Tuesday, December 17, 2019

December's Orphans (poetry)











 
 
 
December's Orphans
 
 
 
 
They opened my tea chest
and discovered I had become
an infamous monster of filmland
There was no excuse
I could see it coming
could have taken a different road
 
I'd had my run in supernova
went back to being an ordinary star
somehow avoided a black hole
Other planets grow older and more distinct
The crowds are vast and distracted
easy to anger and to lose the point
 
I'm forced to use retro rockets
tired old conformist tropes
to slow re-entry into daily life
Enormous school of shadowy fish
part ahead of my splashdown
aging backward through my dissent
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Pouring Winter rain
in shorts and baby carriage
runs around 7th street corner
How strange the rain a
after its prolonged absence
Puddles in action on a roof
hours later still moving
That it should make this sound
miraculous planet
That drought and desert should be
dangerous planet
That flood or tidal wave
should come down
Darkness in the day
the doors all wash away
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
My capsule became cracked
I was already post-human
intersecting immaterial world
 
Bystanders were flooded
with unfamiliar memories
songs and jungle
jingle bells
bells
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Outside my window
winter storm on the way
gulls carousel past
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Friday 13th
 
Something odd
will come to pass
you may break
 a drinking glass
 
 
 
 
 
 
Rain in rooftop puddle
the moon has burst a bubble
A world sunk in muddle
image capture by the Hubble
 
Under the Long Night Moon
 
 
Last full moon parade
of this dysphoric decade
Thoughts of a world
not God but man has made
 
Under a Long Night Moon
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Epiphenomenal ice pack
recedes into the general water planet
Moisture invades my cracker barrel


 
 



Crisis Climate
 
We sailed so far and vast
that we reached the edge of the world
without meaning to
without knowing it was near

Five days from it we turned about
by then the cataclysm was unavoidable
some of us said it didn't exist
that it was a mirage of the sea

Product of a devil's idle whim
but the sea itself flowed over the chasm
where did it migrate to?
the world afloat in a shoreless sea

A snow squall vanished
the ship's denouement
we were long past the last longitude
there was no turning about







Libido wants to satisfy itself
That doesn't mean it's evil
The ego wants to gratify itself
Pop goes the evil




How great are the humble
How fatuous are the famous







The yelp of a dog in the manger
kneeling at the foot of the Baby
asleep in the animal feed
You are going to give him
a Christ complex
Seen baby-worship before
but this is ridiculous
He does look great though
Take thee and eat?
 not for dogs








To the Trained Ear
 
I contrived to lead a life
in which I was exposed only
to naturally occurring noises
 
Aeolian harp in a glade
to recall the idea of music
brought indoors in Winter
 
When songbirds are gone
when at night I heard
wind and many wolves
 




 
 
 
 
December 2019
 
 



 
 
 
 


Conservatory of Flowers
Golden Gate Park