poetry – Page 44 – Poétique

Under the Moon

On some remarkable stretch of land
Stood a less remarkable man
With so many natural endowments
An ancestral fortune dying to explode
Jumped up in his chest out through
His throat and danced right out
The door without words for how
Restless it feels to rise up in a
Family that requires him to plant
Many seeds on the farm of his
Tapestry and the best of all
That wants to be genuinely was
Always asked to be differently
Different colored socks
Plain colored shirts
Careful what you wear
Or the kids will call you out
Learn how to hold a gun and
Kill things learn how to aim
Listening to the sound of the cattle
On the ground imagine them flying
I can feel the grass in my ear
And the echoes of my favorite
Memories that shaped the man I became
Even though he was only half
Of what was expected
Half of what was intended
Though his first cries
We’re as full and loud as the sun

Breath

She was always irritated
When I would cry the day after
Can we go any further
Can I climb into any deeper insight
Forming a bond oriented
Around a collaboration with
Myself a healing potential
That disallows any
Outside interference
Granted by unpredictable
Stars and wind resources
To be used to control conscious
Rhythms with a sound and
A heartbeat that beats deep in
The diolkos like an ambitious road
Partially paved with stone
Thumping from below I can
Hear myself finally again
Breathing in the beauty
Of my own breath

To Be Willing

When you have a mother
Who kept you alive but
Did not stand behind you
In some of your greatest moments
When you have a best friend
Who coaches you through life
For many years but cannot
Be there for you like a family
Whenever you are down or
Whenever you are in need
When you have a brother
Or a sister who has loved you
And has been there for you and
They have died or even worse
They have also betrayed your
Deepest love for them then where?
Where do you find hope
Where do you find the inner strength
Where does the light come from
It has to come from within
Like a step of one day at a time
Like a drink to quench your thirst
After a very long time you
Take the steps a long the way
Never to forget let go or give up
The path that has been tread
Those people they have helped
You to get where you are today
But who you are becoming
Nothing can stand in the way
Of this someday you have been
Working so hard towards this
And feeling sometimes very alone
Asking the right question
Can bring it home
Not if you can but if you will
This is who you are
This is who I am
This is what it means
To be willing

Du Paradis

Worst case scenario consultant
Benumbed by the current
Icy reactions to a loneliness
That sitting in the back row
Can only bring though in
All the blue hills and
There aren’t any pills that
Can erase all the pain
Or the absence that the
Tanzanian sunset would bring
To the Great Plains if
The lions look to the heavens
And see no light
No celestial pink and orange
Again the same is true
When my heart lies lifeless
On the other side of a banging
Door and the shaking core
Of empty rattling left in shivers
After what’s wasted to tear away
From me in tender cries
As the color dries on the canvas
Of my forehead painted
Like the memory
Of paradise

Pomme

Bad taste in humanity
Might get better at picking
The orchard has been dry
A bit rotten in some places
The worms are happy
A need for riper choices
More delicious comrades
I had a taste of an apple
It gave me hope and
A lot of advice it was
Very wealthy and wise in
It’s perfectly red skin
And then I had a bite
Knowledge and juice
Running down the sides
Of my hunger for meaning
Mouth that was eager to
Take more bites and
Save the seeds so that I
Could grow more trees
And eat more apples
Just like it and for years
I would eat from this valley
Until the fruit was gone
Time to find another
The grass is wet
Beneath my feet the soil
Is crawling with fertile
Imagination and the sun
Woke me up last night
In my dreams talking about
How the rest of the earth
Has yet to be discovered

Happy Laundry

The laundry makes her happy
Just sitting waiting to be done
Next to her love and the boy
Folding one by one
Who is now the man observing
This simpler world of life
Drums are spinning
Clothes are churning
In the background
Of his mind unforgettable
Hard echos of his mother
Saying reprehensible things
About rape and drugs
Why can’t life be happy
Instead of dark and grimy
Like sharing dirty laundry
Wanting life to be more simple
Is like folding happy laundry

Decoding a Dream

If you have survived grief
Then you have learned
How to exist within a nightmare
If life is an inconvenience
If it doesn’t fit into your
Picture perfect frame
(Except for where you
disconcertingly find room)
Then it’s clear that
You already know that nightmares
Can come true

A dream can become a
Flailed fantasy but can a
Nightmare become a dream?
Snow hangs above me
Resting on my brow
The sun is traveling sideways
Rather than up or down
Just as Kiribati floats
Along the equator
My heart sinks with the
Rising of the moon
No holiday exists yet
To celebrate or forget it
If a candle burns
No one knows who lit it
When you finally opened
My eyes decoding the dream
I thought to be a nightmare
It was still only a dream

Everything Again

When most things are in place
Occasionally one is out
Through the top of the circus tent
I find myself exploding
Soaring into the sky without
Understanding every way
Every possible why
Each movement always so
Calculated until one is not
The happenstance is a different
Kind of stress a different
Type of letting go a different
Scent then I have smelled before
But it arouses me in a
Nuclear sort of way
A hiss and a pop and
Every essence flows
Like a river before me
Into the abyss of everything
And nothing and then
Everything again

Flick

Sweet acknowledgments
I don’t know what you’re talking about
Two little something’s making
Encouragements about one another
One is not right the other not wrong
But the cards reveal the path
Gravel rocks kicked under feet
Then my cheeks rose fast or slow to heat
It doesn’t matter even sliced apples
Seem remarkable at a time like this
Just a lot of heart and a little nothing
Goes a long way in a dark place
I warmed your seat you warmed my soul

City Moon

A lost chance to be
Something more interesting
A time gone now that
The music has changed
The spirits of the people
Have left the parks
Where have they scattered?
We’ve yet to know
I like to imagine
That the trees have
Absorbed them all
Where the sidewalks sparkle
And the cement bends
There are souls living there
Memories of the magic
Excitement for life
To be thought of as living
On in the heartbeat
Of us all and in the
Drumming pulse
Of the street
A rattle and a bell
A ringing story for
An opposite conclusion
For death I escape
Into a departure for
My love of the moon
Sixty years ago