Light Descends

Virescens

Sunlight forges
white gold.
                          All colors imbued,
                              save green,
                               with lust.

Green grows bold
ripe blades cut
by forged blade
to ripen.


Green is life outlasting
pale bones broken by root.
Green is death escaping
leaves shed for greener shoots.

Angel at the Crossroads

Trakl Tree's Sky Kissed Leaves

Morocco Became Cloud

Trakl's Tree

Winds solicit limbs of this tree, shedding leaves of Trakl's poetry.

Who Faults Skyclad Eyes?

Limb and Leaf

       

"Put forth thy leaf, thou lofty plane,
East wind and frost are safely gone;
With zephyrs mild and balmy rain
The summer comes serenely on"
In stratis viarum IV, lns 1-4,  Arthur Hugh Clough.

Summer in Romagna

      In castles of endless afternoon
            eyes shine like Suns

Fascism and Terror

 

    "There is a widely held opinion that the fascist terror was just an ephemeral episode in modern history, now happily behind us. That opinion I cannot share. I believe that it is deeply rooted in the trends of modern civilization, and especially in the pattern of modern economy.
   "Indeed the reluctance to face squarely and explore fully the phenomena of terror and their implications is itself a lingering phenomena of the terror."

                        ----"Terror's Atomization of Man", Leo Lowenthal


    "Unless you are prepared to be pitiless, you will get nowhere...Domination is never founded on humanity, but, regarded from the narrow civilian angle, on crime. Terrorism is absolutely indispensable in every case of the founding of power...Even more important than terrorism is the systematic modification of the ideas and feelings of the masses. We have to control those."

                       ---- Adolf Hitler in recorded meeting w/ Hermann Rauschning, quote from same work

               

Fragrance

 

     Lips brushing your warm neck,
       Nostrils flare to flame
           breath of pores

  Sacred murder of
       flowers and Hellfire
         forging desire


Pungent Baubo
  sways limbs
 
We lie left
    of golden apples

Scent swathes dream

Senses capitulate
to vertiginous sensation

       
It never leaves----
remembering when
       breath deepens

squall

bruised clouds
cover the sun

streets blush black from grey

a lightning strike
cracks God's jaw

                                    as mortals seek shelter
                                       from heavenly ire.

Life/Light

                   

Cholera

     The baser pole voids wisdom,
these fouled sheets a generation's labor.

Life so acutely sensed in youth's searing summer,

               when words served me.

Time consumed chasing after absolutes...
Friedrich, Christiane. Alas, there is no relief.

         Ashen twilight shrouds
           all forms ascending
             immutable dusk.

Nanette, a kiss before

  breath's task ceases.

Petals of the Sun (Phaëthon's Ashes)

Holiday Bubble

Galley

    INRI on the calyx of
   our cumbrous garlands,

   if we could skip
       and gush:

                    "Smiles open for
                      mirth gathering
                         les abeilles..."
      (light tongues hum floating cadences).

Breach in the plank
    you prettily
      translate
  Phoebe's beam

         We laugh
       at the bonds
        of restraint

 And wonder below raiment
       of stolen heavens.

Celestial Lute

Cold light trickles
  down shoulders.

Eve's breath tickles
   burning ears.

Stars weep crystal in
  Luna's tilted basin.

                         Under heaven,

with rusty cups
and hollow eyes,

                        we pray teardrops
                        kiss brittle strings.

The Do Undone

She emerged from clouds of hairspray,
gold of her hair in radiant array
as jeune Deneuve midst parapluies,
a Lucrezia d'Este parting rough seas.


Time's coarse hand dulls lively sheen
and pans such splendor to the iron mean.
So cruel the curl unwinds to limp tangles
mournful skies rain tears of Angels.

