all free me
and the pain
and the whispers
and the spider

nothing's changed
about forever
Remember when I told you

We drank our souls in cafe cups
(shared our breath in soul-dance vows)

Can't undo the strand

MOTHER CHRISTMAS

Christmas souls
flash snow storms
Mountain homes
feasts
friends
love

Music &
New memories
new family

Remember the solstice
where we were angels

There's some greater mystery,
I mean...the way the hawk I saw
reminded me of your name
(     )

calls on me to rest
The  forest of my youth
Some kind of home
Death to all of us

freedom of our breath
and always have been
that you are the one

home forever
Before death takes me
I wanted you to know

girl in the coffee shop
to love you
I think it would be easy

Do you remember
the poem I wrote you

( I only spoke it to you
at the party, I came to
with her,
she was also very tall and
easy to fall for)

You said the story wasn't
over (and that we should probably
be in love,
all over the world
all the time)

Nights we tried to
free stars in our heads
(bleed out the pain)

Rode steeds to death
into crumbling sunset
(burned down all your homes)

Trapped in our fantasies
(baby you and me had made
our deathbeds on hot coals
and Phoenix wishes)

If wishes were a princess
(and she had only stolen a kiss)

and death was some kind of freedom
(every time we jumped from 13,000 or so feet
and blah blah blah)

I mean maybe we should sit fly or
fuck it just go free style

The thief in our eyes
broken spiders over the continent
She wore a fire dress and spoke
Latin Poetry

(something about Athena and
the wars)

After all the worlds
(come down around us)
back home to me
mama sweet
child visions
(lights in the forest
and the coming
sun)

Rays of lost truth
escape
(radio-waves streaming,)

Spirit-music
you were my
song

Searchingforsomething
tofreeme

all the gurus
goddesses
death machines
(traps in the spider's web)

Yes I'm reaching
(through these
poems) feel it
squeezing
right around your
heart

Ghosts spill back
home (again
I find you )
lingering in that
space where we
are one

Would you be my stillness
sweet angel of pain
(voodoo doll
enchantress)

ecstatic needles removing
almost no blood spilling


I know you think I pushed you
outside the circle that I am ever
receding into your ocean
and the moon and stars
are yours

Take me to the haunted
places
(and the time you were
a princess)

Tombstone passages
of textual perceptions

(yeah like Ophelia unwinding
and whatnot,
and they say everybody
rises and such,
and such)

Or like Easter and the Heavens
and all the beautiful ladies

(ride them fast machines
son...I mean make a machine
of yourself, cuz, I mean you
and I baby, we were just a dream
(a dream in stillness that does
not move))

Those moments of ecstasy
Unraveled everything
Buddhas shining right through our clothes

If you ever un-dream us
(rust through skies we
lit up)

Remember how every cell in
our bodies would jump right through
our sneakers

(the grilled meat and Indian trails)

you shared your mother-goddess-visions
about life on earth

I gave you time-travelled poems
(I just gave them all to you)

When you burn in
you burn in

Deathless wings of us (Freedom)

Jamming

Speed of union
hurtling stillness
creation

Mother spider lonliness

(forgive the memory vibes of heisting
glorious lives of thieves)

I'm not giving back what's stolen

(keep the ecstasy I gave you)

Your being is flying, flying inside of whatever is free in me
name the spaces of evergreen streaming vision fleeting
is where gardens of us grew to beyond the sun (loving the moon)
poetry melting into the blending of us touching silky hot skin
forever, wherever your thoughts lead into seeing
to the center of the golden dream we dreamed
me I'm just floating in the sky you built long before we were born

I'll always love
the pain you are
to me                  

(blood
 fire
 freedom)

You can set all the angels free
Can you trust in the trust of letting out the dream
All you ever knew was just a wish of us waiting
To enter the lucid cloud of dragons chasing
Such a luscious paradise as us

It's too bad really,
that for me you died
some time ago

(hauntings)

some kinda history
hah baby?

world revovled
behind us

thought I pulled the
trigger on you baby

(Brush the dust off those
ghosts every once in a
while)

 

Keep living the
beautiful life

(memory of the terrace,
off the marble room,Goddess
painting,

and you with the lotuses)

You turned the light on
in Paradise city

Down there in the valley
where all the girls are pretty
and yada, yada, yada,

We rode fast and hard,
jumped at 14.5 thousand feet
slid across the ground

(crashed every goddam thing that
moved)

Spent some time down in the
city gettin' dirty

(rented some time on the high
to get outta the city)

Slipped into paradise just
like a thief and lo
and behold

They gave me diamonds and gold
(all I gave them was my soul)

After the fire they sent me home
all burned out and such and such

and without the keys
I went in search of the perfect machines

(you were everything I ever
wanted
needed
dreamed of)

Sundari

If the comet becomes awesome
you and I will visit
In between the hemispheres

we got hit that night
train-wreck smile
a mile wide

Too high to
hide

 Moontides and
shit

(floated away
floated damn near
to now

grounded down
nailed to the floor

can't find the door)

slammed out the shutdown
round and round the
earthspace

location unknown
she died after she lied
downtown

(turn the moon out
it's early)

Bloodshot free
ripped-jeans ridin
sextasy

days and days of
lucid dreams
poundin pavement
and flesh of
silken memory

those mountain mysteries
Shangri-la gravity
misty peaks

songs of dawn come
haunting

where do you go before
the penultimate run

(we had some good ones;
yeah

rode through storms
and shit-shows

freaked on the stuff and reeling
from the blows

some kinda prizefighter dodgin
stones

and the African flack
with the Asian-dirt-track

she was at least 6'2"
and stone cold beautiful

tear through you in the hurricane
morning and just splatter you in
her paintings:

0h sure she had the candles and the
wine and the silver
and the reasons to never
forget her)

I mean
whatever she wanted me
to be

(easy, easy
for her to free
the free)

slide with
talk of smooth
scenes

a cat with cream
and the cafe steam
(live on the scent and 
caffeine)

Something of the air inside
we shared breath
and it meant somethin
to me

(free and easy
in jeans) and
of course you know
all about the
machines

we rode fast NYC
times and the ghetto swag

(it's just a bag
lady
bag of tricks
and childhood dreams

let me trade them for your
fantasies)

with empty
means

We ain't that
crazy as angels
stoked up to the stars

(it's just the machines baby)
yeah we could fly and
everything
but she told me about the
song without speaking
(I mean she just started singing
halfway underground
inside the pyramids
by the river

perfect key to free
our soul-birds)

and then we rode
moto through the stinking
villages
children sinking into the
decay of a civilization that
once
ruled

Yeah she was a goddess
and whatever
she took the microphone and
told us about the enlightenment,
blah-blah-blah

