There's something about mountains in the sky
Half-hovering above a field of trees
That makes my breath catch in my throat as I
Fly out of here. My vision strains to seize
A last glimpse of the fading vision, see
One more peak capped with snow before I leave.
Yet even as the airplane banks and we
Are born away, I cannot claim to grieve:
I'm leaving where I come from, but that phrase
Only has meaning if I go away.
It does not mean that I will cease to gaze
In longing back for mountains on my way,
But that where I am going is home too
Far from that longed-for, well-remembered view.
Saturday, December 31, 2011
Goner
While you wander I must wonder where;
The simple fact of absence makes it plain
That, when I looked for you, you were not there,
And that alone might be sufficient pain,
But then I had to search to find you out,
Wondering the while where you'd gone,
Fighting back, successfully, the doubt
That you had figured out you should move on
And find other diversions worth your while,
More valuable than my poor conversation;
I tell you all of this with a small smile,
Because you have returned from your vacation,
And come again to me - or if not, I
Have thought you have, and much prefer that lie.
The simple fact of absence makes it plain
That, when I looked for you, you were not there,
And that alone might be sufficient pain,
But then I had to search to find you out,
Wondering the while where you'd gone,
Fighting back, successfully, the doubt
That you had figured out you should move on
And find other diversions worth your while,
More valuable than my poor conversation;
I tell you all of this with a small smile,
Because you have returned from your vacation,
And come again to me - or if not, I
Have thought you have, and much prefer that lie.
Friday, December 30, 2011
Level Up
It's nice to have a purpose now. Not like
I didn't earlier: the transient
Day to day to which we all are bent -
The groceries, or pumping up the bike,
Figuring out how to plug in the mic,
Replying to the email someone sent,
Doing my homework, which was clearly meant
For someone younger, driving down a pike
To run an errand, all those little things.
I even had a goal before - that too
Was somehow smaller than now having you,
And all the purpose that possession brings.
I have so much to, and equal time,
And it's so much more fun than cleaning grime.
I didn't earlier: the transient
Day to day to which we all are bent -
The groceries, or pumping up the bike,
Figuring out how to plug in the mic,
Replying to the email someone sent,
Doing my homework, which was clearly meant
For someone younger, driving down a pike
To run an errand, all those little things.
I even had a goal before - that too
Was somehow smaller than now having you,
And all the purpose that possession brings.
I have so much to, and equal time,
And it's so much more fun than cleaning grime.
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Still Not The Sun
On days like this the sun may never shine
But it's less crucial than it used to be;
I used to think the daylight was all mine
And night belonged to others utterly;
As such, dark days seemed terrible to me:
Washed out weak sunbeams threatened who I was,
And grey clouds covered what should probably
Have seemed sufficient sunlight with a fuzz,
As freezer mold the ancient orange does,
And blocked my joy by making it seem night
To my demanding eyes. Now I find, because
Your love has made my nighttime fill with light,
I can walk happily through darkened skies
Cheered with the recollection of your eyes.
But it's less crucial than it used to be;
I used to think the daylight was all mine
And night belonged to others utterly;
As such, dark days seemed terrible to me:
Washed out weak sunbeams threatened who I was,
And grey clouds covered what should probably
Have seemed sufficient sunlight with a fuzz,
As freezer mold the ancient orange does,
And blocked my joy by making it seem night
To my demanding eyes. Now I find, because
Your love has made my nighttime fill with light,
I can walk happily through darkened skies
Cheered with the recollection of your eyes.
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
A Note on Feminine Rhymes and John Fletcher
It has been quite a while since I sullied this blog with something other than a poem, but the itch has come again and will not be denied. In today's edition, I will ponder an aspect of rhyme that I have come to reconsider since this blog began: the feminine rhyme in the style of John Fletcher.
For those of you who are looking at the page very blankly, John Fletcher is a playwright - or was a playwright, as far as I am aware he is dead, buried, and gone, sans Zombie Fletcher, though that would be cool but I digress - from the late Elizabethan, Jacobean, and even Caroline periods of the English Renaissance. He was a major force in his day, especially in collaboration with Francis Beaumont (so much so that after Fletcher's death {he outlived Beaumont} a large number of his solo works were bundled into a Beaumont and Fletcher joint folio), Philip Massinger, and William Shakespeare, among others. He is supposed to have had a hand in many of Shakespeare's later works, including the lost Cardenio, but his reputation has faded with the years as the kind of showy, mixed genre theater he primarily wrote has waned in popularity and critical acclaim.
For those of you looking a little less blankly, or who just read that, Fletcher had a somewhat distinctive writing style, characterized for our purpose by a particular verbal tic: the tendency towards feminine rhyme (or at least feminine endings of lines) with a monosyllablic word at the end of the line. That is, "I am a poet though I did not know it": 11 syllables, iambic, and therefore with the stress on the penultimate rather than the ultimate syllable, despite the last syllable being a word in and of itself.
Now, as far as I know Fletcher published no sonnets (he was big a little after the late 1500s sonnet craze) but that does not in any way reduce how associated he is with that style. I have no doubt he would have used it in sonnets had he published them, and the question still remains of what to do about the style within the sonnet. Are these rhymes useful or appropriate to the sonnet?
I have for years disliked this choice and considered it inartistic and ugly, especially in rhyme (I have fewer reservations about blank verse in the style, though I still try to avoid it). This is because I have always felt that rhyme should use new words each time as much as possible (I am not of the Homer Simpson bowling episode position that rhyming Homer and homer deserves applause), and this style results in rhymes like "know it" and "blow it" which use the same rhyme word at the end. I am less troubled by "poet" and "know it," assuming your dialect makes it a true and not slant rhyme, because they are different words.
However, recently I have come to a greater comfort with this style, as I have reasoned that certain words are almost unrhymeable without it, as they have difficult stress patterns to match or complicated internal assonance or consonance. Also, I have had to confront the fact that my idea that the restrictions on form should be pared down to the minimum necessary in order to highlight the chosen restrictions more brilliantly conflicts with this prejudice. As such, I am now much more open to this style, which I hope in the fullness of time will be a good thing, artistically and critically.
For those of you who are looking at the page very blankly, John Fletcher is a playwright - or was a playwright, as far as I am aware he is dead, buried, and gone, sans Zombie Fletcher, though that would be cool but I digress - from the late Elizabethan, Jacobean, and even Caroline periods of the English Renaissance. He was a major force in his day, especially in collaboration with Francis Beaumont (so much so that after Fletcher's death {he outlived Beaumont} a large number of his solo works were bundled into a Beaumont and Fletcher joint folio), Philip Massinger, and William Shakespeare, among others. He is supposed to have had a hand in many of Shakespeare's later works, including the lost Cardenio, but his reputation has faded with the years as the kind of showy, mixed genre theater he primarily wrote has waned in popularity and critical acclaim.
For those of you looking a little less blankly, or who just read that, Fletcher had a somewhat distinctive writing style, characterized for our purpose by a particular verbal tic: the tendency towards feminine rhyme (or at least feminine endings of lines) with a monosyllablic word at the end of the line. That is, "I am a poet though I did not know it": 11 syllables, iambic, and therefore with the stress on the penultimate rather than the ultimate syllable, despite the last syllable being a word in and of itself.
Now, as far as I know Fletcher published no sonnets (he was big a little after the late 1500s sonnet craze) but that does not in any way reduce how associated he is with that style. I have no doubt he would have used it in sonnets had he published them, and the question still remains of what to do about the style within the sonnet. Are these rhymes useful or appropriate to the sonnet?
I have for years disliked this choice and considered it inartistic and ugly, especially in rhyme (I have fewer reservations about blank verse in the style, though I still try to avoid it). This is because I have always felt that rhyme should use new words each time as much as possible (I am not of the Homer Simpson bowling episode position that rhyming Homer and homer deserves applause), and this style results in rhymes like "know it" and "blow it" which use the same rhyme word at the end. I am less troubled by "poet" and "know it," assuming your dialect makes it a true and not slant rhyme, because they are different words.
However, recently I have come to a greater comfort with this style, as I have reasoned that certain words are almost unrhymeable without it, as they have difficult stress patterns to match or complicated internal assonance or consonance. Also, I have had to confront the fact that my idea that the restrictions on form should be pared down to the minimum necessary in order to highlight the chosen restrictions more brilliantly conflicts with this prejudice. As such, I am now much more open to this style, which I hope in the fullness of time will be a good thing, artistically and critically.
Shalom Haver
It's always been a miracle to me
That you're my friend; I wanted it so much,
But when I want, well, anything in such
A definite, devoted way, I see
The barriers in front of it (and we
Had barriers aplenty). As I touch
Those walls, they seem to stick and clutch
At me; I always doubt that it could be.
But here we are, and friendship has matured,
Grown into something better and expanded.
And as I look at where we two have landed,
And what, in coming hither, we endured,
I'm happy with it all, and would again
Go past the bars that were against it then.
That you're my friend; I wanted it so much,
But when I want, well, anything in such
A definite, devoted way, I see
The barriers in front of it (and we
Had barriers aplenty). As I touch
Those walls, they seem to stick and clutch
At me; I always doubt that it could be.
But here we are, and friendship has matured,
Grown into something better and expanded.
And as I look at where we two have landed,
And what, in coming hither, we endured,
I'm happy with it all, and would again
Go past the bars that were against it then.
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
Washing
Months flow by like water down the street,
The days, like raindrops, tinkle in the stream;
Refuse piles up, rain turns to sleet,
Oil skims the top like fetid cream,
Bad moments are remembered. Yet below,
The swift smooth stream still runs, and carries past
The dams of diseased memory the flow
Of good intentions, deep, clear, cold, and vast.
If we can dip beneath the ugly crust,
Skim off the scum and see the joy beneath,
We can be happy - and we know we must,
To feel the cool cold tingle in our teeth
Of liquid happiness. We must forget
The worse parts of the stream before they set.
The days, like raindrops, tinkle in the stream;
Refuse piles up, rain turns to sleet,
Oil skims the top like fetid cream,
Bad moments are remembered. Yet below,
The swift smooth stream still runs, and carries past
The dams of diseased memory the flow
Of good intentions, deep, clear, cold, and vast.
If we can dip beneath the ugly crust,
Skim off the scum and see the joy beneath,
We can be happy - and we know we must,
To feel the cool cold tingle in our teeth
Of liquid happiness. We must forget
The worse parts of the stream before they set.
Monday, December 26, 2011
Once More Into the Breach
It's obvious enough the way I feel,
And yet I feel compelled to yet again
Tell you in detail of your deep appeal,
The way you make happier, and then,
When your eyes roll in sarcasm to hear
Once more the way I smile in your sight,
Still not shut up. I think that you, my dear,
Must be so tired of it, and you might
Well be; but I am not, and so I will
Continue 'til you tell me to desist;
And even if I do, I'll love you still.
So since my love continues to persist,
I might as well tell you; and telling of
My love itself expands my growing love.
And yet I feel compelled to yet again
Tell you in detail of your deep appeal,
The way you make happier, and then,
When your eyes roll in sarcasm to hear
Once more the way I smile in your sight,
Still not shut up. I think that you, my dear,
Must be so tired of it, and you might
Well be; but I am not, and so I will
Continue 'til you tell me to desist;
And even if I do, I'll love you still.
So since my love continues to persist,
I might as well tell you; and telling of
My love itself expands my growing love.
Nightwalker
I keep odd hours and I like 'em so;
Awake? Asleep? They hardly matter here.
I do not let the early morning's glow
Control me, and I think it quaint and dear
Precious, even, that some others may
Give such a weight to what the sky outside
Dictates. Who cares if it is night or day?
Day has as many tricks as night to hide
Wrongdoing, and night can be just as clear
If you're tuned to its rhythms. What is he
That lets the turning of the planet bear
Responsibility? I wake when I
Am ready to, and sleep the same. For me
Is not this lazy thralldom to the sky.
Awake? Asleep? They hardly matter here.
I do not let the early morning's glow
Control me, and I think it quaint and dear
Precious, even, that some others may
Give such a weight to what the sky outside
Dictates. Who cares if it is night or day?
Day has as many tricks as night to hide
Wrongdoing, and night can be just as clear
If you're tuned to its rhythms. What is he
That lets the turning of the planet bear
Responsibility? I wake when I
Am ready to, and sleep the same. For me
Is not this lazy thralldom to the sky.
Sunday, December 25, 2011
Christmas
I hardly hold with Christmas as a day
(It likely doesn't help I disbelieve
And therefore doubt the stories that they weave
To make it all make sense). I do not pray,
Nor honor it in any other way
Except that forced by others who, from Eve
All through the celebration, won't receive
My business, present it how I may.
But in another sense, I will observe,
I value it, I want it, I desire
To see a chestnut roast within a fire
And call it Christmas: for that name will serve
To conjure with to speak of joy and peace
And work towards times when violence will cease.
(It likely doesn't help I disbelieve
And therefore doubt the stories that they weave
To make it all make sense). I do not pray,
Nor honor it in any other way
Except that forced by others who, from Eve
All through the celebration, won't receive
My business, present it how I may.
But in another sense, I will observe,
I value it, I want it, I desire
To see a chestnut roast within a fire
And call it Christmas: for that name will serve
To conjure with to speak of joy and peace
And work towards times when violence will cease.
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Eve
I know it's Christmas Eve
Although I only care
Because others believe
There is some meaning there;
For me it is a day
Of joy and family,
But not in the same way
(Of course it wouldn't be).
Still it's a day I spend
With family around
And think of every friend
For whom it would resound
With meaning. Different means
Can lead to equal scenes.
Although I only care
Because others believe
There is some meaning there;
For me it is a day
Of joy and family,
But not in the same way
(Of course it wouldn't be).
Still it's a day I spend
With family around
And think of every friend
For whom it would resound
With meaning. Different means
Can lead to equal scenes.
Friday, December 23, 2011
Departure
It's hard to go
But good to come;
I do not know
Where I'd come from
With more regret
But equally
I can't forget
What's calling me;
I'm happy to
Come home once more
But leaving you
Still pains me sore;
As I leave, sad,
As I come, glad.
But good to come;
I do not know
Where I'd come from
With more regret
But equally
I can't forget
What's calling me;
I'm happy to
Come home once more
But leaving you
Still pains me sore;
As I leave, sad,
As I come, glad.
Thursday, December 22, 2011
Unaltered
Your eyes shine in a way I can't define;
They seem black holes that vacuum up my soul.
I'm far too happy that you're finally mine:
I can't believe I reached that distant goal.
There's something in your smile I desire
Which also makes me think you might want me;
I worried telling you might bank the fire,
But that has ended rather happily.
Some part of how you talk will drive me mad
Never the same part either, but them all;
It's wonderful to say that we have had
Such times, and still look forward. We won't stall
But rather mount, as windswept eagles may:
Soar up without more effort than to stay.
They seem black holes that vacuum up my soul.
I'm far too happy that you're finally mine:
I can't believe I reached that distant goal.
There's something in your smile I desire
Which also makes me think you might want me;
I worried telling you might bank the fire,
But that has ended rather happily.
Some part of how you talk will drive me mad
Never the same part either, but them all;
It's wonderful to say that we have had
Such times, and still look forward. We won't stall
But rather mount, as windswept eagles may:
Soar up without more effort than to stay.
Built
Your eyes shine in a way I can't define;
They seem black holes that vacuum up my soul.
I'm far too happy that you're finally mine:
I can't believe I reached that distant goal.
Yet as I ponder this, I realize
That our close love was never a surprise,
But rather a necessity, to me;
Without that love, my current self would not
Be who I am; I cannot comprehend
How I could be without it, and be me.
This does not mean that, had I never got
Your love, I'd be destroyed, or I would end,
But rather that I know your love is mine
And so I have passed past the time to pine.
They seem black holes that vacuum up my soul.
I'm far too happy that you're finally mine:
I can't believe I reached that distant goal.
Yet as I ponder this, I realize
That our close love was never a surprise,
But rather a necessity, to me;
Without that love, my current self would not
Be who I am; I cannot comprehend
How I could be without it, and be me.
This does not mean that, had I never got
Your love, I'd be destroyed, or I would end,
But rather that I know your love is mine
And so I have passed past the time to pine.
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Warming
You say you're cold, but I can scarce believe it;
Your touch is warm, and warming to my soul.
You say you freeze, though, so I cannot leave it;
It isn't quite decided by a poll
Of all concerned - you only can decide,
And if you're cold, then I must try to form
A way to keep you closely by my side,
The which, I hope, will also keep you warm.
But more than that, it satisfies my need
To keep you by, and hold us proximate;
For having you will make me glad indeed
(Feeling just how well you always fit
Into my side) and keep you warm as well;
Whether you're cold or not - who needs to tell?
Your touch is warm, and warming to my soul.
You say you freeze, though, so I cannot leave it;
It isn't quite decided by a poll
Of all concerned - you only can decide,
And if you're cold, then I must try to form
A way to keep you closely by my side,
The which, I hope, will also keep you warm.
But more than that, it satisfies my need
To keep you by, and hold us proximate;
For having you will make me glad indeed
(Feeling just how well you always fit
Into my side) and keep you warm as well;
Whether you're cold or not - who needs to tell?
Illing
The world's a little hinky I suppose,
At least the little bit my stomach is;
The buzz within me consistently grows
Along with something like a soda fizz.
Some basic thing within may have gone wrong,
Or else the acid; my pH is off,
And pushed off-key my inner happy song.
If comfort is the peak, this is the trough,
And I lie here, considering with care
Parts of myself I often take for granted;
I wonder if there's any hope in there
To reach back toward the balance I have slanted.
If not, I'll simply take another pill
To ward off the effect of feeling ill.
At least the little bit my stomach is;
The buzz within me consistently grows
Along with something like a soda fizz.
Some basic thing within may have gone wrong,
Or else the acid; my pH is off,
And pushed off-key my inner happy song.
If comfort is the peak, this is the trough,
And I lie here, considering with care
Parts of myself I often take for granted;
I wonder if there's any hope in there
To reach back toward the balance I have slanted.
If not, I'll simply take another pill
To ward off the effect of feeling ill.
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
WWW
Constant input leads to overload;
Slow output leads to backup, just as much.
The internet is like the open road,
But it's a one lane highway, and as such,
A little inconvenience can become
An utter traffic jam, and make men curse
Who had been choirboys. It seems so dumb,
But every slowdown seems to just get worse
Because the speed increases in between;
A jam at 20 is a minor fret;
At 80, you get angry and careen
From violence to tears. Now, any let
Becomes a cause for histrionic cries,
Woeful despair, excitable surmise.
Slow output leads to backup, just as much.
The internet is like the open road,
But it's a one lane highway, and as such,
A little inconvenience can become
An utter traffic jam, and make men curse
Who had been choirboys. It seems so dumb,
But every slowdown seems to just get worse
Because the speed increases in between;
A jam at 20 is a minor fret;
At 80, you get angry and careen
From violence to tears. Now, any let
Becomes a cause for histrionic cries,
Woeful despair, excitable surmise.
