wealthy men decide
worldwide military dependency
whitehouse motives dubious
war means death
without meaningful direction
wholesale media duplicity
wanton mercenary demonstrations
willful misinformation dissemination
wrongful misuse doctrine
winner molded demographics
warped mission definition
wholly moronic defense
whitewashed mind denial
well manufactured destiny
whipped mainstream democrats
wanting more dialogue
well meaning dictatorship
without much decorum
will made dull
we miss democracy
winning means deception
wasting my dollars

America, I know your secret:
There is no deep intellectual struggle
fermenting in your collective mind;
that's for the coasts to sort out amongst themselves,
with their isolationist disdain for solidarity
thinking that beyond the Holland Tunnel,
above the Causeway bridge
east of the valley
over the Golden Gate
is some fetid quagmire of yet to be united
and that the nation consists
of only its urban centers.

America, your secret is this:
your corporations, bloated with white-haired men
and Ivy League connections
are selling youth and sex and freedom.

as long as we keep buying into the myth
as long as there is no concerted effort below the surface
as long as there are toys to occupy our time
as long as supermodels and actors and pop Musicians promote our causes
as long as becoming famous is more important than being intelligent or informed or educated

no one else will want to get old, rich and powerful enough
to take your place.

Wasn't it enough that you dumbed down the textbooks after Vietnam
to prevent the possibility of organized resistance?
Wasn't it enough that your McCarthyism emasculated the left wing,
leaving the eagle of democracy crippled, flopping in useless circles?
Wasn't it enough that even after Watergate, and J. Edgar Hoover,
Kissinger and Oliver North
we still trusted your power-brokers in Washington
and believed they were representing us?

America, I know your secret, and it is the omerta of the pirate code:
keep 'em in hookers, rum and shiny trinkets, and
they'll never want to own the ship,

but they'll keep saluting your flag until they die.

29 APR 2004

From Barry Miles' biography of Ginsberg (link under current.reading), page 488:

Eorsi [Hungarian poet Istvan Eorsi] pointed out that, unlike Mayakovsky [Vladimir Mayakovsky, Georgian poet, see * below], who had to live with the revolution that he prophesied and helped to create, Allen [Ginsberg] had to live with the fact that the revolution he helped to create did not win, but lost. By this he meant the Beat, hippie, anarchic, flower-power, LSD-using, pot-smoking, sexual freedom movement of the 1960s, which was being swamped by the neo-conservativism of the late 1970s and early 1980s.

... and is still in full swing today, sadly.

* Brief biography of Vladimir Mayakovsky (1893-1930) from Russian Poetry Land - Mayakovsky: Born in Georgia in the village of Bagdadi, into the family of forester, in 1902 he went to secondary school in Kutaisi and later studied in Moscow where the whole family moved after his father's death. Mayakovsky left school in 1908 to devote himself to underground revolutionary work. At the age of fifteen he joined the RSDLP(B) and carried out propoganda work. He was arrested three times and in 1909 he was kept in solitary confinement in the Butyrsky prison. It was there that he has began writing Poetry. He joined the revolution and made a lot of the perfect artworks as the comunist. But he was very unordinary man, the kind Bolshevics dislike. There was internal conflict between him and the ruling circles. He was found dead in his own room. The official version was suicide. The truth is still unknown.

Their America is seventy-percent against them,
but they do not know, these kids in New Orleans
their ebony faces eager or sullen or lost in some other world
lugging heavy booksacks on their narrow shoulders
facing teachers tired of trying to pretend
reading of themselves in textbooks they cannot translate
into their short-term teen idiom
between commercial breaks

It is their America because it is just like them
stubborn, proud and undereducated
looking in the rear view mirror, not to see what's gaining
but to fix their hair and make sure their teeth are clean
one hand on the wheel, the other on the cell phone
loaded with ring tones by Mozart, who they've never met
talking smack about their teachers
planning what dress to wear this Saturday night

They think of America like the French Quarter, but clean
not knowing of the patina left on the great melting pot
from colors that tried to mix in and remained seared, on the edges
they shout out "Black Power" without benefit of Carmichael
in the Dirty South, greet Malcolm like a friend at the movies,
assigned Ellison's Invisible Man every February without fail
their indignation rising with each chapter
hating themselves for needing MTV and Cosmopolitan

It is their America because they do not know
that seventy percent of the world is like them
different shades against which white pales
language not heard in the broadcasters' flat Midwest
like the French Quarter, but dirtier
filled with cardboard shacks and rusted tin hovels
no yearly prom dresses, new cars or bling bling
and roaches more fierce than meek palmettos

Their America is seventy-percent black
because the world is like New Orleans, right?
And most will never see beyond the Huey P. across the river
where the white sheets hang damp on the clothelines
fresh-washed after a night of bonfires
marking the line across which Louis Armstrong
swore never to come back,
and they made him the city's patron saint, anyway.

It is estimated that when Allen Ginsberg died, besides the manuscripts (both his own and those he schlepped around for friends), miscellaneous papers and other drafts for publication, he had over 60,000 pieces of correspondence, representing every letter he had either sent or received for his whole life.

Besides the obvious pack-rat comment that could be laid to Ginsberg, that's one hell of a lot of letters. I'm lucky if I can keep track of the bills due just this month, let alone have space for obviously boxes and boxes of pages.

For about two years, I have immersed myself in the classic forms of Poetry, forcing myself when I write to use common stanza forms with their dictates of rhyme and meter. I felt this was a necessary exercise to "formalize" my training as a poet - after all, one can't begin except at the beginning. The imposition of form, particularly with respect to the traditional Welsh meters, I felt was essential in determining whether or not I could in fact have qualified as a "bard" in the traditional, Celtic Druid sense.

And I feel that I have achieved a certain degree of success in this endeavor, not the least of which is the creation of roughly a poem a day for two years - some of which have been collected into a manuscript that is currently under consideration for the Walt Whitman award.

