A Little Bit of Care

Don’t know if when I reach out
and say I understand,
does this help mitigate the burden
the onus of the lonliness

Maybe I don’t give you money
or take away your pain
or keep you from aging
but I can look into your eyes
and say I understand

I can ask “are you ok?”
hold your hand and help
you walk across the street
take you to your doctor’s appointment

I can bring you food
cook for you
make sure you don’t spill it
help you wash up
then caringly help you
under the covers of your bed

I can stroke your forehead
speak softly till you
unknowingly travel into that
soft and gentle space
that when awake you cannot take

This I can do for you
It’s not much
but for a moment
in this harsh and cruel life
it allows you some comfort

And you lie down to sleep
knowing in the last waking moments
that someone cared,
someone understood.

Under My Bonsai

I sit alone
on my living room floor
a cold pervades
not ambient
embraced by absence
a chill a void
abandonment
is my canvas
the color on the brush
matters not
nor the brush stroke
whether in water or oil
in the warmth of blues
the freshness of the whites
the yellows
the passion of the reds
the purples
the darkness of the black
the olives
can’t find the paint
that places smiles on faces
unfeigned glee in eyes
kindness in the heart
caring of open palms
I sit
with my Bonsai
surrounded by a
a spider plant
succulents
a tall corn plant
a sprawling fern
purple variegates
my two small gentle souls
curled on my lap
providing calm
and warmth
supplanting an uncaring
human kind

Feet Raised

The path I walk
my footsteps now are soft
when once they’d stomp
wanting all to here me come
they now step gently
Quietly

They used to run
the legs were strong
in naked feet
unnerved by jagged stones

Faster and faster
they’d run past
much of what now
I wish I’d stopped to see

Slowly they now stroll
callused, some broken toes
carrying weight
that once was light like snow

They used to play and jump
sharing life’s playground
with friends and sibling’s feet
now on this path
they walk alone

When once these feet
sped for miles
now only walk short trails
then rest with bottoms
raised so the pain might wane
sitting, sadly only watching now,
my lifelong bane

To be or Not, to be

Begin this beginning wondering
are the souls hovering o’er their incarnate shells
lying in the streets of Bahrain
in the dessert of Libya
or sidewalks of Iran
make the cause worth the loss

As I watch from the comfort of my home
seeing of how the strong arm of autocracy
is squelched by the gathering of voices
of those oppressed

The strength of this revolution
comes from the strife and scars
of faces gathered who’ve made a choice
to fight with life for human dignity
so that their children will live
in self rule and liberty

We see the violence and lives lost
People in these countries fighting for a cause
Dictators suppressing the fight
through sectarian genocide

In my own back yard I feel a strife,
a strain upon my person.
My face is brown, my hair is black
when I now walk outside my door
I concern myself, always looking back

I’ve lived a citizen of this country
now for many years
placing my life in jeopardy in 1969
still I must walk amidst the question,
because my hair is black, my face brown
‘where are my papers?’, I’m now, forever bound

The oligarchic elite wish to keep the power
They hoard the money and jobs
Pass legislation maintaining privileges
for those whose face is white, the right

Right wing politicians legislate perfidy
Surreptitious and insidiously
they suppress today’s undesirable ethnicity
Their identity is masked as liberators
stealing the name from America’s history
‘ Tea Party’, of those that truly were

Unlike history, though, they believe in segregation,
excluding some religions, ideologies, race,
because of this there will always be interrogation
for those that look like me and you

A Smile in Space

Why do glee filled eyes and joyful smiles last so short a time?

Why do moments of this kind come so infrequent?

