with love to Russia

from Ukraine,

with love to Russia:

"Momma, your son will not be

coming home!"

the dictator with his pet baboon

while i'm reading by lamp light

about our futuristic tools

a dictator is having his lunch

but he's angry at those he rules

for mixing fresh lettuce with day old bread

and now he wants the kitchen staff dead.

they know the way out the back door

but it's blocked by an alligator

who tells them to come back later

when all should be well.

they grow impatient because they recognize the smell

of their own fear:

nothing is as it seems to appear.

so out a side window they jump

hoping to ditch the dreary dump

before their lives completely diminish and erode,

using a moral compass to find the higher road,

leaving the dictator alone with his pet baboon,

hungry and howling at the waning moon.

he's still angry at those he rules

but momentarily content 

as he strokes his family jewels.

sleeping in an old Soviet kitchen sink

i know well:

you're in a prison cell

shuffling down the halls

bouncing off the walls

romancing like a thief

while shuddering like a wind-blown leaf

trying to think for yourself

without falling from the shelf

but it's a trap where you breathe

and you're forbidden to leave

i know well

your life is hell:

unable to speak your mind

unable to acknowledge whatever you find

when adding 2 plus two

three open-toed sandals and a blue suede shoe

it's five but someone has been telling you

and you've been told what to think

as you're sleeping in an old Soviet kitchen sink

shuffling down the halls

bouncing off the walls

romancing like a thief

while shuddering like a wind-blown leaf.

June 1st, 1962

On June 1st, 1962,

The Communist Party press

in Novocherkassk

reported that the price of butter and meat

would rise by 25%

and workers' wages would decrease by 30%.

On June 2nd, seven thousand workers from the

Electric Locomotive Works stormed to the police station

and the Communist Party headquarters

in an effort to protest.

Soviet Army General Matvey Shaposhnikov, 

put in charge of the armed detachments 

stationed nearby, 

refused orders to shoot at the workers,

but many soldiers simply couldn't resist the impulse.

the dead were loaded into trucks and disappeared.

later, 

Shaposhnikov wrote:

"The Party has turned into a car which is steered by a reckless,

drunken driver who is always breaking traffic rules.

It's high time to take away the driver's license and prevent

a catastrophe...

Today it is extremely important that the working people

and the intellectuals should see clearly the essence of the political

regime under which we live.  

They must realize that we are under the rule of the worst form of autocracy

which rests on an enormous bureaucracy and an armed force...

It is necessary that people learn to think.

Our blind faith is turning us into mere living machines.

Our people have been deprived of all political

and international rights."

The KGB were not amused.

He was quickly stripped of his army rank

and his membership in the Communist Party.

Subsequently, he lived in modest retirement until his death in 1994,

always convinced he made the right decision.

In 1920, Stalin said

In 1920,

as a young revolutionary,

Stalin said,

"May the god of history help me."

perhaps he knows that the god did not

help him,

but still demands to be thought of highly.

And on the world stage we have one of his successors

making demands,

thinking highly of himself.

what a waste to appeal to the god of history:

his fate is sealed.

Bloodlands

Bloodlands,

sucking quicksands

expensive drinks spilled onto the Kremlin floor

like memories of a great heroic war

near a private bathroom door

left ajar

look! 

a spying

 

sitting Tsar

taking a needed break

holding his pet snake

reading history books and fairy tales

polishing his scales

hissing orders over the phone

while sleeping alone

with himself as his best friend

waiting for the enigmatic end

missing a loving heart

pointing to an ancient wall chart

watching the tiny grains of sand 

slipping thru his Russian hand

like dreams of former empire

strung on the other side 

of  distant barbed wire.

Russian warship

Russian warship.

Go fuck yourself.

this bear has sharp teeth

Romania,

and Sweden,

Finland,

the Baltics

along with Poland,

and other neighbors

who have spotted a cunning bear roaming

near their cultivated gardens,

a peace train is coming.

meanwhile,

Be Safe, brothers and sisters.

this particular bear has sharp teeth 

and fresh blood

is on his claws;

his appetite is voracious.

there is only a small margin of safety.