The empty chaired gurus and the
stone facades
(stolen lotuses sold cheap
I mean I bought you those roses
grown on the blood of hungry
beggars)

and they probably just died by
the bedside with our
throw-away ecstasy
and Western bravado

I've had some lucky nights
Star-crossed and such
we gave our souls

Dumped our gold
rode fast into
sunset

What was he supposed to say,

"Hey, we took a trip to paradise
and you asked for a refund"

They say he's in the
North Country now

(maybe he has a full beard
and wears the fur coats of animals he's
trapped

I don't know...maybe it's a
lie and he's clean shaven
hustling the rich girls
at Soho art shows

He could be in Asia doing
the phony guru thing
meditating in pyramids
with all the beads and such,
acting like he's gone
local

I'm sure he still writes poetry,
probably riding those damn
motorcycles,

(they say he's started to jump
out of airplanes again)

I have not heard from him
he was always elusive,

but then again he has a habit
of reappearing in full regalia)

Most Phoenix-like son of a bitch
I've ever met
could reinvent himself
at the drop of a hat

(probably pull some big flashy stunt
any second now)

I made the machines
my friends

We had this rock n roll thing
to work through
and the pain
and the ecstasy pulled us through

(i never knew it would be you )
axis of that moment roaring

symmetry of our perfect centrifuge
(everything we've loved and feared)

All ghosts and angels riding
free
Ride free with you
Ride free alone

(I know my gods are
with me)

I keep your tears in an amulet
I keep your smile as a shield

I keep your warmth (it's another
sun inside my fire-heart)

I tattooed your name inside
my wings
(with the blood we bled)

It's okay for you to be free
from me
(I'm just some kinda bird anyway)

Some eagle or
somethin'

(some kind a' tribal tattoo,
where only the mythological
content remains)

We were like
"Sha la la la man"
it's just the machines

She came with the dreamers
(out in the forest)
spirit guides

Beyond the death
times

(she had musical goddess
rhymes)

some kind of sky flyer
(never used the ground)

With the wings and
the guitars and the
trips to Asia
(and whatever else she
says)

We can control
the machines

(it's the beauty inside
that frees you)

lucked into you
pretty hard
(tripped the fantasy times
broke reality lines)

Sunshine mountain
laughter flying through
our skies

all things must die
(reborn a thousand lives)

Don't talk to
the ghosts anymore

Petal to the metal
ain't just small-talk

Burn some rubber
and let's get the fuck
outta here

this ain't no time to
grow old

give me something with a throttle
to pin


(let's jump at 13,000 feet or
so)

Show me some kind of cliff
(let me push your ecstasy a little
past the edge)

Here in the countryside
(stoking the fireside of
my mind)

Take a ride on the crumbling superhighway
representing the cracked pathways
of neural transmitters fucking with the
synapses drowned in
caffiene

(spit this poetry out like blood
another jagged metaphor)

you make me miss
myself sometimes

with the mountain memories
and owls visions

(she had a goddess vibe
with her sisters and her
Asia tribes)

We seen some
graveyard times

(packed our bones
on wooden ships)

nothin' but the star
guides

nothin' but star
guides

(prayers to gods,
vanishing)

You know that I write poems, right?

And that I am also a Poet

That I live to ride

(that I loved you
the way the sun burns
and the heavenly bodies
turn perfectly aligned)

I'll go and find the stardust that made us
wait till the steel walls rust,

(burn down your forest)

so your skin
was the tone of
the Maid Asleep,

While we dined,
on the balcony,
as the music played
(a violin or a cello)

shall we walk into
the View of Delft
Float butterfly-like
through the yellow brick wall

Time is a place
where we are
touching other places

(bring me your madeleines)

I have that indian summer
where we rode outlaw
and unafraid

you know these poems
are all about you
if you read them

my love will
find you

REMEMBER

Indian summer filled
with long legged blondes
wrapped around the Harley
and van Gogh sketches in
red pencil

Hunted the lonely Avatars
lovely in their enlightened pain
hungered for the answers
glory wrapped in silken
refusal

(bit into the fruit
blood dripping from our lips)

cannibals all of
us
(can't forget the taste)

She has wings that flow
so beautiful at hiding the hate
(give me your anger
human-ghost-goddess-killer)

Let it never be said
that I did not love
the Machines

(created Mythology
from our spirit-totem animals,
and the angel's tears & dreams)

Time sounds
smooth movement
hips swaying lips convincing
us of nighttime star tastes
coffee summer-darkness-by the
indian trails

every cell is humming thrumming
bumping into each other to get
to us melding
into love visions of
dead dreams rising
Osiris and jesus and Mother Mary Goddess
and such

(radio quiet
spider visions)

worked through the cowboy
times
(cracked leather saddles carried
us too far)
past the vultures and the sun baked
sky

broken charms littered a room we
never saw (childhood spaces protected
with the talismans of our spirit eagles)

we broke the plain of the main-
stream stream just long enough
for the puma to leap

The universe began
at our flesh connection

(time is only moving backwards
to the point of infinity)

Spider Mythology

She will be
reborn a thousand times

(chiliad of children
crawling across this earth)

Weaver of the universe
great mother of the cosmos

Thank you Mother
for the golden leaves
on the trees

For the unspeakable
freedom
of Being

(coming out of the
mystery,
back into the
mystery)

No spiritual traps here
nothing spiritual about me

(motorcycles, guns
freedom,
jumping out of planes

whispering poetry to ghosts

born to be with or without us

into your name that day
sure as I spelled the clouds
and that wild horses gallop away
as though infinity was a friend

stopped thinking she was free
didn't realize that if
she thought she was a goddess
(out through the in door)
Would she stop dreaming me

Glass breaking
steel/bone smashing
blood spilling
flesh eating

(we live on the free-rush-speed)
goin for 2tons
(jump high
pull low)

full throttle
die fast

Mutant drones
behave themselves
take showers

Mow their lawns
collect paychecks
they're doing it right,

Just like they learned
(from the other monsters)
reproduce,
consume

Die with security

Reverse phophets
interpret grammatology
twisting post-post-modern
back into structure

their brains functioning at a
pre-mythological level

bacteria writhing,
infecting each other
multiplying

Words slide
perfect
(our cells regenerated/
reintegrated infinitely
understanding the bond)

(But when your mind is gone
[fuck the buddhists; it's not a
good thing] down the tragic
road)

You only know ghosts
of yourself

funny how a
whole lifetime
fits itself

into one movie
(one brilliant ride
filled with color,
thumping through Asia,
blitzing across north America,
European precision,
fatal death-dance-sentient
explosion)

We became these dreamers
so long ago
(warriors of the long road)