Sometimes those times of momentary joy come silently
They appear in quiet spaces in the oddest places
When no one is looking and it’s cloudy
the sun is slightly piercing the cumulus
touching with shadows cast on a single soul
she sits alone on a bench underneath
and amidst a conifer, maple and oak

A salient solemnity arises, encircles
papa and mama, octogenarians, sitting together
quietly with arms entwined into one another’s
staring into space, a space known only to them
She gently bends her neck resting her head on his shoulder
A sense of exasperation abounds the two of them
yet with a soft and gentle gasp of fulfillment
to their lifelong shared moments in time

A child sits next to mom on a thick patch of green grass
interspersed with golden strands and daisy caps
blowing gently in the breeze as
she turns to look at me with those large hazel blues
with a curious smile that only pure innocence could demand

If only this smile could pierce the gray of day
and cascade with shards of sunshine rays
upon those who sit alone
in the dark and cold
casting shadows of lonely souls

A Moment of Human Selflessness

His eyes always looking at me
through that curly gray hair
following me throughout the room
his body unflinching only his eyebrows raise
Sometimes with four paws in the air
lying on his back with his head
tilted over the side of the couch
His eyes just stare at me
not that steely eye look of ‘who do you think you are’
that humans do when they leer
but a look that peers at depths
that makes a human want to know
‘What do you see in us and why do you
give us that unconditional love that is selfishly unrequited?‘
He lies there waiting for me to succumb to his heartened eyes
that plead for human contact and a soft whisker whisper
‘ I love you buddy ’.

Her, my ‘beotch’, a mini curly black as jade haired poodle
same as her aforementioned adopted brother
will also chase me down with those big
predominately white iris’s and small black pupils,
eerie sometimes when she follows my movement
one hundred and eighty degrees back and forth
without any movement of her head or brows.
Her constant stare is one of curiosity and caution
calculating when she must jump and scamper about
much like the independence and vitality of her feline genus family
She does not have that same philosophical imparting look
as her brother asking why we humans are the way we are
but in a carefree manner wants us to chase her
and pay attention to her whimsy and her needs,
at her convenience of course

"Why"

When the one who has taken your heart
leaves your side and goes afar
your chest is empty yet the vacuum
makes way for a darkness to reside

One can try to fill that emptiness
surrounded by other voices
walk in crowded spaces
yet darkness houses the noises

No one else understands
the heartfelt words shared
whose hearts blood flows
sharing a common artery

No longer do I hear the symphony of vocals
whose playground is the sky
nor feel the warming breezes
on our dampen palms
skimming through the leaves of trees
as we’d stroll with fingers intertwined

I walk alone in this surreal emptiness
in a diurnal reverie where I now reside
the songbirds music is replaced
by the mystical tune and vocals
of Annie Lennox singing ’Why’.

Never Old

So many seasons have come and gone
Tiny saplings have grown to touch the sky
The little chicks now soar
The children who I’d see playing on my street
Now have children of their own

I saw a friend of mine the other day
hair was long his skin now aged with spots
His once tall muscularity has gone away
and speaks of the forlorn life he’s got

They say that music has no age
so I’m always listening to one song
always hesitant to turn the page
the singer, though, is now gone

My peers all seem to hoard the years
hair gathers white now without the winter snow
Their stories are sad and filled with tears
seems that life has made them pay a toll

My brothers, sister all have grown
cast into the role of marriage and parent
We’ve traversed a bicultural throng
some wisdom found, our love’s inherent

I look again upon that tree whose leaves
now tickle and tease the clouds
and of my peers I look into their eyes
yet do not see the same aging of time in me.

Land of Pyramids and Kings

Poetry resides of the poignancy
on the faces scarred and scared,
Soiled faces of desert air
where they lay at night upon the
earthen terrace of their homeland

Damped in red
on the scarves wrapped
around their heads
arms and legs
in slings

Battled scars for freedom sake
a sight not gone unseen
Known to those
in our own land
in the fifties, sixties
a march with Dr King

So in our hearts
some with similar scars
we cheer those fighting
for their dream
the liberties and freedoms,
the sharing of the wealth,
not so much for the few
but for the many
and their children's health

‘You may say that I’m a dreamer
but I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
in sharing all the wealth
Imagine all the people
where all shall live as one’

"Egypt is Free"
Congratulations
Celebrate!
Remember the faces
of those who gave their
lives for this.

Life's Pallet

Birth avails upon us but a short moment
upon our time allotted to harvest the fruits
of Life with means provided.
These being, our make up
consisting of nominal capacity,
inherited or genetically predisposed,
and inserted into this world to apply.

