Akin to wedding

Akin to Wedding

In the future it is customary

To have an elegant death

A ceremony akin to wedding

Live with colors and flowers

You will be old

Aging will be much harder

If you are beautiful

Beauty does not fade in the future

Until just before your ceremony

When your friends will gather

To see you peeled naked of beauty

And prosthetics

The veil is torn

You are stripped of vanity

A naked cavity

Your body is a withered flower

Everyone will smell your odor

What created you out of itself

Has been waiting to absorb you

You are broken like a sacrament

Your family cries in a circle

The wind chimes wretched with violin

You draw the heavy breath of ritual

You will recognize yourself in the dirt

You will recognize the animal

That you are

You will find beauty in the eyes of that animal

You will slide from yourself into that beauty

Butterflies will dress your body

Does Basketball Have a God?

On the playground, the men laugh and swear.
A young man receives the object.
With half a frown he takes the long shot.
His opponents scoff as the ball sails,
Careening down the back of the net.
Back-peddling, the man scowls to cover his pride.
Later he says, “It seems to go back and forth that way.”

A small boy waits just outside the base line,
As the men finish their game he asks,
“How’s come the really close shots always rattle out,
But the bad shots seem to bounce in?”
All the men stop and look
As if he had said something very profound.
After a few seconds the boy’s father says,
“If it hits the rim, it’s your own fault.
Try to never hit the rim.”

The sweaty guard attends the game.
The shooter sees his pass before it is made.
A quick flick, and the ball carves a curve to the goal.
At a time-out, they meet to slap hands.
“You are a creator,” says the shooter.
“And you a prophet,” answers the guard.

The long black man attends the game.
Palms up with wide open eyes.
Neatly extending he snags the ball.
“Mine,” he smiles as the nine race back.
A minute later he slaps a poor shot
To the hungry crowd.
Raising a clinched fist he shouts,
“I am the judge.”

At the line of judgment they all pay homage.
One man mumbles superstitiously.
Another pounds the ball against the floor in ritual,
So he will not forget.
After, one lifts his eyes in thanksgiving.
The other recoils with shame,
His offering rejected.

“Basketball is a discipline,” says the manic coach.
“And we are its disciples.
Are your feet shoulder width apart?
Does your elbow follow your wrist in a vertical line?”
Now he watches the skinny boys practice,
Smiling with a far away look he says,
“When they move like the fingers of a hand,
As if with one mind, one purpose,
It’s so beautiful.”
As he speaks, white froth shows in the corners of his mouth.

“I can smell the popcorn, too,”
Says the blind man in the front row.
“I feel it when the object thumps the wood.
I can hear each squeak and tweet.”
Behind him, the ocean pours a wave onto the floor.
As it washes over him, he finds himself standing,
Adding his voice to theirs:

In the final second a whistle has sounded.
The smallest man steps to the line.
On the left, the crowd hollers and waves its hands frantically.
They pound their feet against the bleachers.
On the right the crowd sits silently,
Waiting.

Later, as we linger in the dispersing crowd,
I ask the blind man,
“How is it that a shot can graze the very inside edge of the rim,
And find it’s way out?  Or it might smack the rim dead on
And ricochet through the hoop?”
Then the blind man laughs, and he says to me,
“Do you understand, ‘Art is Imitation?’
The bards of basketball don’t fling their shots,
They let their wrists recite from memory.”

What the City Eats

The city eats whatever it can catch:

Rats and cats
Crashed cars, garbage and sewage

The city relishes poisoned pigeons
And baby gulls that fall out
From the bottoms of highways

An old building groans
Like an elk taken by wolves
It teeters and creeks and throwing it’s head back
Crashes into the dust

Old people break like eggs when they fall
The yolk seeps between cracks in the sidewalk
Their shells are trampled by the young

 The city is fat with metal and brick
And bone and blood and glass

Newspaper sticks between
The city’s chain-linked teeth

The rain rinses silt from the street
Parched gutters gulp the dirty water
Into its concrete underbelly

Machines strip the salted streets
As the city sheds its skin

Tar and gravel in the gullet
Aid in its digestion

-The Mind Food Brain Maintenance Tool Kit-

-The Mind Food Brain Maintenance Tool Kit-

Volume 1: Nicotine Cures Alsheimers
* This poem is not intended to prevent or cure any disease or illness.
**These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA.

