As a child
I put my finger in the fire  
to become
a saint.

As a teenager
every day I would knock my head against the wall.

As a young girl
I went out through a window of a garret  
to the roof
in order to jump.

As a woman
I had lice all over my body.
They cracked when I was ironing my sweater.

I waited sixty minutes  
to be executed.
I was hungry for six years.

Then I bore a child,  
they were carving me  
without putting me to sleep.

Then a thunderbolt killed me
three times and I had to rise from the dead three times  
without anyone’s help.

Now I am resting
after three resurrections.

That season again; familiar fragrances:
of flowers and of emotions.
On shortening evenings
graying skies paint the earth in shades of
anticipation; Snapshots,
joyous memories, of
distant years roll out of catherine wheels
and sparkle-pots, rare
treats and new clothes
for the year; rolling wheels of time, how
loves change, people's
priorities change, events
drive everyone further and farther away.
But memories awaken
from vaults in the heart;
Familiar fragrances, blessed resurrections
always chase
all the doubters away
Yes, this season again; blessed fragrances.

I wrote a poem recently.
Not so much a poem,
more like a story;
a story of love,
kind of like a love story.
Sure,
it was the best love story
we've never read.

There were romances,
struggles,
some revelations
and resurrections...
even a few bruised egos.
Blah,
blah.

Yessir,
a bayside view of
false paradise
if I'd ever seen one;
some dogeared page
ripped out of a
journal written in ink
and found in the gutter.

No beginning or end.
Just a thought.
A memoir
of a fantasy that should've just
been
and never had to explain itself.

It begins when a
butterfly dies. My stomach
is an insect grave.

322

There came a Day at Summer’s full,
Entirely for me—
I thought that such were for the Saints,
Where Resurrections—be—

The Sun, as common, went abroad,
The flowers, accustomed, blew,
As if no soul the solstice passed
That maketh all things new—

The time was scarce profaned, by speech—
The symbol of a word
Was needless, as at Sacrament,
The Wardrobe—of our Lord—

Each was to each The Sealed Church,
Permitted to commune this—time—
Lest we too awkward show
At Supper of the Lamb.

The Hours slid fast—as Hours will,
Clutched tight, by greedy hands—
So faces on two Decks, look back,
Bound to opposing lands—

And so when all the time had leaked,
Without external sound
Each bound the Other’s Crucifix—
We gave no other Bond—

Sufficient troth, that we shall rise—
Deposed—at length, the Grave—
To that new Marriage,
Justified—through Calvaries of Love—

I found my voice in a pocket of oxygen buried in my gut,
it was a hot air balloon
backlit by the aura of my lungs,
my chest was the sky that coughed it up.

Knowing that we are water-based creations
spread thin
like the last spoon of pancake batter,
I wear my impermanence like Jupiter wears her red spot.
I wear my fears like continents wear mountains,
pointing them toward the sky,
hoping to someday adhere a sticker to my chest that reads,
THIS CAR CLIMBED MT. COMMITMENT

I have the scars to prove it.

My mother carried me like the last drop of water in a desert canteen,
there was no need for a soft spot; I was headstrong.

I brought the kitchen to the gun fight.
Held my hands to the stove top
turned my back to the knife rack
kept one foot in the door jam and my mouth to the bedpan,
just in case these words washed my mouth out.

Most people never get close enough to recognize
that the smile on my face is written in Braille--
but you've always been there with a blind eye
reading my innuendos
and holding me to my words.

When your marathon feet hit the pavement
it's a lot like Buddy Wakefield at a typewriter
striking the first letter of the word benevolence--

You taught me how to b b b b b in the moment.

Even at my most negative
when my body is a hearse,
this heart is a corpse
and this life is a road-trip from funeral parlor to graveyard,
so that I may have spent my entire life in the company of mourners,
who loved me.

