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Reforming Words

This is a rewrite of a ghazal written many years ago, making this my 131st. The title, refrain, and preceding rhyme are the same, but everything else is different. Also, rather than using my takhallus (pen-name) directly in the final couplet, as I did in the original version, I just allude to it using one of its many meanings.

Reforming Words

We built this ivory dome on founding words;
its dream of hope sustained with grounding words.

Our Lady braves the darkness, torch in hand,
her call reechoed with resounding words.

In wisdom there is depth that can’t be measured
with just the simple plumb of sounding words.

Our elders gathered long ago and signed
a justice poignant with expounding words.

The multitude would never have been heard
without the glimmer of propounding words.

The graybeard mystic gained the truth of language,
and ever since has aired confounding words.

A wounded soldier presses to his brow
an old book full of most astounding words.

The shape of liberty has changed; the stars
are witness to the force of bounding words.

The original, written in February of 2002, can be read under the same title: “Reforming Words”.

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the misty sun

Beyond the elementary description of a scene and some personal feelings common to most people, nature poetry is actually not the easiest thing to write. The main challenge comes upon attempting remove oneself from the scene along with any personal feelings, using only imagery itself to convey such feelings through depiction. This poem was written to exemplify this process, so far as my abilities permitted, for someone who had asked me to critique one of her nature poems.

the misty sun

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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First light gathers

I have a tendency to be up all night, be it working, writing, or other. Not long after we, my wife and I, got a very nice new (second hand, but new to us) couch that allows one to recline comfortably facing the balcony windows, I would find myself there looking out into the night, sometimes as dawn broke. It’s an interesting time of day for me, dawn—especially first light. It has always filled me with equal parts anticipation and anxiety. Dread even.

I’m sure the anticipation is normal. It almost has to be. A new day manifests, with new potentials, even if I’m already tired. The anxiety probably comes from a variety of experiences that have taught me to expect unpleasant things to break with the day, the sort of experiences that instill fear and foreboding deep in the psyche. Here I’ve tried to convey that sense of ambivalence, using imagery gleaned from a passing storm front.

First light gathers

First light gathers above the
        Huffaker Hills, above the
    bulbous shadow of the
            old Virginia Mountains.

Slowly it grows behind
        cataclysmic clouds,
    gray shapes etched dramatic
            on the moving void.

Wind is heard against
        roof and walls, against
    wide glass doors through which I
            meditate my gaze.

Silhouettes of unfurling
        cottonwood and maple
    flail like the wild shades of
            dancing dervish souls.

Inside, a leaky faucet
        drips. The wall clock ticks
    above the redbrick hearth. And
            Joy stirs lightly troubled

        in her dreams.

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Offerings

This is a rewrite of a ghazal written several years ago, making this my 130th. The refrain and preceding rhyme are the same, though possibly more appropriately approached this time around.

Offerings

I’ll walk through tattered corridors of time for you;
I’ll pick through rooms dilapidate with grime for you.

I almost didn’t make it through yon craggy pass,
but I’ll go back and map that deadly climb for you.

Because the great flood covered riches deep in mud,
I dredge destruction from the fetid slime for you.

A legend tells of treasure sunk where memory dims;
I’ll find those depths and search that watery clime for you.

Since priceless pearls were buried with the fractured years,
I dig amongst these bones beneath the lime for you.

A thief once entered in the night and took all hope;
I’ve striven ever since to solve this crime for you.

We lean against a storm of sharp discordant words;
I’ll try to harmonize them into rhyme for you.

The soft wind carries voices from translucent skies
which whisper meaning on the garden chime for you.

The original, written in June of 2002, can be read under this title: “Offering” (not pluralized).

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Midwinter on Huffaker Lookout

Huffaker Hills is 251 acres of treeless, desert public land in south Reno set aside for pedestrian use. From there, Huffaker Lookout—a pair of lower hills—spurs out into Washoe Valley, separating an industrial park from the residential area in which I live. On its way south, Hwy 395, a six lane freeway, bends out and around the westernmost hill, just scraping its base.

Midwinter on Huffaker Lookout

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.

Desert hills have always had a way of luring me up to their stony crests.

