This poem is inspired by CS Lewis's very short story called "The Man Who Was Born Blind"

Tribute to Things Unknowable or Uknown

The light, when it illuminates, does not discriminate.
Embracing all in equanimity it self-eviscerates.
Doing all it can to share its heart
its plans are fraught with flaw,
and in showing him everything
shows nothing at all.
The Man Who Was Born Blind knows only what the light contributes;
the ease it brings to his commutes
or unease (all other senses reduced).
The light's soul is mute,
or so it seems,
to the man, moot.
But when the glory so often un-looked-for
and more often unseen "comes to light," as it were,
he shoots through the mist to grasp that which he knows not
and plummets empty-handed to the rocks.

For Neil

Box

What a poetic word is box,
and it in all its ways is yours
my dear, dear friend.
The box and the word together
(is there one without the other?)
contain you and you them.
Yet only one god
there is
the box and the word for the god,
and the god self-bound ever and unto
the boxish, boxing, box-ed box.
You, you've got your box.

who the heck knows

Forever Is Not So Long

Out there is a canvas
all gradations of black and white and metallic shine,
but flecks of life here and there
among the synthetic bustle.
The organic punctuates--no--it defines.
It punctures the plastic surface
and the real escapes in bursts;
irrepressible shocks of air which force us to breathe and know.
And know whom? Or what? Or whence?...
Or why it is we know not until it happens upon us?

Fights Can Be So Inspiring

Untitiled

Egg shells, egg shells
egg shell white
the walls that wall my mind
sometimes
whether to write or whine
to climb or jump or sing
the walls wall up my mind
white like egg shells
egg shells, which surprise to prick deep
and halter me; my bleeding feet.

This one is not what it seems

Address to the Dead and Dying


How do you go from breath to breath
Stepping with them to your death
Choosing truth with grim, toothy maw
Over me, my brilliant smiling realm of free
Love and loving?
To God have I harkened and heard
The ever judging, crushing, whispered word:
My world would ill be kept in our eye
For my eye is mine and you do die quickly
With and without me.
The sweet is bittered and the wine has turned
And I am burned. I am burned. My heart has burned.
Each face is a broken tether as I, ripped into place,
Find as you are brought so horribly asunder,
I am free. Utterly and disconsolately free.

'nother poem

Engagement Rings

there is an outward sign that feels...
so very sign-like
arbitrary to a tee.
can such a thing be hurting This?
an arbitrary sign is never free
from That which called for an added signishness.
That is alive while the sign is not
it is That which will wash This under
like no sign could.
That makes nothing real without the sign
and so the sign which was not
substance becomes everything
the only thing.
and I am left with nothing real
without the sign
an army of That by its side...
...
there is no This without That.
it seems This is trapped
but much is owed to That.
and much is owed to That.
Even a sign (?)

I Melodramatic Poem I Wrote Today Thinking of the Desperation of Yesterday

Dying of Consumption

Give me something against which to rail with passion
anything but myself
Let me die, killed by another hand
anyone but myself
I cannot survive my own wrath and you will remember
everything but myself
You will never be alone, but I will be ever so by
Myself.

A Blight on My Fairy Tale Adventure

I am ill. I have been ill for about three days now, and have missed two days of work and I hate it! I feel like a drain on the resources, even though I'm really not so much. Everyone's nice to me though. It's kind of funny. People ask me why I'm so sick, and when I tell them I think it's because of the cold, they think it's so funny and strange. It's the middle of summer! they say. Well all I know is last night I went for a walk (probably unwise in my condition) and I could see my breath. Hopefully I'll get over it soon, because I love the work over here.
Besides my illness, I'm having a good time making friends with all the volunteers. I am the only girl most of the time, which is fun. We're all heading to the pub tonight, which is something I don't want to miss however ill I am because it happens so rarely. They're all going to act like goofy fools and there will probably be pranks tonight as well. Goodness this place is almost perfect except for this cold and damp that hates me. It's so beautiful... Magical despite it's imperfection. Man, I can't wait till I'm better.

... ... ... ... ...

Eff. I was too ill to make it to the pub.

First Impressions of Hilfield Friary at Dorset, England

It has only been two days and a half here, and I am already quite ruddy-cheeked. I suspect I expect I shall look very much like my Irish ancestors by the time I leave England.
Today was my first day of work at the friary, and it was barely anything at all. I'm the only female volunteer here, and all the brothers and the rest of the men have this strange idea that it would be very wrong to give me too much work. The schedule here, however, is very easy an I'd like to be made as useful as possible. Here is the typical work day at Hilfield:
7:00- Private prayer
7:30- Morning Prayer
8:00- Quiet breakfast
8:45- Morning meeting
9:00- Work
10:15- Morning tea
10:45- Work
12:00- Midday Prayer
12:30- Eucharist
1:00- Lunch
1:45- Rest
2:15- Work
4:15- Afternoon tea
5:00- Evening Prayer
7:00- Supper
9:00- Night Prayer
The people here are so full of life , character, of themselves really, in the best sense possible. Just really possessed of identity and selfhood. The brothers are just what older men should be. I'm delighted merely by the sight of them. They're just so cheerful and their minds are so active. Good nature simply oozes from them. I couldn't begin to do them justice in writing, but maybe I'll try later on.
Anyway, I love it here. It's the kind of place one wishes to have grown up, and consequently it's made me wish to raise children here.

alright. stream of consciousness poem lightly edited.

