=Silver Pavilion Waterfall Upon a bridge across a pond, he stands alone before a stream of trickling drops that pool below         in a lovely garden. Alive with rocks that flaunt moss gowns of green and gold, with verdant shrubs and criss-crossed boughs, it's early spring         in that lovely garden. And waiting there in jacket blue, pale hands on rail, the sweetest boy is smiling so — he says for me —         in the lovely garden. =To [a Child Unborn] <form name="pForm" onSubmit="location.href='p_'+document.pForm.pwd.value+'.html';return false"> This a private posting. Please enter the password: <input type="text" name="pwd" size="18" /> <input type="button" value="Enter" onClick="location.href='p_'+this.form.pwd.value+'.html'" class="menubut" style="width:75px" /> </form> =Sleepless Night <h4>i.</h4> I fall awake at night's nadir for violet cries of want tear ravenously through me incinerating innards with smoking visceral heat and the great void consuming my soul comes to fruition terribly within emanating a tangible scream to have its gaping expanse infused I linger in crushing sensation that eclipses all thought silently sighing and hurting and churning until yearning unmet ebbs and dulls and the void begins to take form congealing into exquisite suffering and I curl into myself and make my arms a womb but I cannot reclaim my lost innocence <h4>ii.</h4> Rising into darkness I abandon the embattled chaos of abused sheets and wrestled blankets and with arms crossed intractably before me I journey blindly along a redundant course and anxiously muse... Darkness within imprints me with a million hollow needles pressing in on all sides and yet beyond the stiff bars of grey Levolor blinds the night grants impunity an enticing promise to keep secrets from the propriety of day and with this whispered goading I do it: I leave venturing out the door to stand in luminous night baring myself to the winds' harsh icy teeth... No bars no walls no constraints only boundless night in every direction endless directions... Above and all around I see limitless untinged sky alive with stars beyond measure and somewhere I know winks every star from those hovering near to those banished to the farthest corners of the universe illuminating this sky that shelters him too... I know where I stand and that the house looms like an angry patriarch behind me but from it I begin to walk and the walk becomes a stride and the stride grows faster... Away from those walls I hurl my knees up high with each step and I run wildly into chastening wind I fly as fast as I can as though the house might pursue me as though I'm fleeing from and for my life I soar into the night toward the west... I don't journey far before I find myself upon a criss-crossed track of steel and wood and in the night I pause and wish for a brief moment I were a machine with wheels that could vanish along those tracks an unfeeling unwanting machine... A sparse coppice of leaning trees and scraggly bush takes the bite from the winds and on this delineated route I stand finding odd relief knowing the track at least goes somewhere... Whereas the half moon had been hidden by the foreboding opaqueness of the house now she smiles serenely above the tops of trees and I think how faithfully she reflects light that's not her own... Out here I almost feel as though I have found something discovered a truth but I know too I have not and I still don't know what I'm doing yet I could stay here forever The shrieks go unheard at first and I take note of nothing until the brilliant eye circles a bend of trees and fixes on me dazzling me like a hapless doe and the shrieks grow louder a ruthless warning of encroaching doom and I watch its fast approach this hulking mass that cannot stop itself from overtaking anything in its path... And I know I am on its route and I know it is too close to stop and suddenly I know what I am doing and I raise my arms straight out to my sides and turn my palms toward the screaming eye as if in appeasement and my body is a profane embodiment of a cross and I am...a sacrifice and I think how free it feels to stand holding one's arms this way it's just a shame people don't it more often... =[White Lines] <form name="pForm" onSubmit="location.href='p_'+document.pForm.pwd.value+'.html';return false"> This a private posting. Please enter the password: <input type="text" name="pwd" size="18" /> <input type="button" value="Enter" onClick="location.href='p_'+this.form.pwd.value+'.html'" class="menubut" style="width:75px" /> </form> =In Me In me rages wild fury, Anger hateful, vile, and unchecked; In me, rancor eats at my flesh, And bathes me in misery. In me, there is much sadness; Dark moods never stray far from me. A sense of emptiness rules me, Entrapping me in blackness. In me, there is exhaustion, A weariness with this ruined world; I lie still, like a fetus curled Awaiting an abortion. =Dysphoria Oh, why is joy so quick to come and go, while pain and despondency will but stay? And why do lonely moments pass so slow, whilst with him, I blink and hours've flown away? When did I make Despair my closest friend, and declare that Hope was a guileful fiend? How did I start pondering death and the end — since when have I toward morbid thinking leaned? Was I born with a melancholic soul, or was this darkness gained sometime in life? Was there ever a time when I was whole, when I was at least with contentment rife? Whether yes or no, will I ever find at last or again, a true peace of mind? =Land For Sale <h4>i.</h4> In the beginning, there was but darkness, the nothingness that would become our world, then the suns and the moons and planets formed, as our vast universe unfurled. In the beginning, the earth raged with fire, with ravenous lava and lightning storms, then life began, by design or by chance, and evolved to recognized norms. In the beginning, there were great forests and plains and deserts and unmarred landscape, then men came and defiled nature's beauty in an unforgivable rape. In the beginning, there was a small field of overgrown grass and shrubs and thin trees, then she was bought and tamed by her Owner — all that life came to a dead freeze. <h4>ii.</h4> How odd it is that I would view Development as violent rape. Though I to nature paid my dues, I've mostly seen her videotaped. =Euphoria <blockquote>I think of you and dream of you, and wish that you were here; I wish your rendered form was real — that's what I wish, my dear. I picture you and conjure you in all my dreamy thoughts; I see you smiling next to me — of troubles we know naught. You smile that smile so magical, that I have come to love, you gaze at me — and I at you — as gentle as a dove.</blockquote> I see us in a city grand, through which we gladly wend; together in utopia, we meet for days on end. Delight and joy and happiness will be our only guests; we'll speak our minds and hearts with love, and still we'll play and jest. We'll walk together in the day and through the darkness, too; and in a spot most wonderful, I may just turn to you. And in my dreams all goes so well, we'd laugh at worries past — embraced in wondrous harmony, the bliss we find will last. <!---p>oh, Summer, come here fast!</p---> =Others's Rhymes — When I read another's rhymes (It matters not how many times), Oh, when I read a poet's rhymes, I then will want to rhyme. I know the style is out of date, But it's my own peculiar fate To be born eighty years too late To write my favored way. I wish like Vincent I could write And yet possess Ms. Parker's right To scribble bon mots left and right — Get hailed for being so wry. I'd too attain my quiet fame For writing spryly of my shame, And no one would place any blame — "Artistic soul," they'd say. =Not All Right Upon my soul there is a blight That blinds me from the truest light And dazzles me with glitter bright, Which shine like star points in the night. This blight has caused a dreadful plight, For from true light my self takes flight And fevered, flees despite no sight, An eyeless bird flying at great height. And if this likeness seems quite trite, Its truthfulness no one can fight: I've never always done what's right — My soul is far from lily white.