Poetry of Life
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Christmas Poem
What is this Christmas thing, this day each year when the world slows down? How is it, so many give it purchase? What is this fanciful tale about an immaculately conceived homeless child to which a star became a miraculous guide for noble pilgrims to come bearing gifts, at the behest of a king? How is it Gentiles and Jews both worshiped this child, and four billion Christians and Muslims believe He was born of the Virgin Mary and will return to earth before the Day of Judgment, and the world’s most read book chronicles His life, and Earthly time is defined by the year of His birth? Perhaps that unique and unusually soft feeling of peace and calm that overcomes so many on Christmas Day is more than a delusion. |
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Time
time’s not linguistic no periods no commas no questions no colons time endlessly moving like streams and extrusions as time has no sunrise nor sunsets nor pauses nor bending nor rising it keeps ever flowing its pace never changing and we live within it and it rules our daytime and etches our nighttime and dictates our living and measures our living and judges our living yes this thing we call time unseen yet e'er present who then said we need time and who made it this way and can we vote on it and upend it some day and just live our own lives without being adjudged by what time we show up if we get to our class or our work or our play and our years as they are to resolve our status as one wise or damn fool As we’re measured by time versus heart, soul, or mind. |
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Introspection
I no longer- -check the restaurant tab. It’s always wrong and resulting discussions are ill-timed. -listen to Chopin. The melancholy melodies stay in my head too long. -read Bukowski. His cadaverous imagery darkens my demeanor. -use exclamation marks. Exclamation marks are for girls. -seek intimate relationships. There is too much unresolved trauma out there. -covet material possessions. They don’t improve life and they won’t improve death. -ride carousels. They always end up in the same place. -comb my hair. It just gets messed up again. -attend cocktail parties. Insipid conversation is not meant to be tolerated. -drive expensive cars. Been there, bought the poster, was a fool. -indulge in fashion. A black t-shirt and a pair of jeans are sufficient. -wear dress shoes. I’m addicted to wool sneakers. -read frivolous fiction. Actually, I never did. -watch TV comedies. All I can hear anymore is the laugh track. -go to church. I’m indulging my introversion and have sorted things out with God. -have large houses. Beds, recliners, refrigerators and TVs need little space. -answer the phone. It’s mostly unwelcome solicitation and colorless dialog, or my mother. -set my alarm. Time begat alarms and is bootless and oppressive. -cast ballots. Not voting is powerful voting. -consume alcohol. I have discovered my mind and want to keep it. -smoke dope. Counterculturally, it had intellectual purchase. Now it’s just stupid. -fear death. Life is sublime, but death is supreme. |
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Narcissism
I’d like to be swashbuckler-cool. Swing onto the deck of the enemy ship brandishing my cutlass, duelling three at a time with ballet precision, taking control of the helm. The wenches would want me. Gunslinger-cool would do it. Stride into the O.K. Corral, Six-guns ablazin’. Take down the Clantons. Make 'em skedaddle like afeared jackrabbits. Adoring angelicas run to my side. Or, royalty-cool. To be knighted. Sir William. Better yet, to be a lord, comma after my first name. William, Lord Bales. That would fetch the Ladies. I’d even go for society-cool. Silk tux at cocktail hour. Light shoes. Servants in servant attire carrying servant trays. Velvet drapes. Accent chairs adorned with gold leaf. Virgin Steinway. Quintessentially-coiffed couture-clad rich girls at my disposal. At least, be intellectual-cool, like The Village in the 60’s, reciting Kerouac to snapping fingers, quoting Nietzsche and Kafka, tripping with Ginsberg and Warhol, being chased by the hippie chicks. Worst case, five star bar-cool. Black Armani suit. Espresso Ferragamos. Five hundred dollar haircut. The opening lines are by the lovelies. They buy me drinks. Take my pick. Or take them all. To fantasize of such matters, then leave the world unchanged. Innocence
