1987-1990 Poetry Slam Era

I’ve watched you walking by, wanting to reach out and touch you
I can feel your inner strength like a great tree holding in its branches the fruits of many lives
Juggling feelings, needs, schedules and all the rest of a family’s myriad of activities
Carrying it all off gracefully with the simple glee of a child at play
I am amazed and astounded as chores that look like leaden weights to me, float through your hands like leaves on the breeze, arranging themselves just where they need to be
Your deep, dark pool of all accepting love calls to me: “Come in, dive deeply; you’ll not reach my limits yet child/man
But grow to them you might
With nurturing and love

Simple pleasures,  quiet joys
Dawn’s pastel sky arising
Subtle lead,  gentle yielding
Moonlight’s silver misting
Further journeys,  fewer hurries
Sphere of light expanding
Sexual union,  tantric touching
Ocean womb enclosing
Mind to mind,  eye to eye
Blissful fusion burning
Heart to heart,  fingers touching
Great power of enduring

It is a funny kind of prison
I am not being held captive inside of anything
not being  held anywhere in particular
I am just being kept away from one person
held away from a mere one five-billionth
of the human race
yet that person, in all of the world
is the only one I want to hold and be held by
It is a funny kind of prison

Once I loved you with the love of a sailor
long years gone to sea
finally coming home to safe harbor and family
Now I love you with the love of a child
who has nursed an orphaned animal
and is ready to set her free

Large waves flowing
carrying our lives
like  corks a’float
to distant shores
still knowing
That what is right will be
after all our desires
have played their game
what truly and forever
will set us free
There is no need to fret and worry
or try and climb
outside this life
with all of its challenges
and urge to hurry
Because deep in the heart
we remain at peace
knowing that God’s love
will create with our life
an exquisite work of art
Let God make the Plan
choose the colors
shape the forms
creating with his hand
in me, a better man

On the surface there is so much color
The play of complex forms
Look into the center where peace reigns
Pure content
Eternal wisdom ruling supreme
Look within,  behind the surface
Recognizing only that Beauty
That lies Universal at the Heart
Of all objects and beings
May we come to look into each other’s eyes and hearts
And see this one
Knowing that so long as we recognize this
That all else in our relationships
In our life, will be well
Thank you God
That you make your Glory
Available to us all
HERE
NOW

An angel came to me this morning
an androgynous being filled with glory
all arrayed in golds and whites.
It hovered over me
giving me a gift to hold for you
a sphere of swirling golden plasma
an etheric globe of light
a miniature sun.
It filled the cavity of my outstretched arms with cool heat.
I cradled it against my chest
heart’s home touching its living core.
At first its weight was almost too much for me to bear
not in the usual sense of weight
no, gravity hardly noticed it at all
it not being made of earthly substance
but heavy with promise
potentials multiplying, waiting for explication
essences enfolded in implicate order
waves in harmony, resonating, entraining themselves
in ever ascending rhythmically patterned pulsations.
The angel floated there
silently
observing
waiting
finally saying:

“This gift is for her
this gift is not for her
this gift is her
this gift is not her.”
“You are to keep this gift
you are to let go of this gift
you are this gift
you are not this gift.”
“Honor this gift
honor the giving
honor the giver
honor the receiver.”
“Keep it with your most sacred treasures
recognize it in everything you think, feel, sense, and do
now take it to her
with our blessing.”
I am on my way to you
streaming like liquid light
cascading down through endless corridors of Time
finding eternity in the instant
flowing like a planet’s molten core
in hundred million year cycles
steadily forward, towards you
slower when encountering obstacles
faster when aided by allies or the environment is kind.
I send out the thought:
“Please wait for me
don’t grow impatient
I am coming
I am
I really am.”
Then entering rooms filled with psychedelic softness
pale turquoise and deep pink edges surrounding everything
one door after another
leading from room to room
floors, walls, and ceilings beginning to pulsate with soft, flowing waves
almost breathing
each room growing brighter and yet softer as the corners melt
and flat planes curve into each other.
Moving on
ignoring vistas that once would have stopped me in awe
compelled by the call of duty and the desire for completion.
Now with a sense of hope sure of imminent fulfillment
I begin to move on more rapidly
room after room passes by in an accelerating blur
my feet cease to notice or even touch the floor at all
doors open at my thoughts’ most subtle touch
bright flower petal hues infused with light turn to pure pastels
becoming brilliantly white
almost painfully bright
all sense of Space/Time vanishing
no more body, no more self
rooms like mammoth endless caverns
with light suffusing everything
moving near the speed of light
standing still
ocean womb of starry night
blazing
blinding
deafening silence.
I approach with God’s certain promise
the final door
Heaven’s gate
its massive panels intricately carved by the sum total of all human adoration
flaming jeweled edifice.
I pause before it
wondering what lies on the other side.
Sensing my question
it waits until my courage and curiosity overcome my hesitancy
just a brief moment for I’ve come too far to stop now.
Then, with silent, stately majesty
it opens.
On the other side
I see
behind the sky of Heaven’s reign
and the cross’s promise of redemption
blessed by the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost
I see
oh my God!
I see
I don’t believe it!
I see you
drifting there across eternity

