Charles Bukowski As The Buddha

Window and the Sea

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

THE THREE FISHES
—D.R. Wagner, Elk Grove

Oh the path was green as green could be.
The path led down to the sea-O,
And from out of the sea and the night beach-O,
Came fishes three to dance upon the shore-O.

They danced on their tails as they told their tales,
Fins flapping on their sides. And they sang quite
Loud but they sang quite clear and their eyes shone
Bright and greeny as they danced in the blue moonlight:

“We have been to the lands of the fairie queen to show
Her our scales and how they shine, brighter than her armoured
Knights and she bid us go to the green, green path
That leads down to this sea, to dance upon the shore.

The sights we saw were the sights we saw and turtles
Large as dreams, they swam with us in the icy seas
Among the bergs and the herring schools with whales
White and Whales blue, bowheads, finned and the right ones too.

Through the realms of the squid and the great, great rays,
Past the thousand sharks and the octopi, the dolphins, eels
And the barracuda, past the sunfish and the bright sea snakes,
To come to this shore on this bright night to dance in the moonlight
Just for you, to dance in the moonlight for you.

And when you wake in the morning, child, and the day
Collects around you, you’ll tell your story of the dancing
Fish you’ve seen upon the strand. No will believe such
A thing you’ve seen, through it’s true, as true could be.
Such a sight they’ll say could never be and you’ll say the fish
Sang to you too and they will say this couldn’t be true, oh no,
They will say it couldn’t be true.

All you’ll have left are some scales we will give
And these words of our song we sang for you
As you came down the green, green path that
Leads to the edge of the sea-O, that leads to the edge of the sea.”

______________________

HAMMERING IT HOME
—D.R. Wagner

This should be a voice.
This should be a red voice.
I did not know that this
Would have this appearance,
That it would seem to be a collection
Of stars at a window, the blue
Eating away at where the moon
Was just reaching. This does not
Appear to be a voice. It is
So silent. I can’t get back
To it often enough. There isn’t
A sensation of sound at all.

Shaking the sleep away with
A voice. How can this be
As it seems. I will write
It down here. I will come
Here to listen. I will not know
Anything but the voice.
I will not be reading at all.
I will know what this really is.

______________________

AFGHANISTAN
—D.R. Wagner

They were shredding the sky.
Huge chunks of it ripped out,
The skin behind the stars
Showing its edges. They too glowed.

Someone was already sitting near
The piano when she entered
The room. There was something
Familiar about him. His eyes
Had seen rafts of the dead
Laid out in the sand and broken rocks,

A voice of pure red and dirty smoke
Before the bodies had come apart.

There must be a place for them
In music. Please let there be
A place for them in music.

It is bad enough they can never
Be put back together. The sound
Itself weeps blood and fragments of bones.
We walk quickly to find cover.
Perhaps we have not been seen yet.

_____________________

THE CHILDREN OF THE BLIND
—D.R. Wagner

All around me, a gray rain,
A glance dropped so easily
It made no sound until it reached
The heart’s core and leaked out
Through the bottom, not understanding
A blessed thing about why
The coldness cracked the surface
Where love was smoothing and soothing
As much as it could when
Its truth was knocked out
Of its head and scattered
On the runway like

Porcelain gems spinning
The tires of huge jets and
Creating havoc every time I even
Thought of a kiss or your arms
Or anything that might be
Your body next to mine.

______________________

HARMLESS
—D.R. Wagner

Well this is certainly harmless.
All the blood has been washed away.
They have recorded everything so they
Can relive it over and over.

The sounds of the working day
Are muffled here as if there
Was something no one wanted us to see.

I don’t know. Something just snapped
And before I knew it everyone was
Wearing red and screaming and I
Reasoned that the gathered throng
Was some kind of drunken giant
That never heard of Our Lady
Of Sorrows. I smoothed my hair
And my hands are covered with
Blood. I haven’t been taught this.
Just stand here with me, not hurting
Anymore, ever. We’ll talk quietly for awhile.

I wonder if we will meet again.
I can hear your voice, the crying
And that little star that needs
To hear us sing to it so it can shine.

_____________________

 Window and the Sea II

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

(The bitter tears of the wind,
Much of rain is for the sky
alone to see.)

LANDING IN THE DARK
—D.R. Wagner

“The sea is like a splintered mirror.”

