Human Condition

Poetry: Unbleached Face of Death

Universal Death patiently awaits
each, forever it’s permanently there
welcoming every kind of life over eons
it’s always been the same, birth before Death,
if birthed at all, and some sort of demise
for both the stupid and the wise.

The universe knows each speck of dust,
each one of us for thousands of years
and will do the same for thousands hence.
We may count the minutes, hours, and days,
but in the end Death only counts the ways.

© Bill Reynolds, 5/6/2019

Look both ways in life, but we’ll not see beyond the veil.
Mind the gaps, in the end is the last gap.

Poetry: Salty Meditation (NaPoWriMo) Day Twenty-nine

Today I am writing to you from the boonies of Colorado City, Texas. My Monday morning challenge was to produce a meditative poem from a position of tranquility (it is like that here this morning, but I’m snickering), on an emotion I have felt powerfully. I’m not sure what I did, but I felt that.

Salty is a state of mind
on the inside;
on the outside,
Salty is all personality
one must acquire
a taste for the attitude,
with peppery retorts,
for a bit of salt
poured
on the wound,
for the taste of a tear
on my lips,
off your cheek,
on the rim of my Margarita,
or on my hands
with lime juice
for shots of tequila.
Today
my state of mind
is Salty.
© Bill Reynolds, 4/29/2019

Look both ways, attitude follows attitude. Mind the gap in meditative morality.

Poetry: No Rest for the Wary (NaPoWriMo) Day Twenty-seven

Today I’m challenged to remix a Shakespearean sonnet. I was offered several methods and any form, but I decided to write a new poem that expresses the same (or similar) idea as Shakespeare’s Sonnet XXVII, click here to read it (it is the 27th day, I like that number, and the Bard’s poem). I did 14 lines of about ten syllables (semi-sonnet?) with little attempt at iambic pentameter. While the rhyme scheme is imperfect, it worked for me.

Oh, I feel so tired and I’m so sore,
my poor old body can’t take it no more.
For this poor soul, it’s early to bed;
then begins, those voices in my head,
the muses of my mind. My body is done.
Listen to us–speaks my imagination,
I need to rise-up, and write all this down,
the body says no, but the mind says go.
I’m so torn between both sleep and to act,
no matter the loss, either way I loose;
for my body to relax, and my eyes to close;
hello, hello, we have words for you too—

damn it to hell, will this day ever end?
Will I rest my soul? And love you my friend!

Look both ways, for rest and for work.
Mind and write down the gaps, lest our muses desert us.

Poetry: The Autumnist (NaPoWriMo) Day Twenty-five

Taking a cue from the John Keats poem, To Autumn, I must write a poem that is specific to a season, uses imagery related to five senses (I used more than five), and includes a rhetorical question, such as where are the songs of spring from the Keats poem.

Wasted days and wasted nights
for the sheer pleasure of guiltless
unproductive quietude of awareness,
as days are for summer, so are
nights fit for winter.
Loving both, I favor the transitions
of dusk and dawn, different but equal.

Each year, I am not the same person
I was. Nor am I the same each season.
I am at least four, maybe more
as I sense the changes each year
with each season, each day
brings new perceptions.

I belong within reality and metaphorically,
spiritually, and practically
somewhere within a transition
from summer to winter. An
autumnist is what I am,
but different of type with the
arrival of my knowing about cold
temperatures before I walk
and see changing leaves, I miss the
now gone migrating birds.
I do not hear them now.

Gradually, it seems, everyone thinks pumpkin
is my choice of taste, and the
traditional spice. Smell that
pumpkin pie or is that your latte?

The brisk autumn air is more
noticeable than in spring. It feels
different, more promising.

Pain seems less in Fall than
in Summer. I dance more at
Octoberfest, my balance is stable
and my sense of thirst has proven
stronger. I know my place
during those months with Halloween
and Thanksgiving.

Even my sense of passing time,
it’s more acute when the dog days
have come and gone. It is Spring
now—who will I be this year?
And next? What then? And
what about you?

© Bill Reynolds, 4/25/2019

Look both ways for seasons gone and those in years yet to come.
Mind the gaps when days visit from other times.

Poetry: Linguistic Serengeti Maps (NaPoWriMo) Day Twenty-four

Today’s poetry prompt is to write a poem inspired by a reference book.

Today, I learned what I am.
I’m a Stan, no longer a mere fan,
I’m a Stan—the man.

Normal words
help me each day, also
clever and unusual, obscure (and obscene),
preposterous; the strange,
curious, and lovely lexicon.
In a word: troublesome!

Secretly, I hide in a closet
(or bathroom) where I read
books — about words,
of their history, called etymology;
how to say them, and maybe see
an idiom for future reference.
The meaning of words, the lexemes.

Every word has its morphology,
its synonymy family and
antagonistic antonymy gangs.
Some are humorous, others so literal,
I like snarky things and even
the devil has his own dictionary.

