Ashita to ashita no tame no tanka (tanka for tomorrow, and tomorrow)
A fog-covered pond
Blinking for just a moment
Blessed swan alighted
Subtle motions of heaven
The slow rising sun breaks through
watashino jinsei ni ko wo egaku
shoshite watashi wa kumo kara kiita “Oute!” toiu koe wo
ima wa watashi no bandesu…
I drew a circle around my life
from the cloud I heard a voice say “Check!”
now it’s my turn
A Summer Storm
I said, “Young man this is your mountain top.”
Weather rough, it stills and stops the heart.
To breathe and face our new fears, “let’s climb.”
One foot up and then the next; the climb starts,
goal in mind, eyes set on the peak above,
I know you’re young and not my son to guide
But up we climb against the tide of time
The threat of a thunderous sky surrounds,
the branches break with similar cracks.
A foot above, a foot toward the daylight.
Away you went into the thickest brush
I thought you might in need of help return
(As I slipped over wet stones, struggling with
the heavy weight imposed upon my back:
some books, some clothes, to make the road longer)
but you flew ahead without faltering.
We approached the crest several times
As each new height revealed another new height
Across white stone, through a golden valley,
we climbed again; and atop the last peak
a house, a camp, a lonely stick, alone.
Into the ground buried in rock, it stood.
A monument to some forgotten myths,
as if, the world was better left behind
We looked back over the valley seeing home,
and then descended down a new road.
*This was an assignment for my poetry class. I had to do a Blank Verse Monologue so I wrote this for my nephew Erik Michel Jaimes about a hike we did during a freak thunderstorm this Summer in Big Bear.
The Impenetrable Light (A Holy Dove)
Released from your freedom you enter me
Corporeal prison, life of the spirit
See the madness of love in the shallows
Frenzied fish gasping for breath and for bread
To become a part of what their Master says
The madness of love still in the shallows
Protect the decay, it breaks and it fades.
Corruption is always nearest the heart
The beauty of God so deep in the shallows
The Sky Reflected Summer (unfinished)
1
If I had the strength to prove my love is true
To protect you from the one who shares his greedy value
The one who said “Baby, my love is you.”
He will go and come back like echoes across the valley
never staying,
to put out his hand,
to reach for the stars in heaven above him
(Like a lost man who writes his thoughts on a porch)
The one who ran away and loved you more.
Can you tell me who loved you more?
2
I know betrayal.
It comes like a steady stream from my hands
My fingers are rivers of hatred pouring over your back
Caressing your laugh with a smile, my own awkward denial.
Am I the foolish step on a wise man’s ladder
Braced against the wall of your fortress?
Stepping on me now but your name is invisible
Without this pressure
I wouldn’t know you’re here at all
To study the Anthropologist Pt. 1
I felt like a miner tearing into the soft soil but hidden under the break away surface was granite. Hard stone and crude tools, I readied my hands with a pick and smile. Swinging hard and fast, hoping to excavate the secrets of an expressionless landscape, my body jolting as the earth blocks my desire. “Surely, she keeps wonderful secrets from me”.
Today I had to write a sonnet for class…
To pluck the vine and smash the sweet produce,
The warmth of the sun shines upon my habit.
Like a madman, I sip the nectar reduced.
Defrocked nature, heaven’s honey, I grab it,
Smash it, blend it, until no dregs remain.
Discarded skins under the press of my sole.
The sweet residual pulp of my veins
Soaking the spaces of memory holes.
Shiraz, Chianti, valleys of Merlot,
All bred to beat my chest against the wind.
To cry “My moon, tonight you wear your halo!”
Her face shines down says “O boy, have you sinned?”
Laughing in fear but not grasping for breath
Grapes from the vine, wine in my glass resoundeth.
On Going Home
rising mountains
The haunting moon out of the of my youth;
Golden in the low of night as I approach the foothills of San Bernardino.
I travel quickly.
The helium-balloon
valley lone half-emptied,
opens and like a
lightly adrift and slowly ascending she is far beyond my reach.
I drive faster.
Untitled.
You withered the fruitless tree
“Discordia!” The vinedresser sings
An untimely harvest, sweet patience my plea
-
My soil-bed unkempt, You can see
Roots buried deep in loose soil I cling
You the withered the fruitless tree
-
With death in this moment from sin I am free
Yet this drying, pulling, uprooting does sting
An untimely harvest, sweet patience my plea
-
Command me now and I’ll fall to my knee
Chrysanthemums, poetic lexicon, what can I bring?
You withered the fruitless tree
-
I hear there is still a crown by the lee
Worn by a lamb, shepherd, servant and King
An untimely harvest, sweet patience my plea
-
Shadows lengthen, diffused light covers me
Respirations deepen in this my awakening
You withered the fruitless tree
An untimely harvest, sweet patience my plea
The common progression
A sea of gyration
Hands outstretched
Heart outstretched
The world is expanding
With love and understanding
Hands moving; vibrant
Alive, swaying violent
Knees bowed down to worship
Lifting the veil like a loose slip
Kneeling, praying, surrender
Arms aloft in spiritual splendor
Sweet ecstatic loss of self-distinction
One in the crowd, on the brink of extinction
He moves to bow his head to the floor
Like a reverential prayer to the east
But, the Lord understands social demands
In his heart he has become the least
Recoiling there, still close to the floor
And somehow, just a little, further from the Lord.
I don’t believe in love but I believe in the end of my days I have seen the leaves fall turned to brown from… http://t.co/GgmF2yDG
I don’t believe in love but I believe in the end of my days
I have seen the leaves fall turned to brown from green
Suture me to the fallen stars of heaven, sleep
I will dream of your beauty
And all will be sweet in this dream of a maiden from the east
Prayers
East
The death of the martyr, stigmata.
A whisper, a phrase. Ja mata.
The whites of the eyes. Heaven aims, ready.
Fire from the sky upward gaze steady
Nuclear futures burn brighter, shiro
The children left their silhouette, kuro
Cradle
Like diamonds in darkness; blood in my car
Cultural empire Allah Akbar
The lives of the saints, disaster and grace
Anxious eyes condemn behind a veiled face
Your treasure, values, resource, we mine
Shokran
Your treasure, values, resource, is mine
Shokran, jazeelan
West
Oh God what is freedom?
Dear God what is death?
Grace, power, sin
Absorbed in a breath.
Atmosphere, progress, social architects
Science and blind-faith the leap made perfect
We send out our money. We send out war.
We send out our loveless. We hope for more.
Amen.