Gaming
There be some sports are simple, and their labor
Delight in them sets off; and these are those
Unlike piano, clarinet, or tabor
Which, as the feeling of addiction grows
Do not repeat, but alter as they age
Level by level; these are programmed, too,
And render difficulty page by page,
The which, in calm intensity, they strew
With complex simple puzzles, carefully
Planned to be pleasant. These we buy, and love,
Because they can express addictively
That which we are in constant pursuit of:
Easy attention fixes. It's a pleasure, now,
To roam the worlds computer games allow.
Delight in them sets off; and these are those
Unlike piano, clarinet, or tabor
Which, as the feeling of addiction grows
Do not repeat, but alter as they age
Level by level; these are programmed, too,
And render difficulty page by page,
The which, in calm intensity, they strew
With complex simple puzzles, carefully
Planned to be pleasant. These we buy, and love,
Because they can express addictively
That which we are in constant pursuit of:
Easy attention fixes. It's a pleasure, now,
To roam the worlds computer games allow.
Sunday, December 18, 2011
Houses
I think that God must be here too
Although this is not how I pray;
God is too broad, too wide, to stay
Within the bounds we set thereto.
Of course it matters what we do
On Friday, Saturday, Sunday,
But each of us in our own way
Can speak to God, as if we knew
The only way - yet God is great,
And understands all sorts of ways
Of speaking - even without words.
Even the singing of the birds
Can mingle in request and praise.
Where we look, there God will wait.
Although this is not how I pray;
God is too broad, too wide, to stay
Within the bounds we set thereto.
Of course it matters what we do
On Friday, Saturday, Sunday,
But each of us in our own way
Can speak to God, as if we knew
The only way - yet God is great,
And understands all sorts of ways
Of speaking - even without words.
Even the singing of the birds
Can mingle in request and praise.
Where we look, there God will wait.
Saturday, December 17, 2011
Feeeeeeelings
I must admit I feel at home
Though I was never here before.
This feeling may be light as foam;
It may drift off and be no more;
It may sink down into the floor,
But for the moment, it is here,
And I am gratified therefore.
I want to make it very clear
That if it chance to disappear
It still was felt, and I was glad
For one brief moment in the year
To have been here. That moment had,
The rest is less important. So,
I thought you really ought to know.
Though I was never here before.
This feeling may be light as foam;
It may drift off and be no more;
It may sink down into the floor,
But for the moment, it is here,
And I am gratified therefore.
I want to make it very clear
That if it chance to disappear
It still was felt, and I was glad
For one brief moment in the year
To have been here. That moment had,
The rest is less important. So,
I thought you really ought to know.
Friday, December 16, 2011
Loveseat
There are few things better than to sit here, by
Your side. Of course, there always are a few,
But most of those would also involve you,
And this is very nice right now. That's why
I turn to look at you and smile: it's just I
Like seeing you like this, and hope you do
As well. It's pleasant; satisfying too.
That's all I've got - please don't ask me to try
To think of more. I'm happy where I am,
And how I am. I love you, and I'm glad
That we have had the times that we have had
Together - there's no need to try to cram
More into them than what has been implied:
We are in love, and sitting side by side.
Your side. Of course, there always are a few,
But most of those would also involve you,
And this is very nice right now. That's why
I turn to look at you and smile: it's just I
Like seeing you like this, and hope you do
As well. It's pleasant; satisfying too.
That's all I've got - please don't ask me to try
To think of more. I'm happy where I am,
And how I am. I love you, and I'm glad
That we have had the times that we have had
Together - there's no need to try to cram
More into them than what has been implied:
We are in love, and sitting side by side.
Purposive
It would be false to say
That I am past my prime;
And yet there is a way
In which I've wasted time
And now time will waste me
As it has done to many
Passing rapidly
Beyond the reach of any:
I have spent my youth
In learning, and in fun,
In seeking after truth
And running just to run,
But a consistent goal
Is needed to be whole.
That I am past my prime;
And yet there is a way
In which I've wasted time
And now time will waste me
As it has done to many
Passing rapidly
Beyond the reach of any:
I have spent my youth
In learning, and in fun,
In seeking after truth
And running just to run,
But a consistent goal
Is needed to be whole.
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Free*
It's lovely, isn't it? And yet, and yet,
I can't help thinking that we'll have to pay.
Not for the flesh: that's us, it's fair to say,
But for the joys we never will forget,
The moments of ecstatic bliss that set
Our disappointments to one side and slay
Ennui by shocking us from everyday
Concerns. I cannot think the world will let
Us have them free and clear. Yet maybe thus:
All the quotidian frustrations are
The payment; every moment that we fuss
Is paying for the time when our wild star
Will shine ascendant. And we are prepaid
By every moment life seems dull and staid.
I can't help thinking that we'll have to pay.
Not for the flesh: that's us, it's fair to say,
But for the joys we never will forget,
The moments of ecstatic bliss that set
Our disappointments to one side and slay
Ennui by shocking us from everyday
Concerns. I cannot think the world will let
Us have them free and clear. Yet maybe thus:
All the quotidian frustrations are
The payment; every moment that we fuss
Is paying for the time when our wild star
Will shine ascendant. And we are prepaid
By every moment life seems dull and staid.
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Standardization
What poems should remain unwritten? Which
Are too unworthy even for a blog?
Are there such bad ones that, like sticky pitch,
They will defile? Or, is it a slog
To finish them, and therefore they remain?
Is there a standard to which they are held?
Could I write poems that, once read, would stain
The others that I've written, or would geld
The reputation that I might have built
Off of their predecessors? Could they be
So bad that I would be consumed with guilt
And drown myself for excrability?
If not, then why be bothered when I write?
If so, what is the standard? What is right?
Are too unworthy even for a blog?
Are there such bad ones that, like sticky pitch,
They will defile? Or, is it a slog
To finish them, and therefore they remain?
Is there a standard to which they are held?
Could I write poems that, once read, would stain
The others that I've written, or would geld
The reputation that I might have built
Off of their predecessors? Could they be
So bad that I would be consumed with guilt
And drown myself for excrability?
If not, then why be bothered when I write?
If so, what is the standard? What is right?
Monday, December 12, 2011
Woulda
It should be obvious how much I love,
And clear exactly why, at least I think.
I've hardly ever been the model of
Reticence, nor do I tend to sink
In introspective moods that will not tell
The reason for themselves. I'm plain enough:
My love is there for all to see. I fell
A while ago, and wrote you all that stuff.
So let's be open: I'm in love with you,
And you have shown that you might be the same.
I have a thought or two of what to do
About it, and I'm pretty sure you're game,
So let's be happy. Would that be OK?
We'll share our bliss between us while we may.
And clear exactly why, at least I think.
I've hardly ever been the model of
Reticence, nor do I tend to sink
In introspective moods that will not tell
The reason for themselves. I'm plain enough:
My love is there for all to see. I fell
A while ago, and wrote you all that stuff.
So let's be open: I'm in love with you,
And you have shown that you might be the same.
I have a thought or two of what to do
About it, and I'm pretty sure you're game,
So let's be happy. Would that be OK?
We'll share our bliss between us while we may.
Health
It doesn't sound
As if you were
As all-around
Ready to stir
As I'd prefer
That you should be;
So I demur
From happily
Expecting we
Will go and do
What normally
We'd be up to;
Instead, get better.
I'll rest your debtor.
As if you were
As all-around
Ready to stir
As I'd prefer
That you should be;
So I demur
From happily
Expecting we
Will go and do
What normally
We'd be up to;
Instead, get better.
I'll rest your debtor.
Healing
Poems cannot make a person heal;
Like honor, they've no skill in surgery.
But we have proof that they can make them feel,
And so I still attempt this hopefully:
I really wish that I could make you be
More comfortable, and so reduce your pain;
I wish there were an opportunity
To make your aches and bruises simply drain
Away. But it is better to be plain:
To heal takes time, for body and for brain,
And so we must be calm and persevere.
That does not mean we cannot hope to gain
Relief from pain, but rather, that we steer
By longer landmarks than the now. I hope
For healing over time, and that you cope.
Like honor, they've no skill in surgery.
But we have proof that they can make them feel,
And so I still attempt this hopefully:
I really wish that I could make you be
More comfortable, and so reduce your pain;
I wish there were an opportunity
To make your aches and bruises simply drain
Away. But it is better to be plain:
To heal takes time, for body and for brain,
And so we must be calm and persevere.
That does not mean we cannot hope to gain
Relief from pain, but rather, that we steer
By longer landmarks than the now. I hope
For healing over time, and that you cope.
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Web Crawler
The internet is such a lovely toy
It pulls us from whatever we were doing
And tempts us to distractedly enjoy
The random gifts with which it goes a-wooing.
To browse the web is to explore the world
Without the trouble of having stood up;
To see the flag of knowledge fly unfurled
While sipping from your own worn coffee cup;
To rise above the weight of what's to do
And see the universe - yet not to go
A step beyond yourself into that new.
The internet is dangerous to know
Yet hardly possible now to avoid
And who would want to, having once enjoyed?
It pulls us from whatever we were doing
And tempts us to distractedly enjoy
The random gifts with which it goes a-wooing.
To browse the web is to explore the world
Without the trouble of having stood up;
To see the flag of knowledge fly unfurled
While sipping from your own worn coffee cup;
To rise above the weight of what's to do
And see the universe - yet not to go
A step beyond yourself into that new.
The internet is dangerous to know
Yet hardly possible now to avoid
And who would want to, having once enjoyed?
Web Crawler
The internet is such a lovely toy
It pulls us from whatever we were doing
And tempts us to distractedly enjoy
The random gifts with which it goes a-wooing.
To browse the web is to explore the world
Without the trouble of having stood up;
To see the flag of knowledge fly unfurled
While sipping from your own worn coffee cup;
To rise above the weight of what's to do
And see the universe - yet not to go
A step beyond yourself into that new.
The internet is dangerous to know
Yet hardly possible now to avoid
And who would want to, having once enjoyed?
It pulls us from whatever we were doing
And tempts us to distractedly enjoy
The random gifts with which it goes a-wooing.
To browse the web is to explore the world
Without the trouble of having stood up;
To see the flag of knowledge fly unfurled
While sipping from your own worn coffee cup;
To rise above the weight of what's to do
And see the universe - yet not to go
A step beyond yourself into that new.
The internet is dangerous to know
Yet hardly possible now to avoid
And who would want to, having once enjoyed?
Friday, December 9, 2011
Wherez
I'm going where I have to go
And staying where I want to stay
Somehow, at once. It's nice to know
That that can ever work. Today
I found myself at home abroad
And am enjoying how that goes;
Tomorrow I will think it odd
Not to be where cedar grows,
But then be there at once. To be
So happily delivered is
A joy unknown before, to me.
If today there were a quiz,
I would answer: where I stand
Is where I would, could I command.
And staying where I want to stay
Somehow, at once. It's nice to know
That that can ever work. Today
I found myself at home abroad
And am enjoying how that goes;
Tomorrow I will think it odd
Not to be where cedar grows,
But then be there at once. To be
So happily delivered is
A joy unknown before, to me.
If today there were a quiz,
I would answer: where I stand
Is where I would, could I command.
Know Them
When does a poem start to be a prayer?
Is poetry, at heart, a call to God?
And if it isn't, isn't it quite odd
How many points of overlap they share?
The call to something greater; how men dare
Aspire to the highest; how we plod
Down constant paths that other feet have trod
And look to be alike, but better where
The other feet have strayed. Do poems pray?
Do they displace the urge on which prayer feeds,
Answering in other ways those needs?
Or is it both, and can swing either way?
I doubt that prayer is emptied by a poem,
But neither is a poem just prayer's proem.
Is poetry, at heart, a call to God?
And if it isn't, isn't it quite odd
How many points of overlap they share?
The call to something greater; how men dare
Aspire to the highest; how we plod
Down constant paths that other feet have trod
And look to be alike, but better where
The other feet have strayed. Do poems pray?
Do they displace the urge on which prayer feeds,
Answering in other ways those needs?
Or is it both, and can swing either way?
I doubt that prayer is emptied by a poem,
But neither is a poem just prayer's proem.
Thursday, December 8, 2011
Whens
When too much stress has made my life a pain
And weighed me down with weariness and woe;
When even breathing goes against the grain,
And breath itself comes laboring and slow;
When waking up is pointless, or seems so,
Yet sleep has fled me night by endless night;
When from my efforts nothing good will grow,
Except perverted sprouts twisted with spite;
When darkness visible's my only light,
And sunshine fails to warm me as it falls;
When I am wrapped up in my selfish plight,
And turn from empathy whene'er it calls;
When life has made itself an inner hell,
I speak to you, and everything is well.
And weighed me down with weariness and woe;
When even breathing goes against the grain,
And breath itself comes laboring and slow;
When waking up is pointless, or seems so,
Yet sleep has fled me night by endless night;
When from my efforts nothing good will grow,
Except perverted sprouts twisted with spite;
When darkness visible's my only light,
And sunshine fails to warm me as it falls;
When I am wrapped up in my selfish plight,
And turn from empathy whene'er it calls;
When life has made itself an inner hell,
I speak to you, and everything is well.
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Wellness
I wish her well, but far beyond mere well;
I want her good, but good is not enough.
I wish her so much good that good is fell,
And joy such that mere joy feels harsh and rough.
I do not wish to simply bring her happiness,
Though that indeed is part of what I wish;
I want to make her buoyant with success
So she could scorn to feed on such a dish
As simple plain contentment; I desire
To make her life as easy as can be,
And more than that. I eagerly aspire
To pass beyond base possibility
And gild her every moment with a smile
Such as may say "Life is beyond worthwhile."
I want her good, but good is not enough.
I wish her so much good that good is fell,
And joy such that mere joy feels harsh and rough.
I do not wish to simply bring her happiness,
Though that indeed is part of what I wish;
I want to make her buoyant with success
So she could scorn to feed on such a dish
As simple plain contentment; I desire
To make her life as easy as can be,
And more than that. I eagerly aspire
To pass beyond base possibility
And gild her every moment with a smile
Such as may say "Life is beyond worthwhile."
Infamy
It's hard to think that it could be surpassed,
But seventy years on, I have to say,
Its impact fades a bit. Sure, it will last,
At least I hope, beyond my own short stay,
But now and in the moment worries seem
To always suck away at its recall;
And sometimes it appears a sort of dream
Lost in the past, as winter does to fall.
We then were poor yet sure that we would grow,
Now we are richer, but must fear to shrink.
It was a shock beyond what we can know
In self-consuming times like these. To think
We were attacked at home, and fought
For safety - no, it is beyond our thought.
But seventy years on, I have to say,
Its impact fades a bit. Sure, it will last,
At least I hope, beyond my own short stay,
But now and in the moment worries seem
To always suck away at its recall;
And sometimes it appears a sort of dream
Lost in the past, as winter does to fall.
We then were poor yet sure that we would grow,
Now we are richer, but must fear to shrink.
It was a shock beyond what we can know
In self-consuming times like these. To think
We were attacked at home, and fought
For safety - no, it is beyond our thought.
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Carpeing
I wonder if I ought to seize the day;
It's cold outside, and that means that my hand
Could get all frozen - and I'd like to stay
Quite toasty, thanks. It's not that I don't stand
In favor of quick action and swift thought;
It's more than reaching out for seizure seems
More trouble than it's worth. I know it ought
To be my goal, but you should know my dreams
Do not include touching the day's bleak chill
And getting it all over me. Who needs
To seize a dreary day like this? What will
Be helped? It's that dull thought that breeds
Distemper in me. Why not sit and keep
Quiet and warm, and fall at last to sleep?
It's cold outside, and that means that my hand
Could get all frozen - and I'd like to stay
Quite toasty, thanks. It's not that I don't stand
In favor of quick action and swift thought;
It's more than reaching out for seizure seems
More trouble than it's worth. I know it ought
To be my goal, but you should know my dreams
Do not include touching the day's bleak chill
And getting it all over me. Who needs
To seize a dreary day like this? What will
Be helped? It's that dull thought that breeds
Distemper in me. Why not sit and keep
Quiet and warm, and fall at last to sleep?
Monday, December 5, 2011
Busybody
The empty stretch of a half-purposed day
Can still be filled with empty sugar buzz;
Its meaning may be tattered, torn away,
And yet it still retains the part that was,
When times were better, ether to that part,
The business that carried meaning on.
Though purpose may be ripped out of its heart,
That does not mean the errands, too, are gone;
They still may scuttle emptily about,
Filling up the hours as they go,
Vainly surging in and flowing out,
In some deliberately desperate show.
But I, at least, can anchor meaning there
Upon our love, and so avoid despair.
Can still be filled with empty sugar buzz;
Its meaning may be tattered, torn away,
And yet it still retains the part that was,
When times were better, ether to that part,
The business that carried meaning on.
Though purpose may be ripped out of its heart,
That does not mean the errands, too, are gone;
They still may scuttle emptily about,
Filling up the hours as they go,
Vainly surging in and flowing out,
In some deliberately desperate show.
But I, at least, can anchor meaning there
Upon our love, and so avoid despair.
Sunday, December 4, 2011
Pseudomiss
I cannot say I miss you now;
I do not think it would be fair
For destiny to still allow
Me to miss you, while you are there
In front of me so frequently,
And yet, because right now you are
A little too distant from me
(I might be bold to call it far)
And I, poor fool, wish you were not,
I think I miss you, and I sigh,
Not recollecting what I've got:
You in the way that even I
Admit is key: I cannot miss
The one who daily brings me bliss.
I do not think it would be fair
For destiny to still allow
Me to miss you, while you are there
In front of me so frequently,
And yet, because right now you are
A little too distant from me
(I might be bold to call it far)
And I, poor fool, wish you were not,
I think I miss you, and I sigh,
Not recollecting what I've got:
You in the way that even I
Admit is key: I cannot miss
The one who daily brings me bliss.
Saturday, December 3, 2011
Skytrain
Just because the sky is gray and wet
Does not imply that you and I should be;
There are some things we never should forget,
But more that we can pass by happily
And never think about again. The sun
Need not shine always to produce a day,
Nor in a host of memories does one
Bad thought drive our whole horde of good away.
And even that contention presupposes
That there is bad to mingle with the good;
Yet even though not everything is roses,
I have to say, on balance, that I would
Not trade away a thing we've done together
And so pooh-pooh the wind and foul weather.
Does not imply that you and I should be;
There are some things we never should forget,
But more that we can pass by happily
And never think about again. The sun
Need not shine always to produce a day,
Nor in a host of memories does one
Bad thought drive our whole horde of good away.
And even that contention presupposes
That there is bad to mingle with the good;
Yet even though not everything is roses,
I have to say, on balance, that I would
Not trade away a thing we've done together
And so pooh-pooh the wind and foul weather.
