Poems of the Artist, First Set.
As soon as his eyes opened, realizing that it is still early morning; the fresh voice of the Angel still ringing in his ears, another voice rose from deep within and said, “Write, write! I command you to write!” So, with the long practice of obedience to his intuition (and what I mean by long is a decades long practice) he obeyed immediately. He reached into his bag, he pulled out his pencil, pulled out his sketchbook and began to write without thinking; without pausing for a moment to think about what he is writing. Like Giotto’s example, he allowed the words to just flow out of him from the pencil to the paper. Not even lifting his head from the paper, he just wrote and wrote without realizing that the Dog has arrived and was laying quietly next to him staring at him.
When he looked at the Dog, the Dog looked back, but the Artist seemed to see right through the Dog. He returned his gaze sharply to the paper and continued writing, listening to some inner voice dictating. He is the perfect image of a scribe: not a poet, not a writer, just a scribe listening intently to a dictation. An inward dictation being pronounced by some agent that no one can see or hear but himself, and he kept writing until finally another image slowly donned on him. As the image donned on him, it happened to accompany the brightening of the day in itself - so that his attention was grabbed by the changing environment that is light appearing, allowing the image of the Dog to slowly come to in front of his thoughts, or to push his way through the dictation and to make itself permanently fixed for recognition.
So, he turned once more to look in the direction of the Dog. This time he held the look of the Dog by looking directly into the Dog's eyes. The Dog showed signs of recognition, signs of relief - for without the Artist knowing, he had been lying there over two hours. He has been anxious to enter some dialogue with his new master, the Artist.
The Artist noticed that there is something different about the Dog. The Dog noticed that there is something different about the Artist. It seems to both of them that they have changed over night. The Dog was the first to speak:
He said, “I didn’t want to disturb you when I arrived because it seemed to me that you were somewhere else - not here, so I decided to wait, and I was proven correctly for I was waiting more than two hours. Until just now, I can clearly see that you have noticed I am here.”
The Artist, still staring at the Dog somewhat absentmindedly replied, “I am sorry I didn’t see you.”
The Dog answered, “You didn’t see me?”
“Yes, you may have seen me looking at you,” replied the Artist, “but I was not really looking at you and you were correct to assume that I was not here and before you ask where I was, I will save you the trouble by telling you it is no place to describe to you, so don’t even ask.”
“You know,” said the Dog, “I was not going to ask you, because I think I understand where you were. I have heard it discussed many times in my former occupation when I was with my former master, the Gentleman. He always talked about it because he always seemed to be in such a mood. He called it being with the Muse. And was I correct? Aren’t you with the Muse?”
The Artist who smiled happily said, ”Yes, you are correct, I was with the Muse. In fact, I am still with the Muse.”
The Dog charmed in, “Before we go any further by the way, what are you writing? “
“You know,” said the Artist, “I can’t really say. I guess the closest think that you can use to say something about it, is that you could call it Poems, but in my understanding they are not really Poems. I call them Momentary Configurations of Idealized Presence.”
The Dog said, “You call it what?”
The Artist repeated, “Momentary Configurations of Idealized Presence.”
“You know,” said the Dog, “I really don't understand what that means. Can you make it simpler? Can we just call them what they really kind of are.. Poems?”
“Well, for your sake, we can agree to call them Poems, but in reality they are really Neoillusion.”
“There you go again,” said the Dog, “saying something I clearly don’t understand.”
“I know you don’t understand,” said the Artist, “Oh yes, I said it to get you interested."
“Interested? Have you not noticed that I am interested? Have I not been talking to you since we met? Is it not enough proof to you that I am interested that you have to trick me by using the words I don't understand?!"
The Artist smiled again and said, “It is not a trick. I am only telling it to you because it is exactly what it is: Neoillusion. And since you would never ask me about it because I know you don’t know what it, is I have decided to tell you. That way we are both aware what we are talking about.”
“OK, “ said the Dog, “I get it. You want me to ask ‘What is Neoillusion?'"