It may seem strange that a collection of sonnet forms is what I submitted for this competition, particularly since Walt Whitman himself was a champion of new forms, so to speak, and did not adhere to the sonnet, or any other form, on a regular basis. But the point was that Whitman, although one of my earliest poetic influences, was not the only luminary on my horizon. There have been others who used form that heavily influenced my development, although my real impetus to focus my writing was my discovery (really, at the age of 28) of Henry Miller, who I owe a great debt of consciousness regarding writing, and Allen Ginsberg, whose biography by Barry Miles I am currently reading, and jazz by virtue of attending Berklee College of Music.

My initial attempts were to create my own beat Poetry - and being under the influence of alcohol, marijuana, various hallocinogenics and other mind-altering substances and conversations only served to fuel that fire. It was later, in Memphis, where the drug of choice was coffee, that my real experimentation began - using form as a vehicle for modifying sentence structure, creating new words, stringing thoughts Joyce-like in endless streams of consciousness, playing with the sound of language as integral to its meaning, and so on. And so began the manic creation of reams of paper filled with words. At the time, too, I considered myself a songwriter; so to contrast the freeform, Ornette Coleman style of "free jazz" Poetry, there were structured songs that used, like Willie Nelson is wont to do, ten-dollar words. And the constant abstraction wrought by needing to write regularly, in order to have something to present on a weekly basis at readings, to discuss among fellow poets, and to keep my mind (racing on caffeine) occupied.

Now, I find myself weaned of the frantic pace of living that ultimately deteriorated my health to a degree, and while I still write manically at times, these episodes are more structured. I use smaller words, I discovered the other day; so today I deliberated introduced the word "sinew" into a poem. At times, Robert Frost is like a lighthouse - a clear signal in the storm, and at the same time, a marker at the end of a dangerous shoreline. And Blake. One of my earliest influences, I discover by reading Ginsberg's biography another parallel to that mystic soul. It's like my appreciation of David Crosby. Ginsberg, Crosby, Yeats, Dylan, Joyce - with each of them there are aspects of their childhoods, their philosophies, their paths, that are mirrored in my own, but not mirrored or traced, because I had no foreknowledge of their presence on them; more like we sought for Truth using the same instinctual guides.

But back to Poetry. The point of all that is that while my work has been shaped and honed and pointed by form and meter, and these things will always affect, influence and inform my work, that they are merely lines to choose to color within, or blur, or ignore altogether.

BTW, can anyone recommend a good overview of the theoretics of modern Poetry? Besides, say, TS Eliot's commentaries, or Stevens' A Necessary Angel?

To wake
while reading William Blake
to taste of life in dreamlike doses
flexing the sinews of the mind
in the fight against some status quo
that lumbers, like a Clydesdale pair
to drag a dying culture's broken-wheeled cart
along the muddy ruts
of road built to achieve a purpose
travel to the same crowded cities
filled with lives teeming with uncertainty
holding fast to corroded dreams
that emphasize our lack of clarity

the underlying pinions of capitalism
wasted on the ill-at-ease, the wayward pilgrims
seeking truth despite the cost
their families shamed and raked with muck
in vain attempts to build illusions
that all's right with the world

there is a need for change, for growth.

26 APR 2004

Every moment has its special message. -- from Bowl of Saki, Hazrat Inayat Khan

Up until three a.m. defining what
will be required of each to play their part
how they are held accountable for each
production number making up the show

In that nine-span of hours there exist
five times a thousand messages, it seems;
and each demands attention for itself,
requiring focus on the in-between,

disdaining what comes before or after.
These greedy missives at the speed of now,
their hard language garbled in translation
as the echo from the moment before

still rings in the ear, buzzing relentless
with its own sense of restless urgency.
Fueled by caffeine alone at this late hour,
they offer far too much information.

26 APR 2004

So here's the beef:

Having effectively (unless suddenly the possesor of a winning Powerball ticket) pissed away my opportunities to pursue formal education, I find myself often wondering what exactly I might have been forced to study had I attended a major university and undergone matriculation towards a degree in say, English. As a result, I find myself (much like W.B. Yeats) scrambling after knowledge from a myriad of sources. And not so much to falsely claim the title of a scholar, nor to compare myself in any public way to a degreed individual of any kind, I have been looking for lists of required texts, reading lists, or curriculum that encompasses the range of knowledge I would like to have - or would like to share with someone with the benefit of college education.

The blunderbuss seems like a very apt metaphor for my education to date - a wide barrel with not a lot of focused output that can be filled with ANYTHING, from ballshot to nails to pieces of scrap iron. Not a weapon of much accuracy, but deadly useful, particularly at close quarters, and especially if one is interested in deterring nuisances (LOL). As a comparison, the Western Canon (or "Great Books"), often used to describe those works of literature, science, philosophy and history that shaped and directed Occidental thought, is more like a streamlined, hard-shelled, compact ball projectile piercing the veil that is Western Culture.

So I traipse off across the Net hoping to find a plethora of lists for undergraduates and so on that would give a person like myself an idea of what I SHOULD have been exposed to in order to call myself well-educated. And frankly, other than the "Rutgers Reading List", and a lot of "one from column A, two from column B, a minimum of three selections from 45 - 55 AD, etc." I have not been able to find any sort of concrete agenda for study. Is it that universities are afraid that their competitors will "steal" their lists? That they're afraid people will just read these books on their own, and forgo the expense that represents their salaries, their atheletic stadia, their ivy-covered walls and yew-tree lined walkways? Or what?

I understand that there is a great deal of contention out there regarding what one "should study". And I also understand that most of the "intellectual community" (HA) feel that debate on this subject is best held within their hallowed halls, without the intrusion of some ignorant, unread, unwashed interlopers trying to muck up their glory road to tenure. But how about a little help?

