shit-smeared,
Reflecting the dimness of a vapid mind,
Afloat in the doldrums.
On cruel sea of creativity,
Afloat on the sublime
But corrosive brine,
In the absence of wind or current
And an ear and bearings gone for poetry,
Deaf and dumb to the digital overdose
The literary world has become.
Unfurled in vain like sails made of cheesecloth,
My words gather no pull.
Yet in my gravid hull
I hold a payload full
Of words
Like limes
I will use
To stave off scurry
When I'm truly dry
Ready to die
From a complete loss of muse.
I wrote a poem
In the note pages
In the back of my pocket calendar
Which is in my bag
In the other room.
And it is shit.
Dark,
But light,
To the point
And right
But trite
As I might,
Gone unnoticed and in gray absence of grace
Of my poetic heroes in space:
Keats yawning,
Yeats bawling,
Kerouac bemused,
Dylan confused,
Dull, and shit-smeared,
Reflecting the dimness of a vapid mind,
Afloat in the doldrums.
On cruel sea of creativity,
Afloat on the sublime
But corrosive brine,
In the absence of wind or current
And an ear and bearings gone for poetry,
Deaf and dumb to the digital overdose
The literary world has become.
Unfurled in vain like sails made of cheesecloth,
My words gather no pull.
Yet in my gravid hull
I hold a payload full
Of words
Like limes
I will use
To stave off scurry
When I'm truly dry
Ready to die
From a complete loss of muse.
Friday, August 19, 2011
I write for the day
If I write daily
I might
Stumble upon an original thought
And should that happen, I would tell the world
In a way it would not forget:
Print the thought on t-shirts
Or pay to have it written in the sky
Or belly of blimp,
Or bumper sticker,
Or packs of tissue for the throngs of Shibuya to blow their noses.
What can I say to make your day, people?
Haven't poets of old said all you need to feel alive?
John Keats, John Kerouac, and Joyce Kilmer,
Didn't they say enough to fill in the emptiness
Be it a cup of tea,
A bee staring at me,
Or a God-made tree?
I feel life force emanating from every word of every good poem I've read
As they save the world one loving word at a time.
And I want to thank those who wrote them for saving my world, too.
So I call on you, heroes of mine,
To give me voice and rhyme
To write the poem of our time
To capture an original thought
For all to see, to read, to mock
Yet own its truth together,
Sung like Billy's blues
Felt in every fiber of every body
That walks this earth with me now.
I write for the day
Such a thought will dawn on my soul
With enlightenment far, far beyond what I know I can never hold.
I might
Stumble upon an original thought
And should that happen, I would tell the world
In a way it would not forget:
Print the thought on t-shirts
Or pay to have it written in the sky
Or belly of blimp,
Or bumper sticker,
Or packs of tissue for the throngs of Shibuya to blow their noses.
What can I say to make your day, people?
Haven't poets of old said all you need to feel alive?
John Keats, John Kerouac, and Joyce Kilmer,
Didn't they say enough to fill in the emptiness
Be it a cup of tea,
A bee staring at me,
Or a God-made tree?
I feel life force emanating from every word of every good poem I've read
As they save the world one loving word at a time.
And I want to thank those who wrote them for saving my world, too.
So I call on you, heroes of mine,
To give me voice and rhyme
To write the poem of our time
To capture an original thought
For all to see, to read, to mock
Yet own its truth together,
Sung like Billy's blues
Felt in every fiber of every body
That walks this earth with me now.
I write for the day
Such a thought will dawn on my soul
With enlightenment far, far beyond what I know I can never hold.
Thursday, August 18, 2011
What happened to your heart?
The cold winds blow
Well below zero
When I see you
Knowing you have already
Departed
And I shiver when I see
The empty coldness of your eyes
As if your heart has been stolen in your sleep
What happened to your heart
All the pumps and parts?
Frozen in fear with the quick
Steel-cold bite of liquid nitrogen,
A fear of love
A heart of rock-hard ice
Waiting for the hammer's blow
To shatter the heart,
Blow it apart
Of all the love it has ever held.
Well below zero
When I see you
Knowing you have already
Departed
And I shiver when I see
The empty coldness of your eyes
As if your heart has been stolen in your sleep
What happened to your heart
All the pumps and parts?
Frozen in fear with the quick
Steel-cold bite of liquid nitrogen,
A fear of love
A heart of rock-hard ice
Waiting for the hammer's blow
To shatter the heart,
Blow it apart
Of all the love it has ever held.
Days Away
Are we still in Japan?
Doesn't seem we are today,
Nor did it yesterday.
The life in this wind is global and feels like family
Though I don't really know anyone here but my children
But in another way I do
And it feels a fine as the sun shines
And skin browns
And the children speak in tongues
Sharing laughter
Sharing the same air
And the same sun.
Doesn't seem we are today,
Nor did it yesterday.
The life in this wind is global and feels like family
Though I don't really know anyone here but my children
But in another way I do
And it feels a fine as the sun shines
And skin browns
And the children speak in tongues
Sharing laughter
Sharing the same air
And the same sun.
Monday, August 15, 2011
Poets sculpt meaning from less than thin air
I disseminate each day
As a good poet should
By attaching words to thoughts,
Dying each invisible thought that passes through my mind with color,
With words,
For all to see,
All to feel,
All to read.
The worth of these thoughts may in fact be zero
As thoughts themselves weigh nothing
Therefore, poetry is the art of applying dye to air
To the human illusion in which we place so much care
As a good poet should
By attaching words to thoughts,
Dying each invisible thought that passes through my mind with color,
With words,
For all to see,
All to feel,
All to read.
The worth of these thoughts may in fact be zero
As thoughts themselves weigh nothing
Therefore, poetry is the art of applying dye to air
To the human illusion in which we place so much care
Thoughts are weightless
When our minds are filled with heavy thoughts
Our brains weigh the same when they're not.
How can something that weighs nothing make us feel so down?
Our brains weigh the same when they're not.
How can something that weighs nothing make us feel so down?
Friday, August 12, 2011
Inamuragasaki Pointillism
It is said
Samurai shed
More blood here
Than oceans deep.
But all I feel now is my heart’s beat,
As it keeps
Every drop.
We three fall into days like today
As if trapped by a spider of unseen grace,
Bouncing on her web like a trampoline
A dream-like day
I can whole-heartedly say.
Making friends with the world through one person,
Knowing there’s more to the soul
Than wanting to fight
I let go
Reaching in for more and more
Hoping to find a new emotion
Or one that hasn’t been touched so much
It has become tarnished
My children roll like logs down the hill
While the others sit Seurat still
For the sunset to thrill
As the sun slips into gray
Before making its way
To lighten another day in Paris
The sunset seekers leave unimpressed
But I could care less
As I watch my children roll like logs down the hill
Entertaining the Samurai souls,
And for all the men
Who could never have children
And the blood needed to keep that kind of love alive.
Samurai shed
More blood here
Than oceans deep.
But all I feel now is my heart’s beat,
As it keeps
Every drop.
We three fall into days like today
As if trapped by a spider of unseen grace,
Bouncing on her web like a trampoline
A dream-like day
I can whole-heartedly say.
Making friends with the world through one person,
Knowing there’s more to the soul
Than wanting to fight
I let go
Reaching in for more and more
Hoping to find a new emotion
Or one that hasn’t been touched so much
It has become tarnished
My children roll like logs down the hill
While the others sit Seurat still
For the sunset to thrill
As the sun slips into gray
Before making its way
To lighten another day in Paris
The sunset seekers leave unimpressed
But I could care less
As I watch my children roll like logs down the hill
Entertaining the Samurai souls,
And for all the men
Who could never have children
And the blood needed to keep that kind of love alive.
My life knowing you
Sometimes I laugh,
Other times I cry,
One thing is for sure,
My eyes are seldom dry!
My eyelashes,
Wet, glistening-black, Venus flytraps,
Cinch down on two more tears,
Forcing them into the lower lids,
Forming torrents of brine,
In the dichotomous tide pools that are my eyes:
Sharing the ebb and flow
Of joy and woe,
Filling and draining,
Over and over,
Over you.
Other times I cry,
One thing is for sure,
My eyes are seldom dry!
My eyelashes,
Wet, glistening-black, Venus flytraps,
Cinch down on two more tears,
Forcing them into the lower lids,
Forming torrents of brine,
In the dichotomous tide pools that are my eyes:
Sharing the ebb and flow
Of joy and woe,
Filling and draining,
Over and over,
Over you.
The joy in you
To Dad
Are you looking for the joy you lost?
That most human of pleasures,
The one that I treasure
Like the sun,
But would gladly share with anyone
For the price of a smile.
It’s strange,
I still remember a joyful you.
Do you remember the same person?
And if you answer yes,
Is there a vestige left,
A trace of that man who would smile and laugh
At the simplest of things?
Or has your heart been parsed,
Censored, and sanitized?
Do you fear being scrutinized, and criticized?
Because that is what I see in your eyes,
Like an inmate intimidated,
Unable to speak his heart
For fear his keeper will crush him
For saying anything,
Expressing anything
Worth anything:
A fear of feeling joy.
