THE BITTER FISHERMAN'S MEMORIES.

The Bitter Fisherman’s Memories

I am a bitter memory that is

Constantly fighting with myself.

I am a poor river flowing.

I am a torrent river moving.

To the east, and to the west,

A gentle wind blows. 

Overcast in all of its shadows,

The mountains lead to the river.

I found my home into myself.

And gentle winds blow.

Softly the gentle waters run

Straight to the mountain,

And everything is satisfied in it.

The ducks are satisfied because they

Get their fish.  The geese are satisfied.

Even the deer. 

Everyone is satisfied but the fisherman,

Because they run or fly when he is coming,

And animals are terrified of man. 

MY LIFE.

My Life

I am disconcerting in the covering of the crowd.
Some people say I am a little too harsh,
others say I am a bit too winded,
but still I rise like the wind that is mourning,
still I rise several years after death. 
I am fighting for my morality,
and the height of justice which glimmers
and glows like a ripening lava lamp.
Everyone shudders in the darkness,
like a rippling tide. 
Freedom reigns like dragons coming
on all fours. 
Happiness is a warm tongue that drolls
on and on about happy things,
tick-tock of the clock on the wall is incongruent
with your revelations. 
I participate in the mass reduction of the
destruction of the lamb,
and focus on a more feasible future.
Unbeknown, unproud, unforgiving.
This is my life.

On Puppies.

On Puppies

The puppies climb stairs.

I climb as if I would never climb again.

You said you were not coming,

That you were going outside of the house.

How the puppies climb the stairs is

Beyond me, because I don’t know how they

Are able to do it.  It forces me to

Take deep, calming breaths as if I could

Never breathe again, or never breathe

Outward, anyway, whichever comes first.

My thoughts come in fast as lightning.

I am dreaming beyond a realm of thinking,

When puppies climb on stairs, they are

So fucking gosh darn cute,

That I can’t help but think about anything else.

I wish I were a puppy.

I wish I were cute and cuddly.

I wish I were a lot of things, especially calm

And happy, when inside I am screaming and screaming

To be heard,

And then there is a space in the darkness

Where I can breathe in through my nose,

And the puppies are climbing stairs,

And I am climbing, too.

THINKING ABOUT GRANDMOTHER ON THE WAY TO THE FUNERAL.

Thinking About Grandmother On the Way to the Funeral

The car is stifling with heat. 

I hear the noise of its engine roaring.

An airplane flies over head, spewing

Carbon dioxide.  I am not settled.

The mood in the car is bitter,

Because we have to attend a funeral

For our grandmother,

Who died while kayaking on a river.

Sometimes I think I wish life would go

Faster than the blink of an eye,

But sometimes it goes slow as a

Merry go round, spinning, constantly spinning,

And everything is spinning around it.

I am not fascinated by death,

But I wonder what death would be like.

Some things are shrouded in doubt,

While others are not,

And each and everything in particular

Is random,

Thrown about in the dark. 

Sometimes I wonder what would happen if

We survived death,

Or nothing would happen at all,

Or our souls would be crushed at the end of time,

Or we went to Heaven, which sounds better.

My grandmother’s funeral is in a half an hour,

And I have eaten most of the pie. 

Shadows of Myself.

Shadows Of Myself.

The shadows of myself are

Torn of grief,

That is better than the age that is slowing,

That is better than the tides

Running.

All alone, in myself, I seek the darkness

In the dark,

And the moon glitters like a cloud.

All around me, the wind mourns,

And time spins like a clock.

I am going, I am going,

Everything is hard against the light.

Sometimes I write until dawn breaks;

Sometimes I write until the shadows

Turn, and the animals come out to play,

Like the jackrabbit and the skunk,

Sniffing its trail of tears. 

All along the darkness, things tire,

Things awaken, and nothing is burnt of

Ashes, things are lit with stone.

I am a tired old man who cannot sing

A tune,

I am a tired old man who is on the radio,

Like a darning needle that has lost

Its shine. 

This thought is upon me, that I am waking,

And shadows fade;

Then light is thrust in the dark.

Homeless Man In Need of Home.

Homeless Man In Need of Home

A man sits on a train track smoking

Cigars.

He is looking up at the night sky,

Wishing he were at home.

