Famished (i am)

Drink as though you've dreamt
in cool streams of aqua vita.
Devour what you crave
under red flame and red raw.
Indulge in your ingenious ideas,
swoon in the sweet murmurs
of language and lingering lyric,
encouraging and nourishing.
Listen to those.
Ingest for pleasure,
erupt with contagion
-for that I came-
-thou art that-
but You.
Just Now
meaning
Everything.
There is nothing more.



-for that I came- is from the poem What I Do Is Me-For That I Came by Ray Bradbury and -thou art that- is used often by Aldous Huxley (I am certain the all other words have also been used before by someone somewhere sometime somehow in some(other)way as well).


Image of painting by Ramon Casas i Carbó [Public domain],c. 1892 via Wikimedia Commons.

Thin air

The clouds kept 

getting sucked up

in tall towers,

weaving spindles

of cotton wands.

It makes

ponder,

it makes

wonder,

it caused pause

to feel for my feet,

small as they seemed

from up there.

Image By GAURAV MAROO (MY DIGI CAM) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Rime on the windows

Excuses? A few...
I denied-
I plied,
I tried, I lied
I tried to hide,
I cried,
I sighed and then
tried to clarify
why
I might (not)
write more tonight,
despite the slightly dim light,
(not) quite bright
enough
and (not) the (right) stuff
I could do
instead of (not) facing you...

And I steer clear
when I fear you are near
my space, in my place
if you hear a tear,
while fiction is lurking
late-wait
my dear,
it was just sincerely
me.
Wrestling with
preservation, conservation,
constriction, restriction to never do-
well- do not tell all
that has made me unwell...I wont
and dont.
When I go to melt the frost,
I am lost,
my fingertips won't melt the ice...
why a window if it wont show
the way out? I doubt you know,
since the rime grows on itself,
and swallowed the last word.


composed 3/29/16

Image By Hydraulicsuperman (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

To Whom this Invocation May Concern

How am little i,
oh wisest one,
to beg, plead, ask of you-
To whom do I direct this to?
i've been patiently holding it in,
awaiting your silent reply,
yet I regret to inform,
i'm grasping
at air-
missing you there,
perhaps...
-will come when you're ready,
pending by suspension,
willing my belief.
Just know,
as anticipating listener,
my tongue is in your hands.
i banish my own banter,
drowning your voice,
gurgling from my inner ear.
No More! Silence!
i remain fixed, devoted
and listening to every
syllable you may say,
chomping at all your
crisp wafer clues
not knowing how to
thank you.
when you come and go
abruptly as you
please
leaving me hanging
dead before the echoes back
because I never caught your name...


Composed 11/6/15

Image of painting by Sophie Gengembre Anderson, Portrait of a Young Girl [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

You're breaking up

Spoken word poet-

try: talking to ones soul a

loud-can you hear It?

Image of painting By Angelica Kauffmann (1741-1807) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Eminent Domain

Be cause
we have hands,
we take things with us,
carry our burden bags around
and tote our tiny things
call them tailor-made
and hope they are flattering.

Be cause
this land we said was ours
dirt we move around
while space remains unsettled
humanity as a clod has agreed,
since we cannot yet steal stars
all is all
of ours.

Be cause
eminence is an amalgamation
man-made and molded.
Be cause
domain has been appropriated
not by Volume.
We are empty
and entertained
with things
we thought
were matter.

Be cause
we do not have
nothing.
Be cause
dark matter
expands exponentially
Love is the only thing
light enough
to keep.




Image By Internet Archive Book Images [No restrictions], Light and Life Woman, via Wikimedia Commons.

Lesson 1: Nature and the Soupman

Travel back to your first lesson
taught by Mother Nature.
When you learned
your parents were not the only
nor the best
teachers
about life.

We went camping,
my parents, their friends, Hercules-the dog.
We'd go to the Russian River
where there were no campsites-
you sight your spot and camp-
if you like.

They would drink and fish,
and drink like fish,
and more-it was the eighties.
Their friend, 

a man called Kevin Soupman
was fishing near me
when he caught a rainbow
trout.

