Month: July 2021

I imagine what God’s art studio must be like.

Large and white, between boundless clouds,
His studio contains palettes of silver and gold
to prime canvasses of light and shadow.

In another corner, His kiln stores the raw materials:
amber dust, rain and baby’s breath.

Each lifeform lovingly held in His hands;
at our creation,
painstakingly molds each of us
with delicate precision.

We are flawed but beautiful in His eyes.
No sculptor has yet produced a perfect statue.

Even those primal experiments
resulting in imperfect people are viewed
as sacred and dear in His eyes.

This is nothing but a handful of words,
They know not what they mean, yet here they are,
Here as i write, they will speak and be heard,
Their plea, it remains, no matter how far.

You may be right here while I’m stuck out there,
But these letters stand tall, black against white,
Expressing so pure with flavour and flair,
Not just what was, but what is and what might,

Memories may fade, the years, they turn dark,
We will grow old, grow weak, struggle to cope,
But now we are strong. We will make our mark,
It may not be much, but we could use some hope.

Just know, every word written here is true,
Read and you’ll see, I’m still right here with you.

Crisscross applesauce, where do I begin?
Ask, Ash’e’s ashes, while we all fall around the ring of roses.
Peter’s piper told me little Miss, still sits on her bridge that’s falling down.
Wishing upon twinkling stars.
Be nimble and quick, don’t fiddle diddle down the stream Miss little.
Remember, rock a bye went Mary on the hilltop after Jack fell down and couldn’t stop.
Apparently, he broke his crown and all the King’s horses and all the King’s men couldn’t help put him back together again.
Honestly, I laughed when that bough broke, to see such fun.
I ran away with the spoon because we were happy…and we knew it.
Weeks later we clapped our hands and out came the sun.
I said, “did you ever see such a sight in your life, as silver bells and cockleshells?”
He said, “Yeah, but only after I met the farmers’ wife.”

Standing in Line. Eyes front.
No acknowledgement. Robotic recruits
Uniforms pressed. Knife-edge creases.
Summer sunshine. Corona causation.
Shoes shone. Reflective leather. Bows tied.
Tarsal protection. Cobbled, with a mirror image.

No one speaks. Wordless. Mute.
Personal thoughts? Dubious!
Typical English. Restrained. Controlled.
Vehicle now approaches. A two-tiered behemoth.
Military Green-hued. Land-locked missile.
Troopship travel. Ever advancing.

Rubber eating asphalt. Esurient bugger!
Be-capped captain of the vessel, front right aligned.
Serious, concentrated. Steers to our loading bay.
Shuffles begin. Slow, but steady as she goes.
No smiles, no colloquy. Simply shuffles.
Tuneless accordion doors slide open.

Onboarding. Pass showing protocol.
Welcoming officer, cold. Indifference abounds.
I bid him “Good morning, Sir”.
A practiced scowl retorted. Disparaged.
At last. Now, as one with the tacit team.
Herd comfort. Recognition. United.

Conquer the stairs to level two. Privileged deck.
Seating rare in this terrain. Semi extinct. Scoping panjandrums.
Hunters all. Survival of the fittest. Perchance.
Target identified. Crosshairs locked on. Homing in.
Document case launched. Laser accurate.
Target secured. Touch down. Seat meets seat.

A window glance confirms movement. Forward motion.
Speeding. Burning gas. Ice caps thawed. Globe warmed.
A juggernaut hurtling. Chasing time. Mach 1.
Soon be there. Raging anticipation. Pulsation. Momentarily.
My private happy place. Mon endroit heureux.
Secrets to be shared. Jointly enjoyed. Canopied euphoria.

Emerald canopy infiltrated. A virtual, verdure veil.
No others stir. Oblivious to nature. Unseeing. Unappreciative.
Sunlight on dappled leaves. Rays converse. Au Courant.
Morse code messaging. Covert contact. Mine alone.
I revel. This is MY time. Although time’s halted. Frozen.
Enter the single Silver Birch, stoic in a realm of Horse Chestnuts.

