December 26th

I squint now

at the blinking lights

Green and red

Discarded ribbon

in the gutter

A single day later

And the world

has changed

back.

They cannot

yank these things down fast enough.

These memories of hope

That cling like cobwebs

And spring cleaning

is so far off.

In a week

we shall drown the last memories

Of all which has not passed

In a debauchery

Pushing out tradition

For the favored new

Clean slate

Try again.

Youth is so much more coveted

then haggard traditions

Madison Avenue was right

To replace Jesus with Santa Claus

who understands we prefer presents

to forgiveness.

Despite having no resolutions

Save to leave Christmas

to the hucksters;

I fear next year

being snared once again

And I will be caught up in the tinsel

and dizzied by the bells

Tripping over my own

self-righteousness

into the mall

of consumption.

Twenty-four hours later

And the scent of cynicism rises

from the streets

And I pass in

through the revolving door

to exchange the unwanted

And though I find no counter

for compassion or mercy

These leather purses

are exceptionally fine.

A Letter to Death

Angel of Death by Evelyn De Morgan (1890)

They say opposites attract,
And being true, there is no other
To whom I belong more,
My most patient lover,
Who waits in silence

Who waits in the dark.

I know what it is to be trapped,
Inside myself unwanting

To crawl out of bed,
Unable to open the window;
I know what it is to taste
The seeds of passion,
And travel deep

Beyond familiar terrain,
Venturing into the unexplored

Territories of ecstasy;
Like an ancient quest for peyote,
Pleasures of the body

Drugging my mind.

We are so quick

To slap on labels,
The pharmaceutical companies
Have seen to that;
For everything we live
Is but a disease,

A syndrome, a psychosis;
We are not to blame

For the ravages of body and mind

For our choices and our acts;
Surely we must be fixed
For our reactions are anything,
But natural, human, and honest.

Children rush,

When the ride is over
Pushing to the front of the line,
Boarding the rollercoaster yet again,
The slow climb upward as if to Heaven,
Then plunging down at breathtaking speed,
All screams and giggles with each twist and turn,
The rush of the wind, the force that pulls.

Manic, bipolar, paranoid, depressed,
Within accepted parameters of behavior,
Robotic-like in their cars,
Paralysed in traffic
The same time
Every day
Morning
Evening
Crazy.

So I taste this thing called life,
Sometimes sweet and sometimes bitter,
I swallow it nonetheless,
And hunger for more,
Devouring it like the lioness
Victorious in her hunt;
And for this I glory,
For this I suffer.

I know that opposites attract,
And one day you will come for me,
Releasing me as never before,
And I will welcome your attentions,
Willingly I will surrender to you,

After all, finally, I belong to you;
But what you take away,
Cannot be what you desire,
For you are attracted just as much,

To how my hair catches the sunlight,

and is messed by the wind,

By how I laugh, and scream,
You yearn to ride the rollercoaster
To ride beside me, just once;
But that ride is only for me,
As my death is only for you.

Ode to a Balloon

Naturally,

You are red.

Satisfyingly full,

So plump and round.

Yet effortlessly,

Elegantly,

Ephemerally,

You dance with the winds

Though bound by my grasp.

You are joy.

Like a beacon

Signaling to all:

"Here! Here is happiness!"

Bouncing and bobbing,

Celebration cries out;

And the children,

Laughing, squealing,

upon their first sight.

So social a creature;

You delight,

In the company of your own.

Like a pack of animals,

Whatever the hue,

Be it green or blue,

Tangling together

Through and through,

In intimate play,

To part and separate you

Seems selfishly cruel.

 Slender is the string

 That binds you to me.

 My captive,

 You are loyal to none.

 A flighty creature,

 Willful, ready to fly off,

At first opportunity,

 With no thought for me.

Heartless,

To abandon me,

And for what?

For uncertainty.

Always you take risks,

In search of freedom.

Light as air
Floating, drifting,

Up and upwards still,

Away, way far

And farther still.

Just a speck now,

Meaningless.

You might as well

Be a crow,

Or a puff of smoke.

I imagine you still,

Flittering,

From place to place,

Here, now there,

At the slightest whim.

Whimsically flouting

Your newly found power,

Capriciously toying

With the limitlessness sky.

Unbounded,

And so innocently

Unaware.

There.

Two, ten, twenty, or more?

Trees. Branches. Reaching for you.

They watch and wait,

As if with tentacles,

To entangle, to trap.

Or those wires.

Carrying light,

Carrying voices,

So eager to snare you

So ready to possess you.

And if not imprisoned?

Slowly suffocating,

Leaking your last breath?

Violently violated,

Pierced, penetrated,

The final, awful

Explosion!

As you are ripped apart,

Torn from your very self.

My mind aches.

Perhaps 'tis best,

This freedom of yours.

This one chance

To live fully.

To sail,

Among puffy
cotton pink clouds.

And yet you remain
A slave, if only of

The temperamental winds,

Who, blowing fiercely

Ever pushing you

Towards your fate,

Even as you celebrate

Your own perfect nature.

