first lines

once when i was young i ran in the rain
i live on the edge
the order of brilliance is the web fresh caught
my cave has its glimpse of sky 11
the sundays of this fall seem far too warm
there’s more to do, and now i feel pleasure
the time has come for more radical change
this then is my love’s testament
the cold angularity of cities
the tongue lags behind day’s excessive heat
the grey of dawn makes precious color’s feeling
the subway steps are cascading falls
the bitter wet cold surrounds my blankets, wrapped
there was a time when rainy nights became
twice told tales are rarely heard the same way
the last of words should be the best of thought
tangled lips will slur the will of love
there are no truths, there are only stories
my mother died last night
the lunatics has hid its face
a faux pas is chaos of water 28  old air stains my lungs with its dusty taste
old air stains my lungs with its dusty taste
early light, mist rising, down to water’s edge
sense rarely comes the way
musty leaves of thought
what i think i might have been
my god is dead.  he died one day
i consume enough roughage
the nurturing river runs in sweetness
twice again the sun returns as fresh
towns grate around my bed their civil noise,
the sun i see corrupts my sight:  i’m blind.
the window is closed so wavy glass becomes
the echoes of their voices are low heard,
time again the clouds have burst, loosing fresh
i slippery, eelily, watch all my spielery,
i paint a cracked torn wall
attention shifts to what i will become
sijo
blue sky hidden        phantom sky
sun so pure          startle color
autumn sky           puffs cold magic
war is come         dig through rubble
pound on pound      goes my fist down
eye to rome         tall and squalid
sit and wait         as a mountain
choose each time     to be a moment
eastern sun             fade westerly
squeaking snow          beneath my feet
steaming breath      mist grey morning
wander more             feet reluctant
green hills remain silent
my girlfriend half fills the sake’ cup
the whiff of spring wind
you, my love, round as a watermelon
yesterday go  broad             crash wave
i drink czech beer
early morning arousal is immoderate
my daughter asked today when i will die.
newspapers pile around my chair
the slow grey morning sits outside.
blood is only blood
i sit in the scruffy apartment
snuffle deep in the stink of me
outside my protectments the wild things live
the tongue i offer now will quiet speak
did i tell you today that i love you
until you’ve worn the horns
the wind comes back, gusting, wintry  cold
a woven warp of dimness lies across my bed this night
the spring holds back from its promise of warmth
i wonder if the middle of the stream
he returned home to see
a rubaiyat
chappaqua, chippewa, who gives a shit
my thoughts are creeks, their downward flow
my smell is discordant with fear
my melody invites when out of tune
my ganglions grow dull these last few years
my fear is losing what i’ve learned to have
the grass by my front door is dead and gone
how can i hear song resting in chord
i’ve earned my quietude of place
i started as a boulder tumbling off a cliff
morning glory, mattituck, who gives a fuck
a rhythm drives to lock up time
i love the mixing water of estuary
why do i want to know why
the kitchen i cook in has a warm, used look
i smell the musk of earth in your smile
why are you listening to all my ravings
it’s a cruel sad day in amarillo
the greens fresh picked are dark in leaf
i crowed to the sun when he appeared this morning
the murphy form
around this bend, here, now
around this bend, here, now (2)
five thousand steps one at a time 115
five thousand steps one at a time (2)
how imagine an ancestor you’ve never known
how imagine an ancestor you’ve never known (2)
i want a primeval nose
i want a primeval nose (2)
memory is this body’s trap of sense
memory is this body’s trap of sense (2)
my suppleness is long now gone
my suppleness is long now gone (2)
sad yellow of the morning is tarred with his ink
sad yellow of the morning is tarred with his ink (2)
salty slush of urban snow
salty slush of urban snow (2)
that’s the accuracy
that’s the accuracy (2)
the litany of birds at dawn
the litany of birds at dawn (2)
to stop the chatter of the words takes time
to stop the chatter of the words takes time (2)
wisdom takes practice
wisdom takes practice (2)
yellow grass of autumn flowers
yellow grass of autumn flowers (2)
some of us would say our tangle is our skin
i walk a hidden path he said
you taught me to be
i’m not sorry i haven’t solved the three body problem
serious i was in my youth
he drinks beer, he’s rowdy, he’s interesting
i know when i see those others
the land i knew as a child seems far less mine
how can they expect me to tell them what i think
but oh the silence of the pack
i looked around and knew at once
early   blossom   heart   stop   beauty
even   calm   color   bring   life
go    leave   now   ache   heart
steam   hiss   bang   heat   rise
at the stroke of the hand the brush will fall
hard smooth milky white
i sit in a room of white brick walls
the proper sop of gauze smooths stain
today there is no sun
it was one of those times of near strength
they’re dancing on rooftops in harlem today
we had a luncheon conversation
below marble falls
the bars made strange dreams
i am the sun
the most difficult thing
the skewness of tomorrow is today’s world
uncle JT was a marvelous
words are guides
you don’t remember
i love how white stones glow
the clear cold sky is city dawning
the rain soaks down its sullen way
clamor greets cold, wet, spring day
hot summer sweats before its time
a spitting rain and fretful wind
small swarms of men pruned all the trees this winter
the sky is grey scudding frost of clouds
fuzzywhumps and fizzigigs
the wine is here, the dregs of wine
do little i know anything
tuesday night and the cold stillness shows how
i would like to nestle on the bare ground
the screams of the attacking victims seem
the song i sing transfigures our first parting
a poem ceases to be as soon as it is
small sapsuckers peered through dusty slant of sun
it is not my intention to persuade any of you to my position
my ultimate god like my ultimate father
an arabesque within the whirling hands
figure what you figure out
words have a putative power
the winter trees have spirits in their twirl
this winter lurches on with a special timidity
JT was a paratrooper in dubya dubya two
i have some time these days
a gust of cold shrinks neck beneath the fold
if you keep the turtle tracks in mind
to come fresh each spring is to be the child
to come fresh each spring is to be the child
open to the world to close inner form
patterning ourselves on growth’s primal charm
asking how intricately nature has styled
madness returns as color brings morning sun
exciting the dormant feelings to life
luring vibrance with light’s broad stabbing knife
arriving from low angle in shadowed run
corners of darkness gradually yield
health of unique, glowing, exampled views
appearances controlled as well as new grown
narrow byways thus slowly revealed
in exposing dark shunts to further bemuse
numinous reflection being the seeds we’ve sown
the summer brilliance of noon light shimmers
the summer brilliance of noon light shimmers
our instincts move from that full directness
past the desire to absorb life’s full heat
as we reach growth presumed in kernelled wit
madness itself is invited by all
enrichers of nature’s bounty, we tame
love to bear better fruit as we know it
asking not what loose rankness might have brought< charge the sun with fetid air of decay
hail the dreaming green smells carried with us
along with sweating brown skin as we touch
normality flees reason in fullness
impending harvest has rhythmic season
night, never again be so far away
the dropping off is unavoidable
the dropping off is unavoidable
our times run together, each separate
part keeps sounding as all the other’s fate,
asking whether our fall is credible
mouldering ground as preferment seems sad
in formal last fitting of nondescript grey
life’s peculiarity masking choosing
as eternal leaving what we have had
cold enforced in inevitable sleep
heart sore buried by bruised vegetation
again sense of never again never
night is felt not as abrupt cessation
in ordered schemas for forever
necessary essence is always covered deep
the sky’s malevolence presages shroud
the sky’s malevolence presages shroud
in fast whiteness stretching to cover reach
past times no longer suffice as they teach
a leaden lowering has been allowed
massed consequence looms as ultimate
energy is focussed in dampening
life’s force banked by winter happening
as sun’s withdrawn symbol of final cut
cold, idiosyncratic, perverse
having formed individual barometer
afflicts all in soft separate ways
needing light again to hold off the worst
i accept center, flickering, final
nurtured by me alone through these hard days

 

 

 

 

once when i was young i ran in the rain
down to the river, slipping, sliding down
each drop splashed into me, into the ground
free running slice in a free running grain.

once when i was bouncing grin of the wind,
running fresh as spring’s sweet morning mist
each leap was love, was life, was morning kissed,
lightly kissed in rush round corner’s bend.

i see him now, that dart down long ago
space was morning stride, down to kiss the sea
arching in the shot to find the living core.

once i felt like him, all at once to know
death is love denied, life is love set free,
each and every morning the water seeks the shore.

murphy after a hurricane in calm sunshine ripple

 

 

 

i live on the edge
of a mockingbird’s run

and i whistle to let him know
i whistle bird
and i whistle people
he waits
then sings his songs

i listen close when he flies out onward
to the other, the side away
and sings a song he’s learned
but not quite

he sings a man
who sings away

murphy listening hard with an old man’s ears

 

 

 

the order of brilliance is the web fresh caught
in pearly sheen quivering in the wind
the spider’s trap spanning thick path
constricted wholeness sucking water from the air

the scheme this knitting thread of worlds
the special reddening from the east
that flashes in mind when thoughts fall and clot
and inky finger speaks feast of time full caught

a shudder shakes the touching eye of morning
begins at head, sinks to arms, slides down
the person helpless in its path to ground

a rhythm wraps the writhing meat for death
the spider ends his moment’s light
web swept clear of tears without a sound

murphy drifting helpless on the waves

 

 

 

my cave has its glimpse of sky
its small patch of movement
to stand for all of constant change

it suffices for my meager needs
i seek no grand ocean to fathom
i need no cloud to bend, then whisk away

and my cave has its limits
its steadfast parts of inner eye
that sparkle large in hidden brain

the one that knows
that all that goes without
will make its world within

where the self perceives a self
in quick new glimpse of sky

murphy, resigned, sweeping the floor of his hut

 

 

 

the sundays of this fall seem far too warm
obsessive in their clutch of summer green
at once so untimely that they demean
destined change and thus unnaturally harm

even if we wished and so could achieve
life as endless joy and bounteous growth
even if eternal perfection were both
some thing and all things, the leaves have to leave

action always implies different ways
new climates, new ethics, and always new ends
doubtless also it requires a new me

each one i’ve left behind, each year, all days
require that part of myself which transcends
self to assume life now as memory

 

 

 

 

there’s more to do, and now i feel pleasure
over the problems and the reasons for
attacking them, to add existing lore
doubtless answering my mentor’s measure

existence is described, and thus pinned down
lifting arms of delicacy when deftly
expressed,  my wings of fancy solely
standards of individual renown

as i progress in my feelings toward
necessary form, a peculiar pattern
deepens the obviousness of what i do

each man does this in his own time, a forward
rush of unknown force, no time to discern
simple motif of constant wish to renew

 

 

 

 

the time has come for more radical change
old forms were best, re-thought, and then passed on
as i practiced, sharpened as with a hone
directed toward what when new seemed strange
even grotesque, absurd, impossible of smooth rendering– a rough
escutcheon which couldn’t be polished enough

so now it’s done– a fulfilled labor of love
all things must end and so finally be

nothing more than phases, recurrent themes
derived from the peculiar human mind
ever inventive and yet forced to see
relics, and forced to build upon those beams
sent from past lights– we’re all partially blind

 

 

 

 

this then is my love’s testament
ordered and sent to you first, then others
and it’s not the gathering that bothers
depths of quietude earned by wordy bent

else why bother even to set down pen
linking leaves of a yellowed certitude
else why belabor obvious attitude
striking rebounding anvil times again

at least i’m in my mind as i think back
needing the impetus your presence gives
daring to expose that i dare not say

endlessly striving to fill my mind’s black
readings, those modulations it takes to live
sounding those inner depths, the protected bay

 

 

 

 

the cold angularity of cities
old wrappers crumpled to be tossed aside
aspirations becoming gutter pride
drunk again with my sending you ditties

else when the joy was all on the first
living of the dream which now overwhelms
else where my notes were firm personal realms
sent with sense of place ingrained in the verse

afterwards i stripped my feelings in form
noted the passing of love twice again
dreamed a bit and let fantasy become

ever more refuge from ecstatic storm
read again the lines of mine to regain
self and uniquity in modern day rome

 

 

 

 

the tongue lags behind day’s excessive heat
oddly reticent to keep pace with my
ardor trickling from forehead, it drips dry
drinking this sultriness, chewing salt meat

each scratching scrawl grates, sensibility
lacks purposeful life, my quite adequate
ends shimmer into shades, meaning is cut
skewly from whole cloth, sewn as probity

a lounge is all i ask, cool wine and time
news brought by reflecting what’s been before
discovered slowly as protected place

evening charging its easement with muted grace
resonant trueness of tone touching more
surely than mere exercised reason: rhyme

 

 

 

 

the grey of dawn makes precious color’s feeling
old wounds fresh ache in sitting, seeing how
a touching time unfolds its artful healing
deep thoughts that glimmer full are with me now

each time i wrote before i wrote beginning
last thoughts of what i lost in heart’s hot squeeze
each time i write is now in all its meaning
sad framework with its bold romantic tease

a touching time implodes a total message
new notes are strung on strings in fingered guise
dark thoughts are seen as moorings with no ties

each time i scribble scrabble brand new passage
returning to the start i note the skies
see somber shadow spread the day’s soft eyes

 

 

 

 

the subway steps are cascading falls
our collective fears smell fetid and damp
a springlike spate from the slobbering sky
deep inside i keep heart warm and dry

each time i look i see life’s walls
lost memories limned by mind’s fresh lamp
etched deeper yet by this time’s flow
such depths attained, yet so far to go

are you listening still to my occasional word
need i speak again of my bond to you
drawn tight today in my havened thought

each time is now in your presence sought
reality becomes the mind’s purview
sends tremors and tears– seen, felt, and heard

 

 

 

 

the bitter wet cold surrounds my blankets, wrapped
old thoughts intrude into the warmth i find
a pattern once developed stays within the mind
deepens until it holds a lifetime, mapped

each debt we unknowing start by starting
love again, and yet still yet again we do
etches skin with a tattoo colored new
seizes absurd hold on sense of final parting

as i late this day remember where the strife
needled through bulwarks thrown up when i was young
desperate in my haste, i wonder if i’ve been true

each year since then, beginning with sense of you
reveals itself in each these tries, each upward lunge
shows how early, late, i sense in you my life

 

 

 

 

there was a time when rainy nights became
old friends, seeped into my collar and drew
attention to similarities through
deepening puddles at bottoms of soles

each unseen tear of humanity’s poor fools
listed in wind, slanted feelings as i
eked out that pleasantness we all try
sensitively to manage without shame

answers were to be found in my inner
doubts which were dry and protected from wet
events, from that encroaching soaking dark

old habits were formed, the confirmed sinner
rinsed his head, but kept the safety of pet
responses, buttoned his coat to hide spark

 

 

 

 

twice told tales are rarely heard the same way
old sensibilities are slowly changed
as my fingers twiddle in nervous fray
doesn’t it seem odd not to be deranged

even now as i sit back in my chair
looking over my recent histories
each succeeding step on personal stairs
seems inevitable inward foray

as i sit tonight and think tomorrow
needing yesterday to show me the way
down to where i should be made more aware

elasticity of time is sorrow
rending my position so that today
seems already lived, all ready to share

 

 

 