There is no moving closer to it
Or landing on it. We have no way
Of knowing if we are near the ground
Or if we are part of the snow and the terror

The edge of night brings to us
As we hang suspended in the air
Listening to the whining of the motors
That keep us aloft. They seem
Fueled more by dreams than
Gasoline or jet fuel. They do not
Offer us comfort, only remind us
That we are gods of the air
For a brief moment. Then we see
Three flares in the distance,

Decide they mark the edge of a plane
Where we might escape the clouds.
The runway of the night all around us.

We turn our craft toward these
Feeble beacons and begin singing
As if they were the most precious
Of jewels as we feel the lump
Earth becomes beneath our wheels
And we begin thinking of how
Exotic a cup of coffee sounds.

______________________

TESTING THE RAIN
—D.R. Wagner

The sea birds fly low
Across the water, just inches
Above the wave tops,
Like almost waking from sleep
But being unable to do so.

The ladder reaches almost
To the top of the wall
But still falls short
Before one is able to see
Over the top.

O the fire knows my name.
“The velvet voices of the drowned”
Wish this rain to rise again. It seems
So small. We cannot possibly
Be important here. The hours
Will wash over us. There will be
Kind words and the beating
The heart knows as its private
Voice is echoed in the thunder,

Describes the robes the heart
Wears before it has been harmed
By living in these streets, walking
Among the monsters of murder
This city fills itself with.

We watch the birds and decide to test
The rain once more, to fly for all
The days of our lives.

______________________

CHARLES BUKOWSKI AS THE BUDDHA
—D.R. Wagner

You can wait outside this place forever
And never see the same poem that went in the front door.
It was so shiny and full of order, clean metaphors,
Dancing rhythms.

Here comes one now. It is tired and hurt.
It looks like it got into an argument with Charles Bukowski
About a race horse. Thing with poems though,
They have been everywhere. They are like fire.

They are all our senses, these are poems after all.
They go everywhere, they see everything.
They see as well as the Buddha, for crying
Out loud. They might be the Buddha.

Later, when you finally get in the door and go
Looking for it, you will find thousands of them,
Most of them attached to poets however.
If you find one without an ego it just might
Be the Buddha. Or maybe it's just Charles Bukowski.

_____________________ 

Today's LittleNip: 

A QUANDARY
—D.R. Wagner

I found myself a fiction.
No one believed me.
Everyone read me.
I remain the truth.

_____________________

—Medusa

Hole in a Wall

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

An Immense Poetry

Bolinas and Frog

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

CANTICLE DESCRIBING WONDER

—D.R. Wagner, Elk Grove

Who was it joined the hurricane

To the canticle describing wonder?

Clipping it to centuries long gone

And a hand constantly thought of

As a tree pulled from a landscape

Martyrs might enjoy, notes torn away

From the piano, working temporarily as birds.

A glittering air formed of an immense poetry

Where nothing appears but a singular

Consciousness in the form of an umbrella,

A green mind, then changed by metaphor

To a clear spot in the forest loaded

With medieval trappings and a presence.

A bell-like sound across the square

Where we sit on green chairs

And pretend to be waiting for something.

We watch the hurricane unlock itself

And deliver a blank wall of pure rain.

We have forgotten all about words.  We join

Hands and sway side to side, humming.

______________________

HOLES IN THE SKY

—D.R. Wagner

When I pressed myself toward waking

I discovered that some of the rooms

Of my dream had been eaten away,

Large chunks had gone missing.

The parts with the steep steps leading

To the sea, the twilit room where the

Lady sat crying, holding the long-tailed lamb,

The hills where one could see how large

The fires were as they swept toward the towns,

Nothing on earth able to stop them.

A hunger was left in my bones because of this.

I could hear a historic wind wind through my skull

As I reached for coffee, searched to find where

The window looking upon the fields had gone.

Holes in the sky, something peering through

Them from speechless realms, carrying weapons

The likes of which I had never seen before,

Clouded with forgetfulness and trailheads that

I had seen once in youth that had been stolen,

Used to make fires to cook food upon, the smell

Of roasting meat swelling the morning air.

And now this, an aching within my body

Overarching all but the eyes of the highest

Hawk, the screeching bird, seeking thoughts

Smaller than voles to feed upon and I tried

To run back to the sheds of sleep and the coolness

Of streams hurrying down the hillsides

Eager to see the sea, to join the endless tides.

______________________

ONE ROOM IS A HOUSE

—D.R. Wagner

Creeping out among the branches

To know your name.  I am above you now.

