Balloon strings

at a children's

birthday party

I was in my rocking chair
and I asked my son,

"open a can of beer for me,"
and my son said...."sure
Pops."

"the bar was open,
then sometimes open, wait

where was I going with this,

any way, my mind wanders,...oh yeah,
nothing is free

and Son, humanity is doomed,
trust no one,
especially neighbors
who fly the flag

and when you're dead,
you're gonna be dead,
for ah long,
long, time.

so have fun when ever
and where ever you can,

get me another beer, will you?

and keep clear of moonlight,
and walks along the boardwalk,
and women with eyes
as blue as the ocean,
women who smell like wildflowers
scattered around a mountain pass

they become the snowflakes falling in summer

ah, well, anyway

trust the woman who knows
your heart,

pure of heart,

a lover to hold you close,
the candle flame touching the wick

of the candle and son

grab me another...".

her sneakers wrapped around a telephone wire

"tall stone monoliths and crumbled walls
hell is not a physical place
it is a spiritual realm

and this city of locked hearts
a prison of sorts
without barb wire," Kate tells me,

"and the high wire walkers
and the dice tossers
and the lonely ones...
all in search of the lost song."

"I want to sing songs
and dance far from this desolate stage,"
I'm telling Kate,
"I envision myself a tragic figure."

a tender smile and,
"who, Hamlet, Walter White?

we're walking down sunset avenue
occasionally passing other failed animals.
silent howling and teeth hidden in our
lost hearts
those parts too delicate to display
except in anger, rage, and want.

and my love touches in me places
I don't want to feel
and I love her like the mad hatter
loves alice.

it's summer.

we smoke a joint
and we're walking on the boardwalk.
we past the arcade
and a song is playing
and as we walk
down past the coffee shop
a different song is playing
further, another song.

"never tangled or twisted,
how do you do it?"
I asked her.

a serene smile
and Kate says,
"my life is quicksand
struggle you die
relax you float,
you survive."

her blue eyes
bright
my reluctant Cinderella laughs softly
and another song is playing
and i move closer to my heart.

cracked asphalt of the modern realm

and court jester Gus pushes a shopping cart
he borrowed from the A&P to collect

bottles and cans
for a pence, perhaps a schilling.

the alley cat he cared for was named Maggie
and Gus slept with Maggie
in a kind person's village cellar.

it was rumored that Sir Tommy R.
shot a flaming arrow
into Gus's wooden leg.

young knaves
called Gus a *** knowing he'd chase them,
wooden leg and all,
and he was swift.

some threw insults, some threw eggs.
the village was a ballroom
fit for lords
in search of a court jester.

Gus the ***. I saw him

i saw him limping through the rain.
my heart was thin.
I threw him apathy, feigned sadness.


his heart still glows in my sorrows garden.

nobile misfit. all Gus sought was a smile, bread,
and a kind word.

I love,

the desperation
as if wandering lost on a mountain.

I love the solitude
and the loneliness of being
compelled to love.

i love the desperation.

the wolf hidden in my wild heart
howling at a streetlight

and the sorrow of distant echoes in my head
and the laughter coming from an empty bed.
the mountain ledge whistling in the mist.
the pierce of thorn from the rose
clutched tightly in my fist.


some never feel more alive
as love fades into the silence
of sweet lies and blue skies.

just never show the fear that's in your eyes.
never shed a tear for the rose refused.

you are the prettiest women
I ve ever seen.
I ll give you my heart
if i m allowed to dream

white lace dress and red sweater,
you are the tender love,
and if you let me hold your hand,
and walk you home,
and to perhaps kiss you.

you are the prettiest woman
I ve ever seen
and i ll give you my heart
if i m allowed to dream.

her beauty born
of feathers and wax
she flew to close to the sun
and with her palm
holding stardust

her love gave her
a bouquet of goodbyes

never love sorrow
Sarah
the ledge only grows smaller

Broken Heart

butterfly
under the glass

Pure Heart

into my arms you can run

when the bars close down
I walk through a silent town...

an open window
a song is playing...

and you whisper in my ear
telling me everything
I long to hear

you chase me with your Cheshire cat smile
know all my failings

you come to me in sleep
and in sleep I hold you in my arms

such sweet lies
this crazy blue night

I love crazy people.

