Vignettes**



every read is not a feather
but a fearsome weight,
every poem~repast unique.
the desert,
toujours la même chose,
always the same thing,
self~loathing,
for now
thy questioning overwhelms you:
now what, what's next, what's left?
~~~
French bread speaks only in one tongue:
the earthy brown crust language of
soil and sun, announcing I am the flavor,
white flour is but a process
~~~
when the
breadwinner
can no longer provide,
he suffers twice:
once,
the hunger pains he inflicts,
felt more keenly,
then again,
for the dishonorific the world
does crown him,
man of no value,
bread-loser
~
my favorite raindrop is
the one that lands on my
nose and rolls slow
onto to my tongue:
a nose drop twofer!
~
all art begins with stimulus.
stimulus breaks the comfort of habit.
habit is the blackout shade
that strains out the light of creation
~
no two dancers will dance
the same choreography
exactly the same way,
no two poets will employ
the same words
exactly the same way,
the small differences
are the heart of the origins of our specie,
great art,
Vive la difference!
~
Let us give our worst performance,
Write our worst essay,
If it pleases but one,
Its success makes the great ones tremble
with envy

Teach me art

Teach me art appreciation,
Line and Texture,
Light and Composition,
Collage, Montage.

I 'll pay you in kind.
Teach you to write without saying
****.

Teach you to see that beauty
You possess,
That it does not you,
Own,
Unless you let it.

Paint your nails,
Ask your therapist,
Does your coach know what I know?
That the talent and the vision swamped
Neath the necessary but overwhelming anger.

Write easy, be easy,
Let the light enter and fill the space
Like a Vermeer, open up by letting in,
Just one tiny window, all that's needed,

So if you teach me art,
I will teach you how to write a poem
About painting beauty buried within,
About anger, letting go.

Nearer to the midnight hour
Than thee,
My ship sinking neath lids of iron,
I lay me down and entrust my soul
To the muses,
The Gods of Poetry and Art,
My poems to keep.

Tuck me in, kiss my forehead,
They smile knowingly.

I ask in the slow, punctuated,
Indistinct voice
Of drowsy,
"Will I see you tomorrow?"

They reply:

"Soon we shall meet again
In dreams most colorful,
Whether in this world,
Or the next,
T'is another's choice,
All is chance."

*Then they soft whispered:
But new poems will lie by your side,
Pillowed beneath thy head,
Guardians and Friends,
Wherever, Whenever.
For once a poet,
A poet forever.

So journey on,
Good Night To You,
Our child."

for Kitty Prr*

there is no boundary,
Mason Dixon Line, 49th parallel,
uptown, downtown grooves,
separating human from poetry,
but there is living, daily scorekeeping,
push/pull of taking each breath
in a right mannered way

sometime you gotta dig a ditch
to learn to climb a mountain,
pay dues and even get paid back
for living in a wrong mannered way,
which requires laying down of the pen,
doing shovel ready projects
needy for completion,
yet-to-be plans needy for
formulating details,
forethought and caring, putting the
poetry aside,
on top of the dusty piano

sometime you gotta drink it black,
pass on the milk, cream and the sugar,
even if the waitress just brings it,
pour ice water on top.of your head
just for yourself alone
the how-to-cleanse the eyes and head,
sometimes you got to let the
poetry stand aside

sometime you have to open that
black briefcase^ treasure hoard of
all things soured and soliloquy of
missteps and judgement errors,
letting the
poetry stand aside

sometime you gotta do the laundry,
rediscover the bottom of the sink,
watch the washing machine movie screen
picture making,
asking for its very own poem,
but you know this day,
gotta let the
poetry stand aside
and you stand up
and climb,
straighten up,
back creaking,
joints cracking,
first find the place to rest the body safely,
and when the chores of living crossed off,
then only
ready and somewhat good,
dust the piano,
dig out pen and paper
from the kitchen drawer of miscellania,
and let the reign of poetry
rekindle the Phoenix's ashes

this trip
homeward bound,
riding the Q (subway) train
from the messy grime of a
never fully repossessed
cesspool misnamed as
Times Square,

to our apartment
near but yet far,
a poem short & sweet was
born complete, on an 8 minute
fast track victory lap to periodic
successful urban planning,