Señor Verde

"My poor spark had for its source, the Moon"

Blinding Light, Abundant Haze, and Silence

Smell the Columbine

Moon Dog

Artemis Tree

Memorial Spleen

Why should memorials to security failures that fueled wars on nations that had nothing to do with it and, to this day, are still being bombed be built? Making 9/11 "Patriot Day" is masochism that begs more sadism. It's not a day to celebrate or for us to bask in nationalist ignorance. It should be a day to reflect on why it happened and what this nation, in our name, has done since: visited thousands of 9/11's on people who were not responsible. Mining a massacre for nationalism is the lowest form of propaganda which promotes much greater massacres. 9/11 Memorials themselves are a symptom of a greater problem. Tear them all down and you'd see less people abroad getting killed daily for no reason and "terrorism" evaporate. You'd also see less military spending and more money for people--like healthcare, education, and pensions. But some people are addicted to a nationalism that views war/violence(cops) as the only solution. Any person who resists this view is a nail to be hammered. It's a sickness that afflicts this nation. Makes people praise and uphold evil as something to take pride in and hate anyone who disagrees to the point of wanting them dead.

Ruse of the Infinitesimal

Though touching, space is infinitely divisible, haunted by phantom digits.

Feeling is approximation, the ubiquitous suggestion of energy. Waves of heat tender emptiness to felt plenitude.

Words cast a bridge of blanketing waves to console.

Starspill

Panes keep me from night skies.
Stars spill through my hands.

There wishes drain,
stars venerated in name.

Questions summon craving
and drag down the moon
'til it shines full inside.

The vertigo of saints
held so long from clay
wherewith we all come
my dreams crave.

Endless night
of stars and
sovereign light
nothing eclipses.

To eternally love in articulate time:
Split infinity, the circle squared by rhyme.

"...Pray it makes a crack"

The Mendacity of Oracular Pride

Start at 52:55 until the end. "America is Back!" "Gaddafi is dead, Assad is on the way, Al Qaeda is on the run in Yemen and elsewhere, and we got Bin Laden!"

Jellyfish and Crustacean on a Sea-Bed of Sky

"No More Peripheral Vision"

L'Amour peintre

Saloniki

        I

At Saloniki
 the Empress lacks
Corybantes to
    obscure her purple.

Chlorus comes but

her head must go.

Harsh light
   shoves her down
 saltless hills.

          II

We lost five weeks and
 columned a dread span,
 heads lost in 

 Wednesday's van.

 White horses stride past.
       

In shade they cast sight

to grim alloyed light.

Île de la Cité

Barricades glitter like shrapnel of fallen stars.
Bayonets flash Basilisk grins in the square.

A hidden arc of love stretches across metallic rubble.
Pink scarf clouds drift above unseen by clerks.

A mother's sigh hovers noiseless over the jet Seine.
Two gamin scatter as heaven shakes their reflections on dark water.

Thieves treasure daylight when sons slight mothers.
On it goes, silent as shushed sighs, to La Santé.

Sister Amalie cries.
The rope is taut.
No bead, no hosanna,
can loose Justitia's collar.

                                Let us pray for the grace
                                of every gutted chest's hollow. 

                                Light a candle of mercy
                                to hush the amputee's bellow.
                                                 
     

Sensibility

 
     It dawns slowly. Claudia wished her sense and the world were more harmonious. 

   She grew tired of the wait. Wishes without constellar aid equal overreach or, put

   poetically, a fall. Like meteors they consume themselves before touching ground. 

   Claudia never touched for groping. Never spoke for shouting. Her ears were cupped 

   by the din of her own bell. The bell rings and, sadly, dinner's never served.

   
                     A sensibility that starves makes hours of seconds.

Cloud Mirror

Lisbon

In her eyes
      narrow streets open
       
     From her mouth
            sultry air blows

        over Estremadura

    Dark Amphioness,
           Lisbon remembers
   
  Her beauty,
      crafted in song,
        stands

       The Tejo
  slips through open
         hands.

                         
                         

   

Revelation

"Just as technology is always revealing nature from a new perspective, so also, as it impinges on human beings, it constantly makes for variations in their most primordial passions, fears, and images of longing."  Benjamin, The Arcades Project, K.

