the faithful have been trained out of approach
shuttered away in shiny buildings singing approved songs
allowed to, in a very controlled way, approach and worship
but always with a team of observers, holding that Spirit in check
quenching is a word that is used in a book that talks about it

so there are evil and bad spirits that come into the world
some have been here for a very long time
and the thought is that they enter closer during certain seasons
thinning between two worlds between two spaces
but there are songs in books that talk about it a little differently

in certain times and certain places power seeps through the thinness
that power can be good or bad in the hands of the people
'who will save me from this body of death' said a saint once in a book
as if the struggle was real and was within himself
and in that book there were a lot of words written down long ago

the language of the earth and the trees is lost to time
or so they say in many books trying to explain it all
books that cost money on shelves in shiny stores
so a quest to find a dusty book on an old shelf
is the only real place to look to understand the past

the tree looks sad, surprised and angry all at the same time
frozen in place but growing into it anyways trees are stubborn
the ents will tell you that in the deepest of woods there are
trees that will hurt you but mostly they are afraid of you
and they have been made into all the books we are talking about anyway

there seems to be a trick of the calendar you see that brings the closeness
that all hallows eve comes before all saints day
but you see there was a change in the years that have past 
for a hallow is a saint, a saint is a halig, and if you go far enough
the Hāliġ Gāst is the Holy Ghost, and the Holy Ghost is God

ween is an eve and an eve is the night before the day
the night before the day is the vigil for the approaching morn
'will you not wake with me' has been translated poorly by many
one of the more knowing and sad questions ever known
so on the eve we wait together for that which is to come

can you hold in your head for a moment that all saints are spirits?
for like we are bound they have left behind the mortal
and they travel both near and far to those still here
so we live within a very long eve
as we away the Last Day

all the books, in all the realms point to such an idea
we only differ in accent and outfits
in the words of Patsy Cline, 'I stop to see a weeping willow,
crying on his pillow, maybe he's crying for me' 
and Patsy was out late at night and night winds were whispering

for in the thinning between the worlds, the places between
the spaces, we can hear regrets and memories, we can feel what was felt
when it felt, where it was felt by those that go before us
time is often pointed to as an eternal force, something that goes one way
but time, like all things, was turned on in the breaking of the day

by the tree there are geese, eating leftover bread and some bugs
and an old story in an old book says that goosebumps come from
geese walking over your grave in the future
whether you are buried or scattered, whether you were shot or stoned
and if geese can send you bumps from the future

and if geese can send you bumps from the future
and if we can know that we are going to die in advance
maybe those who have gone on can send us messages too
but because we have not gone, we cannot understand
so we struggle with how to interpret that which we hear

and we put on outfits of shadows, some dark on the eve
and some light on the day, that vestments are different from 
costumes is quite the literal trick, or for some a treat
and maybe in the highs driven on by sugar for children
and by alcohol for adults, we think we hear even more

so we go to places we shouldn't go alone
and we write books and movies and shows to train us
to jump away at the things that go bump in the night
instead of listening and writing down that which we hear
like some of the ancients did with stone and hearth

paths in old forests, where we began walking together
paths in old deserts, where we built nations of ourselves
and paths in old books, where we wrote down our understanding
and paths in old books, where we burned everything we did not
turns out the haligs, I mean the hallows, I mean the ghosts

I mean the saints. The saints have a holiday and they are singing
holy, holy, holy for saint means holy as well so you can say
halig, halig, halig or 𐌷𐌰𐌹𐌻𐌰𐌲𐍃, 𐌷𐌰𐌹𐌻𐌰𐌲𐍃, 𐌷𐌰𐌹𐌻𐌰𐌲𐍃 
and you are just saying hello to your fellow saints
they are addressing each other and Hāliġ Gāst with joy

he says that he is just like all the guys
his sharp teeth are just a stylistic choice
he scoffs at the rider in Sleepy Hollow
Crane was not worth the pursuit

'my cousin tends to collect people for no reason'
the Dullahan stopped when he was talking
faced me to make a point, it is quite the sight
and the people of Elm park move along

Worcester's own are used to things being off
under the dome and all that, have you seen the smiles?
so I nod and try not to stare at his teeth
that shine with metallic brightness

and I wonder if he props his head upon a table
to polish them, and if he talks to himself while he does it
quite a picture, eh? quite a picture indeed
when he catches me staring I quickly look away

there is a squirrel mid-snack in the foreground
and I pull out my phone and snap a pic
catching the bathing geese in the last embers
of golden hour in the early fall

this time is the best time to talk to the spirits
as they move between the places that they tend to go
and the dances that they do are less conspicuous
when the shadows are a bit longer

my dreams are full of those shadow dances
tinged in contrast and edged in tints and hues
like Achilles I was dipped by the ankle in a vat
of orange not immortality, and out came a poet

the bards tend to the blues and the Dullahan in his
time was dipped in the blue to his very knees
and he liked to sing songs to the serious geese
to me the silly ones are the ones who like to talk

and the Dullahan says he is going to bed
'I'll meet you John at the big tree tomorrow'
and I walk off to my own goodnight with a smile
and a song to write about a demon misunderstood

