If forgetting is to life as remembering is to death; my fate is uncontrollable.
I can wish to erase memories and detach your existence from my mind pointlessly if I dare.
Though id much sooner give my breath up to have spent the last one reminiscing on everything you are to me.
If moving on is to forgetting as being stuck is to remembering; consider me comfortable in my place.
Accepting the idea that our story together has ended, that I should speak of you in the past tense.
The soul built on hope and bittersweet naivety that soaks up and creates my being wants to believe that this isn't permanent.
Given the opportunity I don't have faith in my own capability of seeing past all the pain I've been left to relish in.
Knowing you, the chance won't present itself.
A bridge I'll never have to cross, only one I can stand solemnly at the end of.
A scant twenty years
grieved a century or more
Poetically perfect
in spirit and lore
A man and his horse
alone on the range
The cattle his instrument
and music to play
Civil War veterans and blacks
from the South
Through dust and dark clouds
even blizzards they mount
Together they battled
in concert they fought
Each unto himself
through prairies uncrossed
The hardship and death
to him worth the price
Pushing always ahead
a stranger to fright
The only thing branded
to be left at the end
Was the legend he gave us
— and the message it sends
(Cowboy Poetry Gathering: Elko Nevada, February, 2017)
Times when I've run out of rope,
out of second chances, out of hope,
and I don't know what to do -
I'm all alone and lost.
I've been too harshly tossed.
I'm drowning in a river, uncrossed.
From Heaven, I hear you.
Times in my life, I've been laid low,
and hope is buried beneath snow -
I can't see my way through.
Cold doom awaits, anon.
How do I soldier on?
Memories of father gone -
I hear a voice that's true.
I already understand that children
grow inside two blinks,
as quickly as the novel Mayfly
comes to the surface to die.
I'm pining for those first days again,
of edentate smiles, milestones
to fund future independence.
Pineapple-sized hearts I cradled;
lulled, exchanged dank nappies for dry;
ferried on uncrossed seas,
your armada.
Smoothed rough waters as if by divine speech
because mothers can. I was thinking that I could always be your oxygen.
I let you walk through me, under, right over.
The rocking horse
brought for my bromelain angels
winged you away -
this blasted Pegasus ...
I miss you now.
How you rode away,
ephemera of innocence!
So, what then?
Me, fumbling wild in the backspace you left.
Your flabbergasting key smash to freedom
broke our finespun home, you left
me to talk to your father, Child,
to renegotiate
the bonds;
reconstruct ancient code,
deleted excess text -
obfuscating precision and knowing -
the tribal tongue of lovers
unlearned, forgotten;
escaped alongside discarded baby bath suds,
strewn puddles of rubber duckies,
tired breasts suckled
by fresh management.
The trees save our secrets in their leaves,
And the stars offer guidance to the lost.
Wear your heart on your lips, not your sleeves,
And walk with me, fingers uncrossed.
Now all that remains is a silver framed photograph
A reminder of when there was a splitting of paths
Between one realm and the other, a bridge uncrossed
One day to be readjourned, but for now is just a loss
Tears are what waters the remaining greenhouse residents
As only one of two remains to stand and be present
Though flowers blossom and continue to grow
The color disappears in the heart that was bestowed
Snowflakes fall as autumn turns into winter
The seasons marching on as timelines are splintered
The moon keeps giving light, but inside it's disappeared
Death stabs the soul like a three pronged spear
Now the two only meet up in the plane of a dream
The tears they cry together make saltwater springs
And just like that they fade away, nothing to remain
Where life has to continue on, always to sustain
Another sunset slipped away.
Another full moon missed.
Another fair maid perished young,
before she was held and kissed.
Another book, unfinished.
Another poem, lost.
A lonely "I", undotted.
A forlorn "T", uncrossed.
Another bridge of dreams,
built o'er the sea of time.
Another thrice-doomed melody.
One more imperfect rhyme.
29 December 2023
written ~2:10-2:20 AM in Broomfield, CO
They came together, love entwined,
When stars in heaven were aligned.
But their love hit a hurdle,
When their vinaigrette failed to curdle,
Their blitz emulsification ill-fated,
leaving oil and vinegar separated.
They crossed their fingers together,
Looked up at the sky, to see whether
The stars had crossed to unsupportive.
Sure enough, the stars were abortive.
So they went their separate ways.
