'Husha, husha,
Whisper, whisper,
We'll all soon fall down'
Now play another tune
And turn with me once, dear lady
Upon the threshing floor
Don't just stand there
Waiting for the revelling to stop
And for all things to draw to a close
There is time enough
For the hooded lime man
With his rickety old cart
We Will Always Need
We will always need
Something more than miracles
And something less than proof
My heart breaks
With you near to me
But I am like a backwards wave,
Hesitant to arrive next to you
These secrets will find their voices
In the end, as all secrets do
Things only seem to be infinite
They're really just in a transition
That lasts forever
Prevail. Be this to me, for me
Because even the sun
Will only last as long
As each flower
Poetry
Poetry's not an act of will
Nor an act of love or hate
It's not one's own biography
Or the longing for a perfect state
It's not an interrogation
Or the bleeding in merciless fire
It's not the fine tuned memory
Plucking away at the wire
It's not about obsession
Or a prayer that sleeps on your tongue
It's not a children substitute
And it's not the iron lung
It's not the waves on the water
It's not the sand on the shore
It will never make you rich
And it will never make you poor
It's all about the moment
Of how you think and feel
About this space and time
And this wound you cannot heal
It's all about the pen and paper
And the hand that makes so bold
And it's all about the dream of warmth
On nights that get so cold
The River Of Sound
Beside the river of sound
They brought her down
They brought her down
Beside the river of sound
Without mercy or pity
And with wrists wound round
Without pity or mercy
Pinned her to the ground
By the river of sound
Lonely, a buoy bell sounds
Even lonelier, a tiny cry
In the distance goes unheard
On the river of sound
A young girl was found
Floating on the currents
Where it was said she had drowned
Now mist muffles the sound
Of the wind on the waters
As it makes its rounds
Across the river of sound
I Want To Take You There
I want to take you there
To my secret place
We'll make a marriage
Between what we know of ourselves
Into what we know of each other
We're just fragments in the end
Of the same unnending dream
We'll learn never to move
From this place
And yet only to move from it,
Hands within hands
Tell me what happens to trees
When they no longer speak;
Becoming mute Totem Poles
Do they dance and fall like us,
In a world between dark and light?
There is nowhere deeper to fall
Than into each other's arms
As childhood loses its mornings
And makes dreams in their place
Slow as legs moving underwater
If only we could exist like this
All of the time
As unselfconscious
As naked children
Wearing only sunlight
I've waited so long
For your beauty
To be born into our beauty
And for the world to stop
Like a hobby horse
Rocking in an attic
Coming slowly to a stand
Open your closed lids
To see the darkness still
Here inside this closet
Where side by side
I've written our names
Twelve Horses
Twelve horses
Through the mist
Bells tinkling
Hooves kissing stones
A dark carriage
With pale girl inside
Fevered children
Dream strange scenes
Nannies murmer
Ghostly lullabies
It Is In The Distance
It is in the distance
Between our hands
The never-dream
Between morning, noon and night
There must be some fragment
Of me in you
Like the moon dragging the tide
In its silver-light fishing nets
Look for mirrors
They're everywhere
A world of reflection
In every pebble, in water
Still or moving
How precious this will all seem
When our dreams have been exposed
And nothing manifests itself
Even in darkness
The Smallest Figure
The smallest figure
Of my religion
You, as disiplined as a
Water clock
I recall
Your delicate frame
I've chased in the rain
In my mind
But don't hear me break
Within myself
Like the splintering of old ships
As I take the cloud's instruction
And don't trade in your shells
Or give up the luxury
Of dancing in the courtyards
Of tilted shores
For you are waiting delicately
In the darkest reaches of my mind
Like joy in death, or worship
As I hide you from my wails
Where Are You, Soft As Nails?
Where are you, soft as nails?
And where is your bed of thorns?
