Musings While Waiting for a Friend

1

The green passage
you stoop down
and undulate
the rushes wave
and part for you
faint music
emanates

it's always been there

2

Center plum
black agents
of dawn

We think too much

The drum beats
all by itself
under sporadic hands
cadenced for two
the human way

Forborne / forlorn
eeeeks emerge
along the space
between the ears

it feels good to say that

3

Ummm is a specific
word to use
for conveying
reassurance

4

In my sneakers
under the socks
is a certain memory
when I was young
and thought myself old
I used to push
just one more mile
to please the color red

5

White wine is a
crisp occasion
if jazz
if poetry

(not this poetry
especially but any kind
where you can stand on the
stair step and
look down into dark
fecundity in all its
senses)

if art.

There are Worse Things than Death

So here I sit, while aging gracefully
In three rooms that suit me very well
Wondering what will happen in the years ahead
When Social Security dies or is taxed beyond
The cost of necessary rent and heat
Will we choose between food and vitamins?

When Medicare doesn’t cover a massage
New glasses, reflexology, or natural remedies
Will we sicken soon and die?
When we cannot pay the rent will we go
To nursing homes with chemical food
Stale air, vile medicines and shots?

Perhaps our generation is scheduled to die off
Infected by selfish corporate lies
Working until 70, just to live
And then no recourse but to heel
Beneath the wheel of the AMA,
The FDA and the other evils of the empire

Our ideas have always been too wild
Our passion way outside the box
Once retired, we might actually do some good
Write plays or music, books and stories
Even a well-inspired painting
Can change a world

Maybe I’ll go back to northern India
And live in a one-room shack
Where the nearest Ayurvedic doc is a block away
Where the night is dark and everywhere is music
I shall miss my friends and all the other
Seniors living on the street.

Apocalyptic

High functioning disabled
Habits ingrained just wrong
The gamut of mental gears
Once removed from a love song
Incipient tears
Somewhere to belong
In the dream real or fabled

A resounding call
To sanity once remembered clear
To be or not to fight
Mine fields in fancy dress appear
Attempts to etch in stone take flight
Wind scours the radiant fear
Chameleon on the wall

The promise of all art
I cling to truth
The book unread
In unrepentant youth
the lady with no back inside my head
The pirate with his sharpened tooth
Come fill my heart

It's not so far to fall
the inspiration so enabled
Deep inside the mind
The answer many-gabled
the pride, the price, the path to find
with all my horses safely stabled
I come on foot or not at all.


This is an experimental stream-of-consciousness poem with a recurring a-b-c-b-c-b-a form. Feel free to leave a comment if you wish.