Here in my late autumn

Here in my late autumn

Trees behind the bare trees

Have grown more evident

I found the woods of me

Beyond old echoes my

Phoenix sings their swan song

Now stars the canopy

New yodels yearning strong

These intimate garments

These intimate garments

Hung out on a clothesline

My dying canary

Or the evergreen pine

The silly and sully

The passion and perish

Moments of pleasure and

The dreaded nightmarish 

A kiss on the forehead

A kiss on the forehead

A brush against the cheek

A pat on the back and

The gentle words we speak

The touching of the hands

A look into the eyes

A long hug and that's Life

And then the sad goodbyes

Surviving our childhoods

Surviving our childhoods

Floating a sense of Hope

Inside the perilous

Untethered without rope

Inspiration buoying

With your success in sight

To define myself that

A capsize can upright

Planning for the future

Planning for the future

The only true abstract

The kinetic landscape

Where chaos turns exact

And finds definition

Swinging hammer to nail

Vapors and future verbs

Solidify detail

Avoiding any trend

Avoiding any trend

But fashionably late

An oak tree in navy

Birds in shoes out-of-date

The cutting-edge grows dull

But passion is real

Time cannot take from it

Fundamental as wheel

All these Rothko poems

All these Rothko poems

Of two color blocks stacked

Can I haiku or ode

This self-imposed word tract

In my mind I Chagall

Or Van Gogh or Vermeer

But when the words settle

They are always two tier

Looking for the entry

Looking for the entry

Of the artistic stone

In dance, in music or

In Life, where ever thrown

The beginning, the start

And not on the ripple

Originality

Not sucking a nipple

Nothing special or grand

Nothing special or grand

Just a beautiful day

Finding myself happy

With so little to say

Wordsmithing and wonder

And pondering aside

Just enjoying the time

As I roll on, yes glide

So much is seeping through

So much is seeping through 

Efforts left for the trash 

Arches without keystones 

My heart a hidden stash

Growing old as fewer 

Chances present themselves 

Wanting new perspectives 

Six to one, half of twelves

Born without arsenal

Born without arsenal 

Trying hard to defend

Weak against enemies 

And gullible to friends 

Time and experience 

Pencil sketches to oils

Protecting boundaries 

Bridge over troubled boils

Here in the darkness peace

Here in the darkness peace

Two black cloaks on the World

Two sleeping bees in the

Joe Pye Weed flowers curled

And when my eyes open

A sense of solitude

The individual

Amid the multitude

Without dam, without walls

Without dam, without walls

My valley wide to wide

Immersing myself in

This tsunami of tide

My homestead of thought hit

I will need to rebuild

All that I knew is gone

The open mind's been filled

The beauty of silence

The beauty of silence

No echoing or call

Travelling butterfly

When the flapping wings stall

When the eyes see silence

Constellation or cloud

Bulbs breaking ground, moments

Of prayers in a crowd

The time passing unmarked

The time passing unmarked

Speeding empty train cars
And like clouds, can’t be held
Nor the sky and it’s stars

Grasping for graffiti
Or thimbles full of thought
But days, a rushing daze
Fleeting and can’t be caught