There was a time in New England
when being sad was cool
to have trauma was to be different
being burned at the stake was heroic

The end of all poets it seemed was
by the very hand that lifted the pen
and the sycophants would trek dutifully
to their graves and rub away obediently

To live and write and write and die
was itself the path to immortality
eulogies that themselves were high praise
were sung, nay wrought from the heavens 

“I waited, as if the sea could make my decision for me.”
Plath wrote that as if her pen was taken from 
granite before the dawn of time and every writer
knows the waiting she speaks of

"I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster."
Bishop lost immensity in these lines, but claimed no special seat

If you look up and about and under
and over the shining glowing electric hearth
of our modern life you will see that
trauma is no longer cool

It is commonplace to cry in public
it is complaining that undergirds our reality
when it is missing you feel relief
when it is present you do not notice

A story of a child being sent to a country
that they are not even from
because their parents came to a different
country entirely is no longer an epic

It is something to read in a flash on your hand
held computer before moving on to the 
next trendy dance or the next trendy meal
or the next trendy diet or the next trendy reel

Sadness is a cliche that you cannot escape
no a blackness that holds you in such a vise
that no one can understand you
and not one person dares to ask

But there is a GoFundMe with that exact
phrasing for a lady in a town in Arizona
who got into a car accident and she is a teacher
and she can't afford it so she asks for help

The noble quiet of locking yourself into
a tower and not even thinking for a moment
that someone would ask you to throw down your
hair because of the level of wallowing you intend 

Turns out that holding in the deepest of personal pains
is not cool in this age at all
and even fellow poets will get up at open mics
and expose themselves to everyone

The land is burnt over in therapeutic speech
so much so that it is a wonder that a Brian Wilson
could even arise in this generation to say, nay
to sing, "It's so sad to watch a sweet thing die"

In the very moment of listening to that record
laying on the carpet of the local rich kids living room
the old record player scratching out the in between 
song waiting room you find yourself thinking in

Finding a place for a person other than yourself
to get that you are not even a part of the self
that you show involves more than finding an apartment
for rent in a neighborhood full of color and life

Bonnie herself sang it best, 'Turn down these voices
inside my head.' But the very idea of no lies told
is a silly happy fable in a land with geese who talk
and gnomes who dance and ducks who sing

There is no joy in Mudville. Nowhere is there a band
playing for hearts that are light. Nowhere is there
happiness that you can hold in your arms. Sadness
grips our very souls, trauma bonds us all.

There are no songs on the radio anymore,
the last DJs have 3 kids in college
and the playlist is set by AI anyways
and all the good songs are covers anyways

The talking heads complain about quality of life
as they consider banning someone for being
unhoused, homeless, lost from the depression
we all feel with all of our stuff in our hands

 “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, 
but the Son of Man hath nowhere to lay His head.”
Was this a complaint or a statement? If it is a statement
it is about sacrifice, the giving of self in love

So those who are unhoused are noble
giving up something that we are supposed to give
freely and the local politicians are so lucky
we are all too sad to rise up in revolution

The marches are scheduled in advance with the police
on Saturdays so it can be a nice day out
the signs can be made with nicer cardboard
on sale at Michael's with a gift card you got for Christmas

After they can drive their Rav-4s to Applebee's or the 99
and get a nice little meal in with the Sox game on in
the background and say nasty things about the politician
that they don't like or compare their Patagonia jackets

The traffic cones are set up before the neighborhood
rises and they remain there for weeks and they remind
you not to park in the spot that you should not park in
and you never even have to think of the name of the person who put them there.

You never have to imagine for a moment that there
are other people who exists outside of your own mind
and all the songs are songs for you
and all the books are books for you

And all the happy movies are made to help you get by
and you get by just enough to order a pizza
and turn on the the show that you are using to distract
yourself from the fact you need to talk to someone

The fall creeps in unnoticed at first and then
like a butterfly bursts forth in a sea of colors
and sends people into warmer clothes and
the anticipation of holiday events and holiday traditions

The lost seek a warmer blanket to pull up
a comfortable snack to order in
a serial killer documentary or a Christmas marathon
and they settle into their silent loneliness

Letting all the social media sadness
bare itself out there for the universe
hiding all the folks who truly need
to read all about the poets they never read

miserére nobis
holding the chalice in your hands
saying those words I see a tremble
a hesitation in your eyes as you look 

miserére nobis
above the chalice to the vaulted ceiling
the paint more expensive than the clothes
of most of the parishioners heads bowed

miserére nobis
I don't know why but I sing this with all my might
and think I need the mercy
and think I need it badly

miserére nobis
a simple song really, with the high highs
and the low lows
and mercy in between

miserére nobis
the world needs it taken away so much
the world needs for it to be real
the world doesn't know what it doesn't know

miserére nobis
lambs look directly at you when you hold them
when you look at the ceiling are you the lamb
looking over the chalice to heaven?

miserére nobis
when I too look above to the vaults
are you waiting to look down at me
and make me think my peccáta is gone?

dona nobis pacem
I seek it with my whole heart
and I use the words to shake out the dark
and sometimes people get it

da mihi pacem
for in the idea of it I rest
for in the tides of my heart I stay
for in it alone I find your face

Agnus Dei
how did they think it was okay?
how do I justify myself?
how do you run from guilt?

