Under the Knife

“A Broken Eye Still Cries” by Marsha Elliott

 

 

counting backwards into the ether

rush of moments remembered

illogical sequence of images

flash like the frames of a movie reel

speeding through sprockets

a ratcheting ratcheting diminuendo

pulls consciousness deep

down and down to the void

the black bottom of nothing

where pain can no longer be felt

but is nonetheless

horridly dreamt and imagined

aware of the cutting

through gristle and bone

vicious violent strokes

precise surgical actions

in synch with unhearable

rhythmical beats of insidious

heart and lung pumping machines

life no longer completely contained

to this flesh and blood entity

shared now instead with

strange grim apparatus

inanimate engines and objects

of rubber and plastic and steel

where the unsleeping soul

finds uncomfortable annex

and desperate prayer

races to and fro coursing through

stiff inarticulate hoses and tubes

back and forth between

mindful and mindless receptacles

frantic in search of a terrified voice

Hot Air Balloon

 

“Balloon Skies” by Emily Louise Heard

 

lift away from the day

rise up out of the world

upon eagle-path thermals

blue currents embraced

by persistent north wind

benign altitudes moving

to undulant timelessness

witness to histories flawed

in their passage below

the receding green ground

dissolves into itself

the eyes fill the brain

with impressions of

pastoral landscapes

ill-lit panoramas of

primitive verdant geometry

drawn by rude hands

human husbands of nature

whose imprints trace acres

between fixed horizons

their cardinal edges delimit

the mortal existence of

men with two hearts

comorbid of conduct

through war or through peace

mornings immanent laid

along linear travel of time

bring their daily surprise

never known to beforehand

which scene will prevail

on each dawning new day

whether conflict and crisis

will bloody the earth or

desist and diminish to lurk

behind vanishing points

leaving license and lease

for tranquility come to brief

moment of burgeon beneath

soft staccato expulsions

and wanderlust whoosh

of the voyager’s flame

Buds

 

Photo by sanda

 

 

trees hold their fingertips

sunward and supplicant

beseeching for photons

capturing raindrops

in meristem beads

giving gratitude

shyly with daintily

incurled green embryos

chaste and auspicious

 

 

(originally posted May 2013)

 

 

Weathermen

 

 

“Mountain Storm” by Tony Abeyta

 

 

tall men walk the earth
raise their fingers
to fondle the clouds
coaxing coquettes
of snow from wry
shiftable smiles
and come-hither hems

they insouciantly wade
the breadth of the oceans
some coming some going
to grope foreign weather
enticed by exotic
enchantments of
unabashed novelty

they speak thunder
flash lightning
from glowering eyes
spit out rain
along squall lines
and exhale the wind
turned by swaggering
tongues to form
sensual circular storms

till their brides declare
halt to these spasms
of inchoate manliness
recalling husbands
to faith and fidelity
pulling the sun
from their bosoms
rehanging the blue
back in place across
endlessly mollified
conjugal skies

 

 

(originally posted November 2013)

Peacemaker

 

Original Colt 45 – 1863

 

 

Forty-five caliber
Royal blued steel
Black walnut hatched grips
Fine balance and feel

Sat low on the hip
For gunfighting draw
Giving wild frontiers
Apparatus of law

Hard men in hard times
Lived and died by the gun
In violent romance
Of leather and sun

 

 

(originally posted May 2013)

Waterfall

“Mountain Waterfall” by Linda Olsen

turgid and tumbled

perpetual flowing

ideas of great men

churn in rapids of history

crash against rocks

of hard validation

rechanneled by judgment

through fine pebbled sluices

that filter impure bits of

unsound reason and

abject presumption

these freshened

clean clarified waters

of potable truth

converge in a cataract

pouring their wisdom

over high ledges

to slowly erode these

last skeptical edges

then plunge headlong down

into deep shaded pools

whose location will

ever be hidden from all

but inquisitive minds

of determined persistence

thirsty for knowledge

*     *

(originally posted May 2013)

Riffs

 

Unknown Artist

 