Even at my most positive
when my body is a universe,
this heart is Hatch Shell located on the south bank of the Charles River
swelling with the sounds of the Boston Pops
and this life is everything leading up to the Big Bang,
so that I may have spent the entirety of my life in the company of creation.

Even on the night we met—same night I found my voice
we stayed up to watch Lake Michigan come to life in a pocket of oxygen
under a Chicago sunrise so inescapably underwhelming
it was covered by clouds.

But we were not disappointed.

Even though all of our rainbows have been stitched into flags,
draped over coffins
and buried by the same people who taught us to believe
in optical illusions.
Our hearts were not drawn by Jeremy Fish,
we're not weighted in fiction,
we did not have heartstrings rigged by Geppetto.

No, we were not disappointed,
this was nothing like (I still remember) when we learned
that we couldn't all be Mouseketeers.

Disappointment is a pastime that we reconciled
when we laid our grandmothers to rest
and recognized that their tombs did not believe in resurrections.

The past is a hot air balloon hoisting us up to a sky we'll never see.
I get it.
I'm not lookin' down.

We are old enough to know the truth.

The light at the end of the tunnel is behind us,
that's where we came from.
We are not running from it.
There's no looking back.

for you, of you: you’ve been between my ears

close enough to being on my mind,
almost the same thing,
though that’s unfairly inequitable, we both agree,
for when in an ear one opines, too oft it escapes
out the other side, only a tree ring mark left,
someone was here, present

as for the Confucius confusion in

ok, who’s writing this poem to whom,

cause it’s never clear between us
who is
asking the questions,
since the answers come
demanded and undemanding,
fomenting newer questions and follow through,
before, as well as,
‘please sir, may I have some more?’

the mutualizing game tasking begin-began-begun,
for this, our lovely crazy teasing of our-thing, ago began,
don’t recall who or how intimated-initiated
this oil drilling exploration,
who is the annointer and who is the annointed,
who seeds the plants, picks the fruit, and who
gets paid with cloves of poems, by the bushel

you say I’ve been on your mind,
which we now have both pointed out
is somewhat extraordinary since,
the sight lines are drawn through
long distance cloudscapes that travel
through underground cables,
making everything said,
fallow and rich-ending, deeply frustrating,
impossible to see the outcome

clouds usually imaginary, (not like now),
making visibility normative poor,
unlike the real ones I’m flying at the moment through,
ensconced in front row seat 1F, heading northwest passage,
passing by so ridiculously close to where
you are minding the soil,
as I am
mining your soul’s soil, tilling it between the ears,
of you, by me, for us, and the excited sadness
makes me happy and yes, inequitably, again,
hopping-mad

because your breadcrumbs and dark Swiss chocolate bars are
scattered and defaced, bitten and chewed, lovingly licked melting,
we who cover our tracks too well;
but what I do have, makes me ravenous,
having read all your poems,
in random order and then one more time,
sequentially

I see your history, near escapes and resurrections,
in fine grained moody minutiae punctuated by huge gaps in between,
that we must cream fill with clouds of wondrous loving curiosity,
a torture so exquisite, only the gods could have invented it like
Sunday Night Football,
and crazy sayings,
like I love you too...

been on my mind and I imagine you
hot and sweaty,
bent over, aching tired, from
picking weeds (gotcha),
when sudden one of us stands up straight, back aching,
screaming out loud
this is crazy, and follows up with
a *** Darius type proclamation,
who’s writing this poem to whom
issued to the upwards-skywards,
but addressed to ourselves,
the poets

as we search clouds by the thousands,
is that you in that cloud, in that poem,
I look down thinking that, that must be,
the plot of green and dusted light brown ground
where she has gone into hidey-hole hiding,
disappearing for months at a time,
before arising for the sticking of me
in the sticking place,
wounding me fresh with brand new poems
scandalous and imaginous,
and our imaginations are both
too skilled

so here I close, overwritten, overridden, too long,
overshot my imaginary bounds, so one
pulls down the shade over the oval window
through which too many great stories have commenced,
and ended

the thick cumulus shouting
as we look up
as we look down,
saying “enough, you crazy people,
your poems tell too much,”

perhaps, find me in that
next bite of herbs buttered,
and then ask (of course)

who’s writing this poem to whom?