that even and
even though
with and/of
which
no speedy highly
disrespectful witch
on a broomstick,
nor a midnight traffickless
auto trip,
could ever hope
to compete
<>
roses red, violets blue,
all the passengers, revelry tired,
both becostumed & be plained,
Hallowed eve festivities
again, lesser than expected,
life be, eager awaited
legal moment of crazy-
-inness-inward-permissed,
never quiet or as good
as hoped,

we tired riders
all look worn from the
aggregated
infidelities of a
a hoped-for
missing-out happier life

nearing midnight,
the new immigrants,
in subway platform
patrolling,
offer us candy for sale,
their toddler children,
beside them
at this midnight hour,
to drive home
the desperate willingness to

survive in a city oft hostile

no longer eager to be
beacon beckoning
to the world, we rethink
to our minded selves,
our Statue of Liberty
engraved invite:

"Give me your tired, your poor, / Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, / The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. / Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, / I lift my lamp beside the golden door”
<>
we exit the underground rout(e)
and the walk from subway to front door
is another 8 minute travelogue segment,
we cover the quarter mile on foot,
covering a skimp of distance that
our urban transport  
of many mileage covered
in the same units of minutes
in flyer miles

<>
late at night,
we walk fast, with eyes wide,
our lives to hide,
from the risks of the
unpredictable
when the street parade
of stragglers
gives not the comfort of a
rowdy crowdy,
and the existence of crime
is not
entirely fabricated

<Did>
I offer short and sweet,

Oh well I only misled,
the trip 16 minutes
and the poem
in my head,
complete emerged
with minutiae attending
et. al.,
in far far less mini~minutes,
for it was
a product of
silent back labor,
from first staggering
screaming pain
to
successful unexpected birth
that can take maybe
minutes five,
to mentally survive
plus,
physically complete the birth,
introduce this poem to life.
when the photos of my mined mind
make images from negatives
into words,:

collect, sort and report the
output picturesque
now in colors black & white,
of a trip from a Broadway theater
through to a high rise building
astride the river
which gives me
a theoretical cleaner space to breathe
<>
rather than short and sweet?
I really reseed,
redeed it as/is:
not too long and a tad
bittersweet

a night in the life of
the mixture of successes and
failures of our troubled world
in
living technicolor,
a few seconds of film
of which one could fairly,
and in fairness
bless/write/curse/
each sight
twice,
uttering:

”mine eyes have seen the glories,
as all come to look for America”

~
for yasaman yohari
~
salute jahari,
jewel flowering faithful in our desert of the quiet misbegotten,
where more most eyes closed by sandstorms torrents of...

this child Jasmine girl, oh!
how I adore her happiest melodic smile,
eyes are opening, gleaming black dots so white bright,
explicitly explicably mystery perfect,
either could substitute for our shared sun master,
or our shy, face changing, hiding traveling moon

listen so carefully to the melodies
of a tired old man, why, no idea,
it has no literature, can paint no drawings,
yet somehow, his yasaman heart blossoms
pricked to revival, renewal, at your devotion,
deepest affection
so a bargain struck

*the old gent,
wise in the way of words,
gladly will tutor you in an  
accented peculiar New York English,
if you can teach him how
a brother can - to- for-
a sister, a family,
love with joy brimful pure,
an added recompense,
I will take her Persian name as well

I don't show her all the poems
I write,
Because if I did,
I would be picking up
***** crying tissues
From every room.

I don't show her all the poems
I write,
Because if I did,
My neck would be sore,
My back twisted,
My arms black n blue
Where she alternatively
Hugged me too hard or punched me harder,
For making her sadmadhappy,
Or just one of
all of the above.

