Magic Syllables
Magic is the repetition
of syllables
and ritual
beyond meaning
into the night,
Nonsense syllables
work as well,
but it helps
to make them solemn,
as a sonorous bell.
The occult is
the path to hell.
I have dabbled in it,
but repent of my crimes,
Yet isn't
the poetic use of alliteration
and rhyme
an instance of magic that bares
some of beauty's light?
The Man Who Would Be King
I went to India
to purge the Temple
of the rats,
and the vermin
welcomed me
and crawled
up my arm.
This is sick,
T thought,
these rats get
more affection
than many men,
and what Temple
harbors
humanity?
But I grew proud
and --
What pagan creed
is not better worn
than mine of light
from which humility
is shorn?
I would be king.
Dandelion
like you
I go
thru stages,
and have
a reputation
for coarseness
and ubiquity.
we will be
mowed down.
not yet tho,
nobler species
abound
but we'll
always be
around.
Marble in Space
White, blue and brown marble
in space, the earth, my home,
is far from the beaten
wilderness trail,
When will the ban be lifted?
When will we join
the universal dance?
When knights no longer bare
their bloody lances
and rifles are broken.
Then the peaceable kingdom
will be attained
and only hatred limp maimed.
Until then we are
quarantined by our disease.
But when lamb and wolf
nuzzle each other fondly,
then the smiling spaceships
to welcome in humankind.
And the world
will begin.
My Favorite Atheist
He believes in himself
as Invictus,
the only demigod.
He requires faith
to continue
believing in himself,
since he often
is awkward.
Broken by brittle facts,
he still sets out
to rule the universe
and make it better, better.
When he is done the universe
will be either a perfect cube
or idiosyncratic and perverse.
Such was me,
fatherless, on scholarships,
the teenaged acned atheist,
virgin and rube -
who cried out, with a friend,
"There is no God"
meaning only:
"We have no fathers."
Jello commercial
at a wedding reception
can we expect
to wiggle
forever fondly
under the fork?
--like, being eaten,
some eternal jello?
Jill is the bride.
Jack is the groom.
Jello is their essence.