rereading All the King’s Men
American demagogue reappears again

Jack Burden burdened
The Boss’s troubled twin

A student of history
Anne Stanton’s boyfriend

The Great Twitch and Great Sleep
But he cannot pretend

To truly explain
The tragedy he’s seein’

Political contempt
Brings a bad ****** endin’

Those ignorant white hicks
Turn against you in sin

No good from the bad
Just the bullet assassin

But Jack not beat down
Gets the girl in the end

A little hope from Dante
last lines in rhyme

Into the future
Responsible in time

Religion hasn't been too good for me
But those cathedrals speak in snow

And when the ones I love are sick
On my knees I go

The professors do discredit
The common people crave

Silently, yes silently
Silence by the grave

Father Mackenzie
No one was saved
No one was saved!

3:37
I keep the couplets comin'

3:38
Wish I was in Dublin

3:39
Closer to my grave

Father Mackenzie
No one was saved. No one was saved.

All these poems
My mind in turmoil
Yearning
Seeking rest

Snow today
My feet are cold
Loneliness
Qualyxian Quest

        do my best

waiting for the multiverse
reading in the night

wandering the library
basketball in sight

wishing, always wishing
distances delight

wondering if dimensions
make Turtle Island bright

The monolith is the cell phone
Or the movie screen

My God it's full of stars
Can you see now what she means?

My favorite middle school book
Still is Things Not Seen

Infinity at BP
Has died her dark hair green

I want to see my youngest son
And my boy who is 13

Do you think that Turtle Island
Swims inside our dreams?

Stockholm to Copenhagen
     speeding train, pouring rain
              Soren Kierkegaard again

               melancholy Dane
              I too feel the pain
           no words can explain

              loneliness refrain

So Trump drew me out
I was mostly teaching, reading books
My son says his English teacher
Ain't got no idea how mean she looks

Theology is curious
What in the hell are you talkin' about?
I have learned from the deniers
And learned from the devout

I do pray to the statues
Do not go to Mass
Mary with the Asian eyes
She was a grand wee lass

Paul McCartney in Baltimore
Dylan in DC
Early Roman Kings
Mother Mary Let it Be.

                 Eventually...

I've known guilt and shame and guilt
Myself myself despising

And I've know mystic Maria
All things sympathizing

I can't change the past
My talents or my sins

The future comes on fast
The Democrats must win!

Emily in Amherst
Dr. King in Atlanta

Me in obscurity
Drinking coke. Drinking fanta.

I don't have to understand it all
Wisdom comes with time

I plant my little mustard seeds
And I eat a little lime

Venus might have life
Europa does have water

Safety for my sons
Good work for her daughters

The patience of the Asians
The hard work of the Latinos

The music of the Black folks
The bread, the Church, the Vino!

a little lonesome quiet
        still yearning - who can deny it?
                 why the poems?

Because I wanted to try it.

tonight a cheap motel - not the Hyatt.
I’d like to see an anti-Republican
Revolution and riot.
The mob against their masters
Tear down the Wall, sell the scrap:
Let Trump buy it.

“Dear brothers and sisters, All Walls Fall.  All of them. Do not be fooled.”  - Pope Francis

              Crawling from Crawford
                San Antonio surprise
                     All Walls Fall
                       Collapse!!!

The racism is depressing
Don't need no Border Wall
Empires Collapse
All Walls Fall

Gratitude for good food
Vegetarian delight
Plus a little salmon
One Dark Knight

        abgeschiedenheit

Said Simone Weil.

Our lives may well be meaningless
Death destroying all

A vocation is a teeming mess
And silence is my call

I kissed her at the Florida beach
I pray the Wall will fall

Don't give up. Never give up.
Keep on tryin' y'all!

She says hi honey and I almost melt
Waitress smile so kind
Barnes and Noble Road to Heaven
Taiwan: me and Red Pine

Vegetarian pizza
Sadness as I walk
Yes, I'd like to...
But I'd also like to talk

Thanksgiving soon
I drive south
Scott, games
My dad

I'm still thinkin' Lincoln
Visited Kentucky
The River ran in Louisville
Calling all you angel lads

              Don't give up.

JMU came through for Q.
               Thank you.