Betrayed our secrets
sold blood
concocted venom
(antidote to the antidote)

The pleasure machines
gave us only more
machines
(and more needs)

The angel is shot down in flames
only to rise
again

You are the Buddha
warrior

Seeking
(answers to
the crime of)
Yourself

Drifting
(what you wished away
from her)
forgiving nothing

Betraying
(whenever driven deep inside
the heart-cave)
you both created
a

Dreaming
(living space outside/inside
of here)
a timeship

no more philosophy
time is moving
for us

pushing and pulling
the double helix

(she should have known
my number)

I don't know
the words
anymore

Did I ever let you
go
(Yes; I still believe in
the machines

The freedom and the
speed)

Climbed all the way
up into the sky
just to jump out and
see if we had
wings

(my poems tell me
when they're written)

Bitten by the spider
(the one who knows
our secret)

gave us her precious
venom

fangs milked of
god's seed

Spun our grave for
Us

Spun the cocoon of
our rebirth

bust through blood-times
leaking into motor-minds

rusted blind 
over infinite machine distance

(fragmented moon cycles merge
into flesh agreements)

Violated memories
hijacked mythologies
(wasted histories)

It don't hurt
to love her
(ride all
day

roll all night)

Loud pipes attract her
wind and speed's what
matters

Fly high every time
(love you all life
long)

It doesn't hurt at
all

Crashed through
the victory times
(blood and loud pipes)

Wounds salted to the max
back off the reindeer tracks
we got myths to support hear

Jack up on the caffeine stream
we got too much rhyme comin' over
the whacked out screen

(she stopped
for a second
to wonder if she got it
backwards in her dream)

wondered if maybe this
was the inverse of everthing

Over great distances
(winds of love)

What kind of faith
(carries you gently)

Into my arms

If I said
"in the spider's mind she loves
you"
(you know she dies for her young
and wounds her lovers and
spins a web
that holds the universe
together)

She wondered if he
ever tried to steal a cloud
or was he just a

Horse thief
and if he could find
her heart as if it was
some stolen jewel

lying in someone esle's
safe

Let us be the time
(changers)

Take my hand
stop
(move through the
continuum

to a place where we
stand together

Notice fiery heart lights
blending

Spider suspended in her web
dreaming of now)

Giver of light
and changer of
the universe

One who traipsed through
wilderness of heartspace
(dying/birthing
aching)

Weaver of the spider's dreams
forgiver of all pain

fashion a blade from this insanity
(a blunt object will not suffice)
shred your way through the
dense overgrowth

(love waits,
in a still pasture)

lemme giveya
the whole truth
maybe

I gotsomethin up
my dirtsleeve foryah

forgive my
angel/sainthood evil
ways

shewasthedevil
anyway
that's why we prayed
(perfect symmetry of
diminishing/eternal return)


forget the puns and the
wits and the innuendos,
double entendres 

(gimme the flesh dyads
of our sins/salvations)

Over great distances
(winds of love)

What kind of faith
(carries you gently)

Into my arms

Same magic
keeps both our moons
floating

(binary stars
orbiting)

Warmth of cave darkness

(stars light up my mind,
points of pain)

Pain gives us 
a light post to
follow

(down the terrible
road of
ecstasy)

Currents will take
everything
(thankfully)

I can take a whole
house and turn it
into one motorcycle

(one tattoo)

There is never an answer
(there is nothing unsolved
by poems)

Let us be
Wise
Free and
Unafraid

There have been symbols
signs
revelations
epiphanies
throughout

all whispering
"your poetry is the
answer to everything"

A stranger, in Port Authority
once asked, with indignity
why the poet, had P-O-E-T
tattooed on his left hand

As the indignant man was walking
away,
the poet said "you asked the question,
but you don't listen to the answer"

Seemed like a trick but
it wasn't

New bicycles for christmas
(dancin' slow to the dj in
the gym)

High on the good times
hidin' in the woods
stilleto in his sneaker

Crunching home through snow
immune to cold

filled with fire and
violence
crashing cars

burning down everything

No we can't turn it off
(and she just wanted somebody
to be lost with)

Standin' by the side of the road
it's hard not to know
which way to go

Mama always said
"ask the angels"
seemed too easy

Like when I was a kid
and they said
"turn it all over to
Jesus"

She wore a denim
skirt

Tequila in our saddle bags
so high and right
it started
first kick

Then we got high
forever

Kick start blind

Remember the road times
(empty dirt miles)

Black highway mountains
(eagles at dawn,
then the Puma,
while I was
alone)

Overheard in a Lower East Side Cafe

"I liked every single thing about
her,

Except who she really was".

I like the Time

(time to find
my spirit)

Call to my spirit
with an easy smile

(jump right outta
the plane)

Kick start
somethin'

Them country boys
keep writin' songs
about us

Remember that night
we burned down the trailer

You laid a warm blanket
over me (with your heart
wrapped around it)

--Stay close to your tribe
With wings to fall--

Our Mother Was a light
Worshipper

A Dancer With Angels
(We call her Sacred
Spirit Woman)

She lives with us
on the other side now

She moves with us,
Always within our
Hearts now

She tried to fly on
(lied to her own)

face in the mirror

takes the sadness pill
everyday
(throw it away)

I could break it if
you could stone it

I would burn it if
you would
own it

Poet wanders through
the world
(cowboy wild
animal pride)

Breaks machines beyond
pain (oil,
fire rain)

eats highway
pisses blood
screams steam

take the slow dream
reverse the main scheme
see you at the
beginning

The fallen
Rise in smoke
(cemetery bones
turning)

all our ghosts are sleeping
through the frightened down
come creeping


dream just born
jump running
open arms of everything

When you are
a soldier
you're ready to die

when you're ready
to die
you're free

when you're free
you can live

(open wings
ride winds of fate
drift through angels)

Burn down the scene
(can't touch the purity
of dreams)

Never know the sound of
wings

(smile while
flying)

One hell of a thread
(must be that of the silken spider
strand)

Impossible postulate of
humanity

(mythical
pursuit of
the unreachable)

Burned in paradise
glistening in hades

I will find/ my own /Death machine

Heavy
Sunset heart

drop
from the sky

We burned down
the trailer last night

You got me high
on the Goddess vibe

I held you down
with the soldier times

Fruit of the mountain
(world keeps giving and
giving)

Mother goddess bares
her milk,
flowing love through
us, minute by minute

(walk into paradise valley
time after time
she smiles)

only sweetness for her
children

We had to hold out on
the ghost rhymes
(hold off on the
beggar times)

Too rich from the switch
them marble palaces came
with a hitch

(sunglasses italian style
and the motorbikes
girls on file

with the boots and the robes
and the skirts and the
third world
hobos)

