I Woke One Day and Was a Man I’d wondered what it would be like to be a stranger in a body rented from God, cargo damaged more each day. I thought being a man would mean freedom to go wherever I wanted, do whatever I liked to do, not bound by the long leash […]
Tag: Death
The Scheme of Things
In a breakneck chase the moose calf goes down, a grizzly devours. wolves stalk for hours the bison get away. the pack sustain on voles and mice mostly go hungry a crow eats the nestlings in a robin’s nest still robins abound. green turtles on a beach lay eggs swim off in the deep. all […]
Has It Really Come to This?
The story has been told and retold: Ben Franklin was walking out of Independence Hall after the Constitutional Convention in 1787, when a lady asked him…. “Well, Doctor, what have we got a republic or a monarchy? Franklin, “A republic, if you can keep it.“ But that’s not the end of the story which most […]
Break This Bottle
If I taxed my heart long enough to reach ninety-one I’d run short of beats, I know, dumb idea, no matter. I don’t need to map life that far to be happy– Still it’s good to know what’s out there before setting a course for the Isle of Calamity—waves rise and fall no gull flies […]
Letter to a Close Companion
You begin in the twitch of conception, a long narcotic lullaby until the song vibrates in every cell and bone. We will never be rid of each other, so come, come, little ones will circle in dance striking your face with flowers I loved mocking your toothy grin they will never take your outstretched hands, […]
A Reckoning
There must be meaning behind a will, there must be healing. Night deepens but I cannot sleep, a lily pond glows drowsy koi floating by a moonlit walk in the park. Is there a reason to feel the loss of so many I never knew, did I help herd them to slaughter my twisted heart pounding […]
The Tree
Buddha before enlightenment starved bony looking into the moment for a way out the joy and pain the universal law at the center of the chaos in and around him knowing we all wait under a spreading tree the return of turtles setting eggs in sand salmon roiling upriver to spawn sea lions […]
Bedtime Prayer
Soma, Zany, vodka sweet Now I lay me down to sleep I pray that death will not come That would be pretty dumb To die alone without a friend Would be a bitter wasted end. But if I die before I wake I did my best for fuck sake I don’t know where I’m goin’ […]
Invocation
In silence older than the sun the desert holds me like a lover needing little, offering nothing but peace– A voice in the wilderness, “There is no lasting happiness Samsara, Samsara.” Darkness older than silence, older than the coyote howl hunting song of the owl bat wing flick, mule deer kick To move and breathe […]
The Search
I wanted to be a serious poet, but heard they are prone to heart attacks so I lightened up and became a playwright, rented a little studio where I could audition the truth, ran an ad in the paper, “Desperately seeking reality.” And some very interesting characters came to read. There was a sage addicted […]
