Head Lines

In his search for spirituality,

he lost his mind…

Gas fumes and steaks on the

grill: perfume of Armageddon…

Clarity means there are no

further questions…

Even Geronimo performed

in the circus…

Edison invented the light bulb,

but, what went on in his head?

Kafka was the prophet of paranoia.

Words can be the cause of any action,

hence, they are innately magic.

“In medias res”…in the middle of things…

this is where we are born…this is where we die.

Enlightenment is like when you’re relaxed,

in front of the T.V. …but it’s not on.

The strongest power on earth

at this time is stupidity.

Are you human?  Is your first thought when

you look at something: “How much does it cost?”

I want to make you laugh, but the first thing I

think of is: “How much does it cost?”

I’m having my last cigarette of right now…

what are you doing right now?

will we both be alive in the next breath?

Lorca And The Firing Squad

Did he have a poem in mind

when he stood against that wall?

Did the killjoys know who he was?

Were they just waiting for breakfast?

They took him out at dawn

like characters from Kafka…

like taking out the garbage…

like Chinese troops

ransacking monasteries…

this beautiful man, this treasure,

they took him out in the dull light,

these dull men, and shot him…

and went back to playing cards.

Personal Inscriptions In Some Of My Books: for Frank Berliner

I’ve seen someone like you before…

you’ve seen someone like me before…

those are two dots…here’s a pencil.

You don’t need anything from me…

just don’t make trouble for yourself.

Seeing your face is a surprise…wear

it proudly.

Be careful crossing the street.

Krishna, Shmishna, hand me the pliers.

If I had a face like yours,

I wouldn’t need mine.

Personally, I’d go with the elective surgery.

Maybe you should get down on all fours
and try to make it as a dog.

Signing your book is not enough.

Is that a family name, or, a genetic tracer?

You wouldn’t happen to have a

bottle of Scotch on you, would you?

Don’t worry… someday we’ll

all look like you.

Statements

I think, therefore, I am.

The worms are the spice.

Sentient beings are Buddha.

Work makes you free.

I am not a crook.

I did not have sex with that woman.

We’ve been attacked by al quaeda.

We’ve been attacked by North Vietnam.

We’ve been attacked by Japan.

We’ve been attacked by the Germans.

We’ve been attacked by the Spanish.

A chicken in every pot.

A Buick in every garage.

LSD in the water supply.

A syringe in every vein.

Stupidity in every classroom.

A soldier on every block.

Every action has an equal

and opposite reaction.

Karma is inevitable.

As you sew, you will reap.

An eye for an eye.

You can’t handle the truth.

It’s not my godamned planet,

Monkey Boy.

To T.G.

Storm

Storm, tormenta, wild clouds and lightning, yet,

gentle rain, and a fiesta and church bells, proving

natural delight and basic goodness. Even when my

lights go out... in the midst of love I will sit in the

darkness in wonder.

Fun Fun Fun

I usually only take myself for a walk

in the morning….I don’t take myself

for a walk in the evening because that

could be trouble for myself and others.

Read between the lines.

I did take myself out tonight which was

a little scary…innocent…and not event full, so,

now I’m back, listening to the Beach Boys,

continuing to sit and wonder as to where it all

went wrong, because this is a poem.

“This is the best trip I’ve ever been on.”

The War Of Art

Declaration Of Art

I declare a state of art exists between

all artists and their sympathizers and

the Bluetaneers, (to steal from Yellow

Submarine) yes, those that would steal

beauty and replace it  with a waxy

facsimile…art will prevail because

Nature is our Ally! This art will be waged

in every venue at every possible moment!

Spontaneous! All the time art! The kids

will giggle and grow up to be saints and

the fogies will all have heart attacks! 

This is my plan! Join me now!

Desperate Man Blues

“The New World Order, Enlightened Society…

at least the concepts of world governance are

beginning to become more prominent. Why?

Regional cultures are beginning to fade as world

culture arises. The world is becoming one civilization,

like it or not. And, as a completely new phenomena,

it is chaotic. It is also inevitable…

also completely beyond control…like a birth.”

                                                    Thornvold Arnquist

I  had to get out of town quick for the usual reasons…

the old scams weren’t working like before…people

were getting wise, or the hooks no long grabbed them.

I checked into an old hotel in Philly…paid for a week

in advance. The desk clerk seemed like someone who

had been around. Maybe I could trust him….well, not

trust exactly…more of a harmless friendly con so I

could get information from him. Hotel staff are never

good marks, but they can be good allies.

I knew they were after me. They were after everyone

who had any idea what was going on. I was an outlier,

a Buddhist, a non-believer…the hardest kind to brain-

wash and therefore a prime target. I tried to erase my

history, but there were some things you couldn’t erase:

body language, facial recognition, even the type of

clothing you wore. Luckily I’d trained as an actor before

my conning career, so I was hard to see. Still, to remain

invisible was a big challenge.

It was the biggest challenge of the coming revolution:

how to organize and not be noticed. Technology was

the answer: using surveillance technology against itself

to hide in plain sight. Look like conformity…act like

conformity…smell like conformity. It’s what everyone

else was doing as a matter of course. One world, one role.

Revolutionaries were trained as actors. They could

mimic a T.V. News anchor, a trader on the stock exchange,

or a guard at a nuclear missile station with equal aplomb.

Infiltrating every walk of societal control, they could wreak

havoc selectively or simultaneously.

But that was not my problem. I was too old to be trained in

that way. I had to sync or swim on my own in this brave new

world.  So, now, I am looking out my hotel window, drinking

whiskey from a Greatest Dad mug, wondering what my chances

are to not be caught for a while.

Eraserblade

Eternity has a way

of outlasting everything…

the big deal of our little lives

doesn’t stand a chance.

