Poem

What We Are What we are? We say we want to become what we are or what we have an intent to be. We read the possibilities, or try. We get to some. We think we know how to read. We recognize a word, here and there, a syllable: male, it says perhaps, or female, talent - look what you could do - or love, it says, love is what we mean. Being at any cost: in the end, the cost is terrible but so is the lure to us. We see it move and shine and swallow it. We say we are and this is what we are as to say we should be and this is what to be and this is how. But, oh, it isn't so. Metonymy As An Approach To A Real World Whether what we sense of this world is the what of this world only, or the what of which of several possible worlds - which what?- something of what we sense may be true, may be the world, what it is, what we sense. For the rest, a truce is possible, the tolerance of travelers, eating foreign foods, trying words that twist the tongue, to feel that time and place, not thinking that this is the real world. Conceded, that all the clocks tell local time; conceded, that 'here' is anywhere we bound and fill a space; conceded, we make a world: is something caught there, contained there, something real, something which we can sense? Once in a city blocked and filled, I saw the light lie in the deep chasm of a street, palpable and blue, as though it had drifted in from say, the sea, a purity of space. The Holding Of lovers, one senses how, coupled, their joy is to think their singleness, together, to find themselves; how, holding each other, they think to hold as well as themselves, the truth, reality. We honor their wanting; what better could we want than that? Or, more than honor, we feel what they feel. If not for another sense, then this were all: we sense that what they hold is not the truth. The World I thought you were an anchor in the drift of the world; but no: there isn’t an anchor anywhere. There isn’t an anchor in the drift of the world. Oh no. I thought you were. Oh no. The drift of the world.

German Die das Fleisch wegnehmen vom Tisch Lehren Zufriedenheit. Die, für die die Gabe bestimmt ist Verlangen Opfermut. Die Sattgefressenen sprechen zu den Hungernden Von den grossen Zeiten, die kommen werden. Die das Reich in den Abgrund führen Nennen das Regieren zu schwer Für den einfachen Mann. English Translation: Those Who Take the Meat from the Table Teach Contentment. Those for whom the taxes are destined Demand sacrifice. Those who eat their fill speak to the hungry Of wonderful times to come. Those who lead the country into the abyss Call ruling too difficult For ordinary men. Another poem: ...

子曰：“笃信好学，守死善道。危邦不入，乱邦不居。天下有道则见，无道则隐。邦有道，贫且贱焉，耻也；邦无道，富且贵焉，耻也。” 半轮秋月挂山崖，孤鸟悲鸣为有家。一己哀愁随落叶，百年世事入残霞。2022.10.2.

Shoveling Snow With Buddha Billy Collins In the usual iconography of the temple or the local Wok you would never see him doing such a thing, tossing the dry snow over a mountain of his bare, round shoulder, his hair tied in a knot, a model of concentration. Sitting is more his speed, if that is the word for what he does, or does not do. Even the season is wrong for him. In all his manifestations, is it not warm or slightly humid? Is this not implied by his serene expression, that smile so wide it wraps itself around the waist of the universe? ...

Green Koan by Rita Dove That the mind can go wherever it wishes is a kindness we’ve come to rely on; that it returns unbidden to the soul it could not banish and learns to thrive there is life’s stubborn mercy – given to soften or harden us, as we choose. Code is the biggest lever humanity has ever invented From Amjad Masad: Code is the biggest lever humanity has ever invented. Yet it’s still constrained by how fast you can learn and type. Imagine how the world changes when these bottlenecks are solved. ...

Mayakovsky BY FRANK O'HARA 1 My heart’s aflutter! I am standing in the bath tub crying. Mother, mother who am I? If he will just come back once and kiss me on the face his coarse hair brush my temple, it’s throbbing! then I can put on my clothes I guess, and walk the streets. 2 I love you. I love you, but I’m turning to my verses and my heart is closing like a fist. Words! be sick as I am sick, swoon, roll back your eyes, a pool, and I’ll stare down at my wounded beauty which at best is only a talent for poetry. Cannot please, cannot charm or win what a poet! and the clear water is thick with bloody blows on its head. I embrace a cloud, but when I soared it rained. 3 That’s funny! there’s blood on my chest oh yes, I’ve been carrying bricks what a funny place to rupture! and now it is raining on the ailanthus as I step out onto the window ledge the tracks below me are smoky and glistening with a passion for running I leap into the leaves, green like the sea 4 Now I am quietly waiting for the catastrophe of my personality to seem beautiful again, and interesting, and modern. The country is grey and brown and white in trees, snows and skies of laughter always diminishing, less funny not just darker, not just grey. It may be the coldest day of the year, what does he think of that? I mean, what do I? And if I do, perhaps I am myself again.

Black Postcards I The calendar all booked up, the future unknown. The cable silently hums some folk song but lacks a country. Snow falls in the grey sea. Shadows fight out on the dock. II Halfway through my life, death turns up and takes your pertinent measurements. We forget the visit. Life goes on. But someone is sewing the suit in the silence. I hear my country in your voice From Romeo Oriogun: ...

In this short Life that only lasts an hour How much - how little - is within our power