10.28.2004

small in the low tide

10/28/04

why not let this surround us?
cast off your clothes of iron
and your hat of molasses
and jump naked into this pool!
let the cool ocean slip around you
and wash away the doubts that
fill your heart and tie you down
like a rough rope to the dirt

the water’s quite warm; come in
for a spell! Here we’ll fill the roll
of fishes in the sea and fall back
to our primitive selves; we’ll
breathe under the water in this new place
with the ease of gods dining on the clouds
and we’ll travel the leagues on
wings of gold

and when we tire of the swim,
float!
Beneath us and around us there
really is a current, a force drawing us farther
like a black meteor caged in so much
a simple box in the desert
and let this current bear us to faraway
fanciful places, ancient cities and
shining rivers
where the water is always smooth
and the wind sweet, a trace of
nutmeg on the breeze

fall in with me!
I’ll even hold your hand,
guide you and help lift you out, at the end
if only you’d see
how warm this pool is under the sun!
how it glides like a whisper of silk against
your legs
and runs like smiling dreams
across your face
fog of the morning and night

10/28/04

it was your birthday, this week
and I didn’t come

I didn’t come ‘cause I’m still lost
amiss in the fog
like a once-druid now ostracized that
runs in slow motion in the mist on the docks
that lie in prairies of gray, lands of stone
worlds of oceanblue and ambient lovelight
that all ebbs and seems compelled to fade
against its strongest
wishes
oh, it won’t fade
but it will

and if I could come to you in this vortex
I would; I know I’m there
but I’m welded shut in the clouds and
rooted to this place in this coastal soup
so much white and so much silence
to distance myself from you and
it only brings us closer

it never left, but that mist it closes
back in around me tonight as a tighter shroud
and in its depth I see your smile
and that rough laugh;
each light that swims in the gray
is the light of a thousand trains
that pass us by in the night
each the heart of those eternal traveling tales
you spun on the notes of a spanish guitar
next to the tracks
the steel that reminds me forever of the sunrise
and calls out with open arms
the journey your gray hair on the wind

for peter r. savenko, grandfather

10.27.2004

aggression, but not for me

from 10/18/04

it’s moments like these when I
begin to wonder exactly why
I’m here
marooned on a tiny speck
in the cosmos
with only a few like souls
this place where aggression
confuses, makes me shake
leaves me filled with cobwebs and
glue
the color of black rotten
leaves
after the spring thaw
their dark sweetness the scent
of misunderstood mistrust
and mistaken impressions bent
a melting, dead world
that only touches the surface, no inward lament
only shallow images, no perception of depth
a flat
technicolor
dimensionless spot
where water doesn’t splash
and leaves won’t press
beneath your sneakers
and the sun won’t flirt with your hair

no, here, it’s all as you see it
and never as you mean it
life a mere television, shooting star
in the space we share

10.25.2004

Dude, i'm vegetarian now. Goat's a veggie!

And someone fucking stole my Kerry/Edwards sign last night. I'm pissed! But i think i can get a new one at the Labor Temple this afternoon. If not, i'm fucking making my own, i don't care. At least i got a Dorgan sign today, Mike Liffrig's opponent. Liffrig = nutcase, Dorgan = someone who gets us jobs and helps this state, actually. hmm...

have a good afternoon, reader!

10.24.2004

wow... four in one night! Cake must have really shoved a proverbial firecracker up somewhere... hehe. I guess i just felt the urge to write and said fuck-all, i can work later, but now, i must write (and talk to kris, too, which was fucking stellar dude, as it always is, but really awesome tonight).

But it's time for me to indeed hit the sack. I hope you've had an excellent night, reader, and that you're staying safe and not raising too much hell. Or else i may be forced to hunt you down and join you. Sleep well, and dream sweetly.
almost bedtime

10/24/04

at the close of the day
this is
how I feel -
soft, like a blanket in the hay
or so much down in
the pillows that I keep
it’s the warmth from a winter hearth
that sticks and mixes with a
touch of floating that hints at
this intoxicating melodic
drifting
that hurls you down the highway
and around the bend
at a blurry pace
on the wings of a furiously calm angel
as we ride a red-eyed, eighteen hour
caffeine-fueled expedition to nowhere
so blow out the candles
and float into the black with me
prayer

