in search of rain
or perhaps some wine
promise to sing
whichever lends me the time
to dance the whirl
to let go of the world
a hop, a skip, a jump from a curb
fly for an instant
downward splash
forget all troubles
blank-in the past
ignore the future
tunnel-in-to now
take a deep sip
take a bow,
take this all in-
for this is now
soak up the time
for your time is now.
(with joyous intent)
fallen
the skylight is round, I’m not sure how long I have been down here, seems like a lifetime, and I’m told by the suit behind the booth that is all I am allotted anyway, choice or by chance? I’m not sure frankly, these parts are not friendly, not deadly, just keep to your personal space sort of place, a pale place, there is enough light to survive, thrive? perhaps not, when moving about you lose sight of planes of existence, this all seems normal until you catch a beam for a dream to ride up on, what is beyond? and why do they look at me with such disdain, shadow faces sneer, canines glean, do they not see? the up there? monochromatic shirts, brown shoes, unisex doors and signs adorn the shoals of this box, everything is a box if you are contained, only if you see the walls, why did I have to look up? what evil impulse and seven years bad luck cause me to break the mirror in pieces so willfully, on the floor, there has to be one, a floor, but just a blurred mist where my feet should be, with a solid form, I am walking on something I pronounce, a dervish whirling, spinning about, the dos-si-do I do with my fellow captives, although they seem to have the arrogance of freedom about them (they never look up, really upward), and I do not have shackles per se, where did this seed of thought sprout, instantaneous? subcutaneous? every thing has an origin, that much I am almost mostly sure, did this come from out there? or in here? and how will I ever know?
sincerely,
searching for meaning
(unknown who found this note or who may have written it)
notes… one of those that just popped in my head, as if I was thrown down a hole and muddling about with fellow unawares but yet I was aware of whence I came, sort of a vision, faceless faces except for the mouths, rounded features, almost like animated stick figures but more like mannequins… that was what was rattling around my brow in this piece… as usual, all comments, thoughts, eyes and what not are appreciated. you could be watching law and order or something instead of browsing my page (because somewhere, at all times law and order is on… I tell you…)
so timing,
why then did you shoot me
for you are my princess-
or this a self inflicted wound
so I ask circumstance
who happens to be, to my left
after some contemplation
circumstance says ‘yes’
(wings are not always feathers)
for might I – fly?
even then-
imagine, a butterfly in flight
is an exercise
the so-delicate the so-soft the ballet pirouette
yet effort lies root the rouse;
to my friend, the hummingbird
a dervish of the common earth
a-wings a-blur
hand a scepter to the nectar queen
move forward from that pounding heart,
I might rather be a simple gull and glide
on above ocean tides, falls and rise
suspended as with silken threads, drawn a puppets ride
swaying forth like a child’s swing
as someone else pushes-
perhaps… even that… the hands of god.
(for the uninitiated, this is freeform where I sit on my porch and let the thoughts flow… sometimes they even do)
sitting outside and being able to unpack the day has been far and few between, aside from life, and winter, and all those things, so tonight, at least a window cracked open for some time to unwind, the day struck 80, so I’m told, I can not say it felt that warm, but a welcome departure from the lately norm, but tonight? not as nice, in fact there is a gale warning, so I’m told, but I happen to enjoy listening to the stories of the wind, especially a busy one, and one not carrying rain, more like performance art really, wind does not make noise it simply rushes over the strings provided, slides over the reeds, bends to creeks, reverbs in the hollows, even here, staring at typical suburbia, my neighbor has company, they all drive hondas, but the not so subtle voice of the wind is able to bring me somewhere else even if I remain right here in place, the pine tree is making an odd clicking sound, almost like tic tacs falling on a tile floor one by two, lights dance, well, at least what blocks them is swaying like peekabo with a shake, the wind brings me a reprieve, empty branches reach out like the skeletons of ancient horned beasts, lined up the trunks like sentinels in formation, at least for the time being, nests of antlers, barren like bone, I enjoy the build up of a strong gust, I can hear it coming like a big ocean wave roaring, hard to gauge the direction until you are inundated in the bluster-under, and then gone, I wonder if this land, this home, will retain some memory of me, some piece, some energy, nearly my whole life have I haunted this space, I think of being buried here, or maybe my ashes can be spread here, so I may remain, here, in this comfortable familiar earth, my little patch, shared through the ages for sure, mine for now as long as I endure, and I feel peaceful as the wind has washed the toil from my daily brow, even if – only for now.
(when a word spurs a thought…)
e·qui·poise
/ˈekwəˌpoiz/
balance, the easiest to understand and the most difficult to master (if such a goal can be truly achieved), the word (equipoise) reminds me of horses, for obvious reasons, and that may be a lesson, for the truly great ones combine speed, strength and stamina, of course that is for racing, and perhaps therein lies a key as well, knowing what race you should be in – or in a race at all, for just as fortuitous as a horse that carries a cart, or lovers in the park, a component of balance is finding your talent or at least the zip code in which it resides, for there are probably too many of us enlisted in races unsuited for our particular gifts, for horses are not alike, so many types and breeds, dancing arabians, driving stallions, brute clydesdales and more, those little miniature ones that are all the rage, can we find balance in general when we are galloping on the wrong path? yes, at some point humanity is the same boiled down set of DNA but in a day to day sense we are our own countries, and if there is a tempest within your borders you surely can not reconcile with your neighbors, so I wonder, how better to chase the ideal, this equipoise, maybe this all culminates from realization and not overt relation to society at large, to learn to quell our own little city-state, to be truly happy with the construct of what we are rather than chasing what is told to us about the gilded castle tall upon the hill, let the fields overflow with the wildflowers of our unique nature, for trees to grow in anyway towards the sun, let the world interlock like puzzle pieces fully formed, but only until we reach a balance, an honest brokerage within ourselves.
