1.

As civilized as a sword can make us —

Hasn’t it a cultural achievement

To fold the steel in layers and forge it

With a hammer and anvil and hone the

Blade to lethality to inscribe it

With vows of victory and to wield it

Requires a warrior’s training to

Surpass the enemy’s might in battle

And all to no benefit without a

Supporting ethos infusing courage

In the warrior? As civilized as

We may be in the midst of savagery

Haunting the human animal forcing

A defense of gentle accomplishments.

And there are methods

for instilling compassion

and benevolence

in the midst violence

in the human dilemma.

2.

Light and leaf — sun and sky — mind and sky — with

My eyes open I see the natural

Cooperation composing this world

And I wonder at the magic of it

That my skin absorbs the light just as a

Leaf absorbs the light just as the sun fills

The space surrounding the earth with light and

Somehow turns it blue — and have you noticed

How we live subject to the natural

Drama of the sky ceaselessly moving

With clouds and rain and wind and light and have

You noticed how the mind ceaselessly moves

From happiness to discouragement to

Confusion and also astonishment?

Too seldom do I see

too infrequently notice

the churning magic

composing combinations

and ceaseless transformation.

3.

It’s a modest dining room a smallish

Round table and in the morning I make

Coffee and have a bowl of cereal.

Maybe a conversation an email

Or an expression on someone’s face from

The day before has left an impression

With me and so I consider what they

Are thinking and how they are coping and

What I should do — I didn’t understand

How to direct my energy when young

How to discover what needs attention —

I come to my breakfast table as to

A reliable sanctuary and

Continuously find intuition.

Solitude is good

regularity helpful

quiet conducive

for the cultivation of

insightful understanding.

4.

I’ve gotten a lot of mileage out of

Playing the sleepless poet rummaging

For significance and sacrificing

While everyone else is sleeping and I’m

Stubborn and I’ll pay the penalty in

Taxes for not having health coverage

I’ll stop taking trazodone my magic

Sleeping pills because I refuse to pay

Hundreds of dollars just to consult the

Doctor once just to update prescriptions

So I went to the pharmacy looking

For non-prescription drugs and I talked to

The pharmacist and he impolitely

Asked me so how much coffee do you drink?

Could it be the pot

of coffee I drink each day

lifting me up in

the morning making me buzz

keeping me awake at night?

5.

Some people are crazy enough to wear

A wing suit and stand poised on the tip of

A Mountain and jump — with fabric outstretched

Between their arms and legs and body — and

They fly inches from the rocky edges

Plunging as the eagles do consuming

Miles of air passing inside and outside

Of alpine shadows falling on the slopes

Below — how divine the venture must seem

Flowing within a spectacle of such

Gigantic proportions — discovering

In a human form capability

For soaring with flaming sensations and

A beating heart — and with serenity?

Perhaps a

flying squirrel was

the inspiration

but where on earth did

the courage come from?

1.

Angus

As a handsome youth with dark hair he’s not

Remarkable but the photo has a

Story — he’s just come to America

From Australia and I wonder what

The photo does to those of us who knew

Him as my father appears very much

Like me or my brother at that age and

He’s full of youthful open confidence

As we know the story of his life of

His family his ministry the journal

He founded — we know the bitterness the

Courage and the triumphs no one else could

Comprehend and each of us remembers

Differently as each knew him separately.

It’s a small circle

of people capable of

comprehending the

photo’s reverberating

depth as only we knew him.

2.

Hazel was his sister’s name and dad said

She had a hard life as her husband was

A brute character and my dad would gaze

At the photo of her youthful smile and

Her profusion of hair and I can see

A touch of family resemblance as

The enthusiastic innocence and

Openness communicates happiness

But you can’t tell by seeing the photo’s

Eight decades old and between them was a

Steamer that traversed the Pacific from

Australia to America when such

A trip seemed irrevocable as dad

Left behind his family and homeland.

In youthful photos

of my vanished family

of a faded world —

I can sense optimism

And eager exploration.

3.

So I was in the square in Paris just

Before Notre-Dame Cathedral after

A year of schooling at Oxford having

Scored well with the teachers and being a

Young man with prospects for success who was

Free of responsibilities and yet

I couldn’t be happy — now here you are

Accomplished graduated prepared to

Be an engineer a young man with no

Obstacles except that you’re unhappy —

Is the world to come so threatening so

Imponderable it’s hard to begin

Or is misery merely a habit

You must overcome? You will find a way.

Unfortunately

I’m not able to give you

exact guidance as

in matters of the spirit

we each have our own puzzles.

4.