Friday, December 2, 2011
{Empty}
I swear there used to be a post in here;
Hiding somewhere on the internet
There may still be. However, I forget
The details of its composition, fear
I will not recollect them, think it queer
That words can vanish like these did. And yet,
Perhaps not so, for what are words? They let
Me speak, and also let, perhaps, you hear,
But what are they themselves? A breath of wind
Easily penned or typed, or even spoken,
As easily as that warped, twisted, broken,
Crumbled in the ear and quickly binned.
The words are not the matter, but the skin
The matter makes to keep its meaning in.
Hiding somewhere on the internet
There may still be. However, I forget
The details of its composition, fear
I will not recollect them, think it queer
That words can vanish like these did. And yet,
Perhaps not so, for what are words? They let
Me speak, and also let, perhaps, you hear,
But what are they themselves? A breath of wind
Easily penned or typed, or even spoken,
As easily as that warped, twisted, broken,
Crumbled in the ear and quickly binned.
The words are not the matter, but the skin
The matter makes to keep its meaning in.
Daylight
The sky is brighter than it ought to be;
Days like today demand a cloud and rain
To show the weather in more honesty
For cold despite the sunlight will cause pain.
The secret chill behind the sunny air
Is hard to recognize when we look out
But when we saunter hopefully out there
The prickles of our goosebumps leave no doubt
Telling us the sun has once again
Lied to our faces, seeming warm and bright
And beckoning out to us in the form
Of summer, when it should be winter's night.
I cannot blame the sunshine, though, because
It prompts me to remember warmth that was.
Days like today demand a cloud and rain
To show the weather in more honesty
For cold despite the sunlight will cause pain.
The secret chill behind the sunny air
Is hard to recognize when we look out
But when we saunter hopefully out there
The prickles of our goosebumps leave no doubt
Telling us the sun has once again
Lied to our faces, seeming warm and bright
And beckoning out to us in the form
Of summer, when it should be winter's night.
I cannot blame the sunshine, though, because
It prompts me to remember warmth that was.
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Lazy Foot Of Time
The hours wander by without much reason;
It's in their nature, though, so I don't care.
Too soon it will become the winter season;
I don't much like it, but I will be there.
Perhaps in time I will care more about
These random walks that hours seem to take.
And if that's true, then I can hardly doubt
I'll blame the seasons that combine to make
The hours move along. If seasons were
Content to stay incipient or past
The hours could stay with us, and I'm sure
That happy days would choose to everlast.
But seasons come and go as they may please
And do not let the hours take their ease.
It's in their nature, though, so I don't care.
Too soon it will become the winter season;
I don't much like it, but I will be there.
Perhaps in time I will care more about
These random walks that hours seem to take.
And if that's true, then I can hardly doubt
I'll blame the seasons that combine to make
The hours move along. If seasons were
Content to stay incipient or past
The hours could stay with us, and I'm sure
That happy days would choose to everlast.
But seasons come and go as they may please
And do not let the hours take their ease.
Happy Birthday
It is not such a feat
To say you have been born;
Nor is it worth much scorn
To say that it is neat
That you became complete
On some now-distant morn
Still sluglike and forlorn
With only milk to eat.
But it is something to
Be able now to say
That it was on this day
(24 years ago)
That you were entered so
And, luckily, were you.
To say you have been born;
Nor is it worth much scorn
To say that it is neat
That you became complete
On some now-distant morn
Still sluglike and forlorn
With only milk to eat.
But it is something to
Be able now to say
That it was on this day
(24 years ago)
That you were entered so
And, luckily, were you.
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Forecasts
The cold outside is seeping into me
By slow degrees I sink into myself
And weary of the world's extremity
Won't move. I see a book up on the shelf
And think it too much effort to extend
My leaden arm up to its promised weight;
I think I used to think I could depend
On my exuberance to heal my state,
But now I know - dull certainty - that I
Will not rise up, whatever is the cause;
I blame it on the boredom in the sky
And how it hammers home to me my flaws.
Perhaps the sky will change, but ere it does
I fear I will not be as I once was.
By slow degrees I sink into myself
And weary of the world's extremity
Won't move. I see a book up on the shelf
And think it too much effort to extend
My leaden arm up to its promised weight;
I think I used to think I could depend
On my exuberance to heal my state,
But now I know - dull certainty - that I
Will not rise up, whatever is the cause;
I blame it on the boredom in the sky
And how it hammers home to me my flaws.
Perhaps the sky will change, but ere it does
I fear I will not be as I once was.
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Culpability
I beg forbearance from you all
For every single time I've been
A little mean, a little small,
Obsessed, perhaps, with will to win,
Unkind, irate, beneath the man
That we all know I ought to be,
Less empathetic than I can
Or even should have been, easy
To anger, slow to be at peace,
Scornful of others, self-concerned,
Oozing my own selfish grease,
Uncaring who or what was burned
When I was hot. I'm sorry, too,
For every time that I hurt you.
For every single time I've been
A little mean, a little small,
Obsessed, perhaps, with will to win,
Unkind, irate, beneath the man
That we all know I ought to be,
Less empathetic than I can
Or even should have been, easy
To anger, slow to be at peace,
Scornful of others, self-concerned,
Oozing my own selfish grease,
Uncaring who or what was burned
When I was hot. I'm sorry, too,
For every time that I hurt you.
Monday, November 28, 2011
Improving Spirit
What would I have ever done without
Her smile and the way it makes me melt?
All she has to do is quasi-pout,
And I am filled with more than I have felt
For weeks on end without her - she inspires
Far more than I had ever thought she would,
Not merely love, or fleeting base desires,
But happiness, and will toward doing good
In ways I never would have thought before.
I do not mean to say that I was bad
Before I had her - rather, that the more
I see of her, the more I wish I had
Been always with her, for she makes me better
Than when, before, I did things to the letter.
Her smile and the way it makes me melt?
All she has to do is quasi-pout,
And I am filled with more than I have felt
For weeks on end without her - she inspires
Far more than I had ever thought she would,
Not merely love, or fleeting base desires,
But happiness, and will toward doing good
In ways I never would have thought before.
I do not mean to say that I was bad
Before I had her - rather, that the more
I see of her, the more I wish I had
Been always with her, for she makes me better
Than when, before, I did things to the letter.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Happy
I marvel at the things you do to me:
The way the least tilt of your lovely head
Can tell me what I ought to do instead
Of what I'm doing; the sweet way you see
A speck of cherry clinging forcibly
To my top lip, and wipe away the red;
The way you listen to the things I've said
And answer them - and always thoughtfully.
I wonder that you choose to do this for
Me, who cannot claim desert, but must
Confess, if I for all my faults am just,
That I for you should always do much more.
And then I cease to puzzle it, and know
Love does not ask permission where to grow.
The way the least tilt of your lovely head
Can tell me what I ought to do instead
Of what I'm doing; the sweet way you see
A speck of cherry clinging forcibly
To my top lip, and wipe away the red;
The way you listen to the things I've said
And answer them - and always thoughtfully.
I wonder that you choose to do this for
Me, who cannot claim desert, but must
Confess, if I for all my faults am just,
That I for you should always do much more.
And then I cease to puzzle it, and know
Love does not ask permission where to grow.
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Able
I cannot gaze forever in your eyes
Nor hold your hand indefinitely long;
I cannot touch your fingers in this wise
Unendingly, and though I know I'm strong
I cannot always hold you. At some point
I must let go and turn my head away,
I must reflex and rest some tender joint,
I must release you and no longer stay
To touch. Yet even when I do all this
Do not imagine that my love is gone
No more than, when I breathe after a kiss
It means I do not want you. I love on
And will continue to, no matter which
Way I am showing it, or if I switch.
Nor hold your hand indefinitely long;
I cannot touch your fingers in this wise
Unendingly, and though I know I'm strong
I cannot always hold you. At some point
I must let go and turn my head away,
I must reflex and rest some tender joint,
I must release you and no longer stay
To touch. Yet even when I do all this
Do not imagine that my love is gone
No more than, when I breathe after a kiss
It means I do not want you. I love on
And will continue to, no matter which
Way I am showing it, or if I switch.
Beau Ideal
Holding hands for no reason at all
Except desire still to hold your hand;
Wandering around a shopping mall
Because we're too excited to just stand,
Not looking at the stores - who wants to shop? -
Just being in a constant sort of whirl
Of motion and emotion, 'til the cop
Tells us it's closing and they want to furl
The little awnings on the shops, so could
We move along please?, wandering at random,
Talking of nothing but still feeling good,
Perhaps explaining some still-unshared fandom,
Or new discovery - this is the way
To spend a perfect unproductive day.
Except desire still to hold your hand;
Wandering around a shopping mall
Because we're too excited to just stand,
Not looking at the stores - who wants to shop? -
Just being in a constant sort of whirl
Of motion and emotion, 'til the cop
Tells us it's closing and they want to furl
The little awnings on the shops, so could
We move along please?, wandering at random,
Talking of nothing but still feeling good,
Perhaps explaining some still-unshared fandom,
Or new discovery - this is the way
To spend a perfect unproductive day.
Friday, November 25, 2011
Coffee, Black
Coffee comes in many flavors now,
Decaffeinated too, or so I hear;
But somehow I still doubt you will allow
A drop of milk or sugar to come near
Your precious cup of black - nor can I blame
You for this deep tenacity of yours:
For coffee will not ever taste the same
Once anybody overzealous pours
A drop of milk or cream into it, or
Adds sugar to alleviate the bitter,
And I know you desire nothing more
Than pure black coffee - and what could be fitter?
I think that is a good sign, too, for me:
You do not change what you take lovingly.
Decaffeinated too, or so I hear;
But somehow I still doubt you will allow
A drop of milk or sugar to come near
Your precious cup of black - nor can I blame
You for this deep tenacity of yours:
For coffee will not ever taste the same
Once anybody overzealous pours
A drop of milk or cream into it, or
Adds sugar to alleviate the bitter,
And I know you desire nothing more
Than pure black coffee - and what could be fitter?
I think that is a good sign, too, for me:
You do not change what you take lovingly.
Fireside
Love need not be immediately sprung
By willing eyes on an unwary heart;
Nor is the virtue of an honest tongue
Contained in giving an aggressive start
To sudden-born affection. Love is not
Only the quick boil of desire
That gives off steam as soon as it is hot,
But also - and indeed, is more - the fire
That slowly roasts beneath the logs unseen
Heating by radiation all around
Until the wood is kindled, though still green
And all consumed before the spark is found.
Love is a heat that grows from little coals
And must - and shall - be fed with loving souls.
By willing eyes on an unwary heart;
Nor is the virtue of an honest tongue
Contained in giving an aggressive start
To sudden-born affection. Love is not
Only the quick boil of desire
That gives off steam as soon as it is hot,
But also - and indeed, is more - the fire
That slowly roasts beneath the logs unseen
Heating by radiation all around
Until the wood is kindled, though still green
And all consumed before the spark is found.
Love is a heat that grows from little coals
And must - and shall - be fed with loving souls.
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Defrag
There may be joys unfound beneath the skin,
Lurking in the corners of the soul,
Unwilling to come out, safe in their hole,
Forever burrowing on, deeper in
Than introspection ever could begin
To seek them out, though that should be its goal
Forever, or confession could enroll
Though it should work upon them as on sin.
Yet though potential bliss should hide away
Within, forever daring to defy
The searching mind until it comes to die,
I do not think we'd need it anyway:
There is sufficient joy in that we know
To let the search for other pleasures go.
Lurking in the corners of the soul,
Unwilling to come out, safe in their hole,
Forever burrowing on, deeper in
Than introspection ever could begin
To seek them out, though that should be its goal
Forever, or confession could enroll
Though it should work upon them as on sin.
Yet though potential bliss should hide away
Within, forever daring to defy
The searching mind until it comes to die,
I do not think we'd need it anyway:
There is sufficient joy in that we know
To let the search for other pleasures go.
Thanksgiving
Chill days are better spent inside
With those you love, perhaps with food.
And if a purpose is implied,
It's just to warm the present mood,
Make everyone remember why
They brave the cold outdoors to come,
And maybe split some kind of pie.
On days when clouds make sunshine glum,
It's hard sometimes, sans company,
To find a reason to be glad.
But when there's warmth and food, there'll be
A greater joy still to be had:
In common contemplation of
The way that food expresses love.
With those you love, perhaps with food.
And if a purpose is implied,
It's just to warm the present mood,
Make everyone remember why
They brave the cold outdoors to come,
And maybe split some kind of pie.
On days when clouds make sunshine glum,
It's hard sometimes, sans company,
To find a reason to be glad.
But when there's warmth and food, there'll be
A greater joy still to be had:
In common contemplation of
The way that food expresses love.
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
To
The world is cold enough, my dear
Without us adding to its chill;
Do not be coy, do not be queer
In exercisement of your will,
Do not stand so far away,
Do not be miserly of heat,
Do not reflect the morning's grey,
But make the cold beat its retreat
And gaily laugh along with me
To warm yourself as I'm designing:
By each reciprocatingly
Limb to other limb entwining.
It is better thus to seize
Our love than, separated, freeze.
Without us adding to its chill;
Do not be coy, do not be queer
In exercisement of your will,
Do not stand so far away,
Do not be miserly of heat,
Do not reflect the morning's grey,
But make the cold beat its retreat
And gaily laugh along with me
To warm yourself as I'm designing:
By each reciprocatingly
Limb to other limb entwining.
It is better thus to seize
Our love than, separated, freeze.
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
All In
It seems a long time to be far from you
Yet I know well enough that it is short.
That hardly matters though until I'm through
This period of waiting. At the airport
It may be so; but here, still far away,
I cannot yet internalize the fact
We'll be together soon. As yesterday
Fades into nothingness, my cataract
Grows stronger, and I cannot see the past;
The future's still uncertain, so I feel
As if this lonely lack of you will last
Until forever, while it is unreal
To think that yesterday we were as one
And will be when tomorrow has been done.
Yet I know well enough that it is short.
That hardly matters though until I'm through
This period of waiting. At the airport
It may be so; but here, still far away,
I cannot yet internalize the fact
We'll be together soon. As yesterday
Fades into nothingness, my cataract
Grows stronger, and I cannot see the past;
The future's still uncertain, so I feel
As if this lonely lack of you will last
Until forever, while it is unreal
To think that yesterday we were as one
And will be when tomorrow has been done.
Grey-Eyed
A gray day is a hard one to use well:
It wants to slip away, and all be wasted.
Waking up is a much harder sell
On such a day - there are no joys untasted,
Just dreary flatness stretching end to end
Slopping about within an uncast day.
It's days like this that send you round the bend
In their too-dismal and destructive way.
But some of them are purposefully dull:
Days of regeneration. It can be
Quite difficult to positively cull
Those from the others which, more boringly
Drip into life. But why discriminate?
Make them all such, and then embrace your fate.
It wants to slip away, and all be wasted.
Waking up is a much harder sell
On such a day - there are no joys untasted,
Just dreary flatness stretching end to end
Slopping about within an uncast day.
It's days like this that send you round the bend
In their too-dismal and destructive way.
But some of them are purposefully dull:
Days of regeneration. It can be
Quite difficult to positively cull
Those from the others which, more boringly
Drip into life. But why discriminate?
Make them all such, and then embrace your fate.
Monday, November 21, 2011
M6
It's never really that I want to leave,
Just sometimes that I have to go away.
I think it's quite important you believe
That I would much prefer to spend each day
Close enjambed with you than take this bus
Three long, unbroken hours out of town,
So even though I may not rant and cuss,
Imagine I am feeling rather down
About this stern requirement that I
For varied reasons show myself to be
In far Chicago. Think that every sigh
That you in prior days had heard from me
Now speaks of sadness at our separation:
This is very busmanlike vacation.
Just sometimes that I have to go away.
I think it's quite important you believe
That I would much prefer to spend each day
Close enjambed with you than take this bus
Three long, unbroken hours out of town,
So even though I may not rant and cuss,
Imagine I am feeling rather down
About this stern requirement that I
For varied reasons show myself to be
In far Chicago. Think that every sigh
That you in prior days had heard from me
Now speaks of sadness at our separation:
This is very busmanlike vacation.
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Hit
I really didn't need this. Not right now,
Not ever, really. Yeah, I'm pretty sure
I'll never need it - and I can't allow
That sort of thing to happen. If a cure
Is found, please let me know, although I doubt
There could be one for sheer bad luck. But still
If there is any way to clear it out,
Please let me know. Right now it seems to fill
Every bit of me, and that's not good.
I'd like to hear some options - are there any?
I didn't think so, but I thought I should
At least have asked - there couldn't have been many
But maybe one? No, this I didn't need
And never will - that part is guaranteed.
Not ever, really. Yeah, I'm pretty sure
I'll never need it - and I can't allow
That sort of thing to happen. If a cure
Is found, please let me know, although I doubt
There could be one for sheer bad luck. But still
If there is any way to clear it out,
Please let me know. Right now it seems to fill
Every bit of me, and that's not good.
I'd like to hear some options - are there any?
I didn't think so, but I thought I should
At least have asked - there couldn't have been many
But maybe one? No, this I didn't need
And never will - that part is guaranteed.
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Windowflower
The rolls of distant thunder in the air
Threaten to unravel on my head
And in a sudden instant freely share
Their load of rain. I should have stayed in bed.
Why did I leave? The window was sufficient
To have portrayed the beauty of the storm,
And therefore it would be much more efficient
To keep myself in bedclothes, dry and warm,
While still observing nature, than to be
Soaked through my khakis in the sudden flood.
But I was always tempted easily
Into these maelstroms of rain and mud:
I love to stick my nose outside and feel
The thunderstorm, to know it's really real.
Threaten to unravel on my head
And in a sudden instant freely share
Their load of rain. I should have stayed in bed.
Why did I leave? The window was sufficient
To have portrayed the beauty of the storm,
And therefore it would be much more efficient
To keep myself in bedclothes, dry and warm,
While still observing nature, than to be
Soaked through my khakis in the sudden flood.
But I was always tempted easily
Into these maelstroms of rain and mud:
I love to stick my nose outside and feel
The thunderstorm, to know it's really real.
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Written
Were I to tell you, love, the way I feel
In any other way than how I do,
You would no longer think my feelings real
And that is something I don't need from you.
Therefore I always tell you my emotions
The same slow way - by posting these long rhymes.
And by such complex indirect devotions
Your crablike knowledge of my loving climbs
Backwards to its goal. Direct approach
Seems strange and out of place. Instead I use
Descriptions that can, line by line, encroach
On your awareness, so you can't refuse
To know exactly what I'm thinking of:
My too-poetic, yet ecstatic, love.
In any other way than how I do,
You would no longer think my feelings real
And that is something I don't need from you.
Therefore I always tell you my emotions
The same slow way - by posting these long rhymes.
And by such complex indirect devotions
Your crablike knowledge of my loving climbs
Backwards to its goal. Direct approach
Seems strange and out of place. Instead I use
Descriptions that can, line by line, encroach
On your awareness, so you can't refuse
To know exactly what I'm thinking of:
My too-poetic, yet ecstatic, love.
