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an inkling hope

The idea for this poem came to me a few months back, at which point I hurriedly tapped out the opening four lines—then nothing. So today after four or so months of periodically checking in on it, I’ve finally managed to sit down and finish the original idea.

an inkling hope

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.

Publication History:

Clamor — Fall 2009

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Her Best

My first poem for 2008. A good friend wanted me to write a poem for his fiance, and here’s what I came up with. Think he’ll like? Think she’ll like?

Her Best

She calls me your very best for her—
I only ask that you mean it so.
And if there’s a doubt in your starry mind,
dear god I ask that you lay me low.

Lay me low in the moldering clay,
if one harsh look or a bitter word
exists deep down in this heart of mine,
so that it may never be seen nor heard,

so that she may live the span of her years
believing the absolute best of me,
trusting forever the love she holds
is the love I keep till she follows me.

But if you look and you see the man
she thanks you for each day of her life,
then please dear god will you guide my will
so I never bring her a moment’s strife?

Will you teach me all that I need to know
to be that childlike soul she sees,
tender as dew on the bamboo’s leaf,
gentle as hope on the slightest breeze?

Will you grant me health and the quiet strength
to stand with compassion at her side
for however long we both may live,
whatever fates roll in with the tide?

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Path Reflections

Just found myself pondering the nature of my path as a “poet”, whatever it is that old word refers to. I’m no Rabbie Burns, that’s for sure. But me and Mr. Burns have a common calling, nonetheless.

Path Reflections

I chose this path—I’m not sure why—
a path of never-ending change,
a path of study, growth, and time
invested in creative range.

I walk this path. I’m not sure where
it leads, or even if I hold
the strength to ever make it there.
It seems so far away—and cold.

And yet, since seven years ago,
when it occurred to me how soon
the spring of life will yield to snows
that fold its memory into ruin—

since I decided then to veer
away from living check to check,
planning for a distant year,
retired bent beneath the wreck

of countless countless wasted days,
the whole of life’s potential spent
on striving for a monthly gain
just tossed to mortgage, toys, or rent

until that truest treasure, time—
squandered to its very last—
is gone, and all that’s left behind
are memories of an empty past—

since then I’ve learned and written things
that may outlive my mortal life.
I’ve sacrificed security
and doomed myself to endless strife

for just the thought that someday some
may part the leaves and find my words
illuminating as the sun,
and wake within them sleeping birds

of hope, serenity, and joy,
poised to spread their feathers wide
and leap across the dawning void
to freedom, held aloft inside.

It’s not an easy calling, and to follow it can be every bit as fraught with hardship as to not. For me my potential as a poet has yet to be realized. It may be years, or a score of years, spent studying and cultivating my craft before I begin to achieve my potential. So to follow your path when your potential has not yet been realized means to follow a path of poverty and ridicule, for very few—if anyone—will see the potential that exists for you. They will insist that you make a living rather than putting your time into developing your path, and they won’t see what you see within yourself. They may even stand in the way of your path and push against you thinking that they are doing you a service to discourage you from your calling because they feel that you will do better in life if you can just forget it and go make a living.

This may be true on the front of making a living, but once someone who has become aware of their potential down a given path abandons that path, he will sink into a pit of dismay that will ultimately end in death from suicide or ill health. The sentient who has become aware of an unrealized potential must strive with all its might to realize that potential, for to do otherwise is to deny a gift that is extremely precious and rare—A gift essential to the health and well-being of the soul, the psyche, the mind, the heart, and the body. It is the most essential nutrient, without which the sentient wastes away into despair and self-destruction.

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A note from Adam

A moment came to my mind, clear as an ocean sunset. In that moment I saw Adam on his deathbed, speaking somewhat randomly up to the roof of his hut. Next to him were his many children, grandchildren, and great great great great great grandchildren. They listened to his words, and after a time they realized he was speaking to his creator, having seen or realized something about the generations to come.

