October #15

overwhelming -
but what would i do
if i wasn't?
i could minimize,
cut back,
but the idea makes
me pull away. What would I do?
With all that blank, frightening time.
How could I fill me up, ensure that I wasn't wasting
a single precious minute if I didn't have something
to fill that darling minute with? I could waste time
on sleep and exercise and meaningless things.
But I don't want those.
I want brilliance.
I long for stardom,
for supernova,
for permanent memory in the minds of men.
I yearn for meaning,
not peace.
I will be blown by mad winds, slogged through slag heaps,
tear myself up and down, burn out in a quick hot flame,
but I will not waste
the ruby emerald diamond seconds,
each too small and short,
that I have got.

October #14

Each time I try to avoid some one.
I run into someone I'd rather miss.
Each time I try to make excuses, run,
I accuse myself of social cowardice.

October #13

lucky number, isn't it?
or evil?
hotels skip it,
for whatever reason.
so do some artists,
leaving blank tracks
in their albums.
superstition?
the hotels and singers
are quite successful.
from what i hear.

October #12

falling behind

what can you do
when you stumble off the rolling train?
it's gone before you know it,
and no silver can run like the wind,
to catch you up.
from that moment on
it's the mad dash,
the full out race,
falling faster and faster behind.
a mountain piles up,
days fly by,
and all of a sudden where has the time gone?
halfway through the semester,
ten days til hallow's eve,
six days til your party,
two days and homework's due,
tests to take,
friends to keep small contact with
before they, too, drift away.
oh life's a madcap race,
and there will never be enough hours in the day.

October #11

I strip off my clothes and dive in to the subnormal pond,
shivering and freezing in the water, my mother, my maker,
and swim. There are fantastic fish here,
huge and gold and whiskered,
and though the water is murky the lower I sink,
they shine all the while, a beckon or beacon of other things.
There is no bottom here, only a darker, muddy, dirtiness,
near which blind white mountain cave fish murmur,
sickeningly grotesque, pallid shapes that come too close
but do no harm.
Is there harm here? There must be, but not in the depths.
The warning comes treading water in the middle,
unsupported - insupportable, unpardonable, ready for the snatching.
Come take me! Here I am, weak and lonely, too far to
speed to shore and pull myself up. Too far.
Too far.

October #10

there is no premeditation here.
i do not examine,
pause the wordflow.
no cork stops my mouth.
my wine pours out intoxicating
drowning
and it's up to you to drink or pass by.
can you live with this,
my sick gold, my horrible wealth?
there is no pausing here.
i pull back my sleeves and thrust my heavy hands
into the bloody, open mess of a body.
i refuse scalpels,
use sharpened rocks.
instead of stitches i leave patients to slowly sew themselves up,
with the thread they make themselves.
i am not silent, i am not kind,
i am not cruel - only truthful.

October #9

Exposure

The northern exposure
freezing cold,
rocky mountains,
no protection from the wind.
That's where the word "exposure"
comes from, anyway.
Nothing to hide you from the chilling cold,
the bone-rattling gales
that shake you from the peaks.
Oh, for the serene postcard stillness
of plausible mountains.
You and I,
we know.
They're not quite so
photogenic up close.

October #8

throw me back
wards in time and
make me remem
ber.
there are people i have forgot
ten long ago,
peop
le i don't ever think
about.
but a song
a mention
a look
and there they are
waving hello.
how disconcerting it is,
seeing these ghosts all about
walking in daylight.

October #7

white legs flash
down the side of dark roads
"it gets so much darker out
when i'm at home
or maybe just earlier"
weapons held in both hands,
heavy blocks of wires,
communication,
entertainment -
the longer one runs,
the heavier and hotter they get,
these tokens,
pressed upon the runner
by roommate or boyfriend or mother.
white legs flash,
all alone,
dark roads.

October #6

Since when have I had this current inside of me?
Before there has been the excruciating birth,
the babies hastily forged, forcibly pulled,
screaming and crying,
from out my bloody brain,
into type and life and legibility.
But now with this season and this time,
an inspiration has moved me to fertility,
wondrous, productive, endless fertility,
the kind where I have so many idea that
I actually can afford to forget some -
and do,
though I wish it not and regret it much.
But there are too many infants in me crying for atteniotn,
and one or two must always fall behind.

October #5

I love this month.
I love what it means.
I love the feeling tha
as soon as this month starts,
the air will be crisper,
the apples riper,
the pumpkins oranger,
life a little more surreal.
I love this month
because fairies and goblins,
mushroom rings and red capped men
are more alive for me now
than at any other time.
I love this month because of possibility,
about wild dreams,
about nightmares.
Because I want to be one with the night sometimes,
and this month lets me.

October #4

let's talk about tired,
about waiting up
on foolish excuses
because of silly fears.

let's talk about tired,
about wasting the night away
on one boy, one hope,
because of long loves.

let's talk about tired,
about burning time
plunking at the keyboard,
because of school or research.

let's talk about tired,
the kind of tired that stays with you
even after you've slept every night,
ten hours,
twelve hours,
fourteen hours,
and you still
can't
get
out

of your bed.

October #3

Give me autumn,
she cried,
give me autumn or I will die.

Who did she think she was,
anyway, Patrick Henry?

It's true the fall casts a special air,
makes sunsets more poignant,
underlines our mortality,
livens up our life
as the cycle of celebrations begin.
In February we will fall again,
laughing,
tumbling to our seats trying to catch our breath,
as the swirl of holidays finally passes us by.

What good times! we will exclaim.
Never will we have known
company friendlier,
champagne better,
memories sweeter,
mistletoe and egg nog more intoxicating.
Then we wil sigh and pluck our clothes
and ponder how long
til next fall.

October #2

the leaves fall down
covering dawn with russet colors,
the leaves fall down,
protecting the earth like patient mothers.
the leaves fall down,
and mere humans watch and whisper,
but the leaves fall down
with no thought of mortal trifles.

October #1

Do not I owe some tithe of poems
to be sung and celebrated this day?
Am I not responsible for some joy
some expression, some rhymed lay?

The leaves watch me as they wither,
and the acorns, pumpkins, too
whispering me secrets of coming winter
And must I not follow through?

I have a debt, but not a burden,
a requirement of words,
a message of thanks for Nature's ken,
that should ring forth like fighting swords.