Saturday, October 31, 2015

LOST IN A POE REVERIE

Add to your day dreams
a raucous rant of reverie
from a fearsome sleepwalker
writing over five stories
about interrogated soul mates
in a mystery meter rising
on the far side of the moon,
multiply mirrors of singers
at live dance halls
divided into lively couples clubs
as the dawn awakes our hearts
subtracted into diamond legends
from king Solomon mines
or Treasure Island
when all lights stamp reality
that quickly burn away
from any spaded handled dross
of locating coins and stamps
from underneath the dark sea
of sinking cargo ships
as epileptic saints appear
from laced curtains
behind buried Puritan blinds
who move like chessboard pawns
over toothless archangels
hidden in church bazaars
fleeing lower basements
as exiled wandering stars
rescued over by shark
and right whale waters
when strong Sicilian sailors
unload fresh salt for New England
for our home harbor
to cook on colder nights
as Mayflies search for trout,
cod, and red salmon
near whitened kingfisher herons
who rest and stretch out
on the sunny high tidal beach
over a first frosty branch
reaching for bread and quail
along the edge of the bay side
of a camp site's lagoon
to search ethereal currents
near a once crunchy snow forest
thawed now among birdsong
as rings of sea voices rise
where Edgar Allen Poe trains
as a once dismissive soldier
in South Boston by Castle Island
despising all regiment
of his rejected discipline
writes in a trance of hours
by the ghostly Atlantic's watch
hidden between portholes
hearing an oceanic Druid din.



Friday, October 30, 2015

LIKE RILKE

Calling on an angel like Rilke
embalmed in a mid dream flight
of a cross-examined poetry
when lost in a parental storm
pressed by a mirages space
outside a tiny strange room
practicing my scales
about the recital riffs
of a first alto sax soloist
hearing church vespers
of those monks who return
from sleeping in the desert
now barricaded in prayer rooms
by a snowy mirror of stars
through cool long corridors
of a sound proof studio
by a constant metronome
of my fingered exercise
moving me to tears
the air assaults the island sky
with a dizzy rain
not far from my home
taking a November night's
chance at science
with a flicker of my wide palm
at a telescope in silence
from shadowy windows
to peer at the blood moon
outside the harvest fields
entangled in a pumpkin muffin
taken in the last light of sunset
as a songbird rests politely
by the lowered bridge's iron gate
near a wellspring marble statue
on the first icy draped branch
an anonymous poet waits with
a frosty glass of green tea
thirsts for a late Fall's pond
to skate as in childhood
as a wagon of hay riders
draws in my landscaped eyes
over the fallen red leaves
of a fallen birch tree branch
with my initials scrawled
from an adolescent crush
as an echo of dissonant winds
motions the sea breeze
as small exiting island birds
who love to circle and chatter
stake their nesting place
above the Cape's river bed.
MANTEGNA AT THE LOUVRE

Walking in the Louvre
sighting Mantegna's
long suffering "Crucifixion"
mutely smothered
by the heavily wounded colors
reproving what transfigures
to be anointed for every age
in a scene of dolor's desolation
presaging a man of sorrows
liberally acquainted with grief
stretched on a visionary canvas
through the sunny windows
at an  honorary altar's relief
carefully shaping a painting
in an oilcloth of pure lines
at our own reproof of unbelief.




FRANK AUERBACH AT THE TATE

Escaping as a child
from any weighted lashes
or hurts from the brown shirts
you are kindly lifted
on one of the last trains
to save you from misery
out of an unmentionable
graveyard of history's
great crime,
arriving in England
to discover your gift
as you paint all afternoon
by the sirens of thunder
amid all shades of rain
desiring a unique gift
in your deluged landscapes
of a romance with the world
that critics marvel at
with our big ben time
of a tower's great wonder
draped with a dowsing wave
at your hand and mind
amid a fountain of a soul's
residing hidden dreams
of flaming imagination
your eyes in a Blakean cast
of resonant fire
outliving the enemies of art
in the narrow streets
parting at London's backyard
in an unblemished toil
of colorful love
in buckets of paint
on a long body of work
covering the gated canvas
among uncovered fringes
of a last faded remnant
under the brightest tabernacles
of a final blood moon
with your miracle anointed oil
that will outlast our century
in brushes at the tall sun
now finally being honored
at the Tate gallery.



Thursday, October 29, 2015

REFLECTIONS

Awaking by a juniper tree
writing early verses
like the exiled prophets
and poets Jeremiah, Blake,
Byron and Shelley
on hills, mountains, lanes
in an unknown universe
with my intuitive anonymity
wishing to travel beyond the Cape
outside the thrilling mystery
of diligently watching
these draped fountain walls
watered down of my own history
wishing to travel back and forth
in a kayak over the river's mouth
toward north, west and south
shaped by a gentle invisibility
peaceful word, sword and spirit
to other spheres of geography
down halls of eminent biography
with Keats, Yeats and Andrei Bely
opening diligently to love others
in my own unlimited sealed span
with you daughters and sons
swaying above Manhattan's breeze
with Crane and Whitman
Emily Dickinson and Merton
in my own raised trope's trapeze
hoping in adolescence for romantic
and critical trophy rewards
as in a prophecy to hope and desire
to be revealed in a lens of reflections
and shine into a stars firmament
clothed in a glorious new linen
with a divine sent perfection
by a remnant of poetic souls
above all the earth and waters
hearing a chorus of small birds
beyond all space and time
in all fate and states of mind.