I don't show her all the poems
I write,
Because some are meant for her to read,
Après les deluge,
After I'm gone,
Safely but sadly,
Out of her reach,
And the man who always carries
Tissues for her,
Has finally
Run out of stock.

~~~

sometimes right and wrong,
good and bad,
are accurate single summaries of
the momentary episodes,
the essays,
that constitute the whole human voyage
to parts unknowable

there are but a handful of persons
who might fit the lightness
of your loveliest of theories

but how could you know
that long ago,
one declared independence from the
oppression of personal dependencies,
from either
admissible fear,
more than,
admirable courage

and yet,
those few,
those so very precious few,
a band, a squad, a fireteam
of successful piercers of
the bark of an ever scaling armor,
are warmth welcomed and comforted
within my hearts hearth,
under the protection
of my soul's furnace,
for welcoming flawed me,
fully,
without reservation

Nowadays,
I write mostly for
the lost children,
the lost loves,
the long agos of long ago,
those whose caring and loss,
scars and medals
somehow
were adjudged,
deemed too costly,
for everyday wearing

and for
those mates,
whose caring and the sharing
of their losses,
demands memorization, savoring,
writing down,
proofs of open boundaries

for me,
in the losing, is the saving,
in the poems that honor recall,
therein, thereof, and
thereby,
gaining
for our lives,
a modest, husbanded,
allowance,
a fund mutual,
of caring,
hard earned
and keeping us alive


~~~


October 26, 2015
8:48 AM
NYC

when the poems don't come,
where do they go?

silly notion,
what's the commotion...
don't they just wait,
gestate,
till the time is right,
till one fires the starter's pistol,
they come when they come,
right?

no.

poems are journeymen,
cover bands,
looking for work steady,
airborne, breeze borne, atmospheric,
looking for a ready, willing & able
host and hostess

a recognizer of their properties,
willing to offer themselves up,
by adding the final touch
to a project that has
its deadline passed,
needy for a Caesar,
cut it out,
to come and get it

are you willing to add
your name to it,
cutting its chord,
let it pass from the airs of heaven
down the stairs
to an earthly audience?

are you willing to own it?

The sun~poem also rises every evening…

A.P.U (as per usual):
this testimony~phrase tilts me sideways,
to relieve the condition, needy to be righted
one must expel the belly kicking seedling,
looking to be outed as a full fledged tree,
a poem planted, a gatherer of insects,
giving shade, perhaps shedding fruit

the sun bids adieu, self~same~centrifuge
of our solar system, is indeed alway rising
somewhere, though the light of our naked
eyes weak, incapable of trajectory bending,
to follow its course’s curvature, nonetheless,
we know it but struggle to believe just as we
struggle to complete, compare, and compose

replanted words in your heart, words that trigger,
are the notions inherent, of a center, rarely eclipsed,
that never ceases to offer up nouveau hope in each
of the days, a placenta to fret you blood and oxygen,
once purposed, discarded into darkness,
b u t
the words rise again, offering what you seek,
diurnally, need, to find within them, for my child,
is now
our child…

~dedicated to the heart fixers~

sometimes I smack my head,
when a poem commission is lying on
the ground before me, and I just don’t
hear it, believe it, in order to retrieve it…

many months of physical rehabilitation,
sessions always ended with a certain cutesy
Gen Z~Millenial crossover phraseology:

“remember to tell someone you love them”

the instructors mostly youngish,
so we senior~smile
a tad dismissively, give them a reward~grin, and
head for the locker room,
where we gossip and compare notes,
on the Part II of our in-process-future-realization,
living a grueling new life of self-preservation, 24/7

the PTs & EPs pound you on the machina, go faster, work harder,
eat better, sleep more, take those meds, motion is lotion,
walk the talk, never be still, but race to live longer and
prosper, this hard work is your new job, and resignation
is non~optional

now, it hits me, via a figurative sharp slap on the side of the head,
triggering an actual physical manifestation that reverbs to the toes,
that the most important lesson went under the radar,
evading the former trader’s dimming vision,
flunking himself on the rehab test paper,
a purple F for fool,
a grade, earned and deserved, and herein poetically preserved

the hardest heart work, begins only after you co-
commence the longest road back to where you once
belonged, but where you can’t walk alone, for therein
a recipe for failure; and the work that needs doing,
is on you; take that tear-repaired heart, and give it away, it,
one can be healed, but not if sealed, for the hard-hearted
walls thicken, and “over  time, the thickened heart muscle
can become too stiff to fill the heart with blood; the heart
can't pump enough blood to meet the body's needs.”

