Letting In (Dance In The Cracks - Part 1 of 3)

Yesterday after work

I found a small orange notebook in the mail

Feel shaky as I read

and after

as the sun's setting

I take a walk

to feel my way

to think about you

It happens to be Halloween

and the sky is getting darker

more meaningful

and the kids in costume

fashioned or bought

are all about

Have you ever noticed

how our culture never seems so healthy

red cheeked

life affirming

as on Halloween?

With everyone in on the exciting ritual

with the homes of the streets open

When I long for a utopia

or some ideal at least

perhaps I ought to console myself

with the fact of suburban Halloween

Is this not a good sign?

A fine ideal?

My thoughts and feels as I walk

are much the same as they have been

a month

two months

more

But they're taut

teething

And so I attend to them

over and over

as they come upon me

It's like this:

I feel so much tenderness for you

don't want to see you go

Parts of me pitch fits

clench up

with all their force

turn into desperate White Dwarves

But I still have some energy

some light

And I want to make a play

to pursue you

Exhaust it, as a possibility

because I will always wonder

because I never fully have

Like a psychology student

or a mountain top fire spotter

I wish to sell myself some silence

Sell some to you too

If I can manage

I've said that I didn't have any regrets

out on the beach

some warm bellied resilience

but I'm thinking now that that conclusion was premature

Truth be told I wish I would have born my neck to you

more than I did at least

Let you in

Stopped showing off

And above all

Indicated where the gravity pulled

choked

Pointed out where the cracks lay

In your small orange notebook

you showed the gravity

spoke in your own voice

through the cracks

and I hear it

And even though

it was likely not intended

I listen like I'm sitting beside you

like you're Wittgenstein

holding my hand

letting me in

to your newest, vital meditations

to the R behind playful coolness

cultivating freedom

independence

solitude

searching for a way out

through

And I want to speak too

directly

More in my own voice

the warmth rushing out

something I rarely did

wished I did more of

and I want to say why

why I rarely did

wish I did more of

Maybe this takes time, care

Will you follow me

follow me just a bit?

Will you sit beside me here

take my hand?

mindfulness

all the run on sentences in my head

inevitably turn back to you

and those simple sacred insights

which i've labored so hard to steal

will not hold

taking care of the self

seems the most unambitious task

from a certain standpoint

we should rather be getting on

with colossal social tasks

orgiastic pleasures

but taking care?

that seems some trifling exercise

to be fit in

between a brisk jog

and piano scales
if the time is free

yet, the effort will be made

it will happen at sunrise

it will happen throughout the day 

and it will happen on into the night

it will happen

this is what i say

to the delicate eyes

of the bathroom mirror

at lunch break

for if i'm going to be of use

i need some clues

hints

more than what I've got at least

more than silence

and crippling

This Head That Droops

These gusts and swift shifts

when we are away

and this thing so young

makes me weary of every next move

Yet some sage whispers

'You can be lonely, very lonely,

and not swept away.'

And I nod

feel nostrils

and breath and body

Remembering practices and words

and those things beyond words

things I suspect all warm bellies affirm

things I'm trying with all my energy

to take in

just a little more

just a little more

each previous take

the soil

for more mature and more present breaths

Yes,

this head that droops

that sometimes droops

is not quite me

Head Cold

Here's George

in the lumpy bed

with sick man

day dream haze

Wildly sentimental

with heroic visions

and apocalyptic regret

Now he's hopeful

now he's doubtful

but with the fruits of

the scientific generations

at least he can sleep

at least he can breath

He showers four or five times a day

stretches and reads

eats bowls and bowls of greens

But what of those whirling trajectories

of thought stew

of raw longing pangs

What have the quantifiers

to say about them?

George has this caffeine idea

he says to himself

"Okay okay, the weak

long for strength and courage

and the poor for wealth and stability

So do those who long to have no longings

- to be content with whatever -

do they escape the game?"

In the morning

afternoon and evening

rising wills of utopian overcoming

with warm sepia lover caress

as he walks away from hectic collapse

Gentle wind touching long field grass

George watches himself take a path to the sea

Magnifying Glass

In my pocket is a magnifying glass

A clear thing wrapped in plastic

I don't know where I got it from

but I carry it around wherever I go

Sometimes I put it up against walls

Trying to spy on others hearts

Sometimes upon passing specimens

of all varieties

When I look out at molecules and planets

I can suffer the weight

this information spreads

But when I turn the thing about

turn it upon this here breathing presence

the weight buckles

eclipses any forward resolve

Am I a bullet in the wind

A bullet with collapsing weight

Did no one ever tell me

The Selfhood of a Soft World

Two boy's come through the lobby

I'm not good with ages -

those sight reading skills

which parents espouse 

at company picnics

at grocery store checkout lines,

have never been my forte -

Anyway,

the eldest

who's maybe ten or twelve

the one with a gray shirt,

with light purple jean shorts

has on this big knee brace

and it ruffles up one side of his jeans

making him waddle

Beside him must be his younger brother

one to two years younger -

spotting family resemblance

has become a recent enthusiasm of mine

replacing mere people watching

as I sip the crappy black tea

you can buy in Styrofoam cups

from the middle aged Chinese couple

who own the little cafe

in the lobby of the Santa Maria library

Other than the resemblance

what I observe is the care taken

in their upbringing:

they're disciplined kids

you can tell,

they have some unimposing way

I've been sitting here long enough to know:

What racket kids can make in a Library Lobby!

So, the younger is in front

with a pile of checked out books

cradled between his arms

palms up

with energy

with play

He heads for the closed door:

There's two of them, you see

And it's expected that you use the opened one

But there's no pressure

And the older steers the younger

with a knowing smile

Waddling quicker to point the way

His presence a recommendation

Soft and Warm

you can see it on his face

Acceptance and trust

Not corrupt

Or some sickly threat power,

like those purely on the nurture side

of the debate

are bound to read in

And I sip my tea

and feel a glow

it radiates like a ripple

I think:

In ten thousand years

we will be Gods

Hainish emissaries

If we, with deep breathes,

with stolid dignity,

Will

The

Highest

Path

we have access to,

Not minding what happens

but not dulling our sensitivities.

Consequences can make us such scaredy cats:

that raw self-worry

so prominent late at night,

curtails the most beautiful leaps

And you would find yourself

in a soft world

if only you would slow down

to a waddle

if only you would turn away
from Omelas
from sugary safety hording

as independent dying creatures

With Risk

With unswayed forgiveness

Because really,
the full weight of the world

sits atop our soft shoulders

of water and carbon
not unlike a brisk dew

You would know
Pilgrim
If you would slow down

Lyceum Blues

You, caffeinated sophisticate

who sit at firesides

pondering wax

allegedly warmed by syntax

full to the brim

with universal affairs

You, fallacy slayer

master of anecdote

practiced at mediation

articulation

charity

who swears fealty

to nothing

but truth

Tell me

alone

in your study

how do you look?

In bed at night

peaking out at wall shadows

how do you fair?

Have footnote efforts stabilized

that panic in the veins?

Have scholastic rituals

diminished haunting states? 

In the early days

in love
with Spinoza
and Rome

did you really -

did you?

really?-

worry like mad

questioning allegiance

in every direction?

Did you synthesize your madman thirsts

and raw-hurts?

Did you take those deep-darks

those devils thoughts

biting out the insides

clamoring for a conscientious purity,

did you learn to breath steady and full?

Pierce through the world of red-dust,

of popcorn advice?

Does my sourness turn your taste buds?

Yes,

This is what we say

when we are not nourishing the higher parts

when our poor bodies cannot affirm

the dust

which makes its way

around where we play