The Smoker in the Yard

but for a mouthful
biting the air—but
better a bowlful blowing

like the fallen rain,
in its collecting, sliding
down like blood the grass blades and coursing
as through veins
the weary cracks of stone

but for the secret shaft
that spirals not, but kisses—sifts
upward through pressures in the layering light

but for the smell—
the rank and fire of hell—or
for the dreamed companion
who holds repressions in his hand

but for the smoker in the yard
I would have shut
myself into the black warmed room
but better stopped to breathe with him
who lingers in the might bright light.

Edinburgh Graveyard

Sunken in the softer stagnance
Where the weary earth gathers from the cold
Breathless currents of submerging--
One touch of moss and muddy flowers
To lay a tender bed.
One breath beneath the leaves
The sunken world pours
into the constance
of the city pathways and
and eyes unperceiving--
Fading Eternal repose
Where the holy lay their Head.
And so they shall Ever be with Him.

I.

This brackless beach
Haven of all the fierce and jagged interminglings of man’s respite.
I feel, I bleakly gaze, I stare
I wrap my daunted senses ’round the bar
Unfurled and reaming like the wind
And curl or crack, I dry and heat

And I will slay the dragon
Follow on unstealthfully to his lair
Where I fear every fear
Each robust tinge of whole regret
Behold it, calm,
Beacon over crests and straights

Can you touch it
Feel it

And all the world lies loosely trenched
As opens before us from folds of ever-past
A full and glorious horizon.

II.

Treasure beyond all scope of twilight
Open blackness, restful seas,
Made to forswear all transformation
But to be
Resides in rise of greater light.

Treasure beyond all scope of twilight
Wind-shared sighs or cliff-sung praise
Lies in the light of darkened stare
Were clouds slow shades of hued in beauty
Starry skies contained more black than transient night.

Glory is a sigh to see
And meaning’s whisper to withhold.
What heart of the Creator bends
To hue in beauty with the clouds?
What we see gleam against the rocks
Can spark a sky is full of stars.

Behold the canopy of stillness
Now in the Eternal hold
Which breeds more fully meaning
Than life emergent from its seems

Canopy of stillness
Like life shown from lifeless seams.

III.

God
Light in the dust
Breath of our souls
Son, Father, Spirit
Whom have we save you
Who saves us, redeems
The tide of all creation
Lapping, drawn only to you.

Not every man is a prophet
Our treasure safe in heaven lies
Not every man is a prophet
But all have life to rest in you.

I want to conquer mountains
While the fallen glaciers drain
To cut each cord and break each yoke
And untie every chain.
Those who creep ’round the darkness
Have lost their dark domain.
I must be fast;
The day is past
To settle in the plain.

I wish to fly in labyrinths
Where the sunset breaks the sea
The one who wails upon the crags
Has bound his heart to me.
The embers of the broken
Have lost their will to be.
I need to walk,
Ascend the rock
And think before I flee.

Flee to hidden jungles in the sizzling of the trees,
Bask on glowing beaches, learn to comprehend the seas.
Call beyond prosceniums, indulge humanities
Conquer meanings of the tongue, and settle in their ease.

Flee
To the land of flowing wine
And taste its grapes to see.
Flee to feel the dusky vine
Where dusk creeps tenderly.
Aflame in vernal gardens
Where the tangling moss gives way,
See her who found was hidden,
The perceived as she surveys.
Run the mangled tunnels
Of the mango groves and taste
The flitting bee’s lost honey
With her, whose lips bid haste.
Past arching limbs of orchards
Which the conquered dare to heed
For she whose very cheek guards
From the heartbeat drums she speeds.
She stands upon the fragments
Of the stone’s autumnal spar
Where these the ashen matins
New moon’s smoldered embers are.
We dance below the moonlight
Where earth opens at its purse
One night then morning’s respite
To write wild, tangled verse.
She looks and at a whisper
All my senses, tastes maintain
Let last the fruits and vespers
Let not consummation’s rain.
And glide and glisten under skies
So black but at a glance,
The constellations feign reprise
And I mourn who once did dance.

I need to find a shelter
Let be peace my only rest
To give my soul for whole control
Bequeath my very chest.
The wanderings of my vision
Would not achieve my crest.
I must be bold
And still take hold
Of whom will guide my best.

My home will be my savior
And my power my cornerstone.
My lord will sing and strengthen with
His warmth my every bone.
The wanderers in the darkness
Will eternal light be shone
Your kingdom come
Your will be done
My heart be on your throne.