holding a golden sphere
that you’ve brought to me.
Oh God
will I survive this bursting of the heart’s feeble vessel
this melting into you
your transclucent sky-born face serene
God’s gift of peace
held in me through you
held in you through me.
We move simultaneously
approaching each other
drawn by gravity’s inevitable certainty
until our fingers touch
then your eyes open
and looking into mine
the serenity on your face
smiles
emitting light
embryonic purity becoming joy.
We laugh
our eyes sparkle and grin,
as we fall through each other
the golden spheres interpenetrate
and when they find shared center
explode outward in silent loving
their boundaries expanding instantly to infinity
encompassing all Space/Time
all possibilities
all sexes, colors, textures, and tones
all joys and sorrows
the play of creation and co-creation
This is what we are
my true love
this
is the gift we share.

I lie here appreciating the infinite play of beauty
as varieties of experience in complex variations
act out their universal themes
Myths and magic realms come to life
kaleidoscopic patterns dance across the sky
imprinting themselves on the back of my mind
The brain stem’s reptilian urgencies
underlying the mammalian’s emotional needs
give rise to human meta-functions
allowing appreciation of the glory of creation
all that is
So let’s come together and dance
creating new movements
flowing without repetition
like the river of life into the infinite
eternal ocean of beauty
Knowing ourselves for what we are
huge majestic beings
enlivening human personalities with their bodies
and their small ego’s identities
from before Time
and beyond Space
as quietly in the night
souls glide by with mountainous sails unfurled
Our intuitions sense these and question
who or what is there?
What immense presence lies behind the surface?
What essences come to life on this small planet?
That as we touch with bodymind
it is as though two mere postage stamps are touching
two small lenses creating a window
through which these great though dimly sensed Beings
can come to admire each other
and through such mutual admiration
admire themselves as well
Appreciating beauty
urging on our exploration of new expressions
the bringing into existence of new forms
rich tones of color, sound, and feeling
in complementary modes
that synergize each other
to reach new, startling new, dimensions
of beauty drawn to Heaven’s song
from and to beyond this world
in and for the appreciation of exquisite beauty
the appreciation of this
Life’s exotic play.

