subtext

My Poetry and Commentary on Life

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grounded

by

acceptance, poetry, response

I eat dirt in handfuls overflowing

like water. The grit grinds between

my back molars. The black taste cloys

thickly along my gums like clay

pulled from the Trinity’s wet banks.

What heaven there is is here with me

within the rich earth’s layered grain:

the heave, and buck, and jostle

along the muscular fault lines

flowing for miles beneath the skin

of the world. Here is no need

for humility. We are enough;

it is enough that we are here

beneath the unattainable stars.

(October 6, 2015)

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inner voice

by

broken, control, doubt, life, poetry

as if with

an articulate

guest he argues

with air

each moment in

sharp contention

like a steel

sliding along

a knife’s edge

until he eviscerates

himself again

and then again

with unforgiving

sighs

every faux pas

every fault pulsates

like sneers rippling

along a smile

each word mouthed

repetitively

to painful precisions

slicing what’s said

into thinner and

thinner strips

until his words

fall meaningless

below tattered white

flags fluttering

flecked with blood

among the dying

and the dead

in yet another

distant battlefield

(October 1, 2015)

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Talk to Me

by

communication, desire, erato, eros, language, poetry, sonnets

“Teach me, dear creature, how to think and speak; Lay open to my earthy-gross conceit, Smother’d in errors, feeble, shallow, weak, The folded meaning of your words’ deceit.”

— William Shakespeare, Comedy of Errors

“… the ideology they are forced (in order to make symbols, hence in order to live) to borrow from the class that dominates them.”

— Roland Barthes, The Pleasure of the Text

I want to speak with you again

to shape my words to your tongue

to be enveloped in the kiss

of your mind then forget

all which has come between

until no space exists to separate

where we are and what we desire

but there are no words so clear

so free so resonate to trace

trembling fingers along our skin

or erase the edges of distance

hesitant and mispronounced

that we can speak into our silence

until we once again fall in love

(September 26, 2015)

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advice to myself

by

attention, change, poetics, poetry, ways of knowing, writing

“The best work we can do is to withdraw the projection of our shadow onto others.”

–Carl Jung

embrace your personal clichés

smother them with awareness

it’s hard enough to be honest

with yourself so forgive others

and do not fix your anxieties

onto friends with hope of creating

your salvation in their skin

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the poet is not the poem

by

abstract, definition, interrelationships, poetry, ways of knowing

O reader,

you are not

the you

I speak

when I call

your name,

nor

are you invited

to understand

anything

about me

beyond yourself.

Do not think

you know me

because you read

my poems:

I cannot say

who I am,

or where I am,

and I

spent days

and years

writing them

lost within

the lines.

These words

are pulled

from a far

deeper well

than can be

fathomed

with biography.

Where they start

and where they go

befuddle me into

an illuminated

present.

Each moment

starts anew,

I know less

than I used to.

(September 24, 2015)

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Dream Journal #25: Baggage

by

dream, fate, poetry, unstable

Everyone I encountered

in the building where I worked

were friendly and helpful

with only a tinge

of cheerful concern

to mar their facade,

as I scurried,

like squirrels in heat,

up and down the stairs.

Each floor resembled the next

with only slight primary color

hue variations to break

the monotony of it all.

I could unlock all the rooms

without a key, yet none

of the rooms were mine,

and all stood vacant.

I had too much to do

and knew I was late.

I could see my anxieties

extend through my hands

like colored ribbons

whipping in the wind.

No one else was in a hurry.

They all sat about the halls

like grandmothers gossiping

over tea in an orderly

Berlin neighborhood.

Then I was overwhelmed in epiphany:

I was in the wrong place – –

possibly the wrong time,

there were no clocks.

Then just as quickly I forgot – –

even though it was important

to remember any of the reasons;

so I continued searching,

opening doors, negotiating stairs,

falling, and falling, and falling:

a constant disappointment

to everyone I ever knew,

or any one I ever was.

(September 23, 2015)

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Cross Pollination

by

abstract, alone, borders, chance, poetry, renga, traces, transition, ways of knowing

“Collaborate with the moment.”