 

the last of words should be the best of thought
or one’s ink is dark and sore lacking blood
a dull totting up with a neat round hand
don’t you miss all my metaphors caught

elsewhere was when the books were found
lying open with their speckled seed
elsewhere was when focused first was force
singing aloud with a drum of sound

a little finesse when i circled around
new forms well chewed, become well worn taste
deep within the old i break new ground

each attack a rout of a self sown, bound
round the pattern so deftly obscured
skirting the absurd: in a ballroom, gowned

 

 

 

 

tangled lips will slur the will of love
once tripped the sturdy rock will change
all know who know to know the strange
deep within the yielding cove

extra touch for free this rush of thought
like bombs up high, above the night
each bursting glint a tamping tight
stretching the soul so it be caught

addled brains amiss,  adrift the scene
nestled within what has always been
demanding attention as to what we’ve got

endless flarings fresh with new being
rash and sure like a teenage dream
sexy, and charged, with an intimate plot

murphy cool, breezy and sunny at the beaches

 

 

 

 

there are no truths, there are only stories
there are no lies because stories change
they change with time and with forgetting
they change to fit what we wish to know

there are the people, they are for always
they always change to remain the same
we hear their lives when we hear their stories
they change to fit what time will know

the children listen to what we tell them
they then become what they then become
their lives are bent by what they’re facing
they change to fit the time they grow

they fit the new in an existing plan
they see the color they understand
they feel emotion that fits their mold
they hear the songs they already know

there are no truths, there are only stories
there are no lies because stories change
they change with time and with forgetting
they change to fit what we wish to know

murphy glowing with blarney

 

 

 

my mother died last night
in a way that she would want
at peace, with herself and with her world

this morning’s skies are clear
with a crystalline autumn cheer
that seeps beneath my cares
this mother earth still shares

my feet are slow and steady
in determined memory’s pace
i search surrounding clamor
for proper breathing space
beneath my feet
lies broken, splotchy, old concrete

a calm within descends
a certitude comes real
the time we have for spending
stops short each spinning wheel

murphy calamitously sober

 

 

 

 

the lunatics has hid its face
the buddings pop and preen
the breathing air is warm sure pitch
of nascent leafing green

this lastly spring leaves daft behind
unclothes the body’s health
briny sweat is welcome tinge
to sitting in the shade

i prop my chin on leaning arm
hold up a vacant eye
that’s turned within to see the soul
behind this spurt of feeling

the youngest birds all dart their love
and flutter in their courting
the taste of food is taste of earth
that’s turned by soft sure hands
that clasp their love, their face of love

murphy sitting at seder with children

 

 

 

 

a faux pas is chaos of water
that crawls through itself like a snake
an oddness repeated is pattern
flip-flops have a heaven at stake

a quarter past sunrise is autumn
the kill done quick to the bone
the rhythm that beats is a tom tom
delivering its richness of tone

ten minutes til spring is the break up
that throbs in the mind as it flows
this movement brings fog every morning
that boggles, then goggles, then goes

murphy crickling the crinks in his neck

 

 

 

 

old air stains my lungs with its dusty taste
deep sighs meet sight of morning’s wind-blown snow
early chores will be harder now i know
the simple things loom large yet they must be faced

old dreams haunt, make my waking movements slow
each thought steams with breath, then is whipped away
leaving soft unheard what i wish to say
i bend once more to tasks harsh as winds that blow

should this be the way i meet each winter day
a grudging plod in place of practiced flow
easy once begun and finished without haste

i don’t remember when i settled on this way
needing no more than this, that habit makes me go
gently through the cold, my spirit steadfast, chaste

murphy warm in accomplishment floating free

 

 

 

 

early light, mist rising, down to water’s edge
look out on ceaseless moving, wet my hand
i know this place, it’s always new, i stand
so slips within my mind the thinnest wedge

a shim so deftly placed glides softly then
bursts in understanding dawn is day
a pry to loosen tongue so i can say
raucous things with this, my rooster pen

but world around still, still fast abed
a snoring ignorance of fresh dim light, of birth
reaching sudden down from eastern tip of earth
above me now, me deep alone in head

kind world allows to life a struggling wrath
in turn again to climb along the way
nodding slowly inward, giving senses play
going patient home on well worn path

murphy grappling gamely with his new found life

 

 

 

 

sense rarely comes the way
we tell our clotured lives
the shams we show today
snicker through as knives
yammering inside our heads

there should be times we’re free
from fears of failing scenes
a subtle reality
become an end of means
a successful might-have-said

our thoughts would prey their way
from toe to tongue to them
the elusive sense of may
at once the cold hard gem
of once and twice through read

 

 

 

 

musty leaves of thought
gather dust in my sickness
a rare book long cornered
in dog-eared waiting
for healing drafts

the freshness to come, motion,
not for the stirring dirt
nor seemly whirl of cant
nor flight from shelves
too filled with neighbor’s print

but at the very least the thought
of stripping the cracked torn
covering from off my back
to bare my inner health
of communicable disease

 

 

 

 

what i think i might have been
once before enshroudments learned
pops in mind most often when
cold candles of gin are burned

stacked against my bookend nerves
interleaves of printed thought
stand my dowdy footfault serves
loosed at least by liquid doubt

ranting, raving, rancorous mind
slowly tilting to downwind side
of youth caught in drunken play

i like the sloth
the sotted bum
the leering lout
i have become

 

 

 

 

my god is dead.  he died one day
i remember when it was
he died so hard the sun’s first ray
was seen as though through gauze
but seen it was

my mind’s alive.  i see the sun
i feel just what it does
this is my work.  it’s just begun
and seen as though through gauze
it’s what one does

 

 

 

 

i consume enough roughage
each day it floats to sea
gently nudging at the shore
piled with creaking docks

mine was a pleasant passage
sweeping the valley floor
with expansive white softness
spreading the plump blue sky

now i fear the inward tide
will cease to turn, and flood
the beds of all my arms

 

 

 

 

the nurturing river runs in sweetness
of water’s downward plunge, in a soughing
midnight wind of lulling call, in the lap
around the shallows behind around the bend.

crossing when it’s flooding tears apart the soul,
inundating thrust in swirling thorough hold.
needing when it’s trickling satisfies the mind,
erasing disappointment in its filling find.

don’t jump in the water pulling close apart,
ease into the current flowing past the sight
seeking like as like in steadiness of will.

end the searching movement in constancy of thrill
tossing precious fluid sparkling in the night,
arching in the aching spending of the heart.

 

 

 

 

twice again the sun returns as fresh
orange wall beyond a slivery window’s pain.
masks the crude brick in a pulsing fire of flesh–
a dancing ephemera of dawn refrain.

crossing in mind to room’s controlling depth,
i note the somber pause in slow cloud’s dance;
note again how briefly fullness of feeling health
entrances gaze on a sudden moment’s chance.

down on the street below this quickened breath
erratic sounds remind of bitter scene,
shadows of the gritty gutter growing pale.

erratic thoughts all, grey images of death
tearing through this brutal clarity i’ve seen
alone above in soft ease of inward well.

 

 

 

 

towns grate around my bed their civil noise,
offer vibrant stench in some peddler’s fall,
mask a lover’s thought in concrete of city hall,
ask a calm acceptance in a doorman’s poise.

crossing below my seeing is fitful stopping flow,
in inundating web of forces known,
next my very window this all is show,
endless other windows searching for a key.

driving manic action, dust and roar and doom,
endless other windows light with humming tune
seeking for the motion a sailor walks alone.

endless are the changes the waves a deck will see,
timeless in their balance of rhythmic changing moon,
and endless folding difference cordoned off as rooms.

 

 

 

 

the sun i see corrupts my sight:  i’m blind.
only color of the mind builds up whole form.
my fantasies are all i have:  i bind
all inside, and hold to self with secret arms.

crossing this threshold faults the visional field,
inflying vortices pinpoint their shifting souls–
nothing is cozy and feathered:  nothing is real,
eager nothing is attention to a particular role.

doubts disappear in remembered ease of ends,
edges blur til haloed stage comes all,
silence draws its curtain to yield an inner sight.

each other steadfastness can only pretend
to become freeness centered, certain to fall,
accepting the vanishing me of my fright.

 

 

 

 

the window is closed so wavy glass becomes
one link to all that’s left so far behind.
my mind constructs a wind to blow about,
around apartment’s sense of space in blind

crossing to inner self, a protective shield
in place, dropped before the eyes can see–
needles of thought rebounding on the walls,
etched as shown framework; end in furnishing me.

despite green leaves, despite limb’s dance
enmeshed in true earth’s change, the sense of real
sits in this chair and orders all to be

enmeshed in time, cocooned in place, my sight
turned back to see the gathered host of all i’ve been–
all astounds afresh with its patient waiting.

 

 

 

 

the echoes of their voices are low heard,
our dead return to the mind’s inner sight,
march in solemn tribute one more time
around the kitchen table after coffee.

crossing on my plate’s parading ground
in rough remembered line of lost years’ flight,
new patterns form in beat to now’s salute
entrancing me with tiny trampling feet.

desire for all beguiles this unique strangeness,
extracts in show the then of this pen’s strength,
sends searching sounds to test this moment’s fate.

each of us is heard a thousand moments,
the thens of each our own repeating song
attaching bone to feeling rush of home.

 

 

 

 

time again the clouds have burst, loosing fresh
occasion; the rumbling gift splattered harsh
morning with its slate grey thoughts, lives this night
as misty lights—probing halos of blind sight.

crossing wipers show my way toward home,
inward doubts fade beside these hissing wheels,
nodding love holds to arm; the thrusting storm
enmeshes swirling fears in moment’s chills.

deep shivers wrack my balanced act, my care
exhausts my seeming calm, the tears now come.
senses reel as spray against the shell i guide.

everything is touched within cocoon i bear,
the outward shield so artfully spun is numb;
as long as massive flood conceals, i cry.

 

 

 

 

i slippery, eelily, watch all my spielery,
matching my thoughts with my sense of the night.
i sloppily, jollily, catch all my drollery
snatching the sense of the chase and the flight.

wolligee, golligee, what is my collagen,
the place that i learned the wrong from the right.
iffigy, piffigy, all is periphery,
spreading as always, and always my plight.

i logic’lly, codgerly, curse all cajolery,
ranting and raving, i fight, and i  fight.
i pledgic’lly, legibly, leave thinking ledgerly.
left on this page is the pen and its might.

murphy with the little mouth hangin’ open with its big-domed head a’crashing back into the yieldin’ sea

 

 

 

 

i paint a cracked torn wall
smoke white
a tinge of dusk to dim
all thought of imperfection
in broad expanse of home

i see the close scarred tissue
i note the pounding wounds
the paint flows slowly onward
to touch each corner’s bend
i paint a cracked torn wall

each spot the other’s equal
and so a saming absence
in wholeness of the room
to free attention’s wander
to broad expanse of knowing
a painting hung in oneness
of its eternal song

i give each unique parting
an eye’s exact detail
the known and yet forgotten
to bring back when alone
i paint a cracked torn wall
of all my father’s painting
and his saying how it’s done
to so enjoy the doing
the pain becomes all wrong

the knowing fades to white
the smoke of dreams be gone
the wall become their wholeness
i paint inside my home

 

 

 

 

attention shifts to what i will become
when picking up the cues from all the parts
performed before me on long forgotten stage
deep hidden from questing eyes which wish to see—
is this leaving now the crucial show,
now closed but once the main event?

a twisted string draws curtain on my stage,
the shift to life remembers lost event,
my mind refracts its hidden sullen parts.
i look inside to see what i’ve become.
i look inside to see that which i see
in sorting out infernal running show.

i walk alone outside all practiced parts.
i focus love in group as shared event
in choosing how to try out for the show.
i walk alone inside remembered stage.
i concentrate my spotlight now to see,
to discover what it is i must become.

i see the rain, not hear a thunderous stage.
i slacken motion in tension of event.
i button coat and, hunching, peer to see
how far it is i walk; and so become
more natural and wet–so part of show
at once a whole beyond sum of parts.

i hunch, and peer through slits; i become
the sodden rain, i flow in guttered show–
a swirling heap of refuse, disgusting parts
of habitation now swept on stage
before me i hunch, and that is all is see.
i stand and stare at whirlpool of event.

the soaking dark surrounds my dripping parts.
i turn my back to wind, i turn up stage
to where i’ve been since when i stopped the show.
i turn my head to lee in search; i see
a fading blackness dimming patchwork of event
frozen in inattention.
i become

a show inside upon this painted stage,
a spoken script; the parts are now become
the event i am in being what i see.

 

 

 

sijo

sijo is a korean form which has been indulged in by all classes and levels of korean society for a long, long time.

it is usually sung in what seems a highly eccentric way when heard by westerners.

it consists of 42-45 syllables with the first four lines the same count, and the last two lines a different rhythm and count.

it is an addictive form.

 

 

 

blue sky hidden        phantom sky
mist grey morning       when we die

tears are streaming      tears are lace
blue sky ridden      to this place

here is wish and feeling       here is wet
blue sky hidden              water’s net

murphy singing a korean song to change his mood

 

 

 

 

sun so pure          startle color
wind so warm         soon hurry spring

quiet gleam          wayward footstep
nascent green        still leading on

hurt is deep         still has no meaning
heart is earth       half buried stone

 

 

 

 

autumn sky           puffs cold magic
window’s blue        cuts through this room

time so slow         has no meaning
now so now           stops heart in flow

this chair sits      holds to very being
this mind waits      sings its happiness

 

 

 

 

war is come         dig through rubble
peace is gone       mist of tea time

strength is come    feeling gone now
numb is heart       smash all else down

why is sunshine     still here sometime
why is wind         sweet in springtime

 

 

 

 

pound on pound      goes my fist down
pound on pound      table scrape back

pound on wood       rattle bottles
pound full loud     fall back people

would my problems   scatter likewise
would my home       repel the rain

 

 

 

 

eye to rome         tall and squalid
backyard eye        dense and careful

streaming cars      hint of river
scream of fear      short sound ugly

where is sunshine   this grey december
where is earth      where is sky

 

 

 

 

sit and wait         as a mountain
stand and shout      fast running gorge

scratch and till     make a garden
rain and sun         til thoughts grow large

sense is feeling     all is nature
sense is form        sense is sky

 

 

 

 

choose each time     to be a moment
choose each place    to be a where

choose a home        to be yours only
choose your heart    to be the door

widely open          to see sun’s coming
wisely shut          this night so cold

 

 

 

 

eastern sun             fade westerly
water’s flow            go slow away

rising man              go stumble man
dancing home            i’m river’s fall

summer shadows          a dank cool wanting
summer shades           a long grey way

 

 

 

 

squeaking snow          beneath my feet
haloed moon             above my mind

opened coat             braving flurries
buttoned shirt          protected heart

careful steps           lead to open door
crackling fire          in her welcoming eyes

 

 

 

 

steaming breath      mist grey morning
smell new green      small leaf borning

stop by railing      see broad river
sooty grey           flows my being

dogs of parting      sniff my snarling
dogs of war          stand with me— stone

 

 

 

wander more             feet reluctant
wander there            beside the shore

river broad             sluggish dim brown
river wide              far starry shore

sit to watch            the ceaseless moving
stand to feel           way home once more

