It rained in Southern California last week...

Rain Comes

In the rains, night streets glisten

like a thousand tear-glazed eyes slick

with pain.

A drought tempered,

not quenched.

A dark-haired man sprawls propped

against a lamp post, yellow light misting

over him in the dark;

his khaki pants damp from wicking the wet sidewalk;

his button-down brown shirt damp from his tears;

his head angled askew as he stares

into electronic memories

of her.

His face is illuminated a ghoulish blue;

his thumb flicking back and forth

back and forth

winding a watch that bears no hands,

yet holds an eternity

of them.

Cars wash by driving

through his anguish.

A jukebox in the dive bar across the street plays

a ballad he will never hear.

Rain and tears blend and flow down

the gutters of his face

erode him

until the flotsam of his soul

with oil and mud and life

drain into sewers toward the sea.

Love's many forms

A whimsical poem, and something more....

Rickety Table

Rickety table

a faithful friend,

always last to be chosen

by others,

but always there for me.

Your wobbly round top, atop

an unsteady post, teetering.

Your cherry wood chipped

stained finish flaking

coffee-stained rings replace.

Your imperfections allow me to love

what would otherwise be

an easy job.

Untitled

The woman who read books turned upside down.

The woman who played scrabble outside the borders

            because completing a fun word is more important.

The woman who taught herself to throw knives.

The woman whose voice brings me to tears.

The woman who thought my humor was hilarious.

The woman who wore fairy wings and flew at me.

The woman who spoke to me in fluent Elvish.

The woman who helped me understand advanced electrodynamics.

The woman whose leg was shattered by an improvised explosive device

            and said to me the scars were nothing.

Requiescat (circa 1997)

I starve myself

and what a blissful fast it is.

I drink not your dark eyes

nor taste such delicate lips.

( do they melt warm on mine like caramel? )

It is for absolution I pay,

            and pray in my solitude--

waiting.

            Your gaze the wine,

            your touch the bread.

What dark sin have I

that I should kneel so,

bowing before Athena.

O, goddess of Wisdom and War, I feel your conflict--

take my anguish, take my head!

            relieve me of my famished pang.

I pace and wear a canyon in the Earth,

my screams of hunger

echo in the void.

Why not eat then as to die?

Because my death

            or desire

will only happen once;

            Rather I await the fruit of Ambrosia

            than the flower of the Bittersweet.

.

 

An homage to any who sacrifice themselves for another...

BULLET

If I took a bullet for you,

would you remember my name?

A year from then

when my blood

in the desert sands dried

would you honor my passing

with a quiet salute?

If I took a bullet for you,

would you remember my name

ten years hence?

With the life you live

the wife you give

kisses to every morning,

the daughter whose smile makes

every moment a wonder,

do you remember the last words I spoke

whispered on death’s breath:

“Live life deeply”

If I took a bullet for you,

would you remember my name one hundred years?

Or rather lay forgotten beneath a bleach’d tooth,

one among many sprouting from green gums of grass,

never again to bite.

Where rain and ice conspire to weather

away every last stone-etched name,

letters weary of lost sorrow

and wash away all memory.

If I took a bullet for you,

would you know I came as close

as any human could

to the Christ-like surrender

of life for the everlasting

glory of love through you?

If I took a bullet for you,

how long would you remember my name?

In which I investigate the limits of forgiveness...

I've been working on this poem for some months now. But at its heart lies a spiritual question I've been asking for decades. Namely, why hasn't God forgiven Satan? If God is all-forgiving, then surely God can forgive even Satan. This spiritual query then opens up more questions: Does Satan want to be forgiven? What does forgiving Satan even look like or mean?

These questions and their answers are all highly subjective and personal. Everyone has a different understanding and view of God and the spiritual life...a spectrum of belief to non-belief, a spectrum of tangibility varying from God as a truly physical entity to God as an incomprehensible metaphor for creation and creative forces that surround us. Opposing God, in the most simplistic way possible to state it, is Satan.

To me, the thought of forgiving Satan was never as simple as one might forgive another human being for some wrong or evil doing. It is far more profound, esoteric, and detached. It means, ultimately, forgiving the most heinous of human acts against other humans. It also means that the individual attempting such forgiveness can't speak for all humanity. It is a personal, individual forgiveness that is directed more toward forces one cannot control while at the same time recognizing them as wrong or evil, and struggling in one's own small way against such injustices.

