Davy Crockett June o9, 2o16

I look through my old poetry and find one that seems to have not received as many views as I would like so I repost them. But more than that I often find poems that I forgot about. When I reread one, I see some tiny faults in it and decided to give a bit of editing. Also, I read a poem that's been sitting for a year or more and find I really like what it was trying to say. Maybe it has more meaning to me now than it did when I originally set it on the page. And maybe, just maybe, the reader will see in it something that they desire to hear again.

Davy Crockett

I never was a keeper of things.

That Davy Crockett raccoon cap
I begged my mother for? Wore it
a few times before I shoveled it
into the closet, never to be seen again.

And Superman flying through the metallic air

on a genuine Aladdin Industries lunch box.
The thermos shattered after three days,
my boloney sandwich covered in milky blood.
The Caped Crusader tossed into the trash.

Some grunts gave me a lighter the day I left Nam.

“From the Boys in the Nasty” engraved on
its stainless steel body. I lost it between Okinawa
and the airport in Guam as I hustled my way
back to the world, to the good ol’ U.S. of A.

And love? A dozen girls tossed aside

sometimes broken by my carelessness.
Sometimes they broke me, tossed me out
or like that furry Davy Crockett hat, left me
in the darkest corner of a cluttered closet.

But a ratty pair of pea green Chucks

I bought back in two thousand six
stayed with me until they fell apart.
They now hang like a trophy
on a doorknob in my apartment.

why’d I keep a pair of worn-out tennies

and not the Crockett hat, or the lunch box
(even though the thermos was busted to shit),
or that one girlfriend who never hurt me?
I never worried about losing that lighter.

Maybe it’s just that when you’re young

losing things don’t bother you so much.
Maybe age tends to make you wanna hang on
to things , even when you don’t want to.
Woodie 12-13-15 (rewrites o6-o9-16)

WORDS June 07, 2o16

Just a very simple set of words. It felt complete to me. I'm looking for simplicity a lot more these days.

WORDS

The words alone
come and go

The words alone
sing and dance
The words alone
without your voice
mean nothing

Woodie o6-o7-16

My Cream Colored Psychedelic Flashback May 30, Memorial Day 2o16

Hadn't thought of writing anything for Memorial Day this year. I have in the past and they are usually something to do with Vietnam. This a poem that I started back in 2oo9. It's stayed pretty much the same all these years. Did a little bit of fine tuning on it from time to time. But it hasn't changed much. Says what I want it to say about war and in particular about my time in Vietnam.

My Cream Colored Psychedelic Flashback

Tumble dried in memories

flashing back to
acid coated tracers
tracking jungle-booted steps
across a stoned-hinge reality...

                                                *"It's getting near dawn..."

Cream's psychedelic shadow

crackling over a portable radio...
blue stained skies draped
in a white cloud cloaks...
rumbling thunder spouting
black diesel smoke...

                                              "When lights close their tired eyes..."

faces green with camouflage,

burnt suntan brown beneath
flak jackets, stale breath
and bubblegum...
way, way back
when we were young,
dumb and full of
deadly dreams...

                                              "I'll soon be with you my love..."

rolling along Highway Nine

adrenaline rush bouncing
up and down my fragile spine
in the bed of a Marine green 12X...
Big Daddy G behind me
with his salty slight of hand
magically fires-up his dovetailed joint
against a sandpaper wind...
suck it down, brother, pass it around...
hitting on heaven in my cupped hand
and... it's one small toke for man,
two giant tokes for mankind and...
suddenly...

                                              "To give you my dawn surprise..."

48 hours earlier

stranded at LAX,
tongue-tied to each other,
my fingers tangled deep
in your blond hair,
the soft flesh of your arms
surrounds me...
a second skin...
never wanting to let go...
your kiss tattooed
upon my lips,
your gentle whisper
in my ear,
"I love you... forever...!"
                                              "I'll be with you darling soon..."

lock and load!

click, click, click!
every swinging Rickie pops
a fresh clip into his M-16,
feeling lean, feeling mean...
the sun drilling tiny holes
through the top of my helmet,
the dust thicker
as the convoy slithers
out of Saigon
like a metal python...
                                             " I'll be with you when the stars start falling..."

as the city gives way

the jungle green and dark
blossoms before us like
an open wound...
the convoy picks up speed
didi mauing like a mother...
lush rice paddies,
napalm skittish mama sans
knee high in mud
nothing but a black pajama blur...
old grunts in ratty utilities,
head tripping glances
over their shoulders
listening with their dead eyes
scrutinizing every tree,
every movement, every sound...
and all us gung-ho
bastard sons of John Wayne,
all us boot camp Jolly Green Giants...
gearing up for war...
ho, ho, ho! rock and roll
screaming in my head, that
pounding rhythm frees my soul
as we disappear into a cold,
gray-hearted darkness...
                                              "I've been waiting so long..."

