David Jaffin
Wind phrasings
For sixty-five years, Charles Seliger (American, b. 1926) has passionately pursued an inner world of organic abstraction, celebrating the structural complexities of natural forms. Like many artists of his generation, Seliger was deeply influenced by the surrealists’ use of automatism, and throughout his career, he has cultivated an eloquent and poetic style of abstraction that explores the dynamics of order and chaos animating the celestial, geographical, and biological realms. Attracted to the internal structures of plants, insects, and other natural objects and inspired by a wide range of reading in natural history, biology, and physics, Seliger’s abstractions pay homage to nature’s infinite variety. His paintings have been described as “microscopic views of the natural world,’’ and although the characterization is appropriate, his abstractions do not directly imitate nature so much as suggest its intrinsic structures.
Born in New York City but raised in Jersey City, Seliger spent his teenage years making frequent trips back across the Hudson to Manhattan’s many museum and gallery exhibitions. Although he never completed high school or received formal art training, Seliger immersed himself in the history of art and experimented with different painting styles including pointillism, cubism, and surrealism. In 1943, he befriended Jimmy Ernst and was quickly drawn into the circle of avant-garde artists championed by Howard Putzel and Peggy Guggenheim. Two years later, at the age of nineteen, Seliger was included in PutzcTs groundbreaking exhibition A Problem for Critics at 67 Gallery, and he also had his first solo show at Guggenheim’s legendary gallery, Art of This Century. At this time, Seliger was the youngest artist exhibiting with members of the abstract expressionist movement, and he was only twenty years old when the Museum of Modern Art acquired his painting Natural History: Form within Rock (1946) for their permanent collection. Shortly after, in 1950, Seliger obtained representation from the prestigious Williard Gallery, owned by Marian Willard. While exhibiting there, he formed close friendships with several of her other artists, including Mark Tobey, Lyoncl Feininger and Norman Lewis.
By 1949, Seliger had his first major museum exhibition, at the de Young Memorial Museum, San Francisco, and since then, he has had over forty-five solo exhibitions at prominent galleries in New York and abroad, including Galerie Lopes AG in Zurich. In 1986, Seliger was given his first retrospective exhibition, at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, which now holds the largest collection of his work. In addition to the Guggenheim, he is represented in numerous museum collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York; the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, Connecticut; and the British Museum in London. In 2003, at age seventy-seven, Seliger received the Pollock-Krasncr Foundation’s Lee Krasner Award in recognition of his long and illustrious career in the arts. In 2005, the Morgan Library and Museum acquired his journals - 148 hand-written volumes produced between 1952 and the present. Scholars like Michelle DuBois - who is completing the first doctoral dissertation on Seliger, “The Structure of Becoming: “ Charles Seliger’s Complex Expressionism - now have access to his introspective writing, which cover a vast range of topics across the span of six decades.
Today Seliger is best known for his meticulously detailed, small-scale abstractions as well as the techniques he invented and uses to cover the surfaces of his Masonite panels - building up layers of acrylic paint, often sanding or scraping each layer to create texture, and then delineating the forms embedded in the layers of pigment with a fine brush or pen. This labor-intensive technique results in ethereal paintings that give expression to aspects of nature hidden from or invisible to the unaided eye.
To learn more about Charles Seliger and view works from his current exhibition, please visit Michael Roscnfeld Gallery at www.michaelrosenfeldart.com.
Since 1990, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, LLC, has been the exclusive representative of Charles Seliger.
Wind phrasings
Poems
David Jaffin
www.shearsman.com
shearsman@macunlimitcd.net
Distributed for Shearsman Books in the U.S.A. by Small Press Distribution, 1341 Seventh Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94710 Email: orders@spdbooks.org Website: h ttp://www.spdbooks.org
ISBN 978-1-84861-031-6 (Shearsman Books, UK)
ISBN 978-3-501-01619-0 (St.-Johannis-Druckerei, Germany)
Copyright January 2009
The right of David Jaffin to be identified as the author of his work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved.
Title picture:
Painting by Charles Seliger (b. 1926)
“Night Blossoms”, 1964, oil on canvas, 19” x 15”, signed Credit Line: Courtesy of Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, LLC, New York, NY
Gesamtherstellung: St.-Johannis-Druckerei, Lahr/Schwarzwald Printed in Germany 37050/2008
Contents
A need for more	11	
Stepping out	11	
Always being there	12	
That blindman’s game	12	
Coasting down	13	
The touch of	13	
Origincd	14	
Before the rains	14	
A backwater place	15	
Become lost	15	
At 5 %	16	
Germany November 9	16	
a) Tlw wall	16	
b) Haw these	17	
c) No home	18	
A) German youth	18	
e) II the wall	18	
The spider	19	
Somewhere deeper known	19	
Barely sound-dense	20	
Brain washing	20	
Light-revealing	21	
Mrs. R.	21	
The rains	22	
The flight	23	
Soul-sensed	23	
Colored through	24	
Transcending	24	
Early Rossini opera	25	
Toeing-the-line	25	
Forbidden	26	
Of dual response	26	
In memory Nelly Sachs	27	
Telling of time	27	
Grammar	28	
If only words could	28	
If all these dying	29	
Game-planned from	29	
Animal sounding	30	
Placid	30	
Of soundless voices	31	
I’ve grown old	31	
Trophy-hunting	32	
The horse	32	
Out-faced	33	
A little too much	33	
Too quick	34	
Stranded	34	
For Rosemarie	35	
Outlasting	35	
Instinct for color	36	
No proof	36	
Passing the border	37	
Christ has risen	37	
The blank sun of Christmas	38	
They may have been	39	
Outlived	39
3 Piano Trios	40
a)		D minor trio	40
b)		C major trio	41
c)		Dumky trio	41
Little bird	42
The fortress at Coburg	42
Train stations	43
Eye-keyed	43
Philosopher	44
Winter sunset	44
Cows	44
These hills	45
The first snow	45
Self-withholding	46
Crucifixion	46
Pink finds	47
Continuing on	47
On-looked	48
At the age	48
Sound-escaping	49
So stone-assuring	49
Self-revealing	50
Wrinkles	50
Markus Wolf	51
Time-eluding	51
A hide and seek	52
The source	52
Out-lining	53
Moses	53
On the Communist border	54
Mutely aloned	54
Waved-through	55
Death-confining	55
Catullus	56
The Jews	56
Schubert’s	57
The blind seer’s	57
Young woman with white headdress 58 Die unglcichc Ehe	58
Dialogued	59
Night-lights	59
Outplaced	60
Wild animals	60
Climbing the cliffs	61
Darkness	61
The wind's	61
Like a guided hand	62
Questioning God	62
The pidgeons	63
Mysteriously	63
Hosea	64
All these houses	64
Skin-awakening	65
Flying foreign colors	65
Those slow passing cloud	66
Of seeing-sensed	66	Shadow-boxing	97	
Train stops	67	Lights on	98	
The thing itself	67	Even-levelled	98	
The timelessness of time	68	Trying to	99	
This room	68	Freshly known	99	
Transforming	69	Cross carrying	99	
Unseen forget fulness	69	What isn’t seen’s	100	
Rock garden	70	Catullus’	100	
3 Uncles	70	Where “to draw	101	
a) With Uncle Julius	70	Christmas cards	101	
b) Uncle Phil	71	In memory Edith Stein	102	
c) Uncle Irving	72	Signals	102	
Unanswered	73	Da Capo arias	103	
A rain-down day	74	O Magnam Mvsterium’s	103	
Voiced	74	Extra Nos	104	
Soft-furred	75	The Magi	104	
Lithe-birch	75	1933	105	
Violin Sonata	75	Twosome’s	105	
“2nd guessing’s”	76	Light-open	106	
A light rain	76	These December woods	106	
Still life with tulips	77	Dried bark	106	
His funeral	77	The slightness	107	
For Rosemarie	77	After a Roman painting	107	
Behind the poem	78	The “golden age of music”	108	
Herford’s	78	Outspreading	108	
Waiter	78	Steps in sand	109	
When the masks	79	Bear poem	109	
Moon-apparent	79	My father	110	
Realizing	80	Holbein’s	110	
Rule-book teachers	80	Fishermen	111	
Alsheimer	81	Charles	111	
Dulled November	81	The room	112	
Out-seasoned	82	A marriage	112	
Torah	82	Ghost writers	113	
Altensteig	83	Madonna (the Master		
Magda	83	of the Holy Veronica)	113	
Little persons	84	This day’s	114	
Altensteig 11	85	The desert	114	
Sentinel	85	Christmas poems ’06	115	
Her nervous laughter	86	a) A Christinas tree	115	
If the words fail	86	h) History of the birth of Christ	115	
For Rosemarie	87	c) The rose	116	
Your lips	87	d) The angel’s	116	
Snow	87	e) Christmas ’06	117	
Ash-scent	88	J) The Christmas candles	117	
Romanesque	88	Women	118	
Schumann: symphonies	89	The woods	118	
The door	89	Schimpf s owl	119	
The churches’ way	90	Words	119	
Was man	90	Alena at age 5	120	
That evil-eyed	91	She	120	
Rilke’s “Carousel”	91	His face	121	
Flat-shine	92	Skier’s poem	121	
Slender woods	92	The walls	122	
Shostakovich	93	Two worlds	122	
Winter birds	93	Why punctuate	123	
Losing	94	Moon-timed	123	
Piously	94	2007	123	
Shostakoviches’	95	The eyes	124	
By the eyes	95	A sacred mountain’s	125	
The telling ot time	96	Plum blossoms	125	
Church counsellor	96	Plum blossoms	125	
Those romantic	97	She smiled	126	

The pelican gliding
Soft night
The city
Sonic wounds
The birth of a penguin
Parrots
At the psychoanalytic conference
Spirit of the dead watching
Flowers on a window
Death’s
The snow
Appearance
In realizing
The smallness of things Transparency of Spider’s Slow-down Slowing down Rules of the game Age of innocence
a)		The countess
b)		Archer
c)		Archer’s wife
d)		A rcher’s son
c)		Wharton’s Ethel Southern These January His heart Little guy Card players
Love poem for Rosemarie
The palm
Her
Retiring
Floating
Quick words
Black boy
No children
Captiva Bay
March of the penguin’s
Bud talked h im
Running
Thin-timed
The fish
Upright
Slippery railings
Spawned
Deepening
Energy-drenched
Horse shoes
The fear of losing
Numb-timed
Signals
Stefan Lochner Annunciation At opposite sides Listened for Rudiger A museum On lost time An abyss Rain birds A quiet place
Tracing the curve	158	
Slowed down	158	
Crocodiles	159	
Gull	159	
Security man	160	
Wrestling	160	
The beach	161	
Little girl	161	
Corkscrew' swamp’s	162	
That seldom bird	162	
Shell museum	163	
Of new identities	163	
Floating memories	164	
Beach pauses Howard’s End	164	
	165	
a) Bast	165	
b) The house symbol	165	
c) Margaret's	165	
d) Wi lcox	166	
e) Helen	166	
j) Bast’s wife's	166	
2 claw-climbers	167	
a) Racoon	167	
b) High-rise	167	
Mangrove	168	
Seminole Wars 1 and II	168	
Swamp lands	169	
Lulled in	169	
Charlie Chaplin’s	170	
Childless	170	
Realms of silences	171	
Michael	171	
Feclingness	172	
The purity	172	
Officiating	173	
Sleeked	173	
New friends	173	
Nights	174	
An affinity	174	
Trembling
Racoon’s	175	
	175	
Apparitions	175	
Boned	176	
Hollywood-like	176	
Snow-dark	177	
Birth of a leaf	177	
Hedda Gabler	177	
a) Personal	177	
b) Hedda	178	
c) Tesman	178	
d) Livbourg	179	
e) Brack	179	
f) Livbourg’s	179	
This dawn	180	
Late winter	180	
A thaw	181	
Ernest’s piano teacher	181	
Christ	182	
Images	182	
Munich’s	183	
Airport	183	
Sad adolescent	184	
The affinity	184	
Masterpieces in Dresden	185
a)		Jewish Graveyard	185
b)		Woman reading letter	185
c)		Tax tithe	186
d)		Fall of Man	186
e)		Christ on the throne	186
/) Prodigal son	187
My Max Brod	187
A minor slow mvt.	188
A diminishing world	188
Ascencion	189
Thomas’ complaint	189
The question	190
Gardener	190
Puzzled	191
“Eye for eye tooth for tooth”	191
Can I forgive	192
Thinking through glass	193
Mean’s end	193
“The rest is silence”	194
Bluebells	194
An early Haydn’s	195
God’s eyes	195
Blue and white	196
The cut-wood	196
Weird colors	197
Categories	197
Jewels	197
Illmensee	198
Time’s running out	198
Each morning	199
Philotas "	199
Prince Philotas’	200
Shoes	200
In becoming	201
Needed love	201
Eichendorff	202
INR1	202
Cyclopian	203
Voicelessly	203
The Sermon on the Mount	204
Dated	204
A windowed view	205
Of interior finds	205
Dark rains	206
Beethoven’s	206
Haydn’s	207
Preordained	207
Rushing	208
The purity	208
These dark days	209
The bees	209
Bringing down	210
Sense and seem	210
Littly Sammy’s	211
T. S. Eliot	212
After a portrait of Leonardo	212
Desert Poems	213
a)		Death-processing	213
b)		The desert’s	213
c)		A quiet	213
d)		Our steps	214
e)		Beware	214
f)		Have stars	214
(!) Oasis	215
h) Moses	215
Spring’s	215
These clouds	216
These mountains	216
The birth of a leaf	217
Wild growth	217
The horses	218
Coloring’s	218
Genevra de’ Benci	218
Shame’s	219
Secret marriage’s	219
Killing	220
Rain-down	220
Betweened	221
Concrete city	221
Masterpieces in Munich	222
a)		King Jesus	222
b)		c) Those two Diner	222
d)		Mashed ball	223
e)		St. Georye’s	223
f)		Bosches ’	224
Global warming	224
Suddenly	225
Crocuses	225
Check-listing	226
Mixed breeding	226
Time-intensed	227
Synonyms	227
The deal’s	228
Sap-pulsing	228
Pink’s two-mindedness	229
A seeing-	230
Sensed-seen roses	230
Rimmed	230
An emptiness	231
Sad eyes	231
Jesus at age 12	231
a)		as high priest	231
b)		Thejews	232
c)		Mary andJoseph	232
d)		Anitnalled instincts	232
Measure for measure	233
a)		Not even	233
b)		If woman ’s	233