so break off pieces of your heart, give them away with
relentless abandon, for this is the heart that self-repairs,
new tissue, new fiber, and most important, regeneration,
the one single reparation that can successfully
accomplish the true miracle of getting by giving,
no forgiving, if you don’t exercise the heart by

“remembering to tell someone you love them”




dedicated to the hard working staff of the
Cardio Rehabilitation  Unit
of Nyulangonge, Rusk Institute of Rehabilitation
who started  me
with a mighty push on the long road to utilizing my heart properly

<•>

Upon appearance of an untitled poem with no body in my Drafts
<>
never have I ever
written an untitled poem,
nor painted a human sans
a head;  arms, legs, o.k., but,
but when the purging urging
enwraps me at 12:22 in the AM,
i cannot birth my babies
stillborn,
unnamed, forlorn,
it’s every breath would be
an accusation, of breach, malfeasance,
a child nameless, is the worst of all orphans,

the poem’s title is its inner essence, a preface,
a forward, and epilogue, just as your names is
both begin and end, a hint of who you are and from
whence you came, and where you are bound to be bound,
it is your birth name, and final resting place, a hint of who you
we’re, ared destined to become, to be, and to come,
an entitlement!

ah you curse or bless, thy given name, no longer do
you examine it, write it repeatedly, to despise or admire
the sounds of it exiting thy mouth, a roomful of teeth
and tongue in concert cooperating and conniving, silky
hissing your who-you-are-ness, you, who are poem, exist not,
cannot be, without your entitlement; ah you pause and say
to the sleeping woman who neither hears nor cares,
who am I, who I am, and the differences
entre deux
that are my
character

yes, a untitled poem is forever
unwished, unfinished
unwashed?
and to eternity, forever lost,
unsigned, unconsigned,
unfortunate
unconsummated

good god a gaggle of girls

read the dispatch thrice; the hierarchical lines some straight and some dotted but all I know they got a genealogical baseball team femi-nine
and maybe an NFL eleven when the twins get older

(husbands and sons ride the motorcycle bench and
back up if necessary, and good for musical accompaniment)

~oh yeah,
for Medusa~

this megillah message team meant for  me to assauge my
mother hubbard accusations  only partial reveals the player’s names:
but if you google a
gaggle of strong women you become informed there is a:

Queens Esther, Miriam, an Eve, four matriarchal outfielders, Batsheva pitching and only Ruth, can catch her **** curveball

in between an occasional poem gig whose costs are covered
under the mental health clause of a health care plan
but only in
California  

too cavalier, get it, you prefer this perhaps

sinewed strength in arms that can
carry three children at once,
age is not a factual issue,
for there is an army of
women soldiers who are a troop contingent,
everyone’s back is covered always-full stop-
they curve like the Earth’s crust,
magma formed strong and mineral rich,
curved to better resist
the comets the heavens cannot resist
to send & test the mettle
of a gaggle of stronger women sinewy arms entwined
reenforced

alas

the grandpa must here resist and rest,
lunch prep before Sgt. Stubby movie at noon,
in reclining chairs they ride like wild horses
and all our shushing noisier than their giggles
just google a gaggle of strong kids,
you’ll see what I mean
in this, we do possess a giggle of expertise




sunday 10:15am

My Tango Master

His hair was deep, rich,
the black of unweathered basalt,
slick backed, like his look,
an arrogant dare to stare,
eyes directed at newcomers,
intended to make me,
a novice especially aware,
a bon voyage has begun,
now a worshiper, full of faults,
warning that I sought entry
to a temple where admission was a
sworn affidavit promising
total sacrifice of body

The flat contours of his body
disguised a airy litheness that  
embraced and made me giddy,
pliant to his methodology,
mastering my psychology,  
making the whole of my body breathe,
as if for the first time  

No questions asked or allowed,
he bent me, taught me supple,
the surety of the pleasure of
following a leader unreservedly,
my body straight from within,
but the exterior,
a symmetry of curves,
I am,
his precision human tool

His hands grasped me
with utter certainty,
with a petal light touch
and fingertip precision,
directing me to Rio de la Plata,
where his swivel hips
lift this black robed disciple
upon a golden altar where
I have remained, entranced,
a devotee forever more,
enslaved to our one god

Demanding the perfection
that comes only from rigidity,
irony of ironies,
it was a vocabulary of
spontaneity and fluidity
step by step learned,
this contradiction, soon intuitive

With posture *****,
he taught the history of seduction,
constructing the tale
each time differently,
creating within me
the ravished need for the
surprise of the unknown,
teased me into obediently
accepting the satisfaction of
joined at the hip ecstasy

With boleos that mesmerized ,
but not a one memorized,
he captivates me,
a tandem for a tanda,
until cortina-released

What is your name?

