Certain Times

There are certain times
when all things come gracefully to your plate:
The overwhelming gratitude
climaxes
and the opportunities
seem endless.

There are certain times when everything
you know pauses
and you and your comrades in spirit
take a slow jaunt through
The length of one moment;
purposely, like sponges absorbing life.
Moving quietly behind
your own heartbeats
while finding blessing
in every breath;
inhaling the magnitude of the human experience.

This is one of those times.


To Ever
October 29, 1998

Appeal

‘Appeal the decisions - fellow beings
appeal the misfortune an’ painful things.
Ask for mistrial - make your objection:
Ask for more love, kindness and affection’

Burton Sunrise

Predictable, but not promised, comes this morning,
Man waited by - the night
to resurrect his mortality
massaged by gifted light.

The meandering wonder, the morning’s rise
over the horizon’s lip.
To compromise the fainting moon
as the stars bow -- then dip.

Hallowed is the clouded glow
that breaks through by it’s fire,
to blanket, both, man and beast;
majestic arrival.

There! A message it comes to bring
speaking the language - Now.
(cradled in the Hands of mighty awe)
sings: “Turn, breath, live, grow!”

Coaxed by order it keeps it’s course
through the blinding glare,
“I’ve come to execute your sight,
I am your sun, still
I am here.”

J'ai Vecu

Do I play the king well?
(Is the crown transparent
my ego in reflection.
Is the golden key to my kingdom
strapped to my heart;
majestic or stealth
to my intentions?)

Is it now
that I accept nobility
more than before
or am I not the hierarchy
proposed by my hands?

I know of this:
A villain, I feel
wearing my shoes.

I come to terms with my misery
by holding my apathy
and lie
by a showing of my teeth.
I court the day, with magic
for it knows little of
death
that silently, purposely
guards my reserved moment.

Learned

‘...but to fill with hope this void of gray.’


What I’ve learned
and heard
and seen
is hardly what I claim to be;
that of choice and fear and empathy
and all the misery between.

Some same, “Misery loves it’s company”
while others think, “I don’t give a damn.”
Either way - its wind may blow
to the lot of them: I am what I am.

Some say honor burns brightly, some blindly
a torch - per say - for truth.
I say, “Come to terms with idealism,
either way - fools - I want proof.”

I Saw A Picture Tonight

I saw a picture tonight.

It was of a man with only one arm
And only one leg, sitting
By the side of a dirty river,
Bathing his two young children.

I thought to myself:
Look at this man.
Know that God’s love
Reflects on him
As much as it does
on yourself.

And a sense of relief,
Accompanied by peace
came over me.

Maybe because I could
Feel I was not taking
More than I am allotted
of God’s attention.
Or maybe that I could
never
Fall low enough
not to qualify
For His love.
Or maybe it was all about
Gratitude for me
Or sympathy for them.

But surely it must have been this:
No one may notice
This man and his children
But I had been assured
In a moment
That God did.

Lost

Dividing Light

There is a dividing light - parting
partaking by those to come
partook by those to leave.
Nestled carefully between is divinity
balanced flawlessly
(a center)
in the prism of all
development and decadence.

Spanning from Alpha to Omega;
catching in its web - both
ignorance and defiance -
yes - all that justice places
and mercy regards, between.

Am I arriving at my destination
or am I denying my journey?
Am I careful to enhance humanity
or is my apathy well enough?
Am I one step from the dividing light
or am I once step past it?

Ego's Philosophy

Surely
to feel the reality
like astronomy
bearing down on me.
Like the gods crying
catastrophe;
will I burn in hell?
Well we’ll just have to wait and see.

My bad luck
is my new ‘winning’ streak
But every breath - I breath
still brings life to me.
But when I die, I pray not the eulogy:
‘Here he fell
- downed -
by his ego’s philosophy.’

Giant

I am a giant today.

I will carry a voice of prayer at every moment.
I know my breath is on lease by a Greater Party and can be taken at any moment.
I will keep my eyes open, my heart free of selfishness; as so to acknowledge,
to accept the smallest of miracles.
I will adopt the words of angels.
I will amend my anthems according to personal revelation.
I will take one or two steps closer to the light; I will not be idle.

I am a giant today.