"I m ****** up
but I m,

too ******,
up,

to care, " she tells me.
"but this isn't the most **** up
I've ever been."

and she druelled on the bar.

if,  "come hither eyes",
it s a crazy woman,

crazy women are the best.
some are so sweet
and they always keep you jumping
like a kangaroo,

a little insane is not good enough.

"meet me in Machau,"
she would say, and then,
"what's your name?"

and I was suppose to reply,

"bond, James bond."

(but the *** was good)

but those were distant times. and so

i ve sworn off crazy women.

(and I mean it this time!!!)

dedication:

to all the women who said
I don't have a heart.

i don't know how old i was, 8 or 10.

I climbed out the window
onto the roof of the garage.

it was summer.

I lied down
and gazed at the stars for hours.

i reached to touch moonbeams,
and with my finger
drew a circle around the north star.

i dissolved into the hush of stars
free of want or need.

a single heart beat.
I, the wind, moon, stars.

I long to lie on the roof, again,
gaze at the stars
and filled with wonder.

3 a.m.

the dying town, dark moon,
the wolf lurks in a concrete tomb.

fallen friends and picnics at the graveyard,
empty stores and sidewalk ******.

streets of sorrow--
one-way roads to no tomorrow.

shadowed eyes, whispers in bars,
fallen angels, shooting stars.

sirens wail the ****** night,
and in every traffic light burned red
time never stops for the dead.

the ****** on the corner.
none to morn her fate,
a wink and a whisper,
"do you want to go on a date?"

the black butterfly,
soul of sorrow,
no echo, no refrain,
lost in silence, bound by pain.

he had
the *******
tatooed on his cheek
above the scar,
whispers when he talks,
and people listen...

the edges worn
on the black and white photo
he fondles in his hands...

he walks passed the tombstones
collecting the bouquets of flowers,
gardenias, some violets, and finally red roses
kneels
places them gently on her grave

she was the prettiest cop
that ever arrested him...

passed the ******* tattoo
above the scar
one longing tear
forever falling...

my memory

I m 5 or6
in the bathtub

I hear the little girl next door
calling my name

I run down the hall
out the front door
down the steps

*******,

I'm naked.

( "........... ...  ..............., ..... .......  .
......... ..................... and ................ .......... .
............, ...................... ............. ."

the sun spills warmth
across the countryside
and the flowers smile

waving their tiny leaf hands
to greet the new day

so I smile with whispers of love
as if the wildflowers are my children.

the elusive thrushes
hidden among the bowing willows

whisper sweet songs.

the tiny bird angels
not so far off.

those tiny angels

far from the silences that **** you inside.

i 'm standing in the dark
staring at the floor

and there s something
spiritual
transcendent
after 5 beers
******* into a toilet
something
like sunshine after a rainstorm

she was just the right touch
of pretty

her bellybutton
and the contour of her thighs

and I thought i had found a heart
that had me feeling good
so good

but you have to bleed out of your heart
to be true to love

and you had to bleed your heart out
to be with her

(a roll of the dice,
sorrow, or joy)

and the Gypsy had cursed me

said all relationships would end
badly

trouble and death
would follow me,


love.

(sorrow or joy)

there s something ethereal
standing in the dark
******* in the toilet
it s all about aim,
aND

suDDenLy,

SATORI!

and as the prisoner was led out of the prison,
"see you later," the prison guard said.

the bar was dark cave.

Dixie sang a song
and I pretended
she was singing to me.

two amateur fights,
2 black eyes
and a broken nose.

(and i couldn't get the silly grin off my face.)

"there is something beautiful
about the fall

to the canvass," I tell her,
"the sweet dreams only of you."

Dixie shook her head,
"why do you fight
when all you do is lose?"

"if you don't fight
you've already lost."

Dixie said I was crazy
and i scared her.

"but Dixie
you are my only friend.
we'll pull the stars down from the sky,
set the wicked night on fire."

Dixie tried hard not to,
but she smiles.

and there is something graceful
about the fall, golden leaves. the brevity
and the cooling air

and the nights we had by the lake.

a silent embrace...her warmth lingers against me,
a quiet tenderness beyond touch
and all we knew was a timeless "now."

the rain won't lift.

it moans a low,
lonesome sound,
gives no mercy.

a window opens.