A note from Adam

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.
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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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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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beads

I found myself writing this in response to a blog post someone made at MySpace, back when I had a MySpace account. She was one of two girls who used to make it a point to sit at my table when they saw me at Denny’s or one of the local coffee houses. I never understood why. When they did, they would strike up completely random conversation. I just entertained them like a good host since I didn’t see the harm.

At some point they found my MySpace account and sent me friend requests, which I accepted. The younger one, while intelligent and intriguing in her own right, had an unusually strong negative streak which she would spill into her blog like an acid.

beads

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.

After responding to her bitter tirade with this poem, she and her friend soon lost interest in me. Kind of strange since I was under the impression that they were curious about me because I would sit in the coffee houses or at Denny’s working on poems, which they would ask about. Ah well.

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Guardian

This poem, my 2nd trisect, reflects on my experiences on the Yukon River in Canada during two river trips, the first when I was 18 and the second when I was 27. Segment one depicts the modern canoe. Segment two depicts the river itself. And segment three depicts the animistic interaction between the paddler (myself) and the wilderness around.

Guardian

Cradle

Fiberglass for birch tree bark,
a coat of paint for resin pitch,
and plastic trim for cedar wood
compose the modern wander-boat.

Nonetheless there’s craftsmanship
in building plugs and curing molds,
sculpting sand to form a shell
that tumbles life down waterways.

A ghost of the old ways filled with gear
caressed by ancient subtle hands,
appraised and held in fair esteem,
the new unnatural ways aside.

Like driftwood on the open surf,
the fiber-foam cocoon is cast
and swept along on buoyant waves,
tossed by every twist of wind.
 

Meridian

Fueled by swollen alpine lakes,
mirrors to the craggy peaks,
countless glaciers, ponds and streams,
sprung from clouds and hidden springs,

an everlasting thunder rolls
that carves an everlasting path,
a stormy rush of living things
that slakes the stormy rush of life.

Firs collapse and boulders plunge
into the undulating surge,
swept across the winding earth
to strike with titan force the sea,

and clutched against the serpents back
a fleck of lost humanity,
immersed in sprawling majesty,
grips the currents deep and black.
 

Spirit

Black bears peer from root-filled banks;
ravens watch from stands of spruce;
eagles gaze from sudden bluffs;
a bull moose stares from out the wash.

All the dreamtime creatures wake,
bodied forth like smoky signs—
deep claw prints in frosted mud,
fang marks on the aspen’s trunk.

Each regards the floating soul
that wanders broken in their midst,
a well of rage and twisted grief
that echoes through the howling wind.

And each respects his long release
until the blood cakes on his lips
with massive silence like a mist
that rises up to steady him.

Publication History:

Art Arena (web-based) — June 2006

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The Release

We drove to Yerington, Nevada to visit the site where her father had died many years ago in a tragic accident. It took hours in the local library looking through the microfiche of old newspaper articles, but we eventually discovered the name of the abandoned mine he was exploring when he fell down a shaft to his death. We also learned a few other speculations about the accident that surprised us. It took nearly two weeks for him to be found.

Once we knew the name of the mine, it was just a matter of finding out where it was located. We drove into the mountains and got as close as we could to the old abandoned mine. Then we hiked. To our surprise, the mine had been collapsed. It turns out that after her father’s death, the City of Yerington decided the mine was too great a hazard to leave intact, so charges were set throughout the mine and it was blown up. This left a wide crater more than three hundred feet deep at the location of her father’s death.

We had her dog with us, who was not able to navigate the boulders down into the crater, so I stayed at the rim while she hiked down to its bottom. Once there, she knelt down, pressing her left hand to her heart and her right hand against perhaps the lowest-set boulder in the crater. At that moment the interior of the crater flashed several times, as if reflecting a powerful source of light, and my body went numb with tingles and chills. It was incredible. She found him, and somehow she set him free from that dark cavern where he died.

Later I reflected on this experience and wrote this poem, my 17th terzanelle.