Bah.

When I am working on a problem
I never think about beauty.
I only think about
how to solve the problem.
But when I have finished;
if the solution is not beautiful;
I know it is wrong.

-- Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983)

"I know it when I see it," said the man
who vainly tried conveying truth to friends.
"When it is absent, the space that it leaves
unfilled describes it clearly, end to end;

and though there are no words to put it plain,
nor etchings I could render without flaw,
there is a quality about a thing
that you would grasp at once, if you just saw."

"Alas," replied one listener, "when you speak,
I can appreciate your sense of it;
it vibrates through your being with each word,
as if using yourself as conduit;

but sadly, in the context of your speech,
the futile nature of your quest is seen -
to clothe in logic's frame that beyond reach
one must assume a great deal in between."

"And, too," answered another, "there is this:
that beauty is too frequently construed
to be only one aspect of the whole:
the menu, presentation, or the food;

but when it crosses our familiar lines
and cannot be contained in narrow themes,
the most common reaction is disdain.
We dare not seek for substance in our dreams

beyond those limits, set and firm, agreed
by all to guide where useful knowledge ends.
True, by this means we seem to guarantee
that we are not evolving." "It depends,"

the first man answered, holding up a rose.
"There are some constants, in spite of our toil
to obfuscate our instinct's depth of field.
At some point, reason's gifts begin to spoil

and eat away at simple, common joy.
We lose that sense of awe, and we are doomed
to live as if machines, devoid of cause,
the boxes that we build ourselves, our tombs.

23 APR 2004

a gloss in the form of a quintilla

Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind. -- William Shakespeare (1564-1616), A Midsummer Nights Dream (1595-6)

The poets speak of love, and some
in tangled words seem lost and mired;
for each one that is awestruck dumb
or struggles when the words won't come,
a dozen more seem uninspired,

and speak of passion secondhand
as if its pull they could resist
while calmly, at their whim's command,
the muses at their elbow stand,
soft fingers guiding pen and wrist.

It does not work that way all.
To write of love, it must be past;
transcription of its plaintive call
in real-time, as the storm in squall
persists, and the clouds of its vast

expanse encompass every hour
spent dreaming, in long nights awake,
is beyond our feeble power;
better to describe a flower
in that brief span its life makes,

relying not on former blooms,
but in that moment, seeing clear.
The dry words dug from memory's rooms
cannot suffice; they but entomb
its beauty in a gauze of sheer

invention, and show not the rose.
And so it is with love that lives;
To name it while its blossom shows
is to disrupt the stream that flows.
Thus dammed, just rivulets survive.

Yet those small trickles poets use
to describe, entire, the ocean;
and in their vanity, refuse
to wonder if the words they choose
outlining their heart's devotion

Can possibly, in truth, report
all that is love. The wisest few
admit their failings, and resort
to politics and other sports;
that, rather than painting the dew.

16 APR 2004

free verse

The squirrels
have gone on strike;
I can hear them
chattering,
each one voicing their dislike.

The gist
is not flattering.

Yesterday we had the trees removed
planted too close to the house,
against the back fence,
that blocked the sun
and housed the squirrels.

The trees had to go;
they were damaging roofs
and fences and walls.

But try explaining that
to a squirrel.

16 APR 2004

a forensic poem

"The one thing I want is to be understood,"
she yelled as she slammed the door. I yelled back, "Good!"
Now looking in hindsight, I know that I should
have tried to defuse the melee, if I could.

But knowing is one thing, and doing is tough,
so against the door, I said, "Not good enough!
You claim independence until things get rough,
and then want help fixing things. I say, get stuffed!"

She opened the door a crack, threw out a plate,
and screamed, "Your compassion is misplaced, and late!
I don't want to argue, or start a debate,
but frankly, your attitude is second rate."

With that, I was fuming, and righteously so.
I picked up the car keys and quipped, "Well, you know,
I'll leave the door open wide after I go.
Just pack up your suitcase with all of your clothes,

your angst-ridden CDs, your Sylvia Plath..."
And she answered, "And the rest, I'll take my half!
I've suffered your breathing and miserable laugh;
that's worth pain and suffering, you worthless calf!"

And so, she left shortly thereafter for keeps,
assisted by Valium and two Mohawked creeps.
The last thing she said was, "you sowed, now you reap."
And I got my life back, on the whole, quite cheap.

15 APR 2004

a villanelle

Adventure here finds peril where great mystery still thrives,
that won't respond to reason or attempts to understand
the me-o-centric universe that is our children's lives.

A place where having grown ourselves, we've proved we can survive
although what proof we have is often just in theory, and
adventure here finds peril where great mystery still thrives.

A mad morass of clique and class, peer pressure and sex drive
that we have with experience found the strength to withstand:
the me-o-centric universe that is our children's lives.

They simply want more everything, and each day are deprived
and nothing is deemed good enough or goes the way it's planned;
adventure here finds peril where great mystery still thrives.

The constant webs they weave, and the perspectives they contrive
are foreign now, though once we were their age and knew firsthand
the me-o-centric universe that is our children's lives.

Successful navigation of this world is one in five,
and those who last intact are held in awe and great demand
Adventure here finds peril where great mystery still thrives:
the me-o-centric universe that is our children's lives.

15 APR 2004

a quintilla

A quarter mile back down the lane
paved with loose stone and bits of brick
past three tall trees that still remain,
after ten years, almost the same
though at their bases weeds grow thick,

a wood frame house, its paint in peel
and tin roof rusted rough and brown
still stands, though some would say it kneels
between the overgrown bean fields
and waits for time to knock it down.

The circle drive, worn deep with holes
from tractor wheels and rude snow plows,
runs from the lane to the light pole,
its path no longer clear and whole -
just where it leads, no one knows now.

Beyond the house, down the back hill
through waist-high weeds and long cat-tails.
a drainage culvert runs; it fills
to form a moat, brackish and chilled,
when the snow melts, and spring storms hail.

