I

To reach up through the blur
And blinding warm glow
Of the morning sun’s slur
To the soft and to know

That the bright and slow
Twinkling chimes in winds
Gently cooing show
No signs of a thinned

Course or love unpinned.
The smile and laugh are
Forever and, sinned
Not once or ever, not far.

I am cradled and listen to tales
Of unseen, unheard details.

II

My greatest joys insulted
And torn from my hands,
My greatest ploys found faulted
And wiped from the sands.

Beside me he stands
To laugh and sing aloud,
To pass across lands,
To take hand in the crowd.

A million spectacles endowed
On me by a million more.
All to be tried and tasted and vowed
To be digested all for store.

Friend, foe and a world laid wide.
A buzzing boil without a guide.

III

Dropped off and left alone
Among faceless, voiceless
Creatures of forms unknown.
Swirled and blurred, they dismiss.

Dancing in total bliss,
Not knowing my boiling,
Eroding fear of this
Place, tension strong coiling

Deep within. Fires foiling
And clutching firm to tears
Frantic and frenzied, spoiling
This hallowed chime of years.

A panicked turn and she has passed,
Lapping waves pour and flood in fast.

IV

One by one I lose them
And the light begins to fade
On me and all I am.
Left cold and gray in the shade.

They have a new bust jade
To gaze upon and cheer,
Who can make all I made
And do what I did here.

Why must they love my peer
And cast me away just plain?
Not special now I fear
Just selfish, dull and vain.

The more I beg and fight
The less they care in spite.

V

There came finally the warm
Breeze that swept away the dust
And dried out all that the storm
Had drenched and caked in rust.

Again all is clear to trust
And we walk into anew
Day of endless grass and gust
And climb the hills for the view

Of all the splendor just through
The old veil of book and verse
And elder's stories heard due,
Shared wisdom rich and terse.

All the great centuries open and free
For the pure and curious to ask and see.

VI

Hands brushing close,
Feet kicking by,
Heart beating most
As minds race high.

Hands in lap. Her thigh
Possessing curves
Eye consuming, imply
Dark deeds with verve.

Eyes off the bust, observed.
Yet not a word on tongue
To coax the heart and swerve
Topics to desires young.

Without act, she will never know
And take hand some other's throw.

VII

Slithering over every bark
And drinking from every pool,
They claw and scratch and mark,
Blind to the most simple rules.

Mind aflame and limbs tools
No longer, but possessed
By some old and ancient fool
With a taste far than less.

Her wishes once more stressed.
One last time and they halt.
Shame shall finally suppress
My most blameful fault.

The departure is no surprise,
Everything prior, a weak disguise.

VIII

One by one the boulders fall
Crashing and tumbling across
The sprawling canyon wall
And spiraling through gloss

Hole to land atop the boss
Of the ever rising mount.
An irreversible loss,
As the relentless down count

Spells my close coming surmount.
Not facing a forked road but
A river delta whose account
May not doors open but shut.

I am stone before the stream,
Encased inert and worn to cream.

IX

The jagged pocked brown teeth
Stand stark and not springing
Above the surging wreath,
The tattered nest up bringing

With a thousand ants singing
Each his own tune and verse,
Carrying their own wringing
Pieces like entitled purses,

Not to share or converse
But to from here to there,
With focus and cause, traverse
The laid out grid of squares.

I stand in the eye of a building storm
Every direction wrong, winds blurring form.

X

All the stars have shone as one
And brought sight to the road at last.
I see the rock to grab hold, done
Up for me an anchor cast.

My great legacy passed
On to the great nations
Across time spread vast,
My memory's salvation,

To evoke celebration
And be studied by all
Long after my negation,
And forever man enthrall.

My ever counting seconds now
Hold new drive and spirit to vow.

XI

Above the mouth shines the morn
And higher I scale the wall,
But no matter progress born
One slip will send me to fall.

Yet I waste all day and stall,
Deep in thought looking for some
Great inspiration and call
"Eureka! Yes! It has come!"