The Overwhelm surprise

The Overwhelm surprise

Placid clouds, diffused light

A slumber of silence

Gentle peaceful twilight 

Expanding the heart

Inhaling the exhale

All the intake of one

Incredible detail

Self-centered and awry

Self-centered and awry

The spinning plate wobbles

Too much perched upon the

Self in time just bobbles

All witnesses must lie

And not speak of the fall 

Someone must be at fault

Not self, no not at all

Problems are not clover

Problems are not clover

There’s more than boats and oars

Oceans ever changing 

Mine are not just like yours

Sense similarities 

See differences, listen

So much is fingerprint 

Each problem a christen

On a clarinet note

On a clarinet note

Lonely twilight winter

Sentences tossed until

They break apart, splinter

In the evening vacuum

Bumpering left and right

Seeking punctuation

To make the words finite

My blood is stained in spots

My blood is stained in spots

The stains pass through my heart

Superbird gone, starfish

With rays somehow apart

Under the piano

Turtles from Chinatown

And Mrs. Robinson

Dead in the road they found

We are cutting loose threads

We are cutting loose threads

For a better finish

We tidy up our lives

So not to diminish

Yet struggles and dead-ends

The processes of work

Are part of the journey

To finery from quirk

In between two deep breaths

In between two deep breaths

Is the center of change

The uprooting of same

For the unknown of strange

And learn from our mistakes

Take note, guardrail the heart

Feel and feel better, let

Time invite and not part

Demising these thoughts of

Demising these thoughts of

Bridges without bases

No chance of arrival

No destiny places

In this corner of World

Tending to shoelaces

Life, a series of steps

Small crumbs or no traces

In white oil paint rolling

In white oil paint rolling

On avenues of yes

Moments incidental

Keep asking me to guess

Blanking out the present

Elevating from past

In clouds of existence

Ever changing forecast

Here in the turbulent

Here in the turbulent

Navigating the wake

Cross-hatching and weaving

Against the water break

So difficult to live

When you are surviving

Necessity comes first

To avoid crash diving

Find a fresh perspective

Find a fresh perspective

Back away from the cliff

Are these real mountains

Or merely but a drift

Whether my perceptions

Be either true or false

The intent is to change

Add a beat to a waltz

Basking in autumn light

Basking in autumn light

A homeless man aloof

His walls exterior

The sky above his roof

What a day like today

Must be for the fateful

I in my pleasure dome

Questioning my grateful

A distortion exists

A distortion exists

A breached reality

Not a broken promise

And not duality

A fragile filament

Acting as a lighthouse

Ships seeking safe harbor

Lured into a shithouse

Across sunsetting fields

Across sunsetting fields

Sensing longevity

An oak standing in rows

Yet, purely brevity

The beauty of being

The good and bad and such

How much it means to us

But that, too, is not much

Privacy and fishbowl

Privacy and fishbowl

My mantra, a motto

A dingy mid-ocean

Silent winning lotto

The message is not mixed

Not visiting Venus

Our two bloody thumbs meet

It's not intravenous

Nothing left on these bones

Nothing left on these bones

The carcass is picked clean

A skull head in the sand

Even vultures can glean

First life is gone and then

Anything life-giving

A circle of mushrooms

For a tree not living

Up above silent planes

Up above silent planes

And below on the ground

Fall shadows long and stretched

On this small piece of round

And all the come what mays

That never came to be

Are not in this round hole

With this round peg of me

In a forgetfulness

In a forgetfulness

Waking a sliver slice

A sequence of seconds

Gone forever suffice

Even the packages

Tied with ribbons and bows

Are suffering the loss

Of who recalls or knows

Releasing, letting go

Releasing, letting go

Our two paper sailboats

And coins tossed and like them

Our wishes didn't float

Crayons, coloring books

We both ignored the lines

You were in the fringes

I was outside the bind

The sixth of January

The sixth of January

The counting protested

Q population, the

Ignorant molested

Rabbit holes now fox holes

A civil war pending

The south will rise again

Racists never ending

The danger of being

The danger of being

Definition of man

Harm of gender bias

Starts in names, Stan or Anne

Feminine masculine

The fourth position rad

Or an upper hook, the

Same movement just a tad

Pages after pages

Pages after pages

In a Ulysses day

Seeing the blank margins

With no typeset display

Is it in nothingness

That we dream without text

How do we explain the

Empty paragraph next

Nomadic narcissist

Nomadic narcissist

Empty lobster cages

Nets without a starfish

The internal rages

A shepherd seeking sheep

They travel to the bleat 

But sooner or later

They will shit where they eat

In the bleak of abstract

In the bleak of abstract

A broadside accident

A collision of thoughts

Untimely evident

Like two grave stones bumping

Two matches lit and burn

All in the openness

An illegal left turn

It's coming to a close

It's coming to a close

I'm reading the road sign

Halted Icarus, the

Horizon a clothesline

No radio signals