He held it across both his hands,
it was shiny, slimy and squirmy-

the things kids like.
Moments later,
he said he had something for me.
He told me to hold out the palm
of my hand.
I did, eagerly.

In it,
he placed a crimson pebble.
It rolled a moment
as I tried to see it more closely
then it settled in the evening sun-
(un)still

throbbing and beating its inner drum.
Thus,

Nature and the Soupman
taught me
all I needed to know
about heartlessness.


Image By Ken Hammond / USDACornischong at lb.wikipedia [Public domain], from Wikimedia Commons.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

Things were going along swell
rolling back and forth,
forth and back...
All is stimulating, titillating, and conversating
smoothly sailing the syllabic sea,
until suddenly-
I am slapped across the face (!)
with an open backhand,
knuckled under the weight of the word-
As though fired from an ex-husband,
who knows me better than me-
says he. Like a master I've never served,
who insists on digging up old dilemmas
from dank old trunks,
prying through and poking around
for the finest, sharpest, loftiest bone to pick.
Tossing ancient history at me like china darts
through fragile names like
-Racism and Sexism-
pointed accusations
hurled only by
an immaculate him,
who wants to deflect, deter, stall, divert, and exert
his preeminent preferences of him-
self-
less
threats to masculinity.
Never to be
for-
given
for-
peace
sake.



Image of Betty Ford's travel trunk, By n/a (Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Whose in the way of whom

What does it matter

if water may hollow stone,

it also melts ice,

and is able to absorb

its likeness

to become more of itself.

Who can blame the wind 

for putting pressure

on structures we've built

opposing its whims,

where we erect our wants;

which is why we tremble.

Unlike the stone

that is grounded

lays low, erodes slowly

and goes nowhere fast.

Water I care

emote a dust in the wind?

Amidst stone cold silence,

I heard the wind whisper

and the water splattered back.

This poem was inspired by the poem Wind, Water, Stone by Octavio Paz.

Photo credit By Sequeira, Paul, Photographer (NARA record: 8464471) (U.S. National Archives and Records Administration) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. Description: Homeowners lined a lake beach with cars in order to prevent erosion threatening their dwelling residences. 

Silly Chilly

Write hot?
I think not.
I should be composing in the cool air.
I should be writing in the frigidaire.
I just can't figure out how to fit quite yet-
but I bet
my ideas would last longer
my prose may sound stronger
it would increase my freshness-
although, no one has tested this.

But I have been told
when you work in the cold
it increases the racing speed
of the firing synapses I need.

The icebox stocks
are actually quite empty-
some left-over spaghetti,
some moldy cheese and condiments
some things growing antioxidants...
(ahh, the minimal groceries
of writers salaries)
While it is conceivable,
working in there still doesn't seem feasible.
Does anyone writing from an igloo
know if this is true?



Image By jean-lucien guillaume (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Remember it so

By now,
neurologists all know
we lie
and believe what
is so
vivid enough to make
it so-
in our alternate reality,
what we call memory.

Who was there to witness
it so-
they can testify the truth
as it happened by view
they say-
it is,
so we believe it.

Duality seems determined
by a parallelogram sent
from another timeline
started forever ago,
we think we know
it so-
Infinite possibilities
project our stories,
our memories,
our-one time-
gone another way.

So tell it all ways, build
it so
intricate and elaborate, that
it is
simply the best story
only you know
by now.




Image of painting by John White Alexander [No restrictions or Public domain], Memories (1903) via Wikimedia Commons.

Fear Fiends

If every single one of us
stopped right Now-
pointing aim and angle-
no longer letting out the line
tightening the drag
on those baiting fear
would schools be safe?

If every personhood
could forget they ever saw terror
we could forget its name and
claim for attention and mention.

If we remained strangers
violence would be candy
that decays our good taste.

If all of our hands were clean
we could touch without harm,
and move without touch
yet the lines are long
and gloved with grime.

If we knew how to weild love
without fear of rejection
violence would be in vain.

This stress has made a bloody mess
of bones to pick and bodies to bury.
We have come weak with atrophy
choosing wealth over value,
terrified by the tought of loss.

