You cannot win. It seems no matter
which way you progress
(to seek self-sacrifice for good,
or your own happiness),
the world will work against you
to undo what you have done.

It will erode your monuments
and interrupt your fun
with either condemnation
for the talents that you waste,
or horror at the way your talent's used
beyond good taste.

To wit: should you choose sin
and find yourself in deep debauch,
you'll be proclaimed a wretched soul
by those who only watch;
and virtue? that's no better lot.

For should you speak your mind,
those holding power by wrong means
will take offense and find
some cause to treat you with contempt;
and with the line you've crossed
will spare no opportunity
to prove themselves your boss.

Perhaps the wisest course to pick
would be: stay underground,
refuse to share your wealth,
let your great talent stay unfound.

The world will think you "normal",
worthy of no great alarm;
and if you're lucky, your whole life
will do you little harm.

But then, your only enemy
will be the self you hide:
the talent that you must express,
that will not be denied.

So walk your path. It matters not
who praises which you take.

They'll use tar to annoint you
for both feathers and the stake;
both ridicule and persecute,
should you step out of line
and either let your talent rot,
or cut an edge too fine
that it offends the sense of those
who claim to be your peers
yet think your life, in either case,
the sum of wasted years.

19 AUG 2006

Meet me down in the delta
where the hot summer swelter
will melt all our blues away

We'll sit on the front porch swing
not doing a damn thing
but thinking up new games to play:

things that don't require running,
'cause under the gun
in this heat you'll likely as not expire

only a damn fool would venture
from where it's cool
run the risk of setting themselves on fire

Don't pay no mind to what the weatherman says
He's a liar if he says he knows
Ain't no point guessing, and use in stressing
it'll only make you sweat through your clothes

I wish to communicate.
Alas, fate does not desire
that we should speak today;
instead it blocks our way with fire,

which we perceive as brute force.
It's not, of course, merely smoke;
but feel - its flames do not burn.
Though we both yearn in dismay

at the chasm between us,
neither trusts the other's pyre;
and so we forgo friendly chat,
each one thinking that a liar

is not worth time spent to know.
Enmity grows between us;
two who could have been such friends.
The whole world ends just like that.

awdl gywydd

15 AUG 2006

No passive meal, no rare stuff bird,
true peace is not a noun, but verb;
inaction, apathy and doubt
that whisper are not her. She shouts

from rooftops, making foul war shake
in fear at her approach. Mistake
not mewling whiners for her knights,
but rather find those awake nights

who seek to change first, in themselves,
the hurt and violence that dwells
inside us all, and is expressed
in hatred's cruel unhappiness.

Peace is no victim, she just waits
while we excuse or blame on fate
why we act not who know the course
that will alone deter blind force:

to cease rewarding strength and might
for its own sake, calling it right
that those who kill and those who die
are somehow not just you and I.

11 AUG 2006

Oh wisdom seeking mendicant travelers,
your baggage and burdens are troubling handicaps;
they will not help you on your journey.
Abandon this garbage by the roadside.

If you would find some unforeseen adventure,
let drop your jaded world-weary illusions;
you have no need of those old crutches.
Use your own power to find the pathway.

Look inward, pilgrim: investigate carefully
what you have right now. Nothing is infinite
that has an ending, a start or finish;
if you see its edges, it's not the source.

No dusty volume filling up shelving space
can provide answers; nor can just believing
in teachers, prophets, soldiers or saints.
The source of energy does not costume.

It is not waiting, patiently camouflaged
while you are wasting excuses and lifetimes.
It does its business, whether you are
singing in harmony or out of tune.

alcaics

11 AUG 2006

Something to think about in the context of today's America and unrest around the world (emphases mine):

Hitler was able to enslave his own people because he seemed to give them something that even the traditional religions could no longer provide; the belief in a meaning to existence beyond the narrowest self-interest.

The real degradation began when people realized that they were in league with the Devil, but felt that even the Devil was preferable to the emptiness of an existence which lacked a larger significance.

The problem today is to give that larger significance and dignity to a life that has been dwarfed by the world of material things. Until that problem is solved, the annihilation of Naziism will be no more than the removal of one symptom of the world's unrest.

-- Konrad Heiden, Der Fuehrer, 1944

an alba, or aubade, a love song sung at dawn

That morning comes again is no surprise;
the laws of physics have not been withheld,
nor has the motion of the planets, if
those laws are merely whims, been held at bay.
No vengeful demons or vain deities
have paused the world in darkness for their play.

No, the edge of space where I sit has again
been turned and tilted to its burning star;
while elsewhere on the globe, lights flicker out
and someone borrows my fear of the night
(which is not trepidation of mere dark,
but rather, the unknown outside the cave
[or box, as we prefer to call it now,
since we are civilized a thousand-fold]
that waits for us, like some divine pop quiz
on that damned chapter we forgot to read).

So, morning comes again; and every time,
despite all evidence to prove it will,
and though our own experience and sense
would tend to ease our worry on this tack,
yet we stand dumb still, starstruck at the sight,
in shock that our blind faith
caused it to be.

04 AUG 2006

All those who're lost aren't there from wandering;
some are asleep, and dream of squandering
times and places they've not been,
describing wonders they've not seen.

All those who're lost aren't there by accident;
some choose confusion, it's self-evident.
They take for granted the status quo
and make decisions to make it so.

All those who're lost don't want to be found;
it's too familiar, their common ground,
the box they dare not step an inch outside:
public opinion and their own sad pride.

