l_ArtMan

VENICE POETRY 2003

THE ESSENCE OF THE MATTER AT HAND

the present world in it's avariciousness

has so precluded beauty, truth and justice

that we three freethinkers are forced

to ponder the dilemma of humanity's demise

twenty-four hours a day

seers agree that even in the darkest age

imaginable, virtue's law is immutable

so stand on that my noble friends

the merit of character is eternal

and the measure of virtue is doing;

the rest is talk

A LOVELY ONE

a lovely one from venus

reaching for the stars

has exposed her tender navel

"may i? may i? may i?"

may i just brush my lips

on the ineffable dual mounds beneath

i promise that is all

i will do

not all i want

but i respect your wishes

unless you say

"go ahead do more"

"i love you"

your passion and gentleness

a cause to abandon first and second thoughts

my pleasure is your joy

the lotus is moist

and i am yours

i breathe you in and exhale myself

compelled to succumb to

nature's imperious and delirious reward

the divine entwining

of molding lips to lips

and form to form

I breathe you in

And exhale myself

The dance begins

With heightened awareness

Purest enthusiasm

Coming in so softly…

Excruciating sweetness

We prolong our joy

Beyond my cold expectations

You and I

My soul and yours

Blending

Attending

Animal maximum

Senses overcome, engulfing time

Now, intently attuned… a mounting necessity

Divinely devised, simultaneously we pray

I for your release and you for mine

Testes and womb conspire

Primal ecstasy, the end all… petite mort

Love is made… gratefully, gently, hand in hand

The silent aftermath of reverie completes the play

BETWEEN THE STARS AND THE ATOMS

somewhere between the absolute maximum

and the infinite miniscule

i am

and i am wondering

at the mystery of my private universe

and time and love

DIVINE PURPOSE

coming as i am to the verdant swamp

i cry out a dying war cry

imploring gods outside myself

for succor

at the end

life so precious as a gift

abjuring blind faith and heedless hope

await the chopping off of my very life

i have no regrets as to my merit

the prize of posterity exonerating

not so much my paltry work

or four fine progeny

as a point i've held stalwartly

if people work together

the hidden but not disguised elixir

will foment

the tranformation of base metal

is the truth of our work

the goal is the gold of the soul

Doomed

The boy did shed his happiness

The girl her sweet perfume

But ah! Alas! I cannot laugh 'cause

I love mortal doom

The artist paints disease on

The brick beguiling wall of existence

A requiem forlorn

Or with master strokes portrays

The hidden beauty of universal form

EDEN AND THE CITY

Yes! Know that I walk in the clovered fields of Eden

Thoughtlessly radiating peace

Mindfully eating the honey of wisdom

See? The world is blooming with new spirits

A waterfall of souls

Streaming in two rivers

Into the city.

The city pulses with hungry insistence

But Eden breathes in and out

The city feeds the hungry

But Eden knows no hunger.

The food is the sun and the rain

The wheel of seasons rolling interminably on

Mornings and nights

Turning turning turning

Whither turnest thou world?

Hurry hurry hurry

Before it escapes you….. Eternity

Can we prepare not to miss it?

Ducks in a row

Bang! Bang bang bang!

Take your prize and go.

ENCOUNTERS WITH WOMEN

The ones I see I know are lovely

I wish for them

Most are beyond me or behind me too far

The ones that I meet and love, may want me

I carefully consider their needs

The ones I befriend

The ones who befriend me

With some I'm false…. With some I'm true

The ones where my attempt at the summit

is a crumbling ledge.

But, it's the ones who give me themselves that I adore

You can have the rest

I will always love them all

Women! Can't love 'em and leave 'em

Can't love 'em and keep 'em

But I can always love Their winning ways

POLYNESIA

amidst the jaybirds turkeys and pidgeons

i ply my trade

the work of my hands and eyes and heart

pulling myself up

with pure feeling and grit

amongst the myriad madmen and lunatics

i forge my self with newfangled design

my cup runneth over

the milk and the honey are sweet

now laughing at worry

exultantly singing the song of love

i ask for nothing

go ahead, put me out on eskimo ice

if that's your opinion of the old ones

but the chunk i am riding will

drift to polynesia and melt me on the beach

ROBIN

There never was nor will there ever be a more poignant memory

Than when I held my girl's bared breast for the first time

There against the meadows ironwood split rail fence

Even her light blue shirt yielded softly as I fumbled with virginal buttons

The perfect form was beauty like strawberries and cream

I cupped that single breast in reverent hand

Caused a gasp

And gulping back my grateful tears

Began with hungry mouth

To shower kisses on shining eyes and ruby lips

In the crisp turquoise spring morning sun

The lark's song praised the seasons juices flowing

SLEEPWALKING

that morning i saw her

lithe.... Sappho nymph

herding butterfies on the bike path

maybe warm and hazy days

increase the nose for sex

my appetite for love went haywire

biting my tongue not to blurt out

"i love you"