Wednesday, October 28, 2015

ON THE TRAIN

On the train up to Boston
when the first fragile snow
fell from the heavens
like isles of rainbows
we glimpse our spirit days
as shade and sun's shadows
begin its narrow peeks
from a still glowing first light
upon the walls and windows
like a  pre-Christmas surprise
I'm busily eating
my brie cheese croissant
with a cup of coffee
when I was eleven
going to symphony hall
my violin case next to me
with a complimentary ticket
from my uncle and aunt
to hear Munch conducting
L'enfance du Christ by Berlioz
and across me is Father Adrien
a priest from Brazil and Argentina
who is writing a biography
on John of the Cross
we struck up a conversation
in Spanish and Portugeuse
and we became better friends
through a festival of letters
and when his book arrived
with his signature inscribed
knowing as a boy's shadow poet
from all my joy, loss and sorrow
I would venture outside my home
from a lone walk in my century
now writing in my diary's arena
of my open yet vanished geography
that secret divine appointments
would follow me
in my every day history.



ALWAYS HEREAFTER
(In Memory Samuel Beckett
 1906-1989)

Through alleys and hallways
the runaway's heart beats
even by the French bakery
already tasting a baguette
with his own laughter
be does not beg
the manager takes a chance
for to him no one is a stranger
even by the creche and statuette
on hay and flower beds
as swallows visit
he returns to the river bridge
surprised to sleep and dream,
ye there is a poet nearby
on a secret mission
as a courier for the Allies
who lives with gallows humor
a day at a time
who writes plays every hour
when he can escape
here Beckett cleverly thinks
with an Irish wink
this optimistic boy needs
no critic or Schopenhauer
for knowledge is a wish
always ever after the last act
expecting another line of verse
to remember this child of promise
whose eyes are exhausted
who slowly swallows his bread
hiding out with the Resistance
who already sees the wounds
like a poet with St. Thomas
expecting to rise from the dead.


Tuesday, October 27, 2015

STREET OF SILENCES

Walking on country roads
where my words should be
housed in a double row of roses
near my rock garden
caught between islands
as Fall showers us with wind
trembling on our back
between a life-line kayak
near a lobster boat man
speaking in Portuguese
out of breath
in the morning shade
drawing a cerulean landscape
of a blue dusty sky
at the Cape's coastline
greeting me
with six mourning birds
drinking in the river
as they plan to fly South
covered with sunshine
amid the shadows of the sea.



Monday, October 26, 2015

MIKLOS RADNOTI'S LAST HOUR
(1909-1944)


Rain on your torn fingernails
tortured by murderers
who not not explain
the empty road
an empty glass
a perfume of the past
in a cross-examined
eye socket
by a concave room
with one bulb of light
of toothless betrayals
there is skull
by a ravine of hail
in a mouth of trampled snow.


PARIS LETTER, 1944
(for Paul Eluard
in memory 1895-1952)

A shadow wall clouds overhead,
of a poet's Resistance face
on a friendly wall bed
there is no death in a tricolor
from life's red moon
waiting for one letter
by candlelight lost to a moth
in the darkness's surveillance
of a thousand portents of snow
with blood in a chance meeting
on the road's silence
from your sudden passage
in the corridor of a dim abyss
as seen from a sentry of birds
hatching in nests for the spring
Eluard, those breathless nights
by icy endless silver birches
at first light guards you
in the feverish voice and hand
from a war's metamorphosis
with long rustled suffering.
LETTER FROM VIENNA

I am the last of my kind. The gates have opened. The ovens have been closed, forgotten like the

last snow in the mountains, there are no rescues to report from the millions of red eyed souls on

dying faces in black and white printed about on broken press releases at the end of the last war.

But this is another last battle to report. The West has died but hardly anyone bothered to know

and certainly to acknowledge the surrender on the news round-up or on the obituary page.

London, Paris, Brussels and even Jerusalem's headlines do not write of it. There are no deadlines

to speak of. It would not to politically correct to confront civilization's enemies; after all free

speech is no longer speech or free.

Here the once wise,the disguised, the despised are speaking again on exiled passport whispers

while shopping for bread or bottled wine.

Oil it turned out was life, energy and hope, as only a few have the anointed oil on their body and

soul for a spiritual war and the Christian armor is for knighthood or armies of the Crusader's day.

Never a loving prospect for me or you anyway.

To be free one must have good eyes to report what is going on. Civilization is under the rug,

disposed of.

Yet the love of God, literature, culture, Bach, Mozart, Freud, Auden, Weil will live on in books or

on the radio. But for how long.



