VIDEO: Planting

This is a video I completed for the youth concerning a project they were doing for the Caring Cupboard in 2010.  I like the way it came out, and it's one of my favorite videos.  My brother, Rick, did the narration for it.  It would have benefited greatly with the use of a tripod, but such is life. 

Poetry: Songs of Death

THE BOOK OF REVELATION

The love of life is gone
     darkness touches its inner soul
     filling remote corners
     with its velvety, numbing pain
Emotionless
It moves as a puppet
     pulled by the twelve strings
     of the dark believers
It experiences anew
     round objects with sharp edges
     colors that smell
     sounds that taste
Fillings its empty mind with
     new thoughts
     new ideas
     a reformed purpose
The soul, now blackened
     does not return
     from out of the ash
     from out of the dust
     whence it came.
Smiles caress the faces of the dark ones
     their numbers grow
     as beings convulse and die
     the stings are jerked and pulled
Their powers increase

Time passes by
Impatiently awaiting the Son
     to lash our from behind its
     heavy curtain
Waiting to split the darkness
     and bathe eternity in
     Awesome Light.


INCIPIENCE*

Go now, O soul
     tread upon that land
     follow the footprints if you can
     leading toward the unknown
Worry not that your prints
     track not
     lost in the many
     that have gone before
Follow the trodden path
     hardened by centuries of
     perpetuate use
Think not that your footprints
     obscured
     seem washed aside like the
     millions of lives that have gone before
Wave upon wave of years
     swirling past
Fleeting , spectral shadows
     cast by the fading light of
     an eclipsed sun
     waiting for no one.

The future remains a vision
Dreams awash in haze and clouds
Muted by the millennia
Of past suffering and silence.

Follow the scarred, treacherous route
Upon whom fewer have traveled
Where pristine, outlying reaches
Remain unmarred and unexplored.

Search now, O soul
Search for the meaning
     in memories lying dim
     in the recorded pages of time
     waiting for those who seek
     bereft
     as solitary prints upon the sand
Tread upon that land
     follow the footprints, if you can
     of incur to make
     your own.

Go now, O soul, Go now.

(*beginning to exist or appear; in an initial stage)
 

SOUL FLIGHT

In consummation of life
     it drives itself through the barrier
Clashing with the stark cold
     beyond the frozen sphere
Casting effervescent tendrils among the
     ensconced ecclesiastic
Sparkling against that
     icy, black backdrop
As some precious diamond
     prematurely crushed from existence.

Hallucinogenic origins
     of the universe
Revealed through mist-clouded embodiments
     of a life now extinct
Reality awash
     in waves of time
As a new version of life
     gestates and grows
Until time and space themselves
     wink out
Lives join and
     become one
Bounded by the Glory of
     the Immense Being
Whose face is masked
     by that of the Lamb.

Woe to those who
     make the journey unprepared
For the path is dark, long and
     traveled unexpectedly
Death reveals the key to life
     and the key is simple
Yet how often it is ignored
     by those who understand.


SUPERNOVA

One quick flash and
All is over
There is no sound
No deafening explosion
No cries of anguish
Only looks of curiosity
Followed by one brief instant
Of apprehension
An instant between arrival
Of that terrible light
And the cosmic radiation.
Hundreds of light years away
An alien nation lifts their eyes
Toward the heavens
A glorious nova
Lighting the sky
Even by day
Alien astronomer focus
Their sensors and recorders
On the spectacle
Unaware
That they record
The final death convulsions
of a once mighty world.


INSOUCIANCE*

The flame of life ebbs
And as his eyes close at last
     in death
He sees himself more clearly than he
     ever has before
The floating grayness
     and the retched scream that marked
     the final transition
Have faded into dull nonexistence.
All is peaceful
Tranquil
Blissfulness overtakes
Pain, anguish, fear
Debilitating emotions
     that have plagued him through life
     have been stolen away
Vanished
Set to ease by those emotions
     he searched for all his life
     yet never found.

