Of Hope and Fear

Hope is a gift
So rarely given,
Mostly hoarded
Like money kept
By proverbial misers
Stuffed beneath a moth eaten
Mattress, turning into
Crumbling remnants of
Dead presidents, smiling
With their inky green
Faces encrusted by
History's lost pages
Where they slowly learned
Each secret handshake
In sullen observance
Of bogus brotherhood
Ruled by its unblinking eye
Floating across the dollar bill and
Filling checkbooks with dim sums
(Dim ditties diddle-dim)
Each figure glaring
Like the tuneless melody
Of St. Anthony's fire
Blazed in a single mind.

Fear is a gift
Freely delivered
Like an invite to a tea party
Behind old Bedlam's walls
Where the end of history
Led to a minor pause
Next to the edge of reason
And the cliff-jumping lads
Took to zip-lining
Across the land
Leaving only a faint trace
Like a human face etched
In the sand
Till high tide
Worked its way.
Just another day at the whaling station
Before the Pequod sailed.

Shenandoah

In the shadow
Of the mountain,
More shadows glide
As hawks and crows,
Crowd against a sun
That's pale and sullen
In a dreary sea
Of mist and sky.

Far in the valley,
Tiny and serene
Lay rolling farms
Like a small train table
In dappled light and
Looking reserved
Like a perfect
Photograph, fixed
And frozen in an
Infinite depth of field.

Then came the rain
And the fog
And a chill that seeped
Through the cabin's walls
And every tree glistened
In the dimming light
Like gossamer wings
Taking flight.

Like a Child Again

As I crossed the steps
To your house
I suddenly felt small,
Like a child again,
Still mystified by a world
Far removed
From simple wonder.

When I was very young,
Each creak of the house
Was like a ghostly presence
Sneaking through dark hallways
Searching for its own
Lost corner.

I learned to bar hop
At the age of five,
Courtesy of my uncle
Who was a legend
From his days as a leather head
(Though I only understood this
Long after he was dead).

Sometimes at my aunt's house
I would sleep in a window's seat
And wake in the morning
With sunlight pressing
Through the frosted glass.

Criss Cross

Withering Christ
Criss cross
Passion imprecise
Hushed confessions
Dim lit rooms
Like a phone booth
Minus loose change
No dimes for sin
No dimes for the sinner
Like a toll booth
Stuck somewhere
Near the gates of Hell
Last hopes near fading
By a rose colored window
Passion imprecise
Like an altar mislaid
Stripped for sacrifice
Withering Christ
Criss Cross
No final words
Just a relic
Packed in ice
While the prayer
Grows exhausted
From the prayer
Like a candle
Near extinction
Sweat vapors
Make fading trails
Amen to night
A final toll
Yet coming
Criss cross
Passion imprecise.

Life Lessons

1.

Catch the sky
With an open hand
And pocket each cloud
You find.

2.

A penny saved is worth less
Than two birds in a bush.

3.

Step on a crack
And break your mother's back
But a ball bat
Is infinitely more effective.

4.

Time waits for no man
But it occasionally waits
For just the right woman.

5.

A fool and his money
Catches more honey
Than flies.

6.

Beautiful dreamer,
Light unto me,
Buddha is sleeping
With a wake up at three.

7.

Each day is a precious gift
To be shared and saved
But never hoarded.

8.

There is never enough time
So don't bother
Wearing a watch.

9.

All men are equal.
Some are simply shorter.
It's their destiny.

10.

Catch the sky
With an open hand
And chase the sun
Every day.

The Last Rave

Twilight's last gleaming
So turn on the lights
Before the dark age falls
And we stumble into night.
Armageddon is here
So get ready to fight.

Chorus:Economic meltdown
And global collapse.
Too much sturm und drang
Is gonna bite your ass

Four horsemen riding
From the gates of hell
Stopping at your town
And ringing your bell,
Spreading new diseases
Like a toxic spill.

Chorus:Economic meltdown
And global collapse.
Too much strum und drang
Is gonna bite your ass.

2012 is the target
For the world to blow,
And doom is the racket
That will fill the bill.
So run for the bunker
Before it close.

China Blue

The nature of your mystery
Is not the unknown contours
Of your mountains draped in mist.

It is, instead, the ease
With which you assume
So many forms
And still retain
A dreamer's sense of grace.

Your beauty is transit and elusive,
For a single well turned gesture
Invokes a thousand songs.

The Serpent Mounds of the Midwest

Connecting links and
Multiple lines
In stone and mud.
Earthen shapes
Tracing paths from
Stars to stones.
The meaning is lost
Within its riddle
(The riddle lost
Within its form).

Mysteries coiled
Like a serpent
In the sun.
Sinuous and suggestive,
Resting before it strikes.
From the snake
Came knowledge
As well as pain
(we are all united
In this single refrain).

The makers are gone
(Unknown, unmourned).
The meaning is gone
(Unknown, misread).
The culture is gone
(Unknown, quite dead).
Even the mounds
Are mostly gone
(Plowed and bled).

But nestled in
The warming earth
The snake remains.

How Do I Tell You

How do I tell you
what I feel
Each time your
simple kiss
Reminds me of our
passion, still there
Despite the many years.