for i do

and see myself with you

wrestling in the pungent grass

instantly, i knew the exact shade of pink

your twin aureoles

and gaged the length of your nethermost beard

all i offer is a kind of potent stiffness

and a clumsy passion walking in my sleep

SMOOTH

Smooth and silky her hair

Her golden hair on slim brown arm languorously draped

And loving across still heaving chest

The aftermath reverie

Gazing at nothing at all

Hungry pull on cigarette

No talk at first but then a happy joke, a giggle a loving smile

She snuggles closer and mixes our breaths

Sparks alchemical in the hidden world.

Sends messages only my body needs to know

Drifting in safe contented love my dreams

Come softly in.

SPRING

in the braken noble bonfires

illuminate the northern night

a fete fantastic for errant fools and savants

fueled by roasted suckling lamb and pomegranate wine

naked nubile nymphs enact the vernal epiphany

an ancient tribal ritual

of gratitude for spring

with gentle moss a bed is made

and aphrodite's twin recreated in perfect form

her compassed lines and amaranthine glance

like a solitary candle in a windless cave

she stands tall and luminous

then, twirling in their midst to pagan rhythms

her vestal veils a flying

and glimpses of a creamy skin and rosy orbs

a hero's eye fixed and enamored

intoxicated, entranced even

he joins the dance 'pas de deux'

'til golden limbs well oiled reflect

the roaring pyre and watchfull moon

breathless and disheveled entwined the two

on fragrant carpet moss

strewn with sweet rose red petals

and her petals yielded hungrily

to his potent power

and two were one and blessed

THE EXUBERANT PALM

the exuberant palm

dares the wind to blow

her feathered fronds are bending

as if bliss could be a vision

or, in the calm expectant

loosely letting limbs languish

like actors' arms, gathers

power from the light

then when the howling winds

shake lashing leaves

the limit of endurance

and frowning branches snap

and fly and fall to a remnant

of their original selves

the palm stands humbly counting

fewer arms

and sucking deeply

from the soil

transforms a liquid intoxicant

the mother tree spews forth

fresh shoots to fan the laughing stars

THE POOREST OF THE POOR AM i

the poorest of the poor am i

my two hands rhinoceri

still can craft substantial life

with bleeding blasphemy deformed

the center of my core

is cracked

for the worm of desire

continues to gnaw on my soul

so full of life, a past

a trail of noble efforts

a showering of gifts of god

the children still giggling in my brain

caged with me

in a fiery furnace of a cranium

the pearls of pleasure

strung in sequence sublimely sustaining self

still i see a secret satisfaction

sneaking in

my shame is of the hardest sort

my remorse eternal

the grace of faith eludes my prayers

and disaster dogs my path

VENICE VORTEX

in the venice vortex various victims

are sucked in and down

while others thriving on purer energy evolve

the sleeping world sheds ethereal particles

tiny stars gleaming vermillion ultramine or cadmium yellow

and with surpassing grandeur

we gather and save the gems

and swallow them and wash them down

with molten lead

the fire within blazes with ardent passion

courage it takes to contain the truth

persistence it takes to be true

my dual dilemma

who am i?... who is asking?

what am i? ... what is wishing?

why am i?... why the question?

the seeds of fear

there's insanity in being right all the time

there's insanity in ignoring truth

soft rose petals float from innocent mouths

collide with the sparse dark particles

splinters of evil have a headlong pace

every movement, every lie

becomes ridiculous in the real world.

i mind that the silence is shattered by metallic scrapings

noxious gases gather in layers of frightening colors

my opinion of precious beauty

may be the poison that corrodes gold

but wishing that those thorny daggers of error

are tricks of the light

and those fantastic chimeras which peaked our joy unexpectedly

and fed our wantonness were all a mist... no harm at all

are but the pains that seeds of fear will reap in times to come

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