Shell

Sometimes I feel like a shell

Rejected by the ocean

And abandoned on a hostile shore.

You admire the cool curves

And soft colors of my features;

Failing to notice I am hollow inside;

A carcass tossed in the sand.

Wanting to possess me,

You put me in your pocket

And carry me to your home;

Then place me on a shelf

With other’s you’ve collected.

Admiring me, like a trophy,

Comparing me to all the rest.

But all you have is the shell

Of what I really once was.

Two Lions

Two Lions
Representing
Fear and Desire
Pass through the gate
And into this garden
How are we to be alive
Yet remain detached?

Bees cannot control
their endless quest
for the pollen
Do they notice
the complexity of the rose
the scent of the gardenia
Or the burst of orange
from the poppy?

Children rush and tug
Push to be first on the train
Demand coins for balloons
Coins for cookies
Coins to toss in the turtle pond.

Same garden, another day
Rainfall washes the sky
My body draws the rhythm inside
And I am grateful for the drink of life
There is nothing wrong
with the gray sky
the cold wind
Or the mud.

Drink green tea
Underneath the awning
Of the little Japanese hut
The brew warms and is delightful
upon the tongue.
I do not require
time to pass
too quickly here
For there is much
that fills me
In this moment where
Fear and Desire
Do not exist.

Without Logic

Indian Ma, oil painting 1992,
artist information at bhawana.gather.com

The logic of babies is lost upon man,

Who never had one grow in his belly,

Who was never ripped apart to bring her to this world,

Nor bared a breast to supply her with life.

What is more natural than to cry out,

when your belly aches for food?

To send out a call when the warmth goes away,

When you are left in the dark without touch?

It’s man who lives illogically,

He sits in the excrement of his words,

Caked upon the cavernous floors of

Backstabbing power and blood-stained wealth.

In a few short years she has learned to wiggle and walk,

To giggle and talk making men gush with delight.

Whatever she needs, they do with a smile,

Whatever she does, they lavish their praise.

Who is without the logic indeed?

If only they made diapers

For the bullshit born of men.

Reflections on the Cross

He suffered and died on the cross
They say it was for me.
They say he is the way of salvation
The promise of eternal life.

I played the drum at the ball court;
I cried as Vikings torched my village;
With rifle in hand I slipped through the quiet forest;
And lit my cigarette, late one night,
Walking, again, through the city's dank streets;
This time I nursed a babe;
Next time I'll pilot a plane.

My suffering I do alone
Though sometimes
I delude myself
Believing there is someone
who watches, who knows,
Exactly the way I do.

Today the roses spoke to me,
Pinks and reds,
and yellows and white,
Like a lover, caressing my senses.

Paradoxes, placed
Upon the cross of sacrifice
These blooms are the anti-thesis,
They are a burst – a rocketblast of life
Egotistical and demanding,
even as they delight,
Destined to decay,
Destined to be no more,
Destined, just like me.

Another rose will grow,
this season and the next.
For years to come,
For centuries,
And that’s not enough for me.

I’ll spin around
On this merry-go-round
For many more a ride
I want to be dizzy
And laugh
And get sick.
I want to bleed
And taste of the wine
And know what it is
to burn in the flame
I long for the heat
Of my lover again.
No, I am not yet ready,
Not ready to be saved.

The Girl Who Played With Fire

Well, I drove the old pickup on over to Ford County,

On account of the girl who played with fire;

Stood there watching from under the dome

Of that crazy church they call the Alter of Eden.

That blaze was too big to fail,

the whole damn town was going rouge;

and I, Alex Cross, felt pretty fired up

at the sizzle and the smoke and the smolder.

Saw one of the firefighters arguing with idiots,

Who wouldn't move the Imperial Cruiser off the road;

All the while the joint smelled like someone had mastered

The art of french cooking -- if the french cooked roadkill

Buried deep in kimchee and deadman, and then dug up again.

I never did know what the dog saw

That caused him to run off like a pilgrim finding the lost symbol.

"Have a little faith," was what Janet Outliers whispered in my ear;

But I was off, after the dog, passing the unnoticed boys

Who lurked in the shadows, throwing stones into schools.

What is our true compass?

My happiness project has failed, there is no 4-hour work week.

Were I someone else, were I, sniper, a killer with a stone for a heart,

Who cared for nothing, not even about the honor of spies;

I could fire the last song into the crowd, and care not, like the girl,

Like the girl who played with fire.

But I am like you,

And U is for undertow,

Even as we all sink slowly down;

Drowning so slowly in pirate latitudes,

We barely notice

When our breath at last fails.

Note: I wrote this poem from a prompt using best seller titles.

Skunk Train

The Skunk Train travels from Fort Bragg to Willits, CA

We two

Chug along through

Greens, golds, browns – a woodsy hue.

Redwoods tall – a glorious view.

Choo Choo!

