We Want to Be All or Nothing

December 2^nd, 2010

But we have to be this

That

And those

All at once

None being sole.

In all being many

Nothing is plural,

And you’re left with something

Neither boy nor girl.

All fight for dominance

For the first light of day

To the last thought of night

Where none are finished

In the fulfillment of love

Leaving frustrated and jealous

Those left in bed

That wants a special place

This earth can’t bear.

Thus suffers our soul

Along a black hole:

Wanting entirety

Left knowing that given eternity

It is left with its like

Also lacking

And lusting—

Limited,

Until beyond time

Voids collapse

In darkness,

Deaf to the end

When all becomes nothing,

In respiting light,

Relinquishing unattainable rectitude

And rigor.

A Completed Bridge

November 5, 2010

New signs in many windows

Plants now lining the road,

New sidewalks already overgrown.

A hill for a lawn

A statue put on

The road where I used to live.

The route for its speed

Has gone wayward

Or merged

The path

Of the party has been paved.

And as much as I’ve now built

In place, time, absence

The completion still feels lacking,

While the construction was left

Previtae the building of a new house

Has begun whose plans

Encompass rooms in greater number

But elements that more encumber

The message behind the front foor.

How Does Four Years

May 15^th, 2009

Separated by one

Become a dream?

It came alive for two weeks

After an absence of the same,

In form diminished.

So much greater is it from a year

In the faces of friends

In buildings changed

In halls where my name

Is no longer spoken

The bells ring.

Is it enough to erase

A connection

Once as deep as the school’s

religion?

Angst from a test,

Long days of learning,

Late nights with friends,

Laughs in the lamp-light.

They are whispers to any who listen,

But burdens of life dead to me

As I live on

In other places

With other people.

The buildings

Sidewalks

Trees echo

The past:

Conversations

Realizations

Run-ins with people

Too long unseen.

Foreign at first

They reagard you.

Standing regarded

They’re distant--

Miles measured in feet.

As I am an outsider

Where is my place?

The bells ring again,

But only I hear them,

If only they tolled for me.

Seven Years…

March 16^th, 2009

Can I wait for an affair?

Can I wait for him to die young?

Arrive as the rescuer returned

Somewhat forgotten

But never had longing lusted.

Conversations upon confidence.

Your adaptations,

Watching stars from the shadows,

Patiently counseling pride

Believing it to someday bloom prudence,

And eyes to see you.

Can I now confess?

Is time against such words?

Always you have been admired,

For spirit,

For faith,

For speech and thought,

For kindness and love,

You worked to bridge my great divide,

To welcome me to you.

I wasn’t ready for you,

Or I wasn't ready for it.

My watch got away;

Our Time left before I knew.

If such a moment,

Unwanted yet unexpected,

Sounded the alarm,

Distant but true,

I’d ask you

What are your dreams?

What is your future?

What is ours?

When you got a cat,

I was skeptical.

Now I understand.

Too late.

Will I Be Satisfied

May 10^th, 2009

By a Desk Job,

Making schedules and phone calls galore?

A dark room lit by an induced screen?

Paper by brads with phone in hand?

Placing scrims to block light I’ve just purposed?

Emissions to ease lack of sleep by cappuccino?

To further an image of stereotypes, exploitation, impossibilities, narcissism, and glory?

Years of waiting

Clawing

For the silver opportunity

That most never get,

While envy and doubt surmount.

It comes to facts of personal being

Or at least its displacement by bravado

Or earnestness.

Do I like constant warfare to be original?

Do I like skipping several nights of sleep to work on crappy projects?

Do I like driving to subsist?

Do I want to make a name more than a difference?

Community dependency can be found in both

This place and the one called home,

But this one has more opportunity for burning,

And that one less potential for a match.

Do I want to learn something useful for the days to come?

Do I want to thrive instead of flounder?

Do I want space contracted

Or at least thinned?

Do I want to help the ever increasing,

Never to cease,

Dying of want,

By providing the water of life

And fields of plenty?

Money does come near:

Providing time for the page and the world;

Ability to help friends in need

While keeping the level of life you’ve known.

Less creative,

Maybe.

More substantial,

Definitely.

Turning what is held into hobby won’t kill

Like the chase of the occupation will.

Grabbing onto the dream

Gone across town,

Rounding the corner again

Would lift life past limitations

To the path which was

Former and naive

Into remastered Technicolor

With the director calling the cuts.