Do you fear endearment?
Because I know it hurts when your love,
Given to others for free,
Is thrown away.
When we value love like no other
Only to see it squandered like water
Down the drain of a one-hour shower,
We feel forlorn,
heart torn,
Our love wasted.
Cliché to say,
But there really is more joy in the giving of love,
Than in the receiving of love.
Joy and love always work hand in hand,
Not always heart to heart.
Trust that joy is in you,
Just as melatonin is in you.
Trust your body can still produce it,
And it will react with warmth and brightness,
Given the time,
Given the space,
Given the exposure
To the sun,
And to love.
Do not invest your trust in trite.
Do not believe it is OK to invite
The demons in your heart at night.
Try sincerity instead,
And feel your heart rise from the dead.
Turn your television off.
Turn your grandchildren on.
Take them fishing.
Fill the air with story and song.
Give love and feel joy.
Feel joy and give more love.
Tell your keeper to keep to himself,
To throw you the keys to the shackles
He has chained to your heart for a quarter century.
Walk beyond the prison wall
And feel your insecurities fall,
One by one.
Sure as I am the sun will shine,
The joy you seek is the joy you will find.
Are you looking for the joy you lost?
That most human of pleasures,
The one that I treasure
Like the sun,
But would gladly share with anyone
For the price of a smile.
It’s strange,
I still remember a joyful you.
Do you remember the same person?
And if you answer yes,
Is there a vestige left,
A trace of that man who would smile and laugh
At the simplest of things?
Or has your heart been parsed,
Censored, and sanitized?
Do you fear being scrutinized, and criticized?
Because that is what I see in your eyes,
Like an inmate intimidated,
Unable to speak his heart
For fear his keeper will crush him
For saying anything,
Expressing anything
Worth anything:
A fear of feeling joy.
Do you fear endearment?
Because I know it hurts when your love,
Given to others for free,
Is thrown away.
When we value love like no other
Only to see it squandered like water
Down the drain of a one-hour shower,
We feel forlorn,
heart torn,
Our love wasted.
Cliché to say,
But there really is more joy in the giving of love,
Than in the receiving of love.
Joy and love always work hand in hand,
Not always heart to heart.
Trust that joy is in you,
Just as melatonin is in you.
Trust your body can still produce it,
And it will react with warmth and brightness,
Given the time,
Given the space,
Given the exposure
To the sun,
And to love.
Do not invest your trust in trite.
Do not believe it is OK to invite
The demons in your heart at night.
Try sincerity instead,
And feel your heart rise from the dead.
Turn your television off.
Turn your grandchildren on.
Take them fishing.
Fill the air with story and song.
Give love and feel joy.
Feel joy and give more love.
Tell your keeper to keep to himself,
To throw you the keys to the shackles
He has chained to your heart for a quarter century.
Walk beyond the prison wall
And feel your insecurities fall,
One by one.
Sure as I am the sun will shine,
The joy you seek is the joy you will find.
Monday, August 1, 2011
Beatles at Shea
Beatles at Shea,
Wow, those were the days,
Man, how those girls would scream
heinous helling neck veins!
Please, please me.
The horn-rimmed glasses and beehives, alive
New York cops, exasperated
Fan faces of fainted fans,
The glow,
The undertow of hope
And JFK still alive
A drive to the moon soon
A blanket of silver screen
A sheen of youth’s glazed gaze
Shiny shoes, dancing of pools of sweat and all...
And all those Beatles records
Spinning madly in every other home around the world.
Kamakura July 31 2011
A Naturalist in the Making
The massive Kanto Plain shakes me awake, again.
Shaking too our jungle, feast wild, infested with semi, cicada, shrilling, droning
In the break of morning,
Further agitating the lonesome homopterous lovers.
Heard too are birds, some punctuating nature with bars more beautiful than Mozart,
Then the raspy caw of the crow, steals the show
To the backdrop of
Lazy summer breezes through trees,
The gentle sway of take,
Opaque sky, in gradations of dark to light gray,
Dilating warmth and luminous flux,
Shrugging off the last of dusk.
Squirrels scamper along telephone lines like acrobats on high wire, on fire.
Given their prominence in this ecosystem,
I factor in
The fukuro, and the tombi.
Though they hoot not, soar not,
Both are hidden in mystical lushness and mist,
In deep, dignifying sleep,
Silent,
Save a rustle.
I am awakened to witness this solitude
Amidst cacophony,
And glorious light.
Gokurakuji house, July 30, 2011
Shaking too our jungle, feast wild, infested with semi, cicada, shrilling, droning
In the break of morning,
Further agitating the lonesome homopterous lovers.
Heard too are birds, some punctuating nature with bars more beautiful than Mozart,
Then the raspy caw of the crow, steals the show
To the backdrop of
Lazy summer breezes through trees,
The gentle sway of take,
Opaque sky, in gradations of dark to light gray,
Dilating warmth and luminous flux,
Shrugging off the last of dusk.
Squirrels scamper along telephone lines like acrobats on high wire, on fire.
Given their prominence in this ecosystem,
I factor in
The fukuro, and the tombi.
Though they hoot not, soar not,
Both are hidden in mystical lushness and mist,
In deep, dignifying sleep,
Silent,
Save a rustle.
I am awakened to witness this solitude
Amidst cacophony,
And glorious light.
Gokurakuji house, July 30, 2011
Mormor
What words do I choose to capture her nature?
There are poetic devices to be sure: poetic words that were penned to do just that.
But let me dispense with those for now,
And just write the colloquial ode
She would have wanted me to write for her.
In my youth,
I heard her speak with charm and wit before I knew what those words meant.
At first, I based my impressions of her on the impressions she made on others, which were always bright – the filling-shadow-with-light type – yet impressions that commanded respect few could without first having to don a big hat, pin on brass, or put on airs.
Mormor – even the day-to-day lady – commanded the respect of a general’s wife, a 5-star one at that.
She exuded a brand of dignity rare in this world today, and no matter with whom she was talking – could have been the bellboy or the The Queen of England – Mormor never lowered nor raised herself to the level of others; she held her own, comfortably well.
Mormor gave me a sense of wonder – a hunger – for the world long before I could see it – before I could taste it – for myself.
Mormor was the embodiment of the world for me in my youngest days.
Her home on El Camino Real was really the Vallejo Smithsonian, a wonderful world within a world:
Grandfather clocks that tick-tock-ed into the night,
Oil paintings, scrolls of old, glass cases filled with figurines, Fabergé eggs,
And ornaments, and bell pulls, and books,
Firm couches with frail doilies,
And fine furniture of hardwoods and
On and on and on…
Her living room was a masterpiece with everything but Allister Cook in it!
Mormor instilled in me both wonder and wanderlust,
And talked of every corner of the world like it was stone’s throw,
On the other side of her front door,
There for me to explore.
Mormor was a bastion of manner and class.
That is not to say I did not rebel – I did – I did…
I did not embrace all of her old-world ways,
Eschewing, in particular, the canon of proverbs that define our culture, like
“Children should be seen not heard,” I would clamor, “We children have a voice!”
But a bigger part of what Mormor taught me stuck, and, yes, to the ribs!
Like a broomstick between chair back and my back,
Like rice pudding and pit,
Like lamb and mint jelly,
And other things hard for me to chew,
Hard to swallow.
1977: The year Aunt Lorriane took me to Star Wars and came back a different child. Remembering the Death Star had a tractor beam that could pull in anything.
Mormor’s house – The Life Star – was filled with intrigue, and had a gravitational pull of its own right:
There was the milk drop box filled with toys,
And basement boiler shaft that led to the center of our Earth,
Jams, jellies, and chutneys at the end of a gangplank to the pantry,
The paintings that kept secrets while imparting wisdom,
Candy jars filled with soap,
Monochrome photos of my dad and his sisters,
The heavy bedrooms,
The crown cushions,
The little people who lived in a strawberry,
Figurines rolled from fingertips dipped in Elmer’s glue,
Ecology flags and Danish flags,
Dead posters and doilies,
Garden gnomes and statues,
Old ghosts and new ghosts,
And smiley, hairy, dimpled rubber gremlins,
And that large alabaster Venus in the garden room,
Sitting still like a naked art student,
Shyly eying me drinking my Tang and eating my pink champagne cake,
A brass quail faucet shining like a pig snout in Italy,
Irresistible to the touch, to the twist…
Those spotless wool carpets of a color I have never seen since,
And cats,
And rats,
And cats,
And more cats.
With names like Jet and Snowflake,
Curling up at foot of bed like Ferlinghetti’s fog.
In Boy Scouts I made Mormor a yule log,
1974
Loaded with multi-colored phosphorous,
Burning in her hearth and home.
And I drew a picture of bird for her,
A King Fisher, I think,
Which earned a frame,
And hung on her museum walls,
A great honor bestowed upon me.
And she kissed me
With her jewelry and her soft skin.
She loved me.
And in her big car,
Off to another bazaar,
In colorful clothes,
With sweetness trailing,
She smiles,
She winks,
She waves,
As she motors up 80
And on to heaven.
Kamakura July, 2011
There are poetic devices to be sure: poetic words that were penned to do just that.