 

 

 

 

green hills remain silent
running water has no form

a clear wind runs always free
no one owns the full moon

as long as health lasts i am happy
with all these i will grow old

murphy smiling after a new year’s feast

 

 

 

 

a translation roughly after sung hohn (Korean 1535-1598) who served as vice-minister of defense and also vice-minister of home affairs under king sunjo (1567-1608).  but he was deprived of the government position toward the end of the hideyoshi invasion of the country for backing a peace treaty with the Japanese invaders.  later he was called in by king injo (1625-1649) and was appointed deputy prime minister.

my girlfriend half fills the sake’ cup
my wife is mad with jealousy

i should dump them both in a leaky old boat
and float them out onto the wide, wide sea

hopefully a storm would spring up around them
and bring them back to their senses

murphy eternally serial in his monogamy

A rough translation of an anonymous sijo

 

 

 

the whiff of spring wind
melts all the snow on the ground

the old face of the hills
reappears with its beard of green

would that i could melt my white hair
to find that black brush of youth

murphy with muscles atwitch watching the baseball on tv

rough translation of an anonymous sijo

 

 

 

you, my love, round as a watermelon
have not its sweetness

every word you say
is bile, is a lie

your words are as sweet
as a large zucchini

murphy disappointed on a blind date

roughly translated from an anonymous korean sijo

 

 

 

yesterday go  broad             crash wave
tomorrow  kelp rock            slurp hair

sky clear blue          flower blossom
sand wet cool          pull down darkness

stare long hard        never seeing
quiet sit                   always peeking

murphy getting cozy with his visual aids

 

 

 

i drink czech beer
it’s drizzling outside
the tv drones a violence

my peace is here
accepting the latest pain
of wet induced sore aching

i huddle, sip
self puddled inky streak
all luck now bad
spiralled loss swirling away

today there is no sun
i can’t afford this beer
its cost a pittance more
than what they leave me now
when i give myself away

i drink it though
it brings a simple solace
taste, a dull to ache of bone
a settled stomach before i eat
simple pleasures i understand
and precious while they last
and i can invoke them in faithful habit
i’m lonely though
and sip an extra glass
before night’s show

murphy still warbling away

 

 

 

 

early morning arousal is immoderate
the light has yet to find harshness
the bed has not lost its pungence
we alone waking face the world

 

 

 

 

my daughter asked today when i will die.
i wonder why she wants to know such things.
i wonder, as she answers, “when your hair turns white,”
why mine still clings to its dark brown state.

i wonder why i cling to younger ways
than my flesh is wont in its age to do.
i wonder why she wants to know such things,
and i answer, “life has death as its first sure date.”

i ask my son if what he wants to be
is still the same as it was yesterday–
and it is, as engineer; and daughter wants,
as daughters will– money, fame, a movie fate.

i look around, ask myself in quiet tones,
if its fear or boredom will get me first.
i wonder new my small-boy wondrous thoughts
of life, of love, of getting to stay up late–

to talk to women and to learn it all,
to learn how life can be short, full and sweet–
how death might come tomorrow night,
or be here right now, coming down the street.

 

 

 

 

newspapers pile around my chair
the lamp has two lights out
side table strewn with coffee cups
beer cans, magazines, junk mail
the sloth of summer taken

my children show no industry
content with what they find, they mind
their moment’s interest, then lose
their thought to other things, in other rooms
they mimic what they see

that’s fine, and so am i, in cluttered home
that’s home — that serves to set the stage
for siblings two to get to know the third
they are about up to getting mad
enraged at someone’s taking charge
someone old and large

i keep my thoughts to self
and set a slow paced path
for reconciling loved ones
solved intricate as math

i read my morning papers
they slug their bed til ten
and wander in to nibble toast
and ask how i have been

just fine i always tell them
just fine now that you’re here
and seemingly together
all together what i hold dear

murphy hovering above bustle of place

 

 

 

 

the slow grey morning sits outside.
i sit with coffee and no papers,
no handy escape to large events
and sweeping forces to fall into.

i sit with coffee and with my dreams
which persist in their reality.
i sit with a pen and blank paper,
a handy escape to sit inside.

the slow grey morning seeps away,
the full of cold is now inside.
there is no heat to luxuriate,
no sun of color to tan my hide.

the slow grey morning reflects my thoughts.
they’re old and thick in their purpose,
and blocked by years, and blocked again;
but turning world insures a change.

and change is the dappled horse we ride
into the teeth of slow grey morning
time of grief at the cold inside
that time will bring; and now i tell.

i seek to dream and thus make real.
it’s hard enough sometimes to tell
exactly what it is i feel
and not have those i love recoil.

i sit with coffee and this scribbled page.
i’ve spent this time to spend my rage
in squiggling lines and muted thoughts.
the slow grey morning becomes my me.

murphy reluctantly on square one

 

 

 

 

blood is only blood
my father would say
blood tells

i’ve tried to find my blood
in terms i understand
whole blood
half blood
breed

but
blood is only blood
in terms i understand

and my mother would nod
as if to say
but i don’t tell
the secrets of the blood
i just know
that things will change
and blood be only blood
that bleeds

i’ve tried to find my blood
in terms i understand
of whole death
and final say—
and half-red blood
is only blood

murphy being partly irish

 

 

 

 

i sit in the scruffy apartment
and stare
i sit in the water’s drip
in sink all piled with crud
i molder slowly in the cans
half eaten by the cats
and dirt
i sit to think of always
in this bedraggled place of curs

i hear a memory told
ground to this rough hewn meal
ground down below mere thinking
strewn in a stench of fools–
i sit in my mind’s preferment

i remember all the people
with sullied wasted lives
half eaten by social mold
in the clutter of their things

the rich in all their splendor
are spent as the trash they cause

lesser men
stare at the bones
of waterdrips

murphy on an urban reservation visiting a woman gone mad

 

 

 

 

snuffle deep in the stink of me
i am an animal
who doesn’t know how to live
burrowed deep in my sink of fears

i don’t know how to live
as an animal
i dream i keep traffic flowing with lights
and words
my master’s call
mechanical and learned

i can’t free the traffic
in my mind so rational
now flowing down in curling sleep
to dreams of when i was
an animal

sniffing proud my complex world
i sort
i straighten form
and weave a cloak of being

but covered now i lock my doors
and hunker in my clothes
under blanket haired by cats
i smell collected fears
from dreams in twisted nights

i snuggle down to see
just how i’ve lost the life
remembered as parent’s tears

a close repayment builds
slow as memory
i keep up with my arrears

i am an animal
who knows the whiff of freedom
born close in smell of night

murphy in early morning drinking instant coffee from a bowl

 

 

 

 

outside my protectments the wild things live
dining on small things as big things will do
eagles eat rabbits and the wolves caribou
the polar bear eats all the ocean will give

outside my mind is the wind and the cold
etching my thoughts with their presence sore felt
leading my dreams to your warmth which will melt
inturning fears so our futures will hold

since my home is now safe in that it feels
as you laughingly greet me, more and more warm
kind to each weakness and molding my strength

i look out my windows and past all the seals
note how their presence distances harm
gifts reaching arms appropriate length

murphy jumping through his usual hoops

 

 

 

 

the tongue i offer now will quiet speak
the song, the rhythmic sky are words of love
my tongue slow teases taste in ample proof
your lips grow full in softness ruby round

the song i sing transfigures our first parting
the taste, the then is sparrow on my breath
my words seal now as blood passed to another
disappears to flow alone remembered red

the sounds i hear remind of senses flowing
the lips of love retell the sad sweet dream
i love you alone of all the others

the softness now surrounds the dark of night
the lips of love in parting grow anew
the lips consume the all envelop me

murphy waking to cuddly fetal form

 

 

 

 

did i tell you today that i love you
were you with me in dreams i adore
are you holding as tightly as i am
holding close as the sea holds the shore

were you there when i saw you the last time
was the where with all proper esteem
do we dance in the palace as ballroom
or squeeze with our bellies asteam

are the stars out tonight in our dark thoughts
have dolphins slid soft next my bed
to nuzzle and touch as the morning
springs grey when it brings back the red

murphy alive, and kicking on purpose

 

 

 

 

until you’ve worn the horns
you don’t know
i mean the gnarly things that strut
and pierce their way from out your head
you can’t slow the world enough to hear the cheers

until you’ve worn the horns
of cuckold’s creek
meandered in her flow
i mean the switchback swish
that loads the outer bed with silt
you haven’t sense of upward stream

until you’ve pushed your bigger head
and laked and and pooled your way to overflow
i mean that understanding when it goes
and floods the outer plains
you’ll never know the drowning fool

until you’ve wanted all you’ll want
in life that’s left, and quiet looked in doctor’s face
i mean that awful knowing man
that pokes and prods
you haven’t seen what that might mean

murphy squashed in the back of a vw beetle

 

 

 

the wind comes back, gusting, wintry  cold
my spring wool shirt, unbuttoned, flaps
i give in to the wish for warmth to come
refuse a shiver, ignore dampness taking hold

the others here have shed their coats
and lost the sense of wild, the real out side
they shout and point to distant things
they hitchhike on the feral ride

their abandoned senses cough and reel
fill the floor with banana peel
which can’t sustain sharp move away
from knife or club that’s come to slay

they lack the net to catch the real
and keep it close so they can know–
they drop instead their heads, and kneel
accepting whatever their fate bestow

that’s all right as far as i can see
now that i’m warm, protected, dry
i will not kill the likes of these
and they will never care, nor wonder why

i sit in peace this raw spring day
and wait for you to bring wildness in
a calculated stance, this sense of play
love captured whole, public in mild kissing

but that’s not here, that was a there
today i keep the score in schemas sung
i mute my horn, its song burbling fair
i lick my spoon with telling tongue

murphy not long to be with children

 

 

 

 

a woven warp of dimness lies across my bed this night
discursive woof of print on page now snags my jaundiced eye
i, once more startled, try to find the inner cloth of me
the blanket warms my open pores, unbidden comes a sigh

the focussed gaze full inward turns as hands go slack in pose
the glasses chewed around their stems taste new of thoughts grown old
this night of nights alone i seek the truths arranged in rows
of mildewed words, and slackened days, of youth so recent sold

i track my mind, its memories hold within my guts of fear
i hold to life which slips away so slowly beer by beer
a book in bed and shelves still full await my palsied hand

i see the buck, the dauntless lad, who fought the heedless foe
who backed his thoughts with blood and bone while always stubbing toe
who clung to words though their porous web was always seeping sand
is this the way, recumbent way, he finally proves a man

murphy a bit confused as to the form of his endeavor

 

 

 

 

the spring holds back from its promise of warmth
as wind still bites with its northern roots
i hurry with shoulders hunched against the cold
to food and you, candles, talk, simple things
that open like yellow roses in a heated room

tension dims with the sipping of wine
the talk grows fevered, fresh and free
it leads me on and i chase my thought
i wander to place of unexpected me

you lead me there as you always do
hearing what i haven’t yet learned to say
showing what i hardly dare to wish
touching me lightly in your serious way

the winter is gone despite its chilling leave
the growth to come shows in fuzzy tip of hedge
streets surrendered to cabs and scurrying men
rushing somewhere searching for the likes of you

i’m leaving instead to talk with children
ready for their spring and first warm taste
of life, and how it all rushes away
except when time forgets its parting haste
and makes a love, an inviting place

murphy patient and happy in his chinese bar

 

 

 

 

i wonder if the middle of the stream
gives the proper down hill slide to dream
the rhythm of the richness of the ride

i stagger down the middle of the street
quite vainly hope that my strides are neat
enough to get me back to where i hide

i seldom catch the volume of my thought
til it is over, snaggled tight, and caught
my copy cat that notates talk sits by my side

i often find myself in the middle of these days
staring obliquely at the sun, its sparkling rays
a verdant trap that i allow to grow inside

i float as leaf within the belly of my rhyme
that flashes up to videos of time
that cut apart the wholeness of the ones who died

murphy venturing out to see what’s left

 

 

 

 

he returned home to see
himself as he was once
but stealthily
as if to see
the backside of all his fronts

murphy laughing with his father

 

 

 

 

a rubaiyat

chappaqua, chippewa, who gives a shit
the wrap around or run around, she’s gone
chapparal, cherokee, who stomps the dirt
the feathered hawk, or chicken scratch, it’s me

murphy circling just beyond the outmost dancers

 

 

 

 

my thoughts are creeks, their downward flow
thickening to pool, to search cold depths
dropping in spray of rock’s sharp spill
to final surge in tides at moon’s salt rim

murphy watching a slo-mo flick of a rose that blooms

 

 

 

 

my smell is discordant with fear
i stink of defeat and what it brings
where is the might of sinewed youth
where goes the ground but under snow

murphy discussing his recent eviction with the mayor’s representative

 

 

 

 

my melody invites when out of tune
it niggles jars of syruped yams
it winces childish suck on lime
it rankles hair on back of neck

murphy writing in his diary on new year’s eve

 

 

 

 

my ganglions grow dull these last few years
they don’t fire with the force of raw ecstasy
they don’t store with ease all the sounds i hear
they don’t fire with keen eye of child

murphy wandering alone in his senility

 

 

 

 

my fear is losing what i’ve learned to have
my safe little island where i turtle bask
where warm sun drives blood to sluggish boil
as thought’s impose their brakes, and slow to brambles

murphy laughing at the thought of never going back to school

 

 

 

 

the grass by my front door is dead and gone
worn down and killed by my daily pacing
you never come to see, nor drink my tea
you’ve left me with the always of expectation

murphy reading the morning papers in his favorite chair

 

 

 

 

how can i hear song resting in chord
how does echo teach the wind to blow
how add sound’s sense to wordy snow
how does the earth receive its rain

murphy pondering imponderables

 

 

 

 

i’ve earned my quietude of place
my solitude in my irish bar
the gnarled oak of finger’s burning
the clog of lung which comes from war

murphy listening hard for the whistle of the morning train

 

 

 

 

i started as a boulder tumbling off a cliff
i smashed down the shoulder of the mountain
i made a creek for the earth’s sweet tears
to run their course to the salty sea

murphy doing the daily crunches to keep his abs in shape

 

 

 

 

morning glory, mattituck, who gives a fuck
which flower creeps above your gate
a colored splash of border’s run
innisfield, copperfield, who stokes the sun

murphy listening patiently for the weather report

 

 

 

 

a rhythm drives to lock up time
so it will pulse instead of spend
gather slow its own sense of change
all those details twinkling in its sky

murphy ecstatic with the key to further inspiration

 

 

 

 

i love the mixing water of estuary
the crowded swirls of ecstacy
breathing fresh the gills of life
the resplendent health of blended edge

murphy insisting that the piano man play on

 

 

 

 

why do i want to know why
why not let my whims form patterns
whelp their own, as water carves the earth
why wish for wisdom instead of life

murphy letting his memories run riot

 

 

 

 

the kitchen i cook in has a warm, used look
the food i offer settles joy on the plate
brushes bowl of broth with taste
beckons with its bit of bacon

murphy resplendent in his hand wrought vest

 

 

 

 

i smell the musk of earth in your smile
a welcome kiss makes slime of soil
as raining heaven makes the garden sprout
sheltered neath the thatch of your apron’s spread

murphy ceding suzerainity

 

 

 

 

why are you listening to all my ravings
why not dance alone to your own songs
you can’t buy more than all your feeling
why sit at home when frogs know the moon

murphy reintegrating with his nature

 

 

 

 

it’s a cruel sad day in amarillo
with the wind from the north, and it’s cold
the barbed wire fence holds out nothing
i’m as frail as this feather i hold

murphy talking to the bird clan mothers about marrying his love

 

 

 

 

the greens fresh picked are dark in leaf
and the water beads as oblate spheres
i grease the pan with light oil of life
and wilt with fresh bite of  lemons

murphy reading his chinese cook book

 

 

 

 

i crowed to the sun when he appeared this morning
i rustled my wattles in a hullabaloo
this earth is mine to share for my time remaining
i’m here with you on our stomping grounds

murphy warming his hands with his coffee mug

 

 

 

 

the murphy form

A pair of poems with the same lines in each.