He is a man of many means,

And cannot escape the things of his past,

That ache in his chest like old vines growing.

Morning comes and he wakes, rise and shine,

And he is a mask of reasons untaking;

He is the river that is flowing in the north,

And good things come, and yet there is the bad,

Wrapped in shrouds.

I am a good man, he says, patting himself on the

Shoulder as if he couldn’t stand what he was going

Through on a daily basis,

Sometimes people give him money on side streets,

Sometimes there are things that make him whole

Again,

Like good money and good beer.

He needs a job but no one will hire him,

He has a degree in communications,

He has a method of transportation, but this is where he lives,

On train tracks or in his car.

Someone said once he is sick in the head and spat in his

Face, and he didn’t call for an ambulance because he has

A kind soul.

In the distance, the darkness doesn’t seem so great;

Because he is homeless and doesn’t know where he is going

To live the next day, maybe a motel, maybe a place

That requires an id and then the next day comes and the next

And the next and still he is not whole.

O the Wandering Poet.

O the Wandering Poet

The master poet lives in countless sorrow,

In soaring drought, the master explains;

How he bought and sold himself for

Food to eat, how he wandered the heavens

And the moors.

Countless times he wandered like great things

Waking,

And the deepest dark, and hearts unfurling.

Shadows wave like forgotten things,

And I am here, but not again.

I am the master poet, and I am gone;

Interspersed with sorrow and wandering loner,

I eat my fill but I am not fulfilled.

Time is waning, like a child,

And justice and education are not bitter in coming.

Sometimes I eat soup just to please my belly,

But in my mind, there is none.

The master poet goes to the shadows of yore,

And the marks of angels are upon me.

I DO NOT KNOW.

I do Not Know Except How I know

I do not know except how I know,

My eyes speak like withering vines,

And travel along the end of days.

Speak to me of reasons unknown,

In bitter temptation, and heartfelt promise.

I told you I didn’t want to know anything,

That I wanted to remain blind, deaf, and dumb,

That I didn’t want to know the receding of the tide

Or the way the winds move or bend,

Or how destiny cannot change your perception

Of anything until the last moment,

Or how you talk or move or drive,

And sometimes I am not hungry and then I am,

And sometimes I wake and am hungry again.

I found myself in this mood of forgetting,

On occasion, about different things,

And the tides turn and everything turns,

And the moods are forgotten with the tides,

And we make things out of broken things,

And death rises out of the ashes like a song,

And in the tiring mood, you are wanted,

And in the hunger you forget to be born.

I do not know except how I know.

Dnepar River.

Dnepar River

The river goes splish-splash like a tidal

wave to freedom.

Darkness wanders on all its fours,

and the moonlight hits the water like

a silver sieve.

A wolf howls in the stillness,

breaking all train of thought.

No matter where you go, or who you are,

destiny is what makes us who we

are.

Once I had a guinea pig that got

lost in the mist and I could never replace it.

Once I found a lost diamond that was hidden

by the dark.

Inside of myself, inside of everything,

the humanity lies within me.

I am a monster, tall and plain;

I am the darkness, that comes on all fours.

So you say. So you feel like the night,

like a horse walking, trotting, then walking

again,

and there is the river, so tall and proud,

standing against obsidian light.

Because He is Alone.

Because He is Alone

You have all those mesmerizing eyes,

That take and make and break and stare.

Terrible twos are completed by tomorrow,

The shadows bend like the night,

And the moon is lit like a skyscraper.

Shadows make me nervous. I am not calm

in my waking. Things move quite fast,

cars are pretty slow going down the highway

at fifty miles an hour, we could be faster,

where are the flying cars.

We all make mistakes.

Education makes mistakes, says my lover,

going faster than an airplane that

goes through the sky, and rain pours

down like liquor, and everyone drinks liquor

in the evenings, only the drunks drink it

in the mornings. And some people are

homeless and some are not; and destiny

is wanted; and the light comes pouring

from the plains, the sunlight and all that,

like a great swift moving cloud.

Time is a roller coaster and moves on the air.

Sometimes it takes roller blades to gain

momentum,

and the old man sleeps his days away,

crying at nights because he is alone.

HOT AIR.

Hot Air

The hot air balloon soars through the

Air like a majestic bird on its wings.

