POEM: AND-A ONE, AND-A TWO...

 

Two Skies

There really are two skies; I’ve seen them.

I know you probably won’t believe me.

You’ve been told otherwise,

and you’ll take the other side of things

more often than not, won’t you?

But let me show you two skies.

Let me show you what I mean.

Under the bright grey underlay

and curling foreground of cloud shapes

is a bordered canvas.

And here time has a way of slowing down

so you can see the two skies.

Under two skies, seasons don’t matter.

Heat and cold, wet and dry  are unimportant.

The ground you stand on (a parking lot, a grove,

a marbled balcony), is just a place for your feet.

Settings are as forgotten as a clumsily-drawn mural.

Harsh suns that stoop tired backs,

and redden necks and arms are banished.

Winds and storms and rain,

and blizzards with their stinging, icy bullets

are dismissed.

Swollen rivers and cruel mudslides, fires,

and the wild distortions of tornadoes and volcanoes—

all these are for another place.

Birds need not fly under two skies.

Animals, all those pets and microbes,

those wild things—

all from life’s tree are gone.

And people, too,

are gone, though it must be said,

that each of us is already alone

under two skies.

Others will say it is a false aligning of planes,

some visual trick that gives the appearance of a canvas

layered with artful puffs of tinted clouds.

Of course it is.

Of course the sky is made of gas and water vapour,

and particulates.

It has dimension and depth: it is of a set piece,

complete in its own creation,

along with everything else.

But that’s it, isn’t it?

The fact that I can look up

and see a sky move across another sky behind,

and know, without hesitation, that both are real.

Spring Moon

Light. Pure white. 

The moon’s

bright healing—

like a beam

shot from a ray gun

by some alien friend

through the tree’s

dark branches.

Spring moon—

so round and tall.

You’re a neighbour’s

marshal call

framed in my kitchen window.

And I am captured,

bound and chaste,

by your colour.

   

Mouse: 
Referendum  
on a Soul      

I set a trap

and killed a mouse.

A little murder

in my house.

I’d woke to sounds,

not quite chatter—

a skittering

of waking matter.

There was no deed,

or other way,

to get along

with him today.

The space was filled;

a place, declined,

and room for two

went unassigned.

With eyes like beads

of deep-brown glass,

and fur as dark

as midnight’s mass,

I’d culled him from

a vanished herd,

once Eden-named

by other word.

Naxt Big Eff’n Tang

“Impressive, boyo, but does she float?

Why, she’s as big as a fishing boat!”

“This is no boat, my plain-speaking friend.

It’s the world’s new machine—ULTI-MEND!”

“So, what will she do? How many knots?

Tell us her load and what has she got?”

“You don’t listen, like all your kind.

You’re like rocks archaeologists find.

What will it take so you’ll understand?

What I’ve accomplished is something grand!”

“No, boyo, I ain’t putting ye down!

You’re from away, and new to our town.

Manners is something Ma taught us well.

If it ain't no boat—it still be swell!”

“A rude compliment, but nonetheless,

I thankee, neighbour, for your address.

Little you know the power it holds:

It changes the world! Tales will be told!”

“How does she work? On what does she run?

By the electrics or from the sun?

Is she fuel-driven? By wind or steam?

Or does she run by the flowing stream?”

“A simple question, well understood:

Friend, it’s not fire, water or wood.

Its power’s from an ultimate source.

It's perpetual. That’s obvious,

of course.”

Passion Unbound

At least this is not us.

Here—now—we can say:

“No, we did not go this far.”

Surely, we can say:

“We are bound,

saved by love,

by our common humanity,

by the same blood

coursing through

all our veins.”

And that this

was not,

could not,

will never be

our way.

We can say this much,

can’t we?

Stealth of Purpose

The shark comes to mind,

swimming its ever-slowing circles,

turning in the white-frothed water

to strike and tear—

that indispensable

tooth and jaw of nature!

But it’s also in the desert animal’s

desperate trek to the next oasis,

stealth growing with its recovery.

It’s in the rocks

and moss-covered trees

falling in the forest

that will decay and acquire,
always.

It’s in the silent microbes’

ancient legacy of the single cell

got from the cold between stars.

It’s in the winging of birds,

their glory and their shadows,

and it’s heard in the great,

chambered breaths of whales.

It’s in the sky, the land and the water.

It’s there, and it’s here. In us.

Written in the geography of our skin.

