Fifth September Selection 2012

It’s probably just as well that I fell into a coma

as I came dangerously close

to entering the classroom 

and teaching by example

which means that I'd walk through the door chanting

singing

reciting

dancing

inciting

invoking

proceed to the black board

and commence writing until

blackboards ran out and into walls

walls ran out and into doors

doors met floors

until hopefully others would join in 

to rewrite reality 

until the period was over

or

until our time ran out

Of course it’s possible someone would play God

and fire me first

But I'm pretty confident that someone else would go crazy

and pick up where we left off

--Richard Velez

August 2012 1st and 2nd Selections

Hachinohe Port:
hah, hah, haaaah!
The umineko gulls that perch
on the gateways and walls of Kabushima Shrine
are said to number over forty thousand.
At sunset
children in an empty lot
tickle the evening air
with the sound
of flutes and drums.
In open garages and
out on driveways
the busy mystical clouds
of red and blue
spraypaint shroud
dragons and samurai
apparitions
rendered in larger than life
styrofoam.

On this full moon
the horses and tiger dancers
must charge down the streets.
Surely
the Sanchu Taisen fesitval
is in full force now.
On this full moon
I am far out at sea.
Even the umineko seagulls
of Hachinohe Port are
behind me.
Only now am I
an only tourist
to the gentle sway
of saltwater and the
open whisper
of the ten directions.

--Glen Snyder

clouds stirred into
the moonlit
miso soup
of madrugada.
each footstep
placed softly
steadily
on the warm
back of
dawn-hidden
penumbra.
both songbird
slumber and
the bowl of
vegetable scraps
dropped gingerly
into the bin
of returning to
this very
morning.

--Glen Snyder

3rd and 4th August Selections 2012

The Fractional Full Moon

I got the word to go out and look at the full moon,

And I thought: It’s not time yet.

I was out with the old dog under the fractional moon

And I noticed there was no time to fully round.

My dog delicately sniffed a single rusted barb

On a fence verging on collapse.

Sometimes the circle is completed in darkness.

--Chris Gaffney

Question to the Moon on the Way to a Funeral
 
When you go about grey,
do you mourn,
in the middle of the day,
that those who are born soon die?
 

 Or do you imply,
 walking through the night,
 that we who wane are soon again
 born, and filled with light?

--Birrell Walsh

Fifth Selection, August 2012

29

When the Buddha woke up

to his snoring harem

drooling over their

pretty mouths

the mystery was gone.

This sacred coyote ugly

started it all

The royal escape

to see

the ill

the old

the dead

and

the holy.

So sometimes we forget

in our rules based on

sin and suffering

that it was

this band of otherly fools

singing at death

shining at darkness

reaching toward

the truth

that woke up our sleeping prince.

--“Rachel”

First Selection, July, 2012

Busy

Last night the Moon came looking for me,
Poker, football, no time now.

This morning Life came looking for me,
The phone rang, Waterboarding, Starving children,
Handball at six, see you then, someone ought to do something.

This evening Death came looking for me,
I’m reading a good book, it’s very interesting,
I have a new girlfriend, I’m sure this one will be the one,
Can you come back later?

The Moon just laughed.

--Joe Mancuso

2nd and 3rd Selections, July 2012

White One,

will you carry this message

for me,

that someone

might see it written

in the shadows you cast?

--Birrell Walsh

red bird
     goldfinch
                    bluebird
          alight
on the branch of a white flowered tree


--Patrick Mizelle

Fourth July Selection, 2012

There has to be something under this
I can feel it.
The way I became obsessed with forgiveness
the theology of it
after that night.


I thought that in forgiving
rushing there
I might get back to the ground
that unground


To God
Who I needed
and thought I could find
on that mountain

He choked me
with arms that read
Om Mani Padme Hum

We were buying our enlightenment

Your level 5 beat my 1  

I stopped climbing 

I came down the mountain

looking for the home 

where we lived before the words

and the prayers

and the spiritual tattoos

the mistakes that lost us

So

Whatever is underneath,

I know that

it is not the ink 

that makes the book holy

and mountains are just piles of dirt

that go up and down

and that you will forgive

me 

when I stand in the pulpit

boldly preaching the wrong directions

Just like you forgave us all 

the minute we left. 

--“Rachel”