Those of us fortunate enough to realize
this which has been provided
will ascend to heights of creative utility,
sharing with this world
the unique individual wealth of talent,
integral in the tapestry of Life

In this pallet of existence
the many colors of Life
can be appreciated in total sensorium
then unselfishly and selflessly
can breath life into this awareness of beauty
onto and through our progeny

If it be our choice:
Allow chaos’s destructive characteristic
to be the nature of things
without the caring, impunity of insensitivity
Or, choose the alternative characteristic
which can be born of destruction, that being;
a rebirth of our creation of the Arts, harmony,
Love, possibly, Peace

The Visit

She quietly comports herself
doesn’t know that I feel her soul
I peer into her eyes
a sadden pain has welled
knowing that soon she’ll
travel many miles
to visit Mom and Dad
Maybe the last embraces
before they’re God calls upon them
to share what they've done here, now, for ninety years
Mom bowed mellifluous sounds on her violin
and taught young students for many years
He, a minister, who’s gentle hands and words
lay upon so many allaying their burdens
My wife’s gentle heart, a gift from mom,
attends to these moments of life left
with soft nurturing verve
in lieu of the pangs that feed pain and loss
As I hug her tight, my friend, my lover, my wife,
I softly whisper in her ear…
‘I Love everything about you
especially the wisdom and gentleness
that comes from your Mom and Dad’
I think she knows that I am there for her
to share life and to give it up
when we must.

Chugging Along

How does one transition
from where they’ve been
to where they’ll go
after this short stay

Seeing other’s depart
after temporarily visiting
we watch their backs
as they fade away into life’s nebulae

Reflecting on words that have been shared
the laughter and the tears
Too little time, too few the years
with those for whom we’ve cared

Here comes my train,
a  transient, I hitch up on it
and wave at my life
as we ride by

The tracks they rumble
and rattle me to the bone
I watch through the portals
of this compartmentalized abode

Witness the leaves blowing off their trees
birds flying seemingly to hover still
Mountains cover the sky behind them
while fields of gold dance in the wind

I witness the vast rolling hills
Aqua marine streams tipping white caps
kids on the embankments playing, skipping stones
All, unaware of my train passing

It runs too fast even when it chugs
I got coal dust on my face
trying to stoke the burning embers
so that the flames burn hot
and the train, ‘don’t stop’

What lies beyond
when these tracks run out
Will there be another train line 
or another means of transportation?

What is Providence

Will we be saved
Will someone come down from Heaven’s sake
Tell us how we’ve had our chance
and all our time in history here
we’ve only made life disappear

The gift we were given
we devalued
Showed no real effort
toward correcting our hate
We gathered opposing voices
making them our enemies
We learned to kill
from a book we interpret literally
in Adam and Eve
and Cain and Abel
accepting these words as Providence

We’ve not learned to Love
and have made the choice to kill
We’ve not learned
that the world is not all about 'me'
but about escaping the self
onto the understanding
that we are but a part of all
and when we destroy any part of life
we are killing ourselves.

Is there any entity somewhere
that witnesses the jeopardy of our demise
and has the power to intervene,
saving us from ourselves,
enlightening us to what is wise

Intimate Cycle

Can Love survive
Can Love sustain
Without intimacy
Is it all
It’s ‘cracked’ up to be?

If memories still, freshly, exist
of the spontaneous kiss
the stray and erotic touch
the seductive, ‘Hello”

Now we fall asleep
in separate rooms
the space between us
is no longer an obstacle
like it was when youthful intimacy
consumed our loins

The queries now persist;
‘Have my looks faded,
my attractiveness lost‘?
‘ Do you still love me?’
‘ Of course I do,
Don’t be silly’
‘Was it something I said
or was it something I did?’

A daunting winter is measured
The haunting of intimacy, desire, lost
One by the abundance of snow gathered
The other by the chill of the ice formed

Nature we Love
for the seasonal changes
and cycle it tolls
Agape, the third book
in the trilogy of life
abandons personal intimacy,
will our Love die by this
or like Nature,
will it re-grow?