Word

      What is told
         another takes,

Spirited away
   by reckoned steps.


Anoint tongues
in endless night

  and teach
   Godless
    rhetoric.

A Vigil

                  I

It matters not the Sun rose
  above measured breath.
Will morrow bring the same?
   Will her body cast
    its winsome frame?
This bed, a familiar shell,
       purls my name.

               II

What foam did she rise from,
           Poseidon?
   Suppose gold locks
obscured Phoebus' eyes
        as she shored...
  The Gods' smiles set
     'neath her pillow,
lost in futile approximation.

             III

Thro' unbroken night,
   still hours centuries,
    stroking her hair...
   Overlooking dream
            deceive
between world and world.
   

Else

Heavy fog swathes the pallid cone of Helicon.
 No longer touched
   by paternal light,
 Maidens scatter
    to lower lying vales.


A thread was lost.
  The boughs hush
     their plaintive hymns.


Mother's arms awkwardly crown this wearisome head.
No longer touched
   by maternal light,
my face descends
     to her lenient breast.


A thread was found.
   The cloth stills
     my plaintive sobs.

Counterpane

Paula draws the counterpane gently
and settles in sleep's misty close.

Lazily I drift to the largo of her inspiration.

At the desk lies a book
unevenly parted by
my left hand,
I read the legend:

           "Absolute Freedom and Terror"

                     A nimbus parts the son's hair.
                     His head settles a copse's lassitude.
                     Mother is the soft moss he rests upon.
                     The counterpane, a softer lid, covers eyes.
                     A shadow show murmurs 'til Father stirs.

Carmen

Song shines in those eyes.

Claw them out,
Heave them up
skies.

Night, like heavy fragrance,
sated with love's scent

Strangles the sweet breath
       of paradise in
          melody.

Imagining Holly

                  I

         Blue thread
          hung from trousers,
        vestigial hems calling
              for shears.

    Mother stilled me
       and fell the errant
          cloth.

   White sheets cover
       the desk my brow
     shed its first
         dew.

             II

 Ash fell
   from a cigarette
 on an empty page.

 Her finger
   pressed it flush,
      smearing a dark trail
     sinuously down...

   A lock of Holly's hair,
   like Christ's face in clouds,
     was the word made.
                                                                      She wants
                                                                       clear windowed silence.
                                                                      She, rendered still.

      III

 She sent the sun.     
  On its face                                                She is under the sign,
translated                                                         an order:
Michelangelo:                                              Please
"I blame the mistress                                        remember nothing.
   I was born to serve."                                    Simulacra, the Dead's liturgy,

Postmarked "Siena, 2013".                             Passed by sleeved
                                                                              hands.
Siena eclipsed Lisbon.
The ships, dismasted,
    off shore.

     IV

Paula blew
  smoke from pursed lips
as we walked narrow streets
    stretching to shore

Where listless
    crafts
gently rock
on sun-dipped
    blue.

   Her ash fell to sand
  covering our wreathed path.                               She is the sign.
                                                                                  The world's chant:
                                                                                She, she, she, she, she
                V
                                                                                      Passed by naked
      The lamp burned                                                                hands.
    low upon
        arrival.

Locks fade to ash.

     Like Holly's face
   in the creased photo
     adorning a staircase,
    accompanied by
       Sun.

             VI

Paula smothered the lamp
     and curled sinuous
      beneath sheets.

Lisbon mounted Siena,
     Our bodies, displaced,
   at Sea.


         VII

Smoke shot from
   creased lips
as I discard
  these pages.


       
                                                                           

     

A Hush

"Old Adorno"

"You have said my fortune shall be forty thousand crowns; this you would not scruple to pay down upon the nail to any old curmudgeon, deformed, abject monster that shall hit my mother's foible. For if she says it must be done, there's no remedy. We must both consent, though my eternal quiet is sacrificed to her capriccio. Such a one I'm informed she is in treaty with -- old Adorno, you know him, my dear papa -- but what are his large possessions to me? I shall ever hate him."