This is like breathing.

The support we feel when

We recognize our name on

A list of things that may be

Eternal, a whispering in a hallway

That we do not understand.

We watch the lightning strike

The trees in the garden,

The fountain.  Oh who will tell

Me if I am dreaming?

I look through the long lists of the saints.

They had no idea at all if they were

Dreaming.  I discover my face

In a book of rare engravings kept by

The captain of a long ago disappeared ship.

 On Jack's Path, Bolinas

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

A CHANCE ENCOUNTER

—D.R. Wagner

A primitive land that leaves

Nothing much behind.  It owns

The Winter sky and displays it

In the dance a willow tree

Chooses to describe a wind.

I would try flight but who would

Understand?  Even the birds do not

Know why and it is not everything

To them.  Huddled close to a tree

Trunk, knowing when the wind departs

It will once again be time to find

Seeds just beneath the snow.

They have black heads and blacker eyes

And carry maps made of their bones

That tell them where to go.

So I, come here late and without guile

Still detect a primitive ecstasy in

The noises of the crows, the impatience

Of the weather, the scolding I endure

From all imagination for calling this reality. 

____________________

A POSSIBILITY OF BREATH

                                         for W. Stevens

—D.R. Wagner

This space between here and the clouds

Seems careless but for fleeting beauty

And a wharf for docking weary eyes

To something not covered with the dust.

A dreamt majesty that doesn’t

Stare but remains an argument

That there is a sweet, staring

Distance between all things.

Waking as we do from whatever

Uncertain depths we

Direct ourselves in so-called sleep,

We find the wide heaven,

This sparkling haven where we no

Longer need make choices

But use the energy we have gathered

To quell time’s complaints about

Everything that is not dead,

Forgetting even our own names,

Living here without bodies to see

‘The low owl plummet, rising of the morning.’ 

_________________

SUNLIGHT

—D.R. Wagner

I am sunlight on the surface of the ocean.

I too am the ocean itself,

Streaming to the very bottom

And tracking all that moves within me.

I am the tears of children.

I am the fjords leaning deeply into

The land.  I can see the high cliffs.

I am the the songs of the beasts within my body.

And I can speak their words.

And I can know their language.

And I can move with storms.

And I can move with romantic calmness.

And I can carry the burden of the loveliest

Of breezes within my wave troughs.

I can capture the light of the lighthouses and guide

The ship and soul back to the rooms

Away from the wind to sit before

The fire while night rages against

Everything and I can tell you of these

Things for I am the sunlight on the surface

Of the ocean.

______________________

MICHAEL APPEARING UNEXPECTEDLY 

—D.R. Wagner

We did not at first recognize him

As the archangel.  How could we?

A svelte and affable young man

Saying, ‘Hello, my name is Mike.

I’m here to tell you that you

Will want to check on your children.

This is a very bad neighborhood.’

Who is like God anyway?

Someone finally thought to ask

To make sure the children

Were alright.  ‘Whose side are you on?’

Shouted another.

‘I’m just here now,’ he answered.

It was later we saw the sword,

The splendid boat he boarded to

Leave us.  ‘I’m going to the mountains.

I just wanted to say I will protect

You forever.'  And then we believed him

And saw the chairs surrounding him.

____________________

Today's LittleNip:

BASKET CASE

—D.R. Wagner

Music in a basket, taken to make a room

And then a dwelling and then a palace.

It has proven itself to be no

Architecture for living.  There is no

Inside.  The rooms are beautiful

But without doors.  There is only

Sound at the end of an arm or a

Stepping across a threshold trying

To direct the forward motion of the whole

Thing.

We live in the crescendos and

Diminuendos.  Legato to the

Edge of the cliffside

To see the view and there,

To once again discover the

Woven basket,

Capable of any season,

Full of song and placed beside

The clearest water of a Spring.

____________________

—Medusa

 Bolinas Rockslide (with Lisa)

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

 [Check out Medusa's Kitchen's Facebook page

for D.R. Wagner's photo album, 

"Surf's Up!"]

The Broken Glass of Memory

Roly Poly Bumpy

—Anonymous Illustration

—Poems by D.R. Wagner, Locke, CA

WHAT IS SO CHASTE

A gauntlet of rainy mornings
Like something was wrong
With the sky.  Cities floated

By as if they had forgotten
The world.  Important fires
In their pretty buildings,
Green and purple flames
Pretending to be shelters
For little flowers and thieves.