Chair on my Patio

Used to think life as a constant
but now days go by so quickly
moments pass by at an instant
sometimes I forget to breathe

A chair sits on life’s patio
I sit and watch the passers by
Some will stop for a short stay
share their tunes as if on a radio

There are those whose hand I hold
their fingers intertwine into mine
cause a rythm change in my heart beat
and the promise of forever, I am told

Reality comes along sits next to me
shares some anecdotal fun
some of joys and pleasures
like the rise of a morning sun
letting the starry night go free

Yet, come a stormy day
leaving destruction in it’s way
Helping pick up after it,
is life’s mandate, is it’s writ

And as I witness life, now, many years
many more behind than those before me
putting ‘life’ in a perspective
enjoy the laughter and deal with the tears

If there’d be wisdom
Reality has shared,
In life, the only constant
is ‘change’ with whom it’s paired

Fireflies and Memories

Gathered some thoughts today
Memories of good things
some not so much
Cupped my hands to hold them
Some sieved between my fingers
but captured some from falling through
They felt warm in my palms
and when I raised my hands
to see what I had captured
Opened my cupped palms carefully
like fireflies, they were glowing
The faces the places, glowing and fading,
glowing and fading then began flying about
I gently clenched my hands together
not wanting to let any more fly away
Alas, I open my clutching hands
releasing them from my grasp
giving them their freedom,
allowing me mine.
Fly away, for once again,
I shall gather you another day

Being Human

The day arrives
I hold it’s hand
we lumber about
together on a pathway
where others also dawdle
They pass by not seeing us
as they tend to their cyber-link toy
in their hand unaware of life
abounding about them

I stop to observe and enjoy
the daily playful display
of chipping sparrows,
cardinals and blue jays
flying from tree to tree
Squirrels and their chipmunk cousins
scurrying about playing tag
They notice me and stop and sit
upright on their haunches
watching me watch them
The crimson of cardinals
the blue of the jays
the brown and black of the sparrows
are a colorful attire perched
on white capped otherwise baron limbs
of undressed trees on this wintry day

I turn around to go back inside the warmth of my abode
Awaiting me is my favorite reclining chair
and my entertainment implement of choice
where I can exist vicariously
in the likes of Keats, Shelley,
Poe and Emily, Pat Conroy or Sam Harris,
Amy Chua and Sherry Turkle
The crackle of logs burning
wildly waving it's orange and yellow flames
warming the side of my face
as Chopin tickles those ivory's in my ears

On my lap the gentle chest compressions
of my small canine children
sharing my warmth of space
whilst the heart beat of my partner
sits next to me drifting into her world of erudition
sated by the whimsy of fiction
We appreciate our human presence
the life that warms our laps
and not an email, text or twitter
or a cybernating avatar

Released

Love’s abused
     hearts forlorn
          the human spirit
a distant cry


     my words
en writ
         decried
  but still
               I sing

        I hug
my muse
               release
I fly

Untie Me

Used to be tied in a knot
Have recently been untied
My ears are now clear
My eyelids open
My chest can inhale deeply

I don’t know if I like being untied
Free, dangling
Where anyone can tie me
Into the knot they wish

Now I can be tethered
Anchored under water
Tied to a kite, soaring
Hold turkey legs together
Hug a roast
Thrown into a heated oven

They use me to tie wrists
I travel around the world on packages
Best of all, though,
Some use me to steady
sweet smelling flowers in their gardens,
Roses to the trestle

I’m used in parables
'Thread of Life'
Morphed into metaphysical theories
(the string theory)
Used as metaphors
‘held together by a thread’

I guess I don’t mind
being used to tie things together
Don’t know if I like being in a knot
But I also don’t like being
‘left dangling not knowing,
hanging by a thread’ .

I’m all knotted up

Gabby's Chant

A chant like a song
A refrain for equity, for parity
ascends from her voice

She sings the words
from her heart, her soul
‘this nation embraces all of us
in the words of our Constitution’

A crack rings out
The song is quieted
Screams resound
She falls and
a child of 9/11/01
lay beside her
on a carpet of red
now breathless

The chant has stopped
muffled by an angry hand
holding a weapon
given to him by the very ‘rights’
of the verses being sung

Her chant; ‘Our Constitution provides
us all the …freedom of speech;
peaceable assembly and the right
to petition the Government for
the redress of grievances‘.

Bullets will not quiet voices, convictions
we've tried this with 'wars'
The taste of liberty, freedom
remains in memory, in songs
chants by those with the courage
to sing on Mall corners