“No,” said the Artist, ”this is really not my intention at all. Believe me, I know that to ask such a question is a minefield, and I have no desire to bring such a task upon myself to explain what Neoillusion is, but since we have to say something and since we are going to talk about it anyway, I have decided to bring it out so we can get over with by starting on it early."
“Oh, I see,” said the Dog “You have something in mind. You planned this, didn’t you?”
“Plan what?” asked the Artist.
“Planned to end up talking to me about Neoillusion like you said.”
“No, I did not,” said the Artist. “Didn’t you hear me say that I would rather not bring it upon myself? But since we have to say something and talk about something, and the thing we are talking about is what I am doing - that is, the seeking of the Ancestor - and you have decided to come along with me, it goes without saying that we will be doing what we set out to do on this road - that is; finding out about the Ancestor, who in reality embodies Neoillusion - and since this will come out sooner or later, I rather it to come sooner than later, so here it is: Neoillusion. That is what I am doing.”
The Dog is not amused, this caught the Artist’s eye and the Artist asked, “What happened to you during the Night Watch? You seem different. You have become more serious, almost too serious.”
The Dog chimed in, ”You are one to talk, you seem different to me!”
“Oh, I'm different?” the Artist retorted.
“Yes, you are different,” replied the Dog. “I guess we are both different.”
“Still,” the Artist said, “You have not answered my question which was 'What happened to you in the Night Watch?'"
“Well, that's why I came so early, to speak to you about it,” said the Dog, “But when I came I found that you were in your own world, so I had to wait. First, I thought I would be disturbing you since I am so early and I thought I was going to wake you up but I was surprised to see that you were already awake, busy in another world!”
“OK, so what are you going to talk to me about?” the Artist asked.
“Wait a minute!,” said the Dog, “Before we go into that I am interested in what you are writing.”
“Oh, yeah, yeah, my writing,” said the Artist.
The Dog asked, “Could you read some to me?”
The Artist stared at the Dog as if thinking about something, which he was. He was debating whether to warn the Dog about the nature and the style of the Poems before he read them, but he decided against it, so he began to read:
"When stars sleep in calm string of black night
Great intention floats in pale bosoms like Ophelia’s eyes.”
“Wait a minute,” stopped the Dog, “I really don't understand what that is about and I am getting a strange feeling just by the sound of it and that I probably will not understand it.”
The Artist said, “Do you want me to read this or not? If you want me to read I will continue, if you don’t I will not, but you should not stop me in the middle of my reading. “
“Ok, I am sorry, “ said the Dog, “Please continue.”
The Artist continued halfway rolling his eyes,
“When stars sleep in calm string of black night
Great intention floats in pale bosoms like Ophelia’s eyes.
Slowly, they blink revealing dreaming birds
Who are wounded in veiled dreams like half heard sentiments
Which hollow out the call of distance in their constricted throats.”
At the end of the last word ‘throats’, the Artist stopped and looked up at the Dog to see the Dog completely perplexed, confusion swimming in his eyes and on his face.
The Artist said, “Let me guess, you don't understand.”
The Dog said, “Correct,” continuing, “You know, I told you before that in my former life I have been in many drawing rooms and I have heard so called poems recited and danced and sung, performed, and debated. I have even seen people pretending to write poems, including my former master, the Gentleman, and granted, some are very good. Others are quite dreadful of course, because how many poets you know who can write good poems? So as you see, I have somewhat of some idea what poems sound like, or some idea in some way, but this is not anything that I understand! I don’t mean to say that it is bad or it is good even. I am saying that I don't know what it is because when I hear it, it immediately takes me away from myself. I feel like my being is just an echo chamber with these words as its only life, and when I feel this life it puts me in several places at the same time, somehow in a confused state, but at the same time in a unified state that makes sense - a sense pointing to a different dimension. I mean granted, you only said a few lines, but already my stomach is turning and I am having hot flashes and I guarantee it is not menopause, and I am in several places at the same time. My curiosity has completely swallowed my whole being. I must know what these poems are because there is something about them that makes me feel something I can’t explain.
The Artist listened calmly with a sense of half pity and half amusement towards the Dog. Not in a condescending way, but a way that says he knows exactly what the Dog is talking about because he himself has had this experience with his own writing. He knows and understands that it is Neoillusion that causes it and that is the very sense of its’ definition - You appear to be in several places at the same time and yet you are held in a singular place as soon as you focus - so he knows the Dog’s experience.