Your mind is in your hands.

Studies show that an active mind is a healthy mind.

In double blind studies

Laboratory raccoons who were genetically pre-conditioned

to develop Alsheimers were twice as likely to enjoy

Nicotine as non-demented control animals.

Lab tests prove a demented raccoon quickly learns

To roll its own cigarettes but it can't flick its bic,

Only a wooden match will suffice

As paper ones don't work in their little hands.

The study also shows demented raccoons roll

Twice as quickly as their non demented counterparts.

Startling results from hippocampal and amygdala dependant

Learning tests prove submerged demented raccoons

Had only 80% of the normal tau protiens

Of their unsubmerged non-demented cousins.

They displayed tangled clumps of tau proteins

And hyperphosphorlylated tau strands

Causing their neurons to become diseased.

Healthy Neuron                                                                Diseased Neuron

These results show that nicotine prevented the

Neurofibrillary tangles which cause memory loss

In demented raccoons, while improving short term spatial memory

In non demented control   animals.

                                                        Modern Poem

Today this poem fell out of my nose
Stopping a nostril with a thumb
I blurted it out onto the page

It’s trying to impress you
Like a coconut against your skull

Perhaps you could crack it
And suck out its glowing milk of life
But it will crack you first

                                          It needs to be ironic\
                                                                                     \
                        (Perhaps you should feel sorry for it)         \
                                                                                                     \About what it isn’t sure

Its tone is so amiable (and humble) that you can’t help admiring it

It wants to be an atomic bubonic bannana-fanna-fo-phonic
language poem

But it still can’t decide if it should try to mean
Or just be

Now its got an idea:
There is a white clothesline outside of a red barn
And its got some white chickens on it strung upside down squawking prophecies
And a shiny red convertible wheelbarrow glazed with rain water that so much depends Upon is driving back and forth over the broken glass of society and your life
And all of nature trying to catch the feathers

And can’t you sense the chaos?
The inevitable dialectic
Shaking the white clothesline of consciousness in an ironic earthquake?
And all those prophetic chickens, strung upside-down, bobbing like piñatas?

Fragment

The whole of reason

is a fragment

of the man

Psychology forms

the blind spot of science

The place where

the million eyes observant

form one compound eye

Fused into that great

dumb place

The center of all we know

the place too close

to be seen

For as a telescope

can not look back upon itself

So the mind of man

attempts to view

the mind of man

About Manure and What Great Stuff It Is

Beagles running in tall grass resemble geese in flight. Their ears must be strong to keep their heads aloft in the sunshine above the tops of the blades. The white tips of their tales are a kind of rudder heading them in their direction. I noticed this as I watched my two puppies run at the county fairgrounds, where we often go, in hopes that the puppies will teach me to hunt rabbits. Unfortunately, they don’t seem to know any more about hunting rabbits than I do.

Even after we learn to hunt rabbits I will still need to learn to shoot. Ironically, I already have a very small shotgun perfect for rabbit hunting. I imagine myself handling my weapon—cocked and ready—with perfect patience waiting for my chance to shoot it off. And then blam! The peppery pellets ejaculate from the end of my gun. How gratifying it must be to see the rabbit flop dead on the ground. In this way hunting becomes a kind of sexual replacement therapy. Like war itself, where thousands of frustrated males gather to spurt their guns off at each other in homo-erotic rage. The battle of the bulge a gigantic and deadly circle jerk, covering the face of Europe in the gysm of war.

