Poet13's Blog

It’s a non-stop world life lived on overtime.

People on the move got things to prove.

Got no time to fill the empty spaces between us.

Hearts under attack war of nerves brain fever.

The kind of world we live in makes the people we become.

The places we inhabit bear the scars of who we are.

We take what we need and we are lost in thoughtlessness.

When no one understands

                                         a billion suffer silently.

We are the great disturbance in the force.

Our planetary shriek undulates across space

a tidal wave of agony washing away the stars themselves

an unheard subsonic distress call an echo fading into endless emptiness.

If we do not hear each other we are not here.

If we do not heed each other we are nothing.

If we do not touch each other we are alone.

We must be god if there is to be god.

And as god we must save ourselves.

And if we be a merciful god we must bless each other.

And if we be a jealous god we must bind each other.

And if we be a vengeful god we must smite each other.

There can be no other god but ourselves.

We are that we are what we are.

We are the Mighty Karma Cavalcade marching to our drum beating hearts.

I need a more precise index of my life

thorough categorization and lucid segmentation

I need to get organized sanitized and immunized.

Amid this clutter I cannot recall my dreams upon waking

they fade like smoke leaving behind wispy trails of soft memory

invisible vacuums compressing small space into dust.

I need methodology and archeology the better to

trace and translate myself into the common vernacular.

Understanding myself is the one way to true knowledge

everything worth knowing is already inside me

I am the Guide Book the Road Map and the Dictionary

I am the Encyclopedia Britannica

I embody the entire body of knowledge of the KNOWN WORLD

I am the Rosetta Stone.

I am called

Me A to Z

The Universal Biography

                                                                                                                          and I am self titled.

          After all it’s ALL in my head.

The heart is only a dumb muscle that does what it’s told.

The further you go the more there is to look back on

so much psychic scenery a map of your own making

a topographical record of the journey

across landscape you shape from the clay you inhabit.

So solemn so often so many so longs will do that

make you less fun to be around on the merry-go-round

in the big amusement park another roadside attraction

you create to delight and distract the general public.

On you go so much more to see you can’t do it all but you can try

as you go by that way you’ll remember you’ve been somewhere

each stop along the way just another day

portions of time served up as memory.

Snapshots of people and places you’ve seen and felt

touching to be touched they can’t know you if they can’t see you

you learn that much on the trip learn it’s a far cry from a long way

and when you get this close there’s always an off ramp.

All roads lead to home no matter how far you roam

it’s like you end up where you began to realize

you had to get out in the first place so maybe where you started

determines how far you can go and what you become.

The only way out is the door you came in through

after you arrive via the maternal passageway by which we all embark

home is the first tribe we join its rites and myths inhabit a far shore

the limits we set as our own personal event horizon.

Once you leave the village lose yourself in the jungle

you come to know and fear (because you cannot unmake) nature

it’s out of your control like the voice of another like god speaking to you on the radio

broadcasting on every channel

the air waves become a river sweeping you along.

deep sleep is the new narcotic cures a mild malaise

until the next diversion presents itself

nothing personal but in the end everything is

to third generation complicated females

who sometimes forget to feel bad

embrace the inner ascetic

more is less and enough is enough

walk away from pushbutton convenience

the labor you save is working against you

stop talking stop listening

imagine yourself not thinking

taking a long journey away from everything

you arrive precisely on time right where you need to be

nowhere other than here now

in the quiet where silence speaks

the message is the meaning:

preparation impedes spontaneity

                                             they come in dreams 

                     agents from the past assigned to subvert my mission

                                     disguised as contractors

                            they seek to wallpaper over the new edition

                              i engage them successfully

          until the ceiling itself begins to bulge under the weight

     of insecurities raining on the roof seeping from the attic

                                              pressing down

          i push back against the swelling threat which      

                                                 sloshes away then reemerges  

                                                            someplace else

                                 memories keep me dancing

                 test and urge me into awkward contortions

                                        beyond my skill level and range of flexibility

                              this is a clear indication 

                        this is a sign

               i tell both my dead parents that in view of the deteriorating situation

                     we must work on the infrastructure before we deck the halls

In a moral panic over failure to launch

The unspoken given voice at long last angrily sabotages its now captive audience

Delivers an ultimatum:

You will stop, you will listen, you will heed

Or you will perish

Not dramatically in a spontaneous unilateral nuclear implosion

But hereafter day by day slowly but surely

A little bit at a time

As time runs out

Till the surplus you’ve stored is drained away

And the measures you’ve taken are taken away

And the fears you’ve fought gain the upper hand

And falling you remember the helping hands you’ve let go

                      Your fall is your fault

                      Your fate is your fault

                      Your lot is your life

Your landing site is a prison of your own making

You are the master builder of your own temple of doom

All the gloom you’ve generated now descends

A foggy shroud covers your landscape like a blanket you’ve thrown over your head

To hide from the boogeyman

This beast of your own creation

The anger you set free to challenge your god

Returns as compassion with a message just for you:

                       You are the god you question

                       You are the god you curse

                       You are the god unworshiped and forsaken

Your faith succumbed to a terrible will that will not stop

Your life is a machine you have set in motion and cannot turn off

The further you go the more you see that you’ve seen before

Used scenery glides past your limited vision

Like a circular mural describing an enclosed carousel  

Your life is a carnival cavalcade

A calliope cacophony that soothes and comforts and distracts and entertains

Eventually you will come to an end of something

The ride will stop the sound will cease the sensations shrivel

And in the terrifying gift of silence will you hear?

Can you stop feeling long enough to know?

Can you close your eyes and see clearly the clarity you cloak in living color

to camouflage the meaning of your life?

                                                             sleeping through bright mornings

                                                       speeding through clear dark nights

                                                            satisfied and stimulated

                                                            senses attuned to every sight and sound

                                                    a thousand points of night guide me to my inner twilight

                                                    the secret private place where I can be who I am

                                                               where anything I attract I become

                                                                                             and everything I fear waits

in my senescence in a time of true lies and other falsehoods

when time itself is a slave to olfaction

the scent of this well-ripened tableau perfumes my life

with the bittersweet fragrance of decay and remembrance

gone are the days we worshipped at the plastic altar of universal monsters

erected across a pale plane supporting infinite miniature diorama

a worldwide village ancient and ever in redevelopment 

with no warning beyond premonition obliteration unfolds in thermal shocks

and tissue vaporization and shattered bones and boiling brains exploding

this is not our fault this is clear evidence of nature’s cruelty

the celestial mechanics of a merciless deity

our bombs replicate these geologic forces and random phenomena

our genius is an ability to re-think the mind of god

we know release only through the kind embrace of instant extinction

when at last we are buried under airy stones from heaven

pummeled into harmless dust

we become unrecorded history compressed into the bedrock strata

of another desolate plateau beneath a beautiful and indifferent sky

fossil evidence of life’s dumb persistence 

midpoint at the epicenter of my passage

beyond ignorance and aspiration

far from the getting of wisdom

the journey to the center of myself propelling me with its own

momentum

the velocity of destiny

taking me where I am going

a passive passage into the consequences of my nature

“how you are is where you go”  

                                                  like

Beneath the Chinese cherry tree on a cement bench still warmed by rain

I sit eyeing two frogs poking slick snouts above the surface at each end of

the small crescent shaped pond

dimples on a smile.

I assume the lotus posture touching thumbs to fingertips forming a circle

Knowledge Hand Gesture signifier of the Individual Soul’s connection with

the Supreme Soul

a lighted cigar in my left hand.

White smoke catches late afternoon light

a storm washed sky of platinum and silver

shimmering aerial phosphorescence tinged with violet and purple

bathed in the glow of healing rays.

I realize and resolve to still the inner storm to tame the turbulence

within the calm I can see at rest I can be

here now:

this much I know:

A cigar makes a reasonably effective personal anti-mosquito device

but you must keep puffing because when the smoke clears

tiny flying carnivores zoom in to suck the life from your tranquility

and there it is: us against (our) nature.