Normally the first poem’s lines are rearranged in the following order:

The first stanza of the second poem consists of the first lines of each stanza of the first poem.

The second stanza then is the second lines in order, etc.

However other patterns may be used as long as all the lines of the first poem appear in the second.

 

 

 

 

around this bend, here, now
there is a pool
a small eddy shifting sand
a thick purity of motion
a clarity of passion

around this problem ahead
there is a rush
a squeezing speed as arrow
a movement solid in intent
a calm only of purpose

around this proper place
there is a fence
an in and out of feeling
a slap of bared chest
an angled run of frenzy

around this heart of mine
there is a beat
a thumping gush of gifts
a reddening stool of light
a steady conn of helm

murphy under a tamarind tree waiting for justice

 

 

 

 

around this bend, here, now
around this problem ahead
around this proper place
around this heart of mine

there is a pool
there is a rush
there is a fence
there is a beat

a small eddy shifting sand
a squeezing speed as arrow
an in and out of feeling
a thumping gush of gifts

a thick purity of motion
a movement solid in intent
a slap of bared chest
a reddening stool of light

a clarity of passion
a calm only of purpose
an angled run of frenzy
a steady conn of helm

murphy pausing to sniff the breeze five thousand steps one at a time

 

 

 

 

five thousand steps one at a time
with careful tread on yielding ground
soft skin molding foot to clutch of earth
to follow the river and learn its ways
from mountains pitch to soft ess curl

float downstream round bend on bend
lose trail of back in rambling course
splash through rapids scraping skin
to find the sea of what has been
since new born thought came clear

wind and tide harsh in crashing waves
the salt accepting water slosh
the breathing deep as water breathes
to find the place of balance
the last pulsing push of gravity

murphy having finished his vacuuming for the day

 

 

 

five thousand steps one at a time
float downstream round bend on bend
wind and tide harsh in crashing waves

with careful tread on yielding ground
lose trail of back in rambling course
the salt accepting water slosh

soft skin molding foot to clutch of earth
splash through rapids scraping skin
the breathing deep as water breathes

to follow the river and learn its ways
to find the sea of what has been
to find the place of balance

from mountains pitch to soft ess curl
since new born thought came clear
the last pulsing push of gravity

murphy seeking the direction of a sudden smell

 

 

 

how imagine an ancestor you’ve never known
except as déjà vu, in echo of fresh tongue’s phrase
how might the mayan light his caves of tomorrow
staring down into the very fundament

how see the stars embedded in their sparkle
except in darkest night enwrapped in inward sight
how might the first hour fill the belly of today
to sate the thirst for fail safe certitude

how feel the roots that hold you to this earth
mid the tangle to those whose roots you share
how might the odd new leaf reach the widest branch
to bare itself to sun in selfless churning

how sing the taste of love’s tart sting
except as darting child with his wilding
how might the tones enhance the daring leap
to find the swirling depths in tidal reefs

murphy proud of his brand new kitchen

 

 

 

how imagine an ancestor you’ve never known
how see the stars embedded in their sparkle
how feel the roots that hold you to this earth
how sing the taste of love’s tart sting

except as déjà vu, in echo of fresh tongue’s phrase
except in darkest night enwrapped in inward sight
mid the tangle to those whose roots you share
except as darting child with his wilding

how might the mayan light his caves of tomorrow
how might the first hour fill the belly of today
how might the odd new leaf reach the widest branch
how might the tones enhance the daring leap

staring down into the very fundament
to sate the thirst for fail safe certitude
to bare oneself to sun in selfless churning
to find the swirling depths in tidal reefs

murphy hobbling with a broken toe

 

 

 

i want a primeval nose
that smells a pagan richness
i want a fertile land
that nurtures all my seed

i want a primeval eye
that sees through screen of danger
i want an autumn hue
that fills my barns of greed

i want primeval ears
that lend hands to guitar’s song
i want a dance to set my mood
that bares my heart to bleed

i want a primeval touch
that soothes fur for neck to snuggle
i want a food that fills my longing
that feels thicker when i chew

i want a primeval taste
that tells what death still gives me
i want my meat to feast upon
that freshness in earth’s blood

murphy imagining an onomatopoeic god

 

 

 

i want a primeval nose
that sees through screen of danger
i want a food that fills my longing
that soothes fur for neck to snuggle

i want a primeval taste
that feels thicker when i chew
i want a fertile land
that fills my barns of greed

i want a primeval eye
that bares my heart to bleed
i want an autumn hue
that freshness in earth’s blood

i want a primeval touch
that nurtures all my seed
i want my meat to feast upon
that smells a pagan richness

i want primeval ears
that tells what death still gives me
i want a dance to set my mood
that lend hands to guitar’s song

murphy sending e-mails to his other selves

 

 

 

memory is this body’s trap of sense
snapping shut on tape of inward sway
to set its own awareness fence
that sieves impending fullness of the day

forget again and then be wrong once more
the past does bite with all its hidden code
there is no knowing, not the reason why
just that the new is gnarly new again

it hurts as often as a knot will tie
the heart again will in its good time heal
that’s what  i know within my open eye

the ones in close know when it is to know
to see small wounds slow, slow bleeding still
the ones in fruit know not the time they’ll go

murphy writing slow sad songs for the basso profundo of his mind

 

 

 

memory is this body’s trap of sense
forget again and then be wrong once more
it hurts as often as a knot will tie
the ones in close know when it is to know

snapping shut on tape of inward sway
the past does bite with all its hidden code
to set its own awareness fence
the heart again will in its good time heal

to see small wounds slow, slow bleeding still
there is no knowing not the reason why
that’s what  i know within my open eye

just that the new is gnarly new again
that sieves impending fullness of the day
the ones in fruit know not the time they’ll go

murphy of his own will testate

 

 

 

my suppleness is long now gone
i creak, and crank up purpose
to barge along the way, with eye
that glows soft as a summer river

my strength is off, late fallen
to wince in pain when pulling hard
to utilize as tool of worth
to shape with as i flow

my mind at least keeps open view
quick in sight, though slow with fingers
so deft at weaving words, intuitive in songs
that play as dance, life long

my hands still scribble each proud new passage
in string and ink and food and form
so automatic in skills my thoughts can go
where i will in willing walk

my memory’s store is stocked with goods
whose tags are fast retrieval’s sail
as winds that fill the moment’s wave
in waking dream:  exact, and all

murphy grinning shyly in the corner

 

 

 

my suppleness is long now gone
my strength is off, late fallen
my mind at least keeps open view
my hands still scribble each proud new passage
my memory’s store is stocked with goods

i creak, and crank up purpose
to wince in pain when pulling hard
quick in sight, though slow with fingers
in string and ink and food and form
whose tags are fast retrieval’s sail

to barge along the way, with eyes
to utilize as tools of worth
so deft at weaving words intuitive in song
so automatic in skills my thoughts can go
as winds that fill the moment’s wave

that glow soft as a summer river
that play as dance life long
to shape with as i flow
where i will in willing walk
in waking dream:  exact, and all

murphy making it up as he goes along

 

 

 

sad yellow of the morning is tarred with his ink
his scrawl so gladly writ in frenzied haste
water then his balance of moment
washing clean, then swift to morning tastes

mad fellow of the midday is sane through his drink
the crawl so fully bared in mindless soak
loping then his amble on the cement
sweating clear and chortling at the joke

glad mellow of the evening is glowingly pink
the drawl so gladly heard is now in voice
careful then his musing on the foment
behind him now and without willful choice

slow bellow of the nighttime is briefly a blink
the sleep so softly held in his living hands
rising then his meeting all his torment
beside him now the melting way of sands

murphy seeking the direction of a sudden smell

 

 

 

sad yellow of the morning is tarred with his ink
mad fellow of the midday is sane through his drink
glad mellow of the evening is glowingly pink
slow bellow of the nighttime is briefly a blink

his scrawl so gladly writ in frenzied haste
the crawl so fully bared in mindless soak
the drawl so gladly heard is now in voice
the sleep so softly held in his living hands

water then his balance of the moment
loping then his amble on the cement
careful then his musing on the foment
rising then his meeting all his torment

washing clean and swift to what he tastes
sweating clear and chortling at the joke
behind him now and without willful choice
beside him now the melting way of sands

murphy windows open, birds singing

 

 

 

salty slush of urban snow
he wets the boots of where i go
gusty wind stings face i know
woe enough for such as me

my father died this sunday  last
no longer mine his voice of past
the forward now is what  i cast
i talk as though  it’s what  i see

this plodding gait  is cold  award
and somehow  all i can record
i have no elder still on guard
now it’s  i who will be free

all directions seem somehow  wrong
life become  this bitter song
i wander,  cold;  oh, how  long is long
this all that’s left for me to be

murphy knowing the secret and telling no one

 

 

 

salty slush of urban snow
my father died this sunday  last
this plodding gait  is cold  award
all directions seem somehow  wrong

he wets the boots of where i go
no longer mine his voice of past
and somehow  all i can record
life become  this bitter song

gusty wind stings face i know
the forward now is what  i cast
i have no elder still on guard
i wander,  cold;  oh, how  long is long

woe enough for such as me
i talk as though  it’s what  i see
now it’s  i who will be free
this all that’s left for me to be

murphy  hunkering down before the storm

 

 

 

that’s the accuracy
the perspicacity of events
that led to this warm softness of place
this warm ingle snug from winter’s face
those crowds outside

that’s the audacity
the particularity of event
that led to this last easiness of days
this endless ocean we slowly crawl
the storms betimes

that’s the acumen of taut old age
the persistency of event
that leads before this fragile face
the swarming slaver of their feast
that glints in eye

murphy being close to the fire and keeping warm

 

 

 

that’s the accuracy
the particularity of event
that leads before this fragile face

the perspicacity of  events
that led to this last easiness of days
the swarming slaver of their feast

that led to this warm softness of place
this endless ocean we slowly crawl
that glints in eye

this warm ingle snug from winter’s place
the storms betimes
that’s the acumen of taut old age

those crowds outside
that’s the audacity
the persistency of event

murphy wondering how he survived his youth

 

 

 

 

the litany of birds at dawn
the crosswinding trills distinct
how direct seem my aimless thoughts
one, two, then three and four
not all at once, not eyes, not ears
a plodding slog to heaven

the ache of color branding western sky
the evolving shades pulsing with life
how simple are my fondest dreams
soft, warm, and dry, with water sweet
not grandeous and rich, just snug
a nestled ease from fearing

the exploding tongue loosing all its wets
the eddyful swirls mixing their souls
how frugal are my fueling needs
fresh and green, meat and starch
not candied up with cream, just food
a peppery fest of being

the silvering touch of full grown moon
the shivering shadows in flow of breeze
how few my onward worries
teeth, guts and ticker, the gripes of old
small aches that ease with movement, with grace
a savored text unfolding

murphy on tip toe in his circle dance of love

 

 

 

the litany of birds at dawn
the ache of color branding western sky
the exploding tongue loosing all its wets
the silvering touch of full grown moon

the crosswinding trills distinct
the evolving shades pulsing with life
the eddyful swirls mixing their souls
the shivering shadows in flow of breeze

how direct seem my aimless thoughts
how simple are my fondest dreams
how frugal are my fueling needs
how few my onward worries

one, two, then three and four
soft, warm, and dry, with water sweet
fresh and green, meat and starch
teeth, guts and ticker, the gripes of old

not all at once, not eyes, not ears
not grandeous and rich, just snug
not candied up with cream, just food
small aches that ease with movement, with grace

a plodding slog to heaven
a nestled ease from fearing
a feathery fest of being
a savored text unfolding

murphy having quit his day job for good

 

 

 

to stop the chatter of the words takes time
great dollops bring an awkward mind
then the need to tell will slip away
behind the glare of what it means

to still the spirit of the wind won’t do
great spirits have their wills not wants
for the day requires a final deed
before the task begins of moving scenes

to search the clatter of the social way
small sippings of the downward seep
leads the mind to nodder soft in dreams
beneath the pillow’s plow of sleep

to bring the quiver of the new strung bow
small tremors of the muscled hand
means the aim must never shift its hold
become the fleshy flume of now

murphy in his dotage still worrying about his children

 

 

 

to stop the chatter of the words takes time
to still the spirit of the wind won’t do
to search the clatter of the social way
to bring the quiver of the new strung bow

great dollops bring an awkward mind
great spirits have their wills not wants
small sippings of the downward seep
small tremors of the muscled hand

then the need to tell will slip away
for the day requires a final deed
leads the mind to nodder soft in dreams
means the aim must never shift its hold

behind the glare of what it means
before the task begins of moving scenes
beneath the pillow’s plow of sleep
become the fleshy flume of now

murphy staring out the window of his glassed in cave

 

 

 

wisdom takes practice
it must be made habit
automatic, unthought
a distillation of breaths
a fermentation under control

wisdom takes time
it must be dwelt upon
for a moment and for ever
a recollection of thoughts
a congery made to order

wisdom takes a leap
it must be a novelty
for the jaded, for the quick
the close cut fingernail
the stabbing hold on life

murphy with his ego cut off at its knees

 

 

 

wisdom takes practice
wisdom takes time
wisdom takes a leap

it must be made habit
it must be dwelt upon
it must be a novelty

automatic, unthought
for a moment and for ever
for the jaded, for the quick

a distillation of breaths
a recollection of thoughts
the close cut fingernail

a fermentation under control
a congery made to order
the stabbing hold on life

murphy preparing to move the bookshelves once again

 

 

 

 

yellow grass of autumn flowers
all the world is shining now
those who’ve gone have no tomorrows
the sun all afternoon is songs

blue shares a winter clearness
all the sky is awesome born
those who live live their sorrows
all moon sightings still bring sighs

green peeks early its spring wetness
all the earth is speaking clear
those who sleep shoot errant arrows
all the mountains lose their snows

white sticks cover all in stillness
all the rivers dampened down
those who die leave us their marrows
all their bones lined up in rows

murphy drinking hard in irish mourning

 

 

 

