To Blog or Not to Blog...

Boxed Celebrity

                              xxix
Watching boxed celebrity drink flashed bulbs
And nibble the foamed heads of microphones,
We’re held captive by what we wish to hold:
Ravenous Fame glowing bright as hot stones.
Immortality—the allure of stars
Spelling our names in lights across the sky—
Pulls the hungry soul toward black pits of tar
That mimic Night’s promises gone awry.
The shine is an illusion, the darkness
Unbroken. Fame’s maw gobbles another
Life chasing life’s most glamorous excess,
Consumed by that whale like Jonah smothered.
   What appears eternal bright on this eve
   Will fade as fickle fashion changes weave.

I watched the 77th Academy Awards last night. It was fascinating—being both repulsed by the fawning and excess and, at the same time, being drawn to it like a fish to a hooked worm.

Rationally, I understand that fame is not an end—that it rarely makes one happy. On the other hand, there is a spark within me that wants to burn brighter than any sun—that wants to be seen and heard and remembered.

Once Mary asked me if, as a writer, I would want to scribble action-packed pulp that sells like the Da Vinci Code, which would give me enough money to fill four swimming pools, or rather, construct a piece of writerly perfection like Brighten the Corner Where You Are, a book that sings to those few who have read it long after it’s been returned to the shelf.

To be perfectly honest, I can’t answer.

Right now, I just want to be published.

On the red carpet
The brightest stars from the screen
Walk tall. They seem short

Tod und Schlaf

                              xxviii
If death is sleep, then what, pray tell, is dream?
Is it an afterlife filled with extremes—
A cartoon—a parody of life’s themes
Replayed on shut eyelids in endless streams?
And for those who cannot dream, iced in sleep,
What of them? Are these quiet souls condemned?
Is paradise lost or is it gained deep
In soundless slumber in silent soil hemmed?
Is dreaming Heaven or a curséd Hell,
Invading Death’s rest with lively visions
Reflecting life lost to Time’s tolling bell?
Do dreams free or could they be a prison?
   Who can tell to what fancy we’ll be flown
   ‘Til that eternal instant of Sleep is known.

As sung in the immortal, four-part infinite canon arranged by Franz Josef Haydn:

      Tod ist ein länger Schlaf.
      Schlaf ist ein kürzer, kürzer Tod,
      der lindert dir, und jener tilgt des Lebens Not!
      Tod ist ein länger Schlaf.

While dreaming in sun
A butterfly balances
On red rose petals

Green Fists

                              xxvii
The American Dream of owning land,
Bought with hardship, struggle, and bloody sweat,
Is threatened by the Public Good’s demand
To cure blighted cities of rising debt.
The antique homestead of Grandpa Moses
Is slated for destruction tomorrow.
A new Gap, the government proposes
And forecloses on folk lost in escrow.
Cash governs the law, and big business rules
With green fists flinging green hope to and fro.
Muzzled and bridled and whipped as if mules,
The polity is sent to pasture, bowed.
   Private property is our sovereign right
   Unless, that is, you have not money’s might.

The Supreme Court is hearing a case testing whether local governments have the right to take land from private owners and sell it to private developers to squash blight and increase the tax base.

The Public Good is one thing, but to see my home turned into a Wal-Mart frightens me. If New Haven forces the owners of coveted land to sell and then, in turn, sells that property to Pfizer, how can anyone own anything?

Businesses will always produce more revenue than residential properties, so what will stop the government from handing my house over to Johns Hopkins or Barnes and Noble or MacDonald’s?

But the same could have been said about railroads versus farmland, family homes versus public utilities, even small settled communities versus the vast territories of the Mohawk or Chippewa Indians. The west was founded on the doctrine of Eminent domain, and our country spans two oceans because of it—from sea to shining sea.

What a sad land.

Blighted streets lead toward
Our urban hearts, encased in
Concrete wet with tears

That Genesis Hour

                              xxvi
Seeking the day without a yesterday,
Both scientist and theologians peer
At the shrapnel of Creation’s decay
And theorize how that first bang appeared.
Whether by Breath commanded with Word’s power
Or random collision of hydrogen,
A still clock must strike that genesis hour
When molecules first spin and life begins.
So both say. On that, they agree. Mostly.
But, such bile flows between these warring camps
That brief words exchanged are followed closely
By curses, each claiming light from Truth’s lamp.
   Yet, if either opened their eyes to see,
   The world would blind them, and they could be free.