Ohh I thank you for your love
I thank God for your love
I rise up over you like a sky-spanning bird that spreads across the world
in a spiral pattern
seeing all, feeling all, as we enter into a consecrated episode of lover’s play.
My very cells quiver in ecstatic joy at the thought of being near you.
Ohh I growl a deep-throated purr UMMMMMMM thinking of you.
Ohhh I want to feel you under me, the perfect receptacle for my thrusting,
throbbing might
and I do.
Our nakedness greets each other’s like ancient friends finally reunited
with many stories to tell, many gifts to share, and oh so much to teach each other.
I ride you long and slow and deep like the warm ocean swells caressing
a South Pacific beach
explore with you
finding so many richly decorated rooms lying in wait of our further investigation
that even with the most diligent care we will never exhaust exploring them all
and diligent care is what we bring to bear on this oh so very, very delicate matter.
My studied wisdom riding atop your abundant natural talent
both much practiced on less challenging courses.
Ohhh and now I would feel you and see you riding on top of me
we roll with the practiced grace of a pair of dolphins
and you rise up over me like a geyser climbing to the sky.
I watch your face, eyes closed, mouth barely open with pink tongue tip
slightly protruding
as waves of rapt expression pass through you.
Watch as your head and shoulders sway atop your undulating body
watch as beads of sweat ooze out of your skin
forming drops that flow down your body joining into rivulets
some of which find that lovely valley between your delicious heaving breasts
and pour down off your silken belly onto mine
while others creep across those heavenly mounds, collecting on your sweet nipples
and swinging right then left and right again until they let go and leap in a spark of faith
landing with an inaudible splat on my damp body.
I see the fine sparse web of dark, curly, glistening hairs stuck to your chest
and belly
borrowed from mine when I lay on top of you.
I watch as your consciousness goes internal
watch as you are filled with a white-hot fire that consumes you totally
leaving nothing, not even ashes or a wisp of smoke
as we become the high voltage alternating current
that pumps life through the earth’s arteries
OHHHH – I love to fuck you
fuck you better than anyone else ever has
and watch your face from a close, steamy vantage point as you come again
and again
listen to your rapturous moans that cut the night air like warm indigo velvet
kiss those pursed and panting lips
lick off those mustached beads of sweat
find ever deeper more exquisite passageways in your hot, juicy,
consummately skilled pussy
carry you to heights that you’ve never reached with anyone else before
transport you to realms of golden light as heaven opens within you
yes – do for you what no other man has ever been able to do
and then more
Yes much more
drive the ecstasy longer, stronger
become all men for you
the perfect expression of the archetypal Other
and then when I’ve taken you further than you’ve ever been before
stop and turn
finding new dimensions of gentleness that evoke your most profound trust.
Now you take the lead
something you do so expertly
as through the wall of Space/Time even more exquisitely subtle realms are
opened to us
we pulse in long languid waves that bring an esoteric message
all our cells come alive in a cool fire as we know each other as denizens
of this heavenly domain
eternal lovers engaged in eternal mystery
given expression here on earth once again
as we are matched perfectly in skill, and love, and service
joined together in appreciative awe at this great blessing we’ve received
and wrapped in gratitude, as we vow to pass it on
lying in each other’s embrace with a quality that words can never
adequately convey
giving ourselves gradually to sleep
breath slowing
deep sighs
sure that we are loved
loved more passionately, more completely than any love but ours
as it perfectly mirrors God’s could ever have provided
until now
in this magic moment
we are fulfilled.

Mind climbing high to new peaks
Where even the valley’s lows hold an exalted position
Over previous, more dense forms of existence
Sailing in acrobatic ecstasy on heaven sent currents
That tease with pulsing surges and perfect calms
Expanding to embrace new realms
Then coalescing to stabilized those gains
Joy, as strange new sights become old, familiar friends
And new newer, more exotic horizons beckon
Steady progress
The acceleration of acceleration
As new talents and insights
Are synergistically accommodated by the family
Of previously recognized generalized principles
My heart opens and soars
Leading the way for less bold dimensions of my being
Laughter and tears meld together
As the sheer joy of existence overwhelms me
With gratitude for the beauty that surrounds me
Living, fluid, conscious beauty that works miracles
In the hearts of those who suffer
Beauty that spreads across the earth
Unifying diverse elements onto one lovely picturestory
A complex scene manifesting simple themes
Complexity with distinct internal order
Complexity with clarity of its boundaries
Complexity that evolves
Feeding on itself and its harmonious relationships
with other entities
Complexity with the infinite patience
That comes from knowing that in God’s Drama
All scenes will be acted out
All roles will be filled
All themes completed
For our gory and more
Rich beyond feeble human imaginings
Rich beyond history’s clearest note
Subtleties refined from subtleties
And then further refined from further subtleties
Bring a satisfactions rarely expressed
In human arts and letters
Till nows

What surges up from the archetypal depths
touching all people
in all times and all places?
If not love, then nothing.
And something immense
does stalk the deep labyrinth
of mind and time
through cultures old and new.
Massive sinewy strength
that lifts our souls
like dandelion puffs
wind driven
destination
home.

Silence descends
like the closing note in a splendid symphony
that has been perfectly performed.
Or the saddest, and that too in full measure
as this last note is extended until my heart breaks
from the ache of straining after it,
knowing that as it ends so will my time with you.

But I hope that our love does not also fade away.
That we have the hearts to hear
the lone pure note of our love
that is forever undiminished.