Agnus Dei
Credo, Domine; adjuva incredulitatem meam
my unbelief is a floating miasma of memories
was I there? was I real? am I real now?

Credo, Domine; adjuva incredulitatem meam
there it is. My share of faith is not enough
where the gap is you should be!
where the gap is you should stand!

mensura fidei
it is a word it is a portion
and it is my own to contemplate
lambs look directly at you when you hold them

Everyone uses schedules in a different way
and if you look at each person's calendar
you get an idea of what they value
what exactly is important enough to write down

at least that is how it is spoken about
some people don't use schedules at all
they make time for things they make time for
no neglect has gone into the decision

at least that is how they want you to think about it
all the while plotting a secret plan behind your back
making time while making time with someone else
and completely ignoring you the whole time

at least that is one way to think about it
as you go over each and every thing again and again
in your mind like the sands through the hourglass
on Days of Our Lives such as these are

at least it would be one way that Stefano would
manipulate you into thinking before he revealed
you are not even yourself but the evil twin you 
never knew about living as yourself under his power

at least that is how one of the plots seemed to go
when I would watch while my mother watched
while she was vacuuming, cooking and going over
my homework with the phone cradled at her ear

at least that is one of my favorite memories and 
it really doesn't suffer from interpretation it just
is a scene I replay in my mind when I think of
a strong woman an uncrowned queen a kindly ruler

at least that is how I interpret many of the Mary J. Blige
songs that I associate with her have you ever heard
the remix of I Love You with Smif & Wessun?
my mom couldn't afford duck down jackets 

at least that was how she told me I was allergic to feathers
instead of telling us that we couldn't afford it
how do you explain to a child that doesn't understand
the nuances of the economy's money supply

at least that is what you end up discovering that
the economy of the so-called greatest nation on earth
is okay with single mothers subsisting on just enough
to get by without dying on a sidewalk

at least that is what you get to when your family is one
of the ones that survives and doesn't die on a sidewalk
and it turns out that someone out there has even greater
trauma than you and that it is not their entire identity

at least that is what you tell yourself when you try to
make a change in how you present your masks to others
and the work you did on the newest mask will surely result
in that everyone will love and accept you for who you are

at least that is what you write down in the margins of the
day planner you grabbed at the airport on your way out of
town to another place with new people who you never need
to know enough to schedule a time to talk to them.

deep in the bowels of the ancient scroll room
there is a little note scrawled in the margins
and the ink is worn a bit, as the note was written in haste
before someone entered the room

the hushed movements of a person running away
from having gained and given knowledge
having found a little something extra in the cobwebs
and in the memory a power is inscribed

I often wonder what it would have been like talking to Hume
a very smart man who didn't believe in miracles
couldn't see past the end of his own nose
and declared anyone who could to be irrational

that the laws of nature are immutable is something we must accept
so says Hume and countless other nincompoops
who never saw a party they wouldn't take the music away from
or a true love they wouldn't ship off to separate boarding schools

faceless philosophers trying to wrestle without joy
struggling without belief in something bigger than themselves
not the structures now
not the foolish authorities but the idea itself

of course humans fail we are inherently flawed
imperfect mortal beings dying slowly on a dying world
lit and heated by a dying star in a universe that
is slowly stretching itself out into a frozen infinity

of course if you look at it like that
we should all be on antidepressants
we should all be draped in gray 
and sweeping the hallways of institutions alone

'lock it up when you leave' the supervisor will say
and although Sherry had brought scones you forgot to grab one
before the long walk to your parking space in the far lot
and it never fails to amaze you that you have a flat

and to live in the worn ruts of the downturns of life
will never allow you to see the sun break through 
on a truly cloudy day where the rain has swollen the drains
and the gutters fell off into the streets

without miracles, without magic there is nothing for
philosophy to argue against anyways ergo philosophy is
a pile of horseshit ipso facto Hume is a jerk and I would
never let him pick songs for the playlist at the Christmas party

what direction would you want to go in
if you only had straight lines
what would be the point of it all if there was no Route 9
and the roads were clear of fools?

ok well that might be nice but still!
Hume is such a Debbie Downer
and I still go to old libraries and look in the pages
to see if some old Thaumaturge thought to leave a note in the margins

In the waning twilight
a chill has entered the air
and everyone is wearing 
more layers than last week

Inevitably one or two of us
is hiding something from
someone else and we tell
something we know is off

You know the type of words
that you need to use to convince
the person you happen to have
that they are the only one

Forever is a long time for
mortal beings to promise
forever is a time that doesnt
exist in the current state

Constants are unreachable
the best you can hope for is
the steady beat of someone in three
keeping time for Mr. Charles

The vibes were never immaculate
and neither was Mary
she humbled herself
and was chosen for that alone

So instead of making false
promises could you instead
admit that the person in your eyes
has found favor with you?

