Vectors

“Instinct”
Painting by Bobbi Pearce
From pinterest.com

this map is broken
its routes leading
nowhere worth going

dead reckoning
path integration
should prove better option

vestibular memory
cuing an idiothetic
approach to new destiny

animals use what
the mapmaker doesn’t
the vectors of instinct

and man is an animal
no less equipped for
an organic progress

putting ear to the
inner voice opens the path
that enlightens the eye

intellectual journeys
have speed to commend them
and swift is arrival

accept no excuse
as an obstacle minds
cannot live standing still

The Raj

Poesy plus Polemics

British East India Company Ships
c. 1685
Image from britishempire.co.uk

bound from Bombay
for the overland east
across four thousand
years tolled by scripture
oaken crates holding
artifact specimens
Madras museums await
with a pride of defiance
outsmarting through
bold contravening
designs and devices
those black market
sly Raj factotums
the opium eaters
absconders of
provenant cultural art
temple talismans
ancient accoutrements
tending the birth
of a civilized orient
objects of reverence
in limn of deep time
rimed by winters
surviving the coldest
the bleakest of eras
when black-timbered
grasping incorporate
British East Indiamen
plundered hearts and
chewed limbs from
this fragrant sweet
sacred sub-continent

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Live Free or Die

New Hampshire
State Motto

piss and vinegar
juices that animate
those with real bark
on their hides

stern stuff of
the northern
New Englander
perish the tender

come and visit
but don’t plan to stay
if you can’t
take the oath

La Pucelle

“Joan of Arc”
Painting by Paul Berenson
From paulb.com

(Regarding Joan of Arc)

conversations with God
charted destiny
child of violent virtue
miraculous champion
driven to rescue the
Armagnac birthright
this mere wisp of a girl
with a warrior’s heart
given holy commission
to punish pretenders
the English in league
with Burgundian dukes
maiden general took
her spectacular triumphs
of field to the feet of
her patron and new
restored king until
captured and tried by her
still writhing enemies
stood to the fire with
all of the stoical faith of
her young nineteen years

in the end did her cause
for a justly united French
kingdom prevail and a
posthumous trial returned
her to innocence raising
her up as a martyr to faith
emblematic of doctrinal
courage in face of all odds
setting grounds for the
hearts and the minds
of the centuries keeping
her memory loved
as a legend and saint

Libretto

Poesy plus Polemics

Luigi Illica
Librettist for Puccini

Francesco Maria Piave
Librettist for Verdi

our intimacies
are reserved for
Puccini and Verdi
indelible orchestral
bones feel grand
passions of opera
crescendos that
tingle the spine
played with audible
fingers we recognize
time and again

but what do we know
of the poets who
paint upon notes
bringing scores
to their stories
with words speaking
triumphs and tragedies
giving emotional
substance to voices
we celebrate even
the more than the
greatest composers

pray tell what
did Caruso Luciano
or Sutherland sing
but for poetry laid
in the candlelit ink
of obscurity verses
transposing the
suffering human
condition to song
lyrics lifted from life
born in garrets
on writing desks
flowing from quills
of anonymous minds

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Steamer Trunk

Poesy plus Polemics

Restored Antique Steamer Trunk
Photo from pinterest.com

compartmented lives
secure secretive transport
elegant escape

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Faces

Illustration From
tatoobild.com

every face a biography
storylines quietly written
etched evidence traces
fine creases of skin
features shaped by events
yielding ridges and
hollows of character
rectitude standing its form
furrows running to wrinkles
mark remnants of worry
complexions of conscience
glow smoothly
or carry the scarring
of blemished regrets
and the eyes
yes the eyes
bring the whole into focus
defining the man
not the windows of adage
but organs expressing
emotion reflecting
compassion’s true caliber
here to behold
here it all of it is
the quotient humanity
held in the faces of strangers
live mirrors by which
to observe our own traits
look away
and risk ignorance
missing the chance
to know honesty

Sundulgence

“Abstract Sunrise”
Painting by Patty Baker
From lookoutstudios.com

it baked me brown
and burned her red
who knew we’d both
too soon be dead

Whither

“War and Peace”
Painting by Lamis Dachwali
From pixels.com

hawk and dove
locked in plummeting spiral
trees hold their breath

Why the Cold

Poesy plus Polemics

Moroccan Brazier
Photo from hollywoodbollywood.co.in

inhospitable tropics
melt the good blood
into watery wine
wilting spirit that
sweltering victim of
obstinate suns
heat unhinges men
limbs fall from torsos
in puddles of
purposeless flesh
where ideas find
no provident purchase
the mind wants for
briskly chilled chambers
where building and
tending a careful laid
firewood brazier
will introduce warmth
with distinction
that radiates rather
than absorbing
definitions of self
a most personal shape
filling spaces that
all the world ever and
always will recognize
take to its memory
name it uniquely
appreciate all its
thoughts gelid with
rational lucid assertions
cool climate conducive
to reason instead
of deformative
uncontrolled
free-burn of
fire-pit passions

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