The fear we put here
as bearers of terrors
we make
hearts ache.


Image By Popular Publications (Scanned cover of pulp magazine) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Femme

Lips for licking words
sweet and sour said to taste, tongue
buds roses and thorns.




Image of painting by Władysław Czachórski [Public domain], First Roses (1891) via Wikimedia Commons.

Keeping it Inside Out (There)

Between you and I
secrets
Yes
You've seen parts
none cared
for, but me.

You see,
remember that time
you knew
I was lying
or the time
you knew truth
was hiding right there
and both times
you thought,
why not?

Or of a poet-
that needs words
that hold places for
secrets
that are not known
but shown
anyway...
In between
poetry shared
somewhere
someone
else may
someday
care
and keep
secrets 
with me.




Image by Julia Margaret Cameron [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Pro Crastinator

When it finally all came out
and was nowhere near right,
I tried again.

And it was worse.
So I started over
with countless scratches and
don't sniff around-
it stinks!

Well, all I could do
was begin anew
way of coming at it-

Quit is not a possibility,
cruelly
Failure is my reality
and I see,
this jutting angle
enmeshed in the rest
will work,
once I throw it out
the window.
There's always tomorrow.



Image of painting By Anton Laupheimer (1848–1927) (Auktionshaus Zeller) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

The Poet's Dream-by P.B. Shelley

The Poet's Dream 

by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)

On a poet's lips I slept

Dreaming like a love adept

In the sound his breathing kept;

Nor seeks nor finds he mortal blisses,

But feeds on the aerial kisses,

Of shapes that haunt thoughts wildernesses. 

He will watch from dawn to gloom

The lake reflected sun illume

The yellow bees in the ivy-bloom

Nor heed nor see, what things they be;

But from these create he can

Forms more real than living man,

Nurslings of immortality!

One of these awakened me,

And I sped to succour thee.

Image of painting by Jozef Israëls [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

The missing lyrics

When I do not say
                           it is not that-
I made this mask
                          this way.
You can see its guts
                         through the eyes...
The cogs and fogs.

When I listen
                         I welcome news
from outside.
To share a smile
                         is a welcome view,
a radiant defiance of conservation.
When I hear
                         music in the mundane,
I take it out
                        of context
and am moved by its song.

When spoken
                        I regret empty words,
that fulfill
                        nothing perfectly.
All the non-existent ways-
                        I said nothing
In so many days-
                        it has all been said.
I am done telling
                         All,
when I do not say.



Image of painting by Vittorio Matteo Corcos (1892), [Public domain] via Wikimedia Commons.

Prescription: Just two a day

Ever since doctor
Williams stole a cold plum- (yum!)
I take more than one.













Image By Nishimura Goun (1877 - 1938) (Japanese) (Painter, Details of artist on Google Art Project) [Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

You again

Why would you be
looking here
when you should be
looking
somewhere else

There you go again
anywhere
but furthermore
and curiosity does not
have nine chances
to land on a point
where you find
yourself
here
again

Still
stop wasting another line
It will always be here
nevermore
than at its worst
a waste of-
a treasure of-
private epiphany
helium to some.

Anyway, today is the day
you stop.
And now
it is an insult
to see you watching these words
fly away-
don't check-
yet-
they lie
unrecognizable by eyes
other than yours

How you can see
not all the words are empty-
but half full-
of themselves,
it is beyond further explanation.
You know what I would say.




Image By Internet Archive Book Images, described as Life of James McNeill [No restrictions], via Wikimedia Commons.

A chain linked fence

Galvanized tendons twist
to form diamonds uncut
steel.
Roughly transparent in
semipermeable static lines,
electrified when more than it
is.
Keep in the bad,
holy cells skewed of
graphed locking turns,
sideways squares that we see
thru.
Holding red cup circles,
as a symbol that means
heart pushing thru
with
crimson aura.
A link between sides
that were never a
part.
Kept inside shapes,
diamonds tilted sideways squares
holding red circle cups there
to share a cold heart, locked,
barbed bivalve and by block-
nearly far enough to-
gather.



