Thursday, February 28, 2013

Heart to heart

They say the eyes
Spy best to where
The soul lies,
Lifted curtains to
A window
On the deepest desires
Shaded from unwanted
Intrusion with a
Flicker of a lash
But I say the pathway
To the heart is through
The mouth,
Penetrating pursed lips
With the tip of the tongue
To taste love’s thick honey
To take it in
Swallow it whole
Let it linger inside
And bloom
Sucking up every drip of it
Heart to heart


Wednesday, February 27, 2013

First bloom




I wait for the thaw
That comes this time of year
Those nimble buds
Blunt and poignant
Pointed upward
Each glistening
With bits of melting
Waiting to drip
Aching to explode
With a rush into
The warm air
Rubbed whole until
They rise up and flower
The wind shakes them
Making them shudder
I drink in each limb
With my eyes
Each drip touching
My lips with
Its wet kiss
The whole world throbbing
At this touch
That first blush
Forgotten at full bloom
And longed for when
The leaves fall
And the world goes barren
That ache
That sweet ache
Priceless!

Adam



I can’t touch the apple
And not think of your
Cool skin against
My overheated fingers
The drip of condensation
From my breath
Spilling onto my palm
The tang lingering
On the tip of my tongue
As I ache to bite
To break the red flesh
To slip the juice
I know will
Taste so sweet

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Surrender


( modified from an earlier poem)



We turn to sleep again at dawn,
the pale glow of morning against the dusty sky,
chirping birds and hooting trains singing,
the entanglement of bed sheets and
oversized pillows around our arms and legs,
the webs of passion,
or roots to some greater desire
of which neither can attest,
wood pressed against wood,
growing in and out of the barriers,
of our lives,
filled with moist dreams
and abrupt awakenings,
bars of light over limbs
only dawn can expose,
revealing us
in ways we never expected
but not undesired
for at the root of it all,
in this wrestling
over night
we ultimately
ache for
surrender.

Morning glory



I spend my life
Waiting for you to open
The pale glow
Of morning ripping
Though the lace
Eyes wide
Lips parted
Waiting to turn
To seed
Even before
I have succeeded
In pulling
Open the petals.

Each layer
Loosened with gentle
Fingers,
I ply
Feeling inside
For that place
Where your seeds
Form
My touch inching
Deep through
The quivering
Softness

Some flowers
Do best in night
Drawing heat
From some
Deeper place
The invisibility
Of progress,
As fingers seek
Sweet nectar,
But me
Whose eyes
Feed as easily
As my fingers
I need to see
And feel
And if possible
Taste each
Petal as it
Falls away,
Morning glory
Withering only
To the mounting heat
Only exploding
Sunlight
Can bring

Sunday, February 24, 2013

Believe in miracles


I needed to find
Something real to cling to
In my routine Friday night
Fortune cookies
I got with my pecan shrimp
And broccoli
Some measure of wisdom
Or home the mundane
World has ironed out
With starched shirts
And practical solutions
Something beyond
the typical predictions of
“You’ll be rich,”
Or “Lucky” or “Wise,”
Something to hint that
A life full of frustrating struggles
Leads to more than
Gray hair and a bent back,
And forlorn glances
At what might have beens,
But all I got in this Friday’s batch
Was the stale taste of lemon cookie
And all too practical advice about
Discipline and self control.
And life being full of routines
I went to my Sunday morning laundry
And watched my world spin around
In the dryer, while near by feet,
Fluttering around my ankles
Like a pale butterfly,
Someone else’s abandoned fortune
Begging for me to retrieve,
Filled with no mundane advice at all,
But what I needed to hear most,
What we all need to hear all the time,
What we cannot possibly life without
Without going crazy,
“Believe in miracles,” was all it said.

Saturday, February 23, 2013

Waiting



“Don’t speak until you’re spoken to,”
Sister Cecilia used to tell me
Right after she smacked me
In the back of the head
For blurting out in class,
Or laughing too loudly
Or letting her overhear
Some rude remark.
The pain of her blow
Adding to the lessons
She tried to get through
My thick skull
About not assuming
I had the right
To impose my opinion
In places where
I didn’t belong
That wild kid
In the black of the class
Too busy melting crayons
On the radiators
To actually pay attention
To what was going on
And yet, with guilt-stained
Multi-colored fingers
Poking up into the air
While saying whatever it was
That came to my mind
At the time,
“Don’t speak unless you’re
Spoken to,” the angry nun
Always told me, and I
Said, “Of course I won’t,”
Yet always did,
Needing more than
The back of her hand
To get that lesson
In my head,
Thought after so many
Years, I learned,
To wait until spoken to
Before I make
An utter fool of myself.

