~for Wyett Yocum~

nowadays, we slice and dice ourselves
by gender, race, and any thin wafer division
by which the human persona can be identified,
as if we were tattooing our ****** identity
on the wrist of your societal recognition scales

all in order to say,  Hey!

this is who I am,
this! is why
I am special unique, very very
deserving of your accoladed admiration

so the newly acquired phrase,
there is no brag in that boy
leaps and bounds, coming to rest on my wide eyes white,
now part of my lexicon, there, where my vocabulary stored,
for its very contradictory contrariness
demands the realized anti-hero,
the natural quietude of
the aw shucks, that we used to value, people,
above all

nearing the end of my days, my vast
knowledge of words and people grows smaller
by leaps and bounds, for finer refinement and focus,
vastly diminishes and distinguishes but a handful
of verbal grains, seeds, a few is all that’s needed,
kernels, that when deep planted, well watered,
a gift nurtured by nature’s simplest greater gifts
regifted us human exmplars

there is kind.
there is honor.
there is selflessness, character, service
and a very, very few more.

some new, just today, recently obtained,
the very title of this late night reflection!

a fine spun summary depiction of modesty,
a trait so rare, it’s existence now under appreciated,
and so very hot-not, au courant, fashionable, woks or lit,
hardly deemed valuable in the me-matters age

so crumple up this minor essay, store and stick it
among your mementos, and other keepsakes,
let it not be seen, avoid confusing the young man of whom
it was spoken and herein recorded, but this prize! this poem!
this award without proclamation or gold statuette or degree,
will, a secret well kept, by those who raised him, recognizing,
that their own mirrored imaged is quietly well reflected,
his inherited invaluable, distinguished modesty,
product of his pedigree


Nov. 10, 2029
12:44am

I went to a funeral

Of the father of a man,
I liked and respected.

It was a two hour drive,
Each way.
I missed a day of work.

People were impressed.

But the calculation was easy.

Thousands of hours yet to live.

Even if but twenty four, yet to tally,
How many men do I
Know and respect?

Born with two hands,
Would only need one,
To make this calculation.

One is greater than twenty four.

~ encore un autre, inspiré par Sally B.~

another poem excised from an
interdepartmental message from
The Dept  of Poets, (Global), a
ridiculous thot mine, deserving of
removal, remorse and regret,
(modern human’s woke 3 r’s)
nonetheless deserved of exegesis,
mainly because I think so…

Surficially, I comprehend that of the bones,
of the billions of those who have gone to
their where~ever, if could speak. we would
require a huge commitment to building out
our cell phone networks, the best comm
tool, for portability between differing
dimensions, times and spaces

let us cut to the chase (thank god),
my bones shall be without a doubt
return to a granular dust, my minerals
contributing to some future breakfast
cereal, thus assuring my recirculated
inspiration for generations to come(?),
acknowledging that my “gifts” are
the product of apriori Jews who wandered
this planet, forever rootless and semi-
displaced by their haters for reasons
that have nothing to do with reason

By way of my gratitude that you have read
so far, hopefully to continue, let me assure
you that this P.  will not trend, nor spit or spot
or high lighted, as it’s worth is as fleeting as my bones, when one dwells on the size of space expanding and the time & space
continuum

that disclaimer claimed, we breathe easier,
and I happier, and now at last to the meat
of the matter:

My poems will wither, and eventually their
ions will be erased when the internet servers
undergo the many purges that yet will come
(better this than purging people)

yes, my ego’s cells, which one of you will
no doubt will imbibe and perhaps????
imbue, may actually reappear in a newness,
in a refreshing refreshment, that some Believers will think is absolutely brand new
(which it won’t be), for the new treads are on
the old treads, only now, dug a little deeper,

and I, in my ionosphere, inside my cells
yet within you, will muse amusedly,
“there is nothing new under the sun” (1)

but the sun will be shining and that is
good enough for all of us

Nov. 23
9:04 am
nyC

Multi-tasking

Kissing your eyes,
Sensing the tickling of your trembling lashes,
Between kisses and breathes
Utter word-wisps of
Love poetry.