Tango
he whispers,
his name is in his eyes,
never spoke aloud,
I am your new master,
now come and master me

~~~

someday soon gonna reread
the four figures of my
poems over lifetime inked,
divvy  them up by what each is about,
assemblage of
the themes of me

review the who what when and weird
of this guy through his own eyes
multiplying confessions
of graces and disgraces

particular to recover,
desirous of collecting those poems that:

valorize society’s strugglers
and stragglers...humans doing the work of living^

don't know how many will be uncovered,
but here's hoping there are plenty,
needy of recovery and uncovering the poet
and worthy of pointing too,
valuation markers of a
decent human

strugglers, stragglers,
those from all over this world
and lives that can only visualize
no-horizon-in-sight oceans
sailors, from ports unvisited,
some even, still undiscovered,

working ****** and women,
not those,
don't owners
of fancy dress whites,
topped of by jaunty angelic-angled caps

the ones I sought and seek,
grime and coal dust etched into
every ****** crevice, ink under fingernails,
in obscurity, toil in windowless engine rooms,
in the nooks in libraries hiding,
satisfied with
a moment of glory,
and a lasting
hand upon
their wracked minds

these are my mates,
sharing fates
of woeful countenances
of bruised bodies,
recipients of hardest blows repetitious,
comrades in open arms

the unflavored, unfavored of
sons and daughters,
unblessed with sobs and smacks,
who rare lift the head in hope

the sufferers of ignominy
of the
prison of their existence,
for those I write,
have, will, and willing

to do it till I see a
chin rising, white of eyes gleaming,
a hand delisted,
arms defused of black weights

come to me,
words, encouragement, perspective,
that this too shall pass

believing ain't easy,
take it from one who couldn't see
happy endings, but had no choice but
to choose to,
now prepped, ready
for my arms to do some serious uplifting,
shoulders heavy-loaded and wide of loads,
eager for honest work,
aiding and abetting
the stragglers and and stragglers...
humans doing the work of living,
deserving for valuation,
awaiting their salutation,
and relief, even if,
tiny and small,
a slim volume of poems,
that but one
poet
provided

~~~a Requiem for the DedPoet~~~*



the air we breathe
and its best accompanist,
a good life, well cherished,
that's a symphonic harvest reaped,
knowing the magma of countless blessed times daily

fill it with the glee of children,
raw joy, still unfermented, unpasteurized,
by the sour vinegar candies of life
inevitable to be delivered,
mouth puckering and ill tasting

bring good skills to all you do,
the wisdom to lean forward,
admiring it in a satisfied manner,
best work leads to best content,
now is the time to witness the value all about us

remind me to set aside,
the sidebars of grief, struggle,
pause me in minute minutes,
to grasp the pleasure of the
joys this world provides so easy freely

you come early time to me,
early, as I search for your words,
finding none, to begin this day,
but your gravelly voice intimate initiates,
you remain for me as alive as ever

reminding an old poem writer,
that the best is to come,
if one allows, if one allows,
this is my un-sad requiem~song for you,
hoping that the joy of living and
remembering

