That's what misery is,
Nothing to have at heart.
It is to have or nothing.
It is a thing to have,
A lion, an ox in his breast,
To feel it breathing there.
Corazón, stout dog,
Young ox, bow-legged bear,
He tastes its blood, not spit.
He is like a man
In the body of a violent beast.
Its muscles are his own. . .
The lion sleeps in the sun.
Its nose is on its paws.
It can kill a man.
liquid hours poured forth,
rolling over rock
& into the sea.
a meandering melody
hijacked my bliss track
and, as I drifted in the void,
my spine straightened,
my breath slowed,
and I tumbled -- for a time --
through eternity.
Once there came a man
Who said:
"Range me all men of the world in rows."
And instantly
There was a terrific clamor among the
people
Against being ranged in rows.
There was a loud quarrel, world-wide.
It endured for ages;
And blood was shed
By those who would not stand in rows,
And by those who pined to stand in rows.
Eventually, the man went to death, weeping.
And those who stayed in the bloody scuffle
Knew not the great simplicity.
Throw the blue ball above the little twigs of the tree-tops,
And cast the yellow ball straight at the buzzing stars.
All our life is a flinging of colored balls
to impossible distances.
And in the end what have we?
A tired arm -- a tip-tilted nose.
Ah! Well! Give me the purple one.
Wouldn't it be a fine thing if I could make it stick
On top of the Methodist steeple?
Walking beside the tree-peonies,
I saw a beetle
Whose wings were of black lacquer spotted with milk.
I would have caught it,
But it ran from me swiftly
And hid under the stone lotus
Which supports the Statue of Buddha.
Tourists walk an ancient town,
Hoping a residue of its past
Will cling to them...
But not too much:
Not the plagues,
Not the torture,
Not the petty monarchs
& aristocrats,
Just some romantic notion.
A horde of sunflowers
Grows on thin stalks
With big, bright heads
That tilt chin-upwards.
Could they stand so tall
And proudly if they weren't
Packed against each other?
When one bitch-slaps a sunflower,
One expects its head to fly
Clean off, but it just does
An angry little head bobble,
And goes about its business,
Looking skyward...
Though - occasionally - one breaks
Into a sad nod.
On a sandy beach,
I think of each grain
of sand as being
the same.
But on a pebble beach,
Each stone has its own
color, texture, size,
and shape.
It's made me second guess
What I know about beaches.
The saying goes:
“No mud - no lotus!”
But I can’t help but notice
That the flower is long-stemmed,
Raising it high above the mud.
A tropical newbie,
I used to confuse
Lotuses & Water Lilies.
Then I learned the simplest
Way to distinguish the flowers
(From a distance)
Is that Lily pads
Rest on the water,
While Lotus leafs
Also try to rise
above the muddy water.
I can’t help but wonder whether
Our admiration has made the
Lotus too good for its mud?
Tiger Riding for Beginners 