The promised time has come and gone.
The loved ones are not here.

Tarried, perhaps, in forgetful play;
Congestion
Or confusion on an unfamiliar way;
Surely, though minutes mount, a trivial delay.
Absurd to fret the creep of time,
The beloved will soon appear.

But, minutes merge to hours.
No call! No word! No hint! No clue!
Whom to phone?
Where to turn? 
What to do?
Such blood-shapes will restive minds construe,
When hours ooze like noxious slime,
And worry turns to choking fear.

---

                                                                                                                                                             >>> ToP

Siren Song of the Pancake Ice*

              Caressed and scoured by wind,
              Rocked and heaved by waves,
              She lies in timeless wait,
              Murmuring in her singular voice --
                      sighing breeze,
                      sibilant sound of rubbing floes
                      and softly singing silence --
              She beckons:
                     Come.
                     Rest.
                     Lie down on this cold, barren breast.
                     Here is no sustenance nor warmth nor aught to slake desires.
                     But in this pale, grim nether world
                                    we shall quench the bitterest fires.
                    Your desolate soul and mine have long been flirting lovers.
                    So come, you, now and sleep.
                    Sleep here,
                    With me,
                    Forever.

     * A kind of polar sea ice characterized by large areas of flat, irregular shaped floes of varying sizes.

     Who Cares?

Smash a rock -- it doesn't care.
Explode a bomb -- it doesn't care.
Crash a car -- it doesn't care.
Poison a planet -- it doesn't care.

              

                   The Excuse

There was pain and rage in his voice:

"Don’t look at me like that!
I tell you it wasn’t rape!
And I  didn’t mean to hurt her!
Do you think I like seeing her this way?
Bruised and feverish,
So weak she might die?

"I did it. And I’m sorry.
But it wasn’t rape!
He gave her to me!
After all, he is her father!
No, I never saw him,
But he called, at night,
And said I could have her.
So it wasn’t rape!

"Sure, she fought -- at first --
But you have to expect that.
Like a devil she fought.
For a time I even thought she might win.
Then she let me.
Just lay there, open and sweet,
Even helped bit.
Jeeze! It was good!
And all that chemical stuff?
 Only made life easier for me.
I never thought
It would make her so sick!

"Look, I didn’t mean to ruin her!
I need her!
But he did give her to me.
And she was such a pretty thing!
What would you have done?

"Damn your eyes!
Don’t look at me like that!"

And that was his excuse --
Sapiens excuse for his violation of Terra.

      Loneliness 2

The light is hard, the shadows heavy.
Quietly,
She sits --
Huddled shoulders,
Gray head very low.
Flannel stockings droop over thickened ankles.

The hour is deep.
Time gapes like a hungry mouth.
Motionless,
She sits --
At the worn table, in the neat kitchen;
The frantic ticking of a small clock
Is huge in the empty quiet.

Various pains throb and burn.
Inner parts are breaking too.
Listening,
She sits.
In the corners,
In the dark places,
From the empty rooms,
Yesterday’s voices speak again --
Faintly, very faintly,
But clearly --
Familiar words.

Today’s pain,
Yesterday’s voices,
Quietly
She sits.
Waiting.

     



                 Loneliness

  “ How are you?” I asked.

 He replied,

"I am alone.

"I wander stark byways, staring into void
  And the sound of each footstep
         echoes through the gloom,
          racing into the vast quiet
         without waiting for the one to follow.
  Like me, alone.

“There is happiness behind the door,
        fellowship in the tavern,
        love in the room with the blinds drawn shut.
 Hands in pockets, chin on chest, I pass.
 These are not for me.

“I eat alone, drink alone, sleep alone.
 I am not helloed on my way; my eyes are down.
 No hand is laid on my shoulder.
 No lips caress my lips.
 I cringe from the longed for touch.

"At a party,
       Voices swirl about my head but do not alight,
       Laughter bubbles to my face and bursts,
       Untouched, I leave.
       My solitude remains undisturbed.