c)		The duke	234
d)		Higher morality	234
e)		Christ	234
f)		Life	235
Lady Macbeth’s	235
Again for Rosemarie	236
Grown young again	236
No way out	237
Through-timed	237
“Dark comedies”	238
Concert in Munich	238
a)		Violin sonata	238
b)		The opera glasses	239
c)		Schumann’s A minor violin sonata 239
d)		Ravel’s violin sonata	240
c)		Schumann piano quintet	240
f)		“Wolfsponsor"	240
4 of the great portraits	241	The earth	268	
a) Rembrandt's Saskia	241	Pale-voiced	269	
b) Da Vinci's Mena Lisa	242	Self-expressioned	269	
c) Bellini’s Doge	242	Why then	270	
d) Raphael's	242	First colors	270	
These cold winds	243	2nd Allegretto	271	
Bluebells	243	The first blossoms	271	
The fear	243	D minor trio	271	
Before he wasn’t	244	Blossomed remembrances	272	
Curtains	244	The bee’s	272	
Blossoms	244	Colorings	273	
Worn colors	245	The desert	273	
The snow	245	Flemmish	273	
Sugar-surfaced	245	Faces	274	
Van Dyck’s	246	That edgy feeling	274	
Truth	246	His hour had come	275	
Distancing	247	The day will come	275	
Self-attaining	247	Vintage early 50s	276	
Chopinesque	248	What he didn’t preach	277	
a) Perfumed	248	Our favorite uncle	277	
b) Proud	248	Coming down to	278	
c) alas	249	“How are things in Glaccamorra”	278	
Tchaikovsky 5th	249	Orchids	279	
Mirrored	250	Imitation	279	
Spacclessly	250	Time-flow	280	
The blackbird	251	Seymour	280	
Funeral music	251	Not knowing	281	
For Rosemarie	252	The long-lived	281	
Purcell’s anthems	252	“Put on your Easter bonnet”	282	
Twinned	253	Cold shadows	282	
Moon-sensing	253	Prayers for the dead	283	
Signs	254	Prevasively blue	283	
The overripe	254	Easter fires	284	
That choice	255	A tension to person	284	
Either way	255	Off	285	
The train	256	Old men	285	
For our son Raphael	256	Soundlessly voiced	286	
Pidgeons	257	Cat and mouse	286	
The fields	257	“I thirst”	287	
Poems from Klingenthal	258	Aron	287	
a) Of awakening light	258	Crystallcd-spoken	288	
b) A lone bird	258	Age	288	
c) Sensitised	258	Atlantis-time	289	
d) Of the Germanics	259	That snooping-	289	
e) Timelessly exposing	259	Resurrcction	290	
j) This tired snow	260	The swan	290	
g) Phis room	260	Slowing down	291	
h) The moon	260	The rooster	291	
i) Witnessing aloneness	261	Out-timed sermons	292	
Deacon’s	261	“New born”	292	
Saxony’s	262	Beethoven’s 7th	293	
Their motives	262	Marked-off	293	
Remotely	263	Jewish transport	294	
The river	263	Mozart’s	294	
That castle	264	For Rosemarie	295	
For Rosemarie	264	Wurzburg: Residence	295	
Pink’s love-lost voice	265	Wurzburg Residence: The park	296	
Requiem	265	Annunciation	296	
Vision’s	266	Tony	297	
Start-day	266	Rothenburg’s	297	
Nussbaum	267	Rosemarie	298	
Rachel	267	Blank shadows	298	
To be first	268	A courtyard	298	

“The handwriting’s on the wall” Image of “The church” Riemenschneider in Wurzburg
a)		Candelabra angels ca. 1505
b)		Mary andJohn
c)		Eve's 1492/95
d)		St. Stephan's
e)		St. Sebastian ca. 1515
f)		St. Barbara ca. 1510 Mary’s church Skin-shedding Track-lines
Pink’s Spitzweg’s Spitzwcg II for Ernst The psychoworld Sleep
St. Margareta Spitzwegean These corridors Buttered Rain coming “Caught a cold"
Alice in Wonderland
a)		She may
b)		Nonsense
c)		We all
d)		Who's A lice Relentlessly holding Reading
Corot’s
Illuminated manuscripts
Human
Nathaniel Pink
Landmarks
The dead
Lost
The old windmill At sundown Byrd: Mass for 5 Voices Schumann op. 12 Wolff s spies Formed
True-telling stones Utc
Schiller: Joan of Arc
a)		Does
b)		Joan was
c)		He saved
d)		Joan
Autistically in mourning Isaac Babel
The jewelled necklace
Closer
Clarinet’s
Nathaniel Pink’s
Drying up
Unframing
That vacancy of wind
Pity’s
Chagall’s Esther
Commas
Heinz
Samson	327	
Quick-stepped	327	
Evergreens	328	
Lake of Garda at Campione	328	
Implied	328	
Twinncd-fcelings	329	
For Rosemarie	330	
A quiet snow	330	
Cloud-invoking	331	
The Bacchae	331	
a) The enemie'	331	
b) Pen the ns	332	
c) Wine	332	
d) Caravaggio’s Bacchus	332	
Smoke-clouds	333	
Menorah	333	
A void	334	
Karl Marx City	334	
The Pharisee’s	335	
Magritte’s	335	
Otherwise	335	
Glassed remembrances	336	
Of its speechless thoughts	336	
Little old ladies	337	
Wind-phrasing	337	
Amputated	338	
Rembrandt in the 40s	338	
Incomplete	339	
Unlimited possibilities	339	
June 22/08	340	
Thunder	341	
The blank end	341	
Wind-aspiring	341	
A mythical power	342	
After the rains	342	
Too hot	343	
Books	343	
Waiting	343	
That Monet for Ernst	344	
Wall-flowered	344	
Hemingway	345	
Of inner intent	346	
Alone	346	
Tensed	347	
Insect’s	347	
Mary Poppins	348	
The piano man’s	348	
Adrift	349	
Defiantly	349	
Predator	350	
Janacek’s 2nd quartet	350	
Quicker	351	
Fathered	351	
ForS. L.	352	

A need for more
He awoke each
day with a need for more
An emptiness at heart as
if his lake had been drain
ed of all its watering
sources and left him bare-
ground-aloned to the expos
ures of those nakedly inha
biting wind s.
Stepping out
to a no man’
s world before he knew the
where of his catching up
to himself as if shadow
s had been taught to lis
ten.
Always being there
He knew it
was coming (one sense
s such thing s at each
stop) as the train slow
ed to an ap pcarance of
it’s always being there.
That blindman’sgame
we played
as children helpless
ly numbed from that see-
touching-light we wander
cd through a darkened
world of never find
ing.
Coasting down
those snow-
sliding hill s with the
ease of not caring the
why or where of that al
ways reced ing from.
The touch of
A child fear
ful of the dark-spread
ing night he needed the
touch of some thing soft
and smooth to ease him
selfback to where light
could suffuse his very be
ing.
Origined
He learn
ed through touch to see
why words could be the
way they mean.
Before the mins
came we felt (somewhere
in those hidden irre
trievable places of
self)
a silence so
incomplete yet needing a
loud for those unheard va
cancies of touch.
A backwater place
of dark in
tendon s Water co
alesces here into the deep
of their under sensed mean
ings And their kind of laugh
ter hurts most impli
citly remind ing of hidden
recoiling
temptation
s.
Become lost
She had a
face about her as when
times become lost and
there’s no history
left for finding them
out.
At 5 %
The bank ere
dited him in to a lost
house and home and a
soul eaten out with the
pains of re gret face
lessly at
5 %.
Germany November 9
a)		The wall
fell divid mg a people
from itself same day the
synagog ues burning
through the broken glass
of pain re fleeting
a day of fear and blood
dancing now in joyful
oneness.
b)		Have these
fallen leave s forgott
cn with only the blood
stains left dried and
collected burned in to
sheaves of fire and
smoke.
c)		No home
except in the need for
one a long ing for what
isn’t The Ger man-Jew once
called off the map here
neither really Ger
man nor Jew resettling
the buried hope s of what
once was call ed for home.
d)		German youth
taugh t to re member what
they’d never known as if
history wasn’ t more than
being there now of then.
e)		If the wall
fell did the Salomonian
curse fall with it A
people di vided from it
self now one with their
vvall-divid ing past.
The spider
sudden
ly there Bigger than
my eyes could sec him Black
er than his instinct
s could re veal my pain-
sensed fear ed through.
Somewhere deeper known
Do we per
son our voice Or is it
somewhere deeper known
the hollow echoing of
a drained- down well.
Barely sound-dense
When they
took those picture
s down room ed in for co
loring over a nakedness
barely sound- dense.
Brain washing
They call
ed him guilty long enough
with such a persuasive
guise of see ing him through
until he be came innocent
ly guilty of believing
what he wasn’ t.
Light-revealing
This cool
ed-down Oct oberday
with the for saken trees
stripped of much of their
meaning and the barren
stones touch ing so hard
as they could light-re
vealing.
Mrs. R.
She sat
there on a semi-harden
ed chair in tently list
ening Eyes and dress
thought-appar ent as a
close and cold winter
night star- studded ab
stractly de fining.
The mins
darken
mg in to a world of
muted flow ers that
touched a sadness
through though re
motely un heard.
The flight
The birds
mountain ed through
those long ing height
s of fear left in shad
ows behind almost weight
lessly en during.
Soul-sensed
After sea
son the swan s reclaim
ing a birth ed-through
whiteness of waves par
ting with the winds soul-
sensed.
Colored through
The rush
of flower s color
ed me through to those a
fter-scent
instinct
s for light.
Transcending
At a moment
not to be defined
in time or the space
lessly voice of the sea’
s transcend ing.
Early Rossini opera
with the
lovers test ing their
true but needless
ly self-find ing inclinat
ions melodio usly as uni
soned as bird s already
nesting in their pleasur
able pursuit s.
Toeing- the-line
may mean o
ver-stepping some of your
own thought s of no way
back Either side’s a dia
logue in selfdisguise.
Forbidden
and there
fore found The fruits of
man’s reach ing beyond the
length of his not know
ing why.
Of dual response
Does
language change what’
s seen Or do we see be
cause we need those
words for the meaning of
a dual re spouse.
In memory Nelly Sachs
So small
fragile and yet the
wounds knott ed in tight
ly there bleeding
through
light.
Telling of time
You can’
t turn time back reliv
ing what’s no more your
s or their s exclusive
ly past.
Grammar
out soul
cd the moon time of her
light-trail ing exposure
s to where ends meet
punctuat ing a ritual-
respons ive presence.
If only words could
fill his empti ness at heart
as the slipp cry well
Joseph confin ed to a
height high beyond his
lasting reach for
touch.
If all these dying
leaves were downed to that
piled forget ness of fire
flaming out quick and fast
light-devour
ing.
Game-plannedfrom
those straight- line Scars
dalian track s of right
school marr iage profess
ion that left him aloned
without right or rea
son derail ed.
Animal sounding
scream-gest
ured swaying compulsive
ly as a pray erless Litvak’
s “sound and fury sig
nifying” all that there
and then of his being.
Placid
His thought
s so placid as the lake’
s inreveal
ing clouds
shifting be yond the mo
ment of a doubt.
Of soundless voices
The rush of
soundless voices shad
ows of the mind’s echo
ing beyond the Hades of
secluded
shores.
I’ve grown old
with these
self-haunt ing images
that inhabit the more of
me than I can acquire
or even test through their
ground-thrust ing incurs
ions.
Trophy-hunting
Head-count
ing close-sha veil men Skull
ed me in to a delusion
of cannibal trophy-hunt
mg.
The horse
was dead lay on
the fields all
he had eaten away from it
Flesh and bone s accumulat
ing his deaden ed resolve
for life.
Out-faced
He sat
down square ly on that
problem un til its four-
sidedncss out-faced which
ever way he could be grasp
ing there from meaning.
A little too much
She was a
little too much of what
she wasn’t As those Eng
lish dessert s over-cream
ed from their benevolent
tasteless
ness.
Too quick
Those too
quick to blame other
s at that sudden appear
ance of where conscience
might be re calling them
back.
Stranded
emptied is
lands desert souls The moon
eclipsed from the tide
less wander ings of their
shadowless
searching
s Modern man vacantly haun
ted from his
ing loneli ness.
For Rosemarie
If there’
s no you from return Where
can I outlast this aching
loneliness from self.
Outlasting
Some town
s have outlast ed their time
s by building monuments
to what wasn’ t anymore
standing so forsaken
ly there.
Instinct for color
Is there’s
an instinct for color to(o)
The way some animals in
habit an a wareness of
seeing-eyed
darkness
es.
No proof in memory M. B.
but he was
there dream- felt pedestall
ed at a height even beyond
his living claims risen
prayer-risen with that smi
ling down so self-assur
mg transeen dental face
of his.
Passing the border
of fear
death-fear that boat of
no return ing silent
ly awake the way you touch
ed flower s once to
know their scent of fold
ing through so breathless
ly alive.
Christ has risen
the choirs
of heaven bright beyond
all that word s have known
Because He’ s no end or
beginning Christ has ri sen The thorn has bled the
rose through its resurr
ecting light.
The blank sun of Christmas
eve washed down with all
those unsett ling rains
bared from that immens
mg light that only a
star could touch out of
such cold and forsaken time
s as these.
They may have been
whatever they were name
less number ed or not
though giftbearing I’d
count myself among them
though fear ed at the
deathless sight of the
Living Lord bending my
knees I’d count myself among
them.
Outlived
She out
lived her time s The world a
bout her seem ed strange
ly new as if untouched from feeling she walked the
streets of passed memor
ies shadow ed as unanswer
ing ghosts as if all was
known for not being now.
3 Piano Trios
a)		D minor trio (Glinka 1827)
wasn’t able
to place where the one
movement began theo
ther ended in a lost unity
of sensed persons trying
to dress them selves in
to phantom i mages of
what they were n’t.
b)		C major trio (Haydn no. 21)
He took me
off as u sual from
whatever seat ed pcrspect
ive I could n’t hold for
long into a world’s in
volving re volving as a
caroussel changing —
lighted the always more
of its beco ming through.
c)		Dinnky Trio (Dvorak)
slowed
down in to that weight
ed feeling of sound-felt
clarities thrown off a
rush of fleet ingly danc
ed.
