do not confuse them (sex and love)

this,  fadeless.

today i missed your hands.

and...about honest writing...

In every bit of honest writing in the world there is a base theme. Try to understand men, if you understand each other you will be kind to each other. Knowing a man well never leads to hate and nearly always leads to love. There are shorter means, many of them. There is writing promoting social change, writing punishing injustice, writing in celebration of heroism, but always that base theme. Try to understand each other.

                                                                                       ---John Steinbeck in a 1938 journal entry

end beginning middle end beginning... (after ginsberg)

in the end:
with raindrop style we shattered stone                   

the cankered guts   the brittle bone

of us whelmed.  gush    unclothed     unknown

in the beginning:
we were for each the other's Ruth
wild blankets covered spurring truth
abroad we danced with purling youth
traced river reach and rush and ebb
too,  surge recede   too, dry stream bed
conviction crocheted   spindled web

in the middle:
elaborate lacings tat by claws
stitched up our failings   netted flaws
gripped all our moonlights   all our dawns.
awake asleep in numb and sting
cold beast infested plainer things      
froze fly condensed to seep and cling

in the end:
i could have knelt   i could have prayed
on slated floors     i could have stayed
but faith was gone.    love came too late.

now: 
             blast implode    multiverse                 
anonymous   surrounding    first
on planes of string uncurled, emerged.

oh hello space:   you lift me high
and gravity throws down my sighs                              
in starry soup   this all    divine



*******

i thought i'd give it a swing and experiment a bit after reading some beat stuff and allen ginsberg telling his truth in a strict rhyme scheme, which i found odd and interesting.  so, this little scrap above is my interpretation of (one of) his styles.  i am not accustomed to working within the scheme, and find it tedious and near impossible to express without the rhymes sounding completely contrived and idiotic.  i thought it would be nice to get out of my voice for awhile, and this has turned out ok, but i don't really dig it much.  i don't think it sings.  oh well.  **you play you win you play you lose you play.**


also, as bob dylan did and said, he only practiced during concerts, so what people heard was his working away toward something new.  i think i like that, too.  i will probably be editing this poem after the fact, so this dog may have its day yet.   or not.  ha!

**added sunday 9/25--
one of the things i want in my writing, beyond the obvious, is to create something that can be universally understood, without spelling things out so specifically that relating to the piece--not liking it or admiring it or hating it--but relating to it, is only possible for a few.  everyone can have an evaluative opinion based objectively upon some established standard, or subjectively, and upon their own aesthetics--but relating is something completely different.  if a story of rags to riches is so specific that it may appeal to some in an observational way, that's nice.  it's nice to get a different vantage point of the world.  but if a story of rags to riches is told specifically and generally enough, everyone should be able to find some angle or some part of it that is theirs, and they should feel recognized.  this is difficult to achieve--often people assume the work is autobiographical (of the writer, of course) of one person, when what i am going for, at least, is a work that is autobiographical in a more universal sense.

so, all that said, my pieces succeed or fail toward that end, of course.

and, with all that said, i ask you:  what is this particular poem, above, about?  you can think about it yourself awhile, then i will give you some multiple choice offerings.  think think think think, now:

a)  the falling apart of a team/group of some sort--baseball, PAC, book club
b)  two people breaking up/coming apart
c)  soldiers in some theater of operations far away or close to home
d)  existentialism
e)  the aging process
f) none of the above
g) all of the above
h)  faith

**added later pm 9/25--i'm continuing to revise, and change this thing up, and am getting closer to "can do no more--for reasons of skill and will"...

***added 9/26--i am so done with this thing.

****9/28.  ditto the above.  maybe really, this time.
*****much later 9/28.  ug. ug. ug.  i may be done but this thing isn't.
******10/1.  i do not think i have ever hated anything i have written as much as i hate this thing.  a curse upon it, a pox, i give it my evil eye, HexHex!  i abandon this effort now, having lost the battle, and maybe will return later to wrestle again.

10/2.   i am done.  i am happy (-enough).  i couldn't stick with his style completely i felt like i was strangling.  i changed it a bit and have learned my lesson-- i should not try to shake my voice.

sabine's poem, april 2011--(3rd grade)

do you ever think,
do you ever glide?  i do
and here's why:
i live like you
in my heart
but deep inside i have
my part.
i keep my talent to myself
but you my dear, you're just an elf.