Friday, October 23, 2015

AMAZEMENT

Between you and me
speaking confidentially
it's all an amazement
how Odysseus still inspires
our own return to Greece
through his words and phrases
we remember his exiled journey
that even a warrior like him
deep down longs to smile
visits an island of sirens
and birds until he relieves,
relives and returns
to Penelope at peace,
or recalling Jason 's hopes
with the bold Argonauts
at Colchis searching
for the golden fleece,
or wake up
with a cup,cake and saucer
in an English priory
reading the tale of Bath
by Geoffrey Chaucer
or when contemplating
from a chapel in Paris
the poet Jean Pierre Jouvre
being fortified as art rules me
back from the Louvre
seeing what is colorfully new
with a wide critical eye
among different classic
or romantic schools
taking in imagination's part
deciding what to review,
or by chance to fly
near the fountains of Trevi
designed by Salvi in Rome,
or just dog walking the Spaniel
gone far from home,
or reading how Daniel
was a captive
exiled in far stranger Babylon
yet praising and praying
with the angel Gabriel
in his prophecy for Zion
with an interpretation of dreams
in signs for freedom, it seems
God showing him the demons
of four future kingdoms
with so much governmental danger
among the lions and  beasts
it's a a great parenthesis
from his deliverance too,
or the shepherd king David
kneeling inside Jerusalem's walls
broadcasting from Israel
when God calls,
or in St.Teresa's consolation
in her convent in Avila
water flows in the Prayer of Quiet
continuously without delay
for blessings in depth and height
in her Seventh heavenly mansion
clothing her contemplation
from numerous conduits and way,
or we being a devoted scholars
being creative back at college
quoting Rimbaud ,Verlaine,
or the Romantic Baudelaire
seeking poetic knowledge
in a lending library of words
of linguistics from Saussure
or Derrida's heliocentric
metaphysics as an arranger
to my friendly mind
yet without a worry or care,
daring travel like Dante
telling his story with Virgil
his guide going forward
in hell, purgatory or paradise
for we all have a secret garden
and sanctuary by the bier
of Hamlet, Ophelia or Lear
to seek pardon and dwell
as Master Shakespeare,
not being a monkey, cockatoo
or any songbird on a tree
yet leading as a lion in a zoo
wishing like Daniel to be free
do not be embarrassed
at my words, all is well
we could be in a desert
or mountains of Grenoble
with your Alps goat herds
grazing for another day
it's all amazing,
would't you say,
or wrapped like Leonardo
in the draped fashion of his day
by his paintings, sculptured art
inventions or portraits to portray
or hearing a Bach cantata
or a clarinet concerto by Mozart
we all have passed our part
in sonata, Passion or quartet
learning from the rapturous art
from Ravenna's Mosaic culture
or bolder frescoes at museums
above high Mobiles of Calder
echoes composers like Webern
or older Vienna professors
like Dr Freud trying to convey
how our early genesis of genius
came gingerly to love and play
we remember Venus and Adonis
conferring dreams for us
or as the conspicuous insect
of Franz Kakfa
offers us his Metamorphosis
until his last regret.




Thursday, October 22, 2015

WHEN A MEMORY

When in pursuit
of the past
you seal your words up
as in a waterwheel
watching the sea waves
as a lobster net catches
some red salmon
already ordering
my next meal
the sun conceals us
as in the allegory
of Plato's cave
with a theory of forms
as people are untutored
behind a visionary's wall
in a fiery burning parapet
where prisoners awake
and puppeteers may move
as in a snatching net,
it's like the last cup of water
we noticed by the museum
in a long box
of wild roses by the phlox
are gathered by campers
near the Blueberry Hills
thinking of packing
up our belongings
for our journey
to a hike up on trails
near the Green mountains
up to Vermont's high peaks
a landscape arises
out of nature from my camera
revealing out of nowhere
scenes of expectancy
as fond memory scenes
will return to remember
these wide open fields
in a variety of naming colors
of blond, green, flaming red
like Blakean seasons of October
by the White River bed
near a painter of oils
clothed fresh from the city
in his handsome denim
tells me he wishes to become
a Master of the snows
in the coming months
as a weekend jazz recital
rocks in an alabaster courtyard
near an ambrosia bandstand
I'm asked to play violin,
by the hyacinth out in the sun
my child spirit is within
nature's poet's full enclosure
from a lorry of sightings
by fireworks as we swim,
it seems our brief time
motions us to linger now
flowing as if we are by shore
near the quarry waters
on a visionary's mission
we motion our chapped lips
like Wordsworth or Whitman
transformed for our time
as a young rap singer
puts away his radio
of German heavy metal
sings about a fountain of youth
with a bong and guitar nearby
winks to remind us
at this hip hour
that we are like birdsong
or a mute blue petaled flower
only here for an hour
yet after a brief melody
and riddled laughter we live on
drawn together
to share what is cool
as Wordsworth or Wheelwright
knew that often communication
is justice misunderstood
I'm here to honor the unknown
when words wait to appear
in the setting sunshine
to rejoice in the pine woods
gathering moss and stone
by the fawn, deer or lamb
as a witness to feel free
in an open sky's countryside
are never spoken as gone
nor of our missing
daughter, son, or swan
residing out by the sea
perhaps hiding out by bicycle
or out riding
in another neighborhood
as seen in the next dawn
suddenly finding
a last love letter of Dear John
below the blind alley
or writing on an Oak tree
by the golf cart lawn
a text message in Swahili
 "I am who I am".

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

MAKE POETRY ALIVE

As if words surprise
absorbing attention
when a smooth jazz poet
and alto sax player
with all night riffs
emerges outside the  club
as an Elm branch falls
because of a cool, bright
late October wind
over the downtown docks
the poet draws his eyes
toward the river bed dunes
on the first light Esplanade
by the bandstand gazebo
with resting songbirds
delivering dreams in images
of articulate voices
yet somehow remembers
he must turn back the clock,
we survive with words
come snow, welcoming frost
speaking in a foreign sense
of divining phonic tongues
we watch until my kayak anchor
once fastened by inertia 's rope
now moves like a swan boat
across the back of the pond
by the rocks of the sea
thunder waves over us
as the catch of sorry phrases
are a wonder of honesty
going beyond our sixth sense
to a characteristic fifth dimension
with intuitive friends
greeting me this early dawn
the sun rises by my bicycle
sighting our tense choices
at tension's moments of truth
as nature awakes the vineyard
an authentic bard of New England
walks over a trail bed of leaves
hearing chaotic squirrels
sit in an apple orchard tree
as mourning doves chirp away
we're fumbling a football
with a blizzard of verses
red-eyed for a creative day.



