History

He wore a path
in his carpet bald
pacing in resentful meditation

which roused his will
to finish his
diabolical treatise

that kicked the groin of the world
while he coughed in the shadow
of its constant industry

that insulted his days
and clanged in his sleep
while he dreamed up plots to topple it all

and then he’d wake and rub his head
and write more arguments
and one blue day

he died. And was no longer ignored.
Governments used his arguments
for agendas he’d abhorred.



.

Testimony

Bad gravity
swallowed me.

Haphazardry
tore my circuitry

and suddenly
nothing propelled me.



A shadow covered my mind.
Dull, mapless,
with a cracked compass,

I meekly tried to find
what I thought I’d lost
—a groping ghost

whose clues
were flashes of dignity
in more than a flickering few:

a courageous sanity
of human decency
that inescapably knew

that she is me
and I am him:
a mirror to model myself in.



Friends, I hate to admit
that I almost tried to quit,

almost stopped striving to be
more than merely me,

almost bowed to fear
and wished to disappear.



I’m still here.



.

The Buzz

Tom Calm
smells a con
in all the tangled signals

twitching in the wind
twisting through his skin

and stranding him in the street
with a bleeping blinking phone.

In a city.
Not a tree
in sight.

But we all fall
like leaves
soon—

so let’s BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
in a great big room

alone with a glowing screen
sending messages:

I’m not feeling super okay today.
Call me when you get here tomorrow.

So does Tom Calm
hear a hum beyond
this nervous wind?

a magnetic murmur
so basic it buzzes us
into a party

more rumbling and deeper
than BOOM? (listen)



.

Once Born

Once born,
his death concerned him
while he lived.

Once dead,
his death concerned
only the living.



.

Wavelength

Someone hums
the slow signal
of sheer sanity

and slides a sly
eye my way

he (who heeds
what whispers when we
hear our own clear
beat) beams

and I gaze
what I know

in his eye



.

Alone in the Woods

Gazed on by ancient faces
in the cracks of the rocks

your own face
takes its place

among faces
dreaming in the trees



.

Bliss Bus Mask

But you gotta
bliss bus mask on

as you breeze by bright
monoliths of business

and doom bass booms
from black cars

and an old man drives by
with smiling eyes

in a weathered leather face
blessed with the subtle grace

you seek in a loud casino
with the gentle lamps of your eyes

dizzied by obvious prizes
which dull you to the bliss

that could lift you out of this
mess of dazzling noise

but instead you spend your strength
just struggling up from the pit

and that’s your bliss bus
mask my man

striving for the sanity
of a smiling old man



.

Only a Smile

A day dazed
by a brain’s
unspeakable strain

hovering over
a hollering gleam
of a grin,

something
for someone
to focus on,

a distraction
from abstraction,
a smile,

a siren
slash, a flash
of flesh

to gnash the mesh
of thought
to a stuttering pulp

then burn it away
with a blinding bright
ray

so before you
is only
a smile



.