Come to me Muse, sweet Muse, and bring
Full many a time and deathless lay;
For a new song I would sing
For maids at play

Mountain and valley lie asleep
High crest and deep ravine
The monsters in the purple deep
The bees about their queen
Creatures that make deep earth their lair

Alcaman, a Spartan

Young men of Sparta, stand and fight
Shoulder to shoulder in the fray;
Fear not, tis vile to think of flight,
Stout-hearted face the foe this day...
Return a hero, battle crowned
Or else fall fighting in the van
So set the teeth and stand your ground,
Unflinching, as becomes a man!
~Tytaeus

Homeward Bound

I’m sittin’ in the railway station
Got a ticket for my destination
On a tour of one night stands
My suitcase and guitar in hand
And every stop is neatly planned
For a poet and a one man band

Homeward bound
I wish I was
Homeward bound
Home, where my thought’s escaping
Home, where my music’s playing
Home, where my love lies waiting
Silently for me

Everyday’s an endless stream
Of cigarettes and magazines
And each town looks the same to me
The movies and the factories
And every stranger’s face I see
Reminds me that I long to be homeward bound.

Tonight I’ll sing my songs again
I’ll play the game and pretend
But all my words come back to me
In shades of mediocrity
Like emptyness in harmony
I need someone to comfort me

Homeward bound
I wish I was
Homeward bound
Home, where my thought’s escaping
Home, where my music’s playing
Home, where my love lies waiting
Silently for me

~Simon and Garfunkle

Silence and Tears

Jesus died for us, in his name we pray
At night we find light
And we live darkness by day.
In the business of working
And the busy-ness of play
We forget what he taught us.
We forget what to say.

Jesus loved all of us, sinners and all
We spat on him and taunted
Lifted his cross up tall
We nailed him there, thinking him gone
Such arrogance, we had such gaul.
To think we could beat God.
And ignore his call.

But God forgives us, His children we are
So we rush around on earth
With jet-airplanes and cars
Neon glow in the dark bubblegum
Electric bass and guitar
We're free of all strife now,
Good God here we are!


But now, something is wrong
This is a sin that cannot be forgiven.
Eli, Eli, lema sabacthani?
Where are you LORD?
In the hearts of a society that does this?

Hurdy Gurdy Man

Thrown like a star in my vast sleep
I opened my eyes to take a peep
To find that I was by the sea
Gazing with tranquility

'Twas then when the hurdy gurdy man
Came singing songs of love
Then when the hurdy gurdy man
Came singing songs of love

Histories of ages past
Unenlightened shadows cast
Down through all eternity
The crying of humanity

When the truth gets buried deep
Beneath a thousand years asleep
Time demands a turnaround
And once again, the truth is found

The Pheonix

Our love died with the cold
And the embers have gone out
Long ago it was.
Still, this madwoman sits,
Waiting in the wilderness
Of what is left of my heart.
This madwoman, waiting for the Pheonix
The Pheonix that will never come
The Pheonix that will not rise
From these bitter and cold ashes.

Peace Meditation

Lord, make me a channel of your peace
Where there is hatred, let me bring love;
Where there is wrong, let me bring forgiveness;
Where there is discord, let me bring harmony;
Where there are lies, let me bring truth;
Where there is doubt, let me bring faith;
Where there is dispair, let me bring hope;
Where there are shadows, let me bring light;
Where there is sadness, let me bring joy;
Lord, grant that I might seek rather
To comfort than to be comforted
To understand than to be understood
To love than to be loved.
For it is by self-forgetting that one finds,
It is by forgiving that one is forgiven,
And it is by dying that one awakens to breathe in eternity.


~St. Francis of Assisi

Told

I can’t stand the distance to the other side
Tearing and ripping my being apart,
I can’t stand not knowing who you are
But I know that you have my beating heart

I walk alone in the dark,
My mind plays tricks on me
I know you’re out there somewhere
Wherever that is, it’s where I wish I could be.

A night, a word, a kiss…a feeling
I jump into the winds that blow me
Away, you are. How far? I can’t tell.
Let me tell you about the thing you carry.

They all ffffllllyyyy away
The dreams that I let pass by,
And they all move together slowly
Teasing me taunting and killing and haunting

Perhaps you’re a ghost,
Perhaps you’re a dream
A ghost of a dream
Or a dream of a ghost.

Having stolen my heart to the otherworld
Where will you now go?
Where will you take me now?
Will I ever know? Can I ever know?

The firefly will sigh goodbye
And winters coming on
All the leaves have flown and ice is coming.

The tears flow more readily these days.

Where are you?

(An old one)

Draft 1

Purpose and meaning,
These things seem to go
All it comes down to
You know what you know.

You know what you know
You see how this works
You are who you are
Despite oddity quirks

All the days pass,
Things seem not to last
Off to space blast
Be not an outcast.

You can tell what you tell
And you tell it well
Without rhyme or reason
Develop the season.

But I likes a lot of seasoning in me soup.
Speak out, remain not silent
For OUR SOUP IS COLD
Babbling like the noodles
That we are all made of.

Click clack with your body
Slap ice cold water
Onto your neck in de morning
Yes in de morning

De deep cleaning is what we shall do to your soul
You soul needs deep cleaning
And we shall
Clean your soul
But first, enrich your mind

Leave not your senses behind
Let music and rhythm flow
But speak out through them
Most of all, and go

Follow the path
Render your state unto being
Into your state of being
Be. But not only Be.
Be good.

Good vs. Evil
Now we shall speak on
The good verses evil
Whereupon?