"i'm a little lost lamb," she tells me.

and I look up and she smiles at me,
she always smiles,. "Maggie," I sigh.

"what are you doing out on a night like this?" she asks.

"i long to dream in black and white
of deserted city streets
to waltz down at night in a cold rain."

it's summer and Maggie's
hanging out the window,
streetlight in her eyes,
her long ***** blonde hair
getting wet from the rain
hangs down around her face.

the dreamer of all the good dreams.
i have to tell her, "Maggie, you're
so beautiful."

"come up. I'll tell your future."

I shrug my shoulders, "I know the future. you die."

"not with me." she laughs softly
like a summer breeze
and her smoky voice whispers,
"your getting soaked, come up
the fire escape."

"so you're the lost lamb," i laugh,
"then what am i? the beckoning scarlet knight,
the golden moth drawn to your fire?"

"there's no music, Jack, but you know
the song too well."

"who chooses who we are,
what we become?

"no pity for us lost lambs."


whether lost or found,
the way a bird knows the sky.
i always know that where ever
I drift
or whoever I might become

I'd can always
find my way back to Maggie's window.

walk the high wire without a net.

the poem is life all else is waiting.

he lives in an oblong trailer
at a trailer park.

every night he'd make a pitcher of margaritas.
salt around the rim of the glass.
crushed ice to the top of the glass.
the glass cold to his hand.

he turns the t.v. on
and the lamp on the night stand off
and sits in the easy chair
in the darkened room.

he'd drinks the margaritas
and watches t.v. until the station
goes off the air

and then watches the random dot pixels
and listens to the static coming
out of the t.v. speaker.

the flashes of light flickering.
and the blue light settles on his face.
eyes open, staring.

the darkness reached for him
and in the ghostly flickering,
he let it.

Nietzsche knew of the waiting abyss,
those inside and those outside.

...Bobby's wife is *****, murdered.
he gets a gun, tortures
and slaughters the 3 men.

the entire movie theater cheers. some clap.
we've had our fill.
(transitory though it is)

we've realized in the husband,
the animal lurking in all,
not hidden, but not acknowledged,
our dark light rising from the mist
of primordial quicksand,
the mirror facing the mirror.
the monster fighting the monster.

and we are pleased.

in the meadows above treeline
the wildflowers are in bloom
turning time into sunshine:
the indian paintbrush, green orchid,
yellow columbine, heart-leafed arnica

and climbing through the rain into sunshine
our shadows stretched across a cloud

and my love's surprise
echoes across the mountain side
to the bow river
and snow-covered mountain tops.

it is an angel's song, gentle and sweet
where the wildflowers bloom
and our hearts are always free.

Alberta.

the door to his room moans open.

a shadow familiar and sad
like the cold, raining night, whispers,

"Jack, are you awake?"her voice startles him.
"can't sleep again?"

Jack shifts in the chair,
"yeah, I'm awake. i can sleep alright."

he stands, and as he walks to the shadow,
"I want to climb a high mountain
through snow and ice
and never be found."

"a heart that's empty hurts. I miss you, Jack."

"i'm glad someone does. i miss you too."

"you forgot something our last night.
I didn't know it was goodbye."

"what did i forget?"

the shadow moves towards him.
jack slips his arms around her waist.

"you didn't kiss me goodbye."

she puts her arms around his neck.
her lips are soft and warm
and like a summer night, the warmth of her body
comes to him through the coldness of the room.

the shadow raises her head
looks into his eyes as distant
as a sailor tossed on a violent shore,

"why jack, you're crying."

"yeah, i'm crying."

her lips are soft against his ear.
"don't cry, my darlin.
i can't bear to see unhappy.

if you love me. tell me you love me."

he is looking down into her dark eyes,
and softly whispers. "I love you. I do."

"Hold me jack, hold me."

"i'll never let you go..."

...jack probes the snow bridge
with his ice axe. the bridge collapses,
day becomes night
and he is falling, falling,
falling...

startled jack opens his eyes,
jumps out of the chair.

she took my picture,
that's how it started
that's how i knew,
she took my picture
off the refrigerator door

when your picture is taken off
the refrigerator
like dust off a knick knack shelf

you do the dishes,
you have to wash your own socks.

the refrigerator is cursed
like a lost winning lottery ticket.
cursed with pictures of dead pets,
dead aunt's, cousins, grandma...

