O my Life and soul's breath--
I weep for weakness,
for I can barely hold
my wandering spirit in.

My self plays me traitor.
Why thirst I for the broken wells
Who have the Wine of Life?

Draw tight the bands
and fetters of Your grace;
and bind me to You,
lest I leave the One I love.

Clip my wings if I would fly--
I trust Your Lover's heart
where I dare not trust my own.

It is late.

The house sleeps around me,
But I sit at my computer
And think thoughts of genius.

(I’m always a genius
After midnight.)
When the clock strikes 12,
Einstein himself
Has nothin’ on me!

So I'm a backwards Cinderella,
And my magic carpet awaits.
Someday I’m gonna learn
How to drive that thing...

But as I was saying--

Funny, how this magicking time
Is so unpopular with Them.

They say that sleep before midnight
Is the best for you,
And makes you healthy,
And wise,
And rich--
which is a lie.

But I don't tell them They lie.
I just say,
"I can sleep when I'm dead."
Respectfully.

I don't care to let them in
On the secret of the century.

For if they knew what I know,
Sleeping would be
Like last year's fashion.
Out with the old
In with the new.

Because bedtime is for babies.

Long live the New Regime!

I go
tomorrow
to be stuck.
When you wake,
grope for black coffee
and stumble out of bed--
think of me.

Sitting
cold and tired
in a white waiting room
that reeks of cleanliness
(which is not next to godliness,
whatever they say)
I will sit
and wait.

At seven AM,
sterile-faced nurses
with scrubbed hands
and cheerful smiles
will pierce
a blue vein,
and watch it
spurt red.

(I hate their cheerfulness
at 7 in the morning,
but I smile too,
deceitfully.)

Afterwards,
as that bit of red
in lonely tubes
is whisked away
to microscopes,
and peering men
in masks--
I go
and find again
that barren whiteness
that clinical cold
that marks
a waiting room.

At 8 AM, when
you reach an absent hand
for marmeladed toast,
and fried egg;
and you quaff
the orange
(with which
no word
rhymes)
juice--
think of me.
I fast.
I fast because
they say to.
They don't
say why.

As clock
strikes 9,
and you push
your plate away,
happy for no other reason
but that you are satisfied
and life is good--
think of me.

A second vein--
a second spurt--
a second tube...
the same waiting room.

Another hour,
another needle,
and you sit at your desk,
and read the morning mail--
(a nurse
sits at her desk
in red hair and glasses
that stare vacantly
at paperwork
or nothing.
She is not rude,
just impersonal--
this is her job.)

I wonder,
can one die
of boredom?
Magazines
in sterile colors
sit gazing
at the wall.
A nurse
at the door
(this one male)
says it is time.

My arm grows tired
of tight elastic
and the pinch
of the needle.

Do you think of me
as you leave the house
and start the engine running
while you jog back
for your keys?
(You had
your mother's.)
I am still there.
It is nearly twelve,
and I'm nearly done.
The paperwork
is filled out
by the red-haired nurse
who smiles for politeness' sake.
I do not smile back.

An open door,
that I would run through
if I were not
so tired.

I think...
I think
I will go back home
and sleep.

To a FRIEND:

Bugsy,
You and me
Out on the town.
With our camo and army boots,
Our black face-grease
And .38 specials,
We’re going to rob
The Dead-Letter Office.
(Don’t smile and give us away!)

Two fools
Looking for fool’s gold
(I say this in affection).
At least we’re wise fools—
We know that the gold isn’t important.
It’s the looking for it
That matters--
It’s the fun of the chase!

The two amigos—
Three if we bring Jorge.
Have you got the map?
We’ll go exploring
And climb the tallest pine
(really, any one would do,
they’re all so tall!)
To find—what?
I forget what we were looking for.

Two armies—
Marching to defend
(or was it seize?)
A tiny country
That I cannot pronounce.
Somehow our armies
Went blithely past
And missed each other completely.
Ah well.

Two glasses
Of lemonade.
The sun is hot,
But we lie back
And look at the future.
This grass wouldn’t be
So long, or tickle
So much, if we weren’t
Such lazy chaps,
And if we cut it.
But what’s long grass?
It’s better long
For making whistles.
Bet I can make mine
Louder than yours!
But you’re too lazy
To argue.

Two hep cats,
Blowin’ off the joint
And duckin’ the Feds.
We’re hot—-gotta wait
Until we cool off.
Avoid the cheap dives,
See Freddy the Fence
To get some lettuce,
And we’ll be in the pink.

Two admiral birds—-
Grab your hat and scarf
And let’s find some tigers!
I hear the Siberians
Are quite charming
If you catch them
On a Thursday.
And what luck—
Today is Thursday!

Two grins
And two scowls,
But only the grins are real.
(The others are masks
to deceive the uninitiated)
One dope and one idiot—
But which is which?

Bugsy,
You and me
Out on the town.
Ain’t we a pair though?

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(based on Romans 7:21-25)

I am two men.

Within this house of clay,
I live and strive
against Myself.
That which I hate,
That which I love,
Is likewise Me.
Division of two worlds—
Two realms;
A rotten corpse of death—
An Adam, Eden-new—
The one is Life,
The other Death.
Did ever Love and Hate,
Or Dark and Light
Exist within one frame?
Yet here am I.
I am a dead man walking.
I am Alive.
When shall I be just One?
O Who will rid me
Of this corpse?

When He who holds the sundered realms
Of Heav’n and Hell
Exults upon the heights, Humanity within His grasp—
His sword, blood-red,
Shall cleave my soul from Death.

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As I contemplate this site
It seems to me it can't be right
That it and I are doomed by Fate
To pass as ships pass in the night.

What peevish wind it was that blew
Our ships off course I never knew
But somehow, lonely site of mine
We separated, me and you.

Can I be blamed? I cry--Heck, no!
I never would have willed it so!
The gods of fate must simply hate
This blog and I like billy-oh.

And is this world so full of pain
That I must leave my blog again?
(Which last line only rhymes if you
Are British and a Limey--ha!)

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