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moods

My 128th ghazal, inspired by a woman with deep brown eyes.

moods

a clarity settles deep in her soft amber eyes
and peace wells up from nearly fathomless eyes

adventure lures the heart to the mystery
of sidelong glances cast from her earthen eyes

imagination paves her path with promise
where patience lightly walks with brownstone eyes

hope found refuge under the feathery green
of one long look into her mahogany eyes

she cheers the sunbathed home of inspiration
with a glittering veneer of cherry-wood eyes

love tastes of strawberry kisses beneath dark curls
coated with the cream of her dark chocolate eyes

compassion sways against the sprawling skies
praying up to the stars with terrestrial eyes

Instead of qafiya, or that species of rhyme that occurs just before the radif (refrain), I used words loosely hyponymous with the color brown for an associative parallelism.

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sunyata

A friend of mine, a scholar of Buddhism and traditional Chinese, has recently been talking about how ‘sunyata’ is grossly mistranslated into English and misunderstood in the West as ‘nothingness’, when the most accurate translation would be ‘evanescence’.

When he first mentioned this I thought to myself, “Well then, I guess that makes sense.” Everything about life and every moment has always seemed evaporative to me.

I didn’t quite know what the title of this would be when I started writing it, but about halfway through, ‘sunyata’ seemed like a perfect fit. Still feels like a perfect fit. So, my 23rd villanelle.

sunyata

fill with evanescent light
every momentary cell
coursed throughout imagined form

every vessel heart to limb
pulsing moments on to self
fill with evanescent light

illuminate each hidden fold
churning vapors through the soul
coursed throughout imagined form

every fiber bound to life
linking bone to skin be still
fill with evanescent light

elucidate this vital force
streaming like an endless swell
coursed throughout imagined form

every sorrow pain and fret
breathing mixed amid the silt
fill with evanescent light
coursed throughout imagined form

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acceptance

Sometimes something breaks within ourselves, and the psyche is terrifically disfigured. Yet sometimes this becomes part of our growth and strength and not the cause of destruction.

acceptance

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. However, the above player can still be used to listen to it.
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Elegy

My first marriage lasted just about a year. We were together for all of about two years. She was a walking dichotomy. Loving, kind, supportive on the one hand—evil, spiteful, and treacherous on the other. The emotional roller-coaster ride came to an end when she added drunken extramarital affairs to her treacheries.

I was in love with her, for some reason. Deeply so. I suppose this is why her compulsive treacheries were so poignantly painful. I understood that she was a borderline, and so I endured as far as I could. But, enough was enough. After all, her first husband had already committed suicide. So, I left her to her insanity before I found myself buried next to him.

It was another year and a half or so before I finally began to really accept that it was over, and thus was born my 22nd hybridanelle.

Elegy

I’ll not forget your kindness, nor the pain
staked between my ribs to rip my vital center.
I’ll not forget your laughter, nor the tears
I cursed in vain against the all unseeing skies
or whimpered like a mongrel clamped in iron jaws,
bleeding broken lamentation to the stars.

I’ll not forget your whispers, nor the poison words
you coated on the rusty spike of truth,
staked between my ribs to rip my vital center,
healed only by the seal of deep unfeeling scars
that still can never hide the searing touch of rage
I cursed in vain against the all unseeing skies.

I’ll not forget your comfort, nor the angst
inspired by deception, the shameless treachery
you coated on the rusty spike of truth,
the weeks of turbid panic that thundered like a storm
until my thoughts were beached on barren shores of death,
bleeding broken lamentation to the stars.

I’ll not forget your promise, nor the tragedy
that left me in a state of desolation
inspired by deception, the shameless treachery
that marred my sense of trust with green infected scabs
until, half crazed by torment, in uttermost defeat,
I cursed in vain against the all unseeing skies.

I’ll not forget your presence, nor the absence,
the swollen scarcity of faith and understanding
that left me in a state of desolation,
clutching onto dirt-clods, scraping over stones,
choking clots of dust, and in the hollow night
bleeding broken lamentation to the stars.

Though I may one day drink from streams of inner peace,
I’ll not forget your kindness, nor the pain,
the swollen scarcity of faith and understanding.
I’ll not forget your laughter, nor the tears
that welled from acid springs to melt away my skin
as, trembling at the edge of self annihilation,
I cursed in vain against the all unseeing skies,
bleeding broken lamentation to the stars.

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spires

A ghazal! I haven’t written a ghazal since June of 2005. So that makes this—what?—my 127th. Feels nice to get one out again. I remember I got real tired of them by the end of my ghazal project a few years ago, but I never really intended to abandon them altogether.