Right hand strokes thy chest,
sensing/sending heartbeats upon my palm to the
Forever keep part of my
Treasury memory chest.

All the while my left finger indexes,
Mesmerized, it memorizes
The curvature of the face
To be stored in the
Never forget always place.

My tongue restless to participate
Goes whatever it feels like,
For the tongue is the only body part
With a mind of its own.

My eyes, my eyes, see only the
Totality of this moment.
When mastery of multi-tasking
Is the single best poem this man ever
Penned with his entirety.

May 19th
Laguna Niguel, Ca.

You Kidding (resubmitting for your consideration; posted here one year ago, today)

For Ian

Lived a long time coming,
Picked up yesterday my three year old grandchild boy,
Third of a third of a third of a third
Of a half of me,
Who I only see once a year,
And we fell in love once again,
all over as is our style,
Annually, annuellement.

We belly kiss,
Fist bump,
High five, talk jive,
Tell each other grand stories
Of dragons in pizza parlors.

Each of us,
Trying the other out,
To ascertain just what
Stuff we are made off.

I love to put him to sleep,
My fingers, rhyme writing like Pradip,
To the turning tires of mom's Toyota van,
When the tired is a steady stream
Of word mumbles of which I understand
A word here and there, but an epic poem
He recites, a verbal dream, a slippage
To that place where three year old bones
And crying go when they pass the point of
Exhaustion,
Rub his cheek with circles of forefinger,
Stroke his head with full palm of my hand,
Close his eyelashes with gentle fingertip kisses,
Take the toys from his fists without any resistance,
Sure signal time for both of us to nap.

His surprises endless,
His cunning now legend,
Alternating disguises tween
I a big boy,
I a baby,
As the situation arises that will
Get him what he wants,
A masterful manipulator.

Which is funny cause I still do that too.

But when he stops me in my tracks,
It is when somehow the brain that has
Just crossed the thousand day alive marker
Says the profound, the uncanny, the
Philosophy of the world weary that is something
That I think just about every thirty seconds.

It is when after some particularly wild reverie
I compose, of seals that swim from his Frisco bay
Around the world to his Nana's, on Long Island,
Pacific to Atlantic, and after ten minutes of
Escapading with Batman and his mates,
He looks me and takes me down with this
Almost clear, spoken, sabered-wisdom,
In the juvenile voice of
soft sleepy, of a babe of three

you kidding

Half statement of fact, half a soulful-questioning,
How does this three year old comprehend
The essential difference between dreams
And reality, that is separated, wheat, chaff,
Milk curd, cheese, the spider silk line that differentiates
All of life essentially.

Yes kid, I am kidding,
I tell that to myself every thirty seconds,
To keep me sane, straight, true,
But I whisper it to myself grownup style,

Who ya kidding?

So it appears that when they say
Out of the mouths of babes
They were talking about adults
Who are hoping they can still be three,
When serious and silly are just the
Same-thing.

You kidding(?/!)