Before, this place was live and hale,
a stand against the world untamed -
its yards well-tended, hay grass baled;
was not the farm, but farmers failed,
and left the land to take the blame.

Now later, its old bones lay bare,
the marrow dried to dust and stain;
gone too, those who could point to where
among the wild weeds it sleeps there
a quarter mile back down the lane.

revised 26 APR 2004

englyn cyrch

Simple things make me content:
knowing where my money's spent,
poems written, letters sent,
feeling good the rent's been paid,
evenings without things to do,
working 'til the work is through,
reading a good book or two
'neath a tree's new morning shade.

Children play along the walk,
neighbors come to sit and talk,
flowers bloom along the block:
roses, phlox and marigolds.
No advantage to be sought,
Only groceries to be bought;
Smiling at the others, caught
where I too once was so bold.

Day turns into night again,
phone calls come from kin and friends;
happiness for me, depends
on how I spend such days.
Simple, yes, but never stale,
these nothings make grand things pale:
seasons changing without fail,
the thin veil of nature's ways.

Offered more, I would refuse;
Lest by chance, this life I'd lose.
Let it humor or amuse
society - I don't mind.
I will walk by my own path;
that shall be my epitaph;
Let those who'll grieve on my behalf
keep laughter and I entwined.

Simple things, like life and mirth.
These are treasures of great worth,
pleasures of our time on earth
that nurse our souls to health.
Money, fame and power, too -
all will fade when life is through;
what remains, and stays as true
defines what you have as wealth.

14 APR 2004

a descort

No outrage, just amused
(perhaps its because I can't stand the sound
of his voice)
It reminds me of a song by Robyn Hitchcock
"He's the president of Europe and he's talking to the dead /
They're the only ones who'll listen or believe a word he's said"
That, and Wenn ich Kultur hore
entsichere ich meinen Browning*
runs through my head as he testifies
(as in testifying about his faith, under oath
only to his God)
There ought to be a law against running the country
without a mandate to do so
(like say, the popular vote).

13 APR 2004

* Hanns Johst, a German playwright of the Nazi era, wrote "Wenn ich Kultur hore... entsichere ich meinen Browning" (When I hear the word "Culture", I reach for my Browning (rifle)).

a series of septenary stanzas

It's doubtful that democracy's dense doyens can reclaim
the country's core without creating more sorrow and shame,
to count coup on the status quo, entrenched in apathy,
seems like the wisest way to go, at least it looks to me.

The Left Wing's fawning satyrs spawn their imbecilic imps
who feign as fiends for filibuster, but are worthless wimps,
while on the Right, cropped high and tight, the fascists frolic on
investing in the right of kings and trampling the pawns,

and in the Middle's mild morass, the muck is made and sold
that so entrenches everyone, they just do as they're told.
The nation's fate is fixed, with fools all wrestling at the wheel;
Smart money might just scan the hand, and demand a redeal.

13 APR 2004

deibhidhe

Most days I don't mind the mess
that fills my fancy, doubtless
in its mad mire growing grand
plans my desires demand;

But today, the turmoil seeks
to wreck my poor reason's speech;
and turn to tares the flowers
where I've worked long hard spent hours.

Voices volley in my head;
Oh, that order would instead
cast this chaos to the void
before this day is destroyed.

13 APR 2004

cywydd llosgyrnog

So much to do, and time so tight
that one would think to do things right
the first time might be thought wise;
but it's a finger pointing game,
no one willing to take the blame.
Things stay the same. No surprise

there, I guess, but one can still work
to bypass the constant knee-jerk
reflex that lurks, just waiting
to derail some major meeting
and cause dissent, thus defeating
those who bring hope. Frustrating,

when it takes more hours than at hand
to craft and hone some kind of plan
that spans the project's gamut.
Consensus is great, that is true,
but other times you just have to
Shut up and do it, dammit.

13 APR 2004

cywydd deuair hyrion

April is the cruelest month, breeding Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing Memory and desire, stirring Dull roots with spring rain. -- T.S. Eliot, from The Waste Land

Again the winds are playing
like knives, and the steel wool gray
and ominous gathered clouds
have the horizon shrouded.
The spring that for a week warmed
winter's bones is now forlorn
and hiding beneath the porch,
confused and quite out of sorts,

proud short-sleeved glory faded,
its sun-drenched dreams frustrated.
Like giants, groggy, half asleep,
the trees hang to their new leaves;
and tender young plants, untrained
and weak, lay flattened by rain
that keeps coming at odd hours
to chill the blooming flowers.

April, you promised sunshine,
but delivered a long line
of bitter squalls; now just half
spent, your span's sad epitaph
will read of somber, bleak days
filled with dreary, wet malaise,
seeking in vain for some warmth
from your cruel unending storms.

13 APR 2004

I cannot hear the sirens' song
my ears have been clogged for too long
with endless drivel, mindless stuff;
but I can see them well enough.
Their mouths are moving, and it's tough
to lip read, but I still can do it:
"He's not listening, so screw it!

Why are we wasting our time
on fools like this? We are divine
in purpose and this role demeans
the stature of all other queens."
They loose their talons from the rocks,
and slip them into shoes and socks;
then swim off to the nearest shore
to charm the devil from some poor

demented poet, who is cursed
to think he's what they claim, their first.
He buys them drinks, ten bucks a round,
and doesn't notice when the sound
of their sweet voices starts to fade;
and at the jukebox, I hear played
some song of love's last promise made.

When he next looks, the girls are gone,
and in their place sits Xenophon,
who tells him, "They have gone stone mute;
they cannot speak save in pursuit.
You've made their game too simple, son,
and so their purpose is undone;

They've gone back to Odysseus,
who's laughing now, at all of us.
There is no song without an ear;
now, pony up. I need a beer."

