native prairie grasses

there is something to be learned from this trial by fire

IF one is nude and tied to the most important stake
in the overwhelming presence of anxious enemies,
regardless of the time of day and in spite of several
persistent appeals to a hoped-for shared humanity.

not even half-hearted support seeped from the Speaker,
who had an embarrassing hand holding the doomsday gavel.
it doesn't matter if this speaker is masculine or feminine,
as a lusty sex is never part of their equation.

i heard the deep bass sound of a 1980's Pink Floyd
tune and "I'm all right Jack keep your hands off my stack"
slipped insistently inside my spinning head, bounced me on The Wall.

When i moved closer to a full time job inside the virtual heart of darkness,
the beating roomful of intensity draped a blinding hood over my eyes,
and from that moment on, i could not see from sea to shining sea.

the coffee chit chat space reminded me of a television reality show,
never to be canceled in spite of woefully low ratings.

outside, our great smoke is still visible, largely caused by fossil fuel burning
and often conjoined at birth by the charred corpse of a terrible irony:
during break time, a few souls volunteered for Yoga class and didn't seem
to mind trying to be mindful without the past or the future interfering.

their proud city high on a hill decked in white in spirit if not in style,
sat tightly connected in a fast 5G network, unconcerned that
the curtain is coming down, even while the audience shifts
uncomfortably in ever smaller seats and all the house lights turn dim.

here, ocean fish no longer go to school in abundance & glaciers melt.

no buffalo roam over boundless stretches of a once familiar world once
greenest with wildest native prairie grasses;

the untamed Indians are long gone but the high rises have come,

banishing the hide-bound tents to lonely reservations.

no soft touch violet round-lobed Hepatica can be found flirting
with its' slender white eyelashes as a simple hiker paused in search of spring beauty.

there is much to worry about when the natives dance in circles
and Wednesday is always known as hump day,
even while the island sinks into the bay.

Sergei Diaghilev (died: August 19, 1929)

he died in Venice:

before the floods swept away the chairs,
and the perfume princess brought her broom
to sweep away his cares.

she was on a yacht
cruising the Adriatic with a friend
when his telegram arrived from across the sea
to suggest this was the end.

he had eaten too well,
with rich food and sugary desserts,
and diabetic pain exhausted him,
yet he claimed it didn't hurt!

on the Isola de San Michele,
his grave site sadly
had only four mourners by the muddy hole:
two were Misia Sert and Coco Chanel;
also Lifar the clown and Kochno the troll,

while Massine, far away, was hastily trying
to persuade wealthy Beaumont to keep Diaghilev's Ballet Russes afloat.
but he said no,
and Picasso refused to gloat.

Sun Ping said

Oh, yes, Sun Ping said,

if you are a die-hard Taiwanese separatist,

you can be killed, but not by her personally,

for she is a coward who hides behind verbal boasts and threats.

she is employed by China's Ministry of Public Security,

which is a comedy show for couch potatoes.

a sharp sword of legal action will hang high, she said recently:

no one on mainland China laughed, but Taiwan chuckled.

listening for an encore

Sydney, Australia

and the opera house
at dawn
was singing 'Good Day' to a
regatta of sailboats
which i saw and heard
while walking to the famous bridge
out of my way
but not too far
at the end of the summer of
1970.
for nearly a month
i waited for my flight from
Saigon;
in spite of everything,
i was able to board,
and on landing,
the Aussie girls were waiting
after i cleared Customs and
found my army duffle,
their big round eyes shining
brightly in fresh happy faces.
they waited to dine and dance,
to walk and talk,
to peek and probe,
to be close to me, to touch.
did i ever say how much
it meant?

war and peace, so close together.
and in the crisp springtime, future months away,
with the opera house filled with song,
the evening harbor aglow with lights, sails and stories,
i'd be dug in under a misty jungle canopy
far to the north,
listening for an encore.

into the wind

i rode my bicycle into the wind
And you followed me like a swan in flight
Maybe slightly less graceful but right
Before we reached the hill
You gave a determined look and still
Managed to keep the pace
Even though we didn’t race
Like crazy we tried to look quasi-pro
And people who’d see us would say “Oh!
They’re so colorful and obviously fit
How do they find the time to keep doing it?”
But on the hill we focus and pedal
As we pushed our rolling steeds of metal
Because something was in the air
As we rode we found it there
And it was good for our spirit
So we kept riding farther to better hear it
To the top of the hill and away
Into the distance of another day
Where you rode your bicycle into the wind

And this time, i followed. 