(my picture rip off the fridge like $#@#$#@...)


the fridge hums its song,
warm on the outside
and cold on the inside.

you *******, i shout,
and i punched the fridge,
packed my suitcase,

grabbed my fishing pole
and out the front door
I went.

half way down the sidewalk,
I turned

and there was little Jack
looking out the window at me.

(tears ran down my cheeks.)

MAN! I'm gonna miss that dog!!!

a tribute to  Dave Roskos, poet.

at the Poet Wednesday
a long, long time back
in Woodbridge, I heard
the poet, Dave Roskos,
and the one line that rings so true,
a bittersweet, one word, symphonic waltz
the one line i 'll take to my grave.

"2 flies ******* on my coffee cup."


BEAUTIFUL, Dave Roskos, poet.

surrounded by the vastness of stars.
the mare silhouetted on a hilltop wishing,
waiting, she prays,

"O, nightingale
sweetly sing your solemn song.
send white butterflies adrift on moonbeams,
so he feels my longing in the night.

his wings carved from distant dreams
Pegasus drifts through silver mists
into the moonlit meadow,
but dawns golden fingers
drift across the field
and the winged horse must flee...


...Pegasus weeps from distant stars
to his love waiting on the hill

and her whisper drifts to the heavens

a hush held still in the lullaby of all distant hearts.

and as he was led down those hallow halls
he hummed the melody
of the song he had come to know, too well,
my friend,

and he was forgotten by the hammer of justice
reaching from the obsidian night, soul lost
in the song without words

the angry sky's mournful lament

the wild howl of the wolf
hidden in the hinterland of his heart

the leaves are frozen on the trees

and every wolf must howl
and every wolf must run
through the glass night,
when no heart will beat for him
where no soul can find him.

she had a wicked kind of motion,
a cold beauty
with the radiance of a sunset dying.

Jack had seen her,
had seen her walking
the sidewalks and streets
that are too dark for dreaming,

the acne scars on her cheeks
had left faded marks,
with her wolf spirit longing
to be unchained.

the sudden rain drumming on the roof of the car.

and Jack was no stranger to sad streets,
the sidewalks and tenement caves,
strangers in a crowd laughing.

his sad eyes, two black eyes,
another fight,
he looked like a raccoon.

he came around the car
as she knew he would,
took her in his arms,
kissed her and when he withdrew
from the kiss
she felt his warm breath.

Melissa was from Montana,
had left her husband.

just one more nightmare to try
and understand
and so Jack didn't want to know, why,
He didn't ask

and she is the one women
that never took the smile
from his face
and some loves forever to ring true.

2 souls in the fire.
one heart.

"come in, come in, part the curtains.
I'll tell your future.

i tip toed in...heavy night
beyond the door.
the curtains parted rippling
like water circling a deepening hole

and the face of shadow moans,
"you seem to be looking for answers???"

"well, yeah, does the size of the tombstone
tell how much you are loved,
or how much love you gave?'

"sit down," the shadow tells me,
i'll dust off the prayer wheel,
tell your future."

"when i was a kid
i dreamed in shadows
and whispered to the night.

i know the future.

the dead go to places
they will only know."

the face of shadow offers
roses cupped in wistful hands.

the shadow dissipating,
petals from black roses falling to the ground.

true love is hard to find.

it's like turning lead into gold,
water into wine,

ketchup into barbeque sauce.

miracles do occur,
most often times
under moonlight

and sometimes under saffron and silky streetlight.


(play your wild card, Sam.
bet the jack of hearts,
run with the feeling.)

(she has

ICE,  BLUE, EYES,
and so innocent.

he wonders what it will feel like to hold her.

(think Sam,
use your imagination.)

(the clock is ticking on you, Sam,
let's do something crazy)


the what IF?

(with billions of stars
what if,
we are???

you can't always be an angel???)

he is searching for the perfect line.

Sam does not know she will bury his heart
in silent sorrow

she turns and smiles at sam.

he does not see the ghost in her eyes,
the blueness of ice and empty tears

i woke up in the blues,
sat on the only chair in the dark room.

put on my torn shirt, worn shoes,

I wished upon a tumbling star

and down the steps, out the
front door
I went.

the puddles electric shimmer neon.

a robin dances fragile and free.
(I tip my hat, ah, what the hell.
I wish the robbin well.)

old man Bennett sitting on a park bench
in the rain
feeding pigeons.

how are you? I ask.

he sighs, ah, things don't get any better
don't get any worse.

he gives me a smile. (ah,
what the hell, quiet mercy,
I gift him a smile.)

