For All
“Ah to be alive
on a mid-September morn
fording a stream
barefoot, pants rolled up,
holding boots, pack on,
sunshine, ice in the shallows,
northern rockies.
Rustle and shimmer of icy creek waters
stones turn underfoot, small and hard as toes
cold nose dripping
singing inside
creek music, heart music,
smell of sun on gravel.
I pledge allegiance
I pledge allegiance to the soil
of Turtle Island,
and to the beings who thereon dwell
one ecosystem
in diversity
under the sun
With joyful interpenetration for all.” – Gary Snyder
“there’s a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out but I’m too tough for him, I say, stay in there, I’m not going to let anybody see you.
there’s a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out but I pur whiskey on him and inhale cigarette smoke and the whores and the bartenders and the grocery clerks never know that he’s in there.
there’s a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out but I’m too tough for him, I say, stay down, do you want to mess me up? you want to screw up the works? you want to blow my book sales in Europe?
there’s a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out but I’m too clever, I only let him out at night sometimes when everybody’s asleep. I say, I know that you’re there, so don’t be sad. then I put him back, but he’s singing a little in there, I haven’t quite let him die and we sleep together like that with our secret pact and it’s nice enough to make a man weep, but I don’t weep, do you?”
“This is to God, To all the new borns that just came from her And to those who have just returned, To those whose cries were never heard, And were absorbed only by the night, This is to love, over loneliness, We live on, To the silent nights where only beating hearts are heard, And to those who could never quite find the words to take them there, This is to those who have turned their backs and walked away, And to those who would never let you walk alone, Our paths are different but the same, We live on, To those who stay strong, but only to mask the pain, To those who are brave enough to show the tears on their face, This is to the meek, To the quiet, Your voice will one day come alive, This is to life, To the days that have passed us by, And the nights that have drawn us closer together We live on”
THE RAINBOW
“My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began;
So is it now I am a man;
So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!
The child is father of the man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.”
“The name of the author is the first to go followed obediently by the title, the plot, the heartbreaking conclusion, the entire novel which suddenly becomes one you have never read, never even heard of, as if, one by one, the memories you used to harbor decided to retire to the southern hemisphere of the brain, to a little fishing village where there are no phones. Long ago you kissed the names of the nine Muses goodbye and watched the quadratic equation pack its bag, and even now as you memorize the order of the planets, something else is slipping away, a state flower perhaps, the address of an uncle, the capital of Paraguay. Whatever it is you are struggling to remember, it is not poised on the tip of your tongue, not even lurking in some obscure corner of your spleen. It has floated away down a dark mythological river whose name begins with an L as far as you can recall, well on your own way to oblivion where you will join those who have even forgotten how to swim and how to ride a bicycle. No wonder you rise in the middle of the night to look up the date of a famous battle in a book on war. No wonder the moon in the window seems to have drifted out of a love poem that you used to know by heart.”
For L
“I love you
You can never have too many
I heard once what is
is what is
and what should be
is a dirty lie
But if what was wasn’t
then the truth is what isn’t.
Yet it is what it is
uncatchable shadows
disappearing in the mist
A land once sunny
now a valley full of dreary
I shall wait in this cloudy piss
and should the sun return
I shall capture the shadows
and lock them safely
between my teeth
I love you
You can never have too many
I heard once what is
is what is
and what should be
is a dirty lie.”