Five Years Ago

Though I first heard that song five years ago, it's a fact

That sometimes a song takes me much further back,

Perhaps back to much older songs that I know,

and then deeper in the minds labyrinth I will go.

Memories layer like seamounts' precipitous climb,

Gather snow as they roll down the mountains of time.

Used to Know

Anything I do, anyplace I go
There's a chance I'll see someone I used to know,
That my old mistakes will come back for communion,
Which appears to the world as an unplanned reunion.

Why I Write, Part x+117: I Walk

I walk until my body tires

Because the act my mind inspires.

For some reason, this movement works

When I'm writing in starts and jerks,

and so I set out all alone,

I log some miles, come back home

Covered in ideas and sweat,

Exerting both my legs and head.

Finding Emily

To find the girl I'd like to meet

Would put long miles on my feet.

She had a tendency to hide.

She closed her up and stayed inside.

Not social, brilliant in that stead,

She lived full lives inside her head.

Perhaps I'd not meet Dickinson.

I might do better with John Donne.

Too Hot

This brave new world I live in, for my tastes, runs too hot.
Four hundred and fifty one degrees of separation I've got.
I'm too far away to show others my mind,
The contents of which are unsanctioned, maligned.
The only choice left is to surrender my convictions.
The unthinking man is no thought police jurisdiction.

Money, Codes and Copyrights

For money, codes and copyrights

I lack the time, care or delight.

There's no idea one man can own.

In thinking this, I'm not alone.

Hey, thought police! There's nothing new.

There's no thing others ain't thought through.

For inspiration, play is good.

Plus, no one steals like Hollywood.

That's why I always write for free.

If asked who wrote this, mention me.

Why I Write, Part x+116: I've Always Known

I work the way I've always known,

By which I mean I work alone.

A product's purest from one source,

And that's my sole motive, of course.

I don't with others poorly play.

It's not my ego in the way.

It's not a flight from compromise

Or fear of other readers' eyes.

Loneliness, integrity,

They're hand in hand. That's all, now see?

Athena's Groom

You, self-proclaimed Athena's groom,

The sharpest tongue in every room,

Make every word you say a test

To craft replies (or hear the rest),

To let your words sink in, inspire,

(To listen on and not get tired).

Feel

I lack a certain feel for lines,

For what to say and how to time,

For what is news, and fit to print,

and what's a brag, where ego glints.

I have success. I wish to tell,

and if praised once, then feel compelled.

Perhaps my friends are too polite,

and I say wrong when I did right.

So next success, a second task:

Rather than tell, perhaps I'll ask

If people really want to hear,

Though such self-doubt abuses ears.

Now Comes the Hour

Now comes the hour of my mistaking.

I commit my mind to an undertaking

Claimed by many and praised by all,

The perfect platform for one more fall,

Or else, thrown into work, I earn a rest

By drawing near to the end of my test,

Which, though completed imperfectly

Is more than I could from beginning see.

Drive Me

Whitman's love of all things doesn't drive me.
I once thought my own life's joy'd not survive me,
But finding no joy in my life or in things
Led me to knew ways to greet what life brings.
Instead of just hoping or trying to fight,
I'd expect the worst, be well-startled or right.
Mistreated by people?  Go places without them,
Find joy in the green in the shade-trees on mountains.
Hunt me down?  Bring me back?  Lock me in?  Well what then?
I'll just hide under books or my paper and pen.

Why I Write, Part x+115: For All This Talk

 For all this talk of pens and swords, my metaphor's more fun:
The canon is my ammo clips.  My writing is my gun.

Why I Write, Part x+114: If the Pen Is Mightier

If the pen is mightier than the sword, then I've got
Plenty of quotes to cut Gordian knots
That pen in my poetry, bind up my brain,
Leave my muse all a-pacing and readers insane,
But repetition's the weapon I've got in this fight.
Write the same thing enough, I just might do it right.