Got off and shot
my gold
off the rooftops and
the pyramid tomes

(we read them scriptures
while they burned before
the pages turned to
space)

Some kinda grace she
rubbed me with
(oils of himalayan honeyed
fruits)

with the disciples and the
offshoots of the offshoots
the Goa queens and the
bad enlightenment dreams

Crazy Cowboy hang on
the rope's broken so are
the spokes
hang on

(she dreams in smokes
dopes poems)

knew how to fly once
crazy cowboy
(hang on)

He just rides boulders
over the stillness
(flies through clouds,
understands her earth
better than she does)

He's got a blade that cuts
through untruths
it hurts

she'd pull the trigger
if she could find it

(He was born with
both barrels loaded
can't unwind it)

Crunched the numbers
they don't make
sense

(she oughta' just fly that
plane,)

Crazy cowboy runnin
strong
(hang on)

All the devils
and all the angels
waitin'

for that song

Crazy cowboy
hang on

no one told you
freedom
hurts

(pain of burning
away chains

too much for
those who fade
into what they
were told)

wings cost

Sorry you couldn't
hang with the
(outlaw-vibe)

(even though I hid
from the tribe)

Just to learn to fly
(creepin up the moutanside
just to get you high)

I'll always ride
always ride

Maybe it's a ride
to take alone
(out into
wilderness)

Thinkin' 'bout what you
Lost and
What's goin' out the
Door

Push it to the Floor
kick out the windows
Rip out the
Walls

(she's so beautiful
underneath
the pain)

Everybody's bein' crucified
(everybody has wings that
they hide)

so the death machines
and the high times
and the night jumps

and the suicide rides
(and the stolen moments
inside of
beyond your wildest
ecstasies)

It's not like we
ever (died or anything)

Left our bodies to
fly
waited universes to (skin on skin)
and then die some more

(we fly through the sky sometimes)
we just keep flying

And riding and
(riding)
these fast machines
can never keep up with Jesus

(give me some wheels faster
than Jesus)

and we can meet behind the moutains
I know your still waiting

(with the ghosts and the
Indian spirits)

Thank you
Thank you

My friends and
lovers

My brothers and
Sisters

And everyone I
have not
known

When we took our
mother to heaven

I held the way
with arms open
wide

You sang
the shaman's
song

I always knew
I could fly

                      I whisper to my
BROTHERS

(We are KINGS)

rule on the earth

Surrender to the
SKY

Not afraid to,
(fly baby fly)

14.5 thousand feet

jump into the arms
of the one
(you see
everywhere)

She trusts me
and I trust Jesus

(when you leap
into the sky...)

No more angels
no more prayers

Speeding bullet into
the sunset

I rode with you
when you were
young
I'll ride with you
when you are
old (when you are gone)

I'll fly with you
(when the summer
cools down)

let the fear of your
freedom
free you

(we fell through the sky
together)

Higher and higher we climb
reaching for sunset

crazed angels
jump out of
anything

speed into the distance
pierce my heart with 
resistance

(I am just a rider
of these things)

The Silence of your
silence
crumbles

(phoenix rising
bold colors
burn everything)

Fire-times
Turtle-signs
Spider-minds

We musta' spooked
the circuit
Made somethin' jump
off the tracks
(a star that won't turn off)

Remember the fast times?
(faster than the devil
faster than jesus)

The photons couldn't keep
up with the stillness we
shot
through the nights

We gotta be free
you and me

I am the angel
that the angels sent
to lift you up

Help you shine

Cleared past the outposts
midnight-dirty-chai
road-times

lawless filthy bastards
all of them
cops with sticks
could never catch us,
blew by them coming
and going

(threw away our passports
and let the buddhas help us
get paid)

women flowed like water
sunlight soft and still
heart-space

Let go of your stone tablets.
commandments,
obligations

Grow your hair.
tell no one the
source of your
strength

build da Vinci's
machines in the golden
caverns of your
enlightenment

I'm strong
when the Sun is in my Sign

(Accept the new power)

All Princes
were born to
be Kings

She...

We,

Or was it the moon;
Athena

(forget the raw metaphysics,
mythology,)

infinite return of us

After the war,
as he was approaching a bum
with a dime,

the street prophet
said,
"Keep your money.
I am not interested in
teaching,
or being taught"

New Horse of the
Apocalypse
Save us with your
Speed

Be just a little
Faster than Jesus

(The last line of this poem was spoken by Freakin Frankie)

Our religion of freedom
and death
Epic times of sex and destruction
our anthems screaming over the
radio

(speed: foggy boozed out slurred
motions
Hallucinogenic enlightenment)

Feet that have never touched the
ground

Thousands of takeoffs,
very few landings

Gotta figure,
If somebody gets
a tattoo for ya'
ya' did pretty good

Are you on this crazy ride
(have you noticed you're alive)

Masses multiply like rabbits
vegetative brain-waves

Live outside the box
(burn down every wall)

We buried your ashes
on Mars
To keep them
for ourselves

and impossible
as it may seem
Lady Slippers grew
with them

Rebel Mother-Fucker

my love needs a
place to go

It's in the hearts of my friends
(into the hearts of my friends)

SERIES OF SMALL POEMS: FOUND IN A PILE OF PAPERS

I.

The wild Ones
burst into Your
Heart

II.

Wild and beautiful
and soft and
Alone

III.

They don't even
notice I'm
Livin' the
Outlaw
life

IV.

I'm a Holy Juggler
Roller of the Bones
(Lost Angel lover)
Some kinda Strange Outlaw
Makin' my way
Home

VI.

Let the Poetry Be
THE MACHINE
YOU BUILD
AND LIVE WITH

Proustian images
timestream slips

Some say she sang herself
into paradise
(she wasn't born a goddess)

Ride through the fire
all you need is no fear

(only the brave and
the crazed)

Everybody goin' nowhere
worryin' about dyin
(you died a long time ago
built a box around yourself
and let the dream go)

Dialogue between an Outlaw Shaman and a Princess

OS: My intentions with you are purely mythological

P: Sounds hot

Stop time again
the flux reciprocates
all-ness into now

(memory of gas station
fill-ups
Harely-Hammering 
100 miles an hour
all the way to Montreal

Cross the bridge into Emerald
city

Rarer than the wildest
wild orchid

her soul is free in the sky
(dancer's feet never touch
the ground)

She planted stars in my head
grew wings right onto my
back

Estlin's (from an alternate universe) Ride

"Some planets that died
(suns that collided)

sprinkled this space/time
with incarnations of us"

[they said he had a shotgun
mind and
motor-headed fingers
of truth

(I swear he built that machine overnight
all inside his brain

he had to slow way down, for
anyone to even
see him)]

Swing it
(trip stone)

Broken sticks
(mended bones)

Heart-sick
go home and
grow some wings

(take the knife out
lick the blood off
put the glass away

let the water find its way
through

We tripped through the death-times
(fucked up with outlaw-minds)

listen to the angel-vibes
the avatar-highs

"these machines will
free you"

Outlaw fantasies
of the Radio Contingency

(summer rises
with its own
memories)

There was a dream
of the dream
we met in

Let us construct our
own machines

(I laid every brick
on this highway)

I am
myself

Smell of summer
rain
Thunderstorm darkness
Thriving!