The Dilemma Is

October 12^th, 2010

My thoughts are dancing,

Mixed and cohesive as light

Bringing viscous tension

And stalled deliberation,

One thought no greater

Than another in the pursuit

Of a direction.

Life stops.

Opportunity missed.

Time squandered.

Work dilapidated.

Realtionships deteriorated.

Death no different

Than a delinquent decision.

Even on the darkest days

When the bucket is near dry

Dabbing the runny nose

And dampening the burn

Will start the brush drawing

To defense of divine dedication.

Death-defying diligence demands

Drowning the daunting danger

That duty is distant or dainty;

Deliver the last light

That has not diminished

To drain the devoid,

Decry the depraved,

Dismiss the years of depression and disregard;

The deluge of detrimental drudgery

Will be dammed.

In this drought decorate

One in definition and decorum

Of delicious decency,

The delicacy of discretion

And delight.

What If In The Future

October 17^th, 2010

Our friends delivered

Our judgments.

Pictures of photographic

Portraits where our faces

Reveal the complete experiences

Of all our actions;

An episode guide to every season.

I'm farther off than I am right

Here, A man finding himself failing;

Leaves falling outside the window

Slowly over weeks

As weather and soil chill.

Tragically we shiver

In the awareness,

Like naked saplings

Fresh from the soil,

Of our helplessness

Which isn't to be

Helped but by one

Who through helpfullness

Has gifted strength to overcome

And break the progression of

Fall to an early rebirth

With the promise

Of everlasting summer

Contained in the deep breath

Of an old red maple,

Boughs rising

In sweet defiance

Of the inevitable

And the law.

Ferocity Is In The Eyes

November 9^th, 2010

Not of a lion

But a man unafraid

Of the imagined predator

And the strength of his gaze.

The stab of a stare in stark salaciousness

Comes easier and deadlier

Than the difficultly of a soul's

Window opened blinds

Letting in what might also fly;

Honesty less sought than needed,

Rarer than an emotion completely shared

Through the glance of the forgotten

Abused

And convicted,

Born from the lost

The abuser

The victim,

Healed from the adopter

The cherisher

And the forgiver.

Bearing watts of emotion

Our sockets charge both poles

Of human nature to their places.

If one is to stay

What current will you send

And let be sent?

If records of rock let ring

Their truths from the depths

Below fathoms beyond time

Then sight lines can switch

From one to another

In our own and to others.

Without wanting of whence it wandered

Or wondering when it awoke,

Wither will your force wade?

The Faces We See

November 8^th, 2010

Come and go with the rain but

One face never leaves us.

Through the hurricane’s winds,

Was your hand with mine,

Battling long and strong,

but torn apart near the end.

Though shingles were ripped

Shutters unhinged,

Windows torn down

The flume left abridged,

Skylights added in new

Pine-wood living rooms,

This face holds on steady

To the day it’s faded

When to all others it

Is hidden unto itself.

In mountains and valleys

Streams run as joys and pains,

Geoclines folded to match.

Hills of trees and vines obscure

And bind the fathomless caves

That had given the depth of recognition

To a plane as uniform as coastal.

Through time it confided

Enlivened

And sated

Now keeps me in view

Of young energy askew.

Without hope to function

In the slow, sudden death

Of independence,

A world gone dead by its doings,

The trappings don’t hold,

Let drain,

Identities, memories, me.

As I stand on the cleft

The earth opens wide

To engulf me at last.

Let the forests burn grey.

Let the magma spew and cool.

Let the plates finish collisions

Building continents, mountains and dunes.

For the outer firmaments

Does the last breath flee

And the view, to infinity,

As the foundations slow

Their gears of metal

Manacles finally release

Setting me free.

Then a new face is found

In fields of tall fescue

Spying faces come back

Among bison, returned,

Numbering millions upon

A land with great breadth,

Water clear as the sky

As defined as ambition,

Lit by fusion’s fresh flirtings

Raising plants by their own

In soil deeper than roots,

Darker without addition,

Charged beyond demand,

On the earth, like new,

Such color,

Where we meet again.

What Drives Us

Nov 8^th, 2010

To People

And People to start

A Relationship

Cruelty

For which it departs?

Out of Love did it sail

But for tides often fail;

An outcome more common than sought.