(*lack of care or concern)


THE JUMP

Go ahead,
 Jump!
You think it looks so deep, so dark?
Have you really looked?
Do the walls look as solid as you think they should?
Go ahead,
Bend down and touch them
But not too far
You must be ready
When you go over the edge.
Well?
What do you think?
Not so bad, eh?
The surface is kind of soft and warm
And do you see that small shimmer of light
Way down there?
That's where your journey ends.
Your path is predestined
Only one way to go
Once you jump.
You've no real choice at all, you see
And the light does look inviting
Doesn't it?
You feel a little calmer?
But I can see that
You're still scared
Don't be embarrassed
It's natural
But fear is something
You have to overcome.


HOLOCAUST

Appropriate
For the disintegration of life surrounding
Darkness
Ruling over existence
Latent sins
Arising continually
Out of the shadowy paths of past consciousness
Duty calls to lay such sinners rest
But death, which is death, as life is death,
Remains forbidden by ancient laws.
Vengeance acquiescent
Unacknowledged
The cunning past retains its haunting
Over all how have touched
Its fevered, spectral hands
Claws
Which decay when trust removed
In agony
Live or dead
Changing consciousness
Actions
Thought
Remaining vivid
Revengeful
Influencing as the present
Not yet laid to rest
Or more so
Seeding the wind that reaps the whirlwind
Only death, which is death, as death is life
becomes less harsh and cruel.


DEMENTIA

Time
The embryo floating in its glossy fluid
Has no notion
Nor the old and feeble minded
Whose neurofilaments
Entangled among themselves
Flash signals here and there
In a vain attempt
To rouse the life
That once was theirs
Ticking by
Gaining speed as even it
Grows old
Perhaps perceiving
What human flesh cannot
As it runs from something
From which there is no escape
But for death
Or races toward that
Which we have yet to know
Something glorious and
All-encompassing
Picking up speed
In an anxious attempt
To grasp it still sooner.

Time seems against us
We sit
Confused
Doubtful
Unable to change
That which cannot be changed
As leaves tossed about
In an autumn breeze
Floating on the winds of time
Willing or unwilling
Going where e're it blows
Cast into wretched piles
To rot and decompose
Or
For a few

To soar with the wind
Sensing new freedom
Excitement
Experiencing the wind
Becoming part of it
To change
Explore
Belong
Achieve
To live life
To its fullest.

And when that time comes
When our own neuronal cells
Flash incoherent signals
To themselves
To be inwardly content
In the knowledge
That time
Never ceases
With the assurance
That the confusion will end
In death
And once again
Time will be our friend.
 
Time
As the wind
Will carry us aloft
And show us all
We yearn now to know
Yet cannot comprehend
The enemy of the dawn
Will prove itself eventually
Too be an ally at twilight
By showing us that our lives
No matter what we've done
Will have been important
If we've spent them loving
And caring
For each other.

Poetry: More Mundane Mental Meanderings

STELLAE

Your light glances down
Giving incredible visions
Of eras long past
And gallant worlds beyond our own.
As a symbol, you have been
The Inspirer of Legend,
The Director of History
Your movements have guided the smallest
To the largest of tasks.

Oh stars, how many questions
Have been raised to you
As you sit knowingly, eternally
As a demigod of lightening
Powerful and indestructible?

Yet the merest wisp of moisture
Erases you from the heavens.


CORONA

The ones you wear are not of your choosing
Had you known, fear might have been
Your overriding emotion
Or curiosity
Masked as that insatiable desire
For knowledge of the unknown
Thrust upon you in the wink of an eye
None would have chosen your fate
You did not
Whether you know it, or care
You bear them well.

(Written in honor of the crew of the Challenger.)


REJECTION

The ocean bid me welcome
     though I was far
     from our usual meeting place
We had struck up quite a friendship
     the sea and I
So I ventured down
     to sit by her side
     for a time
But a fierce storm blew up
     from the south
     before I could arrive
So I sat
     not caring to venture
     from the warmth and dryness
     of my car
     gazing at the water
     pummelling the beach
Reaching out with my mind
     to embrace my friend
But the ocean
     like a wounded lover
     concealed her thoughts
     from me.

