night night (24 February 2006.1)

night, night, i'll rejoice when i hold you tight
when i have you for my own, when i'm in you
when you receive me deep down and far inside
all that you are, all that you know, all that i give
beside you, below you, beneath your freshness
i, enmeshed in the wondrous succulence of you
wandering about in the aqueos light of your form
i want you beyond all wanting
i need you beyond all needing
i urge myself to go and have you for my own
as you lay beside me, welcoming me into your place
giving me leave to take you into my arms
and love all that you are, every night, all my life.

Copyright 2006.

6 August 1997.1a

he was on the phone
in the sun
trying to reach her
through the electric lines
through the rubber
through the copper
the tin
silver platinum
the microwaves
resistors
amperage
standing at the phone booth
along the busy Boulevard
people passing thinking
'he's probably a drug dealer'
calling his target, his supplier
what scum
on the phone,
at a phone booth
on Foothill Boulevard
right across the street from Memorial Park.
Ah, yes.
Memorial Park.
What a coincidence.
The first phone he came to
the first phone he thought he could use to connect
the first phone that worked
the first, no the second phone, that didn't
make the connection
she's gone
in the air
in the plane
on donner, on blitzen on dancer
on to New York
to Aussie land
to greatness
to what she is
to ... where ... exactly
to him
half a world away
cold
beautiful
....
disconnected by a crutch
an electronic crutch
in the days of letters
and no air‑mail
were loves disconnected though
miles a part ...
one hundred miles
might as well have been 20,000 miles
connections are not simply about
tactile touch
visual cues
but about understand
awareness
reception
a clean window
the view cannot be blocked by mountains
if the window is open

yes, Love
the window is open
i cannot shutter it
cannot
cannot
my hands are able to shutter it
my arms can hang blackness between us
but i cannot
you have me because you want me
keys to a door?
no need
nor even possible
to enter
to re‑arrange the furniture
to re‑decorate
there is, my friend
no door.
never has been
never will be
not within me
not within you
not within anyone
i feel
the power of the Sun setting
is that you can see it
the power of the Sun setting
lies not in breaking into the core
only to be instantly vaporized from
the nuclear reaction
only to be consumed and used up
the power of the Sun setting
or rising
a clear line of sight
you have that
and a clear line of sight
requires that one look
we do that
we look

my friend
there are no mirrors in the soul
there are no t.v. monitors
no video tapes of what we are now
but there is feeling
there is sensation
there is reception of what we see in each other's windows
and when the windows are in sync
straight on
without angular reflection
what we see is the honest reflection of us, our impact our self
we are warmed by the warmth we convey

it takes a very great person to sense their own warmth and
carry on even when that warmth isn't radiated back
your greatness is apparent,
warm and sweet
when no one will allow you to see them,
when they are so out of sync the reflected radiation is so distorted
it cannot be you

close the shutters.
allow the warmth to reflect back upon yourself
warm yourself
you are the Sun
you are the Moon
you are a Star of such brilliance
and magnetism
that my universe is now realigned
and moving closer
hoping that, when you feel the heat on the outside of the shutters
you will know that i am there
and that what you will see
when you open them again
is the warmth we create, share and thrive upon

"It is the heart with one sees rightly. What is essential is invisible
to the eye."

1 August 1997.1a

fundamentally we live within
what we are
surrounded by those who cannot see
but what they are
and when we find, stumble upon
trip over
are knocked down by
one who vibrates at a complimentary
frequency,
so that their soul
does not disturb the concentric
ripples of our own life
but drops seamlessly into the center
a bulls eye
causing not identical but complimentary
ripples across the watery flexibility
of the surface of our soul
then,
from the bottom
of the clear blue lake
we can still see the sun
and the stars
through our own eyes,
but with the amplification and power
also
of their own,
and they too feel us
being with us
in between us
in between them
and the ripples never stop
always resonating and reverberating
until, at long last
the water is clear
smooth and flat
and the energy from the sun
and the moon and their stars
warms us,
feeds us
and shows us the light within
our selves
that the waves had always known would
erupt when they were gone

23 August 2011.1

I am the Walrus, I am the Sun
I am the Breeze that Fans the Flames of Love
I am the Light, I am the Dark Dead of Night
I am What You Need and What You Want and
I am Laughter and Joy and Mirth Among Children.