Crane's Midwest Nebraska town

ten minutes on my bicycle is worth more than a week at the Jersey shore walking the sandy beach leaving imprints a good detective could gather hints from how deeply my bare feet sank 

so no, i would never go to a full services bank 

i'd go directly to a chair to read and drink 

watching the tidal pool i'd think of Latin phrases and the root word of the most recent medical term i heard i couldn't imagine myself in a cave 

i would be tempted not to shave 

if i became sweaty and hot, 

i'd still pedal instead of trot

i'd want a kiss from which i'd reminisce 

it's considerably easier to ride with an ice-filled water bladder on my back wearing my Giro helmet and sunglasses 

enjoying the afternoon as it passes 

ten minutes on my bicycle is worth more than a single bed at the Blue Hotel 

walking around back to see the bloody fight not far from the railroad tracks at night where the Swede really got what he deserved 

ten minutes on my bike i braked and swerved 

because it was snowing and i was down in Crane's midwest Nebraska town

making circles in the sand like a circus clown.

Hawking

with the nearest star filling his eyes with magnificent light,

Stephen Hawking knew it would be impossible to talk
in a half-hearted way 

and so he perceptively
continued exploring the universe 

which was found
spinning on his shoulders.

i understood it was his universe, but i kept looking at my own shoulders
while shifting my eyes left and right.

i discovered there was little to be learned by studying his face,
or listening to the inflections in his curiously
artificial voice, 

but nonetheless, he struck me as brilliant in the manner of Cousteau.

while in his presence, i found myself
directed to a well-regarded book which he recently added to
his collection.  

he encouraged me to read it.

and so i learned that all my last moments were streaming
into eternity.  

i wanted to visit them,

but he reminded me i was already here and there.

time, he said, was bursting into shards of exploding star particles,

and from any room

in any location, 

this expansion of speeding nature

broke human rules 

which hadn't yet been formulated.

as Stephen talked about infinity, he smiled his smile, 

his words dancing on
faint breaths of air,

moist nouns and trembling verbs racing 

beyond the hard, high rock towers of
nearby Stonehenge.

i began motioning with my hands, rearranging tiny pebbles of time.

and i stretched, and found my own voice, 

although i never saw a genuine Deity, 

even
though
i did hear
Stephen,

in his special chair, 

hair unkept, humming a tune,

perfectly in rhythm with a passing butterfly.

smalll boy in white

Out beyond the boardwalk
the air was warm;
the sun was hot in a boiling mess
and i felt like a whistling teapot
swimming to the beach.

i was forced to confess
when you asked me to consider the future
that i could barely tread water.

But I digress,
Sitting on a spot of wet sand from where i watched the tide:
It never tried to hide.
It went out first,
came back in stride.

In and out.

You were by my side
pointing to a speeding boat.
over the noise, i heard what you had to say.
A repeat from yesterday.
i wanted to leave, to run, to play.

i saw a wide moat
between us where the swirling waters swirl.

i had to leap over it to get to the street
where interesting people sometimes meet.

There i saw a small boy wearing clean white clothes;
he mounted a bike which had training wheels attached.
i wondered what plan he just hatched
as he coasted by on the sidewalk,
but he didn't look around or talk.

When he came to the moat where the swirling waters meet
he didn't stop, either,
so i figured he knew how to swim.

And the air was warm
which might explain why he wasn't wearing any shoes,

but whatever he did, it was his to choose. 

it's easy enough when you know

 it's easy enough when you know:

playing in fourteen part harmony
she was looking good from head to little toe
and i wanted to shake her live fruit tree

but i had to grab her by her truck
she gave me a little squirm

like a famous Hollywood Hills drunk
i wanted to hook her like a glow worm

she asked me to take a second guess
ah, i heard her breathing on my Hawaiian shirt
as though we were on an afternoon recess
could i be sure this wasn't a school yard flirt?

so i asked to play hardball with my new Anna Bell Lee
she tossed me her softball
i hit it as far as anyone could see
over her head and down the shirt of Jerry Hall
and i wanted to shake her live fruit tree
but a police car came to a screeching halt
we were dancing in the street
she told a cop it was all my fault

and he started to shake and tap his feet

it's easy enough when you know:

playing in fourteen part harmony
she was looking good from head to little toe
and i wanted to shake her live fruit tree.

Auschwitz

Auschwitz on a sunny day
was stirred into activity
upon hearing
of Hitler's Berghof estate
in Bavaria
and the priceless art hanging
from the walls of his apartment
at the Chancellery in Berlin.

He tremendously enjoyed fresh
cut flowers and marble statues
of classically posed nudes, 
demanding the presence of such
treasures throughout his living quarters.
But the powerful Nazis do live a lavish
home life, while their most
unfortunate subjects fall, choking on thousands
of pounds of deadly gas,

fragments of splintered bones found underfoot.

Auschwitz on a sunny day!

There is no champagne in a gas chamber.  

No joy.  No flute.