then breathe out, exhaling me a
breath-poem up above, to where I’m hiding
just as I, am sending one to you,
earth falling from thirty thousand feet,
coming to rest on your mind,
in between your ears,
friend

<>

8-6-19
somewhere in the sky, clueless, heading north by northwest

Courageous Phoenix, what do you know
of past and future conflagrations?
With wings afire, do you sense
the embers of your renascent soul?
Is your savage life-death vortex
as mysterious to you as it is to us?

Although I'll never fly on Phoenix wings,
or share your tortured falls and resurrections,
I feel I know you as a brother
for we all have Phoenix games to play
with each dividing and perishing cell
its own ancestor and descendant -
tomorrow's joys born of present sorrows.

Who among us has never tasted
the bitter gall of enmity -
or been driven to our knees
by the searing blade of failure?
But time is the most physician -
stirring new life from the ashes of despair.

Noble Phoenix, in our barren seasons
when scorched spirits tumble to the earth,
soar down from your blackened rock
and restore the feathers of our tattered wings.

*March, 2012

Lisa and I finally tested covid-free! When we saw our results, we began an impromptu dance that felt like levitation.

Although my covid case seemed much milder, Lisa’s been nothing but supportive. Why just yesterday morning, before we tested, Lisa said, “If you test covid-free before I do, I’ll **** you.” She was holding a spork which gave the threat a specific gravity it might otherwise have lacked.
“Back off, Sweeny,” I said.

We worked the next day, masked - just in case - and I’d swear that Rebecca, my surgeon, almost smiled when she saw me. As funny as Rebecca is, off-hours, once she puts on that white coat - forgetaboutit - she goes to some other, humor-free zone.

That night, we went out to our favorite bar to celebrate our Lazarus-like resurrections.

In the club, as we were walking to the bar, Lisa asked me, “What if we get carded?” I gasped. Never, have I EVER been carded. To even suggest the possibility is to risk breaking a spell that has lasted since I was fifteen years old and first walked in the adult-bar world.

It’s not that I look old, I’ve been told I don't look 21 (although I’m almost 20) - but in dark, bar-light - I just look “right,” like I belong. And let's face it, no bar turns away college girls or charges them a cover - we’re good for business.

I put a hand on Lisa’s shoulder and stopped us in our tracks. “Turn around three times,” I said.
“Why?” She asked. “To break the god-****, bad luck, vu doo you just put on us!” I said exasperatedly. She shrugged and started to turn in a circle. Again I took her by the shoulders, “Counter-clockwise,” I instructed, “don’t you know anything?!” Once she’d broken the jinx, we were free to go on.  The next part can only be poetry.

Behind the bar were shelves of bottles, brightly lit,
with pastel glows that shame the merely silver moon.
Red rums, golden bourbons, begging you to commit,
elixirs that dull every pain and brighten every mood.
Give us your tired, your lonely, and like Houdini
we’ll invoke fun with mystical treats like martinis.

We were basking in those lantern-like glows, like tourists, in heaven, when a bartender said, “What can I get you?” How generous those words were, how open and inviting.

“What’s your name?” I asked, he was wearing a name tag but I leaned in and gave him my friendliest smile. It’s important to establish a personal connection - but you can’t get carried away. He might be gay and decide you’re trailer.

“Brian,” he said. Brian was talking to me, but then he’d noticed Lisa and suddenly, he couldn’t take his eyes off her (Lisa’s an adriana). This bartender wasn’t gay at ALL.