is a bond tween us, unbreakable*

~~~

(NOTE: Since posting, the details of this item may have changed due to fluctuating market prices, federal regulations, currency rates, drought, pestilence, bandits, rush hour traffic, filibusters, clowns, zombie apocalypse, punctilious poem~developments, death, and breathing life and lives, well remembered

prayer of hope, for young and old, who suffer from the slings and arrows sadness and the loss of love; I offer up this prayer of hope and offer you my hand around your shoulders until you no longer require it

more than once,
for lengthy periods,
by events, other people,
my self was eradicated
and limping from day
to night, and J faced
absolutes, choices choking,
alternating alternatives that
offered zero, or even less
than zero, and the inkwell
wasn't refillable, and I could
point to nothing yet encouraging a mystifying purposed existence

then came a woman

who asked nor proffered
conditionals
pre, prior post or otherwise
and
offered up the miraculous
drink, human kindly notice,
snd it
drained the bitters,
began fluid replacement,
and slow resuscitation

and then
poems rebirthed me,
 liberated the angry sacred
gory sadness words devoid of glory,
with a reworded score, and
the eyes could write without
a patina filter of jaundiced hatred,
and whispered private internally
many times a beloving
hallelujah

and when ever the remembrance of
the near misses are crackly occasionally appearing, the surge dissipates intact quick
into a netherworld for suppressing
and bid "away with you," and a
thin lipped smile part sneer
for having survived
even
prospered when
                    then came a woman

and the self, the my self,
returned
after an absence of destructed
decades...deadening decades

and I smile when
the grandchildren tell me
knock knock jokes
and gently knock me on the head,
to make sure I'm alert,
then came woman
who had already~all ready
knocked me on the
heart

for my tattoo girl

am admitting,
revealing, believing, expecting,
asking direct,
no inferring, no discerning,
needs answers,
need *more,
need art in my life
need teach in my life,
need teach me
how
what
to ask for more,

when get one sweet answer,
get two new quests,
get two new queries,
need you to teach me
how to ask, how to never be satisfy,
anything else would be madness

There was never a time
that he could not love,
only long periods of years,
decayed decades,
when the could
could not,
for he had forgot
from lack of practice,
daily vitamins taken of soured love,
which is a polite way of saying
sneering hate, distrustful makes,
and hard calluses and body armor
make any human tin man rusted and
cowardly lion afraid

and later,
after loneliness turned him
sweet and sorry,
when many wanted him,
to love them for
why not!
he was a desirable object,
in possession of a fast red jaguar car,
a job that left him money for gas
and summer trysts,
a ruggedly handsome face,
which he shaved daily,
and the right kind of patience
in things that woman love,
like Joni and kissing
head to toes,
on a
round trip ticket
with unlimited stops in between

and

using words that seduced,
that were intended to ******,
though he did not intend to
make them love him more than more,
yet they did....

he appreciated them,
with kind and cherish,
and just happy gave just enough of him for them
to take as their own,
and they loved him for that...
but it was hollow bridge in spaces that
needed filling, denying completion,
or safe passage

gave them gifts unasked,
jewels and poems unique,
valued them in the ways
they so wanted,
and deserved,
but could not love them
free and clear,
which is all they wanted -

for he was not
free and clear
of broken memories...

one by one,
they left,
no one to blame,
broken is broken,
Oz was a bridge too far
for him to cross

years later,
muses buzz like flies
around his head
asking buzzy questions,
demanding poems of clarification,
apologies of sorts for his inabilities,
dissatisfied with rationalizations,
payment for adoration given
and taken but inequality in love
is still a crime of sorts

and he tenders this in consideration,
years too late,
not an apology, but a thank you,
for those who said you are a
good sort, worthy of love,
and restored him in ways
that gave me the confidence
to let the whole later be filled in....

He was abused, but never a user...
now, clear and clearer yet,
his poorer faults were later his greatest riches
once gained, easy shared,
yet
here he is years later,
tinged with regrets and mea culpa's
and asking himself
for forgiveness of those for whom,
he
could not be enough

did not know what to title this,
for it is an explanation and a plea,
a thank you note written on bended knee,
many titles came and went,
some with guilty, never and could not,
prominent in their bookends

but then it was instant clarity
for it was a tale of how,
he rebirthed an ability to love a
woman true and total,
and thereby
himself,
thus celebrating those who gave their teaching trust
which he cannot ever properly
repay
except to note that it is 3:00am years later and
I
write of thee,
and how you taught me to speak
a language glorious

see http://hellopoetry.com/search/poems/?q=My+proofs