What remains is the energy

of our intentions that expands

in all directions infinitely and

forever and which manifests

eventually in every conceivable

form.

Prayer Flags

They’re still up

after a couple of years

after the wind and the rain

bleached by the sun

tattered and frayed

but even now,

in the storm,

still whispering

into the wind.

"What day is it?"

It’s boring to get

from day to day.

Some find peace in that…

routine…certainty…

Put on a good face…

you just have to try

a little harder than before…

If you can’t make it, fake it…

you won’t be the only one.

Sync or swim beneath the

voices from a farther room…

the rules are clear…soon

they’ll be a chip…(if  the

drugs aren’t enough).

Poem At Work

“Not now, you bastard! I don’t have pen

and paper!”  And I was driving down the

freeway 100 mph with the top down…

I skidded to a halt at the side of the road

and rummaged through the glove box…

found an envelope and pencil stub…but…

it was gone….the poem was gone…

“OK, OK, you bastard…but I’ll be ready

next time!”  I placed the pencil and paper

on the seat next to me. Then I peeled out,

burning rubber in three gears.

Poetry

It never happens when I try…

it’s always an accident….

it’s not even me…

it’s the universe, drunk,

speaking through me…

it is the fountain of creation

possessed by everyone,

owned by no one…

it is the reason there is

evolution…

it is the universe

talking to itself.

Burnt Umber

My drink: tequila

and orange juice

my mind amber

ambient sounds

linger…delicate

tissue tears…all

a charred mirage

but perfect in the

garden of delights

where evil has no

presence, or, does it? 

Don’t Waste That Drunk…Hand Me The Pliers

Oops…here I am again in that “special” way

that bards and PTSS sufferers seek for  solace or

inspiration…where the muse and intuition hang out

together at the bar at Juanita’s in Boulder with

William Burroughs, on the railroad tracks all night

wth a bottle of sacramental wine burgled  from the

Northfield Catholic Church, Saturday night with

the son of William Bundy…don’t waste that drunk,

the one you’re in, or, the person over there propped

up against the doorway, either case something cosmic

important, don’t you see? 

Trungpa  Rinpoche was being driven in San Francisco.

He was driving by a place where there were many drunks

in the doorways with paper bags...alone, or in small groups.

Someone in the car asked him: “Who are those people,

Rinpoche?”  He responded something like: “Oh, they’re

all great enlightened beings…mahasiddhas!”

Don’t make me bring out the pliers…trying to drink myself

into a place that might be where I’m crazy enough to have

something to say that might attract your attention like a brick

in the head is hard enough…you don’t have to make it harder.

But, now I’ve reached that glory space where I don’t really

care about what I care about….like when the crossing guard

takes off her uniform….like when the old man is finished for

the day scavenging cans, and sits down to his plate of beans.

It’s all there in all the written words, what those people who

wrote about it went through…waking up on someone’s floor

and trying to figure out who you were, that person there, alive,

breathing ashes of last night’s Xanadu,

Armchair Armageddon

If I tell you  about my life, it doesn’t sound like much.

I usually go for coffee around nine or ten…read the paper

and do the crossword.  Then I’ll have some

breakfast in the market,,.,buy a few things in the store

after I’ve had my walk. Then, back to my casita…meditation,

and after maybe some writing.

But the computer, the internet, provides me with a fantastic

and fascinating universe. One can actually see the world changing

in real time for the first  time in history. Mainstream  media is the

froth on the ocean….one can find  trends buried in the various sites….

the World Civilization Disorder plays live  twenty-four-seven; just

boot up and tune in! See where the latest crisis has  flared up anywhere

on  the globe! Plot the resource wars on your interactive

map! Who’s killing whom? Find out before the body hits the ground

and  see it on instant replay a thousand times in a row!

The evolving planetary megillah begins to emerge as patterns…

the exponential complexity and scope of technology, ongoing

environmental catastrophe brought on by a short-sighted egomaniac

social class, social unrest to the extent that most  of the world is at

war, or wants to be…breakdown and neglect of infrastructure,

marginalization and corruption of institutions such as education,

health, public  safety, law, finance….the consciousness raising

movement that has seen the study of meditation move into mainstream

science…all this and more happening at an ever increasing rate of

speed, the process of which, itself, increases the intensity

of the phenomena.   Question is, can Homo-Sap keep up?
Is civilization already being genetically engineered  for the future
somewhere beneath the Denver airport?  Stay tuned.....

http://zen-haven.com/pentagon-officials-claim-entire-world-is-a-battlefield/

Three Shades Of Grey

One

my friend’s mind is affected

by the chemo…memory shot

concentration gone…but I get

to see glimpses…whispers…

still the way he was.

Two

all the excitement in the world…

all the changes, all the trends,

the fads, the wars, disasters,

mask one thing:  the certainty

of nightfall.

Three

was it worth it…this life I mean…

old age is leaving its literature

on my doorstep…senses tone down

their brightness…was it at all real…

distant sounds…hauntingly familiar…

how old was I? I don’t remember…

sometimes we sit together

and don’t speak…a slight smile

as if we’ve failed.

  

Matter

Matter is what we worship….

what we believe in…

Jehovah, Allah, Yahweh

are names given to beings

that really exist, they say,

So, the belief is that the

“thing” behind the name

really exists (matter).

We strap our minds to matter

and go for the ride of our lives…

Spirit, intuition, first thought,

inspiration, vision…all those

aspects of phenomenal existence

not chained to matter are subject

to suspicion, skepticism, fear,

mistrust by those that cling to

matter…in fact, those very

reactions indicate disconnected-

ness from the heart and the whole-

ness of being: the wholo-graph of

being; the fact that the spiritual

and material aspects of being

co-emerge and interpenetrate, and,

in fact, are inseparable.