Latter works…

Complication.

Nev­er real­ly runs out, this course.

No mat­ter what peo­ple tell you.

And Even though you think it Might,

Might.

The Geog­ra­phy doesn’t mat­ter, because

an Easy Climb can be as ter­ri­fy­ing as Rough Ter­rain.…

The Brain

Sees it all the Same.

 

 

Look here!

What you see?

Something Strange?

No!

Something ME!

 

Wisdom…again!

Who’s the wis­er,

when the wind no longer blows -

and who will take the time

to stoke the fire when it’s grown cold!

There’s a dark­ness in my mind’s eye

just beyond my line of sight.

You can see it

when the crows fly

and the embers lose their light!

Who’s the wis­er

when the fire no longer glows,

and who can see the line

left by seeds the wind has strown!

There is cold­ness in some kind­ness

just beyond the edge of night

You can taste it

in the water,

when the air is wet with night!

Replace­ment Part.

I always felt jeal­ous of Vin­nie. Jeal­ous, and in love.

You know,
(and you do),
I nev­er met Vin­nie,
except in your pic­tures,
and in your eyes.

Some­how, when­ev­er we were togeth­er,
Vin­nie was with us.

Not in per­son, but in our minds.
Yours, and mine.

And I was jeal­ous.
Jeal­ous!
Can you imag­ine!?!

And at the same time
com­plete­ly head over heels in love with Vin­nie.

With a man I’d only met in pic­tures,
and in your words.

Jeal­ous!
Of an Agent in absen­tia.

Of God!
THE God,
at least of Art (and of every­thing
I’d ever hoped I’d want)!

And where was He

when I came want­i­ng?
Wan­der­ing.…

Moved on!

Moved on, you say?!?

Gone!

Hav­ing made His place in anoth­er place -

Beyond My reach, and my obses­sion.
Moved out of place, and out of space.

Out, then, and into anoth­er place!

Out­side of Where and How.
And out­side of Me, and My Now!

And you missed Him,
and I missed Him,
for you and for me,
and he missed him too!

A lit­tle for him­self, but most­ly for both our sakes!

Vin­ny was the only thing miss­ing,
from the pic­ture, and from all of this.

Instead of the orig­i­nal,
you were work­ing out of a tool box
filled with replace­ment parts.

And I was chief among them.
Left to love you -
See you,
Be you!
YOU!
My Sis­ter in Silence.
Moth­er of Mad­ness.
Dream­er in Dark­ness!

Maid of Heav­en,
Queen of Light.

It was sim­ple just to watch you,
and admire your Line of Sight!

II. Replace­ment Part, Anon.

I always felt jeal­ous, you know.
Jeal­ous, and in love.

You know,
(and you do),
I nev­er met Him,
except in your pic­tures,
and in your eyes.

Some­how, when­ev­er we were togeth­er,
He was with us.

Not in per­son, but in our minds.
Your mind, and mine.

And I was jeal­ous.
Jeal­ous!
Can you imag­ine!?!
And at the same time
com­plete­ly head over heels in love with Him.

With that Man I’d only met in your pic­tures,
and in your words.

Jeal­ous!
Of an Agent in absen­tia.

Of -

Oh, God!
My God, maybe -
at least at the time, and with my lim­it­ed Sight!

And where was He, then?
Moved on!
Gone!
Hav­ing already made His place in anoth­er place -

Beyond Your artistry, and My reach -
No, my obses­sion.

Moved out of place.

Out­side of Where and How.
Out­side of My Now!

And you missed Him,
and I missed Him,
and he missed him for both our sakes!

And in the end, all there was, was a tool box
filled with replace­ment parts.

I was chief among them.
Left to con­spire with you -
Try to Inspire you.

Try to be Him,
seek to love Him.

Wish­ful think­ing, that.

Sim­pler just to watch you,
and admire your line of Sight!

What Makes Move­ment?

When mem­o­ries fail to bring about
some­thing worth sav­ing for all eter­ni­ty,
where does the heart go,
and the Mind?

Who calls the Cat?
Cat Calls being the only thing worth say­ing,
when time has stolen every­thing, includ­ing my tongue.

Can I make these sec­onds spin? Work move­ment into turn­ing,
and then turn­ing into some­thing I might remem­ber
the next time I Turn.

And, in look­ing for­ward,
What turns Time, when the only move­ment we find avail­able
is akin to the birth pains we feel we must have felt
the Day when we were ripped out of the alto­geth­er
and back into this mess we call the World!