I was tired of looking at them.
They reminded me of poetry
Or of those tunes God whistled
When he went walking
With his lions across his lawns.

What had any of this to do
With the white arms of war?
The bridges of blood
That filled the newspapers
And the filthy spill of stained words
I saw around me every day.

What was supposed to be this beautiful?
Men and women?  Children?
Water?  Some clouds?  A world?

What could I do
With such a splendid vista?

Go hunting, I suppose.
With the forest filled
With gibbets and pits
Full of monsters.

But, oh it was nevertheless beautiful
And oh, it was a glorious day
And oh, it was only ourselves
Being good to one another.
My arm across your body
As we lie abed.
Your beautiful breasts.
The smile on your sleeping face.

 Three Little Stars

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

A PROMISE

A coyote passing through my bloodstream
But I was blind to his silver grey being.

I noticed that he had placed the great
Hands of a clock on my back like wings
But I could not fly, nor could I die.

I was given angel names.
Was I given too much?
I am talking to myself at night.
Everything stripped of color.

When will I hear a real voice again?
I stumble over the broken glass of memory.
I struggle to recognize clouds, roses,
The patterns of waves upon the ocean.

The coyote tells me, “Bad meat, bad water,
Keep moving toward the mountain.
Dawn will remember many things for you.”

 Peruvian Cactus Blossom

—Photo by D.R. Wagner 

 

A SUMMER WALK

Summer says: “I cannot hold anything
Very long.  I fill with vegetables and fruit
But they are but a moment in time.”

The road passing so quickly it seems
Not to move at all, then becomes a blur
Of children and lovely colors swirling.

It takes all of our lives to get here.
It fills with incredible power,
Whispers a few names and departs.

The day grows late.  You ask if it
Is even real, or just an enjambment
The breath encounters because
We are holding hands and dress
In this Summer, thinking we are leaves.

 Luffa Climbing

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

A KIND OF SINGING

The light beginning to crackle and glow
Around the buildings on the horizon.
In traveling through this place
We have no idea why such a phenomena
Should occur.  It’s rather like a
Small child being born and immediately
Becoming recognized as a great king.
What are the chances of such a thing?

The evening scoots down the low hills
As if it were another child, on a slide,
Being called to dinner just as he
Finally gains his spot at the top.
What to do?  Come home now?

Sit down, press one’s legs into the
Sides of the slide and take as much
Time as possible to descend to the ground.
Everyone will understand somehow.

When we reach the bottom of the hill,
The entire landscape looks embossed;
A storybook cover one could run one’s
Hand over and still feel the real worth
The story has to hold.  No one has
Visited this place below the hill
For so long, we have forgotten the songs
That used to be sung about it.
We believe we are making up a new song.

 Irrigation, Watermelon

—Photo by D.R. Wagner 

 

THE POOL

The pool became very frightened.
Something he could not see
Said, “Do not let anyone come here.”

“I shall pray to the sea,”
Proclaimed the pool.
“The moon can carry my voice.”

“The wind can dance for me.
I will touch it with my little waves.
Someone will understand.”

“It might be a dream
Or the press of a season.
Listen to our doings,” said
His frogs.  “We have songs.
Do not fear, dear pool.”

They leaned toward the sunset.
The kindness of night birds
Held them until they could sleep.

 Bean Rows, Locke

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

THE POETRY OF THINGS

They have found out who we are.
Mountains remember us.

They know our names.
I reached behind a shrubbery
To touch its back, hard with little
Fur patches.  It bristled when touched.

Things are not supposed to have
Personalities.  They only want
Us gone, so they can continue
To be things.

Be careful where you walk.
Many things have memory.
They seldom forget a kindness. 

 Melons, Luffas, Sunflowers, Gourds

—Photo by D.R. Wagner 

 

 

Today’s LittleNip:

THE YELLOW PLUM
—D.R. Wagner

The yellow plum tree
So sure of itself.
It pops tiny, one-bite
Fruits among its leaves.

On tiptoes, in early Summer
I reach into its dark green,
Pulling golden fruit to myself.

I imagine I see your face
In the deep green shadows
But, truly, my eyes are old.

Even my memories are
Seen from a distance.

___________________

Our thanks to D.R. Wagner for this fine Saturday brunch of poems and pix, celebrating mid-summer and its bounty!

—Medusa

Celebrate Poetry!

Locke Garden Restaurant

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

Photos in this column can be enlarged by clicking on them once,
then click on the X in the top right corner to come back
to Medusa.