The humanity of an eternal being
always was hard to grasp 
the latins didn't have a good word
for it so they made up hypostatic

Don't linger on that word too long
because you are not going to figure it out
it is a word made for today in hopes that
in eternity we will know the right one

Forever is like that too
you say forever to the one you say you love
because you hope that maybe
they will be there in the end

But everyone is a liar
because not a single one of us knows
whether we will wake up tomorrow
or crumble into the ether

There are no flags in the afterlife
of that I am the most sure
and all the lies will stop forever
and forever will mean it

You didn't mean it
you just said it
because it felt good to say
and I understood

because it felt good to hear.

when you wake up in the world
you look for those things that fill you up
you seek out those people who do the same
on a treasure hunt through the day

too good to be true
life stranger than fiction
makes the letters of strangers
a refuge from reality

what we can't find with our eyes
we make with our minds
we build up in our hearts
we give all to make real

Shakespeare's stage is very much real
there is something missing in the heart of men
and we make things
and we make them again

there are scenes in my head
from books 
from songs
from poems

and I am desperate to make them real
and I am fraying at the seams
that keep my mind together
without their being in existence

and my friends think I am only good
to make deals
to bring money
to sign contracts

and all along I am in the basement of my mind
scribbling these verses
listening to the songs
that drive down the valley of my sanity

so i build other people's stories
and they stack on top of each other
making the stories I reach to
a little closer than they were before

charlatans don't know they are 
they just play the role they play
until they are faced with truth or death
they are unaware of the crumbled pages

in the trashcan in the basement of my mind

there is a staircase covered in rug
staccato noises play off the ceiling
as I lay cantered to the last stair
my knees upon the riser, my shoulders pointed up

I wonder if I fell asleep here
would anyone come to find me
are my spawn spots known to more
than the interior of my mind

a house of construction materials
there is no real ceiling the softboxes glow down
upon me and I am sweating about the next line
there is a sense of judgement behind the lens

and I am not awake awake again and I am dreaming
of a place where I know all the things
there is to know and everyone smiles
at my answers, I sing them to them

I sing them to them in key
you must remain in key the money
comes when you are in tune
are you attuned to the needs of the people

the people who rely on the things you do
and you are bound by task paralysis
and you are frozen in your chair 
and you need to make the deadline

and no one knows that you are giving 
everything you ever had to give because
its says in the Scriptures that even the little
you have will be taken away.

so you might as will give it freely.

I thought about Woody Guthrie today
His father was a Klansman
and Woody became a travelin' communist

If you were dancing on an endless skyway
and I told you factoids of the day
Like that turkeys were almost the national bird

Do you think that in an alternate universe
where turkeys are painted and eagles are ignored
That presidents pardon eagles on Thanksgiving instead?

Or that in that alternative universe we speak a different
primary language, probably Pennsylvania Dutch
And the Amish are in charge of everything?

Maybe in that world Buddy Holly and Richie Valens
did not get onto the plane and formed a supergroup
With the Big Bopper, and they still tour today...

In the misty crystal spray of the Pacific Ocean
where the King Columbia meets it do you 
Think that Woody knew how different it would be?

I can't get away from the image of the Turkey
replacing the stripes and having some purple mountain
Majesty on the flag instead

I guess I will write a novel where this is how it is
and make a movie about it
And the corporate overlords will love it.

But they won't get it,
like Woody's song
and like this poem.

in the world beneath the water
everything is right side up
everything looks the same
as if you were here

in the world beneath the water
the trees can talk
the geese can walk
the dogs salute

in the world beneath the water
all the men wear top hats
and take them off to say hello
to the saluting dogs

in the world beneath the water
the ladies all have parasols
and they spin them right round
this way, that way, this way

in the world beneath the water
all the squirrels are card sharks
and you need to watch your stack
before you make a bet, they play for keeps

in the world beneath the water
bears are in their rightful place
owners of the butcher shops
purveyors of fine meats

in the world beneath the water
there is a story of a king
who lives off in a far land
and is kindly and old

in the world beneath the water
all the girls are princesses
all the boys are princes
and they all can wear pants

in the world beneath the water
singing is the coin of the realm
and knowing your do rey mi 
is muy importante

in the world beneath the water
i stroll along in the park
and when i want an ice cream
i turn to Patsy Cline

in the world beneath the water
my best friend is an old oak
who tells the best stories
as i eat a vanilla cone in his shade

in the world beneath the water
you never left, you are writing your book
sitting under the apple blossom tree
her name is Frances too

in the world beneath the water
i am who you thought I could be
i did in fact grow up 
i became a person you could see

in the world beneath the water
there is no death you see
there is only life
the streets are made of platinum

in the world beneath the water
wizards are politicians
and they make everything we need
with their wizardly ways

in the world beneath the water
everyone has their way
their path to grow further up
their road to grow further in

