subtext

My Poetry and Commentary on Life

Designed with WordPress

disconnections

by

breach, identity formation, lost, poetry, sonnets

too often now

another breach opens

a wall between

one moment and

another between

one thought and

the concrete force

resonate in the poem

I don’t know

where I am

too much

empty space

fills the gaps

in my tattered map

(October 8, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
eclipsed

by

acceptance, change, life, poetry, ritual, tension

the moon bleeds tonight

beneath the weight my back aches

another month gone

(October 8, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
dispersion

by

change, fate, poetry, process

some lost

what was left

of their soul

some laughter

some their tears

others sighed

away hope

after years

and years

until even

the dust

of their shadows

had disappeared

(October 7, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
Augeries

by

audacity, belief, control, erato, hope, hubris, obsessions, poetry, traces

What do these things mean,

he asks: black birds fly

north in a newly cleared

sky; a bear’s blood-splattered

scat forms a pattern in the snow;

and again today he thought of her.

Where desire seeks causation

any falling leaf will do to tease

the meaning he wants to create.

He knows any connection is only

his own, yet; he fingers each link,

as if it were a shattered saint’s

reliquary, with enough mediation

to bring her back again into his life.

(October 5, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
Awaken Into Poetry

by

belief, clarity, hope, metaphor, poetry, traces, ways of knowing

Life’s bitterness

melts on my tongue,

like the tasteless wafer

placed by a priest,

full of false promise,

and a redemption

to come:

the next day,

the next minute,

always a later

waits with hope,

like a bouquet of roses,

until there is not

another next.

We are compelled

to believe

in something other;

some translation,

without metaphor,

into a clarity

we can understand.

(October 3, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
Leavings the Dead Stutter

by

change, fate, poetry, ritual, sonnets

As ritual replaces love,

ravens circle the field;

their black eyes survey

the ground’s cold wreckage.

Beneath fluttering wings

and caws, today’s blurred

light bathes my vision

with a new absolution.

Steam rises with the sun.

Morning dew mixed with blood

dampens all with a cold dead

sheen. The ravens land as one.

Turning my eye skyward,

I moan once, then lie still.

(October 3, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
Daphne Translates

by

borders, control, identity formation, metaphor, poetry, ways of knowing

I search for some wisdom:

some tickle in the lines of bark

surrounding these carved runes

like a scar healing memory

into my common sight.

It seems real enough,

this occluded vision:

a humming bird plays

along my periphery,

destitute of any metaphor.

I am myself the maker

of meaning I mislaid

within this whirring bird’s

divine dance, between what

I thought I was and am:

to accept the image into myself,

and seal it there, transforms

what I think I once saw,

and what I came to know;

and to reject it, does the same.

(October 1, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
Spiral Orbit

by

definition, desire, lost, love, poetry

what we search for most

of our lives is to be

accepted by ourselves

here not on a horizon

some other place later

which never arrives

yet distracts well enough

beyond current horrors

the want breeds motion

away from our skin

away from our kin

until foreign to ourselves

blinded to love

desire turns us home

(September 29, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
Love or Fear

by

control, fate, fear, happiness, love, poetry, sonnets

“Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord

But you’re gonna have to serve somebody”

-Bob Dylan

love and worry obsess the same

both beyond our simple reins

the reason why we bow to both

dwells in their common mastery

no chains or ropes to unbind

for none are needed to hold

our simple obsequiousness

when we do just as we’re told

we worry the power outside

knocking through our walls

and fall prostrate on the floor

to love’s unrelenting flow

which choice we decide to make

creates the difference in our fate

(September 28, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
Love’s Dance

by

chance, erato, love, poetry, relationships, romance, sonnets

Clifton Chenier’s accordion pulls us

onto the dance floor in a slow

shuffle of pulse and delight like

the calm comfort of love’s embrace

soft flesh and time’s decisions

forgive more inside the day

today than any acquiescence

to obsequious control provides

at our table near the bandstand

we hold hands halfway attuned

so lost in our love’s vague rhythms

and the sloppish beat’s adherence

no answer echoes our heart to explain

the dance is the dance is the dance

(September 26, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
White Rabbit

by

dissatisfaction, fate, life, poetry

It will take me

away a way

and just as long

along this trail

to finish and start

as it would

if I weren’t

but I am

so late lately

I must madly

leap and hop

thought over thought

step back

a half

step away

to the left

then again

in quick

succession

of indecisive

pirouettes

a medley

of mad

attempts

to fix

the flux

pulsing along

my periphery

like St. Elmo’s

fire dancing

around about

the main masts’

lines taut

with the dainty

gentility

of high tea

crumpets and scones

displayed

with such

bourgeois glee

as I descend

again within

the sidereal day

knowing full well

since the well

is so full of air

the seemingly

unimportance

of all

the importance

which clings

to all

I hear and say

like cake

crumbs

tongued

from chappy lips

until all

falls

and’s

said

then done

and I drown

in someone

else’s tears

(September 26, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
no ember no ash only flame

by

definition, identity formation, paradigms, poetry

I read through poems I read

and marked years ago searching

for traces of who and what I

was and I discover the same

troubled man longing to still

the raging thoughts burning

like a defeated city in flames

(September 24, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
Grip

by

happiness, identity formation, poetry

“I hold a beast, and angel

and a madman in me.”—Dylan Thomas

you’re lost within

such moments

as today

and there are

such every day

and as such

are slippery

as peeled mangos

or fish

or time

or words

so you hold

tighter

in fear

or love

or fear

of love

only to lose

your grip

on all

about you

who are you

as well

and you

are left

with nothing

left to hold

and are lost

without

a within

(September 23, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
Easier Said

by

definition, dissatisfaction, poetry

Chop wood,

carry water,

everyday.

Yes, but

they hand you

the bucket

filled with water

as the ax arcs

toward the wood:

you miss

the wood;

water soaks

into the earth.

(September 23, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…
Viscous Thread

by

acceptance, definition, poetry, power

A constant trickle of lost moments:

ends and edges, border crossings;

all metaphor’s lost as it is written.

Doubt falls from devouring mouths

only to serve recrimination’s echo.

What can be said whose foil does not

wait with snide repose for blood

to present the unremarked thrust?

It’s over. Each day remains a hollow shell

even the scuttling hermit crab ignores.

Beyond nostalgic brooding and regret,

nothing’s to be done. Any agency

collapses beneath the puppeteer’s hand

as she lays the cut strings across the sand.

(September 23, 2014)

Share this:
Facebook
Tumblr
X
Bluesky
Threads
Like Loading…