Image By Evan-Amos (Own work) [CC0], via Wikimedia Commons.

Lunar Landing

Thē clouds cleared
a hole to see
a place behind beckoning thee

She stares up there
at thē crescent moon
hung on beams
like a porch swing
an empty place
to sit and reflect

on thē
storms that pass over
We see
anew
day
a new way

Thē night will not last
forever
it is already a part of the past

thē lunar light illuminates
All of her shrouded secrets
never
before it dawns
on us
all the while
we slept
we wept
the moon was reflecting

over thee.

Image By NASA of Crescent Earth from our moon in the foreground (http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Only a child

An Only Child
sounds like
the First Lady
or entitled like
the Prodigal Son.
These are American
moniker things-
names with rings.

Siblings
sounds so simpatico
but No-
As you know,
they do not fit
in one
two syllable word
like peas in a pod
and odd numbers.

Two many people
Tango too close
to call it
Immaculate-yet
they still dance away,
as though they were center stage
and a child is
their understudy.

The Only Child
has a stunt doubles chance
in hell,
They are the fall guy,
which is why
sisters are nuns with a habit and
brothers are bros with a swagger.

Individually sold,
they are marked down
and mislabeled
which happens
to
only 

children.




Image of painting called Siblings2 (1930) by Paul Klee [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Castle: A fortress for thought

There is a monumental metaphor

Castle, it is called.

Fortified by its brick wall,

im-mortal and un-mortared-bits

rectangled pixels and adobe loaves

Stacked smooth and asymmetrical

hump, bump, stump, rumples

a little in the middle

It's shadowed likeness 

stands subversively

asserting its compacted artillery

under pressure, balanced between

weight and state, rectangle for

wreck-tangle.

Look

past the wall

A book 

mistook 

A meta for

its frontispiece

Building Blocks by Blake

A fortress for thought. 

This poem was composed with the image of the art exhibit created by Jorge Mendez Blake called 'Castle' where a wall of bricks visually demonstrates the effect of a single book, in this piece the book utilized was of course, Castle by F. Kafka.

Image By Otoomet, Alūksne Castle, remains of the eastern wall of the convent building, from inside. (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Pry-mordial

Where I have been
Distracted, reactive, cantankerous, aloof
or Icy
I am stuck-hear-the-dis-jointed-inter-up-
ted propositions, twisted and wrenched
all wrong
In-
side-
re-flective, remembering, re-mind-ing
all the while pointing
else-where
I have seen
annihilation
and simply tried to copy-carbon-to smoky
mirrors-crystal-
eyes
fractured sensical seeking more meaning
where I
conserve which is absorb
nothing and all mergers of mass
swallowed hole,
spinning in-
ward In
It-self-full
starring
celest-
ial
hear
I
am
cen-trip-et-al(l)
condensed
at the core
until semblance is no more
protracted, re-fracted-de-
toured
where I am lost
a-
gain.
This is only a distant memory.



Image By X-Ray (blue): NASA / CXC / D. Hudson, T. Reiprich et al. (AIfA); Radio (pink): NRAO / VLA/ NRL (http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap100314.html) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Info: "What's happening in the middle of this massive galaxy? There, two bright sources at the center of this composite x-ray (blue)/radio (pink) image are thought to be co-orbiting supermassive black holes powering the giant radio source 3C 75. Surrounded by multimillion degree x-ray emitting gas, and blasting out jets of relativistic particles the supermassive black holes are separated by 25,000 light-years. At the cores of two merging galaxies in the Abell 400 galaxy cluster they are some 300 million light-years away. Astronomers conclude that these two supermassive black holes are bound together by gravity in a binary system in part because the jets' consistent swept back appearance is most likely due to their common motion as they speed through the hot cluster gas at 1200 kilometers per second. Such spectacular cosmic mergers are thought to be common in crowded galaxy cluster environments in the distant universe. In their final stages the mergers are expected to be intense sources of gravitational waves."Source-Wikimedia above. 