As if I were trying to sneak a look

At his cards to see what he’s doing he

Holds back and won’t communicate how he’s

Considering his options what he wants

To do what he thinks he’s capable of

Becoming — it’s time that he makes his way

That he determines a direction and

I know he doesn’t have to get it right

There’s wide latitude — it’s not a lifetime

He’s planning just the first few steps and then

He may reconsider readjust and

Change course but how can he know what’s best for

Him without testing his abilities

And discovering how the world responds?

Because he’s done it

because he’s reconnoitered

possibilities

a father may guide his son —

but the son may be stubborn.

5.

Being in a place where a person was

Makes the separation more poignant and

Who am I to complain as didn’t I

Get on a bus to Galveston Texas

And take a plane to Osaka Japan

And didn’t my parents wave goodbye and

And didn’t they watch me depart to an

Uncertain fate thousands of miles gone

And haven’t I been wondering when you

Would take a worthy direction but now

I realize emotions can become

Mixed as your courage is inspiring

As you’re behaving just as I did but

Part of me I’ve found wants to keep you near.

How can I complain

of my son’s emulation

as Joshua has

decided to go northward

up to Juno Alaska?

6.

Jocelyn

You were resisting in Pioneer Park

Pouting and refusing to walk on a

Summer afternoon as resolute as

A toddler with a bulging tummy

Could be bereft of her container of

Water that I forgot so I scooped you

Up and we proceeded home — today you’re in

Graduating robes at Moore College of

Art and Design in Philadelphia

Which is far from home with a degree that’s

A gamble the schooling will be useful

As we have encouraged you to become

As creative as possible because

Your talent deserves opportunity.

The conveyance of

emotional subtlety

comes naturally

in faces you create so

experience carefully.

1.

Stillwater

When the native peoples walked for water

This same valley was here resonating.

They called a section “Stillwater” because

The water spread between limestone bluffs.

Iced-over river and overcast sky

Slopes of bare trees and snow the clean cold air

The quiet settling among the bluffs

Prepare this place for reverberations.

Sioux and Ojibwa fought in a hollow

Lumberjacks floated rafts of logs downsteam

A frontier prison held the Younger Gang

And steamboats plied the townsfolk with supplies.

Pioneer Park has a southward view

For sunrises and sun speckled water.

Sun river

eagle soaring

seeing

2.

Kristine

A name is a gift that accompanies

A life and the christening of a child

Is a bestowal of your parent’s best

Intentions and wishes for the passage

Of a life as if they could be present

To smooth the way so to proclaim “may you

Be Kristine” is to wish in all your days

That you be moved with wisdom and love like

Christ and Kristine is a lovely name you

Should cherish as a gift but a name is

Only a word repeatedly pronounced

And the magic of the naming does wear

Off and the essence of spirit is yours

To express and no one else can do it.

It’s much easier

to say Kris and pronouncing

Kristine instead is

expressing formality

invoking incantation.

3.

Her parents left her behind at a gas

Station and at a swimming pool and they

Didn’t intend to hurt her but worse they

Forgot she was one of the family —

And though they retrieved her they also gave

Her the impression she’s worthless

And now the grown woman can’t get enough

Attention to lose the expectation

She is forgettable — just as if she

Were given a piece of a puzzle and

And assigned the task of finding where it

Belongs — so it seems she’s been abandoned

She’s lost and upset and struggling to

Compose herself and to find the way home.

To compose herself

to discover the way home

is quite a puzzle —

in a world full of strangers

to find those who are loving.

4.

Eric

I remember my first friend beyond my

Family the first intimacy when

We discovered there were secrets to share

And with innocence I gave my trust and

I encountered how much fun it was to

Delve and roam the neighborhood and then my

Family moved to Minnesota and

I left my friend in Kansas — and there was

A procession of friendships and there were

Disappointments and betrayals and I

Had to grow a layer of armor and

I began to measure how much trust was

Sensible and I’ve tasted bitterness —

But I want to be gentle and sincere.

Wholehearted

innocence was

lost — but I have

circumspection

and kindness.

5.

A rascal put a

snail shell in a

tuba —

rumble has rattle

curlicue in curves.

6.

Matt’s a six-foot banana today on

The sidewalk and might have been Gumby a

Coke bottle or Spiderman yesterday

And he’s standing and driving a Segway

A T-shaped vehicle with two wheels and

He was a soldier in Afghanistan

Was shot in the head has memory loss

And headaches and because he can’t work he

Passes the time in a costume looking

Ridiculous to snare the attention

Of passersby attempting to impart

Happiness because he intends to turn

Around a bad day someone is having

Because his humor is the best of him.

It’s too easy

to become isolated

laughter is magic

humor communicates and

people need inspiration.

1.