Yes I am.
Just a kid,
Kidding you, kidding himself,
Pushing his very own stroller,
Writing crazy stories he calls
Poems, lovely little things,
As soft as your skin, stories of him,
That always end,
With belly kisses and a
you kidding.**
~~~~~~~~~~~~

Columbus Day
Oct. 14th 1492/2013
When I "discovered" the Americas.
You kidding?
Maybe.

psychotic, she says

psychedelic, he says

tho black n' white,
tumultuous are the variances of shading,
the hints of unknown fragrances
of days yet to come when,
spring earth and spring buds
long past the point of expectation,
inject colorful unexpectedness

eyes so clear so bright,
how can she not see beyond the pale
emotionless expression of gaunt,
that all turbulence is not bad

see that streak of black hair,
refusing to be hidden, a provocation,
curling, asking to be stroked,
pitter patter it teases the lips,
but only after it grazes the eyelash
so seductively it screams
I am beautiful!

does she fail to see?
who will not permit her
to see what I have seen?

the lyric comes to mind instantly:

Well let me tell you 'bout the way she looked
The way she'd act and the colour of her hair
Her voice was soft and cool
Her eyes were clear and bright
But she's not there


her eyes are clear and bright,
her pen delicate and light,
she unbeknownst surrounded,
by admirers that gladly lay,
not their cape, but their whole body
across these leftover puddles of winter

will she? will she cross over?
with those eyes so clear, so bright,
there is only one acceptable answer!

*come spring, come summer,
her true nature will nurture

jump shot some ***** laundry into the
closeted hamper, where they go to be
regrafted like new skin on an old body

hanging about her lacy finery,
her private undergarments to be
laundered with soapy kindness by
hands from the land of gentility

these double purposed garb,
(Think)
she wears with great pride and
greater pleasure on and from
her dancing toned body

label facing out, unintentionally,
and there I learn she be a
a C cup, not a wee cup

and **** a poem sprouts
like a volcano Word pimple on my tongue,
begging to be bursted,
busted, tasted and remade publicly

not the poem or the place
for French irony, subterfuge,
came out of the closet,
laughing more than mere out loudly

for when I read that black label,
my neurons fired a
singular message to my heart:

she is my cup,
and when I drink her
body and soul,
I C myself clearer...

and this is where I'll cease,
the non public, the to-follow verse,
for her private consumption...

but when I, self-confessed man-idiot
remarked upon it to her,
for my laugh was more roar than
smiling simile,
she had the lovely temerity,
my old lady (she hates that),
to blush like a teenager
in her training bra

and I C now why she inspires this old man,
more than anything else in this world

so i ask you, sage,
in all sincerity

sage - one who has made mistakes, and would share
the fragrance of his lesson plan, his historic failures and the knowing that fear can never be defeated but it can be
                                   deferred and differed until lessened

and asks,
how to put aside
a ridiculous pride...a palpable fear

this I know -
and you yourself have answered:
when necessary, I have made my self an object of
Ridiculous -
and endured the ridicule
and loved
the laughter of the fools,
and harmonized both
for this trite
is the best they have,
know that sages have
                                    bested fear, but never can it be defeated

to let fly
the asking?

start with a looking glass,
perforce speaks the truth,
and the answering machine image, undeniably,
                                              is you.

easy?
no.
i have found no easy thing worth doing
or loving.
   i don't want ease
i want l o v e

love - the rush of trust, the release of the unconditional sharing    Can never happen till you
trust yourself to say,
                                I am afraid


that i would burn bridges for
a struggle of understanding
that will keep me alive and whole
a sickening rush
worth every sacrifice.

paralyzing terror
because nothing is due me...
nothing should be expected
so nothing can be misplaced
    misguided

EVERYTHING IS DUE YOU,
ROAR WITH ANGERED FRUSTRATION,
      AT YOUR FRUSTRATED REFUSAL
TO BE ANGRY AT YOURSELF.
      BEAUTY INSIDE OUT AND OUTSIDE IN,
EVERYTHING IS EXPECTED, AND GIVEN
       THERE IS NO HIDEY HOLE FOR YOU TO BE MISPLACED ~
BURN BRIDGES THOSE BRIDGES OF REFRAIN AND RESTRAINT!

COME OUT COME OUT WHEREVER YOU ARE!

restraint,
restraint!!!
yes?!
   yes.
that must be the answer.

for if not restraint,
  then earth shaking love.
and if the earth shakes
  people might get hurt.

and i might be one of them.

              restraint, restraint,
this is your refrain?
                 retrain, retrain,
I believe, can you not too?
                  believe in you,
can you not too?
                  hard knocks endured, loveless years, disgrace
and more to come, yes love soothes and coos
                  but who can love but those brave enough to
love themselves first?
                  but my refrain will never be restrain,
only
                  unbowed undefeated asking for
the more
                  you deserve

I drop the BASS on you in your own words:

cast out fear and man up.
or at the very least
pretend to do those things.
then you might
have something to talk about.

musing on memory and all that
re its capabilities, its utilities
and wondrous
abilities, to cover, recover, and
surprise surprise uncover the known
and unknown, what was, what is and
what there is to dis-cover, for memory
is a tricky ole *******, you recall what you never knew at all, forget the address where you lived twenty years ago, and don’t get me
started re telephone numbers
of
old lovers, who get got gone good away
and the combination of a subset of their
digits is likely to be on a discarded lottery
stub, that stubs your shoe too

cannot remember all the women I’ve ever kissed, but I remember the kiss, and that’s
a fair trade off

pretty bad at remembering, birthdays, anniversaries, but that’s because my electronics believe me of this obligation;
Not the obligation to buy a present,
On time, but the kindness keenness of
doing the action, is you an in Nate satisfaction, One gets, when crossing off a line item on your to do list

Sometimes the choices between remembering,
and being dismembering, when is definitely preferable to the other, and though you are not present, I hear your moaning softly
I know I know!

So take a moment to make sure all those critical dates to others, are in your calendar, electronic, and I recommend minimum one week ahead alerts; and one day before as a fail, safe

Do it now or fail to be safe

~ for Rob Rutledge -
@ 6:15am
~~~~~
we all are living, reading and writing,
paycheck to paycheck
even if by happenstance, our bellies full,