Echoes less than half-full

Fireworks falling or clay

Pigeons after the pull

In the end it's my fault

In the end it's my fault

Boundaries were not set

The permission given

For leeches to blood let

Forgiving myself and

Forgiving all others

My failures and their faults

Mother, sisters, brothers

The years in a desert

The years in a desert

All dry mouthed and tongue-tied

What was a worn path that

Sand storms would always hide

In this oasis void

Chasing the mirages

My heart on my sleeves but

Hand-cuffed with corsages

In long shadows longing

In long shadows longing

For a winter cocoon

The softness of snowfall

And clouds veiling the moon

Reflection and planning

The ago and the when

Reaching the conclusions

Of we will and have been

My mother refusing

My mother refusing

Cast out from her Eden

Love a bad apple not

Live forever sedum

So unapproachable

Both tortured and feral

I'm here in the future

Surviving the peril

Abundant Overwhelm

Abundant Overwhelm

Drowning without struggle

Not buoyant and bouncing

An ocean wave juggle

Accepting the stained glass

Broken surface pieces

Light hitting water on

One of Earth's timepieces  

The choices of mundane

The choices of mundane

From lifestyles to clothing

Wanting to look the same

Eyeballing and noting

Find the inner self and

The points of no return

Choose these lessons in Life

To know thyself and learn

Enjoying the balance

Enjoying the balance

Proportions are in scale

The right amount of clouds

In the perfect detail

And the blue dome of sky

With a sun at its peak

With both of us below

Expressing without speak

The dreams we traded in

The dreams we traded in

Used and worn, shot with holes

We slowly outgrew them

With our wandering souls

Becoming a friend who

Can only reminisce

Of times long ago now

A suburban abyss

Are we re-writing days

Are we re-writing days

To make useful and serve

The past cannot be changed

That we hold in reserve

Days are like wooden plaques

Writ with moments we felt

And not for mold casting

Because wood doesn't melt

Answers in the abstract

Answers in the abstract

Fishing in the abyss

Beyond our wild senses

To live and not remiss

Discarding references

Verberating the noun

Neighboring the notes to

Resolve discords of sound

Shangri-La's dark alley

Shangri-La's dark alley

Where the narcissist shacks

Used grandiose needles 

Marking both arms with tracks

Where magical thinking

Is a daily prayer

When they hear a calling

It's them calling, beware

In this October light

In this October light

With fallen shawls of leaves

Beneath the locust tree

These days of winter eves

A storm is closing in

The temperature dropping

With the loss of shadows

And fields of corn cropping

Chiseled names last longer

Chiseled names last longer

Than the conversation

In these mortal stories

No self-preservation

Grandmother, grandfather

There's nothing of you here

But aging DNA

Dead-ending, that is clear

Reluctant memory

Reluctant memory 

The same static sentence

The person who said it

Did not show repentance 

They passed away but were

Forgiven long ago

And without an utter

Yet in my heart I know

Allow this tree to walk

Allow this tree to walk

Without fuss or applause

Or chorus or cheering

Just the quiet of pause

No longer having strength 

The energy of crowds

Longing for open fields 

With my own set of clouds

A sky unfitting of

A sky unfitting of

Time of season or day

Clouds close enough to touch

A moon not far away

Seeing faces of friends

On strangers passing by

Basking in the beauty

Of an uncommon sky

Growing laurel branches

Growing laurel branches

I can't succumb to this

Your strong sense of wanting

The doorstep of a kiss

The portraits you've painted

Colorful impasto

Fresh until disrupted 

A muddy fiasco

Beyond derivative

Beyond derivative

Beyond the fingerprint

An artist extinction

The snuffing of a glint

The infinite monkey

Would be our only chance

Replacing their keyboard

With their bare feet and dance

Be brave on this new day

Be brave on this new day

Steps from a raw frontier

Old worlds are vanishing

Languages disappear

Change beyond change of light

It is I who is new

The mistakes and success

Are mine for me to do

Your love was a burden

Your love was a burden

Built with broken doorframes

Insecurity glue

On a marsh of false claims

Heavy as a shipyard

Constructing cargo ships

Unwilling to unload

And grounded in boat slips

The watercolors of

The watercolors of

Empathy are bleeding

My yellow and your blue

A green landscape seeding

The softness of the edge

The blurring of the lines

Blend for understanding

Beyond our own confines

Sad when something simple

Sad when something simple

Becomes far too complex

A walking path became

A tightrope and perplex

My reality and

Your delusional dreams

Embedding me with hooks

And not the kinder seams

Our world wider than wide

Our world wider than wide

In the smallest detail

The moments we share are

Halftones on a grand scale

Just fly from our perch and

The above will reveal 

The image of our crest

Our badge, our stamp, our seal

Lazy astronomer

Lazy astronomer

Looking at the light post

The insect satellites

Pecking the cobra host

Are we as bug-eyed when

Seeking an evening sky

Past the moon, into stars

