December 22, 2009

CHANGES

an altar 

boy, the moon, lighting

our dreams

robert d. wilson

©2009

Nothing is constant. Everything changes. Nothing's predictable. For many it's hard to accept. Many in the west are comfortable with sameness, tangibility, and what they can easily understand. Some people resist change. Too many compare themselves with others, forgetting that we can only be who we are. Decisions and changes mean a lot of things: Where to go?

What to do? Should or shouldn't I? Or, should I metaphysically just let things be as they are,

accepting what is and isn't, let cosmic energy be, or is that a cop out for empathy? I have been in constant change since birth. Things happen, don't happen, causing other changes . . . and like outer space, eternal.

Yesterday, a series of events occurred, requiring action on my part? Meditation? A clear mind un-muddied by preconception, hormonic imbalance, and changes I have no control over? Not all of the events were a part of each other, or were they? The world a live television show without a script. I was hurt by what appeared to an orchestrated resignation of four staff members at Simply Haiku. And felt forced to close the journal. What to do? I felt anxiety, sadness, anger, victimized, like a mother watching her only child die from a quick, all of a sudden cancer with the or two of life remaining. Prompted by others, especially my dear friend from Serbia, I decided not to knee jerk, but to, instead, which the emphasis on the "in", to explore, and see if Simplu Haiku, the finest literary journal of its kind in the world, is still an entity meant to be. E-mails came, offering help, expressing sadness, and emotional support. And with them, clarity, the stirred up water, slowly clearing. I've learned from this experience that not everything is at it is: a motorcycle zips past me, the rider on meth, weaving, skidding, screaming, Mr. Easy rider on the ground, disoriented, higher than a kite that broke loose from the string holding it, his eyes popping out like a cartoon character, the arriving officer trying to take off his boots, the biker, saying, "No one takes of my boots!" And then the calm, when the smokes clears, the biker goes to where high wired nuts on boots go when they skid into the mouth of hell, and me, without a scratch on the outside, the dragon above me snorting a belly laugh that echos like a heaving volcano. I'm still hurt, shocked, blown away, anxiety pulsing in my veins, neon lights blinking on and off in my mind . . .then poof, out of nowhere, an old friend arrives in a yellow submarine and agrees to be webmaster and help me steer the ship through story waters. Another change. A good change. The Wonderland Amusement Park, where anything's possible, Simply Haiku bouncing past me on a pogo stick, waiving at passing pelicans, on her way to the "what" of whatever ,the moon, a blob of jello. At least for now. The past has come and gone, the future may not come, all of us stuck in the now, oops, now it's in the past. On the menu, the next NOW.

Decisions, changes, and what they mean. Anyone care to share their concept of CHANGE?

I'm not talking about the money you jingle in your pockets or purses, for those of you that have change. THEEEEE un-predictable anything goes when you don't expect change. "Honey, did you remember to lock the back door before we left to see my mom in Florida?"

Enter now, admission's free, your head will spin like an Osterizer blender, and don't bring the kids, they might like it and stay! Oh, and what the hell, become a member, not an arm or leg, a real member, and who knows, you might one day even get a newsletter. Heaven help us. Or as my late first wife, Ileta, used to say, "Pizza Pie!" and "Mother Bear!"

Robert D. Wilson

tonight i

dance with the stars

on a vast

stage without a floor. . .

swathed in clouds

take my hand . . .

tiptoe through a forest

snoring blossoms

slide with me,

when the moon is full,

down blossoms

wet from dewdrops and . . .

leftover dreams

death, you're

where is your armor?

full moon!

how do you

do it, ambassador,

using words

people elsewhere

won't misinterpret?

an altar

boy, the moon, lighting

our dreams

do i ignore

her when the tide's red;

the weight of

her limbs, thick with

ripened apples?

jeepney's . . .

stagecoaches wearing

armor

a plastic

doll, my friend's 25

year old girl;

not to play with . . .

a thousand doves set free

stillness, her

only company, moored

between stars

wakened, my

eyes scan the room for

feelings i

can clasp onto

with a mute smile

clear sky . . .

will you too will be

shorted lived

crickets with

hammers, a cold box's

song of wind . . .

morning dares me to

join her for coffee

and now the

saws, the chipping, the

haiku sky

bundled up

beside me in a

yellow sheet . . .

a warmth i can't

describe with words

last night, death

looked at me through

a doll's eyes

*for my friend, Kaat

*Angel, gray

clouds swim elsewhere

when you rise

up from the dormant

loam of a cold winter

again the

breath of a wind

without direction

will she learn

when a snake speaks

to her of

waves singing songs

out of empty captions?