Listen To The Heart

The Wall

—Photo by D.R. Wagner, Locke

AN ADMONITION
—D.R. Wagner

In the broad daylight, the ships are shifted
Port to port and from their masts we see
All of sleep’s delicacy of cities,
Their kirks and their graveyards.

So much seems familiar, and still
We are afraid to waken and find
Only the night touching us, making
Bargains for our dreams.  We can

See who we used to be.  They will
Let us have all of the cities of our past.
They will allow us all the rivers except
Those crossed by the soul only.

And we do not know of what they speak.
The offer us rooms full of the most beautiful
Candlelight and the most perfect of ships
With which to sail... but we may not awaken.

We can intend to find our awakening
But it shall be as a high land, far above
Any sea.  And we may not touch it
Or let it come to be in more than
Dream.  “You shall be happy,”  
They say and “You may roam here
Forever and its day.”

Do not give them what they came for.
You are the Opal they desire.  Do not stay.
You are the sacred one who has
A home and can return to tell
The others.  Theirs is a blackthorn
Plum, the sloe, made into a drink
That coats the throat and makes
A siren-like music as we struggle
To move from these ships of sleep
To a dawn in which we may find speech.

_________________

THE MOON BARGAINS
—D.R. Wagner

The moon—it sells its silvered light
To shadows that they may be bright.
It bargains for their mystery and clouds
In which to hide as it pulls the ocean's tides.

We were out upon the strand
To watch the ships up close, first hand
And we saw her toss her light away
Till only half a moon she did display.

Still we will have her back again
Full round about the night
And the shadows will be darker then
And chase her in her flight.

 —Drawing by Tatiana Toronto, Davis

A MATHEMATICS OF ICE
—D.R. Wagner

The long voices of water.
The sky speaks to the mountains.
The mountains mumble back.

When I came into the house
All the floors were covered
With broken and crushed animal
Crackers.  People were lounging in chairs,
On the floor.  Animal
Crackers were everywhere.

I noticed the house has no walls
And adjoined a gas station.
People were looking into the living
Space as they walked by.

I was trying to clean up the mess
When I began to realize that my
Musical instruments were gone.
Some had been stolen.
Some were being stolen.
There were no walls.

A few people were concerned for me,
But most just wanted to grab
Something and split.

I began to panic.
A wave of great loss spread
Over me.  A sadness followed.

I could not shut out the noise
Of the street.  There was nowhere
To hide.  I began to write everything
I could remember about this down.
The words invented their own
Geometries and formed strange algorithms.

_________________

PASSION PLAY OBERAMMERGAU
—D.R. Wagner

They eat oranges and wait for the sky
To clear, for the black silhouettes of crows
To crowd the early morning over the Dorfstrasse.

They have been coming here since
1634 when that woodcarver returned
To the Ammergau Alps with buboes that hurt,
High fever and muscle aches.  It was too
Late.  There were huge ships in the bloodstream.
They moved out of port.  Twenty-five per cent
Of the population died.  The rats were dancing.

We could see people walking on the paths
Through the forest.  Most of them wore
White and sang songs in an ancient
Tongue.  At night there were candle
Lights and voices of such softness
One would think the clothing of angels
Had been changed into sound.

It rained most of the afternoon yet the light
Was unbearably bright, a mystery indeed.
Christ was scourged and made to carry
A cross through the streets, crowned with thorns,
Finally crucified and died before the wooden
Wagons stopped moving through the streets,
Silent in the morning, full of terms and orders.
Direction was certain but it had no sense.

Today the air is cleaner, so it seems, and thousands
Throng the streets to see the labors of the Christ.
Daily poor Jesus undergoes his terrible swift sword.
For two thousand dollars one can walk over the graves
Where once the stage was built and feel the power
Come down, people carrying the pain over centuries.

They eat oranges and wait for the sky
To clear, for the black silhouettes of crows
The early morning over the Dorfstrasse.

 Guitar

—Photo Enhancement by D.R. Wagner

THE BROWN AND TAN ROCKS
—D.R. Wagner

Poetry squats in the corner
Waiting for something to do.  It
Expects to see angels nuzzling
Time as if it were a furry
Pet beloved by all.  It waits
For God to smooth its strange
Clothing and talk of how good
And beautiful everything is,
The evening full of that light
God gives it to entertain himself.

