Daily Archives: June 22, 2004

Box Haiku

Inside the small box
that is our experience
there is nothing new:

the folded edges
let in small amounts of light
to read old news by.

But the lid is loose —
a gentle push opens it;
look, there is a sky!

If you throw your weight
against the side, you can tilt
the whole world open.

Just another box
that may look like open space
but has edges, too.

Some spend their lifetimes
thinking the box protects them;
they worship cardboard.

What lingers outside
is violent, wild and risky:
it is fully alive.

Without much warning
it may devour your small box;
why die that slowly?

Life is not easy;
anyone who denies this
is selling something.

Look! Your box and mine
share a common boundary.
Let’s leave together.

22 JUN 2004

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Beat Cops (the Pilot)

Introduction to a Poem Requested by a Dear Friend. Please note: dear friend is somewhat of an ambiguous phrase, which should not be misconstrued to mean that I have anything against any deer, elk, moose, springbok, or other non-horse, leaping, running, jumping herbivore – which is like a vegetarian except more boring in conversation – because I like woodland and veldt-dwelling creatures of that sort because they never try to talk to you when you’re on the phone with someone else).

Anyway, here goes: It’s a never-ending story, a pit without a toppus or a bottomus, a continuous saga, or at least a tale that seems to be sagging ever closer and closer to the ground: it’s the ending of the end-all, the creme de la creme of something that was once was soft and pliable and oh so very pleasant to the touch, smell and sight but now has hardened into a plastispasmodic dessert tray offering that shows signs of oxidation, sugar viscosity breakdown and overall loss of morphologicality and appeal. What is it? Or rather, what was it, what could it have possible been, from whence did it come and will it return at end of day to close our eyes and minds to deprive us of the burden of imaginative recompense? I don’t know.

I’m milking this one for all it’s worth: I feel it’s my udder responsibility. What I have attempted to attempt here is an introduction, a prologue, a pre-initialization segue, an opening monologue, to set the stage, give you the background, or sort of give you the “in last week’s episode” synopsis of what you might have missed if you had been out having some sort of a mid-life crisis experiment consciousness awakening mind-bending good old fashioned get up and go something going on last week and between the sound bite politics and other mindless trivia that have been sandwiched in between your neurons and synapses in the intervening time period instead of paying strict attention to the events, actions, and their separating moments of extreme boredom (don’t you just love those peaks and valleys?).

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No Surprise At All

She said that she was longing for the life that she once had
The changes they were coming fast, and some of them were bad
Said she could not believe it
Maybe she was going mad

And I saw just what was happening
And I wasn’t much surprised
That the laughter was now missing from her eyes
No, it was not much surprise I felt at all
More like autumn blues when leaves begin to fall

She said she wanted happiness and things as they had been
For life had started laughing and the joke was quite obscene
I shook my head and tried to say
I know just what you mean

For I saw the road she’d taken
And I wasn’t much surprised
That the laughter was now missing from her eyes
No, it was not much surprise I felt just then
More like longing for the wisps of might have been

She spoke of that long trip she made somewhere into the East
And the times she spent in turmoil wrestling her inner beasts
And of all the men that failed her: businessmen, and clowns and priests
And I wasn’t much surprised, not in the least

She said she wanted more to life than memories that fade
For going through the motions seemed like such a sad charade
Said she felt like an old record
That was scratched and overplayed

And I noticed what was happening
And wasn’t much surprised
That the happiness was missing from her eyes
No, it was not much surprise I felt at all
These things happen when your past decides to call.

1988

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Concerning Past and Present Loves

Concerning K. I cannot say it came as much surprise
There always was a kind of fuzz that lingered in her eyes
And anyway, the games you play get serious enough
Without the threat of psychopathy breaking all your stuff

Concerning E. it seems to me our ages were all wrong
We didn’t grow up with the same books or sing the same songs
And furthermore, her mom got sore that I was more secure
Than her strange fundamentalist preacher man could endure

Concerning M., I won’t condemn the daydreams of the past
But it was never meant to be, and never meant to last
And in end, I won’t pretend that dream died slow and hard
But there was no room for me then or now on her dance card

Concerning V. I won’t deceive you, that was a mistake
She wanted oatmeal safety and I gave her nut and flake
And when it stopped and she just dropped me, it was for the best
There wasn’t any way I could have sat through the whole test

Concerning J. I went away before something could gel
But we were shooting in the dark, as far as I could tell
And so to speak, as different freaks our paths would never meet
Except at the rain-soaked crosswalk of some Seattle street

Concerning G., and M., and R., and maybe J., and C.
There were some magic moments, but they’re all now history
In retrospect, if I neglect to mention you by name
It’s not that you are unimportant; just say I’m to blame

Concerning S., now, more or less, there is so much to say
I wouldn’t trade what I have lost for what I have today
And truth be told, now getting old seems less a cross to bear
Because a life worth living is a life you want to share

21 JUN 2004

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