My love's an artist whose central goal
Is to conjure a collective around him
Who would unite to make him whole.
Feeling his friends' successes surround him,
He's struck out in many modes,
Resentment growing as silence confounds him.
He missed the decade of steel-clad odes
To vaudevillian death and displays
Of flame and sparking electric nodes.
But really he wants a legion which stays
Loyal to something he can hold,
Be it him or some movement ablaze,
He needs something to help unfold
The riddle of his history.
He needs help, his story's untold.
It's all that he insists to me,
He needs a following but seems barred
From all contact. Is this to be
His life, spent in disregard,
Ignored and obscure, unimportant
And immured in paintings charred
And dumped in some landfill assortment?
I try to tell him, but what do I know,
Attentions are fickle and discordant.
He's sure he'll die with nothing to show,
No idea or accomplishment
To force the world to take a slow,
Long look at his complement
Of nightmare arches and windows,
To see his soul in astonishment.
The myth and magic held within those
Doors to worlds beyond our own,
He searches despondently for symbols,
Figures which he hopes to clone,
Bridges he would replicate
To make a way from his corner alone.
The moments passing dessicate
The prison cell we'll call his domain.
Who'll succor as we supplicate?
He'd build the mechanical train
Of automata Daedalian;
If no one else, they'd remain.
They would be his daily in-
struments and aides, but could they talk;
Could he discuss the salient
Values of being as they walk
Together on the river's shore?
They might only tell like a clock.
Of course the interpersonal core
Demands what senses cannot say
Without the heart to give them more.
Conversations gunmetal gray
Sting when brought into the light.
Rather bring him a band to pray
With and feast the sacred rites
Which keep a spirit's wavelength true;
Brothers to make love worth the fight,
A legendary army who
Found strength in war and love alike,
The kind that ancient Thebes once knew:
Lovers poised to fiercely strike
Side by side in phalanxed ranks,
Surviving by the spearhead's spike
And beloveds' shields protecting the flanks
Fate has chosen for them twice,
Earning and giving double thanks.
Nothing since approaches a slice
Of their bond, and yet a fraction,
Even only earnest advice,
Would help to vindicate his actions,
Any step toward a base
Of comrades he can call his faction.
He's still running, still in the chase
For eyes and ears to bring forth hands.
Frantic pursuit. What is this place?
There was only one Sacred Band,
Even the deepest attempt to scour
The world couldn't find that strand
Of bond, which until the final hour
Is ever loving, ever loyal.
Perhaps by bones with magic power
Fruit could flourish from his toil,
Dragon's teeth in Theban soil.
Category: Terza rima
Helmet’s Return
Now we see why Helmet was gone of late,
And it comes with quite a revelation:
Helmet is a girl! Had she gone to mate?
She has her nest in the same location
As Mom did, at the laundry room between
The AC unit and wall adjacent.
It's perfect, shortly before this we'd seen
Her reappear amongst this family
Who hatched right there on that very same scene.
Many little soon-to-be progeny
Beneath her downy bosom incubate,
And we pray she's rewarded handsomely.
The second generation to propagate
Since we began to keep tabs on our friends
Is upon us; it's a difficult wait.
It's still months until brooding season ends.
I pray they will be kept safe from the drakes,
Or if birds-of-prey-disguised death descends.
Although anxiety for these ducks makes
Up quite a chunk of my expectant thoughts,
To see them flourish my waiting heart aches.
Little puffs of down all around her dot
Her nest where we counted somewhere around
Eleven eggs within this most blessed spot!
Who can wait to hear that heartwarming sound—
Ducklings cheeping in perfect innocence
As they swarm and skitter across the ground?
This season continues with cryptic hints,
The swapping days of warm and cold belie
Their secret day of hatching's imminence.
Newborn mallards have hatched somewhere nearby,
Perhaps on this first day of the new year.
Soon Helmet's chicks will poke out and arrive.
Though nothing more of the future is clear,
I dream of them joining us in growth here.
After the Loss of Miracle the Duckling
The sun descends before a mere
Mortal could ever fathom when,
And that's what fills humans with fear.