Friday, February 22, 2013

The ducks


The ducks huddle in the water against the cold wind as winter weavers her slender fingers through their hair – oiled feathers their own protection from the deep chill and the intense isolation this season brings.


I walk here watching them wait, for the ice to melt, for the change of season that brings them warm kiss to their cheeks.


They wait, picking at whatever offerings winter deems they should have, they accepting each previous bit as manna from a goddess they can only imagine, keeping faith that their waiting will bring them some reprieve, some sense of forgiveness in this Easter season when the death of winter leads to rebirth and perhaps salvation.


They wait and I walk, watching them wait.


Thursday, February 21, 2013

Church mouse



 If he had to live
His whole
Life like this
The church mouse
Might find
Some measure of bliss
In staring through
Glass so beautifully stained
To suffer from clearly
Self-inflicted pain
A nod from the nun
Whose cheese he desires
A drop of some wine
That so often inspires
Standing on tip toe
To peep over the lip
Into a world
He might never live
Life being a dream
Or so it would seem

The same old story


Yes, she cries all the time,
soft spring of salt
From the edges of her eyes,
Trying to drink the memory
Of his demise out of her head
But can’t,
The memory too much like
A tattoo with each color
Un-faded, from the pale
Finger on the trigger
To the blast that casts
Deep shadows into
That motel room
As bits of his anatomy
Make a mosaic on the wall
Behind the bed
Pistol bounding on the carpet
From his opening hand
Sjhe strolls through the bar
With eyes fogged,
The room always full of strangers
She seeking new faces
Each time to buy her drinks
Her tale told over and over
Against the back drop of
Cheap Trick on the jukebox,
Her tears glittering red
From the bar lights
Like blood on her cheek,
A convincing rendition
Winning her sympathy for a night
And maybe company
Back in the same motel
She claims it happened,
And me, always listening in,
Trying to find a deviation
From telling to telling,
Always willing to buy her
A drink
When the strangers run out.


Wednesday, February 20, 2013

“If” is not a blade of grass




April 18, 1981

I guess there’s something wrong in me
Some distorted bit, an ugly flaw
That bites both you, and painfully me
In different ways, a bit you’ve caught
And I have not. That’s my fault,
I’m afraid. The blinding of a lover
Who has missed the glaring signs to halt,
I see them now, too late, and you’ve another
Way of living set in your mind
I can’t blame you. I can only sit
And wonder if I’d been in time
Would fate have changed that little bit?
But bits and ifs are not enough
To turn you back to feeling love

If I was only a wide pine tree
With needles jutting from my finger tips
I could stab myself and remove from me
This terrible ugly frightening bit
I could grow new bark to hear the wound
That flakes now from my chest
Where once a heart like a flower bloomed
Out of sorrow and loneliness
But I have neither limb nor bough
That can stiffly stand your leaving
I have no roots that can swiftly grow
To seal this gap that’s bleeding
I’m just a simple man, it seems
Who burnt his wood to light his dreams.

If I was but a crow that sounds
Harsh and bitter and brooding life
There would be no heartless frame around
To ponder you and crave you like
A blind man must crave his sight.
I would have never had you
Near me, touching here and there, a knife
Cutting with pleasure, cutting me through.
But I am not a crow that caws
Or a bird that can fly away
I’m hooked upon your feline claws
With words not wings to sway.
But you who once had a softer side
Have hardened into another’s bride.

If I was but the yellow sky
Glowing with the predawn light,
Growing into an ocean wide
Of love and warmth and smiles
Maybe that would change that mind
Which thinks long thought with short replies
Maybe I could scorch and blind
And melt the frosting from your eyes.
But I am but a flicking flame
A short match’s light that forever longs
For you to help me ease the pain
That comes with being forever wrong.
But the flame that flickers learns to die
Without much warmth, without much pride.