But let me dispense with those for now,
And just write the colloquial ode
She would have wanted me to write for her.
In my youth,
I heard her speak with charm and wit before I knew what those words meant.
At first, I based my impressions of her on the impressions she made on others, which were always bright – the filling-shadow-with-light type – yet impressions that commanded respect few could without first having to don a big hat, pin on brass, or put on airs.
Mormor – even the day-to-day lady – commanded the respect of a general’s wife, a 5-star one at that.
She exuded a brand of dignity rare in this world today, and no matter with whom she was talking – could have been the bellboy or the The Queen of England – Mormor never lowered nor raised herself to the level of others; she held her own, comfortably well.
Mormor gave me a sense of wonder – a hunger – for the world long before I could see it – before I could taste it – for myself.
Mormor was the embodiment of the world for me in my youngest days.
Her home on El Camino Real was really the Vallejo Smithsonian, a wonderful world within a world:
Grandfather clocks that tick-tock-ed into the night,
Oil paintings, scrolls of old, glass cases filled with figurines, Fabergé eggs,
And ornaments, and bell pulls, and books,
Firm couches with frail doilies,
And fine furniture of hardwoods and
On and on and on…
Her living room was a masterpiece with everything but Allister Cook in it!
Mormor instilled in me both wonder and wanderlust,
And talked of every corner of the world like it was stone’s throw,
On the other side of her front door,
There for me to explore.
Mormor was a bastion of manner and class.
That is not to say I did not rebel – I did – I did…
I did not embrace all of her old-world ways,
Eschewing, in particular, the canon of proverbs that define our culture, like
“Children should be seen not heard,” I would clamor, “We children have a voice!”
But a bigger part of what Mormor taught me stuck, and, yes, to the ribs!
Like a broomstick between chair back and my back,
Like rice pudding and pit,
Like lamb and mint jelly,
And other things hard for me to chew,
Hard to swallow.
1977: The year Aunt Lorriane took me to Star Wars and came back a different child. Remembering the Death Star had a tractor beam that could pull in anything.
Mormor’s house – The Life Star – was filled with intrigue, and had a gravitational pull of its own right:
There was the milk drop box filled with toys,
And basement boiler shaft that led to the center of our Earth,
Jams, jellies, and chutneys at the end of a gangplank to the pantry,
The paintings that kept secrets while imparting wisdom,
Candy jars filled with soap,
Monochrome photos of my dad and his sisters,
The heavy bedrooms,
The crown cushions,
The little people who lived in a strawberry,
Figurines rolled from fingertips dipped in Elmer’s glue,
Ecology flags and Danish flags,
Dead posters and doilies,
Garden gnomes and statues,
Old ghosts and new ghosts,
And smiley, hairy, dimpled rubber gremlins,
And that large alabaster Venus in the garden room,
Sitting still like a naked art student,
Shyly eying me drinking my Tang and eating my pink champagne cake,
A brass quail faucet shining like a pig snout in Italy,
Irresistible to the touch, to the twist…
Those spotless wool carpets of a color I have never seen since,
And cats,
And rats,
And cats,
And more cats.
With names like Jet and Snowflake,
Curling up at foot of bed like Ferlinghetti’s fog.
In Boy Scouts I made Mormor a yule log,
1974
Loaded with multi-colored phosphorous,
Burning in her hearth and home.
And I drew a picture of bird for her,
A King Fisher, I think,
Which earned a frame,
And hung on her museum walls,
A great honor bestowed upon me.
And she kissed me
With her jewelry and her soft skin.
She loved me.
And in her big car,
Off to another bazaar,
In colorful clothes,
With sweetness trailing,
She smiles,
She winks,
She waves,
As she motors up 80
And on to heaven.
Kamakura July, 2011
Turtle Island
Gravid
Luring
10 times mooring
On dock
Locked with
Knotted, salt-encrusted rope
To creaking wood
Tied to pier,
Sea turtles to the rear
Their snouts
Steaming in the lull of this languid, oily bay
As if to say
We love this pain,
Take us away.
Kita Kamakura, July 14, 2011
Luring
10 times mooring
On dock
Locked with
Knotted, salt-encrusted rope
To creaking wood
Tied to pier,
Sea turtles to the rear
Their snouts
Steaming in the lull of this languid, oily bay
As if to say
We love this pain,
Take us away.
Kita Kamakura, July 14, 2011
Kirin Ichiban Shibori (unbridled inebriation)
The horse’s mane aflame
Emblazoned and dancing across my beer can.
Liquid gold in aluminum
I succumb
The Green Car girl I resist not
What she has to sell
I pay
I pop
I swill
And feel the first wort’s worth team trough my veins
Like whip tight reigns
To my brain, cracking
Before I drain
My heart
Of all the passion it holds of this day.
Juli, 14 nearing Totsuka—Yokosuka Line to brine 2011
Emblazoned and dancing across my beer can.
Liquid gold in aluminum
I succumb
The Green Car girl I resist not
What she has to sell
I pay
I pop
I swill
And feel the first wort’s worth team trough my veins
Like whip tight reigns
To my brain, cracking
Before I drain
My heart
Of all the passion it holds of this day.
Juli, 14 nearing Totsuka—Yokosuka Line to brine 2011
You Were Nuts, Alan Watts
Every man in his quietest hour asks the same questions:
Who is I, and how can there possibly be something from nothing?
And if the world is meaningless, made of nothingness, the universe chaos,
How come I am I?
I cry,
I scream into my pillow,
A feather-filled silencer,
Pressed tight to my face.
My voice is scratchy today, needless to say.
I am a teacher, and therefore I need my voice, I think to myself…
(Screaming doesn’t help.)
Also such thoughts as…
The bear in the woods,
The Pope shitting there with bear
There too with Jason Clark, rationing TP as if it were gold leaf…
And of course, you too, Alan,
Beckoning the little kiddies with parcels of wisdom,
Dizzying schisms,
And shadow play.
Hell, maybe I even met you in Kresge, Larwin Plaza, Vallejo
When I was buying a Slip-n-Slide with Dad.
Maybe your British accent stood out like cystic acne,
And I -- for that Shamrock-Shake split second –
Imagined myself riding home in our 450 SL
Up Whitecliff Drive to Uncle Pat’s house,
With Ray Crock stuffed in the truck,
Bleeding green from the nostrils,
And smelling of Holy lard.
Alan! Where is your shadow now?
I want to greet your nothingness
With my somethingness;
This trite, moonlight lit page of poetry
Speaking to me,
Channeling you,
Channeling me.
Oh, please!
Around Totsuka, JR Yokosuka Line, Green Car seat damn-near supine… 7/13/11
The Night Carmichael Died
I turn my back
To have a heart attack
And in the privacy of my sadness
I cry the driest tears a man can cry
I often wonder what really happened
The Night Carmichael Died:
“What a night it really was,
Yes, indeed.”
The Paper Lace on my veiled face
That of the thin mask of child wanting a love he could not get,
Knowing it best to give it all away, anyway…
Then one day,
Danny Padilla tells me to tell my mother I love her
Just to stop the anger.
It stopped. It worked. That day.
Why was she so angry?
How did hate come back to berate
Her life’s purpose,
Her very existence?
July 12, 2011 – Yokosuka Line, nearing Yokohama
To have a heart attack
And in the privacy of my sadness
I cry the driest tears a man can cry
I often wonder what really happened
The Night Carmichael Died:
“What a night it really was,
Yes, indeed.”
The Paper Lace on my veiled face
That of the thin mask of child wanting a love he could not get,
Knowing it best to give it all away, anyway…
Then one day,
Danny Padilla tells me to tell my mother I love her
Just to stop the anger.
It stopped. It worked. That day.
Why was she so angry?
How did hate come back to berate
Her life’s purpose,
Her very existence?
July 12, 2011 – Yokosuka Line, nearing Yokohama
Poem 6K
Sandwiched between my thumbs, a reed of grass to blow
A crazy duck honk
My 5-year old daughter laughs and asks for me to do it again
And I do, gladly.
Kaito-kun shows me how to make parachutes
From the magenta-colored flowers that grow around Sakurabashi.
We watch them drift below the bridge.
They land on the hot track and ties.
And my son knows how to spin the yellow flowers that look like small bouquets,
Making their blossoms fly like sparks off a pinwheel
I help the old men paste sheets of white with black shodo strokes of
Names, amounts, donation accounts
And it feels good to weave life in this way
Watching the children play
Oh, Gokurakuji
Your poetry
Speaks to me!
7,9,11 gokurakuji house
A crazy duck honk
My 5-year old daughter laughs and asks for me to do it again
And I do, gladly.
Kaito-kun shows me how to make parachutes
From the magenta-colored flowers that grow around Sakurabashi.
We watch them drift below the bridge.
They land on the hot track and ties.
And my son knows how to spin the yellow flowers that look like small bouquets,
Making their blossoms fly like sparks off a pinwheel
I help the old men paste sheets of white with black shodo strokes of
Names, amounts, donation accounts
And it feels good to weave life in this way
Watching the children play
Oh, Gokurakuji
Your poetry
Speaks to me!