the wife's up,

i haven't slept a wink . . .

the season?

tonight i

dance with the stars

on a vast

stage without a floor. . .

swathed in clouds

take my hand . . .

tiptoe through a forest

snoring blossoms

slide with me,

when the moon is full,

down blossoms

wet from dewdrops and . . .

leftover dreams

death, you're

where's your armor?

full moon!

how do you

do it, ambassador,

using words

people elsewhere

won't misinterpret?

an altar

boy, the moon, lighting

our dreams

do i ignore

her when the tide's red;

the weight of

her limbs, thick with

ripened apples?

jeepney's . . .

stagecoaches wearing

armor

a plastic

doll, my friend's 25

year old girl;

not to play with . . .

a thousand doves set free

stillness, her

only company, moored

between stars

wakened, my

eyes scan the room for

feelings i

can clasp onto

with a mute smile

clear sky . . .

will you too will be

shorted lived

crickets with

hammers, a cold box's

song of wind . . .

morning dares me to

join her for coffee

and now the

saws, the chipping, the

haiku sky

bundled up

beside me in a

yellow sheet . . .

a warmth i can't

describe with words

last night, death

looked at me through

a doll's eyes

*for my friend, Kaat

*Angel, gray

clouds swim elsewhere

when you rise

up from the dormant

loam of a cold winter

again the

breath of a wind

without direction

will she learn

when a snake speaks

to her of

waves singing songs

out of empty captions?

robert d. wilson

©2009

December 16, 2009

when i die,

it will be alone . . .

an egret

will land on the limb

of an elm tree and stare

robert d. wilson

©2009

What is a death poem? A wish? A suicide note? Empty words stirred in a cup of cold tea, just because other people write them? Basho, Shiki, many others have written them, and they stand amongst a poet's best work. We've all had moments when death death beckoned us, telling you that the pain you were (or are) feeling was (is) preferable to life: a wife of 16 years abandoned without notice by a mate who wanted greener fields, left to care for their children, and forced to sign up for public welfare; an old person without Alzheimer's disease left alone by his family to die in a convalescent hospital, unvisited, the place a hell hole without a doctor, urine and Lysol in the air, staring at walls and television until he finally dies or becomes senile, treated like an infant by nurse's aides, wearing a paper plate bonnet tied with a ribbon around this head to celebrate Easter Sunday or Christmas, the celebrants, Orphan Annie eyed, stooped over in a world laced with who knows what.

Life dishes out the unexpected, nothing is for sure, always changing, and unpredictable. One moment this, in the next, that. None of us have gone to school to learn how to deal with grief, loneliness, pain, especially when unexpected. A soldier talking to a buddy and in an instant, holding his buddy's intestines . . . shooting a 7 year old girl to death while charging at him with a hand grenade . . . A young girl sitting in the back seat of the family sedan with her toddler sister, when suddenly, her drunken father rams a telephone pole, leaving their mother and father dead and brutally disfigured . . . a child raped nightly by a drunk father held down by her mother. HIV, cancer, a heart attack . . . no age is exempt. Pain hurts, psychological or physical, the idea killing one's self, tempting.

The death poem. Many are beautiful, lending insight into the mindset of a poet preparing to die. Some commit suicide, some accept death, looking forward to what comes afterwards, a part of the natural progression of life. Books have been written about them, dissertations and essays. My death poem, a tanka, is above under my haiga. It's for you to interpret as you are not me and vise versa. What doe it tell you about yourself? About me? Does it make you uncomfortable? Judgmental? Upset?

Sometimes what you read and how you interpret a poem is a mirror speaking to you.

I like what Carol McRury wrote about death haiku in a past issue of Simply Haiku:

"Basho said that each verse he wrote was in effect his ‘death poem.' This speaks to the practice of mindful living—a deep awareness of the transience of all things. The moment we are born we begin our odyssey towards understanding the meaning of our lives in the hopes of coming to grips with the fact we must die."

Matsuo Basho (1644-1694)
Sick on a journey,
my dreams wander
the withered fields.


Yosa Buson (1716-1783)
An autumn eve -
An hour of leisure
In a fleeting life.


Kobayashi Issa (1763-1827)
A bath when you're born,
a bath when you die,
how stupid.

excerpted from: http://www.simplyhaiku.com/SHv2n5/haiga_modern/carole_macrury/death_poems.html

Mount Fuji, Japan's revered, sacred volcano, translated means "no death." What is meant by this name? Is it symbolic or something to take literally?