Asking the heavens why

Loose threads like coral reefs

Loose threads like coral reefs

In a toss and turn sea

Rapid murmurations

Stormy tropical tree

Raising all our hands up

Dancing to jazz rhythms

In the daily traffic

Grand opening ribbons

Birth and death and unknowns

Birth and death and unknowns

Our lives between bookends

Held in by mysteries

Of which no one transcends

What are the from and to

Darkness without a light

Living is the answer

The one thing in plain sight

Empathy, compassion

Empathy, compassion

Roots of a Shepherd Tree

Even in the desert

A depth of Nth degree

The Banyan canopy

Offering merchants shade

Being there for others

Without jury or grade

While soaring for wisdom

While soaring for wisdom

Up from low hanging fruit

I began to question

The need of my pursuit

A greater happiness

Deeper understanding

The failure to find it

Is just a crash landing

Walden Pond polluted

Walden Pond polluted

Leaves of Grass are browning

Greta growing grumpy

With good reason frowning

Iv'ry billed woodpecker

And twenty-two more

Species now extinct with

No future, just before

There are too many lost

There are too many lost

We must hold a counting

Find the shepherd in us

The numbers are mounting

The lifeboats embarking

Lifesavers will be thrown

We must try and rescue

The ones who are more prone

Real reality

Real reality

A star is just a star

Wishes wafting upwards

They never get that far

Youth, a lost possession 

But we find character 

Our words tended flowers

Our actions the nectar

September painted light

September painted light

Yellow and gold with white

The moon without its night

A witness to it all

Soft notes of a wind chime

As the day ends its climb

No sense of the true time

Not answering the call

Collapsing foundations

Collapsing foundations

Preparing for the worst

Facts being made fiction

Truth seekers being cursed

Stealing what's not stolen

A tragedy of fools

Someone lies, someone dies

The elephants are mules

Poetry like Christo

Poetry like Christo

Moments in a wrapping

Both intense and fleeting

The Raven is tapping

Present then nevermore

Now stories to be told

Words riveted into

A digest, a skirt fold

A divided spirit

A divided spirit

Without a dual heart

Both math and emotion

Yet a pushpin on Art

Sporadic energy

A mosaic of mixed

But a central essence

Unwavering and fixed

No consequences for

No consequences for

Lying to our neighbors

For distorting the truth 

With all sorts of flavors

Wrapping the lies in flags

Yelling fight for freedom

Refuse to wear a mask

It's a choice to be dumb

Piece of stained glass window

Piece of stained glass window

Broken winged butterfly

The fish bowl is cracking

Not long now, it will cry

And not long thereafter

Shangri 'la burns like film

Hopes of clay spun like gold

Will break within the kiln

Far and then further out

Far and then further out

Beyond rescue mission

No sign of lighthouses

Northern Star omission

When the gut is guidance

The heart is unhampered

Emotions raw and red

Begging to be pampered

In the light and close up

In the light and close up

The flaws are standing out

This rickety structure

Need to miter self-doubt

Thoughts live a rural Life

As off the road drifters

Self-awareness prevents

Succumbing to grifters

Before the full circle

Before the full circle 

In this arc of the day

A rush to gain traction

To answer Hopes not pray

To produce and to tend

Before the overripe 

The passing of chances

And left only to gripe

This is meant to impress

This is meant to impress

From the shallow to deep

A verve for the living

Dreams billowing in sleep

But what is its substance

Organic or plastic

Consumption, expansion

Mundane or fantastic

Time gives and takes away

Time gives and takes away

Leaving on arrival

Moments lost in ever

No hope for survival

Dust and little glitter

Future rarely knocking

On the closed doors of past

Time ticking and tocking

Autumn is now bedside

Autumn is now bedside

The long summer ailing

With apples ripening

As their leaves start paling

The sun sinking faster

Quick as a Times Square drop

The temperatures follow

So too the cornfield crop

September eleventh

On August the seventh

The great Phillipe Petit

Stepped where no one has stepped

And now can not repeat

September eleventh

The World Trade Centers fell

The innocent murdered

In a terrorist hell

Everyday arriving

Everyday arriving 

The answer is living

To all of Life’s questions 

Without a misgiving 

It is not inquiries 

That matter in the end

We answer by doing

Verbs, actions and expend

Here is a wave for you

Here is a wave for you

This teardrop of potion

This single small plating

Imagine the ocean

Seek the soul in the troughs

And lose sight of the shore

Take a step on a crest

And telescope explore

I am not a Judas

I am not a Judas

Nor lucky Barabbas

Update your perceptions

Put down your abacus

Grow up as I have grown

In emotional school

Act your age, be adult

Abandon the slide rule

One foot nailed to the floor

One foot nailed to the floor

Circle like a chained dog

Even earth is caught in

A galatical cog

We build with corners yet

They are not to be found

In the natural world

It must be curves or round 

Are we all fallen leaves

Are we all fallen leaves 

