Writing has always come easy to Dr. Concrescence and hence like the slacker he is, he has avoided it assiduously. Until he was forced kicking and screaming to start again, by the necessity of his life situation, by the unremitting existential crises that consumes the planet, by future somethings appearing like a mist on the  horizon (too early to tell if friend or foe) and to illustrate what the psychedelic perspective is- Besides he was never any good at poetry, hence why not? Please keep that in mind when approaching his work and just maybe you’ll have as much fun as he obviously does.

________________

Daily Practice

There is a picture of me
sprawled on a couch, blue denim
throw-overs, mismatched but once expensive
pillows, a joint between my lips
and an ancient expression
on a surprisingly young face

The caption reads: I used to do
Yoga everyday, but life got in the way
I did not mean to lie, but everyone
in the room, hidden by the camera’s
frame, knew I was, and laughed
accordingly- And maybe that is

where the yoga has gone- Struggling
now to make it one taste, to integrate
the burning, the irritation, to be with
compassion for someone who once was
and shares my memories, who glanced
into hell seeing heaven. Seeing that picture

a photographer is implied, and we will leave
it to future generations, to identify if there
were others, but if there is one understanding
I can take away, that person is a stranger, and
he does the same yoga, with the same purpose
you and I do, hiding outside this frame.

The Hanged Man

Needing,
to see me for a consultation, you left
a message saying I’ve pulled the Hanged
Man and my sources say it means Death,
but I am past caring and of course it does,
with your dreamof babies it is a cause

for celebration, notremorse. I tried to say,
As we get older we have more of ourselves
to judge by and The brighter the light the darker
the shadows but in this case, it would
not have covered the spectrum of guilt
and shame. The Hanged Man does not

feel, he is beyond reproach, his struggle
is over, the executioner’s comedy has just
begun, and if we ever live in a civilized
culture, rather than simply by natural law
of father killer, mother cannibal we might
invent compassion and justice, but this

is not an occasion to wear black and wail
or funereal theatrics that create a sense of order
in absurd mathematics, rather this is closer to my
irritation, as I switch from coffee to tea, and
wonder why my ability to think seems castrated
from the me yesterday- an excuse to drink

champagne in a strange cemetery, to dance
with such passion you shake loose the self that
can only crawl, and to stick out your tongue
at wasteland specters and howl with delight-
you are shedding you, stitched from necessity

and uncertain trauma, tailored measurements
of who you should be: a good girl, a mother,
an instrument, a legacy- but the mob is coming
all wearing your face, shouting, Enough is enough!
It’s time! It’s time? It’s time. The same argument

I have whenever my life changes: Who did I
leave dangling in the wind? Myself or the other?
Watching the crows feed happily, we fluff
our wings, and continue our life’s migration
neither predator or prey, just our own
necessary next manifestation.

Seed

Our habit is to drink coffee
and smoke, while I make huevos
and black beans, always in the heavy
skillet I add whole cumin, blossoming
the flavor in a way most reminiscent
of my sudden growth when I discovered
certain elixirs stopped time, allowing the universe

to come in. Kesey remarked- One can count
the apples in a tree, but not the trees in an apple
gazing at last year’s fallow garden, fox gloves and
feral cats stalking the ancient paths of heirloom
tomatoes and hearty garlic, it seems impossible
that later this year we will eat giant zucchinis and chard
with butter and vinegar from this wild and untamed place

sparrows and finches dart among the long grasses
hunting the spring bounty of an overly wet year
innocent of the global implications of too much rain
and only dimly aware of  how many predators bred
by apathy, are watching for signs of weakness, or
too rapid change. The smell of hot peppers and onions
permeate the kitchen and drift into the garden

creating a momentary nostalgia for times when life
was simpler and well ordered- when congress with aliens
and angels was only a game and when fermenting social change
was as easy as a dinner party among educated friends.
But breakfast will be eaten the plates will be washed,
and sometime soon seeds will be planted, a new garden
will grow and what it leads too, not one of us knows.

Ordinary Things

Last night, as you told me this morning
you dreamed of rainbow hued dragonflies
seven feet long, and had difficulty sleeping
in your grandmother’s house because New
England squirrels were scratching in the walls.

Last night I had a hard time, afraid of a new
era of insects, come once again, generated from
ebony clouds stacking against the sunset of our
drowning world. I worried how the giant earwigs
and bloodsuckers would treat my child and her
children, woken repeatedly by the triumphant
squeak of vermin finding new paths in the walls.

Was this what he meant by the ‘archaic revival’?
Among those present, with certainty, the rate of
measurable coincidence, and perceived crypto-
allegiance is replicating like lice and mice in
bleak houses and yards of too lazy, too cozy
to become feral cats, and always summer dogs.

What would a jingle for the Oversoul sound like?
The gale of mythic dragon scales rubbing together
in easterly harmonies, or the hallucinations produced
by nerves singing their ‘freedom’ from embodied
and castrated cults of cultural conformity. Today

fifty years of domesticated caring, arrived in our
basement. Beneath art-deco lamps, precious and
collectable china, and clothes from thirty year old
fashion, was a desk, my name attached and printed
bold upon yellow scrap with light blue magic marker-
A future place, now used, for poetry, work, meditation
and, with luck, our  microprocessed daylight dreams.

In the bottom drawer, amid old leather gloves and
purses, a historical collection of playing cards (even
a bridge deck from a dental lab) and commemorative
knick knacks, was the polished walnut cigar case,
wrapped in purple velvet, of a family member’s ashes.

How ordinary it was, for me to be surprised as I pried
it free, my memory is of a small woman filled with
life and love, that the box was heavier than I expected.