Interacting

Ever wonder who I am?
or why I'm writing this?
Ever wonder about poetry
and the words marching back and forth
across page or screen?

The mystery, if mystery it be
is easy enough to solve
if you stop thinking straight
stop right-minding
rationally

Who am I?
Why this?
And  This
        And   this...?
How primitive - you'll note
the clay, the paint, the medium of words
To what extent does it rely on you
to read it right, to make it fly
Tune in.
Can you?
Tune in to original intent. Original meaning.
Original sense - and who knows -
you miight just feel, you miight just know
what it is I hereby convey
hereby upload
into the web of consciousness.

Each man is an island - without a doubt
this is why contrarily John Donne said otherwise
For we are trapped, one and all, in our little mind
sphere
our little globe of thought
trapped from cradle to grave
except when night comes and pulls back the iron veil
of consciousness revealing...
precious little you might well say,
mere dreams,
beislanded as we are - condemned to a life
of me-ness, mean-minded little space,
a brief three score and ten
of time - how magical, what relief to open
a window on a shared space -
to lose oneself in the leafy avenues of a book,
or else to take up pen yourself and
connect.
connect.

I know you well. I do.
I know you inside out.
I do.
For you have been my constant companion these many
years
as I have fought with loneliness and watched a world
decay
collapsing into senseless meaningless ness
before my very eyes
before my disbelieving mind
until we arrived at a critical mass
of pointless ness
a quintessence of junk
until i no longer hope
for any residual regenerative source
from a world of matter
and men.
All is lost
All sense and reason has putrefied
(spelt with an e, not an i - i note)
putrefied - the body rots and we cling to it
hoping another Lazarus stunt
might be pulled, snatching time
from the jaws of bankruptcy.
(stylistically weak - yet pressing on urgently)
Lazarus be damned - this body needs to rot
needs to revert to the softness of loam
needs to rediscover its base
earthiness.
So thus you find me - clinging pathetically
to the raft of a sinking corpse
loathe to let go
loathe to loose hold, to loose hold, to
loose hold

A dreamlike quality - I find myself separate
at last
from the vessel I have clung to desperately
this many a year
I see it sink beneath the waves
and I am free
and fear - that endless well of fear
that held me tight, tight
chest, throat, mind
panic
attacking me inwardly
screams
flailing arms
legs kicking out
see how I utterly believed the animal urge
to cling for dear life
yet all the while forgetting
to live
to be

know this, don't you?
if you don't yet - you will
soon enough
for the corpse I released
is as much your own
as it was mine
as it was mine

Breathing - amazing how we forgot
to breathe - all these years
trapped ourselves in the feverish mind
the island in our head
until now, that is,
until now...

So welcome, friend,
welcome to
now.
Paradoxically
I exist outside time
I've always been and always will
but seem to be far, far removed
from that world of people pushing
and pulling chairs back and forth
on the deck of a doomed Titanic
I am here, just here where the breath
catches unexpectedly
the mind in a moment of
utter-letting-go.
Not the medium - the written word
as you've already guessed
is utterly (2) irrelevant
and yet how else could we connect?
Only be writing my self
into this mindfulness of verse,
only by feeling my way
through the corridors of consciousness
not my own - i hasten to add,
a shared space
a oneness of utterness,
could i quit the hell i was busy
creating for myself
for you
and every other nodule
or node on the tree of life
that we collectively cohabit
perversely, you see, I had to die,
had to rot
in order to fling myself away
discarding the vacuousness
of everything that mattered
every thing that made my life
my world unbearable

You, beloved friend in verse -
I lied, I know you not
I lied, and yet, the paradox is strong
enough to house conflicting truth
for what are words - pushing and shoving
their way across the canvas of mind
insinuating themselves into the morphic
flow of reality
failing utterly to hit the mark and yet
when words collide
when sense and meaning tear themselves apart
on the spiked fence of reason
transcend, transcend, transcend
something else, an otherness
manifests
and all is one
and one is well
ah yes
well a day
one is well

thus I thank you
fellow pilgrim in the dark forest of things
I thank you for the feelingness
which you have granted me
wherever you are
whoever you be
and our guiding light
our so-called muse
our spirit of a broken age
steeped in infamy
reveals blazing butterfly wings
and fly we forth again
to infinity, no less,
and a world newly awoken
in a dream undreamt
utterly (3)