Sigh

“It’s so nice here,” she said
For when lights shine through the night
Some distinct aurora
Be it the dull accumulation of city pathways,
Or moonbeams or stardust—
When they mingle at the water
With evolving reed melodies
And the swift percussion of the surf—
Sporadic and daunting—
All is sheen and all is breathless.
Though lucrative through amplifiers
And bourgeois be the humming lights
We sit in the glow of resort hotel euphoria
“It is perfect.”—
Artificial and tranquil,
The sheen of pleasance.

View From Carson Peak

Beautiful and brilliant
Lifeless and free
The mountain peered into its orbital sea
And jauntily surveyed the layers of trees
The misty sleek pines
The snow at its sides
The dryness of dammed lakes scattered, cold in the breeze
And my scattered, quick, and muddled thoughts
Held still by its aloof and poignant grasp.
And I was still.
Look at me.
And as much as I looked I never grew bigger
Than it.
So I never looked away
Which leaves me here.

The Use For Soap

A man set about washing his hands--just
a little touch to make the water shimmer,
then slowly, inch
by inch,
nail then flesh, leading to
vigorous ripples and a subtle splash of
full emergence.
He turned and twisted and interlocked his fingers
and hands;
then he rubbed them 'til they burned,
seeking cleanliness and losing control in confusion,
for at what point would his hands
be clean enough to compensate?
And through bleeding and calluses and bleeding and
water and bubbles and
dirty water that did not clean,
insatiable night yielded to morning.
And innocent blood was called on parents and their children,
And those who could not trace such lineage
went about living --
some killing
some dying
all seeking fulfillment
some seeking peace--
And the man began to eat away his hands with a sponge.

Keep washing your hands, Pilate.
Sooner or later you're going to have to make another decision about Jesus.

The Poem of a Three-Year-Old With His Older Self

Let me not be in Sunday mornings—
quiet and still, sad, alone
gray morning through tangled blinds (cold and sharp and grainy)
invisible barrier blocking nose and can’t feel it with fingers
desperation inhales and wrinkled dryness
Turquoise room and turquoise shirts laid out for church
The Pounding-Piercing-Shrill-Beating-Loud-Swirling chaos
Like a vacuum cleaner
Sucking, ripping out of bed.
“I’ll pull you out. Suck you up.”
And three-year-old little person below facing the shrill, swirling bedroom air all alone.
Hold on, weak—in fear—powerless
Don’t get sucked away
Sharp piercing
Grab the doorknob
Hold on Grasp
Turn on the light.
Turn on the light.

But let the world this morning be a Grandpa day
A day that Grandpa would be here.
Calm and white, sun shining off chlorine rippling-electric-reflection pool
Through revealing blinds
Welcoming gray, soft living room,
Presence of Daddy walk by my window.
’Cause life can be beautiful
Life can have joy
And not through innocence because of the sucking swirling bedroom
But because of love.

To Long

A simple thing—you love me
Let my life be staunch, in tune
Your steadfast love is holy
I long after you

Take my life and hold me
Forgive me as I am
You are my savior and my stronghold
I long after you

Be your great love reciprocated
Let me meet you in my soul
And erect an Ebenezer
LORD, I long after you.

And speak to me in silence
And I, attentive, be the form
Of a vessel for your gospel
LORD, I long after you.

I still keep your shadow on my wall
Where radiance beams bright two and keeps in time.
Too busy looking at the flowers
We knew not a windowsill.
But we can feel the churning
In your shadow’s time
Melodic pit of
Soil-stained sighs.
We did walk contentment’s lengthy stretch
Rubato seeps in folds of brimming mirth
All sky is sight beyond our peaking growths
But earthward from a bird’s eye one can feel the sway of trees
Where brassy strength precedes in three its sudden resolution
One above
One strained-smeared into the asphalt
We stand transfixed after a window.

For once it was more real
When your shadow shown with sun
Than when your shadow from the darkness
Was the one that held time’s hand.

But there is more

We hold these truths to be self-evident
When idle fixtures of the human form
slope—tender, pensive—o’er the soul
The creep abounds, it slithers lightly,
Deeply, fathoms—but fathom this:
The mind’s elusive, what of the soul
The part is good, what of the whole
But which, bold, which is the part and
Though we feel it, is it in us,
Yet without feeling, soully know.
Hold me dearly, hold me
As light breaks gently over hills
The crunch of feet, the frost that kills
The warmth of life, pleasure is not human
Gaze at the beauty and it seeps out and out and out
And this is not good, O Creep,
But it is Good.
I am equal but there is more.