On this particular day at the fair grounds my puppies discovered a large pile of what appeared to be dried brown grass. As they dug under the surface of the pile, it became apparent that the stuff was not grass but horse manure. The moist manure was exposed to the air, and the ripe odor of the stuff penetrated my nasal passages. It stank louder than the high notes of the electric violin, but my puppies loved it. They rolled in it until it clung wetly to their coats. They even ate it, choking it down before I could take it out of their mouths. “Ginger,” I yelled at the smallest beagle, “Don’t you have any sense?” Just then someone answered me, “They love manure! It’s like catnip is to cats.” I turned around to see a red haired and freckled man and his little girl approaching from the nearby country road. “Did you know on the African tundra that dingos and hyenas must eat the dung of the wilderbeast because of the digestive enzymes without which they cannot digest their meat?”

“I certainly did not,” I said.

“Yes sir,” he slurred, “I can tell you all about manure and what great stuff it is.” As he spoke, he knelt down beside the pile. He stuck his hands and arms into the manure up to his elbows. Then he pulled handfuls of the stuff from deep within the pile and sifted them between his fingers. “Did you know that the reservoir is stocked with yellow perch this big? Its plentiful with fish, but you have to know when and how to get them. Right now they hit only red worms. All the bait shops in the county are out of red worms, but I know where they are,” he whispered, “they’re in the shit.” And he was right. In his hands there remained ten or so wriggling red worms. “I’ll get a fat perch for every one of these red worms I guarantee,” he said.

Just then the little girl trailed up to the manure pile. “Doggies!” she exclaimed. As if on cue my pair of yelping puppies rushed her and pushed her down on her bottom. Ginger attacked the little girl’s face with her tongue and Missy began tugging on her black curls as she squealed. “She loves animals,” the man remarked as Missy led the girl on her hands and knees by the hair. “In fact I promised her that there would be doggies here, it’s the only way I could get her away from the Dora the Explorer.” I was somewhat alarmed at the apparent violence of the scene but the barefoot child seemed incapable of feeling pain or sensing fear. “She’s a rough little girl,” the man said.

“How could you guess there would be doggies here?” I asked.

“The other day she saw your doggies out the car window. I didn’t actually think there would be doggies here.” Just then the child got her little arms around Ginger’s middle and hoisted the squirming puppy above her head. A perfect clean and jerk. The puppy gave a bewildered look as the beautiful monster child spun around holding the dog’s belly on her face, then tumbled backward in the grass. That’s when I noticed the girl’s blue eyes and shiny black curls, her dark skin.

“Those are the bluest eyes I’ve ever seen on a child,” I remarked. The girl’s smoky blue eyes reminded me of a newborn kitten’s. “Yep, she’s got her mothers eyes,” the man replied.

The Firebird (part 3)

The Firebird's brain itches for words

She relishes their complex micro-nutrients

With her beak she pulls them apart

Pulling out the root with morbid curiosity

Digesting them like fatty grubs

It is the capacity of the Firebird

To purge away what is unnecessary

To gorge on a rich vocabulary

Allowing her to glide around the globe

Circumscribing it annually

The Eyes of a Wolf

“Wake Up,” growls the Wolf

The depth of the eyes and their brightness

A luminescent feather becomes a quill

One who sees with inky eyes dips a feather

Into a well

Ivan awakes to find the face of the wolf inches away

Growling intently and gazing with his liquid eyes

The voice of the wolf is hunger

One cannot understand the wolf unless

He understands the wolf's hunger

A hunger so deep it is grounded in sadness

His appetite profound long suffering

A man would give his flesh to satiate it

“So you are a wolf and yet you are Irving Layton?

Not perverted like the pornographic wolf

In Little Red Riding Hood

Who is always in bed with grandma

No! More like the wolf in Hesse's Steppenwolf

Presenting the uncivilized aspect of man

His hunger, his vacancy, his need

A wolf that must be contended with

As Satan contended with Death”

At these words the wolf lunges for Ivan's throat

But Ivan's prepared dagger intercepts the wolf

Beneath the chin and the wolf expires

In a violent and bloody baptism

For when the wolf is killed his power is united

With that of the man who killed him

But the wolf can never truly die

The wolf remains a trusted friend of man

He must be fed daily to maintain his strength

Ivan rides the wolf tirelessly in search of the firebird

He journeys far south from his Russian home

At last he comes to to a fork in the trail where a sign reads:

This way to enter the domain of the wise witch

Ivan rides Irving Layton to the witch's door

The wolf prepares Ivan with his poems

For what he will encounter:

“I know this witch and I cannot enter into her domain

You must inquire of the Firebird alone

This Witch: She rides her broomstick so often and well

That one day she may learn to fly it.”

