WCW

WCW

it is easy to hear her words

in the phone conversation

it can't be taken for granted

it must be a passed down___blessing

of sorts

so my son puts my grand daughter on the phone now

these simple gifts

these precious moments

like paintings of wax fruit

or

little girls with big eyes

or

velvet elvis crying in the ghetto

where is my heart in all of that?

dusty books pointed a way long ago

the direction was to go against the current

swim it or swallow it

never stop

looking for the mentor of my minds eye

searching out the feelings that are left

like crumbs on a lonely trail of tears

you said for us to make the honey into homespun

threads of love that tied every line together

brought every word into sunlight

gave every rhyme a shelter in

a torrent of digital rain

it is cleaner in my mind thanks to your broom of phrases

simpler times call for simpler words so we can come

down from all mountain tops to sit by your fire

old man with candies in his pocket hands

them out one by one

even if the bitter one gets unwrapped in my hand

tears of joy fill my eyes for what I taste and smell

tagged with your words as lines unbroken until broken

then reformed

as brittle

pieces

gathered in

your wheelbarrow

of ripened fruit

preserved forever

fresh

as love

in any season

On Writing

On Writing

I take my beatings for not fitting into molds

for not following instructions

for doing my thing

for doing the wrong thing

then I start writing

I lose out on opportunity and love

lose cash and prizes

gain something back

lose it all again

get another chance

they keep coming

one after one

sometimes

two by two

or even

three by three

but, I keep writing

I take flight into the world of no certain destination

moving like a target that is hard to hit

near misses and head on collisions

almost take me out for good

almost only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades

so I keep writing

I get cut open and live with scar tissue

get shot and it is through and through

my spleen survives it all

my liver falls for hep

fire water burns my heart

I get run down by wheels but get up later

the breaks heal slow and crooked, but they heal

I watch others not be so lucky

I keep writing

I watch others get born and buried

funerals in fields and ashes spread on oceans

I feel my friends blood seep out quickly

leaving me behind with open eyes of shock

I wake up next to a lover who dies in the night

I find another in a hot tub of her own blood soup

I watch another die the slow cancer dance

I hear MS stop a beautiful heart

I sit alone in silence for days

I keep writing

I make many friends for life in my travels

the dope takes so many

the violence and the prisons take so many more

drunken driving into nothingness like

darwinian angels of mercy takes

my little girl away while I

languish in a cold room

on a steel cot

puking my forgiveness

into steel toilets for two

I keep writing

I hear warning shots from invisible guard towers

in my restless sleep forever

watch indoctrination into death

for believers of an honor that was

betrayed long ago by human greed

I keep writing

I ride trains across midnight prairies

hoping to become dust devils above corn fields

as I look at the Brooklyn Bridge become

the Golden Gate become an old stone transom

across the Mississippi River that I walk across

alone after love is just a dead cat that I give

a viking funeral to with lighter fluid on a guitar case barge

in the dark cold river below

and I have to keep writing

I have to move my fingers

across the page even when

they are bloody and broken

or cramping into claws of

eternal damnation that tells

me not to quit or give up or

give in I just have to keep

writing

even as I sit here writing this

on a laptop in echo park

not knowing what will

happen next

listening to birds

dogs in the distance

helicopters in the air

I am moved to keep my fingers moving

to keep writing still

in case I missed something

that might be catching up to me