Pledging to try again on better days,
When double-crossing stars crossways
Had unclasped to an uncrossed phase,
And they could dump their mayonnaise.
I am all over Wiltshire
High up on the hills
I am immune from fire
To tourists I give thrills
You can see me from afar
By plane, on foot or in a car
I am as old as time can be
Many people have come to see
You can walk up close to stroke me
It can be a tiring experience
But when you reach me you will see
I am part of a greater sequence
I am one of thirteen
But five have sadly been lost
Leaving 8 of us to be seen
The other 5 are waiting to be uncrossed
I am the second oldest in wiltshire
Cut in seventeen eighty
There are even some of us in Yorkshire
So drive along the A4 a don't be lazy
Park up in the lay-by at the foot of my hill
Choose a path to the summit
Breathing heavy yes you will
The scenery at the top will be worth it
You can see miles and miles
From Calne, Avebury and Devizes
Stand at the monument starting as rock piles
Take a picnic and see all the other surprises
Stubbs Park is decorously rampant,
its paths scamper here and there
like unruly children.
The original landscapers ran riot,
for they planted arching spans
between and over
many of its grassy hillocks,
its trickling brooks.
If you are in meditative mood,
these diminutive bridges
can lead you away and home again
in the compact unwinding
of a few gardened acres.
Catwalks may connect you
to gaps in your life
ones yet uncrossed for want of a bridge’
They can lead you astray also
until you figure out the right questions
to ask of yourself.
Perhaps more to the point
folks can leisurely pass over
some idle hours
between breakfast and lunch.
On a summer evening
your long shadow
can walk over the park
in a few strides.
You may recall then that all your steps
have been
bridges over time,
a landscaping of a life -
and just a walk in the park.
I have wished on the morning star
to help us find the way we've lost,
the kindness we gave without cost.
The love...it now seems very far--
a ship that's lost is what we are.
Beliefs have become wildly tossed...
I have wished on the morning star.
Entered fantasy--door ajar,
have ideas that in past were glossed,
a line that now can't be uncrossed.
We continue into bizarre...
I have wished on the morning star.
October 13, 2002
Rondine
This ball is mainly water as are we;
touch Mother Earth and hear her soulful cries
and climate is ruled most by air and sea.
Stare into space beyond where science lies.
Seems plants and creatures thrive and then they fall.
Cultures seal their fate by dominating;
humans however have played through it all -
blind fools to dark dangers they are creating.
Nature's order corrects itself in time,
Arctic ice caps melt while world seas do rise.
Human hubris ignores each warning sign,
those wondering think gods see through their eyes.
Not all who wander are forever lost,
some who wander seek realms yet uncrossed.
Sonnet 95 Words: Climate Change
A hole that can’t be filled
an ocean that can’t be crossed
a phrase that can’t be spun
inhaling your exhaust
The measure off the scale
the truant thrice reclassed
the memory twice forgotten
the die that’s never cast
A spider web unwoven
a future distant past
a God beyond religion
a sail without its mast
“To Trip The Light Fantastic”
to burn the bridge uncrossed
to fasten moments end to end
—to find what time has lost
(The New Room: February, 2022)
Stubbs Park is decorously rampant,
its paths scamper here and there
like unruly children.
Perhaps its topographical language
once spoke of bridges
for the landscapers have run riot
planting arching spans
between and over
many of its hillocks and humps.
If you are in meditative mood,
these diminutive bridges
can lead you away and home again
in the compact unwinding
of a few gardened acres.
The catwalks of Stubbs park
can connect you to gaps in your life
as yet uncrossed for want of a bridge,
they can lead you astray also
until you figure out the right questions
to ask of yourself,
or perhaps more to the point
they can leisurely pass over
some idle hours
between breakfast and lunch.
Whisper to the whistling wind the wistful worries of the day
For she is sister, tightly twined to smoke that winds and floats away.
All that I confide is lost, adrift, a cloud upon the air
That flows a distance still uncrossed and stirs a shroud of silken hair
And stirs a shroud with soft spoke dreams, I hope find a kindly ear
I speak aloud the heartfelt reams my heart cannot speak for fear
For fear of what I cannot tell, not even to the night
For all the words that rose or fell, have never eased my plight
I whisper to the emptiness, the wide and wild sky
I breathe out all the ghastliness the smoke that stings my eye
But those who to the wind confess, shall ever be dined
Whatever love they might profess, is second to their pride
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