All those who're lost aren't there from wandering;
just left behind from the army's plundering
that made a wasteland left in its wake,
its former glories, its grand mistakes.

All those who're lost aren't seeking out
an answer to remove all doubt;
they're building walls to try and close it in:
the truth of where they are and where they've been.

All those who're lost don't want a map,
unless it puts the world right in their lap;
it's too much effort to reach the end
and find out you've got to begin again.

All those who're lost aren't there from wand'ring;
some are asleep, and dream of squandering
times and places they've not been,
describing wonders they've not seen.

03 AUG 2006

Just like we've done for a million years
We strike out blindly in the dark in fear.
Some use rocks or bombs, that's their choice;
me, I use music, my words, my voice.

We each know nothing, but take on faith
that truth comes from an honest face;
and when that message becomes a lie,
we use our darkness to hide disgrace.

Just like we were living in those caves:
we fear and worship the ones' who're brave
enough to venture out in the mist,
who tell us monsters just don't exist.

But we know better; it couldn't be
that we alone keep us from being free.
So there be monsters, alive and well;
on one side, Heaven, the other, Hell.

Just like we started. Doesn't it seem
a million years, a million dreams
would make some difference, help us to grow
beyond our fear of "I don't know."?

The truth is simple: there's nothing more
than what we make it, and that's for sure.
What work we're given is to survive
Another million, 'til we arrive.

03 AUG 2006

for Starlight Dances

Looking for an answer, waiting on a clue,
making myself dizzy thinking up new things to do.
My cup runneth over; now it's spilled out on the floor.
Making messes, I can do for sure.

Asking more fool questions, needing to know why,
making myself crazy searching for an alibi.
My life's far from empty. Now, that much is true.
What's the point in worrying, when all I need is you.

Cajun woman, what's that cooking? It smells good to me.
Nothing else we need to do, nobody else to see.
All the spice we need in this life is right here at hand;
what else do we need to understand?
Cajun woman, kiss your lover man.

Searching for a guru, wanting some grand scheme,
making myself nervous somewhere unknown in between.
My front lawn needs mowing, that I guarantee;
What else right now could my purpose be?

Wanting ever after, somehow cheating death,
giving myself indigestion trying to hold my breath.
Who cares what might happen when my time is through?
Right now, baby, all I need is you.

Cajun woman, what's that cooking in your bright red pot?
What do we care what the world thinks of the things we've got?
Everything we'll ever need is right here in our hands;
what else do we need to understand?
Cajun woman, kiss your lover man.

02 AUG 2006

You wanna make it on the pop charts
Shrink-wrapped and sold just like a pop tart
Well, let me tell you: better get smart
it doesn't matter if you've got heart

It doesn't matter what you're saying
and you don't have to do the playing
Don't take a seat, 'cause you ain't staying
If the cash registers' aren't swaying

They'll tell you it's too complicated
or that your appeal's understated
the boys in sales must be elated
to see your potential inflated

You wanna make it on the pop charts
Be the next big thing sold at Wal-Mart
Well, let me tell you, better get smart
Forget your brain and lock away your heart

It doesn't matter what you're saying
As long as stadium's are swaying
They don't have to know you're not playing
Or that you're prematurely graying

You'll be the flavor for a short while
And then be left out on the trash pile
With nothing but a toothy, big smile
"So sorry, but you're going out of style"

You want to make it on the pop charts
Be shrinked-wrapped and consumed like pop tarts
Well, let me tell you, better get smart
and find another path with some heart

It doesn't matter what you're saying
Or if you do none of your playing
It's just an image you're portraying
Don't mind your bags, you won't be staying.

02 AUG 2006

for Bob Dylan

Youth's rebellions dissipate;
brave destiny succumbs to fate.
One morning you find it's too late
to join the revolution.

One's high ideals sink in the mud;
mountain retreats recede in flood.
The fire that once burned in your blood
Is ash and tar solution.

The words you chanted echo back
with missing verbs, with added tact,
contaminated by the fact
they're now just noise pollution.

What was the problem has become
the status quo, opposing thumbs;
and the low beating of the drums
is just sheep in wolves' clothing.

Those questions you posed to the air
have lost their sense of savoir faire.
Youth listens, but it doesn't care;
they have their own self-loathing.

The answers aren't there to find
out in the world, inside your mind,
to questions, now, of any kind.
Your gurus were all posing.

And yet the world is still the same:
victors dividing up the blame,
while tired and poor and sick and lame
sit waiting for a saviour.

While those with strength enough to fight
pretend their side is mostly right,
with pills to help them sleep at night
not doing them a favor.

Pretending at community,
while slicing up eternity;
the dish is done, it seems to me
the salt has lost its flavor.

I could, but now it's far too late;
while we sit back and hesitate
the tabla rasa changes state
and crumbles in the ocean.

And each of us that could have been
if only we'd decided when
is left with words and bitter pens
robbed of our forward motion.

To sit and kvetch about the news
our backsides warm in worn-down pews,
forced now to listen as our views
are shown as foolish notions.

01 AUG 2006

Why bother to meditate,
chanting some mantra for years,
servant to some potentate
guru's smoke and mirrors?

You're right to hesitate;
what proof describes an answer
a fool could appreciate?
Only a clever dancer

could be seen no hypocrit.
Your path is no one else's;
who else would have traveled it?
You must build your own spell kit.

01 AUG 2006