Outrage Poem #2

The Scream as Warhol
by J Wochholz (c) 2010

On the wintergreen pink

Cherry coke wall

Hung the Warhol of her

Carnival mirror face

Boarded in black

The orange block lettering

STUPID GIRL
STUDIP GIRL
STUPID GIRL

Like a rap a tap on Halloween

Come calling with a Gatling gun

Firing her coffin nails

You’d fare better

Sitting in a pile of warm dog shit

With a knife shoved in your neck

Than exposing yourself

To what he calls love

Imagine

Swirls of darkess
trickle like mercury
purple black
becomes midnight blue
that flows like a river
dusted with starlight
towards the creeping dawn
I heard it first
my morning song
its breathe was here
before my mind discovered it
Take flight with the birds
to clouds pink golden blond
Where shimmering glass
castles watch over
green pastures of sheep
while mythical folk play
tricks on the innocents
A thunderous clap
and showers burst forth
I search for my lover
and find him waiting
beneath a cypress tree
with mangoes red wine chocolates
and warm melting kisses
from his generous mouth
Sink into the cool earth
and our limbs like the vines
and roots that take hold
of the fury of living
And this, this
is only my Monday

Crosswords

Pencil & Crossword by Darren Maurer (c) 2008
(#211 of painting a day series)

Blank spaces

Filled with nothingness.

I am surrounded by words.

Across or down;

I find no way out,

Of this two dimensional dementia.

I’m gridlocked,

In the crossroads of the crosswords.

Lost in Times Square,

Or the Times’ squares?

I’ve no time to squander

With squabbly squares,

That keep surroundingly

Spinning around in my mind.

Games.

Some sinister squibbler,

Is playing mind games.

Some pedantic semanticist;

Who serves blackened vagary,

With white rice and strained puns

For dinner;

A fanatic

Who's frantic

I make order

From his antics.

I imagine him,

There in his parlour,

With the checkerboard floor;

Antiquated references

Lining the walls’ shelves.

Deep within he works

Weaving his web;

Out of the gray matter,

He’s forgotten to dust.

Kalisa

In a photograph I took of her

Kalisa stands in the late afternoon sun

Hunched over in the doorway

Of her beat up cottage

Overlooking Cannery Row.

I don’t have a photograph

Of the night thirty years ago

Hours after the jazz festival

had finished for that day,

Of Dizzy, and Percy, and a hundred others

Hanging out at Kalisa’s.

And there never was a photograph

Of Kalisa as a girl

Laying covered up by water

In a fountain on the streets of Dresden

As the bombs were dropped

And the city and its inhabitants burned.

Kalisa has photographs, though,

All over her walls:

Of Steinbeck and Doc Ricketts,

Of exotic belly dancers,

And a beautiful one of herself:

reposed in a chair, glancing away.

For some people’s lives are like that,

Some people like Kalisa.

The Meaning of Life

'Angels Dancing Before the Sun' by Giovanni di Paolo di Grazia

After I realized I was happy

For no particular reason

No lottery had I won

No screenplay had I sold

Just the planets of my life

Aligned in symbiotic symmetry

The needs of the body

The needs of the soul

The needs of a creative mind

Revolved in a harmonious dance

That I had at last learned.

A call at the end of the day

And the laugh I had shared

With my angel

Would never

Be heard again.

Zen masters forgot to read

Newton’s laws of thermodynamics

As much as they strive to be bodies at rest

Their essence is not absolute zero

But heat, throbbing, alive

Forever moving towards chaos

How many angels are balanced

Upon the head of that pin?

None, I tell you,

For I once stood there,

For one nanosecond

And witnessed their scramble

To remain stable and sure

In this tilted universe

Without center

Without edges

Without within

Nor inside out.

After I found

The meaning of life

I discovered

God had asked

A trick question.

Whole

Chartres Cathedral Rose Window

And you

like a stained glass window

through which the light shines

At the memorial service

They play Bach on the piano

And I am transported into my childhood bed

where I lay early one Sunday morn

Downstairs my mother’s fingers dance

Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring

Almost three hundred years ago

Melodic Mathematics

expressing his love of God

Who died upon a cross

seventeen hundred years earlier

Dusty dry backwaters of an Empire

Fishermen and a carpenter

the wood from which

my rocking chair was carved

I sat in the dark

and nursed my babe

Sublime suckling

Her art hanging on the wall

Where she taped it today

Tonight the glow

of a distant star

at last reaches my eye

after eighty thousand years

All things are woven together

And the circle is whole

Jerusalem

Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives by Frederic Church (1870)

Eyes always sighted
The blind wonders how
it is to be achieved
walking into walls
and holes that evil doers
move about with malice and glee
Stay still! Shout the wise ones
Listen to the drip from the bamboo
water pipe or the breeze
as it strikes
the bluish flowers
But I think instead
of the hummingbird
trapped inside my garage
panic stricken he flew upwards
Though escape lay downward
He found the light at last
just before twilight ceased
and took nourishment from
the orange blossoms

discovered waiting
just beyond his prison.
Where is my nourishment?
I wonder as I seek my escape
in the wrong direction
as night begins to fall.

Listening, no one replies.