Haibun Monday # 23 – contemporary cityscape

Circus Cities 

        I’m a town and country person, although I have lived away from my New Hampshire woods. I have lived in a few big cities. In Pittsburg, living in the projects, we use to go into the rail yards and scoop up left over vegetables into pillowcases that the unloading machines couldn’t reach. Or, go over the stone wall to steal some grapes from a neighbor living below the projects, which I believe, let us ‘cause we never got caught. But, the most disturbing thing I witnessed, going to school in NY City, watching a dog defecating on the sidewalk. On concrete, not grass or leaves in the woods… on cement! That, I thought, was the most dehumanizing, de-animalizing consequence of our circus cities.

We don’t know we’re goofy

Until it rains

After building our house

Forgotten the roofy

 

Notes Found on the Refrigerator July, 2016

When I think someone nearby

Is charging me too much for my resources,

I spend more on gas and time—

Not really saving a dime!

But, I guess, it is not the cost—

It must be the satisfaction

Not buying from them

And—

The beautiful drive.

 ****

As A Writer:

How can anyone capture a free spirit when one lives alone—

Even with another;

Gliding, diving, and bumping into things—

Independent of reason or rhyme?

Yet, their direction is always the same—

Straight ahead;

Come hell, heaven, or high water—

Destination, always unknown.

Unable to catch the spirit passing by—

That captured sight;

Unable to capture it—

With an un-capturing eye.

****

Through the abyss of “reality’s diminishing disguise”

Beauty and imagination often reveal themselves in subtle smiles;

Lest we forget, where we— come from!

How to read this reflection—

Showing us—

Who—

We really are.

****

Good Morning sunrise

Moon’s reflection still shinning

     Oh beautiful day

****

 

Releasing Illusions On The Shore

Beach sand sifted from my hands—

 Flowing stream

Silently clutched by gravity

settles in small drifting piles beneath me.

 

Thought and mood changed from grain to grain.

Perils and adventures rise and fall—

Again and again.

 

From one position to the next—

 All things change

Us—

From illusion to truth—

 

 Only a mindful soul steadily remains

In each sunset, in each full moon, in each new sunrise,

Where, we become the sand—

Released from our hands.

 

*****

From sand to diminishing pottery

My soul pours out the last of life

Of existence to non-existence

To non-remembrance

Of holding its last

Lover’s rose.

*****

Whoa! There’s a small spider in my car!

Catching me unaware—

How did he get in?

Kissing me on my chin—

So sweet,  so devouring

what should I do with him?

I’ll stick my head out the window,

At 50 miles per hour, that should be the last of him.

Shoot! There goes my hat!

But, apparently, not my new best friend—

Best buckle up then.

 

Love

Love does not exist in the hearts or minds of flesh,

It is elusive as a cloud of breath—expelled in fog.

It, is captured in the imagination of the soul,

Then, released into action as visible as dreams—unexplained.

 

Picture: Benjamin Cline
https://ashq.wordpress.com

 

Bonsoir Mémé et le Pépé, Bonsoir

 (curtain rises…both are getting into bed)

Mémé: I’m not asking you to cheat

            Only to tweak. (turning over, back to Pépé)

 Pépé: I refuse to participate, in the choices they make,

can’t you see, Just let it be!

(he does the same and turns over. now both are lying back to back)

Mémé: Get off your arse then, and turn off the light!

            There ain’t nothing right… left to be seen this night.

Pépé: I thought it was your turn

To turn out the lights, tonight.

Mémé: You want to fight?

(as a matter of fact)

            I still got a good right.

(giggling)

Pépé: What is it that you want me to do?

            Again. Before I lay down.

(slowly getting up)

Mémé: Go and tell the grandchildren

            To stop this, this… “Messing around!

…La vie ne est plus le pont de d’Avignon.”

Pépé:  

  (re-enters and gets into bed facing mémé)

            Bonsoir Mémé.

Mémé: Bonsoir Pépé.

(Both start humming  ‘Sous le pont de d’Avignon’)

(Curtain closes)

 

On the lighter side, in my “research”, I stumbled on this and if you have the time… [growing up with this song, I couldn’t help but smile when I saw this.]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1W1-hZQNdC4

 

Angel From The Host Of An Ivory Moon: (Crosby’s Baptism)

Wings reflecting the moon at sunrise,

Settled upon the child with no sin;

In water and parents, he was baptized.

His heart now lit, from a light within.

Shadows may cover his smile

As his youth transitions into understanding;

From failure to the success, patient all the while,

Like a crawl… to standing… to running,

For no minds’ reason at all.

He will awake during his life time

With a drop of water, a tear of joy

Running down his face; acknowledging his mother and father,

Being born under an ivory Host, with a visitor without error,

Or mistake. His Guardian Angel,

For whom, he will never forsake.

 

 

 

 

 

Blameless Hurried Follies

Sins and whims follow swift currents.

            (errors in delight move faster than light)

Skipper and passenger, in myriad murmurs,

            (Mind and heart argue and fight)

blame the sinking of the soul, in all events,

            (each acknowledging neither is right)

On their leaning, to close to the brim.

            (capsizing the balance of each other’s sight)

 

Their voyage unable to transcend the peak of the waves,

            (oh, but their argument will not let them sleep)

float to the bottom in lifeless bubbles;

            (with promises and assurances unable to keep)

seeking passage without having to pay.

            (Feeling blameless, wolf’s victim as sheep)

For neither the price, nor for the rescue or salvage.

               (follies, human salvation, shallow as deep)

****

“…Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.” 