I wonder why it is on the extremes of things that we have trouble agreeing. Many Creationists wish to debate stories as if it were science, while Cosmologists and physicists hope to strip the myth from the world, making it some sort of Cartesian machine.

But, to me the universe contains both myth and machine, God and Science, chicken and steak.

Next time I run into a rocket scientist, I must remember to ask him about poetry and myth, and furthermore, at the next wedding I attend, I must make a note to ask the preacher man about the space/time continuum and the evolution of man.

Somewhere in that conversation, may I glimpse the beginning of things.

In that cold vastness
Of nothing, perhaps there is
A clock being wound

Spring's Midwife

                              xxv
Deep in the Northern Wastes, small towns exist
Where miles separate neighbors and years
Part friends. In such a climate, to persist
Is a struggle against dark creeping fears.
Pine trees hang heavy beneath drapes of snow,
And instead of beauty, hearts feel alone.
Glass rattles in windows as fierce gusts blow;
Yet, we watch from the kitchen, frozen stone.
With the hope of Spring, we watch in Winter
For companionship, strolling down the lane—
A friendly ear, a smiling face, to stir
Mouths with words—greetings—a forgotten name.
   The human heart craves a mate more than life
   Just as Spring needs Winter as her midwife.

Last night, Mary and I watched a movie recommended to us by Markus, lover of poultry and all things fowl. It was a Swedish/Norwegian affair called Kitchen Stories.

The movie chronicles the life of lonely Norwegian bachelors after WWII while being observed by Swedish scientists studying their movements and habits so that the perfect kitchen can be designed. Once you get past the sing-song Swedish and the more guttural Norwegian (unless, that is, you speak those languages), the movie is hysterical in a soft, sad way.

It strips humanity to its basic materials and shows what we are—how we live—how we continue on—with such delicacy and humor. I can’t escape the images from the movie: a red tractor; a wooden, eight-foot tall, rickety observation chair; the bleeding nose of an old horse; a mangy cat scarf; the taste of chocolate; the smell of Swedish tobacco; two white tea cups with blue trim held in the fragile grip of porcelain saucers while water boils in Spring.

I wish I could see with such clarity—could feel with such purity—to tell a story so.

In a warm kitchen
The table is set for two
A kettle whistles

A Mountain in Glass

                              xxiv
With Dawn’s rising, I climb a mountain growing
Rounder with each passing day, expanding
Like a moon, swelling pale in May, showing
My image etched in smooth water standing.
Upon that unrippled surface, I see
What I have been—that which he will become.
Just as my father saw himself in me,
I glimpse the past in a future winsome.
But that is tomorrow. On this night,
I imagine that morning ascent made
With finger steps to the summit stretched white
And streaked purple, which only time can fade.
   Love has made a temporary mountain
   Shielding our past within our future kin.

The human body is an amazingly beautiful contraption. As I watch Mary sleep during those few minutes when she isn’t stumbling to the bathroom, I am baffled by what Nature can manage. I love every minute of it.

Reflected in glass
A growing mountain presses
On the poor bladder

The Grove Gethsemane

                              xxiii
It’s the will of God, the believers say.
But, what that may mean, even Priests remain
Silent. I’ve heard it said, toward Judgment Day
All things point—by the Architect ordained.
To the nonbelievers, such talk of plans
Or destiny or heavenly decrees
Is but fancy, soothing the son of man
Tormented in the grove Gethsemane.
Between these extremes—blind faith and blind doubt—
There’s plenty room enough for mystery.
Nature hides miracles from the devout
And agnostic alike; neither are free.
   Whether divine fate or random event,
   It matters not; it’s how your life is spent.

Last night on American Idol, 20 of 44 contestants were cut from the competition. The fascinating aspect of the whole ordeal was the number of people who attributed their fate to the will of God.

Simon would say something like: "You sing like a caged baboon whose tongue has been calloused by years of licking his own ass. Stick with accounting."

Whereupon the aspiring singer would frequently respond along these lines: "This must be part of the Lord’s plan. This rejection is a test of my strength. Just as God giveth, he taketh away...blah...blah..blah..."