Putin’s grave

Andrei Dmitriyevich Sakharov 

died 

and the thousands of mourners listened to

Chopin’s “Funeral March” and

Schumann’s dirge “Traumerai”,

a lament for the dead.

At the cemetery,

lingering by his coffin,

his widow kissed him once more.

Soon the grave was covered over with flowers,

red carnations and yellow roses.

But the people will piss on Putin’s grave.

eating salt peanuts

i'm frustrated, honey

eating salt peanuts

on the dance floor

spending my money

while you're keeping score.

i'm hearing things

every time my phone rings

shuffling to the beat

from in the back seat.

i don't have the view

of what's coming over you

but i'm going broke

laughing at your joke:

like a busted inside straight,

i'm always one card late

feeling out of time

at the scene of the crime;

and when the music stops

the final curtain drops.

i'm frustrated, honey

eating salt peanuts

on the dance floor

spending my money

while you're keeping score.

i'm hearing things

every time my phone rings

shuffling to the beat

from in the back seat.

ignoring what you just said

growing numb

living under your thumb

hiding my face

on each lap of the race

eating black bread

ignoring what you just said

not knowing

which way the prevailing wind is blowing

but trying to remain glad

with what i once had

and you're looking at me

knowing i want to be free

giving me a frown

while you're chasing me down

so how can i make sense

if i'm always jumping a fence

as other folk are simply grinning

their winter tires spinning

blowing up in smoke

is this some kind of joke?

well, i've had more than my fill

balanced on the edge of a window sill

looking down

looking around

afraid to fall

afraid of the prison wall

growing numb

living under your thumb

hiding my face

on each lap of the race

eating black bread

ignoring what you just said.

Sakharov

"Andrei Sakharov,"

said Tatyana Zaslavskaya,

"was the only one among us who made

no compromises.  For us,

he was a figure of the inner spirit.

Just the bare facts of his life, the way he suffered for all of us,

gave him authority that no one else had.

Without him, we could not begin to rebuild our society

or our selves.

Gorbachev may not have understood it quite that way when

he let Sakharov come home,

but he would understand it eventually."

In his Nobel Prize lecture,

Sakharov said

"Other civilizations, perhaps more successful ones,

may exist an infinite number of times on the preceding

and following pages of the Book of the Universe.

Yet, we should not minimize our sacred endeavors in the world,

where,

like faint gliders in the dark, 

we have emerged for a moment from the nothingness of

unconsciousness 

into material existence.

We must make good the demands of reason

and create a life 

worthy of ourselves

and of the goals we only dimly perceive."

the more you sang

you leaned in close

grabbed the microphone

you knew you could sing and had the tone

but the more you sang

the more i felt alone

lots of tables and chairs

but all i saw were vacant stares

and a hardwood floor

and i kept wanting more

someone like you

when i'm feeling blue

but if you don't want me

i'll need to bury my fondest memory

on the bar room floor with broken dreams

nothing is ever what it seems

i took a last drag on my cigarette

felt the smoke burn in my eyes

i was wearing a disguise

you leaned in close

grabbed the microphone

you knew you could sing and had the tone

but the more you sang

the more i felt alone.

near Katyn, April 1940

in the forest of Goat Hill near Katyn, 

during the month of April, 1940,

no prayer was answered.

The Mountain Eagle ordered it so.

he was doing his Pole dance,

hiding behind a black mustache

trimmed beneath black eyes,

proximate to a black heart.

he had come a long distance

from Tbilisi Spiritual Seminary

and the seamstress mother

whom he rarely visited.

his game was blood,

from others.

and fear,

from others.

and then he died.

during the Mikhail Gorbachev

realizations, 

old graves,

rotting boots,

smashed skulls,

skulls with bullet holes,

lost youth,

destroyed dreams,

all were found in amazing abundance.

history was to be rewritten,

again,

and again.

memory lived.

was the gulag archipelago dismantled

or momentarily lost from sight?