My clothes are torn, and I cry out
For all this radiance dimmed
This is what you wanted
To lose me in your fields of pain
I have nothing
Only a strange honor
I cling to it, like a coward
Behind a victorious weapon
I have nothing
While lovers meet
I lose the child within
I learned to draw from darkened rooms
While you slept
I built my flesh strong as lead
And drove away all the strangers
Who kept me from my work
You have closed every door of revelation
That you opened for me
It wasn't even for the vision of your beauty
That I stood next to you
It's just that I had nowhere else to go
And no one else to leave
With Endless And Unknown Purpose
With endless and unknown purpose
With a gesture like a finger on a piano key
Or a single raindrop on a branch
I held you in the palm of my hand
Like a stone until you were smooth
And I looked underneath everything
Every rock, every leaf
Lifting them to reveal
That everything is seperate
And everything is one
But now you are gone
And
still I wait for your voice
In the whispering of trees
The wind through strangely shaped stones
And in the glistening darting scales of fish
For everything within still compels me
Towards your distance
And all that you have tossed from your deeps
And I cannot move forward
And cannot move away
Now I can only offer words
Tiny and muffled like rain
That I may draw you out of myself
Like a sword from a wound
Into which even needles are lost
St. Catharines, 2001-12
When The Rains Come Down
When the rains come down
They came in a flood
When the rains come down
They came with blood
I know my name
I know my way
The way I had come
Where the beast had lain
I wait here on the shore
By the signal fire's glow
And when the ships draw near
I'll know which way to go
When the rains come down
They came in a flood
When the rains come down
They came with blood
There never was a home
Or a place for one like me
And I never was much good
In civilized company
But when the battle's finally over
Beneath this setting sun
I'll turn away once more
And holster this smoking gun
When the rains come down
They came in a flood
When the rains come down
They came with blood
I Am Lost
I am lost
Lost like fabled cities
In the wilderness
Lost in the garden, the orchard
Lost as a shell
Is lost in the deeps
And in the burning mountains
The spices brought forth
Lost in beauty
And in love
With the woman
And without her
Lost as buried relics
Are lost to the ages
And as tears
Washed away in rain
Lost within prayer
The words of the Lost
And in the caves
Where holy doves are born
Lost in the blood
Spilled on the alter
And as the flower
In the rages of fragrance
Lost within, lost without
Lost like the lamb
That bleats out
Into the inky darkness
Night Sonata
She stands on the threshold of the door
As the music plays itself
Through veils of beauty
Autumn touches everything this way
Like ghostly fingers that hesitate
Over the keys of a piano
The night and the season unify
Giving birth to new monsters
That peer out like pale children
Whatever Was, Was
Whatever was, was
Whatever is, is
Whatever shall be, shall be
Whatever shall not be, shall not be
Whatever rises, rises
Whatever falls, falls
Whatever breaks, breaks
Whatever holds, holds
Rains fall
And tears will come
Let them fall
Let them come
Beginnings begin
Endings end
Let them begin
Let them end
Whatever was, is
Whatever shall not be, shall be
Whatever falls, rises
Whatever breaks, holds
Shake The Trees Of Their Lemons
Shake the trees of their lemons
Shake the trees of their fruit
Down come the lemons!
Down come the fruit!
Three armfuls at once
Gather them up
Tricky, tricky
Just before the dawn
But mind the crows that wait
Mind their harsh cries
For they find easy prey here too
Where the orchards are rattled
Down to their bones
Now mindlessly shake down the lemons
And shake down the light
Where yesterday's sun still lingers
Sweetens all the air
Death Awaits Everyone
Death awaits everyone
My moment too will come
As I wait here in this trench
In the place they call the Somme
I too will meet my death
Out in No-Man's-Land
It waits amidst the cutting wires
It wants to take my hand
So let me rest a moment here
While the clock slowly unwinds
And let me listen a minute more
To the squeezebox, as it grinds
Was I still young when this hell began
I feel I've aged a thousand years
Here among the mud and the bones
And the constant nagging fears
But when the shells begin to fall
And we run toward some battered hill
I'll be thinking of the spring
And the singing whippoorwill
So let me rest a moment here
While the clock slowly unwinds
And let me listen a minute more
To the squeezebox, as it grinds
Yes, I will steel my courage up
When the whistle it does blow
And our Captain raises his pistol
And shouts out 'All lads go!'
But whin I die upon this field
Either tomorrow or today
I pray that my blood will nourish the soil
And that flowers will bloom where I lay
So let me rest a moment here
While the clock slowly unwinds
And let me listen a minute more
To the squeezebox, as it grinds
Flowers To Earth
Flowers to earth
Earth to flowers
Clouds to rain
Rain to clouds
Fire to ashes
Ashes to fire
Stones to dust
Dust to stones
Words to silence
Silence to words
Light to darkness
Darkness to light
Flowers to flowers
Rain to rain
Clouds to clouds
Fire to fire
Ashes to ashes
Stones to stones
Dust to dust
Words to words
Silence to silence
Darkness to darkness
Light to light
Like An Open Flower Gives Away The Sun
Like an open flower gives away the sun
So my openess gives away my heart
And I am drawn to you within and without
Like the ear singing in a shell when pressed close
Songs like these flicker on my tongue
And make me into a poet, and a singer
For love covers everything with its gleam
And reflects itself back onto everyone
I once tried to empty myself to be filled by you
And to give away all, in order to have everything
I wanted to dance in and out of that flame
As dweller in the darkness, or as seeker of the light
But now I am totally enraptured!
And need not give up one joy for the other;
As both the joy of being empty, and of being filled
Spring one another from the same fountain
For we will learn, that happiness and sorrow
Are both contained deep within oneself
And love is the bursting nectar of both
That sweetens this endless spin about the sun
So put these naked words like seeds into your breast
Where they will blossom and bear fruit
And like children will dance out the heart's shape
That guides its sorrow along the weaving path
Oh, what a gift you have bestowed upon me
To let me give myself in your own scattered fashion
That drafts in dark winter the poems of summer
And that kisses stones and flowers alike
I Watched You In The Sun
I watched you in the sun
A blossom bloomed above
As light poured down like honey
On the woman that I love
And I saw you in the rain
It touched you everywhere
Pressed close to every part
Of your body and your hair
And I want to be that sun
And I want to be that rain
But how to get that close
To your beauty, and your pain?