Caffeine-aided
Coffee is a magic plant
Whose beans remain beyond compare;
What other steaming mixtures can't,
Coffee alone will always dare.
It lies beyond the ken of man
To speak the fullest measure of
What coffee does, and what it can:
And so, from many, it takes love.
Among those lovers is my own,
And I by coffee am displaced;
A love that is not wooed, but grown
Is not so easily erased.
Yet I have found a way to swerve
Her coffee love to me - I serve.
Whose beans remain beyond compare;
What other steaming mixtures can't,
Coffee alone will always dare.
It lies beyond the ken of man
To speak the fullest measure of
What coffee does, and what it can:
And so, from many, it takes love.
Among those lovers is my own,
And I by coffee am displaced;
A love that is not wooed, but grown
Is not so easily erased.
Yet I have found a way to swerve
Her coffee love to me - I serve.
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Knishes
A little room is space enough, my love,
For all that we require; yet the world
Is far too small for the fulfillment of
What we desire, though 'twere squirrelled
Away efficiently as it could be.
Each atom of the earth, made an intent,
Each bond between them metaphorically
Standing for a wish we might invent,
Would not suffice in the entire globe
To tell our wills - yet they are summarized
In but a word or two, which daily strobe
Across my brain, and cannot be excised:
You want to be with me, and I with you;
That all these many wants aspire to.
For all that we require; yet the world
Is far too small for the fulfillment of
What we desire, though 'twere squirrelled
Away efficiently as it could be.
Each atom of the earth, made an intent,
Each bond between them metaphorically
Standing for a wish we might invent,
Would not suffice in the entire globe
To tell our wills - yet they are summarized
In but a word or two, which daily strobe
Across my brain, and cannot be excised:
You want to be with me, and I with you;
That all these many wants aspire to.
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
A Scanner
In three long hours I will be with her,
Finally at home, though long from where I rent.
I cannot help but wish that that time were
Already, by some cosmic power, spent
So I might say at last that I am here,
Not half away and half remaining stuck
Halfway away. Ah, then my sight will clear
And focus, so that I may finally pluck
The mystery from things - not see reflected
In some black mirror what my eyes pretend
While truth and beauty slide by unsuspected,
But face to face behold my promised end.
Three hours left in which to sigh and groan
And then I shall know as I shall be known.
Finally at home, though long from where I rent.
I cannot help but wish that that time were
Already, by some cosmic power, spent
So I might say at last that I am here,
Not half away and half remaining stuck
Halfway away. Ah, then my sight will clear
And focus, so that I may finally pluck
The mystery from things - not see reflected
In some black mirror what my eyes pretend
While truth and beauty slide by unsuspected,
But face to face behold my promised end.
Three hours left in which to sigh and groan
And then I shall know as I shall be known.
Two Seats Up
I swear she's braided up her hair
A dozen times or more by now,
But still it is in disrepair
More than she's willing to allow
She reaches back again to seize
The central lock and twist it 'round;
Another half-twist done, and she's
Complete - and yet once more she's found
She does not like the way it sits
(Or maybe how it makes her seem)
So she dishevels it and fits
It once again into her scheme
Perhaps by Indy she'll have done
Her hair down straight - or in a bun.
A dozen times or more by now,
But still it is in disrepair
More than she's willing to allow
She reaches back again to seize
The central lock and twist it 'round;
Another half-twist done, and she's
Complete - and yet once more she's found
She does not like the way it sits
(Or maybe how it makes her seem)
So she dishevels it and fits
It once again into her scheme
Perhaps by Indy she'll have done
Her hair down straight - or in a bun.
Monday, November 14, 2011
Double Falsehood
Theobald wrote it; that is sure.
But what matters is before:
Do his changes still immure
Shakespeare? Is there something more
Than the eighteenth-century
Could invent itself? Is there
Something in the text to see
That rewards our constant care?
Is it even Fletcher's work
(As once Moseley registered),
Or is Theobald just a jerk
(Something no one finds absurd)?
Every hundred years or so
Some say yes, but most say no.
But what matters is before:
Do his changes still immure
Shakespeare? Is there something more
Than the eighteenth-century
Could invent itself? Is there
Something in the text to see
That rewards our constant care?
Is it even Fletcher's work
(As once Moseley registered),
Or is Theobald just a jerk
(Something no one finds absurd)?
Every hundred years or so
Some say yes, but most say no.
Chicago Weather
Chicago likes to play these dirty tricks:
A day like this one, cloudy, dull, and grey,
Will be much warmer than the wintry mix
Of sun and cold that falsely fills the day
Throughout December, promising a heat
That, like this morning's cold, is seen, not felt.
On days like this the sunshine will retreat,
And yet I daresay water would still melt;
But in the coming months, the sun will shine
In lying beams of bright frigidity,
And those of us who cursed this day will pine
For greyer lies lapped in liquidity.
Yet old Chicago will keep keeping on
Lying until the winter too is gone.
A day like this one, cloudy, dull, and grey,
Will be much warmer than the wintry mix
Of sun and cold that falsely fills the day
Throughout December, promising a heat
That, like this morning's cold, is seen, not felt.
On days like this the sunshine will retreat,
And yet I daresay water would still melt;
But in the coming months, the sun will shine
In lying beams of bright frigidity,
And those of us who cursed this day will pine
For greyer lies lapped in liquidity.
Yet old Chicago will keep keeping on
Lying until the winter too is gone.
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Artless
I've lost the art of being without her.
There was a time when how long it had been
Since I last lacked her mattered; now, I'm sure,
Though it had been an hour, I'd begin
To feel the pains that used to take a week,
While weeks, which used to be my currency,
Are endless episodes of hopeless, bleak
Despair. I used to think it bad to be
Without her for a month - now two days feels
Already just as long. I had the touch
Of knowing, when the Megabus's wheels
Had rolled away, exactly just how much
Time it had been - but now times matters little:
When she is gone, I mountainize a tittle.
There was a time when how long it had been
Since I last lacked her mattered; now, I'm sure,
Though it had been an hour, I'd begin
To feel the pains that used to take a week,
While weeks, which used to be my currency,
Are endless episodes of hopeless, bleak
Despair. I used to think it bad to be
Without her for a month - now two days feels
Already just as long. I had the touch
Of knowing, when the Megabus's wheels
Had rolled away, exactly just how much
Time it had been - but now times matters little:
When she is gone, I mountainize a tittle.
Plain
I hope it will someday be ordinary
To have you sitting with me, side by side;
And though I know our schedules will still vary,
I hope they will not frequently divide
Us from each other - that, in time, we two
Will become used to being in one place,
Accustomed to my being next to you
And you being engaged in my embrace.
I hope that it will be a common sight
To see us sitting at one dinner table;
That it will not seem some trick of the light
To have us very close - that we are able
To always be so. This I hope - yet pray
We won't forget the way things were today.
To have you sitting with me, side by side;
And though I know our schedules will still vary,
I hope they will not frequently divide
Us from each other - that, in time, we two
Will become used to being in one place,
Accustomed to my being next to you
And you being engaged in my embrace.
I hope that it will be a common sight
To see us sitting at one dinner table;
That it will not seem some trick of the light
To have us very close - that we are able
To always be so. This I hope - yet pray
We won't forget the way things were today.
Saturday, November 12, 2011
I Presume
Whenever I set foot in a new place,
Exploring where I have not been before,
I feel the pressing lack of your embrace.
I do acknowledge that we did explore
Without much contact, but I have since learned
The wonder that is wandering with you;
Therefore the thing for which I only yearned
Is necessary, and I greatly rue
Its absence, even though before we went
Not hand in hand, or even side by side;
Now I am used to having your arm lent
To me, and so it's harder to abide
This solo exploration. Please come back
And with your loving arms fill up the lack.
Exploring where I have not been before,
I feel the pressing lack of your embrace.
I do acknowledge that we did explore
Without much contact, but I have since learned
The wonder that is wandering with you;
Therefore the thing for which I only yearned
Is necessary, and I greatly rue
Its absence, even though before we went
Not hand in hand, or even side by side;
Now I am used to having your arm lent
To me, and so it's harder to abide
This solo exploration. Please come back
And with your loving arms fill up the lack.
Friday, November 11, 2011
Substitutes
Froth of a sort can fill the emptiness;
Activity suffices for a while.
What it produces isn't happiness,
But isn't sadness, and sometimes can smile,
So it will do. It whiles time away,
Pushing aside a little of the gap
Between the visits, coloring the gray.
But this soft methadone is just a trap:
For when it ceases, the withdrawal pains
Can be far worse than what there was before,
Negating what had seemed to be the gains
It brought, leaving a pain increased the more
By past palliation. Now all that is there
Is absence lingered out in constant care.
Activity suffices for a while.
What it produces isn't happiness,
But isn't sadness, and sometimes can smile,
So it will do. It whiles time away,
Pushing aside a little of the gap
Between the visits, coloring the gray.
But this soft methadone is just a trap:
For when it ceases, the withdrawal pains
Can be far worse than what there was before,
Negating what had seemed to be the gains
It brought, leaving a pain increased the more
By past palliation. Now all that is there
Is absence lingered out in constant care.
Old
I remember mornings with Safe Ride
No longer evenings, though not quite yet dawn,
Waiting for the call from just inside
Tired, and barely stifling a yawn,
Yet eager and excited still to be
Beside you, even at this weary time,
Basking in your warming company
Inspired to a retrospective rhyme
That could not be expressed in public. Then,
I was more cautious and yet no less thrilled
To be by you - and when I am again,
That happiness will be again fulfilled,
And I as joyous to be next to you
Though likely not, this time, quite frozen blue.
No longer evenings, though not quite yet dawn,
Waiting for the call from just inside
Tired, and barely stifling a yawn,
Yet eager and excited still to be
Beside you, even at this weary time,
Basking in your warming company
Inspired to a retrospective rhyme
That could not be expressed in public. Then,
I was more cautious and yet no less thrilled
To be by you - and when I am again,
That happiness will be again fulfilled,
And I as joyous to be next to you
Though likely not, this time, quite frozen blue.
Corrupted
There was a poem here - I swear there was.
Not a good poem, no, but workmanlike,
Touched with a couple of delicious words.
But then the Internet, as oft it does,
Decided on a small impromptu strike,
And shatter that old poem into sherds,
Leaving me with nothing. I could try
To write that poem out again and see
What would come back; but that just seems absurd.
So I am forced to simply let it lie,
And have this poem be what it will be,
Instead of what, at first, I had preferred.
Still there's one thing I'll keep: the final beat.
With you, all things are better on repeat.
Not a good poem, no, but workmanlike,
Touched with a couple of delicious words.
But then the Internet, as oft it does,
Decided on a small impromptu strike,
And shatter that old poem into sherds,
Leaving me with nothing. I could try
To write that poem out again and see
What would come back; but that just seems absurd.
So I am forced to simply let it lie,
And have this poem be what it will be,
Instead of what, at first, I had preferred.
Still there's one thing I'll keep: the final beat.
With you, all things are better on repeat.
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Communications
Letters can get lost
And emails fail to send;
Little notes get tossed,
Attachments don't append;
Texts can be deleted,
So can files too,
While an unrepeated
Phrase can slip by you;
Gchat has its troubles,
(Some times disconnected),
While iChat's bright bubbles
Cannot be resurrected.
I don't trust them much:
It's better if we touch.
And emails fail to send;
Little notes get tossed,
Attachments don't append;
Texts can be deleted,
So can files too,
While an unrepeated
Phrase can slip by you;
Gchat has its troubles,
(Some times disconnected),
While iChat's bright bubbles
Cannot be resurrected.
I don't trust them much:
It's better if we touch.
Sniff Test
Coffee fumes are wonderfully wild,
Painting the image of another clime,
Where summers were inevitably mild,
And winters easy, over in no time.
They speak the wordless language of the nose,
Preaching, not of the wondrous world to come,
But beauty in our own, which climbs and grows
Within the coffee grinder's selfless hum.
A sniff of coffee can deliver bliss
Beyond the humdrum world of most of us;
It doesn't matter if it's weak as piss:
The smell of it alone's miraculous.
There's only one scent better, and it's you:
You smell of your own self: and coffee too.
Painting the image of another clime,
Where summers were inevitably mild,
And winters easy, over in no time.
They speak the wordless language of the nose,
Preaching, not of the wondrous world to come,
But beauty in our own, which climbs and grows
Within the coffee grinder's selfless hum.
A sniff of coffee can deliver bliss
Beyond the humdrum world of most of us;
It doesn't matter if it's weak as piss:
The smell of it alone's miraculous.
There's only one scent better, and it's you:
You smell of your own self: and coffee too.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Breakage
I hate to think
That you might be
That which puts me
Upon the brink;
But when I blink
I always see
You smilingly
And then I sink
Into my heart
And let it fly:
I cannot try
To keep apart.
So I, from you,
Split through and through.
That you might be
That which puts me
Upon the brink;
But when I blink
I always see
You smilingly
And then I sink
Into my heart
And let it fly:
I cannot try
To keep apart.
So I, from you,
Split through and through.
Typology
There are some people that you need
Only when you're feeling low,
Who help you get up and succeed
But aren't that wonderful to know
When you are at your best, because
Just as they pulled you up before
Out of the sucking mess that was
Your painful life, off of the floor,
Now that you're high they cut you down,
As if they cannot stand to see
Either a smile or a frown,
But look only for blanks to be
Around them: these, thank God, have passed
Leaving true friends, who truly last.
Only when you're feeling low,
Who help you get up and succeed
But aren't that wonderful to know
When you are at your best, because
Just as they pulled you up before
Out of the sucking mess that was
Your painful life, off of the floor,
Now that you're high they cut you down,
As if they cannot stand to see
Either a smile or a frown,
But look only for blanks to be
Around them: these, thank God, have passed
Leaving true friends, who truly last.
Excelsior
On days like this I like to settle in
With hot cocoa, a blanket, and a book;
To nestle far away from what I've been
On warmer days, when all was bustling,
Ensconced in the embrace of some small nook.
I like to hear the wind still whistling
Around me, merely heard but never felt;
To feel the warmth around me, certain that
No matter what, I'm safe. Oh, I have dealt
With many days of sorrow, wet and cold,
And wished myself inside a cozy flat,
With some half-steaming beverage to hold.
But now I venture forth into the damp
To seek your warmth under a cold streetlamp.
With hot cocoa, a blanket, and a book;
To nestle far away from what I've been
On warmer days, when all was bustling,
Ensconced in the embrace of some small nook.
I like to hear the wind still whistling
Around me, merely heard but never felt;
To feel the warmth around me, certain that
No matter what, I'm safe. Oh, I have dealt
With many days of sorrow, wet and cold,
And wished myself inside a cozy flat,
With some half-steaming beverage to hold.
But now I venture forth into the damp
To seek your warmth under a cold streetlamp.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Counterclaim
Self-knowledge is the hardest victory,
And hardly worth the winning when you do;
Who wants to suss out every mystery
Inside of you, including even you?
It hardly seems worth troubling about
When you consider what you could have won
With much less effort. Sure, there might be doubt,
But just ignore it so you can have fun,
And everything will seem OK. Explore
Nothing but a hedonist embrace,
And there will be no need that you do more.
Except when you desire final grace
And see the limit of yourself was void
Unthought, and useless, though once much-enjoyed.
And hardly worth the winning when you do;
Who wants to suss out every mystery
Inside of you, including even you?
It hardly seems worth troubling about
When you consider what you could have won
With much less effort. Sure, there might be doubt,
But just ignore it so you can have fun,
And everything will seem OK. Explore
Nothing but a hedonist embrace,
And there will be no need that you do more.
Except when you desire final grace
And see the limit of yourself was void
Unthought, and useless, though once much-enjoyed.
Blow Winds
It isn't often that I want to break
Something (even a line) in order to
Make something that isn't in me quake
Under my pressure. It's not what I do.
But now I find the need and feel the urge
To smash and smash and smash at something small,
Making it break itself beneath the surge
Of my frustration as it takes it all
And leaves me less. I want to vandalize,
Leave shards of something hanging somewhere odd,
Destroy something and leave it where the eyes
Will catch it, crack the soil and the sod
And leave the earth aware of how I feel.
I couldn't do this, though, to something real.
Something (even a line) in order to
Make something that isn't in me quake
Under my pressure. It's not what I do.
But now I find the need and feel the urge
To smash and smash and smash at something small,
Making it break itself beneath the surge
Of my frustration as it takes it all
And leaves me less. I want to vandalize,
Leave shards of something hanging somewhere odd,
Destroy something and leave it where the eyes
Will catch it, crack the soil and the sod
And leave the earth aware of how I feel.
I couldn't do this, though, to something real.
My Favorite Things
There are a few small things I know
Can always make my mood improve,
Infuse me with a special glow,
And put me right back in my groove:
A day of rain with sun behind,
A calm within a thunderstorm,
A light plot perfectly designed,
A blanket wrapped to keep me warm,
A line or two from Shakespeare's plays,
A game involving strategy,
A balanced Wildean phrase,
A mug of steaming Earl Grey tea.
But more than these I know that you
Can make me redshift when I'm blue.
Can always make my mood improve,
Infuse me with a special glow,
And put me right back in my groove:
A day of rain with sun behind,
A calm within a thunderstorm,
A light plot perfectly designed,
A blanket wrapped to keep me warm,
A line or two from Shakespeare's plays,
A game involving strategy,
A balanced Wildean phrase,
A mug of steaming Earl Grey tea.
But more than these I know that you
Can make me redshift when I'm blue.
Monday, November 7, 2011
Downpours
I long to feel the rain cascade on me,
Washing away the grime of life, setting
Me free of failed responsibility,
Impatience, anger - cleansing me, and letting
My soul fly out into eternity.
I do not wish to die; merely to sail
Beyond myself into an astral sea,
Mysterious and open, blankly pale.
I want to end frustration, and to be
Emptied of weariness and doubt - to rise
Above the everyday, prosaically
Boring world I live in - to surprise
Myself for once. I want to feel the rain
Soaking my body, wringing out my brain.
Washing away the grime of life, setting
Me free of failed responsibility,
Impatience, anger - cleansing me, and letting
My soul fly out into eternity.
I do not wish to die; merely to sail
Beyond myself into an astral sea,
Mysterious and open, blankly pale.
I want to end frustration, and to be
Emptied of weariness and doubt - to rise
Above the everyday, prosaically
Boring world I live in - to surprise
Myself for once. I want to feel the rain
Soaking my body, wringing out my brain.
Textual
After a while words don't matter.
What good is saying yet again
"I miss you?" All it is is chatter,
Know and repeated, so that when
The words aren't needed, they've been said.
It doesn't mean I do not mean
The words. Just that their meaning's dead
Although the thought is evergreen.
I cannot live - no more can she -
By simply typing every day
I miss you and I love you. We
Know that already. Still we say
Those words because they're markers of
What can't be said: the heart of love.