Road Kill

Trigger Man,

tell them they have no heart,

that they’re soulless,

beyond redemption;

that their offspring

will become monsters.

Remind them they have

no fixed address.

Explain to them

they’re vagabonds, nere-do-wells,

that their hygiene is poor
and something 
they were born with (some genetic stink).

Complain to them when they

live like animals in filthy holes,

jumbled together like broken-open
boxes of jigsaw puzzles,

with no sense of order or vision.

Tell them they get what they deserve.

Tell them, Trigger Man.

It makes everything easier.

On Reading the Obits

Thank you for being so successful

and for making all that money;

for having so much

and for knowing so many people!

Thank you for contributing often

to local charities, 
and for your civic pride.

Thank you for your dedication,

for your place, your time,

your weight in the world.

Thank you for living large,

for travelling far, for having a family,

for being loved and missed.

Thank you for all of that.

And thank you for your photograph.

(It will never do you justice!)

I’ve taped it to my mirror.

And each day I look at it

to remind me

that a life less lived

is still better

than no life at all.

Thank you.

Garden 101 
Your fingers cake with loamy soil 
that worms have heaved on their way.
Roots moisten in their cradles.
Flowers spill with fruit.
But snakes—are optional.
Why is that so hard to remember?

NEWS OF THE WORLD #4

Slim-hipped! Why, she’s god’s gift!

Buttons torn, fabric shift

Public scandal—midriff!

Tabloids run: “A BIG TIFF!”

Diet race? Out of space!

Gated-lanes; pocket mace.

Home runs or masturbate?

Daisy-chains (Find-A-Mate?)

Mink stoles in graveyard rows.

Bare bowls top grassy knolls.

Gangsters rape: party tapes!

Boardroom apes; cassock japes.

Solar flares? Price of air.

Sewer-streams; county fairs.

Cell-phone thrills; costly pills.

Maggots drill; pious shill.

Fields of toil; oceans moil—

Real-estate’s virgin soil.

SHOCK AND AWE! (Devil’s claw.)

Bodies found: Ma and Pa.

Summer sage; falling age.

Babies killed, babies rage.

Poison scare? (Over there.)

Poison air? You beware!

Zyklon B; gold-filled teeth.

Mushroom cloud—coffin sheath.

Smiling bites pin-stripes mask.

Final rites: time’s own task.

Starving child, meek and mild.

TV preacher, rich and riled.

Comets come, comets go.

Will they stop us? We don’t know.

Frozen

The robot turned a delightful phrase

on this most happy of happy days!

Delighting the lady and all of her guests,

until he thawed them out, and then the rest.

IN LORD OF THE RINGS THERE IS A SCENE WHERE Gandalf confronts the evil wizard Saruman in his fortress-tower at Isengard. Gandalf and a group of his company stand outside the walls of the “Orthanc” while the traitorous Saruman speaks from a window to those assembled below. He is about to have his power broken and his evil conspiracy with the Dark Lord Sauron thwarted by Gandalf, and he uses his Voice to cast a spell in a final attempt to seduce his listeners and win them over to his side. Tolkien has a vivid description of the episode:

“The window closed. They waited. Suddenly another voice spoke, low and melodious, its very sound an enchantment. Those who listened unwarily to that voice could seldom report the words that they heard; and if they did, they wondered, for little power remained in them. Mostly they remembered only that it was a delight to hear the voice speaking, all that it said seemed wise and reasonable, and desire awoke in them by swift agreement to seem wise themselves. When others spoke they seemed harsh and uncouth by contrast; and if they gainsaid the voice, anger was kindled in the hearts of those under the spell. For some the spell lasted only while the voice spoke to them, and when it spoke to another they smiled, as men do who see through a juggler’s trick while others gape at it. For many the sound of the voice alone was enough to hold them enthralled; but for those whom it conquered the spell endured when they were far away, and ever they heard that soft voice whispering and urging them. But none were unmoved; none rejected its pleas and its commands without an effort of mind and will, so long as its master had control of it.” (601)

There were some, like Theoden, King of the Rohan who struggled against the slippery words, lulling tones and cadences Saruman uses to turn him to his cause, for the king had long be under the control of his chief counsellor “Wormtongue”, who was a creature of Saruman. [Wormtongue: great name BTW—sounds like a politician!] But he eventually clears his head and says: “’We will have peace when you and all your works have perished…You are a liar, Saruman, and a corrupter of men’s hearts. You hold out your hand to me, and I perceive only a finger of the claw of Mordor. Cruel and cold.” (603) But, the stubborn dwarf Gimli, Gandalf’s companion and ever the skeptic, is not persuaded from the start. “’The words of this wizard stand on their heads,’ he growled, gripping the handle of his axe.  ‘In the language of Orthanc help means ruin, and saving means slaying, that is plain. But we do not come here to beg.” (602) Gandalf stood silent, waiting to speak, and when he does Saruman’s final gambit is to cast doubt among the men, to create the impression that he and Gandalf talk together like two noblemen conversing above the rabble, and whose vested interests align more with each other than with lesser men.

