Clifton of St. George

There’s a black man in Bermuda who asks each tourist he encounters this specific question:

how old should someone be before allowing them to drink?

There’s a tourist in Bermuda who answers if they’re old enough to die.

There’s a black man in Bermuda who's asked if he remembers being born and answers he recalls that original swimming.

There's a tourist in Bermuda who knows the only knowledge is I am, yet in the deeper water asks his ginger beer and black Bermuda rum:

but who am I?

Formalism

I was nurtured on the teat of sweet belief

creating what I call myself. Unique. Good grief!

My personality is like an onion made

from all these other second-hand beliefs conveyed

to memory and accepted as a god’s own truth.

And so I fade from infancy to bitter youth.

But ask myself this question most see most naive:

do I remember being born? I can’t conceive

a moment never being. That is what I am.

The rest is just some evolutionary scam

the absolute unknown intends so I may know

I am the absolute unknown. No pain, no rhyme.

The Last Thing

Alone again but more alone than ever I have been since ever I have been me.

Most would say I wasted all my talents on obsessions, circumventions, and preoccupations.

So I’ll repeat my psychological evaluation here: my father never introduced me to the world; my mother was completely fearful of it.

This left me with one simple task while in and of this world: to tread upon the tiger's tail without alerting it to my inquiring presence.

I could write this story now as if this character possessed a choice in plot, development, or setting. But I didn't.

So let me end this introduction with my lifelong findings: there’s no world to introduce except a false one. And fear is why the world itself is false.

The world will never tell you this because it doesn't know it. And the ones who really know it know there's nothing to be told. I’d listen to them.

Oh to be sure, there are religions that will sell the sea to every wave within this ocean but religions are the world’s own fears personified and organized to hide them in some other hell.

And please do not misunderstand me. I'm still going further. The only reason why I'm writing is this entropy of poetry. This form enjoys the rhyme of dancing with the beauty of the truth it knows to date.

First, there’s only love. And if we listened to the Beatles back in nineteen-sixty-seven, we'd already know this. Then again, if John and Paul were listening, they'd never write the song, or I, of course, this poem.

Love is what we are without the need for wanting love or making love or needing to be loved and once this faith in love is truly followed, there’s no ‘we’ or 'me' remaining. Jesus Christ, just listen to his message.

Last, the only thing you need to know is there is absolutely nothing to be known. In fact, the thinking that there's something to be known is why one never knows that great unknown. The Cloud Unknowing says: unknow and know your—no, that—yes, my—unknown.

I'll end with just this other way if love is not the hard direction wired within your brain. Deconstruct the world as now you see it: tread upon the tiger's tail without alerting it to your inquiring presence.

Sometimes I'll talk to me so I will listen to myself. Like a rolling stone.

The Ballad of Long Division

In the land of long division

our denominator is the king.

And in the world of yin and yang

she may be queen. Or anything.

In the land of long division

war is our default position setting.

War may be defined as worldwide

or a little bit upsetting.

In the land of long division

answers always end with more divisions.

Taking sides will always lead

to new improved sky-high collisions.

In the land of long division

genuine nonviolence is the hero.

Long division ends when one

denominator sets to zero.

Memories in Triskaidecameter

They're cutting down the woods again to build another house upon the hill that overlooks the river valley.

They haven't reached the woods I see directly out my window but I know it's just a matter of the timing.

The world is always changing and we love it better in the memory than the one we see before us changing.

A memory is a work of art creating something out of nothing freezing form from endless transformation.

The past is always being lived again because the past that's in our memory always changes with our living.

Today the woods are lush and green and yesterday the woods were empty and tomorrow never really happens.