See! Behold!

I am The Smoking Buddha of Two Frog Pond

casual deity of my own creation Mighty Morphing Pan Lord of New Eden

afire with inspiration unilaterally re-inventing religion

new and ancient thoughts tumble from my head into the sky.

Intricate black strands of coalescing hydrogen molecules

finely etched chains of disintegrating atomic structures

un-entwining geometric constructs drifting up and away

sucked toward the setting sun

in the golden radiance of their fading a kind of clarity.

The signs are everywhere if you see them

signifiers or reflections of personal space and time

a lifetime totality logically organized like numbers on a clock face

take a look it’s all there check the time it’s never too late.

sound is the most sensual of senses

(forget touch of course too coarse)

in the evolution of the species

listen up to make progress

what you hear can impel you

(not like touch compels you)

when less is more the more you feel the less you progress

sound carries you forward

touch holds you back

you can live on ear candy

nobody gets nothing

nobody understands

nobody cares enough to make a difference

          not that they don’t want to just that they can’t

nobody occupies the same space

nobody lives in my place

nobody feels the same way about anything

nobody knows what I know

nobody goes where I go

          nowhere is the one place we all share

nobody’s seen what I’ve seen

nobody’s been what I’ve been

nobody

gets me likes me loves me chooses me misses me caresses me feeds me feels me cures me completes me conquers me dares me supports me believes me knows me

nobody’s responsible for any of this but me

nobody’s to blame

for my shame my loneliness my anger my depletion my gloom my doom my failure my fear my mediocrity my cowardice my coldness my apartness

nobody can do anything for me

nobody can do anything to me

          but what I allow

Here

inside me where fear reigns supreme

the forces of nature lie dormant and repressed.

A lifetime

of watchful care and well timed response

has left me adept but crippled agile yet stiff

clouded like an unpolished gem

buried under sediment and personal history.

Now

urges long suppressed bulge like Mount St. Helens

the day before the day after.

What erupts

is genuine and primal

it burns the practiced arts to ash –

The Book of Acts writ large now gone to smoke and shadow

and the dry whispered echo of turning pages burning.

From shouted gaping fissures

cones of life emerge.

What was inside spews out.

Oh, to erupt in fiery wonder

become just another force of nature!

we have merged

essence, yours and mine, commingles

we flow inexorably toward our evolutionary epitomes

we have become us

 the crowns of our creation

 joys to the world

I am a piece of everything and everyone I’ve ever known

I am a pastiche

 an assemblage

 an abstract cubist impression of reality depicted as an ever-changing work in progress

with no end in sight

my hues    my textures     my color     my shapes

have been formed by many hands

some tender some tough

all have left their imprint

Am I me or am I you?

Am I us or are we me?

I am the shape of things to come

 the residue of what’s left

 the substance of things felt

a memory framed within wishful thinking and abject resignation

I hang in the gallery of mankind

a minor work

on temporary exhibit far down a hallway off a corridor in a neglected wing

let traffic pass me by

 let a crowd gather and gape

appraise and critique

shrug off or condemn

the thing that I am is what it is

take it or leave it

reality is the space between us

 the rest is real too

too much input

     rough thoughts

                              drawn in

           tightened up

      backed out

                        up stream

                                       in under

 incremental despair

                       random       chaos

                      applied     at     constant     intervals

                     like     death     by       a thousand cuts

no use denying physiology

it is what we are

it describes our potential

presents possibilities

prescribes our limits

everything

every thing

that ever was

and could be

is happening

in a split second exploding

at one one-billionth

of one increment

of infinity

now

at the speed of light

it’s how fast and how far

we are going

in time and in physics

we are caught between where memory begins and eternity ends

this is when we no longer ask why

this is the be all and end all of all being

here

now

there

then

 if not this time

when

which

eventually becomes where

and where’s just here with no time for w’s

at the intersection of time and physiology

the collision is a connection

but time has velocity on its side

and weak backs are poor instruments for pushing clocks uphill

therefore:

I’d rather do the easy thing more often

than a hard thing now and then

hobnobbing with my fellow homo-sapiens

                    and other gorillas in the zoo

                              standing erect

                     gripping cocktails with opposable thumbs

          sniffing out the herd

                    youngsters gambol and twirl at play

                              my attention drifts their way

                                              away from my own species

chattering in a language i understand too well

what if we put down our bones

          took off our clothes and

                                                  groomed one another

                              instead of trying to fuck one another

          even in necessary ways

naked apes have more to conceal than our shaggy brethren

                    our clothing a temporary hide we don to cover our baser selves

but once dressed we lose our senses succumbing to artifice

                        aping the apes the caretaker avoids direct eye contact

                        while interpreting the behavior of our distant relatives

                        tells us it’s a family affair

                              we know the dance and perform it well

                              the tribe requires it

                              we serve the greater good without thinking

advice to self on a rainy sunday: let go

if i accept the possibility of doom

then doom will come

the thing you fear is inside you

      you are your own worst nightmare

 you are every part of the dream

my mortal coils tighten their grip

i squeeze back

                             wait for lightning to strike

fuck with yourself

          undermine assumptions

            challenge accepted truths

risk blowback

the more you take what you think you need

         the more you need it

and so my friends in closing

i cease and desist the urge to resist

accept the things i crave

reject happy endings

brew bitter tea

                             the better to brace myself

can’t get past it without going through it

the distance from here to there

describes the trajectory of desire

the long distance journey of all wayward travelers

dodging bullets

missing stops

ducking and weaving through the pleasure dome

angels on duty impart wisdom in passing

care is advised     risks are taken

skirting edges in a downward spiral

along the endless ziggurat atop the pleasure dome

from beneath its foundation

a cosmic tornado spins a funnel cloud that sucks earth into heaven

to appease the appetites of envious gods

celestial forefathers of our worldly manifestation

                                                                      our humanity is the result of their desire

                                                                                our existence an accident of divine conjecture

                                         restless minds at play

                                            having our say

                                              processing    analyzing    regurgitating

                                                  novel arrangements of classic concepts

                                                  new thoughts composed of ancient remnants

                                                  fragments of lost civilizations

                                                  put to fresh use     lyrics for our song

                                          despite fanatical devotion to the lesser gods

                                          after all is said and done

                                                  we worship ourselves

in the throes of an agoraphobic fit

            a housebound hissy

trapped alone with my anxiety

                        the thing that compels me to put up a false front

                                    the engine that drives my edgy agitation

it diffuses and removes me

             phases me in and out of the picture

holds me prisoner locked inside the charming façade

          keeping the creature alive

manufacturing the monster requires massive jolts of energy

            the bolts in my neck also keep my head from flying off

i screw them down tight as electricity explodes in fiery fractured flashes  

            the furious spurious frissons forced from living tissue

                           straining to replicate the behavior of others

lurching elegantly i stumble with grace fall on my face

            the pleasing form transformed

                        the transparent visage reflecting rather than emitting

i manipulate musculature

i smile look interested or sympathetic

i feign understanding          

            i pretend to be human as best i can

                        so they will say of me

                                    it’s alive!

