Reflections on the Farm; draft #5

15 years later I returned
to visit buildings I played around when I was a kid:
to walk by survivors of our colonial past
corn crib, pig sty, empty garages, and a barn built long ago,
ground floors diffused with the dung and dust of 200 years,
some still hoary-marked with faded rosettes
of white, green, dapple red, and sometimes pale blue.

As sheep owners we had enough lambs, one for each of the six of us.
On occasion we'd bridle them to posts like natural lawnmowers,
and we would take turns, the six of us, every thirty minutes checking on them:
except the time my brother forgot and was it irony that strangled his sheep to death?
Sheep's body lifeless and limp
it's eyes bulging and black
in the middle of field on a hot summer's day.

Flaked wood so bare the paint covered like a transparency
and the corn crib's simple rectangular skeleton
laid bare in old grey slats standing against time,
and for evenings reposes with its long lean shadow,
its body ripped
almost apart
now choking on an overgrowth of the thorn bushes and weeds.

My mind recalls sweat sticky evenings, bur bruised and thorn stabbed,
rough-housing only interrupted by the sound of metal against metal,
mother calling us to dinner,
banging heavy on a great iron triangle.
This dinner part made by an acre now come full
of cucumber, peas, green beans, corn,
and so many that the mind loses count.

Thin Sheet; draft #1

A man stands hands holding high a sign
and as an aside he digs trenches boy 'til he can't dig no more.

For every road a trench and these trenches are deep.
Ten feet deep built to hold fortunes of gold.

And though his eyes may be Portland
fogged in quiet
on a slow rainy night,
lately I linger awake.

The sweat and stink of my body
sings into my nostrils' airs
and the also scented thin sheets pulled lightly-tightly over my naked body
in this calm but all too warm and humid autumn eve.

Letters on a Plate; rough draft

Indeed I followed too far and this is not
unbound I say goddamn can you believe what the maker said
when you can't believe the maker?

Emasculated jellyfish sit in packs off the Florida coast
awaiting an unspoken invitation
to thuggery
so we deal out the card until Jokers wild.

UFO landing in Arizona reads a bumper sticker.

Lickety-split and still I lick the cream of memories.

Wonders upon wonders speaking through mirrors
I guessed the return of the elephant
and here it comes trampling the earth and all who walk on her.

Faster than lightning the program goes unbroken
typist finger digitalis heals all maledictions.

40th and Market; final draft. (formerly El Thoughts One)

Salt dissolved in water sticks to my shoes
crawls up my pant legs
fresh spit snow and crusty coat
chunks of ice slip and slide beneath the soles of my shoes,
black and gray speckled white mazes
in this record-breaking winter
I criss
cross the dwarf I am
against this skyline of man made sequoias
concrete rebar buildings of glass and glowing lights
testament of some kind of life in the spinning airs of the world:
a soft pillow to our concerns pitted far flung in space.
I am moving so fast I'll never slow down.

The scene on the corner of 40th and Market
men standing grease or anything-else smudged polyester jackets
worn soles propped on empty and upside down Pepsi crates
and the ambassador speaks, “Get a ride!” “Get a ride.”
A taxi ride but where's the taxi?

The El runs under these streets and you can hear it rumble
you can hear it scream
and you can have whatever you want
trinkets cheap bling incense body oils,
bootleg movies hot off the press,
Bo-Sing Chicken, nails or a new haircut,
H & R Block day care and a wine shoppe
tried to go into Flynn's but Flynn's be closed.

I slide my gloved hand on the rail and descend.
my feet graze steps and my eyes like a beeline
keep my pace in line
so I don't stumble here at this stairwell finish line,
too late to miss this one, too late to wait
six or less or ten or twelve minutes
depending on the time of day.

I cross the platform entrance
run the pass push through the turnstile.

The whine and screech of train songs congest the air
platform three-quarters full of scattered people and I,
step left step right fill gaps in efficiency
ever crowding is the rush hour El.

Doors slide open like Star Wars
I pass portal to a land of blank stares
and vacant aural landscapes
but for the tinny sound of a hip hop amplified iPod
and the cajole of a mother to her daughter,
"Sit down." "Sit down!"

Or the braggadocio of two seasoned brothers
slap-sticking black verbal dance on the urban landscape
scat about cards and women and hard luck,
two seats to a man.
And though I am just on my way to work
language also is written on the walls around me.