And so the sirens have returned,
their course adjusted, lessons learned.
They'll sit and sing, while I transcribe.
The worth of which, you must decide.

12 APR 2004

cywydd deuair fyrion

Awake by chance,
I watched a flicker
in the dark clouds
growing quicker.

Drawn, I watched this
fleeting wonder:
the dull sound of
distant thunder;

the dreamlike build
of slow suspense
in too calm air
still warm and dense;

the dry leaves' dance
along the street,
edges scraping
on the concrete;

the slow advance
of mist and rain
that gently fogged
the window pane;

the sudden spark
of jarring bright
as lightning cracked
the grey-black night;

the numbing taste
of ions churned
that caused my throat
and eyes to burn;

the sudden gusts
of storm-pushed wind
that hissed and moaned
through the tree limbs;

and then, the whip
of sleet and wind
that chilled my bones
and soaked my skin.

It raged an hour
and then was gone,
leaving small pools
that dried with dawn.

11 APR 2004

cyrch a chwta

The past is now dead and gone,
its Doppler echo a song
that fades and yet lingers on,
palimpsest written upon
then erased with each new dawn
born as a wobbly legged faun
yet grown each night to a stag
whose hooves drag the forest lawn,

old and feeble, a weak king,
Day's prince become an aged thing
that twilight's wolves will soon bring
down. Each night as this hart sings
winter's lament, dawn, as spring,
struggles from the womb and swings
the world again from abyss
to the bliss of beginning.

11 APR 2004

cyhydedd naw ban

In California after eating
they called up to offer a greeting,
their plates filled with beans and broccoli
ours with roast beef and mashed potatoes.
We passed the telephone back and forth,
discussing children and work; of course,

we spoke of weather and summer plans,
the price of groceries and minivans,
and then of mom, who now lives alone
in that big house, her children all grown.
We discussed if this year we would meet,
compared our schedules, and each month's heat.

They want to visit, and spend a week -
catch up on all the news, so to speak.
I wonder sometimes if the link we share
is stronger because of distance there;
We meet rarely, just when someone dies,
and talks like these are a big surprise.

California, it has been so long
and I have grown up since I've been gone.
They just keep on talking in my ear;
although their voices are nice to hear,
I hand the warm handset to my wife,
thinking of Easter, and of new life.

11 APR 2004

common measure

My house is not a Christian home;
I serve much older gods.
So there are times this world and I
would seem to be at odds.
I do not mean the world, per se,
the growing, greening life;
but rather, those who fill it up
and wish to create strife.

I tolerate the point of view
of those who think their path
is the sole method for success;
I shake my head, and laugh.
Their holidays I don't observe
(which raises a few brows),
and hold my tongue while they defend
and tout their sacred cows.

But they insist that I reform
(while standing at arm's length)
and tell me that to find true peace
I need their Saviour's strength.
With quotes from books and lengthy quips
my ears are filled and stuffed
(which makes me wonder now and then
why once is not enough)

Among my friends, I number some
from every path and creed;
and on the average, most of them
I'd help if they had need.
But those who shun my friendship
on the basis of belief
are those who I would rather leave
to their gods for relief.

Some are surprised that I believe
in anything at all;
the basis for my way of life,
they guess is base and small.
Without a weekly term at church
(which they seem to require)
it's hard for them to understand
how I can stay inspired,

And live in peace and harmony,
extending helping hands
where needed to lift up each other
and meet life's demands.
I rarely bother to expound
how I engage the world,
but instead prove by actions,
not words, with my fist uncurled.

From most, there is acceptance
(well, at least, an easy truce)
and where not, my philosophy
is conflict has no use;
For we must live together,
and one's faith is private stuff;
there is no need to make demands -
The world does that enough.

There is a happy medium;
we do share common ground.
At their core, most religious paths
are similar, I've found.
All I suggest is sapiens
nihil affirmat quod
non probat. You do what you like;
I serve much older gods.

11 APR 2004

sapiens nihil affirmat quod non probat: a wise man states as true nothing he does not prove (don't swear to anything you don't know firsthand)

cyhydedd hir

A quiet place to sit,
think what I see fit,
and watch the birds flit
around the yard.

Not so much to seek
(a crumb, so to speak)
to make each work week
that much less hard.

And yet, through each day
small things block the way
and my time to play
cedes to something.

But when time is spare
I seek out that chair
and just sitting there
do great nothing.

10 APR 2004

a curtal sonnet

This morning, when I rose from bed, the street
was all abustle with the weekend's chores.
Fresh coffee brewed, I filled my favorite mug
and sipping slowly, found the flavor sweet.

The cat was chasing lizards 'round the floor;
I shook my head and gave my wife a hug.
Outside, the sounds of lawn and garden tools
and stereos blended in a dull roar;

I shuffled, still half sleeping, 'cross the rug,
whispered silent curses at these fools
and shrugged.

10 APR 2004

a complaint or lamentation

Bang the drum and sound the horn
Wash and press the uniforms
From each window flags are flown
Now the troops at last come home

Proud young sons and daughters, too
Freedom's torch they've borne for you
Through the world they've marched and roamed
Now the troops at last come home

In the face of unseen dangers
They went forth, and fought with strangers
Giving of their flesh and bone
Now the troops at last come home

For the cause of pride and nation
Each assumed their assigned station
In the name of some unknown
Now the troops at last come home

Trusting in their leaders' visions
Never doubting their decisions
Each one thinks now of their own
Now the troops at last come home

Used as pawns in plays for power
Missions logged in countless hours
'Til last reveille is blown
Now the troops at last come home

Cheered and thanked and decorated
From the headlines they have faded
In battalions, or alone
Now the troops at last come home

Limousines in long lines creeping
Sounds of countless children weeping
No more battlefields to roam
Now the troops at last come home

Bang the drum now, slow and loud
Drape your flags as funeral shrouds
Speak in low and somber tones
Now the troops at last come home

Fold the flags and thank the grieving
For their service, for believing
Wrapped in concrete, wood and chrome
Now the troops at last come home.

