xxxxx - take care

 

xxxxx

it sings because the middle is an end and end beginning new

 

 
 
 
 

take care and

 

don’t take something unless you know the place for it

the world speaks in degrees of appropriateness

 

such that, a thing in its place

isn’t proper unless it’s true

 

attention reveals itself in the shape of thoughts

and thoughts formed in subjects discerned

 

in this, to each person the world speaks in worlds

calling through promises in the thoughts and things about us

 

the world speaks in degrees of appropriateness

we hope you will know by the whispers within you

 

take care

 

 

 
 
 

 

the products of reason belong to no one.

possessing, through the illusion of their possession,

the possessed become consumed with their consumptions.

and injustice is freed where mercy risks the surety of giving

in the form of credit that give the world its shape,

and shape it to its reasons.

 

xxxxix - prelude to its ending

 

49

no home prime

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a prelude to its ending

is ever where we are    

entitled

comfortable creatures

throwing tantrums 

shapes a privilege  

around the inside ocean heaving

with the winds

slowly

is greatly

assured

rising in its undulating

waves

your prow is gilded be sure

the lifeboats have two oars

people

are

weakness

is what we see because

we are predators all

the strength in the world comes

in two forms what

we fear and what's

invisible 

so skyward

heaves the sea equal with

momentum to its falling

it knows

neither

tumult or peace a measure as

if reaching for

itself drawn

flat at its own end 

a prelude

to

the horizons pull

is the romance of our ending 

 

 
 
 
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The Season of Phantasmal Peace

Then all the nations of birds lifted together

the huge net of the shadows of this earth

in multitudinous dialects, twittering tongues,

stitching and crossing it. They lifted up

the shadows of long pines down trackless slopes,

the shadows of glass-faced towers down evening streets,

the shadow of a frail plant on a city sill—

the net rising soundless as night, the birds' cries soundless, until

there was no longer dusk, or season, decline, or weather,

only this passage of phantasmal light

that not the narrowest shadow dared to sever.

And men could not see, looking up, what the wild geese drew,

what the ospreys trailed behind them in silvery ropes

that flashed in the icy sunlight; they could not hear

battalions of starlings waging peaceful cries,

bearing the net higher, covering this world

like the vines of an orchard, or a mother drawing

the trembling gauze over the trembling eyes

of a child fluttering to sleep;

                                                     it was the light

that you will see at evening on the side of a hill

in yellow October, and no one hearing knew

what change had brought into the raven's cawing,

the killdeer's screech, the ember-circling chough

such an immense, soundless, and high concern

for the fields and cities where the birds belong,

except it was their seasonal passing, Love,

made seasonless, or, from the high privilege of their birth,

something brighter than pity for the wingless ones

below them who shared dark holes in windows and in houses,

and higher they lifted the net with soundless voices

above all change, betrayals of falling suns,

and this season lasted one moment, like the pause

between dusk and darkness, between fury and peace,

but, for such as our earth is now, it lasted long.

Derek Walcott

xxxxviii - a prison of simplicity

 
 

xxxxviii

composites composed

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This is the Wartime Broadcasting Service. This country has been attacked with nuclear weapons. Communications have been severely disrupted, and the number of casualties and the extent of the damage are not yet known. We shall bring you further information as soon as possible. Meanwhile, stay tuned to this wavelength, stay calm and stay in your own homes.

Remember there is nothing to be gained by trying to get away. By leaving your homes you could be exposing yourselves to greater danger.

If you leave, you may find yourself without food, without water, without accommodation and without protection. Radioactive fall-out, which follows a nuclear explosion, is many times more dangerous if you are directly exposed to it in the open. Roofs and walls offer substantial protection. The safest place is indoors.

Make sure gas and other fuel supplies are turned off and that all fires are extinguished. If mains water is available, this can be used for fire-fighting. You should also refill all your containers for drinking water after the fires have been put out, because the mains water supply may not be available for very long.

Water must not be used for flushing lavatories: until you are told that lavatories may be used again, other toilet arrangements must be made. Use your water only for essential drinking and cooking purposes. Water means life. Don't waste it.

Make your food stocks last: ration your supply, because it may have to last for 14 days or more. If you have fresh food in the house, use this first to avoid wasting it: food in tins will keep.

If you live in an area where a fall-out warning has been given, stay in your fall-out room until you are told it is safe to come out. When the immediate danger has passed the sirens will sound a steady note. The "all clear" message will also be given on this wavelength. If you leave the fall-out room to go to the lavatory or replenish food or water supplies, do not remain outside the room for a minute longer than is necessary.

Do not, in any circumstances, go outside the house. Radioactive fall-out can kill. You cannot see it or feel it, but it is there. If you go outside, you will bring danger to your family and you may die. Stay in your fall-out room until you are told it is safe to come out or you hear the "all clear" on the sirens.