Tuesday, October 20, 2015

STEVE KOWIT 'S VOICE
(1938-2015)

You made an hour's listening
to your urban Beat reading
sound easy no matter
it's how consequential
you ask for a clever
underground voice
to make our attention span
pass all unconventional words
yet you once called yourself
a trouble maker in temperament
or street wise young delinquent
who had so much tension
escaping Vietnam for Canada
defying the government
after a poet's vent and rant
you visit a secret zen peace garden
to observe a choice of leaves
when tossing and turning
sleepless in lemon and red
at Julian to the El Capitan's dam
flowing in a river bed
as blue fish swim beside you
finding in his imagination
even a mermaid or merman
in an expectant delivery
of California's inclement rain
for a life is never a fading thread
there is always a clever knot
somewhere in any deluged plant
that causes us to survive
any injectant life long pardon
remembering what you said
you made us wish to feel alive
willing to entertain
your departure is an absence
within October's rushing breeze
as we wade in your span
making eyes at the dancing moves
of you and partner Mary
move their hands and feet
from grit head to their knees
you showed us to be brave
from any contrary countenance
flowing from a spit image
of recognition and a language
writ to a connection
at your magnetic presence
just by sheer energy
in your main man up ignition
offering and all ready to go
and fully release your poetry
at a leaking lip of chance
never drowning
but going by the  implicit flow
in an innocent body of thoughts
with your unique way of language
yet dowsing for still waters
evidently listening
to sea star shells bobbing up
amid the Big Apple
traveling to Brighton Beach
to hear sea star shell echoes
hidden out by enlightened angels
with Whitman and Crane
and onto San Diego's
sunny Coronado
within reach of the white sand
by endless exits of parking lots
we remember you, Steve Kowit
engaged here to shelter
to enlighten us by an obit
for your own entwined memory
from my own signed elegy
you sought to be at peace.



CHARLES TOMLINSON'S PASSING
1927-2015

To another time
and world where words
meant something
like the critical journey
of artistic voiceless
from frosty silhouettes
dazzled by sky birds
in their flight
you remain in memory
persuaded that light
from every abyss
taught us to touch petals
fallen in the thinned garden
in an age of the pitiless
you rose up questioning
like exiled freed Odysseus
waiting for Penelope
as an invited guest
to pardon what lived
and grinned
from a faceless mirror
at a lyrical wind
through an earth-wise valley
lifting our own darkness.

YEATS AND FRIENDS
(1865-1939)

Yeats in the Rhymers Club
waits to share his words
not to scold, atone
to make amends nor please
at his pub on Fleet Street
but to be here with friends
as words rise on poet chairs
at the Old Cheshire Cheese
to abide with Dowson, Wilde
Symons, Lionel Johnson,
praising his circle to tell all
and to be set at ease
with their cups raised
making their own voices heard
as each now a grown up child
no matter what shadows
the weather portends
they come out each night here
for as songbirds fly
near the window shutters
under the sullen Fall sky
poets arrive here alone
for their enlightened stupor
aware of the other's voice.





UNDER THE POPLAR TREE

Standing in a rose garden
under a poplar tree
asking no pardon to disclose
another's popularity

We are alone under a sky
seen by perhaps only one star
often wondering in the frost
the cost of beauty from afar

But our eyes are stone cast
on two lonely birds
who sing us their solo tune
in a song without words

Putting bread from the feeder
and water for their thirst
soon they will fly ahead
satisfied from the first,

Few bother to stand with me
under this dream of landscape
or understand that poetry
has its own green band of escape

Here we take a surprised leaf
of orange, lemon and red
by our own relief
is already gone on this river bed

Asking to be born
for another century
as we walk
along haltingly,

Perhaps only Keats,Byron
Yeats, Dickinson or Shelley
will greet such an October sun
and still run away with me.







Monday, October 19, 2015

A VIRTUOSO'S BREAKFAST

The door opens
to a china glass of blue
with nana's jam, kvass, groats
boiling green tea too,

Everything seen in nature
leaves small sorry sightings
day dreams on an exciting tram
as all things become new,

Over a dawn's trainload of ideas
drawn from my margin's outlines
and compose in an octave mode
a prodigy shares the road signs,

Until reaching our destination
where its treated human cargo lie
retrieves us at the last station
as a few children wave goodbye,

When is an expedition or experiment
ever wholly completed in rhyme
yet with a hello at our music school
we take our notes in time,

We try to obey the golden rule
in our own maxims and quotes
to pass any secret tension
we live in a cello's rosin notes,

And behave in familiar traits
as in a mirror's dark glass door
and confess as love waits
in a whispered corridor,

Watching dependent bureaucrats
yet one cool cat at every class
students grow into jazz
with knowing incomprehension,

Playing my dressed up riffs
from an alto sax or solo violin
with an open sentence stress
in my first knowing composition,

Confessing to reach a harmony
beyond my voice's convention
to extend my speech choices
on a minor key's vocal invention

We wait for a breakthrough
in content and lyrical form
without any local fear of tension
to encounter a musical storm,

Learning English and Latin
Russian and Greek
translating Pushkin or Bunin
is always yearning to speak,

With a major melody you knew
a poet recites in matins verse
trying to recall the calm night
from Hebrew psalms reviewed,

From a good day's childhood
delayed from recitation and respite
through our neighborhood hallways
we are made to be always polite

After a virtuoso's breakfast
hoping to record
what echoes in our tenses
we sense its own reward.


