What good is saying yet again
"I miss you?" All it is is chatter,
Know and repeated, so that when
The words aren't needed, they've been said.
It doesn't mean I do not mean
The words. Just that their meaning's dead
Although the thought is evergreen.
I cannot live - no more can she -
By simply typing every day
I miss you and I love you. We
Know that already. Still we say
Those words because they're markers of
What can't be said: the heart of love.
Slick
The smell of pavement dripping after rain,
Cut with a little oil in the air,
Brings me back to youth. I feel the drain
Of fifteen years dropping into nowhere,
And I am playing by the street again,
At the old house, with the shorter fence,
Laughing with my friends. A young me, then,
Only half-grown in both body and sense,
Would chase balls to the street and dodge the cars.
The smell returns me, but I cannot play
As once I did; maturity disbars
Such folly, and it's better in a way:
I'm safer now. But oh, the fun we had
Even if the things we did were bad.
Cut with a little oil in the air,
Brings me back to youth. I feel the drain
Of fifteen years dropping into nowhere,
And I am playing by the street again,
At the old house, with the shorter fence,
Laughing with my friends. A young me, then,
Only half-grown in both body and sense,
Would chase balls to the street and dodge the cars.
The smell returns me, but I cannot play
As once I did; maturity disbars
Such folly, and it's better in a way:
I'm safer now. But oh, the fun we had
Even if the things we did were bad.
Sunday, November 6, 2011
To Do List
There isn't much I want to do with you
Except the thousand things that we have done
Again. That's really all I want to do,
Although in new, exciting ways. It's fun
To do things with you, and what we've begun
I always like to finish, then repeat.
You know I'm not like this with everyone,
But something in you is so deeply sweet,
So necessary to make me complete,
That doing what we've done again is good,
Because it means we once again can meet
And join together, doing what we would:
It's not so much the details of what we
Do, as the fact that it is you and me.
Except the thousand things that we have done
Again. That's really all I want to do,
Although in new, exciting ways. It's fun
To do things with you, and what we've begun
I always like to finish, then repeat.
You know I'm not like this with everyone,
But something in you is so deeply sweet,
So necessary to make me complete,
That doing what we've done again is good,
Because it means we once again can meet
And join together, doing what we would:
It's not so much the details of what we
Do, as the fact that it is you and me.
Saturday, November 5, 2011
Ouch
It really sucks to feel my head in pain
And not know what to do - to want to lie
Low in the dark, listening to rain
And hearing windnotes whistling me by,
But know I must remain awake. I am
Tired to weariness, but cannot tell
The reason for it. So instead I damn
My forehead and its painfulness to hell,
And wish I were asleep when I am not.
It's not a pleasant or an easy way
To be - but now, alas, it's all I've got,
And feels like it is all I'll be today.
Someday I hope I will feel better - then
Perhaps I'll be more purposeful again.
And not know what to do - to want to lie
Low in the dark, listening to rain
And hearing windnotes whistling me by,
But know I must remain awake. I am
Tired to weariness, but cannot tell
The reason for it. So instead I damn
My forehead and its painfulness to hell,
And wish I were asleep when I am not.
It's not a pleasant or an easy way
To be - but now, alas, it's all I've got,
And feels like it is all I'll be today.
Someday I hope I will feel better - then
Perhaps I'll be more purposeful again.
Friday, November 4, 2011
Up Up
The calm of morning is a pseudo-rest,
A feigning pause within the storm of day.
It has the normal giddiness, but dressed
In mirror-coats, to shine the stress away.
Only because the tired, half-awake
Problems of the day are coffeeless
Can morning any seeming headway make
Against the cares that so painfully press
On other hours. Day has not yet risen
To its full height, and so neither has worry:
Yet it is not that trouble is in prison,
But rather that its normal desperate hurry
Is half-allayed by being sleepy-headed:
But so are we, so it must still be dreaded.
A feigning pause within the storm of day.
It has the normal giddiness, but dressed
In mirror-coats, to shine the stress away.
Only because the tired, half-awake
Problems of the day are coffeeless
Can morning any seeming headway make
Against the cares that so painfully press
On other hours. Day has not yet risen
To its full height, and so neither has worry:
Yet it is not that trouble is in prison,
But rather that its normal desperate hurry
Is half-allayed by being sleepy-headed:
But so are we, so it must still be dreaded.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Common Theme
Patience is a necessary thing
In very short supply, sometimes, with me.
I do not like to simply wait and see,
Or pause for breath. I find such pauses bring
Only frustration, and I firmly cling
To my belief that patience ought to be
Less necessary. I disdain to be
Staring at life, waiting for its ping.
And yet her absence makes me droop and wait:
I cannot hurry it, although I would,
Although I'm certain it would do me good
To see her now, not have to hesitate.
But I cannot, and so patience must come
I really hope somewhere that I have some.
In very short supply, sometimes, with me.
I do not like to simply wait and see,
Or pause for breath. I find such pauses bring
Only frustration, and I firmly cling
To my belief that patience ought to be
Less necessary. I disdain to be
Staring at life, waiting for its ping.
And yet her absence makes me droop and wait:
I cannot hurry it, although I would,
Although I'm certain it would do me good
To see her now, not have to hesitate.
But I cannot, and so patience must come
I really hope somewhere that I have some.
Is Coming
There are days that beat you black and blue,
Spin you around, then kick you in the knee,
Slam you to the ground with awful glee:
Those days are bad. But when they bring their crew,
And all of them do just the same to you
For weeks on end, you can no longer see
A point of rest or calm, but hopelessly
Keep on attempting to pretend you do.
This is Chicago winter, deep and harsh,
Unwilling to allow for human pain,
Turning the Midway to a soggy marsh,
Covered by the snow and freezing rain,
While we all wonder with increased vexation
Who thought this city fit for habitation?
Spin you around, then kick you in the knee,
Slam you to the ground with awful glee:
Those days are bad. But when they bring their crew,
And all of them do just the same to you
For weeks on end, you can no longer see
A point of rest or calm, but hopelessly
Keep on attempting to pretend you do.
This is Chicago winter, deep and harsh,
Unwilling to allow for human pain,
Turning the Midway to a soggy marsh,
Covered by the snow and freezing rain,
While we all wonder with increased vexation
Who thought this city fit for habitation?
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Temperate
A hot November is a quite strange thing,
A false reminder of the warmer days
Implanted with the memory of spring,
Untinged by winter's fast approaching grays.
Summers are used to leaving in a blaze,
But what replaces them? Autumns can be
As warm as summer in its golden haze:
Where should the line be drawn when, quietly,
The heat refuses to depart? When we
Speak of the fall, we have some expectations,
Which, still unmet, can leave us out at sea.
The seasons are not merely our creations,
Yet sometimes seem so: still, a hot November
Seems an omen for a bad December.
A false reminder of the warmer days
Implanted with the memory of spring,
Untinged by winter's fast approaching grays.
Summers are used to leaving in a blaze,
But what replaces them? Autumns can be
As warm as summer in its golden haze:
Where should the line be drawn when, quietly,
The heat refuses to depart? When we
Speak of the fall, we have some expectations,
Which, still unmet, can leave us out at sea.
The seasons are not merely our creations,
Yet sometimes seem so: still, a hot November
Seems an omen for a bad December.
Bargain
Yet who, when dealing with immortal God
Thinks merely of a bargain? True indeed,
The promise of a good the Lord will heed,
And also often the avenging rod
Scourges the sinner, as was promised us.
Yet mercy can wipe out outstanding debt
And God by massive mercy can still let
Grace pass beyond the bargain. Who can truss
God to mere justice? What is owed can be
Let pass, if creditors agree thereto:
And death for sin, accounted properly,
Is not a wage forever falling due
But penalty for bonds we broke - and so
God in his grace could let that duty go.
Thinks merely of a bargain? True indeed,
The promise of a good the Lord will heed,
And also often the avenging rod
Scourges the sinner, as was promised us.
Yet mercy can wipe out outstanding debt
And God by massive mercy can still let
Grace pass beyond the bargain. Who can truss
God to mere justice? What is owed can be
Let pass, if creditors agree thereto:
And death for sin, accounted properly,
Is not a wage forever falling due
But penalty for bonds we broke - and so
God in his grace could let that duty go.
Faustus
Sin's wages must be death, and they are paid
In total justice and complete desert,
Fully and well, for sinful creatures die.
Yet so does virtue, and the virtuous
Beside their sinful brethren must be laid,
Their lives as painful, terminally curt,
And therefore over. If we should ask why,
What answer can be ever made to us
But "all have sinned"? Yet when that has been said,
The question lingers: "And if God is great,
Why are the good and evil just as dead?
What is the purpose of this common fate?"
But virtue in its heart knows its reward
Is that content it will itself afford.
In total justice and complete desert,
Fully and well, for sinful creatures die.
Yet so does virtue, and the virtuous
Beside their sinful brethren must be laid,
Their lives as painful, terminally curt,
And therefore over. If we should ask why,
What answer can be ever made to us
But "all have sinned"? Yet when that has been said,
The question lingers: "And if God is great,
Why are the good and evil just as dead?
What is the purpose of this common fate?"
But virtue in its heart knows its reward
Is that content it will itself afford.
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Silvius
Sometimes I tell you unimportant things
Just to hear the tickle in your voice,
See how amusement in your body sings,
And feel you smile. I despise James Joyce,
And yet I would, if only for your sake,
Listen, if you had reason to desire,
To someone read his whole Finnegan's Wake
Or all Ulysses, though I think it dire.
In short, you may command, always, from me
No matter what the purpose or the reason,
Great heaps of willing, fond absurdity
In every situation, place, and season.
Some I'll invent, and others I'll endure,
But in them all, I am your servant sure.
Just to hear the tickle in your voice,
See how amusement in your body sings,
And feel you smile. I despise James Joyce,
And yet I would, if only for your sake,
Listen, if you had reason to desire,
To someone read his whole Finnegan's Wake
Or all Ulysses, though I think it dire.
In short, you may command, always, from me
No matter what the purpose or the reason,
Great heaps of willing, fond absurdity
In every situation, place, and season.
Some I'll invent, and others I'll endure,
But in them all, I am your servant sure.
Monday, October 31, 2011
Wave Function
High and dry I stand above the waves
Watching them dash themselves upon the rocks.
Some small part of my soul obliquely craves
The strong sensation of such simple shocks,
But greater reason rationally blocks
Those mad desires, holding me away,
As my more temperate partition mocks
The urge to throw myself into the fray.
Yet still I fear that some oblated day
My eccentricities will overcome
The wiser part of me that tells them nay,
And I will march to an inconstant drum
Leaping and crashing like the waves I see
Upon the empty beach so desperately.
Watching them dash themselves upon the rocks.
Some small part of my soul obliquely craves
The strong sensation of such simple shocks,
But greater reason rationally blocks
Those mad desires, holding me away,
As my more temperate partition mocks
The urge to throw myself into the fray.
Yet still I fear that some oblated day
My eccentricities will overcome
The wiser part of me that tells them nay,
And I will march to an inconstant drum
Leaping and crashing like the waves I see
Upon the empty beach so desperately.
Kaos
Chaos is come again. Not stealthily,
As demons ought to, though in dead of night,
But as a drunken, rowdy roommate might,
Barging in to land on top of me.
He drinks up neither beer, though, nor whiskey,
But my soul's essence, which, though labeled light,
I do not wish to lose - still he is tight
With it, and stumbles on me heavily,
Crashing me down. I tumble on myself
Alone yet falling from his violence
Clutching at anything - a chair, a shelf
A door - to break my fall from innocence,
But slam into the ground. Chaos is come
And all around me, his infernal hum.
As demons ought to, though in dead of night,
But as a drunken, rowdy roommate might,
Barging in to land on top of me.
He drinks up neither beer, though, nor whiskey,
But my soul's essence, which, though labeled light,
I do not wish to lose - still he is tight
With it, and stumbles on me heavily,
Crashing me down. I tumble on myself
Alone yet falling from his violence
Clutching at anything - a chair, a shelf
A door - to break my fall from innocence,
But slam into the ground. Chaos is come
And all around me, his infernal hum.
Sunday, October 30, 2011
Whipping
The swirling wind insists that it is here
As if I could deny it - every day
I hear it race around me, robbing cheer
From even sunny days. Its constant bray
Wears tidally upon my soul, and sweeps
My sanity to sea with every wave.
Even at night the howling never sleeps,
Nor will the sunlight shining brightly save
Me from this demon. It forever breaks
Upon the outer wall, and always shrieks:
That shrieking in its turn forever makes
My mind seep from my brain through tiny leaks
Yet none of this hurts worse than how my heart
By constant absence is pulled hard apart.
As if I could deny it - every day
I hear it race around me, robbing cheer
From even sunny days. Its constant bray
Wears tidally upon my soul, and sweeps
My sanity to sea with every wave.
Even at night the howling never sleeps,
Nor will the sunlight shining brightly save
Me from this demon. It forever breaks
Upon the outer wall, and always shrieks:
That shrieking in its turn forever makes
My mind seep from my brain through tiny leaks
Yet none of this hurts worse than how my heart
By constant absence is pulled hard apart.
Windy City
Sunlight is deceiving in its joy
It claims such warmth, and yet will not deliver -
A miser, lest its happiness should cloy
By being something of an overgiver,
Instead of that, it keeps its heat its own
Maintaining such an insular degree
That, as the blasts of winters winds are blown,
It seems to suck the very soul of me
Despite the sunshine all is cold and grey
Within my quaking body. I am done
And all the lovely visage of the day
Cannot - or will not - give me even one
Moment of life. The cold is cold despite
The so-called warmth of day - I think it night.
It claims such warmth, and yet will not deliver -
A miser, lest its happiness should cloy
By being something of an overgiver,
Instead of that, it keeps its heat its own
Maintaining such an insular degree
That, as the blasts of winters winds are blown,
It seems to suck the very soul of me
Despite the sunshine all is cold and grey
Within my quaking body. I am done
And all the lovely visage of the day
Cannot - or will not - give me even one
Moment of life. The cold is cold despite
The so-called warmth of day - I think it night.
Geography
The city spreads out north, south, west - not east.
There is the barrier; there we can't pass.
This does not trouble most men in the least,
For there is room enough, and more than room,
Where we may go to build towers of glass,
Steel-ribbed and grandiose. But why should we
Yield to this inevitable doom
And leave the east alone? Shall we not rise,
As does the sun, over the eastern sea?
And is it not our duty to declare
We have the right to spread across the skies
As widely as the sun we block out there?
I say build on the lake, and let us swim
Rather than let the sun outshine us, dim.
There is the barrier; there we can't pass.
This does not trouble most men in the least,
For there is room enough, and more than room,
Where we may go to build towers of glass,
Steel-ribbed and grandiose. But why should we
Yield to this inevitable doom
And leave the east alone? Shall we not rise,
As does the sun, over the eastern sea?
And is it not our duty to declare
We have the right to spread across the skies
As widely as the sun we block out there?
I say build on the lake, and let us swim
Rather than let the sun outshine us, dim.
Saturday, October 29, 2011
Absentia
Absence doesn't necessarily
Mean something merely physical. It can
Be so much more, and such it is to me:
I miss her touch, of course - I am a man,
And so feel as men do, and all for her -
But also miss - so much - her liquid smile,
The way she knows me, and the way we were
Inseparable. It all combines to pile
Down on me when she is gone, and make
Me linger longing looks on her grey dot,
Glance at my phone in vain, and nearly quake
With hope that she has called when she has not.
It is all one - all absence is a pain
And either this or I must swiftly wane.
Mean something merely physical. It can
Be so much more, and such it is to me:
I miss her touch, of course - I am a man,
And so feel as men do, and all for her -
But also miss - so much - her liquid smile,
The way she knows me, and the way we were
Inseparable. It all combines to pile
Down on me when she is gone, and make
Me linger longing looks on her grey dot,
Glance at my phone in vain, and nearly quake
With hope that she has called when she has not.
It is all one - all absence is a pain
And either this or I must swiftly wane.
Migrant
I cannot say how much I miss her: no,
That's far beyond my power to express.
But she could see the pain in letting go,
And it is plain I did so in duress.
I would not let her part from me, could I
By any means available and fair
Have kept her with me, for I need her by
Much like I need to be myself: nowhere
Can I be me if she is far from thence,
Nor can I smile with full eye and mouth
If I am singled. It may not make sense
To others, but when she heads to the south,
My happiness is also wintering
In warmer climes, and I am splintering.
That's far beyond my power to express.
But she could see the pain in letting go,
And it is plain I did so in duress.
I would not let her part from me, could I
By any means available and fair
Have kept her with me, for I need her by
Much like I need to be myself: nowhere
Can I be me if she is far from thence,
Nor can I smile with full eye and mouth
If I am singled. It may not make sense
To others, but when she heads to the south,
My happiness is also wintering
In warmer climes, and I am splintering.
Friday, October 28, 2011
Pay
Grace must be undeserved, and freely given;
It cannot be a wage that virtue's paid.
Mercy and justice are, by nature, riven,
The one to sway, the other stand unswayed.
Grace, delivered for desert, must be
A pale wraith of itself, but half-sincere;
To be substantial, it must openly
Be self-produced, self-motivated, clear
Of too much justice: what is earned is earned,
And is much mocked by being laid to grace:
Where cause of worth is easily discerned,
Merciful grace perforce must yield its place.
Love works in mercy, grace, and open arms
Not payment for commodities of charms.
It cannot be a wage that virtue's paid.
Mercy and justice are, by nature, riven,
The one to sway, the other stand unswayed.
Grace, delivered for desert, must be
A pale wraith of itself, but half-sincere;
To be substantial, it must openly
Be self-produced, self-motivated, clear
Of too much justice: what is earned is earned,
And is much mocked by being laid to grace:
Where cause of worth is easily discerned,
Merciful grace perforce must yield its place.
Love works in mercy, grace, and open arms
Not payment for commodities of charms.
ETA
Why would I ever go away?
What would my purpose be to leave?
I cannot understand a way
In which it would not make me grieve
To part with her to whom I'm bound.
Why then would I be dumb enough
To find a foolish, useless ground
(Perhaps to demonstrate I'm tough?)
On which to bring down that much woe
Upon my own and proper head?
If I were sad, I would not go;
I would much rather stay instead
For staying would more joy allow
In future times - as it does now.
What would my purpose be to leave?
I cannot understand a way
In which it would not make me grieve
To part with her to whom I'm bound.
Why then would I be dumb enough
To find a foolish, useless ground
(Perhaps to demonstrate I'm tough?)
On which to bring down that much woe
Upon my own and proper head?
If I were sad, I would not go;
I would much rather stay instead
For staying would more joy allow
In future times - as it does now.
Thursday, October 27, 2011
Warty
Sometimes I over-worry: this I know
Has been a problem often in my past.
I do not let the situation grow
Into fruition, when it should, at last,
Be fully understood. Instead I fear
Before the time has come for fearful things,
Flinching before the stroke ever comes near.
