The Weight, Enlightened Over Time

We write 

Because we cannot 

Bear not to 

Bear witness how 

It lightens us, 

Time after time.

 

Homecoming Song

--for my cousin, the silent one 

In the stifling 
Heat of this, the longest 
Day of the year,

While incessant cicadas 
Fiddle fickle time away, 
Just as your coffin is 

Being lowered, to hear 
From out of the shadows 
Of wind-swept cypresses, 

That one lone 
Nightingale's uplifting 
Air! 

 

 

Subjunctive

In the mood 

To wonder 

At the wondrous

As if it always were 

No wonder 

It was.

 

 

Huxley In Gaza

All the witnesses 

Were present 

But no one able 

To distinguish which ones 

Were eyeless.

 

Twofold

God loves each of us as if there were only one of us. 

--St. Augustine 

My love's my ballast; 

Wherever and whenever 

I find myself 

Weightless, she takes me 

Over the moon with her, twice 

As weightless as before.

 

 

Windfall Inclination Complex

--for John Phillips 

the unheeded 

word is what 

we think 

we never hear, 

though it keeps 

calling for us 

to draw nearer, say 

to the wind- 

swept pines 

shaping all that 

we wish to hear.

 

 

Impatient Fledgling

While you wait 

For the next poem 

To show itself, that restless 

Small bird nesting 

In your heart has grown strong 

Wings and will 

Soon flutter away.

 

How The World Turns

It couldn’t 

Care less about your so- 

Called life’s work—the words 

You’ve chosen 

With so much TLC, 

Now hate how 

You tendered them simply 

To show off more 

Than they could ever 

Hope to endure.

Subterfuge

Clearly a shroud, 

He was at his best 

Whenever he took 

Pains to write only 

As much as was 

Needed for him 

To remain hermetically 

Under wraps.

 

 

Classic Myops

Look at it 

This way--

You could've been born 

A spectacle with only one 

Gigantic bulging eye- 

Ball planted right 

Smack dab 

In the middle 

Of your bucolic, 

Dead-to-the-world 

Forehead and everyone 

Who's anybody, including 

Some shifty dude who called himself 

NoMan knows how that turned out,

Stake my word on it.

 

 

Caveat

Trouper, muse on 

This a bit: 

You're a poet only 

When caught in the act 

Of writing; the rest 

Of the time you're just

 

AWOL, derelict 

In your duties--

Get back in line 

Or pack it in, 

Double time.

Poem For The Duration

--for Eleni, forever 

Love remains 

The last word 

In a world that never lasts 

Long enough.

 

Writer's Stinking Rut Grotesque

You know you're in 

A thorny one when 

Everything once rosy's now 

Coming up wilted, decomposing 

In a reeking kitchen sink.

 

 

The Art Of Hearing Amongst The Multitudes

 

Hear, hear--
Odd to be here 

Where each human
Sound sounds 

Like no other--even
The same ones

Can't tell the difference
Between them.

 

 

 

When You Can't Sleep, What Else Can You Do But Write?

Which is what the poet 

Jim Daniels says 

About poets plagued by insomnia 

While on hectic reading tours; well, 

I’ve never been on one but 

I’ve never lost any sleep 

Over it either, so you just might 

Keep in mind that sometimes 

Much of the writing of a poem 

Takes place while you’re sleeping— 

Try sleeping on that for a change.

 

 

Once Upon A Time, Naturally

I wrote only about 

How the wind sculpts

The shape of pines,

And not how 

The bed of needles lining

The floor under them 

Helps form how we look

At things round us--

If only we thought 

To lift the coverlet

To examine the mildew

And the impending

Mushrooming rot.

Biblical Nightmare Spill

Chums, our scripture 

Of hate's full 

To the brim and loves 

Overflowing, searing 

Bosoms of dreaming,

Dead-to-the-world 

Cherubim.

 

 

Stoic Dreamer Stuck In The Doldrums

Snap out of it, kiddo— 

The wind that took you 

This way and that has nothing 

More to give you—it’s about time 

You live with that.

 

 

The "Unfortunately It Just So Happens" Fugue

Beginning with 

Each day is 

The start of something 

New, that ho-hum message 

We were hammered with 

All these years, and which 

At 80, I now suspect is in- 

Deed true but I also 

Seem to recall too few 

Town criers remonstrating 

To the tune of 

I told you so but you 

Weren’t listening to the beat 

Of that thumping boot- 

Tromping music blues, 

 Were you?

 

 

Rx Against Vacillation

You will not live 

Through this 

Hell if you let 

Your guard down 

Even for a minute— 

While the clock keeps 

Time ticking away 

Each second like 

Your life depends on it, 

Just this once 

Write it down right.

 

Run Silent, Run Deep

Bouyant, self- 

Satisfied with your craft 

Turning out shallow 

Wake after wake of far- 

Fetched mixed metaphors 

Under the sonar that seeks 

To find you out before 

You can escape, sneak 

Back now to the safe harbor

 

Of the ship’s slip, moored 

And with the fickle wind finally 

Gone out of your sails, fall back in- 

To that narcotic, 

Familiar deep, 

Sleep— 

You’ve earned your keep.

 

Cynic Bitching Frugality

What is necessary 

Fare we always take in 

Just the right amount, 

That which is 

Leftover, we leave 

For the bellyachers, 

Who always lack everything.

 

 

Mesmerizing Prestidigitation

Willing 

Victims of the phony, 

Once more we find the bogus 

Poet in his medium with us 

Wondering how 

He put us there.

 

 

Classy Catty C-Class

Seriously now,
On a cold winter’s day

A poem should be a lot
Like these three chummy

Felines cuddled round each
Other on the still warm

Hood of this classic cool gun-
Metal gray Mercedes-Benz coupé.

 

  

 

Fishing For The Poem That Got Away

To have your line 

Baited and dunked in- 

To the legendary 

“Rosy-fingered” Aegean 

Waiting for the slightest 

Tug that tells you something 

Classically fishy is dangling 

At the end should be enough 

 

To tell you you’re all 

Wet and it’s well 

Past time to reel 

Yourself in.