Little bird
pretty color
ed in assent bling-for-fea
thers Why have you ask
ed yourself for being
there so branched still
ed in a world such as this.
The fortress at Coburg
so time lessly resol
ate-resist ing the on
slaught of those increas
ingly nonheroic time
s.
Train stations
criss-cross
ing the stand ing still’
s of pulsed awareness
es.
She sudden
ly rose into a resonat ing voice eye-keyed high beyond the assuring
shape of her in swelling
person.
Philosopher
He became
the answers himself as if
always there cushioned
upon a seat ed purpose
of high-light ed over-view.
Winter sunset
mirror
mg the cold light of re
fleeted si lcnces.
Cows
ponder
ously weight ed from their
numb-telling time’s hold
on grassed- down exposure
s.
These hills
in their rhy
thmic evolv ing in to a
sameness of sounding
through what always was in
their becoming now from
then.
The first snow
continu
ing in un touched si
lences falling so light-wav
ed through the shadows of
a dreamless sky.
Self-withholding
The house
s shadow ing more than
they could have possibly
known as some persons secret
ly unaware from those fath
omed depths of self-withhold
ing.
Crucifixion (Barlnch Marburg 1914—1917)
Christ not in
His suffer ing not even
a touch of that but far-
seeing through- feeling over
time and e ternity last
mgly there
Pink finds
living with himself can
be tiresome at times the
same answer s keep quest
toning back the other-side
ness of waving that across-
the-street smile unquest
ionably his.
Continuing on
The train
didn’t stop when it should
continu ing on to an
unseen future uneasing the
where-sense of his mind’
s tracking through.
On-looked
He look
ed me on as if I knew
the why of his think
ing so cen tered beyond
seeing me
through.
At that age
He was
more what he wasn’t
at that age of outused
remembran ces A long
ing for what’ s inescap
ably trans cending.
Sound-escaping
The rail
way kept running
through his mind sound-
escaping as if his were
tire tracks that kept
their purpose on the through
ness of course.
So stone-assuring
Have all
those fortress es so stone-
assuring been wrought in
defense of our own
through-cast led killer
instincts.
Self-revealing
Why must
wc measure ourselves
on others when the yard
stick can’ t extend be
yond in sell- revealing
length.
Wrinkles
on his skin’
s as time- cnclosmg as
the rings ot a tree’s
through-tell ing phrases.
AddvkuS Wolf (head of the East German spy agencies) a man
without a
face so im
peccably attired to
the insinua ting graces
of love-long ing secretaries’
political
depositor
ies.
Time-eluding
It rain
ed the wind s in to a
darkness of washed a
way moment s time-elud
ing.
A hide and seek
Writing’
s a hide and seek of where
it’s becom ing for
found.
The source
They found
the source the stream
quenching
through
rock at thirst of its undi
minishing
flow.
Out-lining
Not a word
too many As a tree
stripped
leaflessly
out-lining.
Moses
couldn’t
bring a word to place His
tongue tied and mind
quicken cd in the
flight of spiritu
ally abandon ing resolve.
On the Communist border
they took
my wallet passport with
Only a clos ed door uni
formed stand ing behind
from naked ly alone e
choings.
Mutely atoned
These
houses in los
ing their face s greyed to
a dulled same ness that e
ven the finer touch of words
left them still mute
ly aloned.
Waicd-through
The boat
slowly took to sea His
eyes follow ing soundless
ly out be yond where
he knew wav ed through
that sense of
no return.
Deah-confining
This assent
blage for bloss oming autumn
colors dried out a unity
so sparse ly death-con
fining.
Catullus
loved
through the hate that
flowered so poison
ed with his helpless
denials.
The Jews
target
ed again as if their
dried-down blood and ash
couldn’t be forgotten
for the need of fresh
leechings.
Schubert’s
2nd symphony
with its horse-trott
ing melodies thumping’
s “a much a do about no
thing’s” drama tically thoroughbred.
The blind seer’s
cane touch
ing in the e choing of
coming time s Eyed from
the darkness es’ approach
ing.
Young woman with white headdress (Leibl)
She knew
more than I could tell her
Eyes blunt ed with the
time-knott ing of that
green scarf around her nak
ed-glance time consuni
ing.
Die ungleiche Ehe (Leibl)
She young
shaped through his coarse
hand’s sly ly smiling
with the under cover of eye
s aged from self-use.
Dialogued
the white
of seeing my self looking
back from a house window
cd through its timeless
vacancies for place.
Night-lights
pulsing fear
through the glassed i
dentities of those con
Crete voice s soundless
ly awake.
Outplaced
The wind’
s blown my thoughts a
way and left steadied shin
ing stars in stead.
Wild animals
coming back
crows
crowding
from the blackness of
their wooded habitats
Night-
cities sleeping
restlessly aware the
glaring
eyes of strange
ly emerging creature
Climbing the cliffs
of remember ed touching
for Sisyphus’ hold on a
wearing down of a time
less pre scnce.
Darkness
becomes
It grows out of a sense
from being all that it
wasn’t slow ly prevading.
The wind’s
slowed to the
breath of out forming sha
dows increas ingly absorb
ing.
Like a guided hand
the waves re
ceding from a touched-
out presence unseen contin
ually through oncoming.
Questioning God
is like creat
ing yourself a world that
began before the beginning
of love’s e manating
needs from be ing.
The pidgeons
wired to a
string of less entici
mg thought s electrical
ly refined their sitting-
sensed from light.
Mysteriously
The doors o
pened with out the touch
of being seen Mysterious
ly as the night growing out
of its star s reaching
through.
Hosea
whored
to the cause of a faith
less people and a God
denying His choice by de
manding its all.
All these houses
rowed to a
sameness of lost i
dentity in terchange
ably non-per
soned.
Skin-awakening
He need
cd the feel of light rain
cooling those skinawakening moments as
buds in their color-mind
edness.
Flying foreign colors
Ships an
chored for port flying
foreign color s holding
tight against those so out
sending runn ing tides.
Those slow passing cloud
s of time less presence
of wordless meanings
as those out-going
tides in the night moon-
sense appear mg.
Of seeing-sensed
If those
wide-open eyes of child
ren could poem us back
to their way
of sensed
seeing.
Train stops
spaced- intervals time
d sequences that moment
ary being of not being for
moving through.
The thing itself
If the word’
s the thing itself Named
to a unity in being
even more than phras
ing so ex pressive
ly self-rcsol ving.
The timelessness of time Die Gnade derspaten Geburt (Helmut Kohl) Their time
it was not yours But what
if time had passed over
as a cloud concealing
why you could have done it
Those firing squads blood-
rehearsing.
This room
left behind
a time that wasn’t now
but theirs unknown self-
revealing.
Transforming
The rains
washed all those shadow
s away and left a trans
forming dark ness that
held the world breathless
from light.
Unseen forget fulness
There’
s even more to the bottom
ness of the ocean’s depth
than those dark memorie
s of unseen forgetful
ness.
Rock garden
as if
words were sprouting
from stone’ s self-reveal
ing color- shines.
3 Uncles
a)		With Unde Julius
there was
something
slightly
faint and dis tant about
him perhaps to protect a
gainst his wife’ s challenging
assertions (those middle
age woman ly finger-find
ing needs) his humour an
swered subtlely but involving
I never got to the bottom of
his being (too young perhaps)
or because he always seem
cd so vaguely evasive.
b)		Uncle Phil
a child’s fa
vorite imit ating all those
animal sound s as if the
Bronx Zoo had moved right in
to the strain s of his vo
cal cords “Jewish man of
the year” for those many wo
men Jewish or not whom he
frequented with his itin
erant wares always smil
ing right up to their needs for
his futuring
cause.
c)		Uncle Irving
who always
answered those in need let a
lone this pain pered spoiled
brat of an 8 year old not
yet emerging poet who let
his helium ball oon loose rush
hour Grand Cen tral slowly
drifting to the top of Irving’s
surmise So good too good this
favorite of all uncles ladd
ercd it down with his usual
considerate care died a bro
ken man for all his goodness
the favorite of all uncles
funeralled with unbroken praise.
Unanswered
She couldn’
t answer to what she did
n’t know Men remained most
ly outside the sphere that
closed her in a silence of
protective
longing.
A rain-down day
for its quiet after
The space- viewed scent
of listen ing where only
a bird rccit ing in color
ed phrasing s.
Voiced
Even a
stone’s voiced cool
ing the round ed hands
of your inde ciphering
s.
Soft-furred
The cat
purred soft- furred sens
cd the eye s of steal
thy imagin ings.
Lithe-birch
dancer
s so slender ly time es
caping.
Violin Sonata (C. Franck P'mvt.)
cloudspaced at tuned a wind-
voicing
light
ness
from phrase.
“2nd guessing’s”
like inter
changing the choice
of instru ments when
the compos ers felt it
otherwise.
A light rain
so fine ly felt
through the
transpar encies from
touched a wakening
s.
St ill life with tulips (Macke)
The center’
s falling off Tuliped
in wayward ur ging color
His funeral
all prearr
anged the who s and what
s as if death itself was
his finali zed speak-
through.
For Rosemarie
Your voice
softens in my in
stinct for touch.
Behind the poem
The man be
hind the poem shadowed
in self-appar encies.
Herford’s
first night
of light- shallowing—appearan ces concrete
silences.
Waiter
so impecc
ably dress ed button
ed in to such a worth
while bend ing smile
that he could so mis
understand most every
thing I order ed for such
a palatial ly decorat
ing plate.
When the masks
fall so na
kedly true Imprinting
the image of their imi
tating self.
Moon-apparent
The woods
listening aloud voic
ed in a still ness moon-ap
parent.
Realizing
The night
realizing its own dark
ness Overco ming the depth
s of what it wasn’t space
lessly confin mg.
Rule-book teachers
They’re all
of a type rule-book
teachers
red-inked
eying the out- of-bounds
of their less assimilat
ing student s.
Alsheimer
She took
me for her grandmother
Not that wolf- cinderell
aed change ability but
out-timed
out-placed
cushioned higher than
those image less effusion
s could possi bly in meet
mg.
Dulled November
motion
lessly there spaceless
that al
ways of now
when even light seems
surpris ingly uninvol
ved.
Out-seasoned
The winter
never came The bears
didn’t sleep but hunger
ed for rest lessly clawimprinting what could
n’t hold to the mark of
season’s in dclible
cause.
Torah
A wall
it was word- strong A barr
ier against oneself ghett
oed in the need for gett
ing out It stood relent
lessly selfovershadow
ing.
A Itensteig
These Black
Forest town s falling
from their roofs land
sliding inner perspective
s and this one stream-
dividing in to numerous
voices running steadily
through.
Magda
nervous
like parrot s imitat
ing because there’s no
where else from being
Caged in little town
perspecti ves A flying
out could only mean in
fluttering
room-spend
in unquiet.
Little persons
with their
self-clutch ing faith a
feared of the outside that
might be hid ing in some
cob-webbed
uncleaned
corners of their shorten
ed mind.
Altensteig II
The strength
of these hill-command
ing houses Columned for
sun statuing a permanen
cy of facedesigning ap
pearances.
Sentinel
That lone
tree stand ing out a
gainst a vacantness
of sky’s land scaping its
inreveal ing stillness
from cause.
Her nervous laughter
the rust
ling of dried dead leave
s so slight Iy tinged with
their fallen- from color
If the words fail
a blankness
of mind as a landscape
mowed down to its inher
ent flat-find ingness.
For Rosemarie
without you
an empti ness as a
sea without its shore-send
ing self.
Your lips
parting the
waves of my sensing
through de sires.
Snow
in the wind
s increas ing these
tensions of soundless
ly through- forming.
Ash-scent
Fires
glowing the autumnal
ash-scent’ s stone-dis
tinct.
Romanesque
encase
ments of clos ing sound’
s in-dwell ing shadow
s of where prayer’s
darken ing their
self-seek ing through.
Schumann: symphonies Rougb- forced
rhythms Beet
hovian stanc ed the in
breathing softness of
lingering- phrased over
sights.
The door
stopped be
ing what it was Died from
tire touched return-alone
liness echo ing from.
The churches’ way
Doing it
good after what can’t
be undone’s the churches’
way of semi- righteous
self-apprecia
tions.
Was man
a mistake
Did God ere ate more than
he should have left it for
the blooming growth of
flowering field’s wild
scent of in stinctual
animall ed blood-
thirsting
That evil-eyed
dog barred
behind the bite of his
teething
glare.
Rilke’s “Carousel”
kept turn ing me about
in to the weavings
of a child’ s star-mind
ed goings front’s white
elephant’ s after
math.
Flat-shine
sun has bori
zoned from light the cropp
ed grass of even-timed
deepening fore bodings.
Slender woods
still na
kedly un touched
through their traits
parencies of spring-
timed rever ies.
Shostakovich
So many of
his theme’s off-set
sense a bout them e
lusivcly touch ing/in turn
ing out the center
remote ly unaware
s.
Winter birds
ground-
based their darken
ed instinct s land-hold
ing flight lessly in
shadow
ing.
Losing
the other
side of one self s like
being lost on a bridge
of neither way out.
Piously
money-mind
ed He pray ed that his
will be done the way he
wanted it on the dotted-
line of tear- decensions.
Shostakoviches’ (viola sonata)
fade-out
sonata pal ing for a
wordless sky remote
ly attuned a nothing
ness however distantly
from there.
By the eyes
She held
him tight by the eyes
so fine-feel ing as a dog
on the leash that kept
him at bay from his other
wising in stincts.
The telling of time
It couldn’
t happen be cause it
did Time’s more of us
than we can tell it form
s releases begins.
Church counsellor
His God
believed in him well-
meaning con scientious
ly upholding the pillars
of his self- supporting
faith.
Those romantic
last move meats
Too much too
long as a wo man overdress
ed beyond the needs of what
taste could confirm her selfdefining sense.
Shadow-boxing
a ghost
long since dead She
brought him a live again
to haunt her to the depth
from where he had
so strange ly risen.
Lights on
that sudden
artificial
glass-glowing
intensity of night’
s hollow ing sound
s.
Even levelled
Those sand-
surfacing
assurance
s of time’s cooling down
smoothed off even-levell
ed.
Trying to
catch up
Shadows seek ing for form’
s fullness the Hades of
his non-relin quishing
will.