And I am, too, the sprouting grass
Not a lawn, mind you, but a ragged
Bit of green that grows and wiggles past
The granite blocks and crags, it
Doesn’t matter. I’ll still grow
Though yellow without your light
And parts of me will always show
Your passing, your blinding bright.
I am not crushed; I am not damaged
But bent again in my old ways
Hurt and lonely, yet able to manage
The future filled with dull dark days
For you, my love, are the only ray
Left to raise this humbled blade.


Monday, February 18, 2013

Ballad of Ernie Bly (notebook stuff)



Ernest Bly was a wonderful guy
or so his neighbors say
knock on wood, and they understood
just what he did all day

He sat and spat from the steps in the back
as the girls from school passed by
and he looked and he crooked hoped to hook
this girl that had caught his eye

She was tall and broad and used to call
nis name, "Hey, Ernest Bly!
Do you think you can wind and come to the rink
and watch me slip on the ice?"

And he laughed and he spat and he tipped back his hat
and he'd grin and he's say "That'd be nice."
And she'd wiggle a little and stepped over his spittle
and danced down the street with his eyes 

Every day she die this with a smile and a twist
and he'd swear at her heals lifted high
and he'd wait for her with hands in a fist
for you see deep inside though he would die
if he could not get just one kiss


Saturday, February 16, 2013

Spring sprung




They say the green, green grass that grows
Is part of that which heaven knows
The dabbled dew that dribbles down
Jewels upon that Godly crown

The heads that shade in gusty winds
Spreads sees to grow and honor Him
The leaves that luster with the dawn
bend reverently and revere His song

He sings, my dear, of little things
Of grass’ green fluttering wings
He sings from seeds to sprouting stakes
He even sings of what seem mistakes
And His song is one so very old
That sings life out from the depths of cold

The gilded age




 She takes pictures with both hands
Trying to grasp the masters
Before they vanish
Their gilded frames
Always an illusion
She can never capture
Fame so fleeting
Even the fastest lens
Can’t catch it
Only glimpses
Of the intense suffering
It took to get there,
A ear here
Loves lost
Greatness unrealized
Until death’s embrace
Not sought so much
As an ache
To express what
No one has before
And her hands
Shaking even to think
About how much it took
To get here,
And how few ever
Managed to get
There alive

 




Thursday, February 14, 2013

WBAI-FM (1989) poem and drawing

This was done when I was interviewed there about my underground newspaper -- I called both "On the Air"


Tuesday, February 12, 2013

more notebook art (1982 to 1986)

This includes some classic cartoon characters, art stuff I did as exercises in college etc




 The class after art class was one of several women studies courses, I took, and I usually drew in it while Sheffield, the professor lectured.








 This was written and drawn in a strip club, with me looking in the mirror at myself the journal entry is about lust and frustration.


Notebook Art (1974 to 1980)

With some very bad poetry included, I studied art for a while, but was never good at it, so I use it still as a warm up to writing, sometimes writing around old drawings. Here are some more extreme examples from an early notebook

Watergate




John Lennon murder


Can't get it out of my head

Flowers
Early days of rock


Graystone Park

Images from a proposed graphic novel
Censorship

Big Bang Theory

Saturday, February 9, 2013

Passaic River Melodies (with video)









One





Cold river twists like a worn rope

each inch pinched tight as if to break

Mulberry trees and hard oaks

clutched over the brink

curled leaves fraying,



Catfish and Carp

caught in the tangles of river’s current

Humped backs flat against the bonded waves

The mocking laugh of free-winged gulls

echoing over them in the bitter air.





Two



Rainfall,

Dots of the irretrievable fading at the river side,

like worn LP grooves

their sounds expired, retired, scratched

limbs of trees, old brown leaves,

wilted reeds bent with the oldest songs of all



The first face seen in that hazy dream

his

school bell sounding in the back of his head

He used to play here, cool water skimmed with stones

and stringy islands of grass, a whole head higher

than he remembered



spray paint lyrics long out of date

Jerry & Jane, June, 57

Mark’s Marauders, March 59

No Mark Twains or Tom Sawyers

No weasily big-eyed poor kids either



just rain



            Three



           On Sundays, the lines eke out like webs

            caught deep in the bosom of  the water

            tiny circles mark each touch

            where hooks wait for catfish

            as if they were flies

            

            Motor boats speed over the deeps

            with furious contempt,

            beer bottle bait bobbing in their wake

            the bottom is banked in tinted glass

           

            Carp crawl here, tadpoles dally,

            sharp stones reach up to form the tips of islands,

            and fishermen sit hoping snares

            will bring them more than old boots and bottles.





