A Poet In The Ointment

NIGHT TEARS….

Memories, reflections, joy, then deepest despair all cascading through me,

As though a river bursting free after a winter thaw in fury surging,

Aching now my heart is filled to ripping and I weep unabashedly with

emotions unchecked, broken free from the walls of reserve and stoicism;

Wearing my heart on my sleeve I stand wounded in the gunfire of experience,

A trooper in the war called life for which I never did enlist, merely drafted,

But running from battle to battle, from cause to cause, from love affair

To love affair, from tragedy to tragedy, and never tasting the wine of victory;

They stole my childhood and when I rebelled locked me away branded as insane,

From those days I walked Selma’s roads, Harlan Counties muddy trails, then

Wintered in an army prison for asking the reasons why, and they starved me,

But I won that struggle at another price so high I often asked myself why?

Now I sit playing the tunes from those long and hungry decades, tears stream,

Heart aches for what was given, what was lost, how little was won, gathered

In these years of my graying, as pain wracks me in these lonely weary hours,

And I look to my shotgun and think about the peace that lies therein, eternal….

YET ONE MORE BONGO SYMPHONY……

Lost in the chorale of empty streets filled with echo memories,

Can you dig the sound of naught, the utter cool of lost dreams

Harmonizing with the spirit of places been and now far gone,

Sounds of bongos dissonant, fingers snapping in the darkness,

Rhythms of days gone by, then the memory of future yesterdays

Played out like a skein unwinding into a moebius strip of fabric;

Notes ring out somewhere on the edges of consciousness,

Playing a symphony that was almost too far out,

Filling the ancient concert hall setting in the country of dreams,

With an audience of wandering hungry souls wreathed

In the smoke of audacious hallucinations tinged blue and

Framed in visions of the Mad Hatters very own tea party;

It all seems to come together in a land not on any map,

In a city painted with illusions of a life that cannot be attained,

And they scuttle to and fro amidst the garbage and the trash,

Seeking somewhere warm and dry to get some refuge from the storm,

Lost in the heart of a nation that all to often forgets the poverty

Bound, those on the fringe are for whom this symphony is written;

It may never be complete, this work of tortured beauty,

Yet the coda, the allegro non troppo can go near anywhere

For it only matters if the music is unheard, so listen to the madness

Of the chords rising, falling, reaching the crescendo of subway trains

In collision with the darkness that springs infernal with a roar,

As passengers move like insects in and out of stations without names…..

LACKING GUINESS STOUT BLUES….

Here it is 17 March and there is no stout, no whiskey, no porter,

Just anthems of old Eire playing on the stereo while I sit and thirst,

It’s giving me a case of the blues instead of celebrating the green,

Drank a pot of coffee strong enough to sober anyone, now if only I were drunk,

It’s enough to break your heart this condition most pathetic,

I remember nights in saloons when the roar of my poetry nailed down the floor,

And I drank Tullamore Dew from the bottle until the dawn came creeping,

With comrades whose friendships I thought would never die but

Ultimately even they were lost in the shifting sands of times vagaries;

There was a time at seven thousand feet where I went to hide from

The world but the world found me out and there was days and nights

Where the booze flowed like a river of tears across beds of lust, of passion,

Women came and went, and one shockingly handsome state trooper whom

I loved in the shadows with kisses and bourbon and dreams that could not

Be except in ripples of illusion that blended with slivovitz and hopes lost,

Then that chapter closed like a great iron door and I traveled south to

The border country of burnt desert and scrub where I tried to study but

Again love sought me out and he and I played like young lovers at the party

Of life, with dinners, movies, dancing, and long nights of unbridled carnal

Pleasures that had no ending nor beginning merely was until spent sleep

Found us out and nestled us in dreams tinged with ouzo and sweet kisses;

Now it is the 17^th of March and the memories choke me deep and the longing

For a drink as deep as a raging river tears through my soul and leaves me sad,

Lost among the detris of my memory and my dreams and my fallen hopes…….

A POETS’ ROAD….

Four score and seven years ago ( no I’m not rechanneling A. Lincoln ), okay

How about forty seven years ago I put pen to paper and foot to stage,

So began my poets’ road and over these decades it has been with me

Every day those verses, though I did work in every form in every state,

As well as fought for every kind of cause in places where the work

Needed doing, where suffering was great, where rights were threatened,

But always there was poetry, writings and readings and even publishing;

The poets’ road is paved with obstacles of every type, and challenges

To stay true to the profession of the bard, be it warrior, prophet, laborer,

All had there place, all had there time, and all were done when doing was

Needed in their place and the cost was paid in the coin of flesh demanded,

Sacrifice unyielding, even dreams that had to be turned away for the time,

As highways were traversed, boots upon mountain trails, sandals in the desert,

Miles unwinding like streams of black diamonds unraveling behind my passage;

