3 Sijo

I


It’s all playground politics and chimpanzee relationships
Only one universal law: how you treat the other
Karma/dharma are just metaphors but flowers bloom each spring



II


Pleasure is often underrated; need is a poor principle
A Spartan life may suit some people but it’s not robustly
satisfying. Wake up! Wake up! Joy is the payoff




III


As the shoot springs from the soil, as water shoots from the spring
As the blossom becomes the fruit and as the fruit wombs the tree
As hope floats at sunrise, so mind, self, and soul, bubble from brain



(the Sijo is a Korean syllabic form. from wiki: "Sijo may be narrative or thematic and introduces a situation in line 1, development in line 2, and twist and conclusion in line 3. The first half of the final line employs a “twist”: a surprise of meaning, sound, or other device.")

Day 192

I still walk around

to my side of the bed

even though I sleep 

in the middle 

now

If wars were fought by poets

If wars were fought by poets, the Pentagon would pay five thousand dollars for alliterations in iambic pentameter


If wars were fought by poets, there would be serious statues guarding the gates of Whitman Square Park; Shakespeare would be the fifty-dollar bill.


… there would be a sonnet in every basement.


If wars were fought by poets, every child would learn 4 R’s – readin’, writin’, rhymin’, and ‘rithmetic


If wars were fought by poets, crimson splashed canvas would remind us of birth.


… library cards would be mandatory.



If wars were fought by poets, the only borders would be our minds.


If wars were fought by poets, I would be a soldier.

Is this the Last Villanelle I’ll Write for You?

I own the clock from 4 til 2
striding streets myself again
but 3 am belongs to you

An arrow arced by Japanese yew
the heart of archery & zen
I own the clock from 4 til 2

My head explodes, enfolds Sun Tzu
I command both storm & wind
but 3 am belongs to you

The days are filled with adventures new
& fresh words flowing from my pen
I’m fast asleep at 1 and 2

but in night’s black hole comes something new
like unseen insects across my skin
at 3 am the itch is you

then thoughts of futures lost intrude
& each tick tock’s a raucous din
I own the clock from 4 til 2
but 3 am belongs to you

Ars Poetica

muse fickle words
diamond mined
from carbon thoughts
carbon thoughts
chthonic mind
‘til crystalline
clear
faceted
faced
focused
spare

Bus Beat Drunk M31

(here's a sound poem i wrote while, well, drunk on the bus. people seem to enjoy it whenever i perform it at a reading)


Bus Beat Drunk M31


The guy got off on 23rd
The guy got on on 34th
The guy got off on 23rd & on on 34th
The guy, the guy, got off & on
The guy got off off Off
on 23rd and on
The guy got off on
23rd & on on
The guy got on
on 34th
The same guy got on
on 34th as got off on 23rd
The same guy got off on 23rd
and on The guy
got on
The guy?
Same guy?
Same guy got on
Same guy The guy
got off on 23rd
got on on 34th
And then the guy got on again
@ 43rd & on on
59th The guy
The guy
The bus is full
full of the guy
The guy got off on 23rd
& on & on again

A hit of Whitman

O Captain! My Captain! Our fearful trip is done.

This hit of acid’s wearing off, up rises gumdrop sun.
Last night's star bright vision’s pigments mix to mud,
their profundity has gone to sleep, not gone but hidden in the blood
that feeds and fools my daytime mind & lifts me from the crud.
The trial of sprightly footprints across unbroken thoughtworld’s snow
tell me more than where I’ve been, but hint of where to go –
where visions are like toadstools grown thickly by the road,
each plucked by chance at leisure’s pace or left to shine unknown.