Friday, September 25, 2015

PORTLAND BOY


 

 

Two small feet in scuffed tennis shoes descend

into the damp basement of a 2 story

colonial house immersed in a turgid roiling sea

of infinitely black weather. The boy drops

 

step-by-step onto sturdy wooden planks,

one beneath the other, until the cement

 

floor rises to meet him

where he stands alone.

 

Strange vague feelings in his smooth belly

begin to be deeply felt, quite soothing,

 

quietly.       It’s so quiet here.

 

Somehow                                    only

when by himself

 

does this misted rain fall unpredictably,

subtly onto his receptive lap, gently

 

entering the short ruddy virginal body to fill

an emptiness he had not named before.

 

How does he know to welcome this astonishing

surprise, like those flying seahorses in the dream

falling friendly, speechless and soundless

from a sky so faraway?

 

becoming aware of fruition truly, like the exact

uncertain moment

 

(wild stallion and chestnut mare

together asleep under a sprawling

mesquite in full flame….)

 

conception….

 

peaceful and unruly--

 

mysteriously happens,,

Thursday, September 24, 2015

Portland Boy


 
 

 
In the damp basement strange
vague feelings in his belly
deeply felt
 
(especially comforting)
 
somehow                    only
when alone
 
would they fall
into his receptive lap.
 
misted rain fills him up
 
descends friendly from
a sky so faraway
 
like the exact uncertain
moment
 
conception….
 
mysteriously happens,,

ODE TO SATURDAY’S GRAPEFRUIT                                                       

Your happy tongue a fat
planet eternally orbiting
the yellow-orange sun

of sweet luscious fruit. In love
with its juicy plump flesh
 
and how its ode-orous radiance
enters eager mouth’s cool cave
 
where you speak a lusty grinning
silence, a born-again tongue
your first language,
 
loose and fresh, new
as a white dwarf star.

Breakfast astronaut, strip off your space-suit
burst into pleasure,
free-float naked in your capsule
of citrus where gravity’s absence
 
titillates these taste buds,
lightens all flesh and linguistic
pretensions as it hijacks 
your rocket ship towards
 
an untraveled atmosphere,
seduces quite tasty
like hot hasty sex in the shower
at home far down on earth.
 
Now, you’re a high wire tightrope walker
in thin air married to pulp quite piquant,
a kitchen chair your net underneath:
your face fiercely amorous, eyes
 
sparkle with inhibitions unraveling,
as flying soars further, juices
flow greedily across your chin
like a crowd of kids’ fingers
 
cotton candy sticky, their laughter
goofy and loud
at a clown’s artful hijinks.
 
This long hunger for new worlds to traverse
fulfilled by what flows in-between
taste buds and citrus and
by these small oval seeds that
 
harbor chlorophyll--growing neurons
to flower your blooming bright brain, flourish  
galaxies of mushrooming desires.

Oh astronaut! Oh tightrope walker!
Let yourself languish and linger,
be astonished inside grapefruit's
pink succulence, this stellar ripening
this thin steel wire clear liquid gleaming
 
that’s nourished and grabbed you
star-struck for good.

taste its foreign fecundity,
savor its puckering liminality,
explore its other-world corporeality,
hear its tingling full-flavored poetry.
 
Yes my dear breakfast devotees
You wild devourers
of fresh tangy  
grapefruit
 
simmer and sizzle
sing if inspired
 
in this obscene solar system
under the big mesh canvas tent
 
inside your private Sputnik
of requited cravings
 
beguiled, beguiling
 
crooning and raving,
 
a true lunatic’s mooning,
 
all Saturday long!

                             OCEAN

 

The ocean shimmers out beyond the orange buoys.

 

Daylight bends back towards tomorrow.

 

Maybe rain will fall again one day in this town

of shopping malls and desiccated desert ground.

 

And then you may return with a bracelet of green

jade on your right wrist and a basket woven of small

surprises, salty wet on your smooth tanned back.

 

A robust quiet ripening,  

your favorite calling card.

 

Then the ocean’s play with light and wave

might make sense once more.

 

Then hope shall erupt and rise from the nestled shore

like the slender dancer drunk and lusty wild in her

graced ascension at your first gypsy wedding.

 

And then, and only then, the New Orleans funeral marchers

shall swagger single file down Bourbon Street on a shining day

 

soaked all golden like dervish saints, their music spilling over,

entrancing us with such sweetness and god-damn, rag-tag

swelter.