Abraham Lincoln

He was moved with compassion for the slaves

Declared the nation must choose slavery or

Freedom when none wanted to see the truth

He knew the choice could not be evaded —

Thoughtful and grave with a far-away gaze

Burdens settled on him so he became

The master of himself and of many

Hot-tempered men contesting Civil War —

The north fought to preserve union and law —

Not to free slaves — Lincoln understood the

Temper of his people knew not to waste

The slaughter of soldiers so he waited

Until emancipation could succeed —

He was the only one fit for the job.

Sadness troubled him

compassion moved him to lead

strength sustained him through

thousands of battlefield deaths

may he be honored always.

2.

As the years are accumulating the

Seasons are becoming precious to me

And in the transition from winter I

Watched the tips of trees begin to bud

And noticed the vulnerability

And the beseeching posture of the limbs

Rising up to the sun but now in the

Summer their forms are concealed within

Luxuriant foliage and I’m attuned

To the ascending and dissipating

Sound of the wind in the leaves just as if

The trees are sighing and I remember

These voices from childhood — resonating

Communicating succoring soothing.

The invisible

undulating in the trees

the inaudible

arising within the leaves

communicating soothing.

3.

Crossing a threshold and absorbing light

There’s a connection to be imagined

In a baby seeing swirls of color

And hearing startling and soothing sounds

Experiencing taste distinguishing

The warming power of a smiling face

A comforting voice with an embrace and

As leaves of the trees emerge and absorb

The light as the roots consume nutrients

From a thawing soil the tree will never

Know it’s a tree but when the gnawing of

Hunger comes the baby discovers how

To manipulate others by crying —

Nurturance arises magically.

Before the things of

the world acquire names there’s

no distinguishing

within a baby’s thinking

between inside and outside.

4.

George says hello with a quivering chirp

As I’m entering the room as he’s

Leaning his head on the piano leg

With his back legs sprawling as lazy as

Possible — a portrait of nonchalance —

He’s not a kitten anymore and not

A grown-up either as there’s not a thing

He does but eat and sleep but he knows my

Habits during the night and leads me to

The necessary room but he ambles

More slowly than I want to go so I

Slow down because I can’t get around him

Because George is large and doesn’t hurry

And I’m the one who’s being disciplined.

George hasn’t a mane

isn’t on the savanna

doesn’t have a pride

but he is brown and does have

a complacent majesty.

1.

In a “half-faced camp” a shed with three sides

They lived not much better than bears in a

Cave because that’s the best Thomas could do

Hewing a shelter from the woods with an

Ax and saw — they arrived after fourteen

Days in an oxen caravan to a

Fork on the Sangamon River to a

Place without obligations and to a

Site where Nancy his mother would die of

Milk sickness where Abraham learned to do

 Sums of arithmetic by writing on

A wooden shovel and shaving it off —

He had a year’s schooling but he absorbed

The Bible and Robinson Crusoe.

Weighing his words and

speaking dispassionately

Abraham Lincoln

would present his arguments

sincerely and precisely.

2.

Is there a triter subject than a rose?
They are mostly just stems and little leaves —
Yes their velvet petals are enchanting
But the contrast with their thorns? Overdone —

As common as the sun or moon in verse
Who hasn’t read poetry belabored
With roses? I’d rather see some other
Flower — peony or chrysanthemum —

Yet I adore the resonance of “rose”
And the certainty that every human
Has beheld the sun and moon and roses
So to become one with humanity —

What everyone has beheld I behold
Too what everyone has loved I love too.

Yellow rose petal
evanesces —
thorn

3.

There are raindrops in this piece of paper

And the clouds from which the rain came reside

Now within this white form that was once a

Tree that has become a poem because

Without the drops to nurture the tree the

Expression of the tree the paper and

Poem could not be and the minerals

In the soil also live in the paper

Because without minerals soil has no

Potency and the magic of the sun

Rises off the paper to warm your face

As I communicate to you with words —

The logger the road maker and the mill

Worker have all labored for this poem.

Metamorphosis

is a fact and the magic

is a mystery

and the mystery is deep

though it happens every day.

4.

Such things too
the smudges
and slabs
take part in
the bloom —
row apartments
and vine roses.

1.

My mind is a bowl pondering why my

Friend would say he has no one he relies

On because he’s never said such hurtful

Words before and my mind is a bowl of

Frustration as I’m plotting to persuade

A woman to submit to my way of

Managing our meager finances as

I consider her quirky reactions

And my mind is a bowl seeing the sun

In a brilliant sky amidst moving clouds

And there suspended is a crescent moon

And for moment I’m just watching as

My mind is a bowl and an opening

Offering good intentions this morning.

Crescent moon in the

blue sky of morning —

a hole in the day

2.

