Gold

You were just a baby when you learned to smile that way; perhaps you never found it rather special. I'd call this the second day I opened my eyes to see what many only cough up and call a cliche; I don't mind a cliche.

And it was rather tragic, those shaky finger nights, when the whisky bottle was kept next to the bed; trounced by the tides of my tempestuous head. As I lay pinned by my bird-wrists the conductor swore, "If you give up now you're done for. An unadorned Lenore, sparks spitting fast from tracks, fragments flailing through the black smoke of a train wreck."

Sometimes divine, something beyond your control: When tried I came forth as gold.

When tried I came forth as gold. Creeping through the veins of river stones. My own heartbeat asleep under a blanket; I'm going to dive into the haystack. Because beauty above and beyond our own making

It has been resting as it has been waiting.

california children

well here we have it. in my Walt Whitman course I have gotten to know a very dynamic man who was also a master of the long line, something rather beloved to me. we're clearly kin, and even as i acknowledge his poetry's shortcomings and sometimes annoying quirks i find that i will always intrinsically empathize with/ love him. i have been writing with a long line for a few years and i love it well, but reading so much Whitman has given me a sort of insatiable poetic urge which is really very beneficial for me... and crazy for me; i write so often, and every time i do i think that i've just written the best thing i've ever written. it is truly spring for my writing. i cannot emphasize enough the meditative ecstasy of reading a good Whitman poem. though it must be said that many of his poems are a bit of lengthy bore punctuated by sporadic total genius. if you enjoy poetry it couldn't hurt to take a swing at Whitman. he's such an odd character. i was struck immediately by how infinitely dimensional he is as a personality. one is inclined to love him, and hate him, find him racist and unschooled, or naive and simplistic. here as usual the work speaks for itself:

What is commonest, cheapest, nearest, easiest, is Me,

Me going in for my chances, spending for vast returns,

Adorning myself to bestow myself on the first that will take me,

Not asking the sky to come down to my good will,

Scattering it freely forever.

w.w.

california is my home and it offers endless imagery to any one who cares to look. when i feel moved to write a poem it is generally because i feel moved by my life in california. moved by the land and by the friends that i have met in my time here. i hereby declare that i have the best of california friends, children of california through and through. we have seen wild times, days and nights of nothing to do but get in trouble, 'going in for our chances, spending for vast returns.' i fondly look forward to many more years of by-the-beach laying, camping, river-swimming, road-tripping, land-exploring, laugh-sodden days and nights with all of you. hillary, nora, hannah, lorena, shana, celeste, shiva, chellsee:

i love you all with absolutely drunken abandon. i wrote this poem about it. don't forget the timeless words of john stewart, as sung with the help of lindsay and stevie:

california girls are the

greatest in the world;

each one a song in the making.

California Children

In the sun we are hot and young; we contain the craze and wisdom of our seasons. We kick off the sodden reeds and dank green mud of the wetland we have wandered through to arrive at the present-- covered in dust and free as coyotes. among the things we know is so much flora:

trees of all kinds, burned to the ground, untouched, river-side. Live oaks draw beaded threads of blood along our bare legs. Eyes as soft as a heart in a hand, sun-seeking.

Among the things we know: the drop of a needle on crackling dust, revolving record. The Beach Boys. The Twist. The swell and ebb of a storm in the night, the shifting black tides. The heavy sodden Summer Time.

Leaning into the backseat we could exhale for years. We never do stop. We could sleep as if enchanted infinitely. We never do stop. We long to be light as leaves. We carry weights in our chests, lead-cast, shaped like someone else's heart.

and among the things we have known are thousands of moments of light. some were unmistakable and some revealed in hindsight. the short, black tail of a lynx, the legend of gram parson's palm tree, shading the hot spring. the ones we found beautiful and their shoulders. skewed vision, starry sky, blurred color. succulents thriving in the sun.

whisky or dry red wine; what's mine is yours, what's yours is mine. air heavy with smoke, the things you don't shout about, all that we do admire:

Five gear clutches and room to dance! Young as the moment, seeking our land; our coast, creeks, our red river, our own vibrantly pigmented, fibrous and foliated time.

santa ynez river, santa barbara botanic gardens, route 246

and it can have no bounds, you know

it can have no end.

you can take my hand in the darkness

darlin when you need a friend.

and it can change in shape or form but never

change in size. well the water ran

deep my darlin, where it don't run wide.

joanna newsom

and so,

all is and was and will be and still i am all right with it. a shade of blue and a lucid light have saturated this day. and being no one but myself i can only speak for myself; all the same i have a thing to say. put your ear to the ground. the cattails twitch and rustle. it is more than a sound. i can feel the pull, i have been up the path, (to the right, out of sight, and then all the way back,) i have known how it feels to want to be all things. a mountain, a stream; i have wished to know no feeling. i spent one year sweating and reeling and smiling sidelong through a haze at my impetuous self. i craved and contrived. dusty with orange chalk i sauntered a meandering path of dirt.i was shot with feathered arrows and struggled back to my cave to nurse my limp for several months. i was broken open and made new in the suffocating grasp of the truth.

i am all right with the woman i am. the indigo sky makes me ecstatic. it is all right if no one comprehends. i am an admirer of orchids, i am the poet of my own hand. put your own hand to the earth and tell me if it feels warm to you. it feels warm as blood to me.

i like my berkeley bedroom, it is a fine space for writing.

and for hanging my growing kimono collection.

the light is very pretty in this room almost all of the time.

young and wild 

like on a night long past you can 

lean on me. 

caught beneath a bleeding dark

sky by a fierce humidity

i speak as a soul 

that had to keep still as a stone 

to hear what was sweet and true

so young and so wild

always slipping out of view

bartering under the searing sun 

i won some and lost some too

acquiesced a bit of some essential

for a glimpse of you. And

i survived months underwater 

i survived on salt 

I survived on the dry dirt 

of the fault lines and 

Succulents

I survived and when I spoke 

I spoke through the rustle of

the high yellow grass. I said:

young and wild.

I wear the laurel wreath of 

my profession,

and it is made of pages 

of leaves 

containing all i have seen

honeycomb and 

voracity 

purple morning glories

i am a deliriant,

Deliriously

free.

young and wild 

camille claudel 1864-1943

green daze

green days

pseudo haiku II

many is the time i've thought
you don't have to agree with me
but how could you not?





Poeme

i had a vision once on a summer night. my temperature rose, translucence filled my eyes, and the dark room was just as dark as a cave, the cave of swimmers. i could see only the truth and it touched me strangely. it looked almost like the night before if not for the unusual gleam which lit the water and the stones and the path which leads where we all know it leads.

it was almost undoubtedly after a day at the beach. down the rope to the cove to watch the seals. the long grey wings of birds diving into the sea and returning to sky. one day a feather arrived along my path-

only a feather could bridge such a gap; i've never known a more grave countenance, sir, in my life-

but occasionally a soul cannot help but take note of the wine and ask for a glass. heavy as a wild sadness, in my arms like a flour sack. a hand in my hair and a startling fever. this was a night as clear and black as space. every soul present heavy as meteor iron. a bottle of perfume made of poppies and datura in my right pocket, i observed more closely the fine print of addiction. but i felt free as a coyote and though all was tar around me i did not sink.

and though all was tar around us, we did not sink. the greasy steps we took remain
dispersed-- some to the water, some up the path. translucence crept across the face of the night
as it dissolved