My Picture: Xiahe Town, Gansu Province, China.
Poetry of indifference
Age
Sunday Morning II
My Picture: River Fen, Taiyuan City, Shanxi Province, China.
Big wheel spinning round and round
a sketchy truth about the finer things.
Spring grasses echo a brave soldiers dream,
life forms in places our fingers and lips touch.
Memories firmly held….. grown up without symbols
fire burns the cracks….. passing time.
Fela Kuti flies the eagles, lonely as the poet
a few lines scratched….. by night.
Writing is weighing, a greater void left behind
‘Don’t be stingy with the whisky’…said Bukowski
Call it gray and call it tired, but also call it life.
It’s late, and few want to learn to dance.
In the morning, new mercies I see
as humble yellow hands reach out to me.
Falling through branches
My Picture
Across the frozen field,
a horse breath.
I hear a chime of bells…
a table for one.
Paper flowers,
the old songs
and words we can’t recall.
The poet is out of rhythm.
Hospital waiting rooms,
and jazz in the park.
A mother’s cowlick
squawks the moment.
Walking sticks are left
dropped into a hole.
Foreigners are talking
to a young dog, barking.
A tired flagpole slumbers,
reflecting the new world order.
Bars with under-age concubines
proclaim business as usual.
Growing quiet and suddenly still,
I can see the rice fields glow.
Shyly spreading wispy memories,
with broken and dark stained teeth.
International Woman’s day, 2019
My Picture: ‘Statue of Woman and Baby”: Taiyuan City, Shanxi Province, China.
Women in my life
Weathering the storms
Stand up and be counted
Black-haired mother and daughter
Never to be owned
They made their way out
Birds and Flight
My Picture: Some friends I met in Xiahe in Gannan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Gansu, China.
A deep black satin of the night…
happy hour……
nourishes these broken crowns
…..and words outside their usual habitations.
The only know language
a whipped-up, fading cobalt sky
….and traces of thought
as thin as pins.
And as the girl settles her garments,
a spider with a hidden sting…..
spark fast the blackness of the night.
Like the days before rock and roll
…..and syncopates of love.
Journey to Work
My Picture: ‘Roasting Nuts: Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, China.
Neil Young
was singing about saving the world,
and how to burn love.
The trees looked bare,
behind life looked unpainted.
Xinyun bus, number 25
passed by…..
windows blacked out.
The air hung lowly…..
we need to call the cops…..it will never stop.
Another ‘jam’ but no music,
just people walking away.
So…I got out….
and danced like a giant down the road.
Swift for them I disappeared…..
and then they stopped, as lonely as a poet.
It’s only 7:30 am…..and the cops are late……
How did it come to this?
Ageless
A Picture of a picture by a local artist here in Xinxiang.
Have you seen this place,
the sky, the sounds and the agony……
red cross blazing high and wide.
A ruby sun, unrequited
and slashed by snaking tree-lines.
Walking warily, in half-light moving…..
we talked of horseback
and watching processions.
While others watch the burning forest deep,
and hover in ageless light.
Girls shyly huddled behind each other,
waiting for a snarling lead…..
and the boys…?
…….lumber high and low.
Searching for the perfect black, oily haired girl.
A flitting shape to gape the sky and blink the stars.
Spring in cold sunlight
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My Pictures: Medical Humanities Class…..a characterization of pain…
Time crawls, face droops
the shadow of a lone tree
silently waiting……
Ponderous framework
and over-designed systems
burrow deeper in.
I am ready to go anywhere,
to touch the trees and spiked beaked flowers
dancing in the breeze.
And see the black bumblebees
mesmerizing their audience,
to become warm once again….
A mothering blackness
My Picture: Mahjong in Taiyuan.
Five in the morning,
drinking till the sun comes up.
Unable to slow down,
a single raindrop holding on for life….
I remember a dazed starling,
blue wings and orange breasts.
An iridescent creature,
beating a course to an open space.
A red-haired pterippus,
untouched, unclaimed territory.
Now, there is blue and grey……
no one really won.
A festive devotion paid per use,
chances to hang around some familiar things.
Forbidding Flight
My Picture: Pictures on my office wall.
A Wandering Poet 