Real

He told her there was no reason
to fear clouds would
destroy the sky,
or trees weigh so on the mountain
that it would collapse

not that she said
that was her fear
but I saw it that way

as is said,
it cannot be
stained by confusion
nor exalted by
realization

so why do I find myself
yelling at the clouds,
losing myself among
the trees?

and why do I find myself
thinking there's any
problem with doing so?

what I love
cannot be hurt
by my mad dance.

Overheard in Bruce Lee Movie

And I heard him answer
the wise old white bearded
Chinese teacher
(whose voice was overdubbed
with scary Western intonation)
when he asked the young warrior
big spirit question.

And I heard him say
"There is no opponent."
And he said a lot of
other things, too,
before he flew off
to battle a whole slew
of people.

I dig those scenes
where the collision
of yin and yang
knocks my brain out,
TKO, TKO,
and another
consciousness
arises.

For Valtin

Because I came to post
after a while of nonposting
poems, that is
and saw
your question

good question!

shall I be a bard?
something heavy
for heavy times
ha ha
not likely

nor even a troubador
come from troubled plague-ridden lands
to sing their lives to kings
who for some reason
wanted to hear them.

poems for now when
ecstacy and despair do
braided dances
shall I join in
the sarabande?

You, mad warrior
who defends the sacred psyche
in bold words of rue and rage
in puissant tears
and stony silences
amid the rubble.

Fires are lit in the spring
on strange and lonely
fields.

Beat Evolutions

imitators
spontaneously
obscured them

form trumped
substance
so

you'd hear
wall street
suit and tie man
saying "far out"

see children
in junior high
wearing
blue jeans
and smoking dope

madison avenue
pounced upon it
like hawk on
dove

suburban housewives
viewed sex and
janice in feathers
with dismay

while human
manifestations
on the haight,
in East Village,

on roads
across america
in every small town

beaten and bludgeoned
and fired like ancient
porcelain

flashing through america
with young legs and
long hair

their stories
still untold.

Other than Blue

Three ayem ,
feeling
worn out as
old shoe.

Red satin,
rhinestone
stiletto heels

That kind of
worn out shoe.

Got my burden,
like every
living soul's,
it grows heavy

Violet clouds
and emerald
leaves on
summer laden trees

Beat
but
other than
blue.

Up and Up and Up

Up and Up and Up,
the three of them sang,
it was all the same to them
welcome or not

he told them to leave
and so they left!

someone else told
them to return
and they did!

up and up and up
they walked,
back to where
they started out.

a fine time
either way.

Memorial

Beat, oh hammered and beat like brass like brass cymbals, those big ones, I saw a movie about Charlie Parker, Bird, they used big brass cymbals making their big brass sound for some symbolic artistic meaning, about how he was treated, beat like brass like heavy cymbals, hammered into the mortal form, why not?

Towered over with skyscrapers and cloud formations in the blue, rattling in subways through dark tunnels and on broken sidewalks in big crowds, ascending in high speed elevators to luxury carpets of the workplace and to Duke's deli on 51st Street with big steam tables and giant salmons both hot and cold, beat by the metropolitan hammers of modernity with new TV screens in the high speed elevators seducing the attention with stock market reports and showing eastern standard time, hammered and beat like brass cymbals clashing metal sounds of neverending mortality.