POEM
Love (Life)’s
an open corridor
to Future
suspended in space
pitching like a drunken boat
It’s transparent walled
no ceiling, no floor
with floating signs in strange languages
fading in and fading out
It’s fun
It’s treacherous
Who shall walk that corridor?
All.
Everyone gets their turn
in the wind tunnel of dreams
where all riddles must be solved
all coupons redeemed
I’ve stolen knowledge from its illusions
wrested new faith from shot-down ideals
…though my hair grew white from
the salt of tears
rank with the sweat of love’s pains
— the price I had to pay
for every innocent sunny day
awakened to in my bedizened years
The Corridor widens past each closing door
…each Yes! transmogrified into No.
Cruel, blessed enigma
And the more I’ve loved
the more my heart’s eye was opened wide
though, admittedly, it is a blinking eye
Blink
and I …… see
Blink again
and, as before, I am blind
…then regret and sorrow
rushed in
curling breakers
pounding
my deserted beach
Love stripped me of my dignity
or gullibility
uncounted times
Far behind and beneath me
the sweet, tiny houses and streets flew past
in the fairytale village
of my most perfect happiness
But I was a wretched bat
flying a mission of reconnaissance
over the rubble of Hiroshima.
then sought refuge in dank cave
ugly monstrous thing
despising daylight
It’s true. Love seemed to lie.
to promise then renege.
Still, before me Future beckoned
though it was formless and silent
and I was hollow as a ghost a burned-down house
I was frightened, because alone
and no New Dream came to my encounter
…all round me, still as death …
But there could be no question
Life and greater Love asked me to quest on
not caring that I’d lost my courage
HIC SUNT LEONES
THIS IS LION COUNTRY
They gave me no alternative:
Hunt, child.
the quiet Voices, severe yet kind
Thou canst not stay.
the flashing eyes of burning ice
Remain and die.
So heaving I hoisted this body up
it locked erect over the supple spine
though staggering some
beneath the elephant gun
of years and wisdom
(burden and weapon)
Somehow the Memory Soul
drew aside the gossamer veil
to remind me:
You’ll journey on
cover new spirit ground
Her voice whispered the incantation:
To spot fresh spoor
you must always first smooth
and tramp flat
the shards and debris
of failure and ruined dreams.
You must clear the ground
on which you stand
then resume the Hunt
For you are a huntress!
Ah! …and I remembered.
Yes, of course.
I cannot wait to soar again
look down, a passing condor
above the burnt and ancient desert
from way up high
whence it is the merest brownish spot
on a tremulous sphere
of blue mantled white
But it is not time to fly or glide.
The Circle of Magic
Golden Ring of Eternal Return
may perhaps send me once more …
…to blissfulness in the land of my birth
where Lotus flowers bloom in forests
may tempt me again with madness …
… when I hear the troubadour’s song
serenade the full Italian moon
may move me to compassion …
… when Circe’s wand
hurls swinish grunts inside my throat
when once I trilled nightingale poesie
Perhaps…
The moment is not yet of flight.
I gird myself
with naked resolve
rub my eyes clear of sleep
It is the hour
of the warrior
and the hunter
Not of
lover, slave
Or mage.
The horizon rises rosy hued
The shiver up my spine
of joy…
It is time to hunt lions.
