GOD NO!

..
If God was dying
.....Then would He
Appoint as straw-boss
.....ME?
And would I joyfully agree?
.....Not me!
..
I never know
.....From day to day
What stance to take
.....What game to play
'Tis best I walk
.....Confidentially
And play the cards
.....He's dealt to me!
..
From Time & Again by GeoE
...

TIDES

..
The tides of Time
Have washed upon my shore
A plethora of toys
Swirling 'round my toes
In dizzying array
..
Dare I wet my feet?
..
From Time & Again by GeoE
..

MAY DAY

...
Heady the scent
.....Of buckets of blooms
..........In market stall
..
Heaven sent
......One small rose
..........In Lover's hand
..
Devistation rent
.....In dandelion
.........Crushed by grubby feet
...
From Time & Again by GeoE
..

SONG OF THE SEA

....
Soaring with the seagull
Chatting with the cat
Swaying with the silent sea
I am alive
...
Shadow of a shoreline
Drawn against the sky
Speaks of new tomorrows
In a joyous bye and bye
...
Yet here I stanchly stand
Oyster in my hand
Araid to crack the shell
To see the pearl inside
..
Crack it! Whack it!
What 'cha got to lose?
When you're standing on the bottom
The only way is high!
...
From Time & Again by GeoE
..

ABORNING

...
Shhhhh...........Listen
Do you hear the silence -
The breathless hush of waiting?
..
.....Now..........this minute
..........Out of the dark
...............Mysterious womb of Mara
..
....................Ever bright - the Sun
.........................Eternal light of life
..............................Returns - anew
..
From Time & Again by GeoE
..

YOURS........OR MINE?

..
What is life that we
...........Desperately demand it be ...
.....................What?
..
A job
..........To which we wearily
......................Drag ourselves each day?
..
A lovely house
.........For which we pay
.......................And pay and pay?
..
A spouse
...........Whom we must please
........................Concede - conceive?
..
A child
............To bear our name
.........................Or blame?
..
How desparately we try
.............To preserve a status quo
...........................And if we let it go - what?
..
Life is not found
.............In tin-tinab'ling poud
............................Nor desperate pursuit
..
Not in cacophonic sound
..............Nor silent mediation
..............................'Twould never suit
..
Life simply and silently
.............Persistently,
.................................Ceaselessly exists;
..
The rest is up to me,
...............Whatever and whenever
..................................That may be.
..
From Time & Again by GeoE
..

DON'T LOVE ME

...
Don't love me so much;
......I am dying.
Life has naught
......To do with beating heart
But with being
.......Ev'ry hour - ev'ry day
..
Life's given birth
.....Through the living
Nor you - nor I can know
.....Appointed day
Nor guide our feet
......Upon the way.
..
To sit with blinders
......By the track
May be the way for some -
......Not me;
I want to see
......the boxcars rushing by
..
Memories are sweet;
.....Nostalgia moves the heart;
.....Love brings light
.....And oft remorse,
And then;
.....The train must move again
..
And who can say -
......Nor you - nor I -
What treasures lie
.....Around the bend?
Mayhap beginning -
.....Not an end.
..
'Tis "all aboard" -
......Or never know
When comes the time
......You got'to go
Ride with me
......Or leave me free
..
"The best laid plans
......Of mice or men
Gang aft a-stray"
......'Tis said.
I only know
......I have today
..
From Time & Again by GeoE
..

MORNING PRAYER

..

I CHERISH THAT

WHICH HAS BEEN

...

AND EAGERLY ANTICIPATE

THAT WHICH WILL BE

...

AND SO IT IS!

...
From Time & Again by GeoE
..

The Livin' End

...
The simplicity of life
In youth,
Superb!
..
Moses' tablets
Carved in stone
Were will'o'wisp to
Steel engraved laws:
Mine own.
..
And being mine,
No confusion - doubts - or fears
Were known.
But joy?
Heav'n Forfend!
The Livin' End
Too dark to contemplate.
..
And now
At Seven Five and more
While in the wings, ajar,
Death's dark door;
I dance in glee
On steel engraved floor.
..
Plot and plan
With unconcealed spite
What arthritic limbs
And wicked mind
Can plot for my delight.
The Livin' End
Too bright to expiate.
..
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
September, 1994
..