As these thoughts carress his mind the Dog said, “I have an idea.”
“Oh, yes?” said the Artist, “What idea is that?”
The Dog continued, “Would it be possible if I could just read them myself? So I can take my time and go through them at my own pace and try to make some sense of it myself? I promise I will return them to you as soon as I finish reading.”
Without hesitation the Artist said, “Of Course, of course!” practically shoving the notebook into the Dog’s face.
The Dog took the sketchbook and the Artist asked, ”What time is it anyway?”
The Dog replied, “By the look of it, I say it is 10 o’clock in the morning.
The Artist said, "This is all good anyway because I need some sleep. I did not sleep at all last night and this would give me some time to catch up, so take the book and enjoy.” The Artist smiled thinking, “I am curious to know what is going to happen after he reads it?”
The Dog left quietly with the sketchbook, turning once back to look at the Artist as he disappeared through the bushes. As soon as he cleared the visual sight of the Artist the Dog sat and opened the first page and began reading:
Poem #1
When stars sleep in calm string of black night
Great intention floats in pale bosoms like Ophelia’s eyes.
Slowly, they blink revealing dreaming birds
Who are wounded in veiled dreams like half heard sentiments
Which hollow out the call of distance in their constricted throats.
Gone are the years that a thousand grateful tears
Simmer in Ophelia’s gaze.
Look, it is like phantom affair.
Fair years it glimmers in destructed removable trance
O, a thousand fold sentiments consume this nightly air.
Answer me! You, evening brag!
Shaking fist,
Dreaming these kisses win out by suckling the breast.
Long time your soft lips lie in your streaming eyes.
Don’t take too long,
The shriveling attempts of her speaking eyelids
Are no match for the brewing tears that rush at you
In their lean seasoning.
Sigh out your colors and leave out the lilies,
Squeeze the water out of your wrinkled distress
And at once don’t ask questions about things that have come to rest.
Build a nest of things and cast out your net.
Here, the frightful things that sing some songs
Of yesterday's hollow stares wound you.
Climb up the stairs and sing, O you,
Mysterious music falling from your starry night.
Poem #2
Stake out a snow night,
You are too beautiful for this pale face.
Oh, yes, which way is this?
It is not time to die yet,
Let's drift on and steal a look!
Wow! What peaks of wind that blows away toward no way in?
O, don’t speak so angrily as if I have bitter No’s,
Just dream of Liberty's ring!
Endlessly and ceaselessly your voice drowns me
In the immense sea of your No’s.
Break this habit of your casual breath
That entangled in your long waist of hair.
It sounds like thoughts wondering out to some
Bring about case of idyllic waste.
Your heart is the downcast mood of Nature's rude companion.
Your songs that sing of Yesterday Everywhere Break
Is a sign of things in themselves growing interesting,
Whispering their conversations all night.
Interestingly, it breaks out of you with the breast-feeding a baby.
O, it is too human for that sea of voices
That your tone has imprisoned -
In that morning of the April Fools night
When your poor prince sat there in his lunatic end
Gazing at his wordless feet.
If you call on to that time in the pale frame
You will see that a wordless feel can speak endless books
That drink from immense waters that are colored blue.
You cry like a thing sunken in before you.
You raise your arms from fire to eat snow.
Your sky is wrapped around your head like a Liberty
Flaring in the entangled song.
Great is your infinite longing of your blue-sky trip
That sometimes dreaming arms cause Liberty's wings to shiver.
Poem #3
Some said, slightly askew, "Dreaming flowers -
Our stylized friends."
But, when plucking hands in the night veil
Wounded trip saw it,
Some tears came begging for refreshment
And they were asked to dream a pale blue veil
That covers up some distant bed
Floating on with Ophelia’s pale feet bound.
Of interest in visionary cry,
Flaring thoughts in your charming eyes
Told me of a time where I am not at your side.
O, Poet, where have you gone of late?
