Nothing Concrete - From 1996

 Moaning tide of swelling emotion clashes with the forces of unfamiliar energy
Beneath a full rich glowing buttermilk moon and dark colors are shades
of this twisted world
through your eyes wrapped around mine
intertwined with our arms
shattering unbreakable causes for my pain
I know nothing concrete
except the hard edge of your stare
so the stars drew patterns
with empty space between
some sort of welcome
in the cold compromise
of tender indefinite flesh.
I know nothing concrete
nothing complete.

A few lines from Dorothy Parker....

"General Review of the Sex Situation"

Woman wants monogamy
Man delights in novelty
Love is woman's moon and sun
Man has other forms of fun
Woman lives but in her Lord
Count to ten and Man is bored
With this the gist and sum of it
What earthly good could come of it?"

-Dorothy Parker

private ocean --from 1996

Heart
be still
the mind begins to fill to find
the overflow from head to toe
not enough
it spreads from where it all began
so this is my plan
Heart
are you listening to me?
I command you
in your constant motion
your private ocean
Be still!!
(it does not listen)
I know the heart has a mind of its own
weeping and sighing a tragic moan
of heartache
every smile I fake
every tear I try to deny
leaves the impression of its lie on my eye
though I don't cry
ever enough to satisfy
this red, powerful organ with all the emotion
of a vast, private ocean
Be still, damn it
But wait, what am I saying?
If it did as I said
I'd be dead....

throwback piece from 2000, "landing"

so you say you like your coffee sweet?
complacency adds sugar to your morning treat
our pillow talk is full of gaps
into silence we seem to lapse
locked into dread,
images of smoke swirl through my head
your world so privately contained
your movements leave my heart stained
something unintentionally remained
I have yet to hear you complain
my words fall soft into your space
gentle as rain
into broken pieces rearranged
a misunderstanding sure, but soon
I will be landing
with laughter I am recalling
slowing down and stalling
words are weak and humor falls flat
if I called you would you call me back?
a sore spot I am not so sure of that
but soon I will be landing
there will be no more misunderstanding

here you go.

on the small scale, most of us know how to ignore people who are hostile, bitter, petty, rude, caustic, uncaring etc. Intuition leads us to take our energy back from them, walk away, leave them, cut them off from our attentive giving, and in so doing they have less and less reason to come after us, personally, or come after a perceived group; race, gender, sexual orientation and so forth, that we seem to belong to. without our indignation, they have little to no fuel for their continuing negativity. but on the larger scale, when problems become widespread systemic indignities, we are so incredibly riled up, and yet that same principle applies. If you go about your life being the awesome, caring, present, loving, intelligent person you most likely are, at least most of the time, I tend to think that action is the best kind of resistance. you make change in the ways you can and you leave the excess negativity to drain from those beings while you spread higher consciousness through multiple mediums and you humble yourself to the task of undoing all the toxic tangles that exist in you. in this way, you are serving the highest good, in this way you are part of the solution. and when you do this, know that I and beings much greater than me, are loving you and sending you support. I send bright holiday blessings to all of you, no exceptions. xoxo

dissolve it all

coming back to the very singular present moment
she finds all the fleeting thoughts
like wisps of smoke around her head
her limbs all feel like lead
today
what is leading her now
what is feeding her now
leaking energy from chakras she does not exactly know how to identify
and there never does seem to be a verification process
that these big questions can go through to get to answers,
so that all you seek can be verified to exist,
and maybe these existential and other
philosophical wanderings and wonderings
will someday add up to an understanding
or over standing and I say why don't you

take my hand and let us lean
over the railing
from there
holding hands and laughing until becoming
nearly hysterical
my first time my first kiss
it all rushes back to me
the people in my life that made me into me
the experiences
that chiseled my consciousness into the
statuesque and incredible city of endless
sounds and proclamations
I now identify it to be
when I sit
and dissolve that which
is considered to be me
dissolve that which is considered
to keep me from being free
dissolve that which holds me
in chains I cannot see

so that omnipotent agreement I had with all my selves from the start
can shine through my actions
and there will be no more mistaking or forsaking
or faking
through
the dissolution of it all
in order to
master the art of the fall
the rebuilding
and the unspeakable doors to
death
life
rebirth and beyond
all that
beyond all that........

ongoing

the light within
does not negate the shadow
destiny follows a heart thread
and the machinery of your confusion
stalls on the road
all has drifted from consciousness source
ongoing, a river
desire creating suffering
laced with an insurgent awareness
in the
precious world
all above and all below
that light cannot negate
shadow

Young Man's Conscience

Note:
Here is a piece I read at the Beat Museum, when the Women's Poetry Collective called Tara's Tongue, which inspired me to call this blog by that same name, was performing that night, in the section of the Beat Museum dedicated to female Beat poets. This poem is dedicated to soldiers in all times and places, with sympathy and a prayer for their liberation from the horrors of combat and war overall.

why did you give me war?
I am not your soldier
I am not your warrior
Mother, Father, why have you
aligned me with forces
bent on endless destruction
and desecration?
I call out to you
distressed
I cry out in my sleep
and nobody hears
my dreams are plagued by battles
why have you given me war
when all I wanted was peace?
Now it eludes me
remains frozen in a distant future
a vague possibility

I am not content to fight, to kill
to bring suffering
to women and children
to pretend that men are separate
that I am superior
that the assigned enemy deserves
endless punishment

No.
I resist your maps of untimely death
I will not follow

My soul is sick and weary from these wars
I know there is another way
I believe I will find it.

forced to listen

delicate glass illusion worlds
soon to be trampled, shards glittering
precious fantasies destroyed

this time
we are forced to listen
for although this is a dream
and I am committed to that belief
we are living for real
and we must live as if life depended on it

we get used to disappointments
fragile  moments
stolen by time's fast river

children watch us closely
mimic our voices perfectly
follow our steps exactly
clean and dry minds
absorbing the liquid influence
of our hardened ways.