Sunday, October 18, 2015

DENISE LEVERTOV'S BIRTHDAY
OCT. 24

It is an October wind outside
of us near the Frog Pond
where children will soon skate
by elm branches towering above
a chorus of mourning doves
reminding us of the story
of the hiding in the shelter
in the tabernacles of Exodus
as Fall leaves have slowly turned
a miraculous orange ,blond and red
near a market of pumpkins
in a resonant open shed,
as a camera guy glazed with film
takes you over to the Common
sensing cool air from the regatta
of a cruise race on the Charles
as a Harvard artist cannot wait
to embrace a bard's smile
and paint your portrait,
as we watch one swan
we named Leda move ahead
close to the mouth
of the forsythia river bed
near the bird feeder
a student reads out loud
by the Esplanade bandstand
his assignment of Levertov's
"Breathing the Water"
realizes that words matter,
the tall sun is a strong setting
for your birthday
people pause to hear you
on the crowded podium
as we read and play jazz
and sax riffs for peace
with an avalanche of voices
your presence rings out
remembering during the war days
children from the kindergarten
recall how during the Blitz
when a sparrow would fall
and land on the ground
you would rescue birds
in gentle acts
from their bereavement
over battle line shadows
scattering unknown moments
of eye watered observations
planting yourself in transition
to make up to nature's exile
as your spirit still sounds
whether in London, Boston
unquenchable Seattle
or by the leafy underground
of Black Mountain peaks
full of little poet pockets
and letters from loving fans
tucked into your sweater
hearing that you are here
makes us all more alive
what matters, Denise Levertov
is that in your poet's name
this morning of your birth
seems to the lot of us
to make the earth a bit better.


Saturday, October 17, 2015

PRAGUE TRANSPORTS: OCTOBER, 1942
(FOR PAUL CELAN
1920-1970)

Trains, transports
from Prague to Lodz
citizens from Berlin
cannot find
a place of peace
on the earth,
what greater sin
is to take away lives
along the Vtlava river
by the Old New Synagogue,
who could have imagined
such deeds against the Creator
than the history of murderers
in their victimized strife
now living as a remnant
out of dead dry bones
from shamed skin
as numbers on one arm
on days to atone
in chant of chants
toward God's  writing
in the Torah
to give birth in shame
from talented names
lost to the sky birds
on a parole of souls
before the firing squads,
imagine an engraving of life
its memorial writing
cut with a knife into a stone
a body of words may rise
from explained editorials
before closed doors
from the lawyer and prosecutors
past all just words
in the higher and lower ranks
from crimes of blame
no one may forgive
history's timely lessons
for its innocent
grandsons and daughters
who visit the Shoah
carrying its human cargo
on its memory cards
or to lay flowers
on old unmarked cemetery graves
in the Prague snow and rain
as the absent poet Celan
is saved by his silence
again and again.


Thursday, October 15, 2015

WITH VIRGIL
(Oct. 15 70 B.C.- 19.B.C.)

Dante, guide us again
with Virgil
through Hades,Purgatory
and Paradise
we recognize your story
by your breathless logic
taught by Dr. Chadwick
after linguistics in Latin class
surprised by the power
of the trajectory path
from the Georgics
in a descent of Orpheus
to rescue Eurydice
from the underground
before our cafe noon lunch
that still jogs my daily mind
having recognized your vision
to cohabit sounds
of the pastoral Ecologues
in the Roman poet's precision
for we learned of our Virgil
in his span and ability
as we earned the clever credibility
of logic from all the classics
that are often hid away
in cold attics or library stacks
yet your planned mature words
are still alive to some of us
even if not read in the original
from old Roman Empire's dialogues
we still desire to read you,
contrary to our comic side
we will survive this century
of all dreaded literary quarrels
at our variety popular chorus
of stand up or sit ins,
Virgil is here for us
awakened in our varied culture
to his miracle history
and share the story
of the Aeneid
we light a candle to you
on your birthday cake
with a vigil fire over your head
festooned with earth-wise laurels
we applaud you with laughter
over a never dead poet's society.





Wednesday, October 14, 2015

RIMBAUD BIRTHDAY
OCT 20 (1854- 1891)

An adolescent ever tongue-tied
spinning over the awe
of drawings,maps and words
shadowed by an encyclopedia
opens the windows of first light
overhears song birds
by horse chestnuts
on wide street trees
this October twentieth
imagining aqueducts by
rain shadows of mirrored hail
after sober sweet dreams
as he is being dressed by mother
Arthur beholds the lightening
and girded up thunder
hoping for good fortune
now bent on his knees
by the Virgin Mary statuette
as he composes new honeyed lines
by his garden of Autumn leaves
along the Ardennes roads
now walking with his sister
who weekly takes him to church
for communion and to confess
yet he longs for the wondrous sea
to travel between the sky voice
and earth's remembrance
watching wings of lost sparrows
the boy seems suffocated
catching his breath
looking at pictures
of a sunny Seine river silhouette
by open boats moving
cargo ships in the dusk
all under the darkness
of the call of human exile
by smoke rising from candles
on his birthday cake
he imagines crossing over
somewhere out on the waters
under bestrewn tracked clouds
in a ports search of Casablanca
on a destiny's mission
with a full African moon
by a desert of Morocco
feeling down in his luck
in a long pleated shirt and dress
from a small house boat
somewhere out on the waters
without love or aching caresses
until unexpected tears fall
upon a motionless face
travelling with whispers of grief
he sinks into itself in a day dream
of sweating disbelief
by his visiting seamstress
across his torso by the door
as seen by the painter Fantin-Latour
with a pitying care and relief
unlike the murmuring mistress
and lover Jeanne Duval
trying to wake up Baudelaire
under cover this Fall day
in the fair dawn
as drawn by Manet.