I will have love and tolerance towards all.
I will hold my tongue to protect the dignity of others.
I will, in humility, yield to my own evolution:
From notion to knowledge to wisdom.
I will be sincere.
I will take personal responsibility for my actions.
I will lead my family to the sunshine.

I am a giant today.

I will define my motives, to keep recklessness at bay.
I will respect others free will, expecting the same.
I will take a little less and give a little more.
I will take action, with mercy.
I will approach no one on bended knee, save it be God.

I am a giant today.

When She Was Here

When she was here
she was
like fear stuffed away,
like pain in remission,
like innocence evolving.
She was my Juliet.

But now that she’s gone
It’s a short distance from my lips to my ear.
It’s like a long walk with sorrow;
holding hands with anger.
Like listening to the memories play their tune, fading;
like tears lingering on stone eyes.

Untitled

Someone said
I had to begin again.
Living life with all the sin, again.
All the hopes and ‘nopes’ and giving, in again.
Someone said
I had to begin again.

Someone said
I had to move ahead they said.
Living life with what’s in my head, they said.
All the blood I’ve bled and love I’ve shed, they said.
Someone said
I had to move ahead.


September 22, 1992

She Is No Coward

She’s lost in a crowd even when she’s silently alone.
Even when there is not, not even one shadow to entertain her imagination.
But what ‘they’ say or what ‘they’ do is enough
to materialize, real life, in her head, when all else is gone.
I suppose she knows she has to face ‘them’ tomorrow
or the next day or someday, too soon.

There is a voice, stilled, whispering logic behind everything else
in her head. An outline in the doorway and between them - a mob
of dark figures, spinning and pushing.
Sometimes she seems as if she can’t come to the beckoning of it;
she can never get close enough.

Maybe she’s got too many memories wired to the smell
of these things, of anything -
She feels like crawling into a corner, tail between her legs;
she is no coward, but she’s lost her ‘battle plan.’

I was there. I know it was ‘peachy’ when there was nothing to be done
or always something to say.
The madness, she thought, crept in one night, but it was always there.
I imagine she ran too fast in her youth to take notice
or excused it as a glitch in mortality.

She was making head way, I saw it in her eyes;
the wind to her back. Any friends about would vouch for her, as I.

Now she looks, as she feels there is a hole in her head and all of lives’
meaningful things out, drifted up.
Tired and confused like a broken ‘vet’
who’s war cry is now a whisper, crackling
through a tube in his neck.


To Heather
2005

I, Humbly, Peeked

A parcel of light
hewn down
from the highest heights.
One to touch my hard-baked soul
even to pierce my parched, empty spirit.

Contingent on my will to open ‘mine eyes’
so to welcome a polished glow
for my being;
eyes from which I humbly peek.

To learn just enough;
to hear the sound of a distant whisper.
Yes, to feel the cadence of a marching force.

To yearn enough;
to lie by the wayside the self pity of
‘mine own’ maladies.
Yes, to compel my senses to soften themselves
so to be permeable to
a parcel of light.


2004

Our Epitaph

Thus - it is written:
in blood - our epitaph.
In Greek - our travels
hanging dangerously from the clock.
My own is of ‘ash foundation’ and ‘golden feet’
as I have repeated in an all too odd fantasy:
The fair skin and red brow
the shapely teeth, on the carefully
conspicuous smile.
‘Cold air and warm lips’
tightly pinched together to keep our ‘real’ alive;
like my own cancerous egg.
Wasted - filler proposing replacements for -
the lovers.
But still in our hands, closely woven in another time
(precise in its function)
lied down a web - so faithfully knotted.
And yours - is the name sung from trumpets
tattooed on many a palm
the feathers of a nodding angel
plucked, prematurely.
But - now - with voice
the mass must recognize your eyes -
a miracle, none the less, like from the banks of the Red Sea;
by your right hand - blind men shall see.
And now, I must understand how the inspiration
comes, motivated by ‘the experience’ and not the fantasy of.
How the blank space - between us - lacks hope
and cultivates, only tragedy;
played out, written in blood
our epitaph


To Heather
February 1998

Cukoo Birds

Do you feel as though we’ve ‘spread’ ourselves?
Stretched ourselves too far - fighting armies
from a multiple of fronts;
like ‘shrink’ wrap lying, warping, slowly against the heat.

Like a pair of cuckoo birds - wound too loosely -
who barely step outside the clock - into the sun;
running - in place - as fast as we can.
Carrying with us a basket full of our misfortunes.