(Written while I was stationed at Tyndall AFB, on Florida's Gulf coast.)


DESOLATION

The wind and
lightening
symbols of
loneliness
(inescapable)
so far from home.
Searching for
friendship
companionship
Yet living
without a glimpse of warmth
kindness.
All I see
is the top
of one lonely tree
out here
(awful expanses)
on the prairie.

(Written while stationed at Tinker AFB, Oklahoma.)


THE FINAL DECISION

It wasn't always evil
Many came to meditate by its side
To play in the waves
To cool themselves from the summer sun
Its face was often benevolent
But when its obvious temper flared
Humans stayed away
Unknowingly wise in their fear
For they lacked the insight
To read the water
And often trusted it
When it did not deserve trust
For it was sly
And demanded occasional offerings
A rogue wave caused
The excitement it craved
Much time had passed
And it grew tired
Of the playful beings
Who frolicked in its surf
So it puffed itself up
Deciding it was time
And while his children watched
It killed the man whose back turned
Toward the waves.

(For Thomas Barton, my high school Advanced English teacher, who was killed by an ocean wave while on vacation.)


THE SECRET PLACE

Oh, to be all alone
amid the wood and wind
Where solitude lives and breathes,
becoming a welcome partner
in the pact
sealed before birth.
To wander over the years
always returning
to my secret lookout
over the beautiful horseshoe lake.
I brought my parents here,
my loved ones,
And my friends,
we sang a hymn to its beauty,
And met the One to whom I give all.
And finally
at my twilight I come
to the place
Where surrender means
to become a part of the mountain
In the only place
that yet has meaning.
To die here
alone
on Whiteface Mountain.

(Written either in Grad School or during summer "music camp" with the Gregg Smith Singers.  Both locations are close to Whiteface Mountain, the summit of which is one of the most beautiful places God ever created.  If one has to die, which we all do, I can think of no more beautiful place to do it.  What a great final visage it would make.)


BEAUTY
 
What is beauty
      if it is not the warm haze
     of a summer's day
     delicately lodged between
     the unwavering mountains
Or the rainbow
     cast against the backdrop
     of angry thunderheads
     still charged and alight
     with frightful bolts of lightening?
 
What is beauty
     if it cannot be seen
     in a blade of grass
     ebbing its way forth from earthen cracks
     in the stained sidewalk
Or in the dancing leaves
     on a lone tree
     growing between immense stone constructs
     in the heart of the city?
 
Even a child's tear
     pristine and moving
     as it is wiped away by one
     who cares enough to surrender all
     to protect his innocence and breath
     offers insight into
     a heavenly beauty
     incomprehensible by human understanding.
 
Through His gift of free will
     the universe lies wide before us
Our gift to Him
     our inner eyes which see beauty in all.
 
For by His hand
     all the beauty of the world
     was released from darkness
By His voice
     eternal silence was shattered
     by the vibrations of celestial music
And through His eyes the vision of a universe
     all encompassing and complete
     was released from His thought.  

(New York City, 1985)

Poetry: The Hay

THE HAY

A soft breeze
Rustles the dry hay
Murmured sounds
Inaudible
In an angry world
So full of hunger, dread,
Unhappiness and danger
A world
Where violence
Is second nature
And the tales
Of good deeds of men
Fall upon deaf ears
The struggle transpires
A struggle of decisions
Whether to go on
Or give up

Why?
We never really know
Hiding our doubts
Behind false gestures
Of good will
Our motivations
Remain transparent
Unalleviated fears
Continue to grow
As our confusion
Regarding true wisdom
Clouds our understanding
And judgment
Drenching our souls
With emotions of
Self-doubt and worthlessness
Emotions better
Left dead and scattered
As the dry hay
In an October field