Why I Write, Part x+113: Pens Are Mightier

I've read it, and you've said it, and we've heard it all before,
The standard-issue quote that pens are mightier than swords,
and worldwide the gun's most feared of all, but for myself I find
My pen outstrips the forces dark that work within my mind.

Ode to the Groundskeeper

The boys of summer tread late upon spring's green
Leavings, summer's browns being stayed by some unseen
Hand.  Bask in arcs from the burly, blind force of nature's
Unkindness spared by kinder, gentler agriculture.
They are zen gardens for men who drive pickup trucks.
The Groundskeeper, grassgrower, does not trust to luck.

Why I Write, Part x+112: Trust

In pen and pen-hand I must trust
If I ever wish to thrust
My metaphors to full extension,
The edges of my comprehension,
Or if I ever wish to move
Stars or mountains, systems...you...

My Personal World, Part 9: Lost

New music can at times confuse me,
With art or wordplay quickly lose me
and leave my ears in foggy weather
With words I've never heard together,
But I say, what a paltry cost
For exploration, to be lost.

Why I Write, Part x+111: We Are Most Rich

In words we are most rich by far.
That which they describe, they are.
Words may be comfort: soothing, soft.
They may direct us when we're lost.
Sometimes they can be more intense,
For exploration or defense.
Sometimes they're even cutting, hard,
Thrown our way, that they may harm.

These words I have by scads aren't new,
But what I have to spend, I do,
Perhaps in anger or in play,
Perhaps, I hope, in some new way.

Morning

The best new things are free, like morning
Straight out of its bright, rainbow packaging,
When it can still be used for anything.

Too soon, the sun climbs.  It washes the world pale,
and that new morning, dried by heat, grows stale.

Deep Wisdom

Deep wisdom is everywhere, or there is none;
What seems thus to us is not in other tongues.
In fact, there's the truth we see every day
and half the truth expressed in clever wordplay.

What Gives?

What gives you the impression
and what gives you the right
To think to guilt me out to clubs
To drink away my nights?

I'm no partisan nor puritan --
Won't argue my way's better.
I always say to each their own --
Enforce it to the letter.

You Ask

You ask why friends must go away.
Friendship is like ocean waves.
They come in and out, grow deep and tall,
Rise to spectacular heights and fall.
Love is friendship's unsubstantial spray.
It flies high and falls quick; friendship clears our way.

You ask "is this how it will always feel?"
Your contrast is the ocean's deep royals and teals.
Your personal temper is as water's vague blue,
But as circumstance chances, so does the hue,
Sometimes life gives you azure, sometimes gray of steel,
Shades of joy, shades of sorrow, of indifference or zeal.

Opportunity

Opportunity's filling a bottle with lightning.
It's lucky, it's not everyday, and it's frightening.
It wears many masks, it bears many forms:
Foreign travel and things we've not done before,
Daring risks, unpleasant tasks, and steep climbs.
I don't blame they who don't say "yes" every time.

The Diamond Shines Brightest

The smooth glove's popping, the rough sand's sliding,
The ball's arc -- all unite what my mind's dividing:
Strength and patience, calm and fury, the sounds and the sights.
Summer's burn finds a balm in cool winter nights.

The diamond shines brightest when under the lights.

Why I Write, Part x+110: Writer's Prayer

Give me courage, muse, I pray.
Don't let me wriggle, slip away
From rhymes to write and words to play,
But make me write my peace this day.
Give me the words I need to write
Before I lay me down this night,
and let me struggle, let me squirm,
But most of all, leave me to learn,
So once my pen from paper's parted,
The words are different than when started.

The Poet Must Be...

The poet must be a man.
He must improvise or plan
And thrust his pen down with conviction,
Draw hard lines and brave distinctions
Without any thought to others,
Their feelings, opinions, even mothers,
(Though it ought to be against the law
For man to make such blah blah blah)
and perhaps my poetry doth suck
Because I am not man enough.