for the white sheets we lay our words
down and upon, our supporters of
ids and egos of egg shell thin lifes
are the bare emptied shelves
of our unending, still ongoing
pandemic pandemonium,
razing times
of eroding joys

the sheets are blank, but our souls
wearied, helmed and whelmed
by the unending of the unexpected
that demands, orders and commands,
no matter what
pour it out blasting
unleashing the rage
compelled, compiled,
completely compulsing
we
selves ordered to compose

giving form and firmament
to our vaporous innards,
releasing new oxygen from
the tides inside and without,
clashing ideas, irregular notions
that demand we poets responsible
for reconciliation and auditing for
human truths

we awake barren but weighty,
the emotions are rustling in the
now daily, common,
mighty metors of gusts of higher winds,
spreading fire and measles to spite,
not despite
our fragile failings & flailings

oh goodness and grace,
let that be the colors of
our skin, our face,
essay on, sashay with a
swinging motion,
yes, rhyme and rhythm

and deliver us with words
so soft, they shatter the
gloomy desperation of
what confronts our entirety,
when the terrors of our
sleeping dreams cannot be
differentiated from the
sad eyed waking
ones

so write, and right,
these troubled times,
when trolls, dragons
and yet unnamed monsters
seek to take away our
tiny green planet, watered,
seeded and plentiful fruited
plains enough to satisfy us all

if we are so emboldened to choose
all of us over our lonely selfish selfs

when you accept the ‘I love you’ invite, coolly quietly
understanding this is but a summarizing way of saying,
let’s enter the gated fence to friendship, locking in & out,
the delving reveals to follow are truths more costly than
any fiction, you see only the too real, how much pain can
exist, survive, be survived, quietly thrive, just beneath the
skin’s preternatural strong thinness, holding us in, together
while yet a sieve, separating the granules of our composition,
the coarser fail to penetrate the finer cells, the molecular level
is where the sensory Alice in Wonderland world coexists with
the blunt exhaustion of so much agony, too much, and in the
early morn these words appear of their owned and freed volition,

do what you must do to repair yourself

...and you confess to understanding that to heal oneself,
you must heal others, and that separate and unequal
sorrows can somehow heal each other, praying for ex,
exfoliation, exhumation, excalibur, expelling all the ex’s
so new skin self repairs, a great miracle that, and that
human reparations are a thing you alone initiate, inhale,
fostering a belief that !we! is the solution, the only...

5:46am
11/28/20

Thank you for the best present I ever got

Our oasis by the bay,
Was ravaged by storm and hurricane,
And the men came with earth moving equipment
Built us a renewed sheltering wall that,
Soon enough, will be tested.

