River Song

Back in 1999 I was still reeling from the bubble bursting on my religious delusions and the poem I wrote here reflects where I was at that time and in some ways still am.  Rivers are so symbolic of so many things: time, life, commerce, faith, love, connecting us, separating us, uniting us, dividing us, it is our history, our ancestry, life, death, from the cradle to the grave and returning again; from the rain, to the river, to the sea, to the sky to rain again and to repeat the cycle forever and ever.  The River flows on and on with out stopping.  I find that I am in that river, a part of that river--for a while, perhaps forever, and that's okay.  The River will flow long after I am gone, just as it was flowing long before I was ever around and yet, in the River I've always been around and will always be.  I guess you might say I kind of lost my faith there for a while.  I guess that wasn't such a bad thing.  I guess you could say I found a River.

Anyway, I wrote this poem/song not from my mind at all.  I wrote it like a prophecy.  I didn't worry about sanity or reason or anything.  I wrote it as a song, sort of, but only recently found a tune to put it to.

River Song

What is life, now?
Is it some kind of illusion?
A dream that we all share, now?
A common confusion?

Then I'll sit down by a riverbank
And listen to the babble.
And the babblin' of the River
Will be a brand new Bible.

And I wonder 'bout the animals,
Do they have a soul and then,
Do they die and go to Heaven?
Are they plagued with mortal sin?

And what about those insects?
Does an insect resurrect?
Does he rise like leaven to an insect heaven?
Does he finally get respect?

And when the dream is over,
And I'm restin' 'neath the clover,
Go listen to my river babble,
"Kenny's crossin' over like a starry-eyed lover."

Twistin' Turnin' River
Runnin' windin' ever
Everything deliver
Blood o' gold and sheen o' sliver

Dyin' Dyin' Death defyin'
Here to Lethe and back again.
Only truth and no denyin'
Always workin' always tryin'

She pulls my heart. She cleans my sin.
She's where I'm going.  She's where I've been.
End to end and round to round.
I listen to that River sing
A liltin' laughin' lovin' sound
That'd make me almost want to drown.
Make me almost want to bring
And end to breath and everything.
Then she gives me life all over.
Gives me hope and makes me see
The glory of a river lover--
This desperate soul recover
From delusion's fantasy
And all the things he cannot see.

What is life now?
When the supper things is done
And we gather 'round with Riley
And we has the mostest fun.

You can listen to the witch tales
That the preachers shout about
An how the goblins 'l getcha'
If ya' don't watch out.

Or you can listen to that River
As she trickles over stones,
As she winds her way to heaven,
as she cleans your rottin' bones--

For time, she is a River.
And space is muddy water.
The galaxies are eddies
And we can go no farther

Than the milkweed on the wind.
Five billion little souls, a driftin' in the air
Who fall into the current
And can't get anywhere.

But if I let the River take me.
If I let her have her way,
I'll flow with her forever
And ever in a day--

In the undulating movement,
The gentle push and shove
Of the never-ending river
And her never-ending love.

The Stonemason's Son

Last Sunday was Eastern Orthodox Easter.  And though religion has a greatly diminished role in my life these days, I still retain some sense of God, and am still a Christian.  I still confess the Nicene Creed, but put more stock in a quite simpler creed: God is Love.  To that end, I feel that Jesus is the incarnation of Love and all that he did on earth was Love and heal.   That is what the Christian must do.  It is what Christ showed us.    No judgment, no condemnation of anyone—just Love.  So thinking of Jesus the son of the stonemason Joseph, I found myself writing a song for this season.

White Violets

Do I like white violets the best? 

 I think so. 

Then I wonder if it is because they are

more rare than the violet violets;

and would I like the violet violets better if all

I ever saw were white violets everywhere

and then not a violet one to be seen anywhere?

I think I would become bored with the white ones.

 Ah, but look, there are the children

who are a little of each--

no, these are the loveliest of all.

The children are always the ones

That bring a spark to the eye

and calm to the heart.

Mocking Birds and Holly Trees

There are mocking birds in the holly trees
jabbering as they do.
Mocking Buddha and the Dalai Lama, saying,
"You have anxiety"
"You are living in the future"
"You have regret"
"you are living in the past"

And I say in return
"Thank you, little brother.
Thank you, little sister."

Then there is nothing.
Only the holly tree with its waxy green leaves,
those bright red berries,
the mocking birds,
the wind, the sun,
and me.

In the eyes of my children

Picasso Van Gogh

standing in slush.

busy street corner.

closed café.

heavy traffic.

a tense trench coat.

a fist full of roses.

tight fingers.

drops of red on

dirty white snow.

giving beauty;

getting pain.

ignored.

people pushing past

going somewhere/nowhere.

Okay, I’m experimenting.  Thinking of William Carlos Williams.  Using images and minimalism.  Accenting end-stops with periods.  Thinking of Hart Crane and his “Thomas A. Ediford” line.  Misusing grammar to say something,--not new--but else.  Else what?  Just else.  The poet--artist on a snowy, slushy street corner like a little match girl—giving roses that no one takes—desperation squeezing his hand on the thorns—“giving beauty, getting pain”  We are not here to sell.  We are not here to make a buck.  We are here to love.  We are here to shed light and beauty.  We are here to create wonders and miracles.  This is the essence of my subversive thoughts: the love of money is not love at all.  It is animal drive.  But I say, we are gods.  We must shed the animal.  Gibran said: “work is love made manifest.”  But we have said, “work is money and we are beasts, and we place a market value on our work.”  We have sold ourselves for cheep.  I will offer roses till I bleed--and do not think that because I give them freely that they are worthless.  I am on the road to Shangri-la.  Where is Shangri-la?  It is in the heart.  It is like a seed in the heart.  I am the garden of Shangri-la.  And when I die the seed will grow and in that place the roses will bloom.  The poets and artists will pick them and stand on cold street corners saying, here, take them, they are free come and take the roses of Shangri-la

This Year's St. Nicholas Boxes

Being pressed for time, I couldn't paint my St. Nicholas box design this year.  Instead I drew and scanned it, then put it into the Windows Paint Program to color them and then did the rest as a word document and printed them at Kinko's. I was up late cutting them and gluing them (with Peter's help) I couldn't get gifts or bake the shortbread cookies that I put in the boxes--just that sort of year; but I did keep the tradition again this year--however minimal-- and passed them out to my coworkers on time.  I sure miss the years when my kids were little and all excited. They would get so jazzed.  So Elizabeth, if you are tuning in here, there's one for you when you come home for Christmas.

A Girl Named Ginny

It is the first Sunday of Advent and I'm not very functional and can't get all the work done to make this work.  I need candles for an Advent wreath and decorations and a thousand little details to take care of.  I've got a Sisyphean paper to do that I may not be able to finish.  I may kiss my 4.0 goodbye.  But I'm gonna' try. 

Most things about Christianity turn my stomach these days and that is largely due to so may denominations, mostly Protestant evangelicals, who can't seem to see how much they have confused their religion with political Conservative and would rather do law and conformity than celebrate love, freedom and dignity for all human beings.  It is a sad day when so many Christians have learned how to hate in the name of love; who blame the poor for being poor, calling them lazy and parasitical.  But, as the Bible says, the Lord hears the cries of the poor.

True religion is about compassion.  I did have time to write a song for this first week of Advent.  It is more of a Christmas song than an Advent song, but it dwells on the theme of compassion.  My piano, like me, is old and out of tune, but I'm so glad to have it.  The song takes place back in the days of abolition and well, nuff said.