10 APR 2004

in common measure

(common measure)

If there is method in this madness
by which I compose
there ought to be at least one moment
when that sense is shown

(short measure)

That's not the case; when words
come out, they oft betray
no common ground with sanity
but are a madman's play

(short hymnal measure)

Perhaps that is the goal:
to purge with flowing pen
the ink-stained fingers of the soul
so they can write again

(long measure)

It seems unlikely though, I fear,
for these words rarely seem to cease;
were their intent to cleanse and clear
at some point, I'd expect decrease

(long hymnal stanza)

But still they come, just as they please,
in different forms and varied measures,
as hurricanes or gentle breezes,
half-cast clods of clay, or treasures.

10 APR 2004

colgyrnach

The question that I have is this:
If ignorance is such great bliss,
then why are we sad,
dwelling on the bad
in a mad state of pissed?

It seems to me we are confusing
bliss with something we are using
that's in small supply
or is hard to buy,
that you try not losing.

But bliss is not in forgetting;
It is in knowing and letting
go of each desire,
to cease to require,
quench the fire that's upsetting.

Each of us seeks this kind of peace,
but our reason bids us to cease
and busy our days
with productive ways;
When souls play, they find ease.

09 APR 2004

casbairdne

With words, my sentence fulfill:
The weak willed soul seeks to fail,
its too frail form doomed to fall
before bringing home the grail.

Too true; the trials and tests
that beset the searcher last
past the point where the first zest
wears out. Your whole fate is cast

in a breath's breadth; there is time
for truth alone. You can find
a fool's fitness in the rhyme
that in such straits comes to mind.

A rare few arrive alive;
ah, against such odds the scribe
in coughs and slow signs must strive
and wrest wild words to describe

What wonder their wandered path
has displayed. Most fail, their sad trail
littered with phrases, laughing
and half mad, lost in the veil.

So sentence me to madness -
I am glad to serve my curse.
This penance is not duress;
Others' words would serve me worse.

08 APR 2004

a carole or carol

Let all the world rejoice and sing
To see the sacred in all things

The universe in varied forms,
And diverse structures, sets the norms
With every death, life is reborn
  Let all the world rejoice and sing

Each flower blooms and goes to seed
To exist, each finds what it needs
And understanding this, proceeds
  To see the sacred in all things

There is no rank or hierarch
Within each thing glows the same spark
Composed of light and also dark
  Let all the world rejoice and sing

Each moment fades with no reverse,
Affecting the wide universe,
And in shared energy immersed
  To see the sacred in all things

Let all the world rejoice and sing
To see the sacred in all things

08 APR 2004

a canzone

Canto I. The News

To watch the TV news is to discover
That there is nothing new under the sun:
a movie star found with a younger lover,
convenience store held up by man with gun,
insurgents kill more soldiers by surprise,
another well-known priest accused of wrong,
the difference between fast food joints is fries,
and one more pretty face has a hit song.
The underlying story never changes,
only the details and the point of view;
we watch to prove our own theories of strangeness
and focus not on ourselves, but on you.
There is a comfort in this pap's digestion
that leaves us feeling informed and aware;
by leaving others to ask all the questions,
all we have left is sensing we still care.
The channel doesn't matter, just the faces;
their honesty we've learned to judge on sight,
and politicians, whether left or right
find us amenable to fund their races.

Canto II. Comedy

If it were going on next door, in real life,
we probably would not think it was fun;
In fact, if some of these folks were my neighbors,
I'd probably move, or at least, buy a gun.
The basis for most comedy, it seems
is how misfortune comes to someone else,
the consequences of their crackpot schemes
to win friends, change the world, or acquire wealth.
The underlying premise never shifts,
only the patsy and the inside scoop;
we watch to give our own spirits a lift,
and to convince ourselves we're not the dupe.
There is a comfort in this sad delight
that leaves us feeling better and advanced;
by laughing at some other's hapless plight
we believe that our own case has a chance.
It doesn't matter who the comic roasts,
as long as we don't recognize ourselves,
and are not asked between guffaws to delve
into the issues that affect us most.

Canto III. Reality

The metaphor of raw, uncensored lives
as captured in a staged and sterile form,
arranged and filtered by cutting room knives,
gives us the rain and thunder, but no storm.
The girl next door, the brain, the jock, the creep,
selected for their camera appeal
or their ability to seem so deep;
exactly what part of this sham is real?
The underlying premise never strays,
but every season, moves from place to place;
we watch to give ourselves new games to play,
to pick our favorites to win a fixed race.
There is a comfort in this grand charade
that makes us feel as if we're really there;
we know these fools, and if their path we trod,
why surely, we would be the millionaire.
It doesn't matter what the final prize,
as long as there is drama and suspense;
the benefit of the experience
is that it happens to some other guy.

08 APR 2004

a cancione

I cannot say I know love
the way some would say they do;
I might not recognize it
passing on the avenue.
In a bleak and somber alley
on some cold and rainy night
some amour may say, "I see love";
the chance I would, too, is slight.

It has found me now at last;
this to me, is a surprise,
In spite of all my efforts
to remain somewhat disguised.
I can recognize its voice,
the calm beauty it brings near;
and the soft words of comfort
that it whispers in my ear.

No, I don't know to name it
or describe the way it walks,
but recognize the cadence
in the quiet way it talks.
I did not see it coming
yet its presence in this place
says that it knows who I am,
and will not forget my face.

06 APR 2004

a byr a thoddaid

There is no test today in class;
it's been called off, and you all pass.
The lessons it addressed are tired and old,
I'm told - no more required.

But someday, classes might start up again;
Then those who now are smart
may search in vain for today's loss,
and not find it, but only dross.