13 months after... I

waltz out of the jungle...
                                              " I've been waiting so long..."

back in the world

dragging a sea bag of dying
thought behind me...
                                               "I've been waiting so long..."

back at the airport

where I left her,
listening...
to the suffocated echo
of those last words
she ever said to me,
"I love you... forever...!"
                                              "To be where I'm going..."

knowing all the time...

I'll never see her...
never hear her...
say those words...
again...

                                              "In the sunshine of your love.”

Woodie o9-27-o9 (rewrites 2o12-16)

*Sunshine of Your Love

written by Jack Bruce,

Pete Brown and Eric Clapton

"Never look for something you didn't want to find,” said Peaches May 24, 2o16

A poet never knows what will inspire a poem. My Facebook friend, Peaches, posted the quote on above onto her Facebook page, and it woke up my muse. I have stopped worrying if people like my poetry. I'm writing for myself these days, or at the least, I'm trying to. I'm hoping that I'm enough of a human being that whatever I write other human beings will get it and . . . like it.

"Never look for something you didn't want to find,” said Peaches

There's something floating in my coffee

just below the surface. I only know it’s there
because its invisible movement creates
tiny tsunamis of grainy black water that smash
against the porcelain beach of my favorite mug.

I’m torn. Should I dump the contents into

the sink and discover the secret creature
living in those caffeine depths?

Perhaps, it is nothing to be concerned about.

Perhaps, there's nothing there, nothing at all.
Perhaps, the waves I watch pounding away
at the hand-painted shore is nothing more
than the effects of an earthquake.
We do seem to have our share
of earthquakes in our beloved state.
Woodie o5-24-16

24837 BIRTHDAY POEM 2o16

Two months working on the BIRTHDAY POEM and still doesn't feel quite right. But it's time to show it. Birthday poems are strange. I never know where they are going to go. Usually they express some event that happened in my youth as well as moments that are more recent. Sometimes the past events are very stylized and not necessarily "exactly" the way things happened in real life. But that's the way of art. It takes on a life of its own. Hope you enjoy this latest BIRTHDAY POEM.

24837

It begins. It ends.

And as it begins it ends
again and then again—

a touch of stretch, a scratch across the sur-face.

The darkness digests me, my shadow struggles
to shape itself, fold itself into something, a something more,
into a some “thing” more comfortable than shadows.
A dream, perhaps, that’s what I’ll be, that is to say,
I mean to say, what’s meant by the phrase “a dream?”
Just one, a single dream, a simple, fluffy dream
that my unconsciousness can crawl inside of.

Chew me up, now.  Swallow me up and down,

and down the narrow nightmare we’ll go.
a slippery, slimy mess we’ve become,
a phlegmy specter, a ghostly snot ball of memory.
But the purpose is clear. Well, as clear
as a shadow can appear while rampaging
through the nothingness drawers.

And behold, beneath that stack of unholey socks

and yellowed t-shirts (that don’t quite fit),
there between my anemic eyes my blind
fingers score a vagrant fantasy wadded up
inside  the pocket of the cutoff jeans
I wore just last spring right before
my legs turned gray and thin
before my hair turned  thin and gray
before reality turned grey and grey . . . er.

A street corner someplace, somewhere,

a Banshee scream in my ear,
a throbbing stab at the back of the skull.
I remember. I think, I remember. My gut
recalls a lightning punch ,and one other
across the temple. And an explosive thud,
bare knuckles smashed against the lower lip.
Teeth splintering, saliva, blood and sweat
coughed up into the gutter. I recall it all
and wonder why I recall it all . . . at all.

Slammed face first onto the ground.

My fear punctuated by a thuggish boot
across the throat, that sudden rip of cartilage.
“That’s all she wrote, my brothers. My nose
won’t recognize my face no more,” that’s
what I’m thinking. I won’t remember a day
when my boyish look lacked scar tissue.