In Thick Grey Mists

October 5^th, 2010

Lies an object surreal,

A thing both envied and abhorred.

Neither good nor bad,

Essential nor apart,

In society necessary

And to instinct, contrary.

The limited edition was

Narrow in creativity

and time.

Crunching the numbers,

Running the data,

From the rising of the sun

To that of the moon,

Jobs from the boss became boring;

Fall did the stocks all too soon.

Restoring confidence in the stake holders

A new edition was announced.

Prices would be cheaper

To bring in new crowds

But consumers would be happy,

“Perfection” there they found.

Two products on the market

Was surplus, not demand,

“Too much,” said the buyers,

“You never understand.”

First quarter returns so surpassed all projections,

Fat dripped down the rungs on the corporate ladder.

Returns for investors

Were skimmed in the night,

Carbon copies and receipts pointed to the deceit.

Litigation was filed,

The Judge ruled to condemn;

Guilty workers escorted out by the cops.

Restraining orders replaced the office keys,

No chance for employment or place to sleep.

Sought out all too quickly

By youth’s determined brow

Made to furrows by weight

Under one heavy-handed plow.

We drive the donkey

Though fate we exalt,

Manacles to freedom

And suicide, the heart.

Delusions to the masses

To the government, control,

The strings are invisible

To all but the King.

Deep in the will

We find an abyss,

Pining for reason

Emotions suffice.

To enter more slowly

We can follow the way

Of those we love dearly

To on our course stay.

With ears of great hearing

And eyes that are cunning

A trail might be blazed

Escaping fear and confounding.

Walking and waiting

We just want a sign

That with each single step

Brings us closer to find

That which is calling

Men and women afar

To leave light and safety

Seeking words from the stars

While we find in ourselves

No lack of what’s rare.

Now staring eyes see

What’s been there all along

A man is a man

And he truly belongs.

To those whose feet

Never don shoes,

To whom strolling in darkness

Has allure of foul food,

The journey brings respect

While there knowing to be more;

That what can be seen

Is half of what exists.

The world is behind us

Distraction betwixt.

Oh to Be Young

August 6^th, 2010

To be in it’s total uncertainty

Of relationships

To women

Family

The world

Friends;

Of yourself

With growth

And yearning

Wants without reason

In the shadows of action and reaction;

Of the future

To where you’ll be

What you’ll do

Whom you’ll meet

And whom you’ll spend it with;

Of the worlds workings

In elections and buyouts

Stock markets and foreign affairrs

Wars and laws;

Of self-devision

Between God

Family

Country

And company,

Society

Home

And health;

Of longevity

With the mysteries

Of one’s genome

Of Alzheimer’s or sera palsy

Cancer or heart attack

Diabetes or stroke

Aneurism or virus

Or suicide

For all the medical bills

And accumulated life insurance;

Of offspring

In sex

In number

In profession

In fecundity

In happiness

In survival.

Will you continue

Through your own future

Into the future of the world

By your future children

Of the future for the future

Until the future’s end?

But those are the thoughts

of the aging and the aged.

The true thoughts of the young,

If there be any,

Are of whether or not they have

Purpose to live

Things left to discover,

And happiness to have and share.

The world is right

Stable

Attainable

And whole.

Life and all the rest all too quickly follow

Until questions are formed,

Questions beget avatars,

And the begotten are questioned by our ages.

A Phone Call Comes

September 8^th,, 2010

In and I can only smile.

A best friend you are,

One who didn’t always

Pursue friends in friendship.

What has changed that you

Utter words of love and longing

From and to the straightest of ears?

Past society and male mass-images

Do you insert yourself,

Your values to cut away

Fantasies, falsities, and facades.

Your heart has always been

One irradiating all

Incident bodies with goodness,

Smiles being the source

Of the souvenir on their cheeks;

A life line of joy being ecstatic.

While the past found us

Cohabitants and mere friends,

The present finds us

Confidants and fathomless minds,

The ranges of infinite possibilities--

While failing in personal perceptions--

Run past the Laurentides in our discourses

Of ages and theories,

Peoples and ideas

Much past their prime

But given a spotlight again

Which lightens the soul’s heavy loads

And illuminates life’s hazy disconnections.

All is well, in its own place,

Either known or understood;

Nothing beyond the scope of

A brain’s finite fires,

Or a God’s will to his creation.