The witch occupies domestic space

Which Ivan can enter but the wolf is not invited

He remains suspended outside the window

Contemplating the witch's conversation with Ivan

On first approaching the witch's domain

Ivan sees the witch through the window

Sailing alone around the room

Upon her broomstick

Ivan encounters her small poodle

Who barks savagely and tugs on Ivan's pants

“Billy Collins!” shouts the witch

“You leave that man alone!

Good Billy Collins

Good Dog”

Ivan stands aghast at what he fears

Must be the actual poet Billy Collins

Turned into a lap dog by the magic witch

His balls suspended in formaldihyde

But no, it is only that the witch

Who is a big Billy Collins fan

Has named her miniature poodle after him

There the poodle stands

Representing the cultured male poodle

Whose only wish is to serve his master

Billy Collins is the perfect dog

Affectionate and benign

Cultured to a feminine sensibility

Without any male sexuality or any bad political habits

As if his politics had been lopped off

As if he had been fixed

Suddenly the poodle smells the wolf waiting outside

He hops upon his master's antique chair and peers

Beyond the translucent glass

Inches away from the face of the wolf

Who intently glares back

Half intending to leap through the glass

But Billy Collins is secure within the witch's domain

The two dogs growl threateningly at each other

On opposite sides of the window pane

“The amazing thing,” says the witch

“Is that there is only one generation between them.”

The Fox condemns the trap not herself

“There is no force more subversive than poetry

And that is why tyrants have always feared it

And sought to suppress it

But not only tyrants, everyone who has a vested interest

In preventing the individual from discovering the truth of his own self

And his own capacities fears the liberating power that resides in poetry”

Usury

1.

Amos of Tekoa
The most ancient of the Hebrew prophets
Was a simple shepherd in the field

He saw the oppression and exploitation of the poor
And he raised his voice like one lost in the wilderness
Calling out for social justice:

Not that the high places of New York will be brought low
Not that the pampered ladies of Chicago
Will be slaughtered like the cows of Bashan

Not that the wealth of America will be redistributed
But that the wealthy deserve the wealth
It is their punishment

A wealthy man detests nothing more
Than the sight of the happy poor

And when he has come to old age
He deserves to spend a million dollars a month
To extend his sad life a few more hours

He and his family deserve the pain
Of the facial and bodily mutilations
Done by the plastic surgeons

He deserves to see his family splintered
Surrounding his deathbed like a pack of jackals
Growling and snapping at each other
In hopes gaining a little more inheritance

For this is the pain of wealth
The care of money
The deathly dreading of poverty
Truly they have received their reward

2.

And yet the prophet has not spoken of the government
Of its detestable inter-penetrations with the corporations
Their obscene relationships with the lawyers
Who are guilty of vile acts with lobbyists
Who are in bed with insurance companies
Who have illicit affairs with bankers
Who have spread their disease to the pharmaceuticals
Who hold the medical industry in bondage
While they sodomize the HMOs

Until it is clear that the whole thing is dirty
That our economic failure is a moral failure
And that every greedy man has a stinky finger

The Firebird (part 2)

Ivan awoke still clutching a single feather of the firebird
His headache seared with the dawn sun
He quickly concealed the feather
Cloaking its luminescence

Prince Ivan entered the court of the king
Through large oaken doors
He stepped across the musty threshold
His footsteps echoing on mosaic tile
Filling the gigantic stillness of the corridor

As he approaches the dimly lit throne of the king
He bows before his father's presence saying
“Father, I bring strange news
And a gift for you.”