I handed him my black, Centurion, American Express card “Can we set a tab for us?” I motioned to include Lisa, “and please include a 30% tip for yourself.” I smiled. He smiled.
“Oh, and there’ll be a gentleman joining us as well (Charles).”
“Sure.” he said, as he swiped the card on his iPad, adding, “now, what are you having?”

I’m a bit of a bon vivant, where cocktails are concerned but tonight, we’ll keep it vanilla.
“We’ll start with a Cherry coke (for Charles) and,” I looked at Lisa for approval, “Two American Martinis?” She smiled, “Please,” I added, putting my card away.
The coke is psychologically important; it gives the bartender what’s called 'plausible deniability.’
“Do you have a menu?” I said, as he turned to go. “Coming right up,” he said.

We were on a rooftop terrace that overlooked the Boston skyline. To the left, there were tables enclosed in glowing, geodesic bubbles that changed colors and off to the right, a dance space where couples were dancing, and a DJ was spinning ‘Sorja Smith’s - Little things.’

Our drinks arrived and Lisa and I laughingly toasted our covid survival.
At that moment, at least, everything seemed right with the world.

The witch’s hour approaches-
What an unearthly time to be alive,
To open your eyes in fear,
To shut them back into illusion.

In your tired veins, yesterday’s sorrow sneaks through;
Do they burn with numbness?
Does the air caress your venomous pores?

This girl is a witch;
A witch is a saint,
For all the saints have confessed
To having sinned.
Can a god resign?
Can he seek forgiveness?
I hold him in the palm of my hand-
Tired creature,
Old with time,
Dark with worry.
There are no resurrections left to save
What is to be forgotten anyway.

The witch’s hour passes by—
The almighty can be put to rest once more;

Sleep in a mattress of distress,
Slip in oblivious bliss.

I found a way to make it painless, to make god good, to make myself good, to make myself god—me—Joshua Jerome Hutton, sound familiar?  

God I hope so.

I found a way to make it painless in the checkout line, while the bleary-eyed maidens of South Moore, one in front, one behind, talk 3 a.m. rallies and resurrections right through me.

I found a way to make it painless at the eternal stoplight, watching the eternal Vietnam veteran in eternal rags holding eternal cardboard, summoning crumpled bills from anyone other than me.

I found a way to make it painless during the photo shoot, a way to place my chin so thoughtfully in my hand, a way to look into the middle-distance, a way to imply self-deprecation, a way to find near perfection—only under ample light, of course.

I found a way to make it painless in the soup queue, amongst my fellow unshaven, shamed naked, shamed to the bone, shamed pure, shamed to one flybuzz drive: I must consume.

I found a way to make it painless, to make it to the center of the white space, to suspend, inking out the worst parts of me, an all caps ATTRACTION, impossible to pinpoint, all for the review of books and the cabal of the slowed-down and insane still reading the review of books.

I found a way to make it painless by never breaking eye contact nor speaking a word as you talk yourself deeper into what you hate about yourself, and I stir my drink with a black cocktail straw, and I clear my throat, and I hahaha to myself, and I say these little issues just seem like problems. Just wait. You just wait.

I found a way to make it painless, to eek out of my own borderlines, to meld with the air and chemtrail across the sky, to observe from a holy distance the tightrope walker, the controlled demolition, the desperate young men lagging five feet behind the elusive loves of their lives, firing every clever phrase, hoping for one to land, to glean one little pause, a moment to catch up, and here, I must admit, it gives me great relief to be this removed, this far gone, this far god.

youre snoring awfully loud
so
thanks for interrupting those nightly resurrections.


really.
if whiskey can't cure me
im not sure what will.

yes to the mess
yes to the lessons
yes to the illusions
cracking

yes to me
yes to being
yes to releasing
past ashes

yes to living
again

yes to showing up broken
yes to rising in blue and black
yes to bandaging crimson scar-chars

yes to
healing

yes to love
in infinite resurrections

The big story of this day is Jesus’ Resurrection from death.
It will be celebrated in homes and churches throughout the world.
But I think Jesus is more interested in us than us celebrating him.
He wants us to recognize
and celebrate the way we rise
from our darkness, and digressions
failures, weakness, sadness and depression.