How do I even begin
to describe
The elegant island
of your back or
The slender reed
of your neck.
The beauty of your eyes
and the joyous secret
Of your smile.

The Economic Report

The muddled message
of desert dreams
Crashing about
like an opiate fit
Thrown by the huddled masses
Just before
They dropped their chains
in fervent hope
(lurking deep in their hearts)
That they too
Could go shopping
(each day in the market place)
Only to find the shelves
going bare
While they fidgeted with
their last two dollars
Buried deeper than their
parents' graves
In the silky tattered
folds of moth balled purses
And there, as the chasm opened
to faith long lost
Did they finally cry
to some distant
Spot in the sky
where they heard
The wizard lived
behind fluted drapes
In a seersucker suit
selling ice cream
On the side.

Memories

Perhaps - Remember.
Remember what?
Aside from rambling thoughts
Confusion rampant like
A dreamy if languid fog.

Fragments like a broken bowl
Containing bits of wisdom
And fractured moments
Made of faded snap shots
Left hidden in the back of
An old paperback.

I have forgotten more
Than I had known
And remember less than
A tiny sum
Of where I've been or
Who I've seen.

In the Drought

Bleached and weathered
rows of tattered stalks,
Crisp and golden from
endless sun and days.

Crows made lazy circles,
never dropping.
Never raising
against the azure sky.

So much waste
when your father died.
The world went dry
And cruel
Yet beautiful,
like a Burchfield scene.

We drove silent
through dusty fields.
Nothing ever seemed
the same again.

Epitaphs From the Cambridge Cemetery

Feelings Were Her One Misfortune
so it said,
somewhere next to the dog
who at least was
a Faithful Friend.

She Did What She Could
not that it was much
but what can you say -
one should not speak ill
of the dead
(just backhand them instead).

August

Talk meanders with the shifting breeze
and thoughts slip silently beneath the black,
unsettled ponds.


Early blossoms have decayed and
untended gardens have faded into lawns.
Mornings seem so clear while
each afternoon slumbers toward
long shadows.
Fireflies have given way to the crickets
incessant song.

A Brief Soliloquy

On restless nights crowded
with intermittent meditations
of early selves forgotten
and futures lost
in endless rounds of
jabber and digressions,
only then do I remember
my recent, post-dated sense
of resignation

News Clips

A boy age 8
was struck
by a trolley
while waiting
for a train.

A witness
remembered,
in her senile years
a red bandanna
around the boy's neck.

The driver,
heartbroken,
was detained
past supper
and retired within
a year.

To Sophie Brzeska

Welcome woman

To your world of shit.

Embrace your life

Of piss and pain.

The moon, your mood,

Disdains your ambitions.

Fetid birth

Is your one reward.

Destiny - A Prologue

"...Maybe any human being was his own enigma which he would take with him to the grave."
-William Faulkner

Its strange to say
but there's nothing to be done about it.
It's a junky world full of jukeboxes,
radios, and songs about love and death
and endless highways.
The concrete strings it all together.
Four lanes, six lanes, twenty or more,
if you can make sense of all that.
It's all the same.

More motion and less location.
You got to keep driving like a shark
in the sea.
The locus is the focus of reality.

The asphalt sings a lonely song,
a piston-popping hymn.
A dream of love and motor drive.

S&M, B&D
S-E-X, M-T-V.

Life is like a commercial break
with all of the boring parts
mixed in with crazy spurts of
nostalgia and revulsion.
Emotions make for the strongest cage.

Strange to say.
But maybe it's true
that the universe could exist
in a single drop of our morning coffee.
Maybe.

The universe is really a small place,
full of smaller specks.
There is no vital stuff
except electricity.
We call it destiny.

The outerbelt only seems that way.
Infinity is really just a circle
which is why we think it's eternal.
But we call it the outerbelt.
You could live on it forever.
Strange to say.

Dogs Bark in the Himalayan Night

"Dogs bark in the Himalayan night."

That is the state of these times.

Like the dogs of Constantinople, bound

And abandoned in their sacks.

Leather bound or vinyl -

Does it matter?

Like the voice of the Popol Vuh,

Lost histories eventually return as songs.

Dreams drift between the stars

And we creatures, burnt and ravaged,

Lumber toward the sea.

"Dogs bark in the Himalayan night."

The House With Broken Windows

Vacant

Like an empty face.

We are alone, you and I,

Abandoned (though we are both

Weighted with debris).

So much for sentiment

(often false)

And memory

(misleading at its best).

Its accumulation wears the

Owner thin.

Scissors cut paper

And paper wraps rock.

Was there once hope?

Hardly, though the illusion

Is hard to shake.

Endings are contained

In all beginnings

And the text between the

First and final words

Is often arbitrary

(though some have called it

Destiny).

It has rained

In the bedroom.

Water warps the floor.

Erosion melts most everything

In time's meandering course.

Rock breaks scissors.

The front faces North

But the door points West.

The sun is a constant

Except at night.

Near a window by the door

One chair remains (though

It was never meant for sitting).

And paper wraps rock

(do you remember the game?)

Snow has fallen

Between the rafters,

Hushed in confession.

Is it memory or simply

A shadow?

The difference is mute.

All houses are full of

Such shadows.