The earth movers have long gone.
But a malted milk colored mound,
Broad but not too tall, of the good earth,
Smack dab in the middle of the lawn,
Somehow was left behind,
Like the stickers, the new car dealers plant w/o asking.

This mound, conspicuous like most of us,
Seems very out of place.

But like the box the toy came in,
The young children come from houses all around,
To climb upon it and declare for now,
They are the victors over life.

Even the **** deer that eat
The most colorful plants we raise,
Come in the early morn,
To climb to the top,
An advisory from the animal kingdom,
This place, this land, this isand,
You think is yours,
Was ours before and
Has never left our possession.

So I call the contractor,
Come take this vestige of the
Future and the Past off my kingdom of grass,
And when he picks up the phone,
And asks what he can do for us,
I am looking at the children
Dancing, scrambling, climbing upon
An obstacle perfect-sized to let them
Learn the pleasure of success,
I remain silent for I know not
How to say without sounding weirder than
I already am,
Thank you for the best present I ever got.



June 1st
This day, this morning at 5:55 AM.

LXXI

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,

Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit

   Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,

Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.

LXVI

I sent my Soul through the Invisible,

Some letter of that After-life to spell:

   And by and by my Soul return’d to me,

And answer’d “I Myself am Heav’n and Hell:”

<>
But there are very rare occasions when the translation is so good it actually supersedes the original, taking it to a wider audience. If there is an argument for anyone having done that, it is probably Edward FitzGerald with his translation of “The Rubaiyat” of Omar Khayyam.

roundabout poem (another poem, another day)

<>

the notion punches into my mouth when
chilling , deleting and wasting time *pro=ductively
(professionally ducking responsibilities)
with no home to go to, but to write with purposeful
meandering, in a roundabout manner,
on a Saturday, luxury~leisurely in bed with runs
for asiago bagels and blue mountain coffee,
and wondering why you would read this, and
losing my debate internal & and infernal if
this is worth my time, nonetheless the urging
is only purging by clicking clacking on a keyboard,
inviting you to join me  under my cozy
floral coverlet, and to enjoy my pastoral view,
of water, women and why not, a trilogy of

factorials (or is it factorals? permutations or combinations) *another poem, another day)

panoramic bleeding view unceasingly changing,
reflecting god’s mood swings or an atheist’s humbuggery)

and women lies beside me, guilty pleasure, mine or hers😉, becoming part, a parcel upon the land/waterscape/escape, with sun rays invisible yet blindingly make me glinting and squinting,
and wet grass, dripping trees,  and going round and round, so
stray thots evolving/revolving and thus
this roundabout poem deserves a decent burial,
so I thank it, thank you, thank her, and the sky
and the glisten of a wet drenched everything,
a Saturday~Sabbath on which a poem was delivered
from me within, in a cesarean eruption,
my child blessed, sent to you with gratitude,
a much underrated emotion, but which occupies
me frequently when your days go dimmer,
and the

mind is sharply focused/used on about
what is value,
valuable, and what shall be valued on this damp
rainfall rainfull wordfull wonderful momentary
escapery into being together with…you, silly!

writ  pre-noon,
Saturday~Sabbath,
(on S.I., by the Sound’s calming waters
where the poems fall from trees on a glider
of wet leaves, or fly by on a modest mph breeze,
looking for human sense to grab aholt of for
canning and preservation…come see for yourself….*)

I brush the hair off your face
While you are sleeping,
Risking everything.
Risking waking you,
But I think,
You would do
The same for me
To make sure nothing
Ever disturbs the dreams,
you
are
dreaming
of
us.

They are risen in the East

The coffee, the tea,
Needs brewing,
The poetry, needs R&R;,
(reading and responding),
The garden needs tending,
Milk and biscuits, purchasing.

In the West, the sad and those who
Labor not, stay up late, to "celebrate"
Labor Day, and I, cross times zones,
Embracing their kin and kindred commonality.