Here are the main points again:

Stay in your own homes, and if you live in an area where a fall-out warning has been given stay in your fall-out room, until you are told it is safe to come out. The message that the immediate danger has passed will be given by the sirens and repeated on this wavelength. Make sure that the gas and all fuel supplies are turned off and that all fires are extinguished.

Water must be rationed, and used only for essential drinking and cooking purposes. It must not be used for flushing lavatories. Ration your food supply: it may have to last for 14 days or more.

e shall repeat this broadcast in two hours' time. Stay tuned to this wavelength, but switch your radios off now to save your batteries until we come on the air again. That is the end of this broadcast.

BBC TRANSCRIPT TO BE USED IN WAKE OF NUCLEAR ATTACK 

 

xxxxvii - the stranger

 

xxxxvi

prime trekker


 
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stranger

is the the

 

when we are

when we are not

not not

it

 

a thing repeated

is a thing the same

 

renewed

once again itself

first though

it didn’t know - it was like - it wasn’t so

and there was no one there

so new anew surprise turned tears beware

when no one first became

strange shape no name

the stranger is an anything

can any thing be stranger?

 

we fear to tread

our path was true

we have our normal things to do

the stranger though is always new

the stranger though is always new

and reared its shape and one becomes now two

what dream is this?

surreal strange the stranger’s ask

made heart-mad made

made shimmers in the body of our air

the stranger stood both here and there

where else nowhere the stranger was there everywhere

where any-when is anywhere

though anywhere was not the stranger

as anywhere might be

as anywhere might be a place

and placed we’d place

should something move or do

the thing again would no more surely show

forgotten where our mirrored shadow

 

the stranger is never itself

and plays no game

the stranger is never itself

so wish it never was speaks surety survival

collapsed our hearts and eyes on points of curious flew

there’s no escape save know to know

the stranger prods us go

so go we go

and go we go

our going goes

us going both

both different and the same

 

 

a thing repeated

is a thing

renewed the same

again once itself

first though

it didn’t know

it wasn’t like it wasn’t so

and there was no one there to show

a paper rips to scare

so new anew surprise turned tears beware

when no one first was named

strange shape it then became

the stranger is an anything

can any thing be stranger?

we tread to fear

our true was path’d

we have our normal things to pass

the stranger though is always rare

the stranger though is always rare

and reared its shape and one becomes now two

what dream is this?

surreal asks strange in stranger’s ask

mad heart-made mad

made shimmers in the body of our air

the stranger stood both here and there

the stranger stood both here and there

where else nowhere the stranger there was everywhere

where any where is anywhere

though anywhere was not the stranger

as anywhere might be

as anywhere might be a place

and placed we’d place

should something move or do

the thing again would no more surely show

forgotten like our mirror’s low

 

the stranger is never

and plays no game

the stranger is never

so wish never it was speaks surety survival

collapsed our hearts and eyes on points curious flew

there’s no escape save know to know

the stranger prods us go

so go we go

and go we go

our going goes

us going both

both different and the same

 

 

 

 
 
 

 

“SECRETS ON THE WAY”

Daylight struck the face of one who wept.

He received a livelier dream

but did not wake.

Darkness struck the face of one who walked

among the others in the sun’s strong

impatient rays.

Suddenly it turned dark as in a downpour.

I stood in a room that held every moment -

a butterfly museum.

And still the sun is as strong as before.

Its impatient brushes painted the world.

Tomas Tranströmer

 

xxxxiii - drips tall skies

 
 

xxxxiii

Shri Yantra

 
 
 
 
 
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good poetry begins with
the lightest touch,
a breeze arriving from nowhere,
a whispered healing arrival,
a word in your ear,
a settling into things,
then, like a hand in the dark,
it arrests the whole body,
steeling you for revelation.

in the silence that follows
a great line,
you can feel Lazarus,
deep inside
even the laziest, most deathly afraid
part of you,
lift up his hands and walk toward the light.

David Whyte

 

xxxxi - about the cosmic cliche' or

 
 

xxxxi

the angel number so they say

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about the cosmic cliché

or

the suffering of success

or

there is no such except

they say

you should say the thing you’re scared to say

because that is the sharing that speaks in the voice of courage

hurray!

unsaid

is the kinder you are

the more you’re afraid to say

as if you’re bad inside

because fear and courage are not the whole of it

they are just nice things

galloping on their success

whatever that means

is a way

or way off

because there is a way to say

it

and then for the sayer

hooray

we will listen for us

left unsaying

for what is said



what they mean is to speak in a way we cannot say

what they mean is to speak

in a way we cannot say

impotent (whispers the magic of words makes our sadness a fecund mind)

when we need the words to speak for us

neither knew no words were eithers

or everyone’s

or else our ego’s follow

indicating inauthentic

or worse

the authentic indicator

or both



are you keeping up with this?

