Old Solo

I wish my turntable was working
So I could listen to that Lyle Mays
Solo from San Lorenzo that I love
I can almost hear every note in my head

But there are a few that I have forgotten
It sounded like he was pouring his soul
Into tiny cups to share with the world
But the cups were too small and so

It just spilled out into the world
And somehow found its way
to my ear

That air is not shaking
Those waves are not undulating
Lyle and the crew are nowhere in sight

There is a print of it in my mind
Just like a boot leaves its image in the mud
You can tell which way the walker went

But my memory has no direction
And I fear that Lyle may be lost forever
If I cannot find a diamond needle

For my turntable

Former Dancer In Law

You have grown an inch since you started dancing
You are not taller, but your soul has grown
No surprise that live music, even with accordians
is good for what ails ya, remember Hot Chicken Stew?

Bobbing in the crush with a mass of strangers
Soon to be not strangers, and then to be friends
Breathing their air, following their leads
Making paradiddles accross borrowed floors

Strange that there is so much light in the night
After the sunset, you fling open the door
Rush into the world to find that you can see in the dark
It was always in you, but you never knew until now

Sick

Sick again
And I thought of calling in to work
But I ended up crawling in to work
Instead

Suck it up
We only meet once a week
So if we miss that once a week
It is a very long time

All stuffed up
Half my class is just the same
The half the other half will blame
For our Bob Dylan voices

Every year
I get sick about this time
Just like every other time
Tomorow I will breathe

Rose Shadow

On my dresser, there is a blue vase which contains a single, silk rose. The flower never withers. The thing itslelf is quite realistic looking, with the spiraling motion of a bud just about to open fully for the first time. The leaves however are less than convincing, having only been given a rippling texture on one side. On the other is smooth green plastic, as flat as a disposable party table cloth. Below the vase is a lamp, which casts a shadow upward along the wall. The shadow's stem reaches the corner of the cieling exactly at the flower, with a crooked, decapitating, angle giving the flower the look of a hanged man. Strange Fruit.

In my kitchen is another vase (early Gerke) which contains eight real roses, given to me by a sweetheart. For now they are plush, open, and fragrent. In a few days they will wither and die, like all cut flowers. As the light strikes them in the days to come, what shadow will they cast? And on what walls? As I watch the constant resistance of the silk flower, I am struck by the thought that the real ones always loose thier battle against the light. The light that feeds them, and gives them their shadow. The lustor that is meant to be preserved in silk, is somehow diminished by its own permanency. It is the vulnerability of the real flowers that make them so dear. And when they are gone, they will smell all the more sweet.

Friend

I am remembering a walk
A walk on the winding path
That leads gently to the sea
The soft padding of other feet
Lingering in my minds ear
It is the memory of that sound
My friend, my true blue
That stands out beyond
The washing rush of the tide,
The heavy smell of sage and salt,
The calm horizion's lazy sunset
Trodding back to the car
Pad, pad, thud, thud
And I am not alone
This sound in the foreground
Of my mind's re-painting of our walk
Shaping the comfortable
Recent past, Pad, pad, thud, thud

Not the Same

I thought I'd try remembering
How I loved you
Loosing you was ashame
And wouldn't it be fun

With a bit of tinkering
I'd suspend you
In a liquid frame
So I'd begun

The rush of cheating
Death trancsends you
I'm the one to blame
I thought I'd won

But we were only stealing
A little time to lend you
Our experiment became
Unsatisfying Reconcilliation

Now its got me thinking
Sweet girlfriend you
Just are not the same
I think our race is run

There's no use trying
I can't mend you
My efforts all in vain
You've come undone

And now you're sitting
I pretend you
Want me again
Drying in the sun

I can't help from crying
I wan't to send you
Where you'll feel no pain
I fear it has begun

The birds are circling
Lifelessness trancends you
I repeat your name
Until it is done

In the future when I'm telling
I'll commend you
People will say it's ashame
You were the strong one

Birthday Party

Children in the pool
Splashing keeping cool
Games and words tell
Their histories all to well

Rigid Christian children
Knowing what is best
Glutting on the vido games
They don't have at home

Suburbanite neo-healthy
Twins could not be more different
The one at ease, the other
Headed for troubled teens

Son of Persia speaks his mind
And seems to know what
As long as friends are true
They don't care what the parents do

90% from broken homes
Playing splashing in the pool
And these bonds will be the ones
That break or hold fast tomorrow

My Train

The air is still tonight

My neighbors are gone or asleep

Phone unbothered tonight

by taxmen and collectors

My mind is still tonight

Unclouded by problems

And the un-lover who

slipped away years ago

My child is restless tonight

Feeling that his day is undone

Something more to do

But can't determine what

My television is off tonight

The people there aren't like me

I am patiently waiting

For Orion to grace the evening sky

The winter stars are my stars

Since before the dark years

There was more poetry in me

Than science and it is still true

My son, it seems is the same

Needing to catch a midnight train

That is not coming, itchy feet

To ramble regardless of the hour

RH sang "I often dream of trains"

"Taking me to paradise"

Well the trains around here

Only carry yuppies to work

The short train has just carried my son

Into my room to show me a picture

Of a baseball player with long arms

Trying with all his might not to sleep

The air is still tonight

My neighbors are gone or asleep

In the distance I can hear my train

Strange...how it never quite arrives

Slow Motion

My slow pen and my slow pick
pointing up my lack of creativity
do I really have nothing to say?

Or is it rather an affliction of spirit
pulling my cards closer to the vest?
glued lips and stricken hands

Some things are only alive on the inside
once they hit the air and the light
you find they weren't what you thought

The magicless wonderless jewel of your soul
lying on the page or hanging in the air
as you grow smaller and smaller

JG said "perhaps they're better left unsung"
but I should let it rip anyway
I don't have any water to ripple

My words hitting the ground with a thud
my cupid's arrow, thick and chunky
block leading home at 9.8 m/sec 2

Denoument

Slipping back into aquaintence
after dabbling with the idea
of love

The idea is not enough
an idea too weak to hold
two people

Toes in the water
both can swim
but none do

This idea has no courage
afraid of something different
and can't get started

Move your body!
no

Move your lips!
no

At least wiggle that toe
shrivelling in the water!
no

We speak less frequently
slipping back into aquaintence
like before

Wandering to swim
in other pools
with regret

Harbor Ride

Now the fear is gone
free to roam the streets
in my second childhood
Walter who?
I got my mits around
Something here
I'm not sure what
but it feels
like home