I am your Conscience, I am your Free Will
I am the Song of the Bird Chortling in Victory
I am What I want and What Is Good and New.

If You Want Us to Be, If You Know Us as We Are, There Will Be Beauty
There Will Be Song, There Will Be Melodic and Mesmerizing Verse
And, the Celebrations Will Not Die, the Gatherings Will Not Disperse
The Creations Will Not Cease to Amaze, Entrance and Reward
And, We Will Have a World of Rewards and Lives Happy Together.

17 August 2011.1

Oh, you of little faith,
You of doubting persona
You who wonder how God
Made all these horrific mistakes.

Oh, you who love the wind and the sun
You who know the good of even the vile
You who understand rain and cold
And, you, who need not tolerate adversity.

Give me a hand, Give me a shout.
Please help me to bring a change
Bring a fervor to life that has been missing
And, find a friend in all of this dislocation.

Help us all, together, in concert
To keep the flow going
To keep our families celebrating
To leave something behind we can enjoy when we return.

31 Dec 97.2

there exists in the freshly
cut rose
a sure sweetness
a surety that sweetness
will emerge through you
as surely as the bees converge
in their dance before
the mating begins
before the honey flows
before the energy of life
burst magically upon
that delicious scene of
greeness, yellow daffodils
and the brightly painted
faces of little children at
the merry-go-round
and their laughter
filling the air and the hearts
and the spirit of millions
of those who before
them made these routines
for happiness
for joy
for the pure exuberance of
being
these things were not made
for you or me or for those
men, and yes, women
in the offices to put upon their
billboards, in the super markets
or to use as adornment for their
very important desks
this joy,
those thorns that prick
and the blood that trickles
from them onto the newly
laundered white play dress
are but the perfect
and plainly good examples
of the essence of life
the magic of breath
and the expectation of elation

Ahhhhh, the beauty brought by Spring. What is more beautiful than the fragrant, undulating rose? Just my love. Just my love. Just, my, Love.

Oh, it's Spring and your essence brings me to song,
Brings me to celebration and boisterous rejoicing,
Leads me to jump, to shout, to run all about,
And, leaves me so breathless I fear the end is nearly near.

Oh, the Daffodils are braving their merry heads,
Heading towards the sky, loving you all the while,
Knowing that when you glance their way,
Every One who passes by will sing their praises, Oh My!

And even the Winds do put on a lusty show,
Blowing your love here and there, and virtually everywhere,
Hoping that some of it will rub off on the sky
And, in the end all of us will be happier, for having loved you
Bye and Bye.

3 March 2011

what's the matter with you?  what the matter with me?
where's those things we worry about so needlessly?

you're a marvelous one, so sumptuous, so bold, so wonderful to hold,
no matter what's the matter with you, with me, with eternity,
no matter what may seem like it may stop the game we now play,
no matter whatever else we may be down that long road of destiny.

there's not a thing worth the fuss, worth muss, worth our dying breaths,
that will not resolve into the laughter and merriment of our pasts,
nothing that will come to be less than we are, less than we glow,
less than the joys, triumphs and eternal celebration we so richly deserve

take this time, if you will please, to recognize the beauty you immortalize
take this moment, i implore you now, to stand up and beam your gentle love
rejoice in the knowledge that all that you are you brought here into life
and, regardless of what we will make, where we will be

i so thoroughly, and for all eternity, do, indeed, love thee.

16 December 2010.1

This Ain’t So Bad



I love it here. I love the light. I love the wind and the sun and the sounds.

I love all that there is and all that there could be.

And, yes, indeed I do love the sumptuousness of thee.

No matter your problems, no matter mine.

No matter the seriousness from which we sometimes think we’ll just die.



We ought to run around, and sing and shout and have a grand time.

Reveling in what we’ve got and the time we can make to take it all in.

Rolling down the hill into the arms of yonder rambling stream.

Basking on the slopes of the mountains that fuel our fantasies with its view.



Let’s just live in love. Let’s just find the harmony in what we can.

Let’s just know the time to see each other breathe and sigh.