Cherries Wet in the Sun; final draft

As a youth I would climb high up in a thin-limbed tree,
bark scratching bare arms as I picked cherries,
dropped them into a bucket
and relished the wind on my face and the sunshine that warmed my skin.
These memories are now confined to a picture my mother gave me many years ago as part of a birthday gift: one photo in an album full.

But when summer downpours sucked my sister down a ditch
under and inside a thorn bush's craggy and cavernous insides
I learned not to expect worn out shoes
or tattered clothes to keep the rain out:
fungal feet swollen like monkey paws clutching pacifiers.

Parched throats need water
and arid eyeballs stare up periscopes with foggy lenses
only to see
mountain gorillas running on four legs
their knuckles skipping against stones
(instead of English they use sign language:
universal love signifies speech like bitches signify heat).

Volcano Thoughts; final.

I can't stop mixing feelings with volcano thoughts
and sometimes you need to vomit before you can get cuisine.

Night ride I
down tree vaulted asphalt of Martin Luther King Jr Drive.
Headlights of cars passing too close flash and blur in my mini rear-view,
but my aluminum tubes, carbon-reinforced fork, and steely resolve
carry me as I ride on.
And as I ride
before me rises an artificial sunrise
ambient glow of millions of street lights,
the LED sprinkled city skyline,
and my wheels spinning rpms some sixty.
The moon casts its reflection on the rain flecked street.

Outliers of tree branches hang overhead,
to my left the Schuylkill River's riparian zone,
and mixed among the foliage and sculpted meadow-lands
wild geese and goslings'
goose droppings brown black and white
heavy scattered among the grass and on and along the pathway.

But on this night
I who choose the road also avoid
headless geese carcasses deeply genuflecting on the bike route.

Fist a Flying; final.

I step into the ring fists a flying
blood stained ropes
splotch covered canvas
smashed mouth and I'm shaken all my body through
falling backward
bouncing off the ropes
g-forces whipping sweat off my face
like a dog shaking off water after a torrential downpour.
No time to ask myself what's the fighting for.

I turn and face a battle royal where everyone's against me.
Eyes lean forward my mind leans backward
and I remember a time when I saw the finish line
a mirage rising murky on the highway,
and I drink deep from a dream-works spigot
fade in and out
come round about
hot tub thermostat shoots to the moon
120 degrees
so hot it burns.

Mynd's Letter; draft #4

In mynd's eye there's a letter I mean to send
but since heaven forfeits whoever it forbids
and writing is not a sin,
this bloody letter
iron rich as the rise of society,
is mailed if in word alone is mailed.

Change the rules and dress up names
maim commonality or at least make lame
and after wringing capital paragraphs to thunderous applause
we all clap and jingle our change.

Down the lane
the dapper dressed walk in unison swinging their canes
dipping quills in pitch black ink wells.
Splendor's reckoning comes as a heart wind terrible to behold
and we cease to feel the wisps of wind that sometimes soft
dance across your face on a hot summer's day.

Tickle; draft #1

The more I am tickled the more it hurts
I can't explain my irrational gasps
or the sensation that runs across my skin like army ants on the march
soft blue electric lights seeking for fuel
or a wind that quickly whips across your face
I flush red and my body shakes.

My cat Bella has an uncontrollable purr.
Touch her and she purrs. Give her attention and she purrs.
Now, at least a little, I understand her automaton nature:
tickled I laugh a chaotic mess, not funny but an unthinkable
gagging breathless gasp of funnies left behind.

My wife enjoys my helplessness.
Touch me wrong and I tickle.
Smooth skin and I tickle.
Tickle me I'm the tickle monster's return for revenge.

Tight Rope Walker; draft #3

I stand on the tight rope
toes tight against the coiled threads.
My eyes look forward but my mind sees three-sixty:
steady while I sway, approaching halfway.

The crowd is silent. Should I achieve unscathed the distant edge
they'll applaud but for the most part they await disaster,
that I should fall without a safety net:
I too was dared to perform by passersby
too afraid to walk the straight line herself
but nonetheless gleeful bystander to the glitz
the glimmer of this media driven spectacle.

From on high among the rafters, the nosebleed,
a yawn settles upon silence
my soft feet lift glide inches at a time
eyes glued to the goal despite the catcalls.

The platform nears
my mind turns to the philosophy of distance,
how it changes moment to moment
relative to my pace, the subtle swish of legs.
Mind and eye are one
an audience of Baptists thinks I look like Jesus walking on air.