 

yellow grass of autumn flowers
blue shares a winter clearness
green peeks early its spring wetness
white sticks cover all in stillness

all the world is shining now
all the sky is awesome born
all the earth is speaking clear
all the rivers dampened down

those who’ve gone have no tomorrows
those who live live their sorrows
those who sleep shoot errant arrows
those who die leave us their marrows

the sun all afternoon is songs
all moon sightings still bring sighs
all the mountains lose their snows
all their bones lined up in rows

murphy staring hard at the muddy river of spring singing to the wind

 

 

 

 

some of us would say our tangle is our skin
our pull and tug on others pulsing deep within
matching blood and being in living out today
ending day’s beginning surrounded by our kin

our ways were never secret til heaven found our ways
forcefed its sense of highness, its greediness and might

we kept our sense of rightness deep hidden, deep within
hard, closed, and secret knowledge that burrowed to the heart

a sadness never telling to group just what i do
the same as i have always, a sharing group of you

i, lonely, set my eye to see what i can see

see far, and down the turnings the road i follow goes
away off far, to yonder where all my kin will show
yonder, together, doing what-then-they-all-will-know

i, knowing, send my song out secure in being free
secure in peering hard now toward the other shore

we settle on the rivers so water flow is near
repeating every moment what the water sweetly knows
on down the hill of bending to meet it as it comes
needing nothing gladly and facing what that is
gliding swiftly softness in nature’s liquid thrill

some of us would argue as to how we got to here
our memories pulsing out their truths hard-won
memories steely shined with thinking through and through
etched in symbol’s brightness aglitter in the sun

i, waiting, watch the slow filling light of morning
sea bound by river’s touch to sea, full liquid will i be
reaching what i’m seeing, secure in nature’s nest

i, telling, complete my circle of complex, eddied, thought
getting set my story of what i really know
how it was at this end to see the all before
thoughts gone back to mist time before i joined the show

some of what i say is wrong
some is right

murphy pontifical as they come

 

 

 

 

i walk a hidden path he said
my feet know not my way

i swim in winding streams he said
my way is no straight street

i dig a filling hole he said
my life is what i give

i build a sturdy wall he said
my gift is how i live

i train for an olympics
and wonder how i’ll do

murphy listening to church music

 

 

 

 

to woods by our self

you taught me to be
i taught you to see

there was that time at stillwater
on the lake and by the stone wall
we heard together the soft songs
of wildness still struggling to call
our search was yours for mine has gone
deep into myself, no longer
searching for meaning in what’s seen
but noting patterns as strangers
you though brought some of the old back
out there where we all first attend
Unheard rustles of fairy woods
rising to meet the real we send
so there we were as one in what
each saw for the then first of times
letting perspectives commingle
forcing rhythm to be our rhymes

you thought me to see
i thought you to be

 

 

 

 

i’m not sorry i haven’t solved the three body problem
i’m forgiving myself for not learning more about love
i drink a bit in my shallow afternoons
and wake the side of brain that’s cold

i’m not driven now by my imagined epic poems
i’ve rid myself of desire for wanton rhyme
i chop my food for those i will be feeding
and wake the side of brain that’s bold

i’m not feeling bad for those girls who flirt their feelings
i’m freshened now and love a single, close
i pick up pen to scrawl a crawling message
and wake the side of brain that molds

i’m not certain here exactly what i’m doing
i’ve lost the frame and gained the flow of ease
i gaze outside to manage nature’s calling
and wake the side of brain that holds

to only life i have as now unfolds

murphy, as einstein, explaining drunkard’s walk

 

 

 

serious i was in my youth
heedless of consequence
i progressed rationally
but joy slowly palled
until my aspirations
integrated with my nature

 

 

 

 

he drinks beer, he’s rowdy, he’s interesting
this one i met so recently
he talks well, he’s fearless, he’s quite arresting
in his putting self so decently

i like him, this other self
the one i build toward
the one i’ve been before
i know him

i know him in what i do
drink beer, be stealthy, be sensitive
for i’ve learned that, for some time
i write now, i’m afraid, i’m quite fencitive
in saving this last, this last best prime

i love him, this last best me
he teaches how to see
beyond the patterns and their being
he still does the same odd thing
bursting proud in animality

that is the thing he does
he does it from his loves
his everlasting wishing to be free

 

 

 

argument in early council

i know when i see those others
i know how small they are
how they hunker together behind sedge grass
and plot to bring us into their swamp
i know this as well as you others do

and i see you hunkering together in this meeting room
i see you building platforms around the swamp of your fears
i know your plotting is now mine

for i came here of my own free interest
in calm deliberateness of will
i came to join with others
to live as well as i can for my own

it’s the children i think of when i look
it’s the children killed with their parents
it’s the snuffing out of the fire at the center
which radiates its strength
from eternal birth and growth

we seek to ensure the fuel
we seek to maintain that flame
in the middle of the swamp and its dampness
its fetid growth and mosquitoes
its mildew and water snakes
its clammy hold within the guts

i know, you see, how we all see
those white others and ourselves
they win through hunkering and plotting
and savage disregard of us
we must fight them as they are
we must become the same
in their mind

i wear myself in splendor as the old ones do
i expect not the same from you
and yet i live in you or not at all

i know when i see those others
i see myself in children not yet born
so i see
so i say

 

 

 

 

the land i knew as a child seems far less mine
and may yet be lost for all my sons
they and i must make our peace, with those who covet
we must ally ourselves in strength, with those who will be-us
we must mix the strengths of what we-are and what they-bring
we must be and mingle blood in common destiny

and for this i sent my son and boudinot’s to school
to learn the english of our sworn friends
to learn the laws and customs of these men
who swim toward us to bring their iron and bullets

my son and your son now bring us wives from them
who would be our friends and pledge with us
to commit the future to lasting relations
and mutual respect

yet i hear of riots when they come
i hear the carriage we so proudly bought is pummeled
and hurries through the towns at night with shutters down
they avoid the clamor and hatred
they travel at night through their roads and lands
to come to us again with their wives to live

i hear these things and they trouble my thoughts
the clear future disappears in a muddying stream
its course hard to distinguish, from the new thawed ground
i am no longer so sure of our way

 

 

 

 

elder woman explaining her views

how can they expect me to tell them what i think
how can their mind listen to mine when i’m not talking
who is it that says someone speaks for another
we all know how we argue when it’s done to us

i say no

but i can’t

i understand the only way to talk to them
is through one man
one male,
who is aided by others, all male

so this is what i say
i’ll wait and i will listen
they who will talk know what i want
let’s see what they will bring

murphy strings all-over his wrists

 

 

 

9/11

but oh the silence of the pack
when we saw and understood
the enormity of the act
and how we’d lost our sense of good

the ones went in who always do
to run to quench the thirsty flame
and down it came flat cake on cake
and now we don’t know who to blame

others stood to watch in awe
or hunkered low though thunderstruck
at the ones who looked and slowed their feet
and were bounced beneath the dust and muck

but oh the silence of the pack
when we saw and understood
the enormity of the act
and how we’d lost our sense of good

the ones above who jumped from pain
came thumping down as bloody rain
that quickly bloomed its black choke death
and buried deep their bloody breath

and the floors below are crushed concrete
come tumbling down toward desperate sleep
beneath the weight heaped from so high above
the human hearts in that crumpled steel

but oh the silence of the pack
when we saw and understood
the enormity of the act
and how we’d lost our sense of good

murphy having heard one too many preachers

 

 

 

 

i looked around and knew at once
and licked to taste the smell of you
that now i dreamed a great true dream
that had now happened and was now true

you were the warmth of sun i saw
you were the trees and grass and dew
that sparkled red at break of day
you were the night, the whole night through

and if i chose to end this scene
(for dream it was and this i knew)
your snuggled warmth were there for me
your laugh and touch were all my due

but not right then did i awake
i nestled down where all was new
thought and saw and touched a world
that turquoise shows with its sky blue

murphy admitting love wrapped in his arms

 

 

 

 

early   blossom   heart   stop   beauty
smooth  flesh     color   first  blush
soft    feel      crush   hand   touch
life    love      death   know   loss

early smooth soft life
blossom flesh feel love
heart color crush death
stop first hand know
beauty blush touch loss

 

 

 

 

even   calm   color   bring   life
slow   time   seem    never   stop
stop   seem   slow    never   time
life   bring  calm    even    color

even slow stop life
calm time seem bring
color seem slow calm
bring never never even
life stop time color

 

 

 

 

go    leave   now   ache   heart
stop  come    here  hold   hand
stay  while   eyes  see    face
touch time    warm  you    last

go stop stay touch
leave come while time
now here eyes warm
ache hold see you
heart hand face last

 

 

 

 

steam   hiss   bang   heat   rise
inside  noise  bang   cold   window
outside hear   rush   city   flurry
burst   mind   push   feel   snow

steam inside outside burst
hiss noise hear mind
bang bang rush push
heat cold city feel
rise window flurry snow

 

 

 

 

at the stroke of the hand the brush will fall
clean in the movement
deftly down to clean end
swift and clear in its dropping

at the stroke of the ink the blackness comes
as gray, and grayer still, til gone
gone deep as a wound gone wrong
slow and puffy in its gorging

the time of death is always come
the time of life is now

at the stroke of the pen, her son-man writes
in twisting turning sense of words
in taut, full phrase, or awkward shape
still glowing hard in knowing
this time,  it’s still sweet song

he sees the moon, the yet seen moon
and notes its fading embers
the dark to come for this some one
and all those coming after

murphy laughing with his mother

 

 

 

MLK

hard smooth milky white
marble crypt was placed in bright
crowded sunshine

pungent blooms of varied hue
were placed on high as if his view
were yours and mine

next day mist and bone
smell of earth, smell of stone
bouquet of wine

 

 

 

 

feast of san gennaro

i sit in a room of white brick walls
hear outside air’s conditioned hum
see sun’s triangled slice above
i sit and think in words

my pen blueblack unlike the sky
(a small rectangled space)
moves crablike on this page
i sit in this mind’s cage

i think in words alone to write
maxine along her way
to feast upon when she returns
from feasting on today

i choose to sit and not go out
to be with her this time
i choose to talk a stilted shout
to be whole though left behind
in choosing what to be

i send these words across this page
and on their way to her
alone inside her moving will
return the sky to me

the sky above this still life shows
in small neat plane of light
enlarges mind to fill all else
behind the sights i see

the room does disappear
the white brick walls show through the blue
and love comes breathing through
to feast and walk in words of air
i sit and think of her

 

 

 

 

the proper sop of gauze smoothes stain
and wood appears more hard
and deep in solid tone
the shelves of pine for books

i smooth the grain its texture
i soothe the pain alone
my tree is cut to cord wood
then squared to fit room’s mold
my knobbly soul its heartwood
and standing square and grim

but hands shall smooth the seeing
their stains touch soft to hold
the form i dimly see

i touch the not-yet-being
its nowness all my own
and soon i share with others
the wonder of new song

 

 

 

 

today there is no sun
i can’t afford this beer
its cost a pittance more
than what they leave me now
when i give myself away

i drink it though
it brings a simple solace
taste, a dull to ache of bone
a settled stomach before i eat
simple pleasures i understand
and precious while they last

i’m lonely though
and sip an extra glass
before night’s show

murphy still warbling away

 

 

 

 

it was one of those times of near strength
when i thought to myself of the worth
of standing beside my own hearth

i was reminded of ancient man
bending to his forge
fashioning fendable edges

not of the modern sort of softness
of men stacked midst stainless swords
of swaddling missile steel

 

 

 

they’re dancing on rooftops in harlem today
for no good reason
and several bad ones.
the sky is dirty, an aluminum grey
repeating man’s metallic chains
reflecting dull light of strength.
i sit in an aerie noticing air.

the dances are macabre– heat stirrings bend
the men’s natural grace
the children’s rompish play
the women’s proper place.
i can’t see as clearly as i might wish
having clawed to highness
having played on strength
having left below behind.
i sit in an aerie noticing air.

but i can still distinguish some people
when the winds permit
when i focus my glance
when i collect my wits
when i take the chance.
but those jets above don’t carry discerners
not even part time
not even a downward glance
for no good reason
and several bad ones.
i sit in an aerie noticing air.

 

 

 

 

we had a luncheon conversation
picked idly at our food
told little and heard much

my boss’s mistress knows your wife
the plant manager drinks
your trucking system reeks of

Italianate decay.  the stench
of rotting morals permeates
my individual corporate soul

 

 

 

 

below marble falls
sometime in 1946
pillows, blankets, rocky sand
a sharp bend in the river
sitting at 3 in the morning
staying awake to hear
uncle j t talking to the catfish
hearing the singing of his soul

seining perch in the afternoon
kicking the gar to death
before he could flip back to water

setting the hook in the live perch
running the lines at 4
with the men at last
staying awake

fighting death
and sleep
below marble falls
on the colorado river
somewhere in texas

murphy with scraggly beard on walkabout

 

 

 

dallas 1959

the bars made strange dreams
no rusted cars out back
no hard packed dirt yards
just beer-stained hardwood
sturdy wooden stools, chairs
sawdust and shuffleboard

i talked of strong visions
and probed for what it was like
what no memories held
of the glorious times
when the men knew the land
and the land knew men

we learned of that other
brotherhood of loss
shared and transmuted
of sudden resolve, remorse
and pride soaked to tears
wiped dry to stand

another round again

 

 

 

i am the sun
you eat the ground i slowly walk each day
eat the yearning to be me
to grow and merge with me
the grass and leaves
the fruit and seeds
of me

i am the ground
you eat the sun i slowly bear the way
eat the burning meat of me
the grass and leaves
the fruit and seeds
of me

murphy bringing the spirit in the fire

 

 

 

 

the most difficult thing
i thought
was what i was doing with my body
i acted like those around me
so many clues hidden
i kept quiet

i swallowed self in stalking absence of motion
no attention gathering action
no practiced show of self

i swallowed self
and i never unfroze
became compulsive stillness
silent mirror strength
hunter’s eyes

i watched for pattern to emerge
i took advantage
i swallowed self as i was taught
to kill the game
the particular game i sought

hunt, fish, survive
plant scallions
bring to table to share
bring quietly
so as not to be seen bringing
cook
eat

but those others are frightening
they overwhelm with power
they wreak havoc

murphy still feral in his modern ways

 

 

 

 

the skewness of tomorrow is today’s world
in focus yet to come
and so we forget

the skewness of today is the way they were
in other times
and how they lived

the skewness of the now in the circling sky
of always be

and so are we
in skewness of this day

murphy mathematically zen

 

 

 

 

uncle JT was a marvelous man
who had one spectacular failure
after another
and lurched from one to next
in desperate scrabble

i also
in hanging fire
emulate JT
suggest to him my agreement
in purpose
my steadfast will in lurching
failure of trip-wire steel
to bite the flesh of other
after other
in successful killing
million mad

the imagination of the future
is the possiblity matrix
right now
and the adequacy
of that vision is the truth

murphy assuming an old disguise

 

 

 

words are guides
to knowledge
man’s transcendence
to the natural order
life’s predatory fate
but then they must be forgotten
for gotten once
they entrap
always the indians
referred to themselves
their tribe
as simple human people
that were truly human
yet words are guise
transcending knowledge
always the other tribes
weren’t balanced
complete complexities
of totalness of tribe
of humanness thus achieved
after mastery of complexity
is the circle complete
and predation no longer

matters
life’s usual fate
no longer matters
always the human people
had attained by words
the complexity necessary
to so complete the circle
that words no longer
mattered
so care must be taken
to never so confuse the way
that necessary totalness
communication of the fullness
of being
a human being
is forgotten

take care through concentration
so hard won
to maintain openness
where words are forgotten

for gotten
words are guides

 

