MORE LOST TIME III
AND WE WONDER WHY
The younger man was left
Responsible for the eight year old
Because mom had to work her shifts
And the unasked went untold
The young woman's relationship
With her relatives were strained
Especially with her mother
Whom she came to blame
They couldn't make it on his check
Working periodically, day labor,
Or claiming unemployment; hell,
He supported the liquor store
And she was taken to a room
Where we don't want to know
What happened to her cartoon.
She hurt a lot, she hurt alone
And the girl was invaded
To withdraw most of all she felt
Except for the dying cry of love
Full of pain inside--it barely helped.
___
A ROSE THE OTHER END
Like Stephen the Saint
Coming through late
To the still beautiful
Yet lifeless face
To pay his tribute
He placed a single stem
A rose the other end
Where the lid lay open
She deferred all gathering
In her own name
To the name of another
The lion of humans.
His hair tied at the back
And labored in a braid
He had turned his bricks
An artist at his trade
I know he's no saint
You can't put anyone on a pedestal
But a good heart is rare these days
It's almost extra-terrestrial.
___
LIKE A HEAD INJURY
I am not alone
In addiction
Called in the medical profession
Poly-substance dependence
In my "religion" it is called
A devil of addictive passions
In science it is called
More than classical conditioning--
Self-habit mirrors an illusion
Identity loses all meaning
Through a million generations
Geared toward dissolution
There is treatment
For those who are willing, able,
And ready to practice
The art of a dying experiment:
All medicine, love, war,
Weather, fires, food, feathers,
Reticence, chances, pleasures, powers,
Wood, drums, chants--together.
___
THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH IT
You had better get ready to die
Because you know it's coming
You know you are alive
And you know what's happening
Any moment can open the end
The same a new beginning
It comes, it goes, and then...
To count there are too many.
You had better get ready to die
Because you know it's coming
You know you are alive
Time is running out--it's running.
___
MOVING AGAIN
Get everything stripped down
Set out, in place,
Then put up in a pile by the door
Load it all early
So when the wake up call comes
I'm ready to roll
I've been dying to these nights
Without planning the next day
It's causing problems all right
This just gave them reason
They feel self-righteous
But they are not enlightened.
Let me live this lesson of the road
Don't let my learning come and go
Without being used and applied,
Practiced and improved.
May I use even those unfortunate conditions
To bend me to the truth.
___
YOU CANNOT HURT THEM
I don't have time for all of this
It's already over, and you never started
Writing on the mirrors of your bliss
Just to miss your plane in Jakarta
I'm sorry for this eventual mess
If that is what it is
I wish everything would have worked out better
But it is just like everything else
Now that nothing is cursed
And nothing is blessed
It's just like I said,
I don't have time for all of this
They've never even heard of Christmas
Waiting on presents to make an appearance
But to exploit the passion of martyrs
Now that nothing is cursed
And nothing is blessed
It's just like I said,
You want a little power in this world
You want a little glory to destroy
You want a little flower for your girl
You want a little story for your boy--
___
NEVER THE DUSK TO OWN
He said the smoke was sacred
Because it represented
Communication with the Dead
The whole sky a spirit--
The smoke streams dispersed
Through the emptiness
Signals from the earth
We're still here in this
He could never comprehend
The shifty-eyed visitor
Uneasy as he could have been
"What could he want from us?"
We do not own
That which he asks of us
It is nature, and we are one.
He cannot possess the dusk.
___
HUNGER PANGS
Sleeplessly,
The night rolls us all by
From the fringes of Cordoba
To the dreams of Rio
Hunger races restlessly
In the braces of necessity
From the warnings of the warrior
To the breaches of the fire
A little coffee, a little tea
All I really need
To help me stay awake
To come to my aid
Cordoba--in its very bricks
The stones of its pathways
Routes of commerce and enterprise
Where there is Business
There are a lot of lies
Though some are sincere and honest
Some are controlled (or less-conscious),
Progeny of primadonnas.
And then there are Rios,
And more than the Rios
Where each one of them flows
No one finally knows.
___
FATHERS
In the name of our fathers
I am sorry for our delay
To make peace
Rather than war to the last day
What superpowers
Could hold us back?
Who would they be
To limit what we lack?
In the name of our fathers
I am sorry for our belief
In idols and idolaters
When they cannot cease our grief,
Or come to our sure rescue
When we are through,
Or re-create our rag-tag crew
From nothingness anew
They cannot save us
From our deep-set envy
Or greed in the bleak dust
From points of divinity
___
SOLD OUT, HOLD OUT (ABSOLUTELY NO EFFECT)
April's another month older--
Time's going so fast
New Year's was only yesterday
And spring is almost over
It was a long, hot summer
The sun burned again
Coming up on the gunners
With his imperial head in the sand
Will they pull out after all?
When will they come home?
After they've answered the call?
Will you disown them all?
It disgusts me to hear them talk
When nothing's done at all,
Nah, bull-shitting with the law
We'll never pay it off--
Strong armed, nothing solved...