10/24/04

o lord tonight
tuck me in beneath
your stars, let your wind
breathe o’er me like
my mother’s words as I gazed
into her eyes as a babe
and mayhap, if it please you,
let your tears fall on me
like my father’s, restrained and released
in heartfelt sorrow
and let your morning light caress my face
like a lover’s touch, nothing lighter
in the world
a soft glance of compassion, tangible
and real
such as are the snowflakes I bid you send
when it all ends
and I ask in my final words
"can I go again? Just once?"
head in the gray

10/24/04

death passes her by
strobe flashing white streak screaming
and all she can do
is look up and smile
on this charcoal afternoon
made perfect for errands
soft Irish music
and sofa-bound excursions
to distant bookish destinations
it might even be a good time for
dying
but certainly not smiling,
most certainly not
as the ambulance speeds
past the beaming shadow of
a woman lost
just got back from the Cities - where i took in Sarah Lee and Johnny, the Old 97s, Northern State, and Cake! And i fucking met the last two!!!

but i feel like writin' some more of that thar poetry, so ah reckon i'll-a do that. Have a good one, reader, and stay smilin'!

------------------------------------

on the way to Mecca

10/24/04

in this mist I walk ahead
of the pack
a druid in the forest draped in a bonewhite chant

beneath my steps the concrete lies cold, draped
in a sheet of rain, reflected light
dripping from streetlights a thousand miles away
but my memories and eyes tell me, encouragingly,
it’s only a short walk
however, to my smiling heart and featherweight soul
it seems like a
lifetime
as I walk these old paths in this old city
that pulses and teems with purple anticipation for the
upcoming baptismal on first and seventh -
a thousand souls washed
clean tonight in the soft tears of an acoustic guitar

restraint – it’s out of the question
this fire draws me in like a sullen moth
looking for release
so I walk faster

almost running
feet slipping on the rain-slick sidewalk
full in the knowledge that
sometimes the inside wait is
painful endless forever
like the feeling of time ticking by in days
not seconds
as your plane empties in the night
you’re stuck in the back
feet trapped in molasses two feet deep
that’s eight years old and smells faintly
of that life you left behind
just a few hours ago

the wait, yes, oh its long
it is forever
but in my church I’d wait forever
for just one second of backlit blues notes,
a sweaty, searing, red and yellow solo,
or a common glance of thankful recognition
after the applause

that wait’s nothing
and I could run forever beneath the floating soul
of the city dark and alive
I would
but it’s only a block away
and I know my pack will catch me
eventually

10.20.2004

Hola, reader! It's been quite awhile it seems since i've knitted together a blog posting without having a poem to toss on for good measure, but it seems like tonight's the night for me to simply chronicle, and not weave a bit of poetry. I'm simply relaxing, waiting for dustin to call, and it's been a pleasant day. One can't much complain about good progress at work, lots of emails from friends, and a slow, comfortable evening spent on the couch with the final Dark Tower book in hand. Just my kind of night.

Sadly, though, actually writing this tonight is a bit more challenging than i initially thought. Over lunch poor Goat cut himself with the fucking Wüsthof bread knife! I don't know what the hell i did, but i must have been really excited at the prospect of chomping down on these morningstar farms spicy black bean veggie burgers that i just bought last night, since the knife literally leaped out of my hand and did this tiny little dance on the end of my left pinky finger. And ooo did that bleed like so much a stuck pig... thankfully, though, it didn't hurt a lot. It just makes typing a royal pain in the ass, because i use that finger to hit the left shift and control keys. For some reason i never got in the habit of using the right-side set of them, and it's not so bad now, but when i'm coding it blows the ass, since you're using CTRL a lot, cutting and pasting code and using IntelliSense in Visual Studio. Alas, i pulled through, adjusted my typing rhythm, and all was well with the world.

So now i find myself refecting on the fact that even with a slightly crippled typing hand, it's a fine wednesday night in goat-land. I'm totally stoked that i'll be not only seeing the Old 97s on friday night in my old stomping grounds - Minneapolis - but i'll be seeing Cake, too, on Saturday! I can't fuckin' wait! This will be my fourth time seeing the boys from Sacramento, and goddamn, it'll be such a motherfucking off-the-hook experience - front-row center, hanging out with John and Vince and the rest of the crew, rocking out, lost in a complete wave of concert bliss. Shows are really one of the most spiritual experiences for me, and to see two shows at the First Ave will haul ass. Of all the venues i've been at, i just love it - too, because of it's location in the city, close to O'Donovan's irish pub, the Fine Line, the Rock Bottom Brewery (home of the most insane fucking nachos ever) ... it all culminates to make the First Ave one of my top places for worship.