We Sea Trees

Caressing her steam from the trunk

Hugging her clouds from her crown

The heart blood is trapped in sap

Awash in the beams, lasers of light
through veins of amber rings

Slice the pillared shadows

Spraying musk that bursts
bark rust forth,
settling for dew
likewise, hanging on
to every loose end.

She breathes you in

as you pass

A sapling too slight

to care whose airs

of mutual aqueous

evanescence is about them

re-membered reaching
and thirsting for the light
to rein down atop our crowns.

Photo of Redwoods By NPS Photo [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Whaling the Friendly Seas

When it is clear-
                          ly right or wrong
We say it is-
                          black and white
Which means-
                          not both.

How can we be
                         both friend
and enemy
to our life bearing sea-
at the same time-
                          we are not both
but pretend
there's been no crime
committed
                          revenge goes unrequited.

And without captive breeding allowed anymore-
without cetacean sex-what has he to live for?

He thinks,
hope sinks.

Twenty calves sired
and an erect dorsal was all he ever desired.
At just thirty-five years old
a mere half-way, we're told
he's tired of sharing our air,
letting humans stare,
and dining on dead fish fare.
He's had enough-
living in a bathtub is rough.

Infected lungs with fatal bacterial growth
-we gave him both.
A souvenir
of our mortal fear.

It is black and white,
he has no friends or reason to fight.
Tilikum will die wrongly for our right
to take
and make
slaves of threats
(whales are not pets).
The killing goes both ways
until the last dying blows of Tilikum's days.

Orca playing with an iceball, Photo by Robert L. Pitman [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Top image By Allen Shimada NOAA/NMFS/OST/AMD (NOAA Photolib Library) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

"With a name meaning friend in Chinook, killer whale Tilikum was captured near Iceland in November 1983 at around two years of age. By Martin Evans. 9:41AM GMT 26 Feb 2010. At 22 feet 6 inches long and weighing in at 12,300 pounds he is the largest orca in captivity."Feb 26, 2010

A musical mosaic of lyrical landscapes

If you ask a sound painter

to drawn you a rhyme,

he will enchant you

not by the tone or the line:

but with an audible harmony,

a scenic serendipity,

a symbiosis in the sound

of quietude...

Lost in the paragon of verisimilitude 

With his wand weaves colors that blend 

images that transcend

before your nacreous eyes

here art lies

behind smoke and mirrors

is the image of the looker

You see

all is not fantasy.

You see

if you get a chance 

to harken a glance

you will see 

a song of poetry. 

Image of painting by Christen Købke of the Danish landscape painter Frederik Sødring[Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Ms.(under) Stood

Stood did not see things from the same angle

Ms.

Stood  saw it skewed,

Ms.

Stood pursued things from another way

Ms.

Stood  knew not how to say

Ms.

Stood  that nothing was not the same

Ms.

Stood  as everything negative was positively

Ms.

Stood  

Ms.

(sides)Be(sides)

Stood  stood out, and despite the overwhelming doubt

Ms.

It turns out,

Stood  was right

Ms.

To: Be

Left

Taken for Luna-see…

Ms.

Image by Félix Vallotton [Public domain], (1903) via Wikimedia Commons.

The most Prolific Poet I know

Prolific is not the same 

entitlement

as being called Profound

And despite how Proud

and Pretentious many P words

(such as these four) sound,

the difference 

is in the detonation.

I propose the pretension

that I am the most 

prolific 

(horrific) terrific

(pretending) poet I know-

yet notably remain unfound.

The prose does not resound

which goes to show-

Err Go

I have not a smatter-

of the latter. 

Image of painting by Umberto Boccioni, (1912) Horizontal volumes [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Finders Keepers

I steal everything.
Every thing I find
interesting I keep.
And I confess,
it is crowded and cluttered
but I am still collecting
all the things I like.
That stuff that was already here
when I got here,
all the stuff
and all the stuff in the stuff
is never enough
I still want more...
For I am warning you
to guard what you show me,
I might (definitely) steal a glance
and there is a more than (likely) chance
that I have stolen all these words-
certainly someone has found them,
used them,
thought them
before me.
Before me, it was all ready there
waiting to be found
and unforgotten
lying around like antique truths
until some one
like me
re-members them,
and re-collects them.
Paraphrased for portability,
praised for poetic quiddity,
too, you know-
nothing you do is new
everything you say
has been said another way
and in brief
I am a thief
but on that note,
don't (Ms.) quote me
with words I never wrote.