“I come, a shadow, and bring no joy.
 I go, a wisp, and leave no sorrow.

"Laughter, faint in the distance,
 Loud careless voices,
 Happy sounds call out, beckon,
 But not for me.
 Mine is the desolation, the emptiness, the lonely place.
 I stand in the shadows and . . . ”

“Oh, well,” said I, “have a good day!”

     
                 The Chamber

This is the sanctum of The Mighty,
Exalted Ones who deign to walk with men.
The door is locked.
Only Gods have keys.

To this halcyon retreat,
Consecrated to their service and renewal,
The Favored Ones repair for meditation and labor.
Here, their consummate efforts are spent;
Their most noble productions are issued;
Their Godhood is refreshed.

Mortals, passing with averted eyes, can only imagine --
Immaculate floors and walls;
Alcoves for private ease, exertion or stimulation --
All ashimmer with jewel-like glow.
Cathedral hush absorbs the murmur of secret, sacred rites.
Pungent vapors waft.
Holy waters flow.
Golden libations are poured on hallowed walls.

Ensconced in grandeur on gaping thrones,
In vertiginous throes of creative rapture,
Knitted brows, vapid eyes, flaccid cheeks,
The Great Ones ponder, toil
And birth their finest accomplishments,
Ripe fruit born to the sounds of ultimate striving.

Sighs, eructations, grunts,
Plashing stools, rustle of facial-quality paper,
The sonorous sounds of working,
Peristaltic working,
In the Executive Crapper.

Misery

We have this:
       One after another the customers come,
       Paunchy, flabby and stinking
                       (cologne, sweat, alcohol, rotten breath).
       With artificial affection
                     or boorish humor
                           or cruel indifference,
       Determined to cram satisfaction into the scant rental time,
       Thrusting into them,
       Some have injected disease along with seed.
       Tricked by promises of a better future in an easier place,
       Beaten into a despised depravity,
       Their slavery ignored by disinterested law,
       They toil painfully, numbly towards . . .

And we have this:
       Staggering or squatting on twig-like limbs. 
       Bloated bellies under protruding ribs.
       Hollow cheeks; bulging, empty eyes.
       Dreaming of food,
       By twos and threes they die.
       And, with little strength for corpse removal,
       The reek of death is everywhere.
       But the flies eat well.

And we have this:
       Too  late to flee; nowhere to go.
       Cowering in the gloom and stench;
       Dirty, insufficient food and water;
       Puss stained rags on throbbing, festering wounds;
       Some foragers have not returned.
       From the small, makeshift stove
       Too much smoke, not enough heat.
       Constant nausea, headache, shivering, fever, coughing,
       Children whimpering,
       Explosive thrump and BANG
       And terror!
       Nearby hits spasm the earth,
       Blast into the ears and brain and bones,
       Shake particles and dust from the ceiling, walls and floor!
       Surely, the next strikes here!
       Or the next!

And we have this:*
       Clothes and hair burnt away,
       Skin blistered and scorched,
       Sobbing its name,
       The glistening, crimson, pain-crazed woman
       Has only a seared teat
       To assuage the agony
       Of her glistening, crimson, aching babe.

And we have this:
       The punishments are capricious;
       Increasingly severe:
       Shaking, slapping, punching,
       Wires, belts and cigarettes;
       Thudding, stinging, searing, routine agony.
       Punished for any thing they do
       And for any thing they don’t;
       Punished for all the things they need:
       To eat, to cry, to piss, to shit;
       Punished for what and where they are:
            For being unwanted,
            For being helpless,
            For being there;
       Often not seen until too late,
       The rage that falls on little ones. 

And we have more,
       A whole book of more,
       An encyclopedia of more,
       A library of more!
       There is no end to it!

And we have you!
      You, with your full stomach
            and adequate clothes
                 and comfortable home
                       and perceptible future
       and mindless prattle of "the gift of life"!
       How dare you!
       You, who choose to know so little of,
       And care even less about,
       The wretchedness that pervades?