~~~~~~~~~~
Robert C Howard   Jul 23 2014

"I love this (the poem above). I was riveted to the page (screen) from the first line to the last. It reads like an existentialist credo. I couldn't help wondering if New York makes one an existentialist. Where else in the world can you live so alone in such a huge crowd"*
~~~~~~~~~~
For Robert
(Does NYC makes one an existentialist)

we live alone,
anywhere,
more and more,
not despite,
but because of the ease
that the total expanse
of the universe via
internet connectivity
today enables us to have an 
unrealized, unactualized,
but feels like an
NYC Billy Joel-undeniably-real
"nodding acquaintance"

this contradictory duality,
two parallel continuums of existence,
the flesh and the pixelated,
alone and together,
I have crossed over
in ways prior unimaginable

exist upon a single line
not just connecting
the real to the imagined
but conducting one to the other,
one existence, indistinguishable
border lines indistinct,
artifices superimposed by others

perhaps
NYC was model precursor
for our internet presumed-to-be-alive
model for the world today,
where I know not
my apartment neighbor's name,
yet carry his second child
in my arms,
when the fire alarm
summons us all to flee
to street safety...
and still only
"know" his child's first name,
and the father,
as apt. #16D

an act of existentialism?

so many tears and poems
have I shed
for one who has
lost living treasures,
impossible for me
now to meet and witness them

nonetheless,
heard the testimony,
of disembodied voices,
read the pain
upon the pages so real,
that pixels from screen
rise up to stab my
overwhelmed tear ducts,
voiding the warranty of my tablet

only I can see
the realized proofs,
wet upon the screen/page
crossing over the
humanity divide
that invisible runs
wirelessly between us
and our "devices"

this, an act of existentialism?

Yes, the universe,
unfathomable.
I cannot confirm you exist,
even as I pinch my self..
just to be sure of me,
further I testify,
no machine wrote
this vain attempt
to spoof~proof me human

flee towards good faith,
deny never, my responsibility,
greater than this body
to act, more than exist,
never to remain silent,
the best reason to write
is to reason out loud
your choices

if I struggle to ascertain,
what are the correct choices,
never certain,
but always questioning,

this, an action of existentialism?

none of this satisfies,
is there a human voice
that belongs to you,
and one that belongs to me
above and beyond these
alpha symbols you read,
is there an existence,
sparking, elemental,
a proof-positive Nat,
could conduct himself to
where you are?

think now that someday,
after you have finished
conducting
beauty and art,
extricating sound from
metal and wood,
via the
Belleville Philharmonic Orchestra,
a man will join at its completion
the long line of well wishers,
but your hand,
he will not shake

instead, he just might

"place gentle a finger  
on your lips across, and upon his,
if electrons you sense and taste,
and yours they embrace,
as naturally as if
they were waiting
just for you,
you can almost be sure,
don't ask his name, unnecessary,
for he will face you
with these words:

Thank you, Thank you!
you are my proof.."*

I exist and you now know me by my the
taste of my lips,
just as real as the taste of
your poetry, your music,
upon mine

why stick around at HP,
a question asked frequently,
so many dropping like
flies from the summer heat,
reasons varied

me, tired of the excesses
bad poetry, hailed,
good poetry, ignored,
bad taste celebrated,
good taste, craft, hard work,
are,
you know...


so why stick around?

through it, I have found
a troupe, a collective,
of human beings
from all over the world,
for whom
sadly know,
I will never possess
the metaphors, the adjectives,
to properly hail and thank


but I will keep on trying...

I under stand!
_____

<>

perhaps I do
not fully,
understand,
but nonetheless,

I under stand!

Legs locked,
shoulders set,
eyes ahead straight,  
mouth firmly wavering,
range bound, between
a back n’ forth,
from grimace
to smile resolute,

my support promised,
here beneath,
is where I am,
you, set upon
my frame,
capable~able,
you, for,
to surmount,
overcome,
rise above,
see farther,
vision clearer,
any troubling
fray and say!
I am risen,
with help
of friends,
to place
my reach
never touched,
or exceeded…
until now!

2:34 pm

walking on the beach,
musing, scheming, always,
writing, grabbing words
from sea breezes,
and gusts that
order plain:
now, now,
now!
is the
time,
to share
that load**

May 26 2024