Freshly known
Cut wood
freshly known the
first wants of snow and
stars heaven ly releas
>ng.
Cross carrying
Christ
left his first- chosen people
for more of the crosscarrying than even His
name could in voke.
What isn’t seen’
s the more
in being As the Lord
nameless ly darken
ed and the need for love
s far beyond all those
subtlely
word-finds.
Catullus’
love/hate
flamed so high that not
even his hardened will
could cool it down to a di
minishing
intent.
Where “to draw
the line” could only
limit those who feared
such far- reaching
steps.
Christmas cards
without
Christmas The way Christ
was so ob scurely born
But now by passed as
roads too worn from con
tinual use.
In memory Edith Stein
She was as
much a Jew the blood of
her very be ing as Christ
crying out in pained re
demption for His ir
resolate
people.
in the night
Blinking danger inde
cipherable as a child
tongue-tied
stuttering
inarticu late fears
that couldn’t in holding
back Signals remote ob
scured night- timed.
Da Capo arias (Bach) may
have been
heard other wise than
the time- lengths land
scaped a silently wait
ing world To day we’re
too closed- in Tensed for less
than that mess age could hold.
O Magnam Mysterium’ (Thomas Luis de Victoria)
s depth of
space-concentr atcd stone-
soundings be yond the dark
of so inward ly voiced.
Extra Nos
Man’s at
the heart of his own
problem Ca ged in better
ways of gett ing out
Claws at the bars of his
own self-dc vouring in
stincts.
The Magi
Why it was
that reading the stars
through to their final
sense forbidden in God’s word
was their way for knowing
the why of a revolving
sky met for a child
in the straw- middle of such
a small in- lasting light.
1933
Einstein
wrote a never return
ticket 1 took at the risk
of history’ s never re
peating what some would
have taken for its final
course.
Twosome’s
the only
where of be ing at one
with myself.
Light-open
houses
revealing in awareness
of secret ly withhold
ing.
These December woods
naked
from shame Bared of
all intent Dried out an
unspoken fin ality
of voice.
Dried bark
the rough
age of wound ed times
bled through its sapped-
pulse endur ings.
The slightness
of a win
tered bird suddenly
there before it wasn’t
twig-defin ing in
stinctual
light.
After a Roman painting
The pastel
lightness of her flo
wer-gather ing steps
left nre following
in scent from their di
minishing ly-felt re
pose.
The “golden age of music”
(after listening to Tye)
should better
be called the inflow
ing purity of where
voice trails parently
refin
ing.
Outspreading
If snow’
s the color of sound
lessly appear ing dream
s through the night’s tin
heard out spreading dis
tances.
Steps in sand
not weight
ed for more than a mo
ment’s glance Yet marked
with the cer tainty of
having been told through.
Bear poem (in memory Bruno)
No one
knows the dis tances I
haven’t thought out
with the wind s climbing
my ears straight and the
tidy waters singing me
cooled in stinct my
way man a feared for the
cavernous winter drop-
downs.
My father
always
on the move Now wheeled a
bout the flo wer show
with a fa ding glance
that couldn’ t hold for
long color ing.
Holbein’s
gold weigh
er as I with words touch
ed through in-shine of their impli cit meaning
s to tip the balance
d aware ness.
Fishermen
calling the
silent wa ters to their
nets The moon afloat with
fish flash ing in
caught-through
colors.
Charles
germina
ting color
the seedl ings incess
antly call ing in grow
th.
The room
was where
she wasn’t A world left
behind tin changed those
outdated maps and books
thoughtless front dust
And 1 a stran ger for a
single night of irreconcil
able distan cings.
A marriage
of losses
Both depri ved of their
first-loves A unity in
sadness in tcrlocking
as trees sap lcssly in
tent.
Ghost writers
vanish
ing behind words that
weren’t their s underwritt
en from a plau sibly indis
tinct signa ture.
Madonna with the Master oj the Holy Veronica (Cologne)
Seeing may
be in believ ing But here
touch define s more of
where these trail spar
ent eyes of hers space
fully through- telling.
This day’s
hardly ri
sen above it self So clos
cd in clouds that even
words sha dow in their
sensed-for- meanings a
ship isolat ed from the
voiced wind s it’s pass
ing through.
The desert
heated inten
sides for the cold watch
of night sloping sand-
phrases a timeless
Iv never-for being.
Christmas poems ’06
a)		A Christmas tree
so finely
dressed in the fragran
cc of lit i magining
s angelic calls and the
pearled light from touch-
receding
hands.
b)		History of the birth of Christ (Schiitz)
Not even
candles can still to
the in-dwell ing purity
of this yearn ing through
the darkness of ages.
c)		The rose
so person
ally expos ing naked
from light dried at the
yuletide’
s crumbling thorns.
d)		The angel’s
song of a
peace only they as hea
venly messang ers could con
firm The war s continued
the blood of innocent child
ren a heaven ly message
we’re still for finding out.
c) Christmas ’06
Why this
sanctity of what is
n’t believ ed holy day
without His holied bless
mgs A child in the manger
of our own humanity
Faith and tears so dear
ly held for what isn’t His
but only our feelings
for.
f) The Christinas candles
once so in
flammed with hope
All burned down now to
the cold- touch of wax
ed-in silen
ces.
Women
with the
pains of birth-giving
rhythmic ally pulsing
through those draw
ing in cries the help
lessness of new-bearing
life.
The woods
threaten
ing prolong ing dark
only deepen ing in nowhere- out from see
ing through.
Schimpf’s owl
radiat
ing nightsensing
thoughts phrased through
the inglow of witness
ing eyes.
Words
are like
bridges They have to
cross them selves o
ver until two sides in
seeing from.
Alena at age 5
butterfli ed herself
back until flight—sitt
ing became a means of
coloring out to (
o).
She
so con fid
entally self- revealing
that I won dered the
what and where she was hid
ing herself from.
His face
an imagin
ery screen closing in
and out of the phases of
their trans parently
sensed-through
dreams.
Skier’s poem
Snow-
sounds the winds cur
ving with light down
to the deep- through
hilled si lenccs.
The walls
only felt
in shadow ing higher
than he knew that advanc
ing light calling him
however sound lessly
through.
Two worlds
that left
him ocean less between
a driftwood of sorts prob
ing the shift ing current
s of those restless
sands and the sweeping
winds that couldn't hold
him long e nough
for home.
Why punctuate
a silence
which can’t be held back
from its be coming irretriev
ably lost.
Moon-timed
Night
snow’s the blank window
s of where darkness
moon-timed.
2007
a new year
as if every day wasn’t
as unprepar ed for be
ing ours Pink polish
ed his creative
ly exploring shoes to
shine up this new year
for the glance of his selfimproving image.
The eyes
of my dead
father look ing past why
he never saw my waiting
for a same ness in
view.
A sacred mountain’s
untouch
able awareness of why it’s
climbing through all
our forsaken longings.
Plum blossoms
(follower of Wang Mian)
hard-crystal
rock-emerging
blossom’s
life-envelop
ing.
Plum blossoms (Wang Mian)
secret
ly confin ing why the
winds have spoken so
voiceless ly unheard.
She smiled
through
the phone s distan
ccs of his voiccd-in
response.
The pelican gliding
through streams of
airlit i magining.
Soft night
winds whis
poring star s alight
the palms brushed
through in moon’s
receding
glow.
The city
snowed to
a still stand of impecca
ble stars and the mystical
appearance of its in
seen through- silenced
purity.
Some wounds
heal
Hers didn’t fester
ed to the heart of
where hers open-placed a
thorn field wind-intens
cd.
The birth of a penguin
breaking
through the dark of
those sound less cnclos
tires to light life and the
pursuit ot fish-finding
delicacie
s.
Parrots
can claim
to be bird s She wasn’
t though fluttering
about caged in imitat
ing words colored al
most out to the wings
of it.
At the psychoanalytic conference
all those
restless ly uneased
tables out- rooted in
staring their earth-wombed
nakedness.
Spirit of the dead watching (Gauguin ’92)
because
you can’t see him with
out losing that life he’
s staring the open space
of your in retreating
eyes.
Flowers on a window
sill lightthinking why
the opening expanse of
cloud’s bud- reclaiming.
Death’s
a good
way of be coming known
again your hid den virtues
flowering
chastely
on tomb-ston ed appreciat
ions.
The snow
never came
the woods wordless
ly bared Thirsting
their naked needs to be
clothed in purifying
silences.
Appearance
Pre
senting one selfin
clothes thoughts and
looks may appear as a
thought less a
side in be ing dress
ed over.
In Realizing
That
not quite being sure
Thinking tilings down
to their first parts
Touching in the mea
ning of what it’s
slightest felt listen
ing through words to
their after sounds may
be then or where in
Realizing.
The Smallness of things
it
may be the small
ness of things that sligh
test touch in flower
a word that becomes of
meaning in its own sense
that appre ciable look
a 2nd time or more to
make certain one sees
what it really is in see
ing the inter vals of sound
looking through spa
ced moments from that
small
ness in thing s.
Transparency of
the
morning mist as a
lake’s dis appearing
sound’s trans parency.
Spider’s
wri
ting web in
that fineness designed more perfect
world’s
precision
for death.
Slow-down
Floridian
days that even thought
dulls in to remote
realms in distinct
ly shadow ing.
Slowing down
<3
his steps
weighted with more re
solve His mind closer
to the touch of things
that held him longer as
an object timeless
ly unremov ed.
Rules of the game
he never
learned list ening from a
a distance to measure
the depth of his own heart
a spectator far remov
ed as cloud s through
the winds of transform
ing lights.
Age of innocence (Edith Wharton)
a)		The countess
(why she married
when she married whom she married)
that pre-myste ry of her
person Free to trap other men
Free to her dire needs for
protection The beauty of irre
concilable
desires.
b)		Archer
took the bait
as a drowning fish landed
again into a relapse of prelearned val ues.
c)		Archer’s wife
that Ibsen-
type puppet who knew more
than she want ed to know
Reconciled to her husband’
s unwanting fidelity.
d)		Archer’s sen
the one I
always want ed to have
Living leisure ly his doubleset of selfconflicting
values.
e)		Wharton’s
autobio
graphical
transformat
ions The my stery of wo
man and self The men all-
too- well known.
Ethel
little-dog-
lost patheti cally weak
tongue- tied from
placed sei zures that
shook at the realms of
her heartbreathing
source.
Southern
spelled
streets with those
eased palms strolling
the taste- tang of sea-
salted lightwaves.
These January
cool days
tide-flatt ened sands
withdraw ing in to the
echoed step s of out
lasting si lences.
His heart
went out
with the tides as the
fisherman’ s nets hold
ing tight the silvered
gleam’s
sound-search
ing.
Little guy
with his
more than down-cast
ing looks us back in
the eyes of our own fall
en from self.
Card players
feeling out
that tcntat ive touch of
untimely re lease as if
life itself (just then)
would be passing it
selfby.
Love poem for Rosemarie
His eyes
rested on her knowing
the flavour of his touch
mg folds of desirous
winds so in wardly held
their
closeness
in meeting.
The palm
curving
its crustbearing bark
to a stunt ed height
of where there’s no
more a co ming from.
Her
mildew
cd smile curtain
ed the fa ding color
s of where Southern-
in-softness
nostalgica
lly reclin mg.
Retiring
from life
to a Flor idian talk
taste and card culture
with that re dundant sun
still over sighting
some of his pre-tuned sha
dowing endeav ors.
Floating
on the cool
ing waters of that dream-
through expand ing sky Bird-
like she felt lengthen
ing in winged self-reconcil
iations.
Quick words
clipped
phrases sharp- sensed the
rough edge s of his
unevened
person.
Black boy
lost in a
forest of white man’
s staring him a darken
ed strange ness through.
No children
a womb’
s empti ness from
birth a star less night
voicing only cold re
flection
s.
Captiva Bay
The sky’
s escaping far beyond
the wind’s calling e
veil those va cant sound
s of birds circling
an unanswer ed depth of
sea.
March of the penguin’s
instinct
s for the hard truth
of a protect ive egg
warmed through the
huddling breath of
their chill
ed answer
ing life’s im perative
ly remind ing needs.
Bud talked him
self out repeating
breath u pon word the
syllable s of those
unrelinquish ing times
that held him to his
scanning view Tight with
out pretense ot answer.
Running
she was
to keep up with the breath
of her step s left behind
couldn’t im press their
mark not e ven for a mo
ment of place.
Thin-timed
Spots
of birds thin-timed
their touch of fleet
ing reflect ions.
The fish
glanced
through
scales of its
silver-edg cd death-
watch.
Upright
Man’s un
ique upright bearing of
ten belies a downright
poverty of truthful in
tendons.
Slippery railings
When all
the barriers arc down There’
s nothing left to hold on
to except the slippery
railings ot one’s own
self-dccept
ions.
Spann led
The sound
of these wave s so elusi
vely bright ened spawned
with the sun’ s creating
for light.
Deepening
When co
lors deepen in to the
sound-wave s or in—rc
ceding
thoughts.
Energy-drenched
You could
still sec him swimming his
inevitable laps hour on
hour until the sky left him
floating there so eased in
a coffin of light energy-
drenched.
Horse shoes
with their
sturdied a nimal eyes
ringed through coarse hand
s the cur rents of
these sand- describ
ing sound s.
The fear of losing
whom you most need Only a
blank would be left a
yearning for it not
being now A discoloring
from selfwounds that
can’t be heal ed seeping
through at the depth of
one’s own un known be
ing.
Numb-timed
When it’
s hard and cold Straighttouching you through a rail
ing ironed in the winter
ingsun of numb-timed
impressi
011s.
Signals
at sea
the light house tower
ed with un heard mess
ages deciph ering in
voiced-lit
continuity.
Stefan Lochner
too pretty
to be blem ished by any
tiling other than such self-
proclaim ing loveli
ness.
Annunciation (Fra Filippo Lippi)
Both angel
and Mary bend ing under the
grace of the Father’s hea
venly guid ance and that
flower of pur itv center
ed to the re Fined modes
ty of her in receiving
virginity.
At opposite sides
of the same
person as a dance circl
ing out to the changing
rhythms of that not be
ing found from.
Listened for Rudiger
He listen
ed so care fully intent
on each word that they be
canre aloud with those feel
ing-sounds of his silenc
ing after thoughts.