The Japanese philosophy of death differs from the occidental conceptualization. Most Japanese see death as something natural, a step closer to nirvana. Writes Yoel Hoffman in his book, Japanese Death Poems, ". . . the Japanese attitude to death, which according to Hoffman “takes place in an atmosphere of serenity, with almost pleasurable expectation of the voyage to the next world”. "the Japanese attitude to death, which according to Hoffman “takes place in an atmosphere of serenity, with almost pleasurable expectation of the voyage to the next world”.

I wake and find
the colored iris
I saw in my dream
Shushiki
translated by Yoel Hoffmann


An excerpt from Hoffmann's book, Japanese Death Poems:

Shushiki's poem reflects a viewpoint of the Mahayana branch of Buddhism, of which Sino-Japanese Buddhism is a part, as opposed to that of the older Theravada branch. ...the world of phenomenon [is] called "color" in Buddhist literature... In Shushiki's poem, she awakens from the dream world of colored irises into the world of truth, and there, too, irises are found."

Death is inevitable. To the Atheist, it's an end; to the Japanese it's a journey (hopefully a progressive one), while to the Occidental mind it can represent a host of meanings influenced by religion, guilt, a lack of hope, etc. I have stood an inch away from death on several occasions. i've considered suicide. I've been shot at, hit by cars, mortared, rockets, battered emotionally and physically, but I'm still kicking. In one year, my mother died, I was asked for a divorce on the day I learned of her dying, which wasn't expected, told I'd never se my daughter again, and this was the day after my wife at the time joined me in signing the final papers for buying a house. Suddenly I had to find a place to live, I got in a wreck late at night on a dark mountain rode and went over a cliff, and that's just for starters. Life can be hell, and some of us get more than our share. I am one of them. I'm different than most people, and feel ill at ease around crowds. I have helped thousands of people change their lives for good and not just in the area of teaching, but if I were to die today, I doubt there'd be more than ten people present, and most of them wouldn't shed a tear, and be there out of obligation.

LIfe is never what you think it will be. There's more to live than yesterday and today. Depending on your spiritual or lack of spiritual beliefs can influence how you see the future. I think I am being prepared for eternity and life is school, and yes, I admit, I often get tired of attending school. But it is a 24/7 university without breaks except for sleep and unless interrupted by a nightmare, either awake or unawake. We all live in the Wonderland Amusement Park . . . clouds floating here and there, pushed by the wind and unpredictable weather . . . Life's not our own, our bodies dissipate, and all we really have is a state of mind, and when one suffers from chemical imbalances, that becomes even more difficult. We can learn from the Japanese, not that they are all paragons of peace and perfection.. Their conceptualization of death is healthy. I hope someday I can buy into it 100%. Right now now I'm trying, and sometimes, I am hanging on by a thin worn out thread. I write poetry to share, to exorcise, to rid myself of demons and dragons, and to find understanding. I'm not you, you're not me, and we can never be each other's mirrors. And that's okay. Time for me to take my meds and attempt the impossible, getting a good night's sleep. It's 3:09 in the morning.

twilight

sitting in a

stagnant pond

thinking dreams

could come true

sunset . . .

another lie to

live through

love, an

existential term

gray water

bubbling slowly;

home to what isn't

stillness . . .

a moment threading

tall grass

dry stream . . .

another lie

doing what

everyone's done to

me, peeling truth

an anthem

not a password . . .

revenge

why do girls

paint themselves and

walk past me

knowing they'll

twist me in two?

clowns, whores . . .

waiting until an

okra blossoms

in and out

of dreams that serve

as mirrors . . .

a cheshire cat

posing for playboy

why does the

sun hide behind clouds?

fucking the moon?

illusions

hallucinations, the

lsd trip

pulsing in a

jig saw puzzle mind

hatred . . .

a black widow

wanting love

damn alarm . . .

reminds me that

wet dreams

are shadows born

on starless nights!

the now, a

wall dali painted

with sperm

when i die,

it will be alone . . .

an egret

will land on the limb

of an elm tree and stare

speak to me

bamboo, see me

through my dream

we'll stare

at each other, stars . . .

before dawn,

on the ridge below

heaven's river

after noon . . .

the air caressing

grass fields

i don't want

my smile to come

from a cork . . .

my pillow, tonight, the

softness of your breasts

tonight, moon . . .

no stars, clouds will

mute our words

robert d. wilson

©2009

December 13, 2009

Beneath every stone, a darkness waiting in line to suckle sunlight

We all have our ups and downs on journeys, but it's usually the downs we remember because of

the scars they leave and pain we feel. Allen Ginsberg wrote incredible poetry inspired by William Blake, that will be remembered throughout the ages, but his inner life was tortured by a lack of love and permanence. Jack Kerouac, whose books inspired a new generation who believed they could recreate the world into a peaceful eden, was a closet Republican who drank himself to death and brought into the world children, like his daughter, Jan, whom he literally ignored.