My right foot clears the cedar wood platform edge.
I hear first a solitary clap and then a cacophony of applause
the rhythm to which I declare my living pulse.

Newton's Only Law; Draft #1

For many the dance
quixotic spectacle of crystal meth chandeliers come crashing to earth,
Newton's only law,
became the only thing worth waiting for.
And so sweat boiling on brows and the tension in the air
and thoughts juggled as bites from apples appeal to the worm
while people stared,
made up for puking out metal shards and shitting black tar.

Opossum Belly; draft #3, finished poem more or less

Dead fur dries over and over peels skin
slowly lifting from muscle tissue:
somewhat of death an end to heartbeats love nerve twitch
severing iron from blood the life-giver oxygen reactor,
somewhat the passage of windy airs
somewhat also the rapidity of flies dropping egg bombs
their young pouring forth from fleshy orifices:
muscle becomes meal.

An opossum's belly turns and writhes under the hot summer sun
and it turns also my stomach
thankful I am empty of food late for dinner.
Gas expands turning animal into organic and bone toothed cavity,
byproduct of microorganism-evolutionary vagary:
the small rule the fate of the large
that feed and fuel and wait and crave
demanding more from passerby's lest they sit unsuspecting
and then too bare the rancid meat fruit of fly speck goners
puking red meal acidic entrails out onto the pathways of life.

The Unfurled Sail; draft

The sun the morning
and the ship set to its moorings.
Many men, strong, smiling,
ragged, tanned beautiful blackened
men lifting the chain,
the blood red,
rust dead chain dripping
incandescent. Pulled
from the rock bottom of the bay,
a rock bottom worn smooth
and in a slushy
dizzying poof as a cloud the sand
expands, contracts, and sprays the sunlight,
then floats and distracts
the fish swimming, the fish who had,
until the anchor lifted up, top light, dragged across,
a ragged dance, been supping the blood red
chain, dead but until then to the fish.

These curious fish could not count the
nutrition facts of the great iron chain
but instead the taste, so unlike their regular diet
of scuttering crustaceans
and babes of the placid sea; so unlike
but the fish, unknowing even to themselves,
ignorant of the platypus,
suckled the dead, blood red rusted iron chain
and shackled anchor until its dance,
until the blackened tan smiling out of men,
ragged, pulled tugged
the chain, and set the ship adrift.

The sun, now rising,
raining down constant flash
of sunlight, sunshine
around and almost
through the precipitous clouds,
not the puffed
sandy underwater dance of clouds upon
the rock bottom but instead a
cloud built up from the dust
and love of lives past,
now desiccated and dried,
now mixed and slurried
into the earth’s great
salad bowl; of broccoli, of carrots,
sprouts, and togetherness of material things.

A call comes out across the bow,
anchor now on board,
great chain rust puddles dripping through
floor boards; the call a call to
now set sails to unfurl the
flourish of canvas to readjust ropes
to climb to the lookout and the
subsequent snapping of the sails.
The great boat, lurches and bobbles,
as a stout cork upon a
wine bottle ocean, the sails filling with wind
and yet empty they be, pale white,
as ghosts, but bright in the day’s sunshine.

Pedestals of Rose Petals

I stand on pedestals
of thorns and rose
petals, prick and the blood flows.

my ragged shoulder
sore at the socket
pops and I feel the pain
of separation:
the forever far off sound
of percussion, the suction
of ears as they make meaning of chaotic air
as the ground trembles,
the wind passes
through space and time
passes through our very fiber
but still accounting for the toothless decay
of humans thin,
or rotten in old age
against the supple nakedness of young skin,
ever met with ever.

The glory of sunrise matched only by
a night spent waiting for its rays to pierce my flesh
as arrows pierce armor as bullets shred for death.
And yet the sun rises this cool September morn.

Summer Ice; draft #2

For the sake of summer pleasure
ice once was harvested from waterways of the North.
The Great Lakes, Hudson Bay, the Baffin Sea
and all across the Land Of The Midnight Sun
hulls tought from port to starboard
longitudinally crossed the Atlantic
bound for ports along the St. Lawrence Seaway or the New England coast,
water choppy as unpredictable storms lashed with wind,
raining death on the unwary.

Upon arrival, men stacked the ice in barns
in shady places always the coolest part of town.
It perspired and evaporated but slowly
and as a refrigerator left open wide
emanated cold air:
a respite for resting workers
this ice that stuck out like a sore thumb in the humid sun.