Paula may reassure with: "You’re just not right for this contest." (meaning: you sing like the chittering of a thousand one-legged crickets).

And again the plan of God will be invoked, shrouding the inconsolable within a blanket of order and reason and destiny. I don’t mean to impugn faith because I find such belief perfectly respectable. I sometimes wish I had such unshakable, unbreakable belief.

But, not having it—not ever experiencing it—I always wonder if these proclamations are told by idiots, full of sound and fury signifying nothing. Or could these believers actually be touched by divine decree?

Could God care that much?

Within a garden
Surrounded by ripe olives,
A man prays. I watch.

Sacred Shadows

                              xxii
There are no fireplaces anymore—
No campfires around which friends cluster
To shake the dark with stories restoring
Our humanity to its deep luster.
Instead, we sit before a flickering
Box, Listening to the electric hum
Of canned sound scripted by apes snickering
At their own clichéd jokes, penned with ink scum.
Bards simply cannot exist in this world;
Their words no longer duel with flamed twilight
To hold us captive—to reveal, unfurled,
Our most sacred shadows in shadowed Night.
   Imagination has been overcome
   By these modern times, rendering us numb.

When I was but a wee lad, I remember my grandfather’s white goatee shadowed with red while he spun spooky tales of wonder and mystery around the campfire. He told the adventures of his father’s father as he stumbled upon maraudering pirates, hidden silver mines, and even an escaped psychopath who desired to skewer him with a butcher knife.

We traveled with his voice as it traveled with dancing flames. We were taken to the places where only imagination can fly—the Shire, beyond the rainbow to Oz, across the seas where the wild things are, to the deepest places—those gardens that reflect Eden in its primal glory.

That is my grandfather’s goatee to me.

And, although there are no more campfires, just squawking TVs, I still can picture the shadowed face of the last true Bard—my grandfather.

Shadows paint faces
Red and yellow with burning
Words mingling with flame

Licking Socked Ankles

                              xxi
During what should be a bleak midwinter,
Helios climbs heaven’s vaulted ceiling,
Igniting my powdered soul to sinter
Into a mass of warm Summer feelings.
This mild season, stolen from Jack Frost
And carried by yellow fingers, baffles
Trees to bloom as hibernation is tossed
Aside—restrained no more by snow’s snaffle.
There is no ice, no frozen earth, just mud
Licking socked ankles, splattering clean hose.
But, it’s a small price to pay—washing crud
From soiled cloths—if in Winter, Spring shows.
   For every blessing, Nature has a fee.
   In this strange season, it’s but piled laundry.

The other day I received an e-mail that contained an article by Bill Moyers published in the Star Tribune on January 30, 2005.

Later that afternoon, one Ms. Carol Loy decided that such a polemic needed her immediate response and sent this message to everybody who received the Moyers commentary:

Are you aware that Bill Moyers had to make a public apology for misquoting and misrepresenting what he said was James Watt's statement that "protecting natural resources was unimportant" that is absolutely not what Watt said. I certainly hope that you do not consider Pres Bush a fanatical Christian because he believes in God and prays for wisdom. I'm also not sure who highly respects Bill M., a man who received a 6 figure income from the publicly sponsored radio stations, certainly not me. Many consider him left of F. Castro and a man who has consistently, over the years, spewed out anti-American propaganda. I normally don't respond to liberal messages and I don't intend to start a dialog about this but couldn't let such "facts" be unchallenged. It's interesting whenever such statements are being made and someone says forget liberal and conservative opinion and uses the word scary, it's usually a political statement.

After reading her opinion, I couldn’t help myself, so I explained how I view things. It went something like this...

"I don't intend to start a dialog about this..."

What exactly were you doing then, Miss Loy?

If you simply wished not to receive "liberal messages" sent from Marti, then you might have responded to her rather than the entire group. But, you didn't. So, a dialog you have started, which is a commendable thing...although you may think otherwise.

From dialog, do we reach for Truth, which must be the goal of all who strive to deepen their humanity. You may disagree with Mr. Moyers, and that is fine, but don't you think it important to weigh his words, to study their ramifications, to see if his descriptions match what is happening around us? If they do, even remotely, shouldn't we as thinking being discuss it rather than flailing about by labeling people as Castro-leaning leftists?

