Father's Day

 
My father lives in sawdust and solder,
he lives in the creaking
of my mother’s wooden floors.
My father lives
in lake tossed rowboats
and taut moorings,
in homemade lead sinkers
and the sharp-edged Tooth of the Pike.
My father lives
in the unforgiving canvas of a rain-soaked tent.

I sit in the park feeding pigeons,
thinking back on stories
of my father’s escapades,
while the pigeons of his city
nest at their ease under bridges,
currently undisturbed
by young men shimmying across trestles,
whose tender voices promise
only- God-knows-what.

Fukushima---Postcards

一
The leaves of the basho
lie curled and brown;
the laughter of the plum tree
is silenced.

二
Red sun rises on broken city,
tsunami swallows earth.
News of the death of the last geisha,
an omen--
songs of gaiety
no longer to be sung.


三
Black Crow weaves his tapestry
in pearl grey threads of mourning;
Black Crow weaves his tapestry
in threads of watery grief.

四 
A pale dawn
and far in the distance
a lark sings the
memory of spring to come.



五
Hope is to be found
and lost
in the transience of
sakura.

Postcard

(Image: Postcard, Laurie Hoffman)

The birth of beauty

Butterflies emerge ~
molten gold
from a sapphire sea.
Creation draws
its breath in wonder.
God smiles.


(Image:  In the Butterfly Garden; Laurie Hoffman)

In the end, it's Hopelessness that kills

"And then we came out  to see once more the stars."   Dante


When we came at last to see the stars
we struggled  in vain
to gain hope.
We tried to gaze in wonder,
pride-filled in the proof
that God  held our civilization
above all others,
to read into radiance
the nod and wink of
Divine Approval,
acknowledgement of our status
as unique and favored sons.
We struggled to grasp at straws,
to cling to myth and
ancient superstition.
And then the stars began to fall and
we tried tried tried to read  the promise
of wishes granted.
But in the end all that was left
was to cower under rocks
and primitive umbrellas,
weeping the dawn
of apocalypse.

Photograph

I saw the end of Antiquity
in the faces of men
lying murdered in the street,
in the failed humanity
of leaders of state,
in fallen museums
and desecrated mosques.
I saw the end in a fallen red kite,
in the laughter of children
now silenced.
The eye is the shutter of discord
whose merest opening
elicits the entrance

of death.

Edith

At night she sits by an open window,
waiting for a knock
that she prays will never come.
Footsteps approach, recede,
she covers her heart
remembers to breathe,
but even the shadows
have substance.

This one gone for a soldier
lies garroted in a field of wire;
this one gone for an airman
spun out in a sea of fire---
voices call, no answer
only the emptiness
of air.

(Image:  Umberto Boccioni, The Noise of the Street Enters the House, 1911)

The Ecclesiast











All that stands eventually falls.
The house my father
built basement to attic
bare-fisted --rough timber
hewn, sanded, nailed --
overtaken in the end
by the obstinance of ivy.
Vanity says the Preacher,
All is vanity.
My father was a fighter
and a giant of a man,
but nature is omnipotent.

(Image: Dave Leiker, Blue Door, http://www.prairiepathways.com/PrairieDust/)

Time folds, a
fallen tapestry
whose layers hold
happy scenes from childhood,
camps pitched on pine green,
the endless blue of cornflowers.
Wheat fields overgrown
become newly mown,
feed kings and shepherds
whose kinship shouts
in the twinkle of an eye
or the unruliness of
an untamed brow.
Courting couples
whose clasped hands
form an unbroken chain
stretching ever into eternity
and all the possibilities held
in an empty universe
and an unformed star.

Image: Marc Chagall, Bride and Groom of the Eiffel Tower, 1938-39

OIL!









Smoke moon on the rise
oil spill presages the fall
of the greatship earth.

The gods raise warnings
dire omens overruled by
dollar driven kings.

Black moon on the rise
and the gold of the sun slain
overcome by oil.