i yearn to learn to explain myself

            to them

so I can say

            i did not start this i cannot stop it

                        you see

            although it is within reach

            i cannot turn off the machine with these flailing arms   

           outsiders

                     inside

           circle of love

                                        emanations

                                        expectations

                                        heavens above

                                                            fear joins hands

          circle of hope

                              this is the place

                                        where none may mope

                    seeking the self in perpetual motion

          falling with trust

                                        into oceans of lust

                    shaking off dust

          we must

                    we’re here

                              we’ve come for ourselves

                                        come down from the shelves

                                        gathered to honor

                                                            great god the father

                                                            the mother of our disguises

                                                               the monsters that breed us

                               to complete their destruction

unkind impulses physical dislocation

compromised by polite society

the bigger fish swim at higher depths

the random seas rage on

in the flow i go where i am not needed

swept past islands of sanctuary

too old for these altitudes

can’t take the beat anymore

                                                                              there needs to be less of me

all the bodies i’ve bumped up against

the ways i’ve touched using my cock like a defensive weapon

                              one rod to rule them all

it is fearful out here in the field

this realm where poets can only converse in verse

                              unable to talk or touch

afraid of coming face to face

better verb to verb acting out various versions of how the scene is played

                    letting language do the heavy lifting

hearts too brittle to bear this burden

mistaking common sense for wisdom

                              giving voice to unformed thoughts

rushing my expressions

the faster i can describe it the less i will feel it

                    if i understood myself i wouldn’t ask you to

read this poem

try to assemble this puzzle in motion

each word a particular piece

the whole nothing more than the scored image of a fractured snapshot in time

                              Dorian Gray’s devolving portrait

 locked away in a dark closet somewhere

                    you can see it clearly with your ear

cubist syntax splashed utterly audibly

                              upon the mind’s subconscious canvas

          the living colors with which the world is whitewashed

monday monday just another blue moon

casting irony in luminous relief

a night garden that conceals and reveals

a topiary topography where the wild things dwell

under the banner of heaven’s gate there’s no exit to elsewhere to over there

over that highest hill

on the plane between here and there the beasts of the field return to their watering holes their communal fountains of need and greed

here the righteous and the willful alike drink to live to quench their thirst

to get here first and last the longest

settlements in the valley become cities on the plane all the ways and means we devise to survive crash and crumble one way or another

when the walls fall the menagerie runs wild become drawn conclusions

etched on cave walls testament to our methods and our focus

and all our sacred relics and revered dogma and cherished notions

are writ in the stuff of legend

some day soon and not for eons they remain open to interpretation

by succeeding generations of our contemptuous progeny

doubt in the heart

panic on the brain

an acquired reaction to the love attraction

if you open up and let it in

it might beat you up again

yet not to admit it is somehow a sin

judgment in need decrees out of greed

the blind keep love cut back to the seed

Today is the day unlike any other

When forms and sounds can make us shudder.

Today is the day we must beware

Of those who rip and cut and tear.

Today is the day we’re all gonna pay, a day most appalling

On such a day the sky could be falling.

A day of darkness a day of evil

A day to put our hearts in upheaval.

A day for weeping a day for creeping

A day for tombs and shuttered rooms.

On this day past we’ve stood aghast

At forms and shapes that weird shadows cast.

Across the floor along the ceiling

Scurrying things that send us reeling.

Beneath the floor beyond the door

What cold flesh stirs in blood and gore?

And long buried things – the most dangerous kind –

Rise up from the basement beneath our mind.

This is the time the most dread of all

When demons and spirits awake to the call.

There’s nothing to do there’s nowhere to run

Lament, lament the dying sun!

For today is that day what more to say?

It’s Friday the Thirteenth –

Let us pray, let us pray!