I think of you every day
like the sun rising
that simple-
that feel
a gentle warmth
on my cheek, on my eyelids,
as I see you with them closed,
I think of you every day –
the guilt is the passion of the poison
as I am a circled serpent bite embraced,
I think of you every day,
as I drive past, I drive
from the freedom tower to the empire state
as a made-up façade running along my side like a slide
as the sun glides rises up
like a passenger riding in a train
watching scenery pass by
yet, I’m in my car
almost a dream like state
I am so far – from, yes, so far from-
you,
I think of you every day
and yet
sometimes there is grace
for even in this pit of despair
from which I still breath and draw all air-
for there
there was always the truth
there was and always will be love embraced
and for that
is all that saves me
most days… most days.
notes… I wanted this to feel like my thoughts, stop and go, and yet flow – at times, is that not more real than perfection sometimes ? I realize poetry can just be this amazing stream but sometimes I am trying to create life, real life, real thoughts, and that is never perfect, do I want to create some perfect things sometimes? yes… but not this time, this is being life on purpose…
(stream of consciousness / thought post)
as per my usual musings, I was driving to work this morning, listening to some tunes, perhaps bopping along and singing, so if you saw a guy on the GSP kind of looking foolish this morning, that would have been me, most likely, so anyway, the word ‘strainer’ materialized in my upper ether realm, the idea, so simple, yet so impossible (or?), if I could only pour myself (metaphorically or perhaps spiritually speaking) into a strainer, to let the best parts settle in and let the rest strain out to escape down into the drain of forgotten past lives… why on earth did I think that I had to choose, between one of those old school metal mesh ones, the plastic ones or one that is flat out strange– I don’t know, but my inner voice was telling me so, and to choose wisely it seems, so I did, and for whatever reason (I told myself to myself it was ‘old school’), I picked the metal mesh type for this imagined realization, so I crammed in all of me to let the process begin, this seemed like a simple mental exercise, one to exorcize my demons or just feelings I no longer cared to have taking up space in my inner abode, the cracks in my what seemed to be a perfect argument started to unfold in the folds of my brainium, just like pouring in cooked pasta, what if there was overflow? you never pick up the bits that fall in the sink, perhaps you toss them to the dog, but does that make them less than the strained survivors? what if that is a piece of parchment that has the cypher to unlock the code in the remaining strands? panicked now, I thought I had such a simple elegant solution, instead I am being titanic-ed by minutia, also, when you strain some things, inevitably some gets through, perceptible or not, something is lost in the process, more than you might want, or more that you might not never know, besides, everything, all your stuff kind of gets mashed down, sure the top looks perfect and all the extraneous liquid is gone – but – the bottom thoughts or stands are being pushed up against the wall sort of like the crush at the stage in a concert hall… damn, my metaphor has faltered and failed me now, I suppose there is no quick solution for unpacking myself…
perhaps I need to approach this like going through an old closet, looking at each thing, making a determination, and travelling forward or backward from there, this takes more time, but perhaps offers less orphans, cast offs, miscreants, regrets, all of these, rather than examine flipping about a trapeze, on the ground, grounded, methodical with a giant magnifying lens, to relish the details, the flaws, live them once again, and then – perhaps, then fold them back up neatly or dispense of them.
‘cubicle’
an interrogation of flies-
I sit at my desk
cigarette, half cocked, not lit
ashtrays, ashtrays are long gone my friend
papers, semi-arranged, by year, by slot, desktop
or what the cat lady dragged in-
priorities rise and fall like a tide
always coming in, always high tide
I would like to think I made something of a life
wife, kids, but no, here I am, here I am in this-
this prison to pension, this desk.
notes… in my mind this is double edged, I pictured an old tortured soul sitting behind a desk somewhere in the 70s with stacks of things on all corners, almost a hoarder situation, kind of a noir comic vibe, I don’t smoke, never did, but that vibe, the angry, gritty, smoker stuck in a corner with no smokes, ashtray an anachronism laughing, ending a life where you fought so hard for truth and found naught… just what was in my head when I wrote this. oh, and yeah, in a way reflective of me, in my newish shiny office, I have a window, and that makes me the happiest performing animal in the zoo I call my office home…
So… you know, the moon, that thing, in mysterious ways can do mysterious things, some howl, not me, not this soul, but my mind does wander and wonder at it all...
(1)
from pine tar to the bore
forgive me my grace
a bit too comfortable in my grave
on shadow moon
and misty tides
a rider appears
a delivery, a note of handwritten dour
as we prophesied
in this late hour
for the signs all gesticulated in blood
nurtured in the knowledge
that the past has returned.
(2)
with a somewhat lazy eye
climbs upward the ladder
rung by rung up hazy sky
for an obscure moon there
on this late february night
a caged celestial bubble
lost in the pool
cast in the night
Shades of My Garden 