About It: Up Side Down

                     Know Nothing

                 

              Shows You

        

      Into –It-

  

Reading too much

Image By Muybridge, Eadweard, 1830-1904 [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Why we bother to bother with Why (a deepity)

Because we are here now

facing each other,

listening to the music

we are submissive-or brave

Because we stand up and speak aloud

to show another view,

we abort our own conception

by consent-or dissent

Because we fret and dodge regret

ruts are dead set, circuits carry currents

direct, a dexterity of pre-determined design

connected by linear contact-or experience

Because stasis ensures us

and the foreseen guarantees us

safety in numbers, with all the fish in the sea

our place is secured in parsimony

Because Things don’t change, instead We rearrange

our conception, our perception-a deception

based on learned History, founded on prophesy

we perverse possibility-or reverse responsibility

Because the incentive is steep

Regret is shallow

Because the chances are scarce

Retribution is the final reward. 

Image of cover publication "The Masses", c. 1916 By E. Higgins [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Poem inscribed on bottom left corner reads:
Revolution
Anyone can write Revolution-Revolution
is written
By pale young men with the new conven-
tional mind;
Though it causes, indeed, no such havoc 'mid
humankind
As Samson's did when the Philistines were 
smitten.

It is easy to preach-Revolution-Revolution
in pink reviews,
Or flourish a Phrygian cap from the top of a 
steeple;
But if ever it came to an uprising of the people,
How many pale poets would stand in the leaders 
shoes?
-William Rose Benet

The space of my quiet place

I-in this caged space

Sit hidden, beneath bamboo rods overhead

amidst a lush green crowned atria

I volunteer to sit in the birdcage, with the butterflies and song

perched in the open pergola

I-fall into this open space

In my own backyard, behind the garage, now hidden

even further, behind the black holes of my eyelids.

And I feel the sky, it rumbles discontent when a plane

pushes its way through. A crow objects-to something

while a wren gaily chatters to itself and a mockingbird barks back.

The fountain trickles underneath, like a rushing spring

sounding more than it is.

The steady exchange of footsteps coming

crush the grass and shatter the voluminous silence.

I-give in, open up, and see-this space

and flashing bold colors. The filtered sunlight shows

Leaves prancing over the grey slate stones, that try to compete for my gaze.

Bougainvillea pink paper, peeling skin lays

among the spent honeysuckle bottles. Slowly drained,

looking up to the lattice, it’s a vines race to take over this space-

passion fruit, trumpet, creeper and jasmine-

leaves their perfume trail, in the space we mingle, 

cage door always open. 

Downstairs Lairs

There are no basements in California
even so, the ground gasps and trembles
panting
in subversive growing pains, like mine
in a Rack

And I attest, above me, there's no rest
while downstairs I have dwelt
digging deeper,
while building up

Below deck, I amble
in underlying
immersion
Fathomless and zoetic

In my dungeon with my dragons
I learn to expire
and practice breathing fire

Stomping and romping around the moon,
only echoes left from the rite of passage
steps ghosts long to hear, in a heartbeat

Up there, herds and hoards stampeding
and suspend on high chords
holding up the roof by
ceiling the cracks

Beneath it all
buried in a netherworld
with the worms and bugs
the cold wet earth blankets
a dry eye in decay

Musty, misty, sodden and steamy
I will be the first to drown
when it all comes down

I reside below, with no where to grow
sown in subterranean.



Image By Vert (Own work) [CC0], via Wikimedia Commons.

Holey Trinity: Lie, Cheat & Steal

Lately
I have heard
Every word (not said)

Calling your bluff
Hasn't happened (yet)
Each day, more regret
And yet-you continue
To think I don't know

Stolen moments, my
Trust taken for a ride, Dead
Ends
Await a new pure white
Little lie (by immaculate Mary's men).



Image of painting by Georges de La Tour [Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. The Cheat with the Ace of Clubs, 1630-1634.

A golden jackal steals no fleece

A young jackal whose coat

                          shone gold, glistened in the plain

evening embers

raises his canine

                          nose in the air

just as the lion catches wind scent

kit for cat

and both beatific beasts,

                          noble in their respective

domains

                          deferential of each others persona

pride and posse appropriated

or clash

wearing naked constraint

                          acknowledged by the other, unseen

for each aristocratic hair,

stranded

adapted and august all ways.

In the crevices that morph

                           the middle meets them

converging

                          with coats and charms

a prey of allegiance.

In times of treason

the mice sail the ship

while the jackal giggles

and the lion sleeps

shudderlessly.

Composed 9/19/15.
Image By Thomas A. Hermann, NBII [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. Side-striped Jackal. 

Parental Guidance Not Suggested

My grandmother told me
                            smoking leads to
                            heroin
I asked if that's how Wonder Woman got her strength.
She told me, women don't do the saving.

My grandfather used to say
                           you must make time,
                           for killing time,
since time flies, times a wastin', times are a changin',
and time heals
all of the time.

My mother said she wouldn't leave
                            the house without
                            her face on.
I asked if she lost her mask.
She told me there are no second impressions.

My stepfather warned me not to follow
                             in his footsteps.
                             They left no impressions
anyway he was right.

My father, I met once.
He said he wasn't sorry.
I never asked, I said.



Image By CBS Television (eBay item Photograph: front and back) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.