You, Odalisk

I think I've known you all my life.
I've hidden beneath the roots of your dark,
cloudy hair.
I've tasted the rushing flavors behind your teeth.
I held your very own breath;
the one which with each exhalation stays motionless
in a chamber just behind the place where your nostrils meet your throat.
It's to that breath you send all the blood
from every cut, bruise and scrape on your feeble heart.
You catch it all and imprison it in the breath,
and even when everything there is to say has been said,
you hold that bloody breath like it's your only tether to life
or Sanity or Truth.
To breathe it would be loss,
a violent thrust into nothing, the awful coffin of freedom.
The breath is what keeps you alive, sane.
The blood for you is Truth.
I said I think I've known you all my life.
What would it be like
should you and I know
something else?

Why Am I in Love with Short Ones?

Your Feathers Rake the Wind

Herald to me a coming of clarity.
In charity i trust you will be kind.
Nevermind the disjunct and stammering,
The quiet clamoring of my heart wrenched ajar,
And all of the far-stretched hopes, that fly in your usual wake.

3 Poems, 2 of Which Were Written While I Stood at a Hostess Stand

[sic]

If you're trying to find Truth, fine.
Attempt to discern meaning
in the breaks
of my
lines.
If it's ground zero you want,
or a pre-packaged moral rigidly addressed to you,
resume.
But if you want truth, the beauty
of an unrestrained mind,
falter here.
Box nothing but mozy,
dreaming and awakening together.
Assimilation is understanding,
where we meet each other not in distinctions,
nor the common,
but both--indivisible--intermingled.
When you read my poems let them be
for they are me
and so are you
so let us be together
unedited; free.


Waiting for Summertime

O sweet June! Come close,
Closer now until your breath mingles
With my eyes and tingles on my tongue.
I will hold you, dearest June
For the entirety of the moon
And beyond its waning,
And further than the scent of the honeysuckles
Or the enlightenment of the fireflies echo
Into the darkness that is the lack of you.
With you the night is glamorous
For the stars are clamorous in raptures
At your smolder.
O June! Tarry longer still!
Smother me in your finery of green;
I want to feel you infused in my bones
Though I live or die.
Stay June, stay.


Mother

The Night was like the rain
As it fell surrounding me,
Washing me, astonishing me.
It sustained my being, that is to say
She catalyzed my coming to be.

Indelibly my feet crept
Through the glistening bricks,
And my outstretched arms
Ever extended to the mystery of the stars.

The Night like the rain
Fell like a womb,
A dark dwelling place for Potential.

My rooted feet, no longer allayed by their depth,
And my ambitious arms, no longer content with the stars
Flourished with abandon,
And I was forever.
And I was everything,
Stretched through and wrapped around
The Night like the rain.

hey so this is new

Lucien

I

Ah! Now I see!

I'm awake now
I really don't know how
I got here
I've been away for at least a few hundred years.

II

There's a spot kindling
of concentrated light
at about the height
of your head compared to mine.
It's just you
with poems on your arms
and a novel on your lips
that I want to eat.

III

Let it linger
like strawberry juice,
a sweet stain,
an ambrosial memorial
to something not lost but hidden,
kept at bay.

I make love to you when you're away.

Shorts

A Long Night's Work

I

Like a turned down bed she beckons to you,
Come in! Come in! throw off your weary garments and come in!
So saith the night in her whimsy of you.
Sweet sojourner find your comfort in this:
As much as you yearn is surely as much as you’re missed.

II

Shallow, shallow shot glasses
littering the bar
carve my heart
to pieces all for a few
quick releases I forsook you
like a fool I am full
of spirit and empty of soul.

Short Poem

Goosebumps

Perfect little irregularities
Running around, all up and down
My body,
Pursued by cold, persistent fingers.
Don't get fresh with me!

New Poem

And the World Will Shudder

Rain is wet and cold
But the Sun is rising
And the rain sings like gold.

Children chase the eastern showers
Brothers, sisters, sons and daughters
We once called our own
Dance, soak in exultation
And are swept up.

We refrain, we remain
Much too wise
Staying confined to
Watch them in glorying
Our mouths crinkled and moving
Constantly chewing
As if we can never swallow...

Joy flies from our hollow
Temples leaving us
Sweeping little wicker crumbs
Off our homey front porches.

We shiver
Empty.