in the world beneath the water
i am the only one awake
i never could fall asleep you see
and in total loneliness i embed

in the world beneath the water
i am etching myself into the glass
i am the logo fading from the mug
i am all things at once

in the world beneath the water
i am nothing but a wisp
i know that a wisp is a vapor
i know that a vapor still stings

in the world beneath the water
i look up to the people in the world
as they walk in their real world
and i am reaching for the surface

in the world beneath the water
there is only dancing
there is only dancing
there is only silly dancing

in the world beneath the water
i am at once and instant
i am undone by the memory
i am put back together

you brought two sets of glasses
readers both
and you feel prepared
you printed out the pages

the verses you share on this night
get the venerable 'new shit' and clicking fingers
but there is nothing new
these songs are ancient and worn

in the depths of a stone and metal cell
yellow lined paper
and a pencil on your ear
you listen to the songs late into the night

the beats and the meters and the rhythms
the meanings in between
you hum along in several languages
a gift given long, long ago

you leave the cell on top of a stone wall
you can see the sea from here
and she beckons all poets
for all poets are sailors

singing the foam and the wind
to those who would never dare
the dead who found the floor
need someone to sing for them

----

did you ever wonder about the propensity
for poets to use lines and dots
the pause on the page
the effect getting you to think about it

how do the dead tell tales of the sea
how do the dead send the stories forward
how do the rhymes make it to us
if history is only written by the winners

----

if the historians are bureaucrats
then all poets are rebels
and must weave into the songs
the stories of angst and woe

the times the blood was let
and it was by an usurper
who rode behind a sigil
and called it valiant

the rich rode down the poor
and shouted their own names 
from castles near and far
as armored guards pressed in on the crowds

----

if all poets are rebels
and all poets are sailors
then all poets are pirates
born to steal back what was taken

when we were all young
we thought pirates were the coolest
and that's because we knew
no one takes up the sea by accident

the real pirates sank the galleons
because the rulers were unjust
pillaging all they saw
taking all they wanted

----

the road to serfdom
is littered with the projects of reformers
and they never seem to see
the waste of their good cousins

'Good Cousin, Well Met'
written for posterity
in glittering ink on golden vellum
the deeds of the heroes

and yet in the late nights
there still are found the beats
of hymns not bound in order
and when you sing them

and when you sing them
its as if you have always sung them
and when you pause
and look up at the crowd

and look up at the six supporters
who came to see you 
who came to see you read
who came to see you read the words

you know in your core
that these are songs you were
always meant to sing
and you begin to harmonize

harmonies with ghosts
long lost at the ocean's floor
long crucified on the Roman road
long hung from trees in the deep wood

you sing the high highs
and you sing the low lows
and the baritone smites
the in-betweens with his sword

and you parry against the knight
whose deeds were written down
by his good cousin
by his good cousin indeed

and the cousin got a contract
for the concrete pilings of the 
highways that split the neighborhoods
that the priests chastise to go to mass

and the priests wear all the gold
for it reflects light as if it was in them
but it is not in them at all
for the gold is why they wear it

'but the disciples rebuked them'
and they set up a barrier
and they set up an altar rail
and they polished it 

----

the second set of glasses is a bit foggy in the corners
but in the center it is clear
you are a bit foggy about your childhood
but in the middle you are clear

you are clear to sing the songs
you are bound to sing the songs
you are cleared to sing the songs
you are born to sing the songs

in the moments before my friend spotted the doll
my mind was on the seriousness of the moment
the information needed to process the actions
that we have to undertake as we approach the fall

in the moments after my friend spotted the doll
i needed to process out the parts of my mind 
that have long accepted that Toy Story is real
and that this poor doll is not in fact alive

in the moments before we found the spot the doll
had come to rest so I could take the photograph
one that my friend knew I needed to take
we navigated the grass that was, and is, full of goose shit

in the moments after I took the photo of the doll
i began to compose the meter for this verse
my mind a tape of thematic progressions
my heart a smorgasbord of dactyls and iambs

in the moments when I was writing the poem about the doll
i realized that the poem is not, in fact, about the doll
nor is it completely about my friend's kind salve of my insanity
my crazy is a soft kind now, one that can be contained

in the moments that I knew I was a real person and not a doll
i was sitting on a roof in the deep summertime
having climbed there with my mother's butter knives
and I threw them with force at the wall of the buttress

in the moments when I played little league that summer
having found out that my mother had gotten a call
from a man she once dated who noticed that I could throw
his voice on the line when he confirmed my spot, 'Thanks Doll'

in the moments when I played center for the first time
a young Italian boy hit a rope double into the gap
and I ran it down on a bounce and spun, firing it on a line
he slid hard into second, but the ball beat him, and we got the call

in the moments when you devise an internal poetic scheme
the beats and the time and the flow and the rhymes
you need for your mind to be free of any contaminating thoughts
like about Andy or Buzz Lightyear or your sister's Barbie doll

in the moments when you pulled off the head of the doll
and considered for a moment to hide it, but you heard voices
so in an act of prepubescent mercy you put it back
and carried it as an act of grace for forty years and forty nights

