Selected poems
Cloud meditation
Even when I was a child,
I had a distinct intuition that I had lived
previous lives in which I was trying to
enlighten others around me. I find
most people are not receptive, and, to
an astonishing degree, they think that
they know so much more than I do
when the truth of the matter is that
they know barely anything of what
they speak at all.
I spoke with someone the other day
who told me about a person who gave
workshops on cloud meditations,
that after anyone took a class of his
they looked at the sky differently.
Although when that teacher
wanted to meet with the person
I spoke with at twilight to gain
a different perspective on looking at
the sky, they didn't go since they said
it was too hot at that time of the day.
I neither believe in someone who
teaches cloud meditations,
which resonates with such new age
shallowness it could be what
the Fort River looks like after
a drought summer, with no rain for
six weeks; or anyone who doesn't
follow through on anything due to
the heat at a certain time of day
if it really has the import for them
that they claim. I would trust neither
person with any modicum of truth.
Whatever truth you could offer them
they would hand it back to you, and
say, this isn't truth, this is just
another cloud in the sky.
Whereas, an artist or writer invested
in their craft, a J. M. W. Turner,
painting clouds, and not just
giving classes on meditating on them;
or, myself, might write:
clear summer day —
clouds shapeshift and vanish
over the Peace Pagoda.
Ode to the letter 'A'
Initial vowel
that always reminds us that
we are beginners who are
about to begin, where would
we be without you? How
would our school year
dreams of the best report
cards be without you to strive
toward? Where would our
ability to describe a sneeze
be without the stress on you,
leaving God bless standing
alone as an answer to achoo!
And what about apple?:
the delicious and hardy
fruit of the discontent
in the garden between
Adam and Eve that provides
the first soft syllable before
that lusty crunch past
the skin and into the juicy
white pomaceous flesh?
What would our physicians
do when placing down that
popsicle stick tongue
depressor, as they peer
into our mouths and
look into our throats,
asking us to say ah, if not
for you? Where would
we all be if we didn't have
you to depend on when
we needed to express our
appreciation in our daily
salutations with one another
if we could not even begin to
utter auf weidersehen or y'all?
How would we ever possibly
think to start all of the words
that begin with a
in