7,9,11 gokurakuji house
Our New Home
Sounds teaming abound
In this jungle we now call home
The fukuro, the owl, hooting under bold old-man moon
And the shrill of a bird I know not its name
But thrills me just the same.
In the lush damp tangle of green, I hear squirrels bark
At what I do not know.
And the butterflies flutter about the blue hydrangea with not a care.
And the ants make their way through our home as if they own the place.
And I see Shirotori-san carries his lame dog to take a crap on the hillside,
And back,
An act of love if I’ve ever seen one.
Gokurakuji
The drums will beat tonight
Matsuri, night one
A Saturday night
On fire.
Gokurakuji House, July 9 2011
In this jungle we now call home
The fukuro, the owl, hooting under bold old-man moon
And the shrill of a bird I know not its name
But thrills me just the same.
In the lush damp tangle of green, I hear squirrels bark
At what I do not know.
And the butterflies flutter about the blue hydrangea with not a care.
And the ants make their way through our home as if they own the place.
And I see Shirotori-san carries his lame dog to take a crap on the hillside,
And back,
An act of love if I’ve ever seen one.
Gokurakuji
The drums will beat tonight
Matsuri, night one
A Saturday night
On fire.
Gokurakuji House, July 9 2011
Karri nil (They are young – they are free – they are all beautiful to me)
(To Peter and Peter’s Bag)
The young sun is stealing the sky blind
But somehow I manage to find
The old lonesome poets’ moon
In the Shinagawa skyline
Still glowing in the afternoon
Under blue-eye blink of atmosphere:
And below it?
Yeah, below it, I see our campus glitter with youth and emotion
With the sheen of suntan lotion:
Wow, I feel, summer is finally fucking here!
And the students see it! – yes they do…
Like tan lines in mind,
With books burning holes in their bags:
Both of which are carrying nil,
No, nothing at all.
Even the limpest of pages
Limp with humidity
Catch
Fire
Here.
6/30/11 Around Yokohama, on Yokosuka Line, Green Car, 8% STRONG CHU-HI
The young sun is stealing the sky blind
But somehow I manage to find
The old lonesome poets’ moon
In the Shinagawa skyline
Still glowing in the afternoon
Under blue-eye blink of atmosphere:
And below it?
Yeah, below it, I see our campus glitter with youth and emotion
With the sheen of suntan lotion:
Wow, I feel, summer is finally fucking here!
And the students see it! – yes they do…
Like tan lines in mind,
With books burning holes in their bags:
Both of which are carrying nil,
No, nothing at all.
Even the limpest of pages
Limp with humidity
Catch
Fire
Here.
6/30/11 Around Yokohama, on Yokosuka Line, Green Car, 8% STRONG CHU-HI
Extracting it all
A new high
My dial on “die”
Oh, crush me between your knees tonight
And squeeze me ripe, my over-alive overdrive.
What wonderful senses you have: you hyper-sexual specimen of desire.
What a wonderful world your mind must be!
Your halo hovers over me,
A magnetic field, robbing every atom of every thought I ever had --
I can see the permutations,
And those worldly calculations blur by
Like burning tickertape, reading the raping of the earth, supplying its supply,
Extracting it all.
Extracting it all.
Title of this poem:
Extracting it all.
Extracting it all.
6/23/2011 Yokosuka Line, Totsuka
My dial on “die”
Oh, crush me between your knees tonight
And squeeze me ripe, my over-alive overdrive.
What wonderful senses you have: you hyper-sexual specimen of desire.
What a wonderful world your mind must be!
Your halo hovers over me,
A magnetic field, robbing every atom of every thought I ever had --
I can see the permutations,
And those worldly calculations blur by
Like burning tickertape, reading the raping of the earth, supplying its supply,
Extracting it all.
Extracting it all.
Title of this poem:
Extracting it all.
Extracting it all.
6/23/2011 Yokosuka Line, Totsuka
Can it be?
Where is my world going
In relation
To the rotation
Of your mind?
Can it be
You make mockery of me
In the swirls that wildly ring your world?
Oh, I hope not!
Give truth gravity!
I am not evil.
I’ve been charged with uberlife, is all
And if that leaves me in shackles
Then I will find fine company in such confinement!
JR Yokosuka Line, June Two, 2011
In relation
To the rotation
Of your mind?
Can it be
You make mockery of me
In the swirls that wildly ring your world?
Oh, I hope not!
Give truth gravity!
I am not evil.
I’ve been charged with uberlife, is all
And if that leaves me in shackles
Then I will find fine company in such confinement!
JR Yokosuka Line, June Two, 2011
What Wondorous Lust!
When?!
Fuck it, when!?
When can I see you bleed from the mouth?
When can I see your head hit south
On the salt of the earth
On mat, flat on your back?
Down for the count
Supine; sublime
Spent of emotions
Said all you had to say
To me, to me, to me, TO ME!
Do I still live in your soul?
Do I still till your soil?
Or do I bore you with my Japanese dreams?
Do I bore you, do I bore you, DO I BORE YOU?!
Well?
Do I?
The question is
It is this question I
Have for you:
Do you love me
Like you did when I was 5, not 45?
Do you love me, do you love me, do you love me?
For everything I am,
For everything I am not.
Because, in fact, at 5, I wasn’t a lot… of anything,
Not good, not bad, nothing.
If there is a strand
Of emotion of yours you still command
Tell me this:
Please.
Do you love me at 45?
Somewhere on the Yokosuka Line, June One, 2011
Fuck it, when!?
When can I see you bleed from the mouth?
When can I see your head hit south
On the salt of the earth
On mat, flat on your back?
Down for the count
Supine; sublime
Spent of emotions
Said all you had to say
To me, to me, to me, TO ME!
Do I still live in your soul?
Do I still till your soil?
Or do I bore you with my Japanese dreams?
Do I bore you, do I bore you, DO I BORE YOU?!
Well?
Do I?
The question is
It is this question I
Have for you:
Do you love me
Like you did when I was 5, not 45?
Do you love me, do you love me, do you love me?
For everything I am,
For everything I am not.
Because, in fact, at 5, I wasn’t a lot… of anything,
Not good, not bad, nothing.
If there is a strand
Of emotion of yours you still command
Tell me this:
Please.
Do you love me at 45?
Somewhere on the Yokosuka Line, June One, 2011
Sunday, June 26, 2011
I Will
Trouble me
Easy teasing sad man breaking glass
Glee in me try to be trained the way I speak back to you
Lacking dignity
Speaking out of turn
Burning slowly
In wet wick slicked-back hair
Not a care
To dare to step out of my preset patterns
Earning millage
On my wavelength of choice and shaking voice
Because I wanted to meet you at barrier
Where we both cannot traverse
In no man’s land with no dime in hand
I shake your hand, buck knife slit like mine
And blood brothers become
Undone
Scabs forming on our hearts
We part
Not knowing we have more in common than not
And that really our thoughts are not our own
Anyway
In the light of the super moon
I imagine you sleeping till noon
On the other side of the planet
A world away
In the cranberry clotted blood we share
And I turn my thoughts to those truly in need and
My thoughts of you fade away
The menacing wave now lapping at the shore
Of Tohoku
And my heart pumps harder than ever before
And seeping though the cracks of the scabs
Filling my body cavity with a love swell torrent
For the victims
For the neighbors to the north
I turn my heater off at night and share their cold
And eat their food
And bear what burden of theirs I can recreate here
In relative comfort
In the dark and laptop battery fading, now 8%
And the need to finish this rush of thought
This surge of love
Collapsing into now
Wondering how I can
Keep my heart beating like this
Because I feel so alive for YOU!
Make you proud
Singing out loud
Waiting for someone to make the first move.
And I will follow
I will
I will
I will myself
I will!
That fraction of a split second we call “now” is all we have.
And what I just said is now the past.
My actions determine my future
Each and every action
And the fraction of a split second to act
Is all it takes to s
Easy teasing sad man breaking glass
Glee in me try to be trained the way I speak back to you
Lacking dignity
Speaking out of turn
Burning slowly
In wet wick slicked-back hair
Not a care
To dare to step out of my preset patterns
Earning millage
On my wavelength of choice and shaking voice
Because I wanted to meet you at barrier
Where we both cannot traverse
In no man’s land with no dime in hand
I shake your hand, buck knife slit like mine
And blood brothers become
Undone
Scabs forming on our hearts
We part
Not knowing we have more in common than not
And that really our thoughts are not our own
Anyway
In the light of the super moon
I imagine you sleeping till noon
On the other side of the planet
A world away
In the cranberry clotted blood we share
And I turn my thoughts to those truly in need and
My thoughts of you fade away
The menacing wave now lapping at the shore
Of Tohoku
And my heart pumps harder than ever before
And seeping though the cracks of the scabs
Filling my body cavity with a love swell torrent
For the victims
For the neighbors to the north
I turn my heater off at night and share their cold
And eat their food
And bear what burden of theirs I can recreate here
In relative comfort
In the dark and laptop battery fading, now 8%
And the need to finish this rush of thought
This surge of love
Collapsing into now
Wondering how I can
Keep my heart beating like this
Because I feel so alive for YOU!