That Betula Pendula taught me so very much.
We communicate as I glide by. Subliminal sign on.
Actual logging in. Mental discourse.
I query if he is sad, lonely.
“Alone, but not lonely!” He continues.
“You visit, Flora and Fauna drop by, the sun, the wind…So blessed”.

Certain about the canopy?
“Absolute certainty. It’s the pain”
Trees do feel pain?
We accelerate past. Strain for the last words.
Glimpse skyward. The sun still messaging.
No branches touch the top of our vehicle.

Words float over the engine’s roar,
“Yes, we all feel pain”.
“We all feel love. Like you, we avoid the Via Delorosa”.
Over and out. Communications link lost.
Until tomorrow. Jusqu’à demain mon ami.
A smugly smile steals across my face.

Eyes tight shut. Blind celebration. Yes!
Virtual high five. Fist bump fantasy. Ultimate pictureless selfie.
Ephemeral ecstasy. Cerebral celebration.
Furtive observation. Other travelers oblivious.
My secret secure. Locked up tight.
As tight as a very tight thing. Key concealed.

Terminus looms. The canopy, a rearview mirror throwback.
Glorious morning. Another miracle. One of many already today.
Cradled once more by Mother Nature. With absolute proof.
Loneliness, is a mental state. Alone, exclusively physical.
Disembarking. Stepping out. Eyes peer heavenward.
Pupils contract. Gratitude expands. Thankful.

Thankful I have learned all living things have feelings.
Thankful for complete acceptance. To be trusted. Intimate inclusion.
Meandering through the milling throng. Trudging. Diluted enthusiasm.
To the daunting building on the hill. A bastion of cruelty.
Supposedly of learning. Dark, foreboding. School.
A manifestly different journey ahead. Purely, a real mental state.

Martin Cox.

Symphonic Poem in Five Movements

First movement
– Andante

Today I say dawn
as I could say stories and spring.
The sun takes on the tiny
presence of an atom
with its protons and neutrons
displacing thin threads of heat,
reflexes of anguish
liquor bubbles
placid floating of toasted pale skin
or an evening alarm
with its sedentary heel
or morning horn of the day.

Today I say morning
when the intention is to wake up to the sea,
wake up to pine trees
that claim the altitude of the palms
and border the universe with senile breath.
Nothing is decipherable beyond waiting,
beyond the waiting that spins
towards the voice, towards calm.
Towards the centaur that lies under
Neptune’s trunk,
under the trembling ruins of Hercules,
beyond Sisyphus
there is a cause,
a reason related
with hunger, with Cain
with the universal cry of the perfect angel,
there is party, ideology and a star channel
there is reason and channel after the lyre,
behind the Gregorian chants
behind the myth there is a force.
A glass of water
acquires a god
swallowing it acquires a rite,
a song and a deadly twilight.
So, to say morning
as I could say “stories” and “spring”,
has a lot to do with Aphrodite
with Dante and Bonaparte,
with a Bach concert
with a Sunday mass
with a cotton speck
perched on a wound,
has to do with the eternal
curse of existence.

Everything has to do with everything
from the soap bubbles
up to Hitchcock’s chair,
from Achilles’ pain
up to Einstein’s formula,
from genetic engineering
up to a plate of rice with beans.

Everything is a dictionary of processes,
a tuna sandwich with jam
tomatoes and steel ropes
where it hangs secure,
patient, and vital the wait.

Today I say dawn and I say land
like saying parrot, mountain,
Caribbean, streets, and stone.
Like saying I belong to the Parnassus,
to the bay, to the mud,
to the current avenue
of metals and rubber,
like saying I have
homeland and burger king,
I have Garcilaso and Llorens,
Rimbaud and Machu Pichu,
Hemingway and Picasso,
Fellini’s Rimini and the sunny streets of Ponce
I have Gongora and Mona Lisa,
the whole stream of Spain,
the vigorous pulp of Africa
the noble frown of Agueybaná
the steady hand of Betances.
I have it all
in a rhythmic sonata
of the eternal summer that throbs.