The prince brings forth the feather and holds it aloft
The king's courtiers fall back in astonishment
Beholding the breathtaking feather
Which shines as a white light at its source
Projecting color throughout the hall
Filling it as with stained glass radiance

The kings court sits in breathless astonishment
Charmed by circling lights and swirling patches
When Ivan again cloaks the feather
The room falls into smoky darkness
The king sits silently in the gloomy atmosphere
Until finally he softly speaks:

“Where hast thou this token of power and light?”
“Gotten from thine own courtyard, sire,” said the prince.
While tending my tree of silver apples
I saw a sublime bird woman approaching the tree
Her dazzling plumage disguises a fiercely
Intelligent countenance and strange power
She caused an apple to blight me on the head
She escaped leaving only one feather trapped in my hand

A smile slowly crept across the face of the king
He felt the throngs of desire begin to course in his veins:
“Since the death of your mother the queen
I have sought to replace the light that she once gave me
Finding none suitable I resigned to live out my days alone
But now I know the existence
Of a magical being who may again
Bring light and beauty to my kingdom

Who will go in search of this magical bird woman?”

A hush filled the hall until Piotr
The eldest son of the king
Addressed the court: “Sire, I will quest for the Firebird
I will select the best huntsmen from among my ranks
We will pursue the Firebird on horseback.”

Then Anton the next eldest also spoke:
“Sire, I will quest for the Firebird as well
I will take the best falconers of the kingdom
Pursuing the Firebird over air and land.”

“Yes! Yes!” roared the king.
“Take with you the fleetest hounds of Russia
And the most skillful trappers as well
But take no arrows with you
For I know that men in their zeal
Would kill the quarry before seeing her escape
I only value her alive
Know that the hunter who kills the Firebird
Will surely pay with his own life
But the man who captures the Firebird
And brings her to me will be lauded
With gifts of wealth and glory.”

Hight applause rings throughout the king's hall!
The men rush from the hall in preparation for the quest

"The Firebird" part 1

Invocation.

If there is something in me that loves poetry
I wish you would come to me
And whisper now into my ear
The words of this poem

For truly I do not know them
They are strange to me
As everything I write is strange
Strange as a child becomes to his mother

Still there is love
Still I wish my children would go out
With success into the world
But I know them too well

I wish that voice would whisper to me
Concerning Felicity the immortal Firebird
How she breaks the wild Leviathan
Struggling with him
Finally bridling him securely
And mounting with spurs upon his back
She begins to ride him and bid him do her will

But these are facts
What I am interested in
Is myth:

In her mythological life
The Firebird is prismadically plumed
With luminescent feathers and crystalline eyes
Such that one captured feather
Will brighten an entire castle hall

For to us she is an object of beauty and magic
Something perhaps to be captured and possessed
But not known

And what magic she would give to the man
Who could possess her
What power.

Part 1.

One day in the ancient present
Ivan the young and beautiful prince of Russia
Sleepily lounged in the pleasant summertime
In the courtyard where a tree of silver apples grew

Ivan the prince of Russia
Cared more than anything in the world
About his apple tree
He carefully pruned it and daily numbered its apples

This species of apples was known in southern Europe
In ancient times but here it appears
That silver apples were also known in Russia
In some remote yet contemporary century

This tree of mysterious origin
Cultivated in Ivan's courtyard
Contained apples of the densest silver
Falling with severity on any who may be passing beneath

And it happened one afternoon
In summertime when the dogwood seeds
Drift in pleasant sunshine
That Ivan awoke drowsily from a nap

Through the haze and stillness of the air
Ivan apprehended the magical firebird
For the first time he glimpsed her radiant plumage
Beneath his silver apple tree

Apparently attracted to his silver apples
The silent bird stood motionless
As if aware of being watched
The prismadically plumed firebird
Oped one black crystal eye wide in surveillance

Ivan, not wanting to alert the brilliant bird
Closed his eyes and pretended to be dreaming
But when he again opened them she was gone
Having taken one of his apples with her

Instead of being saddened at the missing apple
Ivan found himself smiling with wonder
Flattered that the firebird
Who is known as a very rare creature
Of magnificent power, beauty and intelligence
Had graced his courtyard choosing his particular apples

That night Ivan kept intent watch on the balcony
Overlooking the garden. A partial moon cast
Silver light and a nightingale sang spooky music
The heavy odor of lilacs perfumed the wakeful Ivan
As he meditated breathing deeply in perfect stillness