Yet always there was poetry, writings and readings and even publishing,

Along the rain streaked pockmarked streets that comprised the poets’ road,

Battles won and causes fought and lost, still never shirking the duties call,

And forget not love that was pursued, gained, then failed in the mist of night,

For love, whether gained or lost, is the armor that holds the heart in thrall,

The quest followed like some mythic journey across the frontiers of the hearts

Imagination, for that too comprises the glue of poetic rhetoric on the length of

The poets’ road……

LADY OF LEISURE…

Her long tawny legs curled up under her as Ophelia

Sat in the window seat looking at her horoscope in the paper;

The translucent California sun streamed through the window

Casting ripples of fantasy across the long oriental rug;

Meanwhile the cat, concerned only with a growing appetite

Disrupted the pastoral scene with a horrendous caterwauling,

That startled the lady from her thoughts of fortune unveiled,

And totally ruined her long sought after time of leisure….

CINEMATIC DESPERATION BLUES…

I miss her so bad that my whole body is screaming for a drink,

Or two or maybe the whole damn bottle, even if it really can’t help,

And it’s Rita who died one California night near the place called Venice,

Or Mary D. who I let slip away among the shadows of the Texas night,

Or the others who were loved, held close, kissed, then lost by my

Stupidity or lousy luck or just the misfortunes of time and tide;

Now alone and feeling more alone than the highway east from

El Paso where dreams were lost and scattered like dust in the heat,

Songs of longing that scream louder than a coyote in the night,

Tearing at my hearts flesh and laying open a soul older than dirt,

And I miss her all and hate my blindness and pathetic choices left

Busted like a bad French film without subtitles where no one wins;

So in this May morning overcast and drear desperation pounds on

The shores of my memory as music plays the soundtrack of my film,

A tragicomedy of hopes split wide like a worn paper sack drifting

Along the gutter with all the other detris that composes the camera

Shots of these days winding down into the vortex of self pity thoughts,

And all that’s left to say is if you’ve found a love don’t let it go for the

Regret if you lose it will always cut sharper than you can stand, so

Fade to black, end of film…..

LONG ROAD TO OBLIVION…….

There is a stretch of road from Austin to Las Cruces thirteen hours long,

Barren beauty echoing dreams of time far gone where you can lose your

Soul as you hurtle along its expanse searching for the place where it ends,

Driven in one bone jarring push as the heat fries your eyes, sand coats

Your mouth as the radio screams music from some station south of the border to keep you awake and your focus on the vacant horizon unfolding;

Rinsing my mouth with warm tequila fighting back the inertia of exhaustion,

Time moves in the cadence of tires hissing on hot concrete, engine rocking

Like an out of tune rock band in a cheap worn roadhouse in a distant night,

And I made this haul roundtrip every weekend for an entire summer,

Until the rhythms of this enraptured odyssey became imprinted in my brain

Like a film loop from some new wave film without beginning or an end;

The why was simple enough, a mix of love, passion, in a desperate breath,

The way one only gets when you’re young enough to not care about reason,

Only the feelings of the spirit when you think you’ve found that one,

Thinking about his smile, his eyes, his lips, the short time so precious in

Its’ yearning, burning need that the bone jarring voyage is worth even a

Single searing kiss, one night of furious explosive lust to hold on to;

And the road uncurls smoking hot like a ribbon of brimstone ablaze in the

Passage of my steel ship cruising the void in search of that special love…..

WINE OF MELANCHOLY…

Gray windy days torn by streaks of greasy frigid rain descending,

The October country draping itself over feelings, thoughts, dreams,

Creating an envelope that encloses, chokes, strangles hope,

Spilling happiness across the stones like blood from a wound fresh,

And there is nothing to be done but curl into a ball and endure the assault;

Now the weather breaks, Indian Summer makes a brief showing,

Sunshine dapples the red, gold, of hardwoods shedding their coats,

Temperatures warm rather than chill the bones, the flesh, and there is a hope

Emerging on the horizon, if only for a short time, a chance encounter,

Dreams flow like a fresh stream through the autumn countryside;

Soon however that promise will be broken by the reality of seasons

Shifting through the passing days and the sky will be leeched of color,

The air filled with a frosty bite that remains like a stray dog seeking comfort,

Then rain will change into snow and ice as trees become barren, furtive,

As sleep encases the earth in a shroud of long standing desperation;

So now we are in that middle ground awaiting the shifts that will come,

A cycle unstoppable, immutable, as long as time flows its’ patterns,

We can weep the passage, or be joyous, or merely accept what is,

For there is naught that the human touch can do about it but await it,

Summer shall autumn be shall then become the tide of winters breath…..