Got to stay strong
for our Brothers and Sisters

(we got enough love
to make the world float)

Free yourself
of the entire Universe

Do you think
A Million light years from now
is waiting for you to turn and see

These are the free
times
Natural born outlaws

Nothing but a rainbow
(Never back a rebel into
a corner)

What do you expect?
For me to go straight and
imitate your imitation

(row after row of useless simulacrum
take a dump on it
and fly away)

Something God-like
Calls us

The Volcano
of the eternal moment we
embraced

(changes all universes)

Holiness of the outlaw.
My job is done.

Walk with the rhythm
kings and queens don't know

(my inheritance of the buddha-angel-sex-gods-wealth)

Spend those gold coins wisely
only on things that make bold hearts
sing

Mama I know
we see the sun comin'
up all the time

(and we got the beat
of the New York City streets
just a pumpin through our
blood)

MESSAGE FROM A TIME-TRAVELLER: WRITTEN ON THE BACK OF A NAPKIN

I created this way of time
travel

(so you could be free
to roam infinity

and so that I could always
be with you)

We went to the Burning side
(came back more alive)

Stripped of cages
Sun-naked spirit-love family
warmth
of mother-earth
lava flow

(when we touch
we are a new
star)

High on the power of death dreams.
She is one of the things God could do to make me happy

It's my way of not hanging on

(free yourself of sin)

So many worlds to let go of.
 Let go of the manifestation.

Skulls thickened overnight
(bullets flowed like rain
and we don't care)

We rode like satan
right down the devil's gullet
(just made us laugh like
hell)

Some fires can't be put
out

Ride with me
golden sister
through the sky times

Grow those wings
(sharpen your bones)

I'm riding fast machines
into paradise

To make you come alive
(what would it take
beyond the fear
to shred the reality you're caged
inside)

When did you die
(not even knowing you
didn't survive)

What's it like to be so stupid
you think you're smart

Inside the dreams we lied
(lived out the fantasies abroad)
demons just like
angels

avatars disguised as beggars,
miscreants

(god hidden in every
fragment)

Stripped of pain
(we fly
won't die)

Beyond your laws
(which are my laws)
Free of the heaviness
(of freedom)

Those times we were high as gods

The lawnmower people move
in perfect gerbil-cage circles

Some of them avoid eye-contact or
waiving,

Others are incensed if their demands
are not met:
demands for chitchat

Open garage door means open
for the business of gossip
a time to air passive agrresive greivances

against the inferiority of other neighbor's
lawns

1959

Told you I'd take you
home but you didn't
wanna go

Promised I'd show you
the truth
but you didn't wanna
know

(obscured by time and
lives
The switching of things

We used to save the Buddhas
for ourselves

(were you some Moroccan princess
Persian queen
Portuguese dream)

Asia fueled the fantasies
(she was Turkish and the most beautiful
woman I'd ever seen)

We watched the delusional pandering of 
Western hysteria

(crashed the car a thousand times)

You know I've decided to
just ride 

They don't show pictures
of the dead
Only soldiers
in clean uniforms
smiling

To my favorite angel
that I have not met

(I feel the timeless sweetness
of us)

Thunderhole times
on the high vibe
(we're never gonna die)

Some kind of answer
we try to think of the questions for
the way you moved inside the inner spaces
(of my time-frayed dream-mind)

We drank of the same cup

Shine from within
(beggars free of sin)

walk out of your tomb
into the sunlight
of this time
(your now begins)

I'm a punch past
your dream

(nail down somethin real
that can't be seen)

Rip off my wings and grow
bigger wings

Surrounded by Philistines
of the worst degree

sterilizing house and yard (and mind)
is their measure of success

Born to be dead
inside

house is
sky blue (amongst rows of other houses)
spotless inside and out
Cut down every single tree in the
yard (just like the neighbors)
50 or more

Lives in the middle
of the Adirondack park
Pine cones are 
anathema

I am just a prince
a long way from my home
(I saved the dogwood petals
we uncovered on the grass
the day we stopped time)

~Letter to a maiden, circa 1836

(you want me to show you
something)
poets cross their fingers
engines burnin' every cylinder
(every bridge I ever crossed is
gone)

She said "every bridge I ever crossed is
gone, and you weren't on the other side"

We read all the old tomes
built with ancient bones
the roads made outta stones
we ain't never goin' home

(subterranean machines we only ride
at night
just read about superheroes all day long
(still writin' my own song)
I'll only love you if you can
fly

Spooky action at a Distance

We are entangled quantum particles
(is that why I am changing)

Accordingly:
you must feel my poems
without even reading them
 

Did she give you something
that you needed

(That one time
8,000 miles from home
on that anachronistic machine)

Foreign mountains
smoke just like mystic fog
enshrouded our beatific minds

We don't even know
we're time travelers
(a thousand graces of strangers
have kept us alive)

Archeology of childhood forests
discover hidden fragments

(paintings on the wall
drawing of your ancestors)

Take my machine and the hand
of this alien technology

Star Spangled

Everything that you've given me
everything that you've taken away
the death and destruction without end
The loving gentle hands

The fear and control
the ruthless hunger
I love you
and I bleed your colors

Your song
is my song

There's no such thing as Sunday
and none of us are real
which makes it so amazing
that I love you

The wild times
grew out of our eyes
(everyone of us should have died
a hundred times)

Forever Young
we ride crazed
machines of perfect
freedom

Beautiful spirit animals
guide me home
to my heart

4 LUDWIG

The young prince leaves
us for heaven's gates

We ride in circles bereft
of our senses
(but love is there)

Scared like angels
fortified with fear
evidence of primal ancestors

Dirt road forged
Mountain tears
It's hard for us to die

shaped by pain
into the fire
paid our dues

Starting at the end
Whatever she told you
(underneath the night turned white with light)

Tried to create a Goddess
(wandering through my
childhood forest)

We came to die here
(live like warriors
immortal)

From another life
we dance in and out of
infinity

Someplace solid and empty
they say it's a center of light
(haunted with shadows oscillating
into forever)