Open the floodgates of my soul…
Yes! though my body cease to dust.
Bear my last fruit; cedes Whom I trust
From weary, sinful make me whole.
Open the folds of Jesus’ arms
Assured in the many rooms
My Savior’s, mine, the empty tombs
And holes on hands that healed the storms.
Though we were weary, grow not faint.
Our mind has drowned, now we may breathe.
Now the one Truth, all lies did seethe.
And Love, where stingless death not taint.
Open the folds of Jesus’ arms.
Open the floodgates of my soul.

We hold the fire in these years—
Young and waning, overripe—
We hope the stay of fettered fears
And dropped and drooping hopes not wipe
Nor make more subtle nor ferment
Through quaking love and companiment,
Through evil thoughts and idle hours,
Delayed suffrage through deliberate powers.
We hold these truths burnt to our eyes
We march naively to our prize
We’ll seek the source that stirs our minds
Our souls will reap the joy each finds
Behold the Source, the prize, the Name
To spread the word, behold the flame.

When flowers fade, they hold their tongues
And life can be so beautiful.
Sweet corn and breath, it cleaves our teeth
And dreams are ever soft and light
Her garden swelled atop soul bliss
With cabbages and firmer roots
And all that purges sin to solely sink our teeth into.
She wanted a good dog
To lap its fur between her swoons
Of robust hands like at the clavier.
A big garden, her dream
Of life, happy
Content and
I love you
But I love You more.
She who loves much loves much.
When flowers fade, they can be so beautiful
And life can hold its tongue.

Some people, when they come
have music in their eyes
and need it to linger
as the hearth cracks the night away.
She was one, such as needs
music when she comes.
Yes, she caught the city’s lights
that dance and dance in the
dark cold wind, the wind
to blow bright, but never glow
like it does on your place by the hearth
where you cried and cried
the soot off your skin—
as the hearth cracks the night to ashes.
Stay with me, though I can’t warm you
I’ll point you to the fire
Which I know can warm you if you let it.
See, don’t go, there’s still some light left
for you if you let it. There’s still a place for you by the fire.
Some people, when they leave
leave music in their glow
She was one, who needs music when she leaves
the hearth to whistle in the cold.

I passed my Grandma in her eyes
That didn’t know that they could fill.
Although my Grandma seldom sighs
Her lingering lungs suggest it still
By how her chest resumes and dips.
My Grandma fails but often tries
To form my name upon her lips.
But I can see it on her will
When muffled sounds her breathings fill
And see me gleam in both her eyes.

When Dawn Breaks

with all due apologies, i call this my T.S. Eliot poem.

When dawn breaks
I will surely be there
Though the turgor within me subsides and secretes
I shall surely be gone as the wind churns and fleets
Foggy and vague is the power wind takes
When dawn breaks
If at all, if nowhere.

And we gnaw away fears
Thaw frost nips at the ears
Numb the nausea we call the soul
And surely our eyes are not dry,
When the dawn breaks
Better ask not how they fill,
And who fills them
When dawn breaks.

From the flashing river of beyond the dawn or before
When glassy, and articulate
We measure and fail
But let us reside, calm,
Swollen like the tide
Sink into human forms
Wait for the dew
Watch it fill our eyes, in the real place, if at all if nowhere
And laugh at breaking dawn
In sadness maybe
But hush, don’t cry, why be when find one no reason?

When I draw to indulge

When I draw to indulge
In passes of primrose pleasure
And deeply drink the cup of fancy
That bears the bliss of lavish life
I see you standing there
That you are who bears the cup
Of pain to pour the flood of living water
And I see you standing there
I know who it is that it is to whom
I’m talking to, sitting, hearing to
Who holds the cornerstone
of my soul is saved by blood.
Whose verses float in ranks
of seeking psalmist pens.
Who lifts the tongues of weary
Those were doubting sent?
I am (he)
I see you standing here
The one who is speaking to you.

Your love is life. Salvation’s faith.
I rest in you.

Young david at the harp

Young david at the harp
whose heart beholds the heart of God
who with his strings sings the glory of His ways,
suspires in the comfort of His gaze,
he knows that love can bear upon his dust
the Image of his Shepherd.
where resonance wreaths its tonic color
all flesh imparts its hidden life within.

Did you know, O Saul,
Where the warmth lay?
A donkey o’er laden with bread,
a goat and gleaming wine
Conceal your respite’s earthy din.
A Shepherd boy can tender tremblings
of your soul where on his strings
he plays your peace.

One night in Djibouti—
Calm like liquid
The stale and rippling sewage, filling the disparity in the dirt roads.
Glowing like heat
The throbbing humidity of a December night.
Evanescent like the sky
Softly peeling, layer upon layer, consuming the world in its transition.