With a wing beat the Firebird appears
Alighting beneath the tree
The Silver apples strain the branches downward
As if magnetized to the bird's plumage
One ripe apple breaks away and flies to her

Vaulting off the balcony and onto the garden wall
Ivan skillfully maneuvers to cutoff her retreat
Confronting her with the guilty theft of his apples
Admonishing her in wrathful tones
He pins her shoulders against the tree

But at that moment the nearest apple breaks away
From its branch and neatly dollops the prince about the head
Wounding him and knocking him unconscious
While he bleeds he clutches a single translucent feather

The Jaded Bumblebee

In my dream
I am a jaded bumblebee
The only bug in a field
Of desperately blossoming petunias

Blossoms

The flowers in your words
Are rhymed with pollen

Which gets all over me
As I read

It sticks in my hair
Infiltrates my clothing

I share it with those
Who rub up against me

Perhaps they will be pollinated
With your sentiments

Perhaps they will bring forth
Hybrid orchids of meaning

Connotative color swirls
With delicate petals

The nectar of verbal orchids
Attracts inquisitive hummingbirds

Who dip their bills
Into the raw juice of those minds

Rich fuel for their own mental flying

The Irony

As I read
I begin to indulge the old romance
That crazy old romance seizes on my mind
The idea, so affective

That thoughts have value
That ideas have longevity
And are seated concretely in mental space

The apparent proof of that conceit
Is ranged before me
Chartered knowledge etched in ink
Bound into volumes for the contemporary eye

The vast architecture of knowledge
Appears as the skyline of a distant city
Bright contrast against the void

And now that city appears lighted
At the head of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream
The pyramid incomplete
The eye
Life as the ordering principal
Complexity reaching forward from the brine
Reaching forward from feet of clay

Two Related Bodies

it is not
that humans have a history
a record of our momentum

but that humans want history
history is what is lacking in us
all other animals carry their ancestries
with them into this present moment

none of them needs a myth to explain
the separation of its personality from nature
none has forgotten
there is a moment created
one moment with eternal changes

exists
in spite
of time

the natural resonance
that orders our universe
only appears in time
colors resound within visible boundaries
octaves ring clear to the ear

the day plays evenly with the night
seasons pass and recur
the moon pulls and pushes on the earth
as if prodding the sleepy earth

heavenly bodies observe stellar relationships
the moon weighs heavily
on my mind

"The Voice of the Wolf" from The Firebird

The institution of Monogamy
Is the mark of a female dominated cultural state

It is the error of the generations
Allowing inferior males to pass on their traits
In which the state of man continually declines

Monogamy is impurity itself
It is the face of perversion

(every feminine institution
of a cultural state
appears as gentle and sweet
but under its cloak hides the cruel repercussion

But let us not forget that the Natural State
Has ended and the Cultural State begun
Because men became inadequate to their task
Stupefied by feminine love
Mercy stayed the noble hands of our ancestors
When violent acts were necessary)

It begins w/ Felicity
(The Firebird)
Riding Leviathan and taming him
Placing Reins upon him

The noble man arises
And he kills and he kills
But he cannot kill enough
Still the degraded hoards come forward
To their slaughter
Born in ignorance
Dumb to their own pain

(The language, the language
is divorced from their minds
They have not the words
Or have not the courage to use them)

And still they come forward
Begetting degradation upon degradation

In the Cultural State, War
(Which in the Natural State
Is fought one man against another)
Is both necessary and good
Exterminating poor men of breeding age
And all their would be descendants
Else we would be over run with poverty

In a beautiful cultural ceremony
The costumed Armies march upon each other
A most noble ritual suicide
With bravery and glory
Blessed with female tears
Their legacy canonized
With feminine sentimentality

Turkey Breast Pot Roast (unh!)

Ever see those packaged turkey breasts on the bone in the grocery store?
Here's what you can do!