BACK IN MY NEST

In the course of a weekend
to the North Shore
struggling with
science fiction,plays
maxims, exams,
and so much more
unable to make a prediction
with the right diction
or pretend to have
the right title on my last story
having left
with an uncorrected ending
yet back in my nest
near a chorus of sky birds
with superpower wings
having discovered
the piles of sunflower seeds
we leave for the birds
near my open porch
when needing to prune the roses
at the rock garden
here at the last hour of night
walking on the flagstones
between the roses
are two smiling guests
with half- closed eyes
who hand us more flowers
and white wine
they place on the marble table
in the scorching air
not being able
to thank and surprise me
at my last reading
having my last collection
of "Everything, Everywhere"
in their grateful hands
asking for my autographed signature
to sign on the dotted line
any perspective of words
for my unmasked pleasure.






OPEN READING

Destined to gather
in noon at the quad
you were calm from the beach
swaying on the sail boat
where waves gave you peace
here to read each others words
in the shadowed patience
we forget the clock
people rise
from a shut eye to watch
the conversant
or relax under a hammock
play with a jelly roll
or a spinach croissant
even chant your lines
in a thousand tongues
before you are translated
is to repent of your past
no life is outdated,
you may move
to the constant future
on outer spaced words
or inner worlds
actually we told Boris
a new Russian student,
not to panic or fear
there is no firing squad here
even when you bare your soul
you are among friends
for to prudently express
your conscience
does not give away our silence
when understanding pretends
to ask out loud in poetry
what questions answers all
that our absence contends
with a small hidden id and ego
yet our goal is viewed beyond
giving amends to the crowd
having hid from our embryo
yet waiting to hear your verse
read from a microphone
the wisdom of Whitman, Homer
Dickinson or Sappho
in our expanding universe
from an ancient chorus or muse
or your lone voice singing
for us till now.


Tuesday, October 13, 2015

NOT SURE

Not sure
if the zip lined cable
and then a taxi city cab
would awake me from my nap
composing a viola sonata
while asleep upon music sheets
under my Angel's baseball cap
then rising to hear
a Bach cantata in B major
waiting for my morning cup
of green tea
with sliced dry melba toast
blueberry jam or pate
from nana's cold jars
still on my lips
to taste a half day
as a dream confection
of Proustian repast
until my freshman visit
to the Coast for an open read
at the free library
giving me down time
to look up "Warsaw"
in a Polish dictionary
which Chopin loved
at his Parisian loft
with Georges Sand,
then I'm trying to find
on a map
"Bardstown," Kentucky
where Tom Merton
had an epiphany
from a clear voice
near an abbey and monastery
by all roads leading
to his own poet's Gethsemani
taking my own daily diary out
on my bench of reflections
at this exuberant October
my lap teeming with croissants
to share with the tiny birds
at this awesome hour
surprising myself
to discover karma
if there would ever be a witness
to my veteran crime drama
written on the city bus
for over a year
and presented to the class
would make it to off Broadway
as I'm being made aware
of the fuss
outside a recruiting station
as two guys argue in Russian
if Tolstoy's "War and Peace"
was greater than any plot
devised by Dostoevsky,
thinking every encounter
addressed to the future
has caressed a past history
of a hot Beat
who keeps it going
by his good acting cast
with an misunderstood
fortune cookie on his lap
along the crunchy valley slopes
of my now snowy childhood days
wanting to cross country on skis
passing over the mountains
or play an alto sax at a gig
near the heavenly resort at Tahoe
watching two opposing sides
at the chess match
near a mission's fountains bench
hearing a heated argument
as their words catch up to me,
now the players link arms
asking to be engaged until noon
laughing at each other's jokes
until their dear John and Joan
love letters are within reach
in a beer bottle disposal
not burned but buried
until the year 3000 A.D.
near the sandy song birds
who hover along the sea's beach
as this couple wave to each other
floating as my mind races
near red and orange leaves
and golden Fall mums,
I'm strumming on a Spanish guitar
given to me at the mission
to face the river beds of Autumn
fixing my motorcycle spokes
within reach
then riding away trying to believe
there is way to live lyrically
and vanish under a half moon.







Monday, October 12, 2015

IN THE WHITE MOUNTAINS

Covered by the mute sun's
high afternoon dust
hiking in a deft weary range
with a poet's October shiver
remembering the cool air
riddled with orange kites
on a high space
at a first frosty arctic wind
hearing tangled voices
on a branch of sparrows
singing a fine tune
entangled in small eternities
on a fresh airy peak
handing a red apple
to a thoughtful friend
and a wounded doctor
embedded in the last war
known for his debates
in sixth grade English class
now on his once soccer knees
by lifted up songbirds
and a cicada chorus
almost covered by leaves
a lone robin wanders near us
with a tangled wounded wing
from an explosive truck wheel
saying a childhood prayer
we all begin to heal.

OCTOBER'S LOVE CHILD

The full moon enlightens us
as wet cut lemon slices
for a Japanese tea
a friend of ours
writes out my initials
on the acorn falling oak tree
after dragging orange red leaves
by a laughing love child
of a neighbor we know too well
in a labor of love
once orphaned and frightened
on the dry ground
almost left behind
in this close knit road
when deer were around
wanting to make friends
as his eyes search twigs
acorns, fruits and nuts
near our picnic table
by the serious flash of wind
in the rejoined woods
under the stumps and trunk
hearing the songbird sound
with his earth-wise lyric
we fall on a blanket silent
trying to capture a picture
of this motioning landscape.

