“No Longer”

No longer middle ground since we crossed the Rubicon to Oz;
Middling, yes! but Ozymandias has not been seen since 1818
Save for one split second threading hairs through the seams
Of two or more zeitgeists along a grey-walled trench, a cause
Of parallel joy for some few hours of silence when a clause
Or two was formed within a certain fecund corporal’s dreams
Of death, transfiguration and some place in line that seemed
To say that true results are neither here nor there; the law’s
Delay will save the day and if we’ve been fêted in a fetid trench
For now, “we’ll soon be surfeiting beyond the need of bread and butter,
on to caviar and champagne.”…
…Let it rain, then, today; suffice
To say whatever comes to mind will serve a dying virtue or victorious vice
With no one left to gainsay what despite the stench and clutter
Is after all to victors, spoils, to prey what words are left to mutter.
What must be must come with no one left to guarantee—
Entitlements be damned—if better souls are weakened, powerless-
Ness succumbs before the righteous face of bribery and cannot guess
Who’s come to dinner than what’s behind the silver screen’s
Sufficient for auld lang syne, and in the end, we’ll euthanise the trees’
Supplies, the reams of notes and asterisks to history in digests
Bound in leather, all that might have served to lay to rest
Licentiousness of blame, contrition in arrears for what we’ll leave
To broad imagination. History takes effect in tomes of admonition
with healthy tongue in cheek; the hornet’s sting can be fatal,
True, but then there’ll always be survivors and who’s got time
To reckon loss when carillon bells toll their rhymes:
so, who pays the bill and who discerns
from death the blessings of the cradle?

“The Pastels, the Liquids”

“The Pastels, the Liquids”

The pastels, liquidity in the glass are given sight
In purest motives from the richest reds,
Blues, or better yet, outrageous magenta shreds,
Cobalt indices within the tincture. The slight
Is, for the moment, intended, frozen, then released
In lucid translucent turbulence held captive by seals
Between the wards as ever-churning shapes reveal
The signs of bailiwick again.  The artist, her fragile ovulation, speaks
In stains, then thoroughly intoxicating flames, and then is gone. She’ll appeal
To hearts in refraction, a natural reaction in framed compassion.
Stationary, held inert, or in the running freely, stasis rationed
Rarely if at all, she invites movement along with zeal
Induced by pure delight in candlelight in the dance
Of elvish fingertips upon the eyelids, no smile left to chance.

“And When I Pack It In”

“And When I Pack It In”

And when I pack it in at night I think
About my day and turn my thoughts to Him,
And feel more than ever that the hymn,
Sweet Hour of Prayer, is more than just a link
To chains within my mind to what I know is true:
Deeper, deeper, yes, than breath itself. The only time
I find I am alive affects the single call, the stolid rhyme
Between what He is and what I am, the simple clue
To what I’ve seen and gleaned and what I am about
To see, a reason far beyond the air I breathe: He
Is, I am, and He becomes for me
The Question as well the Answer, the Mount
Of Olives whereon I hear my voice,
And, in the end, it’s He who makes my choice.

“Kuan Yin”

“Kuan Yin”

Power in the youthful spirit―less
Than perfection and ubiquity by a hair,
Still more than merely hubris, a flair
For outward verbal, visual, and the rest
―This Kuan Yin places both hooves tied
And even, polished in the stirrups, firm
And purposed for the ride. She will learn
Of course that undertow in tides
Is dangerous and that not all imaginings act
Along the grain when divined from the sky,
Ancient planes which may have had a fly
Or two derange the serviced instruments―a fact
That more than must and many learn from time
To time―but spirit? Yes! as she relates to the sublime.

“The Signal”

“The Signal”

The signal, then, attracts attentions, bright,
A single aim, perhaps a company
Of one with two quite simple melodies
Against the backing of a richer, darker light
And punctuated with the same in words.
Some momentary spark of thought
That concerts in itself has caught
The virus and subdues the viewer on the curve
Of things, with nothing overwhelmed; relief—
Yes! no cul-de-sac within itself—and in the end,
With nothing said, nothing done, is sent
The whole to some passers-by with quiet bye-your-leave’s
Sufficient to address but not embrace,
Allowing intimacies, true, but at a restful pace.

