night train
the Lark requests that I
bark like a hound as it passes
but of course a train
never makes requests
a thing of steel without a
soul it roars through the night
leaving me to wonder where
it could take me
somewhere inside myself I
know everything about it
cold iron rails beneath
steel wheels forged in a foundry
it can’t know what I know,
can’t ask questions for itself
yet, the Lark requests
that I bark like a hound as it passes
race cars run on a deep-grooved blacktop
rubbling car tires spline ribbed
surfaces
while rpms register on cockpit
tachometers
like a Camaro briefly reflected
in mirror sunglasses
or sound furrowing like
needles into vinyl records
our human race considers oxen-dumb
jibber-jabber
like a wind blowing no
good over a race track
and meandering day after
night both to be sensible
going further faster to no
avail like a 45 on 78 rpm
IN MONGOLIA
Surmise that on merit I am
the Emperor of Mongolia at such mercurial time and circumstance that this is the
needful
Might I order my awesome
imperial complex built on the plain where currently dinosaur fossils proliferate
Shall I send my otherworldly
emissaries with meticulously crafted plans to Patagonia to isolate, quarry and
cut the exact stones needed for my re-creation of the Great Pyramid of Cheops
upon the Mongolian Dinosaur Plain at the center of the Imperial complex of Luxury
– yes, I think so
And with stones dressed,
finished, polished and blessed they become the latter day instantiation of the
Great Pyramid of Cheops (only better) -- with the all-seeing eye at its
pinnacle, glowering down at ancient, current and future worlds at my whim-behest
shall I beam with pride
Certainly no one objects
and everyone leaps on-board with this pleasurable program; and schedules,
tariffs and rules are devised for all to visit this Mongolian wonderland to be-pilgrim,
marvel, and study fossils, wondering about the rise and fall of the ages of
reptiles without regard to how that reflects on my contemporary age
And I assume to execute
orders for operations to maintain the Imperial Complex Status Quo for millennia,
indoctrinate world citizenry and create belief systems such that humanity obeys
my silliness re: the primacy of the pyramid complex with absolute blind devotion
Whereas plagues are
inevitable I arrange abolition by assembling a really smart team of epidemiologists,
doctors and pharmaceutical research and development teams; environmental
engineers and climatologists to work full-time on health control and population
maintenance.
On the other hand, I might
choose to do none of this and just remain an anonymous poet with no sway in
Mongolia or anywhere else and merely await implementation of this brilliant
scheme someday haphazardly.
Walking a Small Dog
A bird wrinkles a low
branch
as a hawk pierces the
stillness
and in a swoop a bird
passes the wrinkle deeper
into shade
I see motion, I hear the
shrieks, see color
brown against green
through leaves
Something is about to
happen
beyond my inattention
Routine
Business
Levitation
Blindness
Inaction
Escape
Motion
Velocity
A building high above the mist
The moon standing still in the sky
The forest casting living shadows
The wind blowing with abandon
Do not hesitate
Escape!
Together in movement
Moving
Scrambling
We must go!
The building glows from on high
A place of gold and comfort
Radiant with brilliant color
After you enter, realization comes to you
The skeleton of our leader is found in an
automobile
Its motor is leaking dark oil and stink
We must drive it away from here
To a remote, alien place
Come along with me, we are going now
Escape!
The reptile within is taking control
We cannot deny it
Our span of control is infinite
Stop the Earth too, in its tracks
Crawl to the pavilion in the whirling sound
Escape now!
Pink Ginger
Flailing nixes of cruciform thunks
flunked as badly as the skunk stunk
warbling junk to monsieur le drunk punk
or so informs a crunk quidnunc monk
Ginger got her jack-in-the-box gunk
which went funk and clunk into a trunk
then slunk downward and sunk
away from he who plunks a song chunk
Who warbled and what song was it when
the downward spelunk spunk clinked and sunk
What nixes fixed the stinking rupture skunk
to the libelous brotherly rapscallion-men
Now, Ginger Pink suddenly slinks down to sink
into the drink in her jack-in-the-box mink
mountain whiskey
with clear head freed of media
water-conjured I swig
rivulent ancient essence
cold met with grainy heat
and time to unite
invisible spirits
of unknown variables
pickle barrel
brine cumber cuber seedsmore
sharp system stave
rationally reified unusual usuals
float forever jar retraction
I am a man wandering in to buy
realms of pickles the stars of which
fabricate smiling Czechoslovakian
sandwich blue plate specialities
down home not loose enough
to remember bright greenery
via pickle juice transparent hands
flown like birds down into green air
snack and tartar sauce garnished
in Friday night fish fry apogees
Euphonic Dysphonia
An
annual hemispheric exfoliation sequence is a testament to celebration, sharing
of food and drink that runs through the history, legacy, and plans of our
agency; signals the passage of seasonal life, like signal flags turning in the
wind exploding in bright and colorful traditional folk costumes, native dresses
forged in patchworks consisting of cookie-cutter styles per the ancien regime method
as teardrops fall into a silent lake.
