Just as a child talks to his dad, talk to the Supreme Lord.
He'll fulfil your needs and show you the heavenly abode.
Praise him. Worship him. Glorify his name as it's holy.
You are a co-heir of his kingdom. Do not feel lowly.
When you lack food at night for your guest, won't you ask your friend?
Though he feels irked first, won't he answer your need at the end?
With an innate pulse, he knows all your needs before you ask.
As flies and bees, yet, labouring for your bread is your task.
Have you ever asked with faith and felt that you'd not heeded?
Though you searched like a seeker, were your efforts impeded?
Did your kith and kin spurn opening the door when you knocked?
From the sun, moon, and stars (nature's conveyors), are you blocked?
Your soul must be light like a feather, all the burdens shed.
You must twine with the Father, like a flower with the thread.
There's an empty space
you carry around and mostly ignore.
It doesn't cause much pain
when thoughts are elsewhere
or you are given facts to explain
away the ache. Nothing more
than an abandoned space
once occupied by gods
whose ghosts danced
in the flickering light
of an ancestral cave,
a residual hollow left
in the evolution of the brain.
Yet it lingers, a constant niggle
not confined to any one locale.
You try and fill it
with all kinds of tripe,
an endless stream of goods
carried on conveyors disappear
down its throat. Fictions
baked in the ovens
of the human mind may
satisfy for awhile but all
eventually evaporate.
There's still an empty space
you carry around that you can't
seem to fill.
It sits at the center
of your human lot,
a nagging need to be cultivated
and treasured
in your deepest quiet.
It's the only thing you have
that draws you towards
the shapeless gravity
of an unknowable God
or nothing at all.
Some call them junk
because of dust and rust.
Strangers disdain their honored positions
on shelves and secure places.
Owners refer to tricycles
with tattered ribbons hanging from tarnished handles as memories,
Worn out Flexible Flyers with rusty runners
as conveyors of bundled joy on snowy days,
Unpolished roller skates hanging
next to freezers as vehicles of independence,
Wooden handled golf clubs
resting in corners as symbols of health,
Dog bowls resting on top
of old wardrobes as memorials to best friends.
I call them treasure.
A belt keeps pants from falling down
Or gives the loops employment.
A song that’s belted out may give
The audience enjoyment.
A belt of Scotch may calm the nerves
But there is no denyin’
The brightest belt is in the sky
On he who hunts, Orion.
One belt can lay a boxer flat
And factory surveyors
Keep track of goods that travel
On the belts we call conveyors.
What prompted this was Henry,*
Such a proud, excited fellow
Who just passed his test in Tae Kwon Do
And earned his belt of yellow!
*my 4 ½ year old grandson
When packing for a trip to where
The weather’s always iffy,
It’s hard to know just what to take
So you’ll be looking spiffy.
The same advice is given by
Experienced conveyors,
And that is you should plan each day
To dress yourself in layers.
I understand the concept, but
The execution’s tough.
Some t-shirts, long-sleeves, sweaters –
Will that combo be enough?
Or else my suitcase will weigh more
That I do, pound for pound;
And shedding all those layers,
That’s a lot to schlep around.
Whatever clothing makes the cut
Will be what I will wear;
And once I’m there, I have the feeling
That I just won’t care.
Her currents are the watercourses
that drive the gales and rain
her depths carry the bounties
that man has fished for gain
Her circulations can bring the tempests
or breezes soft and warm
movements within her waters
generate
the weathers that will form
Men have sailed her for centuries
She's the one they cannot tame
like the Venti her passages ceaseless
and her moods subject to change
Only men experienced can read her
know what is hidden from the blind
he can see the storm approaching
the rogue waves he's left behind
He knows her ridges and depressions
and the treasures upon her floor
he'll dive deeply to retrieve them
know when her tides return to shore
Her basin rivers are conveyors
which carry many multitudes of life
to the sea captain she is known as
his lover and his wife
COPYRIGHT © 2011 C Michael Miller
In here, the coolness
is other-worldly.
On the conveyors, the passengers
seem to float towards their destination.
Down on the tarmac, a plane's wing
welcomes in more passengers
departing, walking from the shuttle bus,
their feet unseen in the rising evening fog.
From somewhere
trails a haunting nocturne
as a disembodied voice calls out
to milling throng to follow dociley
as lambs.
Some stay a little longer,
to indulge in tote-home vanities:
XO, Dunhill, Toblerone, Joop. . . .
The list is long,
as are the queues
to gates, some moving
the other way, a lot with luggage
bowed, a few with only gate cards
and their tickets sticking out
from jackets' pockets
like brazen tongues.
Some read the monitors
with vapid faces, others doze,
babies whimper,
many take a last bite
at "The Wonders of the World."
Again, the disembodied voice
seems to intone:
"In my Father's house
there are many mansions."
The angels of cleanliness
sweep the leavings
from the tomb-cold floor.
On Bourbon Street in the vertical rain,
In the dominance of shadowed domain,
Where the swamp gas reeks of a distant death,
Faint and remote like a dying breath,
Steam rises up from the cobbled ground,
And dreams misplaced are seldom found.
The rats in the quarter bristle and dart,
Conveyors of plague from an evil heart,
And the legions of dead stay where fell,
Whilst the ringing out of the handcart bell
Sounds like a warning from far away,
A signature tune for judgement day.
As fog wreaths the streets like a living shroud,
A vampire moon breaks through the cloud,
And dogs with rib serrated skin
Howl at the sky and the wailing wind;
The lord of damnation stalks the night
Eyes of blood lust burning bright.
The cathouse sprawl lies silent, still,
The whiskey bars no longer fill,
The hulls of ships tied at the dock,
Creak and groan and gently rock,
And all the oil lamps cease to burn,
They gutter out at his return.
On Bourbon Street where walk the dead,
Eyes of blood lust burning red,
Comes something wicked, black and cold,
Which human sight should not behold,
With pallid face and razor-teeth
And vampire moon to stalk beneath.