“Compassion”

“Compassion”

Compassion solicits slowly here so as to free
And not to frighten those who would be taught
What mother’s brought them, long ago forgot—
Though neither wholly nor completely; the deed
Is sown within the lady’s vision lightly placed
Before the battered, shredded consciousness
Of all that is omission, pounding mounds of history precious,
Stilled, surmounting seas within the eye, tears effaced
For more than moments in the brightness of pending days.
She gently offers peace through words that pray,
And gesture, upward visioned, honed, revealing stasis best betrayed.
And we to this kind woman’s loving sighs may give pause, and pay
Respects, for remembrances freely given through her cries
Against hypocrisy, all warlike hubris and shame that distance hides.
Yes, he knew Ophelia, so he thought, singing sodden in the rotting reeds
Before her robes, engorged, grew heavy with their drink;
Her streams were lost within his waters: phantoms sink,
But souls will rise, and she in her distress, seeds
At once with weight and resignation calling found their depths.
Her mind, but fear; her heart, but fire; her body, haloed hair—
Such glories slight eternity, hasten near naked lust and care.
“And, are you honest?”, “Are you fair?” he asked (integrity is kept
From such as do possess them both), and she was struck,
Smitten—what page in what Book of Hours had she read….
Sings he, “Believe the none of us!”, while in the index she,
“You never cared!” and lay they both a while among the weeds,
He upon the bank and she with garlands bread
From woven woes unwieldy; thraldom, not at all well
Disposed, drew up her robes and locks before she fell.

…paintings by John Singer Sargent…

“Notions of the End”

Notions of the end come willingly
at the hour of knowing
Greaters than the sum of minutes,
An art of instrumentals within the limits,
Fractal fountains, residues of all points flowing
Naturally as when in a fresh encounter, a bolder plan,
A greater announcement, the future itself arrives and even if t’were
Already placed within her pantheon of gods, perception errs,
Perhaps not so much by deception as conveniently deferred, the élan
Of what it means to override possession and play the compliment:
The joy of it, the subtle stroke, the nimble, self-conscious act of doing
What must be done, a supra-natural ruing
Of identity—no hands, she stands—beyond what comes to pass as sacraments
To common passion. Remembrances and souvenirs sustain to no avail.
This, my friend, is what it means to own the gift of mortal life and wail.

…painting by Qiang Huang…

“A Sonnet for My Father”

My father fought as a pilot in the United States Navy in the Pacific Theatre of the Second World War and in Korea. . . for my mother, and for me, and in the name of justice for the entire world! He was the greatest man I ever met in his generation. From my father, the light of justice; from my mother, the fire of love.

“The most important thing a father can do
for his children is to love their mother.”
~~Author Unknown

And was it my own mother loved so greatly,
“No, no woman should,” she said, “love anyone
As much as I loved him!” And as his son
I knew him first because he gave me
Cherished gleanings of the name of justice
There above the love my mother bore
And brought the two together well before
They introduced me to the world. It was right
That she be loved by one in whose eyes light
And honour both to God and to His name,
The promise of his country, and its fame
Lay not so much in victory or in the glory of its might,
But kneading hope for human dignity with yeasts of truth renewed again
That set my mother’s eyes ablaze and far beyond the gaze of other lesser men.

“I’ve Found No Time”

“I’ve Found No Time”

I’ve found no time to drink to you these days;
My skies are not so fullsome gray and nothing presses.
Gates are open, roads are cleared, the milk of guesses
Churned to butters; no delays,
No distractions, no rain checks, and all is well.
And while some sooner sunrise I’ll miss the summer breeze,
The longer play of light from dawn to dusk, the ease
Of minor clothing, still, the autumn spell
Of falling leaves, and promises of best
And better reasons through the seasons yet
To come are smiles. While the fall forgets,
Stiller riots and fomentation, revolutions in the colours
come as no surprise to solar guests:
The greens and yellows, pinks and fuchsias, indigos
And mauves will flee, as blackest soils one day taste my toes.

…photograph above by Todd Small…

“I Anticipate the Moments”

“I Anticipate the Moments”

I anticipate the moments. I survive,
But there’s not it–the fireflies sweep
Through me as sheets
Of rain and sleet within a tired mind. Contrived,
My expectations are a tepid fog compared
To what I feel when you are with me. Now
I see I cannot trust myself to disallow
Disguise and art; when face to face the errors
I embroider come unravelled right
Before my gaze and I am bound to show
Without what should remain within. Even now,
I cannot recreate myself in time to face the light
Of what I am, so plainly seen by you and all our gods, and I deny
I ever waited, wanted, longed, or even cared to see your eyes.

…painting by Susan Aldworth…