The swallow bursts before me snatching my

Sight swooping rising diving and turning

Turning as if it were a whirling blade

Turning and then vanishing into sky —

But the bumblebee lumbers in the grass

Plodding and bumbling and purposeful

Desirous of nectar to return home

Serving the manufacture of the hive —

I can’t resist the urge to grab the toad

Squeezing and turning it as I wonder

Is it toads or frogs that give out warts and

I suppose it’s either but I don’t care —

I’ve spent an hour playing in summer

And so escaped a dreary winter day.

These blasted winter

days have frozen my toes and

I’ve worried about

my constantly frozen toes

until this morning’s thawing.

3.

Only banana

tastes like banana

only a tongue

can taste banana —

I have the joy.

1.

Asphalt Driveway Co.

I was lucky years ago to work on

The crews that put in asphalt driveways in

The summer and we came in tall trucks with

A tractor a roller and a paver

And we were young men exercising our strength

And honing our skills and learning what was

Necessary — like standing on a load

Of asphalt while the soles of our boots burned

And shoveling from the truck down into

A wheelbarrow because that is the

Only way to get the asphalt to an

Odd place — there was no use in wearing

Gloves because they would be worn out very

Fast so our hands developed calluses.

I used a maul

a shovel

and a pickax

and grew a

capacious heart.

2.

Willie’s appearance might not impress you

Because he was too thin and tanned almost

Black and the sun is not kind to exposed

Skin — he was silent unpredictable

And volatile — but as the chief on an

Asphalt driveway crew he was a master

Craftsman working from his tractor seat at

Timing the arrivals of the trucks and

The moving of the grunts and at tearing

Out the old driveway and sculpting the ground

With an eye for the drainage of water

And he was good at raking stones into

Place and once the asphalt was flowing he  

Knew how to lay an impeccable mat.

Willie was wicked

in his rages over

carelessness or

stupidity or

for no reason.

3.

Grunts

Davey folded the six plastic rings that

Connected a six-pack of pop into

A single ring and with his hands grasping

Behind his neck he tore it apart and

Joey franticly shoveled the stones

In the correct general direction

And Joey drove hastily weaving

Around the traffic with a hot load of

Asphalt and there came a day I had to

Prove myself so I swung a pickax like

John Henry and the next day they let a

Surplus guy go and kept me and with my

Boot I balanced on an empty pop can

And with my fingers tapping crushed the can.

The crew chief mastered

all the necessary skills

and he sits in the

tractor seat and he

determines everything.

4.

A tamper is a steel pole with a square

Ending that is used to put a raised edge

Alongside an asphalt driveway and I

I had a good eye for tamping a straight

Line and the chiefs selected me because

My tamping was a fine finishing touch

And I was happy because I could keep

Working and I had a skill setting me

Apart and I enjoyed riding to jobs

In the back of a tall dump truck wearing

A bandana but not a shirt feeling

Like a pirate and encountering the

Curious expressions of passersby

Because I was a member of the crew.

It is easy to

encourage a young man

and entice him to

work like a raging demon —

give him some belonging.

5.

A roller uses two cylinder wheels

That we filled with water and it’s about

Twice as big as a golf cart and I went

Forward by pushing a lever forward

And backward the same way and one day I

Was rolling pressing a just laid driveway

Going right to the edge of a ten foot

Drop enjoying an easy interlude

Between hard labor and I pulled back on

The lever but the roller kept on so

I jumped and down it went boom boom and like

A cat I landed with my heart going

Boom boom and I might have been dozing a

Little beforehand but then I woke up.

Synchronicity —

a mechanical failure

a ten foot drop and

vigorous dexterity

produced a happy ending.

6.

It was a joke we enjoyed — four of the

State government road crew were leaning on

Their shovels as one was shoveling — though

There might have been a little envy too

Because we were like skinny feral cats —

And from the moment we arrived at the

Yard there was ceaseless motion before dawn

And through the heat of summer days until

Returning past the evening twilight and

The only occasional rest was if

There was room for me in the cab to doze

On the way to the next job otherwise

I’d stand in the dumpster part of the truck

With my arms over the sides holding on.

Such a test of pride —

to lift a wheelbarrow

and hurl it up and

over the side into the

dump truck about ten feet high.

Our Mission Is to Reawaken the Genuine American Spirit . . .

11 Principles of a Reagan Conservative, by Paul Kengor. Beaufort Books, New York, NY, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., ISBN 978-0-8253-0699-0, pp. 157.

It is obvious in many who engage in or watch politics and governance: cynicism. My hero/commentator, Charles Krauthammer, is an admittedly proud cynic, expertly honed to see underlying motives. Charles sees motives, goals, and likely results: self-promotion predominates, solutions ignored, Americans without power suffer, and problems accumulate - the veterans who die waiting to receive medical care while VA managers hide waiting lists so that managers win bonuses is a poignant example. The Veterans' Administration is not being run for the benefit of veterans but for the benefit of VA managers, which epitomizes the nature of bureaucracies.