24837 days counted down or up or sideways—

The newscaster pulled me out of a thick sleep:

“On this bright blue sky morning,
a Dove has been murdered by Crows.
On this bright blue sky morning
one pure white cloud wept silently.”
The wind, however, raged and raged
for it is never happy when it rains.

Why would feathered carnivores eagerly destroy

the beautiful song the white Dove sang?
Simplest explanation? Well hell, they’re Crows,
What should we expect from them?

My ears will miss his voice though only for a moment or two.

They’ll forget his sweet sound even before the day is done
because there are more troubling things to wonder about.

The passing of a Dove is a minor sadness compared

to everything else that’s going on, keeps going on,
keeps moving on, a rush down the drainpipe.

But that’s how we survive.

That’s how we continue.
We keep moving.
On and on, keep moving on
until we can’t or will not
move anymore.

Written by Woodie

for his 68th birthday
May 23, 2o16

Heart Whisper May 22, 2o16

I plan to spend most of this day, the 22nd of may, working on my BIRTHDAY poem. This was a little thing I wrote the other day . . . or actually night. I tend to write mostly at night. My muse sleeps late into the day. She's very rarely up before 10 p.m. But once she's had a couple of cups of coffee and a tab of nicotine gum, she is more than ready to get to work. I don't remember what inspired this little poem. But I'm sure it was something I read online, on Facebook, that got my night owl muse all greased up and chattering away in my left ear.

Heart Whisper

A quick, unexpected tug on its leash
and my heart’s off chasing down the street
after the beautiful woman in the sparkly hoodie.
I yell at my heart, “Stop! Stop right now!”

But as we all know when it comes

to our hearts they never listen.
Woodie o5-22-16

The Nothingness May 13, 2o16

I found a poem that was written back in 2o15. I was looking for something that spoke addressed the concept of  nothingness. I typed into word search the single word "nothing" and this popped up. I admit I was surprised to find it, and to be totally honest after I read it I wasn't sure it was one I had written. I mean, it sounded like me . . . but it felt like it was written by someone else. It's funny feeling to create something, set it aside for awhile, come back to it and then not recognize it as your work! But it is mine. No doubt now that it is mine, written by me. I reworked it a bit yesterday, not much. It didn't seem to need much.

The Nothingness

Extraordinary to see yourself outside your . . . self,

looking back into those eyes that you've never
really seen before. Counting each wrinkle on that
alien face, each scar that you never were aware of.
You look and you stare and you analyze and criticize
every nook, every cranny every blemish that time created.
There's a warmth gathering around that hole inside you
where nothing lives, where nothing feels more like home,
like all that you are is that nothingness and that nothingness
is real, it’s solid, more valid than anything they've told you,
and all your life they showed you what reality is supposed to be.
A bare existence that glares at you through that self you've
never known. You have never known. It feels like butterflies
fluttering around a burning bush, like the deepest end
of the deepest pool where panicky legs keep searching
for the bottom and find nothing more than . . . than . . .
and there's that word again . . . nothingness.
All there is, all there’ll ever be . . . nothingness.

Not even a splinter of a shadow left.

Woodie12-19-15 (rewrites o5-13-16)

Dog Freedom May 1o, 2o16

I seem to be hitting a prolific stretch of poetic highway. Not smooth driving, I confess. Maybe a few pot holes, now and then the concrete turns to a muddy trail barely passible . . . but I manage to make it down the road no matter the terrain. I wrote this in a huff over something someone said. Who that person was, what the actual relationship I had with this person . . . I don't remember.

Dog Freedom

We make mistakes.

Hopefully we learn from them.

Sometimes we keep repeating ourselves,

the same response to an action.

Others find fault in our limited ability to "get it right."

They’ve even less respect for us if we do change.

Ignore the ignorant bastards, this flip-flop generation:

"Thou shalt not change. And even if you do,

we’ll still treat you like dog."

I'm tired of being dog.

Scratching at a gang of flees

who I can never, ever please.

I break the leash they strapped on me.

I run free, free through these wilting words.

You’ll never catch me again.

Woodie o5-o9-16

Dragon May o8, 2o16

I'm writing again. For better or not better I'm writing again. a Facebook friend posted a picture of a dragon in a very dark and gloomy cave. For some reason the image jump started my poet's mind. I've been looking over the scribbles I've put down this year and some of them are worthy of working on. about 18 or so "ideas" sleep in my poetry file. Trying to work on them a bit here and there whenever I have the energy and the time. Anyway, here's a little one.