The emotions of a child
Basic and true to life
Free from learned fears
And imagined dangers
The basic emotions
Of a child
Portray our emotions
As they should be
Unpolluted by the
Contaminants of the world
As miraculous
And wonderful
As a newborn baby
Cradled in a stable trough

The hay whispers
In his ear
Caressing his head
Telling a story
He listens
This varlet of God
Comforted
By the soft sounds
Of the hay
Against his frame
A frame
That will all too soon
Be scarred
And bloodied
In an attempt
To draw mankind
Back to its beginning
To understand
The basic emotions of
Love, trust and acceptance
The emotions
Of all children
So close to God

As it has
Since the dawn
Of the first sunrise
Live continues
Perpetually
And since that
First man's sin
Mankind has proceeded
Through life
Wrapped in a cocoon
Of self-misery
Unheeding

The hay
Alive since that night of
So long ago
Still stirs
In the quiet darkness
Still is unrequited
The hay
That told its story
To the King of Kings
Yearns
To tell us the same

Listen
To your soul
Go back
To your beginning
Be mindful and
Watchful
And Listen
For the gentle whisperings
Of the wind
And the hay
And when it comes to pass
Heed its tale
With child-like wonder

Poetry: For April and Les

BIRTH OF A DIVA

The singer wandered
     questing only
     for the loved notes
     of the master Verdi
     scribed for all posterity
     on the biblical pages
     of the score
     she explored the organ room

The organ had been
     a friend
     a bewitching lover
     who caressed
     the golden notes
     she expressively warbled

Echoing through the hall
     they became as one
     the organ and she
     sustaining each other
     in a single, ecstatic union
     that only singer and organ
     could know

But the organ was tired
     of accompanying an alto
     of sounding low
     mournful notes
     repeatedly
     endlessly
     Sunday after Sunday

It yearned for a
     loftier
     happier
     sound

And as the singer
     obliviously delighting
     in her discovery
     of Verdi's Requiem
     reached toward the
     high shelf

Her skirt
     dangled precariously close
     to the organ's diligent
     hard-working
    air compressor

The organ
     always alert for
     targets of opportunity
     seized the skirt
     and sucked
     with all of its might
     dragging her toward
     its ubiquitous maw

And in that instant
     the organ was rewarded
     beyond all expectation
     as the singer
     in startled surprise
     issued forth
     with the most incredible
     high notes.

(This was written for April, a fellow alto and friend of mine from the Gregg Smith Singers, who was injured when, just like the poem says, she got too close to the air compressor of a pipe organ at church.  She was injured and even needed skin grafting to repair the injury.  Being a good sport with a great sense of humor, and despite her being injured, we had many great laughs over this incident.) 


FOR LES

A minuscule piece of lead
travels with tremendous speed
as it explodes
from the barrel
vectoring straight and unyielding.

Should it not know
its destination
and rebelling
turn back and
attack the quivering hand
that launched it?

Yet unwavering in resolve
it screams forth
shattering bone
scattering blood
forcing the soul to flee

So tiny
how can it do
so much damage?

I'll never understand
how a single bullet
can silence
so much music.

(This was written for another friend of mine, Leslie Dorsey, also a member of The Gregg Smith Singers.  Les, who was 44, was driving a gypsy cab in New York  on Labor Day 1988 to earn extra money to put his daughter through college.  He was killed during a robbery, shot point-blank in the back of the head by one of three men in his cab.  He was tentatively identified by police the next day, and it was almost a week before his family learned he had been murdered.  He was a very caring father and an incredibly gifted musician.)

Poetry: The Mountain

THE MOUNTAIN

"By order of the Earth, come forth,"
     the Mountain commanded,
Its huge voice resembling the wind
Storming through boundless stands of virgin timber.
I crept closer
And with repentant eyes
Surveyed the cold immensity of that
     Mountain face.
Staring toward me with majesty
     humbling my very soul, it reprimanded,
"You think yourself unworthy to be a part
     of the same world as I?"
"But," I pleaded, sweat dampening my brow,
"You stand vast and eternal,
Mankind has looked upon your rocky visage
     from the dawn of time
With wonder.
As ruler over all you see,
You know all, and live forever.
How can I compare?"