Out on the brown rocks and the tan
Rocks the soldiers are looking
For something to kill, for the mistakes
The spirit makes when dogs are
Eating their hearts and their dear
Friends are blown to tiny parts
Across valleys with no names.
The death chop of helicopters
Making their false music to the dust.

Oh it does have something to do.
That it could be a lovely girl
Going to meet her lover, that they
Could caress one another and
Make love in a quiet room with
A fire in the fireplace.  Oh that kindling;
There wasn’t all that bleeding.
The lovely fires.

____________________

THE KETTLE
—D.R. Wagner

The kettle finds the fire.  It always does.
There are thick conversations swirling
Around it.  Steam is breath, the evening
Is cool, cool as the edges of dreams are
Cool, twisting as they do through our veins.

We have nothing to confirm the way
The day changed since the dark that
Ate into the earth at three hours after
Noon, moved its nails and spear points
To the top of the hill.  Just a clamoring
That rises and falls and sometimes seems
Close to weeping, sometimes close to singing.

We realize that we are supposed
To know how all of this happened.
We make our way down the center aisle,
Procession around to the back, through green
Wooden doors to a dark room nearly devoid
Of furniture and more so of speech.

Here we begin to wait in silence.  The candle flame
Plays along the walls in an ancient fashion.
We are well equipped for all of this.
We choose places to sit on the floor,
Listen to someone tell tales well into the dark night.

Light

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

THIS ROOM OF BRIGHT MORNING
—D.R. Wagner

This room of bright morning,
Full of the drift come down from
The ways we have learned to speak with one
And another.  Oh yes, there were times
When one could stand upon the ramparts,
Whistling the rain down the windows, not
Caring what might be blown in to our
Sad feet.  Now, it seems, things are different.

The cat crosses the alley.  It has no mind
For the dealings of man.  It has
Seen the light of oceans of fish.  They pour
Past its nose and fill the doorways of the piers
With a kind of knowledge you and I can only
Dream of, a wishing for the smells of our ancestors.

Oh sweet burden of standing this way
Before the morning.  Full of each other, the way
We want to be.  I look out past the rain and its pools,
Past the drift of song caught in the puddles.  I am
Here with you once again.  We seem to understand
The language all this world noise makes.
It has a clarity known only to those who have
Loved a long time.  I do not recall any time ever
Being like this one.  Perhaps I am mistaken.
Perhaps this music is only the sound of being
Ignorantly profound.  Listen to the heart.

____________________

Today's LittleNip:

THE TRAVELING T
—D.R. Wagner

Tte traveling t.
Tht traveling t.
The traveling t.
The ttaveling t.
The trtveling t.
The trateling t.
The travtling t.
The traveting t.
The traveltng t.
The travelitg t.
The travelint t.
The traveling t.

____________________

—Medusa

Opuntia Cactus

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

The Serious Night

Deer

—Art by Ho Yin Mok, Davis

THE HEART AND ITS MANSIONS
—D.R. Wagner, Locke

And plain the lips of flame
Lifted himself into the air
And he could smell the burning
The forest took into its woody
Body and flung the beasts of the wood
Onto the plain but told them
They would become tribes
And live as men for ten thousand
Years and then resume their
Ways as beasts and in this
They would be safe.

We think events like these to be
Tales from beyond the fence
But here the air is clear,
The night is muscled swift
That proclaims such tales
As if they were the word of law
And damned again to fire
Those who cannot find a truth
There at all.

Know you are coming strong
On some thing you cannot know
Unless you make the trek
Yourself.  The world’s variety
Becomes a fickle vanity
And spits us out again and again

Sometimes as trees,
Sometimes the form of the lion,
Sometimes a voice of prophecy
Slippery from being handled
So carelessly we miss the changing
Of the form and tell ourselves
That this indeed is real,
When it is only banks of dreaming
Plundered by cheap tellers of tales.

___________________

LATE AT NIGHT IN THE BIG JUNGLE
—D.R. Wagner

The child he go speaking to the angel.
Only the dog understand him.
He makes three different sounds
With his voice.  He says IT IS LATE AT NIGHT.
The grasses beneath the moon chortle.
They make rustling and call the fox in.

The fox can only come for a little while.
Somebody waking the bear up.  He was
Sleeping from all the berries and now
This damn fox is yapping and making
The voles and the little mice go chasing
Moths and night crickets all around the place.