With this one I veer away from using my penname in the signature couplet (last couplet) to using a reference to one of my penname’s meanings. In this poem it’s “open skies”, since “vast openness to the heavens” is one of the Arabic meanings for ‘Zahhar’.

spires

let’s twine our roots beneath the world together
until we rise against the wind together

let’s turn and reach to gather shades of light
with countless long thin leaves that wave together

let’s make a bed beneath our outstretched limbs
shaded by the dreams we weave together

let’s draw clear waters from the hidden earth
and breathe them out as vapors washed together

let’s share the sounds of creeks and faint cicadas
their rhythmic songs like magic wound together

let’s shelter soft brown trails among the fern
where lovers holding hands may walk together

let’s filter daylight from the open skies
through daydreams spun like amber webs together

Publication History:

Art Arena (web-based) — March 2007

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oak touch

My 22nd terzanelle. There are two particular inspirations behind this poem, but I’ll mention one. Years ago I had an extremely vivid dream involving a large black oak, species q. kelloggii, or California black oak. Without going into detail, in this dream the tree drew me to the shade of its canopy, and once there I found myself surrounded by all sorts of dream-time creatures (the sort of creatures that don’t exist in waking reality) as a raven high in the crown dropped a small something down for me to investigate. There’s more to it. Actually the dream is pretty well laid out in my poem, “markers”.

Well, two weeks later I was driving back to Ukiah from the coastal town of Mendocino over the Comptche-Ukiah road—a radically windy one-lane little thing—and as I rounded a corner just east of Orr Springs, there it was—the massive old oak from my dream. Years have passed, and I’ve struggled to understand what that dream and this oak are all about for me, but I still don’t really know. I would like to know. But I don’t know. I must settle for vague insights, as this is the way of such things.

oak touch

sepia leaves and branches shade
the supple parchment of your years
rooted deep in stardust dreams

wind shimmers through the boughs of time
beneath an ever phasing moon
the supple parchment of your years

bares the mark of ancient grace
that rustles by a canyon’s edge
beneath an ever phasing moon

grasses lap gray plates of bark
spread throughout a billowed crown
that rustles by a canyon’s edge

with each new breeze like subtle gems
glimmers softly in the dark
spread throughout a billowed crown

writhing in elusive light
the serpent beauty of your form
glimmers softly in the dark

etched against the realm of night
sepia leaves and branches shade
the serpent beauty of your form
rooted deep in stardust dreams

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Spillway

Lake Mendocino, a reservoir lake, is a few miles north of Ukiah. The lake serves multiple purposes, among which are water storage for civic and agricultural uses, hydroelectric power for the City of Ukiah, and water-sport recreation for the region’s inhabitants.

About a two mile’s walk southeast of the dam there is a broad spillway that has been cut right through a tall hillside, effectively turning one peak into two. I have found that if I play my flute at the concrete lip of the spillway, the side furthest from the lake, I can create an orchestra of reverberating echoes. The effect is often stunning and mesmerizing.

This is my 22nd villanelle.

Spillway

Amid the ghostlike skeletons of oaks,
a lone song lifts from a channel brown with grass
and echoes up to join dissevered peaks.

Whispers lap the edge of a mountain lake
nestled in a valley, smooth as glass,
amid the ghostlike skeletons of oaks.

Wind shimmers through the chambers of a reed,
resonates across a manmade vale,
and echoes up to join dissevered peaks.

Frogs concealed in rip-rap greet the dusk;
a pair of small birds chase each other’s tails
amid the ghostlike skeletons of oaks.

A raven drops clear pebbles off its beak,
a sound that ripples lightly through the air
and echoes up to join dissevered peaks.

The lone song dims to silence. In its wake
a gentle quiet settles with the dark
amid the ghostlike skeletons of oaks
and echoes up to join dissevered peaks.

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Lapse

My 10th trisect poem. The first segment depicts our sun, the second our galaxy, and the third the process (or principle rather) of acceleration.

There are some prosodic curiosities played with in this poem, like the juxtaposition of primary alliteration in the middle two lines of each quatrain. This proved to be more difficult than I expected, but also a good exercise I think.

Lapse

Entity

Clouds of gas and seas of dust
whirl in layers round a turbid well
which gathers density and force.

Concealed inside a cyclone spun through darkness,
hidden meaning flares flush against compression
and opens like an eye, wide with burning gaze,
its heavy lids thrown back against the void.

For aeons faint reflections cycle round
this fluid presence held haloed in the night,
concentrating dreams deep into the light,
into a stillness wrapped in fusion storms.

In time the fires dissipate
to vapors, glowing like a distant jewel,
which fades into the emptiness.
 

Colony

Vapors glow amid the gloom,
phantoms waiting to return to life
or fade forever from perception.

Splashed across an easel framed from absence,
a hidden brush portrays rays in random molds,
dispersed as tracts of foam frothed beneath the moon
to bulge about the heart of mystery.

Potential blooms like tufts of baby’s breath
with scattered silhouettes wound throughout the fields
where waves of motion spread spectrums far through time
to ripple in the skies of countless worlds.

A hundred billion modes of thought
glimmer like a liquid fused with light,
spiraled round a well of doubt.
 