mahatma summer king

in the territory of gray

squirrels, red ones

hightail branches

going sixties

steve mcqueen

dead vines

tumble down

a tamarack

like waterfalls

whipped with time

do not ask

the woods

for whom

the tree

is falling

everything

is

for the benefit

of knowing

this unknown

a rose-breasted grosbeak

finally arrives

from somewhere

southern, innocent

and full of pure potentiality

every living form

appears to be obsessed

with summer’s near arrival

disregarding every clue

it comes and goes as never here

sleeping means

seeing something is happening

awakening means seeing

nothing

ever does

great ones only

go beyond

division

by dividing anything

by nothing

there’s nothing

to say

that needs to be heard

except

it’s nameless

the leaves are green

the space is green

and my interpretations of

my dream is green

that’s what i’m dreaming

the summer’s here

and time is ripe

to contemplate

the transformation’s later light

and sing what no one’s saying

following after poets

filling the birdfeeder 

with sunflower seed 

watching the splash 

little blackened shells 

big bang fireworks

a red-winged blackbird flies

across the empty road

a man is walking a dog

a dozen boats are floating

on the late sunday river

books of ryokan and saigyo

robert lax

on the coffee table

birdsong coming through

open windows

the light above

my shoulder lighting

purple ink on paper

reflecting in the picture

window

like a moon

in space between

the wall and green face

of an evening

summer wood

manifestation

is

the translation

of revelation

into mind

bliss

is

the revelation

as felt

by body-mind

as evening deepens

reflection of the room

deepens in the window space

basho walking through

the woods

poetry is

the inspirational

reflection of the revelation

seen in words

and dancing

in the dark leaves

appear like clouds

shadowing deep images

although I know

they’re nothing

spoken silence

saying something

leaving

someone

silent

To the Purple Rose of Consciousness

It would appear, in evolution, this form of being which has called itself a human being, is the only form of being self-aware.

Instead of being, basking, in this self-awareness, the human being has discovered transformation, called it death, identifying with the form itself.

The world it builds is just the fear, forgetting self-awareness, disregarding being as its base, and practicing idolatry of form

in semi-permanent outstanding structures of its buildings, roads, and infrastructures, pyramids, cathedrals, banks of skyscrapers,

in other words, materialism, scientific and objective, praying at the feet of form to overcome the fact of form,

to fear of death and not a celebration of this awesome functioning of self-awareness, being, basking in and as this self-awareness,

being light and basking in the light, this being, basking, being, basking, crowning function of creation, crown of evolution,

noumenon of all phenomena, true revelation and apocalypse, the power and the glory, knowing all the universe is just reflection of oneself,

the mirror knowing it's the mirror, truth unborn, undying, I and nothing else.

opening the field

it must be

almost

summer solstice

i can smell the sweetness

of hay

the field is divided 

between tall grass 

and space 

now 

in bales 

  

imagine this confluence of 

intelligence 

consciousness

bliss

like a field of sea

(write with mind

as self

to nobody

then

circulate)

emptiness

using the mind

and not

mind using

itself

consciousness

between intuition

and inspiration

reflecting awareness

is the revelation

tree frogs must be

at their peak

i hear

a distant siren

in their harmony

further is our intent

the open road

is consciousness

dividing lines

speak to mind

a new wild voice

not one in memory

almost like a seagull

in coyote staccato

beyond dna entrusted archetypes

heighten experience

lowering experience

consort or saddhu

any experience

will do

one

doesn’t make

the moment empty

the moment is

empty

reflecting

experience

not

reflecting on

experience

the experience itself

touches dna

mystic third rail

seeing

there’s no archetype

beyond

archetype

is

that

unknown

the time

to speak in

tongues

is fast

approaching

the moment

without reflection

experiential

beyond archetype

the great unknown

deja vu

is stuck between

an archetype

and distant

memory

you may remember rome

more power to you

but experience itself is how

that archetype

got milk in a day

it’s not so much

being mindful

as being

doing

mind

see the moment

beyond all archetype

now phantom

the noumenal

unknown

arjuna doesn’t

just arise

arjuna will

experience

for krishna

by knowing

now

the great unknown

now knows

the great unknown

to know now

i need to know

what isn’t now

this is the clown

of creation

there is a window

i see the window

the window is open

there’s an open window

i am the opening

straw frogs

first there were peepers

now there are tree frogs

around the time

of crickets come

fireflies!

every movement takes

about fourteen billion years

if you really

wish to believe

evolution

a religion

may be

detected

by its glorious

guilt

wax

wane

yin

yang

full moon tao

guilt or

being mindful

there's your yin

and yang

of all religions

i've never not been living

i've never been dead

i'm not guilty saying

i don't know

the difference

you're probably

at the corner of love

and I

you’re probably

within spec

my latest death

poem is

that Evolution see

there is no

death

i've been trying to eat

less words

and finally learning

who to copy

never mind this writing

the word

becomes the primal scroll

then it's printing the copies

later is the reading and at last is

silence