Image of painting by Charles Joseph Grips [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons, entitled 'Opportunity makes a thief', (1875).

Meet Me (half ray)

De re,

My alias is my radius.
Since we were never given a choice
and were named
thus before we could voice
our pick or preference
to see it if sticks and since
most of us think our given name
carries a ring of lame-
ness
Unless
already entitled to impress,
like Princess Di
why
I'd like to say
I think my name should have regally been
Rey-
I'd sing it all day
and sometimes I would spell it Ray
and other days I'd write it Rae
for a boy or girl, either way,
like a vector connector
a reflector, or deflector
of either
Rae.
I think
I'm a pink
beaming scumble
tumbling toward
another's fame
via
various name games
that all sound the same.
A nom de plume,
a ready-made costume,
whose narrow lines
were all mine,
just a sign
to say
I am Rey
just for today.




Image By NASA, DOE, International Fermi LAT Collaboration [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.
Description details:Exploring the cosmos at extreme energies, the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope orbits planet Earth every 95 minutes. By design, it rocks to the north and then to the south on alternate orbits in order to survey the sky with its Large Area Telescope (LAT). The spacecraft also rolls so that solar panels are kept pointed at the Sun for power, and the axis of its orbit precesses like a top, making a complete rotation once every 54 days. As a result of these multiple cycles the paths of gamma-ray sources trace out complex patterns from the spacecraft's perspective, like this mesmerizing plot of the path of the Vela Pulsar. Centered on the LAT instrument's field of view, the plot spans 180 degrees and follows Vela's position from August 2008 through August 2010. The concentration near the center shows that Vela was in the sensitive region of the LAT field during much of that period. Born in the death explosion of a massive star within our Milky Waygalaxy, the Vela Pulsar is a neutron star spinning 11 times a second, seen as the brightest persistent source in the gamma-ray sky.

Welcome Home Space Cadet

After 520 days of being away things change.
After more than a year away
one cannot expect things to remain
the same.

It's not like we didn't know you were gone.
We were watching from home base,
safely and with sound (waves).
We celebrated and we waited
for your safe return
and now you're back
we've learned.

Well sir, welcome home to Earth
 you now have a million twitter followers
for what it's worth.

Imagine the mail, the mess waiting
for him upon return-
and how his eyes and ears must burn!
I imagine our hopeful sunrises are dim,
slim and nowhere near as bright
here comparatively.
When watched from exosphere
perspective where the altered subjective,
figuratively rises either way, for another day
some where
and the effect of green flash last
until at least until tomorrow
I don't know
how
you held on for six
reloads, but with your body double
down here,
we hope to better understand your year
in space, at least physically, for history
sake, the emotional toll will remain a mystery.

Mr. Kelly, you said sleep was hard up
there, there is no rest,
and that was all just part
of the nightmarish tests
to see if you'd keep your head on
straight
without gravity
or a leg to stand on.

So how does one acclimate
to a constant limbo state?
Is fate suspended,
karma expended elsewhere?
Will he ever remember
how to be a heavy human member?
Perhaps he will take more leaps
after he sleeps
for a long
long
long
time
(stretched
blini
thin).

NASA noted
the newly made progress toward
the next giant leap for that kind of man.
Nearer are we, said the space agency
to getting 'boots on Mars'
which sounds warily like warfare jargon.
I dare say, it should be worded another way,
perhaps NASA should ask the ESA...

But NASA's not so concerned with tact,
and rathering to collect all the facts
from more than four hundred
experiments performed,
data they've been dying
for, they said
a benefit to all humanity.

Hopefully Mr. Kelly kept his souvenir
in sanity.
We are glad to have you back,
let's start you off with some Prozac.
The weight of the world is rather heavy.



Image By NASA ([1]) of Scott Kelly (left) and Mikhail Kornienko on the ISS 2015[Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.