I went running in Djibouti,
As the sky settled and the people thrived.
Broad avenues, heaps of debris lying listlessly about,
Oh, I haven’t run in a long time.
The soft groan of returning goats after a long day’s eating trash,
My muscles are aching.
The screaming of cars on the right on the left—
Pale, bitter honk,
Attention aux voitures!
The languid, fierce, and weary march to homes,
to the market, in alleys,
through dust and debris.

(fierce mutterings in Somali)
Mocking “Bonjour”
Rough, cold, angry jargon
Bitter feeling, harsh thoughts,
Oppression, poverty, thrown rocks
Skittering past my feet as I walk

Buying khat, selling khat—
The narrow, rough wooden boxes lining the sidewalks
scattered amidst dust and trash.
Slender, colorful women, walking, wandering, nightly routine
Back to sharp, crumbling fortresses,
trash and sewage-mud, crude shelterless shelters.
The Somali—
Men scattered up on the dust mounds
Dry and weak, sitting out the evening. “Bonsoir” (sincere)
“Goodbye!” (cheery)
Their wives and children back in the alleys,
alone, sick, and aching, mingled in the sewage-puddles.
Dark, dark Djiboutian nights
Calm, like the steady beat of hunger that plagues the body.
Glowing like the passion of the human soul.
Evanescent: the causes, the answers, the understanding.
Persistent, all-consuming, unavoidable, sickening.
I went running in Djibouti.

Lent Breaker

See my heart hung like plaster on a wall:
The life that clung was captured in a room.
For though I see the dead in every tomb,
Still colors glimmer life in every hall.

Laughter had cracked it's margin from the pain,
For springtime now had opened in the trees.
Bright eyes were like the water Monet sees;
I saw my life and saw it all again.

The vamping strokes of pavement soft as two
Who, naked, counter coldly in their arms
Are looks, impressions, where dead love once grew
And curled a town above the streets' alarms.
I saw this life once stoic be made new
As those who rest in peace life's gravest charms.

Paris-April 13, 2009

Piano Concerto

Rachmaninoff bids the whole world listen
With brightness hope, with sorrow sing.
Each conjecture glowing in its fermentation
Beweeps each melody to its grave.
In wrestling we cede our sighs.
In rest our aspirations writhe in pain.
Sweet glints of specters vibrate in our bones
And we, entrenched in darkness, glimpse
That passed climax
The denouement
That zenith spent.
What souls behold no mind can breathe.

I'll Remember Where the Moon Sleeps

I’ll remember where the moon sleeps
When the whole house settles in its hold,
Where the midnight patter soon creeps,
Countless blankets shake and glow against the cold.
I’ll remember wooden stair creaks,
Countless laughters in tumbling descent,
From merry smiles and happy hair, cheeks,
Hands, to joyful sniffing noses upward bent.
The garland of their youth was winter at its rift,
And hearth beheld the mittens after snowmen spent their shift.
The ovens baked of shortbread had never had their fill,
And tunes waft high and carry to the tree around the sill.
I see you when the glistening trees
Shake silver full of flakes
And lights go blind
And lend the mind
(One winter’s all it takes)
To passersby, and the shadow on the stair,
A frost encrusted window for the laying on of care.
One Christmas without Grandma, though, is all the family sees.

Off the Porch

The sun slowly shades
Beneath the trees, beneath the trees
And glitters with the pines
Its wispy rays.
The world whispers in its gray resolve
From skyline piercing arbor
To the creek’s articulate sway
Were blue the sky of boundless pleasure
Shade the sigh of artful being.

Depthless are the summer leaves
Which brim each golden cup to bleed.
So deep and soundless is the stream
Calls out a grave around with rocks
And breathing is the breeze
Which bears all sense fruition
Deathless like the sun
Which sinks to bear in mind transition.

We whisper in the grass
Softly sighs the sun

We whisper in the grass
To weep moon-weary gasps

For naked are the trees
Who hold in hallow hue their heart
And skeletal the stagnant stones
Which water brims to beam their very bones.

And as the sun is known alive when
Dying
All the world must whisper bones to go.

When Adam’s leaves were clenched to hide his sin
The thorny blight choked out
The lushest hue into dispair.

I Have Words

I have words
Waiting to cry out
Waiting to scream and wail
Through weeping sing.

We know that words
Wait in worlds around us
Looking like the shafts of life
To settle in the movement of my soul
Like rays that lend a gracious hue.

And I have words to the Eternal
And though they came from me they came from You.
Once waiting on Your dwelling heart
They wait on You
Through groaning truth
And ceaseless praise.

(October 9, 2008)