Friday, October 9, 2015

FALL

Fall is the time span
to read Whitman's "Leaves
of Grass" to man up
or be mowed down
when passing a touch football
over strawberry fields
after a half hour of rest
after hearing our neighborhood's
laughing chorus of songbirds
with their grackle of sounds
as two mourning doves
a warbling and meadow larks
on the slate roof
begin to sing above us
feeding on rock garden phlox
by sunflowers and yellow mums
we jam into jazz
with my sax riffs of sax
on hedges of forsythia
near woody gazebo grounds
by the music bandstand
at daybreak in a circle
of first light
by Japanese yews and shrub
as we relax on benches
covering pea green lawns
of the golf course,
huge turtle suddenly dives
into the ditch water river bed
I'm already boarding my kayak
for the mid-Atlantic
catching blue fish or salmon
after our croissant repast
a delicious confection
now stretched out on a hammock
by a breeze's quilt
at our early clocked out business
feeling no missed guilt
for leaving Fred, the cat
by our now fenced in gate
at our open window Cape
hearing music outdoors
as the cat hears young Igor
the pianist swaying to Chopin
before Stefan and Eve arrive
at three in the afternoon
for our daily seminar
to share their enterprising words
for our poetry class
at a house call at the lawn
and we realize the daily news
on the house steps
survives another headline
wishing there were no more
rumors of war
as we are in reflection
by the tall dunes
relaxing by cherry blossoms
by trembling hilltop slides
and playground swings
near the greensward valley
even contentedly surprised at all
to sum up at our own deadlines
that we can no longer ignore.




Thursday, October 8, 2015

FRANK O'HARA'S DAY
(1926-1996)

Without regrets
the sunshine is quickening
on Frank O'Hara's day
leaves his single bed
in Manhattan
goes to the sink
in a soapy washcloth
with words on his tongue
saving face in a mirror
stares out of a sealed window
checks his lottery bet
as is his business pattern
up from the dank cellar
by his thick doors
puts up a print on a napkin
of a portrait by Larry Rivers
an art friend at the Cedar bar
on his bedroom wall
Frank finds a pawn check
along the dark corridors
circles his gothic hallways
still chain smoking
until he devours a bagel
chestnut soup and cup of java
from a persistent vendor
on the steps covered for Fall
over trembling leaves
this October morning
a fly by night pigeon insists
on greeting to thank him
with an unwelcome offering
on his newly dry cleaned coat
as he tries to think of a title
and words for a new collection
at an urban read at his recital
trips over trembling red leaves
this October morning
with a future lunch poem intact
inside his slim poetry pocket
he is slap happy
knowing he will get
a massage soon,
yet under cloudy skies
it starts to briefly rain
in a shower of five minutes
he is showing up early
at the dank sweat lodge
forgetting the foul weather
the sun returns to its secrets
as Frank tells Casablanca
(the wonder world's masseur
wearing a sable collar
and a white turban)
loads of gossip from the club
who play dodge ball together
with him many afternoons
yet remains a rank amateur
sharing a poet's flashing words
and flesh on the pool table
for a rub down and towel
near the lanky guys
in the locker room
as he forgets what is not loving
by handing Casablanca
another soup spoon
for his epileptic episodes
when brother Frank is able.






Wednesday, October 7, 2015

MAURIAC'S DAY
OCTOBER 11, 1885

The sun wanes on Mauriac
by his slim volume of verse
"Oranges" we read
in the back bench
of the class
never dreamed of being
in Paris near the Seine
tracing the  rainy riverbeds
with my breathing outlines
by margins of red wildflowers
whose aroma stays with me
all these years
winding over my poems
embarrassing me
at my own readings
in narrow winding streets
from many cities
of the universe
from your weary pages
Francois Mauriac
you live with me
in uncertain hours
at the French library.





MONTALE'S BIRTHDAY
(October 12, 1896)

Over a pine covered park
in Milan on a city bench
eyeing the cloudy smoke
from the nearby factory
as a boy runs
his paper air plane
lands on Montale's knees
nursing his own darkness
in a soft October rain
over an ease of grief
in a loss he sustains
from a lover, Dora Marcus
to his life's birthday wish "Yes"
by the seaside beach
hearing a songbird's echo
in a sparrows chorus
upon a shade in this corner
of the highest tree branch
by the patched up grass blades
within reach of is writer's
still life from an artistic belief
yet cursing his own secret fate
of Dora's shadow bent over
his unearthed notebooks
by his earth-wise desk
as he steps on
fallen red orange leaves
on the thick dune riverbeds
as his lyric peaks to us
this awaited noon day
in his voiceless quatrain
close to his home of rest
in this familiar city.





FIRST MORNING CALL

First morning call
in late September
after being curled up
on my thick blanket
in a night set of dreams
that is remembered
in the familiar sound
of tiny grackles at the fountain
by flowing cold waters
and sunflower feeder
outside the narrow backyard
near the white frosty mountain
waking my motionless lips
for a bard's prayer met
in my quiet sanctuary
by strands of documented words
somewhere between genesis
to revelations's Apocalypse
hearing the peal of bells
in a submission for the day
watching the last summer roses
and pink and white peonies
on the landscaped fence
disclose the metamorphosis
of the skies rainbow
along my ride to the Bay
in the fresh autumn air
with my finger on a crawler,
a hot latte and a French croissant
attached to my bicycle basket
a notebook of poems
and letter from my uncle and aunt
excited about my new collection
"Everything, Everywhere,"
stopping by the airy docks
to speak with a lobster fisherman
who returns from Gloucester
and Cape Ann with a fresh catch
for the restaurant in view
Ramanujan hands me a coupon
for a free Thursday lunch,
the golf grass is still newly cut
with a few mallards on the course
as my mind 's eye is writing
from an imaginary source,
the wind rips the high tide
on the back of a river run
checking on my kayak
by the Oak tree acorns
encountering the Fall's nature
from its branches and twigs
in a changing wooded debris
by my practice in a marathon
to raise money for a charity
near the club of my last read
with my small band
at a dizzy sax recital gig
someone has put up my initials
unauthorized by me,
someone on the ocean waves
puts down his anchor and oars
out on the silver blue seas
for the last summer time
on an island's liquid mirror
watching the nets and nests
of nature's surprising vitality
will be aware of a poet's words
now in a sun rising frontier
my syllables speak
for my age and century
over the birdsong words.

