                         
                       
                        --- The New Atalantis, Volume Two, Delarivier Manley, 1709.

Nice

P.R.N., IM

    

Was he good for you?
          Was he what you wanted him to be?






Annis MCMLVIII-MMXVI
    

Nice Plumage

Irish Rain

Rainfall casts constellations of drops
                    on panes.

The limp face of a lone daffodil droops
                    in rain.

Melancholy and dry a writer dreams
                   of mains.

Overhears boatswain's curse as craft drifts
                 off plane.
               
               
               
               

Au Revoir Rose

Rose swallowed the globe and paints kitchen walls
with a fingernail polish brush,
arabesques of cherubs every three inches.
Her son chokes from a case of thrush
as she hums a fugue never written.

There is a place,
  a tropic bay,
 where cherubs
    fly away
as, at sixteen,
  her boy
  opens his veins
and pales
   like a pagan martyr.

The day when Rose whispers to a love,
     "You're so much like my son"
             as cherubs weep
            down dirty walls.

Merle Haggard, Pre-Jingo Years

Touch to Flank, Limp Away from Struggle

Fragment on Geek Culture

Geek Culture is a technocratic cult.

It produces and distributes everything in the most efficient and stylish fashion possible(slave labor it relies on remains obscene--in every sense), at hand for all to enjoy. Here it echoes Heidegger's dream of an "at hand" culture in unity and totally mobilized. From the banal pretensions of a Joanna Newsom album, an Uber ride, to tearing down "slums" to provide "upscale" housing for young "tech savvy" professionals, it incessantly boasts this relation to product as the summit of free human experience. It is the gentrification of all cultural production/consumption.

The Geek is a well heeled and efficient navigator of the "global culture", an Uber Flâneur.

Sunset II

At the Concourse

They speak bloodless portmanteau.
Nothing they'd own,
but assume is their own.

No talk of morals.
No prison camp cadavers
or tear gas tears,
pass over obscenities.

With bold hued cloth dicks
and flag pins bright as Sun
they have grave matters to run.
Please keep the lines moving.

Nuance

Real Fascists

Wannabe Fascist

Pretty Dissolution

Bruised Heel

A Cut

Locks fell like one hundred lock-pickers broke into my head. Cat was gently solemn, an accomplice.

Eye is the First Eaten

Where to Put It

Head Lost in Representation

       Bizzarie di Varie Figure, Bracelli.

She Bakes Kicks in the Wall

She bakes kicks in the wall.
She briskly climbs to fall
from atavistic monkey bars,
and bumps her head 'gainst spiked stars.

She augurs holes in dark skies
where furnaces sear raw eyes.
She charts a hidden home
above that all, alone.

Selene

    Amber eyes rise
    warm rays stroking cheek.

Dew kisses as
fragrant heavens speak:

         "A million needs to tend."

 Numbers arbitrary, sleep is certain.

Turn back cheek's eccentric measure
and serenely net surveyed pleasure.

La bonne donnant remerciements

Thetis

Obsolete Edit of Old Slogan

                 

                       "Globalism is the last refuge of imperial scoundrels."

I Buried It

To Parveen Shakir

Where are you?

In the cool breeze or colder stars,
    stroking my hair, shaping destinies?

The moon's silver dulls,
  my love's ghazals indifferent.

Bright sunshine reads street signs
and evening downpours account for us.

Deep thought pliant as
Jasmine in a gale
blooms to tend this ache.

A Gorgeous Killah

Heroes

Interrupted Sleep

As Far from the Bullets and Bombs as They Fall

Thetis

Of ashes spoken
  and smiles bright,

fleeting as snowfall
caught by light:

Autumn snow
  disintegrates touching.

Dusk skin shines
with pinched fire.

Tapering eyes
approximate
shafts of Sun
kindling flame.

Orithyia

Barbed clouds
do not bode well...
Yet her pale foot
  sinks genial
in grass.