Somebody better tell him about the tall
People who look like sticks.  How they come
Down spilling on the ground, all the tings
Dey are.  We hear them.  We can make
Dem sounds.  Listen up child.

When the angel come to this and the dog
Go running around making his big barking
Sound, don’t go being afraid.  Pull up the
Grasses around you.  Make a loincloth
With them bright moon grasses.
We all will come to make the dance
With you.  Not a worry.  We all will come.

 Big Dog

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

MIRRORS
—D.R. Wagner

Does the mirror multiply the light,
Proclaiming it to be real light
Or does it know its own horror
And tell the tale as if from
Horseback, riding hard through
Each moment, begging for blindness.

Knowing it will not bring relief
From the vibrating reflections.
Witness to nothing, but remembering
All that it sees, evidence
Tumbling toward the bottom of the hill
Not knowing how any adventure
Will end, expecting each moment
To be the last, promising its
Own children so that it may watch.

____________________

TURNING ONE’S HEAD
—D.R. Wagner

A branch reaches down and touches me.
It knows my name.  I call it
By its secret name found only in dreams.

I was on the walks of the labyrinth
Stuttering to find its sounds.  I became
A harp to its fingers and I speak
To you of how curious the truth has become.

Sliding off the back of a wind
You thought familiar but were
So wrong about, you were found
Weeping in your bed, too tired
To rise.  Do not worry.

So many have been found here
Before you.  We ask you to turn
Your head and the world
Will become new.

We ask that you become
An artist by doing this
Even if no one understands.
The large umbrella cloth
Of the sure-footed will cloak you.
We will rejoice in every tree.

 Dog Collection

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

FREE WILL
—D.R. Wagner

You have free will but your soul has none.
There is something nameless and
Barely able to take form
That peers up, upon us from
The floors of sleep, always a night move.

A recognized face in a darkening garden,
A luminous glow seen moving
Through a labyrinth, a flower
Made of ice shattering before your eyes.

The bark of a great tree that
Has our face attached to it
But which is incapable of speech.

These things dance upon our eyes,
Bow to one another, change partners,
Find a broken chalice, cracked
And hiding in a corner, unaware
It has value as a stair step leading
Downward in some other's dream.

_______________________

DETOX
—D.R. Wagner

I cannot wait any longer.
Too soon the morning will come
And the curl of your back
Will move away from our sleeping.
And the light will crack open
All the work we have made
Of ourselves this night.

I will watch my body dissolve
As a salt into the clearest liquid
And we will be as we never were before,
Plodding and stumbling down
The roadways toward some village,
Town or city, aware only of our
Traveling and the terrible
Ourselves, a cargo neither wanted
Or precious but necessary
For any kind of life at all.

_______________________

DAYS WITHOUT YOU
—D.R. Wagner

Before you even feel it.
Before you see the burns.
Before the serious night enters
And hides in the corner of the room
Waiting.

Before the questions start.
Before the walls turn red.
Before the dreams come
Carrying their cloth bags, damp
With slender breathing.

Before these things,
Language will stop.
I will hold you
With my eyes, as if
All other instruments
Were broken and we
Had no right to come here.

The thickness of our bodies
Shall be of great comfort
Then.  The heavy verbs
Of our movements shall
Appear as dance.

Then, I will kiss you
With my lips full upon
All that is your reason.
And we will be transported
Together.  And they who chance to see
These things will be unable to remember
Our names or if we stood
Before them.  For them,
And their time, we shall
Have only this recognition: love.

________________________

Today's LittleNip:

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. I love you simply, without problems or pride: I love you in this way because I do not know any other way of loving but this, in which there is no I or you, so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand, so intimate that when I fall asleep your eyes close.

—Pablo Neruda, 100 Love Sonnets

_______________________

—Medusa

 Bud

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

 

Unrepeatable Stories

Bracelets

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

 

NIGHTMARE

—D.R. Wagner, Elk Grove

This iron-crowned king I see

Down on his knees picking up pieces

From a shattered afternoon does not

See me standing on his shadow.

His gaze is the gaze of a dreamer,

Forcing events back through me

That spike a deep fear into my heart,

Leave me trying to move away but unable to

Unlock my feet from the marble floor.

I have no memory of time here.

Even my breath breaks into hexameters that lie

About the shouts of men,

The snorts and exclamations of the horses.

I beg for a cause, a fear of wolves,

Coins upon a dead man’s eyes,

Migrating flocks of great birds,

The open sea, a Taoist priest making

A line I am unable to follow.