Dragon Day

Waiting on the edge of it

in a cage, in a rage
creating the fire
that will devour him.
His feet, his thoughts
floating like ash, up
towards the ceiling.
A murmur, like a river,
a disturbing sound
bouncing off the wall.
At peace, a ghost wailing.
Woodie o5-o8-2o16

I Hate It When I Can't Sleep April 3o, 2o16

I found this older piece that hasn't yet been posted on the blog. I lose a lot of poems, or they get lost, or they run away from home of their own accord deciding to hide in one of my flash drives.

I Hate It When I Can't Sleep

I’m wondering if there’s even

a tiny bit of shadow left in me.
The nights aren't closed-in enough,
the darkness isn’t dark enough to be called  
darkness anymore, not these  days.
Too many streetlamps guarding the corners
and the parking lot elms,
the black tar pot holes all but dried up
tormented by a lack of rain.

I should sleep, but I seldom do . . . these days.

I should do something useful, then.
Clean the house, scrub the sinks,
breakout the vacuum cleaner
listen to its small engine purr
like a cat in heat.

There’s something black-green growing

in the toilet bowl.

Tomorrow crawls inside today

and all I can say about it all
is that I gave up
caring about the solar system
the moment they denounced Pluto,
turned her into a stone, a measly rock.

Educated people are cruel.

Science even crueler
than the God they've demoted to a myth.
Heaven. Nothing more than a delusion
dreamed up by the tired working class
that longs for their suffering to end.
Woodie 4-27-14 (rewrites 4-3o-16)

The Dove April 21, 2o16

So, I'm frantically working on my annual B-day poem wondering exactly where the hell this damn thing is going. It's making no sense, it means nothing . . . and not in a good way. And then something happens. The world changes a bit . . . a bit gloomier than it was before. Not much on eulogies for the rich and famous. Figure there's enough folks in the world to do that . . . and most much better than me. But for some reason unknown to me I have decided to write something about a someone who moved on from this plain of existence. It's also going to be a part of the B-day poem I'm working on.

The Dove

I woke up to the news:

On this bright blue sky morning,

the Dove has been eaten by Crows.
On this bright blue sky morning,
a pure white cloud weeps silently.
The wind, however, rages.
It’s never subtle with its grief.

I wonder why the Crows were so eager to destroy,

to rip apart the beautiful song the Dove sang?
What’s the simplest explanation? Well, they’re Crows,
what should we’ve expected?

My ears will miss his voice for a moment or two,

but then they’ll move on even before the day is done
because there are more troubling things to worry about.

The passing of a Dove is a minor thing compared

to everything else that is going on, keeps going on,
keeps moving on, rushing down the drainpipe.

That’s how we survive.

That’s how we exist.
You must keep moving.
Woodie o4-21-16

Beat Down April o6, 2o16

Okay, so I accidently got into poetry mode, wrote quite a bit that was good enough to work on and start publishing on my blog. Politics makes us all nasty, rabid dogs towards the candidates and their supports. I hate it the most of all my friends . . . and yet . . . I'm probably the worst offender.

Beat Down

I don't understand sometimes

the laughter, the sneers,
the beat down with words.

A booted foot, a stomp                      

upon the exposed ankle,
a fist against the pointy part
of the chin paralyzes the whole body.

That I can understand.

Yet it's never enough,

the need to torture,
to poke at the dying scorpion
as the bloodied riders drift by.

It's never enough.

Nail the curtains up,  
let its own weight
slice through the skin.

Not our fault the cloth was so heavy.

We labor, we bear the weight
your words put on our shoulders,
we sing until the voice is but a whisper,
an aging echo, until that echo too fades
and finally echoes no more.
Woodie 4-o6-16

Haunters January o5, 2o16

Well, earlier than I wanted, but here is the first poem of a new year.

Haunters

I couldn’t sleep tonight

because the winter clouds
kept creeping into my dreams.
You were there too which
didn’t help. Ghosts are ghosts
and all they do is scratch away
at the surface hoping that they’ll
hit a vein and make me scream
myself into consciousness.

And then it’s cold coffee

in my favorite cup, an apple
to chase away the hungry demon
clawing at my gut, and an hour or two
on the computer, or however long it takes
for the spirits to get bored and go away.
And I’ll try to sleep again hoping all the while
that these haunters living in the clouds
won’t come back, won’t come back tonight.
Woodie o1-o5-16