Lost S.O.S. bottles 

Lone experience forged

Self-made Aristotles 

Or jesters, case may be

If not for empathy 

Our leaves and bottles would 

Collect but not find We

I haven’t climbed mountains

I haven’t climbed mountains 

And haven’t crossed a sea

So why are these landscapes

So embedded in me

Dreams never reach the stars

Heaven is just a hope

I merely jumped a creek

And slowly walked a slope

Planning for the future

Planning for the future 

Experience waiting 

Flexible and rigid 

Choices still debating 

The fruit is ripening 

The trees are adding rings 

Eager budding with the

Discovery of things 

Song to clouds and canyon

Song to clouds and canyon

Blue roses court miles plus

A summer Hejira

Is Reckless aMingst us

Wild dog in a rain storm

Night indigo sign

With the tiger they both

Now must travelogue shine

First the sun like a bird

First the sun like a bird

In the palm of my hand

Then pushing it into

Pacific oceanland

Yesterday's footprints are

Erased by wind and sand

Like childhood, like youth, the

Generational And

Each time we are leaving

Each time we are leaving

Ruth, Georgie or Stevie

Will they be alright while

We're taking it easy

They say love never dies

And every vacation

They are there at the start

Without expiration

In this fury and blur

In this fury and blur

It's a whirlpool fishbowl

Grabbing, clutching, holding

Moments from the black hole

That warm room in winter

In thick woodwork and calm

We lifted ourselves up

A small pool in our palm

The city skyscrapers

The city skyscrapers

With their Rudolph noses

Are still sitting empty

As this season closes

The corporate ladder

Now a kitchen step stool

Water cooler meetings

Are void as the carpool

The chord still strikes today

The chord still strikes today

Emotion memory

Here again, hear it play

Never gone embery

In my heart residing

Beside me, beside you

A love undividing

For any part is true

Alive in painted light

Alive in painted light

Brushing the underside

Of trees in late summer

Up and down the hillside

And on the ascend just 

A touch more of sun crest

By the time we descend

The sun has gone out west

Amongst the evergreens

Amongst the evergreens

They believe leaves don't fall

The world has it wrong and 

Their arguments stand Tall

The pictures and stories

Can't seem to change their minds

Evergreens, all they know

There can't be other kinds

Adjusting attitude

Adjusting attitude

And how to spend the day

Inviting reactions

That propel and not sway

Seeking a sense of bright

Finding new parts unworn

In touch with happiness

Picking the rose not thorn

Exercise emotions

Exercise emotions

In a stretched out haiku

Word furniture arranged

Poetic sudoku

I am hearing echoes

My anger now whispers

Here I am happier

My angst, it just whimpers

After the Overwhelm

After the Overwhelm

I leave myself behind

There's the All of the World

Outside of my own mind

Introspection takes me

To seek out the full herds

After I free myself

Join the flock of jailbirds

It is time, so I must

It is time, so I must

Bury this elephant

In the deepest, widest

Hole of non-elegance

Not a memorial

This is meant to fossil

Movement forward must leave

Behind this colossal 

Choices are our answers

Choices are our answers

How loud are their replies

Actions are clearer than

All the words of the wise

To view our lives backwards

To explain here and now

It is our chosen path

Where we arrive and how

I am not a singer

I am not a singer

And yet I have a voice

I am not a fighter

A pen is my first choice

Because I cannot hear

I try hard to listen

When I don't understand

I long to be christened

There is no gold to pan

There is no gold to pan

Best get on just living

Accumulate knowledge

Take less, do more giving

Carry the best forward

And rectify the past

Although we are islands

One ocean, we are cast

What does deeper get you

What does deeper get you

Is it greater insight

But sparks in the darkness

Are not a guiding light

Is it the immersion

A summer swim to cool

Cold at first but colder

Getting out of the pool

In this melancholy

In this melancholy 

Its thin clouds filtering

Reality trumps Hope

And begins pilfering

Both weight and weightlessness 

A sinking not a fall

The simple words grasping

The most meaning of all

Exercising my sight

Exercising my sight

Looking for the details

Buried in the vastness

The needles in hay bales

Daily journeys of why

On mysteries of time

Each day may be new but

I'm looking for the rhyme

Love arrives unannounced

Love arrives unannounced

Not by invitation

Ransacking your insides

No negotiation

Shaking the furniture

Until the vase settles

And the daily bouquet

Blooms from buds to petals

Skipping stones are short lived

Skipping stones are short lived

And their ripples as much

Brevity in breaking

The surface with their touch

More past now than future

Needing to skip quicker

Choices and chances are

Beginning to flicker

Lyrics without music

Lyrics without music

Just waiting to be sung

Not a hum or whistle

The notes on bars unstrung

Waiting on wind to bring

A melody alive

Or on a moonlight beam

A sonata arrive

The sun painting a light

The sun painting a light

Made for reminiscing 

Impressionism struck

Look what’s here, what’s missing 

 

