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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.

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markers

This poem follows a dream I had many years ago. I talk about the experiences surrounding the dream in my introduction to the poem “oak touch”.

markers

i was half raven
   the city long since dead
  gray as the silent sky
 streaked with granite

i held the air with
   long black feathers
  in cobblestone canyons
 carved from history

i felt the old walls
   brush my wingtips
  high above narrow lanes
 stretched empty below

then the buildings gave way
   and i soared free
  through an open square
 orange with age

in the distant center
   tall as the canyon
  towers there grew
 an old black oak

its crown was full
   contrast to the lifeless
  city frozen forever
 to a moment in time

it grew from a circle
   closed in limestone walls
  where long sere blades of grass
 rose perfectly still

its scaly roots
   swam beneath the ground
  like coiled serpents
 half risen for air

and there i landed
   near its broad round base
  and rustled black feathers
 neatly behind me

high in the crown
   on a long thick branch
  a large raven worked
 at something unseen

its obsidian beak
   puzzled probed and cocked
  ’til i found myself lifting
 to see what it saw

and as i rose up
   it studied my approach
  then tossed its small find
 from the edge

it settled deep
   parting long thin blades
  as i drifted back
 to the ground

and about me there gathered
   creatures of every kind
  as i knelt as in prayer
 near the trunk

all kinds of creatures
   from all kinds of spirits
  half-mooned around me
 to see

one stood behind me
   covered with stern brown eyes
  which gazed down upon me
 and in all directions

its skin was the bark
   of all the old black oaks
  returned to the dreams
 of the earth

and i held in my hands
   like a soft feathered stone
  the black figurine
 of a raven

whose breast split in two
   its soft downy breast
  where a glimmer of light
 shone within

Over the years I’ve written a couple of poems inspired by this dream and my subsequently “meeting” the same tree in “real life”. It grows by Orr Springs Road, several miles West of Ukiah, CA. I already provided a link above to “oak touch”. The others are “Three Ravens” and “Oak Dream”.

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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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Grace

However you may idealize the human form, there is one reality that wins out in the end—It will moulder and rot and decay back to the dust. There is nothing we can hold onto. Everything must go, even our most cherished fancies.

Grace

take your long lithe figure
your bright ruby smile
and take your pliant stride
filled with suggestion

take your smooth soft skin
carved from lily petals
and your slender toned belly
set in round swaying hips

and take your gentle cheeks
your life-altering glance
fixed like glimmering jewels in
Athenian curves

take it all off
to the charnel grounds
and meditate awhile
amid the waste

fill your porcelain nostrils with
the stench of what’s to come
and fill your deep brown eyes with
the reality of your perfection

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influence

Sometimes I wonder how different I would be today if I never chanced upon the poetry of authors such as Robert Service, Julia Dorr, Alfred Tennyson, Thomas Campbell, and others during my youth. My early teens were fraught with fear and confusion, and not much made it through that haze. But the poetry of such authors—always structured poetry—was able to cut through the haze and give me something to focus and meditate upon. Without that, I have to wonder if I would have even survived my youth.

influence

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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mausoleum

Yesterday I had an extremely vivid dream, which involved sleep paralysis, that has really stayed with me.

    mausoleum

        i felt you calling
through the wide dark space
            and i crossed the cavern
    to your resting place

        where you were wrapped in
folds of cold gray stone
            which smelled of long
    decay and rotting bones

        the air was dripping
echoes through the dark
            lit only by the
    sense’s psychic spark

        mosaic patterns
stretched across your grave
            dreamtime symbols
    etched in beveled grooves

        i brushed them lightly
with my fingertips
            and lay across
    the stony cover strip

        and here i rested
waiting for your touch
            in meditation
    then i felt your clutch

        as one would clutch
who drowns in waters deep
            to any flotsam
    drifting near the reach

        you grasped my psyche
held with panicked might
            and locked my body
    in the realms of night

        and now i felt your
onyx grip of fear
            send through my senses
    manifold despair

        i let you thrust up
through my chest to speak
            an urgent message
    stressed fatigued and weak