    

     “So great was the power that Saruman exerted in this last effort that none that stood within hearing were unmoved. But now the spell was wholly different. They heard the gentle remonstrance of a kindly king with an erring but much loved minister. But they were shut out, listening at a door to words not meant for them: ill-mannered children or stupid servants overhearing the elusive discourse of their elders, and wondering how it would affect their lot. Of loftier mould these two were made: reverend and wise. It was inevitable that they should make alliance. Gandalf would ascend into the tower, to discuss deep things beyond their comprehension in the high chambers of Orthanc. The door would be closed, and they would be left outside, dismissed to await allotted work or punishment. Even in the mind of Theoden the thought took shape, like a shadow of doubt: ‘He will betray us; he will go—we shall be lost.’

     Then Gandalf laughed.” (605)

And with the good wizard's laughter, Saruman’s spell over them was broken. All who listened now understood how false his words had been. And the once powerful servant of the Dark Lord fled to the hidden corners of his tower like a frightened spider.


I’m not sure why I include this bit about Tolkien here along with a batch of poems (if such a poor effort can be so called) but the watchwords: “Truth in Advertising”, a phrase that used to be bandied about years ago came to mind. I can’t remember when I heard or saw it. Maybe it was written on the packaging of a bar of soap or tube of toothpaste. It’s about telling the truth, nevertheless. Well, with poems, you have to settle for a truth—even if it’s just a fleeting image in your mind, or how a line sounds or if the words resonate with you, or perhaps in images some of the words conjure up as a memory, a wish? A dream, perhaps? Maybe they help create a dialogue of sorts.

I think there is magic in words, and unfortunately, that magic can be used for good or ill....

Now, as for “Truth in Advertising”: I don’t think my poems are “deep things beyond…comprehension” or anything. I think of them as anchors—moments when you stop time for a while or enter a ‘temporal slipstream’, so to speak. Some poems seem achingly clumsy to me and come across as shallow as a road-side ditch. Which is why, after I produce my literary creations, most of the time I feel more like an Orc or Gollum than I do an elf, more like a devolved creature soon to disappear. Yet, I think I still attempt to tell the truth, however unevenly accomplished.

 

According to Tolkien, the time during which LOTR is set is imagined as the “midpoint” of humanity’s growth. The story of Frodo, Gandalf, Aragorn and the rest is set in a time long after the proud kingdoms of men that once ruled in Middle-earth, and when the first battles were fought and won against the Dark Lord. The time of Frodo’s journey and Aragorn’s ascension is during the long years that men have struggled to hold onto their past, however diminished. This is also the time when the last of the elves are leaving Middle-earth, after their ages-long habitation. It is a sign that something elemental and ‘pure’ is fading from the world. As Gandalf says after the defeat of the Dark Lord, it is the end of "the Age of Rings of Power", including the Elven rings and his own, and the beginning of the Age of Men. (These 'lesser' Rings maintained the power and place of the Elf and wizard races of old, but for such beings their time is drawing to a close; it is now come for mankind to rule in Middle-earth.)
Tolkien’s tale is set during a time where people live near fabulous ruins of their once-great past and where they begin, under Aragorn's rule by the book's end, to re-build their kingdom on their own, without the help of elves or wizards. Thus, the story is about the renewel of humankind as they muster the forces of good to once more confront evil, lest the whole world be covered in darkness. They triumph over Sauron when the "One Ring" is destroyed in Mount Doom, ending the age. 
And after? Tolkien's chapter, the "Scouring of the Shire", is instructive: Against evil, there must always be vigilance*. 

 

Tolkien is the ‘ur-source’ for much modern fantasy writing and he’s the wellspring for tales of epic adventures, fantastic heroes and stories we’ve all read for generations, and I can’t help feel the ‘truths’ he tries to express in his fiction are more true than many so-called “truths” purveyed in the real world by today’s main stream media. When watching the news on TV or reading the papers, there are times when I feel I’m being lulled into a comfortable complacency, seduced by one Wormtongue after another, all of them whispering lies in my ear until I just give up. It’s a bit like sitting in warm piss—which is cozy and something everyone should try--but you eventually find yourself cooling to the idea.