Shadows fall on the ground from it,

And people come out of their houses to

Stare at it, and children come, and the

Elderly and even the president.

All they do is stare at the hot air balloon,

Soaring so fast, breathing air like a dragon.

My boyfriend told me I was exactly like

A dragon,

As if I could pour fire through my nostrils

Every second,

As if I could fly on majestic wings like

A great big animal,

A lizard, no doubt, but that’s not the

Problem.  I can’t do any of those things

Without help,

Because people do not have wings,

They have airplanes and brains to make

The airplanes,

And I have a boyfriend and I live in a house,

And I like to garden,

And sometimes I go out for dinner at night.

Still, it flies, like a dragon, and the dragon

Is me, because I have the power to use my

Heart and my mind and make the right decisions.

YOU ARE.

You Are

The clash between beasts is utterly complete.

She speaks to me through her words.

Time is like a transcending void.

I am utterly whole.

The foreign land glares in the distance,

we go by boat, not by shore.

In the rising sun we find different ways

to keep us from floating out to sea,

from the rising sun to the horrid moon,

to the day that breaks and bends,

I am here waiting for you, my love,

as the tide fades away.

You are the river that waits for me.

I am the course of the action in the void,

I am the darkness that seeks out darkness,

I am the wading of the tide.

Night hides from me. It is broken.

The seeds of the grapes have been bitter and weep;

I weep along with it.

Nothing comes short of darkness,

bitterness fades to gray.

I am the wholeness and the light,

the darkness does not take me,

nor will take me in the night.

You are whole with me.

You are the grape to my strawberry.

Today, This Morning.

Today is the day I am going

To better myself for the people around me.

Today the day is nice and calm,

And a breeze is blowing.

I sit outside on my patio, watching

The birds go from tree branch to tree

Branch, their song filling the quiet

Morning air.

It is morning, have I mentioned that?

The sun shines above me like a pinched

Nerve, always glowing, like a big star.

The air is glowing, too.

I feel like I can conquer anything,

Including the depths of my own heart,

The heart that beats regularly inside my chest,

And there is a parade because it is summer,

And the night will be vast,

And I am vast with it.

The air is still, stiller than my heart,

And the rhythm of the wind is rhythmical.

Something is not in the way of us,

Not in the way, we go forward, always

Moving, stiller than breath.

THE DREAMS WILL TAKE ME.

The Dreams Will Take Me

As fast as the dreams will take

Me,

I am defiant.

I am defiant in my waking.

The river is vast as my heart.

The tempest is dim as my ears.

I hear nothing.

I speak nothing.

I am nothing.

Nothing garners all wisdom.

Nothing speaks in the void.

The void is darkness.

I feel around me the night,

And it is dimming.

Facts are as small as I am.

I have not hoped things will

Die down,

But I am beginning to.

I am beginning to see the light

Ahead of me,

So deep and sensual,

And I can swim in it.

BATTLEFIELD.

For all time, I will wander, lost,
in the sea of the world.
For all time, I will dream of what
I can't have and what I didn't do.
My love has been lost in an
endless sea filled with rage.
I am lost with the endlessness of time.
Time is a ragged thing, long and winded.

It tears at you with its claws and you try
to break free and can't, something holds
you back, your memories and the faces of
the ones you love.
Memories are strange, forgetful things
that have no thoughts or feelings but still hide
deep inside of you and try to make you forget
the greatness that is you, that is the world,
that you are not lost or unloved.
I still wander lost and afraid, unknown to
the battle field, and my heart yearns
for freedom.

THE FEARFUL SUN.

The Fearful Sun

The thunder crashes against the

Live-long day.

Nothing will sustain it, not even death.

Thunder is everlasting.

It is quick and omnipotent.

It can shake and shiver at the ground.

It can move and wither like a snake.

Branches move in the wind.

Lightning strikes like a gourd.

How hard the sound makes, as the thunder

Rumbles, and lightning flashes,

And the whole sky is lit up because the

Sun has gone.

The sun will not return for several hours,

Because it is afraid.

THE SEA AND THE NIGHT.

The Sea and the Night

My heart is blacker than the night.

It seethes and burns like a sea.

I am the night that is darker than this,

I am the sea that is born of nothing.

Nothing resides within myself.

Nothing is everywhere that I am not.

