"I have a dream"

1998

"I have a dream" he said
i thought "big deal"
but he was serious
and sought again to share his dream
i walked away
he stood and watched me go
for i looked back
suddenly angry at the troubled look
in his eyes

Another offered me his dream to share
and he too i denied
and looking back i wonder why
for he is now a mighty name

others came and went
and all i declined
for i was not a man to share
what another freely offered from his heart

and now?

i walk amid my fellow man
"i have a dream" i say
but their eyes lack faith
and i watch them go
sadness in my heart
for now i know

Transit Lounge in Hong Kong

1998

Transit Lounge in Hong Kong
Lord i hate this place
please Lord send me an Aussie
or a familiar Kiwi face
a Pom would do (but not a yank)
a German would be fine
Just any English speaking sod
or soon i'll lose my mind

pain

1998

an outcast
from earliest memories
a fringe dweller
tarred with the brush of many hatreds
no group to call mine
not even one besmeared by aeons

the street welcomed me, the gutter
then years of self neglect
and "sin" that to us was life
and further, deeper, lower
so that even my mother
did not know me

you slept in feathered comfort
and I shivered on a grave
you ate your fill of plenty
my last penny bought sour milk
you had an education
I stole books and hid them from my peers
you went to piano lessons
I breathed life into the mouth of a dying junky

I finally sought death full throttle
Hess and Nitche cheered me on
and I'd have found that sweetness too
but Gods plan is strange
so to me a son
and a wife from a long dead mother
and I had to struggle on

and I did it too
climbed slowly up, often falling
clawing, dragging others on my way
and earning never any praise
or comfort or ease
for my peers did not see what I had done
or did not care

and many many hard hard years
(the tracks now all are healed)
and made I others greater than they could have known
but what gave they me?
calumny and selfishness and greed
and from the heights I'd climbed
I painfully looked down
and saw I'd come but a single step

now? I've lived, I really have
I've seen the world and built
raised a family and traded fairly
made that others might live too
and still in humble clothes I tread
not caring for the trappings
nor for the praise
giving freely even my last pennies to the poor

so why this?
I had never expected anything in life but death
and hid my heart deep deep deep inside
until one day a stranger who like me had climbed
dug out my heart and gave me back a life
but Gods plans are strange again
for it was not to be
and from my lofty place I fell
and fell and fell
and I am falling still

and for the first time
I know real pain

An infinite surprise of poets

1998

Gods gift: our soul, peeks out sometimes
when poets fall in love
for every cell of being cries
the praise of God above
and from such love come mighty things
an infinite surprise
of poets new who'll speak of love
and open all our eyes

I have no words

1998

an outcast
i have no words of worth
only these
pointless ramblings of a confused fool

i have no direction to go
each way leads to nowhere
and i feel tugged violently there

i have no heart or warmth
a hole, an emptyness
a place to hold despair

i have no worth, no value
what point to help others
when any action could lead to disaster

i have no soul, no God
for i am outcast
no korban can ever be enough

i have no future to see
there is darkness only
and vision has left me

i have no more words at all

After a death

Strange man it seems
There is a constant flow of people in and out
all giving support to the widow
I talk to some and it seems that none of them ever really listened to him
They knew him as the man they'd take their lawn-mower to and he'd fix it
They had "known" him for many years
yet they did not know him at all
I used to go over when he and i were both alone
and we would sip whiskey and i'd listen to his stories
he had had such an amazing life i could listen for hours
he and i used to agree on so many things and i felt very comfortable with him
i never bothered him with my own affairs (i was after all the younger man)
though he would generously ask about how my business was going
because i travel so much now i always dropped off something for him on my return
sometimes cigarettes, other times a "loto" ticket from abroad
i'd been away a long time recently and had not seen him
i guess i should have noticed he was not around much the week i came back
i sought him out a few times as i usually do, hanging 'round the woodpile
waiting to see him come out of the house
i though not much of it
so full of my own troubles

we talked of God once or twice
he claimed a strange agnosticism that was both deeply spiritual and quaint
in his own way he was at peace with the universe
but something changed while i was away
and i was no help when he obviously needed it
now i look at my changed world
changed not just by his death but so many other things
and wonder what's for me and mine
i guess i will stick around a while
a Steppenwolf
a watcher
what else can i do?

(Ah Paganini do i hear you call?)

why do you not seek me out?

1998


I know that you are lonely
like me you feel alone
and we are not the only ones
from whom the "life" as flown

but really you revel in it
(or you and I would meet)
for something stops you wanting love
(so why then do you bleat?)

I'm alone, and cry for help
for just a quiet friend
who'll care not "what" i am or "who"
and seeks no other end

a quiet friend to share some words
a true and honest test
of what lies at the heart of you
and what in me is best

cry out to me I beg of you
cry out and call my name
cry out to me when you're in need
cry out when you're aflame

but no, I think we'll never meet
we'll never share some time
we'll never find a common ground
and it seems to me a crime

for I will sit and click and hope
that mail to me has come
from someone who has thoughts of me
oh God let there be some

Oh God let there be some

Let he who is without sin

They have come. They came in quiet groups, some alone, others with their children. Sitting here on the hard ground, numb from my night in the cold, numb from all the months of turmoil and pain, i thought at first that they had tied me here to spend the night in contemplation of my sin - but now i see their eyes i know that it was not so. They, it seems, are the ones about to die. There is pain in every face. Even the children seem to understand. I feel a cold tear form and role down my face as my gaze meets the eyes of the ones i have hurt. I look for hatred and maybe it is there but i see only pain.

The first man stoops and picks up a stone. I watch, it seems so slow, so very slow and otherworldly and i feel the weight of the rock in his hand. I feel the effort as he throws back his arm in preparation. He throws and turns his head for it is clear that he does not want to behold the result of his throw. The rock passes by my ear and clatters to the rocks behind but though i hear every sound i heed it not for now i watch as all stoop and reach for their stone. I see their lips move. A silent litany that i join.

The rocks are flying now and i feel the first stab of pain though it seems more like a caress. I watch in fascination as they let fly their blessings, none it seems will look where their stone might land though i reach out to them to tell them not to worry, that i feel only relief.

My mind is slipping away now for i have taken many wounds and death is near. I watch he who i have most harmed stoop and carefully choose a stone. His eyes are full of tears but resolute as he takes careful aim and hurls. And now i can rest.

and you and i and God i cry

how you fare from day to day
as each is further from us
how you survive the pain
are you recovered now?
what thoughts you have...
i wish to hold your hand and say it is ok
but you are taken away for good
or ill
(and i'm still sick oh yes)
thoughts of you still fill my waking life
my dreams now are suppressed
for fear of thoughts that terrify

drunken nights alone
the shower for my rain
until it runs as cold as the death of us
and staggering, broken, death demands
i cry
aloud
and pitiously wimper to my bed
oh where are you my love and how
and why oh why the stars so intricate
did wheel away our fire
so now like frescoe hands but further
aye, much further
and still i cry
and what hope?

i seek now only God
and dare the Galileo Clan
to take that too
but we are stronger
God and I
than me and you
at least enough
i pray

gone

1998

I was once a poet
full of words and song
but that was yesterday
and yesterday is gone

So it Goes

1998

so it goes
and so it should
but then of course
we knew it would

Dream

1998

the torment of my mind is but a shadow of a dream
where all the way i run to find a place where i can scream
and i am lost inside myself not knowing where i go
and words just flow from somewhere else just why i never know
they flow from me unbidden and come to life themselves
in streams of understanding where my wonder often dwells
and here again am i in search of where it is i go
but there is never clue or reason just that it is so