#1
eroding hooded in-
fantry hounds endure
rear entry neutron edific-
ation
#2
ninety hidden round-
heads defied the
nations's fourth and
vinyl deity
#3
handy indentured Randy
hoed the feud from his
rooftop redoubt
#4
though yearning for
funds i found
knot butt frauds in my
yard
#5
tiny fading freon
nodes adore yon
daring radon onions
#6
reading frothy innu-
endo is only
funny when the
rhino's red hooves have
little or no foundation
#7
not so ornery
fiends hand out in-
ordinate amounts of
Henry's once hoarded
fortune
A bleak gray mist slowly descends
slays all the color in the land.
Of melancholy it portends.
The slow trickle of hourglass sand
shows seconds turn to endless days
each one a moment of self-doubt
and ever-deepening malaise;
as loathing builds its own redoubt.
The bleak gray mist will darker grow
each time it creeps up to attack;
it was, and will be always so
until there only will be black.
Grab up some pine I cut up last weekend,
back creaks as I put it up on the block,
splitting maul flashes, in an arc descends,
sinks deep in the wood with a meaty THWOCK.
Logs splinter off, tumble across brown grass,
coated in saw-dust from the chainsaw's blade,
small bits for kindling, they catch flame fast,
mix with bacon grease, fire-starters made.
Rack up the big stuff in a woody wall,
looks like a redoubt from the frontier days,
it seems like a lot, but we’ll burn it all,
when the snow comes here, it does come to stay.
Clean out the camp stove before frost sets deep,
nothing feels warmer than wood-fired heat.
The universe got smaller
as my mind expanded out
The limits of imagination
endless in redoubt
Each flash the moment changes
passing light that rushes in
The cosmos but a blinking eye
—when out beyond the rim
(Dreamsleep: September, 2023)
The house I wrote this poem in
became an apartment for the ocean,
then a zoo for the innocently maladjusted,
then a garden for dreaming cats,
then floor-space - just floor space
to walk back and forth on.
The room I find these words in,
these metaphors, these bewilderment’s
these vernal chimes of a younger blood,
flood me now,
now in my narrow redoubt,
now in my condo-maze-ment,
my spindle-boned easement.
Once I was a simile, similar
to something else, a green fracture,
the unseasoned sap of an analogy,
now look at me.
I am upholstered, a place
roomy enough for a younger poem,
for returning to younger words,
finding ghosts in the spaces between them,
breathing through vowels,
with their open lungs,
their brain dizzying songs.
Revisiting
underlining, unearthing
blind roots, simple cyclic thoughts
as if they had just come to me,
and had not been arriving
from freshly abandoned living-spaces
places excavated
from under the forgotten foundations
of elsewhere.
It shouldn't be an acid melting me from inside out.
It shouldn't be a deadly dream that wakes me with a shout.
It shouldn't be a poem that I write as a redoubt.
It shouldn't be a poison I could never live without.
It shouldn't be so difficult to hope, though, still, I doubt.
The possibility of your love is the thing I speak about.
4 October 2019
In the backstreets of my mind I find passages anew
Along diverging paths, I often see my way through
There are places I can ramble or find myself rather lost
But there my thoughts can stumble at no damage or cost
As I rehearse new ideas in my own private hullabaloo
Then along some back roads not often taken or sought
Sometimes hard-earned battles are wearily fought
Am I good enough to give it a try? What if I should fail?
It is sometimes quite hard to allow myself to set sail
As my devils and angels ride by to espouse till I’m fraught
So I walk through my alleyways to hole up in a safety redoubt
Weighing each option before I’m ready to shout and come out
I choose to plunge in to move toward the road that continues on
For there’s no foreseeing the obstacles this path will then spawn
But I’ll use the streets in my mind and my “figuring it out” route
written: 9-25-2019
In the backstreets of my mind Poetry Contest 2nd place
Sponsored by: Silent One
Poor Mister Lincoln
Shoulders cowed
Watched Freedom’s ark sinking
From Heaven’s redoubt
A country divided
An idea torn to shreds
Cried poor Mister Lincoln
My Union is dead
(Victorian artist William Holman Hunt was
both attracted and repelled by his models)
Can we agree that, terrified of sex,
Hunt couldn’t help but hunt it, seek it out?
There doesn’t seem to be a shred of doubt.
He felt his women exercised some hex,
conspiracy throughout the lower decks,
full frontal on his Puritan redoubt!
He hated what he couldn’t live without
(the only punter in the multiplex).
And Annie, Fanny, Edith – on they came,
alluring, curing, reassuring, fey,
and Hunt (who fastened fast on blame and shame)
was racked by guilt and had to run away.
Another mantis, but the same old prey,
(mixed metaphor) Hunt headed for the flame.
Dense implosion of infinite desire
Dead to the sensual stirrings
Events search
Stretch for eager horizons
Blackness
Blackens the mood and raises spirits
Times spaces
Interregnums of intense longing
Hang limply on half uttered words
Pleading eyes call to the stars
Summon the traveling muse
Half dead moons and resurrecting galaxies
Milky in ways you cannot imagine
Gravity
Pulls with inimitable redoubt
Rotating doors of wondrous probing
Earth fire is molten
Baking the inner sanctums
Raising internal set points
Feverish flourish of action
Gyrating to the fulsome Rhumba
Peppering staccato of Saturdays
Dancing delirious
Exorcising gargantuan ghosts
Of tall imposing dreams
In a tranquil valley with banks dark and deep
Silted streams into dreary conduits seep
Shadows bearing yesterday's light on addled walls creep
Images from the dark recesses around each corner peep
Enchanting winds over the heightened senses do sweep
Animated figures from the bleary crevasses leap
Sorrowful clouds hover; o'er conscience penitent tears weep
In foggy redoubt, guarded fears and insecurities do heap
A silent stillness swaddles the night
A restless wind addled floor doth spite
From rim's spout vaporous cloak descends; prescience to slight
Above melancholy mist, hoot owl resounds with doleful delight
In the distance, a billowy plume rises; darkness to blight
A shrill whistle echoes from wall to wall distilling fright
Chilling requiem announces approach of mechanized spright
Two AM shadow creeps across canyon with stealthy might
In desolate channel, pulsating waves a bleary storm doth ignite
With thunderous chorus, the clanging rails a tremor doth incite
Vibrations reverberating through rocky redoubt; airy palpitations excite
A squeaky tenor underpinned by clamorous bass doth medley recite
Unbridled steel caisson through pristine stone columns doth alight
Slithering snake in undulating pattern over matted groves doth kite
Steaming furnace propelling armored mail on brigand flight
Fortified invader with contraband o'er corrosive terrain doth fight
Sagebrush
Windy redoubt
Green sentinels shielding
Enfilading rays pound ramparts
Stagecoach
Bugle resounds call for another fateful charge
Bands of soldiers toward the fortified ridge barge
Enfilading fire from cannons fiery portents discharge
Infantry ranks decimated from center to marge
Wave after wave crest up the rocky redoubt
O'er boulders, mounds their heels dutifully plow
Nourishing with their blood a field so fallow
Trite fodder on a temporal battle strand; sacrificial lambs noble
cause to hallow
Ruddy lads searing in the scorching sun; faces sunk, complexion's
sallow
Surrendering all future hope; boyish dreams in dying hearts so
callow
Precious resources drained from a reservoir so shallow
Southern heroes ressurected and romanticized on nouveau tableau
barren palisade
horned rams prance rocky redoubt
wolf pack scales rampart
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