A museum
of emptied
shells pretty and pink so
nicely lit with that in
feeling of sandied re
minders of what once
lived so re motely en
closed ior the soft and
luscious taste of o
pen-preying
predators.
On lost time
Living on
lost time’s like a buglar
calling to battle when
peace is soo thing through
the intonat ions of his
fingering
needs.
An abyss
the depth
of hurt she wanted to
be known by not say
ing lips tight eye
s evasive ly consum
ing.
Rain birds
lowering
the sky’ s bending
with the wind’s circ
ling rhythm ic light.
A quiet place
just for sitting
your thought
s down with nothing to
hear except the inward
flow of these self-
quieting
moments.
Tracing the curve
of the palm s with the
thought- fingers ot
decipher ing in unev
ened touch- life’s e
volving
through
ness.
Slowed down
to the step
s of hearing himself
through.
Crocodiles
with their
pre-historic armour ly
ing low in subliman
al contemplat ion’s soft
swaying appea sing palm’s
mind-drift
mgs.
Gull
barbed
with the blood-hook
of its own decease
Eyes redden ed for that
last surge of its tight
oiling wing s.
Security man
The young
pale faced se curity man
with detach able beard
flowing out a confidence
mostly want ing from him
self Keys in hand awaken
in a real need for use.
Wrestling
in the sand
to the death of a moment
Crying for light-pain
through their muscled depth
of fictive meaning’s in
tensed.
The beach
at night
untouch ed but solemn
ly aware star-remind
ing The moon cold now na
kedly perform
ing.
Little girl
poney
tailed the sifting of
sand’s feel ing her fing
er’s flow ing through
imprecise ly abandon
ed.
Corkscrew swamp’s
a world of
vanish ing fantasie
s Wild birds circling
their selfenclosing
heights and we below in
the hidden depths of sub
liminal under surfacings.
That seldom bird
colored
to its in stinct for
flight Staling now as
a statue in moment
s ot time lessly there.
Shell museum (Sanibel Island)
with all
those shiny coloring left
over replica s of why
death’s so remotely
pretty.
Of new identities
Here’s
been a growth in green
those germinat ing islands
from the sea rock-sound
ing a stabil ity of new i
dentities
permanent
ly proclaim mg.
Floating memories
envelop
ing in sound s of distan
cing light- appearing
waves.
Beach pauses
Cooled
down beach pauses the
sand isolat ing sound
less in den ial of where
such steps have spent
their claim ing in from
thought.
Howard’s End (E. M. Forster)
a)		Bast
The books
fell down on his aspirat
ions for be coming higher
than he could possibly at
tain.
b)		The house symbol
ofBurkean England close
to the soil enriched
through its time-embodying
depth from mean ings.
c)		Margaret’s
a reconcili
ation of the opposites
that need a center for
being.
d)		Wilcox
Even he
must learn a gainst his
values that life is more
than money can buy.
e)		Helen the wild
flame of ro man tic postinnocence birth of
a seedless myth.
f)		Bast’s wife’s
body could
n’t hold the richness of
what will flo wer from the
depth of more than earthy de
sires.
2 claw-climbers
a) Racoon clawclimbing its noctur
nal instin ct for eyeglaring pen etration
s.
b) High-rise
Florida
panthers
claw-climb
ing in ra pid deploy
mentadvance against landgrabbing in terloper
s.
Mangrove
Indians
hidden in the cause of
their being land-locked
camouflag ing uphold
ing roots of their being
driven out.
Seminole Wars I and II
If you take
the breath from their be
ing Enclosure s of seclud
ed back wa ter’s snake-
inclined reson ances
rhythmic land- to-the touch
cd eye-witness ing.
Swamp lands
drained
from their murky brood
ing under co vering dark
nesses Alliga tors lying low
in pre-histor ic subterrain
ian instinct ual awareness
es.
Lulled in
by a voice
dark with whisper
ing innuen does magnet
ic as a
snake’s frogfixing.
Charlie Chaplin’s
early film
s left me walking in
side out ice-skating
the fanta sies of my
youth with the thievery
of pocket ing eyes pun
ctuating mo ment’s
quick-tcll ing hands.
Childless
but with a
spot of a sick dog re
scued from the cold al
ways close to her breast
childless.
Realms of silences
lost remem
brances as waves float
ing the sur faced winds
of light a way.
Michael
wall-stoned
line-backer
wrestler
law-enforce poemed late
in life to an inner-
touched his shelter
ed-from
soul.
Feelingness
There was
so much of the feeling
ness about her tender
ly ripened soul that
most of the fruits of
her forgiving couldn’t tighten to their core-sense
meanings.
of Rennaiss
ance Marian hymns as
those flowing designs of
Roger van der Weyden’s dress
ed-carcd touch of in-reveal
ing sanctity.
Officiating
These sand
s glimmer in cool re
liance for their prist
ine-touched
surfacing
Sleeked
that black cat in-to
the readied shine of its
claw-evinc ing densi
ties.
New friends
not yet
foot-mark ed impressed
to the mind ofauthen
tic time-se quences.
Nights
of soft
Southern winds the
palm-flow of gliding
pelican s a stream
with their leisuring
sound-touch
ings.
An affinity
between
what was said and what sen
sed wind- phrased land
scaping the growth of
where flow ers remained
the after math for co
lor-finds.
Trembling
waters
breezed be yond the i
mage of their self-deny
mg form.
Racoon’s
footprint
s clawed to the wood of
his nightexposing
eyes.
Apparitions
When distan
ces kept in creasing
his mind spell ed through
sound-light’ s apparit
ions.
Boned
The juice
is out Dried to a bone
less core De sert winds
laying the sands low
Nightmares wrapped in
pillowed
forms.
Hollywood-like
her blankfaced field s of ripen
ing corn a sweetness
of voiced i maginings.
Snow-dark
The night
snow-dark trees openspaced their leafless
ness of bir thed await
ings.
Birth of a leaf (Mordecai Ardon)
That light
touch-voic ed in the
green fluidi ty of life’s
in-forming
leaf.
Hedda Gabler (Ibsen)
a)		Personally
there to be
ing what they always
arc Static All’s said in
so bcing- Greek.
b)		Hcdda
only power’
s play with others Not be
ing where self should
Dictator of a small
man’s world.
c)		Tesman
prisoner
of human smallness
in that “great cul
tural world” of Ibsen’s
implicit
disdain.
d)		Livbourg
more of what
Tesman wasn’ t So Hedda’
s aim right where she
needed to kill centered from self.
e)		Brack
the cynical
male match for her/his
cunning need to possess
at the void from his
through-emp tied person.
f)		Livbourg’s
flutter
ing symbol of a society’
s unease to serve what
wasn’t left from person —
formless.
This dawn
so faint ly uneven
ed Faced for being more
than self could appear.
Late winter
there’s
light in the
air Space a
wakening the snow melt
ing touched through a time
less need in creasing.
A thaw
because
the air breath es through
a warmth we hadn’t touch
ed before bud-bringing
lip’s co loring find
s.
Ernest’s piano teacher (1933)
with thejew
s on the o ther side
after year s of friend
ship not a word more than
that street and its speech
less parallel divide.
Christ
took that long way to(o)
The Jew of J ews de
fenseless in a desert
of unending perils to de
feat the in visible and
still outfind ing enemy.
Images
shadow
ing my word less wander
ings as a moon cloudimmersing from.
Munich’s
medieval
facades lifting from
the weight that time’
s left them imitating
that once- could-have
been.
Airport
shining up
in “marble” and glass of
sound-ilium
ination’
s restless ly throughvoiced.
Sad adolescent
sitting
the far- watching of
a cat’s un derlying-
viewed per spective
The affinity
of many of
these poem s with the
scarce-fleet ing moments
of Mendelss ohn’s fine-
singing seller zi.
Masterpieces in Dresden
a)		Jewish Graveyard (Ruisdael)
brooding
shadows the woods rest
lcssly instin cted rush
ing-silver ed water’s
moon-tensed
stones.
b)		Woman reading letter (Vermeer)
That room as a world
of intell ing objects
the reflec ting space I
maged from her glassed-
through self s opened win
dow so deep ly closed
within.
c)		Tax tithe (Titian)
parallel]
ed eyes and hands asking
out tempt ing implor
ing to the touch of a
single coin Caesar-fac
ed “godlike”.
d)		Fall of Man (Cranach)
Adam with
his own fruit and equalled
need’s desir ing Eve’s
eyes the wis dom of a
single bite.
e)		Christ on the throne (Diirer) of his self- creating word eternal light
and those thoughtful
wondering Jews between
monkied-less ened looks
and the faith fulness of a
little dog s self-attend
ingness.
j) Prodigal son’ (Rembrandt)
s self-port
rait of wine woman and
the sword of sclf-penetra
ting light-a
wareness
es.
My Max Brod
Where’
s my Max Brod to Kafka me
the pure- prin ted word of
residual meanings not
their loss to the flames
of so se initially
voic
ed.
A minor slow mut. (Bach violin concerto)
Tug boat
drugging the depth of
where the wa ter’s aligh
tening in sound remin
iscence
s.
A diminishing world
What I don’
t see I don’ t know an
old man’ s grasping
for a dimin ishing world
of receding self-assuran
ces.
Ascension
Jesus
left his dis ciples where
they were only the more
from knowing Him alone
in that out lasting cause
after-tim
ed.
Thomas’ complaint
that one
can’t ex plain Bach
through the printed ex
pertise of his papering
theology It all must be
heard to be lieving.
The question
of evil’
s more why most of us
don’t see ourselves
as Rembrandt did Christ-
crucify
ing.
Gardener
Fear’s
die root-bott om of the
spade’s sharp- edged cutt
ings to where Christ garden
ed Mary’s loss with more than
hopeless ness could e
ver endure.
Puzzled
The words
came quick cr than know
ing their place right
Poem’s a puzz le that of
ten puzzle s me even
more.
“Eye for eye tooth for tooth ”
that Christ
ian way for national re
demption While the for
saken Jews huddling in
their ghett oed corner
with more than cheeks to be
turned to their aggress
or’s wanton needs.
Can Iforgive
when sin is
denied even multiplied
Christ forgave once and al
most all but also at the
cross only for those bowing
and bending their deserv
ed grief.
Thinking through glass
I can’t
hear Think ing through
glass
winds calm
ed as those deeper under
sea silen ces.
Mean’s end
If the mean
s don’t meet the end
s It’s like being strang
ered to where you’ve al
ways been known.
“The rest is silence” (Shakespeare)
where words
have lost their saying-
it-power as a marriage
deadened from strife
Or his stage corpsed from
through-bleed ing survivor
s.
Bluebells
finer than
their sing ings could
be heard A choiring
scent even darker than
their sweet ness could in
finding.
An early Haydn’
s bare-o
pcncd sound s as a wood
wintered
through
spaced.
God’s eyes
This my
riad of star s God’s e
yes punctu ated in light
distant ly clear the
night through watching.
Blue and white
The sky’
s moving as softly as
these thought s blue and
white innocent ly transform
ing-
The cut-wood
of his dried
down thought s thirst
ing for the sap’s relin
quishing
strength.
Weird colors
witching
their way through sub
terranean passages of a
world’s be wildering
in glow.
Categories
can’t marry
persons to the inexpli
cit causes of such unknow
ing needs.
Jewels
cut to the
sensed precision of their inter nal glow.
Illmensee
in the quiet
surfacing glow of sha
dows spread ing their
fine treetouching re
flection’ s sun-harvest
ing.
Time’s miming out
as if the
sea could ever hear its voice
that way Shore less dried
down to the depth of
those motion less cycling
tides.
Each morning
the fear
at the heart of his not
being more
than just
sitting there as old men
do wordless ly exposed
to the dried wood of pal
ed-down con templat
ions.
PllilotaS (Lessing)
killed the
shame with those sword-
blooded in stincts of
his father less soul A
retribut ion in kind
evening the score.
Prince Phi lotas’ (Lessing)
lonely
choice neith er of father
nor son A kingdom of
death’s self- surviving
instinct
s.
Shoes
remember
them best All those little
ones piled up as persons
in to heaps of
passed-tell ing impress
ions.
In becoming
At 7 he
still sylla bled words
in to their wholeness
for meaning’ s as the
sounds of the water’s
shoreless ly in becom
ing.
Needed love
She need ed love
more than she
could find it kept urging
her on horse and rider to
that bottom less abyss.
Eichendorff
the poet
of dark in wooded enclos
tires of the mind’s feel
ing-sense d moon’
s light- trails cending.
INRI
Who’s
been cruci Tied with
Christ if not the INRI of
His own inner- sourced blood-
revealing i dentity.
Cyclopian
onc-ey
ed worldview Time con
densed to not see
ing other wise than
what wasn’ t there.
Voicelessly
Rain was
tending the air voiceless
ly as a mo ther’s in
stinct born before the
birth of its childless
needs.
The Sermon on the Mount
towering
above all that mountain
ous air low ercd me to
the ground-base of my fleshfinding fault s.
Dated
If work
s become dated It’s
because they were
so much the thing
s of not being the
more for becoming
now.
A windowed view
of a world
calling back to why he
was looking out to see
ing through those trans
ient cloudforming mo
ments.
Of interior finds
When the
shallowed waters ston
ed to the bottom of
your feet-find ing thoughts
and there’ s a cooled
sense of in terior find
s.
Dark rains
the bird’
s song deep ened withdrawn
to the selfenclosing
tonality of the wood’s
mysterious ly darken
ing in.
Beethoven’s
Great Fugue
left me grie viously dis
turbcd at that unleashed
power so pri mitively ex
posing a na kedly re
sounding
through.
Haydn’s
Op. 76,1 slow movement
brought me back again to
a world so finely and
deeply order ed spaced
through a controlled
and so benefit cently exalt
ing beauty.
Preordained
If you list
en to what you’re told
to listen for’ s Music pre
ordained
pedestall
ed on a crit ic’s sounding-
you-through.
Rushing
the stair
s down as streaming
banners lightcoloring
their arrival s from more.
The purity (countertenor singingJosquin)
of that voic
ed angelic blessing In
tervalled be tween space
and its lightsensing ac
cords.
These dark days
so rain-
held petall ed in the
glimpse of spring-time
flowers re hearsing
for touch.
The bees
weren’t
there No one knows why
Housed in an emptiness
that could n’t flower
to its sens ed-from sweet
ness.