Tuesday, October 6, 2015

SILENCE
In memory C.S. Lewis
(1898-1963)

In the presence
of heaven's silence
in a halo of red stars
when the sun goes down
now everyone on his bed
wants to get out of town
and travel to Mars
at least with a Hubble
there is a telescope
to guide and not trouble
you with flying hope
in case of a heathen war
people need something
or someone to live for
in trying to cope
with headlines we already saw,
we will choose signs and wonder
in the open blue skies
offering a divine kiss
from the Prince of peace
in a law we will not miss
for we are under grace
whose kingdom will increase
even in the space race
as a mighty God, priestly king,
everlasting wise counselor
from our poet lore's lover
bearing the high gifts of Zion
from a day and night castle
in mansions of stone
no longer willing
to be man's slaves or vassals
or jeopardize our dry bones
nor to hide as a sc-fi novelist
and believer's visionary apologist
under night's wise cover
of C.S. Lewis,
here blessings will ring out
for a thousand years
from a bell tower
of wonder in a universe
from holy things of paradise.





CHESTERTON'S DETECTIVE
(1874-1936)

Chesterton would live
in his stories
as a priest detective
in the character of Father Brown
with his own actor's laughter
from a loving smile
in cheek and in check
would sit down
to rest in his easy chair
on the deck
after he had his day dream
writing his archdiocese fables
relaxing by watching golf
which the glorious bard
and critic cynically regarded
"as an expensive way
of playing marbles,"
having cottage cheese
and red wine for lunch
would find a murder case
rather contrary to solve
with a hunch
at least by his own directive
not minding to tell
with a Punch and Judy show
of his secretive business
and elected to divine
from his human cargo.



THE NATIONS RULERS

After the mad laughter
is heard in Hell
of Nebuchadnezzar
to worship after Baal's image
in his age we can tell
that before the fiery furnace
for three Hebrews all is well,
here in the third heaven
we hear divine messengers
with their angelic wings
by Bezaleel and Ezekiel
who bring us to holy tabernacles
for our unique offerings,
life flows as bright stars
swinging back and forth
from tracks of Europe
in the South and North
as the Hungarian officers
mount on horseback
with the rider hussar's whip
by the Czar's sparring racks
with rope from the Cossacks,
the morning bell is heard
for the conscripted army
signed by the Kaiser's censorship,
in the West and East
under the agrarian flames
Stalin and Hitler's as gods
became scorpions and beasts
in the sectarian worship of man
giving out Party cards
with a master plan
for class and race began
and a totalitarian chorus
of the egalitarian populace
rises before their firing squads
are all in the stands
here are all the names
of tall statues from the exodus
with always breaking news
in an awakening glorious history
in the Word story of the Hebrews
not saving face from famous rulers
who ruled over their nation states
but giving glory to the King
we remember to high heaven
those whose skillful poets
who sing of faith and power
Milton, Donne,Dickinson
Anna Akhmatova
St. Teresa of Avila
our charismatic daughters
and St. John of the Cross
a son whose living water
distills as showered conduits
as our night visions fulfills
waiting on the holy Carmelites
unwilling to bow down
nor eat the dross or leaven
but choose freedom over loss
as we pass over to Peter's gate
yet like Esther or Mordecai
wearing a golden scepter crown.



Monday, October 5, 2015

MARINER'S HOPE

A rescue ship sways
over my rusty orange kayak
under a noonday watch
of windy North Atlantic gales
refreshing my five senses
as silky rain shadows
the horizontal settling light
on my back
catches up to a poet
spying a right whale
who writes into the sunset
from his warm hand
on a bare Fall red leaf
over embraced whispered lines
as he breathlessly swims out
rushing under the weight
of blue soapy waters
planning to sleep early
near greensward  gardens
over tall grass dunes
along Rockport riverbeds
at the home harbor beach.




Saturday, October 3, 2015

OCTOBER IN NEW YORK

After an October walk
in Central Park
impressed with the flushed
fresh air of the dark city
enjoying Magritte's
"The Meaning of Night"
standing at the art wall
moving with a neat guide
an actor and singer,
named Rafe
with a sense of laughter
like Virgil to Dante
keeping a safe vigil for us
moving through enlightened halls
by tall tapestries
following your ageless eyelids
here in sight read galleries
of Warhols' ,Braque, Oblinski
exciting my still life's memory
keeping watch for hours
with my opera glasses in hand
for a more musical adventure
opening by the strong wind
at the Met's door
this is the day of lyrical art
we had been looking for
and then my urban read
with a sax riff at a club
in a vibrating crowded space
signing autographs
even offered a part in a play
and given bright sunflowers.







C.K.WILLIAMS'S LEGACY
(1936- Sept.20, 2015)

Among my passing on friends
by the earth -wise open books
of C.K. Williams
from overclouded mornings
you understood the reality
as the long suffering bends
in knowledge of being human
at an age and edge of longing
for answers to our Muse
you taught us by the Charles
near the river run of the dawn
hearing the song birds
in the woods near the museum
of the Back Bay Fens
from academic open windows
as we view sails below us
in cruise races
from the Longfellow bridge
and grey brick shadows
locating new languages
from unstamped student maps
in winters harsh as ruddy faces
who come to learn Virgil
Dante, Milton and Donne
as our lamps still enlighten
the dorm rooms
and boarding houses
of Brighton
and out to Cambridge.