You wanna break the rules
(there are no rules)

Can't kill what ya can't find
(Breathe fire
exhale death
ride hard)

Tattoo what you love
burn what you can't carry

Burn it
Reconstitute it
run it over

speed into disintegration
there is blood, bones, fortunes
this is no life for platitudes

We ate the Golden fruit
(now we live forever)

Dreams of rivers flow by
Soles of my boots know
which way to go

Just gonna ride for a while now
ride on down the line

Write about a hero that
gets to fight another
day

Infinite treasures of your eyes
haunted by avatars that never
go away

wish for something brighter
(caves of thought-warmth
paintings on the wall create
our now)

we are the heaven that is spoken
of)

We were some
poems once
(dust and dung
dances in sunlight there)

Pilgrims think it's holy mist
But it's corroding their lungs

God shines on pyramids
(from the inside out)

Some eagles in the sky
don't care

If you sleep all day and
ride all night

Dr. William Bukshott

Forgive me for
not living some kind of
shite fabricated life
Laid out in grade-school

reproducing is not in and of itself
an accomplishment

Dogs reproduce
worms replicate
amoebae split themselves in half

~19th century M.D., poet and recluse.

Creating our own Destruction
Look at all the Ghosts we invoke
(The world is only Silence)

Dream on to the
Death rites

(rise high in the
sun-times
smooth-moon-rides)

We are the same:

Warriors of the long
Road

We had some High
times on the Ghost-
Run

Before turning back
into
smoke

reflecting ourselves
through infinity

only to return again,
brighter

Those cities we
marched towards

(euphamisms
narratives
mythologies)

semiotics, mostly
 (all true mind you,
all true)

At least to the artist,
philosopher

Just ask your visions

IN LIVING ALL THESE LIVES

In living all these lives
(richness of spaces
homes
meals
handshakes
hugs
laughter
eyes)

We rode through the tragic times
rubber meets asphalt we're
so American that we're always
on the highway

Visceral movement of machines
(your soul inside my soul
is locked in a place (freely, floating steely
freedom of something that cannot be given or
taken)  that is not a place)

Opus of the Highway
say goodbye to the death-times
give me a few more life-times

Let us swimmingly glide
through the morning colored tides
into the motor-night

(into the oily succinctness of it all
into the fatal flaws of synchronicity)

I knew when I said
I love you
that I was inventing a new alphabet
for a city where no one could read
that I was saying my poems
in an empty theater
and pouring my wine
for those who could not
taste it.

~Nizar Qabbani



 It's the birthday of poet Nizar Qabbani (books by this author), born in Damascus, Syria (1923). His mother, who was illiterate, sold her jewelry to raise money to publish his first anthology, Childhood of a Bosom (1948), and he went on to become the most popular Arab poet and to publish more than 20 books of poetry. Much of his poetry was influenced by the tragic deaths of two women he loved. When he was 15, his older sister committed suicide rather than be forced into marriage with a man she did not love, and he turned his attention to the situation of Arab women. He wrote romantic, sensual poems and poetry demonstrating the need for sexual equality and women's rights. Many years later, in 1981, his second wife, an Iraqi woman, died during the Lebanese Civil War when the Iraqi Embassy was bombed. Qabbani was grief-stricken and frustrated with the political and cultural climate of the Arab world, and he lived in Europe for the rest of his life.

Unmitigated transcendence
sorrow
lives
paths

Intransigent dreams
forevers
promises
allegiance

Requiem for the fallen
Heroes
Poets
Illusionists

Let us rise up
Indigo children
of the new dawn

(time-travelers
space-dwellers
intergalactic-lovers)

All the same
(rise)

The second I saw your eyes
I recognized heaven instantly
Even death would not wait
That sweetness was such that

Wish we'd destroyed everything
Into the eye of the storm
At least tried to fly

We should have taken our chances
Brief kiss in paradise
Knowing it will end abruptly

and delicious
It makes life brutal
Hail to the death times

We are the art
of knowing the end
is never going to come

Just as Somebody
as anyone

Visions 
other one
(dimensions unseen)

Scattered forest
leaves
ghost-hungry pilgrims

Warmth
shelter
freedom

Burn the maps
Burn the books

Bring me something back
from the edge

Invert all fantasies
Now is the Future
Waking is the Dream

Freedom is the best bet
Pure risk is safest

(Defy logic
presume visions Supreme
King)

Faster than Jesus
Vulgar display of Power
Freedom Rocket

Cash=Speed
American Highway Force
Leather-Clad/Hell-Bound

Cities of new freedom
Ideals of the Republic

(Bow to the Philosopher-Kings)

We didn't just dream them
moments ago
(those dreams)

Stopped flying for an instant
to scribe something
(will resume shortly)

We are after the future
and before the past
(everywhere)

She got the Radio-
times
(darkness,
lives

Fledgling out on the
ledge
(everybody can fly baby)

Angel eyes
the skies hunger
for you

Roaming these answers
(presocratic forms)
meta-fictional fantasies

I write myself from books
(she found me in my
poems)

Storm Rider
have you lost your
vestiges

ancestral memories
cell-recognition
of the cave-spaces

(fossilized primal-shaman
marks

Cro Magnon creator)

freedom of blood-flow
fear of enemies
driven to hunt

Bone-yard times
(she had those red-dress
nights)

Death-machine highs
(with the homicide wheels)

Pure Underground
so far out on the edge
no one on the edge noticed

Blinded by relfections
things that shimmer (bounce back
vitriolically)

each ray lifting a little higher
lighter and lighter
heavier and heavier
more earthbound
more starbound

(I can almost fly
now)

Only the glory
we remembered
in the end

Strange Axiology
herself reflected
(in my reflection)

Have you made
your mind beautiful
wrought it with the infinite
apparatus of deconstruction

a Ghostly avatar unnoticed
Empty plane-ride returning

(angels and gods came
alone at the pyramids,)
Inside a marble palace

I told her my poems once
through Asian streets,
forever goddess, whisping

(lost broken paradises cradled...)
Global meanderings

home
Strange Christmas of being

After the shot-gun times
(shock of realizing the
world was not constructed
of nursery rhymes)

We kept crashing to know
we were alive
(just couldn't die
just wouldn't die)

Made it to the summer fields of
your eyes
Lost in the mountains
no one knew we were there
you and I
making poems

Strange Christmas of being
home

Global meanderings (lost
broken paradises cradled...)

forever goddess, whisping
through Asian streets,
I told her my poems once

Inside a marble palace
(alone at the pyramids,
angels and gods came)