His hand is on the trigger
And by this year's end
It'll sell out again, sold out again.
*this was actually written last april
___
BASIC PERCEPTIONS
temporal
motion
moving
morning day
evening night
continuity
sun and stars (quanta)
dark light
spatial
particle-wave
simultaneity
within
emptiness
outward
co-genesis
sounds
silence
particle-wave
non-violence
___
ADAM'S BLUES
I stay sedated on the chronic
They don't want to see me
On Friday night fight nights
I'll be ripping off my shirt
After watching the Supersonics
With one too many gin and tonics
I stay sedated on the chronic
They don't want to see me
On Friday night flying high
I don't need to see
Your rippling vibrations
Crumbling around me
I stay sedated on the chronic
It makes me passive
And smooths the rougher edges
It's hard to believe in diamonds
When mining-shafts collapse
And cars fall with bridges
Yellow camels in the desert
We ride to the Duke of Marlborough
Who shields the crystal
In a sack from the East
Woven by a child who is missing,
Unacquainted with peace:
___
AN UNPROVABLE HYPOTHESIS
What are you gathering
From all this gold-panning?
Time is limited as are all earthly...
Designations, even limitations
By the life that measures,
And frames all observance
Recoils at scales
And their immensity
And, concludes nothing true
Just not dis-proven
Let's keep an open mind here
People, mercy.
___
THE SHADES ARE GETTING DARKER
The shades are getting darker
But they are lingering
In the between states
The middle ground of meanderings
The midway, the limbo strobe-light subways
In the empty dirty cup where you have
No interest and offer no protest
The shades are getting darker
Your people are persevering
In the wrong direction
The traditional, brutal bearings
Engineer genetic dissections
In the empty dirty cut where you have
No interest and offer no protest
The shades are getting darker
They will never close the case
Going cold, another unsolved murder
She's another big name face
Will they let the story rest?
Will we see the last of days?
A new interest, and now there's protest.
___
GENETIC MEMORY (A HELIXFUL OF LOVE)
Genetic memory will strike you down
Or else help to sustain
The instructions within your veins
Or the strange twist of twain
Things come around again
Life is funny that way
In the end, whatever the origins,
What do they say...
Genetics are impersonal
Lawful, ordered, equal,
Correct, judicial,
And supposing the sequel...
Karmic imprints
Like genetic history
A word of truth is in it
Structured scenes, mystery.
Living through them,
With them, and within,
Inside of us, dependence
In living environments.
The younger man was left
Responsible for the eight year old
Because mom had to work her shifts
And the unasked went untold
The young woman's relationship
With her relatives were strained
Especially with her mother
Whom she came to blame
They couldn't make it on his check
Working periodically, day labor,
Or claiming unemployment; hell,
He supported the liquor store
And she was taken to a room
Where we don't want to know
What happened to her cartoon.
She hurt a lot, she hurt alone
And the girl was invaded
To withdraw most of all she felt
Except for the dying cry of love
Full of pain inside--it barely helped.
___
A ROSE THE OTHER END
Like Stephen the Saint
Coming through late
To the still beautiful
Yet lifeless face
To pay his tribute
He placed a single stem
A rose the other end
Where the lid lay open
She deferred all gathering
In her own name
To the name of another
The lion of humans.
His hair tied at the back
And labored in a braid
He had turned his bricks
An artist at his trade
I know he's no saint
You can't put anyone on a pedestal
But a good heart is rare these days
It's almost extra-terrestrial.
___
LIKE A HEAD INJURY
I am not alone
In addiction
Called in the medical profession
Poly-substance dependence
In my "religion" it is called
A devil of addictive passions
In science it is called
More than classical conditioning--
Self-habit mirrors an illusion
Identity loses all meaning
Through a million generations
Geared toward dissolution
There is treatment
For those who are willing, able,
And ready to practice
The art of a dying experiment:
All medicine, love, war,
Weather, fires, food, feathers,
Reticence, chances, pleasures, powers,
Wood, drums, chants--together.
___
THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH IT
You had better get ready to die
Because you know it's coming
You know you are alive
And you know what's happening
Any moment can open the end
The same a new beginning
It comes, it goes, and then...
To count there are too many.
You had better get ready to die
Because you know it's coming
You know you are alive
Time is running out--it's running.
___
MOVING AGAIN
Get everything stripped down
Set out, in place,
Then put up in a pile by the door
Load it all early
So when the wake up call comes
I'm ready to roll
I've been dying to these nights
Without planning the next day
It's causing problems all right
This just gave them reason
They feel self-righteous
But they are not enlightened.
Let me live this lesson of the road
Don't let my learning come and go
Without being used and applied,
Practiced and improved.
May I use even those unfortunate conditions
To bend me to the truth.