Bringing down
Do you
bring up a child or
should it be brought
down to the earth-need
s ofnot only his.
Sense and seem
A poem’
s sense and seem logic
ofwhy its phrasing’
s those untold routes through
and beyond the mind’s
need tor ask ing why.
Little Sammy’s
made more of
himself than lie should have
Flirting with two beauties
from the o ther sides of
his out-proport ioned figure
and hair thinn ing to a
middle-age re luctance
letting down at such oc
casions to what’s been
left to the top of his
own insinuat ing smiles.
T. S. Eliot
majored
in the length of completion
As if there could be a
wholeness to this world
even after Columbus dis
covered what he hadn’t
thought it was realiz
ing for.
After a portrait of Leonardo
If she isn’
t there Why do I see
her as more than she is
touching voicing me a
live to the presence
oi death s overcom
ing being.
Desert Poems (8)
a)		Death-processing
The desert’
s silently creeping on
a predator instinctu
ally alive for the una
ware decor ative beauty
of its suffo eating prey.
h) The desert’
s flowing
through in waves of
wind-recurr ing sound
s.
c)		A quiet
here so un
earthly close that
I wanted to touch your
breath flow ering alive.
d)		Our steps
tenta
tively un certain
tracing the tar expanse
of a route less cause.
e)		Beware
of those
hidden snake s buried in
the conceal ing depth ot
their dead ly eye-curl
ing glance.
J) Have stars
ever reveal
ed their shine so cold
and cruelly light-intens
g) Oasis
green was
never as pure as this
mind-enchant ing thewa
ter’s clean sing source
of cool-form ing touch.
Ii) Moses
called here
to that thorn cd bush of
ever-trans piring life.
ing’s
so hast
ily unsure in arrang
ing itself until flower
ing in to a
conscious
ness for be ing there.
These clouds
wandering
not answer ing so inno
cently
protective
Iy unheard the fears of
what may be coming or go
ing their ways from
mine.
These mountains
so immune
from the per ilous height
s ol man’ s self-impos
ing grandeur still slop
ing down from their
birth of the wind’s climb
ing touch ed those light-
enchanting
stars.
The birth of a leaf (Mordecai Ardon)
unfold
ing with the green of
its breathtouching
formed.
Wild growth
sun-down
flowers co lored more
in their thirsting
instinct s light-in
sensed.
The horses
mutely
standing out a stillness
as if in stat tied remem
brance.
Coloring’s
the scent
of a flow er’s through.
flowing i mage.
Qenevra de’ Bend (Leonardo)
’s tight
pride of face wounding-an
imalled eyes The curled de
ceiving poetry of hair and dissembl ing landscape
beauty —
How much of
her / Da Vin ci.
Shame’s
the dead-
sense of a dog’s hover
ing over its self.
concealing
wounds.
Secret marriage’s (Cimamsa)
usually
the endgame For him though
eloping came after the
fret of all those intwin
ing cat-cloth ed catch
ing Haydn esque re
prises.
Killing
that cat runn
mg right into my car’
s unstopping speed’s left
blood-stain s not only
where the road marked it
deeper down than off.
Rain-down
promises
as if the sky’s been out
starred of all its hope
ful bless ings.
Bet weened
They cut
their wind ows out of
my seeing from Back-
faces blank silence
s between cd.
Concrete city
the color
less shadow ing bird’s
stoned-remem brances of
what could have been
as if in flower
ing glad
ness.
Masterpieces in Munich
a)		Kingjesus (Titian)
with a crown
of whipping- stick “thorn
s” cncircl ling the step
s to a mocked throne All breed
ing through a mysterious
dark and those strange lights
the evil means of fallen man’
s God-denying mockerie
s.
b)		c) Those two Ditrer
portraits
hung to the two sides of
his seeing us through an i
dealized committ ment to person
and place And
TOO
the other so
directly un pretty that
we knew it was really
him the flesh and boned
of.
d) Masked ball (Guardi)
with those
unreal light s masking the
not being seen or known
outperson
ed.
c)		St. George’s (Altdorfer)
landscape with those
light-shimmer ing leave
s George’s metallic
sword silver ed-in-shine.
J) Bosclws’
Manichaen
evil-eyed
creation’
s bedevill ing even The
Lord's bene volcnt redempt
ion.
Global wanning
in this sub
zero freeze An extra blank
et elect ric heat
ing us up to the dis
tant cosmic glow of its
in flowing warmth.
Suddenly
there its
black sleek ly alarming
glow of fea thers Facing
me so direct ly to a re
treat of feared fore
bodings.
Crocuses
and all the
colors
surfac
ing through their windreleasing gladness
es.
Check-listing
They call
ed from a cross the o
cean for a 7 point creat
ion’s check list of my
faith As I haven’t heard
since The Good Lord must have
checked out on me from
the sinner’ s claims for
His cross- ways route to
lasting salv ation.
Mixed breeding
Those early
time Haydn symphonic’
s mixed breed ing of style
s has pass ed my present
back to what’ s still toning
in childlike- sense through.
Time-intensed
This hard-
pressed grass worn down from
winter’s mem orie’s hold
mg tight time-in tens
cd.
Synonyms
The sleek on
comings of this lithely
black-streak ing squirrel’
s unravell ing such bran
ched uneven nesses to a
synonym for flight easy-
said and gnar lied aftered
thoughts.
The deal’s
been clos
cd his suit case smil
ed a handshaking nod
over writt cn the tight-
knit cloth ed pursuing
endeavor
s.
Sap-pulsing
These green-
bared bran ches sap-pul
sing stream’ s th rough -
craving hard ness of rock’
s flowing in felt desirous
ly beyond.
Pink’s two-mindedness
Follow
ing him self about
Nat Pink two- minded as to
where he was or wasn’t Go
ing with that self-pursu
ing smile of his trail
ing in or out of those
through-haunt ing denials.
A seeing-
rhythm of
your cobbl cd step’s
mind-proceed
mg.
Sensed-seen roses
scarce ly for touch
cd sound less words
can break through
sensed-
seen.
Rimmed
The filig
ree white ness of those
curtain s rimmed
her thought s in to fine
ly—felt touch eel appear an
ces.
An emptiness
of mind
like a tree leafless
ly wind-expos ing.
Sad eyes
He drank
his sad eye s in to
the stream s of float
ing rever ies.
Jesus at age 12 (DiirerMunich)
a)		as high priest
eternally
lighting those need-
taking steps for the height
of His redeem ing cause.
b)		The Jews
eyes all a
wake resound ing from that
scriptural depth of His
that left Christ a
loned from their forsak
en center.
c)		Mary andJoseph
still not
finding them selves in
to where their son
would need more than a
family’s
safe-keep
mg.
d)		Animalled instincts
That little dog humbly
bottom ed down sym
bo] of a faithful
ness that the outsideseeking mon key would es
trangc itself from.
Measure for measure (Shakespeare)
a) Not even
the blind
can see
themselves the way o
thers do.
b)		If woman’s
chastity
can be pedest ailed even be
yond the realms of
person Then our times
have cleansed themselves
of all such purifying
means.
c)		The duke
however
“learned” he remain
ed true to his own to (o)
lenient sense of self-app
lying justice.
d)		Higher morality
pursued by
church and state must
mostly lower itself to a
lesser view of man’
self-reflec ting image.
e)		Christ
may be
seen behind the scenes
as man’s need to be
freed from himself.
f) Life
doesn’t
end that way as man’
s his own self-deter
mining trag ic source.
Lady Macbeth’s
milkless
breasts Galled to her
resolute hardened will
ed with the blood of
hand-dagg ered night-
watching.
Again for Rosemarie
Sweet flow
ers with their lightness
of touched- color soften
ing this harsh and barr
en land of mine.
Grown young again
You’ve grown
this aging self of mine
young again as the seed
ed fields the dark rich
ness of their soil’s re
newing.
No way out
she became
there not knowing why
all the e xits seal
ed off a naked
ness of place.
Through-timed
Identi
cal twins i dentically
clothed in the thought
s of the o thcr’s love
for the same lady The one
died the o ther lived
his brother’ s through-
timed fail ing.
“Dark comedies ”
all the
more tragic because their
artificial endings can’
t surface o ver the real
wounds still bleed
ing below.
Concert in Munich (March 16 07)
a)		Violin Sonata
half-deaf
could scarce ly hear
the violin in the upper
register Playing as a
phantom cd being voice
less ghosts of an imagin
ary past.
b)		The opera glasses
finger
ing even where the most
delicate of arpeggios
couldn’t be seen beyond
the piano’ s hidden se
crets of vis ualizing
sounds.
c)		Schumann’s A minor violin sonata
stormed
me passed in to a need
for revela tory conternplat
ion’s catching- in-breath of
where the mu sic couldn’t be
sounding me out for.
d)		Ravel’s violin sonata
jazzing it
up in “content porary i
diom” seem ed to dull at
the edges of my less than
acquiescent soulcd (sold)
out.
e)		Schumann piano quintet
at the end
death-march ed me in
to those grave feelings that
marked me off for a last
ditch effort of being mov
ed (away from).
f)		“Wolfsponsor” (Helene Griniaud) The beauti
fied “wolf spoil ser” kept those
at home to tame her ro
mantic in stincts changed
from brunnette to blond (on
the cover) but that didn’t al
ter my own
classica lly space-in
herent sen sibilit
ies.
4 of the great portraits
a)		Rembrandt’s Saskia (Kassel)
so imperson
ally intensed That even the
cloth’s speaking the artist’
s tight- fitting mind a
loud.
b) Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa
more the whercd
where site isn’t Mysti
cally land scaped.
even beyond the depth of
his self-in volving
person.
c) Bellini’s Doge
mind-abstract
ed unity of person
ed place.
d)		Raphael’s
La Velata’
s eyes cloth ed in the
mystery of woman’s end
ced call ings.
These cold winds
rushing
through the abandon
ing color s of spring’
s reticent surface-
claiming
s.
Bluebells
lithe
ly escap ing my lip’
s soundsensing.
The fear
of what one
doesn’t know what to fear
A ship unan chored drift
ing through waves of not
finding
where.
Before he wasn ’t
He was
there be fore he wasn’
t waking from a dream
that hadn’t stopped tell
mg him self out.
Curtains
closing
in silence of being
drawn down the way of
stars felt through
for even mg-
Blossoms
cluster
ed from snow- petal fall.
Worn colors
where not
even touch could re
veal their full-toned
bareness
es.
The snow
so finely
rhymed its instinct
for sound be gan beyond
my knowing where.
Sugar-surfaced
Those little
girls so sweet ly dressed
through bro cated design
s of pastry sugar-surfac
cd.
Van Dyck’s
effemina
tcly elong ated my
sense for the finery
of aristocratic touch-through
surfacing
s.
Truth
was her
transient means self-
purposing
whatever
ends site would aspire
A woman’ s enticing
smile hold ittg others
at the grasp of her very
moment.
Distancing
the snow
spreading out beyond
the fields of his light-
shifting
thoughts.
Self-attaining
His suit
ed stance- demeanor
punctua ted adept
ly with that buttomed
smile of his so primely
self-attain
ing.
Chopinesque
a)		Perfumed
that faint
salon scent dreamily ro
mantic Most ly for women’
s vaguely (but still re
wardingly)
abandoning
smiles.
b)		Proud
ly self-as suming
that nation al guise
of uprear ing streng
th Horsed in saddle the
charge through those (most
ly still in nocent) bat
tie-keys.
the whims
ical beauty of those not
quite touch ing moon
lit moment s reminis
cently fad ing from.
Tchaikovsky 5th
A bcauti
fully tooth less woman
Robed in all the colors
that her barr cn nakedness
could allur ingly costume.
Mirrored
She mirror
ed another face than her
own search ing back as
if waves through-call
ing in voice less response.
Spacelessly
The snow
began as a touched-
wind so quietly tin
aware to that space
less void of night.
The blackbird
tracing
his shadow upon the dark
ening snow until night
left him win ged-through
the loncli ness silent
ly in flight.
Funeral music (Purcell Queen Mary)
Death chromat
ically ascend ing inter
vals of a lifeless
there after Its final pain
s of fear time-releas
ing.
For Rosemarie
Our love
thawed through its
soften ing flesh
melting now as snow
the lonely depth of win
ter’s darken ing grasp.
Purcell’s anthems
of such a
lonely pur ity tensed
the internal bleeding of
darkening
sorrows.
Twinned
Chopin
French or Polish Handel
German or the English of
one person semi-identi
cal twinned astride a
shoreless reach selffinding.
Moon-sensing
I heard
the snow falling
through the awaken
ing of dream’ s moon-sens
ing light.
Signs
and symbol
s those blink ing lights
we steadied through vista
s of impend ing aware
The overripe
fruit of
Amos’ vision bereft of
those harden ed daily sur
vival-needs As a woman’
s breast so softly milked
its child’ s taste runn
ing over in to those
stagnant streams of
wellness
culture.
That choice
There would
always be that choice
the original fruit still
hanging for us to decide
against the inner voice
calling us back at hand’
s length.
Either way
It could go
either way they said as
if “it” wasn’ t us at the
crossroad’ s stretch
ing out in unseen length
of hands rest lessly through-
voicing.
The train
started
from unseen hands
switched on its timetable route same-track-
continuity from not turn
ing back.
For our son Raphael
Some
thing more than blood-bind
s walking a lone at night
your steps e choing my dis
tant thought s The clouds
responding through their
tonalities
of cause we
listen the woods awaken
to our darken ing pulse
Something more than that
blood-binds.
Pidgeons
sitting out
their place rowed in to
a causality of chanceap
pearance
s.
The fields
of flowing clouds be
yond where even horizon
s of the mind’ s timeless
ly incrcas mg.
Poems from Klingenthal
a) Of awakening light
He slept
the snow down through
dreams of a wakening light
a boat unan chored re
ceding realm s from its a
bandoning
shores.
b)		A lone bird
in an empt
ied and dried- from season
searching the sky for
winged re lease.
c)		Sensitised
These cur
tains so fine ly spoken
light sensiti sed from
snow-clad
time-descend
ing hills.
d)		Of tlw Germanies
Two nation
s at the his torical edge
of their de feated pride
Now reconfirm ed to a ti
nity of less than a strange
like same ness.
c)		Timelessly exposing
Space
can’t be concealed e
veil through these reach
ing lull’s breathing
themselve s out time
lcssly ex posing.