Semantics are arguable,
but without words there is
nothing to say, to communicate
we’d have to find another way.
Do words grow in semantic fields?

My blessing upon the wordies,
the lexophiles, logophiles,
lingua-(and lingo) philes, also
called word buffs.

A poet without a word is like
a seashell without an ocean,
a cow without a patty,
a day without a sun.

© Bill Reynolds (word-Stan) 4/22/2019

Mine. Raven printed on page out of dictionary.

Front to back, or look both ways, books about words have much to say.
Mind the gaps or stick in some adjectives.

Poetry: Unintelligent Design (NaPoWriMo) Day Twenty-three

Today I was prompted to write a poem about an animal.

Note: Prometheus (forethought) and Epimetheus (afterthought) were spared imprisonment in Tatarus. Zeus gave them the task of creating man. Prometheus shaped man out of mud, and Athena breathed life into his clay figure.

Thus Zeus,
before humans roamed Earth,
set Forethought and Afterthought
to task. Animals lived and roamed
without reincarnation or karma
fish swam, birds flew, and each
creature of day or night,
did the natural things, no karma required.

Dinosaurs upset a jealous god—gone!
With Athena, Prometheus made man.
But then monkeys mated with people
and Afterthought declared, “now
we need second chances”—
reincarnation, and karma came to be.

Humans did not know
what they were nor what to do.
so they caused trouble for goddess Gaia,
fought, became reincarnated afterthoughts
in lower and lower life forms to learn,
but each time, the lower form of
human was worse than the last.

Afterthought said to Forethought,
“look now, lower forms we need
for karma, these are slow learners.”
They created Lumbricus terrestris.
Earthworms that eat dirt and crawl
into the ground and are slimy and ugly
and are both male and female,
thus confused and lost bird food.
But to no avail as human nature
continued to confuse the gods.

Nirvana was vast and empty
when Afterthought reminded
Forethought, “Have you noticed,
we create humans, they fuck with monkeys,
die into lower karma never moving up,
and Zeus is pleased, laughing at us?”

Forethought said, “Indeed. We need a cover story.
I have one about a talking snake, two naked
humans too dumb to know it, some other god,
a garden, a tree, and an apple or some variety of fruit.”
Afterthought said,
“Without reincarnation and karma, no one
will ever believe that story. You need
worms, snakes are too hissy.”

Look both ways in forethought and afterthought but live in this now.
Mind the gaps and respect the worms,
you too have a next life and karma keeps adding up.

Poetry: Nuthin’ Man (NaPoWriMo) Day Twenty

Happy Saturday, y’all. Today I am supposed to write a poem based on language as it is spoken in real life, as opposed to more formal “poetic” speech.

what is it with you — nothin’ man, what choo you talkin’ about — that chick — what about it — we’re friends — fuck that shit, man, you’re tryn’a save her —
she needs help, man, that’s it, i help my friends — how many other chicks you helped, you gotta stop, man, ya can’t help them all, you can’t fix everybody, and where are they now —
get off my ass, just helpin’ a friend, that’s all —
you got some sorta complex, dude, sir galahad or something,’ like yer a knight in shining armer or somethin’—
bull shit, man, you dunno what yer talkin’ about, it ain’t like that — look man, i know it ain’t like yer tryna’ get laid —
you need to stop, it’s not yer business.

maybe he’s right — maybe i’ma sucker — i help guy friends too, if they ask — besides, it’s done and she is ok now— i admit it feels good to help — is that a complex, it seems normal to me — she asked and ah said sure — there’s no problem and it’s not his beeswax anyway — but maybe he’s right about me.

Hey, how’s it going — livin’ the dream man, how ‘bout you — it’s all good, you goin’ to the game tamarra, it’ll be a good one —
i dunno yet, but I think so —
hey, how’s that chick we were talkin’ about —
who, oh her, she called me, said thanks, it’s all good now, she’s sending me a check, i’m glad i helped her, she’s good people —
good that you were there for her — yah, it feels good to help, you might try it sometime —
hey, look man, ima sorry fer what i said —
it feels good to help people, you oughta try it sometime —
fuck you, i help peeps, i’m jist more careful —
sure, whatever man, i’ll get back with you about the game, i may have a date —
oh, who with, you got a date, with who — talk at cha later man.

that’s great, now he thinks i’m seein’ her, let him think what he wants, he’s a dick anyway — but he is my friend — sometime i’ma gunna have to tell him, she set me up with her sister, we hit it off — i’ll tell him when i’m ready — for now, he can wonder — i can be a dick too.

© Bill Reynolds 4/20/2019

Look at things both ways for a clear perspective.
Mind the gaps.

Poetry: Poem’s Point of View (NaPoWriMo) Day Seventeen

Today, I’m challenged to write a poem that presents a scene from an unusual point of view.