Concerts are so integral to me that venues are, in all essence, churches to me - so much more than our culture's normal houses of worship. If you've never been to a show at Red Rocks in Morrison, Colorado, reader, and are of the concertgoing persuasion, do yourself a favor and go; it'll fucking fry your circuits like nothing else.

I suppose i should go get ready, though, and make myself halfways presentable should dustin call shortly. Have a fine rest of the night, reader, and as you lay in rest tonight, dream sweetly.

10.19.2004

TONIGHT THE STARS REVOLT!

fuck, powerman 5000 just kicks fucking ass!

such perfect Tuesday coding music... mmm hmm. :)

10.18.2004

we just had a thunderstorm - yay!

have a pleasant night, reader.

------------------------------------

out of the black

10/18/04

as the rain comes I
realize
tonight is the finest night
a shadowed october evening
dashed with
a generous touch of winter
what ought to be a silent drama
finds itself mingled with
the secretive flavors
of an angry, mischievous god

a storm draws near and
I find myself ensnared
rapt, held close
by this moment
as I gaze in childish awe from my
perfect vantage point
high and dry
above the valley and the city below

as I stand
closer now the light flashes deep
and eternity thunders across the land
time endless mere minutes in the west
it makes me feel ancient, like parchment dragged
across the seas
for seconds
minutes
and millions of degrees
loosely sealed between never-ending
starry cricket nights and bone-dead winter days
stuck between
those tormented insane fickle movietheather whiteblue
clouds
flashing in chaotic pulses
that scream
as the flood lets loose a staccato assault
on my shed’s thin tin skin
heaven’s anger dealt out in a
teary shotgun blast

and as quickly come
its gone
leaving only the soft rain
as a fading reminder of a war long passed
the last adrenal skirmish between the seasons
remembered in the soft whispers of the crying night

10.13.2004

spirit

10/13/04

right now it’s all about
letting go
and letting this rhythm
carry me to you
as it once did
the feeling of a magnet drawing
my soul to this church beneath the steel
the concrete
the sculpting
of a million men in a million years
that felt the same love
that I once felt
but nothing like this, you the iron I the
other
that draws us in like this african trance
that I follow, as it draws me in
a mother holding her daughter’s hand
leading in a forest of dark green shadows
faery voices
and timeless golden sunlit memories
both places churches of my god
both places within us sacred forever
bound to the very blood that flows
like wind
in our hearts
and the electricity that fires
in our fingertips our toes our eyes
like god staring down from the clouds
so let’s stop and share these tears
a soft rain from the heavens
falling from our eyes
home of our gods
fall into my arms again
and worship life
in this holiest of lands
the land of spirit of soul of existence of transcendence
the no-man’s land of you and I
in that inch
only you and I share
between our eyes
float on down the way

10/13/04

screaming and rocking and sweating
it flies through us
the beat pulsing
like an engine on fire in the sunset
life on the wings of god
alpha and omega and all between
ripping and tearing
us into one
while the sky breathes above
in a soft whisper
like a metal crunch double-bass warlord onslaught
worlds turning in your eyes
as it all streams over in out between and through
exploding in blue
and gold
and white
baking in the ageless heat of eternity
ooo... i almost forgot about this one! I started writing it like a week before the girls came, but i sort of forgot i did it until i went to write something new tonight. I massaged it a slight bit, and here she be, ja.

Hope ya'll've had a most righteous, shit-kickin Wednesday, fellas.

I reckon i'll go listen to u2's Electrical Storm a second time...

----------------------------------------

E

10/13/04

morning comes and
floating as I do
sixteen inches above the gray in the black
I drift east towards a horizontal fire
I go dim close my eyes turn back inside
as electronica repetition merges with
roadsong
to that soft place where we
stopped the world
released its pressure
and let it all
fall
‘round us
like silent moonlight

I’m bringing it all back in the silence
with cold
awakening stings
lightning-bolts that
thrash about on a late summer night
drunk and dumb after
a storm
which arrived fashionably late
mingled
and departed a little too soon
leaving the guests wanting

it streams over me like the
moonlight, the light that dances on my skin
and flows through my hair like silk
spun from the lips of an oracle
and as I sail forth, eyes shut,
gripping the wheel tempting death in the dawn
I feel the trees smear past and stars streak above
painting the periphery –
and that, too, is this feeling
coming back
as a single knowing caress
mmm... Powerman 5000's The End of Everything is so sexy! mmm.... :)

nothing like coding to some fucking badass music on a Wednesday morning while trying to stay awake after an insane week, hehe...