I) This tired snow
still re
hearsing steps melt
ing away their im
pression less sound
s.
g)		This room
inspoken
though lies itant in a
light of windless
transform
ings.
h)		The moon
has created
another world from
here Sancti fied through
its descend ing phases
of snow.
i)		Witnessing aloneness
These slen
der trees rhymed to the
wind-height s of witness
ing alone ness.
DcdCOn’s (Zwickau ca. 1500)
balance
between mind and
hands inhold ing a higher
cause face- formed re
ceiving.
Saxony’s
factories
defaced from view
scarred with their
running wounds blood
lessly wind- apparent.
Their motives
We’re assum
ing their mo tives as
our own as if a statue
could be re placed for
its living i mage.
Remotely
imaged in
that glass- moment of
where time translate
s its tin evened light
from form.
The rivet
glisten
ing from stone s flowing my
shallow in stincts to a
depth of far out sound
ings.
That castle
run down
from the use lessness
of time’s pro tective shield
Wind and wea ther tight
ened their mark on man’
s solitary claims for a
lasting re fuge.
For Rosemarie
The morn
ing kiss sunshines your
transient face in to
a gladness radiant
ly stilled.
Pink’s love-lost voice
Night only
appeared as Pink on the
doorsteps of his love-lost
voice with primed flow
ers and that artificial
shine of his summaried
yet courag eously self-
presentat
ion.
Requiem (Michael Haydn 1771)
Is Mozart
dying here 20 years ear
Her intoned in those fate
ful sounds of where his
grave’s been bringing him
down to a pro fessional of
sound-intent
Casket
lending.
Vision Js
the sccing-
grovvth 1 mage-intens
ed “moving of mount
ains’s” roughly impending a
wareness es through.
Start-day
The morning
s start-day still shadow
mg in dream a clouding
through pass ed remembr
anccs.
Nl issba 11 in (of Osnabruck)
defiant
lyjewish- starrcd Na
ked to the act of fruitbearing birth-den
ials.
Rachel
She cried
when she saw little children
smiling the way hers never
knew in a tub ofblood-
ending its lifeless
soundless
motherless
need for love.
To be first
He alway
s needed to be first That
incipient urge for the
where of where he wasn’
t Rushing time ahead of
itself until at the end
It finally caught him
down.
The earth
of my dark-
soil blood’ s deep-down
Cooled in the night of the
moon’s grasp ing hold on
shadows.
Pale-voiced
this shall
ow start of spring’s e
ven remote ly shadow
ing innuendo’ s touch-sens
ing.
Self- exp ress i oned
An almost
empty train soundless
ly cvolv ing through
these night s of self-
expression ed distan
ces.
Why then
not now
Why here not there
the wind’s savage-teeth
ed machete bleeding
the life- rings of the
wood’s o pening desol
ate sadness.
First colors
this land’
s sparse ly in need
of an appear ance-growth
surfacing where the
wind’s claim ing-finds.
2nd Allegretto (Beethoven trio op 70,2)
as partner
s lyrically voiced cir
cling a one ness of space-
toned inter vals.
The first blossoms
have fallen
so tender ly voiced that
even death couldn’t
stain through their white-
forsaken pur
ity-
D minor trio (Schumann)
Schumann’
s passions rushing
through all that’s left
behind until slowed to an
abyss of con tcmplative
silences.
Blossomed re mem bra nces
The land
strewn with white-blossom
ed remembran ces of why
life’s so short for its
holding on to.
The bee ’
s clasp
ing the per fumed scent
of its fligh ty desit
ings.
Colorings
Tile bird
sang because the tree
was bared for its voic
ed- in color ings.
The desert
looming
with the slithering
eyes of stone-awaken
ing tongue d enchant
ments.
Flemmish
15th century
masterpiece s so bright
ly ornament cd a near
ness to the now of rhymi
cally through- transpir
ings.
Faces
more like
those decor ative Venet
ian masks self-conceal
ing their time-lit ex
posnres.
That edgy feeling
that wants
where it isn’ t like crumb
ling space to its off-color
ed tension ed intangib
ly touched.
His hour had come
because He
knew it would only then when
death’s staling us right
in the face of where we’
ve no one to go magneti
cally call ed.
The day will come
when they’
11 outlaw God" s words and
ways as they did with You
forsaken from the laws
of Romans and Jews We’ll be
left as a bandoned as
your hang ing from the
length ot your nailed-
in Cross.
Vintage early 50s
These post
war houses put together
as a jig-saw puzzle that
doesn’t fit Chimneys
as over siz ed cows coloss
ally protrud ing in to
the thinness of air Roofs
that end down the wrong way
out All’s right here as
nothing’s pre cisioned
as before.
What he didn’t preach
He practi
sed what he didn’t preach
Where’s the worth of
knowing or doing Such
worlds re volving along
an axis of in tangible un
certaintie
s.
Our favorite uncle
too good
for being too weak too
late in stand ing up to
the full length of his own
need for peace fill reconcili
ations.
Cowing down to
Only if he
could preach himself to
where the o thers sat
could he come down from
that self-en closing pul
pit of his.
“How are things in Glaccamorra ”
(in memory Uncle living)
Even if he
didn't believe in God He
still needed a paradise of
unearthly
peaceful
ness A land flowering
in the time less repose
that this side of life had
n’t meted him out for.
O irl i ids
deeply co
lored from their strange
tropical or igin here a
world so re niotely pre-
existant.
Imitation
animals
so inquiet ly self-i
maged as if man could
tame his own steadfast
instincts for prey.
Time-flow
So near to
death and yet so close
ly attuned to life’s re
viewing where he sat through
years of con tinuous time-
flow.
Seymour
that shaggy
Bronx low- downer Ghett
oed-eyed
half-steady
stanced his way in to a
new kind of respect
able mon ied look.
Not knowing
but sensing what one
doesn’t know as the sha
dows of fear wind-blown
yet light-re sisting.
turtle slow
ing time down to an ac
quired pace of dust- bear
ing forti tudes.
“Put on your Easter bonnet
with all the
ribbons on it" so joyously
parading a city’s color
ing bright ness oflife
beyond life’ s upsound
ing beat of where your
bonnet’s sing ing in outlying ribbon ed phrasing
s through.
Cold shadows
stoned mo
ments un touching ex
posures.
Prayers for the dead
They sat
their time out until the
dead was bur ied to the
depth of their mind’
s last im pulse for
light.
Prevasively blue
The light
spring sky so prevas
ively blue that touch
ed your lighten
ed step through
the wind’ s transpar
ency find s.
Easter fires
at the Birnau
swelling light
streams of fire burned through
to the ash of winter’s with
ering hold.
A tensions to person
a balance
that must be held the
way little girls string
their puppet s to a hand-
evened sense.
Off
You could
n’t hold him back Off be
fore the count down be
gan running a race a
gainst where he wasn’t
breathless ly self-con
fining.
Old men
entranc
ed in leaf less desire
s couldn’t bloom beyond
the dried-in sap of win
ter’s resis ting claim
s.
Soundlessly voiced
The water
s parted in phras
ing beyond the wind
s soundless ly voiced.
Cat and mouse
more like
a children’ s game let
loose and run catch
quick hold tight till
the pains arc singing
through a dead-warrant
ed victim of your play
ful delight s.
“I thirst” (Haydn 7 Last words of Christ)
as Christ
s life-stream s drying
down the un broken bone
s impass ioned for re
lease.
Aron
at age 7
wiesel-slen dered his
lithe form
wherea bouts of
left behind s retrac
ing.
Crystalled-spoken
Do flower
s cool their intent down
to the moon- kept light of
evening’ s crystall
ed-spoken
touch.
Age
only part
ially in habits us
We’re more like a string
ed instru ment attun
ed to the changea
bility of what’s touch
ing our throughframed ap pearance
Atlantis-time
dream-swell
as the wa tcr’s under
currents shift ing in sand
to these lost pcrspect
ives of a world sinking
back m to the sea of
its birthed creation.
That snooping-
around-the-
corner type insinuat
ing beyond his nose
length Eyes full of those
betraying need s for the
all-clear
signall
ing in smil cd accommo
dations.
Resurrection (Rembrandt Munich 1640s)
Sitting it
out stone- tombed timc-
rcflccting as if death
hadn’t lost its hold on
his waiting for the angel
of light’ s time-redeem
ing.
The swan
season
ed for a whiteness
of wind-flow ing grace
fully through waters of un
attending
shores.
Slowing down
his thought
s as clouds accumulat
ing into a mass of less
than moment ary growth
wind-holding steps re
solving
through sound lessly.
The rooster
mostly red
in its clawed- in fixture
s steadily eonseienc
cd Peter’s alarmed- through den ials.
Out-timed sermons
can take us
askew off-bal anced as those
worn-accent uating steps
to a pulpit ofbared down
scripture
s.
“New born ”
(perhaps)
but old-tim ed featured
their low- lying sinner’
s breed wor thicd (only
then) for re demption.
Beethoven’s 7th (3rdmvt. Rattle)
rhythmi
cally dialog ued in to a
Haydnesque response of
trailing off shadow
ings.
Marked-off
she was with
a purpose ful sense in
direction as colors ac
centuating their depth
ed-for con tours.
Jewish transport
children
parent-alon ed in to the
darkness of a not-know
ing- where land closing
behind as drama’s death
scened no where now but
beginning.
Mozart’s
flowing
through the streams of
your hand-re fining lightvoiced.
For Rosemarie
Your lips
have open ed the birth
of my be ing moon-
sensed eye s dimly
receding.
Wii rzbu rg: Res idence
In the clois
tered halls of the resi
dence stone- silence
isolating walls protec
ting a time’ s vanish
ing in view.
Wurzburg Residence: The park
These tree
s artifi dally trim
med that one expected tin
soldiers par ading a manne
quin’s pretti ness from
view.
Annunciation (Herlin Rothenburg)
Such an
inner weav ing melodic
after find s as if that
angel was still in-flow
ing heaven ly grace.
Tony
there’s lot
s of you in mind of these
words imitat mg what
you’d be thinking of.
Rothenburg’s
still virgin-
medieval un touched as
Penelope by all those
suitors who would unveil
her self-re framing
dignity.
Rosemarie
I’ll awake
the youth back from you
if only be cause the
moon’s your trail spar
cntly mine,
Blank shadows
their face
s shallow ed to a
depth of sun less smile
A courtyard
window
ed in-to thought-
response
intermin
ably
asking.
“The handwriting's on the wall”
but now it’
s shimmer ing indistin
ctly as these leaves reflect
ing concrete silences
through.
Image of “The church ”
when the
roots have been torn
from their earth-renew
ing growth That tree so
proudly cm bellishcd
aspiring
heavenly
vistas sap lessly in
ert.
Riemensclmeider in Wurzburg (6)
a)		Candelabra angels ca. 1505
escort
ing in the light of
transcen dental vi
sions.
b)		Mary and John (the small one ca. 1520)
break
able hand- touched
hold of the dead Christ’
s together ness.
c)		Eve’s 1492/93
hair How
ing down the depths of
her death' s realiz
ings.
d) St. Stephan’s
face cut-
form hand-re fleeting
ascension to the Christ
of his long ings.
e) St. Sebastian ca. 1515 That stead
ied gaze be yond the inbinding pain’ s light-bleed
ing.
J) St. Barbara ca. 1510
her hands
circling the womb
from its cha liccd blood-
light.
Mary’s church (WurzbuyO
although
statucd within worth
icd tradit ion lofty a
hove my sitt ing down from
those few pris tine yellow
flowers caught me at a
glance.
Skin-shedding
Snakes
shed their skins out
realising in self-re
vealing a newness
of what's been cast a
side.
Track-lines
as parall
died as my uneven
edthought s time-in
creasing,
Pink’s
early morn
ing blossom ing checks
the spring trees of his
flushing through co
lorings.
Spitzweg’s
gentle breath
of humour Hanging his
coloring un derwear on
that watch ful length of
cannon (per haps) reload
ing for its drying off
sponsors.
Spitzweg (II) for Ernst
may be hid
ing behind a gentleness
of touch ed appcaran
ces what is n’t seen but
implied as those roosted
chickens and lady’s stock
ings hung be hind the fire
s of his in tensing glow.
The psychoworld
left her
little time for self Sha
dowed as she was in the 1
mage of what once was for
being even now the more
so.
that dark un
known of the somewhere
else The bott omless ocean’
s sinking sounds in to
lost forget fulness The
death of where only
life can re deem itself.
St. Margareta (Cranach Munich 1520s)
Her hair
touched with the spontane
ous glow of where inno
cent eyes self-seek
ing.
Spitzwegean
birds wit
nessing what we wouldn'
t want seen flight-messan
gers voice lcssly expos
mg.
These corridors
sound
lessly lead ing either
way out of his self-im
prisoned
direction
less.
Buttered
She butter
cd her stale- face bread
to a dia logue of in
tricate
pleasuring
s.
Rain corning
the cloud
s dulled from usage
A closeness here sens
ed-waiting.
“Caught a cold”
as if cold
s could be caught upon
when you’ re caught
in draft' s cold-mind
edness.
Alice in Wonderland (reread)
a)		She may
have out grown her
knowledge in to the
smallness of a lessen
ing world.
b)		Nonsense
can make more sense
in the
upside-down
ness of our Old Father
William’s
world.
c)		Wc all
at times dialogue
ourselves Even if the
speaking back’s only
the other side of that
somewhat o ther world.
d)		Who's Alice
who are we in the possi
bility of more in those
other ways of realiz
ing.
Relentlessly holding
These
austere
mountain
s relentless ly holding
tor the still ness of time’
s sloping down phrase
s.
Reading
through
the eyes of others is
why glasses need be indi
vidually
prescrib
ed.
Corot’
s the
poet of si lent- voiced
sensibil ities the sha
dows of these lake- trails
cending
winds.
Illuminated manuscr
with their
individual letters so
finely addres scd as a cour
tier with flourishing
hat improvis ing beyond the
usage of such isolating
meanings.
Human
If the
Indians weren’ t human Were
those Spaniard s any more
so Or does human mean a
finishing
meanness
from design.
Nathaniel Pink
bought
the store out of sunflower
s and high standing color
ing balloons Trying to cur
ious the real sun out of its
paled appease mcnt policies
for some more of that real
shine that e ven
Pink couldn’t long attune with
those virtu ous smiles
of his.