(what it says in you,

you are saying)



and here you’ll assume

you know you’re right

to judge the either

with your own authentic you

and maybe you’ll start to say

what you see everyone else isn’t saying

or can’t say

or maybe like us

they don’t have anything

until there’s something

such is our desperation

that desperation is the condition to flourish cherishing



like blood on the wall

or an unwanted love

or a stunning sense of beauty

or an embarrassed hatred

or an empty stomach

or a barren womb

or a work done well

or a washing revelation

or a union of divisions

or a grey sunny day

or a steak for a dog

or the extinction of species

or the death of a wonderful thought

or the felling of ancient trees

or the birth of dread in a child

or the love that keeps us waking

or the habit of our said



creation comes in the shape of before we can say

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even putting down these first few words makes me aware of an emerging rhythm, a pattern of repetition, and consequently of an attention to what has been written that will tell me what to write, as if the first few words were seeds already intending the plant they would become, as if they were anticipating the earth they would occupy and own, if not adorn, the nettles they would form, the allergies they would eventually exacerbate. that is: the sentence seeks its fulfilling form.

William Gass
 

xxxx - red maple

 
 

xxxx

transformations more numerous than becomings

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in front the back window which beyond

the older the house the more certain

you’d be standing in

a kitchen looking towards out

a yard and garden

is a maple named red which captures

nothing of its essence

erupting phantom crimson soul

would be insufficient if

you were one who ever watched a maple red

dance among the chore clean bubbles cutting by a kitchen window

 

past where floating soul unbridled

we marched yard out to turn our dripping hands

from knives to saws

pruning puckers hands

makes turds from fruits

and is the word we use to cut away the parts that we dislike

like the wild hair of faces

or the wild youth in streets

or folk living solely in the wilds of our city

we prove we are civilized by the way we shape our sights

marched i and jon and uncle rick

to open up the yard

so the sun could bleed in

my maple red had done

its reaching much too low

do not fly too low says daedalus to his son

or the earth will pull you down

to the water, trees and stones

who taught us our invention

do not abide our own

so marched we out to lop a limb

which is as simple as a thought

and incredible as a task

novice and ambitious is a recipe for

failure, destruction, learning, creativity

and the laughter of our mortal nerves when our souls realize we’re near to die

so i can’t recall laughing harder than when maple red precipitated ricky from its bough

and his body scrambled with wild frantic

caught a rope to fuck oh my god down

i discovered then an inside war in the jumble of our oh fuck fumble

of our lungs that move as if through an inside understanding of the outside air

minds move only when they are struck

so such a mix of blows cascaded on the anvil of my skull

reluctance to severe red’s swaying elegant bough

fear to witness my uncle become a crippled mass

and the hidden complexity of simple stupidity

there are butterflies in the up of trees i’ve never seen in the down

as shocking small as autumn colors in the height of summer

when a leaf gives in to drought and gives itself to fall for others

if it wasn’t for what needed be we’d be

a bother if we were brilliant before it’s time

save we glow to pause a drifting moment in the warmth upon the day

who could we say is ready

to be reminded of the cold

so much easier the thought when lifted with exuberance

 
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paint is a cast made of the painter’s movements, a portrait of the painter’s body and thoughts. … painting is an unspoken and largely unrecognized dialogue… paint is water and stone, and it is also liquid thought.

James Elkins
 

xxxix - supposition more accurte than reality

 
 

xxxix

3 + 5 + 7 + 11 + 13

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we are floating in a dangled space washed ashore and wrought to fit.  where are we is what we are.  how to know where shapes our search.   identity shifts along experience towed memory.  that it is said, “WE ARE THIS,” gives comfort, with belief, and otherwise offends.  “we are this”, even when we’re nothing is enough to give us ends.  shadows haunt the density of light circling air within our lungs.  what we are, is our condition, hanging in the nothing like a vision.

 
 
 
 
 
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Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.


Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.

Langston Hughes
 

xxxviii - perhaps it is

 

xxxviii

88 - E

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to hell with _________

everything (is)

politics

speculation more accurate than reality

images are from my solo show currently on exhibit at wagner college:

https://wagner.edu/newsroom/wagner-college-gallery-exhibition-reception-oct-6/



 

“People seize on painting to cover up their nakedness. They get what they can wherever they can. In the end I can’t believe they get anything at all. They’ve simply cut a coat to the measure of their own ignorance. They make everything, from God to a picture, in their own image. That is why the picture-hook is the ruination of a painting – a painting which has always a certain significance, at least as much as the man who did it. As soon as it is brought and hung on a wall, it takes on quite a different kind of significance, and the painting is done for.”

Pablo Picasso