67 Angels 3/4 Time, May 23, 2o15

Well, I 've been unproductive all through May. Very little writing going on, no blog, a few movie reviews and very little poetry. I don't understand why I have all of a sudden lost my desire, my need and my ability to write, to create art. I've always thought that creativity would be with me, a part of me for as long as I breathed, but lately? Not so much. Anyway, it's my birthday and as a part of my personal celebration I have written a "birthday" poem for this {snicker} special date. I think the first BP I wrote was when I turned 54. That means with this poem that I post right now it will be 13 years of sitting down and writing something about where I am in this life, how I'm feeling about . . . it. Well, it was a struggle to come up with something, but I did it. And here it is . . . Happy B-day, Woodie!

67 Angels 3/4 Time

 

This is the sound of aging gracefully,

an unpleasant little ditty dropped in 3/4 time.
Can you feel it slowly, slowly winding down?

 

and ONE two three,

ONE . . two . . three,
ONE . . . two . . . thr—

 

My perpetual orbit disintegrates

at a disturbing rate these days.
Shattered, splintering,
burning myself out
at such a sluggish  pace.
I plunge head-on down, down,
forever down into the thick abyss,
into the greasy mass of it.

 

and ONE two three,

ONE . . two . . three

 

An internal warming of my organs,

an uncomfortable itch. The Polar Regions
compel my quixotic self, sends it rummaging
through closets, picture books and cabinet drawers
wherever a stray memory might be stored.
Just the gentler ones: youthful runs across an open field,
ballgames and horror movies when the folks were out.
And as a young adult: chugging beers and chasing girls,
motorcycles and cigarettes, Vietnam and ACID trips.
Not much more to it than that, not much more at all.

 

. . . The duller years,

thirty malingering to forty . . .

 

And then my fifties?

The world felt safer then, kinder then,
smaller than old man sitting on a cold park bench
near the septic shores of’a dying Duck Pond.
The geese still swam along the muddy banks,
back then, even though the water levels were so low
they could’ve  walked about  in it
if they bore the presence of mind to do so.

 

and ONE two three . . .

 

Sixties?

I miss my dearest friend.
I miss his sturdy, tires, his dirty sprockets,
his WD-40 musk stinking up  the morning sky.

 

From the moment when the sun would wake
we’d ride and ride and ride . . .

jumping the curbs that pepper Boyd St.,
swerving playfully around pot holes,
the tree branches that fell to the ground like
wounded soldiers during the last storm
that butchered Norman Town.

 

and ONE . . .

 

I’ve been told

that there are angels in the elms. Yes,
Sixty-seven angels lurking in the trees
along Trout Avenue.

 

I’ve never seen one, of course,

but they do exist.

 

For I have heard them dancing

through the winter years on days so cold
a thought would freeze.
Sometimes, I feel them
skulking about inside my head,
snickering from behind bright white wings,
giggling, I suppose,
at all the silly things I’m dreaming.

 

Sixty-seven angels I’m told,

one for every year old.

 

For Woodie on his 67^th birthday

 

The Consequence of Art, May o9, 2o15

Last year, a movie titled American Sniper was released and created a lot of controversy. Audiences were pretty much divided on whether it was uber patriotic or uber insensitive. If your politics were Conservative, you would think that this story about an American sniper in Iraq was definitely pro-American. However, if you were Liberal, you more than likely thought it was highly racist and anti-human beings. This poem was inspired by that controversy.

The Consequence of Art

 

American Sniper is a movie.

It’s not reality. You can't condemn it,
you can’t  praise it just because it denies
or supports your political point of view.

 

What “reality” are you talking about?

You boo this film, condemn it
because it's not the way you wish
your reality to be, it’s not the way
you want the world to turn?

 

Do you look at Picasso’s Girl with Mandolin

And go, "That painting’s a fake, a lie! No woman
born of Earth could look like that!"
Of course she couldn’t. Her reality pours out
onto the canvas through the truth of art . . .
which in itself is a lie . . .  a dream . . . a fragile hope
that this existence offers more
than just the constant beating of the clock,
the steady, dreary crawl toward the ever dark.
Woodie o5-o9-15

The painting is by Pablo Picasso

Gravitational Pull, May o7, 2o15

Been a bit of a while since I've even written a piece of poetry. Short and sweet.

Gravitational Pull

 

There are softer things to remember,

kinder places I could  go, warmer weather.
Friendly, but unknown faces stare at me
beneath stocking caps, over the top of coffee cups,
through thick blankets of cigarette smoke
that linger ‘round their stranger heads like ghosts .
But I’ve got my own memory to worry about;
orbiting around me like yesterday’s news
a carbon copy  of an overly abundant face.
I can’t pull away from its gravity.
Its greater mass keeps my thoughts imprisoned,
confined inside that smile you always smiled
when we made more than love.
Woodie o5-o7-15