today,

swimming in oil profits and total corruption,

Russia has a new Tsar who is writing

a new chapter.

his millions of peasants watch,

but their windows

are framed inside a mausoleum.

a KGB caterpillar

Romanov

and the House of cards

assembled together

with the white rabbit and a judo man

to look for a full head of hair

near a nuclear waste dump

in northern Ukraine.

a physicist and an expert on arms control

hypothesized

that weather conditions 

and Soviet incompetence

caused a jet of debris to bomb

the citizens of Donbass

as they were hanging a famous movie poster

on a bullet-riddled wall.

strands of hair 

like thin sheets of confetti

swooned like soft winter snow 

onto the Moskva River

which was dimly lit by street lamps 

near the southern towers of the Kremlin.

inside the former Tsar's Moscow residence,

the emphasis was on greatness

rather than impending baldness,

and where a KGB caterpillar was sucking

on his hookah,

wearing a tailor-made suit designed in Italy,

threatening the world with destruction

if he lost the remainder of his hair.

you heard the cracked bell toll

so you might try to be sly

but death is the winner

all gray and foggy

inside a paradox

adrift inside an ancient box

and it reaches out a bony hand

pointing toward the nearest street

where you meet

in private

looking outside from an open window

for a safe place to go

but the train stopped at your station

when you least expected it.

it wasn't a day like all the other days:

cheap Champagne and cigarettes on silver trays

hot blood 

red wine

eyes staring in space and time

you're jumping over tombstones laid on the ground

without making a sound

looking around

but underneath the trap door is for you

wearing two boots or one shoe

in the steady rain and sucking mud

on a live grenade or a dud

dressed for the dance naked or in costume

on a normal Friday afternoon

you heard the cracked bell toll

calling your soul.

it's not for you

when you sit down to eat

are you in bare feet

in the awful cold?

or dreaming on a summer day,

growing old,

holding friends

close to your heart

simply in no hurry to depart

or wishing for a fresh start?

well, there's so much more to say

and more to believe:

you can have your fortune

hiding up your sleeve

on the minute 

on the hour

pulling a reluctant weed,

planting a lovely flower;

or perhaps you're on the edge

with a bad case of vertigo,

losing balance,

no safe place to go,

and you're dressing well

or in tattered rags,

belly taut

or with one that sags.

well, look around

and take the grand tour

witnessing

the many desperate poor

on the bottom of their boat

with no hope

that they'll ever float,

and it's long after midnight

when you shine your shoes

and it's possible to hear

them singing the blues,

but it's not for you;

no, it's not for you

so what will you do

when they come wandering thru?

on the bottom of their boat

with no hope

that they'll ever float.

the fellowship of dance and voice

along the shore

the tide was coming in

and it was midnight;

there were stars above

and nervous laughs below.

the tallest mountains were far away,

stripped of sentiment,

exposed to the persistent winds

and rains and snow.

the heavy grinding of ice

from millions and millions of years ago

sculpted and shaped.

and it was warmer than the recent past,

but among the distant city dwellers

there was a noticeable chill.

their newspapers printed front page stories

of calamities and charity bake sales;

local libraries were seeing books 

tossed and turned,

banned and burned.

i could't tell why i found old folk songs

so sad,

especially as the visible fellowship of dance

and voice

seemed vivid

and spirited,

like wild horses on a wild range

where no corral would ever be built.

that crazy horse

i saw you riding that crazy horse

underneath a starry sky,

maintaining a steady course.

you were looking for love and a quiet night,

singing your own song,

welcoming the light.

and the road was long

and the road was tough,

with many temptations

but you knew you had enough.

in a frontier town,

tired but satisfied,

you were resting but alert

and clear-eyed.

simple and sweet,

taking a front row seat

and happy to be back home.

