Tuesday, September 27, 2011

After Leaving Here - I Will be There

After

wrapped moon-silvered and glimmering
listen and hear the collective chorus sing in
gathered crescendoed filaments from a street still simmering
with the heat of past passion drifting in the soft night breeze
the music of Muse call ripples down the dusky avenue each to another
on that wet cobblestoned street, emptied and departed, washed in living
lyrics - sweet, painful, searing, soul seizing
wispy, wafting, fragments lift shimmering with soft light
as the last poet walks with slow steps alone into the darkening night

Leaving

sole foot-falls indelibly rising from glistening ground
to meet with the others, for truly leaving this place, though challenges concluded
shall never be, once Muses have met, dance and dipped, each slips
into the archival ever of the glowing after leaving ever-present
glimpsed in the rustle of leaves on a soaring oak
in the tumultuous shower of white chestnut blossoms
on the glistening of that forever wetted cobblestoned street

Here

as the wind sings of all that was, and remains, in the breath of
poets past, present and those that will come to walk for a while and leave
footfalls in the mist, whispers riding the wind

After leaving ..

Sunday, September 25, 2011

Wordle # 23 Jostle in the Shop




A gentle jostle, a benign unintended move, so apparently her awkward accident

There in the shop where with fingered clutch she held that tiny dimpled hand


Important to chat with the owner, unfurl a bright silken blanket

A move designed to attract the eye of strolling passers-by


Each to leave a look, as one-handed she snapped the fabric into the air 

Letting it flutter, filling the store window with brilliant color  

It will be all they remembered, as always, opening that occasional portal of time 

through which she slips yet another child into the annals of absentia   

Sunday, September 18, 2011

WORDLE 22 In the opal corridor



In the opal corridor
Her fingertips thrust
Before her the muse
stumbles toward the mirror
Yearn raw as sheep dung
As she sews to strengthen
With silken thread
Filaments to dusky dreams
Recalled



WORDLE 21 In the Opal Corridor (revisited using all words)


In the opal corridor
Her fingertips verve-thrusted
before her the Muse stumbles
toward the mirror pausing to sit
in yearn raw as sheep dung
as she sews to strengthen
with silken thread
filaments to dusky dreams
recalled
omen to yet impassable egress

Sunday, September 11, 2011

The following three poems were written early this 9-11-11 morning....

Mourning TV

I was cautioned from
early childhood about
the threat of morning tv
turning intellect to mush
and so it always sat quiet
and dark, except for that
bright september morn at 8:45
when for some reason I
rebelled, lazily tuned in
and within a moment
sat in shocked stupification
in the mush of my mind
incapable of thought
stricken to stare
hour after hour as the
crystal blue sky
shattered into
crashing planes
falling towers
and ashen
people
running
in a loop
indecipherable

Falling Heroes

Into the waiting arms of
black-eyed Susans
fell the sacred rain of
heroes
flinging seeds of
immortality

Bearing Witness - 9-11-01

We went to bear witness
one or two days later
maybe three
counting was odd
in those melted clock days

Blocks away the strobe
lights lit the streets
and in my mouth and
nose I breathed in
the acrid ash of crematorium dust

Deeply…

Saturday, September 10, 2011

America, america (this piece was written on 9-11-01 and originally published in the 9-11 Memorial Edition of the Adelphi Society for Psychoanalysis & Psychotherapy Newsletter of which I was editor for several years ).

Oh beautiful for spacious skies
cut deep by silver steel
For purple mountain majesties
above the
gaping
hole

American, america
heart cut
and bled and teared
Lift now
her face
from evil
brace
from al
that now
is feared

Told us they
did of
brotherhood
of hand held
fast and
strong
those purple mountains
majesty
above a rising
dawn


America, america
I gave my heart
to thee through bombs
that fell
and napalms
hell I held
you close to me

America, america
I marched and sung
and cried
for liberty, equality
for others lost and died

We learned of
pots of melted
walls
a land of one
for all
A special land
where freedom
rang a universal
call

A place where
free we all
could be
no crematorium
sweet stink
the evil
things that
happened then
too distant far
to think

And through it all
our self-control
belief in moral
might
a land that's
free for all
to be whatever is
felt right

We didn't always
get along
We didn't all agree
But that we learned
was just the point
of sweetest liberty

And so our
buildings went
unscanned
our skies
unmanned
and free
our streets marched
through by many feet
for causes differently

America, america
I gave my heart
to thee
to noble
cause and
idealized flaws
in name of
liberty

It served us well
until this
hell unleashed
its heinous face
but never more
than here a door
to courage
rich embrace

It takes no
strength to fight
for right when
fear is far away
when babies cry
in distant lands
and others
starve and die

Our alabaster
cities now
agleam with
tears and dust
From this came
we to liberty
As then and now we must

American, america
I gave my heart to thee
gave my belief
a child of grief
to dream
of liberty

All children
of a certain age
remember
with crisp
pride
that we stood
so much
taller then
and that we did believe

American, america
it's simple
to believe
when safe and
warm and tall
and strong
invincible we seemed

American, america
for oh so very long
we've mouthed
the words
without a test
of right against what's wrong

America, america
you raised me in your
arms
So strong
and warm
and held so high
america is no lie...

********


....and tonight 10 years later I quickly write...

We went to bear witness
one or two days later
maybe three
counting was odd
in those melted clock days

Blocks away the strobe
lights lit the streets
and in my mouth and
nose I breathed in
the acrid ash of crematorium dust

Deeply…

Monday, September 5, 2011

Alphabeted Out-Of-This-World. (a silly bit of fluffer nut) for PA Prompt Out of This World

astrologically-sparkled babies. creeping. deeply. forward. gurgling high-up
In June-warmed  kite-bright-crayon-colored  lair

marmaladed new-kittens onward plushly-pounce quick rumbles
softly tummy-tumbling-there
under veils-of white-diaphanous xanadued  yellow-sun shined. zeal
(All that is of, but out, of this world of stolid shouldisms giggle floating in the sweetened aired appeal)

Sunday, September 4, 2011

The Sunday Whirl - Wordle 20 - In Darkness


At a slow crawl, there, pallid women
quivering under choker studded boys
claw toward hoped for hordes of help
spread there on pavemented  rack
as leathered boy-men hitch up pants
elbow each other at their 'goof' and
return raucously reeling  to the bar
while they lay, fractured-winged birdlike
waiting for sun rayed blooms