Past years are pushing me

Without details or word

I’m a lemming pausing

Wishing I was a bird

Behind the smile such vile

Behind the smile such vile

No feelings and pure rot

Knowledge based on nothing

Injuries not forgot

In a place of power

Swinging their sharp sickle

Poised in nurtured chaos

Not worth a plug nickel

So many young people

So many young people

What are we leaving them

Is it a better world

Here are our crumbs or gem

The progress bulldozer

Do we block and protect

When there is so much we

Have chosen to neglect

Feelings are an abstract

Feelings are an abstract

Words are just park benches

On the landscape of Life

Vast views and deep trenches

To feel as others feel

We can stay for awhile

Look back, down, up or out

And feel their inch or mile

The poet narcissist

The poet narcissist

For me, it is not true

I have empathy, can

Walk a mile in your shoe

I am not a peacock

The shedding snake, I know

And what I don't know is

All therapy not show

This is not about me

This is not about me

It's all our togethers

My heart breaks when yours breaks

Tethers when yours tethers

A shirt inside a shirt

The sharing of the sleeves

Cause for celebration

When our happiness heaves

These modern cave drawings

These modern cave drawings

Lost in books unopened

Bottom of the sea shells

Can't surface, unspoken 

Does it truly matter

It's better to give hope

Than footprints to follow

There is no map, just scope

Second guessing myself

Second guessing myself

And wearing myself out

Can't give unto me the

Benefit of the doubt

Keep school figure skating

Tracing the number eight

Were it three dimensions 

A mobius equate

Seeking a melody

Seeking a melody

Longing for its chorus

Born on experience

Where it is most porous

Uncompromised and true

Notes in brightest marker

Constellations of Life

A song in the darker

Without inhibition

Without inhibition

Like a wind in a storm

Uncontrollable fire

No sense of rule or form

Thoughts breaking like lightning

Like tree roots in a flash

On a spherical eye

That is batting its lash

Unwillingness to change

Unwillingness to change

Some minds can see no choice

Two plus two equals five

Reasoning has no voice

Is there no way to help

When they cannot see fault

A lost combination

On a security vault

Happier than ever

Happier than ever

Fireworks are hollyhocks

The Milky Way, daisies

The evenings, four o'clocks

The only robber, time

Plateaus are long and wide

The future viable

Beethoven's Ninth inside

Emotions without words

Emotions without words

The silence of forest

The steps of Isadora

The alphabet poorest

On the wave of a whelm

In the rush of a race

The expression of joy

And contentment of grace

Fingers, life touching life

Fingers, life touching life

My nose bumping cat nose

Butterflies on stamens

Clover, daisies, a rose

Us leaning into us

In the colassal All

A sleeping bee, a worm

The greatest things are small

Reject this résumé

Reject this résumé

Make it an infamous

With no academics

I can't pass the litmus

Private community

Higher noses and stares

Climbing the social rungs

While I'm sitting on stairs

Squelching the glorious

Squelching the glorious

Trampling the garden bed

It takes years to come back

Without tools in the shed

Planting perennials

For this season and next

Take added protection

Turn concave to convex

My heart went out too far

My heart went out too far

I had to reel it in

In the World's atmosphere

The air had got too thin

It was swollen and raw

It didn't go untouched

Just before it toughened

I had it in my clutch

Are my answers correct

Are my answers correct

Questions I ask of me

Am I dodging the truth

Or objectivity 

Are they what I believe

Or should I say “go fish”