I cannot bear this kind of nightmare any longer.

I am being dreamed by a colony of ants.

My throat opens like the morning.

I open my eyes, stare back into the mirror.

The history of the night

Adjusts my clothing, points me

Toward a different eternity.

I recall the white horses of the Chaldeans,

The whistling of their dark riders.

______________________

THE KITE

—D.R. Wagner

This string is so taut it

Barely holds anything the

Wind can say yet it

Holds and I will beg

It, say, “Look up, Look

Up, see me there.  I am

Your love.  I am I am.

I hope to find you there.”

And watch the knotted

Tail dance against

The breeze and watch

The twists and turns it

Makes and watch the

Way I love you, for that

May be all there ever was to know.

__________________

PAY HEED TO THE MAGIC

—D.R. Wagner

Like anyone made more vivid

By the sea it will become possible

To see a diminution of decoration

As the season grows the shell the

Nautilus bears as a home or the

Sloughing off of the green sea turtle’s

Wonder of shell to make yet

More room for a cavalcade

Led by seahorses and huge schools

Of the tiniest of fish leading

The greatest creatures of the deep

To its far reaches by becoming

Part of them as food and living

Safe for centuries because of this.

Pay heed to the tricks of gills

And scales and lateral lines

Which keep the pressure correct

To the most minute of fractions.

Then, gaze upward, creatures of the air,

To allow huge gulps and head for the stars.

A Fixture of Light

—Photo by D.R. Wagner

THE PERFECT WORD

—D.R. Wagner

The world had already begun before

Anyone noticed that the word was

With God and that, as has been written,

The word was God.  Somehow it had

Remained unspoken until it was too

Late in the day to be found out.

Music was substituted.  I believe it was

The piano where the whole thing

Got served up like a soufflé or a flan

Still glimmering with a slightly brown

Crust and filled with a flavor unobtainable

Anywhere else.

The sound of the sea

Just as the moon rises,

That hiss of water on sand.

At that time an angel, over against me,

Told me that my poem was in the mouths

Of all the angels.  I was dumbfounded.

He quieted me profoundly. Word.

_____________________

THE ACT AND PROCESS OF WHISPERING

—D.R. Wagner

Murmurations of the heart

Clearly caught upon unknown thorns.

The long kiss of phantom wings

In such uncertain light,

Something blindness might reveal

Had it Milton’s tongue

Or the knowledge of something

So essential to dreaming that it

Must seek through a thousand

Stories of kings and queens,

The children of dying parents,

To find the mysteries of slowly

Falling leaves, a vague understanding

Seldom articulated.  A garden

Long neglected so that it becomes

Almost impossible to tell if it

Truly was a garden.  A confection

Made by butterfly wings that

Wakes from oblivion into

A common dream.  Here we will

Build a house with them.  Sails

Borne by a great ship, bent with wind

In both tedium and splendor.

A history of speech

Able to reside in our most private

Lives, always intruding,

Never more than uncouth

Fragments attempting to

Explain our lives to us.

_________________________

THE POEM OF WATER

—D.R. Wagner

The story is unrepeatable.  It has no

Walls but dominates dreams with its

Huge body, so huge civilizations may be lost there.

Never finding their way, such a labyrinth

Undoing our tongues by refusing speech

As we open our mouths, no longer able

To breathe, lost once more on our journey

As Ulysses was lost.

I remember the last time standing

On the banks of the Niagara River,

The Upper Rapids.

The rocks seemed to be exploding.

The sound clear and loud but still

We were able to talk to one another.

Then it happens, for over a mile

Eternity opens it mouth so wide

We swoon upon the river banks,

Gazing full into your body.

You are the element.

Oh water that is all things to me

From life, to death, filling my body

With your flowing.  Am I in love with you

Or is it that you are in love with me?

I seem to speak as you do, drop by

Drop; some clear, some clouded.

I do not know what I am trying

To say.  My library pours from its shelves.

Filling all available space, pours through

The windows, through the town and city,

Never stopping.  We hardly notice

Where all of language pours back

Into your element, washes itself

Within you and returns to our lips

As we sing endlessly to your mystery.

_________________________

Today's LittleNip:

The mind that in heaven created the earth and the mind that on earth created heaven were, as it happened, one. 

—Wallace Stevens

________________________

—Medusa, with thanks to D.R. Wagner for today's gourmet Kitchen, including our LittleNip

Iris

—Photo by D.R. Wagner