Your dreaming eyes have caught sight of an impossible bait,
So you have painted mask of fateful plate
That forever on charms in your fingering thoughts
That never deflate.
Love's time has brought a breaking rhyme.
Eyes are held in the place that has no time.
Your gestures have sunk to the side
And they have become intimate partners in their rhyme
Breathing all the while a finely prime of a voice over crime
That is whispered in the relay of tree-to-tree time.
RACE OF MAN
Seventeen thousand times seriously that nobody called it a crime,
It is overnight time with the parade of fools in drinking rhyme.
Beer and Vodka songs, chatting in front of cafés with challenging fights
O, what a noisy atmosphere you breathe in
In that cascade of breath
As the trees bow to your walk on the promenade.
It is bizarre to look at the scent that you cried.
If you point up there you can make up the sky
In this scrappy piece of paper,
If you look far off
You will shiver and quiver
Shooting arrows into the distance, killing butterflies.
Lopsided ones would dismiss you
As if you are struck with the disease of drifting on.
So they let you go on with it because
They have become mistresses of your return.
Seventeen days of getting it on
And no one told me of 'not to be afraid to die.'
That is how your champaign kiss sunk into me
Like a drifting collage that is dragged by the lips of a child
Who is confused by this mother’s breast.
A kiss arrives to untangle your butterfly’s eyes.
Don't mind these flittering lips, it is only for your light.
I dream of novels with heart that have passed crucibles.
Wherever I am, trees pass through me to become forest.
I am a danger to the road signs.
If you cross me I will pull from beneath you
The pull of your swinging idols
And allow a straight light to reveal your charming right.
I know of the girls that curl around your windows.
I know the dark colored code that you show through your father’s grip.
I know.
Since the naiveté has found you marvelously well
I have healed the sidewalk trails.
If you walk fast your heels would tap and make a turn that hearts would fail.
Or, quick! Hazel look,
Don’t wrap your despair around a branch growing fair,
Just die in your song and that is all it will declare.
Poem #4
Falling out of touch like rented boat I saw a grain in your eyes,
And it flares up like cutting scissors
Moving along the paper trails that laugh at your friends.
Their giggles are lover’s trails that sing the song
To a lady who is hidden at night.
Don’t you know it is the Goddess design who invites you to sigh?
When we go back we will ask them to pray
For all the colors have gone array
And today the atmosphere is full of sittings’ ways.
Why are you not serious?
You are only seventeen?
Full of caress as you scream drinking lemonade
Holding your hands out, crisscrossing the promenade.
PRAYER TO THE MOTHERS
Long chair holding you upright is not a way
Just sitting just right.
Spend time looking at the angle in your barber’s chair.
While you're there you may ask for a slicked out design,
Something cut across the back bent toward the front,
A little mooing on the side to allow free trade of waterless drunkenness.
Don't be so casual about that,
Lift up that weightless head of yours
And pipe that smoky song out of your lungs
Not bothering to hang the pictures of your father’s wishes.
Within your held down time tight lipped advocate will stream out your thoughts.
Sitting on the dung hill whispered to a dove whose ears are not without concern -
A thousand wishful dreams you would whisper,
But all of that is burned away in a soft whimper.
But from time to time the heart will hold out that dreamer
And ransom the cake of words that the blood drenched out.
I see you sitting on that Oak
Solitary chewing the bread you tore from thy golden breeze
And you are happy with the blood running by tearing your nature before the sundial.
Swallow it down until the dreams are weld up in your eyes,
Don't take no for an answer.
Maybe the intoxication of that hour,
When I turn you back even if it is sour.
Your thirst will not ignore the hour
To satisfy the need that seek to devour your adore.
Don't ignore the can words by delaying the steps to take,
It is an impossible myth to power.
Don’t worry, just piss off from the tower
And let that soring piss consecrate those heads
That flower your patchwork to devour.
Breaking bread the first time
Ugly are those towering masks
That are paraded like country pumpkins in the Church town.
Smear yourself in that stupid frown
And line up those fifteen girls that you talked to in your dream since childhood
Your paramour of later days kiss
And tell obituaries.
Listen, they are talking to an ugly priest
Just like themselves
Drowns in mirrors cut always.