Faith














The evening of her last day entered quietly,
soughing in on feet shod in silence and purple.
She listened for the rustling of the lilac branch,
the whisper of the breeze through the silver birch.
She listened in vain for the nightingale's call,
the shrill cry of the killdeer.
Hearing none she raised her voice--
sent up a song to the Father of Silence,
sent up a song in celebration
of the silence that was
and the silence that was to come,
and when she was finished
she listened--
to the slowing of breath
to the slowing of heart.
When it was finished
she listened and waited
in silence.

(Image: Jim Strong; Empty Chair)

Rouge,
Detroit











We were a city built on war
a city built on ashes
stone statues hacked to pieces
mixed in a river that overflowed
spat blood fire and ash
spat sand brick and stone
and the gods of industry took it as tribute
built railways boatyards a bridge
built Highland Park Cadillac Piquette
The Rouge
and the gods of industry genuflected
at the altar of the De-troit dollar
but war reclaims her own
and ashes return to ash
the spirits of the statues prevailed
rose up shattered
sand brick stone
rose up and shattered
sinew and bone
but the soul of the city still burns.
We are a city built on war
a city built on ash
crushed automobiles
rust in heaps
dreams lay dead and dying
violence in the streets
but in the end
we have nothing left to do
but rise.

(Image: Andrew Moore, The Rouge, Detroit Disassembled)

Cooper Elementary School
East Side

Nature wages war in empty halls
windborne erasure of blackboard
ghost voices echo
children long gone
Brick Book Stone Slate
Earth returns Earth
man’s work falls
conquered by crowns of daffodils
and the majesty of
Queen Anne’s lace.

(Image: Andrew Moore, Cooper Elementary School East Side; Detroit Dissassembled)

Ballroom, Lee Plaza Hotel
Detroit










City of dilapidated ballrooms
Ancient pianos
Gutted of strings
Stripped of the songs
that gave life meaning
Stripped of voice mechanism tempo
Who will sing for this city?



(Photo: Andrew Moore; Detroit Disassembled)

End Game















In the corner of the yard a raven coughed
echoing an old wives' tale
looming above
sky slate blue
sliver of outer space shining through
ominous cold.
Ice storm began
and I held out my hand
each crystal I caught disappeared
In the corner of the yard
a raven coughed
eyes of stone gray
refused to look away
I blinked and in that moment
you were gone.

(Image: Samuel Bak, Chess Piece, 1933)

Castle














It seems you’ve crossed into a land
I’ve never been--
stepped over
the metaphysical line
where life reaches out
and shakes death’s hand,
back again how does the light look
after hours in the tunnel?
does it blind the soul?
how long before promises made
in moments of panic
loosen their hold
and drift unmet into the aether?

(Image:Dmitri Zajtsev, Chess)

Opening Gambit











Atmospheric disturbance
almost electric,
inhale exhale
while Time holds her breath.
I stand in the gap--
between knowing - unknowing--
and All the while
the end of the world
is no more than
a heartbeat away.

(Image: Marcel Duchamps, Portrait of Chess Players)

PURGATORY

Long gone dead
days spent stumbling
through the nether
sunrise deja vu
faces mere
recollection
ancient voices no more than
echoes - mistaken
illusion of solidity
strength of rock
fallen to shadow.
Somewhere in the in-between
a soul stands
naked
unarmed.

(Image: Francis Bacon, Self-Portrait, 1971)

The Death of Culture














Midnight and the Minotaur's lost in the city,
circling the same neon walls passed
in the endless orbit hours
following dinner with Pablo.
He approaches random passersby,
dispassionate cocktail crowds
who offer shrugs of apathy.
Kong had it right--
once they force
you off the island-grab
a likely virgin-hightail it
up the Empire State--
film at eleven--
a face no one forgets.

Days were different in the labyrinth,
before he entered the mental maze
that led him to trade
fame for freedom.
The Minotaur in his prime
welcoming the flower of youth--
a fan club willing to pay any price
for nothing more than
the merest glimpse of glory.

(Image: Pablo Picasso, The Minotaur and His Wife, 1937)