Balance

Suspended like an ornament,
the master clock wheels slowly through the void,
seconds passed in fluid count.

Cogs and coils gyrate, stretch, and snap,
countless turning gears gripped by gravity,
which sends the broad machine churning through the dark,
momentum bound to arcs across the deep.

Throughout the ages systems come and go,
little flecks of light lit for stellar moments
like after-image flares fading from the mind,
half remembered from a distant past.

In time the random orbits dim
and yellow like a blurry cataract
across the burning eye of god.

Publication History:

Tales of the Talisman — Winter 2007

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Fizzle

This is something along the lines of impressionist poetry.

Fizzle

I’ll grant you dreams
  which fold the beams
    of light until
      your shadow gleams

I’ll grant you shame
  to bless your name
    with blissful guilt
      and narrow fame

I’ll grant you tears
  a moment’s fears
    a glimpse of joy
      the span of years

I’ll grant you pain
  the crushing reign
    of silence forced
      across your vane

I’ll grant you space
  to briefly trace
    the edges of
      your aging face

I’ll grant you breath
  filled brim with wrath
    a glass of wine
      to drink your death

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take me

Latest spill-over. Had Cohen‘s “Dance me to the end of love” stuck in my head so fiercely that I couldn’t make any progress on another poem I’ve been working on. So I decided to write something with a similar feel to it—but without the refrain and chorus—to see if I could get Cohen’s song out of my skull enough to focus.

take me

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.

Maybe I’ve learned a something through my study of Cohen’s poetry. His earlier poems were usually terrible, but his more recent material is outstanding on average. This is what I hope will happen with my own work as the years wear on—Steady improvement.

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Value

A child where I work was having a hard time last night. It was one of those times when you just want to be left alone to sort out your thoughts and feelings for yourself, but people keep prying and trying to get you to bend to their will. He had gotten pretty worked up, and really needed to be left alone. Yet because he said some things that indicated he might hurt himself, he also had to be supervised. I managed to intervene and get him twenty minutes of personal space. I stayed near him, and my night-shift supervisor was near, but we both had the presence of mind not to talk to him except to quietly state a couple of simple expectations—basically the time he had available for self reflection.

I could see pain and rage in his eyes, and I could relate. He talked of being worthless earlier, and I wondered if that had something to do with it all. When he said he was worthless, I explained to him then that there is a big difference between “being” and “feeling” worthless. I told him, “you feel worthless, but this is not the same as actually being worthless.” I made it clear to him that to feel worthless is to feel worthless, but that feeling worthless doesn’t actually mean you’re worthless—It is a feeling only.

He seemed to catch on, though it took a while. Later, after he had calmed down some, I heard him tell my supervisor, “I hate feeling worthless.” It was nice to see him recognize and look it as a feeling. He ended up going to sleep. And as the night wore on I found myself reflecting on that look I noticed in his eyes.

Value

for a particular youth

I watched the cyclone raging through your mind
behind the storm front of your gray-blue eyes;
I felt the gale wind thrust of every word
you bellowed to the over-clouded skies.

And here is what I saw: An empty place.
A realm so foreign to the world of men
that few could bear to grasp or understand
the magnitude of desolation there.

The ground as far as I could see was razed,
wiped free of every feature bearing hope;
a river seethed throughout the barren fields,
filled with poisons welled from pools loss.

All horizons bore the faintest touch
of mountains, jagged shadows ripped from time;
the sky was silver-gray with high-spun clouds,
the kind that never break to show the sun.

And here were you, hunched over on your knees,
your fingers clutched into the ash gray soil,
stunned into a state of pallid shock,
silent, still, and breathing low and mild.

I could not guess what leveled all you knew
and left you magically alive—alone.
But when I heard you murmur, “I am worthless,”
I creepingly began to understand.

Dear Soul! What worthless thing could hold!?
What petty life could face such storms of loss!?
What worthlessness could carry on despite
the emptiness of such a barren scape!?

This life is yours! This plane of dreams your own!
Whatever storms have left you thus are gone.
Now you must stand and walk until you grasp
the nature of your reconfigured lands!

Stand tall! For you have shown your truest mettle.
You have endured where most have failed and died.
Your face still holds the will to learn and grow—
So go! Explore the landscapes of your life.

Those distant mountains surely harbor hopes.
And they are yours, so go and see what kind.
But you must leave this place of tragedy,
this epicenter of your broken past.

This place is but a fragment of your soul.
There is much more to you than what you see.
Beyond those mountains continents are filled
with every form of possibility.

For there are treasures hidden in your world,
and there are forests standing green and wild,
but you must make the survey of your soul,
to learn your inner worth and sense of value.

I’d like to give him a copy of this poem, but there are strict policies in place concerning client-staff relations. Giving him a copy would be entering into a gray area that may or may not have repercussions. So I’ll err on the side of personal safety.