1 packaged turkey breast (on the bone, on sale, about 6 pounds)
Chopped veggies-- Onion, Carrot, Turnip*, Garlic

Here's the Rub:

1/4 cup peanut oil (you might use olive oil)
1 tsp. Rosemary
1 tsp. Thyme
1 tsp. rubbed sage
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. course ground black pepper
2 tbsp parsley

Directions: Peel the veggies. Chop them into large pieces. Put them in bottom of crock pot. Use as many as will fit in your crock pot w/ the turkey. Combine all rub ingredients. Place turkey breast in crock pot. Brush rub evenly on all exposed surfaces. Cook on high for 4 hours (350 degrees). I served it with a side of mashed turnips. Instead of gravy, I used the drippings--but you could make gravy from the drippings.

*you could use rutabaga instead of turnips

My mom said this was the best meal she has had in years. I couldn't believe how good it was. Very economical and nutritious. It has really increased my confidence in the kitchen. I'm getting down right cocky in the kitchen. Some people just don't have it going on in the kitchen like I do.

The Spirits at the Pub of My Soul

Deep in my being there is a pub
Where every archetype is served
In the evening I make a visit
To get what I deserve

My emotions are invited
All my thoughts are entertained
Every ghoul has his own stool
And every chin is stained

The bartender is mysterious
Invisible you know
His whispers pour his drinks to me
They appear from empty holes.

Today my pub is populated
With ghostly clientele
As my band of spirits appears on stage
The crowd begins to swell

The band strikes its first chord with me
Pyramus and Thisbe start romancing
That Hindu couple Shiva and Kali
Begin their dirty dancing

The Grecian gods and goddesses
All sit round their steaming bath
And Milton’s Satan grimaces
As he drinks his cup of wrath

Even Michael the Archangel
Is caught up with all the rest
The spirits dance together
In a Dionysian fest

Only Satan maintains reason
And sits there in a stupor
His own minions dance around him
Chanting, “party pooper”

And when the music’s over
My drunken ghouls begin to boast
In a moment of silence I clear my throat
And raise a heartfelt toast:

“Here’s to every spirit
Both the living and the dead
And to all those spirit’s out there
Of whom I’ve never read

Wherever your destination
As you stumble through the night
I pray you make it safely
And before the morning light.”

You're black
And I almost didn't notice you
But then you turned your eyes toward me
And I knew that it was Larry on the table
You know...He knows
He's not supposed to be up there

Three Animal Poems

The New Squirrels

Did you notice
How the squirrels have changed?
The new squirrels are not happy
They are small and black and fearsome

The old squirrels were friendly and brown
But the new squirrels have circled
The brown ones away

Their beady black little eyes
Sparkle with orneriness and ill will

And they preach at me from their elevated pulpits
Scolding me with public pomp and posture
So fiery is their moral rhetoric
I cover my head in shame

Absurd little conservatives!
Casting down acorns of scorn upon me
Tails shaking with furious indignation


Raccoons

A trap for a raccoon can be fashioned
From a small hollow log
Five penny nails and a dime

The nails should be driven inward at angles
Their points make a small circle
With the shiny dime beneath

A raccoon’s paw slips between the nails
It grasps the shiny object but
Pointed nails prevent it from removing its fist

And how like a man is this funny animal?
Excruciating tactile curiosity!
It knows it will be caught
And yet it must possess what it has touched

You should see it when the trapper comes
Hopping around the hollow log
With its tiny fist pinned inside

What must enter its little mind
As the trapper approaches?


The Pigeon

The maimed pigeon
unable to achieve flight
circumnavigated me on the dirty sidewalk

It’s left wing broken
it could not but flap its right wing
and so it scooted around me in a circle
its beak scraping the cement

I seemed to be the focus of its rotation
standing alone with my feet together
as it disappeared on my left
and reappeared on my right hand

I must admit I pitied the hapless creature
hesitatingly, I lifted the heel of my right shoe
intending to crush its skull
and end its pain

Just then it looked up at me
with its calcium eye into my face
and shouted coarsely at me
in unmistakable German

“Ach!” it said

Unfortunately I do not speak German
but the glint in its eye
communicated not fear but rage

I understood only that it did not pity itself
and also that its pain was not considerable to me

I did not pity the bird
but my own discomfort at the sight of it

Moments later the bus arrived

Rationalism

There is no such thing as simultaneity
If events are displaced in space
Then they must be displaced in space/time
But simultaneity is imagined within perception

The big bang occurs at conception
Space opens outward internalizing a universe
And time is simply a measure of our displacement
From that moment

We are all drifting away from each other
Our heavenly bodies, our personalities
Apparently, the universe will become a cold
And remote place where nothing coheres.

