How gently, falling snow,
Without authority or force,
Without ever raising your voice,
You transform all I know.
All I see is rebirth
Softer than the gentle rain pours
You float, you follow your course
Changing the face of earth.
Monthly Archives: August 2013
Hubris
A new idea, a new idea,
And all of you must bow down low,
Put on the yoke, put on the yoke,
I do not listen for I know.
Try it on, you must try it on,
How will you ever know I’m right
Unless you yield your point of view;
Your faith, your passion, and insight.
Be quiet now, be quiet now,
Don’t dare assume I’ll fail this time
As all the times before have gone;
The only Right Idea is Mine.
Liturgy
I love liturgy, the ancient rites
Striking chords at the heart of man,
The depth of sin, the cost of grace-
Where we stood, where we stand.
Ageless insights passed age to age
Tools to clarify the timeless Truth
A bulwark to the aged man,
And caution to impassioned youth.
Reboot the System
Depression is the next seduction.
Stuck in another deconstruction,
I hate the long transitions
Stuck in my own sedition-
How long are these traditions,
These binary oppositions-
I wish I could follow instruction.
I wish I didn’t speak destruction.
I miss the walks on the sandy shore-
I know I don’t belong there anymore.
No one thought I’d find subsistence.
It’s hard to break the habit of resistance.
I want proximity that isn’t coincidence.
Every part of life is long-distance.
I’ve walked all the new roads before
There’s nothing left here to explore.
I feel trapped in a world of vanity-
Ego is the worst profanity,
And we’ve built our towers high.
I wish I could still see the sky.
I wish I could hear the tide.
The waves are just implied,
But they were once my sanity.
What do I contribute to humanity?
I wish I could find my purpose.
I’m sick of the three-ring circus
Everyone is a juggler at a cheap fair
Everything stays in the air.
I meant to be more prepared.
I’ve dropped everything on a prayer,
And a cluttered surface.
I forget when I get nervous.
I need to take a walk to remind me,
I need for You to find me.
I’m good at shutting out the noise,
Carving fancy decoys-
Some towers need to be destroyed.
Deconstruct these cheap ploys,
Show me again Your glory,
Tell me again our story.
The Caretaker
Two weeks in the ground,
and the family’s dried up
so he carries them home-
his bride’s dead shrubs.
“Oh, he loves me still,
still, he loves.”
She places the black blooms
in the front room, unforgotten
she admires the dry petals
crisp like starched cotton
He eats quiet, sleeps fast,
and leaves with no kiss,
to tend stones and bones
and she tends his.
“Oh, he loves me still,
still, he loves.”
Roses need not open red
with petals silk to skin.
Beauty is, in life, in death,
where it is seen akin.
Restless
Throwing decisions over my shoulder
Grains of salt to the fates
Waiting and watching and working
I can’t concentrate
On the weight of these days.
Brooding inside me, in my neurosis,
All the pieces fit,
Falling into my obsessions,
The passions I won’t submit
And who will acquit me in my guilt?
One day more, one more week,
And I know how to fight
Addiction with distraction
Ignore what incites
But I’m not contrite enough
to marathon.
Darken the lights and dim the senses,
These days are long, and senseless,
Feel the same old something different,
Something deliberate or irreverent
To break the ice and crack the dam
Or wash away what I am.
Proof
Is the old world gone again
Or dead again
Weathered from self
Or talking lies to each other
weather and agendas and
walking surface streets
near but not together
Is the old world mourned
or underground
or do we hold what remains
of barefoot days
bare headed in wind and rain
and raw, bleeding laughter
After sunset, after days,
I wanted a lover in secret and dark
and whispers of alliance in ears
Too young, too small
To hear the storm
Talking, talking,
but never whispers
Ferocious gale storms
Battering windows that shake
and moan and creak and threaten
to give all- to give way-
Hungry, angry, the tempest grows
Screams devoured silently in its center,
But whispers…
Ah… whispers echo all.
Then the morning,
Sunlight breaking as a fever-
branches strewn like fallen garland
homeless leaves flit and wail
seeking, searching,
never found again
but by death, decay and rot.
The acute pleasure of fear
Eclipsed by the organic waste left behind,
Proof of storms and fury and sin
Proof of mankind
written in waste.
My God
Stumbling and halting
Over my faltering confidence
You stood me up once,
And I’ve thrown me down since
Like a child in the throes
Of tantrum and rage,
So blinded by self
I can’t be engaged.
But the waters will still,
The fever will break,
The fervor I feel
The Sculptor’s hand slakes.
Ashamed again,
Of my all things supine,
I throw my face to the floor
Before The Divine-
The Almighty and Compassionate God.
Propagation
The weight of beauty
drooping low, dropping childhood
into eager palms
falling petals
Raindrops of time
small explosions, quiet accumulation
incapable of maintenance
or preservation
Born again,
functional, complete,
afloat on the surface
of recollection,
the seeds of beauty reborn.
Retroactivity
Perhaps I would, I will,
Not for my pride,
But to spite you, still
Caught inside.
Impossible to shake free,
Tangled in the breath and touch
And yearning of memory-
Every break a crutch.
Maybe one day
I’ll do whatever must be done,
To hear you say
I am your one
and only regret.
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