Make you proud
Singing out loud
Waiting for someone to make the first move.
And I will follow
I will
I will
I will myself
I will!
That fraction of a split second we call “now” is all we have.
And what I just said is now the past.
My actions determine my future
Each and every action
And the fraction of a split second to act
Is all it takes to s
Educare Il Cuore (Educate The Heart)
In the classroom
In front of eyes alive
I too feel alive
The surge
Of urge to teach from the heart
To the heart,
To educate.
Oh, I feel it today
Oh, it is there in the air, Frierre!
The pedagogy of the free
And it is coming from me!
My heart and me
Be proud of me,
Won’t you?
“Be creative,
Imaginative”,
I tell my students.
And like the crack of a bat I hear it kiss the ball
And a moment later bounce off the bleachers,
Landing in the collective consciousness.
And I think to myself,
I love my job.
In front of eyes alive
I too feel alive
The surge
Of urge to teach from the heart
To the heart,
To educate.
Oh, I feel it today
Oh, it is there in the air, Frierre!
The pedagogy of the free
And it is coming from me!
My heart and me
Be proud of me,
Won’t you?
“Be creative,
Imaginative”,
I tell my students.
And like the crack of a bat I hear it kiss the ball
And a moment later bounce off the bleachers,
Landing in the collective consciousness.
And I think to myself,
I love my job.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
You Could Have Been My Son
Take me to the shore
Of where your
Home once stood.
Let me help you find your photographs
And toys
And the desk you begged to have
To study at
To be the man
You’ll never be.
The sea stole your life but not your soul.
And though I don’t know your face, your name,
I miss you just the same.
March 22, 2011
Kamakura
story link here
Of where your
Home once stood.
Let me help you find your photographs
And toys
And the desk you begged to have
To study at
To be the man
You’ll never be.
The sea stole your life but not your soul.
And though I don’t know your face, your name,
I miss you just the same.
March 22, 2011
Kamakura
story link here
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Hotaru (Fireflies)
In amazing parallax contrast I gaze
At the moon whispering lullabies with light.
I must write.
I cannot not write!
I take my share of this view,
Then shut the blind,
Leaving the rest for the rest,
Those who actually need its light
And the sweetest of songs it sings tonight,
Singing to the souls pulled away in undertow:
The children the age of my own,
The parents no different than my wife and I,
The old on cold gymnasium floors:
The dead who died this way.
My heart relents, letting mostly darkness rush in.
Today, the sun ablaze,
Racing home on high-speed train,
We stop in Hiroshima
I feel the souls of war pour aboard
Through our window like countless sieverts,
Invisible, but ever-present in this city’s air.
Their half-lives – infinite –
Illuminating our hearts like hotaru in jars,
Guiding us home.
March 19 & 20, 2011
At the moon whispering lullabies with light.
I must write.
I cannot not write!
I take my share of this view,
Then shut the blind,
Leaving the rest for the rest,
Those who actually need its light
And the sweetest of songs it sings tonight,
Singing to the souls pulled away in undertow:
The children the age of my own,
The parents no different than my wife and I,
The old on cold gymnasium floors:
The dead who died this way.
My heart relents, letting mostly darkness rush in.
Today, the sun ablaze,
Racing home on high-speed train,
We stop in Hiroshima
I feel the souls of war pour aboard
Through our window like countless sieverts,
Invisible, but ever-present in this city’s air.
Their half-lives – infinite –
Illuminating our hearts like hotaru in jars,
Guiding us home.
March 19 & 20, 2011
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Depeche Mode
I will stand all alone
N' I will be on my own
When I... break free
I will not come undone
When my song has been sung
When I... break free
Listen to me
When I say I will be...
Free
Free as the wind
Free as the sun
And the rains
And the blood in my veins
Cause...
My life was given for free
So why can't I take back what was given to me
And... break free
So many shackles abound
So many traps lay around
On the floors of the forest
And the mighty blue seas
So many hungry thieves
Have even more up their sleeves
They'll stop at nothing to get
The last of it yet
To stripe mine our time with
Unruly devices
Distract us from the things we truly hold dear
Filling our minds
And hearts
With shock, awe, and fear
My heart was an ocean
Now drag netted of emotion...
Look at me now
I'm no different than you
I may be striped and so bare
But I want to declare...
I will break free!
N' I will be on my own
When I... break free
I will not come undone
When my song has been sung
When I... break free
Listen to me
When I say I will be...
Free
Free as the wind
Free as the sun
And the rains
And the blood in my veins
Cause...
My life was given for free
So why can't I take back what was given to me
And... break free
So many shackles abound
So many traps lay around
On the floors of the forest
And the mighty blue seas
So many hungry thieves
Have even more up their sleeves
They'll stop at nothing to get
The last of it yet
To stripe mine our time with
Unruly devices
Distract us from the things we truly hold dear
Filling our minds
And hearts
With shock, awe, and fear
My heart was an ocean
Now drag netted of emotion...
Look at me now
I'm no different than you
I may be striped and so bare
But I want to declare...
I will break free!
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
A new emotional landmass
I feel a poem coming on
A welling in the belly
That suggests an imminent eruption of my soul.
And with it
The need to explore
A new emotional landmass
On which I will walk
Barefoot
And on fire.
"Take away time,
And you take away the journey"
Said Alan Watts.
I love that.
So I am stopping my time
To be with you.
With my heart bleeding like magma
But too fast to burn
And too fast to track
And too fast to know precisely why,
I sit here alone
Pouring out my soul
Light speed into the Internet
Just to be with you.
A welling in the belly
That suggests an imminent eruption of my soul.
And with it
The need to explore
A new emotional landmass
On which I will walk
Barefoot
And on fire.
"Take away time,
And you take away the journey"
Said Alan Watts.
I love that.
So I am stopping my time
To be with you.
With my heart bleeding like magma
But too fast to burn
And too fast to track
And too fast to know precisely why,
I sit here alone
Pouring out my soul
Light speed into the Internet
Just to be with you.
Monday, October 18, 2010
Seaguls Are Angels Are Vulchers
Angels, like vulchers,
Swirl in halo formation
Over my head,
As my mind is blown skyward
In a dream.
I realized then
That's how death might seem:
Set aloft among the clouds,
My earthly pride,
Dematerialized,
Scattered bout like breadcrumbs
Thrown to seagulls in flight,
As each one takes a piece of me,
Gracefully,
Yet hungerly.
Swirl in halo formation
Over my head,
As my mind is blown skyward
In a dream.
I realized then
That's how death might seem:
Set aloft among the clouds,
My earthly pride,
Dematerialized,
Scattered bout like breadcrumbs
Thrown to seagulls in flight,
As each one takes a piece of me,
Gracefully,
Yet hungerly.
Friday, October 15, 2010
Words Have No Magnitude
Falling on ears that could never hear
Not even from birth;
Falling on eyes that never knew sight.
Guttenberg's words were gravid as rocky crag,
Laboring a rock slide.
But words in this new world carry weightlessness,
Impressing nothing nor no one.
Rapid
Vapid
Pixelation:
Digital
Representation
Of
Poetry
Of
Life
Of
Thought
Paper shaped our world in ways
The screen you see now
Will never.
In fact,
No matter how passionately I hit these keys
On this keyboard
The impact is the same,
Homogenized
Sterile
Fonts on blog.
Some fuckhead in Japan
Thinking he is Wordsworth rebirth like
Guttenberg meets Hindenberg:
Waking up this digital Earth,
Beating his typewriter
Like a drummer,
In vain.
Not even from birth;
Falling on eyes that never knew sight.
Guttenberg's words were gravid as rocky crag,
Laboring a rock slide.
But words in this new world carry weightlessness,
Impressing nothing nor no one.
Rapid
Vapid
Pixelation:
Digital
Representation
Of
Poetry
Of
Life
Of
Thought
Paper shaped our world in ways
The screen you see now
Will never.
In fact,
No matter how passionately I hit these keys
On this keyboard
The impact is the same,
Homogenized
Sterile
Fonts on blog.
Some fuckhead in Japan
Thinking he is Wordsworth rebirth like
Guttenberg meets Hindenberg:
Waking up this digital Earth,
Beating his typewriter
Like a drummer,
In vain.
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Leaf On A Stream
In dreams
It seems
Our time
Does stream,
Floating like leaf,
Freely
Downstream,
Riding ripples,
Meandering
There, here, everywhere
Then locked
Between rocks,
Twirled in eddies,
Till set free
By breeze
And on and on
Our time floats down
Fresh stream to saline
Set truly free
In brine
Lost at sea
It seems
Our time
Does stream,
Floating like leaf,
Freely
Downstream,
Riding ripples,
Meandering
There, here, everywhere
Then locked
Between rocks,
Twirled in eddies,
Till set free
By breeze
And on and on
Our time floats down
Fresh stream to saline
Set truly free
In brine
Lost at sea
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Close
You can only be close to a person by heart
And heart alone.
Suppose our love was quantified
By distance
Or proximity;
We'd all be under the same roof,
Or thereabouts,
Don't you think?
And heart alone.