This question for me remains unanswered. It is a dwelling point, a paradox for spiritual exploration. As a simple and familiar example in Buddhism, one is asked to contemplate the sound of one hand clapping. Can this question ever be answered? Our rational mind says such a sound is not possible. But such a question isn't meant of rational analysis. It's a doorway into spiritual and philosophical exploration.

To that end, my question of whether I can forgive Satan is ultimately itself a spiritual pursuit possibly without answer. But that is okay.

Below is one poem that has come out of these ruminations. It is more of a chant really, and helps me calm down when I'm faced with monolithic, faceless evil beyond my control. It is written in chant form so that my weak memory can recall it fully, especially effective when under duress and enraged at some injustice.

(As a side note, I sent this to a trusted acquaintance of mine who happens to be a contemplative monastic in the Camaldolese order. He was gracious enough to say he believes the poem makes Jesus smile, and had the Devil in tears. I'm just glad I'm not already a heretic one week after becoming a new Catholic.)

A Chant Of Forgiveness

I forgive you,

the Great Deceiver.

For all the chaos

caused in this world,

I forgive you.

I forgive you,

the Potent Enemy.

For all the violence

caused in this world,

I forgive you.

I forgive you,

the Greedy Mammon.

For all the want

caused in this world,

I forgive you.

I forgive you,

the Prideful One.

For all the ignorance

caused in this world,

I forgive you.

I forgive you,

the Incarnate Fear.

For all the hate

caused in this world,

I forgive you.

I forgive you,

Satan,

for the gratitude you've withheld;

for the grace you've ignored;

for the love you've abandoned;

I pity you,

             and I forgive you.

It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. ~ Frederick Douglass

One of my favorite versus from the Bible, one of the few that I can actually recite from memory if given a moment, is Matthew 18:3.

And he said: "Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 

It seems a truism that throughout human history, our children exhibit our best qualities as a species. They are often kind, compassionate, full of energy, filled with boundless curiosity, earnest. Their senses and perspective aren't yet closed off, cynical. They can believe in a magical human riding in a sleigh pulled by reindeer which can fly around the world and deliver gifts to all...in one night. They want to believe that there is endless bounty.

The act of comparing spirituality to 'child-like' sensibility isn't restricted to Christianity either. Not at all. Just one example from Buddhism:

A Child’s mind is Buddha’s mind. Just seeing, just doing is truth. 

 In this passage, at least for me, the meaning is quite similar to that of Matthew, if shorter. Children certainly may learn to tell falsehoods, to lie to their parents and others. But I don't believe that children yet lie to themselves about who they are and what they want. They live in the moment energetic. It takes the machinations of an adult mind to lie to oneself, the adult guilt that is rationalized away, the adult who believes they might be incapable of something without even trying first, or giving up after a small effort.

At some point, many children loose that divine, God-like, Buddhist-like mind and enter the miasma of 'hell' known as adulthood. Some might shout out right about now: "It's called growing up! Ya' two-bit new-age Buddhist/Jewish/Christian/Islamic/Hindu self-helper!" Well, I'd only point out that some of the greatest spiritual works of humankind argue directly against that. If the wisdom taught over millennia isn't convincing, then I encourage you to look at your own children and how happy they can be even in the most difficult of situations. (Of course, not all. Disclaimer.)

To that end, I offer my own small contribution to the wisdom of childhood.

I Do Not Fail Enough

I do not fail enough.
And when I do fail,
I weep too much.

How better it is to laugh
at each and every failure
to revel in the attempts,
the challenge,
to pick oneself up,
smiling
as a baby wobbles
from the seat of its poopy diaper
to its pudgy feet,
trundling forward only to fall again.
And yet someday
     to walk,
                   nay to run!

To The Pain

Those familiar with Princess Bride may remember this famous speech by the other Wesley. It has little to do with what I'm about to share, but it came to me in a flash, a way to spark a humorous memory, a buffer if you will, before this mini-essay on pain.

