In This Moment

build
on me
the castle
of your kingdom
and abandon
yourself

build
yourself
a kingdom
in me
and abandon
your castle

build me
into you
and leave me
alone in you
as I leave
abondonment
in myself
-------------------------

It is the hour of petals falling;
listen hard to the flower blooming in reverse.

We are losing parts of ourselves
we did not know. It is not spring, yet
everything is being born uncontrollably.

Is this gale
preparing the heart to tremble?
-------------------------

Open & Shut
Shut & Open

Moving in
to the present
bodies of this moment
and taking control

Moving out
of the present
home for this moment
and letting the dust
stir and settle

Moving away
with myself to
start a new
presented present

Moving to
another place
where my eyelids will
shut & open
 moving
from another place
where my heart has
opened & shut
(shut & opened)
----------------------------

Ours,
this one.

The multiple-bodies
of this moment
exiled
to hover around
the altar
of the winter-bare trees
Awaiting their visa
to climb to the sillouhetted branches
and be offered to the single world
of this breath
This one
is ours,
the immortal
crying of the trees.

This
body on its knees.
--------------------

Deaths Died Running Morning Errands

We are not
the other
but
we are not separate
from the other
by being ourselves.

We must know
who we are
and
who we are not
 so we can
walk down the street
more easily

We must know
if we are
or
if we are not
 so that the difference between
being dead
and
being alive
won't creep up behind us

If we know
what we are
 then
can't we recognize
ourselves
in the mirror of the world?
---------------------

In This Moment
(maybe revolution)

Now
we are all slaves
brought here in the belly
of our mother's ship
where we were tied
to our ancestors
and tied
to our unborn grandchildren.

Our first sight
of the new world
comes with screams and tears
where we are sold
to Life

that marches us
bound to each other
to a land
 where we must callous our hands
in the thirsty Earth
and receive nothing in return
but the dreams
we squeeze from sleep
 where our ankles
are in the same
steel and concrete chains
as the earth

Our umbilical cord
has shriveled.
We can feed ourselves.

Now
we are all
free.
so we can look up
from the ground we've been ploughing.
we are no longer
shackled to another's world.
we
are now free
to have a different perception-
to unlock our eyelids
opening unto
the trail of tears
we leave behind.
---------------------------

Diving In
I bear my arms
under my skin
and I bear my scars
and my tears
and my purple-blue bruises
I bear my arms
under my skin
but I am prepared
to do all I have to
to rip through layers of flesh
to give you a glimpse
of the arsenal that I hold
-----------------------

Nationalism
On this Earth
are we to be crushed
or scoured
like the broken rocks
by the sea?

like the burden
of the moment
to give nothing,
of the body
to take nothing away.

On this Earth
our moon-white bones
are buried
and their true power
is redeemed.
---------------

or otherwise
we'd die
if we became
unrecognizeable
to our enviroment
and to ourselves
we were left
with the hearts of others' eyes
and the surviving skills
of others' love

or otherwise
we'd live
but born someone else
alien to the truth of our own survival
and the truth of the world
which is not ours
would not be a lie
and that deception
weakening the world that was left us
------------------------------

Wandering Through Streets and Centuries
They say
it's their true selves
But have the people
sharpened their weapons?

They say
it's their clenched fists
with true power
But have the people
opened them
to look at the dreams
and humiliations they hold?
Have they let go of the rock
made of childhood and gravity?

They say
it's their storming words
that hold the true revolution
But have the people
worn the thread-bare suit
of History
 and wandered through their streets and centuries?

They say it's
their true selves
But then
who is in the silence
other than
their breath?
------------------

This is Me
This is You

Ours is a violent death
like every breath
and the wind

It is the minutes
that return on the hour
to return the day
and the seconds
that tick as our last

Ours is a violent death
that comes after a lifetime
of eyelashes sweeping sights of the world

The sizes of the piles
gathering at the edges of our eyes
and because we can barely
hold any beauty or filth
the piles that gather outside our doorsteps and minds

Ours is a violent death
when hearts are in bodies
and bodies are in boxes

The things we use to close ourselves in-
the safety that is as thin as our skin
our hearts can barely bulge
through the wire and steel
but we're addicted to the pressure to live
 

Ours is violent
Death!
The metal is starting to line our bodies
The electric lights are flickering behind our eyes
The blood is spilling from the ground

The violence can no longer hurt us
for our cement is drying
This is our last breath
This is our last death
-------------------------

History
is being raped
by the unforgiving hands
of the present
and so the future
will look again
like the past

and though
the future
will not die
until we die
 it has been desecrated
because
it must first pass
through our spoiled bodies

and though
nothing
is ever
innocent,
History
should have the chance
to feel that narrow passage
or our body
painful and bloody,
anew

because we can not forgive
the past-
for leaving marks
on our backs, and on our hands
and our hearts,
so young,
can barely squeeze out tears-
because we don't know
what is forgiveness

but the future
doesn't have to crush us!
rolling down our own backs!

we do not have to grope the present
it exists, though fleeting,
in us.

Eric Clapton

Jimi Hendrix

Allman Brothers

SRV

Albert Collins