~for a she who denies it~

c'mon c'mon,
have you ever got a
grade lower than than
A-?

ever stayed out so late,
causing your parentals
angst and  aggravation?

Not go to class,
without being overcome
with an all day long
residual residoo
of big ***
flashing "guilty"
tattooed
on the inside of your
brain?

doubtful
but I'm sure you are unwilling to
confess!
(Shame! Shame! Shame!)

but here is what you are;
a good'un
with admirable qualities
that cannot be denied,
even if you tried to lied,
for you reveal yourself
in every script
you pen,
******,
you are
too
a goodie goodie

good'un...

(that nobody can deny)

each to his own, every family a nation unto itself, and genetics undeniable, perhaps my disabilities have infected my descendants and
thereby, I am justifiably guilty of
their sins of commission and
omission

they do not generally like me,
or mire specifically do not
like me stylistically

how I perceive myself,
and how I am perceived,
are in opposition,
and while,
all the while,
it is the sun~sum total of our lives,
added up, divided, pinpointed,
we draw,
we make,
conclusions,
decisions beyond inferences,
and behave accordingly

~for she who knows ~
<>
The word "likeability" is spelled L-I-K-E-A-B-I-L-I-T-Y., though the inhuman spelling master of this site, deems it a misspelling mistake, condemning it to live in red, and offering up no replacement

<>
it is that time of night, which is also
a time of early day, when dark silence prevails, except for the excessive rumbling of the our old little cottage's environmental devices gut rumbling while laboring to condition our atmosphere

our atmosphere;
is my brain on fire at 2:30am,
with new conceptuals, many contradictory, racing in and about my brain all begging to
write me first, while the mental fluids are juiced, and words are finger pecked into existence with a maddening slowness

but this one,
re likeabilty has risen to the fore,
because it is the last to be born,
and seems therefore claiming precocious precious preeminence

not a quality I deem much in my owned possess, but one easy discerned in others and delicious delighting to the human souls who
recognize it instantly by the smiling comfort of its parfume

what I like about like about likeability is it's a pleasing scent,
that aerosol invades a room and
spreads like a virus of happy,
quite contagious to we old curmudgeons,
who by nature feel put upon by
our aging equipment, and the daily struggle to maintain it, and the forces to countervail it ,
are endless and not cheery by nature

So
I am enlivened and enriched,
engaged and effervescent,
when youthful patois,
direct and with little boundary,
radiates the human existential,
and light shines upon my soul,
awakening in me
an optimistic countenance!

perhaps I exaggerate,
confusing youthful energetic optimism
for a condition,
and not merely a demeanor,
but I rethink upon it,
snd decidedly decide
this for real, this is genuine,
and by its very natural nature
(a lotta nats in nature)
its openness, unguarded,
refreshes and moisturizes
our skins,
internal and external

this special quality is not universal,
or else there would be peace on earth (ain't happening),
but those who have it,
who think beyond privilege and
privacy,
but intuitively,
offer up to all
a pleasantness
rich and original,
will write an indelible script
upon the world
for the better

I like it.

~Primus inter pares~
(first among equals)
<>
the risks
the aspirations
the trial and erroring of
outrageous under appreciation

the silence,
the unabashed frustration
of our inability to right express
the exact precision needed to redress the pile of self~unsatisfying drafts
that need the evermore honing, whittling
curettage of accumulated filing
repeated nip and tucking

T his!
makes us all
first amongst equals,
we,
who throw ourselves again and
again, at Henry's urging
"once more into the breach"
we foot soldiers who but toil alone in grande silence until we satisfy our innermost creativity
are all so alike
all of
^firsts^
among
equals
in this grande society of
poetry addiction!

~for George Harrison~

Very

soon George, I am bound for
a stilled shaded land, a tiny isle,
which knows the
all encompassing fog,
hurricanes wrath that days linger,
and though memorable,
never the first image recalled,

but a mind's eye video of
a perpetual sunset,
agonizing silenced colored fantasies of farewells,
each unique and alike though all things must pass,
a benign benefit comfort suckled this old man's
never fully at rest visions,

for the sunset is perfect perpetual,
always setting, never settling,
ever bound to surprise,
our farewell is another's welcoming,
and each of our days an
A-1 slicked continuum,
a sliding circularity
and
we sigh, ooh & aah
at it miracality,
its genteel reawakening
we admit with pleasured honesty,
yes, sunsets are a corridor edged,

somewhere it is always sunset,
nevereverending,
and its farewells
are truly truthful welcomings

<*>

Shelter Island
May 2025

as a house in the country,
by the water's edge,
on a clouded, zero moonlit night,
and the handful of light ****** are
far far distant and inform you that
are essential alone

the almost total absence of vision
reminds me that once,
long long, ago, I
stood by a river's edge
in a great big, well lit,
city of millions,
and the loneliness was
so acute,
the despair so
encompassing,
the overwhelming sense
of loss,
so comprehensive,
all made the dark swift waters
a close distance beneath my body,
the equivalent black pitch
of this
countryside night
both purported to
offer comfort,
neither were

Black
is a knot,
non~neutral color

~for old poets every where

I'm a short burst deep sleeper,
the woman is a restless wild eyed story telling schemer~dreamer, who drives at night
in fourth gear,
shaking the bed,
with dreams gone wild,
crazed & crazy intermixed stories unhinged but always
real life related

most by morn forgotten,
'cept for the truly bizarre,
where scraps of unbridled unbelievable
remain for head shaking disbelieving

i sleep in clumps,
four hour sessions and thus oft
bear witness to her
charcoal activated dream states,
where physical reality intersperses,
i n t e r m i n g l e s
with her dream life,

when she wrestles with an
unreal
dreamed restlessness;
my fingers find an exposed
body part, arm, shoulder, tummy,
and steady massage a message
from my fingertips to her
brain,

mantra: it's ok, it's alright,
and return her to the safety
of a deeper sleeper,
so the brain can do its work,
washing away the unrefined,
needy for distilling,
overnight cleansing,
of unwanted memories
which generally works

in the thorny morny morning
she gets a questionnaire
and 9/10,
has no recollection collection,
my magic prophylactic
fingertips, each tipped with
a inked smiley face,
look up at me,
know-it-alls,
smirking contentedly,
"our work is done here!"

Nay, May 25
2025
writ by starlight

a hand without a palm,
a smiley face with a ----
for a mouth, a
headless horseman who
passion rides country roads at night,
but sees no one and no thing

the title is a poem's crown,
full of hint and mystery,
an encapsulation of a poem's
source and origination;
do not mot~send us little pearls
unstrung, for the beauty
so greatly
amplified, when their lustre
is so
great fully magnified
when
strung together in to a lace necklace shape,
clasped by the overture of
the meeting of
the beginning to an end

the title is a mystery, a provocation,
a first bite intended to arouse,
a first kiss upon a neck that tremors
our souls with unanticipated shivering delights, and an ending to which we return with sighed satisfaction, and the cloture and aclosure, and a smile of
ah, I get it!

entitle us to the puzzling delight
that a title hints at what surely will
follow!