the spirit world

expanding inward, in many ways,
the family collapsing and contagion
pulling out the weaker. each with its own
way of maintaining: haircuts, boots,
trimming fingernails (external); marriage,
sarcasm, lost luggage (internal). old men
walking dogs, but we are not. we are not old;
we are not dogs. many years ahead, years of
maintaining (boots; sarcasm). the family inward,
the individual outward. sustenance in food,
and in time something more. measuring days in meals,
and measuring years in love. love lost;
love gained; love dropped and picked up again.
(family inward.) the family as finite, and the
soul as infinite. the god as the topic, the
light source for some or the camera for others.
god as the point of view. and yet closer atoms,
closer points on the compass, providing their
own views (outward from the individual), each
in its own orbit. each measurement of love
counteracted against the others, the outward
in contrast with the inward and pulling against,
pulling toward. expanding inward while pulled
outward. internal decomposition held in suspended
animation by external gravitational energies.
the effect of time on mass, or the effect on love
by the passage of years and centuries. the human
condition: love wanes while civilization waxes,
or vice versa; the civilization as family: further
inward collapse, expanded gravitational force
locking each individual into fixed orbit, becalming
the beating heart of love. or vice versa, versa
vice. expansion and contraction of the heart,
beating on the edge of break. or the liver, if in
a foreign country. point of view, tightened up, focused
from somewhere internal, possibly the lungs, with
each breath an affirmation and then an extraction
and implantation of that point into the outer world.
then pulling back inward, alternatingly an inch or two
outside of one's face or within the core
of one's internal cavities, the viewpoint moving from
lung to atmosphere, atmosphere to lung. yet always
a gravity, pulled downward while outside, not
in comfort zone. sarcasm when outside of comfort
zone, and on the inside buying boots. the
persistence of maintenance in an inherently
unstable system. gravities in every direction
nulling each other out; floating through untended
ether. the spirit world overlapping the intimate
internal workings. the spirit world as the crux,
the spirit world underlying all. the spirit world
as the plane of all points of view, invisible to
the external eye. both the internal and the external,
working against each other in harmony.

love in 3 lines

love is lost,
sightlessly, soundlessly, stupidly
searching for me.

gravity pulls me down.

i wake up in the morning,
then gravity pulls me down.
i read the sunday newspaper,
and gravity pulls me down.

sometimes i wish i could fly,
but gravity pulls me down.

sometimes i think that i love you.
(gravity pulls me down.)

there are times when i am happy,
and times when i enjoy my thoughts,
and times when i let myself loose,
and times when i think i can live
until someday i am old;

yet gravity pulls me down.

november

she tells me, tonight, to fall in love,
as if it's something easy to do,
like snapping my fingers
or putting on a glove.

she tells me this, and i resent her for it,
and that's another reason why
i am so completely and utterly failing at it,
and i resent that too.

she tells me to fall in love,
as if i never have before,
as if that particular feeling
had never crossed the threshold
of my universe.

(i love my favorite spoon,
i love the way the seasons change,
i have friends who i love very much;
i am in love, even now.)

she sounds ecstatic, as if
she's never felt this way before,
as if i've never felt that way myself.

and yet i know someone who loved;
i know someone who loved for
decade after decade, who had
enough love to give a little bit
to a poor, lost, loveless soul
like mine.