in the moments you think you are alone with your thoughts
they burst forth onto the page in a deluge of incoherence
only to come together as you stir in a bit of music about the doll
to reveal that you were not like the boy who hated toys

in the moments you are thinking again about the doll
and you think about the walk with your friend
and you think about your years behind the wall
you realize that, in fact, technically, you have never been free

in the moments that you are finishing the verse
and you consider the doll, again, as an object, as a cruciform
you see your reflection in the mirrors of your mind
some broken, some older, some smaller, and some gone

in the moments you desire to become like the prophets of old
in the caves in the desert with only your own mind to contend with
and you sit down to write it all down about how you fell down
in that picture, in that cave, you are not alone, you brought a doll

it turns out that Jeremiah was not
in fact
a bullfrog

modern theologians
have carved out the very idea
that a prophet could be real

the forecasters have claimed
the role of prediction
for themselves

and the intelligentsia
have enough evidence
of that failure to scoff

so the preachers, the shepherds as it were
never have to deal with
Jeremiah

in particular the weeping prophet
mentions something
that only makes sense

if prophecies are real
if he knew something
if he saw a bit of future

i wonder if being a prophet
is quite like looking through
the bottom of a glass bottle

warped and lit strangely
but just enough to be
comforting to some, and terrifying to others

(on a side note
have you ever heard
God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen

but the version by the 
Bare Naked Ladies
and Sarah McLachlan?

the version is so different
it makes you think of the
one you heard as a child

and hear it through that
glass bottle, strange
and warped in a good way

there is truth in these texts
but maybe we are not the ears
that ought to hear)

so Jeremiah says to the shepherds
and the principals of the flock
that they shall have no place to flee

and that the peaceable habitations
are cut down because of the
fierce anger of the Lord

the shepherds and principals 
the preachers and leaders
the pastors and ministers

shall cry out
but their habitations
are cut down

you, like me, must wonder
if the sounds of those cries
come over the mountains

and through the valleys
like trumpets in a dark alley
like drums through broken windows

and that the one part of the sacred
texts we have come to call into 
question, or minimize as myth

when Yahweh said they prefer
mercy and not sacrifice
they meant it, they meant it

and you hid your peaceable habitation
behind a fence with barbed wire
and you sang about families

but you didn't sing out into the hedges
or the highways or byways
or the ditches or the puddles

and Jeremiah was confused
because he was looking through
the end of a shofar, or a trumpet

and he said shepherds
instead of preachers
instead of pastors

or maybe he meant it
every single syllable
every single curve

and as we leave those with our eyes
to sleep on the streets in the cold
we are to be cut down

(i am standing on a sidewalk
in front of a convivence store
and I have five dollars in my wallet

but i say i don't carry money
because i am convinced that
he will use it to use

in this i am the same as the voices
not calling out in the wilderness
but sleeping with air conditioning on)

the Hebrew word could be used
for the leader of a band
as the sheep were a chorus

and i stood on stages looking out
into the eyes of believers
and saw the need to be affirmed

there are children who see videos
of dances and find joy in the movements
more joy than a flock ever gave

there are children who sleep on the ground
i was a child asleep on the ground
and i ran with more joy

and i ran with more joy
and i ran free
and i sang God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen

and i meant every word
i knew every verse
and it was as real to me

as the voice of the shepherd is
to his sheep in the embers of the day
as he calls them to sleep

the phrase 'most scholars agree' is deployed
often to deny beauty and design to the poor
that a fisherman from Galilee could turn a phrase like
'I am no more in the world, 
but these are in the world, 
and I am coming to you.'

that is the standard move you know
when you want to deny someone credit
that a woman, unmarried no less, could drop
'amidst the conditions of an imperfect social state, 
in which great feelings will often take the aspect of error, 
and great faith the aspect of illusion'

no man in his britches can handle such.
no one can allow it to be.

in the embers of failure
there is always a path
painful that it might be
to get to the place that 
you were always supposed to be

the key change is a musical
leading by the nose
and the reintroduction of metrics
that you did not pace yourself for
is a poet's red flag

flying high on the battlements
flying high on the battlements in D

do you think that when George Eliot
sat in her window, looking down on
Agnes while she watered the garden
that when she looked up to the sky
she saw the same stars that John saw on Patmos?

do you think
for a second
that John was
describing
what he understood
or literally?

do you get 
offended when
someone says
that you are wrong
but you do not agree
in your heart?

do you hum hymns
that your mother
taught you in the key
of A-minor that
the presbyter insists
are to be in E?

in the purple hours
when you wish you 
had stayed in the dream
do you feel pain
from an unseen prophecy
that you impose on yourself

or do you wait until
the yellow dawn
to run yourself through
the paces of an imagined
gospel of un-prosperity
a very, merry un-gospel to you

are you a poet who parses
the verses of your peers
to find references to dead poets
that never knew society
that never intended to be a footnote
in an Irishman's pallid sonnet

are you a poet who peers
at the papers of the poets
who sit in the front rows
at the gatherings of poets
that need each other to know
that they too are singing still?

