…set for tomorrow night at Arts In The Garden. Included two new pieces from the post stroke(s) work. Likely to be my last set for a while.
Wish me…?
T
Monthly Archives: May 2024
Sunday exclusive poem 5/26/2024
I lost a post this morning.
It was a good one, full of wolves and a baby and it likely followed the river to where the baby would be slaughtered, but then a worm showed up and I was left with a partial poem and a draft which vanished.
So I wrote this instead out of anger.
What do you think? Does it make up for the one lost to the stroke?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward.
T
First Things
Spread your arms wide.
Take it in, all of it. Open yourself
up to closing suddenly, even unexpectedly.
Then remove the doubt
you came with — yes,
even that doubt which kept you
closed to possibility. You lived
without it, after all; you gave up
hope, wonder both dark and wild-lit,
even fear — even fear,
that precursor to all else;
fear, the wide-eyed amazement.
You let it go.
You gave up so much
that you are afraid
of what will replace it.
You find yourself
having forgotten your name,
immersed deep in the indigo ocean
off a coast you don’t recognize;
it’s a night built upon stars.
Your boat’s getting away from you
and you are miles above the bottom.
You wouldn’t know the bottom if it rose
to greet you, and yet
there must be something down there
to shape this, to hold this.
You have forgotten your name…what a relief!
What ferocious joy is this now?
Who do you dare to become?
This isn’t the end. Only
a new origin, an ecstasy
foaming, fresh in the vast sea;
you are open to it
reforming and refashioning
above inky darkness.
You were born to this.
Joining up
Until I start gearing up again it would be great to have a few more folks join the site. Say, four?
http://patreon.com/TonyBrown
Thanks.
Suicide
Go now. Find your way past
edges and borders. Look into
liminal space for his preferred
edges.
Into his explosive space,
his placement in it; was it central
to him, a fence post of his reason,
a tough stone for logic? He didn’t
seem to know. He kept
his own counsel in all matters
and it fell to him to do no more
than mutter, say “never mind,”
close his eyes, wonder how it all
went together or not. So:
go now. Go to his source
or go alone. Allow him
this one luxury, this response.
Go into the street and sob.
You are not at fault for this.
Wall and Door
Had a floor
Had a wall
Was quite ordinary
Extraordinary
Had a floor
Remarkable linoleum
Supple and flexible
Floor of wonder and ordinariness
Had a wall
Built of swipes and tenderness
Wall of disbelief
Wall of purest slate and demure nature
Really it was nothing
Wall and floor much like normal
Except they held an extraordinary truth
Only to be revealed in an ordinary light
The house has been reviewed
Floor and wall commented upon on Sunday
Left in a wind-rush of regrets
Left behind wall and door and forgetting
The Tiles
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When I’m Sixty-Four
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My Buddy
My buddy Freddy
is an odd duck, or
a weird bird, or perhaps
an unusual animal:
maybe it’s one
from the past and
fits his clothes?
Some folks dress up
like a bird here. They all
act weird. Fits
their clothing choices.
I don’t see it, frankly;
they got to have a reason
and they don’t seem to
have a reason. Just a gem,
a tapstone. Just enough
to keep me free.
That’s not enough, though;
hiding in the dark
is all I have. Meanwhile
Freddy laughs and giggles
about pressure and the gain
of companionship — wait;
that’s not it. That’s not it at all.
He’s lost and in the maze
of relations and old baggage
and it’s all I can do to think
he meant something to me,
and he did, and it’s
nothing at all
that he’s the killer.
Nothing at all. Just the bones
matter now. The bones
of giggling and contention.
The mystery of the stairwell,
and the lost knowledge of the street.
Ever have a friend like Freddy?
He is all the bird I need: flitting elsewhere
and letting the light guide his way. Meanwhile
he’s a menace and I am alone.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T
Desire
Blond — a woman natch, turning heads,
natch, as if there was something unnatural
about it when she looked that damn good. A redheaded woman
in black corsets. A brunette tearing apart
a costume — red, all red;
devil’s curls, lethal eyes,
no trace of a color beyond
brown, auburn, dark brown
lending itself to black.
All of it resistant,
all of it forgettable.
People walk by nonchalant
and let it be.
Blonde, blackhhaired,
red, brown; all the same, all quiet
in the front and noisy
from behind.
Do you. Mind
the gap between
what you want and what
you resist. Disdain
the noise;
let go the folly of lust
and let be the peace of all things.
However It Does
Will now the body down
until it breaks or
shatters with cosmic force
on the sidewalk.
Hold the mind intact until it happens then
let go the last participant
until it is parked and perfect
and there is little to say.
Sit there. Stabilize until the world ends
like a neighbor. Tell
it to people — tell them
an explosion doesn’t matter,
that it doesn’t matter how many die. But it does,
it does. It is of utmost importance.
It stops mattering the moment
the last victim dies:
you see how peace comes to the face,
how it relaxes. You see
how it begins to manifest in the earth
and sky, are struck by it.
You unwind, let it go.
Whatever cataclysm follows, you let it go
on and on. It’s not yours to follow.
You were its engine — no more. Let go.
Let go and let God take it. You
were always reluctant. Now let God
do its part. Whatever you end up
calling it. However it answers.
Birdsong
Canary sings
from the dark mine
until the candle
goes out.
A robin sings
from his perch, his bush
until his light, his shine,
ends.
I go on and on
chattering until
I stop. Then
I start again.
Day or night
I start, I stop.
I begin, I end.
Opening, closing.
When will it end?
Has it begun? Ask
Canary and Robin
how they feel.
They live too short
to compete. If this a game,
I win. A marathon?
I finished. But
if I won? What if
I won? Who cares?
They left singing while I
fell silent, and the songs
fell silent until
other birds took them up
and raised them again
and I stayed silent, marvelling.
Throw Hands
I throw my hands at
the boxing shade before me.
If I were a rich man
I’d hire a champion
as it’s too large a challenge,
I tell myself.
I am
far from rich, like most
just drifting through,
and these hands
I used to depend on
don’t clench right
for that work —
not anymore. Not sure
they ever did.
I swing on
the vaporous. I am
bound to lose, but not yet,
I tell myself;
that time
I connected —
I felt its mist on my skin
as I passed through
and for once that was revival
more than icy warning.
Having flurried at the hands:
were they snow,
were they vapor,
were they something else?
I have lost touch
with what I’m assumed
I’ll connect with.
I’m comfortable for now,
but wait.
Just wait.
Dark Matter 