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Destiny

Inspired by the notion that every thing in existence has a path, a calling, to follow. Not just people who realize a sense of personal purpose, but everything—From insects to sentients, pebbles to mountains, meres to oceans, clouds to nebula, asteroids to blue giants. I don’t mean predeterminism, but something else—Something much more subtle.

Destiny

Brooks are weeping gently on each stone, calling;
Soft the wind consoles with a light moan calling.

Autumn leaves float faintly to the ground;
They flitter along in the wind’s drone calling.

Deep in the forest, an ancient falls crashing;
Silent airs pursue its last, lone calling.

Seeds take to soil; clouds nest in tall canyons—
Each heeded the seat of its high throne calling.

Do you wonder where the falling stars land?
They go the way of their last known calling.

What is that sound so difficult to hear?
The silent sound of the heart’s own calling.

Zahhar hears again your delicate voice—
Sweet on the breeze, a subtle tone calling.

This is my 77th ghazal.

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Emanation

It seems to me that “memory” is a very natural radif for the ghazal form. It is something that emanates like light from the unconscious. It is abstract and indefinite, mysterious even.

Emanation

I am that visitor in your faded memory;
We’re threaded as ancient friends in braided memory.

Once, we strolled in talk on emerald hills;
They dried in drought, and have rarely bladed memory.

Together we work to weave this spanning tapestry;
Once more our gilded threads have aided memory.

Monuments of stone bear witness to ages past,
But only your words shine light on shaded memory.

To gain its home, a dove flies tossed in storm,
Its way home deeply locked in jaded memory.

My heart was crushed with anguish, but now you have come
To lift, with a longer past, my laded memory.

Zahhar is again a shuttle in the loom of time,
Yet not the weaver of his graded memory.

This is my 75th ghazal.

Publication History:

Muse Apprentice Guild (web-based) — Fall 2003

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Dilution

This attempts to metaphorize a friend’s passing. She died in July of 2002 from colon cancer. She often told me that I was the only one who would listen to her when she wanted to talk about her fear of dying. We would talk as lightheartedly about this taboo subject as if we were talking about poetry itself. This had apparently played an important role in helping her prepare emotionally and mentally for the inevitable. She was a good friend and I still miss her.

Dilution

This poem has been published in my book an inkling hope: select poems, available in Kindle and paperback formats. Out of consideration for those who have purchased a copy, I have removed it from this post and online viewing in general.

This is my 73rd ghazal.

Publication History:

Art Arena (web-based) — June 2005

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Thoroughfare

This ghazal manifested as I read The Shambhala Guide to Taoism by Eva Wong. There is more discontinuity, or disconnectedness, within this ghazal than is usual for me. At the time, this was also the longest I had written.

The word “way” appears on every line. While this is not a demand of the form, it was an enjoyable exercise, and it made for an interesting poem in the end.

Thoroughfare

Where fragrant lilies beautify the way,
Decaying corpses putrefy the way.

Brilliant sages point the way to heaven,
Yet we in bloodshed rubefy the way.

The way of peace was plain when life began,
Then darkness fell to mystify the way.

When harsh and arid places span the way,
How hard it is to ratify the way!

Rivers flow the way of least resistance—
This fact will ever signify the way.

A vagrant walks the way with dignity,
Yet speaks no words to dignify the way.

Crying skies are not the way of sorrow,
They only serve to pacify the way.

If to the empty center leads the way,
There is no need to simplify the way.

Wind demonstrates the way of roaming wide,
But never tries to justify the way.

Who taught the fowl the way to warmer skies?
How is it that they verify the way?

Compassion is the way within us all,
But we must act to reify the way.

Death cannot endorse the way of living,
Yet also cannot mortify the way.

This dream is but the way of dancing shades;
To trust in this will falsify the way.

Who can hear the way the stars are calling?
They wait for us to stellify the way.

Each time Zahhar collapsed upon the way;
Has been a means to clarify the way.

If you sense a lack of coherency, this is because there is very little of it. A ghazal is not necessarily supposed to be coherent. In fact, most aficionados of the form feel it should be entirely discordant, with qafiya (rhyme) and radif (refrain) serving to stitch the couplets into a sort of collage of verbal thought and imagery. The effect can be powerful, though it doesn’t always settle well with the Western ear.

This is my 74th ghazal.

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Shithouse Sonnet

The first and only sonnet I’ve thus far written. After reading all of Shakespeare’s sonnets, three times each out loud, I found myself sitting in a public bathroom seeking personal relief. All around me were homedork taggings, hatefully racial comments, lewd remarks, etc. You know the drill. When I went back to my table in the restaurant I was hanging out at, I wrote this.

Shithouse Sonnet

As here you scan this product of my mind
And seek relief from some anxiety,
There is no such relief for you to find
While reading words from this society;
The troubled minds of half a nation scar
The walls about you in a base display;
Foul scribbles from the crude ones near and far
Encompass you in putrefied array;
And, even tribal markings basely claim
Some ownership of this quaint place of rest
Amid the angry notes that weakly blame
Their fellows for some anguish in their breast;
    The horror of our state is manifest
    In such grim markings by the ill-possessed.