twice blessed with intimacy at one time

needing to touch and touching

needing to be touched and feeling

safe

I open to receive and am fulfilled

trusting

I allow and am complete 

                                                                 in my dreams

cold boy

without you

the night burns me up

if only you’d reach out

touch my touch

what holds you back

skin smooth as ice

eyes dark and concealing

does the hidden heart yearn

do you cry ice needles alone in your room

behind doors closed to my beating heart

recording the unnecessary

mainlining the depths

finding no wisdom

concluding nothing

          an internal dialog spoken in whispers I cannot hear

keeping secrets from myself

yearning for the truth

hiding from the truth

fearing the truth

confronting myself without conviction

          music played on instruments beyond my capacity

coming to conclusions

changing my mind

reformatting my solutions

intuiting the next course

showing off with shadows

          misdirection performed with precise purpose

grounded by fear

asking after the children

engaging in social intercourse

putting my best face forward

          masks worn even before the mirror

verbalizing complex issues

interpreting strange signs

altering my perceptions to accommodate puzzles

riddled with everything

feeling the undeniable truth

          all that there is is all there

assessing bad habits and cataloging character faults

                        keeping it real with myself

yea right good luck with that

            introspection is internal communing

a process to calculate your progress toward some state of being

                                    just another way to try and fix yourself

self-delusional obfuscating bullshit of the first order

                                    contemplation may seem passive

                        but what’s the point of it all if you don’t have the first clue

                                                            all the things you did and were

                                                there must be meaning

there isn’t

you can’t see the obvious answer staring you in the face

eyeball to eyeball 

you go blind trying to fathom the unknowable

 looking is how you see searching is one way to find

                                    what you are looking for

the farther you go the further away you get

what you seek eludes you

you stumble through a thousand illusions

before you hit a real brick wall

no matter how far you go or what direction

eventually you run into one

                                                something lies at either end of everything

best keep to the center and avoid collisions

the middle way is the golden means to your ultimate destination

good luck send me a postcard when you get there

distress in the lower tract

a flaccid lack of inspiration below the belt

          the reflex fails to connect

the baseline has shifted

                                        no amount of quantum electro dynamic

                              string theory or elegant mathematics

can make this reality less plausible

however misguided native instinct does the trick

                              lets slip the golden ratio

skewing symmetry

                                        and harmony

seeking a mathematical formula for beauty

a solid system of proportions

                              absolution through self justification

you come closest to yourself

in the raw moments

                    when the façade slips its skin

and the mask is removed

you don’t need a mirror to know exactly what you look like

this is when you willingly dissolve

          into a rainbow puddle of putrescent stardust

                              comingling with the multitude of other essence

                    inside outer space

Separated from my voice

I am blues in the night

All melody and rhythm

Sliding on slick streaks over wet concrete

              through the acoustic hallways of endless timeouts.

I am desire seeking satisfaction

I am the velocity of sex discharging

            friendly bullets ricochet off the sides of their intended target

                         well intentioned but dangerous nonetheless.  

I feel my power.

I marvel at the heat I generate.

If they could harness me I’d light up a city.

Average families of four could live off me for months.

Extending my lonely karmic hand

I grasp the god within me

Cannot deny the doomed destiny of medieval martyrdom.

Grace descends upon my face

I smile within the flames

Embrace the secular saint I am becoming.

My body rises

Transformed from flesh to fantasy

Seared to perfection.

I am become the life giving fuel that sustains my fellow man

my blood but balm to ease our passage through this matrix of collective longing.

   sunflower sprouts from cracked cement of a city sidewalk

 blade of grass knifes through parched porous earth

vulture hatchlings quiver in harsh fresh air lifting open mouths to the sky

 rogue tiger’s lonely roar evaporates like dew under the morning jungle sun

 lucky dog with no thoughts in his head nuzzles a wet bone

 wise monkey with no sense of self fondles his simian prick with contentment

 old woman back bent by troubles shuffles by a river of automobiles rushing in other directions

 weed tree grasping a patch of dirt stretches over broken cinder block wall

 mouse worries its way through the summer field toward an appointment with a circling hawk

life finds its way

the only way it can

without sentiment without help without thought without love without doubt without wisdom without guidance without courage without fear without maps without understanding without regret without awareness without malice without direction

life is its own justification

life affirms itself

with every sense with every breath

with taste with desire with sacrifice with joy with hunger with claws with love with care with birth with growth with blood with stealth with beauty with will

Come unto me with your pain and worry your sorrow and loss.

Seek me hiding in the shadows wanting to do good

working no miracles.

You see only another dim bulb trying to shine and rise

full of good intentions and other forms of plenty

sitting still eyeing hungry wanderers.

Am I not demonstrating the truth like a Zulu proverb?

Behold verily I verify this is life being true to itself over and over

until it gets itself right.

                                                                   this is what i see

                                                                   this is how i help