10.12.2004

my god. i can't begin to really even process this past week; for me, at this point, to even try to describe it would be simply wrong. Perhaps later, but the feeling of the energies that merged between us all - fuck, between kris and i - was so transcendentally phenomenal that putting words to it right now simply can't do the experience justice.

Also, I'm simply tired, and awfully sad, too. Yet so fucking happy at the same time; and that's what's so different about all this, why i've never felt anything like this - i should be bawlin' my damned eyes out (shit, i mean, my girl just went back home, and for all intensive purposes it might be quite awhile before i get to see her face to face again) - but i'm not wigging out as much as i have in the past, over relationships that were far less deep as this. It just seems that this connection we share runs so deep and so strong that i know in my heart of hearts that it will always be there - it feels like it always was. I can't help but smile when i think of the next adventure we'll share. And, right now, that's what matters, right along with all those experiences we shared over the past seven days. Nothing short of pure contentment and overwhelming bliss. I wish everyone could feel what i feel right now.

I actually wrote a little today, right after i said my goodbyes at the airport, as we waited to see kris & zan's flight take off - as the plane taxied down the runway, stopped, turned around, and rocketed skyward. Now, don't get me wrong, i've written stuff that is far better than this, but this was so spontaneous, and was written really as everything took place, in an attempt to somehow capture that dual feeling of extreme sadness/longing and pure joy when seeing what lies ahead and what we had a chance to share. And in that way i could never change it; to do so would be sacrilege. Have a pleasant night, reader, and dream sweetly.

------------------------------------------------

untitled

10/12/04

chasing the sun, all the way home
you and i
facing not a sunset but a sunrise
forever
i can't do anything but raise my eyes to
you
in the plane
and smile
tears for the times we'll share
dried by the cool breeze
all this
forever

10.06.2004

HOLY MUTHERFUCIKNINSHIT

I LOVE BLOG!

10.02.2004

Hola! I'm in the process of winding down from what turned out to be a fine Friday evening, and I thought i may as well write a little before hitting the sack at such an awfully late hour.

Staying up this late is a good thing, though; if nothing else it'll condition me for what promises to be an amazing little seven-day break from work that starts this Wednesday. Rumour has it that i may have a few visitors joining me, but ... that all seems to be speculation at this point. I suppose if someone were to show up i'd probably offer my hospitality, but dude, like anyone would come visit me. I mean, come on, let's be realistic here.

Today was a pleasantly productive day at work. Although i felt oddly stress-free, i was able to kick out two out of three tools that I need to complete for the first beta release of my program. Well... one still needs some polishing. In fact, i'm sure another good six hours. But i made some stellar fuckin progress nonetheless, thanks in part to some Nine Inch Nails, the Lord of the Rings: Fellowship soundtrack, and Queens of the Stone Age's self-titled album. I did want to hear U2's "Electrical Storm" as well, but they went and changed their website on me, in the process temporarily removing the video for that song. Grr! I just cried and cried... hehe.

After work I came home and eventually made my way down to dustin's grandmother's place, where i was fed some stellar chili and salad, complete with some good tea and finished with a kick-ass bowl of ice cream. And, to my much pleasant suprise, Kris called while i was down there, so we got to talk for awhile too. As always that left me totally bouncing afterwards, and, man, i just can't wait to see her again. Eloquence is simply too fleeting when it comes to describing how much i miss her.

Dustin and I had planned on coming back to my place to chill out and perhaps watch a movie, and meet up with brianne. Alas, dustin ended up at his friend heather's instead, and must have stayed there a bit later than expected, for i never did hear from him. Brianne came over, though, and we had a blast - one can't complain about a fun night of conversation and music combined with green tea and some leftover spicy vegan Goat-soup! And i introduced her, too, to the awesomeness that is Rush in Rio. Wow... holy fuck. I've never been able to watch it myself, alone, for more than about 10 minutes before i have to turn it off, or else i'll just short-circuit - blow a fuse and fry myself out from the energy of it all. Somehow i managed through about half of it tonight, though, so i have to commend myself. Fuck! I want to see those guys so fucking bad again, especially after seeing Bravado and Cygnus x1... and La Villa.... 2112... fucking Earthshine, dude.. my god.

k... i have to stop, hehe.

Plus, i'm awfully exhausted, and at this rate, i've been up for damn near 24 hours. Perhaps that's my cue to hit the sack once and for all after a most pleasant evening (all the stuff i did plus getting to talk to the Lobster and Val, both whom i miss terribly, made for just one hell of a night). Sleep well tonight, reader, and dream sweetly.