Dust and White - 6/13/1993

shattered lights on blue-black
white speckled shot on night
patterns tripping-- the vast
cavern of stellar hues

gradations of the depths
distant flickers of sight
twinkle twink creation
breathe in the eternal

broken fires washed to white
piercing dark to demarc
all that you do or seem
is only a midnight's dream

All the corners are round - 2/20/1997

All the corners are round
the unseen surround
of an incandescent bulb

Sky an off-light phosphor
grey hills tired
and ground

In an empty place
stone ghosts
witness
an emptier sky
and the shadows
of the pine

Cuchulain - 2/23/1993

The poet within rages
with iron claws
in steelish light
bellows a verse
sounds his might
with red roaring open maw
cries the words onto the page
that here I write
(the poet's curse)

Release - 2/8/1993

Sweat drops slowly
from the massive form
a vein in the temple
twitches, twitches
eyes glazed, pupils all--
the coarse rigidity
of muscles in spasm
exacerbated into definition
granite shoulders spread
in supplication
pulses of breath
decline

tremors and currents
wrack the body
shivers of flesh

the templar vein convulses
rips and showers blood
all vessels explode
feral lips retract and mouth
bone grinds, fragments--
skin sloughs off
as muscles tear and writhe free
tendon pops and snaps
collapse into slivers of flesh
and Atlas falls, silent.

The Last Poet - 3/20/1992

Shoulders hunched and hair gone gray,
the last poet sat fidgeting, ending the day.
The hidden lines to the finishing verse,
hands gnarled, mouth forming a curse.

The last of them all, the poet only remained,
looking for the key, the last word unnamed.
Realization then, that the cosmos had stopped,
the age was past, the transitory orbit rocked.

The deaf poet's burden, to finish mankind,
the stanza waiting, the cloudy eyes gone blind.
This is the last poet, given to the divine,
searching for the perfect end, to life, to time.

Epitaph - 3/17/1993

Isabella Pollock

1917-1986

Beautiful Dreamer

A simple proclamation

cut in square brass

amidst the dark earth

and the wet verdancy

does more to transcend

than all marbled words

and this humble epitaph

of life and of the living

melts sorrow with the dew

which runs on the flower

and the beauty

and the beauty

Why I Sleep Late - 2/20/1994

I woke up one morning
to find my legs were broke
and I couldn't get out of my bed.

I woke up one morning
to find my mind was broke
and I couldn't get out of my head.

I woke up one morning
that I never awoke
and I realized that I was dead

The Imp - 5/6/1992

Enwombed in the dark warmth,
of the Great Egg,
a white spark was seen,
to circle a shadow planet.

The frenetic movements of the spark,
bespoke a great agitation,
as it traversed the earth,
touching down at times.

For a moment,
each landing point grew light,
until the spark left,
and the dark overwhelmed,
again.

Hope - 4/24/92

In an endless, formless, black void
full of null light
the nihilistic mind
quavers in despair.

Great starbursts
of colored energy
appear
fade
and blossom.

In between--
the dark
eats.

Soundless
eternal
spaceless

and monstrous.

The state of conciousness
the mind of apathy
the turbulent existentialism of the unborn child.

The battle plain where the forebrain fights the hindbrain.

Ragnarock, the gods have fled. The soul is a lie.

But--
random spates of sound wrack the ear.
The cries of the newborn, hoarse yells of pain.
Longing for the mother.

Utter denial.

Pause.

Supernova.

Being--
life. The colors riot
and merge
and grow.

Ascension of thought.

Hope is born.

And the winds of Nirvana blow the tattered cloak of night, to another fool.