The poet must be woman.  See,
She swims in, knows such gray degrees,
Sees how they're different but the same.
No eye for color'd leave her lame.
A poet with no mind to feelings at all?
Her knowledge of heart and culture's fair tall,
With metaphors and double-meanings
To water down hard stances, leanings,
With mind and heart wound 'round her tight
To set the human soul to light.

The poet must be in-between
Or else, like me, write poetry
Primitive and poor and mean.

I Know Now

I know now you'd never celebrate me.
Still, it tears me up to know you hate me.
I know, it must be things I said --
Which, I haven't figured out, just regreted.
Though I hate you to turn away, lips pursed,
Though I feel there could be nothing worse,
Though my heart gives my mind days off,
Up there, I know I'm better off.

Autoflush Toilet

The autoflush toilet's a devious beast,
Or mischievous at the very least.
If you're the type, and it's easy to incite you,
He'll let you sit, let you relax, and bite you.

Logger Time

My first bike, where I learned to trust

Was harvested, felled down by rust.

The street where balls and cars collide

Is split in the middle, with lights on each side.

The old tree fort, by sleepovers crowned

Was partly recycled, and rots on the ground.

My first school, where was dropped by mother:

Razed to the ground, to build another.

The park were neighbor kids would play:

An office, parking, all in gray.

Memories stay longer, still can't last

As logger Time cuts down my past.

In a Lie

There is a certain amount of planning in a lie,

To prevent revealing how or why,

So I only shake my head and laugh.

I know why presidents have staff:

To reassure the voters, financiers,

That war won't take so many years

As the last, with concentration and support,

and then to help the truth distort

So, when it's convenient, another starts,

Or to convince my bleeding heart

That I should place my “hope” in “change,”

In seeing deck chairs rearranged.

The rich have pull; the rest have not;

The pols have staff; that's all I've got.

Always Use Words

You've always been like this. I've known this for years,

But then, we always use words to change behavior.

I tend to be a bit reductive.

You're always using words like “profitable” and “productive,

A sure sign of someone with an overabundance of concern for money,

Which I don't need anywhere around me.

It's strange that you credit criticism for my flight.

Until you start to praise me, I'll know I'm near half-right.

Muse News, Pt. 3

I nearly pronounce myself unchanging, dead,

Til the thoughts of a new muse creep into my head.

The old ones just pace, but the new gambol, play,

and then just as soon grow infirm, crawl away.

I take comfort in part in your rescue by starts,

For it signals the old muse and my mind might part.

One

One thought of your touch sets my rhyme-sense to screaming.

One side's pinned to you, so in circles I'm dreaming.

One half my dreaming dreams of you, the other of repose.

One thing I write repeatedly, my real muse indisposed.

Like Ash

The snow falls down like ash: gray, lightly.

Of the streetlights which so often shine so brightly

Most are our, and the rest by low clouds and snow's flight

Scattered into a glow which Hephaestus delights,

and I, for my part, think I may die complete

The second time I go out, and see snow, and feel heat.

Understanding Women 101, as Self-Taught

Here's a hint that I hate you:

I resist what you suggest I do,

and what little on the list I heed

Is in opposite priority.

Here's a hint that you hate me:

…

…

…

Winter in Montana

Winter in Montana lies low, descending

So Celts would think the world is ending

and I myself must hurry home

To light small fires, be alone

Without my guilt and expectations.

I felt it once, and long await it.

I Believe In

I believe in
Inspiration,
Desperation,
Conflageration,
Good sex and good conversation,
Sinning,
Winning,
Underpinning,
Baseball as a cure to everything,
and that god, for some reasons, likes me.

I believe that
Some rhymes fall flat,
Some singles are fat,
Sometimes hearts on fire catch,
That relationships work with communication and the sack,
We have freedom to act,
Success is a findable, changeable fact,
That an unreasoned life will fall to the mat,
That everyone thinks their passions "cure that,"
But changing others' religion?  Prepare to fail thereat.