But those were days when miracles became mechanical wonders
days and years before the rudiments of electronic inventions:
cool and cold now manufactured
man made abundance
like winter plucked from the sky
imbuing our favorite tv dinners prepackaged heaven's on earth.

Unstill Earth; draft #1 (revisions to Part 1 only)

Part I

Unstill is the earth and calm is the air
as farmers rise in the early hour
before anyone can even see the sun.
Farmers till the soil,
unearth the past and yet mother is proud
(and yet we may feed off her thinning belly).

But still the earth spins, the horizon nears
and there appears
as storm clouds hanging low,
lights crackling
dancing across the sky
against a mist as rain too falls.
All heard the crash of thunder,
sounding from cliff to cliff
as if reality yet may be torn asunder.

But farmers and townsfolk alike pay no heed
and ignorant of the cookie cutter clouds coming closer
and with strength no more than an echo,
but that still may shake the foundations of houses and of tree.
This storm comes not solely with wind and rain:
it is plunder for that she hungers,
and vengeance rides upon her shoulders.

Like many days before and many days after
hammer blows are heard across the valley,
the din of metal ringing against metal echoes
among wood and river
until, in some distant glen, it dies as it combines with
the slow murmur of life,
becomes hidden in the early day’s darkness.
Though the work of the day indeed needs done
and these men and women are fit to do it.

No one endures for a moment to think about that sound in the distance,
the low rumbling
some say of earth some say of heaven
and some say the sound of hell gurgle-screaming
across the doorsteps of our homes,
and so work with no thought,
workers slamming hammers against anvils,
patient to the demands of the soft metal.

Now rain clouds gather together
and prophecy long predicted comes true
the rain pelts holes and welts in exposed backs
makes right original sins:
wanton lust and selfish greed stirred into the meal of the day.


Part II

Maybe an umbrella opens and maybe a window closes,
but rain, its rank mud flow like a river,
wind blowing through bedrooms,
water rising, flooding over windowsills
water spilling out and pouring our personal secrets across the ruin;
the secret kisses or unwelcome advances of girls and boys.

And crack, the hammer is heard!
Through no one though hearing
except that of the crack of
concrete breaking;
wind scattering dust
water and rock.
And the low din,
the sounds of the smithy dimmed:
a long human sigh.

Looted media and
unexpected sources;
evacuated refugees
the living dead and who among us?
the hearts and minds and souls on television,
The bloated lies stripped bare and torn apart
as rabid, feral animals.
Accountant strikes gavel;
day dusk then darkness.



Part III

Shadow grows up under increasing light,
The sun pushes through, workers lament
mass migration and loss of work.
The cycle returns renders progress mute
dead stones sink swimmers.
Sludge of creation ferments deep inside
name this experiment.
Humans still crawl to some light
less the absence of dark and we wonder at
perspire at swirling sweat, collected in buckets:
recycled remains of yesterday’s fears.

In time the worker’s return and to what,
future sits uncertain before us
Though tragedy of the commons
choices being poor
and the repetition of the worst
the worst halves win and seeks larger families,
but new buildings spring summer buds
Though frighten the familiar
dead boast complete confidence,
architects rise early
horses breathe deep gallop forth,
blood streams behind the memories of old remembered,
Not learn future but repeat past;
In this past is prologue, but so too is present.

Part IV

Months crawl to years and years pass
sand through glass
our species reborn as the same people moved on
though still earthly the color of the people be
They kneel down elbow deep
streets full of the excess of bloated sewers
and rainfall from the hurricane,
exception the accepted prior planning passed aside.
Attention span deficit clinics
a buck to the nearest stranger
hope dwindles proportional
To rising privatization as time changes records show
recess our own perception of how we exist in the great emptiness and openness
this air we breathe.
Convex is the shape of our minds
unchanged potential left yet unrewarded.

Literal meaning of the
kamikaze daydream
of the incessant squawk from a parrot dying
breathing
no indulgence unfettered
leaking deep white and dull gray putty-like matter.
Table top pollution,
scraped and tossed lobster cooked bright red
then lost in the riddles and ripples running up
against mountain sides and hill sides and our eternal nature to react with vigor but to
prepare with dismal failure.

Tight Rope; rough draft

I stand here on the tight rope
not walking just standing
toes tight against the coiled threads.
My eyes look forward but my mind revolves in 360 degrees,
measuring the distance to the further platform
simultaneously looking back on the pitter-patter of my feet:
did I shake the wire? Am I more than halfway?