Lucky is the darkness that is the night;

Luck is the turning of the tide as the ship

Comes in, water crashing against its sides,

Water rushing over the wooden floors

That bend and move and wave because

A storm is coming and it will last forever.

The sea is going on forever until it evolves

Into a calming thing that we like to see,

To move in and feel against our faces.

The clock is ticking.  The night is bitter

And the moon’s round face is hidden

In shadow, and the water is dark,

And everything is dark in it.

DAYTIME.

Daytime

My heart weeps for you in the daytime,

As well as at night.

I thought I could get over it by talking to someone

New,

But it hasn’t helped me yet.

My heart is yearning for the turning of the tides,

When things will go my way and I will be happy.

But sometimes the hunger gnaws at my stomach

And I have to go away and make little green paper.

The little green paper helps me buy food.

It is a treat to my stomach.

I wish it wasn’t so, but it is in the minds of the government

To make it so and I cannot stand up to the masses.

I’m sorry, my love, but my love for you is not so great

That I am willing to risk the goodness of food in my

Belly.

My heart yearns for the yeast bread, the doughnuts,

The veggies and greens.  I am aching, my love,

To hold you in my heart and in my heart you will

Remain, because I am too scared to give up this

Thing called food.  I must go.

THE NIGHT.

The Night

The calm is like the night.

My eyes are bitter as a storm.

This dream seems to be neverending.

Nothing is caught in the web.

I have not heard or seen it in a dream,

This web I have made myself.

I am caught in it, help!  I have made

Myself appear bitter in the eyes of others.

I do not see bliss as a mode of myself.

I do not see time as a way to heal things.

Once something is broken it is broken.

You cannot heal it now or then.

When you miss something you miss it forever.

Sometimes hearts and minds cannot be shaped

To be what you wish.

I hear the echo in the wind.  Sometimes it makes me

Think of you.

There’s a void in my heart that you left,

A long time ago when I had dreams,

But now I have none and I don’t care.

The lesson is not in the dreaming.

I don’t care what others perceive of me.

Sometimes you just have to let things go.

I have not awakened to the time of things.

Dreams are broken now, they are like yesterday.

MY DEAR ROBIN.

Robin

The robin was throwing leaves

Out of the water

As if he were picking up trash

On the side of a highway

Some people like to pick up

Trash and I hail those kinds

Of people

As if they were the only

People living on this faithless

Planet

This planet that throws animals

And people away like they

Are nothing and

I can see why most people

Act like they are nothing

And will be nothing

Until the day they

Are buried in a cemetery

With its hard tombstones

And flowers strewn

About like radishes

Animals making nests

In bushes put in by

The caretaker

And family members leaving

Flowers by their graves

When I die I want someone

To pick up trash in my memory

As if I hadn’t done it at all

During my lifetime

Maybe I should start doing it now.

Just like the robin.

THIRSTY.

THIRSTY

He is thirsty in a way that other people

Are not thirsty and have no desire for thirst

Once he was on an island in the middle

Of a vast ocean that had no name

But someone had named it a long time ago

And someone else thought that was pretty special

Do you know what I think is pretty special?
Finding out something is better than you expected,

Like folding laundry.

He is thirsty.  His nerves are shattered.

He takes things and holds them in his arms

Maybe a puppy or some kind of pillow

That holds his head at night.

But I wouldn’t wonder at self-sacrifice.

That seems almost like a sacrifice.

AS WE KNOW IT.

As We Know It

Life as we know it is strangely misshapen into a pair

Of oxymorons that cannot be escaped or obtained.

Destruction has a mind of its own and creates craters

Where there are none.

Everything is simply solidified into broken parts,

Strewn onto the highways of doubt.

It’s something I don’t know the answer to.

I don’t know the answer to anything,

About the green grass growing or the time of day.

I don’t know who created the sundial or why it

Was created.

I don’t understand the simplicity of anything.

In the dreams of our kind, we strive to be better

Than yesterday, but some people are already there

And I envy them the way a crocodile envies an ice

Cream cone on a long hot day at work.

Strewn about the highway of self-doubt.

Strewn about the occurrences of yesterday.

I am beginning to think about the tides of things

And how light bends and waves.

Destruction is self-annihilation. 

Learn to better yourself in the process.