Reality sober

And not just what I wish

This, my chosen canoe

This, my chosen canoe

I am oceans away

From oceans of people

Oars are my drum and sway

Slowly down the stream and

Not so far from the bank

Yet feeling boundless in

This unimprinted blank

Reaching full exposure

Reaching full exposure

Both triumphs and regrets

The happy small nothings

Mistakes no one forgets

The turning of corners

As small as a grass blade

Here, myself spotlit and

Not two leaves worth of shade

Our Lady of Sorrow

Our Lady of Sorrow

I am feeling the loss

The irreversible

The into abyss toss

The love behind a smile

The experienced shared

The future now empty

Like the open arms, bared

Hesitant to hurry

Hesitant to hurry

To reach self-imposed goals

This sight-seeing journey

These days need no controls

A left turn or detour

A backward circle loop

Let's give ourselves the time

To separate the soup

No guardrails for people

No guardrails for people

Boundaries don't exist

Only finding the breaks

When twisted after kissed

Learning to inspect more

Not admiring the bud

Looking at their roots that

Are thriving in the mud

After the forgiveness

After the forgiveness

A stroll inside the pale

No saturation of

Color of any scale

And slowly shades resume

A richness and a blush

A return to vivid

Seeping then flooded lush

Losing eternity

Losing eternity

To give myself a high

To yawn in the moment

With a short-sighted sigh

Open butterfly wings

Turtle sunning their shell

A fish in the castle

Be bewitched without spell

At the peak of the day

At the peak of the day

Across a brief blue sky

A sun slowly moving

With shadows standing by

And nothing more than this

A page in time turning

Wishing for another 

To hope, this heart yearning

Forever is never

Forever is never

Our choices and chances

Don't survive the long run

So little advances

Exist in the moment

Expand the mental lungs

Empathize with others

And hear their native tongues

Look up at the surface

Look up at the surface

At bathers and waders

The kite and wind surfers

The summer wave skaters

But here in the submerged

Counting my every breath

Chasing discovery

In the uncharted depth

I am not a statue

I am not a statue

But emotional dance

Finding rhythm and chords

Choreographed or chance

Spinning for direction

Leaps for personal growth

Emoting, abosrbing

Self or others, and both

A perpetual loop

A perpetual loop

A ferris wheel spinning

The Operator stops

When they sense they're winning

Keep an eye on the turns

When the bottom appears

Jump from the seat and run

'Til the ride disappears

Sensing limitations

Sensing limitations

Amerstdam and Van Gogh

Are not in the future

It's all talk and no show

Burnt bridges in backgrounds

Dream bridges up ahead

Leaves me on an island

With just words being said

I hope you were happy

I hope you were happy

Were we drowning in joy

Was there power in love

Creating not destroy

Did all your flowers bloom

Did every seed come up

Tending each others dreams

Cherish and not disrupt

The victim asking why

The victim asking why

Survivors seeking how

Regardless of weather

Press on and push the plow

Seeing a safer place

Securing a way out

This is how to survive

And why just thereabout

Please come dune with us as

Please come dune with us as

We let the wind give shape

To the day in nature

On this beach and small cape

In the movement of sand

In a moment of now

We are gracing with time

Without meaning or how

In a passive day sky

In a passive day sky

Ocean cloud overrules

On lion paws pouncing

On soul searchers in wools

Clearing, the Milky Way

Shoots a star like a kite

And in the stillness up

A passing satellite

For mothers who don't care

For mothers who don't care

Those little Rhoda's grown

With children like brooches 

Or broken pearl strands thrown

Gentlemen or bastards

Princesses or bitches

Depends if reflection

Makes them saints or witches

Where is it we can bloom

Where is it we can bloom

After we earned our pride

In feeling glorious

The stem stronger inside

When the introspection

Sees past the self to sky

Where do we root our roots

To branch out shelves of I

Embarking on a thought

Embarking on a thought

Without a map or stars

Further, faster, until

Notes are absent of bars

Left, right, upside or down

In the ancient and new

Cave scrawl or Basquiat

True blue in every hue

Pondering all my life

Pondering all my life 

Imagery collector 

Searching in three-sixty

Discovery nectar

Both grazing and gazing

Rooted deep and dreaming

Like a turtle sunning

In a landscape teeming

Losing velocity

Losing velocity 

Seconds of breathing tick

Mountains now for viewing

Rivers the latest pick

Walking with grace not run

Down the ladder climbing 

No going back, no look

This salmon declining 

Slowly I’m faltering

Slowly I’m faltering 

Future reeling me in

Not pulling on the leash

Taking it on the chin

Finishing up early 

I can beg no better

Much left unsaid using

Mere twenty-six letters 

Embracing existence

Embracing existence

The wish of forevers

But where are dying birds

And where are their feathers

So I join the moment

TV in the background

A lawnmower starts as

Cloud shadows bless the ground

There is no unity

There is no unity

We divide and divide

Further growing apart

Everyone taking side

Small town America

Is not gentle or sweet

Misguided and lazy

Protesting from truck seats

The World is open arms

The World is open arms

Embracing, letting go

We've held each other close

Even more lately so

Foraging through the why's

My purpose has brought grace

Help people grow and change

And find an about-face 

Maple tree helicopters

Maple tree helicopters

And acorns will return

The corn thrice knee high and

Green tomatoes red turn

And the painted light will

Paint this mid-summer scene

While the repeating sun

Will have washed out the green

A hole in my pocket

A hole in my pocket

It must have fallen out

It's nowhere to be found

I've searched here and about

It is lost to the World

I blame only myself

I hope someone finds it

And keeps it on a shelf

I have always been deaf

I have always been deaf

Hearing and thinking rhymes 

Filling in the blanks and

Whole sentences at times

A form of privacy 

And pirateness evolved 

Without guidance or guard

Unknowns had to be solved

Walking on reflections

Walking on reflections 

Of moonbeams, not sun rays 

Pure joy has a pure source 

Not derivative ways

Love is not cut flowers 

It begins at the roots 

Entwined deeper below 

Not the flag but the boots

Visiting time today

Visiting time today 

Its vast passenger seat

There’s no clock on the wall

Or measured seconds beat

Time spent with time hoping

For others in the plan

I came asking for help

But know, nobody can

The sole survivor with

The sole survivor with

Therapy and research 

Was deprogrammed from a

Crazy family church

They promoted greatness 

Excluding empathy 

And mind your P’s and Q’s

Or get the Nth degree

A raincoat in sunshine

A raincoat in sunshine

The tempermental storm

Ready for a downpour

Unpredictable norm

The others are playing

Sharing a hearty laugh

No worry of weather

Or me here on this gaff 

