poetry

yup, much more awesome though different than we’re taught.

poetry

and one day while lying in bed
and reading a clive staples commentary
on third or fifth-rate poetry,
it occurs to me that i’ve never written
a love poem. as in a poem about genuine
love and not the mushy gushy feeling
of pursuit and excitement. of the chase
so fleeting, wonderful yes, but no more love than avacado is ice cream though it shares a consistency.

and now married 8 years to the horribly imperfect, i think myself prepared
for a love poem. about dishes, fights, diapers, and choices again and again to be better than i think she deserves because i know undoubtably she’s being better than she thinks i deserve.
for though she sometimes thinks knows me to be an ass
she delights in my imperfection and offers patience with my foolishness.
finding that, in a way, we live thrive together somehow stronger with the constant struggle of maintaining one another;
stronger than we would be void of one another.
the choice so easy when weighed with the alternative.
so often left unweighed.
because to love is the choice.
the choice is to love.

the giant

poetry

depressed
modern
eating disease
today-america
apathetically excretes
missiles
and
inference

in god-like
proportions

equal in appetite
necessarily naive
an organism
kept ignorant
by the very structure
of her foundation

this cell,
laughs!
and whistles while he
labors!
for where else are
we to go?
where there is only
servitude, or exile?

(Fear) not

poetry

Roots are growing
stark dark
along the walls of my soul
they draw all the clear water
and i plow through memories
looking for that hurling wind
that carried in a seed of
destruction- and
(knocked me down)

from the
first scream of life
to the shock of all things first
to the fading relationships
to the colorful imaginary heroes
to the shadows of death
to the meltdowns
to the isolation
to the refreshing joyful moments
to the blurry vision of love
to the jolts of loneliness

all of it has come so far
entangled and chocked up pitfully
i can’t tell unhappiness from joy
with so much darkness weaved in

at night
when the lights go out
a voice calls for rescue
telling me that I know better than to fall
(close to the tree)
that i am not just rich fertile soil
for disaster to flourish in

with daylight, more roots grow
re-assailed,
i feel routine, i feel borrowed
tacky and useless
like a broken wood toy
vibrating phantom leaves

as every man desires to mend and be whole
I gaze at the sky
hoping for heaven to peek through
and distill the goal of my existence
for i want to be more than the clashing
hues of my essence.

 

“Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a desire fulfilled is a tree of life.”

the last light still on

poetry

in the last apartment at
the end of the island
carving beams out from the fog,
after the trains have started
to whisper and the fireflies
fallen asleep, when even the waves
kiss the beach with less breath,
when even the beach
kisses back with less stone

then, alone, there is a last light
still on, closing in
its distance from me, walking
over the water and calling
my name, and behind it

                          is you.

6.12

poetry

I used to carry a diamond
right here in my hand, I just know it,
a diamond, remember?
we used to hold it up to the sun.
you laughed at how silly I was
when I got distracted by the light’s
clean reflection, this happened,
I used to carry a diamond.
You have to remember, you loved it as I did,
a diamond that had grown in our hands.
I know it sounds foolish, you must think
that it could not have been, not so
perfect, so pure, so worth all the world-
this diamond of ours, this cold coal kiss
this bliss everlasting, what happened, what
happened, I used to carry a diamond.

What of it now? Lost, I think,
being too hard to destroy, but tossed to the sea,
it could be, it could be, that we will not
find it again. No funeral, pockets turned out,
no diamond, the end.

You Got the Wrong Guy

poetry

No, no, don’t call me that,
I told you, you got the wrong guy.
He ain’t me, or I ain’t him,
but either way, I’m not the man you’re looking for.
No, no, it’s not up to you, heck, it’s not up to me.
I am who I am, and I’m not him.
You’ve misheard, or been mistold,
you’d be better taking your allegations elsewhere.
Try as you might, plead if you will,
it makes no difference ‘cause I’m not your man.

it gets quiet enough,

and although it is rare it does happen
usually at night when the traffic has died down
and the only footsteps are drunk ones and
after the bar closes as those footsteps too
find beds to sleep in and even the pigeons
recognize when their dusty wings are beating
the air too loudly,
 

            for twenty seconds
 
and for whatever reason only if I am in the
bathroom but before the faucet is running, before
I am filling another glass of water or washing
my face and after the toilet flushes, even after
it is silent completely, if I’m not making noise
of my own, 

                        in these moments

when if you were to step outside, to finish
your glass of water or have a cigarette
you would find an odd chill waiting to lift
up the hairs on your arm and sneak under 
your shirt, not cold enough to lead you back
inside for a jacket, merely to note it as
“one of those weird summer night when it
cools down too much and maybe it means it
will rain soon”
 

