ALL RESPONSES |
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Are strong. They are two. Their shins
are unbreakable. With our six eyes
together, we have seen time
and all its errors.
They continue to find antecedents
for new things.
They were given to me. To break sweat.
To dance with someone’s daughter.
To kiss a willing mouth. To give a peach
away.
They were given to me. I thought once
by mistake. I sit between them,
sometimes in great pain,
and ask nothing.
Their fingers count. Their hands.
Their eyes. Their mother.
They think they might move. They do.
When they play in the park,
it is no longer empty.
I tell them three things: Wait for the path;
Look to turn; Expect no reasons.
It’s all a juggling act. |
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If I could really see, as
sometimes I’m led to, the man
dancing down the street is
really juggling his love affair
with the things of this world
encircling him. In love,
he has grown huge, heavy
wings for he must also be
part bird; how can you dance
without flying over the floor,
down the lane, taking great
leaps? All the while his love
waits for him. She’s dressed
in a pretty, sky-blue gown,
with a long, lacy train, her heart
beating fast in the wings.
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(For Dave)
My friends called it “canary,” a secret code for raging ragweed capable of complete stonification. I don’t know if anyone was foiled by this fowl buzzword.
I mean, it was never phrased,
“Do you want to feed the canary,”
“Do you want to pet the canary,”
“Do you want to teach the canary a new word,” or
“Do you want to kiss the canary?”
It was always “do you want some canary,” like they were partaking in a bizarre parakeet kind of Thanksgiving, complete with secret herb stuffing.
The absolute giveaway is when they said, “Hey, pass the canary,” or “quit hogging the fuckin’ canary.” Any hint of a secret was now as obvious as a seed in a dish or bud on a plant.
The talk of canaries subsided and in the haze of the encroaching Amazon Jungle, the caws and musings of Mynah Birds, budgies and Macaws hung in the air, sweet smoke from a dying bird.
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Once from her cellophane
box, she was taken
and played with
for hours.
Dressed and undressed
a thousand times.
Hair brushed, lips
pert and fresh
always pink, never red,
and a perpetual smile.
This love affair lasted
for three years.
He told her, “I’ll sit
with your silence.
I’ll sit with your screams.
I’ll hold you as needed.”
And then it began:
Sometimes, he left her naked
for days
on the floor. Beneath the bed.
Her hair became ratty. He
told her she wasn’t pretty
anymore. Held her
upside down. Twisted
her arms.
He finally set her
in the closet and shut
the door.
She was put down
in that place where she no longer
lived:
No one to hear
her confessions.
Never dreaming at night;
eyes open and forever
porcelain.
In the closet, on the top shelf,
listening to her owner
loving someone else tonight. |
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His mother, Feige-Ite.
His father, a fishmonger.
His life, happy though impoverished,
appears on Pokrovskaya Street,
restored as references
two years later as a child
named Ida.
His life, at the age of 97,
issued under threat,
is located in the most westerly
aisle, next to the window.
Upon entering the cemetery,
Large-scale spaces, fringes of
Happiness and optimism involving
Emerging trends, vivid colors
Abounding with rich and intriguing detail
Communicates oppression in general.
Himself.
Often posed with Stalin.
The Nazi Holocaust.
The Twelve Tribes.
Large palettes, themes involving
Windows, meat, milk, leather, all
painted together with lovers
from the present to the 1920’s,
all holding flowers, wearing
wedding gowns for his
121st birthday.
And up in the sky? Freedom.
Opened in 1966 on
A postage stamp made
Of glass, where at the reception
he famously said:
“Will there be anymore!?”
(from the wikipedia entry provided)
Click here |
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Broken bones,
and still you dance.
Joy replaces pain replaces joy replaces pain...
And still you dance.
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Time kindles the fire,
shoots flames from your lips,
cherry stained- the corners of your mouth
point down. It's as if the stars have no say-
no favors to give.
Over the horizon we yell at things that are unfair,
we question constellations and the shapes of clouds.
The noise of the unknown makes loud reverberations,
shakes truth through the shoulders.
An orchestra of the abyss plays
as shadows of squealing violins dance behind the curtain.
The clock that waiting keeps close
its hands juggle the hours of the day.
Life has made you an invalid.
