The Sound That Blood Makes

I am the sound that blackness makes
When it hits the pages of your thoughts.
It is recorded without your knowledge,
Without your help or guidance,
Without your approval. Such as it is
One day you will thank me.
Until then I am just a sound.
Just a hum. Murmur.
Like your head was upon your mother’s chest
And your eardrum captures
The reverberations of her heartbeat
Deep beneath her rib cage –
But she is gone, gone, gone.
And has been for years.
I am the sound in the blackness
That heightens your thoughts.
Perhaps it will return! The plague!
Your ignorance is what I have left to hold
In the darkness; the sound of blood,
Surging through organs to bring life.
You curse my lifeblood while gazing
Into the shallow sea of my eyes –
This cage, you hear the echoes.
But it is dead, dead, dead.
And has been for months. Yes, me.
But I am alive -- like her.
With your curses you spring hope.
My hope is what you aim to smother.
But fear not, I will not drown. Not now.
Not for you or for us, but for It.
I am the sound that your heart makes
When the blackness has left your pages
And your thoughts turn again to Blood
And It will surge through your hope organ
And play a tune so soft
That it will revive us
And we will live, live, live

Signs of Renewal 2.4.08

I want to snatch
Those signs that say
“Turn or burn”
“God hates fags”
And throw them
Into rushing traffic
Watch them crushed –
Smashed – destroyed
Beneath the wheels.
I want to insert
Signs that say
“God is Love”
“I’m sorry for
Not loving you
Like Jesus”.
I want renewal
Of old paradigms.
I want revolution.

My Initial Response to the Winter Poetry Slam

The judges are chosen
By random decision.
And the host reigns
In his supreme jurisdiction.
This is how the Poetry Slam runs.

Some of them rhyme,
Most of them don’t,
Many are quirky.
Peace! Peace! they promote.
A few stand out – gems.

One girls walks on stage,
Jeans skin-tight and boots.
"This girl dresses in sizes too small",
Says I. Who am I? I;
The self-proclaimed jury.

But her voice is strong,
And her words more so.
My ears perk to listen,
My mouth opens without words.
And my shame grows.

It is clear she is what Keats
Calls a “poet”,
What Coleridge would
call “a poet”.
And I belittle her no-more.

Criticism turns to applause
As goose-bumps light up my skin:
Proof of the timeless lesson
That I’ve learned within.
Strangely,

The finger that pointed is now
The voice that cheers loudest.
She might think I was a fan all along,
But she would then be the judge –
To assume me as a good person,
Would make us both bias judges.

My Response to "Into the Wild"

My heart seems to race
to meet some unknown climax:
where Mountain and Wind,
Earth and its children,
River and Hillside all stand together
and form my Desire.
Wolfsong and Hawkcry are
everything -- without them,
I cannot survive.
Who will cradle my loss?
Where will my dreams be laid?
When All that is Pure,
all aesthetic beauty is forgotten,
when All is laid bare --
who will stand and remember?

You -- the One who will stand --
You have lit a Fire beneath me.
Growing, soon to birth, is that Desire
which I ignored for the conformist's
reasons; which I shall now ignore.
What is my blood running for?
It runs for the Wild; it runs
for that Unadulterated,
the Untouched, the Unknown,
and the forever Undiscovered.
Let it Be! Let it Remain!
May my heart never be content:
may you stand in my way and
prevent me from destroying my
Final, Last, Driving Desire.
Let all the Wild World be a Mystery:
so that I may always, always
discover It.

Down with progress! Bring back Idealism!

My feet are bare, books on how to read Ralph Waldo Emerson's Nature surround me as I stare out the big, glass windows that look down on CSUSM. The college's track is bordered on the West side by a hill crowned in trees of all sorts – pines, palm, eucalyptus, cypress, and others. A pair of hawks can always be found circling above this sparse green haven, always with a keen eye and sharp look. They patrol the open, untouched fields that lay on the outskirts of the college. Despite an added dirt parking lot, the raptors have continued to feast on ground squirrels and rabbits (meals which the trim grasses of the campus provide).

I have been admiring all the the (limited) scenery here, what with the sun behind a thick fog, giving everything a dreamy effect. In that, I hear behind me a multitude of people – a campus tour. The leader of the group proceeds to point out the landmarks beyond the glass window panes. Her finger conjures death as it points to that arborial hillside, “That is where our new building is going up. There will be room on the first floor for students to gather...” and her words drone on, but I cannot hear them for the blood pounding in my ears. A building? There? Why?

Where are Edward Abbey and Thoreau and Emerson? Where are Nature's Heroes?

Please, pave right over my heart

for it is inconvenient to your “progress”,

I've no need for it either:

(or so I would lead you to believe).

Faithless. Faceless. Heartless bastards!

Destroy with your hand what you

cannot see with your eyes.

Yet Nature in Herself will stay

despite your vicious attempts.

Contractors, engineers: Beware!

For Edwards Abbey was right:

we will outlive you!

On Returning to Red Rocks, Nevada

My time has come to leave what I know
and to go back to what I once knew.
In this present condition
I have forgotten my past.
There is a dream that stands behind my eyes,
one which demanded existence years ago.
My recognition of it brings it to life;
It learned to forgive in its state of comatose.
Let me now say what
I have said before:
My vision is blurred by time,
Yet there was an elapsed clarity
Which I will soon retrieve and retain and enjoy.

The Drive Home

Last night I finally returned to Ramona. It had been exactly two weeks since I had been home and I knew what I should expect – but what I saw and smelled was far more than what I had prepared myself for. Even in the night I could see the blackness – the deep scar the Witch Creek Fire had left across the earth. My eyes watered for what I could not see, but knew was there; back beyond my limited sight, was the destruction of homes, groves, and lives.

I reached home under smoky stars. It baffled me that even after two weeks, including a day of rain, it could still be smoky.

I dreaded the drive to school this morning. Even though it would be partially concealed by the thick fog that covered the ground, I would still be exposed to more sights of burnt homes and melted plastic fences.

Fog blended with smoke, revealing its secrets slowly, without consideration for time. Trees loomed, dipping down out of the grey, and touched my vision. When the clouds lifted, the devastation was more readily available to me. The tears came and I choked back sobs, dust and ash in my nostrils.

For what I have sustained is nothing – but what these people who lived here, ­lived here, is more than I could understand, more than I could know.

“But there is suffering in life, and there are defeats. No one can avoid them. But it's better to lose some of the battles in the struggles for your dreams than to be defeated without ever knowing what you're fighting for." - Paulo Coelho