 

 

 

you don’t remember
what you do
remember

you don’t
remember what you do
remember

you don’t remember
what you do remember

 

 

 

 

go

i love how white stones glow
in small darkness
i love how black stones slow
to fill the light

i love dally of response
in hue’s pattern
i love wave’s nonchalance
in heart’s pounding

i love the change that’s always
involved in love

 

 

 

 

the clear cold sky is city dawning
the classic line is gravity
your skin melts gold of  morning
the frame of world’s first freeze
this winter time
i bathe anew with meaning
i leave

i leave to fight for meaning
amid a squalid time
you live to me as morning
in solid color’s form

the easement of my yearning
the softness of your guise
are set in memory’s hold
this morning
this morning alive

 

 

 

 

the rain soaks down its sullen way
there across fluffed rockdove preens
keeping dry as i myself

and all outside is rain come sullen down
along the city streets of walls
those crater-surface flats of niche
for dove to sit at home

and all inside is grey, the sullen grey
of winter’s porch; i form
a mind of deftly woven wool
in home of cluttered mess
that’s i alone

dry not wet
this self alone

i hold november day

 

 

 

 

clamor greets cold, wet, spring day
drums into leaves dripping in newness
city quivers as traffic snarls
its fitful swish of movement

i walk alone to quietude
to fresh green park, long river’s way
i stare at fullness, moving still
the water washing down to sea

aged limbs of trees assume
heat will come with sultry breeze
loosen tips for wind’s sweet play
in tossing flounce of summer day

i stand and creak in aged bones
now stiff from sitting, staring
inward to my tossing waves
of liquid thought reflecting

i walk again among the cars
their bullish grills grunt, churlish
i wait for green to walk my way
my thoughts are full, and girlish

murphy sliding into a tired, deep sleep

 

 

 

hot summer sweats before its time
and peeks around the corner
the day begun so long ago
swelters as asphalt heat

i plod along predestined path
and maunder in my musings
how long before was i too cold
how long til i am frying

crowds of bums with  pleading hands
the flotsam waves, beseeching
a tall cool glass, and piped in  sound
no hiss of tires nor screeching

how long have i with such as you
the you i still am seeking
and always will no matter what
i sweat with feelings leaking

and now i’m here, the always here
and calm and fresh in waiting
i  sit and  think as inward keys
sing true with chest inflating

my outward mien maintains its flesh
as stony pool reflecting
between its crags the depth of well
our limpid souls connecting

the heat of sun is far from here
within my centered being
i touch to see what pattern forms
as thoughts carve out my being

the ripples go, and peace descends
to depths of all my knowing
i look inside and all i see
is you, and you are glowing

murphy thankful for the monkey bar

 

 

 

 

a spitting rain and fretful wind
spots the glass of all my seeing
blurs the edge of where i am
drives me deep into my being

i slowly walk to think things through
and feel my essence stretching
muscles warm with work well done
and thoughts of future– guessing

the rush of time speeds through my days
there is no leisure as i run
snatching hard young grasping hands
in river flow that’s never done

i wonder when was last i ate
i wonder what i’m feeling
and smile and see with inward light
how life has clouds not ceiling

i pause to think, decide to stop
and rest while waiting, drinking
a crawling scrawl of my own place
an ego steady– shrinking

murphy in monday’s full glory

 

 

 

small swarms of men pruned all the trees this winter
rode great mechanical cups, up, into the topmost limbs
buzzed with small band saws close to their trunks
opened their skirts and lifted their hems

across the small street on which i live
lives an impressive oak that knows its place
it’s there, it’s been there, still large and healthy
it looms on the left of my window’s look

the forsythia of spring brings eye back to ground
where red, cool sweater turns earth, sweeps leaves
i look again and seek a form within the frame
to focus deep on echo’s pattern’s, the slip of age

through whipping limbs thin slicing wires cut blueness
and closer tree has first new tips of green
its gnarl of hand a freckled fan of awkward thrusting
in shadowed place beyond the light, blocked by me

the birds still sing as does my mind
while heart and soul are sitting
in this small place, this favorite place
in my waiting for your greeting

murphy in early dank of evening, aching in his bones

 

 

 

the sky is grey scudding frost of clouds
as glass of light grows cold and dim.
this march goes on and wetly on–
mind drifts, shadowed by sight gone by.

the room has heat, yet it’s just as grim,
wind is gone in a vapored stillness,
music and chatterings grate tingling ears;
i’m deafened by all the peopled noise.

the bar reflects a beery always feeling,
repeats each crowded night’s blind search.
the day slides by even as i’m sitting.
i’d swear it circles back to feed on me.

if rain were not out there now before me,
i’d track this night in drops of tearful laughing–
track back to what i knowing didn’t see:
i’d swear if it would bring back sun to me.

tomorrow is today that i am missing
and have these two weeks rain now gone.
so now i sit as water, sometimes stilling,
will sit as pool, calm in running still.

 

 

 

 

fuzzywhumps and fizzigigs
how quaint my leaves are made of fog
how queer my downward creek will bend
as homeward seaward i will blend

fizzlefraps and whirlygogs
how won’t i throw stones down to frogs
how will my flowers finely fade
how stone will turn to stone to jade

woogledyglues and things that stick
how sick am i of gate and lock
how well the water runs its stones
how seaward homeward bound my bones

murphy consulting his oed

 

 

 

 

the wine is here, the dregs of wine
the last best cup of sipping
i listen now as wind’s sweet breath
tongues skin i’ve bared by stripping

the red, red skin that touches fire
the sweat hot night of kissing
is gone, replaced by fitful breeze
the kind that’s often missing

she’s gone from here and that i know
her wind, and storm, and feeling
now softest breeze becomes my skin
with all the senses reeling

i love this night, the taste of lip
the licking salt of shoulder
i stretch big toe to wrap it up
oh i wish i still could hold her

murphy steaming out

 

 

 

 

do little i know anything
was little i there
did the dark deed happen
do little i care

i sit in municipal appeals
to betterment
i watch citizen’s squirming
bewilderment

do big i Know Anything
do big I Care
did the Axe Fall When Dropped
was big I There

am i hanging now
for the deed
I was Thinking so
i must bleed

 

 

 

 

tuesday night and the cold stillness shows how
our sudden thoughts look through from the blackness,
movement ceases and the worlds of possibilities
are now with you the clarity of stars.
rustling around my feet are old shades, torn
in growing past, as their fall and mine moved
alongside; in that dreaded coldness, forced:
the pureness of vision could come no other.
only promise me this as i prepare for
more effulgent growth which might not be curbed.
ask yourself whether the naturalness
reflected in my leafy path this night
is wrong, whether the humus in making
assumes its role as inevitable.

 

 

 

 

i would like to nestle on the bare ground
as the sparrows do, as if taking baths
together in simple companionship:
the sun, the occasional interplay.
i trust the mindless gregariousness,
the underlining of sharing pursuits
even if the apparent gain is nothing
more than time of simple feeling joy.
never mind the mites beneath fluffed feathers,
the gnawing individuality
of itch which must, perforce, be assuaged.
that singular concern of bodily
well-being is rarely perceived by the
outside watcher of instinctual flock.

 

 

 

 

the screams of the attacking victims seem
shriller than the actual killer’s moan.
my sensibilities are inverted these days.
earliest lessons i remember now–
to succeed meant doing the unexpected
quiet things to those who flailed in blind rage,
those who felt but failed articulately.
those peers who fell behind shrieking their fears
were me, just as their successors are my
understanding those strengths to win i honed,
those sobs which come unbidden to my male
supremacy, that unfortunate height
one reaches to swoop with deadly folded wings.

 

 

 

 

the song i sing transfigures our first parting
the taste, the then is sparrow on my breath
my words seal now as blood passed to another
disappears to flow alone remembered red

the sounds i hear remind of senses flowing
the lips of love retell the sad sweet dream
the tongue i offer now will quiet speak
the song, the rhythmic sky are words of love

my tongue slow teases taste in ample proof
your lips grow full in softness ruby round
i love you alone of all the others

the softness now surrounds the dark of night
the lips of love in parting grow anew
the lips consume the all envelop me

 

 

 

 

a poem ceases to be as soon as it is
written, my random thoughts become this page
and read more or less indifferently
by those who have a similar sickness
the need to confront a weltering sense
of compatibility of image
their feelings at that time of word sounding
wrest final concreteness from my intent

but that is far off and unheard as i sit
selecting from my smoky wraiths of form
hearing in my graphite pencil a bell
calling to attention the worship i feel
toward squiggly lines and amorphous thought–
a pealing to my special sense of now

 

 

 

 

small sapsuckers peered through dusty slant of sun
called back when I matched my sounds with their woods
the mood settled with motes of spring pollen
the afternoon became the total trees

i heard the rustle of young growth bestir
felt the river rumble in the distance
saw deer asleep in their dappled shadows
tasted air rich with global energy

traced paths of small mammals in my mind
i set snares at appropriate places
thought along the ridges as hawks met dusk

hauled my physicality back to fire
and food to share with those I’ve shared before
my return took ages to task my love

 

 

 

 

it is not my intention to persuade any of you to my position
you must decide things for yourselves
you must think long and hard to find how you feel
about things as important as the blood law
the law of responsibility each for each

we all know we avenge one of our own
that, at least, is my own conviction
the way i live, and the way my people live
we all agree on this

so it is hard for me to find wisdom in what i hear
i remember when old squirrel was killed by accident
killed by mistake by one of blue crow’s boys
that young careless hoptoad
who always had two left feet
we all know he didn’t mean it when it happened

so solid oak was killed to pay the debt
it was easiest all around for him to go
he had just lost his wife, remember
his children were grown
so he went, and it was settled

that is the way it was
that is the way it has always been
my ultimate god like my ultimate father
lives in the ear of my speech
the song recognized as crucial to core
the statutes of memory hard-wired

my words resonate in their chamber
rich with accretions’ patient arrays
underground, hidden til the bloom of their days
caught out in the light giving birth

they slither black on white expanse
to shimmer in their colors
they shape the mind in inner sight
evoking primal glimpse

they leap to life in moment’s tone
erased to all but inner cache
of thoughts that itch their way to top
ready for the mind to scratch

murphy aphasic in his topological inquiry

 

 

 

 

my ultimate god like my ultimate father
lives in the ear of my speech
the song recognized as crucial to core
the statutes of memory hard-wired
my words resonate in their chamber
rich with accretions’ patient arrays
underground, hidden til the bloom of their days
caught out in the light giving birth
they slither black on white expanse
to shimmer in their colors
they shape the mind in inner sight
evoking primal glimpse
they leap to life in moment’s tone
erased to all but inner cache
of thoughts that itch their way to top
ready for the mind to scratch

murphy aphasic in his topological inquiry

 

 

 

an arabesque within the whirling hands
the ones that grasp to sing their joy
i want there my soul, and inward held
i want a panoply of sorts of things

i want a herd of awkward giraffes tall
i want a squad of penguins waddle small
i want a swooping troop of hawks from height
i want a leaping snarl of bees in flight

i want a simple untold thing to be
a net of words to still hand’s plight
of how to sing lost memory

i want a simple issue i can see
in twist of tying hands to sight
in pledge to all that is:  to be

murphy having climbed to symmetry

 

 

 

 

figure what you figure out
it’s never what it seems
someone’s always asking
someone always screams

january, february, fourth of july
first you are born and then you go die
why oh why
is the fourth of july
on the fourth of july

dig right down and dig it out
it’s never half as big
someone’s always screaming
someone’s always pig

thistleberry, singletary, whistle ’til you’re dry
first you are born and then you go die
why oh why
whistle ’til you’re dry
on the fourth of july

think a bit, then think some more
it’s never quite so grand
someone’s always scheming
something’s always planned

count your toes, count your nose, count until you lie
first you are born and then you go die
why oh why
count until you lie
on the fourth of july
count until you die
on the fourth of july

murphy typing on his baby typewriter

 

 

 

 

words have a putative power
they catch hold of wind in their strings
twist it and coil it with meaning
and sometimes, even, they sing

they trill in the thrill of their curling
catch hands in their flexing of things
turn them and sand them to beauty
and sometimes, even, it’s love

they pull with a mother’s embracing
to smother what everything brings
tame it and twist it to nonsense
and sometimes, even, they mean

murphy resetting his tabs

 

 

 

 

the winter trees have spirits in their twirl
their pirouettes of lithe and limber limbs
lost bitter winds still beating with a snarl
the hints of color throbbing in the thrill

the moving world tears through this outward gaze
it never stops its steady hold on sun
time measured in the bending of the bones
to feel how quiver cold it really is

i step outside to check my new found fancies
bend head to funnel up beside the walls
broad shouldered in determined walk to corners
wait for crossing cross the traffic squalls

to glimpse the sky in angle of the shadows
in persistent stalking sense of how to live

murphy redeyed from his flight that raced the sun

 

 

 

 

this winter lurches on with a special timidity
a thaw that seems eternal in its effect
no snow, nor sleet here, on this coast, this year
just rain that comes with strength, then goes

i hardly button my coat these days, no hats
no gloves, nor scarves, just me, two thickish shirts
both open to flash my inner t-shirt glee
the skin below soft cotton nearly free

i wonder as i walk, and bask in southern sun
how life has brought my past to live with me
hot texas sun of all my youthful sweat, here, now

i shudder when i think all cozy in my evening robes
how death shall bring its time to be with me
no matter sun, nor cold, nor all the other worlds that are

murphy working on his strum for cajun stomps

 

 

 

 

JT was a paratrooper in dubya dubya two
i saw an old photograph one time
olive drab skivvies and a much thinner man
i remember him with a lazy strength

but something bad happened back then
i was 5 years old or so
he got hurt, he lost his nerve, whatever
he was discharged under a cloud

but there he was in that armless green
lean, tall, with the wiry strength of men at their best
my father said he died of brain cancer
and bad kidneys and high blood pressure
he was overweight

not that leaper through the open door
that broke his leg one time in a practice jump
he told me about that
that’s what we all need
a practice jump through that open door

murphy reflecting on a truthful tale

 

 

 

 

i have some time these days
i can herd my turtles of thought
those that have stuck to me all these years

they run as deep and as slow as loggerheads
as slashing as red eared sliders
but always in and around water

no terrapins have i in my bank
no dry slogs through desert earth of heat
no ponderous plodding gait to there

just captured moments in their flesh
all the directions clearly seen
a swimming tank of dreams

murphy imagining a new waltz

 

 

 

 

a gust of cold shrinks neck beneath the fold
reluctant steps lead down the slippery bank
a need to find the moving water’s soul
kept steady purpose, focused mind on hold

daybreak just a moment still to wait
all is hush time, the wait for color’s birth
thin red of gold glints from the east
i wade right in, show flesh its mate

i wonder fresh the eternal question
why downhill run leads to highest thought
why we always send our roots beneath the earth

when what we want and wish as each our station
climbs above, invigorates the all that’s sought
insures that eyes will elevate their search

murphy awash in the glory of guinness

 

 

 

 

if you keep the turtle tracks in mind
you raise the rabbits in your brain
that hop to glory each time untamed
and flash as mirror catches sun

if you can track from back til start
then mind can follow depth of heart
that echoes essence in each its part
till all the whole is on the cart
if you keep those turtle tracks in mind

if you can throw your net past fish
that run away toward you swish
and end tattooed on your bright dish
that overflows; if that’s all you wish
you raise those rabbits in your brain

if you can sing an always song
that ripples steep, that ripples long
so every step is high bell wrung
each day that matters, each hour sung
will hop to glory each time untamed

if you can laugh a cauldron full
to cast a spell that skewers true
and hits the point with arrow’s sting
each quivering moment has its own ring
and flashes mirror catching sun

murphy near dusk of pyrotechnic glee

 

 

 

 

spring

to come fresh each spring is to be the child
open to the world to close inner form
patterning ourselves on growth’s primal charm
asking how intricately nature has styled

madness returns as color brings morning sun
exciting the dormant feelings to life
luring vibrance with light’s broad stabbing knife
arriving from low angle in shadowed run

corners of darkness gradually yield
health of unique, glowing, exampled views
appearances controlled as well as new grown

narrow byways thus slowly revealed
in exposing dark shunts to further bemuse
numinous reflection being the seeds we’ve sown

 

 

 

 

spring I

to come fresh each spring is to be the child
kneeling in the mud new thawed and formed
from a hard fastness to a flesh wetness
to the  sucking, slaking force of turmoil’s surface

to be both sire and practitioner, to be
unseen underneath milking raw face
of ideas— to be roots sustaining growth
to be change required to be seductive be

to be form, seed, the guile of reception
to embody chance in proper surroundings
to be chosen as happenstance enriched

to bring magic and beauty of season
in an inevitable forced explosion
open to the world to close inner form.