Empty plane-ride returning
a Ghostly avatar unnoticed

Initiates of the Mystic

carriers of the double edged sword
Preachers of the infinite

for images

groping in the darkness
we have reached through time
Fellow poets

So you noticed the tattoo

(I didn't have it inked in

it seeped its way through my
soul

onto my skin)

Fellow poets
we have reached through time
groping in the darkness

for images

Preachers of the infinite
carriers of the double edged sword

initiates of the mystic

MAMA SUNLIGHT

You grew food from the ground
for us
prepared it tenderly for our infant
mouths

Stitched together our clothes with your
Brilliant fingers
Velvet fabrics of earth colors

Bought land and created a home
for us to rise towards the sun in

(and when we left your arms, and
lifted our own wings you were
always,

Watching, watching
watching over us

and when we had to let you go
let you go to heaven,

We know you're still shinning,
shinning like the sun over us

J.I.C. FOREVER AND ALWAYS

Painter of love
Dancer of life
She knit the world back together
One star at a time

Our fathers fought the war
(came up strong in the
stone times)

Drove trucks
Built knucklehead
bobbers

Everything was
American

(our mothers perfect
in black and white)

Pleated skirts
they knew how to dance
slow

They pirouetted in
smiling stillness

Riding through this life brother
just ridin' through

We've seen the Sons
come up

(watched infinite suns set
over flawed paradises)

women-highs
chemical flows
machine-pain

mechanized rush of gears
hurtling through death-times

(Blinding nights of eurphoric
darkness)

Have you seen the future reaching back
(infinite relativity)

feel the curve
the entire continuum
gracefully recurring

(perhaps the universe is merely
the arch of a woman's back
gently caressed by the hand of
God)

Travel time
move worlds
(dream in reverse)

Her presence changed
Asia

(Put Goa on the map)

She rides
she flies

feeds beggars
enlightens masters

Time is moving
no fixed chronotope
can be located

(after and before all
converging into what is
perceived as now,

which is really another version
of infinity)

Or should it be said that
Time is stillness and the mind
is meandering

Architectonics of Freedom

Plane ticket
deconstruction of the mind's cityscape
immediate actualization

Galloping through artwork
painted in Childhood
Wild Horses

Sweet ride
(this life)

Time-warriors
forever-beggars

(the beginning was the end
and we're heading back there
again)

Silver-gold
(never get old)

Praying waters
kneeling mountains
wishing skies

(let your wings
grow and grow
and grow)

Pilgrims of silence
enter this place

(oceans of rivers
moving in harmony
with chaos

surrendered frequencies
of ancient futures
so forgotten they are
here)

Images
candlelight
procession into darkness
(filled with everything)

Remember the song we
sang
(way before time began)

across the water,
echoing through caves

(when we gathered
after time ended)

It was your face and eyes that
brought me back to the place
we first stood
motionless

Remember when we left this place we have arrived at
(Didn't need this future)

Masters of fate betray me
only to find they defend what's
meant to be

(stupid bargains
foxhole dreams)

Princess wishes
kept in a bottle

(real truths are too
sacred to be spoken)

Let your ecstasies
be free
Find the haunted cafes
(lost vestiges of a
time-strewn mind)

All the way rider
into the new dawn
(our ancestors knew the
power of violence
fire
darkness
flesh)

Understood the sounds
screams
creatures

(feared dream magic
thinning of the tribe
Ghost-time)

Would you like to
exchange

(infiltrate souls
blend something
of the beyond with
earth/blood)

All these visions we've
hung

(beginning where the world
stops
Dust strewn, rabid dog littered,
garbage picked, black smoke sweetness

(forever moments of
river stillness
February smoothness
Glide on by
ride on by)

roadside fried,
dirty glass filled
breathe deep, deeper

Paint the walls, streets
paint the skies over and
over and over

Paint the ground paint the
screens
paint over all the screens
paint the cars and the horses
and the guns)

Let's just inhale these dreams
we don't need to eat or see

Drink the words
(gold of poison
delicious elixir of
implosion)

Coffee clouds
crowded lifetimes
(that's the way we ride)

All we've surrendered
(set us free)

Manic tree spirit energy
circles of human light
vibe-ing into the sky

Attempt at
Photonics

waves/particles
exchanged

metaphor
narrative
analogous movement

mellifluous apparatus 

Pavement
Dirt Roads
Pathless forest

Try on through the bone

Times

Ashkenazi DNA strands

Reaching up from Mesopotamia

Dust spills into the sandals of

Gilgamesh

Breathe molecules of long

Forgotten King’s swords

Erect cities

Monuments

Stones

Ride on
through the time-dance

(Warhorse
signifiers
philosophical apparatus) 

I let the
days go by

All the high-times
and the star-vibes

Long rides
road kinds
astral-minds

Goddess finds
(Montreal nights
Pune skies)

Love lives
in every inch of you

(all the skies and stars
you've seen

are trying to convince you
that you are the one,

yet you look for
another)

Come home to
yourself

It is good to search
everywhere

It helps to magnify the
beauty within

(fills the soul with knowing
that every little thing we seek
is inside of us)

Righteous path
(surrender
death)

Way of the warrior
(embracing all of it)

Give em hell till the end
(only bend the way you
want to)

It's what you seek
nobody has it for you
Your own freedom

Maggots always crawl

Eagles always fly

Punctuated by death we
survive

(parenthesized by birth
and the end)

We wanna let off some steam
in between
Fireworks
Explosions
Bullets
Crashes

Collisions...
(decisions)

got a few good
runs left in me

Get hip to the magic times
stay home (go inside)

So ya been around the world a
few times

Crashed some rides
Crashed some rides

Stick your finger on the
trigger (she don't care why)
Do we have any idea
how high

Just how high we got
just how high

Flyin' eyeball times
Kickstart nights
with the tequila blind

Hard to kick it when you
can't see straight
some of em just couldn't wait
to die

(somehow still alive)
You wann see crazy
I'll show ya crazy

Hey Rider
this is the dream time

Remember me
as yourself and your
High-mind

(stay inside the love-space)

We got this magic thing
cosmically calling

(we are everything)

I.

Freedom to DIE
gift of Life

We are heading away from the beggining
and toward the end

We are heading away from the end and
toward the beggining

Simpler than a child's game
(these illusions are free

Bodies and stars from nowhere
bullet machines of steel(we love them
too much) speed, blood, rush

Rock-n-Roll-remember-me)

(Guns on my grave)


II.