We’ve come from two far camps, equally diverse or simply bland.
What we devise inspire the next of us - the upgrades
inside our four walls - into the sunlight.
Our equation for our offspring is to make them free;
free will is always the standard - the hope - of great people.
Like giant scrolls furled open before us - defining our plans;
read - between the lines is profound, indefinable love.

Do you feel as though we’ve ‘stacked’ ourselves?
Towering from the heights, teetering - swaying
from a multiple of fronts;
like a rising wave, fighting, firmly against the wind.

Like a pair of cuckoo birds - wound too tightly
who would soon as peck at your hand as to shake it;
frozen - in place - praying as humbly as we can.
Carrying with us a basket full of our opportunity and misfortunes.


To Heather
2005

Sweet

I never told you
about so many things:
the cotton candy and elastic dreams
that taste so sweet but always seem
to snap back at me.

I told you once
of my weak element
all cracked and faded
and broken and bent
and you left me.

There have been lifetimes before
and still lifetimes yet,
but for this lifetime
patience is the anthem
and kindness the way.

Will God interrupt the voice which is false -
So we may arrive where "true stillness" resides?
In that stillness where the soul truly moves.

Wisdom carries itself in the splinters.
What then of a fallen tree?
Let us carve it into a wonderful shrine
and spread its seeds.

Travels of Love

I feel the love in me go out and go into you.
A test of compassion without the effort.
The flow of the divine empathy, near me
traveling through me.
It is not my love - but the Greater Love.
I must recongnize the grace in it
or it stops in me
and dissolves.
And so this is my call to action -
to continue its movement
these ripples
as the perpetual travels of love.

Unfinished Moment

Today I (nearly) died.
My demons would like to claim this victory here;
claiming I was merely a spoil of war.

But in reality the poison ran out;
the poison always runs out.
With the poison I ran out, and I ran and I ran…
And you always come down.
Just like that, I came down,
but six feet down is as far down I came come.

I forgot someone told me
that life is always “fresh”
if you look for the miracles.
I - only knew life was always “frozen”
If I passed them by.

So today I (nearly) died.

My Contribution To This Earth

And my body will fall like a brick to this earth
stale and cold, lying peacefully on the ground of my own
Gethsemane:
This Garden of pain.

Lead tears may travel the long path down my cheeks,
but they cannot tickle a dead man.

And maybe a lone traveler, one hundred years hence
may stumble over this patch of grass
so bright and green, tall with sharp blades;
maybe to sit here for rest. If this be so, may their joy be great,
for this patch of grass just may be the most beautiful
ever known.

And below in the moist soil, my sacrifice to life,
which is so ironically, death.
My contribution to this earth.

In this place lodged between heaven and hell
where I have dwelled for such a short time.
This same place that has given me nothing,
save a broken heart and a tear stained face,

where I once prayed to my God:
“May I never forget the pain this world gave me,
so that I may never return.”

1992

I Am Drug

I am a drifter.
I am a splinter on the two by four of life.
I am a liar.
I am the fire engulfing your heart.
I am a broken down dream.
I am a seam on a ragged old pair of jeans.
I am absent.
I am a blister on your sole (soul?)
I am the last snow.
I am a ‘no’ on prom night.
I am night.
I am a bite from the dog next door.
I am a king.
I am a god.
I am a anticipating nod acknowledging your presence.
I am sound.
I am that pound on your front door.
I watch you sink.
I am in your bed, in the corner of your room.
I am fear.
I am a mirror of the world’s reality.
I am fearful.
I am just another tear.
You love me.
I hate you.

I am Drug.

Hail To The Men

May the dreams
of all who aspire
merge in choir
when but one of us
succeed.

Hail to the men
who need not the acceptance of others
to find purity, strength, wisdom. power and peace.
May I join their legion someday
and let the others judge me as I march
into the sunset of my own destiny.

Little Arrows

Lately
I have been practicing
shooting
little arrows.

My bones have been feeling
like a pencil, hollowed;
a tube
without the lead
running the length of it.
I have been pushing
large stones
through the park;
most are the size
of Volkswagens.
I have been killing
time
tearing pages from books;
using the covers as birds.
Lately
I have
been swatting flies
with a broad spatula;
saving them, storing
them in the kitchen sink.
I have been speaking
to my grandma
recently;
she is dead.
I have been walking,
throwing forward
my feet,
as on a tight rope wire;
I can’t afford
new shoes
or the price of falling.