Or shall we ask wherefore?
No, we shall ask whereupon
It sounds so much more distinguished.
And my marshmallows melt into
Hot cocoa.

LIVE! LOVE! BE!
(quickly) Be good.

Piano sounds play in living room
Living room is a room to live
Let music fill you living room

Where you live.
Are you living?
Is this a room?
Then this is a living room.
It only gets confusing when you go outside.

Evil is the opposite of good.
I know not evil.
But I do know good.
And I know the lack of good.
And I know the opposite of good.
Mom’s cookies are good.
Chopin is good, writing is good.

Good mood? Bad mood?
What is the opposite of good?
Bad? Or Evil?
Bad and evil is the same,
Yet different.

I ate bad cheese.
But it wasn’t evil cheese
The cow from which the cheese came
Had a good heart.
She mooed contentedly
In the fields where she lived
The fields that are her living room.

What?

Can you not tell me that the organist
Stopped playing?
The choir softly sing
Three lullabies in an ancient tongue
For the court of their beloved king.

Falling
Falling
Falling.
Ski slopes where I met his evil twin.
Him, who is he? That with dark hair
Who lives miles and miles away
I don’t know him well at all
But I met him in a dream.
We skied together
And skiing in the sky…
His brother, his evil twin
Smote us both upon the snow
For it wasn’t snowy
It was July
And the hills were green
Imaging skiing on green slopes?
His twin was evil.
The evil was bad
And we skied up to that cow.
Who mooed and ran.
And she made bad cheese no more.

And what do you say to that?
What do you want?

I know what you want.

CHEERIOS crunch crunchcrunch.
And my father put a box on his head.
Relive the tragic comedy.

“thripplewhip” he said to me
“bee-stinger” I retort
And we continued to offend one another.
Until at last I resorted to
Plotting against him
We shall throw paint ballons
At his white house.
And so we stole from the town
To the country
To the place where he lived
Cows mooing contentedly in the fields

Trim my hair.
Trim it off.
What if I sneeze
What if I cough.

Ahem.
Ahem?
A..hemmed up robe to sing in
For applesauce like cranberries
Stewed as rhubarb, used to be prunes?

“I’ve got a good mind to join a club and beat you over the head with it.”

If Only

If only you were here, if only I were there
If only I knew how to belong to you.
If only you could see how much you mean to me
If only I could make you feel the way I feel.

If only I could just let go, I could let you know...
I could give the love back better couldn't I?
Why am I so worried about this guy?
Why can't the cynicist in me just die?

If only I could always be my best, brighten up
And shake off all the blues for the rest...
Time could be on my side instead of working against me.

The higher the high, the lower the low
And that's how love used to go.
The sharper the pain, the greater the gain...
That's what I foolishly believed.



For Mike

Siren Song

Sail out o'er the ocean and I'll call you to the shore
Welcome to my world again, of seas and stormy lore
Misty evening rolling in brings rocks you cannot see
If only for a moment, you'll belong to me

Take me to the water and I'll sing my siren song
Softly in the darkness, and hold you til the dawn.
Waves are breaking around my heart when you long to be free
My love is drifting silently forever out to sea

All throughout the ages I have loved you, for so long
Believing it my destiny, knowing it was wrong
Like mystic ladies long ago I sit here on the sand
Waiting for a love that's gone, far beyond the land.


Susan Smenteck

La Sirène Rejetée

– This siren’s call was not enough,
To catch the wayward sailor. –
In mournful verse,
The waves did cry,
In honor of their queen.
For in the depths,
An age has passed,
A world exists unseen.
A maid,
Half fish, half mortal being.
An unrequited love.
For those of land lie often,
They seek to have that which they want,
Soon he tired of her,
And so betrayal coldly sank,
It’s teeth into her back.
She took the bait and paid the price.
He hooked his fish,
thus ended her life.
– This my friends is naught by fact.–

Du Soleil Oriental

Edd Prophur e yn Twyn

Separate worlds,
Two entities,
With separate hopes,
And loves,
And dreams,
And yet united they must be,
For if they do not fight as one,
Worlds apart will come undone.

Two,
The same,
And yet so different,
One seeks the past,
The other the future,
Knowing naught of one another,
Yet it is within each other,
That they might find their truths.

Solitary individuals,
Such as they,
Find their true potential,
When on one another they lean.
To learn to trust,
To live,
To learn.
Should they come as one,
United,
They might find,
All it is for which they yearn.



~Du Soleil Oriental

Birds in their little nest agree and 'Tis a shameful sight, when children of one family fall out, and chide, and fight.
Poor little Foal of an oppressed race! I love the languid patience of thy face.
The lie is a condition of life.
Love is too young to know what conscience is.
There is nothing to which men, while they have food and drink, cannot reconcile themselves.
One gift creates appreciation, many gifts create expectation.
A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you the less you know
Anyone who lies golf on television would enjoy watching the grass grow on the greens.
Don't forget your great guns, which are the most respectable arguments of the rights of kings.
Consciousness is much more than the thorn, it is the dagger in the flesh
Myths which are believed in tend to become true.
Whenever a man does the best he can, then that is all he can do.
The loveliest faces are to be seen by moonlight, when one sees half with the eye and half with the fancy.
The world is the mirror of myself dying.
The reason why so little is done, is generally because so little is attempted.
Our enemies come nearer the truth in the opinions they form of us than we do in our opinion of ourselves.
My unconscious knows more about the consciousness of the psychologist than his consciousness knows about my unconscious.

Issac Watts