By ushered dawn
I’ll whisper long,
By winds since gone
I’ll sigh.
By fountains bold
I’ll summon hold,
By ancient song
I’ll try.
By stars above
I’ll call on love,
By mountains tall
I’ll cry;
By limbs of oak,
By none things spoke,
By thread of Nature’s cloak,
I now invoke.
Much more,
Than I.
What
is this thing -
this commune of souls
we now join?
Like calm weirpool’s rest
after spin of current
washing names
from stones.
You have entered me
and I have entered you
and we are one -
beneath the wind,
beneath the river kiss,
beneath even clefted earth.
And still we ask.
Who holds the ropes
That tug the pulleyed sky?
Who drapes the blinds of night
O’er blinking lamp of day?
They, with black-out eventide,
Down cross dusked light,
Bringing scene-changed actors back;
To curtain call of spotlight moon.
Much more than stagehand turnaround,
More than cued-up interlude,
More indeed than men can comprehend.
Who masterminds this sunset show?
This finely tuned performances -
Before a thousand billion heartfelt bows
I need to tell them how I feel,
Who are they? Do you know?
Does a flame know when it burns?
Or of its brethren’s fellow toil?
All burn bright because they must
And all of this is down to trust.
Is this faith, or faith in destiny?
No call to idols and unproved deities,
Who comprehend these things that vex
Apart from Artist’s charcoal scratch.
Older than I’ll ever be
and wider than the stars
wiser than desires of ours
boulder to the grains of we.
My head is a palace of song
Where sleepy kings and families
Do lie and wait for melodies
That raise the slumbered heart
And teach the dance of life itself.
My head is a golden opera
Where Divas sing of passion
Of life’s regret and tragedy
And grand style dramas played
To dressed coat balconies.
My head is a cathederal cave,
Explored by none but bats and stalagtites,
And darkened echoes that call for me
To strike a match and read scribblings
Of singers and songs, of dances over flame.
I hear this music, but wait …
For stone ochred harmony in the night,
For feeling wind sighing against the walls,
For determined tone through maze of souls.
All resolved in lone-voiced melody, arpeggio blown
Into the nothingness - singular, beautiful, pure.
I am waiting for god’s wistful call.
Tell me how
to make the leap,
the hop from here
to where I want to be.
Show me how
to arc my thoughts
to someplace
new.
Help me
scale the hurdles,
jump the fences,
cut the bindings -
banish gravity!
And I promise,
I’ll move closer
to the island
that is
you.
Goddamn freaks!
What gives them the right
to be more enlightened than me?
I’ve paid my dues to humble servitude
and non-dyed collar platitudes.
Their cheesecloth talk and cosmic hop
is mere thrift sale Buddhist eclectic fop.
Arrrrrgh! Such positivism drives me crazy!
Through bleary nights and an empty glass
That’s where you’ll find the promised way
From bar-stool muse to sucker fool blues
In one queasy step - right foot tripping left
Through the urinated alley that is life.
It IS easy - just stumble over here,
and buy another beer.