When I was in my early 20's, I made a conscious decision never to do drugs, or drink to excess drunkenness. On the former, I have been successful; on the latter, perhaps a handful of times. A bachelor party here, a traumatic death there. This decision came not from any moralistic or high-minded ideals. No. The reason was more private, perhaps even absurd. You see, I realized that I actually wanted to feel the pain and joys of life, unfiltered. I wanted life raw, I wanted it without illusions.

Now you might be thinking to yourself, "So what? I never had to make a conscious decision for such restraint." So right you would be. Yet if you are like me, you might have faced a similar choice. So very often I feel as though I have an open wound to the world, an exposed nerve that cries out with every murder reported, exalts at every accomplishment, becomes enraged at each injustice, deplores each hypocritical stance, loves at first sight, wonders at the beauty in the world. It is a Self that cannot forget my tiniest failure, forever critical of my own accomplishments, anxiously waiting for the day when everyone discovers the fraud that I am.

And in it all, no matter what I do, I feel utterly powerless to change anything.

So it is in this that I feel a certain empathy for those great artists who turn to drugs or alcohol or any number of numbing, coping mechanisms. I don't claim to be as gifted, talented, prolific as these great masters. But if the emotions I feel are even one-tenth, one-hundredth as intense as theirs was, I understand. I don't condone numbing, anesthetized emotions; many artists manage to fight through, bounce back, temper their emotions. But I understand it.

Philip Seymour Hoffman, Hemingway, Joplin...the list is long. Too long. Fight to survive, fight for love, because if you don't, darkness wins.



Let Me Tell You About A Girl (part 3 of 3)

Let me tell you a story
about two soul mates who never met;
one too bruised to leap once more,
the other too guarded to invite him in.
Both too wounded
to love again.

Starlet

This long poem was first published in the 1998 World Fantasy Convention program. I was quite honored to have it selected for this publication, my first poem to be published. It was inspired by a particular actress I admired at the time, but magically seems to have relevance today.

I hope you enjoy it.


Courting the Fairy Queen

How shall I meet the fair Fay Queen?
Not by clever words or devious plots,
nor by sleepless watch.
I am drunk with wine
and something more.
My arms embrace only air,
my lips kiss only each other.
I wish this sanguine pang would cease,
replaced by love's anguished bliss.
By my frustration is complete:
my impossible desire
impossible reality.

The Fay Queen smiles
cheeks bright and high,
hair of threaded night
and eyes of liquid shadow.
Her magic only she knows,
though her charms are known to all.
Under greened hill she hides,
comes out to dance before the rain.

I spy her through my crystal sphere
for I too am magical.
Wizard or sorcerer,
spellbinder; all have I been called.
She is a grown woman,
then a little girl--
changeling in her form,
divine in her presence.
Yet my conjurations,
thaumaturgic words
are frail and weak,
swept away as a hand through a spider's web.

The Fairies all sing
to their Queen.
She beats her lateen wings
and leads them in the light.
She presents little hauteur,
only a bit from confident station--
her saturnine right.
I think she controls the seasons,
for wintery snows never deaden her fairy realm.
At night with fire flies she flits
among the luminescent glistening greens
of leaves and grasses enlivened.
Down upon a pond's embankment she alights
joining the fairies repose
listening to the choral frogs
and the crickets chirping meter.
By day she chances a walk
through flowers wild and tall,
between their shadowed stems,
not dark or glum,
but a natural stain-glassed hall.
It is here she is alone,
though not lonely,
in silent contemplation.
I cannot guess, nor my crystal reveal,
her thoughts.
Sometimes she rides upon a caterpillar,
her furry coach of luxery;
shadows of violet, red, and green
wash over her, eroding weariness.

From a gurgling spring she drinks,
and in it she bathes.
It is then (and only then) I turn away,
believing my intention to respect modesty
though knowing I protect sanity.
This spring, what to the fay is a river,
seems to touch every tree in their wood.
It cradles their fair hill
then empties into the choral pond.
It rages over pebbles,
carves toad-high canyons as it winds.
For me it has a special memory:
here it was I first saw the Fairy Queen--
before she claimed her crown,
before she entertained her hosts,
before she reigned in Fairy.
In a boat, a milkweed pod, she rode
gently over pebbled rapids,
saluting ever tree,
greeting every thrush,
singing of the world.