A vegetable with arms;
lungs in waiting.
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If you will juggle, I will make a rhyme,
No matter that the Devil holds us fast
And all our pretty toys must fall at last,
For all he ever has to sell is time. |
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Juggling a life of esquetarian adventure
can lead one to focus of time, love and
the disabilities at hand when once eats like a bird. |
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Once,
the Phoenix got tired of
being required to rise
from its own
ashes,
each time it
went up in flames.
Now and then
it would prefer to stay put,
sleep it off.
The ashes were nice and warm.
The only way
to do that was
obvious. It would have to
turn himself
into a man,
a human being.
He asked Marc Chagal
who had often been its client
if there was a way.
Marc did not answer.
Just fashioned a painting,
his idea
of what a phoenix would look like
having done that.
Accordingly,
the phoenix got himself
a half-jacket
with the fiddler,
the one on the roof,
that seemed to be
one of Marc's pet subjects.
The phoenix got its rest
but discovered
it hurt more
to burn up
as a man.
much more to go |
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As a younger man,
hopes hovered as spheres before me,
always within reach.
These many-colored orbs whispered
hold us
but with each attempt,
slipped further away,
and led me around the world.
Years later, they still float before me,
closer than ever.
My hands engage in artful play,
deft and studied,
in what would seem to be an act.
With each subtle movement,
the balls come closer.
The prize at last
is almost mine. |
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she wears white and khaki
not a hair out of place
she shakes her rugs
exactly at 1:00 pm
everyday
she washes her windows
once a week
has pretty flowers
hanging outside
she has no pets
very few friends
and she cleans and cleans
for no one
***
he’s tall
curly brown hair
pulled in to a ponytail
he walks back and forth
in front of my window
with a cane
i’ve secretly
named him peacock
i visualize a
plume of feathers
on his arse
***
he rides a bike
back and forth
to the catholic church
he has a full long whitish beard
and long dirty blonde hair
his body language
reveals inner rage
i’ve named him unabomber
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It is appropriate,
the look you have of half bird and half man.
Your bright and sensual colors
make me think of the festive umbrellas
I just left at the Italian Riviera's beaches,
where my worries were limited
to sun tanning and ice-cream.
My time is hidden in the image you are
of a bird ready to fly, again,
too soon away from here.
Like a waiter holding a towel on his arm,
you seem to dance, juggling on one foot
the time we have left.
I don't want to leave,
I don't want to come back & yet
I realize that I have no choice.
I wish I had your wings,
full of wind and white of clouds,
I'd use them to carry me from home to home.
I wish I could dance between here & there
with love and not angst
for what I leave behind and what's ahead...
Color my tired heart
with many shades of red and deep blue,
and hopeful green.
Let me close my eyes and only see the beauty
there is in these last few days
to be spent among family & friends,
so that when I am back to my familiar walls
I'll smile instead of cry.
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You juggle between the candle
of belief, your people, your
Holy Days and traditions
and the empty well of hope,
all that went up in smoke.
Can man ever be redeemed
when he takes pleasure in
inflicting pain? Your broken heart
shone blue in the flame.
Your fiddler wept a melody
of remembrance, then called for
the dance to continue.
And could you guess the rebirth
on fairer soil, the pledge
to be taken down no more,
the fragrant smell of victory
amidst the harsh truth of
plows to swords, swords to
plows, eternal juggling act?
Did you tear your vein
open with your teeth
since they had
removed all weapons
to paint your
memories, your blind hope
that there is justice
and it will at last prevail?
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you took my heart
and danced upon its flame
and then allowed
my feet to do the same
to yours each night
in dreams and parodies
of daylight
like seas of blood
that washed our sin away
each eve soon passed
into a brighter day
until at last
you turned and went away
toward darkness
and yet my heart
beats like you still are here
with arms wrapped round
my columned pillared years
and memory
brings back our days of youth
and tenderness
and soon my feet
will tender sit inside the ground
with your hand next
to where my hand is found
and roots will grind
our bones and breathe alike
rejoicing
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To get ready for any set-to
he had himself done all in blue.
But that head and those wings
kept him out of the ring,
hence, instead of wrestling, he flew. |
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Invocation:
“Resume” by Dorothy Parker
Razors pain you;
Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you;
And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren’t lawful;
Nooses give;
Gas smells awful;
Might as well live.