        “he-elp… me…”
came your feeble plea
            through lips half frozen
    petrified by sleep

        and as you heard my
voice relay your words
            you strove the more to
    make your anguish heard

        and with the strength of
added empathy
            i let you ring your
    cavern walls with pleas

        until the motions
stirred me from the dream
            and i awoke to
    echoes of your screams

Upon waking up, it really felt as if I had connected with some spirit or entity that tried with all its might to communicate something to or through me. Or maybe it was some long buried part of my own mind.

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Eye Fatigue

I have spent the first five or so weeks where I work sitting at a desk throughout the night in a dark group home unit. The only real light is a two foot long florescent bulb, fixed to the wall about two feet above the desk. So, just above eye level. Directly under the light is a fish tank with six gold fish swimming about, occasionally splashing a few drops out onto my laptop.

If you’ve ever seen a fish tank in a dark room with one strong light situated directly over it, then you might have an idea what of what it’s like to sit at this desk, hour after hour, with this fish tank wrinkling surreal light into your face while the full effect of the florescent bulb slowly but surely sucks the moisture from your eyes and brains.

Of course with the psychic imprints from children past and present—ghosts—walking the hall, peeking from rooms, and brushing the psyche, it can get a little heavy on the mind in other ways, too. This sort of thing can only lead to a postmodern bit of poetry.

Eye Fatigue

Objects seem at rest
    like tide pools
  rippling in the sun’s hard light
      thoughts drip restless ease

Lull back heavy lids
    to waking dreams
  feel the touch of ghosts and
      shadow conversation

Bright light darkens
    blurring mental eyes
  blind mind draws
      long cloudy veils

A familiar name
    catches in the ear
  twitch slide cross jerk
      white flash sudden cold

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Origami

Recently, as I reflected on how I seem to resist the best efforts of people to change me in this way or that, I found myself writing this.

Origami

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.

Indeed I have always resisted obvious attempts to change my nature, especially when the person making the attempt seemed to have something to gain from it. Those who have had the greatest impact in my life are people who just offered ideas, letting me take or leave them as I wished. I think such people felt no desire to gain anything by changing me, and were therefore compassionately offering a piece of information and/or perspective along the way.

Publication History:

Clamor — Fall 2009

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List

I have been reading The Aeneid of Virgil, translated into English by Allen Mandelbaum. Yesterday I came across a passage in Book VI, the prayer of Aeneas to the twin doves which landed in front of him at Hesperia; he knew them to be those of his mother, Venus (Aphrodite).

Be my guide if there
is any passage, strike across the air
to that grove where the rich bough overshadows
the fertile ground. And you, my goddess mother,
be true to me in my uncertainty.

And so, with the final phrase of this passage ringing in my head, I found myself writing:

List

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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Whitewater

We’re all caught up in the stream of consciousness, the madly rushing stream some of the old Zen masters would refer to as “mind”. Such is the nature of samsara. It’s rough, but life’s rough. Existence is rough. Being is rough. There’s no escaping the roughness so long as mind moves. And since I don’t have a clue how to go about stilling mind.

Whitewater

we’re caught in a turbid flow
        you and i
    and we must learn to swim
both or die

the banks are high and torn
        rip-rap roots
    churn the heaving surge which
leaves no bar

ahead a canyon booms and
        we are bound
    to shoot its foamy rocks and
shoreless pools

snags menace every feeble stroke
        trunks and boughs
    broken into maenad nests of
tooth and claw

no raft will lift us safely through
        arms and legs
    are all we have to navigate this
wrathful flood

gather up your will and swim
        peel your eyes
    watch the movements of the stream and
tread the wake

beyond these tangled weave of bends
        we may find
    a white sand beach of clarity where
moments rest

Little poems like this can be good for playing around with imagery and exploring different ways of bringing an object to the mind’s eye using words.