The Release

For Bonnie

His shade is drawn from the earth by the light of his daughter’s love,
From deep in the crushing blackness, where he left his broken body,
Free at last from the silence to wander the stars alive!

He lost his footing and fell, in a moment of fatal folly,
Lost below in a mineshaft where no-one could hear his cries
From deep in the crushing blackness, where he left his broken body.

In time they found his remains; they had ferreted many days;
His carcass was raised from darkness, but his ghost remained enshrouded,
Lost below in a mineshaft where no-one could hear his cries.

He stirred in motionless airs while his loved ones were left confounded,
Gripped by senseless bereavement; his presence could not be felt;
His carcass was raised from darkness, but his ghost remained enshrouded.

His daughter held to the hope that she one day could reconnect;
She called to him in her longing to in some way touch his spirit,
Gripped by senseless bereavement; his presence could not be felt.

Her sorrow numbed and distressed, as a part of her heart grew frigid,
Held too long in a stasis where time had no way to soothe;
She called to him in her longing to in some way touch his spirit.

We come to find where he died, and the moment she nears his tomb,
The canyon reflects his spirit, a release from dim confusion,
Held too long in a stasis where time had no way to soothe.

And now with a touched amazement, I gaze on their bright reunion;
His shade is drawn from the earth by the light of his daughter’s love;
The canyon reflects his spirit, a release from dim confusion,
Free at last from the silence to wander the stars alive!

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Pulp

Psychology has its merits—That is when the psychologist is knowledgeable, experienced, and compassionate. But, to my mind, psychiatry has very few merits, no matter how well-intentioned its practitioners may be. I have watched the infusion of psychiatric drugs destroy the minds of those around me, and it has also destroyed most of what potential I was born with and began to develop as a child.

Very, very few losses inflict as much pain and despair as the loss of ones own potential. I know. So, thinking such thoughts, I found myself writing this poem, my 13th terzanelle.

Pulp

they made his mind a molding mess
a slow and solemn nest of thought
a brooding storm of deep distress

confusion ruled his darkened heart
enraged at what his mind became
a slow and solemn nest of thought

as reason weakened and decayed
he bashed his limbs and tore his flesh
enraged at what his mind became

his anguish flared a bitter flame
when it would surge with burning force
he bashed his limbs and tore his flesh

he wished for death with yearnings fierce
a wish he never could perform
when it would surge with burning force

he longed to leave his broken form
destroyed by psychiatric drugs
a wish he never could perform

the poisons flowed within his blood
they made his mind a molding mess
destroyed by psychiatric drugs
a brooding storm of deep distress

Publication History:

The Awakenings Review — Summer 2007

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Release

Understanding comes without invitation and knocks at the door, and yet she’ll often elude a lifetime of the most sedulous efforts to find her. She is a mystery deeper than the Marinas Trench, darker than the void between galaxies. One can only put himself in the path of experience and knowledge, then hope for the best.

Release

When letting go of vain understanding,
One begins to attain understanding.

In the desert, a sea of sand stretches;
Wind bestows to each grain understanding.

If one will not wake from shifting dreams,
What good is it to gain understanding?

A rolling ocean of flourishing pines
Rose from earth to sustain understanding.

When one holds a whisk or a staff upright,
Speaking will only stain understanding.

When lightning flashes across a dry night,
The sky is soon to rain understanding.

What hinders the mind will hinder all else;
Why struggle to retain understanding?

Rivers can swell till, flooding, they burst
Banks not meant to contain understanding.

All seekers find the way in due time,
And then release inane understanding.

Gray grasses bend in myriad patterns;
They yield rather than strain, understanding.

The traveler on the road to heaven
Is filled with an arcane understanding.

The rosebud opens itself to the sky,
Not wanting to restrain understanding.

Be still, Zahhar, there is peace in the wind;
Never prize nor disdain understanding.

This is my 97th ghazal.

Publication History:

Muse Apprentice Guild (web-based) — Fall 2003