ROAD ONCE TRAVELED

...
The road once traveled
................Through the corridors of time
................Has faded.
...
Sometimes lightning flash
................Reveals brief glimpse
................Of love and pain;
Yet 'tis a road once trod
................Never to be walked again:
..
Still, today's lush path
................Had unrevealed been,
................This time and place unseen
Had not the imminent road
................Enticed me.
..
The road once traveled
................Reaches to eternity.
...
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
Sept 1994
...

MESEMBRY ANTHEMUM

...
Iridescent, fuschia-pink
..........Hot against the hills
....................When April comes.
...
A flaming, blatant glory
.........Lying gray........forlorn
....................In May
...
Is the vibrant blaze of love
.........Momentary flame
....................Lost in ash?
...
Is Samadhi but a flash
..........Of heaven, and then
....................Just memory?
...
Or is fuschia blaze In-volved
..........In soft and subtle green
....................Of minute seed
...
To bring forth glorious light
.........Whenever Spring-Love-God
....................shall speak again?
...
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

REBIRTH

...
Outside my window
...........Daily blooms
The glory of the sky;
...........And every evening
.........................Dies.
...
Each night.....Ah mystery,
...........Dead blossoms lie;
Yet on the morrow
..........Doubled, that glory
........................Thrives.
....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
To the Morning Glories in my yard; 1990
...

APOLOGIA

....
Take time......................Give time
.....................Lose time...........................Find time
..................................Hurry time.......................Stop time.
What time will this happen?
....
Some time
............When all thing stop
...............................And Time...................times seven
Spreads out eternally?
....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
On finding my October birthday card on 1/12/87, with a promise of luncheon together when I found time, sent by Doris Elizabeth Einolf, who died 12/19/86.
...

A SONG OF THANKSGIVING

.....
EARTHQUAKE!
........And on the arch man built
........To sweep across the sky
........Forty people dead!
.....
DISASTER!
.......Giant-winged, man reaches
.......Heavenward and flaming, falls.
.......Hundreds dead!
....
AIDS!
.......Man's heedless fight for love
.......Touches innocents and infants.
.......Thousands dead!
....
WARS!
.......Hunger, strife, drugs, rape
.......Age, pain; man's endless daily path.
.......Millions dead!
....
Every morning father-sun
Makes blue the sky
And I
Forget the darkness of the night,
Waken to a song of light;
Build my version of a plane
Or arch to reach the sky.
...
Fecund, earth-mother smiles
Her progeny heaven-bent
And I
Touch love, esctatic in the joy
Of celebrating birth!
...
Thank God for courage to dare and to be;
Thank God for my "Brownie" with gape-toothed smile;
For children of loins and of love.
I have lost and won, known scorn and acclaim,
Lived in fear and distress;
Desparately grasped, gently released,
Made friends of pain and of death.
...
When the time should arrive
That death is my mate
The very last laugh shall be mine,
For I have embraced the cosmic joke:
"Thank God" is my parting line.
...
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

SPECIAL DELIVERY

...
Between the dark and the daylight
......When the light is beginning to taper
Comes a break in pre-occupation
.......While Meghann delivers the paper.
She's been to the mailbox with mama,
.......Put everything there in a bag,
Then lifted and dropped and pushed it
.......In a veritable fireman's drag
For two isn't tall....at all.
....
Somehow all the days tribulations
.......Seem to fade and to leave me free
While collecting the hugs and the kisses
......Of my special delivery.
Advertisements or checks or billings
......Are essence of love that lingers;
The whole of my life brightly colored
......By an angel with sticky fingers;
For two is the bestest of all!
....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
With thanks to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
1985