---------


of course i am a proud mother who thinks her children are Brilliant, but aside from that, i love the innocent confidence, and the deep, revealing truth that she shares in this poem, and which may be said to be universal.  she had written this in her diary, but brought it out to show me today.  thank you sabine!, and:

that's my girl!

to stay asleep

not awaited not invited.  deep
indigo, deep night.   and sweeping
in they come.  unwanted from behind the bed
unwanted from below.  or from the
very in of it.  unwanted.  from the diagonal distant
familiar place.  the stark place,  from far.
from far too close to see.  from far. 

the monster hiss, the seethe
knobby and plain.  and true

with ears and eyes:
mine is a zenith horizontal. 

an already.

diagonally distant.  far. 

pay attention,  i think
in the middle of the night in 

the middle of the mare 
of me i
know:

i want my zenith. 

jumpstand.  and
not awaited not invited visions
damn and visions dark.   and sweeping
in they come.

those feral figments:  the old        
the done.

that flailing mahogany phantasm, that fabled
white inferno.   awakened   

from it: the smiled upon, the understood
the bloodless itchy-warmth.   comfortable. 

lilifed sanctuary.         flat-lineation and
jumpstand.  and it is morning.

at the edge, I'm facing the blaze. 

a faith to spell me back to myself

many personhood-central things along the curl to here i have lightly, or not so lightly, lost.  or tossed.  and as with all nows, this now will vanish and is really nothing but a single flashing, a bulge of possibility with little information as to the direction of next--of the zing.  and like all the others, this time is one for a bit of retrospective tracing and a lot of opening up to the unmapped.  (is it real, this moment, or is it just momentum?)---during the zip between then and next we carry memories, and happily today i stumbled upon this one, in a conversation, this not-lost thing, and re-realized my religion.  and that i do in fact believe its creed.  and practice it. 

i try to assure people that i really Really am calm, i really Really am ok, even if along with the losses-- desired or otherwise--i am sometimes crushed,--but how to translate above that fact the gains achieved alongside, and the sigh of relief upon recognizing oneself, again, still, and/or maybe despite? and that that is sometimes all that matters. 

the following articulation, this quote, comes from Jeanette Winterson, a contemporary author i favor.  i have it tattooed on my bloodstream, (my only tattoo) and have had ever since i discovered it in the early 90's.  it is from her book The Passion.   when i read it, it may have been the first time i have felt recognized, or reflected somehow.  (i've made friends and have maybe lost them over this book...--it is an important part of my story.)

You play, you win, you play, you lose. You play.
It’s the playing that’s irresistible.
Dicing from one year to the next with the things you love,
what you risk reveals what you value. 

right this very moment, as you are reading this, you and i may be friends or strangers.  in either case, you know me now.  

the strand running through each one

crouching on the strand,
forming definitely one brick.  and one brick

patting the shit and straw
into rough evens, and fathoming
the sun.  dream bake turn bake dream turn bake turn to dry.  and hard.  strong.

some bricks break.  and
not.  saving one and one

rain no sun no straw.  double-dutching a puddle.  there is
drought no straw no water.  hide and seeking the dust.
there is no shortage of shit.

in plenty in even bright, measuring
mix the champagne and haunting.

bricks coming slow next to that tongue of questions:
of traveling snakes and god and.
one and one     saving them.

sweating in
steeping in the biscuit rose and in the stink 
creating magnificent castles

take. 3.

then: sit on that red shag carpet or lie on the bear rug spread eagle on my stomach with my chin resting on the head of that poor dead bear’s and  i would watch the zenith. the thing that i remember about star trek (tos, now) on that tv is that dr mccoy was crabby-compassion and had that polaroid camera looking thing and could detect disease. from the outside,  scan people and then with fancy sonogram laser unnamed beam and through their clothes, cutless, germless, would heal them, and no matter how bad the diagnosis, no matter the nature of the injury or the freaky composition of the poison,   bones who was left with nothing but his skeleton after his         could treat almost every broken. and after a few hours or days all would be well.  or   well enough.  kirk still had the blue eye shadow problem but that was small in comparison to the        cases mccoy was able to cure.  now: i picture i am standing in my kitchen with fabulous hair wearing too much blue eye shadow and a zippy black catsuit and with command. i call into the retro modern brooch high at my shoulder, urgently but calm.:  McCoy!  Quickly! The Kitchen!  and then bones is transported from the enterprise or the unknown territories right in to my house despite mistrust, of the whole transporter contraption and runs to me with his migrating geese eyebrows and starts to take out scanner c or something and i turn to him and put aside my jigger and look at him. and say:  just fix me here.  here is where it hurts.  and i point to my weakly fluttering wings and he grimaces a bit and with his hair loosened flailing mahogany, like a white inferno. he ministers to me with his gun of medicine and i wake up. in some sickbay.  scarless..  with an edelweiss engraved brass cowbell on my chest and a terse mccoy patting my hand tenderly reluctantly understandingly, and saying:  i'm stepping back. now.  just      this if you need me.  but i don't need him any more.

