My death days --
Strange and wondrous --
Will come soon enough.
I can feel their thrum
At the edge of my mind,
A slow and rumbling pulsation
That signals
The END is nigh.
I don't fear them.
Like a rumbling freight train,
I assume they won't plow
Through my front door --
But, rather, will wait for me
To become freight.
tight bud opens:
imperceptible struggle
to unpack beauty.
Oh my! I am so very awed
by this mighty l’il gastropod.
Its moves make taiji masters seem rushed,
but it lugs a house without being crushed.
Now as at all times I can see in the mind's
eye,
In their stiff, painted clothes, the pale
unsatisfied ones
Appear and disappear in the blue depths of
the sky
With all their ancient faces like rain-beaten
stones,
And all their helms of silver hovering side
by side,
And all their eyes still fixed, hoping to find
once more,
Being by Calvary's turbulence unsatisfied,
The uncontrollable mystery on the bestial
floor.
There's a goose, a goose on the loose!
They scare me, though we have a truce.
The meanest bird you'll find in the park,
I bet they started shit on that Ark.
Oh me! Oh life! of the questions of these
recurring,
Of the endless trains of the faithless,
of cities fill'd with the foolish,
Of myself forever reproaching myself,
(for who more foolish than I, and who
more faithless?)
Of eyes that vainly crave the light, of the
objects mean, of the struggle ever
renew'd,
Of the poor results of all, of the plodding
and sordid crowds I see around me,
Of the empty and useless years of the
rest, with the rest me intertwined,
The question, O me! so sad, recurring --
What good amid these, O me, O life?
Answer.
That you are here--that life exists and
identity,
That the powerful play goes on, and you
may contribute a verse.
The squirrel freezes -- unblinking --
But I cannot help but thinking:
How come its tail is misbehaving?
A betrayal by spastic waving!
an autumn sapling,
red leaves on a stiff twig,
shakes in the breeze;
i can't help but think of it
as a gray-haired baby.
I never hear the word "Escape"
Without a quicker blood,
A sudden expectation --
A flying attitude!
I never hear of prisons broad
By soldiers battered down,
But I tug childish at my bars
Only to fail again!
Tiger Riding for Beginners 