"I shambled after as I've been doing all my life, after people who interested me, because the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn..."

- Jack Kerouac, On the Road

Most art is born through pain, even comedy. The great comedian, WC Fields, died from alcholism privately in a small private psychiatric ward in Pasadena, California. Jonathan Winters was in and out of mental institutions several times. James Taylor, the folk singer, was no stranger to mental wards due to his penchant for heroin. Two other famed folk singers, the last one I'd met and talked to, Tim Buckley and Phil Ochs killed themselves due to writer's block. Ernest Hemingway shot himself, Vincent Van Gogh suffered from depression and a mental order some claim to be bi-polar disorder, once cut off his ear, only sold one painting in his lifetime, and eventually shot himself. Poets, Sylvia Plath, Sarah Teasdale, Vachel Lindsay committed suicide at the height of their fame.

Goodbye, my friend, goodbye
My love, you are in my heart.
It was preordained we should part
And be reunited by and by.
Goodbye: no handshake to endure.
Let's have no sadness -- furrowed brow.
There's nothing new in dying now
Though living is no newer.
Written in his own blood, and given to a friend the day before he hanged himself.
~~ Sergei Esenin, Russian poet, d. Dec. 28, 1925

Shiki, was no stranger to pain, living out his short adult life in his bedroom, writing haiku and tanka inspired by what he saw through his window and what he'd remembered. His final poem:

our loofah is blooming
here's a dead man
totally clogged with phlegm

Tr. Eiko Yachimoto

Basho lived in a self enforced poverty, having divorced himself from the samurai heritage of his elders, lived out the rest of his life as a wanderer/poet . . . perhaps an early day Kerouac, practicing Buddhism, enjoying a glass os sake, some say he was a pedophile, a womanizer, teacher, writer . . . yet one who is considered the father of Haiku even though others before him wrote haiku.

People who experience great pain and anguish, both genetic and experiential, in their lives, coupled with a cultural memory indigenous to their own bringing, have much to draw upon in terms of artistic expression. Artists oftentimes are considered odd, out of sync, eccentric, because they couldn't if they wanted to, be a sheep.

The Wonderland Amusement Park, the stopover for artists and other creative people, who live in and have experienced a world far different than most, is open . . . a park of mirrors, nightmares, shadows, the equivalent of taking LSD inside of an echo. Enter at your own risk. Bounce back and forth from life to hell in an endless circle.

is this a

child, searching for his

mother's breasts?

sicker then

picasso, sculpting

paper goats . . .

rearranging

a woman's psyche?

mad hatter . . . .

sipping tea with a

cartoon

shattered, the

anger deep inside

my bowels . . .

i wanted to hate her,

still the wind's dervish

no light . . .

dawn and dusk, travel

through me

the look on

your face the night i

knocked on the

door and told you

to return home . . .

i can't watch

the sun rise with a . . .

nonchalant moon

you looked out

the hotel window . . .

and became

a car passing

through wonderland

the lack of

light in your eyes . . .

leaving winter

i joined you

five times today . . .

breathing

in the feelings we

felt the morning before

no time for

day, a poet fleeing

feelings

fleeting, the

thoughts bouncing between

bells, an echo

determined to

make me crazy

a parrot?

an echo caught between

canyon walls?

i stretch

my wings and sleep,

moored in mud . . .

too much pain, caught

in the dragon's breath

this dark cave . . .

i sigh at what could

have been stars!

i pass between

moons wearing a cloak

of words . . .

a soldier, a lamb,

wading in mirrors?

unmoored, where

would i fly to, the

same two holes?

tall trees . . .

a calliope

of dirges

a shot? a knock? my

grandfather's breath?

i make love

to you through moons . . .

fighting fear

warm mud . . .

what am i, a limb

wearing an

egret's feathers,

stalling winter?

clothing . . .

a time to wander through

speechless trees?

ruefully,

i help you search your

womb for a

child that isn't mine . . .

a long winter

madness . . .

seeing through the stone

buddha's eyes

robert d. wilson

©2009