Dimensions Of Flying Maps

Journey, iridescence
Swirling on spheres,
Marmoreal maps in air,
Also there, in scale,
Are routes and destinations.
On sale in gas stations,
Ones stripped of depth
So they can fold,
Be unfolded, consulted
En route, have
Depth left out.
It seems round ones
Shrivel into their
Thousand dreams
And are gone;
Maps minus
Length and width
Never caught on.

Indeterminable Ideas

There are propositions,
Starting from axioms,
That can be neither
Proven nor refuted.
They look up and go

"Oh".

This gap between what
Is true and what is
Provable --interrogative

"Oh?"

Or certain

"Oh."

Contains the mystery
Of all things movable,
Contains you, coexistence
In time where all
Events relate to

"Oh!"--

Exclamatory.

Oh,

There is no symbol
More indeterminate.
I love that.

Cathexis

Gusts struggle in
Hedges and escape--
Unconscious doesn't
Distinguish
Inside, outside.
What divides the mind
Divides the
Universe, which has
No outside but
Wind drums at
Palings, pots topple
And our back shutters
Bang shut.
Then, something is
Out there but we
Don't know what.

Oh Good, It's Dan

Stony rain of
Dust in orbit twirled
Down into a new
World, roaring, compressed
Under its own mass
Exploding back
In boulders --long
Low roil hissing steam,
Soil, oceans on
Tectonic plates.
I was not there but
Hear it from
My garden gate.
It was a slow climb
From debris to garden,
A long time and hard,
To planethood.
But now friends
Get in my yard
And that is good.

Existence Problem

We have an existence problem.
We are not here,
Then we are born.
We are here but
Other things aren't quite,
Like UFOs: celebrity can
Fetch the mail with
His shirt buttoned wrong
And pictures are everywhere;
UFO can shut down airports
And cameras record fuzz.
Then we die and
Don't exist except
As fuzz photographed
Over seances.
Seance is a congress
Of disembodied souls
Like Internet discussions.
You can fetch email
In a fuzzy shirt and
Never get photographed
At all, which means
You are an unidentified
Flying celebrity
Or do not exist.

Wasn't Me

Scylla is an old
Monster, six sailor-snatching
Heads and the yelp
Of unhappy hounds.

It lives in a cave by the sea.

Scylla has twelve feet
Clawed into rock
Inside of me and

Overlooks the course of thought.

Doesn't mind destinations,
Care where they're bound,
Ill or well, canoes or
Columbus in his caravel

And lives in a cave by the sea.

Scylla leaves them
Derelict on tides --cargoes
Go where cargo goes
When no one decides

What follows fear at sea.

Goofy dog heads.
Goofy me could save them
All --barge, brigantine, ketch.

Throw six sticks from Scylla, then yell

"Fetch!" But in this cave
I haven't the heart to
See my monster rip apart.

Musee Mecanique

Under oak veneer and
Bevelled glass,
She is sad sometimes.
Complex, an orchestrion
Rattled, buzzing inside:
Something in dark where
Whippens work; something
Stirring in dark over
Maple pinblock and bridge,
Ridges and racks of
Brass and ash --spruce
Shim slipped from
A soundboard crack,
Lost levers veiled in
Danger and promise.
What dark entails:
Searching after a
Spring fails. I press.
A little felted hammer
Strikes no reply.
Sometimes she is sad
And can't remember why.

Arrival By Time Machine

Morning
Rattle of curtain
Rings, things
Beginning, doors
open, things begin--
Noise subdued,
Discreet.
Feet, issued from
A door, drum
Muffled down
A hall, leaving
Sheets rumpled
Into morning,
The future,
That's all.

Ductile Time

Melting points
Make crystal relax.
At ninety-nine degrees
A human may be drawn
Like wire over years.
Tungsten takes six thousand.
Dreams steam off at that.
Where do they go?
What current causes
Them to glow?

Love Poem

Does it
Change so much?
Memory touches hair,
Cheek unlined,
Lined, luminous.
One's mind
Traces shoulders, knees,
Murmurs fatuities
To time from all time.
No such thing as
Younger, older,
Only now over all--
Arms open under reeling
Stars return
Embraces-- open,
close, open into
Time, faces --
Her eyes, his.
Is love eternal?
Likely, yes,
I suppose it is.

La Poule

Dancing to
Armegeddon grimly,
Young, unkind.
I did not want to
Leave the dance,
Grow a mind in
Patterned chance where
Borromean rings
Rattle free but
Did, didn't we?
Remember dimly,
See it still--
Co-pilots at
Quadrille, partners.
Shall we leave
This festooned hill,
Find a farm?
Let us go then,
Arm in arm.

Weathersmith Grieving

Time sends a
Scrollwork of
Winter wind and
Ore to be
Bent into it--
Brittle ore, careful
Work under
Rounding hammer,
Annealing, pickling,
Or winter breaks
Like glass.
Its dome planished
Upon the past
Spins and shatters
Against a
Future we need
To feel again.