This over-worried way of mine then brings
A great deal too much stress considering
It isn't necessary. I should be
Much calmer, but instead I always cling
To worry, and then let it get to me.
It's silly to be so, but I can't choose:
Could I do so, this is something I'd lose.
Has been a problem often in my past.
I do not let the situation grow
Into fruition, when it should, at last,
Be fully understood. Instead I fear
Before the time has come for fearful things,
Flinching before the stroke ever comes near.
This over-worried way of mine then brings
A great deal too much stress considering
It isn't necessary. I should be
Much calmer, but instead I always cling
To worry, and then let it get to me.
It's silly to be so, but I can't choose:
Could I do so, this is something I'd lose.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Winter!
The cold dark emptiness of winter bates
Its edge because of you; the bitter shell
Of freezing black surrounding life deflates
And living is no longer icy hell.
It's warmer when you're near, even outside,
Despite the snow that threatens in the air;
The promise of destruction is denied
When I can watch the way you toss your hair.
Forecasts of freezing rain can be ignored,
Gloomy deserted days no longer fright,
And nothing can be truly untoward
When you are here to help me sleep at night.
Winter is no winter without snow
And snow will melt away from your smile's glow.
Its edge because of you; the bitter shell
Of freezing black surrounding life deflates
And living is no longer icy hell.
It's warmer when you're near, even outside,
Despite the snow that threatens in the air;
The promise of destruction is denied
When I can watch the way you toss your hair.
Forecasts of freezing rain can be ignored,
Gloomy deserted days no longer fright,
And nothing can be truly untoward
When you are here to help me sleep at night.
Winter is no winter without snow
And snow will melt away from your smile's glow.
Metastatize
I sit alone and wonder why I am
Because she ought to be here - and she is.
She's just out for a moment, but I cram
All of my angst in then - the time should whiz
On by, but no, it drags, and lingers on
Because I cannot see her. Half an hour
Is time that should be very quickly gone,
But letting it be so's beyond my power.
Still, in objective time, it passes fast,
And so despite my silly wondering
My patience does not really have to last
And, thank god, nothing else is sundering
Us two: so I am happy. But these times
Are still good opportunities for rhymes.
Because she ought to be here - and she is.
She's just out for a moment, but I cram
All of my angst in then - the time should whiz
On by, but no, it drags, and lingers on
Because I cannot see her. Half an hour
Is time that should be very quickly gone,
But letting it be so's beyond my power.
Still, in objective time, it passes fast,
And so despite my silly wondering
My patience does not really have to last
And, thank god, nothing else is sundering
Us two: so I am happy. But these times
Are still good opportunities for rhymes.
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
You
The way you giggle makes my smile start
No matter how I'm feeling otherwise
The light that sparkles from your happy eyes
Is warm and penetrates into my heart.
The way you're disappointed when we part
Makes me delighted - since the same applies
To me. When we're together making pies
Your happiness inspires far more art
Than our joint task. I love to see you laugh
And cannot stay myself from equal joy
Nor do delights we share together cloy
For I am always glad to give you half.
You make me happier than I can say
And better it with every passing day.
No matter how I'm feeling otherwise
The light that sparkles from your happy eyes
Is warm and penetrates into my heart.
The way you're disappointed when we part
Makes me delighted - since the same applies
To me. When we're together making pies
Your happiness inspires far more art
Than our joint task. I love to see you laugh
And cannot stay myself from equal joy
Nor do delights we share together cloy
For I am always glad to give you half.
You make me happier than I can say
And better it with every passing day.
Monday, October 24, 2011
PoV
Patience is a virtue, I've discovered
In very short supply, at least for me.
I found that, as a consequence, I hovered
Over my impatience eagerly
When I should have be waiting easily
And letting the annoyance roll right off.
I know that it sounds silly, but I see
These symptoms growing, like the whooping cough,
And even though you may listen and scoff,
I know the way I am, and feel my soul
Covered in impatience I can't doff
Even when that is my explicit goal.
So I just have to live with it: or rather
I must be patient with impatience. Bother.
In very short supply, at least for me.
I found that, as a consequence, I hovered
Over my impatience eagerly
When I should have be waiting easily
And letting the annoyance roll right off.
I know that it sounds silly, but I see
These symptoms growing, like the whooping cough,
And even though you may listen and scoff,
I know the way I am, and feel my soul
Covered in impatience I can't doff
Even when that is my explicit goal.
So I just have to live with it: or rather
I must be patient with impatience. Bother.
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Present
When there's something that I want from you
I'm usually quite clear, at least by now;
I tell you what it is I want to do,
And let you choose whether you will allow
That thing to happen. But sometimes I'm weak,
It takes a stop or stutter to confess
I really just want you. That's all I seek.
Beneath the other things, if you undress
My wishes and desires, that is all
You'd find: bare, naked you, and not that way.
Sometimes I lack the mental strength to call
A spade a spade, by which I mean to say
I like the other things, but honestly
All I want is you, and you with me.
I'm usually quite clear, at least by now;
I tell you what it is I want to do,
And let you choose whether you will allow
That thing to happen. But sometimes I'm weak,
It takes a stop or stutter to confess
I really just want you. That's all I seek.
Beneath the other things, if you undress
My wishes and desires, that is all
You'd find: bare, naked you, and not that way.
Sometimes I lack the mental strength to call
A spade a spade, by which I mean to say
I like the other things, but honestly
All I want is you, and you with me.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Reason Not The Need
There are always reasons, don't you know,
Suggestive whisperings inside the brain
Urging, perhaps, a little lessened pain;
So much less pacing, frantic, to and fro;
Fewer nights lit by the iridescent glow
Of laptop screens; much less time on the train,
Or, much worse still, the Megabus or plane;
Never feeling time pass just too slow:
There are always reasons, but the need
Is far past reason, so there cannot be
A reason that's extreme enough for me
To pass her by and merely wish godspeed,
For though I search below, middle, above,
There is no reason greater than my love.
Suggestive whisperings inside the brain
Urging, perhaps, a little lessened pain;
So much less pacing, frantic, to and fro;
Fewer nights lit by the iridescent glow
Of laptop screens; much less time on the train,
Or, much worse still, the Megabus or plane;
Never feeling time pass just too slow:
There are always reasons, but the need
Is far past reason, so there cannot be
A reason that's extreme enough for me
To pass her by and merely wish godspeed,
For though I search below, middle, above,
There is no reason greater than my love.
Clean
Sometimes it simply isn't fair
To do the things you do to me
Of course, I do not really care
Because you do them beautifully
But also so inscrutably
I am not ever really sure
What is your point of view, you see.
And since I am so insecure
About that point, I much prefer
To lie back and experience
Your actions, and to think them pure
Than analyze significance.
So I am happy knowing less
Since it involves so much less mess.
To do the things you do to me
Of course, I do not really care
Because you do them beautifully
But also so inscrutably
I am not ever really sure
What is your point of view, you see.
And since I am so insecure
About that point, I much prefer
To lie back and experience
Your actions, and to think them pure
Than analyze significance.
So I am happy knowing less
Since it involves so much less mess.
Friday, October 21, 2011
Tanith
It doesn't feel that different to me, you
(He's lying - don't believe him - that's not me)
Know. It hasn't changed a thing I do.
(Please help. I really didn't want to be)
We fit together very comfortably
(Like this. I need your help. Please get him out)
It's wonderful to symbiotically
Live on together. There can be no doubt
It's better so. We're happier this way,
Each benefiting from the other's good.
I don't think that there's any more to say
Nor any need to peek under the hood.
(Oh God) So let us live and self-commune
Dancing to a single, lively tune.
(He's lying - don't believe him - that's not me)
Know. It hasn't changed a thing I do.
(Please help. I really didn't want to be)
We fit together very comfortably
(Like this. I need your help. Please get him out)
It's wonderful to symbiotically
Live on together. There can be no doubt
It's better so. We're happier this way,
Each benefiting from the other's good.
I don't think that there's any more to say
Nor any need to peek under the hood.
(Oh God) So let us live and self-commune
Dancing to a single, lively tune.
On a Bus
Why should I care the bus is late, or worry
That I will miss what's on the other end?
It's not as if I'm in some kind of hurry,
Or that this is a new-developed trend.
That which I wait for is so long in coming
It hardly matters for a minute more
(Well, that's not true, for my poor heart is thrumming,
But this is not the trip for which I store
Emotion up). Nor am I so in haste
That extra moments cannot be well-spent.
The time will not become a total waste,
Nor will I wish so very much I went
A bus before. It all will be OK
Because I wait for later in the day.
That I will miss what's on the other end?
It's not as if I'm in some kind of hurry,
Or that this is a new-developed trend.
That which I wait for is so long in coming
It hardly matters for a minute more
(Well, that's not true, for my poor heart is thrumming,
But this is not the trip for which I store
Emotion up). Nor am I so in haste
That extra moments cannot be well-spent.
The time will not become a total waste,
Nor will I wish so very much I went
A bus before. It all will be OK
Because I wait for later in the day.
Thursday, October 20, 2011
Flaw
It does not take much effort to admit
I am imperfect, flawed beyond belief;
Nor does it bring me any sort of grief
To say it once again: I've done some shit
I am not proud of but could not omit
Because I have these failings, and, in brief,
They are indelible, in high relief
Against the backdrop of my soul, and knit
Deeply within me. No, I'm not perfect,
Not everything I could, perhaps, have been;
I wish I could reach back and redirect
All of those moments when I moved to sin,
But no one can: we all are such, I know.
Yet still it does not feel good to be so.
I am imperfect, flawed beyond belief;
Nor does it bring me any sort of grief
To say it once again: I've done some shit
I am not proud of but could not omit
Because I have these failings, and, in brief,
They are indelible, in high relief
Against the backdrop of my soul, and knit
Deeply within me. No, I'm not perfect,
Not everything I could, perhaps, have been;
I wish I could reach back and redirect
All of those moments when I moved to sin,
But no one can: we all are such, I know.
Yet still it does not feel good to be so.
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Constance
It's eerie when the people that you knew
Are still the same - relationships intact,
Attitudes constant, nothing really new,
Continuous in thought, concern, and act -
And you have changed. It was so long ago,
Yet all I could have thought might have occurred
Has happened. Yes, they've changed a bit I know,
But not substantially. Had I inferred
Their futures from that past I would have been
Correct in each particular unchanged.
It is a strange place to now find them in,
And makes me feel so powerfully estranged
From where I was. Their continuity
Emphasizes all the change in me.
Are still the same - relationships intact,
Attitudes constant, nothing really new,
Continuous in thought, concern, and act -
And you have changed. It was so long ago,
Yet all I could have thought might have occurred
Has happened. Yes, they've changed a bit I know,
But not substantially. Had I inferred
Their futures from that past I would have been
Correct in each particular unchanged.
It is a strange place to now find them in,
And makes me feel so powerfully estranged
From where I was. Their continuity
Emphasizes all the change in me.
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Auto
Some days there is a slowness in my mind,
A dreadful lack of pace that ticks and tocks
As if my wheels were mounted up on blocks
To spin and spin and spin and spin and grind,
When I am certain I will never find
A way to clear my mental vapor locks,
Or reinstate the cushion of my shocks,
For every thought's a bump that shakes me blind.
Those days my metaphors are similes
Mistaken in my non-functioning brain,
And all my puns cause even me such pain
I fear my wordplay is a mere disease.
But when those days are finished, I can run
Smoothly when I'm tired as I pun.
A dreadful lack of pace that ticks and tocks
As if my wheels were mounted up on blocks
To spin and spin and spin and spin and grind,
When I am certain I will never find
A way to clear my mental vapor locks,
Or reinstate the cushion of my shocks,
For every thought's a bump that shakes me blind.
Those days my metaphors are similes
Mistaken in my non-functioning brain,
And all my puns cause even me such pain
I fear my wordplay is a mere disease.
But when those days are finished, I can run
Smoothly when I'm tired as I pun.
Hours
What is an hour? Is it that much time?
So crucial, so important, so divine?
Is wasting one that serious a crime
That if I do I ought to then repine?
Or are they merely constructs we design,
Poor imitations of importance, made
To stand in place of time, and be a sign,
But hardly worth the effort to upbraid
When lost? Are we to treasure them, or spend
Their essence freely as we please? I know
That though activities on hours depend,
I only choose to mark them as they go
When they are wasted: so they are no use
Except to calendar our time's abuse.
So crucial, so important, so divine?
Is wasting one that serious a crime
That if I do I ought to then repine?
Or are they merely constructs we design,
Poor imitations of importance, made
To stand in place of time, and be a sign,
But hardly worth the effort to upbraid
When lost? Are we to treasure them, or spend
Their essence freely as we please? I know
That though activities on hours depend,
I only choose to mark them as they go
When they are wasted: so they are no use
Except to calendar our time's abuse.
Modes of Construction
Brick buildings hide the dirt extremely well;
Unless a brick is missing, all appears
To be OK. To look at them you could not tell
What kind of neighborhood this is, what fears,
What turmoil rests inside of every soul
Who walks these streets at night. Bricks hide the dirt,
And hide the way what's dirty takes its toll,
The way unsafety and worry pervert
What should be normal. Wood might show its fear,
Warping and bending: glass is too transparent;
White stone shows it all, marbled but clear:
In all of these the trouble is apparent.
But bricks can hide, and will. In dull brick red
You cannot tell the way the city bled.
Unless a brick is missing, all appears
To be OK. To look at them you could not tell
What kind of neighborhood this is, what fears,
What turmoil rests inside of every soul
Who walks these streets at night. Bricks hide the dirt,
And hide the way what's dirty takes its toll,
The way unsafety and worry pervert
What should be normal. Wood might show its fear,
Warping and bending: glass is too transparent;
White stone shows it all, marbled but clear:
In all of these the trouble is apparent.
But bricks can hide, and will. In dull brick red
You cannot tell the way the city bled.
Monday, October 17, 2011
Mayim
I stand before a gulf and seek the shore
Opposing me: alas I have no ship;
My swimming, too, is bordering on poor
Sadly from below; I fear the trip
May spell the death of me. Yet on I go
Into the wide cold bay that bars my way,
Into the breakers, smashing to and fro,
Into the misty darkness of its spray.
The destination far exceeds the cost:
To reach the farther shore I would breathe water.
And when you tell my love that I am lost
Tell her to the death I ever sought her.
Yet it may be our love will raise its hand
And part the sea, so I cross on dry land.
Opposing me: alas I have no ship;
My swimming, too, is bordering on poor
Sadly from below; I fear the trip
May spell the death of me. Yet on I go
Into the wide cold bay that bars my way,
Into the breakers, smashing to and fro,
Into the misty darkness of its spray.
The destination far exceeds the cost:
To reach the farther shore I would breathe water.
And when you tell my love that I am lost
Tell her to the death I ever sought her.
Yet it may be our love will raise its hand
And part the sea, so I cross on dry land.
-116
Love should alter when it finds a change
And bend, if it has grown into a bend.
Love should not hold itself aloof and strange
To alteration in the lovéd friend,
Nor be too eager to erase and end
What has been grown over so long a span
Simply because the lover chose to mend.
Love is connection, and therefore it can,
And should, be hesitant to stop or ban
Simply because of change. Love is not fixed:
It lives, and lives according to no plan,
And change and constancy may intermixed
Live on in love. Love is attentiveness
And simple change need not make it the less.
And bend, if it has grown into a bend.
Love should not hold itself aloof and strange
To alteration in the lovéd friend,
Nor be too eager to erase and end
What has been grown over so long a span
Simply because the lover chose to mend.
Love is connection, and therefore it can,
And should, be hesitant to stop or ban
Simply because of change. Love is not fixed:
It lives, and lives according to no plan,
And change and constancy may intermixed
Live on in love. Love is attentiveness
And simple change need not make it the less.
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Graced
Can love be earned, or given for a fee?
Is it deserved, won by an effort, or
Delivered up by strong necessity?
Is it not, instead, greater and more,
Exceeding all that may have come before,
Unequalled by a cause proximally,
Given from a transinfinite store,
Unclaimed by worthiness, and given free?
Love must exceed the bounds of the exchange,
Supererogatory, past all claim
Of tit for tat, exigency, or blame,
Free and unbounded, weird, wild, and strange.
It is unequal grace, blessed from above
To give oneself in perfect, open love.
Is it deserved, won by an effort, or
Delivered up by strong necessity?
Is it not, instead, greater and more,
Exceeding all that may have come before,
Unequalled by a cause proximally,
Given from a transinfinite store,
Unclaimed by worthiness, and given free?
Love must exceed the bounds of the exchange,
Supererogatory, past all claim
Of tit for tat, exigency, or blame,
Free and unbounded, weird, wild, and strange.
It is unequal grace, blessed from above
To give oneself in perfect, open love.
Purposing
Too much self-centeredness is counted sin
Yet I must speak of what I feel myself.
Therefore it boots that I either begin
With self-concern, or place it on the shelf
And only dust it off for couplet use,
Leaving the rest to general interest.
But forcing either way feels like abuse,
Robbing the sonnet of important zest,
Giving it a two-toned, piebald feel,
The parts being divorced and set asunder.
I would prefer to keep an even keel,
Not letting either part be keelhauled under,
But keeping them together: both my thought
And common, joint concerns from which it's wrought.
Yet I must speak of what I feel myself.
Therefore it boots that I either begin
With self-concern, or place it on the shelf
And only dust it off for couplet use,
Leaving the rest to general interest.
But forcing either way feels like abuse,
Robbing the sonnet of important zest,
Giving it a two-toned, piebald feel,
The parts being divorced and set asunder.
I would prefer to keep an even keel,
Not letting either part be keelhauled under,
But keeping them together: both my thought
And common, joint concerns from which it's wrought.
Dos and Don'ts
I do not miss you when you're here with me,
Nor yearn for you when you're already by.
I do not wish you'd come when I can see
You're next to me, nor do I sit and sigh
To mourn your absence when you're there to hear.
I do not curse the fates because of you
When you are lying on my couch, nor tear
Up because you are too far to view
When I can turn and look at you. I don't
Throw up my hands frustratedly and pace
About your absence when you're near, and won't
Shiver in the lack of your embrace
When I am hugged. But when you're gone, I know
I'll do these things again, and feel my woe.
Nor yearn for you when you're already by.
I do not wish you'd come when I can see
You're next to me, nor do I sit and sigh
To mourn your absence when you're there to hear.
I do not curse the fates because of you
When you are lying on my couch, nor tear
Up because you are too far to view
When I can turn and look at you. I don't
Throw up my hands frustratedly and pace
About your absence when you're near, and won't
Shiver in the lack of your embrace
When I am hugged. But when you're gone, I know
I'll do these things again, and feel my woe.
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Night Falls
Night falls and leeches out day's happiness;
The evening robs whatever morn stored up.
It brings a sense of inborn easiness
That shows the empty side of one's half-cup
And emphasizes what could be improved.