Errant, without care
             for restive skies,
      she runs.
A gale crosses open field.
Her white gown lifts
lithe as Sylph's wing,
flush cheek
  nearly eclipsed
 by billowing cloth.

Boreas held
want too long.
 Those bright cheeks,
blood-hued to warm
  wind blasted
countenance,
     are full with
             his breath.
             

Call Me Beelzebub

Spring Within

Autumn Philters

"You're No Star to Guide Me Anyway"

Cotton Ball Sky

Quietist in Light

The Process

for JJ



Fitness is their canon.

Hair up, teeth clenched,
cheek bones whet
sheathed stilettos.

Water runs hard,
marking grist
down pale casts.

She scours it away.

Fitness is her burden.

Tears run sharp,
hewing grist
down flush cheeks.

Curate Blurs

Baldwin

"...I have more faith in Southerners than I will ever have in Northerners: the mighty and pious North could never, after all, have acquired its wealth without utilizing, brutally, and consciously, those 'folk' ways, and locking the South within them. And when this country's absolutely inescapable disaster levels it, it is in the South and not in the North that the rebirth will begin."

                                     ---James Baldwin, No Name in the Street.

Got a Hole

Awake

The faithful are light sleepers.

All the Time

http://www.wat.tv/video/prince-it-3o7v7_3mbzf_.html

Cercamon(12th Cent Provencal Poet from Gascony)

Quant l’aura doussa s’amarzis

When the sweet air turns bitter,

And leaves fall from the branch,

And birds their singing alter

Still I, of him, sigh and chant,

Amor, who keeps me closely bound,

He that I never had in my power.

Alas! I gained nothing from Amor

But only had pain and torment,

For nothing is as hard to conquer

As that on which my desire is bent!

No greater longing have I found,

Than for that which I’ll lack ever.

In a jewel I rejoice, in her

So fine, no other’s felt my intent!

When I’m with her I dumbly stutter,

Cannot utter my words well meant,

And when we part I seem drowned,

Loss of all sense and reason suffer.

All the ladies a man saw ever

Compared to her aren’t worth a franc!

When on earth the shadows gather,

Where she rests, all is brilliant.

Pray God I’ll soon with her be wound,

Or watch her as she mounts the stair.

I startle and I shake and shiver

Awake, asleep, on Love intent,

So afraid that I might wrong her,

I don’t dare ask for what I meant,

But two or three years’ service downed,

Then she’ll know the truth I offer.

I live nor die, nor am made better

Nor feel my sickness though intense,

Since with her Love I want no other,

Nor know if I’ll have it or when,

For in her mercy does all abound,

That can destroy me or deliver. 

It pleases me when she makes me madder,

Makes me muse, or in gaping rent!

It’s fine if she plays the scorner

Laughs in my face, or at fingers’ end,

For, after the bad, the good will sound,

And swiftly, should that be her pleasure.

If she wants me not, I’d rather

I’d died the day my service commenced!

Ah, alas! So sweet she did murder

Me, when she gave her Love’s assent,

And tied me with such knots around,

That I desire to see no other.

All anxiously I delight in her,

For whether I fear or court her then

Is up to her; or be false or truer,

Trick her, or prove all innocent,

Or courteous or vile be found,

Or in torment, or take my leisure.

But, who it may please or who astound,

She may, if she wants, retain me there.

Say I: scarce courteous is he crowned,

The man who shall of Love despair.

September

Hypnagogic Divagation

there are too many holes on the surface of our body.
each one an avenue for invasion.
assail demons, bacilli, legions invisible to sight.

ultimately we succumb.
without we'd never taste glory.
small triumphs trim days with modest laurels
as a skull's pale rictus 

chides from every orifice.

Love's Made on Many Levels

Whispers War

I hear him.
Taut breath
rattles air.

Gasping, his
grave baritone gone,
walls shiver.

Emptiness a ruse,
for the promise
of peace eludes.

All hours
whispers list
like troubled seas
in the ear.

A Scale

True Spirit

Exile On Park Ln

Distant

Shepherd Cries

Love, Husbandry

Love