I have watched the bodies burning
down by the ghats, river running

seen the celebration of fire-music-sex-life-colors-dancing
and the dead-man burning gave me such a gift
of his life
flashing, moving,

and the instruments played, and the river rushing by
and I was just there, a
stranger celebrating the
fullness of a life and a death
(whisper me through eternity)

I thought you understood
the nothingness and foreverness
of each moment

Before language the body
spoke and the trees spoke
and the earth was one symbol

and everything understood

We felt the CRUSH
(did the .45 dance)

 (sacred and filthy
without possibility of
preparation)

 Bacteria invade
warmth stifles
loving decay-filled air

(time slows to reverse
childhood memories float to the
surface. Space is finally here)

To Be to
Breathe
to Choose

(outside the paradigm)

FOR J.T.

Back when the trees sang
sweet for us
pine needle carpet ecstasy

Brothers runnin' free
To high to die hell yeah
we stole your beer

We took your guns
yeah we took your daughters
we crashed your car
smoked your boat

(just the boys on the run
didn't mean no harm
long haired truck drivin
mountain ridin shotgun
totin' sons a bitches)

Don't forget to Die FREE

MY KINGDOM

Words no one
can touch
steal
fuck

Maybe ya never
heard a' the band
or read the book

(we flew 8,000 miles
to feel the disease
let the sands grind us down

makeshift pyramids
with lovers on the steps
(they made us stop throwing flowers
over the newborn
the reborn
and the dead
(they said it was too
hard to clean
up)
We burned with the
pyres all the way to tomorrow)
rivers running backwards
nobody looked at their watches
we chugged midnight chai)

from tiny dirty glasses
If we have spirits
(mine is there)

Welcome to the
stillness

(I know you
"have
to go"

but welcome
to the
stillness)

I know what
 he said
and she said
but,
welcome
(to the stillness)

I know you'd like to
come back later

(but welcome now
to the stillness)

Distance between
freedom and thought

(read the masters
the ones you've
never heard of)

This existence that
gives us life says;

"Give me your blood
your fathers
your sons
yourselves

give your life and
your dreams and the nothingness
and everythingness that
was given to you for
free

And I will give you eternity"

(for a briefness,
for a moment
that does not
end

For a new beggining
that stretches back so far
it never
began)

DEAR READER OF THIS POEM

Have you asked about the infinite
Have you looked inside your own
Heart for the treasures you seek elswhere

Who is it that poses these
questions

Have you forgotten the
Platonic ideal

(Socratic notion of
enlightened love)

No need for a symposium
wine
friends

(no need for Himalayan
solitude
Super-human
fortitude)

We trip over darkness
surround ourselves with
foreign armies

(you yourself are the
prayer)

Dark memories lost
cave-time magic
our souls were born

in primal-fear and
flesh-warmth

(fire
stars
violence
devolution)

Seekers of beauty
(drown inside the...)

Light of your own
heart

Dreams un-break
Fantasies materialize
Pain transmutes

We
are all
going
to Heaven

(headed down the
pilgrim's road
winding through the
cosmos)

Be you a sinner or
a saint
friend or foe

(take my hand and
I will show you)

It's about the energy
in between
(see past the lovers and
their dreams)

It's what happens inside and
outside of them
(two sets of dyads,
north/south
east/west)

opens up the center
pure awareness
Five points of cosmic
light

Earth Power
Plus Fire-Truth

(makes a kind of
dark/light
magic)

God-fuel
for charred
avatars

Ride the high-vibes
(get inside
the dream)

Outlaw style
country raw
4-wheel drive

Go anywhere
always survive
(thrive)

Shotgun crazy
1911 free
Shoot first
(don't ask questions)

Ghost-images,
our mind-players...
flicker

(metaphysical insertions
of tangible fantasies
(perpetual
death/rebirth))

He was just a
warrior
(silent ecstasies
turning)

She was only a flower
(Goddess power
yearning)

Spirits
Ghosts
Engines

Dreams
Fantasies
Ecstasies

Enlightenment
Darkness
Awakening

Dante
Homer
Rumi

Gilgamesh
Ulysses
Achilles

Cervantes
Quixote
Sancho

It's free to be alive
Freedom to thrive

Free men lead their
own lives
Follow no one

Dogs follow
Eagles fly

You know the mystery
times
and the midnight
rides
(wings she hides
wings she hides)

We saw the Pune-minds
and the Goa-times

(Witnessed the Buddha skies
sat right down in the Buddha fields)

Are you strong
do you remember
do you keep your promises

Do you seek pain
or love

To forgive
or to punish

Can you let go
can you trust life

Embrace those you fear
release those you cherish

Who will help those
with no voice?
No gold?
No praise to give?

Will you kick the blind beggar?
Steel his treasure?
Snicker behind his back?

Rare is the one who will risk
ridicule
and stoop to help the cripple
and take the lashes from his master

Criminals will search
poetry for crimes

Liars for lies
(Dogs digging through
garbage cans for food)

The one with wings flies
higher with each
word of freedom

OLD COWBOY STORIES

from somewhere out in the Arizona
Dessert, circa 1977

"I used to ride hard
and shoot first

Now I just ride
and I just shoot"

The Lotus only
opens for the innocent

those pure enough
to enter the temple
alone

MORE TALES OF SUFIS

The wandering master said,
"I don't expect pigs to understand
the great mysteries

Yet I go on hoping that men will
hear the teachings

I will start giving my sermons to the
pigs,
at least afterwards they will eat my words
and roll in mud
and rejoice in garbage"

MORE STORIES FROM OLD BIKERS

This dude, I swear to god, had a peg leg...
and he would mechanically attach his left
leg (the peg leg) to the gear shifter on his
Electra-glide....

When I met him he had a bottle of Jack Daniels
in one hand a bottle of Pepto-Bismol in the other

The first words I heard out of his mouth were adressed
to no one in particular,

"you ever see anybody with a tattoo of a chicken in a cage,
(no, I answered)
But you do see lots of tattoos of eagles flying through the sky
right"
(right)

Drivers of this life
who wants to go inside
(easier to hide
in someone else's reflection)

Those who do not die
riders of the long ship
(before and after)
 we meet on the mysteries edge
inside the pyramids
(by the waters edge)

Ashes of the burning ghats
smoke like rain
trash drifts like garments of the gods
through the unpolluted river

We met ten thousand years ago
So we've all come here again
(good to see you my friends
good to see you again)

The mystery of the Mystery
(chance takers
and death-chasers
we dance with the
dice in our hands
splice with the bones
of our ancestors)

Victory/death
survival vs. the abyss
dream-lovers
and shotgun risk-riders
be gone
down the road into whatever
you think you deserve

The Sufis used to say
that "if you show a beautiful
poem to a cow,
the cow will try to eat it

If you show something beautiful
to a poet,
he will write poetry about it"

Keepers of the Distance
Makers of vows
secrets

(Cavemen to kings
animals, beggars
Princes
Thieves)

We steal
we give
we seek
we surrender