Happy to know that we are in love with a beautiful girl, a sweet guy.

And, frolicking through the tall grasses we’ve found on the side of the road …

… where we stopped just for a moment to savor just this.
 
 
12 July 2010 A

as sweet as your bosom always seems to me now
the light of your soul is far sweeter
and the succulence of our hands twined together
fills the aches of my voids from which love
had long since seemed to have evaporated
until that sumptuousness of our first syllable together

30 January 2008

This day in the Fall, the Sun shining bright

I adore you against the clouds, on through the twilight.

18 September 2008

Incite


 incite me to learning, incite me to love, to yearning, to the heart's palpitations that men can but live a mere second without

 incite in my passions the desire to know all that there is to know about you, how you tick, how your heart beats when i am near

 incite in the lovers around you the desire to be the best for their loves that they can be, that they can imagine, that they can feel

 incite in these words the dedication of one who can know no further, no better, no more immaculately conceived feeling than the touch of your warming hand in winter.



 and, my dear, my friend, my long lost companion, please play for me that soul's music, the poetry of the blessed, or the children at play

 play for the scores that are wrought from the effervescence flowing from Mt. Olympus down into the valleys at noon

 down into the streets and the cafe's where the workmen, the washer women, the mothers and fathers take their mid-day meal

 thankful and relieved that they have, this day, met with the love that they had waited upon for so long, for all those years when they had no hope.




 yes, please, concoct those verses, those melodies, those rhythms that play on long into the night, wafting through my heart's strings, setting me to singing

 setting me to a chorus of accolades for the brilliance that i have felt through the reeds that blow upon the lake's shores,

 in the warm days of spring, just before the Sun's setting moments bring me back to the recognition that it is your touch that brought me here

 it is my searching for you that has kept me going on into the night, into the days, into the creations that guaranteed my joys would overtake my cries and disappointments.




 incite me to playing that wondrous song that flows all around us when we are hidden beneath our bedclothes, snuggled against the cold

 snuggled against the uncertainties that others have tried to impress upon us, others have tried to make us believe are the hallmark of love

 others have not recognized are nothing to do with love, but rather the traitorous lies of the few that would separate us, would have us forsake our future

 the future which, because we have been brave enough to love, no matter what, we have now found assures us a blessed and beautiful life in the arms of the one we love as if they were life itself.

29 January 2010.1

I think this scene is perfectly marvelous. And, I don't know where it is. Or even, for that matter, if it is a "real" scene. What with the ability of artists and technicians to concoct all manner of seeming reality out of 'whole cloth' (as people were wont to say at one time), one could take the pessimistic view and lose the pleasure of seeing a beautiful scene merely because it might not be "real". Real or not, I like it.

Now, for those fascinated (or worried) by the question of whether a "real" experience is better or more to be preferred than an "imaginary" experience (or perhaps more accurately, an "imagined experience") -- which should not be confused with the question of whether the content of a drug induced involunatry hallucination is "real" -- it seems to me that the question of whether "imagination" is as good as "reality" makes a fundamental assumption about the nature of "reality" which just may be false. I think that those people who vehemently insist that there is just ONE reality, and it is the SAME reality for everyone, are the same people who insist that we, human beings, are nothing but a remarkably complex collection of atoms, electrical charges and chemical interactions and that we have no uniquely, and non-corporeal, 'mental' or 'spiritual' component. In other words, there is no "ghost in the machine" (or deus ex machina). The machine simply runs itself. Of course, the assumption --- and it is an assumption --- that one must prove the existence of an un-seeable soul, spirit or other non-corporeal agent, for the simple reason that one can't see it, really ends the inquiry before it starts. If you're interested in this kind of inquiry, you really have to ask yourself from the get-go, why it is that you assume that you've got to be able to see, touch, taste, smell, hit, gouge, run over and otherwise mechanically manipulate in order for "it" to be "real"?

So, to bring this 'round back to where I started ... while writing this post, I realized that part of what makes this photograph/representation so inviting is, for me anyway, that it actually represents a "real" scene which has been 'created' and actually exists in the firmament. I'd still think it is a pretty and impressive bit of art work even if it were made from 'whole cloth'. But, for me, its (presumed) representational nature makes a difference in how thorougly I enjoy viewing this scene.