See you all, saluting, elbow straight, 45 degrees,
With words I wash the eyes of the newly reborn,
East.
With words I wash the feet of the restless,
West.
Shyly, I embrace one and all,
And I text you both my children,
I am home, come home,
I write for you both, I write to please,
I write with abandon,
I write to comfort, to extend my reach.
I write as a second best embrace.
I write to you, for you,
You are with me, I, with you,
No matter the time the day,
The season, the calendar's reminder,
That we are day older,

I write to you, for you,
You are with me, I, with you,



12:30am where I am.

wandered over the midnight
demarcation line, and in but
a few secs, it will click,
1:00am in my head
in the not so mystical
Eastern Standard Time Zone

and I hear voices saying,
Last Call, Last Call,
drink up, write down
those faint sounds,
that have yet not drowned,
succumbed to drowsy purrings
that the body is steady making,
a chorus of yawns and sighs,
time's due, you pay at the exit door

Succumb!
succumb, for no one,
will read this good nitro night poem,
anyway

give in to temptation and risk,
will it be,
nightmare or dream,
poem or horror story,
sleep yet brings us,
gift wrapped  
or
brown bagged


Last call, last call
I am a summer man
and soon I to bid you adieu,
as I board my sleepy
summertime cruise

up at your regularly scheduled night sky patrol,
the colorful clock says 2:47 and
dark skies confirm which 2:47 it is,
for flecks of blackened peppery light exude at this hour,
a time period for former lovers, those old writes enfolded, enveloped,
hiding an active poem volcano spewing bare feet words in clouds of
kidskin soft velveteen cumulus, fleece-comforting slippers of poems

there are half started poems waiting, more than one, triplets in fact,
waiting to be born in the time of pandemic, thinking quietly,
will they emerge healthy and living and grow up to be adults
contributing to society, additives to the engine oil of human living

but the old familiar, dissatisfaction with quality control leaves them
unfinished, poet lurches from dead roses head hanging, a new blues,
disease as an economic and societal differentiation, that you hope,
believe, poems that in due course, all will emerge, for better or for worse,

poetry birthed in the time of pandemic

the city of new york, where I was birthed and will die, a city of
tall buildings, tall tales, short attention spans there is but one nighttime moving automobile observed in a city that never sleeps but now hides blanketed in weariness of trepidation of what are the

well known unknown possibilities in the time of pandemic

and you wonder in this new, different quietude if poems can be born
with birth defects and survive, breathing on a ventilator till they can
breathe by their own lungs, or were they perma-infected on a supermarket trip, a walk by the East River, a pizza delivery man, even

if inspired by a decade-lover, next, in bed, in the time of pandemic

waving to grandchildren in their second story window, you on the street, keeping them safe from you, a modern Auschwitz train station where they separated, the we-useless out, children and their parents, safe in a barbed wire atmosphere, a demarcated world, where some billion of brimming droplets of tears are stillborn

stillborn poems, or perhaps just poems-in-waiting, to still be

born in a time of pandemic


3:29am Sunday March 22, Twenty Twenty
New York City, the epicenter, crossroads

perhaps it is less than great,
maybe a poor mediocre,
but such as it is, is mine,
unique, and it gifts me
easy expression of my
experience, conveying
my excitations, aliving,
freely divining what’s
within and without,
and to exhale said
thoughts and
observations

si so

we can be apart and together,
touch without touching, e v e n
love each other with our e v e r
meeting and that miracle presents
and is a present, this presentation
of my cells impressed upon yours,
thus fashioning newly creative
combinations…

this is what I am thinking,
this is what I am divining,
this is what my reasoning,
permits, encourages, creates
and with your reading this,
cements us in ways unseen
all the b u t s…and hesitation
marks that disconnect us,
are sundered and we are
a forever till reason no longer
matters, or our cells can no
longer divide and recombine
and reproduce our memories,
which are our connective tissues…

nml
3:39am
10-20-24

If we are mark’d to die, we are enow
    To do our country loss; and if to live
    The fewer men, the greater share of honour.
    God’s will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.