Here I begin by saying that it is dawn
like saying it is coffee time with milk,
it is time for a day’s work,
to start the car correctly,
turning the street corner with a hot engine
and look closely at the speedometer.

Flashes of older dwellings

Fortified concoctions of heathen’s past,
May they chase away the dragons at your back.
The chromosome of suburbia flashing at every street corner
The mute merry-go-round
at the fairground
awaits the gentle hands that once
were unchained.

Those times I read, a time I should belong.
Those words on the pages, those lyrics in a song.

Those times I heard a place I should have been,
The incredible stories,
The psychedelic trips I would have seen.

Take me away, take me to that place in Laurel Canyon.
Bring me far away from here and now.
Consider me in your world of 1970
Do what you can, take me back someway somehow.

Daydreaming about a day in LA, a walk down Sunset Strip,
This isn’t just a fantasy, it’s more than a polaroid print.
California, take me back in time, a week, a day even an hour,
Bittersweet notes rain on me, have I lost all my power?

So, tell me now, do I dream about then or live for today?
I’m not one to pray, but Jesus now I pray.
Can I live free for tomorrow or am I stuck in yesterday?

Flower and fauna

You begin again

Of course

Fold to unfold to stretch

To arrive at the station

To punch the ticket

The train moves slowly at first

Metal upon metal, steam

And then speeds by

Green trees turn upside down, then rust

Wheels thrush to a halt

I fall apart

Into the soil I turn over

Feeding the ground

This is a poem dedicated to those
Men and women who cannot help but follow
The unspoken meanings of their soul;
who will search or soar until
They unite their personas with their innate
Motivations; and
Whom will continue soaring
Throughout their vintage ages.

Toward the man who sings to the tune of
His or her own persona
Who understands the unspoken
Meanings of a jumbled heart;
And who listens to those inaudible
Words of the earth which cannot
Be found upon published
Printed pages;

And utmost to those who harbor
The drive to seek out their
Most innate motivations;
The kind that compelled Eagles
To soar so exquisitely
Throughout their long-lived,
Vintage ages.

I roam concrete cracked grasslands,
where even the grass is grateful to fight it’s way through to find the slightest sliver of sunlight

I’m forced to go to underfunded public schools where learning is an afterthought
and every section of the school needs a go fund me account
No after school programs,
making gangs the only after school activity with a sign up sheet

I’ve grown use to dodging crack pipes and bullet shells on a daily,
like a game of improper hopscotch
Caution tape collects together forming tumbleweeds of yellow misery
which are guided down the street as the wind blows

Police sirens echo in the background, bouncing off
abandoned, board, blanketed, brick homes
creating a soundtrack for the ghetto
As the track trembles through the air
it is unknown if the dj is friend or foe

Marvelous Murals of those killed by outsiders and those that live here can be found on the side of liquor stores
Each name etched into the forefront of my mind
making it impossible for any to escape
Crackheads and drug dealers populate the same street corners creating a physical embodiment of an unbroken cycle

Bad memories and lost dreams fill the poverty polluted air
making clouds of nightmares and insanity.
Breath too much and violence becomes your nature
At any moment
and without warnig
the gunshow is given the greenlight and gunshots roam free looking for a new place to call home
Allowing my couch to gain no wear and tear because it’s safer to sit on the hardwood

It begins to rain and pockets of burgundy appear on the sidewalk
as dried up blood comes to life trying to find the nearest drain to escape through,
If only I could escape as easily
Momma said we just too poor to live anywhere other than where we are now.

So I will continue to roam this concrete jungle

My Jungle
with concrete cracked grassland
My Jungle
where I play improper games of hopscotch
My Jungle
where I watch caution tape blow up and down the street
My Jungle
where I listen to police sirens
My Jungle
with marvelous murals
My Jungle
with unbroken cycles
My Jungle
where rain cleans the blood of the sidewalk
My Jungle
with no after school programs
My Jungle
where gunshots roam the air

This is My Jungle
A Jungle I call home

-Writer X-