Where darkness ought to shelter frailty,
Instead it fixes it, not to be moved,
Making what seemed in daylight still to be
Acceptable, a terror to be feared.
Only in light can virtue analyze
The quality of what has been upreared
Beside it - in the darkness all surprise
Is danger, and the good that's done appears
Swamped and enveloped by unfounded fears.
The evening robs whatever morn stored up.
It brings a sense of inborn easiness
That shows the empty side of one's half-cup
And emphasizes what could be improved.
Where darkness ought to shelter frailty,
Instead it fixes it, not to be moved,
Making what seemed in daylight still to be
Acceptable, a terror to be feared.
Only in light can virtue analyze
The quality of what has been upreared
Beside it - in the darkness all surprise
Is danger, and the good that's done appears
Swamped and enveloped by unfounded fears.
Fatherly Advice
How shall I know my love?
By heart afire, my boy,
By loving tender of
Her effort for thy joy.
How shall I know her heart?
By what is in her eye;
By every stop and start
And every stare and sigh.
How shall she know mine?
By reciprocity
By equalling each sign
That she might give to thee.
By that, my loving son,
Her heart and thine are won.
By heart afire, my boy,
By loving tender of
Her effort for thy joy.
How shall I know her heart?
By what is in her eye;
By every stop and start
And every stare and sigh.
How shall she know mine?
By reciprocity
By equalling each sign
That she might give to thee.
By that, my loving son,
Her heart and thine are won.
Golden Age
True gold will never tarnish, so they say,
And keeps its color bright through muck and age;
It never oxidizes green or gray:
When other metals blacken, gold's the gauge
By which to measure their obscurity.
But what of gold forgotten in a vault?
What is the value of its purity?
It does not shine, but not from its own fault.
Such gold would be as valued as the rest
If it were seen, and being aired again,
Being still gold, it is as purely blessed
As when it was put by - as she does, when
Having forgotten how good she can be
I turn to her again and she loves me.
And keeps its color bright through muck and age;
It never oxidizes green or gray:
When other metals blacken, gold's the gauge
By which to measure their obscurity.
But what of gold forgotten in a vault?
What is the value of its purity?
It does not shine, but not from its own fault.
Such gold would be as valued as the rest
If it were seen, and being aired again,
Being still gold, it is as purely blessed
As when it was put by - as she does, when
Having forgotten how good she can be
I turn to her again and she loves me.
Friday, October 14, 2011
Parentheses
Would it were come! I cannot brook delay
(Strange that delay, of all things, should be brooked,
Given that word in normal, everyday
English is a stream, and hardly looked
To for acceptance). No, I hate to wait
Especially for things that do me good
(But why? What would ameliorate
My station, it were better that I should
Wait for that than for aught else). Oh, come!
My heart grows heavy (that's an odd one too
My mass remains unchanged) and I am glum.
Yet I must wait: therefore what can I do
But ponder words, distract myself, and try
To muster patience and not simply sigh.
(Strange that delay, of all things, should be brooked,
Given that word in normal, everyday
English is a stream, and hardly looked
To for acceptance). No, I hate to wait
Especially for things that do me good
(But why? What would ameliorate
My station, it were better that I should
Wait for that than for aught else). Oh, come!
My heart grows heavy (that's an odd one too
My mass remains unchanged) and I am glum.
Yet I must wait: therefore what can I do
But ponder words, distract myself, and try
To muster patience and not simply sigh.
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Regret
Where could I go to run from memories?
They don't pursue me, for they need not run.
Wherever I have come, they take their ease
And yet are there with me, to bleakly dun
My heart, drawing an overdraft on joy.
How can I pay them? Yet my creditors
Will not be satisfied 'til they annoy
My every moment - even my editors
Of past events cannot change things enough
To make these memories repress away
For, oh, regret is made of sterner stuff
Than those who would forget their yesterday.
I cannot flee myself, for I am here
No matter if I try to disappear.
They don't pursue me, for they need not run.
Wherever I have come, they take their ease
And yet are there with me, to bleakly dun
My heart, drawing an overdraft on joy.
How can I pay them? Yet my creditors
Will not be satisfied 'til they annoy
My every moment - even my editors
Of past events cannot change things enough
To make these memories repress away
For, oh, regret is made of sterner stuff
Than those who would forget their yesterday.
I cannot flee myself, for I am here
No matter if I try to disappear.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Fallin'
I do not feel as if I fell in love;
I walked in, boldly, with wide open eyes,
Knowing who and what it was made of,
Of course susceptible still to surprise,
But not too shocked by love itself. I knew
What I was doing in at least that sense:
The place I was, where I was going to,
And something of the journey. How intense
It would become? No, that I did not know,
But figured out with every further stride
And I was well aware that it would grow
Greater in me the more I was inside.
So did I fall in love? I would say not.
But I am still in love, and burning hot.
I walked in, boldly, with wide open eyes,
Knowing who and what it was made of,
Of course susceptible still to surprise,
But not too shocked by love itself. I knew
What I was doing in at least that sense:
The place I was, where I was going to,
And something of the journey. How intense
It would become? No, that I did not know,
But figured out with every further stride
And I was well aware that it would grow
Greater in me the more I was inside.
So did I fall in love? I would say not.
But I am still in love, and burning hot.
Reunion
It is a joy to see again old friends,
To reminisce and smile once again
At such familiar faces that one spends
Effort to remember that was then
And this is now. It makes a lovely time
To laugh at jokes worn old enough to slide
Down to the belly laugh - and to but mime
And have whole stories understood implied.
Delight rides sparkling on such pleasant nights,
So that the bare excuse that caused the meeting
Is unimportant next to those delights
In reacquaintance and joyous regreeting.
But it is best when those reunions last
Until the present one becomes the past.
To reminisce and smile once again
At such familiar faces that one spends
Effort to remember that was then
And this is now. It makes a lovely time
To laugh at jokes worn old enough to slide
Down to the belly laugh - and to but mime
And have whole stories understood implied.
Delight rides sparkling on such pleasant nights,
So that the bare excuse that caused the meeting
Is unimportant next to those delights
In reacquaintance and joyous regreeting.
But it is best when those reunions last
Until the present one becomes the past.
Bright Ghosts
The darkness makes this city beautiful;
Day is her weakness, when compared to this.
At this point I should add the dutiful
Admission that at night, perforce, I miss
The bustle of the day - but night is better:
The sky, the skyline, and the streets all glow
Beneath the neon signs, whose every letter
Illuminates selected scenes below
Ignoring or obscuring all the grime,
The ugliness that day admits to view.
Night is the city's most attractive time
When only loveliness can sparkle through.
If only downtown didn't shut by ten:
Think of the fun we could be having then.
Day is her weakness, when compared to this.
At this point I should add the dutiful
Admission that at night, perforce, I miss
The bustle of the day - but night is better:
The sky, the skyline, and the streets all glow
Beneath the neon signs, whose every letter
Illuminates selected scenes below
Ignoring or obscuring all the grime,
The ugliness that day admits to view.
Night is the city's most attractive time
When only loveliness can sparkle through.
If only downtown didn't shut by ten:
Think of the fun we could be having then.
The Source
Where does the joy flow from that fills my heart?
How am I drowned in sweet felicity?
What is the engine that will drive the start
Middle and end of all I do gladly?
From whence am I made happy and so lifted
Above the common cares of everyday,
The petty arguments - how are they sifted
And so diminished 'til they float away?
What is the source of my good humor? Why
Am I delighted though the sky is black?
What makes all bad conditions not apply
And fills for me all things that seem to lack?
Although it may be corny, you should know
It is my love of you that makes me so.
How am I drowned in sweet felicity?
What is the engine that will drive the start
Middle and end of all I do gladly?
From whence am I made happy and so lifted
Above the common cares of everyday,
The petty arguments - how are they sifted
And so diminished 'til they float away?
What is the source of my good humor? Why
Am I delighted though the sky is black?
What makes all bad conditions not apply
And fills for me all things that seem to lack?
Although it may be corny, you should know
It is my love of you that makes me so.
Wet Black Bough
So many faces and so few meet eyes;
Nowhere to move, and yet no point to staying;
Surrounded by light pleasantries, white lies,
And everyone in private judging, weighing
Each utterance and every little word
For content supernumerary to
The spoken phrase as actually heard;
Jumbles of smiles (almost none ring true),
And silent servitors slipping around
To make sure everything is smoothly run;
Everyone at ease, yet tightly wound,
Listening to all - and to no one;
Polite exchanges of pointless expressions,
Petty inquiries, and false confessions.
Nowhere to move, and yet no point to staying;
Surrounded by light pleasantries, white lies,
And everyone in private judging, weighing
Each utterance and every little word
For content supernumerary to
The spoken phrase as actually heard;
Jumbles of smiles (almost none ring true),
And silent servitors slipping around
To make sure everything is smoothly run;
Everyone at ease, yet tightly wound,
Listening to all - and to no one;
Polite exchanges of pointless expressions,
Petty inquiries, and false confessions.
CTA
Cramped, crowded, full of many types of riders
From lounging hipsters to the unemployed
Cooped in by some half-broke plastic dividers
And metal poles flanking the central void
Packed to the gills, yet never quite all full
Because some empty pockets alway form
Exuding to outsiders a strong pull
Because, in winter, it is always warm
And in the summer air-conditioned; seeming
Forever to be late, yet never quite
Enough to fail to function; never gleaming,
Always a bit too dingy in the light:
And I love it, for it makes me free
To roam the city as it pleases me.
From lounging hipsters to the unemployed
Cooped in by some half-broke plastic dividers
And metal poles flanking the central void
Packed to the gills, yet never quite all full
Because some empty pockets alway form
Exuding to outsiders a strong pull
Because, in winter, it is always warm
And in the summer air-conditioned; seeming
Forever to be late, yet never quite
Enough to fail to function; never gleaming,
Always a bit too dingy in the light:
And I love it, for it makes me free
To roam the city as it pleases me.
Self-Dubious
I secretly feel that I lack all direction
And wander in wilderness, far from all sense.
I doubt I deserve all the love and affection
That I have received. But a doubt this intense
Must burn itself out with a blaze past belief.
I eagerly hope for the moment it passes,
For now it is but an occasion for grief,
For causes substantial and painful impasses
And rubbing the wrong way across all my friends
It's they who have pulled me through difficult places
And worried themselves over my foolish ends.
I long to be better and earn their embraces,
Yet doubt still assails me: I must somehow find
A way to improve self-esteem in my mind.
And wander in wilderness, far from all sense.
I doubt I deserve all the love and affection
That I have received. But a doubt this intense
Must burn itself out with a blaze past belief.
I eagerly hope for the moment it passes,
For now it is but an occasion for grief,
For causes substantial and painful impasses
And rubbing the wrong way across all my friends
It's they who have pulled me through difficult places
And worried themselves over my foolish ends.
I long to be better and earn their embraces,
Yet doubt still assails me: I must somehow find
A way to improve self-esteem in my mind.
Paces
What pace should we expect our hearts to set?
Cupid can fly, and lovers' thoughts have wings,
Yet hours plod in love, lest we forget,
In lover's absence, and love ever clings
To presence, praying it will stay forever.
How quickly can love run if it would stay?
If, in each footfall, it would fear to sever
A present tie, how can it ever stray
An inch - is immobility a motion?
Love then has diverse paces diverse times,
And through it all the constant is devotion
Which keeps the thread as movement falls and climbs.
So let love's pace be set by present need:
From expectation let it then be freed.
Cupid can fly, and lovers' thoughts have wings,
Yet hours plod in love, lest we forget,
In lover's absence, and love ever clings
To presence, praying it will stay forever.
How quickly can love run if it would stay?
If, in each footfall, it would fear to sever
A present tie, how can it ever stray
An inch - is immobility a motion?
Love then has diverse paces diverse times,
And through it all the constant is devotion
Which keeps the thread as movement falls and climbs.
So let love's pace be set by present need:
From expectation let it then be freed.
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Guilt
I could do better than I do, I know;
My imperfection is a constant curse.
My follies all forever seem to grow
Leaving my virtues hidden for the worse.
I strive to be improved, yet I am not;
My every moment fills with failure's sting.
No matter how I abortively plot
I cannot seem to better anything.
Left as I am so certain of my faults
I cannot help but grieve my lack of skill;
My virtue still inevitably halts
While errors run as rampant as they will.
Yet I am not alone in this - we all
Feel our demerits, and think we are small.
My imperfection is a constant curse.
My follies all forever seem to grow
Leaving my virtues hidden for the worse.
I strive to be improved, yet I am not;
My every moment fills with failure's sting.
No matter how I abortively plot
I cannot seem to better anything.
Left as I am so certain of my faults
I cannot help but grieve my lack of skill;
My virtue still inevitably halts
While errors run as rampant as they will.
Yet I am not alone in this - we all
Feel our demerits, and think we are small.
Age Before
I often feel so tired, and so old,
Because I am surrounded by the young.
They're always so; I feel my limbs grow cold,
And still they chatter on with aimless tongue,
For college is a constant, single age,
While those of us who teach it fade away
As quickly as the turning of a page,
And it will not be long 'til yesterday
Is gone far out of memory, while still
They will be young and laughing. I can see
A road ahead that, tread it how I will,
Leads on beyond coming maturity
Into senescence, while they stay the same.
And yet there's no one but myself to blame.
Because I am surrounded by the young.
They're always so; I feel my limbs grow cold,
And still they chatter on with aimless tongue,
For college is a constant, single age,
While those of us who teach it fade away
As quickly as the turning of a page,
And it will not be long 'til yesterday
Is gone far out of memory, while still
They will be young and laughing. I can see
A road ahead that, tread it how I will,
Leads on beyond coming maturity
Into senescence, while they stay the same.
And yet there's no one but myself to blame.
Monday, October 10, 2011
Alterity
I have no doubt that she and I are joined
By something common, deep, and worth preserving,
Something that is not counterfeitly coined,
But honest, open, truthful, and unswerving.
Love may be altered if its bases change,
Or if the roots from whence it grows all die,
But I am certain ours will not estrange,
Nor will dread time contrive to pass it by.
People are always changing, yet together
We share so many common points of love
That they will hold us closer, like a tether
Pulled tighter by a tugging from above.
So as we change, I do not doubt we will
By every movement become closer still.
By something common, deep, and worth preserving,
Something that is not counterfeitly coined,
But honest, open, truthful, and unswerving.
Love may be altered if its bases change,
Or if the roots from whence it grows all die,
But I am certain ours will not estrange,
Nor will dread time contrive to pass it by.
People are always changing, yet together
We share so many common points of love
That they will hold us closer, like a tether
Pulled tighter by a tugging from above.
So as we change, I do not doubt we will
By every movement become closer still.
116
Love is no ever-fixéd mark - can't be,
For once it was not, and by now it is.
What's more, it's known to lack eternity
In place, for what is mine now once was his.
No, love is fixed only because it sees
A common sort of soul, and reaches out
To join two people so that each may please
The other. If this thought breed any doubt,
Consider this: if two are joinéd so,
And each maintains that common piece of soul
Their hearts remain entwined, and love will grow
Upon the jointure, long as it is whole.
Love is unfixed only when people alter
Their common joy - and then it ought to falter.
For once it was not, and by now it is.
What's more, it's known to lack eternity
In place, for what is mine now once was his.
No, love is fixed only because it sees
A common sort of soul, and reaches out
To join two people so that each may please
The other. If this thought breed any doubt,
Consider this: if two are joinéd so,
And each maintains that common piece of soul
Their hearts remain entwined, and love will grow
Upon the jointure, long as it is whole.
Love is unfixed only when people alter
Their common joy - and then it ought to falter.
Transitions
Transitions are the kickers. Aren't they though?
It's fine to say that what will be will be
And look to distant somedays, and there see
A future possibility. But show
The way the now will by a smooth course flow
Into the then, and panic comes quickly,
For it is dangerous to take the free
Present and link it to a future so.
Each step then seems so ponderous, so huge
That one desires to not move at all:
Even the merest inching, small as small
Can be, appears the launching of a luge
Down a dramatic incline with no brakes:
This is the fear much-thought transition wakes.
It's fine to say that what will be will be
And look to distant somedays, and there see
A future possibility. But show
The way the now will by a smooth course flow
Into the then, and panic comes quickly,
For it is dangerous to take the free
Present and link it to a future so.
Each step then seems so ponderous, so huge
That one desires to not move at all:
Even the merest inching, small as small
Can be, appears the launching of a luge
Down a dramatic incline with no brakes:
This is the fear much-thought transition wakes.
Samaritan
What do you do when someone else is sad
Someone passing by you on the street,
Not someone you know, or think you know,
Who would expect some comfort should be had
From you, but someone you would never meet
Except for in this moment when tears flow
Despite the squinting eyes that seek to hold
Them back? What do you do? Do you pass by
Ignoring them, and letting them alone?
Do you impose yourself, perhaps too bold,
To comfort them, or simply ask them why
They're crying? Do you hear their little moan
And smile at them, hoping that appeal
Unobtrusively will help them deal?
Someone passing by you on the street,
Not someone you know, or think you know,
Who would expect some comfort should be had
From you, but someone you would never meet
Except for in this moment when tears flow
Despite the squinting eyes that seek to hold
Them back? What do you do? Do you pass by
Ignoring them, and letting them alone?
Do you impose yourself, perhaps too bold,
To comfort them, or simply ask them why
They're crying? Do you hear their little moan
And smile at them, hoping that appeal
Unobtrusively will help them deal?
Starfire**
Oh home to many US Open Cups!
Arena of arenas, Jaqua's realm,
Where he upon the nets of others sups,
And feasts upon the cross with bandaged helm!
Oh brave Tukwilan bastion, second home,
Undefeated haven of the Sound
Where Terry Boss and Mike Fucito roam,
And others' hopes of silverware are drowned!
Oh simple Complex, cozy, close, and small,
Where great Support cheers on Electric Green!
Divinest pitch, from which all others fall,
The font of flowing goals and endless clean
Sheets for the Sounders. Let us joy in thee
For in thy confines there rests victory.
Arena of arenas, Jaqua's realm,
Where he upon the nets of others sups,
And feasts upon the cross with bandaged helm!
Oh brave Tukwilan bastion, second home,
Undefeated haven of the Sound
Where Terry Boss and Mike Fucito roam,
And others' hopes of silverware are drowned!
Oh simple Complex, cozy, close, and small,
Where great Support cheers on Electric Green!
Divinest pitch, from which all others fall,
The font of flowing goals and endless clean
Sheets for the Sounders. Let us joy in thee
For in thy confines there rests victory.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Starfire*
I think it might be best if we exchange
The warm and fuzzy feelings of our fans
For something darker. Maybe we could change
Beloved characters whom no one pans
And all adore for one-dimensional
Figures hardly worth the paper they
Are printed on. That should be intentional,
So nobody on staff can ever say
They didn't mean it. No, it is our choice:
We will disfigure what was beautiful
Taking away a good, productive voice
And leaving trash, so those so-dutiful
Fans who keep read the comics that we write
Can be "adult" and share our mental blight.