Shoes on your shoulders,
Stocking torn around your neck,
The smell drenches the neighborhood buffing all the rest, but don’t count on that.
Just lift the green leaves of despair
And crawl out from underneath that into the sunshine wearing old colors
Those stainless hands drafted to your contours.
I could of sworn
It was glass.
Outside always, dancing with the soil, tricking the stones in the barter’s fair,
Allowing the pillars to reminisce how much you don’t care
Those boulders that are over there are retaining your stare.
Don’t wait too long,
Take your piled up affairs
And allow the solemn march of your emotional despair
To retain the countryside affair.
Don't divided it,
Just keep the rapping idea,
Pluck the yellow ones that are sweet and make a weed into beer but don’t drink.
Support the plum lagoons that swarm in blue dried up sunny side fishes.
Use it to pluck that block nutcracker ideas,
Sit beneath the mulberry tree
And claim the knots of your sticky vine dreams without apologies.
There is a barn on the side road of the untouchable centuries.
The interiors are cold.
Drunk with their wishes they mimic their eye leads in anticipation of darling’s arrival.
On the walls they enact the hanging scrolls of purple lemonade mysteries.
They are the martyr’s of our ladies’ ring,
And they relay on visions with a bloody flank.
Still, clear out from there, that stinking refusal.
Still, fly out from there with a buzzing requital.
Again, get out of the kitchen without asking for rebottle.
Why devour that last plank, just shovel it into sustaining feet
And paint the stained glass serenade in untiring feet.
At home, there is a tiring duty, a first course in children’s day
Except setting the brickwork into the timing freeze.
They lift the lever; they leave another
Forgetting their faces are never turned to the song.
Oh, where is the priest to give attention to them,
To give them a snack, or I mean a smack.
Oh, come quickly, turn around, let them come out of the harvest time,
Let them earn that.
The house is a little way away;
Right there, three steps beneath a tree that shades your back
Into a curvature of wanting.
Long time ago the lady wearing the pants with a pastry in the hand
Adores Napoleon, she is a fan.
Above it all she hangs the engraving of your family portrait –
A drummer’s holy family.
Sticks in hand, tongue wags like an artificial love cake
Being devoured by some immeasurable hate.
Join them by the two steps mopping rakes in the age of industrious waste.
These are the days when the great memories are withheld in their behavior of late.
The girls are charming,
The Church is content.
Always there is a widening gap between them,
But that is how lost bitches love boys.
If your time it right you can recall the whispers of your lament.
During that time when boys hold out their refusals
Like batches of honor without intent.
Who would not be there stationed over the seas,
Undisturbed in the café,
Shouting with frequent decorum over those stupid songs
Describing the girls’ brand new clothes.
Holy pictures,
It was holy pictures they drew,
Masters pocking fun like youngsters,
Pastors holding time in the Saturday’s room holding out their night crimes.
You can hear their voices dancing in the distance as he heard it.
The structures crumble to his feet.
He tip toes over them without haven’s permission,
His eyes are drunk in nightly benediction.
These are youngster’s song that reveals nothing without addiction.
Come here, unite grubbing feet and light up that torch
That pilots my pirates’ golden fleet.
Part 2
Recognize this among them,
A priestly robe catching drools of catechisms as they fall from the girls’ lips.
Not really.
They have come upon the town.
Better then this
With the child in front of it,
Unknown child, large eyes, sad stand.
How pale, how swollen is the skin’s wail.
I know, maybe her parents are poor,
But that is now is an excuse for her great report.
Common, chase after her, take the prize, the golden choice
I promise, God will ring today in the choice of blessings
That a child tears could never erase.
Part 3
Oh, don't fall ill,
The day of the great happening is before us.
Common and don’t be down on your worship
By whispering into the dark like a high phoenix
Shivering in cold mountaintop.
She felt still and left alone after endless and endless wonders.
Oh, don't stop there! Don't you understand it is an endless going!
Those kin folks of your have trespassed the air that you breath.
Forgive their stupidity,
They have given their exhaustion to retirement, that is OK,
Just poor water for them and dream of angels’ virgins with hi-voltage breasts
Milking the children from their lunch money.