A Psalm of life

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

 

MY GRAVE MISTAKE

 

“If someone renounces themselves,

then whatever they might keep,

 wether it be a kingdom or honour

or whatever it may be,

they will still have renounced

all things.”

                                                           Meister Eckhart

 

I have lost everything I loved,

trampled below me and from above

I cannot find those things anymore.

They have been sacked and plundered, scorched and scored;

Expelled from the belly of a Trojan horse

Wrapped and gifted, without remorse.

 Perhaps, I had to abandon those things

 in my surrender, in my winter before the Spring;

Empty handed, on my knees,

To learn there is nothing sacred, for desire without need.

 

As I grow older, more mature, more disposed

to release those things  I can’t believed in anymore,

You, have stayed at my side, through this resolution,

to help me place the plastic flowers of illusion

At the grave sites of what I thought was at stake;

 

Allowing me, now, to be peacefully embraced

At the foot of my grave mistake.

 

Notes Found On The Refrigerator March 2014

I find my depression by calling myself the witness.

      **********

 It is time to re-discover …and scrap what I have invented.

      ********

“I did not make all things. I AM all things. Cursing what is made is futile and disparaging. Things are fine, they just need to be put in the right place.” scribbled by a pencil across a terrible “act”.

****************************

pick up or point out

Ah, here comes the picker;

that poor bastard is unconscious.

 

If he sees something out of place he straightens it right out.

If it’s his, he puts it back in his pocket. If it’s not

he puts it back from were it fell from.

 

Or, may consider its current placement

for another day. Not anally, just clearing his path

putting things away.

 

Usually behind him, is another unconscious bastard

looking about and enjoying the sights.

Hands clutched to a dustpan and broom

 

hunting and finding faux pas,

preferably on shiny un-carpeted floors,

under the bed, and behind opened doors.

 

 

they will always “AHA!” …to the picker, often in terse tone,

extending their hands in laziness, except for one finger, pointing it out;

handing over the resolution, expecting a bow and a “thank God” he follows you about.

  

When you become responsible for yourself,

 you are  freed to appreciate the picker

 and the other bastard I suppose.

   

 

 

Notes Found On The Refrigerator February 2014

Self-pity is a stone

thrown on a still pond

 that ripples only misery

with everything it touches;

eventually to dissolve, I suppose,

on the banks among the reeds

before the pond returns

 to its peaceful

state.

 

********

Guilt:

The snake has legs

carries a dagger in its  boot

curled up to the warmth of its prey

plays heads or tails with a two-faced coin.

You know it has slipped in

when you hear the closing  door

awakening with a  dagger in your chest.

It’s best to forgive, be forgiven, and forgit.

Good-night, now shoo! Git.

 

***********

 

Who dares give shit to the dishwasher for dropping a dish?

 

**********

Love?

I’m not talking about beating the piss out of something

to straighten out dents!

 

I’m still a romantic;

a flower, a kiss,

a small candy heart

that says in fading blue letters

“I love you.”

A card or two

even if it’s from your mother

just another remarkable reminder,

in addressing the word “you.”

 

********

 

regardless, of your creativity fella,

it still needs to be somewhat refined

as raw gold, or silver, or coal, and

in this particular instance

even mud. 

 oh, up your nose with a rubber hose!

Oh, oh, “F” plus 

 

*********

 

Traveling the birds path that leaves no trail

the sickle of time, the cycle of life,

became ripples from a circle in my eyes.

The splash has wet my face.

I morn less for time and change,

awakened to see

what the center had to divide.

Learning to put things where they belong;

most of them, I found,

empty under my wings.

 

Notes Found On The Refrigerator Jan. 2014

The Buddha is the perfection of free will. Jesus, the Christ, discourages failure; allowing the dignity of risk to be forgiven and forgotten. The gods and Saints, Prophets, and Great Chiefs exemplify this understanding struggle that arrives to the Center of Inner Peace (God) before our minds created the earth. The path has already been chosen. It has been blazed and traveled on long before light. I need to stop chasing my tail.

********

Falling down the stairs (sorta like stumbling on the Truth) has it’s initial physical reaction but none so surprising, after landing on the first stair, as there was, in realizing (with some fear) that, there are more stairs, I was falling. OUCH! 911 me!

    **************

Every feather I found on the ground was accepted as a gift to wear 🙂

     **********************

Do I really understand what it is, I receive?

   ****

I accept our similarities and I am familiar with them.

I am seeking, however, my uniqueness among you;

which we equally possess within ourselves.

   *******

I need to bring strife to a mutual conclusion.

I need to resolve it and move on.

If I can’t, I’m in real deep shit!

If, that is the case,

then let me hold my breath

and dissolve. 🙂

   ****

I have accomplished more things in my mind,

that I have failed to do.

Proud of my success I suppose,

but under an empty roof.

   *******

shaved and wearing a smile, hopping and limping along

Fred the peg all dressed in red was going to the neighborhood bar.

He had met a lady there last night, real cute and precisely square.

Go figure?

After much conversation which seemed to go everywhere

They both agreed to meet again, at exactly the same spot, there.

Fred spent the day whittling his leg hoping to better fit in,

 with the square.

Now kinda looking slim, with an awkward limp,

she made it clear when he got there,

unfortunately for him, they would never fit

Her edges were there to stay.

The peg was initially liked by the square

but, he gave too much by whittling his leg

and she unable to understand

 the free space existing there,

that could eventually be filled

 by the things they share.

     ************

Sometimes you have to scribble things into irrelevant obscurity, eh! 🙂