 

 

 

 

spring II

open to the world to close inner form
we bespeak consolidation of purpose
the effortless reconstruction of the new
particularities enjoined by now to other time

yesterdays, tomorrows, strings of nows
are our whens, ultimately sorted out
reflected upon within the framework
our own choosing within fresh uncertainty

we pinpoint a moment as meaningful
absorb its inner force before the collapse
leads to the next indelible balance

we chance by focused light on etching sea
swimming lonely midst tempting enchantments
patterning ourselves on growth’s primal charm

 

 

 

 

spring III

patterning ourselves on growth’s primal charm
we ask acceptance of contradiction
and the saying of what we do, do not wish
to happen in symmetry of the telling

what will finally flourish does not begin full vigored,
nor can the spindly child be pruned
to immediate knowledge of its bloom
no, the thrall of self is trying

i ask again what is the goal, what end
does man presume, which of the many thoughts
he’s held lead to the higher ground of love

i ask if the much used words have life
whether assumed plumage is mime, or mask
asking how intricately nature has styled

 

 

 

 

spring IV

asking how intricately nature has styled
beguiles the shaping hand in soil’s dream
turns the earth to loosen its packed sense
elicits a fond use of its presence

and once this groundwork’s well laid and over
once the chosen shoots have been well started
comes the battle to prevail, to become
in worldly struggle an answer found new

it is always so with what is wanted
it looms large in sleepless night of desire
and takes form in blind hand’s grasping sight

it’s feeling flesh become flesh at first light
in groping closure on fresh immediacy
madness returns as color brings morning sun

 

 

 

 

spring V

madness returns as color brings morning sun
soft grey remembrance is hanging plant wall
the scene through wickered pane grows natural then
reflects first sights from before we were born

a faith in complex nuanced feeling grows
details creep, fill the dark masses slowly
slowly, a relentless sense of total show
begins awareness of flooded whole time

there is surcease which steals upon the lonely
small early hours of our person, we touch
love that begins the long learning process

paused in our slumber, we slowly rouse hand
to soured heat of close entangled soft form
exciting the dormant feelings to life

 

 

 

 

spring VI

exciting the dormant feelings to life
we probe our inconsistencies, sense
in those differing faces ways to be
which lead to memories buried hard-by

and our eyes glimpse at odd moment,
when time seems a rocky creek in its onward flow
a stretching of froth as bubbly cover
an iridescent, pristine happening

the cold runoff from mountainous fastness
seems most alive then, burbling in careen
splashed as awakening handily tossed

as dawning, as purification rite
as harbinger of sun’s full liquid growth
luring vibrance with light’s broad stabbing knife

 

 

 

 

spring VII

luring vibrance with light’s broad stabbing knife
we rouse ourselves early to catch the sheen
the future, a dimness imperceptible
outlined, a felt looming presence made manifest

at last a beginning with heart at hand
a singing first reach of echoic soul
there can be no other response to self
as loss of onset peals reluctant toll

those memories of night become as real
as recall, made alive most when we accept
the view of dreams we’ve all held far down

we are lulled to quiescence within the eye
belying repetitive dark acceptance of storm
arriving from low angle in shadowed run

 

 

 

 

spring VIII

arriving from low angle in shadowed run
possibilities abscond as our fears do
scampering before the illumination
the primeval moment taking to itself

an awakening arrives, blurs edge’s beginning
becomes consciousness, the far horizon
a greyness suddenly transformed into shards
the color of our quickness full blooded

and, sighted, we slow appreciation, so seeing
can be unblinking calm, so it becomes
our seeking feelings in their nurturing fullness

as this new found skin is spread to surround
unblocking directness with its massive tent
corners of darkness gradually yield

 

 

 

 

spring IX

corners of darkness gradually yield
to this time’s inexorable advance
in the sweep of experiential data
overwhelming in immediacy of its flying

but behind fusty drapes of our further needs
reason lies, as we have so often assumed
it stacks splintered words next to proper response
as we leave in the rush to fully begin

passage is crucial if we’re to reach home
having understood so finally how safe
our haven must be in mortal guarantee

and this dawning becomes suffusion in birth
of process, and fitness, in its approaching
a health of uniquely glowing exampled views

 

 

 

 

spring X

a health of uniquely glowing exampled views
which might supersede our every other plan
presupposes a toast for individual efforts
we’re programmed to protect self as sanctity

the strength in reaching a decisive state
either in measurement or in leading
lies not in the exercise of ruling
we radiate certainty in our vision

the attention attendant on our honor
asks personally for absurd reason
anger focusses upon an occasion

the furor forces change on balanced cell—
a chance is taken, the telling itself survived
our appearances controlled as well as new grown.

 

 

 

 

spring XI

our appearances, controlled as well as new grown
burgeon past their purpose without our knowing
and in their passing show pathways chosen
instinctively in purblind feeling drive

we look back to see where we’ve been going
searching for steerage in this trackless now
we grow as we have been programmed, fathered
and mothered to our estimable ends

we imprint these as ineradicable
arrows, irreversible in their cues—
barbed in their underlined tenacity

disallowing all discursive mistakings
we have this surface as constant direction
narrow byways thus slowly revealed

 

 

 

 

spring XII

narrow byways thus slowly revealed
we pass them unheedfully, mistiming
our response to some new reality
of our own making, of our own becoming

we can only discover what we are
through homage to this attentive purpose
we seek exploration without the mainstream
we find value as complete reflected calm.

we should value our sight, our eyes, the touch
we bestow; and become bone of those we love
shoring their sensate strengths, carrying our selves

we should beware false openings luring to dead end
we should shed our looming fears
in exposing dark shunts to further bemuse

 

 

 

 

spring XIII

in exposing dark shunts to further bemuse
the sense we crave of enveloping warmth.
we clasp a tattered covering to hand
a peculiar and vulnerable security

at abruptly learning to survive strangers
who are protecting their own hidden doubts
this secrecy involved in human fear
is experienced, visits past its stay

but recurrent beginning rebirth cycle
brings with acceptance a faith in order
an open trust that offers self to world

the telling then becomes a way to be
constantly mulling an awed sense of now
numinous reflection being the seeds we’ve sown

 

 

 

 

spring XIV

numinous reflection being the seeds we’ve sown
in random miraculous beginnings
a fullness to be is encapsulated
becomes shaped growth to ultimate known end

the replenishment of our animus
treads a thin line bordering on rage
to survive, yet embodying love
encompassing such frustrating pain

the intense pleasure presaging the life
we offer chance, nonchalantly or no
repeats joy basic to our balance

we begin a new process as we change
in restless proving of fertility—
to come fresh each spring is to be the child

 

 

 

 

summer

the summer brilliance of noon light shimmers
our instincts move from that full directness
past the desire to absorb life’s full heat
as we reach growth presumed in kernelled wit

madness itself is invited by all
enrichers of nature’s bounty, we tame
love to bear better fruit as we know it
asking not what loose rankness might have brought

charge the sun with fetid air of decay
hail the dreaming green smells carried with us
along with sweating brown skin as we touch

normality flees reason in fullness
impending harvest has rhythmic season
night, never again be so far away

 

 

 

 

summer I

the summer brilliance of noon light shimmers
in my mind, a palpability is
purpose presents its own reality
fullness of design has become now

there has always been colorful essence
as epitome of fecundity
self perpetuating forms of self
timeliness allows a force of thought

mature fruit of striving escapes
tender beginnings, its obviousness
obscures willed hope necessary to grow

obfuscates others crowded out
in mad thrusting to gather all of sun
our instincts move from that full directness

 

 

 

 

summer II

our instincts move from that full directness
perceived as antidote to ego’s dance
the fearful protectment from impinging
others with their clouding shields of tactics

the assumed guilt of needs we have shared
are our inadvertently ripened fruits
to be taken in full open supping
a conquering of dangered beginnings

the roundness, beauty, and color we attain
seems worthwhile now as a final reflection
of those other achievements, of those passed

and sometimes when the fullness of pattern
shows constricting sameness of heart, we push
past the desire to absorb life’s full heat

 

 

 

 

summer III

past the desire to absorb life’s full heat
lies a no-man’s land, such fertility
as was never dreamed, to be sown full grown
before its sharing bestows its essence

at the end of endeavor, at the expense
of certitude, we risk our mortal sons
for careful nurturing of new leaves
and tendrils presupposes surprise

to wish to know the fullness of one’s worth
while striving is immutably affecting
one’s course, begs the question itself of change

A seed is miraculous in its closed
protection, a life’s mystery is solved
as we reach growth presumed in kernelled wit

 

 

 

 

summer IV

as we reach growth presumed in kernelled wit
we begin to marvel at subtle chance
the choice we have made in retrospect
the divergent paths withering channels
carrying the fullness of finality
and making way for realizing the goal
the middle ground of life, the awesome strength
of mature purpose fed by effulgent sun

the rush to reach culmination poised
proudly, shining in total obeisance
eschewing the murky wetness inside
equally necessary to so fatten
direction til it bursts destination
madness itself is invited by all

 

 

 

 

summer V

madness itself is invited by all
we imagine, thus accomplish, those maps
laid out to chart meandering recourse
exemplify redoubts we hide behind

it’s certitude we wish which beguiles
the storied happenstance, highlighting
our worth as singular achievement
inevitable denouement, proudful craze

touching mortal perfection, a portrait
of the moment in purity of style
coming to each man in his trueness to time’s

relevance, and what should be a reaching
toward beauty’s poised balance, we are
enrichers of nature’s bounty, we tame.

 

 

 

 

summer VI

enrichers of nature’s bounty, we tame
the sense we assume becomes manifest
in completion of complex maneuvers
we use the use we put things to to be

our feeling for life, the symbols we share
are manipulated, gathered, pruned, made
to be more than they were before we saw
and unaware decided they could be

we especially form our love’s forms
in our minds; we shape what we hope to feel
before us as promised gift, growth and change

to suit our needs we feed other’s aspects
that are part of ourselves, we espalier
love to bear better fruit as we know it

 

 

 

 

summer VII

love to bear better fruit as we know it
persists as never ending surprise
as newly opened flesh of feeling
taking aback willing acceptance, forcing

life is unexpected, even unwanted
rawness rankles, brings attention to bear
on changing shape in retrospective care
after the harvest is full design seen

it’s long afternoons of heat, controlled
transformed in slow chemistry of burgeon
as limb bringing life in its completeness

we accept what we find, we transcend selves
at our peril, we face fresh accomplishments
asking not what loose rankness might have brought

 

 

 

 

summer VIII

asking not what loose rankness might have brought
we place faith in preordained order
within beginnings we unknowing start
finally accept that which we become

we shape the sense we know, what we are
by this acceptance of maturity
we concentrate awareness on its parts
to more fully grasp blotches of the whole

it’s never all we wished when end is seen
bringing slow decline from flawed achievement
inexorable sliding off from peak

performance never quite the same
in grace or bold reach, but form always distinctive
charge the sun with fetid air of decay

 

 

 

 

summer IX

charge the sun with fetid air of decay.
my sturdy trunk begins its sleep, my fruit
stand pure in faded background of nurture,
my broad fanned interest reluctantly leaves

its fulfillment, full fledged trust of season.
slippage is to come, to that complete rest
from inviting growth, change, if it’s selfless
somehow achieves that negative balance

sets up tenacity of memory
brings level of feeling sustainable
allows perpetuation of self room

to assume owned point of departure
to grow again in its good time of morn
hail the dreaming green smells carried with us

 

 

 

 

summer X

hail the dreaming green smells carried with us
in our rummage through life, in our constance
we watch small increments of existence
and pay those attentions necessary

for the continuance of noticed patterns
preordered in the somatic balance
of forebearers, those who carried on long
before our peculiar impingements emerged

in our commingling of felt purposes
we are furthering that which went before
and changing only in our selection

that which we choose to take with us as ours
becomes our heritage, our shared linkage
along with sweating brown skin as we touch

 

 

 

 

summer XI

along with sweating brown skin as we touch
go our dreams, steaming themselves into pores
in reverse orientation, bypassing
normal function, realistic control

entire being subsumed by protected seeds
surrounded by succulence enticing
consumption; storing is recurrent theme
cutting across obvious grain of time

a realization of memories buried
in vapors beclouding rational outline
the assumption of future becomes now

in good season comes the calm certainty
of fruition, emphasizing how strangely
normality flees reason in fullness

 

 

 

 

summer XII

normality flees reason in fullness
as rounded form aches for my touching hand
pendulous in its instinct for this time’s
destined return, tasted as completeness

the heat lingers past its call for being
burdens reaper with the salt of old wounds
licks liquidly at demonstrated strength
pools its essence in drugged plodding duty

there’s too much to do now, days grow shorter
ground provides its fruit unceasingly while
we stagger under imaginative load

there seems no end to this munificence
as the full gushing exhausts its sources
impending harvest has rhythmic season

 

 

 

 

summer XIII

impending harvest has rhythmic season
we try ourselves in blending well our wills
with nature’s there is always the return
of pattern despite singularity
of existence, choice becomes our
weapon for survival, our only hope
of mastery, of tribal enrichment

we now debate certainty of difference
my ways are not yours nor are my daughter’s
completely hers, She will be measured more
carefully for having been part of birth

this burden we share from a past choosing
in proud defiance of ultimate cold
night, never again be so far away

 

 

 

 

summer XIV

night, never again be so far away
let beauty of struggle hone eagerness
to knowing, a constant concentration
sharing each moment’s perfection as loss

for we remember not imperfect parts
we select from the maelstrom spinning by
neglecting the lessons af spindly youth
in our haste to prove a singular worth

be with us especially on the heights
of desire, when plucking is mere reaching
to tip of swaying plant patiently there

show ends as beginnings, tell the hard truth
of mirage, reflect on opposites as
the summer brilliance of noon light shimmers

 

 

 

 

fall

the dropping off is unavoidable
our times run together, each separate
part keeps sounding as all the other’s fate,
asking whether our fall is credible

mouldering ground as preferment seems sad
in formal last fitting of nondescript grey
life’s peculiarity masking choosing
as eternal leaving what we have had

cold enforced in inevitable sleep
heart sore buried by bruised vegetation
again sense of never again never

night is felt not as abrupt cessation
in ordered schemas for forever
necessary essence is always covered deep

 

 

 

 

fall I

the dropping off is unavoidable
those left behind are never to become
as ourselves, and we have happened to be
merely preparation for this one time

we seek sureness of quiet steps, answers
leading a trackless way left behind—
choice again, masking necessities
at this moment, when all hurries to some

thought of perfection, where will i choose sleep
rejuvenation through ritual death
a calm preserving of assumed being

for those who might have dissimilar hopes
persist in honoring initiative
our times run together, each separate

 

 

 

 

faII II

our times run together, each separate
ink its pattern, the river of whole dreams
fulfilled in colorful tangy leavings
the sheer flamboyance of just sleeping life

stoppage first becomes noticeable
as a frenzied zeal of mortality
asking a readiness for last lessons
and an end to fresh possibilities

we check first the others to dare ourselves
all over with an adolescent dread
of being just behind average growth

a few are beginning their stab at the mark
while most are culled before the next round
part keeps sounding as all the others’ fate.