Zen is almost, but not quite,
An enemy of civilization
Insists Red Pine

Civilization desires to accumulate
It's way is more and more

Zen seeks purification
It's way is less and less

I play basketball at twilight.
I read Red Pine. I guess.

We almost lost democracy
Confederate flag
Aushwitz shirt

Our politics become poisonous
Fox News
Real people get hurt

We need better schools
Need beauty. Need Prince and Peace.
Indigeneity y Spain y Ancient Greece

              The Giver. Not release.

It's been almost 10 years
Since I started writing the poems
Burning down the days
Awake in the restless night

Will anything get through?
Susan Meek not Sue
Carolina blue
The little way is light

              mystic flight

it just rolls on without me
the thought that scared me so much

inconsequential but
Chris Mullin had a shooter's touch

i have quiet at night
bball in the day

St. John's had Michael Clayton
My t-shirt too did say

Her smile
if only it could stay

I reach out but do not reach
Silence down the years
All my fears and doubts
All my terror tears

Chicago for one year
Probably a mistake
London for one week
Lady of the Lake

Tel Aviv was blue
My oldest son can bake
Jerusalem was brown
Please do not forsake

Politics portends
Demagogues appear
The silence never ends
Ambiguous unclear

             Cordelia
         Not King Lear

Almost zero influence
         endurance
               rest

Miss my sons
My darling ones

      yo espero

No, there's not much hope
But not much isn't none

Some seek fame and fortune
Some pray Thy will be done

Some do the best they can
Some just suffer through

I walk the quiet night
I whisper I love you

I sit alone outside the church
And wonder what to do.

Students: Are we alone?

Guru: Yes.

Students: So there are no others?

Guru: They are alone too.

Alone in the quiet library
Me at Seattle U.
Susan Darlene Meek
Hair of black, Eyes of blue

Tired. Exoplanets!
2042
Als Ick Kan
Doo wah diddy do

Nothing profound.

I just like words and music.

And I'm a shy, quiet type.

Ah! I don't like lying.
I am afraid of dying.
And I keep trying.

cardinals in the trees
       deer rushing near the breeze
                   fear within makes me freeze ...



             but the colors please pleas.

Been deeply fearful of being forgotten
Since she got closure and moved on

Then it mixed in with the cosmic
Terror of eternally being gone

Though often I live hopeless
I love the moon and twilight sun

If God exists, She is Unknowable
But Oh God! , how I miss my three young sons!

Ick! intense the isolation
  wandering this world, a bit of joy
                   much desolation
         fighting back the fear
                  mortality a mutilation
               the mystery of female beauty
                    songs are the soul’s *******.

I'm not the Prophet Mohammed
I fight no religious wars
I struggle to survive
Tempted by the ******

Quiet little libraries
Reading alone again
The silence is eternal
Silence be my friend

Read a little Salman Rushdie
His story of the knife
Moby **** kabobs
My truly troubled wife

Life is isolation
I drift I drift I drift
Texts to my dad
Thank you kindly for the lift

                            Ole!

Hamlet wants his sins remembered
I want mine forgotten

I sing Johnny Cash
Others Johnny Rotten

Shelley said his soul
Simply could not be boughten

Marriage like Muay Thai
A war so often foughten

Golden Temple in Kyoto
Also Angkor Wat and

Back again to silence
Alone, as I've often thoughten

Night is coming.
Darkness. Fright.

       Endurance.

No joy in Mudville
Strikeout once more

Melville prophetic
Hate like before

Oh, Canada!
Is it you we implore?

Where is Elsewhere?
Who opens the Door?

No one important
Grateful for my boys
Alone at 55
A phone call away

Susan Darlene Meek
In my wildest dreams
Chungnan Mountains
Silent is the Way

           Yea, verily. Yea.

In a world of frequent terror
And no ultimate hope

Slience and basketball
Is how I cope

library card to open
          the Alleluia, Leonard, still broken
                             in sleep the dream is woken …

                          
                                searching

She might have called me a hypocrite
But that charge is not true
So now I cross the street
Demon in my view

Solitary bird
Am I dove or raven?
No definite color
Will my soul be savin'?

            Wendy.