The candelabra, having been lit, was unseen
as workers swept the floor of dust 
where the young girl's heart was found
burned within her scorched shirt.

the blueberries from Peru

the blueberries from Peru

gave my hunger an early morning wink

as i picked up their plump promise

from my kitchen sink.

i offered up my mouth,

and enjoyed a special lap dance

with sweet young things

and it felt like romance

as they slid down my throat

before tumbling away

into my smiling belly;

it felt like foreplay!

and nothing else that i swallowed

had such an personal impact;

i asked them all

if we could reenact

this first bite of each day?

and i'd applaud their blue beauty,

their dancing moves like operatic ballet,

satisfying my appetite

like a lover at a candle lit cabaret.

as a naked man

sure i sat there listening

after my shower with face newly-washed & glistening

feeling somewhat loco

hearing the strange wails of the infamous Yoko

when i grabbed a tobacco-laden pipe

using its' smoke to hide from the sudden sight

of my wandering soul 

about to pay the highway toll

to take a ferry ride to Heaven's bar

which i knew couldn't be very far:

i could almost see the bartenders

who were adjusting their spiritual suspenders,

snapping each one in turn,

asking me what i hoped to learn

when it finally became my turn

to sit with God while drinking a cup of sweet tea

and he'd smilingly question me

about the shampoo leftovers in my hair

and how it had ended up there

since i was naked and obviously well-fed,

still sleeping in my own bed,

pretending that i wasn't dead?

so i took another deep drag from my smoking instrument

wondering where Yoko went

while rewinding the 8 track tape

to a metropolitan phone booth and a lonely Superman's cape

where the hanging phone is constantly ringing:

i can hear a black chorus singing

in spite of everything having gone wrong

and i am in awe of their beautiful Freedom Song,

so putting down my pipe and removing the last traces of shampoo

i'm remembering what's important and what I still hope to do,

answering the call is just the beginning and a decent start,

blowing smoke rings as a naked man with his human heart,

watching and waiting, but i'm no longer anticipating

seeing how the twinkling stars in the night skies shine

as they take their celestial seats to align

with all the mysteries carefully written on the hands of time.

ready for the next page

i've already been 49
and WILL
soon be 76 years of age

i'm ready for the next page
of astonishing images
representing the human body
and the potty
where yellow isn't the coward
that Noel was
when he slept on a fat mattress
playing electric bass
and meeting experienced people
who kept their pulse
inside a well-seasoned wallet or a stylistic purse
either of which could be found hanging in an art gallery
in Hoboken, New Jersey, USA.

the images i saw in my childhood
include the red-backed sofa in a small living room
underneath which was found
tomato soup spilled like Rothko paints
on the cheap carpet threads
and simple hard beds
and baby peeps unable to fly
dropping fast without a sound to steel steps
descending sharply to the Mediterranean Sea
for their non-stop service to Barcelona
and instead of dead within the hour
they became a white center leading to the Rockefeller Center
and real ice
which for a young explorer was especially nice
shaded from blue to pink
like a jumping rabbit in my neighborhood
holding a rose in his mouth to better think.

i once led a horse by the neck
climbing from the smoking galley to the upper deck
to find the ladies in a brothel
who spoke Vietnamese with a fluent ease
as i kneeled to my knees
and met the massive oversized ears of a girl
who lived in Paris with her lady friend
although she was in constant hiding
like a distorted cube
in shades of muted grey and brown
stripped down and streamlined
an hour glass figure
there in the mix with an accordion
making music with scraps of metal and wood
odds and ends
folds and bends
when this becomes that
the three dancers becoming grotesque
and i could just about recognize myself
ripped apart by a brutal civil war
jagged grief and childless
on the narrow road to a bull fighting studio
where overhead beams and white-washed dreams
provided sanctuary near the French Riviera
on a tall bed
onto which i jumped
to find my hand holding the strongest one of a special friend:

at 85 i will feel
more fully alive
than i ever did at four.

we will lounge on the warm sandy shore
the dove of peace flying like a soft balloon
overhead
without wearing hat pins

and we'll laugh at the sight and our grins

will spread like inviting female legs often do
when welcoming a favorite lover.

General Do Cao Tri

lam son 719,
or Dewey Canyon II,
an operation:

as was

Birmingham
El Paso
Hattiesburg
Springfield
Shenandoah I
Amarillo
Attleboro
Lexington
Baton Rouge
Quyet Thang
Resolve to Win
Toan Thang
Certain Victory

in an uncertain place
where the road meets the air
there was a certain death
but wasn't it everywhere?
23 February 1971
a hero's life explosively undone

General Do Cao Tri
died swiftly
in a helicopter crash
in Cambodia
i saw the funeral procession
from atop my compound wall
when i arrived just in time
with an army friend of mine
i could see the armored personnel carrier
and wonderful bouquets of brightly colored flowers
and i heard the marching band serene they played
spreading upwards and outwards music with a mournful edge
enticing, but there was nothing here to bomb,
half broken walls and a stony dirt road and the hot sun
and it seemed the war fell parallel to the road
where all the answers sat when there was no danger
i watched merely thinking what a damn good show it was
the General was buried in Bien Hoa's military cemetery
with his dress hat, gloves, sword, and baton
used "to spank the Viet Cong,"
he once said, before he was dead.
and Nixon said, before he was dead,
"Tonight I can report that Vietnamization has succeeded."

and very logically, i thought that he was conceited.