Four





The last call from the river edge speaks of her dying

the mourning geese sit in October rain

with gray suits stained,

waiting as they have always waited

homeless noses dripping, orphaned children

fluttering up and down in protest at her absence



They cry at the empty lawn

where on fair days she spread crusts of bread or broken popcorn

the river land around her house, a sore sight

to city fathers for over forty years



Flocks of ducks and geese and pigeons

pained, abandoned creatures with tarred feathers and broken wings

crawling to the shadow of the bridge,

looking for handouts and mercy,



And she, dying on them as the golf course people

pay for cages to cart them away

and the state forecloses on the land

to reroute the highway.



             

               Five

             

             

               Passaic River water spurts black from the tap

               protesting winter

               no cause for alarm, I tell my friends,

               who ponder the stink of dead fish and chemicals

               generations have drawn from this well

               from bucket to pump house

               open sewers long sealed now,

               fat rats died in unholy places, but no humans

               I say as each raises tea cup to lip

               At least, no one to my knowledge.





Six





This stream ran to the river when I was a kid,

an open sewer, raw and vile,

stinking as its water gushed down the narrow gully



It seemed wider then,

framed in maples and willows and oaks,

leaf-filled limbs, weed choked roots on either side



A thread of hemp hung from one large tree,

jack ass kids beating at its roots to grab hold,

swinging from one side to the other as the rope

burned our fingers.

always too stupid to let go



We bitched when we bruised our knees or burst our britches,

blaming the sharp stones and shiftless dirt,

fighting each other for one more chance to keep hold.



When it broke, the others vanished,

leaving me to stare at that frayed piece of rope,

leaving me to curse the tree for letting me go.



When I needed it most, it was gone,

and I sat on one side of that stinking shore,

wishing I could be on the other.





Seven



Two rivers flow together

swirling under the Quik Chek dumpster and Fotomat booth,

to the smell of pizza and trash,

old men sit on the concrete sides, feet dangling like children

fishing poles poking the empty air,

the low hum of water bubbling over brutal eddies of stone and junk

the handle of a shopping cart, thick with rotted newspaper and clots of grass

entangling their lines, hiding the catfish they can’t catch,

no one much caring either way.





                         Eight

                        

                        

                         I cross this bridge, even in my dreams,

                         its sagging center groans beneath the bulk

                         of ten ton paper trucks

                         that come and go through the mill’s metal gate

                         bumpers splintering the bridge’s wooden sides

                         leaving wood shavings and paper pulp

                         for the street sweeper to sweep,

                         leaving a thick coat for the river to carry away

                         like messages sent without hope.





                Nine

              



                The stone marker and rusted bench

                are all that remains of war and retreat

                the river washing the shore here where Washington crossed,

                a residue of soap scum licking at my heels,

                Post’s Ford measures the low water mark,

                Oak leaves trapped in swirling eddies,

                birds pecking at worms between the rocks,

                each puddle reflects bleeding leaves

                and a road that now runs along the riverside,

                the rumble of trucks and busses banging loose

                the marker’s mortar until dust drips from it like tears,

                and stone by stone, even this memory fades,

                Post’s Ford, Washington’s retreat, washing away.

              



                         Ten

                        

                         Most evenings this pond is a circle,

                         its round and perfect face neatly dressed

                         in Dusk’s pervading shadow

                        

                         staggered along its narrow shale rim

                         cool gray stones stand like outstretched fingers,

                         waving at the rising moon

                        

                         And every day of every winter the sun falls wearily

                         into this pond’s frosted wordless mouth,

                         dousing its flames in the Pond’s hungry water

                         until morning once more asks the sun to shine





Thursday, February 7, 2013

Ghetto rain




1

Rain brings truce to summer warfare here.
Silencing the boom-box shoulder-born cannons,
Needy ghetto boys cars to the corner
To advertise their whereabouts to God knows who.
They cling behind the steamed picture windows
Of neighborhood grocery stores, praying for the rain to stop
Or hover in the windows of their family homes like prisoners.