In "Don't Fact-Check the Soul" (New York Times, April 29, 2008), Rosanne Cash observes that creativity is "outside" linear time and that commitment and diligence are more valuable, and productive, than infatuation, or as she calls it, youthful inspiration.

And, she's right. The supposition that everything we do, say, or feel must be a 'confession', or a reflection of some unyielding superstructure which exists entirely independently of our mark, our contribution our development of IT, is a misguided Freudian-style bias which wholly robs the soul of its power to create life, beauty and harmony.

We --- each of us, and all of us together --- are the creators of what there is, how it is conceived and what comes "after" now. Someone who is inclined to wallow in victim-hood would demur, I am sure. But, the fact remains that we aren't mere observers of what has been set in motion by forces greater than ourselves and which runs independently of our contribution to it. We are the authors of life, the architects of beauty and the managers of our self-directed fates.

Don't look for the truth. Create it.

Mother Earth, much like old Mother Hubbard who lived in a shoe, with so many children she didn't know quite what to do, is groaning from her childrens' wanton fertility. Today, January 30, 2008, it is reported in the New York Times that it is estimated that Mother's children will increase from 6.6 billion today to 9 billion in 2050 -- an increase of 2.4 billion souls in 42 years.

I suppose if you're a PC maker, chewing gum manufacturer, software vendor or pharmaceutical manufacturer, this news will be met with great relish and renewed vigor to plan on how to profit from this inevitable invading horde.

But, what if you are someone who relishes open, unspoiled, unregulated, naturally majestic and aesthetically and spiritually inspiring spaces? What are you to do? How can you preserve your dreams without seeming to be (or being) reactionary? Is it inevitable that crowding, poverty, squalor, division and discord become the norm? Do we have any right to load Mother down so thoroughly that we return to the medieval norm, in which, as Thomas Hobbes put it, life was "nasty, brutish and short"? Do we, in other words, have the right to shirk our responsibility to leave future generations with some fighting chance of creating good, worthwhile, reasonably pleasing and productive lives?

Is is right that we escape our bodies, knowing that in our wake, we left our Mother bedraggled, besotted, bereft and not even a little bemused?

Saving our Mother from an iniquitous future, which will almost certainly involve mass genocides the likes of which no rational sane being willingly contemplates, is a little like a weight-loss diet or improving your health after a long endorsement of indolence and irresponsibility and sloth: You have to take it one step at a time, on a gradient. But, if you don't get started, no matter how long it will take you, no matter if you have no idea how to reach your goal, or exactly in what direction it lays, then your good intentions, as the saying goes, will "pave the path to Hell".

So, let's get started. One gradient step at a time. Let's make our Mother proud. Stop our bickering, maligning, carping and complaining. Get along. Join in the one goal that each of us must share, if we share anything at all ... and that is to leave Mother better off than she was when we first laid eyes on her. Let's all, each of us in his or her own way, leave the world a little better off than when we got here and, when we come back, we'll surely be glad we did.

“We act as though comfort and luxury were the chief requirements of life, when all that we need to make us really happy is something to be enthusiastic about”

Charles Kingsley

Today, I would like to grant myself the honor of paying tribute, as it were, to a fellow of my acquaintance, David St. Lawrence. David is a wonderful chap, cheerful, intelligent, hard working, good company and married to a lovely woman named Gretchen. David and Gretchen live in the hills and valleys of southwestern Virginia near the town of Floyd.

I say 'grant myself the honor', because I believe that it is my honor to have had the fortuity to meet and spend a few days of my life in David and Gretchen's home and environs. Why? Well, that's a good question. I'm not exactly sure I can explicate, in an organized concatenation of symbols and spaces -- in words -- why, exactly, I like having met David. Actually, why I like David and find him a valuable fellow.

(Which is, a lot, different than merely liking to have met him. You could have liked to have met someone because they are much uglier than you are, and it made you feel better to know there is someone worse off in the world, in terms of ugliness, than you are. Mind you, however, David is not ugly, but a rather handsome chap in his own right -- which I feel I must make clear lest someone skate through this tribute over quickly and draw an invalid inference.)