    By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,
    Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;
    It yearns me not if men my garments wear;
    Such outward things dwell not in my desires:

    But if it be a sin to covet honour,
    I am the most offending soul alive.
    No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England:
    God’s peace! I would not lose so great an honour

    As one man more, methinks, would share from me
    For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!
    Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
    That he which hath no stomach to this fight,

    Let him depart; his passport shall be made
    And crowns for convoy put into his purse:
    We would not die in that man’s company
    That fears his fellowship to die with us.

    This day is call’d the feast of Crispian:
    He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
    Will stand a tip-toe when this day is named,
    And rouse him at the name of Crispian.

    He that shall live this day, and see old age,
    Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbors,
    And say ‘Tomorrow is Saint Crispian:’
    Then he will strip his sleeve and show his scars,

    And say ‘These wounds I had on Crispin’s day.’
    Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,
    But he’ll remember with advantages
    What feats he did that day: then shall our names

    Familiar in his mouth as household words:
    Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter,
    Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,
    Be in their flowing cups freshly remember’d,

    This story shall the good man teach his son;
    And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
    From this day to the ending of the world,
    But we in it shall be remembered;

    We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
    For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
    Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
    This day shall gentle his condition:

    And gentlemen in England now abed
    Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
    And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
    That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

For Sally, who loved this the best*

Be forever young n humble;
Feel ancient and royal;
Ride tall in the saddle;
Do something nifty;
Take someone's hand unexpectedly.
Drive home in the slow lane;
Do the minimus;
Do the maximus;
Leave a book on a park bench;
Use pen n paper, write a letter;
Take a chance, make people laugh;
Barrel into contention;
Show mercy to the confused,
Show anger to the abusers.
Bless a child with both hands;
Grasp your soul, throw it down,
Raise a child to the sky
Straight up,
A continuum, you and they,
A ladder to heaven

Sad Girl, Write Till You Are Righted

Awake to an inbox not overflowing,
But drowned
In sadness.

Despair,
A close second.

Tho oft I rise to/o that awoken-swollen-emaciated river,
Somehow your ache, worse than mine.

I figured out why.

If we write of it,
It some degree lessened.
So when I gift you my words,
It gifts me easement some in return.

But reading thy cries, an exercise,
Teeth-gnashing frustration.
It brings no relief.

So sad girl,
Write till you are righted,
May be it will snow on July 4th,
And tho unnatural,
So is thy grief.

Nonetheless, write me write me all about it,
Right us,
For tho snow falls, its loveliness,
Makes the heart rise up in gladness!

on the phone with her sister,
a 9:00am, a Saturday, weekend ritual,
and I hear say "even..."
and I wait,
knowing she can't
remember my name,

so I help her out,
filling the blanks,
and say out loud

the guy in bed next to me,

but that makes it worse,
cause now she is
laughing so hard,
tears are rolling,
she can't talk at all.

me, I'm writing this
down and
done.

not much of a poem,
agreed,
but a moment,
a slice of the day,
forever captured,
and someday,
when she stumbles on this,
when I am no longer scribbling,
here's hoping she starts
laughing all over again,
like you are now.

(happy  belated first birthday, po-hymn)*


To whomever you pray to,
And if there is no such icon,
Then I hymn-hum to you, this tribute


Let all my mistakes, my typographical errors,
Like writing poem and getting back po-hymn,
Bring delights to keep, to grow ancient on my face,
For from every accident, we grow and bend,
New tree leaning towards our collective inner
Sun Ra.

I am no David, psalms and hymns,
Unreadily exist, so dug deep Lord,
To write this prayer, for my brethren.
Just one day, someday, let heaven
Grant only poets births, no passings took.

Give us goodness and grace
All the poems of our day.
Shed special light all about our faces,
From our shoulders, rise up insight inside our heads,
Brighten, enlighten, give us eloquence and sanity.

