It’s been a long time Since I was the flag

Dancing with the wind.

It’s been a long time

Since I was the dog lying lazily

In the shade of the oak.

It’s been a long time

Since I sat by the dock

And let the waves of the lake

And the gliding of the cormorant

Be my rhythm.




I am all of these

And more

When I accept their invitation.

When I am the buoy on the water,

My thoughts become the clouds

Passing overhead and no longer

Interfere with who I am now.




I am the one observing.

I am one with the observed.

I am that

I am.

I worked some years ago at a restaurant which had a hotel above it that Maya Angelou would rent the same bare-bones room in, each visit. It had no phone and no TV. She used it to write. During a period when she was not renting it, after one particular night of some debotchery, I borrowed the key from the front desk, snuck into the room, and sat for a time on the floor. I wanted to absorb any energy remaining, and any possible inspiration. The following resulted later.

 

Full Moon in the vacant room of

​Maya Angelou.

A bed, a desk and chair furnish the portal

​To your muse.

I don’t know you

Black Lady Poet

Three flights up

High.

I feel you Bounce

Off walls. Blue Stripe, Old White

Plaster Cracking Poetry

Lurks in Vampire Wings.

Stay with me and Drawl.

Tell me some story never shaken

​From your pen.

But alas, the sobering sun comes

​All too soon,

Through windows holding in

Your light

High

Up in your room.

This writing thing can be like a guy who buys a new boat
and spends days and weeks outfitting it with gear and supplies,
but never takes it out of its berth. Or a deep sea diver who never dives.

I can see all kinds of stuff floating around down there,
and it's obvious not much of value ever floats to the surface
of its own accord, so I am going to have to go down there
after it.

I know there is a slim chance I won't find anything down there,
but I think I'm more likely to not want to come back.
Who would do the chores and all the trivial stuff then?

 

              Uncle Fred only wanted one thing in life—to be a pilot. He had been turned down because of poor eye-sight, so he started a regimen of devouring as many carrots as he could possibly eat everyday and he eventually passed the test which qualified him to be a fighter pilot in the Army Air Corp. He always credited those carrots, they say, with his reversal of fortune. He died on training maneuvers, about a year later, when his wingman made a wrong move and they touched in mid-air, causing Uncle Fred to crash.

              In my early teens I was rummaging through the cedar chest my mom kept at the foot of her bed, and which got forgotten a lot by me, like so many overly familiar things do, simply because it was always there. But it was more like a treasure chest for the same reasons. Each opening of it was a treat because it happened so seldom—a treat for its rich and pungent assault on the nostrils, a treat for the eyes because it contained bits of long gone family history, and, therefore, a treat for my imagination. Right on top, in the maroon velvet-lined shelf that had to be lifted out to view the contents of the chest, was a tiny white alpaca sweater that looked like it might fit an infant. This had been my mother’s when she was twenty years old. While still swooning from inhaling as much of the cedar fumes as my lungs would hold, I would try yet again to get my imagination around any adult size body fitting into what lay before me. My mother told me it had once been washed by mistake and shrunk, but this news did nothing to salve my amazement or my inability to imagine this garment ever fitting anyone. I always got stuck here on this item and this information before I could proceed. Only then could I move on to open the hinged blue leather box, lined with white silk, containing a distinguished service cross for some World War II valor my father refused to ever discuss. Also on display, a diamond stick pin with a three inch long gold shaft, and a mink stole made up of two little creatures with beady eyes, each biting the other on the ass by means of a spring-clip that formed their jaws.

              On this particular day, after I got past these usual fascinations, I lifted out the shelf and found a black wool turtleneck sweater I couldn’t remember ever having seen. Probably I now noticed it because I was older than the last time I had visited here, and probably because here was something that could fit me. When I asked my mother about it she said I should probably have it, if I wanted it, and get some use out of it. It had been my Uncle Fred’s.

       My only recollection of Fred was being carried down a flight of wooden stairs by him in the house we lived in, while he teased me by taking my teddy bear from me with his free hand, giving it back, and doing it again. After which, he waved good-bye and left. I was three or four years old at the time. This incident is a fleeting memory of a man I hardly knew personally, but he was a living legend to his older sisters, two other brothers, and my grandparents. They may or may not have embellished their memory of him, but the stories I would hear over the years from each of them at varying times, always told of a very handsome, very likeable, very capable and athletic young man who could captivate the ladies, win over any adversary, and was honest and trustworthy to a fault. The man I never really knew became the man I wish I had known.