                                    right then

when I am so close to sleep it seems only
under a pillow, when the day has shaken my
legs clean of muscle, when my eyelids are
sliding down a pole to a pile of sad dreams,
 

                                                if I listen carefully

I can hear four stories down and under the
sidewalk, the subway blurring by, and if 
I am lucky, it sounds like the end of the world. 

poetry

Counting Sheep

poetry

The sun rises
you hold me tighter
for i’m the one who’s always lost
and because you’re my dream
i hope you’d unravel me
and sew me back together
i’d better, i’d be beautiful
down to my ligaments
down to my mind
and when i slide
my undergarments back on
i’d believe that i’m kind of
a challenge, an intriguing riddle
a kind of virtue
and joy will always find me
when i close my eyes
(but) i go back to the dance
the urgency of a late night song
the yearning-
heart beats, collarbones and lips
in the silent words of your
almond shaped eyes
i read the world
and I, forever a passenger
a guest
wait

Saxsquatch

poetry

“Nights like these I wish I was dead,” she says
and he nods assent knowing
that could only be but about half true
when she’s been known to exaggerate
every now and then
and how could she know
what dead is like anyway
or if it’s any better
for that matter.

Wouldn’t she be in for it.
But he doesn’t tell her that
because he knows better,
knows that once she makes up her mind
you’d be daft to tell her otherwise.
He tried once and remembers
how well that turned out.
No sir, not at all,
and there’s nothing you or
anybody else can do about it.
So he keeps nodding
and says, “yeah, definitely,” every
thirty seconds or so
but who’s counting?
He’s not.

whumph

poetry

for these times we
need to argue
the facts when the
truth is blurred
with rhetoric
like blue mixes
with green to make
a blue-ish green.
you know, it doesn’t
really mix. the two
colors seem always
altogether distinct
but indistinguishable
in a strange it’s
obvious but not
entirely kind of
way which apparently
poetry is unable
to express.

at least mine.

Hard Work

poetry

Leaves fall every autumn
after dying and they
crumple up and blow away
and some people are just
the same but some people
write great records before
they go and instead of brown
mulched detritus we are left
with a snapshot of those leaves
in all of their glory and
we still must rake the yard
but the sitting room will be
beautiful
when we do finally come inside

Pictures

poetry

Oftentimes the most gorgeous pictures
hanging on the nicest walls
are covering the ugliest holes
and crookedest nails that there ever,
ever was

Those pictures get knocked down,
sometimes, and they tear out those
wretched hooks, and all that’s left is
the scars that were once hidden by
their beauties

I will not despair, however, when those
blemishes come to bear:
for though that frame may never hang
again, it will certainly
lean against the wall atop my
mantle

scattered and forever lost ?

poetry

you were sparks and burning flames
a mixture of colors
a sky blushing
briefly
with your existence –
always blood red

Born with fever
you could not drag yourself away from the
worlds of peaked suns and sirens
you were never you even when you tried

for all the love you got
left you hungry still
starving
you had a bite of rotten fruits
and the rot stuck
bound
you were never sure if
you’d cut deep enough
you sprayed your youth into the air
your feet barely touched the ground that
you were already in the air exploding

…and your ashes are everywhere
sticking to the people you loved

settling in a way you never could

 

Every Atom

poetry

An all Walt Whitman imitation—
“Song of Myself”

1
For every atom belonging to me belongs to you.
My tongue, every atom of my blood, formed from this soil, this air,

2
The smoke of my own breath, passing of blood and air through my lungs,
The sound of the words of my voice to the eddies of the wind.

3
To elaborate is no avail, sure as the most certain sure,
I and this mystery here we stand.
Clear and sweet, the unseen is proved by the seen,
Till that becomes unseen shall I postpone my acceptation and realization.

4
These come to me days and night and go from me again,
Apart from the pulling and hauling stands what I am.

5
I believe in you, swiftly spread around me the peace and knowledge
And I know that the hand of God is the promise,
And I know that the spirit of God is the brother,
And that creation is love, and limitless are leaves, and brown ants, and mossy scabs.

6
I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
A gift bearing the owner’s name, that we may see, and say
All goes onward and outward,
And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.

7
Has any one supposed it lucky to be born?

8
The little one sleeps in its cradle, living and buried,
I come and I depart.

9
The doors stand open and ready, and I am there.

10
You should have been with us that day.
I saw the far west and he came to my house, I heard his motions and led him in
And brought water, and gave him a room, and gave him clean clothes,
And remember perfectly well, I had him sit next me at the table.