When Jesus was on Earth he was honest.  He was himself.
That’s what got him in trouble.
He teaches me to subdue the anger and every hint of violence inside
to be true to the unique creature his Father has crafted
not special or above the rest of ordinary men
just different and true to my own voice.

Unlike Jesus, I am not that courageous and mighty with the power of love.
I still fantasize doing damage to those whom I deem evil
still I care too much about what others think
about how I look or sound in public.

I am unlike Jesus in too many ways,
but I am like him in my rising from darkness and doom
from my own self-made tomb.
My resurrections might be tiny
but large is the Spirit in me
and the ability to see
the light
to see the right
and pursue it wherever it leads
into meadows and into the weeds
away from tradition and my roots
beyond my past moorings
toward truth
and its small soarings
telling my little stories
from death to glory.

eight months we loved and fought with equal rage
upon the net's equator spinning round
we baked our flesh in sun of summer's age
and died on winter's snow filled concrete ground

this, every day a battle to the death
we slaughtered one another to the grave
then making love, restoring life with breath
we'd soar back to the skies embraced and saved

each day has been a lifetime full of life
lived fully in our love den's angry place
ineffable our love in passion's strife
so many resurrections in one space

and now too tired to raise again the sword
we rest with silenced love and not a word

(C)2012, Christos Rigakos

Money to be made with moves to make

The right to exist and do business 

Time to occupy each corner occupants

Do comply and follow obstruction

Not your average FAQ

Free software for the eye to sync

Learn sign language before we lose our freedom of speech

Thus page is an open source of parapsychological poetry

The movie extra you did not see coming

Firewall around the communication bubble 

Saving up ameros to invest online 

Pedestrians crossing walking the line

No binge drinking only red wine

The liver gets important just in time

4x4 on every Friday

Don't forget the right of way

Moral duty on everyday basis

Pledge to humanity not a three colored quilt,

The man infested with manifestation

Where did this past year go?

About 10 jobs and no money saved,

I've died like about 5 times,

Baptize my nostril and felt my brain vaporized,

Having an auction for my addiction,

Suffering from wisdom erosion,

Once enlightened by the souls resurrections,

Here's to you higher evidence of existence,

Please end this phase of false occasions,

This human ghost rider is at his last hour with decaying flowers,

Three quarters shy of death,

Life is just a biological process,

Space continuum hole to heaven just to hide,

Or to the future perhaps,

Thus next year might be my last.

when there are no answers which will satisfy your questions
i can tell you
i can tell you

stop with all the questions, they won't help when there's no answer
i can tell you
i can tell you

you are only one small star but
you
can light the darkness
with your smile
little child.
when you go to sleep at night you try to let go of the fright
and pain
in your brain
and when you rise and shine it might not be the way you feel inside
but someday baby
someday
you will laugh and shine again and wonder how and wonder when
it happened
how'd that happen?
things
are not the same for everyone
it's not a game, but still
we come back
somehow
we come back~
and if you do not know the way, there's someone by your side today
to guide you
right beside you~
He's the one and only one, the Father sent his only Son
to find us
to find us
lonely and in emnity, and searching for identity
we stumbled
then we tumbled
still we had our ups and downs
'cause even in the depths there's clowns
that cheer us
the demons fear us
but if you've got connections to the King of resurrections
you'll be lifted
free and gifted
so if at night, you can not sleep, count it right, you are the sheep
he shepherds
your loving shepherd
leaves the rest and comes for you, wants you back, to talk to you
just listen
wait and listen
rest in Him, He holds no grudge
He hates all sin, a righteous judge
but loves you
deeply loves you.
don't be fooled there's nothing out in outer space but you need Grace
it's right here
always right here.
in a closet. on a shelf , in field all by yourself
he's present
ever present.
Waiting for the day when you will take him in and say
I want to know You
just to know You.