Lately
I have been practicing
shooting
little arrows.

December 2005

The Compromise

Is it not true
what we do - or not do
we struggle the burden
to set to peace - the feuds?

All the ground gained
and lost - could blamed
on the compromise:
or certain shame?

Oh, when to give up a bit
or when to drown - with the ship.
When the debate
or when a tight lip?

Oh, all the quarrel - we rise
as our egos are tried;
but it is then we give - half
all for the sake of - compromise.

Adapted

Oh,
how I’ve adapted to my optimism
willing to accept life’s grander lessons
humble enough to recognize my own blessings
so to my pen I offer my present confession.

Oh,
how I’ve relied on my false stability
came to be convinced of my ‘honesty’
relying on a chemical support system, chronically
and now freed, thus far, into peaceful irony.

Fixture

I have been speaking
to myself; rattling - numb -
on and on
about darkness
and how crowded it can be.
I have been speaking
to ears, stuffed with cotton.

I have been thinking
about this king named James
and his version
on how things went down.

I have been gnawing
on my finger tips
anxious about how I view myself;
their is little holiness
in these matters.

I have been shifting
my legs
bouncing on the balls of my feet,
caring less;
less about the solution.
My issue is with these
blinders,
(made in America)
assembled in my mind.
I can’t see them thus I can’t remove them.

It is not so much about indecision
as it is about my usefulness;
the trajectory to a meaningful end.
I have been bored, lately
as I read the books of others;
hardly comprehending
the context and even lesser
the wholeness
of the concepts.

I am mighty
in my approach to the impossible.
Though, it is easier
to believe in what has -
than what has never been.
I have been pondering
the futility in function;
how my desires - are a wash
a stale,
frozen intention.

My Journey begins at sunrise
and ends at sunset.
I concede I am only man,
as human as they come.

I do neither more, nor less
of my ability.
It is a normal consequence
for people of my type;
to play through long evil
so to acquaint myself
with quick death.

I light my own ‘cell’
as I realize my nothingness.

I am not greater than the sum;
only a slice of eternity,
becoming dim in my mortality.
Like a fixture
in the dining hall of the Lord.

December 2005

Undermine your own assumptions.

The greatest truth is this: Love is the bringer of life. It is why Love will always survive. We can fight our instinctive role in it's current or we can joyfully participate in the ebb and flow of it's life.

Is it safe in a "box"?
Is it not?
Whatever the structure
the safety is self induced
by the comfortable confines our own perception.

The spiritual path reminds us -- that we can no longer fool ourselves and even more - we are less consumed with fooling others.

(Winter) Poet

The winter --
there is no quick cure for it.
A singular event, drawn out
and as mortality has its way
no guarantee to see the next.

Embrace it, this once
as you beckon the “common thought”
that floats above you.
You are still young, Winter Poet.

But lo!
If you raise your sails --
be prepared to move.
(the wind will incite your command)

I myself have lasted long enough,
to laugh long enough.
Though the foam and the roll
have tilted me --
there has been enough joy in their experience.

For divinity losses not its order
if it thrusts us back
to the womb.
I should see the winter, again
for the first time.

Stillness is where thoughts - go - to die.

Extra Cheese and Finality

We’re brothers;
they say family trumps all.
It transcends all.
There is no divorce in all this.

(this may be a very expensive re-run
if money matters at all)

We populate the third rock
- for the time being -
and we make a beautiful and shiny collection.

And how are we subject
to the elements;
even if the worse of them are only in our minds.
We say hello
and from the other corner of our mouths
we say goodbye.

Hey, love is no big surprise.
We’ll all drink the champagne that came with the shellfish
or maybe wait until a better occasion...

but I don’t suppose we’d see each other
at the Democratic National Convention
no matter how funny that may turn out.

Anyhow, enough with the competition for God’s attention;
we all have a sense of humor.

To Scott

Untitled

It is not what you do in the light;
it is what you do in the dark.

It is not the medals you have been awarded;
it is the scars you have received.

It is not the hands you have shaken;
it is the lives you have touched.

It is not the dawns you have witnessed;
it is the days you have endured.

It is not the the treasures you carry;
it is the burdens you have lifted.