I watch the grayness of the day
And the ripple of rain assaulting each puddle,
Me, half expecting new life to evolve out of the mud.

Not all is still, of course, since the streets
Still squeals with panicking brakes
And the thump of delivery trucks over the humps
Of grave-like utility digs public service can’t quite fill,
Drivers cursing each other and the city for ruined shocks

Self-proclaimed auto mechanics rattle their ratchets
In the mud-streaked car port behind my house,
Rolling out their half-fixed classic cars
From the line of rented garages with leaky roofs
When rain permits,

Slick ghetto kids ease into the mouth of the driveway
With new machines, paid for by easy credit
Or drug sales on Third Street
Too dressed up, hair-greased too perfect, to risk the rain,
Leaning on their horns instead
To hurried the harried resident they’ve come to take
Car windows sealed tight against the wet
Yet vibrating with the heavy back beat of hip hop
Loud enough to raise even me from the death of sleep,
Vibrations so intense they spread through the court yard
Like a earthquake or a tooth ache,
Leaving me numb when they finally leave.

In between, I heard the rattle of the rain against the glass
And the impatient thumb of dribbled basketballs
In the sheltered alley where kids wait for the drops to stop
So they can hop over to the school yard courts,
The thump, thump, thump my heart soon imitates,
And I fear will stop, me, sealed up inside the coffin
Of my ghetto apartment, cut off from the world by
The constant dripping, no scent of sweet supper
Drifting in at me from the neighbor’s kitchen
No sound of the Latino gossip which always
Gives it spice,
Just me, myself and I, listening for something
I never quite hear, but ache for,
As if my life depended upon it.


2

Cobwebs round out the corners of the room,
Anchored in the cracks of pealing paint.
I wonder why I am here
My face reflected on the inside of dusty glass
My fingers gripping the splintered arms
Of a cracked wooden chair.

I keep thinking something must be wrong with me
For sitting here like this,
Yet I make no move to leave
I think the room is lonely instead of me.
I imagine the window shades and closet doors, mocking me.
Even the chair groans as I shift my weight,
And I think it is me.
I’m barely 27 and preparing myself for death
Needing to die for lack
Of anything better to do with my life
Yet I keep looking at my face reflected in the dusty glass
Trying to figure out,
Just exactly who it is I’m looking at.


3

They tell me not to worry
That I don’t have office spaces
Filled with love
No coaches for secretaries
After hours
In fact no office
Except for a phone booth
In Grand Central Station
Where I remain at almost any hour
Night or day.

My life is a party line
With two slick chicks
Pulling tricks,
Collecting nickels and times
For me as charity.

Ugly as they are,
They sometimes get lucky,
Scoring five dollars
For a trip to the toilet,
Ten if the john wants more
Than a warm mouth
Each man dressed in business suit
Carrying a brief case
And a wallet full of wives and kids

Some call for reservations
Then flock in
Their pockets stocked
With ripe bananas
Each voice still whispering
As if still on the phone
Their palms full of sweat
And their eyes full of acid

Some men want men
To accommodate them
Which doesn’t pay as much
As my girls do,
Or as much as my shinning shoes
Used to, though I still get down
On my knees.

I hate my face being inches
From the edge of a greasy toilet
And look for lingering lice
While the man above me moans,
I always ache from something better
Something more than the grunting impact
Of man inside man,
Wondering why my turn never comes.


4

The change comes in little ways
A name or in tainted snow
She stands so small
Baby riding her hip as if a saddle,
She looking staggered, stomped or stone.
I ask if she is in pain
Does she feel the miles
She’s been dragged along
At the end of her rope,
Her dreams banging asphalt
And dusty roads,
Old cowboy movies
Paint the scene just right,
Maybe even Greek myths,
She is Hector, not Helen,
Dying ignobly,
Harassed by life
Even after the fact.


5

The forest is new
Only the trees are old,
Roots transplanted
From a more innocent age,
Lined up against
The barroom wall
Like ten pins

Sweet young women
Swaying in the breeze
Of cool rock
And hot cocaine

Stone axes blazing
Through them from the stage
Search them like cops
From limb to limb,
Stealing their virginity
With a stare and
Seductive wind of sound

Paul Bunyan types
In t-shirts and jeans
Kicking the heals of Reebok sneakers
On the chair rain,
Waiting for their chance
To climb on for the ride,
Each endangered tree
Drawn to the heat
Of this budding
Forest fire


6

You walk by night
Strolling streets of broken beer bottles
And littered with the carcasses of shattered men,
Star light illuminating their faces
Their eyes glittering with dripping tears
Of self pity.