Look, it is indeed true that Mr. Moyers misquoted James Watt, as did the Washington Post and Time Magazine, but does that mean that everything Mr. Moyers said is irrelevant? The Catholic Church claimed the Earth was the center of the universe for centuries, but that misstatement does not necessarily mean all Church Doctrine is patently false. The idea of forgiveness and redemption seem rather important ideas that shouldn't be tossed like a baby out with the bath water.

And, even if you conclude that everything Mr. Moyers says is drivel, there is no reason to attack him as a man. Attack his ideas, not his character. His ideas are separate. You say "you are not sure who highly respects Bill M...." Well, I do. And it has nothing to do with his thoughts on the environment or his other left leaning ideas. It has to with his courage...his courage to say what he believes rather than hiding behind labels, his courage to stand up for his beliefs, his courage to admit he was wrong...

...by saying this:

In a recent speech that I made on religion and the environment ("There is no tomorrow," Jan. 30 Op Ex), I made a mistake in quoting remarks attributed to James Watt, former secretary of interior, by the online journal Grist without confirming them myself. Because those or similar quotes had also appeared through the years in many other publications—in the Washington Post and Time, for example, as well as in several books that I consulted in preparing my speech—I too easily assumed their legitimacy. Despite their widespread currency, I should have checked their accuracy before using them. Grist and the Washington Post have now published corrections concerning the quote attributed to Watt in 1981. I talked to Mr. Watt on the phone and expressed my own regret at using a quote that I had not myself confirmed. I also told him that I continue to find his policies as secretary of the interior abysmally at odds with what I, as well as other Christians, understand to be our obligation to be stewards of the earth.

Bill Moyers, New York

Is not such a statement something we can all respect?

See feelingly.

I am still waiting for a response.

Words lacking reason
Are as annoying as mud
Staining my new socks

A Crescent Behind Clouds

                              xx
Muse, why did words once float with grace and ease,
Wrinkling the air as thoughts wrinkle the mind?
On that day, I balanced on a trapeze
Strung high, where sweet prose molds what my eyes find.
Yet, from such heights, it’s common to tumble;
Eyes slam shut, ears go deaf, and words fall flat,
Played from an un-tempered clavier mumbling
Notes as soured as lovers in a spat.
A struggle to rediscover balance
Begins; yet if regained, the heights never
Seem as lofty—like a drug of malice
Revealing a glimpse that is soon severed.
   O Fickle Muse, why guide my pen but once?
   Why cap me in this corner like a dunce

Sometimes sentences flow like Liquid Plummer down a clogged drain, and other times they don’t.

I wonder why that is.

It must be the moon or something.

Suspended in sky
A crescent briefly lights Night
Clouds cover the moon

Words Speaking to Air

                              xix
So many grand ideas are left unsaid,
Entangled inside to fester and chafe.
The tongue is tied with delicate threads,
Knotted and re-knotted so we stay safe.
But there is a moment when the mouth stirs,
Trying to mold our silent spirit.
Dumbness is cured—no longer to deter
Our secret selves, slandered a hypocrite.
Insubstantial breath, heavied by thought, clouds
The atmosphere like mist in morning’s glow.
These wisps, unknotting deeds when voiced out loud,
Rise heavenward with the Sun’s grace in tow.
   When words speak to air, action must follow,
   Carrying us to our depths from the shallows.

So many times, I have thought a wonderful deed—imagined a spectacular gesture—and never spoke. The idea faded...along with my better self—the person that I strive to be.

Perhaps, next time I won’t remain silent.

Clouds fly across sky
Carried by breeze from the south
The wind has shifted

Natural Alchemy

                              xviii
When groups gather in the comfort of home,
Natural alchemy smokes in the space
Between old friends and the glowing hearthstone
Of long forgotten faces, now embraced.
A common past, stolen by time's passing,
Glimmers red in memory transmuted
By renewed conversation surpassing
Our remembered history, polluted
By white sands leaking from life’s hourglass.
Clouded so, even the brightest moments
Fade with age...unless distance is bypassed
And groups gather, making the past present.
   Once lost, remote friends can be found again.
   Once found, hearts glow as gold as Autumn glens.