Black, indelible ink; the pen
Proscribes loved and unloved while I
Feel the true fear of change again.
These nearly-limitless things vie,
Each one of them so small at birth;
Yet some it sees fit to deny.
Lives inestimable in worth,
Newly born; why do some survive
While others get but days on Earth?
Why is it while they were alive
The bloody blade reaped thereupon
And nothing done could help them thrive?
I hear the doleful singing swan
Echo my thoughts. I must praise.
Even after, new young will spawn.
There will be more ducklings to raise;
Even those we've lost will be kept,
Remembered my remaining days.
And beyond when my windows wept,
They have their niche that they've occupied;
I'm a moment to intercept.
In all my childish, misty-eyed
Attachment I forfeit most sense,
For this is how they've multiplied.
Citification built the fence
Which separates and shelters me.
Life becomes unreal and intense.
Competition is anomie
To one with precious much to lose;
Life and fear in synonymy.
Such is the case for one who views
Constant struggle through rationale
And the tragedy it imbues,
But how could an animal scowl
At the fate of life, its one gift?
They don't see things as fair or foul.
They only know the life they lift
From the seed of their forebears' soil
And the changes of seasons' shift.
They're not averse to earthly toil,
Their being, both parcel and part
Of their place in this mortal coil.
As such there's never loss of heart
For them when tragedy befalls
Their life, the ever-forward dart.
An indomitable will calls
Their spirits onward with elan
Uncomprehending of our galls.
These ducks have but a single plan,
Which is to be what they will be
And to nurture their little clan;
To follow their ancestral tree
With peace wild and docile at once,
My darling ducks, this family.
So even when misfortune hunts,
I trust these ducks will persevere
Through both dreary and merry months.
They could be my teachers of cheer,
Wary for their safety and yet
Unknowing existential fear.
They simply take what they can get.
They remain happy and content,
Though looking out for any threat.
They're unafraid how much is spent,
It's all for life and it's all fair.
That's how nature builds its ascent.
A million generations' wear
Strengthens the very DNA
Which brings all creatures up to bear.
Very little controls the sway
Of fate. But, as their parents had,
They grow confident with each day.
It's like their souls are armor-clad,
Uncrippled by softhearted pain
That never fails to drive me mad.
Nature is indifferent to strain.
Prepared for total loss, it gains.
Goodwill
Smiling with friends is what gets you smiled on;
The will determines, so let it be good.
Goodwill is the path the masters styled on.
How many humdrum days have been withstood,
Bleeding together in monotony;
A good humor repaints them as it should.
Even here in the labor colony,
Life can be life if one allows it to.
Integrate goodwill with economy.
Look at your fellow as part of the crew
Weathering life on our vessel of soul,
Each in search of a piece of what is true.
Friendliness and compassion as the goal
Recreates from our common solitude
A feeling that the universe is whole.
There's much that can be gained and much eschewed,
Doors open and progress may resonate
When approached with positive attitude.
Even when enduring frustrating waits
Or rushing through the chaos of a blur,
There are opportunities to create;
Character that can be built, as it were,
Exercising fellowship and patience,
Growing into the person I'd prefer.
Why not work for positive relations?
There were years when that was impossible.
Happiness allowed the new nascence.
So how did happiness deposit, full
Of life-giving change for my stagnant gloom?
To not say would be irresponsible.
And yet I can't answer; was it the flume
Of love or maybe good drugs, I don't know.
Does anyone understand their own doom?
Peace is sudden and surprising in scope;
Once you have it try not to let it go.
A bounty on my head, and brine
A bounty on my head, and brine Surmounting conchblown elegies Ahead where drawn's the hellish whine. Resounding dawns of dread unease Endowed upon cliffshelves and salt, On eddies calm and felling seas. The bounds of haunting, bed of fault, The pounding on the cell and screams, The bed that's gone which dwells in vaults. I'm found a pawn left dead in dreams And ground to squandered shells and sand; The edges on the mellow streams; And now the longing shreds the hands Around the wrongs that fed demands.
A place for my poems 