Saffron robes
And a suitcase full
Of cigarettes
Eating past dark
We trade a blue-spotted orange
For bag of salted cashews
In a train compartment
Bound for a jaunty frontier
The garland of marigolds for him
A dried purple bloom
Intertwined within
my battered straw hat
##
from Towns and Trains, Sudden poems 2016-2018
Daydreaming all afternoon
til darkness
changes the dream
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from Hotsprings and Stubbed Toe, Occasional haiku… 1992-2004
Download Hot Springs and Stubbed Toe (.pdf)
Tea in tiny cups
Hardwood porch, Chiang Mai 4 AM
Shivers with thunders and rain
##
from Towns and Trains, Sudden poems 2016-2018
Smoke from someplace
points the way
driving west
##
from Hotsprings and Stubbed Toe, Occasional haiku… 1992-2004
Download Hot Springs and Stubbed Toe (.pdf)
Neural pathways exploding
With potential energy
Cataclysm yet to happen
Described by chemistry
Its clear my brain
Wasnt quite connected
Sending misfires
To my legs and ankles
False signals in the rain
Is the heart the centre
Or is it the belly
Populated with a congress of organisms
Manufacturing serotonin
##
from Towns and Trains, Sudden poems 2016-2018
In my hand
wet pebble, borken twig
nothing less
##
from Hotsprings and Stubbed Toe, Occasional haiku… 1992-2004
Download Hot Springs and Stubbed Toe (.pdf)
Upon turning 70 years old, Dave’s dear sensei (since a teenage Utah community college stint), Larry Harper (among various monikers) curated 70 items of advice (at request of Annie Dandelion).
As such, between licks by Grateful Dead and master potter Marty Kendall, he riffs the list – ranging from practical to mystical to almost comical, many including nudity and space. Oh, also includes his ethereal autoharp songs (rescued from a ca. 1991 Zzyxz Rd cassette).
Gather some wisdom with: Sensei Larry’s Wisdom – Postcard #80
(45MB, 32:59, 192k mp3)
From the tribes to Pistol-lock
Safety switched to off
Rails change gauges
Locomotive rusts behind a fence
The Oiler crouches low
With cartridges on hand
Washes dingy mangoes
Water tank strapped low
By silver wheels
3 coins for admittance
Or 17 with dry powder
Ignition proves difficult
With the absence of a fuse
Get your basket to the platform
Before the diesel glows
The wheels stutter, shovels put away
Replaced by urgency
##
from Towns and Trains, Sudden poems 2016-2018
Swinging left
down darkened road
all smiles and wrinkles
##
from Hotsprings and Stubbed Toe, Occasional haiku… 1992-2004
Download Hot Springs and Stubbed Toe (.pdf)
Rest me Naught
The partisans attacked
Shortly after sun dawned
Trapped behind the lines
Two days after the treaty signed
Under grey sky I consider
Am I the last one to perish?
Perhaps the final number
In a redundant skirmish
Papers signed inky in a rail car
I’ll never chance to see
Peace comes for some
But no solace arrives for me
The religious get their rites
Murderers given last meals
I’m ordered a shovel
And to get down on my knees
Night-flashes of lost loves
Forever gone forlorn
First flash of eye glance
Waking early on a first mourn
Distant desperate acts
Seeking a fleeting peace
Unadvised by the muddy
The needy and the weak
Boots and coats removed
To strip last identity
The cold doesn’t sting
As much as anonymity
Trenches are flooded
Mortar shells rest unused
Canteen still has drops
Munitions stockpiled to abuse
Grandmother will never know
When my corpus lays
Flowers will grow eventually
While a Legion prays
I am unknown to no-one
Forgotten by unborn kin
What counts as victory?
Who credits this a win?
No photo in a locket
Soggy letters long left to rot
Telegrams remain unanswered
No lover to forget me not
(All my years for naught)