Move­ment? A Minute’s pass­ing?
I can feel it some­times -
When the Earth falls silent,
and the stars fall into place
around the Dreams we Hope to dream.

I’d wish for more! But then the move­ment becomes a blur.
False shad­ows in a space that must be sim­ple
since it is most­ly unde­fined!

The Next One.

If the throw had been stronger, or the kick,
then the order of the pick­ing might have changed.
Might, in fact, nev­er have been.

It did not.

And so the heart, and the hope that went with it,
all explod­ed into bloody rags.

The World still went on, though,
and con­tin­ued with its pace,
Bleed­ing still -
until it found anoth­er chance to dream.

This one took, and it was me.

Strong enough to stay the course,
but not as like­ly to suc­ceed
when the time came,
and it did,
to ful­fill wish­es.

In fair­ness, it could be said
that wish­es such as those
should nev­er have been made.

Can­not wish real­i­ty into anoth­er person’s soul.
Best left then, to the dead.

But when, in mat­ters of the heart, is that ever real­ly the case?

And so there was expec­ta­tion, and fail­ure.

The fail­ure was not, how­ev­er, born of Weak­ness.
No. There was Strength there.
But almost unrec­og­niz­able.
Of a dif­fer­ent nature.
Mis­un­der­stood, most­ly,
Mis­placed, and often, as a result, Bit­ter with regret.

Strength con­tin­ued! Born of fail­ure!
Wound­ed by every action,
and blood­ed by every breath.

There was a heart, though. It still beats.

Still knows weak­ness, and still knows strength.

A heart — buried trea­sure, and a liv­ing veil. But a heart that beats, nonethe­less.

It wish­es for its oth­er self to this day,
that ghost who might have ful­filled dreams and great desires.

It is not that heart, nor could it hope to be.
And so, since the world will not recant its actions,
it must stand in, and in still­ness grieve.

Leave me.

Too many times, when the world wait­ed for a way to make amends,
I found myself want­i­ng.

Wish­ing!
Hop­ing!
For some­thing that might make me more of what you want­ed!

What you wished for,
Expect­ed!

Had a right to Expect, for God’s Sake!

And per­haps you had a right,
Had it right to ask -

Is this it, then?

Is it me?
Am I all you Get?
Me?

After all the gen­er­a­tions,
can it be that it all boils down to noth­ing more than me!

I did not ask for this -

Can­not be “this!”

See this!

Can­not bend the angle (or the Tree) far enough
to find the Right per­spec­tive,
The Right­ness of being

Or the Rea­son I’d be Me!
Lady.

There is a Lady in my dream­ing mind who tells me I am Her.

I run!
Hide.
Hope.
Cry!

Some­times I Dream of Her,
deeply,
and in dream­ing find myself abstract­ed from myself,

Turned!
Torn!
Tak­en out of Me and into another’s eyes -
Oth­er!

And then I see -

See!

Some wispy Woman who swears that She is Me!

And then I think
Where does real­i­ty reside?

Where can I Hide?
Find a Minute to find myself,
or at least Free myself -

Maybe Hope to Be Myself?

That’s it, then.

Hope.

I’ve wished des­per­ate­ly for some Hope, and under­stand­ing
that will some­how make this life,
and this exis­tence,
begin to make sense.

I’ve seen a woman look­ing out at me
with eyes that look sur­pris­ing­ly like mine.

And despite a life­time of learn­ing and liv­ing,
of deal­ing and dream­ing,

I am still pos­sessed some­times,
by some­one who is not -

Not Me!

And yet I think
She might have been,
or Was.

Or, look­ing for­ward,
Per­haps Should Have Been.…

If the World was Right.

Ever.

In my Desire to make a mark,
I forced my mind to wan­der.

But enig­mat­ic Dreams crashed in
and kept me from my Goal.

I tried again to take myself
beyond my need to pon­der

But found a Wall too tall to Cross,
and a Fear to deep to dread!

Brighter.

In this dream,
I am myself again.

Not me,
But Me!
More!
Myself, and Me again!

And all the weights
that shack­le me
fall off like slough­ing skin.

Me!
My Self.
My Burn­ing Heart set fire again.
My burn­ing Soul set free!

My des­per­ate Mind made Me again,
My one desire in Sight again,
My Cer­tain self set Free!

I am of One Mind, most­ly.
This One.
Most­ly mine. My Self!
Again.

And so my Dream appears,
and I begin again.

Brighter. Bet­ter. Born -

Again!