Body and Soul

They say you must work to keep body and soul,
That cash you must procure,
But what truly unites supreme with mundane?
It's more than that, I'm sure.

I find that it cannot be love, company,
For I've gone months without.
The same could be said of holy Thought
By others, I don't doubt.

One could search their whole lives, many things go without
and not the answer see.
Perhaps our own multiple minds come about
Through pursuit of this mystery.

What Holds Us Together

As I fume, and I wonder what holds us together
With those who speak only of movies and weather,
With those who bring only the wrong sorts of news,
With those who cannot understand others' views,
With those who live to demand and to stifle,
With those who make worlds of their fears and their trifles,
With those leave peacemaking, praising 'til last,
Who will criticize first, who can't let go the past.
To those family and friends and those lovers we cleave,
For we stubbornly won't be the first one to leave.

Measured

They speak often of large lives, but how are those measured --
By the things a man owns, and the size of his treasure,
By the breadth of his travels, in life lessons or miles,
By the size of the party of mourners behind him,
Or perhaps by the way he gives these things to others
and the path to spiritual comfort discovered?

Why I Write, Part x+109: Static/Dynamic

My words are dynamic.  I catch static for writin'.
If I have any readers, I hope I excite them
With new ideas and old meters, with puns and subtext.
I hope I'm dynamic, so they can't guess what's next.

Why I Write, Part x+108: Ideas Meet

Ideas meet in forgetful weather,
Decide to settle down together,
Build a town and build a home
Permanent, no longer roam.
For those ideas: no growth, no fun;
For me, that's one more poem done.

You Look Back

They say you look back when you're through,
Regret the things you didn't do,
But I look back on what those hid:
The time for all the things I did.

All Repetition

There was a time, in my youthful condition,

When my beliefs precluded all repetition.

The value of safety, what works, of tradition

Was not up for consideration,

But countless walks 'neath pin-poked skies,

Food that pleased without surprise

and friendship, consistent seeing's prize

Proved my youthful mind unwise.

Silky

Silky, she slides side-to-side, sashaying,

Teeth bare, brazen, biting, breaking, braying,

Softly smoothing flesh with squeeze, caress,

Scraping nail-shards pierce skin, artless.

One's ways to say, to see love's art

Speaks to each pristine, broken heart.

Why I Write, Part x+107: My Legend Tells

I write to pull me up from hell,

Or so my untold legend tells,

But maybe it's to show those hells

To every unsuspecting else.

Perhaps I'm sharing ecstasy.

That's what I'd like to think of me.

On purpose? Accidentally?

I'd buy each possibility.

As to why I write these crops,

From my heart's bottom to its top,

Agreements couldn't drown pins' drops.

All I know is I can't stop.

Over Forty or Under Fourteen

It's fine over forty, or under fourteen,

But imagination best not be caught in between.

For the young, it's more than okay to pretend,

From birth 'til young manhood brings childhood's end.

Then, once you reach middle age or so,

It's 'cute' that your dreams live on, one more go.

Caught in between, and you're “one of those artist types.”

(I'm 'one of those', but I'm no artist; don't be buyin' that hype.)

Imagination, when found in young men, is called weird.

(I embrace that, as seen in the shape of my beard.)

Alone in a Maze

Alone in a maze of silence and emptiness,

A stately, monumental, civilized mess,

I wander the residues of humanity, smile on lips,

Delighted by my own custom apocalypse,

By the shadow and snowfall in a world barely lighted

By plants unattended, running on fumes, autopilot.

Utterly alone in this world, my feet long to dance,

Grateful for peace and a real second chance.

Emerald

Played on diamonds surrounded by emerald fields

Where players are given a green-light to steal,

Surrounded in walls clad in ivy or painted,

and crowds drinking beer 'til they're sick, green and fainted

Who wish they were playing, in envy's green sin,

As they covet green paper, the kind gets them in.

If I'm Counting

Seven to ten to thirteen, if I'm counting.