Swallow your wishes

Like a swallow swallows the wind-

You have only just begun to walk

We heard these things one time too often

Almost like we never heard it at all

We spent the rest of the days thinking,

Deep in diverse musings,

Ears open for deep nothings,

Hopes for meaning dropping from the skies

Like the skies dropped answers as rain,

Like the skies dropped answers as rain



We danced, happy as the sun

Eyes open for all of its brilliance

We lost time; we were never in time

For the first time we had a taste of God

Forgotten moments, one stretched into many others,

Never ending continuum

Till we enveloped the universe,

Till we enveloped the universe:

We made many others



We lost all we came with

Crashing into one other plane-

Before we became gods, we slept

Sit at table with the ages,

Converse with the days, days on end

Days without end, sempiternal stretch

We believed what we believed

Making what we can into what we believed,

And all the rest were true

Like a swallow



We flew like falling stars

Piercing into the mind of wonder,

Truth variables and conflicting paradoxes-

The dead were asleep

While we walked the other sides:

The other sides of reason

Like a swallow



Ashes risen, fiery resurrections

Parallel worlds closing in on each other

It was the discovery of madness,

An awareness of the powers of the mortal mind

Twisting desires, twisted cravings:

They were all given to unnatural uses, one for the other

For want of propriety, inconvenient fates

Shed skins, like shed feathers

Like a swallow



In the end we disappeared

Out, out, out of time

We ceased existence

We believed what we made

Stuck in our own madness, we disappeared

As our wings opened to the sun

Our voices loud, ringing to eternity

Spirit soaring, rushing thunderclaps

Plummeting down earthward

Like a falling star

Like a swallow



Like a swallow swallows the wind

You have looked into the sun, and lived:

You have only just begun to walk

Falling star; now your spirit takes wing,

Wind

Like a swallow

my eyes are raw
and sting
from the constant blotting
of deep
and soulful
resurrections of emotions,

perhaps I would feel better
If I stopped trying to hide them.

Spotlights burn confessions from the sinners pockets as their penance is paid penny by penny in spare change jars and guitar cases all along the interstate,
Go and tell the gutters of our suicide and leave a note in tomorrow's obituaries if they wept for us
If not, just ******* spare me
Neurotic breakdowns in melting rooms filled to fever with strung out felons just now crossing the lines of the tally marks that denote their resurrections,
And I long to start trash can fires with my wasted chances and apologies from former lovers mixed with equal parts sawdust and gasoline,
I've got more than enough to light up the backstreets I take to get home every night at least, but you know how melodramatic I can be
I'll be dressed in all black back against vandalized brick walls on some steps somewhere claiming to be able to read the future in a deck of hand-me-down tarot cards,
I'll be hearing the whispers in stuck tongues about my hair and how it's grown as I listen to the horizon waiting for the crack of thunder to begin the storm,
I'll be contemplating connections between drags of cigarettes in the hum of static evening with the drifters drawn like moths to the glow of empathy,
I'll be ready to go whenever I'm called, and I promise I won't cause a scene,
But now I think there's a girl walking calmly towards me, ignoring the traffic jam of my speech patterns and I find myself catching fireflies by the hundreds to illuminate her approach,
She tells me she'll see me in the morning if I ever decide to lay my head to rest,
And we wish each other good luck

spending time with you is like
being cast eternally as a character in
a Terrence Malick film, a narrator dictating
our every move, our scripts unfolding
in slow, mesmerizing motion

someone always has to die in these tales
and question the almighty's purpose, if there
be one, beyond birth and return to the earth;
the time between being swallowed
by our eyes, undigested

I am ****** in as well, slowly, by the lungs
of our creator, whose exhalations come as oceans of light,
though high tides recede to reveal dark shores,
our inevitable demise, before painful,
interminable resurrections