MATILIJA

...
Beside a flat and barren road
A soft-white poppy stands
And casts its fragrance
Through the desert air because...
That's what a poppy does.
...
Does grey and prickly chaparral
Shriv'ling in the midday sun
Spare a scornful thought
For pale and fragile Matalija,
Or does it know,
.........gain strength
And far more richly grow
In scented air?
...
My precious poppy seems so frail,
Buffeted by the winds of life.
Often, in the night, I fear
This bloom will fade and die
.........and yet
The desert air was ne'er so sweet,
Or life so fresh and new
Except Matalija
Does what she must do.
....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...
Matalija Poppy, native to Southern California and Mexico, Spectacular, growing to 8' or more, flower up to 9" wide, white, crinkled petals surround a cluster of golden stamens. Fragrant. Grows by desert roadside where little else is found.
...

SENTINEL

.....
Dry
.......And sere
....................And barren
Lies the earth.
....
'Neath burning sun life
Shrinks,
........Withers,
....................Hides.
Glaring spotlight drains,
........Moisture burrows deep;
....................Silence bears, endures
..............................and waits.
...
In all that vastness stands
.........Saguaro.
At his feet,
.........Daring light,
....................Daring heat,
Prickly clump of cactus;
.........Hard needles defy
....................Stupefying glare,
...
Yet hidden in her depths
.........Blood red drop of courage.
....................Hope blossoms there.
...
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
For Melissa, 1993
...

MY SON

...
He did not stay with me.
Methinks
He did not come for me,
........my strange and alien son,
........And yet
After death he said goodbye;
A silent, bold farewell
Twixt he and I
.........Stet.
......
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
John Ernest Paine 12/1/43-5/26/65
....

GRADUATION

.....
Dry-eyed my body sat
While I from other-where
Observed this one called "daughter"
As she sang her songs of life;
It's joys, its pain
.............and wondered
....
What have I to do with her?
Or she with me,
This child my body bore:
The baby my heart desired;
..............it seemed forevermore?
...
She was what she was:
Never a baby,
Though I adored, hugged and nursed
What I could hold of
................Precious, beautiful, talented.
..
Strength grown out of fear and pain,
Confused: other-worldly mired in manifest.
I watched, adored and often feared;
Did what I did,
................And prayed.
...
Tonight I lost regrets and guilt,
For what she is
Was born of the good and the bad:
Upon her the Gods smile.
....
I adore...and wonder;
What had I to do with her,
Or she with me?
...................She is what she is.
....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
Charlotte 12/17/90 on graduation HLCC
....

POEM

......
It seems to me
.............that if my pen
......just wanders 'cross the page
.......................disordered
Like some
.......nectar-drunken bee
........................from thought to thought;
'Tis thought to be
.......poetry!
.....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
....

TO LOT'S WIFE

....
Fortunate the bee.
No neck to look back upon
Empty honey-tree.
...
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

RESURRECTION

...
Like unto Phoenix
Out of ashes of old
Unfolding the new.
...
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

TEMPEST

...
Tempest in teapot
Shatters its container. Let steam
Return to its source.
....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

TIME AND TIME

....
Outside my window
Maple buds, blossoms, withers,
dies. Wrens come and go.
....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

SO-CAL WINTER

....
Summer hot sunshine
Frail, the feathered pepper-slyphs
Waltz in false-spring time.
....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

AUTUMN

...
In bold defiance
Aspen wears her gypsy dress
To winters' snow ball.
......
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

SUMMER

....
Lush red carpet laid
Beneath bottle brush tree.
Lady wren walks free.
...
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

SPRING

...
White-footed, spring lies
Softly on Eucalyptus
Defying grey skies.
...
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

LIFE

...
Deep within the heart
Of dying blossom moves the
Pollinating bee.
....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

GRIEF

...
Grasping dead blossom
Wet with lonely tears, while seed,
Unawakened, waits.
....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
...

YOUNG LOVER

....
I kiss lips chastely cool
Guarding frightened, wounded heart
To taste love's prayer.
....
From Life's A Bitch by GeoE
....