Thank you, Jeanne, finder of juice and muses.
Thank you, Andrea, obsessed with birds and coffee.
Thank you, Ike, love poet of Latvia.
Thank you, Marcus, eighteen turner.
Thank you, Louis, thinker of things that can’t be written down.
Second Half Invocation:
“You Are Old, Father William” by Lewis Carroll
'You are old, Father William', the young man said,
'And your hair has become very white;
And yet you incessantly stand on your head --
Do you think, at your age, it is right?'
'In my youth', Father William replied to his son,
'I feared it might injure the brain;
But, now that I'm perfectly sure I have none,
Why, I do it again and again.'
Thank you, Wendy, passionate poet of unique venues.
Thank you, Piece of Pink Paper, written by Wendy,
and thrown at me by Britt, that says:
18.
clicked shut and he
is afraid to open his eyes
on the scene, the way their life
has suddenly emptied
into one blue backpack
Thank you, Joel, publisher who appears elsewhere.
Thank you, Britt, runner, liver, computer, retirer, germander, and father.
Thank you, Esther, who writes.
Thank you, Maia, coverless and unjudged.
Thank you, Common Roots coffee shop, our time and space.
Thank you, 35 or so attendees, enthusiastic and supportive.
Thank you, if I forgot you, really, you’re unforgettable.
Closing poem:
“Observation” by Dorothy Parker
If I don’t drive around the park,
I’m pretty sure to make my mark.
If I’m in bed each night by ten,
I may get back my looks again.
If I abstain from fun and such,
I’ll probably amount to much.
but I shall stay the way I am,
because I do not give a damn. |
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Metaphor today--
tomorrow maybe five or six.
Next week might be
synecdoche
just for kicks.
Happened on hyperbole--
tipped my hat to trope.
Parable and paradox
build a wider scope.
Literal and figurative--
both are here to stay.
Isn't it a wonder
how words can have their say.
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(nothing to do with the image, just a random poem)
In my hut
you'll find
a Brass Arabian spyglass,
yellow tallow candle
and a walnut-colored skull.
Well,
It’s not really a skull,
it's a coconut shell,
but during the full Samoan moon,
through my bamboo window
it looks like a hairy thugee head,
ready to rob me blind.
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We have the big blues
from juggling the stuff
we think (we're told) we
cannot do without.
With the legs of an Olympian,
wings of a dove, brains
of a chicken, we are--with
the other shadow figures
in the show, chasing the clock.
The others fade to faint and
small--idea-bubbles, from
somewhere in the background
of our turn in the spotlight.
It's all about the center ring, and
what we're wearing. What animal
we are today, jumping through
hoops put up to make us look
loony and utterly uncoordinated.
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The village is a sparkling green
from singing and dancing and
the reverb of a banjo karaoke
We howl at the dog star
the young ones gossip and giggle
and we kiss our girls
full on the lips, on the sweaty brows,
on the cherry cheeks
our lips now salty, and sweet with
perfume.
Our girls blush,
a universal giggle. This is a taste
we want to never leave our mouths.
We lick our lips and dance.
The Christian blue of evening
has turned to a pagan twilight.
Do you feel that? We're loose.
Set loose on the world.
Do you feel that?
It's joy, that's what it is.
I think. No...
Do you feel that? It's pain.
How friendly and warm it is.
How it cuddles up next to you
like a pair of thighs and the crook
of an elbow slung around your waist.
That pain right now is the sweetest thing
we've ever felt, and we all feel it
tonight.
The old folks call it
'heartbreak,' a familiar friend,
and they banish it away with a wave of the hand.
It comes for us, though,
as a knot in the gut,
as a languid flash of knowledge,
as we dance in the courtyard, the music faster
sparkling green becoming ripe plum purple.
It comes for us as big blue eyes, dark brown eyes,
hazel eyes and green eyes--the girls.
Because they are the first, and will not last.
We will hurt them, and they will not be the last.
We will hurt each other and move limping
to new partners and hurt them too.
The twilight has turned to night,
and the music has slowed.
This is the world just being honest with us. |
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She is a window to him, and through her
you can see his dancer, his clock.