 

relaxing the ride
out and back
fluid phrases
free-slip in and out
ghosting melody
breathlessly
improvised
grace-notes
hang ornaments
up and down
quicksilver bones
cached in clusters
of chord tones in
rhythmic progressions
with slurred
syncopation
that’s felt by the ears
and heard by the skin

true jazz virtuosos
perform
one-on-one
in a roomful of ones
carry on
closed-eyed
intimate dialogues
with no one
but you

 

(originally posted November 2013)

This Thing of Ours

Movie Poster from “The Godfather”

deadly affinities

centuries old

social system

the bastard of

feudalist fathers

imposed upon

enclaves of

immigrant yearnings

black hands and

blood oaths enjoy

unholy loyalties

underworld ethics

that undermine

civic integrity

nullify laws as were

given by God and

by governments

small-minded men

little caesars

pretenders to

neighborhood thrones

make their meals of

misplaced admiration

grow fat upon

forfeited virtue

persuasion at point

of a pocket stiletto

they heartlessly

pillage the pride

of evolved

hearts and minds

put to shame

contributions

achievements

the righteous

endeavors of

two-thousand years

upon bones of a

violent empire

building enlightened

new culture

reborn of more

gentle philosophies

given to prizing the

wholesome aesthetics

that elevate sentiment

science and art

free expression of

free-willed humanity

this is the cultural

character handed

on down by my

fathers and mothers

the dominant traits of

respectable bloodlines

resistant to easy

seductions of

illusory romance

immune to the fiction

of seemingly quaint

mustache petes

or their flagrantly

criminal offspring

of capos and dons

who would readily

poison the nectars

of renaissance legacy

Pathology

Artist Unknown

sadness turns into pathology

when tears flow unbidden

in rusty red rivulets

rutting the cheeks

when joy slips and slides

lost of handholds

on woe-heaving hearts

when smiles are stillborn

on quivering sighs

and hopelessness settles

its dullness in eyes

surrendered of light

when even strong judders

of anger and fear

fail to energize spines

and refocus the mind

******************

(originally posted May 2013)

Match

 

Image from HDWallpapers

 

 

(The following poem represents my 1,000th published post since I launched “Poesy plus Polemics” eleven months ago. I can hardly believe it. It’s almost as if my long retired and dormant mind has erupted with new urgent purpose. As I work on my third book of poetry, I realize I won’t be able to keep up this pace, but I fully intend to wade into 2014 with all the gusto I can muster. Thanks to all my dear followers and readers for your unexpected and most gratifying encouragement.)

I first lit this match
knowing nothing
of how long or bright
it might burn

in my time I have
held it to dismembered
faces of infamy
cowered in corners
believing their sins
and I learned from
the shape of their shame

with its meek lumen
glow I found maps
giving secretive routes
to indigenous purpose
for civilization and
syllabus families of
broken-sleep scholars

cold caverns
warm grottoes
revealed to my years
future histories
ringing in echoes
of batwings and
bailiff’s batons upon
cell-bars of quandary

it guided my climbs
over mountainous
creeds of philosophers
steeped in screed
rubble of rhetoric
sallied to mystify
dull-minded centuries

pirates and princes
bastards and barons
cavorted within
its free-curling smoke
painting hat-feathers
charcoal with products of
intrigue’s combustion

shadows rose
in oration
to mock predilect
faith in healing
by shamans
with rattle and bone
exhortations

aboard riverboats
stealthy incursions
enabled my espionage
into firelit heartlands
of madness
ensuing the failures
of putative titans

my dim circle of light
walked the wounds
of paved intellects
shone upon beds
banked in streets
bearing bodies of
unrealized dreams

it imagined vignettes
into sentient existence
pulled life from dead words
through the gasp
of slight finger flicks
shocked by their
first breath of air

but now and again
moreso lately
this trivial flame
flickers close to extinction
despite my best efforts
to shroud it from
ill-minded winds

at a thousand thoughts old
that it flickers at all
is some miracle
needing a younger
and hungry
new light
to illuminate

 

 

(originally posted November 2013, to mark 1000th post on this blog –

as of June 2017 I have published 3800 posts)