The crowd is silent. Should I arrive unscathed at the distant edge
they'll applaud my efforts, but mostly they are waiting
some say courting
disaster, that I should fall and this time with no safety net:
for this walk was a dare, put on me by passersby
both too afraid to walk the straight line themselves
and also gleefully participatory in the glitz and glimmer
of this spectacle and media driven life.

I can hear someone up in the rafters,
someone too cheap or too poor to pay full price,
yawn.
My feet softly lift and glide forward and my eyes are glued
but my mind is a juggler
looking between tossed balls of circus glory
and the wonder, are they tired of me or worn out from work
where my dance at sometime
became the only thing they've been waiting for all the week long,
as if the sweat boiling on my brow, the great heights, and the tension in the air
made up for puking out metal shards and shitting black tar.

Nearer now the platform looms,
my mind philosophizes on the meaning of distance
and how it changes from moment to moment
in relation to the pace of my legs swishing back and forth.
Mind and eye become one body glides,
baptists in the audience think I look like Jesus walking on air.

First I hear a solitary clap, and then a cacophony of applause
as my right foot clears the cedar of the platforms edge
declaring both my living pulse and the success of the venture.

Wanting a Bonfire Blaze; draft #1

My fingers linger on her soft skinned belly
pale red glass of a tummy ring for as long as I've been looking.
The skin stretches thinner after each exhale
lungs vacuum mucous membranes
ribs barely hidden behind flesh
ribs almost pushing against the smooth flesh.
But I want
lips lick tongue kiss up belly button hard hips
hope for internal combustion, a lighter lit flame igniting body
such that our skins touch and
THE WHOLE THING GOES UP!

But she lays still
eyes soft glazed breath
dizzy pain of long workdays:
unable to release as talons of sharp-eyed gold feathered eagle
clutching chinook between claws.

I wish she'd spot me a thousand miles away
grip me bloody tight between her fingers,
take me to her nest and eat my flesh warm and raw.

City With A Slow Heartbeat; draft #3

Welcome Latenight Rider, the cool eyed El awaits you.

Knife scratch phone numbers etched in dull stainless steel
seats covered in seventies style thin and stained carpet
violet speckles on soft neon blue.
Ink stain directions smudged in broad crack head script
From the 15th ride the broad street line north
get off at Allegheny
and you're at the Diamond street projects.

Welcome Latenight Rider, the cool eyed El awaits you.

From Erie-Torresdale going West
here on elevated tracks high above Kensington Avenue
ride quiet quite like the glance of a bull
in the kicked up dust just before the charge:
just the squeal of breaks
the breathless mechanical whistle of metal against metal
and a mechanized voice announcing the next station on deck
letting us know whether the doors are open or closed.

Welcome Latenight Rider, the cool eyed El awaits you.

To my left across the aisle two men sit facing each other,
I see them out of the corner of my eye,
each sprawled across two seats,
one sitting back twisted
arms gray anguish folded across the back of the seat
speaking gravel too fast
but not for his brother no he ain't no fool
he won't get fooled again
he ain't no fool and he won't get fooled again.

He speaks and chants and sings
and God bless this and god bless that
god bless these bitumen black-grey roofs that stretch out
endless in the dusk and we only pass by with vacant stares
burrowing holes into windows seatbacks and floor,
or chins notched in books
avoiding cigarette burn holes in my jeans,
even as we ride by abandoned warehouses shit full of shattered glass.

Myth of Meritcracy (draft #2)

Lightning flashes across the maddened sky
cuts molecules in half and you can count the seconds
1...2...3 then crack and boom!
Peering down at that moment you see the slow shuffle of yesterday's work,
the careworn and withered movements of dying-eyed
shadow characters best known from a distance
best known as abstract in a less than ideal world
while working-class stiffs think concretely,
lest our own thin skin be ripped
sinews and veins born against an x-ray sky.

Storm moving fast as clouds churned up by a whirlwind
dark masses floating in ethereal airs:
turned hot on its heals an evolution
of stomaching stuffs and growing the belly's bulge.
Fat now made famous
its consumptive powers render supposed evidence of our own will to fight
mano y mano
even though guilty till the last man standing
oink and you slobber over dinner
hwoink and your tongue pale pink lolls out
once more to suck on mother's tit
as anecdotal evidence insulates fallacious theory
in this myth of meritocracy.