Slate grey

Starting to look like my old self

Or young self

And when I steal a glance

In a random reflection

I have seen

The crazy haired

Listening

Clean slate

Child

That has been there

All along

Long time,

No see-

eyes were always grey.

Seriously-

is that the same 

insides out?

Born that way

They say

It goes that way, life

Mirrors...

What?

Again,

an echo reiterates.

Or so it seems slated,

Starting Over and I

Was Here

As if carved into

A tree.

Painting by Thorolf Holmboe, 'Weeping willows' c. 1907 in Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Line by line

Life unfolds this way,

the face now resembles our grey matter

what is inside comes out.

The clouds will unravel again,

you can hear the wind 

moving them along.
I am done
telling others to listen.

Paper, then. My life. Drawn to fire.

All those the people carrying dead burdens
on their cracking lips.

They burned books
into their memories and cauterized the wounds

with chanting and invocations

shaped to sound like smoke rings

they read the signs.

As with people and colors
they gather but do not become,
one another,
as with clouds, the heaviest fall
and we say we needed rain.

In these conditions

the symbols bleed together

and it is red
Open.




Painting by Emile Claus, c. 1898, 'Ampelio, old fisherman of Bordighera', in [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Sea minor

The day you were born
It would never be the same
as it ever was.

This day, at that time
started this life
                       from lives past-
Passed through you to you
creating something
from some things that were before
you arrived as you.

This time and time again

many things came first
many more things will come to pass
none have counted you
in years
             -as the last

-pushing through, pulling you-

The only time you
were you,
we met
            through others
matters were made

any day now we will change
-back-
into strangers, fate carried vessels
pulling our chords,
                              the other way.



Painting by Ivan Aivazovsky [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. 

Recycling poetry

When we are children,
all we take in
is Poetry.
In adolescence
we lean on Prose
without punctuation,
growing longer to gauge the resistance
of rooftops attached to support beams.
It seems maturity makes less time
for more meaning,
the old begin shrinking time
too little to learn anything less
than Poetry.




Painting by Eero Järnefelt, 1895 in [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Add ages

Don't let them tell you

You had just one job,

they always expected more.

They say, Just be yourself,

as though given a choice.

Stand up for yourself.

Don't believe enough is ever enough,

it is only enough.

The first bird and the last owl

awake

are equal aviators

afflicted with (chronic) fomo-curious-itosis.

Silver bullets and linings should help save us

before things change anymore.

We have nothing better to do

than keep busy, make haste and donate

to causes

we make no effect on reason

such as why the wherewithall has

deteriorated and became dilapidated into

three-wheeling metallic adages.

Don't ask. Don't listen. Don’t look Back.

Don't do them.

Reason is revived with hind-

sight. You will see later.

The Truth

will set you free

to follow your heart,

to do what you love,

to be mindful,

to forgive and forget

Thyself

and rest in peace

lying down.

Take it.

Your Time

is up.

Painting by Édouard Manet [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

No vacancies

It is the voice, or sound
as far as limits and ripples can----
as loud as the noise altogether

static, each wrinkle folds under
the aging and erosion,
older than dirt lays claim,

lighter than air, dust-skin,
settled palimpsest
on rice paper arms, 

by shreds of rags and stitches 
to cover the cold.
Shivers scream inside, 

turbidity of the spirit, malicious matters
needing shelter; brittle now
by leaves, dry twigs,

words, thorns, starlight and smoke
becalmed back to the senses
in a murmur of metaphor,

rewritten as revelation. 
Must Have.
Must Heard. 

Image credit By Scan by NYPL [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Dead-lines make us dance

I am going to die.

Not today, I really hope.

Inevitably I will it so someday.
Not this one,

I know, I can control that. Will. Be.

Able to stop the Time: why we write. Though,

all know, the endings are not ours.

Cracks in the porcelain grow-stress-lines

like faults at forty. At thirty, we don’t think

of meeting our match-in dem eyes. 

Now Ecstasy we see

helps alleviate the stress.

Chemically, elasticizes the skin,
that tightens in fear, out-looking grim,

youth is fear-less-ignored-immortal.

I’m-mortal-immortality?
How could we want more…

sublime with the time we have

had-enough time-time enough.

“Relieved of the burden of passion, and freed from the pressure of desire”

Sounds serene, quiescence, in essence, is nothing left to say

any other way.

Sleep. Sueño.

Nobody stops to Thank Death
for bringing these:

Dreams, drive, to do, be for, we go.

Dead-lines makes us dance.

“The death of a beautiful woman, is unquestionably the most poetical topic in the world.”
-Edgar Allan Poe

Image of painting by Thomas Pollock Anshutz [Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. 

Mirror, mirror, how old am I?

How old am I

                       you asked me

as though I were here first

                       which I was

You were talking with your Grandma

                        enjoying and knowing she'll be

passing soon...

My cousin was born when I was a decade

                        or so already checked-in

She just passed Route 30,

                          her two young girls fine blonde hair

flying in the wind-will be snarled soon enough

                          stopping at the next town “Generation"

just passing thru...

A childhood friend who lost his mother

                            before I could find him again

noticed the 5 o'clock shadow of quitting time

                             resigned to put in some over-time

got a promotion of fast-track

                             merging lane, death draws closer 

but he blazes by....faster than 65

Last time I checked, I was wise

beyond my years

double checking lines, they cue my fears

the scale to weigh the time

gets heavier with one foot off

gauging the mass I now carry

until weightless without reflection.

Composed 4/12/15.

Image By Shymanski, Robert [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. 1933, Hegeler Carus Mansion. 

Growing Old While Waiting In Line

Growing Old While Waiting In Line

I find myself shrinking with fear,

trembling a touch making contact-in the eyes,

peering through the windows,

beyond the fragile glassy panes.

Shuddering at the cataract reflection-

noticing my naked youth

while waiting in line...

Patience reminds

Your turn will come

when this wait is done

my eyes avoid noticing

further running to a spot

liver on the empty face

of my spotted analog watch

hands fidget childishly

feet shuffle deliberately

I don't have much time

My heart thumps wildly,

Primate pounding fists-

I am Alive!

Discontented rumblings remind

of a scent, a smell, a pale zest,

for Life in this free Time

a penny for my thoughts

with inflation of receding interest

-I ponder-

What's is it worth?Is this the cost-

Of time well spent?

Tic-toc goes the clock...

Perpetual seconds elapse

When we are born do we know?

The time of our death?

Slipping glasses on bridges

rose colored reflections

of what used to be

fitted with sagging drapes

can't hold on to it all-no Time

to hold back- the time Now

replaced Impatience for Pabulum

to do, to have to do

and why not do?

Yet I see through porcelain

dentistry, the hollowed

gum smile, a knowing wink

(flinching blink) I smile back

knowing I'll make it

(on Time)

while waiting in line…

Painting by Karl Aegerter "Waiting in Line". Image from Wikimedia By Taxidermized (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons