Red & Blue Talking Heads

The partisan political commentator
Is a human of a special class,
Who delights in fights, part ideologue,
Demagogue, and pompous ass,
Whose words are the intellectual
Equivalent of intestinal gas,
Stinking-up our politics into a
Confused and hateful morass.

Time Out

That several minutes in the morning,
When I pause, and sort of meditate,
Before getting up and walking out
Into what the day will create...

A short time of peace,
before dealing with
What chance will release.

Life's River

I may not predict the future,
But I can see things go by,
Some moments purely happy,
Others that make me cry,
Then there's the ones that beckon
Questions, "How?" or "Why?"...
All flow forward, sequentially, and the
Laws of diminished returns apply,
Inexorably, and I can't stop or
Slow it, no matter how I try...

Impermanence

I hurts me to see this haunting,
Beautiful, image of the moon,
Knowing that the one who
Made it, disappeared too soon.

Photo By Geoffrey Hamilton 1955-2011

Beneath The Fronds

The palm tree points up to the sky,
And whispers to me to look up,
Which I then do, not asking why.

The palm tree reaches up to
Clouds convoying quietly across
The cool eternal blue,

That it all could be so splendid,
I never really knew...

Art By Mark Harm Niemeyer

Rendezvous

After I ran into you on the street,
I realized how many things must
Have happened for us to meet,
In such an unplanned manner...

If I had stopped to shop or eat,
Or had turned left instead of right,
And even something as discrete
As the speed at which I walked,

All could have combined to create,
A scenario where we, unknowingly,
Missed each other -- call it fate.

French Gift

There is a way I know,
To get all through a day
Way too dull and slow,
And it involves good music,
And a bottle of Bordeaux.

Izu Oshima, October 2013

The rain pouring like a river
Caused the mountain to break,
And the soil on its slopes to
Loosen, slide away, to make
A wall of wet muddy death,
Which surged down to take
The lives asleep, on a night
From which few would awake.

The Limits Of Youth

Sometimes, looking down and back
On results your team achieved, it becomes
Apparent that the younger ones lack
That little something, which would
Make things proceed more smoothly,
Towards a harmonious greater good,
A deceptively simple approach and
Plan to follow, if they only could.

I Minored In Philosophy

Nothing easy or peachy
Reading Friedrich Nietzsche,
But it's not as hard
As Soren Kierkegaard,
Or the fret and fume
Over David Hume,
Trying but never gleaning
Just what he was meaning,
Then there's the brain fart
Existential stop an start,
Of the Frenchman Jean Paul Satre,
At the end, Immanuel Kant
Issues a metaphysical taunt,
All written in 9-point font,
Which leaves me very sorry,
A-priori ... A-posteriori.

And Your Bird Can Sing

The Dream Birds stand in front of plants,
And make statements through their cries
About something aesthetically urgent,
Because they intend for us to realize
That art can be viscerally vital, a resurgent
Force in our otherwise pedestrian lives,
The Dream Birds' song an emergent
Emotional force, released for us to hear,
Reverberating, well after they disappear.

Art By Mark Harm Niemeyer

Small Garden Miracle

Does an insect have any pride,
Or does its tiny functional
Brain know, somewhere inside,
Of how beautiful it appears
After landing on the flower,
Where its color coheres
Into an image of magical power.

How I Spent My Day Off

A fine bracing autumn day,
Spent purposefully walking around
Inside, in zigzags, large curves,
And smaller circles, to the sound
Of mindless, easy-on-the-nerves
Melodies to browse and shop by,
Following the menu she serves,
Go with the flow, don't ask why.

Our Promise

I pledge allegiance to the ring,
On my finger, and to the union
For which it stands, our thing
Together, under continuous review,
Dealing with what each day will bring.

O-Kesho お化粧

Spooky chemicals and powders
Applied, with care, to the face,
And the formerly plain-looking
Girl, disappears without a trace.  

Detroit City (Part 2)

I'm working at the service counter of a
Big-box store, in an unavoidable extension
Of employment, instead of being retired,
After they eviscerated my pension.

I'm forcing smiles, and dealing with all
Sorts of customer jerks, all the while wishing
I was doing something else, less dull, less stressful,
Like playing golf, or deep ocean fishing.

The municipal service union job paid well,
And we felt like middle-class -- it all seemed
So secure, American Dream-like, until it fell apart,
And we joined the ranks of the screwed, the reamed...

Court Of Appeals

To love is to put one's heart on trial
Where the judge is another unknown,
Who will feel for a decision, while
A mystic jurist force flows to a
Conclusion, and hopefully, a smile.

Razor Ritual

She shaves her legs,
He shaves his face...
Similar intentions,
Different place.

Sisyphus With A Mop

The janitor cleans the same mess,
Every day,
For minimum-wage-per-hour,
A job whose pointlessness
Is part of its corrosive power.

Just Another Shutdown Day

I wake to face the morning
Of another working day,
In the service of my country
I will labor without pay,
For as long as the supervisor
Mandates me to stay,
I shall man my computer,
Heroically, the American way.

As The World Turns

Each day, allotted by the Sun, and the miraculous,
Just-right, orbit, position, composition of our small
World, opens and proceeds, offering the pleasures
Of simple life, as well as the pain and shocks of all
Unlucky fate; each day giving differing measures
Of happiness, sorrow, or numbing mundanity,
Twenty four hours, full of potential treasures,
Each day, the rotational root of our humanity.