But alas me it flees from
And I tighten my grip on
The water, slipping through thumb
And fingers trembling off sawn.

What good is a great cause and dream
Without the means to forge the stream?

XII

One's era is hard to gauge
While deep within its walls,
So we turn to the old sage
And look back through archive halls.

We can't our own time recall
Yet it is shaped with our hands.
The past holds many clues small
To what remains under sands,

What is weak and what stands,
Permanent, built on by new
And thus guiding the young strands,
Never quite fully in view.

We study the movements and trends
And see what flaws we must amend.

XIII

Pressed into my palm firm
I hold at last the chosen free,
Lying under dust and worm,
Twinkling in sun for me.

The quarrel, the great decree
Through a thousand other's mist,
Now dressed up in allegory
And disguised through blur and twist

Shall be placed high in lists
And spread open and chewed
For its poor and its greatest
Truths woven and old failures skewed.

It shall live beyond my time
And justify my cracking lime.

XIV

The growing child in my hands
Springs to a life of its own
And nearly not help demands
In its form on which it hones.

Its length laid on table prone,
More pages than one can hold.
Nearly enough to be shown,
But all tomes must come in fold.

Nearly ecstatic, with gold
My heart seems filled and lit
With the greatest light in bold.
I can not help but submit.

The work itself is not all bright
But its end has me excited.

XV

Wearily I clamber up through
The narrow, jagged fracture in
The face of the mountain side to
The clear and flat ledge jutting thin.

Loose from the dark and dank within,
I stand in the cool air and gaze
Out into the valley to begin
The descent through the fresh spring haze.

Each blade and pedal glints new rays
That only now I feel I see.
I stop and stare and catch the ways
Everything moves when eyes are free.

Now to the simple I can return
And work on the less grim and stern.

XVI

Reenter onto the stage an old friend
In whom I now find a new warming seed.
The chance passing now routine without end.
To get better acquainted with each other we need.

I shall let the natural course take lead,
But I hold close lessons learned too recent,
Shall not rush nor cheat the game, and take heed.
I must act now with a truer intent.

In the howling cyclone more time is spent,
But I forget the faceless crowds for her.
Despite old fear and greed, I am content
With whatever for me this will confer.

At last there is no need to clench or fret,
And I forget anything worth regret.

XVII

Passed over, skipped for some other.
They still hold them above me
And my freshest crops they smother,
Without even trying to see.

Where I bring them rawest degree
They demand cautious, stifled whit.
Where I use calm and tactful key
They see failure to commit.

I have been thrown back down the pit,
Clawing fingers ground under boot.
Only dying embers stay lit,
My time above the mouth now moot.

The ungrateful always get their way,
Yet despite how we lose, still we play.

XVIII

Lost in anonymity
Sinking under through the quick,
I see with equanimity
The rope laid slack on the slick.

With one candle's dying wick
One can light a thousand more.
With a numb and raw leg thick
One can keep a foot through door.

I shall not rest as before,
Filling the pages with bold
Through piece after piece, to core
Burrowing and fresh new folds.

I shall evoke a sprawling torrent
To drown the old failures abhorrent.

XIX

Now at the end they turn,
Discuss, dissect and take
In. They Laugh, cry and learn
In my wide spanning wake.

As I grow older, ache
And tire, the world after
Seems to me not to make
Concern betwixt my laughter.

The Artist and the Drafter
Know as I, the Work holds
Under it’s lacquered rafters
And walls the one real gold.

Creating for sake of creation,
Is my sole, found too late, sensation.

XX

Pen in hand, slouched down.
The candle drowns in wax,
Window dark for the town.
The moon smiles on tracks

Left by selfish acts
And noble all the same.
Neither pride nor tax
Haunt my dimming frame.

Turn to photographed dame
Who left before I,
And say once more her name
Before mind runs awry.

The broken clock winds down at last.
After running for a span so vast.