Today, Mary and I saw some friends that we haven’t seen in a while. It felt as if we were all around a roaring blaze, just listening to each other.

Just listening to the past.

A dark forest looms
Around a dancing fire
Painting gold shadows

After-Rain Greens

                              xvii
When one's love is captured by another,
The heart splatters the world in complex shades.
Greetings are played and replayed, which smothers
Spontaneity; feelings are betrayed.
A casual touch controlled by blind chance
Inflames hope to heights of madness untamed.
And that abrupt glance must promise romance
As surely as the passion it proclaims.
Happy accidents pave this bridle path
Where the prancing heart, saddled like a horse,
Gallops, reign-less, toward that embittered bath
Of ardor unreturned without remorse.
   Eros dispenses a painful potion
   Of tumult and unrestrained emotion.

I watch my friends being yanked across the face of the earth by love. Some drag their feet, while others leap in with obsessive enthusiasm. It adds such complexity to every act, every word, every sly glance. The world seems pregnant with the possibility of love fulfilled, passion realized, ardor crowned.

We live for that feeling—the heightened sensitivity to everything, those bright colors of after-rain greens, the beat of love keeping time for the music playing in the wind.

Yet, the pain is also magnified. The lows are lower than the bowels of Hades. Tears cut caverns down the cheeks, carving canyons to the heart, ripping it open, revealing it unprotected to the harsh atmosphere of mundane living.

And yet, we love.

Even with the pain and turmoil, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Heavy drops on leaves
Magnify the sun’s weak light
Rain falls no longer

Infinite Roots

                              xvi
Those that have power to hurt but do not
Are the ones carrying Heaven’s grace to earth.
With virtuous deeds, their words will not rot
Upon poisonous vines of little worth.
Their soul is a tree with infinite roots
Stretching to the heart of matters, where Truth
Nourishes the sap flowing to new shoots.
These green greetings educate our green youth.
Alas, such mighty clout corrupts with age;
Soon roots shrink, bark peels, and gray leaves shrivel
To fall during this, their life’s final stage
When lessons are lost in spiteful drivel.
   So, speak with care and act with even more.
   Don’t become a cantankerous old bore.

I just read an article about State Comptroller Schaefer. Sometimes I think there should be an age at which our politicians need to resign. It seems that the switch connecting brains to mouths is locked open, and words just flow without thought.

Politicians have an obligation not only to represent their constituents but also to set an example for us to reflect upon. They are our mirror and should try to show us those characteristics representing the best things about the human race, not our most vile and primitive behavior. That is not to say that our leaders cannot be pulled by animalistic urges, but they must hide them.

For our own good.

In Winter, naked
Branches scratch, blown by wind
Roots upended

Breeze-Stirred Ripples

                              xv
When left alone, irrational fear grows
Like breeze-stirred ripples roiling into waves
That batter the stressed mind under seas known
To capsize the strongest men—those most brave.
I am not in such company. Instead,
I put on a good face, calm and patient.
Inside, the ocean rises, and I tread
Water frantically while you are absent.
Horrific visions drown human reason;
The animal takes control, pumping arms
And kicking legs during this wet season,
Keeping me afloat and away from harm.
   Scant moments have passed since you bid adieu.
   I wish the door open, and you’d walk through.

They say absence makes the heart grow fonder.

Which is true...except for those times when it doesn’t.

I suppose that's why God gave us cell phones.

April’s third week passed
With winter still clinging tight
The dogwoods bloom late

A Honeycombed Heart

                              xiv
How strange a pair do my muse and I make.
Extending fellowship, she flits and flies
Like bees; the air from clover to hive shakes
As I watch behind wax sweets crystallize.
In public sight, this nectar is locked tight
Within the den of my honeycombed heart.
Later—under the hush of star-filled nights—
Like a bear, I nose that veiled hive apart.
From those layered depths do soft words rise
To growl just as my wingéd muse hums
Among flowers—noted by loving eyes,
Yet unheard ‘til night, when the honey comes.
   Bee and bear are as linked as you and I;
   The one feeds the other as star lights sky.

Valentine’s Day is better celebrated early, don’t you think?

From lily to rose
A bee bumbles nectar-filled
A bear waits for night