Streetlights At Six

In the long haul of getting

used to it, an acre of years

in the bottleneck of time,
What about the flags, the stories
to tell, receipts and neighbors
who bicker over parking space.
I am the homeless I'll say. A good excuse.

All of that Atlantic below us,

every one of her fish.
Leaving is always the same,
goodbye to fog and the shape of bread
there, impractical kitchens.
Hello to the typical bravery
of fire departments, right on red remember?
Sliding doors and old formica.
Year after year labelled first to thirty first
in Gregorian. Everyone is bringing 1980
to the pot luck. Streetlights at six.

Xeroscaping. Lawnmowing. Post offices.
Little Debbie cakes, better homes and gardens
up the yingyang. A certain kind of heaven
but no where like home, clicking my heels
and they don't know where to go:
Witch of the East, Witch of the North,
one shiney the other vindictive.
It was always about them. Then someplace else.

Big Tall People

Rare appointments

in the festooned ghost matter,

allegiance tender

caught amidst imbroglio

after imbroglio on the bridge

overgrown in pyracanthus,

over and then down those streets

down those roads

down all the downs

to the bottom then

around a corner

at the intersection of contemplation.

We go and we go

and go again until there

is no more going.

Not up, nor down,

to wait as time

does her thing

to the ants and plaster.

Ah, the "Valentine" sent to Beirut in 2005 from the 'you know who they ares'.

This is actually, a true poem in a cannon of other true pomes. I do not like writing fake news...but that's just me. One addendum was made after we evacuated the next year (July 2006) after the 'you know who they ares' got rid of the Lebanese financier who worked in that lovely Saudi Arabia for Saudi Oger...on February 14, 2005..Rafik Hariri, who had rebuilt Beirut in its own image..of yore. The one that now is in ruins after countless attacks on the banking system by the 'you know who they ares' both inside and outside the country.

Cash was king and Saudi was laying the ground work for who knows what...I mean, sometimes generous but never when muslims need it the most, like right now or when the banking system was being crashed in order to disable the 'resistance'. Love those old movies when the 'resistance' in France was idolized and yadayadayada. Oh puhlease. France used to know how to be honest. And to be clear, Saudi has suppressed knowledge for so long, they get quite confused in terms of um...the knowledge in which they are well described.

Zoom in, Zoom out: This is the term coined by Sayed HN, may Allah be pleased with the shahid when the Western media sought to provoke internal turmoil in Arab lands by declaring that 'no one is on the street supporting' their ________you fill in the blank...go ahead, they've taught many of you the words they like to use to insult Muslim Leaders both political and religious. Please note, you are supposed to call the religious ones Imams. Or you could say clergy if the word Imam is just too triggering for you. Lets level the playing field shall we? "Mullah" is really not an ok word to use and it will in fact identify your internal bias. Just saying.

Anyway, he was referring to the enormous crowds supporting the liberation of Lebanon, yet again, from the vile invaders to the south. The crowds were gigantic but Western "MSM" would keep the camera at a narrow angle and avoid panning out to show the truth.

Sorry...but I have issues, quite frankly, it is PTSD. I have issues with blind people who continue to spew propaganda meant to obtain your consent. Know this: Psychopaths NEED you to be complicit so they can continue to conduct business as usual...you know, the murder and mayhem that Psychopaths are known for.

BEIRUT ASSASSIN LEAVES MARK

The cocks were storm-crowing that morning
after a real long spell of total
environmental darkness. Two broughams sped by.

(In the land of the prophets
the angels speak out-loud,
people pretend not to notice.
Here it is the status quo.)

All the clocks whirred with quick sighs
and at sunset the clouds were full of the dust
from extinct volcanoes.
On the beach loversbodies were kissing
each other while long lost birds
perched in the Cedars up north
and sang their common song of return.
On the Corniche, people brought
valentines, coffee and cardammon
from every shop on Hamra.
Then everything just stopped.
Windows fell apart one by one
and people ran home, started looking.

Zoom in, ZOOM out, zoom IN, zoOM Out.

I felt around for my watch to note the time.
School was letting out and I compared JFK,
that unholy day to this one. Must have been similar,
the way we huddled close and locked
all our doors, turned on our TVs .

Human forms felt their way toward the crater
and the same herd of goats crossed my path twice.
Cars hung in the windows of hotels
for months and years on end.
No more luck, no more money, no more beadsmen.
The predictions are keen to usurp everyone
and the last unlucky man born will keep vigil
near a pitcher of water and a set of lost keys,
a tape recorder will produce the truth.
Airports fell first and then the invasions,
a graveyard was blown into the sky,
the dairies all went dry
but it does take some time, perhaps forever.

The poor remained indifferent.

One man was found two weeks later in the rubble,
pointing in one direction, holding his cell
in the other, see him?
No one called out the dogs because it is said
the canines ate the corpses in Sabra and Shatilla.

I wonder.. to whom was he speaking,
where was he pointing?

...again, I've been witnessing this for decades now. I'm sincerely hoping people can catch up and are galloping to do so.

Life is actually a race if you only knew.

Peace belongs to those who deserve peace. It belongs to those who know which side they are on...and those who avoid shooting not only other like minded fellows but their own stupid foot.

Notes from Crowhaven Farm/The color of Rust

My old friend, the Snakefeeder, the herald of the rains, a scribe of May who watches children walk home on the last day from Lincoln elementary. I do recollect the consideration of dropping that card into the Liffey that ran below us as I'd never failed a class before, let alone two! All because I didn't want to handle an eaten-up chicken bone and attach it to construction paper. My mother made me do it anyway and Mr. Brindley changed the grade. Or maybe he didn't, it was one of those lesson things they're convinced will get you to the top of the heap. All the adults insistent on the learning process, but this...I never learned to sew and barely brushed my teeth. I was all wrong until one day until I wasn't and blossomed. It was that easy to turn life around because adults are so good at that, seldom try and when one does, it's the wrong guy.

Ode To The Gully Washer

When it came down we'd bow
our heads and utter each to each
in the plain-spoken dialogue
of the deluge. A year's worth
of waiting over in a flash. Resurrection's
aisle cleaned up, mint and grass
combed out properly in three directions.
A kicked ball would turn up
near the corner in a stretch
of wild rasberries wholly out
of reach, trespassing sign not needed.
Toe-pinchers and water walkers,
giant red dragonflies called snakefeeders:
everything with a description
sorting origin and function, a collection
of results-specific identifiers
for the concerns of our people.
Wasps with addresses and vendettas,
rocks with names beside
bamboo and China Berries,
pop beetles and walking sticks.
A host of communion eaters
and seekers, drought prone to river wise.
Our contempt reserved for the fires

The Age of Ignorance

In order to get there
go out and return
or haven't you been there?
Up and up, to the shade
and forest, and down
again because to die there.
Have not all rules
been ignored then
and that is ignorance?
To each his own
they say and that is
our noble polytheism.
Sending these coupons
through the mail
to you, to your table.
Have not the laureates
culled their letters
for the laws they lived by?

Ode to Higgin's Hill

The stuff of loosed

children where the dead dogs

we remember
keep our secrets,

up in the summer

in the rains

and lightning,

we swam to swim

and walked there,

walked our bikes 

up the hill, 

rode them down

between six and supper.