Pleiades

Reward of constellation,
Rising sun--
Rainy ones, sisters--
Resist definition
In numbers, as father
Atlas suffered.
Hunters, suitors
Stalk because
Orion does stalk,
Brawl the stunned beast,
Make dogs of us all
And bring us to our least.
These were ancient
Greeks, real, devout,
Who knew worlds
Heal inside out.

Atlantis Underway

Cherubs study
Marble lilies
In their hands.
Statuary makes such
Permanent demands.
Life, fur and chalk,
Clutching a
Mossy rock ringed
In water, ancestors,
Sons, daughters
Composes, annuls.
What is seen above?
Fog and gulls glide
The good we do.
What we love
Remains inside.

Blepharospasm

Positive thinking
Leads to insomnia.
Anything complicated
As a brain begs
To fly apart.
Faith is a
Different art:
These immortal
Sparks in fur
Are cats, sleeping,
Seeking their
Containers' shapes,
Curled in baskets,
Pie-tins.
Now awake, escaped,
Sprung into passion
And care, and
Like me, uncertain
And losing hair.

Seven Words In Search Of Punctuation

One looks
Into it
It looks
Into one

What is
Created
Created
What is

One is
Created into
What is created
Into one

Dream Trail

Down a narrow
Track to water,
Winding under trees,
I like to think
Something happens
At the end -- a
Pool fringed
In reeds--
Something important
In a way we
Don't understand.
It emits a mist
That disappears
On land --
Indeed, miracle
Enough for me.

Needs Must

I have risen early
To no purpose,
My opinion
Not required.
Old enough
Surely -- I should
Be resigned to
Under-rank design
Outlined in
Fallen apples--
To know art
And novelty tick
Away in others'
Needs, that what
I think, feel,
What I do
Recede.

In My Stove

A log can burn,
Release years
Of gathered sunlight
From its rings.
We also burn,
Metabolize the
Ageless light
Of things--
Far fires,
Stars unknown--
And to the
Light of stars
Return our own.

Monody

Some things
Are impossible
To find on purpose.
We are composed
Of stunning antiquity
And antiparticles
Shot from the
End of time.
Only here, you,
Me, forever,
Do we seek
Causality.

Sweep Second Hand

I can plan the
Contents of an
Hour, know its
Coordinates by
Clock and calendar

And tell where
Rain fell alive
On dust where
Dust traveled in wind.

I can see where
Rain ends, but
What an hour is,
Or instant, I can't
Tell, and understand
Eternity as well.

New Morning

Time in a window,
Impossible eliminates
Itself, moonlit lawn,
Night, lives go where
Curtains close, where
Sounds pass, stars rise
And eyes shine in hedge.
An unending edge of
Dawn ignites the glass.
Probability saves
Your ass and that's
All right --just keep
Probable, night
After night.

Barometerhead

Migraine day.
I sit outside
And pull down
My hat--
Aspirin, espresso,
Meditation informed
By birdsong.
Nothing wrong
With that.

Working The Dream Exchange

I go down grassy
Dunes, with sling
Of tools, to the
Beach --littered
With leather straps,
Brass buckles,
Shin boots, hobbles--
Where souls rode in
On waves that rolled
Out of bridles,
Surcingles and slid
Back out to sea.
They are little use
To me, but I untangle,
Sort and store them
On sand for those
Who strike out,
Traces in hand,
From this shore
And need them more.

Garcia Bend

On this side of
The levee you
Can hear the
Heavy bray of
Barges --sound
Delivered to
A child whose
World enlarges
By the river.
The other side
Is still wild.

Short Term Prophecy

Day exasperating in
Every particular.
All its doubts so far
Nagging, deliberate.
Time pinched, dodgy,
Going late --we wake
Bewildered.
Things skid off,
Break --we learn
Wilderness.
An unkind day,
Nattering, unpunctual,
In no way
Flattering, functional
Or fit for memory.
Yet I'll remember
It, this silly day,
And like it anyway.

Quantum Wave Adjustment Kit

Being you is
Barefoot on broad
Piers at night rejoicing
Where beach fires
Compose wishes.
Being me is
Fifty-some-odd
Years ago noticing
How much pliers
Look like fishes.

Ponchielli, Religion Too

A steel spoon
Over an oak table,
Wine refracting
Lamplight red on
Two cookies in a
Blue glass bowl--
1952 recording,
Callas, "La
Gioconda" on the
Radio-- who knows
If I have a soul?

My Stunt Double, Part Two

She talks about friends
Our age --generations:
"They had children who
Had children who are
Absolutely crazy..."
Never have I heard the
Old Testament expressed
So succinctly, and,
Because it is
Is a book of Biblical
Proportions, I should
listen to her oftener.