Genius of Doubt

Link to February 25, 2009 sketchbook update- 19 new pages

Nestor 36

To keep sifting meaning, revealing
Until there is no more meaning.
Telemachus, fighter, I am happier than you
Born to forsee
The wife of sin
Struggler, sifter
Commiter to strangeness
Faithless to the King
To remain not
To begin to
Learn failure to
Be made in error
Then to learn the shore
By working the work of
A raised woman
you will not remain here very long at this work
You were not born to be a teacher.
Perhaps I am wrong.

Engine Sounds

link to Sketchbook update February 23, 2009, 15 new pages

Nestor 35

Unoffending sunbeams came forward,
eyes that surely matter amid
the gestures of clothes and flesh.
Eager dying
In exchanged darkness,
History remains massed all about them
(History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake.)
Weaving heaps of wings
Already pressing destruction
Of nations of light,
The earth swarms with wanderers
Quoting decay with
The zeal of uncertainty,
The vain dishonor of god.

Sturm-Esser

Link to Sketchbook update February 21- 2009- 21 new pages

Telemachus 31

I put youth into my mouth
I break them in instant wisdom
I will tell you of room and
Of living, though this
Soiled, empty lump-
Carry it like the proudest hollow temple-
A poet, a machine, the power of blame.

I will tell you of history
And word, and empire:
When you’ve lived as long as I

More Tales Of Ordinary Unhappiness

Link to February 17, 2009 Sketchbook update- 16 new pages

Nestor 30

An embarrassing Pilgrim:
He, on the porch and life in waiting,
watching the hurried voices in strife.
They, in teams and wisps of feet,
Calling, angry.

Listening.

Stowing golden treasure, shells
Secret from these smoky apostles
Preached to the rare world,
A world without end.

Watching the same.

“ I restore here,”as he steps

across the empty matter,
Gathering into hasty pockets
The drab bargains of the heart.

Is it now?

The Book of Yes

Link to sketchbook update, here, February 15, 2009

Telemachus 27

Riddle, riddle wave
The lips, the cock’s
Tribute the coin of
the underworld the
sentence long it
lies, shifting, riddling.

Asking secrets crowding then
remembering woven, woven but
yes! The heart is offered to the
shadow.

Nous Sommes

Link to Setchbook Update February 13

Telemachus 26

In sheltered Bedlam
Satchel and knife jerk
To breast , begins a ghoststory.
A weeping, drinking,
Across the wildbridge- a strategy for straddling,
Itself the void.

A boy and his book
Branded by impossible envy
A history of breath disesteemed
Fed on silence, raised by Paris
Amid the jesters
And drowned lambs
Now a shepherd,
Now a faint hand.

Secret to Miracles

Link to Sketchbook update February 11, 11 new pages

Telemachus 25

The memory of a city or
Was it the road the way remembered?

Corpsestrewn hill swollen proud,
(That excessive, shitty phrase)
Thank god I didn’t die, there.
But what does god care?

Welloff daughters live with the flame
Of glass battling waves to
Get to port

To get to Pyrrhus.

The Grace of the King

Link to Sketchbook update: February 9th, 18 new pages.

Telemachus 23

A swollen sail
Waiting , some Boatman
Watches days rippling
Winding sweet around the
Breastbone and the lips the hips of the
Drowned young girl clinging
To a photograph of the day
She stood on the stone
Throwing money into the waves

Folding Stars

Link to February 7 Sketchbook Update (20 pages)

Telemachus 22

The void before Marcellus
Kneeling beneath his gods
Again and again asking for meaning
While voices of those
Vigilant angels, mocking
this rare chemistry.
The listening country singing
The cold masters fleeing
Surely valentine’s bodies waiting
Their Roman lances piercing
Applause within the fiber

Now all the detached apostles
Are left to blame.

I thought I was Feeding the Bird, but Really, I was Feeding the Cat

Telemachus 21

Jesus fluttering in his waistcoat
Made of stone and tinder
Sober ballad the path of
The senses narrow from
Here to creation.

Behold, God is in the stomach
The word calls us from
The bird’s hat
Quivering on the wind
That brought us back and gave us
A wavering key to the
Salt eaters, found at the edges
Of the salty sea.

Caveat

Telemachus 20

The halting tale
Told on wings
Rising, fluttering bringing
Smokeplume into freshened eyes

Reminds me of the unbound tower
A place where disciples joined
Then rose, tacking into the
Bright skyline.

The free and the divine made of
Fine clear water bade goodbye
To the pale salty sea then

Forward in fluttering instant
Speaking in tongues a doll’s head
Chanting: to the jewbird and the joiner-
Goodbye,goodbye.