Undimmed.

Cycle.

All around, the Soul was sta­ble.
Sim­ple!

And the World was Fine!
Soft-framed with bits of light
left over from Creation’s efforts
and the new­ness of All Time.

And then,
What?!?

You want me to believe that Shit?!?
Why?

Because it answered some sort of ques­tion posed
by ancient (and unsta­ble) astronomers!

Or because it was an answer to the fears,
and the focus on the night sky,
when souls, and an emp­ty stom­ach,
made mens’ minds won­der where their God was.

‘Just Because’ can­not appease the Child whose par­ents lost the fight,
and more needs say­ing than can be said in just one night.

Turn. Turn again.
See the cycle, and the sick­le bend the Light.

Life Comes,
but with a Cost.

We Take it,
Embrace it -
Taste it!

But Life is Self­ish;
Tied to Time.

The more of it we Take,
the More we want to Take!

We want More!
Life!

And for all we often hate it,
in Truth, We Hate to Leave it!

We Seek Pay-offs -
Par­dons,
Delays and Detours.

Any Thing
to Stave off
the Inevitable Leave-tak­ing.
Dirt-Mak­ing!

And all the While, Life looks on.

Laugh­ing through our efforts
while danc­ing down a Line.

You know, it’s funny (in a weird way), when you find yourself having to overcome a personal prejudice against yourself! It’s strange. And yet, it’s exactly what has been occupying my mind here of late (perhaps because I turned fifty this past June).

First, there was the whole AARP fiasco. You know. To expand their ranks, they’ve lowered their membership to fifty. The fuckers!

So when you turn fifty, you automatically get a direct mail piece from them, letting you know that you qualify for membership. I threw it away. Did I say Fuckers?

OUT!

LOUD?!?

Then there was the demographic thing. I have spent the greater part of my adult life in the business of marketing and advertising. So to me, people are usually corraled into “standardized” age groups.

And then I turned fifty.…

Suddenly I’d been moved from “35 to 49” all the way up to “50 to 64.” That was no fun at all.

Fuckers!

The really strange thing about turning fifty (ok. one of them!), is that I remember not only my parents at fifty, but also my grandparents at fifty. And I’m nothing like them…I don’t think!?!

Am I?

I certainly don’t feel like I thought they must have felt when they were fifty.

But then again, I was looking at them from the standpoint of being me — the child, or grandchild.
What did I know about where they really were in their heads?

My dad’s mother, my nannie, was well into a second marriage by the time she was fifty. And what did fifty have to do with who my nanny was? It was, after all, only an age, and a great excuse to ask for ever increasing amounts of good drugs designed to make every minute of waking life into a soft-edged blanket.

Dream Deep, then!
And often.

On Turning Fifty.…

I used to think that by this time -
fifty!
I might know some­thing,
have some insight,
hind­sight,
that might guide me
to some con­clu­sions,
about some­thing,
about me!
maybe?

Some­thing I could take some­where,
or to some­one,
who could explain
exact­ly what it was that hap­pened here with me.
made me BE!

who I am,
what I am,
and just for an instant,
why
this cook­ie cut­ter kid, at least in looks alone,
could be so out of pat­tern,
out of fash­ion,
for­eign -
Left behind,
left!
So uneasy,
so unready,
to expe­ri­ence any­thing that was any­thing
of any impor­tance in the world where I was born — made,
Left!
Mys­ti­fied!
…by who I was,
and where I was,
and why I was all about noth­ing to do with any­thing
that mat­tered to any­one I knew!

I used to think I might know by now -
Be ready to at least defend my strange­ness
to some­one more than just myself.

But here I sit, clos­er to noth­ing more than death,
with no more knowl­edge, or defense,
than I had when I was still a child in search
of some­thing that might val­i­date me
to some­one besides myself!

I know there are those who love me!
Lives I’ve touched.
Lives I’ve changed
(hope­ful­ly made bet­ter)
through the course
of all these years.

But for all I’ve done,
I’ve nev­er breached that wall
to see who I might have been meant to be -

or what.…

And although I may bemany things,
the one thing I can nev­er be,
is what my par­ents thought that I should be,
could Be!

Not in this life,
nor in any oth­er
I might imag­ine!

So what do I call me?
Fail­ure?
Future.
Dif­fer­ent!
There is POWER here.

POWER!

Born of some­thing raw and won­drous,
and alto­geth­er unplanned.

POWER!

A dream.

Pre­cious!
Per­fect.

Dream­er!