Let our missives dismiss the gloom,
Polish, remove the tarnish, we cannot secret
From the all seeing confessions taker,
Honesties writ daily but never published.

Give us meter, yes, give us rhyme,
To make sense of the grey days,
The black hole invaders,
Given iris-shine be our responsibility,
But a sweet nudge, prithee,
Enhance our impoverished ability.

This Sabbath day your fog-hide
Your gift of bay and beach
So quiet implore, beseech,
Keep the sailors safe,
And your poets saved.

I ask much.
But I ask for all of us,
There are so many such
That are booster-chair needy
That I am succumbed, overwhelmed,
Enormity fearsome needs help even from a deity.

Small words, big hopes.

If you cannot grant it,
Won't wait for intervention,
Do it myself, answer prayers one and all,
Best I can, starting now with this
Po-hymn.

July 13th for always
Pohymn.    Such are prayers born

"You better stop kissing my neck,
The butter will burn!"

the most beautiful roses are not red,
but palest of yellow with pink
streaks,

violets reside in a giant Etruscan urn
before our modest home, a
reminder to the modesty
and brilliance of color spotting in a sea
of immense waves of ski-ed blue and
verdant green, a visual, floral,
peak,

the violent virtual of the week,
wrecks a soft creamy despair across
the nation’s cheek, another slap at
the notion of our greatness residing
in our above all, unifying and
basic simplistic notions of kindness,
and the violets turn out insufficient
to gladden our hearts in a sea of
bleak,

and I turn my eyes to the great scapes
that surround my soul, absent
only snow capped mountains
but memory works, serves up,
what resides a mere thousand miles away,
so now my visual vistas completed,
and a tea of c a l m, aroma soothing,
massages my temple and rests my
blood pointy fingertip composers,
and I am somehow, someone who is
tweaked,

upon my heart in the real of solid
dark of fog and cloud that is my
true tempered reality,  where I am
wrecked and wreaked,
a havoc of pain relief cream,
soothing, relieving the anguish
that rests within and periodically
calming, thus alive to survive,
and yet remind:

a-salve to inject,
to still,
and yet,
permit stll,
a streak of

shrieks

you have already failed

Oct 2020
Poets, let us examine this friendship thing, again.


Poets, let us examine this friendship thing, again.

This is a poem of humans, regardless of our natural multi- flavored striations, that tend to over-define us, thus separating, instead of celebrating commonalities.

Like most things we enjoy, our five senses are the gateway to pleasure, even the pleasure of friendships. They act in concert, a symphonic interplay that reenforces and heightens so that in combination they create a whole greater than a single sense could provide singly.

This is on my mind this week, as I wrestle to understand the meaningful possibilities, the limits of friendship.

Poets form bonds without hearing each other’s voices.

Poets connect despite geographic distances that makes grasping each others sinewed arms, caressing the softness of hard cheekbones, without ever having been granted the unique, all encompassing satisfaction of embrace, hugging.

Poets sometimes can hear but not see each other’s words.

Poets sometimes can see/read each other’s words, but never hear them voiced aloud in the authors own, true voice.

Poets sometimes cannot smell or taste each other’s words, though it can take a poem to another, higher sensory level of coloration.

And yet, a bond so strong forms that defies the conventional limitations of the physical. Should we share such a bond, them you know it, no need to ask for confirmation.

Words, can be gifted, without teleportation, even when and if the bridge of a shared spoken language is not extant.

This is nothing short of miraculous.

Just like friendship.

All my wrestling to true comprehend this state, for naught, for the miracle of words is like the color of water. Universal, invisible, but so varied, that it too bridges and is shared by every ! human body regardless of any human shape, color, form of the billions conceivable.

But wrestle I do nonetheless, for the pleasure of this (non?)soluble problem that both creates queries & quenches simultaneously, so I break off this thinnest wafer to share with you, offering this notional:

All humans are poems.

All poems are human.

Solve this poem for human.

(And ignore the wet spots of my watery, clear tears staining this poem).