From where fairies arrive, no one knows with certainty;
some are born from flower scents,
some from the rustle of leaves,
but she it is said
comes from the scent that light makes
when shining through the thunder of a waterfall.
Some there were who feared her,
some who distrusted her,
who did not like her.
They mocked strange garments she prefered.
They mocked her for sailing alone
upon a milkweed pod
on a stream apart from them.
They--who seeked to secure their own position
by sacrificing her with swagger and fist--
they harassed and laughed at her naked broken spirit.
But she knows a truth
as she lay in her boat on its floor:
That this River reaches to the sea;
all else is tributary.

I in wintery dress espy
from the coldness of my tower grey,
her winsome form cavorting. . .
now with midges, now a moth.
I should crush this crystal of mine,
perverse window it is,
cruel transmitter
of one-way affection.
But though I know its limitations,
that the earthworm is far dearer to her,
that this glass is for light and not emotion,
I still descry her dance,
and hope.
Yet how shall I,
the wizard-poet know
before I am mad
to quit the crystal
and find reality?

This is what I observe of the Fay Queen:
Though she has her hill
speckled with daisies,
she is quite unsettled.
Though she is Queen of Fairies,
she is prone to frolicking
and raising a voice to their cause
while sharing her trove with many.
Though she flies with special favor,
higher up with birds and such,
she longs to be even more;
if she revealed her desire, all would faint.

I high in my dungeon tower,
my ankles shackled to the floor,
watch through my crystal orb
this Fay Queen in revelry.
My hands are free to write
and that I do on magic paper;
infinite are its blackened pages
while resting on my table.
I etch white letters from each black page,
trying to find her light there,
trying to uncover the brightness of her face,
or the smile in her eyes.
Though I scribe and carve,
the lettered form finds no meaning.
If I could release my legs,
to her I'd walk; to her, understanding.
My only release, my only walk,
is that imagined on the page.
If I can write enough, perhaps the page's weight
will sunder my bindings, drive me through the floor.
Or maybe a pile, growing,
scattered around me,
becomes my own dark hill.
Then would she, intrigued, come?
So I write--not knowing exactly why,
not knowing if any poet-wizard's words
are enough to delight a Fairy Queen.
Faith in the magic is all I have.

I wish at times I could reach the crystal ball
to raise it high,
to drop it, smash it, weep over it.
Such is the cruelness of this self-imposed torture.

I rue the day I clamped these shackles
only slightly less than the day I lost the key.
I had the key once when I was young,
had the lock in my hands,
looked at them both--
thought about their intricate connection
their infinite pleasure,
and to be free.
But the lock slipped away,
the key lost.
Oh the days I searched for that key!
days, months, years,
until my exile had a life,
an importance,
of its own,
an entity that overpowers me
and would even now had I the locksmith near.
It is beyond control
and so I write
to forge a key of pages and words.
Insecurity had led me to this tower
to its chains for shelter;
here I shall stay
in solitude
for eternity.

I think our spirits touch
for they greet each other
in my fretted dreams.
She hands me ancient books of hers,
and I to her a kiss.
So it is that in my dreams
she is there
Fay Queen,
cradling my weary soul.
It is as though at times she seeks me out,
but she knows not where I am.
What magical paradox, this sorcerer's irony!
That she is free to seek me out,
yet oblivious;
while I in my tower chained and starving,
know of her and where she is.
This Kingdom is large,
borders from sea to sea,
Should I be so prideful to think no others chained,
to think that in the course of chance she should find only me?
No, not pride, I say, no ego involved;
it is these odds against me that I fear.

I make a pillow of my chains
to rest my dreary head,
to lie as if on your soft rising
falling breast,
and find a dream of starlight in your hair.

In the waking morn of my stone tower,
outside the frosted window,
clear icicles descend.
I've watched them grow
from teeth
to daggers,
until they hang as thick as iron bars.
Then it was one warmer day,
warm enough to snow, that I
with my back against the round room wall
espied a slow prancing spider moving toward me.
It crawled along the wall horizontally
on some natural errand
or perhaps it simply tired of its web;
something so lovely to me
is to it so bland.
With what weak conjurations I had,
I bade it stop and listen for awhile.
I told her ( for female she was )
of my longing to know the Fairy Queen.
No sense of time had I as I spoke,
but she listened well for being earless.
And as I sat gazing sideways at Ms. Spider,
I felt a sense of commiseration,
and a fleeting hope.
I ensorcelled Ms. Spider by passion alone
and she agreed to deliver
under bitter snow and tumbling winds
a message to the Queen.
She delved through a crack in the floor
saying quite earnestly before she left,
"I shall ride a snow flake if need be there."
And I laughed for such generosity.