I have strange compulsions when tallying things.

Then from seventeen to thirty-six I bound,

So clearly there's no pattern to be found.

Forty-eight, fifty-six, sixty-nine and seventy,

Are where settings between one and a hundred ought to be,

Along with seventy-eight and eighty-six, ninety-one and ninety-eight.

If all those numbers previous are impractical or taken,

I can use the number twenty-two and not be badly shaken,

Though that number isn't mine. It's borrowed from my brother,

and given half a chance to choose, I'd sure prefer the others.

Not Very Wise

I find love at first sight to be not very wise,

Making life-heavy decisions with only your eyes,

But abandoning reason isn't the worst.

The problem is to make a person what you see first,

Is to make them a sign, or some picture-book

That a person can read more or less with a look.

Love at first sight's two dimensional, flat.

I fail to see the romantic in that.

Why I Write, Part x+106: I Don't Study

I don't study; my mind buzzes an ivory tower,
Rocks it with a moment of my rhyming power,
Which you will never see come to full flower
Since it's moving at one hundred miles an hour,

But I see beauty as I flash past, and I bag it.
If I ever want to write something that ain't true, I'll gag it,
But when I see life's untruth, then I earn stripes.  I flag it.
With so many hats to wear, my head runs ragged,

and I forget my worries, the date and my name.
I might tweak my techniques, but my whole life's the game;
Once I was quatrains and couplets, always the same,

But my new child, the tercet, it grows, and I nurse it.
Right now it's tiny.  I could keep it in a purse.  It's
Here to stay, whether you crave or curse it.

Why I Write, Part x+105: I Cannot Be Sure

I fertilize poems grown from idea-lings
Though I cannot be sure if anyone reads them,
Because one cannot write long for such as those reasons.
I'm more likely to dance when I think no one sees it.

Come Together

Your lips come together like comet and earth,

An explosion of contact, apocalypse birth,

A prelude of fire to world-ending sex.

I've been stuck for too long to move on to the next.

There's a Reason

For everyone who drinks, there's a reason for drinking.

Some are simply surrounded and sinking.

Another may swell with pride, and drink to fill the space.

For every broken vein, there's a reason for the face.

Losers and Lovers

The difference between losers and lovers

Is revealed entirely in covers –

Which losers stain, and mothers wash away;

Where lovers make (or roll in) hay.

To My Runner, In Retrospect

You let me get close, and then you'd run,
Leave me looking back on our night before my day was done.
We'd hear lots of songs, but never had one.
We were never "we."  We were only for fun.

Explained

I'm turned on by mysteries, the can't-be-explained,
Like why clean porta-johns and candy hearts smell the same,
The Voynich Manuscript, why I stopped feeling pain,
and why I always get so close and stay so far away.
Lost cities make my heart and mind impatient to play.
I fiend for theories; for answers, I'll wait.

Cut Down

Memories are ghosts of things that don't last.

They start off when you're born.  They cut down your past

Drawing-sidewalk by schoolhouse, landscape-by-tree,

There's little left of what I grew up expecting to see,

Of the places and things and the people I knew.

The future I grew up with, well that's gone now, too.

I, alone, travel time unchanged, march in one direction, ahead,

and play “The Saints Go Marching” for the ghosts in my head.

The Price

She always seems to know just when the price is right,

Probably from shopping at least every other night,

Or the three counties of newspapers she always goes through

Finding coupons that always seem to save a buck or two.

She tells me “you ought to work two jobs to save up for later.

Watching all that baseball, you're the wrong kind of waiter.

You spend too much time writing, your mind flapping wax wings

To appreciate the important, valuable, substantial things,”

But I've never found a substitute in mere financial planning

For taking the time to value what's really worth having.

The Hypocrisy of Sensitivity

We test someone's humor where there's not any give,

and tell them “stop being so dang sensitive,”

But imagine for a moment, if you can, the tables turned.

Are there jokes that would offend you?  Should this be unlearned?