The questions continue

The questions continue

From sapling to the tree

Who am I and how I

Fit in the World of We

Shaping and changing as

Quickly as clouds in sky

And like the child learning

Grown old and asking why

Boxing fists and clenched teeth

Boxing fists and clenched teeth

Courage found from anger

Justice fails us all when

Truth becomes a stranger

Whining about losing

Finding solace in lies

And do not blame others

If you have cloudy skies

Stars are buttons sewn on

Stars are buttons sewn on

The universal skirt

Twirling while its hem is

Dragging Earth in the dirt

Is this all haute couture

Or merely avant garde

Caught in a button hole

Somewhere in a square yard

Poetry needing pause

Poetry needing pause

The period is there

Not run-ons or ramblings

Performances in air

Am I too old-fashioned

Not modern and advanced

It's not do-si-do but

Has it already danced

Come here to the hillside

Come here to the hillside

Past the cities and burbs

Make a solo treck here

To molasses day verbs

Where butterflies flap their

Wings like newly spined books

And breathing starts syncing

With distant staring looks

Still here after the floods

Still here after the floods

The childhood broken dam

Here in aging orchards

On the plateau of am

Long past the struggle and

Great rapids to this spot

Celebrating living

With every daily jot

I am one of many

I am one of many

All futures have one known

The infinite journeys

From our first breath to blown

Colassal in color

Feelings run the gamut

From celebrations to

Grace or plain goddamnit

Alive and wondering

Alive and wondering

Curiosity gene

Not demanding answers

Just inquiries of keen

And the what ifs and hows

The chaos or the cog

Enlightenment lighthouse

Finds an exit from fog

Bending the circumfrence

Bending the circumfrence

To bring us together

Can't we see ourselves as

One flock many feather

Discarding Shangri-La

And requirement of friends

And still have great respect

From beginnings to ends

Giving moments meaning

Giving moments meaning

Isolating raindrops

Celebrating clover

And kernel in the crops

A granular beauty

Transient yet touching

The passing Overwhelm

Is at times too muching

Simplicity striving

Simplicity striving

Singular as a flame

Love of metaphysics

The familiar unnamed

A weathered stone or drink

Of cold water when parched

Releasing drawn arrows

On a path of pure arched

Outside of the frame yet

Outside of the frame yet

The distance creates view

The eagle and water

If schooled fish only knew

Still longing for lasting

A soldier amongst troop

I'm MIA fighting

From my balcony stoop

Boats falling from the clouds

Boats falling from the clouds

Comets like dried flowers

Stars ground like white pepper

And feather rainshowers

Re-spinning the planet

Stirring houses and cars

Jumping rope on treetops

Blue treble clefs on bars

Beginning today with

Beginning today with

A long meditation

Questioning arrival

And self-medication

Dismissing the baggage

In order to travel

Both lighter and farther

In shoes without gravel

Going through the motions

Going through the motions

A needle without thread

Hemming and hawing thoughts

White Rabbit sloppy dead

Conclusions drawn without

Any pencil or lead

Finding the perfect words

That are not being said 

Long after a rainstorm

Long after a rainstorm

A small puddle remains

Not evaporating

Not finding any drain

A perseverence mop

Has taken on the task

It is time for a change 

If anyone should ask

Raised with the absolutes

Raised with the absolutes

The always and ever

Finding myself wanting

Sometimes and not never

Mondrian to Rothko

Fine lines to edges soft

With primary colors

Bleeding together oft

How did you end up here

How did you end up here

Surely this is not home

Were lighthouses absent

In your drifting and roam

Instead on a light pole

With presence still regal

How is it you became

A parking lot seagull

Unwanted and unplanned

Unwanted and unplanned

Trees growing in chainlink

Absorbing the crosshatch

Like skin and tattoo ink

Fighting for survival

Struggling but with success

Branches crown above their

Branded trunks of distress

Boating past burnt bridges

Boating past burnt bridges

Franz Kline water graveyard

Efforts to reconcile

Has Truth in disregard

And here, firm as before

A non-deluded choice

I am in reality

And comprehend my voice

Gnarly Rodin scultpure

Gnarly Rodin sculpture

A stocky sycamore

Grappling to stand upright

Pillar, ceiling to floor

The hardship of being

Tireless grunt of the gut

And there beneath its feet

A squirrel and its nut

We had our brief bursts of

We had our brief bursts of

Beauty in time and place

A few sparks sprouting stars

Hurling for outerspace

So many fireworks flashed

Billowing smoky clouds

Dissipating drifters

In temporary shrouds

I wanted more for you

I wanted more for you

A greater happiness

A sense of worth, like gold

Comforting tenderness

Be mother and father

To your innermost child

And protect your dreams in

The wide open and wild

The yellow is waiting

The yellow is waiting

Chasing the rising sun

Envelopes opening

Landscapes where chickens run

And into the city

Museums full of Art

Avenues of unknown 

And back again to start

We had to save ourselves

We had to save ourselves

Maintain our sense of be

Leaving loved ones behind

In order to be free

We were impoverished

But were wealthy with will

Looking back, years passing

And they are same and still

Never questioning All

Never questioning All

The butterfly, the bee

The spider and the owl

The ant and manatee

Yet when ever Life is

Threatened or could be lost

The fight for existence

Explicates at all cost

The light is painting gray

The light is painting gray

And in my center sea

Red in morning rising

On the melancholy

Solo applause clapping

On the sides of my boat

The feeling I'm always

In a circular moat

Why could you not love us

Why could you not love us

Hugging you, no hug back

Worhipping and bow down

The one avenue, one track

Discrediting dissent

Insisting our madness

Competing, but you win

Here's your trophy - Sadness

Without an erasure

Without an erasure

The missteps and mistakes

Alongside achievements

And the luckiest breaks

Having pride and regret

Succumb and overcome

Routinely turning soil

To find a greener thumb

Great painting of unknown

Great painting of unknown

Provenance or artist

Unrecognized talent

Art abandoned carcass

Like a cabinet card

Portrait dressed in finest

Finding obscurity

Accoladed minus

An afternoon of grace

An afternoon of grace 

Clouds creating shadows 

A sense of slow motion 

Nature in full repose

The lone honeybee and

Birds resting their voices 

Here without story, no

Ulysses James Joyce’s

I know who I am and

I know who I am and

See greater potential 

Deeper roots, higher limbs

Desert or torrential 

Both dredging and dreaming 

The shovel and ladder

To succeed by trying

Stem and bloom both matter

The whole world feeling small

The whole world feeling small

Oceans are a bathtub

The stars are circling birds

The sun a yellow nub

Gently small cargo is

Being spooned overboard

Poems are gentle eggs

Nay umbilical cord