For days I watched my crystal sphere,
waiting for some clarion of deliverance.
But as time clouded my message's memory,
I began to ponder the self-sacrifice of spiders.

But lo, one day upon the Queen's back
 I did see my eight-legged messenger.
Ms. Spider tapped one long leg insistently
as would you or I with a finger on a shoulder tap.
But the Fay Queen did not respond; she didn't notice.
And, all too clear to me now, who should heed
the soft touch of a voiceless spider
when the Queen's fairies are thronged,
her devotees legion.

Her attention is too remote to catch
in my spider's web.

Every time I see her in my crystal orb
I notice something new,
something wondrous:
Merrily with friends she plays,
and there,
her right eye flutters
like a moth's wing in the light of her laughter.

And I cannot bear her angry eyes
when there is occasion for her wrath.
I turn away,
though I hear her words,
and I grieve for those seconds of beauty lost.

Closer now, more intense.

What it is you do inside your hill, I can only imagine.
This hill you've piled and built around you.
At the sentry's gate, the gatekeepers watch--
few are admitted, and then they only Fay.
Fay Princes come and go, some remaining longer than others.
With each entry into your hill, I believe they will stay
for ever,
and for ever shall I stay chained in a dream of despair.
But this is how complete my delusion is:
That even should you find a Prince,
that even should my life be known to you,
that then you'd leave your Prince for me.
There are times when I indulge fantasy,
when I imagine a life beneath your enchanted hill:
O marvelous naiads there are in pools of aquamarine,
or dryads playing in the wood.
I imagine unicorns sparing tete-a-tete
and though your home is under hill,
a roof of heaven hangs above your head,
and there among the clouds, a thousand butterflies.
Dragons there are, but you are strong;
your magic keeps them at bay.
Would you protect me, shelter me,
slight wizard that I am, from these scaled wyverns.
And I often wonder what duties keep you away.
Would living there
in Fairy
find me more alone
more chained
than I am today?

Stop! There is madness complete!
Read and see:
Not have I known her, and I dream of her home.
Not have I spoken to her, and I conjure predicaments.
Not have I my name upon her lips, and I believe us wed.
Idiocy take me quick!
The rye fields whisper her name and she hears,
while I with screams to heaven
remain unbidden.
How deep I mine for madness,
how close I feel to release.
Surely life with reality respite
is (safer) than insanity embraced.

So my book becomes weighty
despite its magical whisper.
Soon I must decide--
shall it shear my chains or ignite a beacon.
On this I ponder;
while turning one page, another appears,
I fill one with white letters
and another begs enlightenment.

I write
and write
with aching hands--
furious pages turn.
The table cracks;
it splinters.
I write on stacks,
I write in crevices,
I push and shove,
swimming with no place to rest,
to sleep,
I'm buoyed by the gathering sea of dark paper--
engulfing.

Epiphany.

A Magus in white sacramental robes
appears,
gifts me his knowledge:
That this magic tome of mine,
its pages surrounding me,
covering me,
is neither a beacon for my desire
nor hammer and anvil for my chains;
it is both, it is either first, neither last. . .
Such does a Magus visit, so does he leave.

So the dark beacon flashes through the light,
so its light beats upon my chains to shatter.
I am free at last--
I am Universe.

My words have reached you, my hill of letters intrigued.
Yet you have seen only the smoke of my fire, thinking  it incense.
My passion races on the wind, burns under the forest growth.
And though you are the Fay Queen, this passion frightens you away.

There it is, the final irony;
that the love so desired, so sought after,
the love to release me,
is frightened by its own intensity,
consumed by its heat,
unknown
and lost.

Now the prisoner is my heart.
What good that I am free, my heart a lonely captive?
I say,
a prisoner knows only hope,
        a free man reality.