I woke up with blues,
wished upon a falling star.

fell into a full moon.

(feel the pull!)

it rolls me over
the ocean of misty streets,
tall alley walls,
the dark corners hiding my heart.
(so give a smile to tomorrow.
???will there be cold beer in hell.)

I ve lost my way,
creature of silent sorrow .
(so throw me a smile.)

I fell upon a fallen star,
how far from the grave?

a crow caws at my window.
the night is so long.

wishing on a tumbling star,
no matter how you look at it
you lose.

I woke up in the blues,
sat in the only chair in a dark room.

"he hopes the book will
run into many editions...
to defray legal costs..."

Mein Kampf  2,  

by Donald J. Trump

we are going to fish

we carried our backpacks
fishing equipment
into the cabin

the cabin wasn't
Thoreau's cabin at Waldon pond

then came the storm
lightening
thunder
torrential rain
and

and then
the lights went out

there we were

******

eating potato chips
and drinking beer in the dark

"quick
put all the beer in the freezer,"
my brother says

we put on our headlamps
sat in the dark
discussed
the care and handling of fish
how the hybrid strippers
don't have the beautiful stripes...
we played cards
I read "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance"
by candle light
til 3 a.m.

rain
thunder
and lightening
for 4 days

and living the way Man was meant to live

read Aristotle (logic)
and then St. Francis (kindness)
and Neruda (passion).

be wary of neighbors
who wrap themselves in the flag.

remember nothing is free.

pure heart,

love always returns, is never lost.

you belong
with your arms around a love.

wind through the willows.

bird song trilling
from where time is the silence
falling into the valley.

sunlight beneath the leaves.
the grass bends from where you lay.
foxglove gentle and blooming in your eyes.

each step
slow and certain.
i fall into your open arms.

love rests here, among the moss and mist.
the trees, the sky, the flowers
know our first kiss.

and the wind through the trees  
whistles every mystery gone.

we sigh the words we were always meant to say.

clouds may wander blue sky
but love stays
sure and stubborn
pressing white petals always in our hearts.

"what's the longest you stayed up?" jack asks.

"oooh, 5 days, a week. who knows?"

they take the shots, touch glasses,
throw down the bourbon.

"I wonder if animals have dreams?" jack says,
I wonder if dogs dream?"

"sure they do, dogs, cats, squirrels, birds," bob is nodding
his head up and down." it's all biochemical.

"not insects."

"why not? fleas, June bugs, moths. it's all biochemical, mix in electrical impulses, you got love and dreams. jack,

tell your dreams to me."

madness masquerades
as mornings that come
and go

and dancing madly backwards
Pan plays his lute
down desolate streets
disappearing into the raging sun
of all possibilities.

the sad mornings that come and go, and

all possibilities considered

far from the haunted clocks
and cracking glass
margins shout
where walls never meet

in forgotten stillness.
so dance on silent ledges,

walk the high wire,
jump into the fire,

welcome madness passionately.

do something completely unexpected.

enjoy the imperfections,
kiss a stranger,
laugh when you should be crying,

madness is magic,
so strip down
naked as the wolf in the forest,
logic be ******,
howl along with the howling wind.

flesh became the silent cathedral
who whispers of bread.

the child's eyes
as black a veil as the Gaza night
have not tasted hope
                                                            ­            
and the multitude of the thin, faces sallow,
ghost the empty cooking pots
that offer Lilies

when hunger falls heavy
the moment before a scream
the sorrow sparrows grieve
what hell waits softly with silent breath.

once upon a time in the Holyland
the earth forgot to morn
and silence wrote the ending.

the cracked mirror
splits my face down the center.

one eye opened wide.
the other eye heavy.

one shard shows me young,
the child with dreams
filled with wonder.

the other sharp edge, old,
etched like tree bark in winter

(cuts deeper than jagged mirror glass.)

waxing moon, waning moon,
ashes and the flower blooms.

one eye looks back.
the other eye forward.

morning light, midnight,
all in the blink of an eye.

the mirror---no lies here.