The day without you

will find the candle’s flicker fading

And my fires fleeting to the caves,

The heights forsaken to the mazes

Of a thought in a skyless corner

And a face turned crooked from the fact.

The Greatest Rule About Vision

Aug 19th, 2010

Is that at first in life

The world is the universe

And the function you see

Goes to infinity.

Youth finds solace in the endless

Future before them.

But the more you see

And the more you learn,

The more you find truth

Is precisely measured.

Not going much farther,

Given its extent,

The world becomes smaller

Leaving only lament.

As we watch the ground

Bellow our feet

Exponentially shrink

We make ourselves the universe

And wouldn't you think

We become thinner and perverse,

Black holes to all with gravity

Expanding on self-depravity

To a minuscule sink.

Age finds solace in its begotten,

False hope that an impossibility,

A law of existence,

Might be bent or broken

To allow passage for the chosen

To the fable of a baby's first view,

And a rearing's first promise,

The greatest lie of life:

You can do whatever you want to do.

To accept this as false,

And in your game lose,

Would be to stave depression

From great expectation

Of what society holds true,

Born from excess

And many a broken dream

From a generation's broken world

And booming economy.

A Steady Shimmy

May 10^th, 2009

Back and forth

Racing toward a destination

Unknown.

A dark tunnel.

Sporatic lights.

Innumerable shadows;

The stink of discontentment.

A subway for a mind.

While not derailed,

Uncontrollable it speeds,

The contents and possabilities of the heart swirl

Like colors on the seat hidden

They are kept;

Tacky and soiled they seem.

One must prevail.

A junction:

Decision close.

The law or the gauche?

Whichever comes easier.

More avenues appear.

Will it ever stop?

Will it ever arrive?

The noises of screetching metal

Drown the will

Until its speed is all it will know

And all it will have

Bluring the eyes of the future to see

The defened will in the dark.

What is My Part?

July 19^th, 2010

The part in such hatred.

What's really so different?

From many love treads.

To few it comes truly,

When commit they shall,

Who can call is so cruelly

A thing worse than fowl?

For now we are taking

The blame in our heart

A mark of great sinning

To hell would depart.

The man or the women,

Accused of the wrong,

Should know such straight doctrine

Deeper than sunday song.

The toughest words of Jesus

that ever he preached

"Love is the greatest,"

Now let me beseech,

There may be one right,

But God opens the door

To arms that hug tightly

His lost children ashore.

I Dreamed

May 10^th, 2009

It came

I sought

I lost.

In confusion

Scrambled.

Lesser things came,

Happiness.

Exploration.

For a time.

The dream is raw

Rotting.

Older dreams than recent dreams

dreamt are redrawn.

New vigor

New vision.

Dreaming continues

Until night

When the last, long dream begins.

There Is a Point

June 19^th, 2010

A moment so sudden,

At the end of a list

On the return from a party.

Succes first the feeling

Turned lost and asunder.

Don't know where to go

Nor quite what to do.

I sit here and ponder

The life I just knew.

Transparent yet sensory,

Looking for something forgotten--

Remembering what it was to do--

Someone about to come--

The end of the sidewalk--

A cliff to the sea--

The last station of the line.

Not knowing what will be

Life continues

As the trail is now gone--

Mapless wilderness so foreign you aren't scared;

It's but crumbs and fantasy.

Anything fast

Fill up the senses

Pleasure me now as

The stranger keeps knocking,

As if his dark entrance

Might my exit light.

Without remembering

one must forget,

and will kill if the mind stays

on the question too long.

Square By Square

May 10^th, 2009

House by house.

Some have swirls

Or smaller quarters.

The barren desert disappears

In water

In sod

In concrete

In light.

How far will nature fly?

Not as far as our reach.

Because it has not wings

Or the will to leave

Or the perception of its end.

We see potential,

It sees limitations.

It gives all it can

Yet we take more than it offers

And squander it on fountains

And lawns

And pools without number

Or concern.

A once unique miracle of life

Can be seen daily at the Bilagio.

It’s origin is unquestioned.

Our miricle of gamling cities

arid suburbs

And desert golf courses

Will soon end.

Our dead will overflow from yards

To sidewalks

To the gutter

Just as people begin to ask where it all went.

With her last breath

Nature will say

She offered herself freely

And we raped her anyway,

Not feeling the raping of ourselves.