And the horses, the men in hats.
There is a red tree, a violin set to his shoulder.
And there is that mirror in his back
where if he is very still
you can just glimpse her wings... |
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Like birds, we see from
only one eye at a time:
One eye looks back – at the
monochrome of family and first
home, the girl on horseback who
waved you on, and the uncles
and cousins who watched you
lean firm into your life, unfurl
wings – not a bird, but something
sleek and hurried – watched you lift
away, leaving childhood baked firm
as an urn of cinnabar clay;
The other eye aims high, away
from roots, and like the unfolding
of a blanket, the sky opens
to you, the wind carries you swift
over pastures where blue horses
reign, past the billowing skirts of fresh
girls hovering high over lakes, and you
follow your own fiddler’s call, hang
the clock’s pendulum upside down
so you find your own pace;
And then this: swirls of lilac and rose,
the dusty blue of cornflowers,
beckoning –
come,
come,
as you glide the upward spiral toward
your holiest state – that of living
head on, as all life approaches, your
movements unprescribed, the blood rushing
hard through your thighs,
And you wind your way
higher,
higher,
toward the limitless you, taste
the delicate cotton of clouds
that whisper wise in your mouth, feel
the fragrant tips of treetops that tickle
your feet, while you juggle moons of many
planets, and your eyes finally work
together to take in the full world.
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After the heat of the day:
the burning grass, my scorched
heart
I wait for a sudden rain
to raise flowers
from the dust
I need something
to believe in
a pretty girl selling
newly picked peaches
from wicker baskets
or a two-lane wayside
dotted with red corn poppies
i place my wrist
watch over my right arm
and wait for a place
any place I could stop
and dance; where soft
earth can measure steps
of quiet desperation |
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when I was young
I never was so young
as to appreciate the dancing globe
outside me
when I was old
I never was too old
to figure out
your hand was in mine
I disappear
I simply disappear
and memory
is trailing here beside me
I disappear
I know I disappear
and yet your hand
is terror here in mine
I do not know
why we are growing old
so strange to say
we are growing as we are dying
to disappear
like footsteps placed in sand
to blow away
in time to blow away |
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Nine o'clock holds me in her arms,
dark girlfriend no one can see.
Mosquitos sing warnings, distractions
designed to keep slapping hands
away from thickly veined ankles,
delicious human entree.
Ten's beer feeds flying swarms,
gainfully engaged as themselves,
lovers, eaters, gourmet critics -
leave itching pink hillocks on skin.
Please don't scratch them,
don't make them bleed.
Eleven closes eyes, rubs back with breeze
blown as heat retreats beneath earth,
planning next week's killer storm,
or tomorrow afternoon's
doomsday sky formations.
Midnight writhes, makes mad love,
whispers wild ideas. Her cries
are beating wings no one can hear.
Soon, she begins to sleep in peace,
lips parted to release
another poem with each deep breath.
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Waiter, your legs are blue with standing, and varicosed with trees,
what kind of man are you, then, with your beak pointing - snooty -
and your watch-fob pinning the serviette over your sunburned hand?
The violinist in your soul worries no one, but the time you keep so close to your vest, and to the wine, has everyone upset.
The foot of woman at the base of your bird-beaked body is disconcerting.
You might consider this as you go about kicking one heel up to your gullet
when the people come to dine.
You are an anomaly - grotesque, and it’s lucky you’re made up of blue,
and the shapes of caresses…
Your wings, ah, saving grace (thank your maker),
for they theoretically allow your flight away
from this confounding existence.
But perhaps your intentions are to remain?
Maybe you want to wait
until the varicose legs leaf out and
your arms wrinkle in age…
wait until you cannot live -
according to your watch, one second more -
and fly only in that instant. |
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The juggler’s trick is setting back the clock
so far that she dances through the war
with clocks on her silk stockings.
Diners feasting on pheasant hear
running feet, a sort of percussion
in Tiananmen Square, as the maitre ‘d
draws the shade and makes Chagall
limn the one-legged gymnast,
who teeters in the abattoir—
his useless wings won’t fly,
but the president keeps him there,
the chosen one who earns his daily
script: Support the troops. Wear your flag
pin. No new taxes. Get over it. Get over it.
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