The Mountain seemed to smile,
Dislodging a pebble from the corner
     of its rugged mouth
"No, my child, only God is eternal.
For all His creations there is a time
     and a place.
Even I have a beginning
     and an end."

"Could you impart some of your wisdom
     to me?" I pleaded again.
"One small insight into the meaning
     of existence;
One thing to be thankful for?"

"Surely, my child,
Let us go down into the valley
     where the stream trickles through,
To gaze upon the elk and the deer.
The summer breeze will warm us,
And my wisdom will be all
     for you to hear."

I began to journey, but after several steps
Turned toward the silence at my back.
The Mountain, stony and immobile,
     watched me with sorrowfulness.
Its waterfall,
Which had once been an echo
     of a mighty voice
Had become a torrent of tears.

"Perhaps you begin to understand?"
     the Mountain queried
Its voice now seeming a
     windless whisper.

I turned and started down the mountain
Amazed at the infinity mobility
Within my two
Small feet.

Poetry: On the Lighter Side

SLATE RUN TALISMAN

I know a place
Across the creek
Where you can wade to on a hot
     summer's day
When the water runs low in its banks
Where you can sneak up to the
     train tracks
Staying hidden by tall marsh grass
And, when the train's not looking
Steal a penny onto its track
To be smashed flat when the train
Hurrying to be on time
Fails to see it lying there
Quietly
Waiting with anticipation
And to skip along with it in
     your pocket
Feeling the smoothness against
     your palm
Knowing its been to a place where
     you can't tread
Ah, the joys of youth
To take such delight
In flat pennies.


INITIAL EXPERIMENTS

We honor our youthful scientists who
     after careful experimentation
    deduced

That quartzite
     crushed ever so finely
     layered lightly atop
     garden soil
     containing only minimal amounts
     of sand or shale
     could be spread evenly over earth
     with a high oil content
     usually scraped from beneath the
     family car

To make the most wonderful
     mud pies.


TIMESCAPE

One has only to sit
along the shore
and gaze intently
at that unfathomable horizon
to become
a time traveler. 


ERIK

With a giggle
     he takes his rake and playfully
     scatters the leaves in all directions.
He looks like quite the character
     with his grandfather's cap
     six times too large for him
     haphazardly perched
     atop his head.
Stumbling on an untied shoelace
     he drops the rake and races off
     toward the trees
     an imagined safe haven
     from the friendly ghoul
     who gives chase.
But luck is not with him.
The monster charges and with a grin
     lifts him into the air
     scantly four steps from the shelter
     of a big maple tree.
Amid strains of laughter
     he and his grandfather
     roll onto the ground
     throwing the once-raked leaves
     toward each other,
Accumulating mud and grass stains
     on their knees.


GREG

I had to laugh
a moment ago
as I watched your tiny feet
still uncoordinated
and not too helpful
trying to run along the beach
joyfully chasing shells
before the waves
could carry them away
your little suit falling
down around your ankles

Yet I sense fear
as your watchful eyes gaze
over those crashing waves
never venturing too far
not wanting Daddy to wade
towards that watery horizon
as you sit
perched upon his shoulders

Fear not, little one
you may find as you grow older
the sea holds the answers
to many of life's questions
if you sit beside her long enough
and wait.


ALONE

Alone
I sit under a dark cloud of doubt
Yet, as I look up
I see untold billions of stars
Each glancing down with a contented glow
I wonder
Are we the only living things in this universe?
Small blobs of protoplasm bouncing around
Each tending his own business
With no concern for each other?

I know
That we are not the only things in this universe
It was not created for us alone
For as many stars there are, so too
May there be
Habitable plants.

Alone
I sit, yet not alone
For as I look up at untold
Billions of stars
I know there are untold
Billions of eyes
Looking back
At me.