I’ve climbed icy peaks
crossed glaciers’ crevasse-riddled expanses
crawled across burning desert sands
then swam the ocean broad
stopping only to eat, sleep, and eliminate
yet even then my eyes did not close
not even to blink
My gaze is held steadfastly upon you
I see your presence in the sky
and will climb even there too
till I embrace your hibernating soul
and my warm breath thaws your frozen spirit
Then you will spread your newfound wings
and fly with me through a rainbow sky
filled with the delight of exquisite companions
and their most companionable ways
turquoise and pink in a vast fluffy sky
Pegasus striking his white hooves at Hippocrene
bringing forth these sparkling images in an ageless process
that would serve you now
humor that comes with clarity is both ever present and precious
coming as it does with healing intent
out of the infinite creative mind of God
as we celebrate through the salvation of laughter
and the atonement of gentle loving
the growth of life into ever more subtle domains of delicate awareness
and mutually satisfying play
is to be nurtured
encouraged
shaped
lightly
into many domains of lacy symmetry

In dreams too deep to be remembered
but yet known by their effects
you come to me
bringing healing
and a reminder
of the infinite.

Upon being asked for advice
on how to obtain lasting happiness,
the venerable hippy said:
“When in doubt, take poetry.”

I come down out of the rocky highlands
to roam in your lush, green bottom land.
Flowers greet me,
and bird songs.
Ferns along the stream bank offer me comfort.
The mystery of the glade reminds me of a familiar
but long forgotten promise
that I may lie down my burdens and come to peace,
resting eternally,
comforted and protected by your heart
as I let my boundaries fall away and merge
with life eternal.

Archetypes, angels and stars
are one thing
the same thing
art
process art
God’s art
us.

Mountains beyond Time, lofty pinnacles that reach the very heavens
beckoned, whispering an invitation:
“Come explore my hidden valleys, they are sweet and lush and kind.”
Ohh how can I ever hope to tell you how profoundly those few words struck me.
How hope was reborn in my heart long cold,
rising like a Phoenix from the ashes
How immediately I set about preparing for my journey.
How I endured long days of strenuous hiking just to reach their foothills.
Still, hope did abound in those days of innocence and wonder,
and I traveled on and on with a light heart.
Climbing from vistas grand to vistas truly awesome and sublime,
seeing visions that no man like myself, for I was not from around there,
had ever seen before.
The atmosphere had such clarity that it drew the liquid bird songs
across great distances undiminished.
It drew the nighttime’s stars down into my mind where they danced their sparkling dance to beautiful etheric music.
The days of the journey merged together like a river, sometimes in a placid calm, sometimes in a raging torrent, but always, inexorably moving on.
Until in the highlands where the last vestiges of normal life struggled for a
tenuous hold on existence at all.
The pure white of mountaintops came down in a swirling all-encompassing mist.
The tough grasses and ancient gnarled pines turned white.
My boots and gloves and mind turned white, a perfect white so true.
Outer forms melted away.
Gravity itself seemed to give up its hold and light shined brilliantly
all around and through all things.
I thought that surely I must be dead or on a journey far stranger
than any I had ever known or could even have imagined.
And while I felt no current I seemed to move though from whence to where
I could not tell.
Gradually the white seemed to part like clouds and looking down I saw color.
I had a living vision in which I saw a young boy at play upon an emerald lawn,
absorbed in some childish game with sticks and stones and bottle caps.
He looked up, smiled a radiant smile, eyes bright with recognition and an invitation to come join him in his play.
I stood there paralyzed.
I knew not what to do until he reached out his little hand, took mine
and led me down onto the grass.
Taking hold of the props we set about making the drama of the world
unfold within our play.
We began with beauty and grew to love, till dark shadows came
to obscure our day.
Then here and there, gentle loving unions were swept aside by rude tides
of plague and war and famine.
Down into the play I plunged, taking on roles, some noble but mostly not.
I felt the actors’ joys and happiness.
I felt their pains and sorrows.
Shared their ambitious plans and their grievous failures.
Out of the darkest clouds I felt lightning bolts of rage flare out,
scorching the very atmosphere they traveled through.
And once in a while I felt the warm glow of compassion and was touched, deeply touched.
Modest flames that joined together into a burning sphere of love.
Flames that grew into a roaring conflagration burning all old sadnesses away.
Then, with fear dispersed, I surged back out in soaring flight,
back up from the game upon the lawn.
Tumbling, rushing, expanding.
Gladly returning to that white phosphorescence more than mountain high,
the home of reason wed to love, where serene and pristine contemplation
reigns supreme.
I felt the chill and brittle wind blow right through me.
My heart chimed a perfect tone like a perfect silver bell, bringing me back into
the two-armed and two-legged troubles and opportunities
of my own making.
I awoke on my bed looking at the familiar ceiling.
I felt the slow rise and fall of your breath and the warm glow of your body
next to mine, and I knew far more than what I had known
before this journey began.
I prayed a deep, deep, most heartfelt prayer full of anguished longing.
I begged God to help me understand.
I prayed that the roots of pain acting out their sad story
in this already long suffering world
can
and
will be
healed.