It is never easy living in a concrete jungle
Beating back weeds of desire with will
Rather than machete
Brushing off Roman hands
Without Rosary beads

But you love the scene
A silky lady with loose hair
Whispering around your face,
Your fingers flirting with each strand.

You know you don’t need them
And they know it, too,
Though they never stop pelting you
With tired lies, offers of drink
And, of course, more.

You like the danger, too,
The precarious fly strolling
Over the outer edges of a spider’s web
Taunting the dark bulk
With your delicate vibrations

They think you are inviting them
When you’ve come merely to mock,
They think you are happy to see them
When you want only drink of cocaine
They think they have a chance with you
When all you ever really want
Is to walk lightly in the dark


7

“It’s a lazy way to spend the day,”
she says leaning back against
the splintered porch rail,

Two flights up and dreaming
Of that paneled apartment
We saw above the head shop
She says she will miss this view.

She says the new place is upscale
A better place to bring a baby
Though her heart always gets restless
This time of year,
Stirred up by the rustle of
September leaves.

She says she’ll mist the view
That narrow space between the trees
Where a silver sliver of the river runs
Cutting through out lives
Like a scalpel.

It is a slice so small we might not
Recognize the river at all
If the old landlord never pointed it out,
One of the attractions he gave us
When suckering us into moving in,
Giving us green trees and fresh waters
The way white men gave blankets
To Native American Indians.

“It’s a lazy way to spend the day,”
she says, coughing back unwanted tears
as she hurries off to finish packing
for our two block trip to new digs
and rooms without a view


8

They locked him away
Like a rare stamp
Postage due,
Brain expansion
Pressing against his already
Weary skull
The stroke a legal notice
For eviction,
Testimony on
How he has lived his life,
Bad diet,,
Too much booze,
And a tendency towards perversion,
Me, standing at his door
My hat in hand,
Waiting for the nurses to decide
If a nephew was
A close enough relative to let in,
Fascists in white
Prophesying the next generation,
More death merchants
Than the street pushers,
Who sell hope on the street,
Waiting for the moment
When they can declare him dead
And can stamp him with
The cancellation notice,
One less soul left to circulate
Among the living


9

They teach you first to be tough
To get your shit together, man,
Or get the hell out,
The congestion of school desks,
The sock top switch blades
The fights in the street
The real report cards,
Jungle halls strew with potential victims,
The frightened weak ones
Bending over backwards or forwards
To keep from getting beat up,
By meaty boys of any color
Who used any kind of excuse
To get the girls to giggle
Being too smart,
Wearing glasses to thick or not hip
Being too straight
Or honest,
Or talking to the cops
Who are as bad as thugs,
Talking to teachers too frightened
To do anything,
Except to survive,
Thinking “better you than me,”
Turning deaf, dumb and blind
As you get raped or drugged,
Never seeing your bruised face
When you come into class,
Never hearing the beasts outside
Until you come in with a gun
And start shooting,
At which point
Everybody asks:
What’s wrong with you?


10

They gave the storm a name
And now it pursues us,
Beating a path up from the south,
They say, to soon knock on our doors.

This is no bluff like the puff pieces
Of past storms,
But one thick with bent trees
And ruined lives,
TV images showing South Carolina’s
Blurred faces and strewn lawns,
Trash and leaves whirling by the camera
Along with reports of death.

I sit in my Passaic apartment
Casting a glance at my world,
Walls heavy with books which I envision
Cast down and over-turned,
The scent of spilled cologne rising
From not yet shattered bottles.

In my mind, I ride highways before the storm
Seeing its wrath in my rear view mirror,
Hearing its roar in the back of my head,
Yet for some reason, unable to stay ahead of it,
Losing ground inch by inch,
I feel its storm clouds creeping over me,
I feel the cold chill of its painful touch
I scene myself being sucked up into it,
And know I will never escape it,
Even as my cat purrs and rubs against my leg,
I reach down, fingers feeling fur,
In a desperate effort to touch
Something real.