I remember my first house it was yellow with a flat roof and a big yard and a sandbox and roses and giant oak trees and lots of acorns and squirrels and leaves our neighbors played football in the street one time a guy visited the guy next door with a new Corvette some smoldering leaves at the curb made their way to the Corvette it burned up just like three people in a crash a couple blocks away my father and I walked to see what was going on I saw the charred bodies our family birthdays my grandmother made angel food cake with orange icing my uncle never talked but he smoked a lot my aunt always baked really good things my father was always late he didn’t like it there there was lots of loud talking my uncle changed a lightbulb in the dining room he dropped broken glass into the mashed potatoes our lake house was red and white we spent the weekends there we did lots of work in the gardens my father mowed the yard with his shirt off my uncle hid in the garage grinding his tools my older cousin swore a lot and had boyfriends with lots of pimples they did things on the couch she never felt well she died of cancer on christmas at my grandparents’ house we got lots of presents we ate broiled grapefruit and cinnamon rolls that my aunt made I loved them the big turkey dinner lots of pies that my aunt made and the wonderful smells uncle abe always came he was a jew he brought us presents he was my grandfather’s best friend even though my grandfather thought jews were bad in my home we had a big warm fireplace I had an electric train in the back room the engine made smoke our cat was named inky because he was black my mother yelled and cried a lot she beat my father over the head with a pan she was sad her twin baby girls died when they were born at my school I brought home a paper I had written I thought it was a good paper about how I tripped and fell outside but my teacher was really mad she gave me an F and wrote a note to my mother she didn’t like how I said that I fell in the fuck I didn’t understand I always got A’s but she gave me an F I thought my mother would be very angry but she wasn’t she gave me cookies and iced tea. |
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A Zen Thing
Life is today. After today, life will be tomorrow. Yesterday, life isn’t. |
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Shoes
These houses amongst the gently swaying pines, where the sun shines well, and the breeze is just right, with rooms unused, chairs unused, and bureaus of misplaced memories. The light-shoed residents glide from room to room with ballet grace, sipping imported spirits from lucent vessels, their bodies soft, their skin pale and perfect. These houses amongst the weary brambles, cast on forgotten fields, the sun reluctant to reveal its fire, no footing or furnishings without plan, no objets d’art or frivolous adornments. The heavy-shoed dwellers purpose from task to task with oddly elegant fatigue, their extremities calloused, their sinews drudge-disformed. And they dream of the light-shoed life, its unread books and tea tables, the noble distant grass devoid of office or account. |
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The Poet
He entered the room to uneven applause, carting a fatigued briefcase, a bottle of wine and a tall glass. He sat at a small table on the low stage, opened the wine, and poured the glass full. He drank down most of it, and without lifting his eyes or saying a word set his case on the table and extracted a stack of dogeared papers, with which he proceeded to fumble. He looked up and began to speak randomly, no starting or ending points, saying nothing yet perhaps everything, his uneven beard and shabby dress conceding an aspect of no import. Shuffling further, he made a choice. “I had an online date, a woman with a gigantic ass. We wandered through an outdoor market, well, I wandered, she waddled. She carried herself with dignity and confidence. Her profile had said she was slender.” He refilled his glass, tossed the paper back into the case, and proceeded to babble further as he dug through the stack. He took another long swig of wine, and another. “I sensed something positive within my soul the other day, so I beat its brains in with a baseball bat.” He chuckled to himself sardonically. And he momentarily spoke lovingly of his cats. They continued, these phosphorescent airs of life’s wreckage, spilling out on all sides in every dimension and landscape. |
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Unafraid
Be unafraid. Unafraid to do, create, love, cry, to fail. Unafraid to exist, accomplish, succeed, prevail, to lose. Unafraid to write, sing, dance, teach, to die. |
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I'd Like
I’d like to... ride every road swim every stream scale every peak turn every stone watch every dawn smell every bloom climb every tree count every star read every book speak every voice sing every song dance every waltz know every man touch every soul try every bed wear every shoe hold every hand watch every birth kiss every cheek give every gift feel every feel smile every smile end every frown calm every mind stop every loss pad every blow mend every pain knit every wound slay every beast oust every czar end every war and dodge every shot I’d like to see the unseen I’d like to be the unbeen I’d like to live the unlived this is what I’d like |
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We Must...