In any event, David and Gretchen live in a lovely and charming home just suited for the two of them and their two cats, Buffy, who is a sweet, cream colored, friendly and appreciative tiny cat, and Sherman. Sherman doesn't socialize much with those he doesn't know very, very well, so I really never got to learn much about Sherman, except that he is diffident, or timid, or shy or whatever the appropriate term might be. And, he is pure black. I also hear, through the grapevine that he is a more than passable hunter, and has recently taken pains to show David so. David, Gretchen and the cats live on a good sized parcel of property, once covered uniformly in trees and assorted creations of nature, but which now sports a central clearing within which they built their home a few years ago.

I suppose the best way I could describe David and Gretchen's home, from my point of view, obviously, is to say that it is well-ordered, peaceful, welcome and creative respite from the turmoil and strife and vagaries of the world. One feels, when one is at David's and Gretchen's home as if the world is alright and, despite the horrific matters that seem to threaten to inundate us all every day should we pay too much attention to the "press", everything will be alright. You feel, when you are around David and Gretchen, in other words, that "It's all good." as a friend of mind is wont to say.

I'm afraid I could, however, write for eons and not tell you enough salient facts about David to give you a full enough understanding of him and his nuances and the goodness which he brings to the world, and so, what I figured I'd do is let you see David for himself, by providing you this link to his very own blog:

Making Ripples

I invite you to make the acquaintance of Mr. David St. Lawrence and to join those many others who have found that David acknowledges portions of themselves which they had forgotten, or never had known, existed.

Cheers and salutations ....

It was a rather conservatively adorned day. Not too bright. Not too dark. "Just", as the baby bear is said to have said, "right". Oh, well, it wouldn't have been just right if you fancy a nice clear sky bright blue sun blazing kind of day. Today, however, I'd have felt even more depressed than I already was, had I had to suffer one of those glorious bright blue clear sky days. All I wanted, and perhaps all I needed, was some peace and quiet, some insulation from the spiritual -- or perhaps 'metaphysical' -- noise that almost invariably seems to pervade my subjective universe when I'm walking near where I work. And, it seemed like that is what I was going to get. At least until I rounded the corner and spotted him. That same fellow who has darkened my path many another day. That homeless street dwelling fellow loudly hawking the "Street Sense" newspaper on the street for "just one dollar". He is very loud and very invasive and makes you (or me, at any rate) feel as if I've committed some crime against humanity by passing him by without having contributed a dollar to him. I find myself having this conversation in my head in which he insists that it is my moral duty to buy this rag, this paper, even though I have not the slightest interest in what it is "reporting", for the simple reason that it costs "only" a dollar. And, then I feel bad and come up with a 'rational argument' in my head why I shouldn't have to buy it, and why he should get a job and why it is bothersome of him to stand in the driveway of the CVS and slow people down before they get to their cars in order to guilt-trip them into paying for something that 'no one' wants.

It doesn't matter whether I'm "right", whether he's "right", whether my imagination is over active or whether he's selling the next Pulitzer prize winning short story. What mattered to me, today, is that, instead of being left alone, I had to walk by his contribution to the metaphysical noise that I so desperately wanted to avoid.

Next time, when I first catch sight of Mr. Street Sense, I'll turn right around and walk all the way 'round the block in the other direction. That'll teach him!

Today is a new day. Of course it is. But, in particular, it is a new day for this, Magic Poet, blog. Up until now, I've treated it, more or less, as a neglected step child ... yearning for my attention, which I only sparingly meted out with the most stingy of dispositions. No wonder it never gave me anything back. And, in addition, I suppose I treated it like a disguise, instead of a river from which to wave to my friends and meet new adventures.

I'd quote some Emerson now, to the effect that I'm happy if I've changed one life for the better. But that would be entirely too erudite (and perhaps even using the word "erudite" is too erudite) and possibly pedantic (another one of those words) for this forum (or should I call it a "venue"?). And, it wouldn't be true. I won't be happy, at the end of my current life if all I've done is improve the life of one being, besides myself. A tiny little goal like that is a bit like admitting that you're a failure before you even get started. Goals were meant to be big. Life is meant to be lived. Not shyly diffident, but with head-high-chest-out-balls-to-the-wall-gusto.