              When I put that sweater on, some reconnection was made between us, preserved all those years by the magic potency of cedar. I don’t know why, but each time I wore it afterward, I walked a little taller, felt a little older, and acted a little braver than I really was. I felt some family honor to be able to wear something of Fred’s. And I’ve never refused a carrot, when offered, since.

He put his coffee cup within arms reach of his work space and inhaled the welcome aroma. He hadn't even sipped the piping hot liquid yet, so the inhale was like a prelude to a kiss; enough to suffice the moment, sufficient to prime the pump in expectaion for the real thing.

He picked up one of the brushes that had been cleaned the day before and left to dry on the paint-stained blotter, which covered almost the entire desktop. He was mentally anticipating reaching for that first sip of morning thunder, but his hands were busy working free the bristles on the brush which had dried hard together, as though they were never intended to flex and become their individual selves. His hands were familiar with just the necessary effort and routine to break them free, transformed suddenly into soft and willing partners. With his right hand he now fanned the brush, back and forth, again and again, in a gentle see-saw motion against his pant leg. His left hand reached out and drew in that first suckle from his cup of the steaming, welcome, mother's milk.

You can almost taste it, the aroma from the
blossoms on the cherry trees when the wind
blew back in your face before you had to
go into the stuffy church building on Sunday
morning. Or how about the way the sea air
would suddenly fill your nostrils and the entire
world changed as you neared the ocean in
the car with mom and dad and Uncle Bob
and Aunt Jane? You couldn’t breathe deep
enough or long enough. Just moments ago
you didn’t even notice the air, and now that’s
all you could notice. Or the country could do
that. Aunt Helen would stop the car by the
side of the road and announce everybody
out to pick huckleberries and the dust from
the just stopped car and the closeness of the
bushes as you climb out seemed to almost
suffocate you, but you had to keep inhaling
all that your lungs could hold. The air was so
intense you couldn’t get enough. Think of it.
    These were the days when encountering the
world came to you by sensations, by newness,
by never-before-experienced-experience,
through the magic of your fingers and nose
and ears and the eyes they all widened in
such astonishment. When the train thundered
into the station and blew it’s hot steamy air
all over you as it rumbled past, with it’s
brakesquealing and bell-clanging assaulting your
ears, your feet vibrating, your heart pounding,
and your nose picking up on the staccato
mixture of grease and coal and heat; it was
your eyes that couldn’t resist opening wide
to be filled with cinders because of the absolute
immensity of this black iron machine
that seemed to be an alive beast. That was
aliveness--that was growing up. And each
one of those lip-smacking memories was a
right of passage. Remember?
    Exactly when was it innocence and aliveness
got cashed in, traded for some form
of emotional sleepwalking we adults seem
to favor? At what moment did the last toy
get laid down, never to be played with
again? Was it when the little bike was replaced
by the big bike; was it when the
bike was given up for the car; or was it at
a more subtle moment not definable by
event? Perhaps shame or embarrassment
flipped the switch. Disappointment maybe.
Finding out that your favorite people were
not going to be part of your life after all,
and finding out in a slow-creeping dawning on you.
Santa Claus, Peter Pan, and the
others that topple with them, making way
for some little person with clenched fists,
set jaw and a straight face, hiding insides
screaming “WON’T GET FOOLED AGAIN”.
Who knows? You can’t stay a kid forever.
Who would want to? But more than fists
get clinched and I’ll just bet it’s the very
things an adult could use in trying to walk
around upright with balance and bounce
in his ever-aging step. Let’s look.
    It’s not what happened, it’s not the thing
itself in particular. We all have incidents
and accidents we can relate. It’s what we
did with them. It’s about what we made it
all mean. It’s about who and how we decided we’d be.
    Go back with me. Let’s go
take that little person by the hand, wipe
the tears from those eyes, blow noses, and
go get an ice cream cone. There are little
people all over the planet with our names
on them, still standing there waiting for us
to come back. They have things to give us
we have disowned, and we have reconciliations
to offer and stories to tell.
                ---excerpt from Synergy, in the iTunes Bookstore