***

He will not leave me alone. All that touching and feeling me, he tweaks me mercilessly,
and (too often) makes me look like barfed up SpaghettiOs.
It’s embarrassing.
He thinks I am his and that he knows all about me.
He doesn’t.
I know teenagers who know more about me than that old fart.
Others simply see my words or hear my meter while he sees me as his personal art (bitch).
He puts his name on me – how rude is that? He doesn’t get it.

He talks about me (us—there are others) endlessly, influencing his friends
to fool around with me.
Sometimes he gets violent with paper and pen and pushes me around
because he thinks his mental malady will be short-lived. How rude!

He knows so little. He has been writing poetry for fifty-three (long) years.
BFD, right?
When he was young with a hard cock, he ignored me. Thoughts?!
That’s all I got from him. He liked us, but he was ashamed
because I didn’t do much to make him look strong and tough and mean.
I think he is an imposter and so does he.

I am all he does—all he thinks about. He explores me in every embarrassing way,
he sniffs me, touches me, he reads bawdy stories. He acts like I am some sort of trophy bride. And oh, my fucking god!
The limericks! The men who write them must be burning in hell.
I know for a fact that he’d rather a crusty, edgy limerick over a sweet love song poem.

Sometimes he writes me and then loses me.
Rather than be upset, he writes another me.
It’s as though I matter, but I also don’t. Which is it?
What the fuck?
He will never win a damn thing.
He wants to put us in a book and claim us as his own.
Such possessiveness! It’s unacceptable.
We are our own persons, who just happen to be poems.
If we belong to anyone, it is the poetic universe,
but he’ll never understand that.

There are reasons he was as he was,
and more reasons why he is as he is,
but none of that has anything to do with us,
the poems, the words, the lines and rhymes of Our verse.

When he looks at me it is like he is seeing a ghost, a shapeless cloud figure,
wavering without beginning or end,
just flowing shapes in many forms of endless words,
of unknown visions and interpretations.

Oh crap, he is picking up that god damn pointed, sharp pencil.
Soon he will be poking and scratching, adding and removing, or changing—endless changes.

In my next life, I want to be prose. Just a little time on his laptop, maybe one printing and we’re done. At least he knows prose and has been doing it since way back.
This rookie old fart poet will be the end of it all.

©Bill Reynolds, 4/17/2019

Look at all things both ways, male and female, creator and created, toucher and touched, kisser and kissed, poet and poem. Mind the gaps which harbor resentment of the art.

Poetry: The Stock of Love (NaPoWriMo) Day Fifteen

Today, I’m challenged to write a dramatic monologue poem. I tried to create specific voices of character that act as both narrators of the poem and participants, which could be acted out by someone reciting it.

****

He is just there, out of reach for now.
Or is it us? So waiting and watching his stare.
Dare we touch such darkness, or look upon him,
in a time to sample solutions?
To this time we have come, as you and I will have done,
to seek his work in our lives.

The darkness that follows, at times closer or farther,
but always, always there.
We look not to see into his darkness
as he looks upon us with calm eyes
for seeking an inevitable time, when we
feel his welcome breath as a wind of the wise.

With a song he beckons us to release
this pain of our suffering into his care.
This love has been our personal world,
but now we may touch an eternal threshold of peace.
Release me not, but allow you go with me
in search of our final love of his prize.

With pain and regret I feel deep in my bones,
to him, I send you in my despair.
Such shaking a coward deep within me,
I step into our eternal new home.
As we lie here in the dark, and together we sleep,
for a time never again to rise.

© Bill Reynolds, 4/15/2019

Look both ways to feel the times of birth, love, life, and death.
Mind the gaps in space and time.

Poetry: Evil Darkness Denied (NaPoWriMo) Day Thirteen

Today, I wrote a poem about something “mysterious and spooky!” (As the prompt challenge defined it.) I mused the denied duality of human nature as set forth in the classic Jekyll and Hyde, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde [1886] by Robert Louis Stevenson. My review of the book is here.

***

Not evil I but you
Live with a darkness
of truth denied with
not to Hide mind
what must be true.

Wretched are you
to ask me to see
a truth as part of I.
Created by god
no evil must I be.

False belief is
the sinless soul
of self-righteous evil,
within you disguised
as good and pure.

As Lanyon needed
Jekyll’s truth to see
from Hyde’s reveal,
to accept the two,
both part of you.

There is no light without darkness,
no good without evil,
no truth without lies,
no life without death,
no two without one.

Seek out truth in you,
of more than half,
balance reality or die
from the only good truth
is really a lie.

© Bill Reynolds, 4/13/2019

Look both ways to find evil and good in you. It is your one and only truth.
Mind the gaps of fear and self-deceit, they hide your Hyde.

“O God!” I screamed, and “O God!” again and again; for there before my eyes—pale and shaken, and half fainting, and groping before him with his hands, like a man restored from death—there stood Henry Jekyll!” Dr. Lanyon’s words and recollection serve as the climax of the story. The question of Dr. Jekyll’s relationship to Mr. Hyde is resolved.