MISTY HIGHWAYS…

Autumn roads unraveling through the courses of my memory,

An endless ribbon of places, people, events, long unthought of,

Until this early morning hour when the chill shakes them loose,

They spill out like building blocks from some dusty playset,

Building into emotion filled images that are too vivid to ignore;

A gathering unremembered comes to focus and I see the barricades

Erected on streets when the time for rising unfolded and came to be,

We stood for causes that made the heart soar in their intensity,

As the blood we shed had more value that the transitory pain felt,

Our songs raised above the din of sirens and claxons sounding raw;

There was that love so rare that words can only fail to describe,

A passion born from fugitive wanderings and the accidental meeting

Of two souls seeking each other without knowing they were sought,

Making the emotion ever more incendiary, the contact more powerful

Than even imaginings could have supposed in all of its musings;

Then there was that dilapidated smoky dark coffee house where all

The rebels, artists, dreamers, travelers have gathered to share life,

And poetry was read there that resounded with hopeful dreamings,

Songs played that cut across the inner self with tears, smiles, sharing

All the moments of everyone of our beings as we moved through time;

Highways of autumn unspooling in the misty morning like smoke upon

The eyes of thoughtful reminiscence as the coffee steams fresh and we

Travel across the years…..

I’LL NEVER FORGET WHAT’S HER NAME…

There was a time in my sorrowful lonely night that we came upon each other,

It was filled with furtive stumbling, word games, then a sudden kiss that

Rose up in the smoky dark like a winged specter to smite us with dreams

Of so much more, then clothing began to fall like autumn leaves upon

A bonfire kindled by that spark of that single kiss leaving us naked,

Wild like crazed creatures in a nocturnal fantasy of an erotic storm;

Later we merged as one life upon the stage of this existence and for a

While traveled together along the pathways of time with a passion, a

Fury held together with laughter, tears, joy, anger, and so much more,

Until we became scattered by the storms of being and began to drift

Toward the rock strewn reefs of the sea of love where destiny tore away

At us and left our hopes shattered as though glass upon an anvil of iron;

And I’ll never forget what’s her name who gave so much to this traveler

Who had not enough to give back and so lost it all to his shame,

From love came the bitterness of failure and the kisses ceased to fall

As twilight swooped down and became a tragic midnight chorus of

An unrequited relationship that was devoid of all but a sardonic smile

In a time of love spent, the used, then torn like a cloud in the moonlight….

CHRISTMAS TIDE THOUGHTS…..

Crystalline snow laying in heaps like white sable nestled over the earth,

Air crisp, fresh, flavored with pine and wood smoke fills the sky,

It is the day before Christmas and my thoughts turn and twist to those

Long gone past as well as to today, choking me with strong emotion,

Not bitterness, only a sense of loss and of hope, which is our nature;

Now it is the day of Yule and I find myself alone, brewing strong coffee

While Beethoven fills the air with a string quartet and I sit in deep

Thought wondering what is going on everywhere else but that goes

Nowhere fast so I focus on the music, the dark brew, grateful to have

Made it to yet another day no matter what it may be or what it’s called;

This day passes without event leaving me with a sense of peace as I

Accept the truth of my story and look upon the snowy forest thankful

For their quiet wisdom, calm presence, and enduring patience,

Night falls and I eat my dinner giving blessings for what there is and

As darkness moves along toward the dawn my story changes again;

So the Christmas tide comes and goes once more in quiet fanfare,

Another year waiting in the wings to change, to rollover the calendar,

More snow is coming and the air is sharp with ice from the far north,

It is the season of the solstice when fires are banked up higher,

As our dreams turn toward the distant days of green fields, warm sun…..

Pulse Blues…

Rhythm coursing through my blood like the wild Sargasso sea,

Memories of years gone by wash across me as if a tide on a beach;

Music playing carries dreams across its’ waves relentlessly,

March 6, 1967 Tim Buckley at the Folksong Center, N.Y.C., a

Marker on the road that was to lead to San Francisco and the

Summer of Love, another pulse in the travels of this old poet;

Now I have the sounds, remembrance, and unfilled yearning,

To pass the long hours that grow ever shorter with time,

And there is this book I’m writing, a montage of my life rife

With anecdotes , experience, history, philosophy, the pulse of

Decades streaming from coast to coast like blood rivers,

Forming canyons deep as all the power of emotion unleashed;

So the day passes in streaming rain sounding the chill of autumn,

The bones ache with a melancholy pulse rhythm giving life a frame

Of pain that gnaws at what joy there may be bringing darkness

To light, shadows to every movement that crosses my weary vision,

But there is hope, no matter how faint or tremulous or flawed,

Now the hours pass, music plays. And the pen doesn’t stop….