Underground
ox-wheels maintain illusions fluttering in the air as the festival capers on instant
by instant before the first freeze tinges with sadness.
People
lined up in the distance smile widely, laughing while shouting vivid sayings
known for happiness day and night. Children sneak in and out of doorways where stockpiled
sweets draw them the delirious village offspring whose laughter echoes down the
stone streets pursuing pinwheeling stilt-giants and feathered clowns with an unheard
loon flying over that darkness in light.
The
chickens stutter and dance as heads bounce in anticipation of the revelries.
Foxes, wolves, raccoons and other nocturnal bandits in constant crowd evasions
list from events. Dogs, cats and domestic birds become invisible in buildings
and under them, scuffling amid the lighthearted danger.
Rudely
hewn barns, shops and huts festooned with dyed streamers and woven straw around
colored pebbles seethe like heaven in the starbright autumnal sunlight like a
celestial city of admiration constructed by magical golden sheep as the shepherds,
rangers and cowhands roll into town. Random frowns cross some brows.
Dance,
sports games, music, parades, care, joy and soul renewal; declamation of heartful speech, vocal recitation
of song, storytelling, poetry and group inspirational recitations. Exchange of seed and goods, handiwork of men,
women and children. Pennants, flags and banners waving. Frivolity. At the equinox.
word by world
the world keeps speed-reading past me
while I slow down to savor each phrase
it rattles off words like a ticker tape
words ideas and ends I don’t care to hear
the olive oil universe is fast and thin
where it should be slow thick perpetual
it is momentary fragmenting temperature
burnt from the grate in a dulled instant
a smokiness instigating clangorous alarms
where lubrication and frictionlessnesses
should abide to counteract toxic ice storms
hovering just beyond our insufficient reason
the words and worlds steal slowly to a crawl
to listen one by one sentence for sentence
Four Dope Jams
|
life popeye and olive oyl simulate and repeat till now is it real now cartoon things think already things I didn’t think thought put upon put up on her shelf upon a shelf just like themselves thinking thwarting ly things situate always to cartoon my mind |
cartoon unlikelinesses and it’s in a blink dazily dozily done astonishedly gravity-defiantly shown through practice makes perfect momentarily forever fictive surrogates in pre-visualization objects unconscious revolve in still time |
|
on-line a mere representation quicktimes its own daydreamily droned self wrinkling away from heavenly obstacles and protrusions of
grandeur over and over then it happens
transcendent I watch again the
againing a burnt imprint of a
dream all ideas being all
ideas that are stuck in place |
dream emblem
at the hearth a speed
of light error subconscientious
nature bwanahat
geological movements as tangerine
universes spin in a big
oozing sacrifice and eons
by moments blow my
collective mind in observational
blips as clattering
chatterbirds of capitol
everyworld streets radiate
a radiant static |
Garden
A brick wall is a kind of sign
one that anyone can read:
no over, no under, no through
Four make an enclosure
to deny the unicorn
Inside, a circular path
is slowly scribed
against four corners
in order to wander
as if still free
Inversions keep us whole
and circles and distance
displace lives we dream of
something false to leverage
recurring what can unwind
Into such a place come formulae
admirable in structure
superimposed from without
on the opposite side
of four walls and consistent
peace
A book cover is a brick wall
We enclose the world just in case,
read it backward so everything is
clear
and test read (forward) so it
seems
to logically progress in reverse
order
Making better sense read backward
a book (supposition by supposition)
may be foundation for previous
claims before its start-proposition
Two brick walls form a frame
for all perambulations in-between
as well as complementary thoughts
and internal silent precedents
Circular nature recalls other thoughts
which follow brick by brick formulae
and designs we find in the facade
as we consider masonry as works
of art
A most attractive approach is design
the brick-wall version of honest
artistry
immediately appealing philosophy
in the form of time and the substance
of a wall
The bite-size-chunk-nature of red
brick
the terseness of moonlight inter-divides
shadows that are sleepwalker-friendly
opposite the thorniness of vines
up walls
Architecture may explain influence
while being debatable but I
hardly agree
its
attraction is aesthetic, and am amused
as I am
by a brick wall on a book cover