the city of Trieste

walked the streets

of the city of Trieste

the sun was doing fine

heard people talking in tongues

and the name i heard most often was mine

when a woman with darkest hair 

in the bright light of mid-afternoon

strolled into my life

shaking her Bulgarian fork and spoon

said she lived in the Rhodope mountains 

and would i like to take a private walk

but i didn't know

if she only hoped to talk

or was there a boat she wanted to sell

i wish i knew 

but i couldn't tell

her flowers smelled fresh and there were hints of sweet grass

looking low down but feeling high class

my flag flew stiffly in the sea breeze

i saw two peaches at the market that i wanted to squeeze

but i didn't know

if that was the way i wanted to go:

she sat for a drink at the inner harbor bar

waited for me to play a love song on my old guitar

so i bought her a meal while we discussed the deal

well, what would be the cost

considering that i was in a foreign land and terminally lost

but she didn't know

if that was the way she wanted to go

and the music and the dancers in the square

made me wonder if i should be somewhere

kneeling on my knees 

asking for forgiveness, please

looking into her eyes

where i saw a woman's comfort and surprise

but i didn't know

if that was how we should go.

We are what we pretend to be?

But then, who am I if I'm not Ulysses

on the turbulent seas

fighting against the GODS?

Who am I if I'm not a great king

leading a great army to vanquish my enemies?

Who am I if but a mere mortal

clinging to a raft

floating between birth and death?

What is my intention if I intend

to discover an unchanging,

unalterable core of Self?

to find a center that remains steady, regardless of the changing

circumstances of my natural life?

am I what I pretend to be?

I have a hunch!

and that at any moment there are countless universes

within us and we make choices:

to be busy; 

to experience stress;

to be joyful.

to 'see' oneself being drawn toward 

or being repelled away from.

as the world turns,

How do I want to be? 

I've found that by being truthful & loyal & loving,

I attract others who value those attributes.

They are not taught.

They are integral to what it means to be the best of Oneself.

and I am equally drawn to those who express the integrity of those values.

A flower does not feel it's pretending to be a flower;

it simply blooms.

and any fragrance is beautiful and timeless.

Maxime de la Falais

the death of Maxime was of natural causes: 

at 86 it wasn't considered extreme 

her life was colorful artful in fashion and exquisite 

with really good friends and food 

she fed the Warhol brood 

in her loft apartment 

she lent 

Mapplethorpe encouragement in New York City 

she was a rare English beauty 

and silent lover 

lived her life proudly without unnecessary cover 

worked for Vogue magazine where she was often seen 

writing long lines for columns 

she moved to France to dance 

to write her memoirs in her golden hours 

when she died 

high society sighed 

in Provence where she was buried 

in rhythm and completely unhurried.

Pavarotti knew none of this

Pavarotti,

dressed like the bass player in Pink Floyd,

sang for his breakfast

in a deeply melodious tenor voice

and was given a plate of eggs and German sausage

along with a grande cup of foamy espresso.

there were originally three singers on stage

when the audience applauded,

but a famous magician made two disappear.

when the Greek diva rose from her box seat,

all eyes watched her grab the arm 

of a small in stature shipping tycoon

who had another First Lady in mind.

Pavarotti knew none of this,

so finished his breakfast and asked for a second,

which was served immediately.

he said life was a miracle!

the cabbage rolls

in a year of magical thinking,

when music from the 1960's

kept sinking

into the past along with Elvis and his slicked-back

Mississippi hair,

children looked up at the stars

and wondered what was there?

as do i.

the land upon which i walk,

the oceans and the sky

remain intriguing,

as do you!

and the grey owl

on her perch listening,

eyes glistening,

sat wondering why new houses were sprouting

high on her hillside 

above the free-flowing mountain stream.

and as if in a dream,

at high noon,

the Maasai danced in a colorful circle,

holding sticks and jumping to the moon,

imagining the black rhino in herds

of incomprehensible numbers

near the heights of Kilimanjaro.

and the Japanese,

in their ancient heroic voice

sang lustily to the Emperor,

like wrestlers undiminished by an opponent's 

relentless advance,

gaining advantage by giving ground.

and as the cabbage rolls

rolled across the enormous dinner tables

like lucky gypsy coins

and were caught by the smiling mouths

of ten thousand spirited Romanian dancers, 

the holiday music began to play,

in a year of magical thinking.