Breath released lit softly
as morning vapor drifts
trailing from idling cars.

Lawns still asleep under
mist filled blankets laid
down by an autumn breeze.

The dew point reached
as the tears coalesce,
in the damp corner
of your eyes.

A man wrote somewhere
something, striving to leave
an imprint before he goes.

And when we read him,
when we see what was
written do we ask or think

is he alive or silent, laid down after
his children's children
have forgotten his face,

squeezed out of our lives,
pressed thin by the soil,
thin as the ink on this page.

Poetry's Singing Voice?

---

I asked a poem to sing for me
torch songs lurid and slow.
I wanted to hear the longing
in her voice the hunger of

love unrequited.

But she could only give me
a few enjamed lines in a

jazzy iambic.

Sitting here with a drink in my hand,
the empty stage lonely and wide.
My eyes sweep the floor slowly
   
           
       
          failing to hide
my letdown at not hearing from you.

The Frenzied All

---

Emptiness completely
fills the spaces
between our eyes.

Running, everything,
doing, being
                   and
               
         nothingness.

To have
             not, to be
               
               all.

Incomparable as a
one sided equation
we could solve.

We are alone
with only the equals

               
            sign.

---

Joy Street

... and they came to me the way true things do: with the certainty and subtlety of a shaft of sunlight on the back of your head.

1. Excerpt from "The Boy With Blue Hair" published in The Sun, January 2006, Issue 361.

Flicker

---

lambent LAM-buhnt, adjective:

1. Playing lightly on or over a surface; flickering; as, "a lambent flame; lambent shadows."

2. Softly bright or radiant; luminous; as, "a lambent light."

3. Light and brilliant; as, "a lambent style; lambent wit."

 
The Rein and Cathedrals

A short bridge from
here to eternity
echoes of light come
with lambent certainty

A sigh centuries long
runs deeply
between houses
as a rivers lies

in its bed.

Oh I've seen my dreams come true in the pleasent faces

of you.

Grandma's Grass

---

I remember my Grandmother's
grass.  She had one of those classic homes built around the turn
of the century; all warm and full of pre-war sensibilities and gram's
love.  The basement still had the coal chute next to one
of the basement windows and the furnace was a multi-armed silver
skinned monster lurking in the drafty basement.  On to this parcel
we have nicely placed a very large Elm tree in the front yard and a
smaller oak in the back, next to the detached garage equipped with a
stored '57 T-Bird.  This idyllic scene unfolds on less than a
quarter acre of land, sidewalk in the front, driveway down the side of
the house to the garage.

And then there was the grass.  

I
don't think they, mom and dad who took care of Grandma's place after
Grandfather died, actually did anything to the lawn.  It just
seemed to grow, lush and green, like a by-product of radioactive fallout; a fallout of love.

Of course we didn't have a power lawn mower.  No, in the garage,
next to the covered car was the pusher.  I don't know the
year or make of the old thing but it was ancient.  Dad would
faithfully get the blades sharpened every year and starting in the
spring I would walk over to her house and roll the old thing out of the
garage.  I started in the back and worked to the front.

I don't think the mower actually cut a single blade of grass.  It
was much too kind and having been on the property for many more years
than I had attained most likely had an agreement with the grass; 
if it didn't grow too tall or too fast the mower would just brush the
tops of the blades, gently brush the tops and never really do anything
to the lawn.

The sound a push mower makes is unique.  The push and rush forward,
blades grinding, then pull back, the wheels ratcheting and taking a
step forward repeat.

A rhythm sets in and you are one in the smell and feel and texture of
the earth; lawn mowing as a tactile labor.  Dusk descending, not
really sure you are cutting straight lines.

Years later we would bring down the power mower, all roar and quick
cutting, and very different than the old push mower.  Maybe it was
a symbol of my growing up, growing older and moving away from the
family.

Today, I would use a push mower or just let it grow ... 

Scattershot

---

I'm the cook for the pear 
of us, but tonight she had the
dinner waiting, no problem,
no recrimination - extra love
on top, steamy
and waiting for me; hot.

I've noticed something - I've lost my taste for black.  Not the
color but rather the dark attitude.  I mean, God Bless, if you can
walk in all those dank places, self-described bottoms of pits, sharp
objects everywhere waiting to cut and maim;  I choose not to go
there.  I believe it is necessary to visit these dungeons, to look
the torturer in the eye, but I can't do it on an everyday basis. 
I have subscriptions to some of these folk who only know isolation or
loneliness and will continue to read them - they have very real and
coherent pain, and very good ways of expressing themselves, ... but I
want more for them.  Not that being in a state of constant bliss
is attainable or even reasonable to wish for anybody but to use the
powers of observation and soul searching exhibitebed by some - is there
only darkness?  If you are in up to your neck in a pile of shit,
acknowledge it, and move on.  If you want to stay in the shit,
fine, just say so.  But for God's sake, get your head out of your
self loathing and view something in the world for what it is ... I bet
it's not that dark after all.

Peace and Love,
RF

Quotes From A Century Ago

---

I've been reading the essay
Nature by Emerson.  This man wrote before Darwin had even
postulated his theorem and pondered the meaning of the spirit and of
all things.  His breadth is that of a true scholar, his humanity
and compassion is astounding.  A couple of snippets of words have
struck a cord with me.  They are interesting even out of context.

The first is a bit odd but reflects his idea of becoming one with everything;

I become a transparent eyeball.

Seeing all but unseen by all ...

The next is a great description of language and thought;

Words are finite organs of the infinite mind.

So what do we make of all of this thinking on the state of the mind?

And The Winner Is

---

And I still remember our trip to  Switzerland ...

Morning Moon

---

The moon is a flashlight

high over the restless

water prowling past my

heavy and troubled eyes.

Shouldering the bank

lit by a golden fall glow,

head down the river

slips between them

a dark and angry punk.

It has taken too long,

traveled too much,

wandered too far,

only to fall frantic,

agitated, and resless

at the impending dam.

Last night the heavy coal cars,

wheels strummnig a rumble,

squealed me awake,
alive
and tingling,
taught,
as a steel string.

I worry the water will rise,

and the train whistle blows 6 AM.