Suppose our love was quantified
By distance
Or proximity;
We'd all be under the same roof,
Or thereabouts,
Don't you think?
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Shopping at Dean & Deluca's Heaven Branch
My truffle oil has lost its smell,
I tell the epicure wearing a tall,
White chef's hat and gray stubble
Of a beard,
Standing by the truffle products from
Italia.
Would you recommend another way to
Season my spaghetti? I continue.
And he stops still, stays silent
For an uncomfortably long time,
As if he is faced with having to tell
A secret of the kitchen.
He looks at me in a manner that suggests
We share a mutual love for the Fungus
Of The Heavens. And his careful reply
Comes metered in the way one might tell a
Secret: with suspense and a dash of drama,
Of panache. Have you tried the truffle salt?
He asked with a sly wink. I say no, but
I've read about it. Ah, then you must try it,
Says the epicure. But do know, he continues,
If you open this jar, the smell will travel far,
From here to there, pointing to where the Bordeaux
Stands stately, gleaming like rubies, five steps away.
Truffles are the only evidence there is a heaven,
I say before opening the jar,
Before releasing the gastronomic genie
Within.
And the effect is instantaneous, the smell travels at
Speeds unknown. I soon hear another shopper breathe in deep
Through the nose
As one might in a flower shop.
I see this salt sells itself, I say to
The epicure as I too take in a deep and heavenly whiff.
I say this
With a sly wink as I place a jar of truffle salt into my basket
and make my way on to the cheeses. Is that
Parmigiano Reggiano I smell?
I tell the epicure wearing a tall,
White chef's hat and gray stubble
Of a beard,
Standing by the truffle products from
Italia.
Would you recommend another way to
Season my spaghetti? I continue.
And he stops still, stays silent
For an uncomfortably long time,
As if he is faced with having to tell
A secret of the kitchen.
He looks at me in a manner that suggests
We share a mutual love for the Fungus
Of The Heavens. And his careful reply
Comes metered in the way one might tell a
Secret: with suspense and a dash of drama,
Of panache. Have you tried the truffle salt?
He asked with a sly wink. I say no, but
I've read about it. Ah, then you must try it,
Says the epicure. But do know, he continues,
If you open this jar, the smell will travel far,
From here to there, pointing to where the Bordeaux
Stands stately, gleaming like rubies, five steps away.
Truffles are the only evidence there is a heaven,
I say before opening the jar,
Before releasing the gastronomic genie
Within.
And the effect is instantaneous, the smell travels at
Speeds unknown. I soon hear another shopper breathe in deep
Through the nose
As one might in a flower shop.
I see this salt sells itself, I say to
The epicure as I too take in a deep and heavenly whiff.
I say this
With a sly wink as I place a jar of truffle salt into my basket
and make my way on to the cheeses. Is that
Parmigiano Reggiano I smell?
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
The Placidity That Was Once My Soul
There is a carnival in my head,
Nightly:
A nauseating carousel of nonsensical images,
Disjointed stories,
And freak shows by candlelight,
Performed by familiar but distorted faces,
Disturbing the placidity of my soul.
I wake exhausted
As if I've been battling demons,
In drunken fights all night ---
All the images,
Stories,
Faces,
Still haunting,
Fading fast as I fully waken,
By noon all forgotten.
The day unfolds like gauze bandages;
My soul exposed,
I feel cold,
Pining for the the placidity that was once my soul.
Nightly:
A nauseating carousel of nonsensical images,
Disjointed stories,
And freak shows by candlelight,
Performed by familiar but distorted faces,
Disturbing the placidity of my soul.
I wake exhausted
As if I've been battling demons,
In drunken fights all night ---
All the images,
Stories,
Faces,
Still haunting,
Fading fast as I fully waken,
By noon all forgotten.
The day unfolds like gauze bandages;
My soul exposed,
I feel cold,
Pining for the the placidity that was once my soul.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Shibai Taruka!
Shibai taruka!
Fuck it!
My new chopsticks nitpick
At my brain
Wondering if my career will ever be the same
How I've become so belligerently wise in my mid age
How I can laugh now at getting older
No longer denying I am dying
Graying
Aging
Aching
Shibai taruka!
Shibai taruka!
Shibai taruka!
Fuck it!
My new chopsticks nitpick
At my brain
Wondering if my career will ever be the same
How I've become so belligerently wise in my mid age
How I can laugh now at getting older
No longer denying I am dying
Graying
Aging
Aching
Shibai taruka!
Shibai taruka!
Shibai taruka!
Friday, January 1, 2010
अवलोकितेश्वर (Avalokiteśvara, or Kannon)
Midnight nears.
The year is ending.
The cold of this last night, 2009,
Is sheathed in a warmth that comes with knowing
Everything is all right.
Hasedera, home of Avalokiteśvara,
Draws us in like grey whale might krill.
A large paper lamp illuminates the gate,
Bleeding a red not often seen.
The leaves have left the trees,
And rest not on ground,
But in bags for garbage collectors.
Some rinse their hands in water,
Some take pictures,
Some bleed their youth, warming older hearts.
All love being here at this hour.
I join the other souls up stairs
To where Kannon has lined her nest
With scraps of detritus
Found washed ashore below,
Those fragments of dreams
We have lost throughout the year.
Everything comes together at Hasedera tonight.
Everything is all right.
At your feet,
Candles form whirlpools of light,
Heating your hands and face
With just enough lumens for me to take
A picture of your hopeful face
Without having to spoil the moment in a flash.
The year is ending.
The cold of this last night, 2009,
Is sheathed in a warmth that comes with knowing
Everything is all right.
Hasedera, home of Avalokiteśvara,
Draws us in like grey whale might krill.
A large paper lamp illuminates the gate,
Bleeding a red not often seen.
The leaves have left the trees,
And rest not on ground,
But in bags for garbage collectors.
Some rinse their hands in water,
Some take pictures,
Some bleed their youth, warming older hearts.
All love being here at this hour.
I join the other souls up stairs
To where Kannon has lined her nest
With scraps of detritus
Found washed ashore below,
Those fragments of dreams
We have lost throughout the year.
Everything comes together at Hasedera tonight.
Everything is all right.
At your feet,
Candles form whirlpools of light,
Heating your hands and face
With just enough lumens for me to take
A picture of your hopeful face
Without having to spoil the moment in a flash.
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Saturday, September 5, 2009
Not A Poem; Just The Simple Truth
I can't write a poem tonight
But I want to write
I have to write
No poem could say the simple truth I feel
So I'll say just that: the simple truth
I miss you, my children
And it's only been hours
I wish you were here with me
Tonight
As hanabi burns like road flares
Etching the Kodachrome of my chromosomes
My mind's eye denies nothing tonight
Phosphorous for us, for me, olfactory, be, memory
You two in Ninomiya
Under sheets
Fast asleep
Dreams swirling about the heavens within your craniums
I love every milligram of your existence
And you should know that!
But I want to write
I have to write
No poem could say the simple truth I feel
So I'll say just that: the simple truth
I miss you, my children
And it's only been hours
I wish you were here with me
Tonight
As hanabi burns like road flares
Etching the Kodachrome of my chromosomes
My mind's eye denies nothing tonight
Phosphorous for us, for me, olfactory, be, memory
You two in Ninomiya
Under sheets
Fast asleep
Dreams swirling about the heavens within your craniums
I love every milligram of your existence
And you should know that!
Sunday, August 2, 2009
An Ode To Charles Darwin
This is an ode to Charles Darwin.
We woke to the whirling of the vacuum,
Sucking the life right out of our lonesome dreams.
My brother still asleep beside me,
I turn my head on my yellowed pillow,
And beg for forgiveness.
I see the lines in my palms begin to tangle,
Lifelines filled with tears,
Flowing long to wrists.
Lying here I hear your authority aboard the Beagle
As waves lap like lizards on her hull.
I wonder where you took us, Charlie Darwin,
And wonder how much further we can go
Before all know the truth about us:
That monkeys love their offspring more than we do ours.
We think we know too much, and I fear we're right, Mr. Darwin.
Those lizards on your islands are the smart ones,
Lazing in the sun,
Letting boatloads of teleported tourists
Take pictures for their kitchens.
A film gathered on the Equator,
Forming a hairline of salt between the azure sky and sea,
And in that fine line, somewhere,
All this came to be.
Isn't that it?
I mean, really, isn't that it?
We woke to the whirling of the vacuum,
Sucking the life right out of our lonesome dreams.
My brother still asleep beside me,
I turn my head on my yellowed pillow,
And beg for forgiveness.
I see the lines in my palms begin to tangle,
Lifelines filled with tears,
Flowing long to wrists.
Lying here I hear your authority aboard the Beagle
As waves lap like lizards on her hull.
I wonder where you took us, Charlie Darwin,
And wonder how much further we can go
Before all know the truth about us:
That monkeys love their offspring more than we do ours.
We think we know too much, and I fear we're right, Mr. Darwin.
Those lizards on your islands are the smart ones,
Lazing in the sun,
Letting boatloads of teleported tourists
Take pictures for their kitchens.
A film gathered on the Equator,
Forming a hairline of salt between the azure sky and sea,
And in that fine line, somewhere,
All this came to be.