As I write this there are escalating tensions between the US and Iran: a civilian contractor is killed (is that what we used to call a “mercenary”?); an Iran-sponsored Iraqi militia group is killed in response; then the US embassy in Bagdad is vandalized by protestors; next, the drone assassination of a high-ranking Iranian military leader by America. Tit for tat in a game of brinksmanship—it’s like playing with matches in a room filling up with gas! [Update Jan.11/20: A tragedy--Iranian missiles accidentally shoot down a passanger jet taking off from Imam Khomeini Airport on Jan 8. Iranian officials initially deny responsiblity, and then several days later admit their military mistook the airliner for a cruise missile. In the fog of war things quickly spiral out of control. This shocking event seems to have given the US and Iran pause. For how long?]

 
So truth matters. And where do you go to find it? Why poetry, of course! [See above!] But if you’re somewhat skeptical about that, I would suggest checking out alternative media—YouTube news shows such as “Breaking Points" podcast, or “The Gray Zone”, Mint Press, or the humorous “Jimmy Dore Show”, to name a few. You’ll find fewer Wormtongues there—and not a single Saruman in sight!

As an aside (though it’s not, really), I noticed a store that opened four months ago is now closed in the little plaza where I go to do my laundry. That’s the plaza with the ‘spa’ where I've ever seen only only one person go in—and she looks the owner or the “Madame!” Who are the customers, I ask. When do go in there to do their business? Anyhoo, they had a shop open in the plaza that was an “annex” to the “Bait Bucket” store, nearby. They sold paddle-boards and ice huts, sportswear and gear for the local fishing and “boarding” scene that’s active on our beautiful Lake Simcoe. It was run by a couple; I remember the gal standing expectantly at the front door where they’d put up posters and balloons, announcing the grand opening in September. Well, I guess business wasn’t so grand, and their annex was nixed—by what, exactly, I don’t know. But, a couple of days ago, when I was doing my laundry (and doing reconnaissance outside the ‘spa’!), I noticed the store was empty and “For Rent” signs were in the windows. Later that morning, while I was returning to my car with a jar of peanut butter I’d bought at the local health food store downtown, a woman came around to the side of my car and leaned in the window, asking me if I wanted any “company.” Surprised, I said, “No—but thanks.” And drove off. (I wonder if she worked at the spa?)

So, again: Truth matters. What’s the truth concerning the hopes and dreams of that young couple starting their new business and having it fold so soon? What’s the truth around the pretty woman offering me her body for money? How can we know the truth surrounding the actions that are happening in the Middle East? Are there truths to be gotten from a fantasy novel or a poem? Or a news report? I guess my point is that all of the above are things needing to be carefully, respectfully and fully explored in ways we seem less inclined to do these days, both to our detriment and our peril.

Well, that's enough for now....

Cheers, Jake.








* BTW, a character of interest from LOTR, and often over-looked, is Tom Bombidill, who lives in the Old Forest just beyond the borders of Frodo and Sam's beloved Shire. He appears at the beginning of the novel and at the end (where he's mentioned), when Gandalf and his young Hobbit friends make their final journey together back to the Shire. Gandalf turns off the way to go visit Tom and have, "such a talk as I have not had in all my time. He is a moss-gatherer, and I have been a stone doomed to rolling. But my rolling days are ending..." (1033) I'm not sure if Tom is a wizard like Gandalf, but one thing he seems is elemental and vibrantly alive, yet he is touchingly simple and humble, too. He is the caretaker of the Old Forest, and his only concern is for its welfare. He reminds me of Sam, who we read in the years ahead is instrumental, because of his frenetic revitalization efforts, in restoring the Shire after Saruman's dispicable pillaging. (He 'scours' it clean of the wizard's filth.) But, while the Shire is a carefully-groomed garden, gentle and tame, Tom's forest is wild and evolving. 
Also of interest are the "Ents", perhaps the oldest living beings in existance, who are the "shepherds" of the forests. (Not in Tom's wood, but elsewhere.) Their numbers are small and their flock is becoming more and more sedentary. Their time seems to be passing. But is Tom Bombidill's? And if Tom and his wood continue to thrive, what could that mean?