How fortunate for us there are no Jesus’s for them to cry to.
We are tranquil and dismayed by this behavior;
Don’t drink this, Oh Lord!
They have formed lines as if in the Roman phalanx
Showering them with the Love of Adonis.
In the afternoon they would serve salads mixed with raisins and eggs,
Someone is touching their forehead with kisses,
Caressing their feverish stain illusive blood.
Outside, the heavenly vault they have designed is a great will,
A will to outlast the sky in the starry night.
They came dressed in Linen,
White linen that is.
In yesterday’s time
When they came as if their virginity has not been taken away, yet
The bite size ice cream that she is licking
Has not acquired permission to go into her throat.
Or, that is great, she is in remission.
All eyes are on her now.
She bites the water lilies as if she can get juice out of them.
How sweet of her to think of her mother that way
It is a desert, let just go on and give her this forgiveness in that rigid form.
Oh, Queen! You have been warned.
Part 4
In paperback books our lady is drenched in a blue veil,
A mystic dimension assaults her gaze.
Exaltation of cries sometimes pulled at her skirt.
She tripped and fell,
Then, a picturesque take over consumed that growling notion
And rode out a story with a boring look lacquered in Chinese glaze engravings
Mixed with a decadent pale looks that frosted this pages.
You, who have just now stepped in her shoes,
The distressed soul that you wear have striped your twin sister in court.
Her pillow face is marked by red line sniffing the sobs out of your lazy hands.
Why are you prolonging this stares, why those streaks of cares?
The tenderness is aching in regret
As it drools the shadows’ roulette in the barn filled with yardsticks.
Upon your eyelids standing out is a child gazing into your smile.
Don't turn back; the loose curtains have concealed her face.
Pull down the shades,
Refreshments will be served shortly.
The air here is fresh enough,
But beneath the sheets the baby is born
Who’s born desire is a rejection of breast-feeding,
So give her a glass of refreshment and don't ask her name because of choices.
You are immodest, your desire is a peak of a height of their retire.
Don't startle me,
I am in the blue sky shining dreams on God.
My celestial overcoat is dripped in frantic Gold Dust
Undoing the celestial interlude.
Don’t bother me!
I am with him who hides in Linen with nakedness of form
That only God’s appetite could devour.
Part 5
At midnight windows open to the broad blue sky,
Her love locks awake and tuned the slumber of blue tirades.
The moon beyond her
Reached in and soaked her despair
And shade the drenched vision that cause the whiteness of her name in veils
On Sunday’s like dreaming after thoughts
Whose red nose extends into forever more
By bleeding all over your adorables.
By bleeding into the chest of hopeful ‘I don’t cares’,
By bleeding like a thought that has delayed the meaning into a crystal glass
Mounted on the carefully open lips sucking the lights in the delightful kiss.
God enjoys your weakness like a Sunday branch.
God enjoys your chaste at the Graduation dinners.
Come with me to the bathroom
Where lovelock can thrust my aftertaste into your thwarted dreams.
Common, are you scared?
You heart is full of gold beneath the trembling legs,
Your shoes, that tender shoots that are heavenly bound, gazing at my delightful rise.
Common, come with me into the bathroom
Where we fall and rise like a delightful paper floating after use.
Bath yourself in the spring waters of the impalpable.
Virgin mother is undressing into her night gown,
Her reddish childish stares have captivated your rapture making your member rise,
Hurry up already, pack up the suitcase!
No, don’t take that coat, take the soft grey one.
I am thirsty; her hand is reaching for the water,
But the night has deceived her bleeding heart.
Now, you are released,
Stuffed with hope in Peace with your rebellion remote.
Oh, your holiness, you have passed by the outhouse
As if nothing has happened!
Did you not case the joint looking for the victims of your enemies to expiate?
Come; let us look at them,
They have been all made into the child brides,
They are beneath the glaring eyes
Sucking on candles that are no longer flaming stars,
But inside the courtyard a hand is readily prepared
Coming out of the shirt firmly gripping the dry hope,
But her whitish face has ghost risen into a charming aftertaste