But behind this world of sense
And substances to be experienced
Lies reality
It is not a spiritual reality
It is not experiential or psychological

It is mechanical
It is subject to the rigorous laws of mathematics

It is a blind and deaf place
Where myriad numbers multiply
The big numbers eating the little ones

Our living bodies express the coiled chemical
It combines and recombines
And it appears that this sensual world
Is only a product of those mechanics

And beauty itself appears as a trick of the senses
A routine, A flattery of specious breasts
And lilting voices

Toward a Philosophy of Romance

Toward a Philosophy of Romance

What do they mean when they say
You can't put a value on human life?
The bear that is chasing you through the woods
Certainly does put a value on your life.

How humiliating that situation is
When a person's flesh is of higher value
Than that which the flesh sustains

The soldier marching into the meat grinder
The prostitute standing on the corner
Both understand their flesh value
They understand the material and economic necessity
Which has placed them in their situations

But while you are running from that bear
Who is chasing you through the woods
Consider what it is that is compelling you onward
Away from the bear that is time
And the surety that he will run you down

Its this sentimentality which inspires all action
And on which all value is based

2.

What is wrong with 2 + 2 = 5?
The terms are well defined
There can be no confusion
In this sense it is just as good as 2 + 2 = 4

But 2 + 2 = 5 is an incongruity
And that's really what we don't like about it
Its falsehood

We prefer our mathematical statements to be congruous
Our judgment against 2 + 2 = 5 is an aesthetic one
This aesthetic is seemingly universal
It is easily taught and well understood by children
Perhaps the study and practice of mathematics
Would be impossible without it

The undertaking of science would be a fraud
Without an aesthetic preference for the truth

Idealism

Beneath everything there is a drummer
Who has been drumming very slowly

The Tabla has been dictated
Living performers interpret the fatal command
Resistless amplifications
Subliminal reiterations
Frogs blurting out in fractal fragments of it
Birds hymning it

Matter rises animated before it
Compelled to dance vigorously
Mimicking its symmetry

The Dictator of Resonance
Whose force leveled Jericho
By the arrangement of his arms
Will sound the seventh trumpet

The attention will be called
Into the highest chakara

For now the body [churns under]
Gigantic molecules
Producing fierce flame within

The course bodily energy
A consuming red flame

The cumbersome molecules
Must be digested with torrential mathematics
Burning too slow and hot
To attain a higher color

The Emotive mechanism
Has a measured rate
Vibrating in minute orbits
Churning gear ratios produce the flame
Creating orbital resonance with numeric frequency
Associating colors by sympathize vibration

Entire regions of pitch buzz within us
Consonance and dissonance are physical terms
They are emotional terms
The planets resonate in orbital vibrations
Octaves below human sense
Worlds away from color and sound
And yet ordered in the physical family

And beneath everything there is a drummer
Who is drumming very slowly with his hands
He projects an interested yet detached smile
He is deeply satisfied and patient

Homeless Hygiene

after a week of homelessness
the confluence of one's bodily odors
carries a humiliation all its own
the scrotum cries out for salvation

When personal sanity must be sacrificed
for uncleanliness is also of the mind
one realizes that poverty is a spiritual state
not disconnected from a corporeal economy

that there is moral poverty
intellectual vacancy
the culturally disinherited
the people in whose minds history
has not taken root

you've got to get some of that gold bond powder
doesn't matter how you get it just do
and some hand sanitizer

take your socks off
rub your feet down until you feel
the heat from the alcohol

then squirt some gel onto a dirty sock

and now the nuts
that's right
focus through the burn
the pain is temporary but the clean
raw feeling lasts into the afternoon sun