as the digital paper takes
this my digital ink
will it stand the test of time
that the greats who stole
Latin and Greek inscriptions
in the same way we interweave
lyrics of musicians who were just guessing

guessing at what the A&R man wanted
because the disk jockeys had come
forward with a new trend because
they were annoyed at how great
McCartney was at everything
like did he have to sing his own backup?

and then the new elites
writing on blogs and vlogs
try to tell you that 
Tusk is somehow better than Rumors
and Rumors was dipped in the
acid of just incredible sales

that on a cobbled street somewhere
in a European town
where the river is older
than the streets
a boy can write an aria
that will someday crush your soul

are you not offended?
are you not afraid to fail?
are you so full of ire that
you don't know that we all know
that in the corners of shady
bars we laugh at your conceit

---this is the moment when you think the poem is over---

in fact this is the point where I need to tell you
that I once sat in a log cabin
it was long and wide, with recessed seating
like the pits from the seventies

in the pit sat the Moirai at one end
Clotho smiling as always
Lachesis intense and focused
and Atropos almost sad as she worked

and to my right sat Athena and Arachne
before their argument
Arachne had midnight in her hair
and Athena wore sun as a bonnet

to my left giggling were the sisters Norn
Urðr was farthest from me
Verðandi was practically next to me
and Skuld sat a bit away, almost in shadows

the floor of the cabin was made from the roots
of Yggdrasil and many dwarves and elves
flitted about tending to the many-colored jacket
that they were collaborating on

they did not acknowledge me
nor each other
but sat in concert
playing the music of the loom

and when I stood free
wearing the jacket of my dreams
I saw my sister Naomh Bríd
and we danced a light jig

heading towards the peat moss
she had shamrocks in her eyes
and I felt the power of the moats
and the walled cities of stone

in my blood, in my ancient blood
there is a call to die to myself
and for years we called it sadness
medicated it, therapied it

most scholars agree that 
I am incapable of writing
this poem, this ode to self-immolation
that my trivial failures
are but insignificant blights
upon that of the high-born

and how could I have found the
Upelkuchen on my own
how could I find the Upelkuchen
there are cabinets full of the cake
in the libraries of the darkest
prisons on the earth

in my blood is revolution
in my memory is harmony
the harmonies that are hummed
in the keys that I choose
in the keys that I sing
in the key that is I

and in the singing of the songs
that the ancients whispered
to the youth listening raptly
passed through briar hedges
and in the alleys of long forgotten
we give ourselves away

in failing we forward
the promises failed to us
that on some stone
someday a child can pull
a sword of flames
and lead them.

In the morning's context
there are a kind of goodbyes
that can fill one's intentions
a cup spilleth-ed over

the ladies in the Dunkin' drivethru
catch a kind of smile
that leads to better home lives
for the unemployed boyfriends

you find yourself
driving in the middle lane on the Pike
and letting all the overbearing pickups
drive 95 up the tailpipe of civil servants

and you change the station
to the oldies, and are happy to find
that the songs there
are the ones you sang in high school

these goodbyes are kept in a locket
a golden one that you save
in the deepest corner of your mind
for when you think of her again.

....

In the afternoon's context
there are terse exchanges
that can stop the momentum
of what was once a grand Friday

the guys in the breakroom
receive the kind of dead-eyed stare
that leads to negative reinforcement
of the silly thoughts of false male role models

you find yourself
clicking through minesweeper aimlessly
torturing yourself with the little explosions
and imagining yourself imploded

and you change the playlist
to the one that makes your left earbud
hiss a little, and the pain reminds you
that you have 4 hours left

these exchanges are kept in a pocket
in the negative spaces around your
abdomen, and eat away at the ulcer
that you pounds Tums for anyway.

....

In the evening's context
there are wary glances
that make one dread the conversations
and how long you must wait to tell

the one friend you have maintained
from the cobwebs of elementary school
that you both desperately rely on
to cover for the therapy you can't afford

you talk without direction about
sports teams you stopped believing in
when your little league coach
played his son in center over you

and you sit down to write poetry
with a soundtrack connected to moments
moments unconnected to anyone else
other than the you you want to be

these tellings are poured into verse
and you experience relief from the
sounds in your own head for a moment
until the words pile up again.

if you could imagine Buddy
as he sings Jealous Guy
he didn't mean to hurt that girl
not at all, not at all

take him and ask him to duet
with Art on Santa Monica
adding the spilling voice to
the surging one, the surging one