On this orb of misery and pain;
Of blind passion, malice and war;
Of pestilence and accidents
                      and errors in the code;
Of random wrath of nature
And reasoned cruelty of man;
Where self-justifying greed prevails;
Where love can save but few at a time,
While hatred destroys by thousands;
Where, if there is a god that listens,
Obviously, it listens not to the victims;

How can you think it a gift,
When more likely it is an infliction?

 
The Hammer
 

The hammer strikes,
Again and again,
Without rhythm or warning.
Little taps crack and dent.
Monstrous blows shatter.
Relentless, pitiless, mindless;
Beating, bruising, mauling,
             chipping, smashing,
Hammering, hammering,
Until we are destroyed.

                                                                                                                  >>> ToP

       



              Adagio^*

The choreography is complex
And their beat is so much slower,
The dancers need support.
But  the orchestra  is indifferent
And the audience ignores them,
Scorns the feeble pleading --
The malformed, inadequate parodies --
To which they must resort.

Their equipment is somehow faulty;
The music weak and garbled
And nearly lost in noise.
It confuses and upsets them.
The theater they play destroys.

They struggle to find the movement,
But are bewildered by the steps,
Cannot understand
            the intricacy of the dance.
Cues are missed.
Synapses spark too late,
Or not at all.
The performance is flawed,
The performers retarded,
Born without a chance;

Summoned,
So ill prepared,
To this hard, remorseless stage,
Where achievement is the god
And perfection is the gage.
But a spastic drummer hammers
In their uncompleted brains --
A slow, arrhythmic, wild tattoo
That dizzies and restrains,
And attenuates their efforts
To reach the impossible par.

For  all the anxious trying,
They travel much more slowly
And cannot go as far.

     >>> ToP

      

                   Titch Titch

A cry is heard.

It is the same in the banner headlines,
          in the glib broadcasts,
          in the attaché cases carried
          by somber men in gray capitals.

“HELP!   HELP!
“HE’S MURDERING ME!
“OH, GOD, THE PAIN!
         “Somebody?
         “Please?
         “Please help me?

But He is hungry and big and strong.

Me is weak.

God is unavailable.

And Somebody (at a party)
Turns askance and hisses,
“Shhh!
“You’re disturbing the peace!

So Me, quivering, expires.

And Somebody says, “Titch. Titch.”
As the ice cubes tinkle in his glass.

While He, quite stronger now, burps,
Licks the gore and ashes from his hands,
And, wiping the grime from his tanks and planes,
Contemplates another prey.

                


        Silence

Inarticulate Fool!
I spit on you!
You and your miserable silence!
You, who can not tout your virtues nor laud you deeds;
You, who worm like,
         have no voice to cry pain though being crushed,
         but writhe and tremble in silent agony;
You,  who dying of want, can not find the words:
         I need food. I need drink. I need love.
You languish in a sewer of silence
While glib idiots babble to shimmering peaks
         and sigh into moist grottoes.

O! The opportunities wasted, the fortunes forfeited,
          the conquests ruined, the victories obscured,
          the ideas strangled by your immobile tongue!
O! The campaigns that were lost
          to an ass with a voice,
While you misty eyed and passion choked, stood by!
Why, Inarticulate Fool?

Here are words! Thousands of words!
They are such wondrous instruments!
Use them!
Speak!
Speak!

Speak or be damned!

    Disillusionment

Sobbing,
Hurtling in Gomorrah,
Package tightly clutched to his frail, pounding chest,
On a mission most unsuitable
For one not yet a man:

The passion that impels him
Is a knot within his craw,
And the sunlight, glinting from his glasses,
Obscures the brimming eyes,
As the virtue of grim purpose
Obscures the error in the plan.

Bewildered, embittered, meek of mien;
Bereft of place in a world obscene;
Innocent and eagerly
Escaped the womb at age fourteen;
Running, weeping ever since
Impotent, bitter tears.
He’d been taught:
         That the world is round,
         But not how hurt and sad;