Landmarks
some
where set in those o
pening field s with their
phrasing sense for
grass No word s only num
bers hardly decipher
able worn down from their
time-touch
direction
less viewed.
The dead
know better
than we so quietly
entombed in such peaceful
places with only the wind
to hear No tensions
no pains no fears And
only those overspread
ing trees protective
ly stilled.
Lost
she was
in a garden of over-bloom
ing flowers Coloring e
veil those nights through
with the wind s of choired
echoings.
The old windmill
turning
slowly
through sound
lcssly continu ing the way
s of the wa ter and the
wind’s word lessly found.
At sundown
the boats
soundless ly passing
through the flow of homecoming’s a sadness of
return motion lessly wave
d.
Byrd: Mass for 5 Voices
Ifthen’
s being Cath olio’s be
ing truer to Christ’s
suffering The mass of
upholding the signa
ture of that voiced-
through pur ity in faith.
Schumann op. 12
That piano
keyed for a larger hall
And she small or than the
music’s mean ing Overcoming
with eye-tell ing technique
much of the mood of Sell u
mann’s subtle ties from
sound.
V\/blff> S Spies (Head oj DDR secret police)
Bathseba-
like wormed their way in
to the flesh ed desire
s of their wanting Vic
tints for a cold truth
papered o ver but se
cretly inholding.
Formed
That
round ball coloring
her eyes through
for its touching
sense
from form.
True-telling stones
It's just the right
word strung to their co
loring find s A necklace
of true- telling
stones.
Ute
She was
too strong to let other
s decide An over
bearing tree shadowing
most deeply the depth of
her own self- persuasion
s.
Schiller: Joan of Arc
a)		Docs
man still need God to
free him self from be
ing bound and tied to
his own in terests.
b)		Joan was
the witch for England and
the Holy Saviour for France
Does God take sides in our
own national interests.
c)		He saved
her from the pyre The
real flame s were God’
s burning de sire through
her for France’ s freedom.
d)		Joan
sainted only 1920 in those
times of hope less despair
Has she risen again above
the meaning for her sin
gular message.
Autistically in mourning
She didn’
t know what death meant for a mother she rarely
saw More in a sadness
for her own unspeak
able self.
Isaac Babel
that Jew
ish Cossack horse-fear
ing his own trampling
down instincts.
The jewelled necklace
that she
touched
through
her finger ing needs
Articulate with the
shine of a smiled a
wareness.
Closer
Rain
sadness and quiet
spoken thoughts an
intimacy of nearing
you closer.
Clarinet’
s slow
streams deep water
s winding through the
flow from self-express
ing sound s.
Nathaniel Pink’
s lost his
athletic looks Shoul
tiers droop ing as a watch
less dog’s so eared out-peer
ing Glasses worn through
their respec tability
sake.
Drying up
This
earth’s dry ing up
cracking down to the
pores of where breath
ing’s no way of seeing
it through.
Unframing
There’
s still too much kept sc
cret here Old-timed
family picture s revealing
that he wasn’ t what he
was told to be AJew-kill
er unframing the antece
dents of his war- timed
heroic posing.
That vacancy of wind
His empti
ness of mind’s like
that vacancy of wind
blown field s with out
a resonance for voice.
Pity’
s where
one’s own nakedness
so readily on display.
Chagall’s Esther
so close
ly clothed in that in
stinct for un revealing
beauties just as she
was symbol of Israel’
s untouch able calling.
Commas
Small dip
ping birds skirting
die water’ s edge with
the commas between the
wind’s line s ont
breathing.
Heinz
had that
staid look of his butt
ed-out cigar swollen
stance and the pride of
smokcd-occas ioning relax
ations.
Samson
was smitten with a blindness
of seeing too much
Told as he was in-to
the secret confines of
a voice less dark.
Those quick-
stepped birds imprinting the less
of a mo ment’s
sound.
Evergreens
formed
with the self-delu
sions of al ways being
there
after.
Lake of Garda at Campione
Water
falls of fall ing stone
Abstract vistas reshaping the mind’s con
fluence of rock-
down surfa cings.
Implied
What she
said im plied for o
ther mean ings As if
words were less than
that chance movement
of her eye s or hand
s brushing down
for touch.
Twinned-feelings
Women
may dress to their in
tended sense for self
as if cloth cd to in
ternal wants for
such twinn cd-in
feeling
s.
For Rosemarie
Mild winds
that’s your thawing this
wintered heart of mine
to the sweetflowing of
its time-re hearsing
streams.
A quiet snow
like clos
ing the cur tain’s ask
ing for a voiced inti
macy of no where but
there.
Cloud-invoking
You voic
cd yourself softer
cloud-invo king wind
s from the mildness
of a south ern clime.
The Bacchae (Eurpides 4)
a)		The enemie’
so far off
beyond the seas from the
north or east in the pasto
ral flow of mountain’
s so deeply designed to
that mirror ed image
from self.
b)		Pentheus
with the
curiosity of Eve voiced
through the serpent’s
so cosmic cunning.
c)		Wine
that delight
s the human heartless
ness overflowing in an
imalled sane tities.
d)		Caravaggio’s Bacchus
feasting
on the in ner needs
from his own impassion
ed self-dest ruction.
Smoke-clouds
abandon
ing those lost thought
s of celes tial imitat
ions.
Menorah
with its
uplifting hand’s light-
embracing the wax-
blood’s see ping through.
A void
at the cen
ter Fear as if white
wasn’t a lapse from
being found.
Karl Marx City (Chemnitz)
with a
huge bust of his plasti
cally in the fullness of
prophetic
claims
still staring down Timeless
ly what should have
been but wasn’ t.
The Pharisee ’
s urging
Jesus’ answer
ing eye’ s coin-
invoking the Emperor’
s god-struck image.
Magritte’s
head on
balanc ing hat’
s unease s my squareframed sit ting in
from place.
Otherwise
I could
have been the other
wise from being now
These time s the tide
s of moon- sweeping stir
facings me away from.
Glassed remembrances
Strange
eyes watch ing him
through glassed re
membrance
s.
Of its speechless thoughts
This
trees’s sha ding itself
inwardly en closing the
shadows of its speech
less thought
Little old ladies
with their little old
worries of more-than-
finding word s as birds
scatter mg for their
incessant ly feed.
Wind-phrasing
The sur
face of this smooth
ed out sea So breathless
ly stilled only in
the soften ing touch of
word’s windphrasing.
Amputated
They cut
the limbs of tit is tree
to its sha dowed rest
away Out- armed sway
ing dull- pulsed rem
nants.
Rembrandt in the 40s
still form-
controlled
precision
ed metallic gleam
the cloth of touched
beyond ness for soulfinding Godsensing.
Incomplete
Man’s incom
plete created with a need
for more that emptiness
at the centre of self-ribbed
to the right woman to make
him whole but still incom
pletc against the claims
that death has sought so
constantly
securing.
Uni in i i ted possibil i ties
Abandon
ed houses flood-ridden
plains middle class down-
clutched to the bitter root
s ot their ere dit clauses
Only the dust bowl’s failing
us now in this land of unlimi
ted possibili ties.
June 22/08
This summer
day’s as end less as I
can imagine clouds un
spoken where the wind’
s timing for light and all
those unseen birds master
ing the voice s of their
through-shadow ing silen
ces.
Thunder
flashed
through his mind an appear
ance of naked ly reveal
mg-
The blank end
of what
he didn’t want to say
as a sea wind lessly a
drift.
Wind-aspiring
At the bott
om when there were no relic
s of the past to be earth
ed out A si lence came o
ver all that had been said
as clouds windaspiring.
A mythical power
Trees inhabit
a mythical power of their
own encompass ing ages of
transcend ing shadow
s.
After the rains
It cooled
after the rains that e
veil my voice became aware
of its shad owing phrase
s.
Too hot
to think a
loud even the shadow
s absorb ing in heat
I’m where I’m not
untelling.
Books
have black
and whiten cd me in
to their en visioned
sense for touch.
Waiting
for what wouldn’t
happen these time-toll
ing fears as if person
ed irresolu tely there.
That Monet for Ernst
it must
be a late one Not so
formed-flo wered feeling’
s out going scent But ab
stracting in light and
shade’s con tinuity of
that path’ s overhang
ing Voiced.
Wall-flowered
and what
of those not- so- pretty
women Wall- flowered a
loned for the touch of va
cant stones that won’t
be answer ing back.
Hemingway
as Cezanne masculin
cd his wo men As if the
softness of flesh could
n’t be but moulded into
their exter ior sense
d form ed.
Of inner intent
Language
was learned before it
became mean mg But with
out those words of in
ner intent How much ex
pression less void.
Alone
She sat
alone in a room of
shadows Only the
trees knew why and the
glass of inflecting
silence that told
more of her than she
could re veal to her
self.
Tensed
Words
even the unspoken
ones tens cd at the
finger’s
edge.
Insect’
s needled sting through
the skin’ s ripe
ness for blood-
taste.
Mary Poppins
umbrell
aed that flying wish
for dream’ s over wa
kings.
The piano man’s
a fake
Mute to the
needs of o thers Strip
ped of his untold i
dentity Fingers can’t
tell beyond the imita
tion of where they’
ve stopped for self-
performing.
Adrift
These
times a drift as so
many today cut loose
from their anchoring
cause far out upon a sea
of endless ly wind-shif
ting course.
Defiantly
Her defiant nature reminded me
of those cold stone
s you could n’t touch
deeply e nough echo
ing for re lease.
Predator
That
snake slow ly unwind
ing its bo died length
Tongued loud in veil
omous glare.
Janacek’s 2nd quartet
as a man
standing on both side
s of where he’s not go
ing from A unity inti
mately enchan ting in the
aged ness of post-war
traumas.
Quicker
It came
quicker than it
was over.
Fathered
He
fathered with that
quiet conten ance of his
self-contain ing words
That I felt as if har
boured from my own ri
sing in stinctual
tides.
ForS.L.
Red rose
s A portrait of his dead
wife on the piano of his
most inti mate thought
s fingering through
for lost re membrance
s.
Poetry books by DavidJaffin
1.		Conformed to Stone, Abelard-Schuman,
New York 1968, London 1970.
2.		Emptied Spaces, with an illustration by Jacques Lipschitz, Abelard-Schuman, London 1972.
3.		In the Glass ofWinter, Abelard-Schuman, London 1975, with an illustration by Mordechai Ardon.
4.		As One, The Elizabeth Press, New Rochelle, N. Y. 1975.
5.		The Halfofa Circle, The Elizabeth Press, New Rochelle, N. Y. 1977.
6.		Space of, The Elizabeth Press, New Rochelle, N. Y. 1978.
7.		Preceptions, The Elizabeth Press, New Rochelle, N. Y. 1979.
8.		For the Finger’s Want of Sound, Shearsman Plymouth, England 1982.
9.		The Density for Color, Shearsman Plymouth,
England 1982.
10.		Selected Poems, English/Hebrew, Massada Publishers, Givatyim, Israel 1982.
11.		The Telling of Time, Shearsman, Kentisbeare, England 2000 and Johannis, Lahr, Germany.
12.		That Sense for Meaning, Shearsman, Kentisbeare, England 2001 and Johannis, Lahr, Germany.
13.		Into the timeless Deep, Shearsman, Kentisbeare, England, 2002 and Johannis, Lahr, Germany.
14.		A Birth in Seeing, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2003 and Johannis, Lahr, Germany.
15.		Through Lost Silences, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2003 andjo- hannis, Lahr, Germany.
16.		A voiced Awakening, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2004 and Johannis, Lahr, Germany.
17.		These Time-Shifting Thoughts, Shearman,
Exeter, England 2005 and Johannis, Lahr, Germany.
18.		Intimacies of Sound, Shearsman, Exeter,
England, 2005 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
19.		Dream Flow with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2006 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
20.		Sunstreams with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2007 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
21.		Thought Colors with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2008 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany
22.		Eye-Sensing, ahadada, Tokyo, Japan and Toronto, Canada 2008.
“David Jaffin is a scrupulous weigher and weighter of words - by which I mean that a poem is, for him, always a matter of collaboration with the true spirit of the language. Every word is given its value, neither more nor less.”
Edward Lucie-Smith
“David Jaffm’s Preceptions is a fine book. Jaffin’s poems, slight on the page, entice, engage, amuse. Yet their brief touchings often reach wholeness, and they are poems of philosophical consequence out of keeping with much of modern poetics. The poems catch perceptions in the act of happening, to be, the short-line verse appropriate to what becomes.” Paul Ramsey, The Sewanee Review
“Jaffin’s poetry is as “modernist” as abstract painting while still poetry in the traditional sense, whose purpose is the verbalization of basic human experience and whose form derives from a serious exploration of language ... it is remarkable what depth of experience Jaffin manages to relate through his severely limited vocabulary and imagery.”	Victor Terras (Brown University)
“Mr. Jaffin uses words with a real fineness of diction which emphasizes a characteristic understatement of emotion. One recognizes a cultivated sensibility. He adopts a theme and mode which one cannot help but admire. He writes very well indeed.”	the late Norman Holmes Pearson (Yale University)
“Jaffin’s Through Lost Silences offers a rare display of manifold poetic variety. Succinct and challenging enforcers of new insights and deeper understanding, his poems soar in far higher realms than those of prosaic description and rational analysis ... There is sincerity and conviction in Jaffm’s crisp, multi-sensory poeticisation of ideas. Existential and philosophical shapings of language, simple and complex at the same time, draw out the true nature of his chosen subjects in an original way overwhelming the faint echoes of older poetic traditions and leaving behind a profound aftertaste of experiences lived through for the first time.”	Edward Batley (University of London)
“David Jaffin is a master of the restrained but purposeful statement. If his poems do not have quite the briefness of the haiku, they have a good deal of its light-dark inflection and rounded perfection of form ... Jaffin’s poems almost always give an impression of “light reflecting light”. The fact is, that if one wants restraint and elegance, he will find it in abundance here. Jaffin’s subtleties are, in short, dazzling.”	The Library Journal on Conformed to Stone
www.bogpriser.dk/Denmark Denmark:
Om Dream Flow
“David Jaffin is a prolific American poet whose work uses the minimum possible means of expression in order to reach for the essentials in his subject matter ... The limpid texture of his work resists quotation or excerption; his deceptively simple surfaces use the tensions inherent in the vocabulary to open up new horizons. Delicate creations, his poems tend to be wonderfully light lyrics.”