The first time I saw Los Angeles,
it was after midnight.
Descending from Cajon pass and
entering the chaos of light and
the formless poetry of traffic,
I thought of Ezra Pound’s line from near the end of the Cantos:
“I cannot make it cohere.”
“It” is the most important word in that sentence.
In language we can conjure wholes too big for us to comprehend.
Push hard enough, and names fade and pronouns are all we have left.
So what is this place?

listening to contemporary soundscapes on the radio
I realize I am the  age of my grandmother
when she was terrified that I was
happily howling the latest Beatles  songs
and trying to play them on the piano which
    for her
was a sanctuary of late 19th century music
she liked to play with virtuosity and passion

much of what my culture radio station
calls contemporary music
or pop music stations praise in their charts
does not really catch my ear either

times keep changing

A good poet speaks to a generation.
A great poet’s work echoes loudly through the ages.
The rest of us just talk to ourselves and hope someone is eavesdropping.

Dropping to my knees in prayer to a god
who might or might not be listening--
hoping somehow the ache in my heart
will reverberate far enough along
as my tears are streaming, glistening
and find their way through
the silent waves of grief and worry
that envelop and grip my heart
to find god's undivided attention
for just a moment or two--
"dear god, I beg of you--
stop all the pain that has its clutches
upon many of our throats in this land
and swipe away all tears
with your mighty hand
and please, please if you can see through
to the core of me now
do the magic that they say you can do
and heal not just myself
but the many many others too
who are in pain, bereft and alone,
who are in dire need of your love, in need of You."
Amen.

He lies flat on the rooftop
looking at the stars.

Useless worlds birthing and dying
he muses
the colossal magnificence of waste

if atrophy is the verdict
why create a complex web of universe
just because someone from an island
would stare at them
in awe of the beauty
seeking a key to the riddle
himself a grain of dust
lost in reading the firmament
and not grasping
of what significance
he is
within his shrinking space and time
in an expanding universe.

you mustn't be so impatient my child
our time will come
you know the numbers are limited
we will be leaving soon
I promise you
and the adventure that awaits us
will be beyond our imagination
we will be kings
and they will love us
because we are what they strive to be
but it cannot be rushed
we must move slowly
they will not even realize that we have saved them
and in a thousand years
it will be all ours
as their species fades to relics
now come inside after the earth sets
and just remember
we shall be there
before the next eclipse