So it might serve you well to learn
what's in these books that brightly burn.
For future generations might require
the fire's fuel more than light.

The grades we earn from today's inaction
one day may do us in;
For knowledge is built upon roots, not soot,
and much depends on where the seed is put.

06 APR 2004

a bucolic, of sorts

In memory of Christena Ann Litzenberg (1817-1909)

To those who wish the past returned
and simple life brought back in fashion,
a relationship with the land renewed
and the blight of urban living shunned,
a hundred years of progress dissolved
in the bliss of primitive survival,

Who see the plains of Arcady
As pristine lands, fertile for the tilling,
and in the slow change of the seasons
some majesty of divine balance,
I offer this emetic for nostalgia:

A worn stone lies broken on the grass
in the graveyard at Indian Hill.
Thanks to early hours in freezing rain,
eighty rough acres and pneumonia,
a husband and two sons, gone the same year.

06 APR 2004

a bref double

Speak to me, if you linger at the trough
and hesitant to take a drink, hang back
while others have their fill and more besides,
expecting none will challenge their self-right.

I give to you a gift - the words you lack;
Do not refuse their use or doubt their strength.
Employ them, let their fiber warm your bones,
and fill your inside 'til it's round and tight.

As weapons, are these few small words enough
to arm a soul, defenseless, for the fray?
They may not seem a danger at first glance,
but steel beneath their slack coat gives them might;

So drink, and what you find no use, give back;
as iron rusts, so words forgotten die.

06 APR 2004

anglo-saxon prosody complete with bob and wheel

The sky was shot with grays and greens,
and clinging clouds that hung low;
from the west, the wind was slight
against my face that April night
     when first
     I found I'd lost my way;
     and more, what's worse,
     with nothing left to say:
     a writer's sad curse.

I stood in silence, stunned and mute
and watched the world continue on;
Despite my dumbness, nothing changed
in how life lumbers slowly on
      and stops
      for no one, rich or poor;
      both thieves and cops
      react, and nothing more,
      as each moment drops.

For quite a while, I watched and waited,
'til the lights lowered and dawn was near,
as the darkened earth began to glow
with the soft shimmer of newborn day
      and awoke
      stretching its tired limbs,
      the spell of gloom broken
      by a small bird's hymn.
      And only then, I spoke.

06 APR 2004

Some men stand tall, some men feel
Some men show signs, some conceal
Train is rolling, iron and steel
Steam that blows the whistle never turns the wheel.

Some men make plans, some men deal
Some men kick out, some men kneel
Highway's burning, oil and steel
Steam that blows the whistle never turns the wheel.

Some men destroy and some men heal
Some men build up, some men steal
Trouble's boiling, blood and steel
Steam that blows the whistle never turns the wheel.

Some men save life, some men kill
Some men won't cry, some men will
World is turning, earth and steel
Steam that blows the whistle never turns the wheel.

1998

A Real Audio version can be found HERE.

benison or blessing

I've asked much from the universe
Expecting, like a child,
That forces outside my control,
Untamed, feral and wild

Would take a hand, and mold my life
In ordered, simple ways.
Such is the expectation
Of most people, when they pray.

But my petition now has changed;
I listen, more than speak,
and hope for nothing sure, except
reminders where I'm weak.

The universe can bless or curse;
To me, they are the same.
Just tests from different teachers,
With only myself to blame.

Again, I ask the universe
To contemplate my role,
and where required, make changes
that may benefit the whole.

Much more than that, I cannot ask,
nor really, do I need,
except a blessing to move at
a self-determined speed.

04 APR 2004

a poem in blank verse

Again, the conversation turned to fate;
and as the group was interested, to chance,
the lines of battle drawn between the ones
who thought the world predestined yet misshaped

and those who found perfection or kismet
in random acts and notions of free will.
The problem, said the former, is the lack
of evidence to justify our claim;

and to rebut, the latter said, to wit,
all evidence is houses built on sand.
For after all, our frame of reference fits
inside a thimble floating on a sea.

At best, we know our own spot on the shore;
and of the entire ocean only guess.

04 APR 2004

a double refrain ballade

The cynic's eye sees wreck, despair,
the order torn asunder;
and finds delight in citing where
the world has lost its wonder,

his focus on the thunder
in soft and gentle rain,
and how each stupid blunder
makes a life of loss and pain.

"There is no good found anywhere,
no qualities of number,
and further, I find no one cares
the world has lost its wonder."

Thus the cynic speaks with thunder
his apocalypse refrain,
"'Tis the ignorance of slumber
makes a life of loss and pain."

Now, it can be said, to be fair,
that life is mostly umber,
and if to a dream compared,
the world has lost its wonder.

For those who think of plunder,
seeking only their own gain
the illusion they toil under
makes a life of loss and pain.

Perhaps it is no small blunder
the world has lost its wonder
Looking constant down the drain
makes a life of loss and pain.

04 APR 2004

a ballade

A pebble leaned against a towering wall
(at least that's how it first appeared to me)
just barely seen beyond the shadow's fall,
not much more than a speck of loose debris,
looking like it had been carelessly knocked free
and now was fated to be swept away
by passersby on their way down the street;
the lesser are forgotten in that way.

A smaller piece of stone, I can't recall;
it seemed so insignificant, tiny.
Yet how it seemed in juxtapose enthralled
me, and caused me to think of destiny.
Because the cause for much we cannot see,
we overlook the obvious and stay
in search of greater meaning than we need;
the lesser are forgotten in that way.

The edifice that blocks the eye, the wall,
is built of unseen bits and filagree
that separate, are not much to see at all
but joined together seem like majesty.
So useless, insignificant, maybe,
these molecules of fundamental clay
that lend their strength and will the great to be;
the lesser are forgotten in that way.