God of light
I catch you for a moment in gold and amber hues
I let go into your primal pulse of ambient wonder
and leap
like a spark
away

I walk thru the misty night
Accompanied by dreams and a few precocious fireflies
Long Down the silvered road
Walking walking
Going nowhere in particular
Following God’s advice for the lovelorn
I guess
What could and would happen
Blinks
Like the fireflies
The mist catching a breeze
Pirouettes
Dons a sequined gown
And braids moonlight in her hair
She comes to me
Her soft misty arms embracer me
Her graceful fingers dance around
Behind
And come
As a cool cavern’s breath
Into a sultry summer’s night
Lying languid, loosely folded
Pristine and fertile on the land
And we skip like a child’s flat stone that never fails
On it’s journey across the pond
To find one more skip and hop
Deep into lover’s charm
Soul’s aspiration soaring above the dense cloud cover
To flirt with the naked moo
Just turned the bend to new again
Two dark and quiet shadow gliders
Take the night as theirs
And move through the world’s blacky-inky tunnel
In one heart, one truth, one union bound
What warriors, saints or silly children these
Now outside the roles of civil tone
Taking the glass-banked turns with frictionless ease
Wingtip to wingtip, flying free

Back and forth, back and forth,
the soft slow and gentle rise and fall of lapping waves,
the subtle rhythmic groans and sighs of well-worn rigging,
the gentle plops of rope and canvas hanging heavy in the sultry salt air.
A sleek and sturdy vessel lying anchored in the bay.
A most benign and pleasant place
from where the light and friendly breeze and I,
with enigmatic smile and touch do journey casually.
Journey overseas to you.
Now naked
I lie stretched prone and glistening
on the polished teakwood deck,
soaking up the sun’s warm healing rays.
Watching as sunlight plunges into the emerald depths.
Watching how it gives up yellow as it takes on blue.
Sinking, sinking,
yes I remember
sinking into you.
Oh yes, I remember, ohhh I do I do.
We were graceful dolphins
in a very silky-fluid-friendly dance,
sharing telepathic empathy and longing touch,
loving deep and deeper into the velvet depths
where aqua turns to indigo and diving deeper yet
turns a cold jet black.
And there in an unremitting absence of all light
save for the glow of an occasional bioluminescent jewel
just swimming by
and the fading trace of phosphorescent waves we made
I also remember you.
I remember us singing together in harmony
notes that were not just heard but felt
in a complex and exquisitely beautiful symphony of touch,
and still are
as we, in the depths, are touching consciously
through a medium that knows neither distance
nor Time’s erratic passage.
No near, no far, no slow, no quick.
Our future as strongly present
as the spirit waters through which we swim together even now
though many miles apart.
Only we’ve been making quantum leaps
and like a bubble that’s just burst in joy, in ecstasy,
are just now finding our way to round and whole again.
To come together soon,
again, yes once again
in a place of wonder.
Reaching up out from the earth, as though drawn
by the etheric pastels that roam the highland skies,
where the barrier between the heavens and the land has thinned
and where lovers’ faces pale
becoming white with the light
shining from, all around, and through us.
Yes, I remember sinking into you
as day remembers night at dusk
and flowers back to the earth
their seeds, their racial destiny entrust.
And we a pair of wings
that have felt the lift of left and right and common body
sweep through the waters
sweep through the air,
and sweep even through the void beyond,
with memories alive,
sweet delicacies of memories,
tender tidbits transcendent and sublime.
Fortuitous beyond our mortal dreams
once shared in wonder
and still seen as gems, if only semi-precious now,
for what we were we’ve gone beyond
though they served us well as omen bringers,
signposts pointing the way to this far brighter day,
more splendid, more alive in constant bliss,
more precious than all the old King’s treaures
now lying bored in some museum’s dusty haunts
or some bank vault’s sterile coffins,
while the living things we do are free.
Oh yes, I know
with the certainty born of patient testing
and ceaseless observation
having verified again and again
that which I have glimpsed
no, more, that which I have been filled with by the fertile flood,
the winds of ancient memory
that will descend in future days
with a graced and noble strength
that enters through our bedroom door
and exits more enriched by far.
Sharing the wondrous tones, the ecstatic moans
that carry light to heaven’s heights
and need not ever come down again.
Ohhh yes yes yes yes, I remember