Tuesday, April 9, 2002

2002 - tea room

tea room poem for j.s.

we, learners, sojourners
of sunsets and dreams,
in a countryside city,
sing, and feel no pity from books,
brains and how the everyday
explains our love of poetry and
laughter from Martha Ellison’s Song.

We, believers, stand strong
in comfy jeans and well-worn sweats,
singing how we belong to diversity,
and dancing to the complexity of being different.

In the clouds, both rainbows and raindrops are born into a hammock of
tattooed colors --
a sun brings us
the comfort of pillows,
a moon reminds us to walk barefoot in wet grass.

From class to class, a human pyramid
of students and teachers share
deep breaths and laughter,
and grow from memories of love and respect.

Everything swirled, whirled and twirled
makes Brown...
and it is the sound of our music,
a first and muhammed ali
cacophony of
us.

2002 -coffehouse

for a coffee house and moonbeams....

stupid me, and this dumb b.s. reality
that found myself in a cinematic paradise
with music, a city of circuits for $15.99....

and once again I sit here tapping, like a poetic swine
into memories of a life I’ve always longed to live....

yet content with the everyday that a teacher must give
and save the applause for a subordinated clause

(trust me, I don’t know what that is either).

Yes, there’s a piece of me totally Toto,
young, naive and an absolute fool upon the stage,

but there’s also that age in me that makes me
intellectual alfredo
a destined dodo amongt the
beautiful daffodils of which I teach...

I reach,
I preach,
I leach upon day after day after day....

6:30 a.m. okay
coffee injected
email projected
Alice protected
and I’m elected certifiably insane.

What other job calls for the inane
ridiculousness
riddles and bliss
of the mind’s mental kiss
and magic,
(the constant flickering of flame,
the constant bickering and blame
of “whydowehavetodo this”

hissssssssssssssssss
sssssssssssshhhhhhhh

the music is getting louder
and I’m growing prouder and prouder everday
that I can stand out to say “I know the 2002 salute”
and have a breast I can always grab....

this, makes me smile, when life is most drab....

And the songs make me seek out the truth
and I find it quickly from Boehnlein and Ruth
who’ve brought this house into meaning....
watching as they’re weaning their way into graduation,
satiation,
intellectual constipation
and relief
of “uh oh, spaghetti o’s”
what a relief it is....

offering this poetry hand, so we can stand before one another and create...
find those words which make us irate and strong.....

because, like all of our presence, words, too, must say “so long”
and onward we all move.

we all go.

we all fly.

we all know.

and tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow
creeps in this petty pace
from today, today,
to the last uttering of the tick tock watch....
and all our yesterdays will light this fool
the way to a dusty rest
out out, young poets,
life is but a walking shadow
that struts and frets his wisdom upon the screen
and then is heard no more.

it is my tale, our tale, your tale, told by a moron,
full of noise and chaos
signifying everything.

Bring the world everything you can............
cuz we are the everything........