and the silver spoon,
little boy blue and
the man in the moon.
When you coming home,
son? — ‘I don’t know when.
We’ll get together, then.
You know we’ll have
a good time, then.’”
My new love of mine
she is very fine. Takes my hand
to declare me “Mine.”
Works a job, collects her dues.
Owns a house, collects rent too.
Then she spends it
on gifts, on me, and
I but think,
“Is this heaven sent?”
How many loans
have my past lives lent
for me to earn
such dividends
from penny tithings,
lousy cents. Is this,
I’m guessing,
what He meant,
one-hundred times
this present age,
the age to come,
eternal life
from time-to-time,
spirit to, spirit goes,
how we do forget
our woes, our life,
for better and
for sometimes worse,
in death do we
forget our purse,
forget our worth,
our sickness, health,
our peace of mind,
our reasons stealth
why we were sent
upon this earth,
our souls to mend,
to get on closer
to the bend,
as I did travel to the north,
to take on one more
mid-life birth.
The cold north wind
is very cold. I left for
some northward goal
to get away, to be a man,
though I never, really,
had a plan
but to sit in pose
on colder ground,
cross my legs,
bereave aum’s sound,
the thrum of which
is always near, yet
drums of which
I cannot hear.
I live two lives and
two million dreams.
I act on some
to avoid good things:
the smell of blood,
the mourning heart,
perfuming from
her lips that part
from tearing eyes
now broken valves,
from which I drink
love's sweet salve.
I wake in drunken
curtain light,
the dimness of
the Monday blight,
my plane to leave,
our farewell sight,
to feel our grief
and take my flight.
I sing a song of
Sir Chapin,
the boy whose
father left his kin,
as soon as life
was to begin.
The son would call,
and call, and call,
to hear love’s voice,
to throw love's ball,
but what say they
who felt that they
had but no choice
to work the day,
to make their name,
to earn their card
through heaven’s
gate, as if life were
an earning game.
“I want comforts,
I want gold. I want
not to feel harsh cold,
want not for you
to feel old.
Want now for you
to act bold,”
but end our lives,
our bank accounts,
reconcile,
(reconcile!),
and part from
having walked
a mile, what have you
of money’s pile,
refuse to you
like body bile,
for when in life,
life comes to pass,
all we want is
who we miss.
Achievement is
but earthly piss,
how it’s rot
when we’re remiss
for failing our
meek timidness,
for in our
end of life review
when I see scenes
of time with you,
when I’m asked
if I did do what
I did say I
was gonna do,
I fail to think
it has to do
with when I had
forgotten you,
so in this
somewhat
metered verse,
in rhyming and
slight timing words,
I take my ink,
tattoo my hands,
my desperate plan
to break this curse.
Now upon this paper white,
I write your name to make
things right, I write three
words that I might fight,
that I might win
to banish night,
to banish sin,
Thine fog of war,
forgetfulness,
our first promise
when that good man
did come to us, to me,
to ask, to see
if I’d take part
to never part,
to which I said, “I do, I do,
I surely do,” so now I say
anew, anew,
I say your name,
my muse, my muse,
I whisper softly,
You. You. You.
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