Perhaps the towering wall is that which leans,
and depends on the pebble where it lays,
believing in what other people see;
the lesser are forgotten in that way.

03 APR 2004

a balada

When I was young I sought to find
The furthest reaches of the mind
Now at the edge of the abyss
I find it's simple things I miss
There is no comfort in the mist
That once I found hard to resist
  What dreams remain when we grow old
  Determine how our story's told.

The challenge of my younger days
Was seeking behind nature's ways
A science of the hidden climes
I would discover, given time
But now I find my logic skewed
All my grand theories of no use
  What dreams I had when young and bold
  Are stories not worth being told.

With complicated schemes I've sought
To find ways to be sold and bought
The price of freedom, and of fame
I've learned, and sought them, just the same
Despite my failed and shipwrecked plans
To conquer truth, and understand
  What dreams I had were smoked and rolled
  And now just stories that I've told.

And now I'm still adrift at sea
A flyspeck to eternity
But I have joy and mirth besides
Though aged by season, wind and tides
I do not know the primal cause
But still I dream, and hope, because
  What dreams remain when we grow old
  Determine how our story's told.

02 APR 2004

an exercise in anagram

I'd just as lief pretend to know,
Like Aristotle, where to file each thing;
But to seek more knowledge than I need
On this subject is to pursue evil ends.

For life arranges on its own
The order in which lessons come;
Worrying that their sequence is vile
is not to live at all.

02 APR 2004

an awdl gywydd

She's sleeping there on the chaise,
on her face a gentle look;
dreaming no doubt of flowers,
and quiet hours with a book.

Her eyes are closed, her heart eased,
and I am pleased that she rests;
May her dreams be sweet and kind,
and may she find peaceful hours.

When she wakes in the morning
may the day bring her gladness
filled with laughter and sunshine
and a decline in sadness.

I listen to her soft snore,
wanting no more than her joy;
she fills where I am nothing,
and brings happiness sublime.

01 APR 2004

Alas, my head is bruised and hurt
My hands are filled with ash and dirt
The fire has gone out in the sink
And there is not enough to drink
Perhaps the sun has lost its flare,
But as for me, I couldn't care
The world is turned to shades of creme
And melted fact and sense with dream
  And willy-nilly 'cross the tiles
  The jester dances as he smiles

The king is slumped upon the throne
His sceptre limp, his shoes unshone
And where the queen is, no one tells
But something in the kingdom smells
The knights have turned to lonesome days
And all the banners' greens to grays
Perhaps the cook has spiked the stew
With who knows what, for who knows who?
  And flouncy-bouncy 'cross the room
  The jester dances with the groom

Upon the hearth, three parrots sit
And gambol in raw seeds and shit
They cannot speak except in rhyme
And constant, crawk out "What's the time?"
A raucous noise they raise 'til dawn
Without a thought to dwell upon
Perhaps the pages have all turned
And left the roast beast on to burn
  And tripsy-dipsy 'cross the stage
  The jester incants like a mage

My head is filled with nonsense stuff
Cracked teacups, straw and milkweed fluff
The chairs have taken up their arms
And forced the maids to sell their charms
Beside the moat, Ophelia waits
Insulting those with balding pates
And deep within the prison's keep
The prince is trying hard to sleep
  And onesy-twosy 'cross the hall
  The jester's tripped and had a fall.

01 APR 2004

an alcaic

If someone listens intently, patiently
for something beyond audible sensation
each moment becomes sacred silence
embracing the hearer into being

If someone watches quietly, carefully
for something behind visible perceptions
each vista becomes secret beauty
embracing the viewer into making

If someone ponders honestly, tirelessly
on something beyond logical reflection
each finding becomes useful knowledge
embracing the thinker into balance.

01 APR 2004

an alba, or aubade

Before the first ray of morning sun comes
over the muttering lips of the sleeping world
(like the last soft warm breath of a restful sleep
is released from the tight grasp of that little death)

and there are not yet schedules to be met,
children to be shuffled off sullenly to school,
arrangements to be made, broken and remade,
the drudgery of household chores still untackled,

I listen in that dark and peaceful lull
to the gentle sound of her breathing next to me,
warm and serene under the sheets and blankets,
cocooned like a butterfly, just dreaming of flight.

31 MAR 2004

the Irish form ae freislighe

The path that we're traveling
has today only begun.
So don't start unraveling,
don't think the whole race is run.

To enjoy the adventure,
we'll take time with what we see,
cast away old indentures
and seek past what seems to be.

Though each step seems surrender
to some distant unknown goal,
for our souls we'll find provender
by acknowledging the whole.

There's no end, no conclusion
to this journey that we make;
cast off that sad illusion
and each mile is no mistake.

So think not destinations
but of time to live and laugh.
Let dreams come to gestation
while we're traveling the path.

31 MAR 2004

Well, it's that time again. Time to revisit, in alphabetical order, the poetic forms as identified in Lewis Turco's The Book of Forms: A Handbook of Poetics. Starting with today's poem, we'll visit all the traditional verse forms, starting with lyric Poetry, then progressing to dramatic and narrative Poetry.

an acrostic

I()

J ust give me a moment
O f your time, and together, we'll try to
H onestly explore the taste of
N ew wine in old wineskins,
L ight cigarettes with old matches, and
I n the process, attempt to learn something about
T he way the world has shaped us. In the quiet
Z en of here and now, where
E verything, like Shroedinger's Cat, both is and is
N ot, let us wander wide-eyed and amazed,
B oth expecting nothing, and
E verything, seeking for a new
R eality. Let understanding be our
G oal, this time around. On the next trip, who knows?

I(I)

J ury's still
O ut. Will they
H ang him, or
N ot?
L ikely they'll call him
I nsane, either way.
T ruth is, the
Z eitgest that
E nvelopes this time will
N ot accept or
B elieve the possibility
E xists for a
R eality outside its chosen
G rail.

31 APR 2004