Isn't that it?
I mean, really, isn't that it?
Saturday, August 1, 2009
The Dream Makers
Dreams cannot wait for me to sleep, to take over the vacant theater,
To play in my mind, to dance all night on that dim lit stage
Behind my sleeping eyes.
Make it a good play tonight,
Whoever you are.
Make it a loving cast;
Give them the faces of my past,
Then let them bring to life the love they once had for me,
So I too can feel the love I once had for them.
Oh, yes, true love is a dream,
For in dreams love never dies.
To play in my mind, to dance all night on that dim lit stage
Behind my sleeping eyes.
Make it a good play tonight,
Whoever you are.
Make it a loving cast;
Give them the faces of my past,
Then let them bring to life the love they once had for me,
So I too can feel the love I once had for them.
Oh, yes, true love is a dream,
For in dreams love never dies.
Monday, July 6, 2009
Earth
In a world of six billion
Things seem eerily calm
Round here:
The air stripped bare
Duchamp ready-made air
Not rare Perrier air
But the kind of air
For all to feast upon
Quietly
In mass meditative state
12 billion lungs take
Bites from the sky
Then exhale
Filling the sails of our heavenly sphere or
Spilling hell-filled tears
Before she dies
Before we hear her cries
Our collective denial
On trial
To be found guilty
Of being human
We
Bow
Our heads in shame
Thinking we had the brains to change
Our ruinous ways
But didn't
This
is
it
Things seem eerily calm
Round here:
The air stripped bare
Duchamp ready-made air
Not rare Perrier air
But the kind of air
For all to feast upon
Quietly
In mass meditative state
12 billion lungs take
Bites from the sky
Then exhale
Filling the sails of our heavenly sphere or
Spilling hell-filled tears
Before she dies
Before we hear her cries
Our collective denial
On trial
To be found guilty
Of being human
We
Bow
Our heads in shame
Thinking we had the brains to change
Our ruinous ways
But didn't
This
is
it
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Tsuyu Blues
Hello, Sun of Sunday
So, where are you?
Under blanket of gray, midday, 3PM
Looking more like 3AM
I am
Missing you
I am
Feeling blue
Like the pocked-faced Moon of Monday
Or the wet hydrangeas
Blue as Moon
Crying in the rain
So, where are you?
Under blanket of gray, midday, 3PM
Looking more like 3AM
I am
Missing you
I am
Feeling blue
Like the pocked-faced Moon of Monday
Or the wet hydrangeas
Blue as Moon
Crying in the rain
Friday, June 12, 2009
Poet Tree
Ever look at wood
And think how it could
Grow from earth
To be so much for us:
Be our shade,
Bare our fruit,
Give us warmth,
Provide us shelter,
Clean our air, Let us
Swing from limb,
Carve initials in
And best of all
We fell to tell
Thoughts we spell:
Trees
To wood
To papyrus
For millennium could
And think how it could
Grow from earth
To be so much for us:
Be our shade,
Bare our fruit,
Give us warmth,
Provide us shelter,
Clean our air, Let us
Swing from limb,
Carve initials in
And best of all
We fell to tell
Thoughts we spell:
Trees
To wood
To papyrus
For millennium could
Sunday, June 7, 2009
This Life
This life
Is all I have
And that’s enough
To break my heart.
I trust the lies
And mend the ties
Of worn out shoelace friendships
And yet I still trip over them
Where do I go from here, my dear?
Let this heart of mine bleed a trail for you to follow
And show you where death has its lonesome place in my life.
Today the sun shines bright alive, thriving in the cosmos
Like my mind in the cosmos
Swirling under bone, scalp and hair
Marry this poem with your soul
Spin out of control
With the love you feel for your life
The only thing you have
It’s got to be enough
to break the heart.
October 10, 2005 Kamakura
Is all I have
And that’s enough
To break my heart.
I trust the lies
And mend the ties
Of worn out shoelace friendships
And yet I still trip over them
Where do I go from here, my dear?
Let this heart of mine bleed a trail for you to follow
And show you where death has its lonesome place in my life.
Today the sun shines bright alive, thriving in the cosmos
Like my mind in the cosmos
Swirling under bone, scalp and hair
Marry this poem with your soul
Spin out of control
With the love you feel for your life
The only thing you have
It’s got to be enough
to break the heart.
October 10, 2005 Kamakura
Thursday, May 21, 2009
And You Said Yes
You asked me what it means
When you saw my ripped up jeans
And I said, "fashion...",
"Uh, anti-fashion."
And you laughed.
And I laughed.
I was high on oolong tea
When I thought of you and me
For the first time.
And when I saw your broken nose,
I really had to know,
"What happened?"
You were running in the sand,
Trying to beat every man.
You must have beat 'em.
I was falling in love, but buried to the neck,
Waiting to lose my head,
And then you saved me.
I said, "You wanna see that movie?"
And you said yes!
When you saw my ripped up jeans
And I said, "fashion...",
"Uh, anti-fashion."
And you laughed.
And I laughed.
I was high on oolong tea
When I thought of you and me
For the first time.
And when I saw your broken nose,
I really had to know,
"What happened?"
You were running in the sand,
Trying to beat every man.
You must have beat 'em.
I was falling in love, but buried to the neck,
Waiting to lose my head,
And then you saved me.
I said, "You wanna see that movie?"
And you said yes!
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Where Dances The Firefly
My conscience
Launched this fear
Into stratosphere
Of mind,
Exploding like an E-bomb there,
Knocking all thoughts out!
The invisible, yet lethal arsenal of weightless thoughts, I thought,
While all I had tried to think about was nothing, except how it is
Fireflies emit light, but no heat.
Then came the thought of how I used to release my dreams like fish,
Enjoying just knowing I had caught them,
If even just to feel them.
I think now
How I mount and hang my dreams at night
Like unwanted trophies,
Like an unlikely taxidermist might,
Yearning the returning of a simpler life,
One near freshwater stream,
In which all fish swim till they die,
Where wasabi grows like weeds,
Where dances the firefly.
Launched this fear
Into stratosphere
Of mind,
Exploding like an E-bomb there,
Knocking all thoughts out!
The invisible, yet lethal arsenal of weightless thoughts, I thought,
While all I had tried to think about was nothing, except how it is
Fireflies emit light, but no heat.
Then came the thought of how I used to release my dreams like fish,
Enjoying just knowing I had caught them,
If even just to feel them.
I think now
How I mount and hang my dreams at night
Like unwanted trophies,
Like an unlikely taxidermist might,
Yearning the returning of a simpler life,
One near freshwater stream,
In which all fish swim till they die,
Where wasabi grows like weeds,
Where dances the firefly.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
And To All Young Men
Like explaining what color is to a dog,
Like explaining the limits of the universe,
How could I have imagined what having a family truly meant
Had I not had one of my very own?
Now that I do,
I can't imagine what my life was like without
My wife,
My son,
My daughter.
Sap, I suppose.
Sticky, messy sap,
Dripping from severed limb
Of family tree,
Getting all over me.
That was me,
Yeah, that was me.
Not understanding the discomfort
Or how to wipe my skin clean
Without half removing it in the process.
From about age four,
I was already looking for the door,
Knowing in my heart there was more love out there.
Forty years on,
I am happy to say I have found more than I know what to do with.
Moreover,
My skin is clean,
And intact.
So, to all dogs: be happy that you can see,
Color or no color.
To the whole universe:
You go on being just as big as you want to be.
And to all young men:
Keep exiting the door till you find what it is you are looking for!
"The universe is wider than our views of it." H. D. Thoreau
Like explaining the limits of the universe,
How could I have imagined what having a family truly meant
Had I not had one of my very own?
Now that I do,
I can't imagine what my life was like without
My wife,
My son,
My daughter.
Sap, I suppose.
Sticky, messy sap,
Dripping from severed limb
Of family tree,
Getting all over me.
That was me,
Yeah, that was me.
Not understanding the discomfort
Or how to wipe my skin clean
Without half removing it in the process.
From about age four,
I was already looking for the door,
Knowing in my heart there was more love out there.
Forty years on,
I am happy to say I have found more than I know what to do with.
Moreover,
My skin is clean,
And intact.
So, to all dogs: be happy that you can see,
Color or no color.
To the whole universe:
You go on being just as big as you want to be.
And to all young men:
Keep exiting the door till you find what it is you are looking for!
"The universe is wider than our views of it." H. D. Thoreau
Sunday, April 5, 2009
I am not angry, America
I'm not angry, America.
Though I do feel let down,
Let down gracelessly
Like sack of grain
From your strong arm crane
Here on familiar California shore,
Where seagulls soar,
And sea lions roar.
On dock I wait to hear Golden Gate foghorn blow,
A vision of Jack Kerouac,
Or just you.
But all I see has been recreated,
A reality virtual
To the one I hold forever dear.
San Francisco, I have not forgotten.
The songs of the 70s I learned,
Now burned
Onto three CDs.
Are meaningless in this day and age,
Sung in tongues it seems
To those who might stop and listen with that rare, spare 7 seconds:
"Where have all the flowers gone..." and think "what the fuck, hippie chick?"