–Lyn Hejinian

Summer’s heat’s outside

I wait lost inside my books

time patterns the walls

turn along a labyrinth

everything seems so simple

a leaf turns yellow

then falls obliquely to earth

inconsequential

as I age I disappear

a slow fade into grey dust

on her car he drew

dusty hearts she wouldn’t see

then drove home alone

much goes unseen and unheard

oblique gestures in the dark

he held his hand out

unbidden and undesired

if noticed at all

along a vague edge it lurks

shadows enwrap the shadows

a heart darkly marred

provides a darker tattoo

a hard-blued rhythm

veins like sun-baked cracks in mud

trace patterns within my flesh

dried rivers and roads

no longer pull us along

we’re alone and lost

as if another state could

exist where I had a clue

to think divergent

instead of a precise line

is praised yet despised

all the boxes in a row

we only reap what we sow

the dust rose higher

obliterating the earth

smothering the sky

our history laughs quietly

the obvious slaps us down

the ubiquitous

surrounds us like the night air

breathe and disappear

today I wish to vanish

take the interstate and drive

got to pay the bills

I’m too much like my father

self-abnegation

even now his anger burns

a cauterized part of me

thick scars from old wounds

split and crack like winter’s ice

blood flows into earth

as summer’s heat ends

the trees finally relent

leaves drop to the ground

I’m even too tired to weep

my age wears me down

not so much stamina’s lack

as that of resilience

to maintain my shape

requires me to be alone

darkness blurs edges

an amoeba flows slowly

silently devouring

silence speaks as well

all he said was unfinished

she only misunderstood

within conversation’s flow

there’s not room for impatience

see where I stand now

opens up a newer world

both for me and you

a mirror or a close friend

reflects and distorts us all

I once was certain

in all my fixed opinions

I am still the same

my clichés clot every word

I speak my aneurism

I move into fall

a cold dotage I now rue

so many lost paths

implication of a choice

all delusions are heartfelt

he wanders alone

each step divides another

as if he were one

the leaves have floated away

squirrels scurry about in fear

(September 17, 2015)

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dream journal # 24: echoes

by

dream, erato, poetry, relationships

then again

she leans in

from the dark

of dreams

with the promise

of skin on skin

the calming curve

of body into body

wherein dream’s

disturbance coalesces

into love

such slight whispers

after months and months

of silence

to conjure her

from the night

like a strand of hair

from a book

she once borrowed

marking a poem

she might have read

while thinking of you

(September 15, 2015)

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Abstract #5: enclosures

by

abstract, definition, loss, lost, poetry

as he moves within

each grey room

his past collects

his darker parts

like secret sins

less transgressed

than imagined

he invokes ghosts

friends he dare not see

to haunt his day

like laughter lurks

on the edge of tears

slyly mocking him

on his silent way

like sacrificial children

who slowly crawl

a convoluted maze

he wanders lost

within the seams

of all the words

defining him

(September 10, 2015)

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The Violence of Contextualization

by

context, definition, identity formation, interrelationships, paradigms, poetry

She writes of absence

and almost seeing:

his face across a crowd,

a figure on a bus,

other people’s husbands,

other people’s lives.

What’s missing manifests

along her vague edges

like old gilt frames

around strangers’ faces,

unfamiliar people fixed

in familiar situations.

She inscribes another hole

with nothing much at all,

set shadows content

within shifting contexts,

until she finds yet another

face behind which to hide.

(September 7, 2015)

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obliviously happy

by

attention, happiness, poetry

in darkness I am almost content

not the shadowy dark of moonlight

dancing between leaves and branches

illuminating bits of bramble and rock

the way memory mottles most of what

I allow myself to know but black like

the proverbial hand before a face slap

to the forehead level of awareness

of nothing but me and the dark

yet not too sure where I leave off

and all else begins I’m staggered

to think perhaps I am as aware

of the dark as it of me as in not

at all like a bird believes in air

(September 3, 2015)

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direction home

by

abstract, lost, poetry

where to now—

as if a destination

provides legitimacy

easy platitudes

to chide into submission

any restless soul

where to now—

someplace else

someone other

as if history could be

stripped away clean

like sinew from bone

where to now—

a turn to a return

where always is already

like a sea anemone

retracting into itself

unfulfilled again

(August 31, 2015)

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the need to be alone

by

alone, poetry, solitude, space, ways of knowing

Each moment bears in its fragility

the omnipresent weight of all my wounds,

as if they were only feathers adrift

after a sole shotgun blast silences

the crisp air in a sudden gasp of fear.

Desire for silence propels me to gloom,

for few will tolerate such dark despair.

They wander off embarrassed to intrude

further than any wish to be allowed,

leaving me far from any distant crowd.

Solitude allows the mind to wander

away from life’s niggling inconsequence

and the dark voice’s articulate doubts;

allows the rage and fear to fall away,

leaving love like light to a new day’s dawn.

(August 29, 2015)

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Evil

by

desire, fear, god, paradigms, poetry

let’s talk of evil

it’s slow inculcation

like a breeze

beneath the trees

lulls us to sleep

yes let’s speak

in low whispers

lest it hears

the least syllable

parting our lips

fear feeds it

a simple fare

like monk’s lentils

little need

more to sustain

it grows on

those who oppose

as if a friend

you know

who’ll never leave

we never see

even after we

should

it’s laughter grows

beneath our noses

it walks in light

to deny the myth

clinging to the lies

we breathe in

ecstatic sighs

so let us talk

to define each other

along thin lines

where nuances dance

their chameleon eyes

all we risk

is all we have

to be enslaved

by the lies

we crave

(Summer 2015)

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transitory conjunctions

by

acceptance, borders, breach, clarity, death, life, poetry

*

and then

you’re thrown in

our vast

ignorant sea

to swim

or drown

unheard

*

and what else

is there to do

but stumble along

to find a way

to some new space

other than here

other than now

*

and then

without thought

you’re not

as if

you could be

anything

else again

(August 23, 2015)

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