 

 

 

 

fall III

part keeps sounding as all the others, fate
intruding on completely summing up
adding complication in selective
iteration of pattern from new source

we take ourselves as models completely
resolving the forces we impinge on
we neglect frameswork being outfitted
from strange perspective yet meeting our needs

the problem of extension of feelings
cuts two ways and both underline at best
how simple to echo all history

how confining are our optional ways
how quickly we accept cold incursions
asking whether our fall is credible

 

 

 

 

falI IV

asking whether our fall is credible
begs the issue by praising direction
instead of completeness, cursing waves
instead of curling circumspection of being

truth is both solidly moving and odd
resonance of balanced poise between
extreme manifestations, through thoughtful
probing attempts at prideful resolution

we all fall short of wished for achievement
and escape disasters imaginable
add our magic distance as protection

from ecstacies too painful for any
to maintain, so we accept this, our time
mouldering ground as preferment seems sad

 

 

 

 

fall V

mouldering ground as preferment seems sad
in the sure appeal of its cool clamminess
we accept too readily denouements
sensed in a tipping to no return

we desire to add essence as enrichment
we become obsessively inevitable
we assume inner workings come unsprung
our terminations become all the same

too soon
i want one last stand in that sun
named by others for red men, for color
deeply felt and seen as bounteous gift

eschewing the rest waiting patiently
and ritually closing each additional day
in formal last fitting of nondescript grey

 

 

 

 

fall VI

in formal last fitting of nondescript grey
a distinction shows as leaf’s full moment
of descent, a seeming haphazard pattern
of last reckoning, of gene’s memory

color as finality, rubicund
fixation of a natural throbbing
unseen, fitful creep to the full green height
of existence in rustling grab for light

those fortunate foes thus left moments free
see strife release its dread precipitate
washing away problematic progress

body cowered today under covered warmth
neglected to renew losing battle
life’s peculiarity masking choosing

 

 

 

 

fall VII

life’s peculiarity masking choosing
lies inadvertently along the way
we willy nilly ply our oddnesses
being as there happens a perfect fit

it locks behind, you see, it disappears
with bitter winds sweeping ground’s soft gnarled face
just before frost fixes meandering paths
of animal’s scurried frenzied searching

there is no preparation, you see, no
anticipating moment of crystal
catching that side which shows only our best

there is only certainty of freezing
our showing gestures, our sharing ourselves
as eternal leaving what we have had

 

 

 

 

falI VIII

as eternal leaving what we have had
love stands alone: as we hold quicksilver
as we pinpoint ambiguity mldst flush
as fingers point to palms; we miss the point

we stack our wood for winter’s long burning
and roughly brush heavy cloaks for our flesh
we focus attention on flame’s flicker
drawing out what we so hope to draw in

arms extended to searing warmth we need
does nothing for our nether sides, our other
necessary accoutrements for life’s wars

we’re left with fading embers and tiredness
a sense of having somehow lost the day
cold enforced in inevitable sleep

 

 

 

 

fall  IX

cold enforced in inevitable sleep
the flakes of purity accumulate
cover our groundwork with inhibiting
perfection; all movement is uniquely shown

as long as fresh patinas aren’t added
we grow enured to habitual patterns
it’s only the singularity of choice
which is feared, not the trampled known sharing

stubble is given smoothing clarity
awkward angles become unbroken curves
it’s only recurrent thaws which still remind

these memories recur past their welcome
fruit has been given, essence will be gone
heart is sore buried by bruised vegetation

 

 

 

 

fall X

heart sore buried by bruised vegetation
we fester in benumbed isolation
mucking out subterranean nests
while preparing for sparkled slow slippage

it’s time for anticipating clear decks
and gravity’s swift recall from cold heights
in long blur, our sight a stabbing zag of flurry
in swooping aching achieved as beauty

this first deliberate conquering push
reveals valley’s full sweep of pristine hood
hiding life’s continued charmed reliance

on layered protection from artful force
of being this constant rhythmic changing
again sense of never again never

 

 

 

 

fall XI

again sense of never again never
to seek primal form for basic thrust
relying at last on only the past
sketchings for sure intricate magic growth

tap roots in place, or forever denied
ambivalence of purposed probing now
delimited to fertile borders, canvas
primed with chosen subtle hue from known design

now when fear of foreshortening is gone
when perception is proved by honest deeds
comes attentive eye on moment’s detail

freeing already felt patterns as once
they were seen, and changed by this fixing time
night is felt not as abrupt cessation

 

 

 

 

fall XII

night is felt not as abrupt cessation
but as proprietous dark otherness
a needed freeing from the particular
the evidence we’ve come to begin to see

and the start is as knobbly and stunted
as whorled lopped-off knotty loss of fresh arms
as tender as unbroken linen’s limbs
and reaching familiar sameness, never be

disjunct where blind probing will must begin
the small lost momentum starts many lives
to bring an enigmatic immortality

recurrent black patterns reflect as waves
interferent lapping colors distinct
in ordered schemas for forever

 

 

 

 

fall XIII

in ordered schemas for forever
extend the rolling grids of blind seeing
we search them fitfully with twitching feet
scrabbling after a firmer underpin

for some controlling pivot, to force form
to assume imagining, some ready
row of unused bins to recognize as felt
completeness, for our full fixed discarded wares

the system then become a bordering
of waters’ wandering, a shoring up
to delimit flow as regularity

a quiet strength sustaining floating worlds
of fanciful ephemerality
necessary essence is always covered deep

 

 

 

 

fall XIV

necessary essence is always covered deep
we reach beyond our encrusted vitals
with expendable feelings of person
our hearts as our fears are beribbed and caged

this inaccessability of mind
shading eyes with visored aura of leafy
verisimilitudes, leads to other thoughts
and so beguiles our knowing nothingness

for expanse comes with freshly seen ends
the forgetting of immediate forms
the sensing further sides of childish dreams

the becoming certainty of having been
sharing for now and the requisite time
the dropping off is unavoidable

 

 

 

 

winter

the sky’s malevolence presages shroud
in fast whiteness stretching to cover reach
past times no longer suffice as they teach
a leaden lowering has been allowed

massed consequence looms as ultimate
energy is focussed in dampening
life’s force banked by winter happening
as sun’s withdrawn symbol of final cut

cold, idiosyncratic, perverse
having formed individual barometer
afflicts all in soft separate ways

needing light again to hold off the worst
i accept center, flickering, final
nurtured by me alone through these hard days

 

 

 

 

winter I

the sky’s malevolence presages shroud
as implacable shield of cold knowing
a sky in nakedness with need unbound
a life as uncontrolled total now

a feverish frenzy belying lost sun
a finality of our summative praise
in inevitable pattern of season’s round
return to beginning’s fabled endings

the crystalline refrain of happenstance
is frozen as static surface, as clinging
chained liquidity, as rushings stilled

the unique quality of chosen statement
lost in eye’s landscaping sense of order
in fast whiteness stretching to cover reach

 

 

 

 

winter II

in fast whiteness stretching to cover reach
beyond the seeking eye, in such seeing
do we take part when outward mien crinkles
frosts deeper than the springs of life can touch

for the blues and blacks play upon shadows
of old codgers standing with a stillness
for the long glittering bareness so there
an iced shield with colors now grown precious

my senses sigh with the depth of history
seeming in balance now, past sharpness
shown in gentle curve above known serration

past division in parts to measure whole
truth, past privilege as value or prop
past times no longer suffice as they teach

 

 

 

 

winter III

past times no longer suffice, as they teach
worn images echoing as failures
as background fading into indications
as sketching of underlying details

it’s the immediate incongruities
of this now which must be the basic text
allowing our choices life in future
misreadings of known human completeness

patterns then our only saved messages
the sortings of totality as one
memorable act of creation

a full and final inadequacy is
embraced as knowledged vestige of self
a leaden lowering has been allowed

 

 

 

 

winter IV

a leaden lowering has been allowed
by weight of time’s accumulated face
the mists hung in permanent reflection
of many moments wrung from liquid now

they press, these shifting patterns, they press round
each special world’s disparate living cells
they press til edges crumble and surface
tension pulls difference back, and sameness holds

they’re inside searching for sun’s singularity
watching shifting nether side of choice
each one becoming small dispersing shield

each one in itself self-contained aptness
gathering in clusters; while merging inner
massed consequence looms as ultimate

 

 

 

 

winter V

massed consequence looms as ultimate
form, fixed in circular finality
assuming permanence as shown chrysalis
left in woven place of hidden birth

ends fill beginnings with signal singing
meshing with rhythmic melody saying
yesterdays were tomorrow’s nights today
foreseen in resonant ripple’s starting

vibrations then, with such short waves, to see
water as image is to blend sound’s sight
as surging systolic nurturing now

each being echoing all history’s plan
and yet, touching infectious peculiar man
energy is focussed in dampening

 

 

 

 

winter VI

energy is focussed in dampening
fires of a charcoal fineness, moderation
holding back accelerating rush to ash
a sane controlled use of thinned resources

but burning all the brighter for attention
for giving proper light of scarcity
for holding in hot center of feeling
hoarding for prolongation of duty

bones holding so little aloft, flames flow
whispery now in last tracery
falling in from skeletal powdering

softly with flaked greyness holding outside
they glow slowly in stately ethic care
life’s force banked by winter happening

 

 

 

 

winter VII

life’s force, banked by winter happening
leaps forth when least expected, surviving
all attempts at control or harnessing
in manifest self-quirksome being

it lives as husks in patient numbed holding
of otherness than what seems to be near
what obtrudes as slow path of cessation
inward movement freezing to an imagined shell

last lessons are as mute as grasping firsts
and as individual; fumbling structures
felt in the incompletion of their designs

to fill all possible space, persisting
in the already made patterns, fitting
as sun’s withdrawn symbol of final cut

 

 

 

 

winter VIII

as sun’s withdrawn symbol of final cut
ice creeps to unprotected warmth, being
dissipates, an overwhelming stillness
protrudes into consciousness, thinking stops

feeling slows til intensity has gone
wind’s soul remains, motion, as seeking
as flash of effrontery, as sweeping
as flakes flowing to efface eternity

there is no place discernible as mine
no extension of my sight brings vibrance
no color, no hope of the quick we attend

erasure, rough texture as the only sign
dim remnants of boldest peculiar line
cold, idiosyncratic, perverse

 

 

 

 

winter IX

cold, idiosyncratic, perverse
it freezes unexpected momentum
and denies life to desireable end
it steals force by stilling true magic dance

i walk a lonely path this day of time
placing careful foot on earth’s frosted way
those left behind, those gone away, it’s they
who cheer my huddled form its gentle sway

this summing up, this stab at totality
for my last great sore need suffices
to free the sense in quick melting memory

as shared monument, as living out one’s will
we peer from pellucid ground with heavy mien
having formed individual barometer

 

 

 

 

winter X

having formed individual barometer
we charge senses with a practical abandon
and lose nothing which might be savored, saved
while been is in its formative stage

we vary interest now as minutiae glint
unexpectedly call for their true resolvement
as a timely wrapping of feeling chance
in package having need of no other time

we thus allow play scales of certitude
which weigh heavy as accumulated flint
slowly sparking advance of final fear

and our last desparate choices scatter
contained full-stopped memories resounding
afflicting all in soft separate ways

 

 

 

 

winter XI

afflicting all in soft separate ways
thoughts grow short in felt will of their purpose
and see inescapable newness of death
in fresh cessation of self each has known

within careful frame of total enfolding
an acceptance of otherness: so do i know
a total enjoining so void as is black
and full as is feeling for all that belongs

we hasten to flower each sense of our being
when being is taken so finally away
we stop in our frenzy of ordered preparing

we choose as reaction an acting to steady
the whispery whisking to clear path of days
needing light again to hold off the worst

 

 

 

 

winter XII

needing light again to hold off the worst
i await slate dawn in this dark freezing
winds of change ever reaching to the time
awaited now with watchful eye expectant

the blue blurred gray of being just now seeing
finely etches sense of one more day
one more leading round of beauty’s rising
all important breath of life to stay

now is dread of cold’s sure sore succeeding
reaching for a last true stoppage— moving
so like the ways of love self cauterized

there is no other now can share my feeling
alone with these my hardly trickling lives
i accept center, flickering, final

 

 

 

 

winter XIII

i accept center, flickering, final
breath of resonant being softly there
in hoarded safety of stately ash
fluffed to baffle tearing, gathering wind

hunkered in practiced ease, shifting slightly
sensing unseen vagary come as sealing
of each few views which remain outstanding
before decrepit vision of my mind

at last no worry for other mourning
no sense of morrow’s self-creating love
held to steady hold, thinking on this time

there is crumbling sharpness now to vision
making real these precious feeling’s givings
nurtured by me alone through these hard days

 

 

 

 

winter XIV

nurtured by me alone through these hard days
eternal sense of self is reassertive
waking pain of feeling’s formful being
just the growing awe of cutting edge

chopping through thick thread of all my knowing
stopping all additions for this pattern
playing to curtained time in all its flowing
falling before my eyes have lost their glow

i check around and manage meaning’s message
and look to see what dawn will soon portend
the light before the light will surely show

as much as ever was to be uncovered
is here today and ever has been here
the sky’s malevolence presages shroud