___
YOU CANNOT HURT THEM
I don't have time for all of this
It's already over, and you never started
Writing on the mirrors of your bliss
Just to miss your plane in Jakarta
I'm sorry for this eventual mess
If that is what it is
I wish everything would have worked out better
But it is just like everything else
Now that nothing is cursed
And nothing is blessed
It's just like I said,
I don't have time for all of this
They've never even heard of Christmas
Waiting on presents to make an appearance
But to exploit the passion of martyrs
Now that nothing is cursed
And nothing is blessed
It's just like I said,
You want a little power in this world
You want a little glory to destroy
You want a little flower for your girl
You want a little story for your boy--
___
NEVER THE DUSK TO OWN
He said the smoke was sacred
Because it represented
Communication with the Dead
The whole sky a spirit--
The smoke streams dispersed
Through the emptiness
Signals from the earth
We're still here in this
He could never comprehend
The shifty-eyed visitor
Uneasy as he could have been
"What could he want from us?"
We do not own
That which he asks of us
It is nature, and we are one.
He cannot possess the dusk.
___
HUNGER PANGS
Sleeplessly,
The night rolls us all by
From the fringes of Cordoba
To the dreams of Rio
Hunger races restlessly
In the braces of necessity
From the warnings of the warrior
To the breaches of the fire
A little coffee, a little tea
All I really need
To help me stay awake
To come to my aid
Cordoba--in its very bricks
The stones of its pathways
Routes of commerce and enterprise
Where there is Business
There are a lot of lies
Though some are sincere and honest
Some are controlled (or less-conscious),
Progeny of primadonnas.
And then there are Rios,
And more than the Rios
Where each one of them flows
No one finally knows.
___
FATHERS
In the name of our fathers
I am sorry for our delay
To make peace
Rather than war to the last day
What superpowers
Could hold us back?
Who would they be
To limit what we lack?
In the name of our fathers
I am sorry for our belief
In idols and idolaters
When they cannot cease our grief,
Or come to our sure rescue
When we are through,
Or re-create our rag-tag crew
From nothingness anew
They cannot save us
From our deep-set envy
Or greed in the bleak dust
From points of divinity
___
SOLD OUT, HOLD OUT (ABSOLUTELY NO EFFECT)
April's another month older--
Time's going so fast
New Year's was only yesterday
And spring is almost over
It was a long, hot summer
The sun burned again
Coming up on the gunners
With his imperial head in the sand
Will they pull out after all?
When will they come home?
After they've answered the call?
Will you disown them all?
It disgusts me to hear them talk
When nothing's done at all,
Nah, bull-shitting with the law
We'll never pay it off--
Strong armed, nothing solved...
His hand is on the trigger
And by this year's end
It'll sell out again, sold out again.
*this was actually written last april
___
BASIC PERCEPTIONS
temporal
motion
moving
morning day
evening night
continuity
sun and stars (quanta)
dark light
spatial
particle-wave
simultaneity
within
emptiness
outward
co-genesis
sounds
silence
particle-wave
non-violence
___
ADAM'S BLUES
I stay sedated on the chronic
They don't want to see me
On Friday night fight nights
I'll be ripping off my shirt
After watching the Supersonics
With one too many gin and tonics
I stay sedated on the chronic
They don't want to see me
On Friday night flying high
I don't need to see
Your rippling vibrations
Crumbling around me
I stay sedated on the chronic
It makes me passive
And smooths the rougher edges
It's hard to believe in diamonds
When mining-shafts collapse
And cars fall with bridges
Yellow camels in the desert
We ride to the Duke of Marlborough
Who shields the crystal
In a sack from the East
Woven by a child who is missing,
Unacquainted with peace:
___
AN UNPROVABLE HYPOTHESIS
What are you gathering
From all this gold-panning?
Time is limited as are all earthly...
Designations, even limitations
By the life that measures,
And frames all observance
Recoils at scales
And their immensity
And, concludes nothing true
Just not dis-proven
Let's keep an open mind here
People, mercy.
___
THE SHADES ARE GETTING DARKER
The shades are getting darker
But they are lingering
In the between states
The middle ground of meanderings
The midway, the limbo strobe-light subways
In the empty dirty cup where you have
No interest and offer no protest
The shades are getting darker
Your people are persevering
In the wrong direction
The traditional, brutal bearings
Engineer genetic dissections
In the empty dirty cut where you have
No interest and offer no protest
The shades are getting darker
They will never close the case
Going cold, another unsolved murder
She's another big name face
Will they let the story rest?
Will we see the last of days?
A new interest, and now there's protest.
___
GENETIC MEMORY (A HELIXFUL OF LOVE)
Genetic memory will strike you down
Or else help to sustain
The instructions within your veins
Or the strange twist of twain
Things come around again
Life is funny that way
In the end, whatever the origins,
What do they say...
Genetics are impersonal
Lawful, ordered, equal,
Correct, judicial,
And supposing the sequel...
Karmic imprints
Like genetic history
A word of truth is in it
Structured scenes, mystery.
Living through them,
With them, and within,
Inside of us, dependence
In living environments.