Be you, as serene as a cat
watching you for clues. Be you,
twitching internally; be you,
itching all over with phantom illness.
Try and do otherwise, for once;

be someone else
if you can. Assume their virtues
as the old man once recommended;
be all they can be, could be.
It’s all you can do, after all.

If you are truly committed
to it, you could try and become
a worm, or a snake wriggling archaically
on the earth. Become a robin
or some other bird — perhaps
a hawk, an eagle of some exotic sort?
It doesn’t matter much anyway.

In the end you will fade off
in the near distance, almost
as if you couldn’t be bothered
to try another form. Resigned
to what you are, you will become
sorrow to your loved ones.
Animal or not, you will be loved…

it does not matter much to the earth.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

Last night
was a powerful dream.

Got up and out of bed ordinarily enough.
Got to shower and shave and then I just sat
till breakfast, after which I sat some more.

Did not read; I can’t. Did not play guitar;
I can’t, not to my liking. I sat like a
television guru, waiting for it to come
to me, and it didn’t.

Nothing came to me.
The dream was that nothing came to me
and I wanted it to
but some force,
some divine force or wind
or other kamikaze memory
kept it from me
and I woke up stifling
under the bedclothes
longing for anything at all to come by,
shaking like a poplar leaf
or quaking like a bog;
anything in motion would be enough.

Motion excites me, riles me up.
I am awake enough
to go into motion —
tai chi would be ecstasy,
even breathing at all under tension
would be good;

anything except this stasis,
this indecision
that pins me to the hollow in my bed
and keeps me there alone

until I fling back the covers
and let something, anything come to me,
so that I may stop the holy breath
of just living and rest easy in the stillness
of being complete
as in a dream,
a powerful dream.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

Wake up most days
and add a poem to the list
in hopes of stirring
something…

Wake up most days
and add a poem to the stock
in hopes of simmering
something…

Wake up most days
and add a poem to the life
in hopes of stopping
something…

Maybe one day
I’ll know what needs stopping.
Maybe some day
it will just stop…

and I will say,
finished. There, I’m
done with
all that…

Somewhere there will be
one poem left unfinished and they
will claim: his fault, entirely.
Everyone will blame me…

but friend, it won’t be my choice
to leave it unsung. It will sit there
like a bird on my fading face,
staring at the next person up,

waiting to sing…waiting
for you to sing. Waiting
for anyone to say a word
of it to anyone…
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

Up at the top of the hill,
at the top of Ledyard Street
where a few big houses are,
they are saying their prayers.

Up on the hill,
lower down but still up there,
at the crossing of Ledyard and Lesser
where rundown gentility is obvious,
they are wringing their hands.

At the lower shelf of the hill,
where Leper Road merges with
what came above them, with what streets
led them to here — Ledyard, Lesser,
all the rest — they are done
with their praying,
finished with their wringing.

On Main Street now where
the Salvadoran restaurant ekes out
a living, where the bakeries
close early and the tired workers
hurry home, where you are now —

on the main street where
nothing haunts the brains of
the unhoused like memories
of the times they had on
Ledyard, Lesser, and Leper;
insistence on failed nights
of pledged commitment
and a whispered promise
to do better next visit
comes empty from your lips.

You know, right now,
that you will not come back.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

Gray day outside, cars starting up
and receding as they leave you
alone. You wave at them from
behind the shades and fool yourself
into thinking it matters, though you know
it does not.

Alone; none of the furniture
matters, none of the floors matter,
none of anything at all matters
one bit. You could sit here
for hours and no one would know;
no one would have even a reason
to care.

Turn the lights off and do not
show yourself to the people.
They won’t trouble themselves
with knowing. They won’t even
trouble themselves with not knowing
you are drowning in their oblivion.

Something was left out,
was allegedly inevitable,
was supposed to happen.

Outside it’s getting
inexorably brighter.

It must mean something.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T