Mary Travers, I have not forgotten.
And, finally,
There is you, my family,
A vision, perhaps,
But if you are an illusion, don't spoil my joy!
My family, I have not forgotten.
Though I do feel let down,
Let down gracelessly
Like sack of grain
From your strong arm crane
Here on familiar California shore,
Where seagulls soar,
And sea lions roar.
On dock I wait to hear Golden Gate foghorn blow,
A vision of Jack Kerouac,
Or just you.
But all I see has been recreated,
A reality virtual
To the one I hold forever dear.
San Francisco, I have not forgotten.
The songs of the 70s I learned,
Now burned
Onto three CDs.
Are meaningless in this day and age,
Sung in tongues it seems
To those who might stop and listen with that rare, spare 7 seconds:
"Where have all the flowers gone..." and think "what the fuck, hippie chick?"
Mary Travers, I have not forgotten.
And, finally,
There is you, my family,
A vision, perhaps,
But if you are an illusion, don't spoil my joy!
My family, I have not forgotten.
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Running, Singing, Young Monks
Every so often
In the early morn
Young monks run and sing by our door,
Helping wake old souls
Such as our own,
Well before 8 when temple bell tolls,
Long before day's toils,
And always,
Always before our coffee boils.
In the early morn
Young monks run and sing by our door,
Helping wake old souls
Such as our own,
Well before 8 when temple bell tolls,
Long before day's toils,
And always,
Always before our coffee boils.
Monday, November 10, 2008
Night Blooming (Gekka Bijin)
Is that the moon, Papa?
My son asks me
When the moon is at its thinnest
Is that a smile, Dad?
I ask myself
When I think I see you smile
Your lips bloom
An inverted blossom of
Clear petals of paper thin ice
Then melt
As another smile vanishes
Before it can form
Was that that smile
I ask myself
That smile I haven't seen in decades?
Do you selfishly enjoy
A Gekka Bijin, Queen of the Night
Blooming in your cold perpetual night?
Do you think that it blooms for you alone?
And that my deprived eyes
Might make your mouth close shut for another long year
Should you let me see even your thinnest of smiles?
You should know that
Should you
My faith in you would restart
In an instant
Not unlike the self-winding watch I wore to bed
The one that wound itself down
Completely
During one long restful winter night's sleep
Till I awoke
To a time I did not know
There was a time your smile could have
Melted away the coldest of wars
Thawed even mastodon grudge
Buried deep in iceshelf of disharmony
I need to see that smile today, especially
On this cold, cold Tuesday
With news running dry
Time standing still
Ginkgo trees shitting on the ground like stray cats
And late fall faces
No matter how young
Looking old, gray and glum
And with most everyone not asking perplexing questions
Like, "Is that the moon?"
My son asks me
When the moon is at its thinnest
Is that a smile, Dad?
I ask myself
When I think I see you smile
Your lips bloom
An inverted blossom of
Clear petals of paper thin ice
Then melt
As another smile vanishes
Before it can form
Was that that smile
I ask myself
That smile I haven't seen in decades?
Do you selfishly enjoy
A Gekka Bijin, Queen of the Night
Blooming in your cold perpetual night?
Do you think that it blooms for you alone?
And that my deprived eyes
Might make your mouth close shut for another long year
Should you let me see even your thinnest of smiles?
You should know that
Should you
My faith in you would restart
In an instant
Not unlike the self-winding watch I wore to bed
The one that wound itself down
Completely
During one long restful winter night's sleep
Till I awoke
To a time I did not know
There was a time your smile could have
Melted away the coldest of wars
Thawed even mastodon grudge
Buried deep in iceshelf of disharmony
I need to see that smile today, especially
On this cold, cold Tuesday
With news running dry
Time standing still
Ginkgo trees shitting on the ground like stray cats
And late fall faces
No matter how young
Looking old, gray and glum
And with most everyone not asking perplexing questions
Like, "Is that the moon?"
Monday, October 13, 2008
blues haiku #4
Halls waxed and ready
For youthful feet to scuff up
Hopes like fumes rise and then fall
For youthful feet to scuff up
Hopes like fumes rise and then fall
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Typography of Astronomy
The moon
At noon
Is a bullet point
In an otherwise perfect blue sky
Though...
The moon this night
Is bright
So bright, in fact,
Half the sky is blue, not black
As if to say, "I give it back, that blue
I stole from you
At noon."
All the while
The stars punctuate
The night in their
Subtle
But
Equally
Bright
Way
That
Which
They
Cannot
By
Day
.....................
.
. . .
.
.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
blues haiku
cold vending machine
all buttons glowing hot red
sultry summer night
販売機
ボタン売れきれ
夏の夜
はんばいき
ボタンうれきれ
なつのよる
all buttons glowing hot red
sultry summer night
販売機
ボタン売れきれ
夏の夜
はんばいき
ボタンうれきれ
なつのよる
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Monday, July 14, 2008
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
A War For Jim Morrison & The Doors
for Spc. Joseph Dwyer
This sky hides smiles
Lying like thief
Holding back tears
Reserved for deceased reptiles
Like you
Jim Morrison
I hold folded umbrella
In mock defense
Yet very much
Dependent on
Its promise to protect
I bask in the foolishness of this thought
Instead of say
Reading the real
Bad-news newspaper:
"The headache gray"
As Michael Stipe would say
Wishing it all away
But
Knowing well the world is raining blood
In untold megatons
Palms supine
I feel for rain
Rain
A real rain
One that may or may not ever come
But wouldn’t matter either way
Anyway
And
Like the liar clouds
I lie my own lie
Pretending to shine
My own sunshine
Denying the untold toll
Of Burmese souls
Or those taken by tornadoes
Tomahawks
Or other weapons our heavens have shat upon humanity today
Now shit-splashed about in Reuters gray:
Humid newspapers
Wilting in sadness
In newsstand
Command
Attention of
No one
With our shame deeper than the National Debt
We
Thought to be
Agents of change
Stand
Striped
Naked in orange
Exfoliated
Crushed
In unending pain:
An Escheresque loop of deceit
A Möbius bug strip collecting more and more lies
An endless PSA
Played over and over in our collective American mind
Ad infinitum
I think about the limbless men my age
I saw in Vietnam:
Whole lives without limbs
Without lips
Whole lives missing parts to their bodies
Phantom limbs
Signing
Mouthing
A strange language any standing man could understand
Telling the legacy of war in ways words could never
I put away my pocket-size English/Vietnamese phrase book
Speechless
In tears
Not wanting ever to return
To that dark
Shame-filled fold of mind
Should I press my eyelids tight this night
I can imagine Iraq War vets
Someday
In Iraq
In tears
At the sight of limbless there
There in the cradle of civilization
Rocking the world to sleep with
More boring war stories
More promises of peace
More lullabies
More lies
I may be the only man carrying an umbrella today
I may be the only man thinking these thoughts
Then again
You
Too
Lizard King
Mister Mojo Rising
May care
Then
The thought stops here
And the rain never comes
Photo: Warren Zinn, Army Times
This sky hides smiles
Lying like thief
Holding back tears
Reserved for deceased reptiles
Like you
Jim Morrison
I hold folded umbrella
In mock defense
Yet very much
Dependent on
Its promise to protect
I bask in the foolishness of this thought
Instead of say
Reading the real
Bad-news newspaper:
"The headache gray"
As Michael Stipe would say
Wishing it all away
But
Knowing well the world is raining blood
In untold megatons
Palms supine
I feel for rain
Rain
A real rain
One that may or may not ever come
But wouldn’t matter either way
Anyway
And
Like the liar clouds
I lie my own lie
Pretending to shine
My own sunshine
Denying the untold toll
Of Burmese souls
Or those taken by tornadoes
Tomahawks
Or other weapons our heavens have shat upon humanity today
Now shit-splashed about in Reuters gray:
Humid newspapers
Wilting in sadness
In newsstand
Command
Attention of
No one
With our shame deeper than the National Debt
We
Thought to be
Agents of change
Stand
Striped
Naked in orange
Exfoliated
Crushed
In unending pain:
An Escheresque loop of deceit
A Möbius bug strip collecting more and more lies
An endless PSA
Played over and over in our collective American mind
Ad infinitum
I think about the limbless men my age
I saw in Vietnam:
Whole lives without limbs
Without lips
Whole lives missing parts to their bodies
Phantom limbs
Signing
Mouthing
A strange language any standing man could understand
Telling the legacy of war in ways words could never
I put away my pocket-size English/Vietnamese phrase book
Speechless
In tears
Not wanting ever to return
To that dark
Shame-filled fold of mind
Should I press my eyelids tight this night
I can imagine Iraq War vets
Someday
In Iraq
In tears
At the sight of limbless there
There in the cradle of civilization
Rocking the world to sleep with
More boring war stories
More promises of peace
More lullabies
More lies
I may be the only man carrying an umbrella today
I may be the only man thinking these thoughts
Then again
You
Too
Lizard King
Mister Mojo Rising
May care
Then
The thought stops here
And the rain never comes
Photo: Warren Zinn, Army Times
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