Got the new car in for its first service today and it reminded me of going to different dealerships with dad when he used to be on the road.
Calendars with look-alikes of Marilyn Monroe would be tucked into a darker corner of the workbench. But not so hidden that they couldn't peek out and inspire or be peeked-in-at and aspired to by some burley guy who looked like no woman would ever talk to. These guys just had a look that didn’t fit much with anything—meaning you wouldn’t figure them to be smart enough to do their job by listening to them speak or by taking stock of their appearance. And it seemed to always work out that the guy who looked the most inept or incompetent or didn’t measure up to some ideal you had of him was the one who saved the day. He was the one who brought life to some block of iron that every other mechanic in the place had been stymied over. It was entering the fun house, really. In those Buick garages of the 1950’s there was no such thing as insurance restrictions or health codes or any kind of codes imposed from the outside. The codes of those days were implied and learned and they weren’t written down anywhere. You could wonder in and out at will, but if you wondered in you became a part of the landscape and had to play your part. Your part would be whatever anyone threw at you, because you would be noticed and you would not be ignored. Some guy with grease up to his elbows, sweat on his forehead, and a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth would eventually  stop cursing long enough to ask you to grab that rag over there so’s he could stop the bleeding from that blankety blank wrench that just slipped from his hand and landed at your feet. And then, as if nothing had just happened out of the ordinary, he might ask you, "What, no school today kid?" Or,"Hey, how ‘bout them Pirates—those damn Yankees don’t stand a chance now, do they?" And then he’d return to trying to bloody another knuckle like you were never there. But he’d watch you and at break time he’d get the other guys on you by pointing out to them some personal tick of yours they could all tease you about. It was adventureland, it was street theater, it was exciting, because you would be made a part and you never knew how it might happen.  You were included—not because of your Buick, though that was a given—not because your old man worked for the company, though that was a plus—not because of your age, though that might be considered. You were included because you were there, breathing, and taking up space.

Today I stood in an antiseptic, modern, well lit garage for two hours where the only thing on the walls were warnings about casualty and obligation and the only thing said was “we’ll call you when it’s ready—oh, you were thinking of waiting for that?????"

I am standing by the curb

At the end of my driveway, 

Pretty much gazing off in the distance

At nothing in particular,

But the occasional  hawk

Striking fear and irritation into

The personal space of the local

Mockingbird population. 

Having wandered into the street

To follow the meandering air show

Is when I notice the treasure

At my feet. Anyone else

Might have claimed they felt

Like Lewis and Clark,

But my found object

Only made me feel

Like Pam Dixon. 

There it was. A large textured,

Grained and heavily lined section

Of Palm tree bark, unevenly broken

On each edge, that would surely

Find its way onto or into

One of Dixon's future sculptures

Or paintings. 

It spoke her name

By its mere appearance,

As surely as if it had

Been given a voice. 

This is no minor event; 

Tantamount to being able

To offer Picasso a brush

He might treasure,

Or Manuel Neri a section

Of marble only he would choose to sculpt. 

I had managed to forage

Something Dixon would never

Have found without the aggravation

Of the hawk. 

This is serendipity. 

This is synergy. 

This is surreal. 

For it is the kind of item

No amount of money could procure

As an appropriate gift. 

And while it may truly be of use,

It's discovery and delivery

Will give Me all the pleasure. 

    The raindrops splashed the puddles before his feet, like soldiers marching in formation, row upon row. The cold and the damp had already penetrated his being. Head bent against the wind and shoulders hunched like some barrier reef, his hat produced its own downpour by diverting the excess it collected, depositing it as an assault upon the marching soldiers below.
    Odd how conditions help create a world all their own. If the sun were out today and the sky clear for miles, this would be a world open to the gaze and intersection of any passerby. But this day, this landscape, with a driving beat, had its own cosmos. A person could feel encapsulated, shut up in a cocoon providing shelter from others. No shouting or carrying on was going to stand out. Conditions dictated you pay attention to your own maintenance, and awareness of what might be going on around you take second place.
    So this walk, this path he was on, which he traveled many another day, became today a never before experienced experience. The world seemed different, was different, from what it had been only yesterday. He felt alone and was puffed up, in a new way, as though he were the master, captain, and sole inhabitant of this sodden universe. He was safe, to act any way he chose and no one would notice. Others would be busy grappling with their own microcosm.
    This pleased his delicate nature. This buoyed him in a way he would find hard to explain. His history of watching out for what others might think and expect, colored his moment to moment existence. But this day had a freedom in it, a cover that allowed some part of him release. Even he felt acknowledgement of it on some faint level. It wasn't a decision to be some way; it was a response to a sense of protection, a sense of camouflage, a sense of permission.
    Like the birds who now produced a chorus of high volumed delight, who amped up their play as well, as if they too acknowledged this blanketed condition and thoroughly approved, he began humming some tune aloud. It wasn't a song he knew. It was just humming. A response of his own, made of his own substance, and a smile formed on his lips.
    Walter Mitty made flesh, he picked up his pace. He had courage aplenty now and he wanted to reach her door before it all went away. He could do this; he would do this, and today, in this world, under these conditions, knew that he would.