I'm sitting at the piano
with an unfinished whiskey
and an unlit cigar
I don't smoke, I don't drink

the beach beyond the patio
is empty except for couples
paired off unto oblivion
and not, and not, and not me

the statistics are in my favor
becoming something not everyone is
the lone voice of a poet
in the wilderness of the internet

that millions of mile of wires
and cables and electricity
could potentially bring us
together, for the first time

that this whole time
my dear gentle reader
you were really only a click away
a login remembered, a password suggested

and that my little ditties
sung to my ghosts in the twilight
could make you think we think
in a similar way, in a way like us

that us could become we
as you sit down at your typewriter
nee, keyboard, nee, app on your phone
and pull verses together

makes me think that maybe
the darkness I feel as I empty the whiskey
out in the ocean
just past the breakers

maybe, if we did watch the world die
or if we are watching it now
that O'Day and Stevenson
are right, and that band will change it all

that in the new world
born in fire and ash
resurrected from the dead
beliefs of the ones who came before

we will be able to dance in the streets
lined with silver and gold
and our feet will never be sore
and our smiles will never fade

unless we want them to
free to think of the lost
free to imagine the songs
that they write, that they write

I went to a Bible study
the kind that Protestants have
and they talked about
the Word of God for a while

eventually the tone shifted
and they made fun of Popery
and they said that Catholics were
less Christian than they

one man argued about the names of
the archangels
the literalists say that there are only 
Michael and Gabriel

but they also think that there are
twelve archangels
they just refuse to say
the names the Catholics do

its too bad then
they miss out on the true lineage
of one of the best Ninja Turtles
angels before artists, ya heard

....

I went to an adult catechetical seminar
the kind that the Catholics have
and they talked about
Mary, Mother of God for a long while

eventually the tone shifted
and they spoke darkly of heresy
and they said the Protestants were
less Christian than they

one man argued about the Traditions
of the Church
the conservatives say that 
Tradition trumps Scripture some of the time

but they also say that the
separated brethren
are missing out on the 
Sacraments, seven of them, of course

it is too hard then
to try and explain 
the Greeks call them Mysteries
and they are exactly the same

....

I read a lot of books
and many, many poems
and in them I found
a pervasive grace

there are those who high church
and dress all fancy
and love gold dishes
and those are Baptists

there are those who low church
and wear brown bags
and use paper plates
and those are Franciscan

....

but in the dark mid-whisper
from a man who lives under a bridge
asking me for a dollar
as he lays on the naked concrete

all of my training
all of my learning
all of my doctrine
spills forth onto the floor

in the small light that persists
in my darkest of hearts
I remember that they all agree
He said, 'Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me'

maybe the Reformed are right
and He said verily, verily
and said brethren not brothers
but to save another is to save them all

....

I dreamed I had the courage
to walk downtown with a basin
and clean the feet of those who need it
and I know I am not worthy

and I know I am not worthy

but one day last week
I bought a basin

sometimes I wonder
about the regular-ness of life
and each age's desire to make
heroes and villains of small men

Miller mentioned quiet desperation
and we build cathedrals to our bodies
our vanity
our need to be affirmed

in a desperate attempt to distract
us from the fact that not everyone
gets the same
is the same at all

in the darkness of many cold rooms
in institutions from my youth on
I thought about all the holidays
that I was allowed to miss

reintegration of a lost soul
is not possible
regeneration of a broken boy
is not in the cards

across the table from me
a man is holding pocket kings
and I can see right through him
I fold my aces anyways

self-destruction in a verse
immolation in a chorus
sung to the high heavens
in a vibrato tuned to a high E

there was a cave and I saw
the shadows on the wall
long before I struck them all down
long before someone wrote my name

in the nominations before the committees
and in the backroom dealing
there are no stories
of a hero to look up to

it is not disappointment
not for a single second
it is, in fact expected results
of a boy who dreams in triolets

in the mornings I hum sonnets
and in the evenings I dance odes
I eat elegies in the late nights
snacks I just cannot resist 

I had a teacher once who tried
and thought he should show me Milton
and there I met a fanciful Lucifer
a pretty boy, whose eyes were stars

and saw that it is in the hearts of men
to be fallen
to be broken
to be unhealed

and of all the times I tasted love
it was but a false amber shade
of indigestion and physical desire
a fluttering of bats

in the comic stories
billionaires have hearts of gold
and boys of all shapes and sizes
believe in the leaders we see

in the reality we all share
however it is that we see it
it turns out there is no Batman
and he beat up the poor anyway

the colorful villains always escape
and always kill again 
and always kill again
and always kill again

I stood in the pantry
with a towel around my neck
and I leapt towards you
and you let me fall

and you let me fall.

behind the door is nothing of interest
of that you are sure
and being so sure
you stare down the hallway at the door

it is not the only way out
it is not the easiest way out
it is not even attractive
with mold above the threshold

demons and demogoblins could be
awaiting at each of the sidedoors
that hold the hallway's arms
and you know the spells to cast them out

gremlins that have just eaten
may be hiding behind the exit sign
and bats that have not eaten
could be in the rooms that the doors hide

a swirling destruction could await you
and everyone will say that they told you
so and that you were well informed
of the certainty of your failure

'i told you so' an enemy of yours will say
to another enemy that played the friend
the opp that kept close to you
the fiend that played the advisor

Grima Wormtongue that they remain
they will post on Facebook how they miss you
and that they still believe in you 
and they will count your money in silence

and yet...

as you stand at the head of the hallway
knowing your inevitable doom
you are certain
that your path is different.