The warm and fuzzy feelings of our fans
For something darker. Maybe we could change
Beloved characters whom no one pans
And all adore for one-dimensional
Figures hardly worth the paper they
Are printed on. That should be intentional,
So nobody on staff can ever say
They didn't mean it. No, it is our choice:
We will disfigure what was beautiful
Taking away a good, productive voice
And leaving trash, so those so-dutiful
Fans who keep read the comics that we write
Can be "adult" and share our mental blight.
Starfire
Never believe that I am not in love;
Doubt everything but that. You have the proof.
I've shown, by now, sufficient signage of
My feelings; when was I ever aloof?
Do not invent the possibility;
I am all yours, and will continue so.
I do not know what else you'd want from me
But that, and that you have. So you should know
I am in love with you, and so it stands
My love is yours, to do with as you will.
My happiness is therefore in your hands
And I will ask you to retain it still
Until it does not please you, which I pray
Will always wait until another day.
Doubt everything but that. You have the proof.
I've shown, by now, sufficient signage of
My feelings; when was I ever aloof?
Do not invent the possibility;
I am all yours, and will continue so.
I do not know what else you'd want from me
But that, and that you have. So you should know
I am in love with you, and so it stands
My love is yours, to do with as you will.
My happiness is therefore in your hands
And I will ask you to retain it still
Until it does not please you, which I pray
Will always wait until another day.
Thwart
Thwarted desires hurt far worse than bruises;
Both throb, but only one can be repressed.
An injury ignored in good time loses
Its deadly sting, but wishes unexpressed
Burrow within the mind, making it twist
In ugly rotten shapes around the hole.
Those who are stopped from doing what they list
Are in some peril for their larger soul.
Not that I think there should be license for
Whatever villainies men wish to do
But rather that we ought to think before
We simply squash all hopes. I longed for you
And, thwarted, that caused pain; now, spoken, known
It is the opposite. Thus joy is sown.
Both throb, but only one can be repressed.
An injury ignored in good time loses
Its deadly sting, but wishes unexpressed
Burrow within the mind, making it twist
In ugly rotten shapes around the hole.
Those who are stopped from doing what they list
Are in some peril for their larger soul.
Not that I think there should be license for
Whatever villainies men wish to do
But rather that we ought to think before
We simply squash all hopes. I longed for you
And, thwarted, that caused pain; now, spoken, known
It is the opposite. Thus joy is sown.
Saturday, October 8, 2011
Contemplation
Days like this are made for contemplation,
For pondering how pasts have changed the present.
And, spent in just such ratiocination,
I must admit, for me, it's almost pleasant
To spend a day in fasting and in thought,
For though the body may complain, the soul
Is by the act of contemplation brought
Into a better state, feeling more whole,
More calm within itself, more sure of what
It chooses to accomplish, and will do.
For all of that, of course, there is the gut,
Which does complain at least enough for two.
But still, the day is quite worthwhile when
I think of what I know I'd do again.
For pondering how pasts have changed the present.
And, spent in just such ratiocination,
I must admit, for me, it's almost pleasant
To spend a day in fasting and in thought,
For though the body may complain, the soul
Is by the act of contemplation brought
Into a better state, feeling more whole,
More calm within itself, more sure of what
It chooses to accomplish, and will do.
For all of that, of course, there is the gut,
Which does complain at least enough for two.
But still, the day is quite worthwhile when
I think of what I know I'd do again.
Nidrana Lo Nidre
How have I sinned? And what have I done wrong?
Where are the faults I know lie in my soul?
The list, should I have counted, is too long,
And still I know it would not have been whole,
For there are sins I do not know I did,
Failings I have forgotten, errors made,
Yet by the slip of memory still hid.
Should I hear them all, ah, how dismayed
Would have become? And yet I did each one,
Certainly, undoubtedly, myself.
And will I cringe to hear what I have done?
I cannot put them on some unswept shelf
To be ignored. Yet on this day, I know
If I repent of them, God lets them go.
Where are the faults I know lie in my soul?
The list, should I have counted, is too long,
And still I know it would not have been whole,
For there are sins I do not know I did,
Failings I have forgotten, errors made,
Yet by the slip of memory still hid.
Should I hear them all, ah, how dismayed
Would have become? And yet I did each one,
Certainly, undoubtedly, myself.
And will I cringe to hear what I have done?
I cannot put them on some unswept shelf
To be ignored. Yet on this day, I know
If I repent of them, God lets them go.
Friday, October 7, 2011
Everything
She isn't everything; of course she's not.
I cannot breathe her hair (I know, I've tried);
Nor, though I find her lap a lovely spot,
Can I be totally, fully supplied
With all life's deep necessities with her.
But when you discount all I need to live
In physical good health, are you quite sure
She doesn't at the very least still give
A large percentage? And, though not sufficient
Isn't she still necessary? Yes.
Besides, I know at least she's the efficient
Cause of my joy, if not the final. Dress
It up however you might wish, I know
She's not the world, but I still love her so.
I cannot breathe her hair (I know, I've tried);
Nor, though I find her lap a lovely spot,
Can I be totally, fully supplied
With all life's deep necessities with her.
But when you discount all I need to live
In physical good health, are you quite sure
She doesn't at the very least still give
A large percentage? And, though not sufficient
Isn't she still necessary? Yes.
Besides, I know at least she's the efficient
Cause of my joy, if not the final. Dress
It up however you might wish, I know
She's not the world, but I still love her so.
In the Moment
I don't recall the last time that I wanted
To be somewhere except for beside you.
Well, that's a lie - I must admit my vaunted
Memory can tell me how we grew
Into what we are now, and that I knew
Other loves before. Hyperbole
Is hardly necessary for me, though:
I still feel what I feel, see what I see.
I see you far, too far, away from me
And know I want to change that, for I feel
I love you, and that's how it ought to be.
These feelings are what constitutes my real;
In them I live, and therefore I can say
Despite recall, I know no other way.
To be somewhere except for beside you.
Well, that's a lie - I must admit my vaunted
Memory can tell me how we grew
Into what we are now, and that I knew
Other loves before. Hyperbole
Is hardly necessary for me, though:
I still feel what I feel, see what I see.
I see you far, too far, away from me
And know I want to change that, for I feel
I love you, and that's how it ought to be.
These feelings are what constitutes my real;
In them I live, and therefore I can say
Despite recall, I know no other way.
My Kind of Town
Chicago is a city that I love
Not crazily, hardly head-over-heels,
But patiently, and calmly, and above
All else, productively. It feels
As if my love for this Midwestern city
Makes my life better, in a solid way.
It isn't that the skyline is so pretty,
Although it is, or that I love to sway
Dancing in the parks - though that I also do -
But rather, that Chicago, on its own
Is just pleasant to be in. Yes, it's true,
This stockyard railhub factory has grown
Into my heart, and I am glad to be
A resident - though I still miss the sea.
Not crazily, hardly head-over-heels,
But patiently, and calmly, and above
All else, productively. It feels
As if my love for this Midwestern city
Makes my life better, in a solid way.
It isn't that the skyline is so pretty,
Although it is, or that I love to sway
Dancing in the parks - though that I also do -
But rather, that Chicago, on its own
Is just pleasant to be in. Yes, it's true,
This stockyard railhub factory has grown
Into my heart, and I am glad to be
A resident - though I still miss the sea.
What's It Like In Theory
Produce a reason why I should not love
And maybe I will sigh a bit less strongly;
But 'til you do, I'll be the picture of
The third age of a man, and that not wrongly,
Making perhaps no ballads to no brows,
But roughly close enough to be the same.
For everyone who has observed me knows
I tend to revel in that sort of game.
Are there such reasons? I could well believe
There might be, but I doubt there really are,
For some men someday, I imagine, leave
Their loves, but I have no desire to mar
My own. So leave that theory, for the fact is
I do not plan to implement this practice.
And maybe I will sigh a bit less strongly;
But 'til you do, I'll be the picture of
The third age of a man, and that not wrongly,
Making perhaps no ballads to no brows,
But roughly close enough to be the same.
For everyone who has observed me knows
I tend to revel in that sort of game.
Are there such reasons? I could well believe
There might be, but I doubt there really are,
For some men someday, I imagine, leave
Their loves, but I have no desire to mar
My own. So leave that theory, for the fact is
I do not plan to implement this practice.
Thursday, October 6, 2011
Selfish Bastard
There is some little waste in being free
With you and your spare time. Of course it's best
To be a good, kind person (unlike me)
And honor every general request
With personal performance of a good,
Yet those of us with a more selfish bent
Must always wonder if you really should
Be quite so open. After you have spent
Hours being helpful, there's a glow,
Of course, of self-esteem in usefulness;
Even we old crabs, be sure, do know
That much. Yet even so I must confess
The more you volunteer the less free time
We have together: I call that a crime.
With you and your spare time. Of course it's best
To be a good, kind person (unlike me)
And honor every general request
With personal performance of a good,
Yet those of us with a more selfish bent
Must always wonder if you really should
Be quite so open. After you have spent
Hours being helpful, there's a glow,
Of course, of self-esteem in usefulness;
Even we old crabs, be sure, do know
That much. Yet even so I must confess
The more you volunteer the less free time
We have together: I call that a crime.
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Influential
Even on the days when all goes wrong
And nothing seems to fix it, you can come
Armed with a smile and before too long
It's all OK. It's even true that some
Times, when you cannot come yourself, you send
A bit of you, an email or a text,
And that small sign of reaching out will lend
A calmer color to whatever vexed
My heart - or when you cannot even do
That least of things, and you are gone for real,
I can remember when I last saw you
And thus ameliorate the way I feel.
So if this can be true in my malaise
How much the better on my better days?
And nothing seems to fix it, you can come
Armed with a smile and before too long
It's all OK. It's even true that some
Times, when you cannot come yourself, you send
A bit of you, an email or a text,
And that small sign of reaching out will lend
A calmer color to whatever vexed
My heart - or when you cannot even do
That least of things, and you are gone for real,
I can remember when I last saw you
And thus ameliorate the way I feel.
So if this can be true in my malaise
How much the better on my better days?
Beep
A beep - a text -
A ring - the phone.
Each intersects
My mind, alone
And makes it leap
To think that she
Is in that beep
Contacting me.
If so, then I
Am happified;
If not, I sigh
And let it slide.
Someday it will,
So I wait still.
A ring - the phone.
Each intersects
My mind, alone
And makes it leap
To think that she
Is in that beep
Contacting me.
If so, then I
Am happified;
If not, I sigh
And let it slide.
Someday it will,
So I wait still.
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
47th
To quote: this bus will run express between
Forty-seventh and eleventh streets.
Because of this nobody ever meets
A mid-south-sider. They are seldom seen,
Wish-washy creatures. Maybe they are green!
Or just invisible. The bus sure treats
Them all that way; there are no seats
For them. I think it's kind of mean,
But then again, I could take the Red Line,
Or Green, and be exposed to just such places:
New people with new habits, clothes, and faces
But I do not. It's slower, and I'm fine
Going express and never meeting those
Who have those newer faces, habits, clothes.
Forty-seventh and eleventh streets.
Because of this nobody ever meets
A mid-south-sider. They are seldom seen,
Wish-washy creatures. Maybe they are green!
Or just invisible. The bus sure treats
Them all that way; there are no seats
For them. I think it's kind of mean,
But then again, I could take the Red Line,
Or Green, and be exposed to just such places:
New people with new habits, clothes, and faces
But I do not. It's slower, and I'm fine
Going express and never meeting those
Who have those newer faces, habits, clothes.
Times
Do not imagine, though I write of her,
I think of nothing else. Of course I do!
I may spend hours wishing that she were
With, or talking to, me, what have you,
Or pondering what she may be up to,
Or thinking through her day instead of mine,
Or texting her to get her point of view,
But do not think I only sit and pine.
I may, perhaps, by purpose and design
Be there to talk whenever she's around,
And whisper sadly to myself or whine
When I cannot; but that is still no ground
To think I only think of her. I keep
Something to myself: I have to sleep.
I think of nothing else. Of course I do!
I may spend hours wishing that she were
With, or talking to, me, what have you,
Or pondering what she may be up to,
Or thinking through her day instead of mine,
Or texting her to get her point of view,
But do not think I only sit and pine.
I may, perhaps, by purpose and design
Be there to talk whenever she's around,
And whisper sadly to myself or whine
When I cannot; but that is still no ground
To think I only think of her. I keep
Something to myself: I have to sleep.
Broken Pencil
I watched a couple kiss at Randolph Street
And wondered why that shouldn't have been us.
We are as capable of such a feat,
As they are, and I love to hold you, thus,
As he does now to her. Why are not we
Entwined together in a joint embrace
Oblivious to all the world, and free
Of all the busy worries that erase
The happiness that they, together, share?
Why are we not, as blissfully as they,
Turtled together as a loving pair,
Ignoring all that anyone might say
About us? Why, in short, are you so far
From me? But hush. I know well why you are.
And wondered why that shouldn't have been us.
We are as capable of such a feat,
As they are, and I love to hold you, thus,
As he does now to her. Why are not we
Entwined together in a joint embrace
Oblivious to all the world, and free
Of all the busy worries that erase
The happiness that they, together, share?
Why are we not, as blissfully as they,
Turtled together as a loving pair,
Ignoring all that anyone might say
About us? Why, in short, are you so far
From me? But hush. I know well why you are.
Night Wonders
The dense electric forest sways around
My head, and I am dizzy with the sight;
I knew, or thought I knew, this patch of ground,
But it was dark. Now all is blazing light,
Although the sun has sunk into the night
(Perhaps because). The alteration brings
A different feeling, separated quite
From dull unlunar ordinary things.
A halo of omnipotence now clings
To everything, which might as well be holy
Though I suspect they lack the proper wings
For angels. But it may be that is solely
Envy of their transubstantiation
By one who never matches their new station.
My head, and I am dizzy with the sight;
I knew, or thought I knew, this patch of ground,
But it was dark. Now all is blazing light,
Although the sun has sunk into the night
(Perhaps because). The alteration brings
A different feeling, separated quite
From dull unlunar ordinary things.
A halo of omnipotence now clings
To everything, which might as well be holy
Though I suspect they lack the proper wings
For angels. But it may be that is solely
Envy of their transubstantiation
By one who never matches their new station.
Skyline2
I look up at the city and I see
A mighty golem mankind's hands erected;
A monument to our humanity,
Whose every stone our ancestors collected
And reared up high; a common edifice
Made up of individual desires
Yet joined together to be one in this:
The height to which humanity aspires.
So what if every working day is spent
Inside them hardly thinking of that goal?
Outside observers are not thereby pent
To see only the form and not the soul.
The city breathes us in and out, and thus
Makes all of us a monument to us.
A mighty golem mankind's hands erected;
A monument to our humanity,
Whose every stone our ancestors collected
And reared up high; a common edifice
Made up of individual desires
Yet joined together to be one in this:
The height to which humanity aspires.
So what if every working day is spent
Inside them hardly thinking of that goal?
Outside observers are not thereby pent
To see only the form and not the soul.
The city breathes us in and out, and thus
Makes all of us a monument to us.
Narcissus
The place feels empty, but it cannot be:
The shelves are still the same, the books are there,
Every item is still in its place.
Yet every step I take echoes to me
Through the still and overopen air.
It ought to echolocate, ought to trace
Her body by its absent echo, yet
I feel the walls surrounding me reflect
In each direction, none obscured or gone.
It would be easy if I could forget
Her absent presence, but I recollect
It all too well - her vacancy is drawn
By every sound I make. I knew she'd go
But I did not expect this new echo.
The shelves are still the same, the books are there,
Every item is still in its place.
Yet every step I take echoes to me
Through the still and overopen air.
It ought to echolocate, ought to trace
Her body by its absent echo, yet
I feel the walls surrounding me reflect
In each direction, none obscured or gone.
It would be easy if I could forget
Her absent presence, but I recollect
It all too well - her vacancy is drawn
By every sound I make. I knew she'd go
But I did not expect this new echo.
Monday, October 3, 2011
Bye
How can I say goodbye? How do I stand
There, as she leaves, and not break down?
How do I not stretch out a longing hand
As swimmers do, who fear that they may drown,
To clutch at her as they do for the shore?
How can I watch her drive away in peace,
Or even let her close her driver's door,
Without demanding that her journey cease
Before it is begun, and that she stay
With me, no matter where she should
Be going? How can I let her go away
Even when her destination's good?
I think of her return, and barely can
Recall my better wiser part of man.
There, as she leaves, and not break down?
How do I not stretch out a longing hand
As swimmers do, who fear that they may drown,
To clutch at her as they do for the shore?
How can I watch her drive away in peace,
Or even let her close her driver's door,
Without demanding that her journey cease
Before it is begun, and that she stay
With me, no matter where she should
Be going? How can I let her go away
Even when her destination's good?
I think of her return, and barely can
Recall my better wiser part of man.
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Foiled
Even her imperfections shine to me
Like polished gems set in a silver foil;
I know them to be qualitatively
Defects, yet I find they do not soil
The beauty that I see in her. Although
She is no goddess, and not all in all,
And I can see her faults, I let them go,
Not letting any of them cast a pall
Upon my feelings for her. They are known
Yet not too crucial, nor too emphasized;
For who among has no fault to moan,
Or nothing that they might prefer excised?
I am myself imperfect, so we meet
On equal ground, and that itself is sweet.
Like polished gems set in a silver foil;
I know them to be qualitatively
Defects, yet I find they do not soil
The beauty that I see in her. Although
She is no goddess, and not all in all,
And I can see her faults, I let them go,
Not letting any of them cast a pall
Upon my feelings for her. They are known
Yet not too crucial, nor too emphasized;
For who among has no fault to moan,
Or nothing that they might prefer excised?
I am myself imperfect, so we meet
On equal ground, and that itself is sweet.
Saturday, October 1, 2011
Clarified
What, oh what, am I to do with you?
It sometimes seems quite obvious, of course:
We are in love, and that is everything.
But how to show it? That, I wish I knew,
For now I fear there may be a divorce
Between my love, to which, in joy, I cling,
And its expression. How can I be sure
I am conveying it to you properly?
It's not an easy point for me to rest
Assured on. Although I know I prefer
You to the rest of all humanity
I can't be positive I've shown that zest
And zeal for you as clearly as I should.
So to be clear: I love you. Are we good?
It sometimes seems quite obvious, of course:
We are in love, and that is everything.
But how to show it? That, I wish I knew,
For now I fear there may be a divorce
Between my love, to which, in joy, I cling,
And its expression. How can I be sure
I am conveying it to you properly?
It's not an easy point for me to rest
Assured on. Although I know I prefer
You to the rest of all humanity
I can't be positive I've shown that zest
And zeal for you as clearly as I should.
So to be clear: I love you. Are we good?
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