We must think feel observe act dream reach strive achieve lose win learn forgive want need give help accept understand believe encourage We must live |
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Dots
Thought, science, art, faith, the sum of fragments, an incomplete equation. We are born, we die, our lives vagrant, accidental, unless we connect the dots, an opaque sum. Random elements, separately meaningless, vapor, particles of existence scattered about, windswept grains of sand. Connected together, revealing essence, answers, these dots, through a looking glass beyond known thought, to acquaint life’s soul to the end of awareness. |
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Dreams
Antarctica is a citadel of purity in a diminished world. It’s a dream. I hope I never go there. The poetry of dreams makes reality seem so very prosaic. |
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Never Too Early to Say Goodbye, or Too Late to Say Hello
I have reached the point in my inescapable temporal decline Where contemplation has subjugated planning, And the amenity of constancy has eclipsed the adventure of lust. While to the unordained this may seem a woeful lot, It affords a sedative attenuation of the confused seas of my past. At any point along the timeline of one’s corporeal tour, From the unsurpassed grandeur of birth To the concluding moments of infirmity, One assumes an ever changing yet always singular perspective that defines us, And impacts all whom we touch. I circumspectly presume my birth, to my forebears, To have been as glorious as that of my progeny to me. I have faint but wonderful memories of the innocence of childhood. My teens into early adulthood saw the antiestablishmentarianism typical of this age, Laden with the trauma of current events. The precarious energy of my twenties was greater than most, Followed by the ever more sapient revelations of expanding experience, Emerging in my thirties and beyond. There was darkness, perhaps no more than most, And no doubt part of the madness of His plan. All in all, life for me has provided a tuneful yet dissonant symphony Of experience that challenges non-contradiction. And were I to be offered a reprise of the oft affanato middle movements, I’d leave the premier as it was, A flawed yet complete composition. Temporal decline has provided an acquitting extenuation Of what I once perceived the profundity of my missteps. There will be no manic reflection or post mortem. And as with postpartum mothers, my memories of past pain will disappear And leave only the joyful moments accessibly lodged in the temporal lobe. And if the drawers of my subconscious open at the final crescendo, Unleashing past trauma, so be it. That would only serve as a parting reminder of God’s wisdom In His consignment of my brief moment of the flesh, And the glory that lies ahead. I am not yet dust, And my first life of learning leaves me qualified to give the best of man. The remaining days dictate I must apply the lessons of the past, And be diligent in the manifestation of man’s chief end. Consider this my ode of swans, and ultimate song. So, dear friend, embrace life’s bittersweet tintinnabulation. Be free, with peace. Covet your moments before time vanishes and the Kingdom emerges. Cherish your family, apply your mind, and open your heart to all. Adieu, mon ami. We shall meet again. |
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Looking Back...
Looking back at past compositions, I think to myself “Why did I write this crap? Why did I invest time out of my life producing this drivel?” Then sometimes I think to myself, “Who wrote this? How did this emerge? It has meaning. Certainly it couldn’t have been me. I write crap. Looking back at my life, I think to myself “How could I have lived this life? How could I have invested so much time in drivelous existence?” Every once in a while I look back at my life And think to myself “Did I live this life? Where did this life come from? This life had honest moments. It couldn’t have been my life because my life is crap. Every once in a while I contemplate my soul and I think to myself, “What a troubled soul. Whose soul is this? Who allowed this soul to exist?” Every once in a while I reconsider my soul. And I think to myself “Maybe my soul isn’t troubled.” But it is. |
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Dairy
The pasta special seemed a safe choice, but the diabolical blend of exotic cheeses, heavy cream, and butter was assailing my fragile sextenegenarian constitution. I lay in bed attempting to logically deduce that the bovine trifecta of saturated fat, and the resulting symptoms, were not the augury of a most insidious end to it all. Reeling from this Titanic case of indigestion with enough stomach gas to refloat the Hindenburg, I lay scared awake, my insomnolence fed by an intense desire to avoid dancing the obituary mambo in my sleep. My contemplations wandered between impending collapse and how many of my offspring I’d sacrifice for a vat of Simethicone. While the deterioration of my sanity has been outpaced only by my growing paranoia, not atypical for a feeble-minded male on the downside of life, I still have to wonder if others wax on as I with some sort of warped tragic-romantic philosophical bent about how one must do certain things one wouldn’t otherwise consider if one didn’t think one was, within a fairly short time... going to croak. |
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Peeve
Lie down. Lay yourself down. You lay down. You had laid yourself down. You have lain there. Past, present, Tense, participle, Transitive, intransitive. Figure it out. |
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Perspective
When I moved into my community one of the things I liked most was that there were no stoplights. We did have a blinking light in the center of town, but it didn’t work. Later, the blinking light came down, a four-way stop put in its place. Years later, they built a roundabout at another intersection. Just the other day they built a stoplight. The world is a much different place. Everything moves so fast. |