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it nears dusk

One of my favorite places ever is the Montgomery Woods, a state natural reserve of old growth redwoods about 30 miles west of Ukiah, California, where I used to live. This poem was drafted during a visit as I sat deep in the woods at the easternmost edge of the reserve. Reluctant to leave this special, tranquil place that I can now only visit rarely, I walked about a mile back to my car in the dark.

it nears dusk

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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Without a Title

To begin anew, one must leave behind the old. This is at least the theory.

Without a Title

Perhaps I’ll start again
This time without a title

This time without the candle wax
the matted hair the long thin wire
all twisted and tangled into shapes
of desire and expectation

dangled from twine like a shrunken head
gouged full of pins and chanted words
until imago jerks and dances wincing
tortured steps of belonging

Maybe it’s time to forget all I dreamed
to tear free from voodoo strings
tendrils of blood wisped through the air
until the tired old spells are broken

to let go and plummet back through long
deep breaths and crushing gasps for air
through years of fear and foreboding back
to half-remembered moments of joy

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The Empty Cubby

A perspective poem, written from the perspective of a child as she ponders the empty cubby by the wall in her classroom. I’ve only written a handful of perspective poems over the years, though I would like to write more.

   The Empty Cubby

   The cubby hole is empty
      where your lunchbox used to be,
and everyone seems quieter today.
   There is an eerie stillness,
      like the playground in between
our recess time when we go out to play.

   The Teacher tried to tell us,
      when we all came in for class,
that you were never coming back again.
   We asked a lot of questions,
      but it was hard to understand
the way she hid her face as if in pain.

   All morning long, your best friend
      Tommy turned to face the door
whenever anybody entered through.
   At recess in the play yard
      he sat out by the handball court
alone and staring up into the blue.

   We know that something’s happened.
      Somehow we know that something’s changed.
Nobody is the way they usually seem.
   We didn’t even play much
      when we had our classroom brakes.
The whole entire day is like a dream.

   Now class is almost over,
      but no-one seems to really care
the round clock on the wall is nearing three.
   I think they all are thinking
      of the cubby with your name.
The cubby where your lunchbox used to be.

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Cherry Drifts

There are a handful of things that I always find myself looking forward to throughout the year. One is the budding of black oaks. I’ll go on walks and drives just to look at black oaks as their leaves bud and fan out, like little purple feathers at first, and before you know it a deep green canopy.

Another thing I look forward to are cherry blossoms. I was staying at my employer’s house in the hills west of south Reno when I wrote these. A month earlier I got to watch the cherry trees bloom in and around Ukiah, California. Then I got to see them bloom again in Reno, like clouds of light, as spring came to the higher elevations. Yet on the mountain where I was staying it still snowed some.

Such surroundings are bound to inspire the occasional proper haiku.

Cherry Drifts

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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Trail of Prayer

In 2009 I visited Bear Butte in South Dakota with my Filipina wife. We weren’t yet married, but we were soon to be. The hike took about three and a half hours, all told. It was the day after Summer Solstice, and something unique was in the air.

There are several stories behind the trip that led us to this special place, and a few specific to our experience at the butte itself. Perhaps they’ll find their way into poem someday. For now, here’s a tribute to the butte, what it means, and what it has meant for years untold.

Trail of Prayer

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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Forsaken

I would consider this a random write. As someone who has lived in or at the edge of poverty his entire life, I have sometimes found myself wondering about my wealthy counterparts.

Forsaken

God has abandoned you. Go!
Cower beneath your rocks and pray.
Pray for a swift release. Pray
for a lesser hell. Pray for sweet
oblivion, cast deep into
the weightless black of naught.

Meaning has dried and mummified
taut against your splintered bones.
Hope has cracked and crazed and peeled
revealing raw infections of
despair. Where can you hide? Where
can you tuck your oozing loss away.

Seek the cellar. Seek the marble
floor. Seek the solitude of
pillared halls. Seek the satin
linens of your tier. Seek the
the double-breasted Valentino,
pressed firm against your perfect corpse.

You are followed, each and every
step. Followed by an ever
present loss. Followed by the
exponent of emptiness.
Pursued through every twist of fate,
through every vain attempt to flee.

You are damned, forsaken, lost.
No one waits for you beyond the
veil. Nothing but the cold and
fetid clay awaits the one
who banishes his soul to claw
for bloody scraps of worldly gain.