scene 1 take two

then i would sit on that red shag carpet or lie on the bear rug spread eagle on my stomach with my chin resting on the head of that poor dead bear’s and  i would watch the zenith.  the thing that i remember about star trek (tos, now) on that tv is that dr mccoy was crabby-compassion and had that polaroid camera looking thing and could detect disease from the outside,  scan people and then with fancy sonogram laser unnamed beam and through their clothes, cutless, germless, would heal them, and no matter how bad the diagnosis, no matter the nature of the injury or the freaky composition of the poison,   bones who was left with nothing but his skeleton after his divorce could treat almost every broken and after a few hours or days all would be well.  or   well enough.  kirk still had the blue eye shadow problem but that was small in comparison to the severe cases mccoy was able to cure.  now i picture i am standing in my kitchen with fabulous hair wearing too much blue eye shadow and a zippy black catsuit and with command i call into the retro modern brooch high at my shoulder, urgently but calm:  McCoy!  Quickly! The Kitchen!  and then bones is transported from the enterprise or the unknown territories right in to my house despite mistrust of the whole transporter contraption and runs to me with his migrating geese eyebrows and starts to take out scanner c or something and i turn to him and put aside my jigger and look at him and say:  just fix me here.  here is where it hurts.  and i point to my weakly fluttering wings and he grimaces a bit and with his hair loosened flailing mahogany like a white inferno he ministers to me with his gun of medicine and i wake up in some sickbay.  scarless.  with an edelweiss engraved brass cowbell on my chest and a terse mccoy patting my hand tenderly reluctantly understandingly and saying:  i'm stepping back now.  just ring this if you need me.  but i don't need him any more.

thank you for coming to my sight

i am so happy.  look what came to me today!  a beautiful, beautiful present--

being looked for
being seen
being responded to
and music that soars to match. 


"hi, suzanne!

i attached a song in response to your visual images.  if you look closely - real closely - at the wheat field, you will see..."
 




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tg0vHnk9_28&feature=fvst

**very important, if you go to this link.  close your eyes and listen.  do not watch. 



what an honor, what pleasure.  i feel like a drunk in a midnight choir.  with a bunch of others kind of different but kind of the same.

peter, again :  thank you.

she's not dead, jim.

then i would sit on that red shag carpet or lie on the bear rug spread eagle on my stomach with my chin resting on the head of that poor dead bear’s and  i would watch the zenith.  the thing that i remember about star trek (tos, now) on that tv is that dr mccoy was crabby-compassion and had that polaroid camera looking thing and could detect disease from the outside,  scan people and then with fancy sonogram laser unnamed beam and through their clothes, cutless, germless, would heal them, and no matter how bad the diagnosis, no matter the nature of the injury or the freaky composition of the poison,   bones who was left with nothing but his skeleton after his divorce could treat almost every broken and after a few hours or days all would be well.  or   well enough.  kirk still had the blue eye shadow problem but that was small in comparison to the severe cases mccoy was able to cure.  now i picture i am standing in my kitchen with fabulous hair wearing too much blue eye shadow and a zippy black catsuit and with command i call into the retro modern brooch high at my shoulder, urgently but calm:  McCoy!  Quickly! The Kitchen!  and then bones is transported from the enterprise or the unknown territories right in to my house despite mistrust of the whole transporter contraption and runs to me with his migrating geese eyebrows and starts to take out scanner c or something and i turn to him and put aside my jigger and look at him and say:  just fix me here.  here is where it hurts.  and i point to my weakly fluttering wings and he grimaces a bit and with his hair loosened flailing mahogany like a white inferno he ministers to me with his gun of medicine and i wake up in some sickbay.  scarless.  with an edelweiss engraved brass cowbell on my chest and a terse mccoy patting my hand tenderly reluctantly understandingly and saying:  i'm stepping back now.  just ring this if you need me.  but i won't need him any more.

flying home

                                       
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                          e                                   w                                                                                               

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                                                                                                                                                   l

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                                                                                                                                                                  s

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                                      d         u                  
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       c          
                                           
                                   

                     
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    q                                    

                                                 


                                             s          o                                       t       u                                
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                 d        i       z        z         y                        s         h        o          w
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 Fertile Soil.    
           Spikes And Blades.


___________
___________

evening skies like this are my cobblestones