DC Vision Poetry II

At first I only wanted to post poems of a spiritual nature,
but realised that some of these poems were written right
around the time I was in transition from sleep to being
awake. These are really the only written record of that time
in my life, so I include these in that spirit.

~ DC Vision

Autumn Matriarch

the tears
and leaves
and crows
find their autumn courses
inside the vigil room
and outside
over blue hill bay
my breaths
unconsciously matching yours
in this
the dawning of the day
drawn within
the final hours
of your life

share this lightening
of burdens and walls
this lessening
of the need
to do anything
but be
with each other
you in the hospital bed
me at the window

seven breaths
the space between each
stretching out to meet
the morning sun
and the impatient crows
the mourning son
and the falling leaves
all within our own
signature volume setting
of silence

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Waking To Oklahoma

i have never
gotten the hang
of living life
in complete sentences
i stutter episodes
of focused and forceful strains
in stark juxtaposition
to agonizing waits
i woke up in oklahoma
the middle of a continent
the center of a lifespan
like a symbolic bullseye

a lawn chair at midnight
my driver’s seat
to the stars
i’m just trying to feel
my place in the expanse
the fading and sleepy
voice of a town
a background reminder
that i am a citizen
a neighbor with ambivalence

i am so lonely
and yet want to be
left alone
i speak foreign tongue
to the hard of hearing

just a point of life
contemplating
after midnight
when explorers do
their best work
shooting stars
like gray hairs
mark the passing

i am exploring
what it really is like
to feel everything
without an audience
it’s cool being like this
even if i am the only one
here who knows it

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Equinox

i am in bliss
on the first real day
of spring
when the sun
greets you like a lover
and ceases mocking
and holding back
its embrace
when the long
hibernation is over

i venture out
to explore
as i get older
the first signs of spring
have a deeper meaning
i need this promise
of new beginnings

the sun did not come out
in days past
but it did eventually return
and i weathered the repose
with time tested resolve
in youth
patience is alien
just as my latest chapters
start to fade
so too do my anxieties
of life’s cycles

i can outlast these times
the sun came out today
and i chided it
as i returned to what
i had been doing
yesterday
when the clouds were in

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Feasting Within Famine

i dare not exhale
knowing how fragile
the moments are
when all is right
in my world
wrapped up in
this absorption
of effervescent joy

i dare not speak
or the spell
may be broken
what good can words
come to
when there is nothing
to say
to add to
perfection

i dare not seek
beyond the immediate
for fear
that the anxious world
will crash in on
my solace
my moment
where the music
of the heart
holds center stage

why must peace
and contentment
live as estranged neighbors
of mine
on my street
why must joy
be such a rarity
happiness is
handed out as samples
when we are in famine
and denial
of our hunger

i dare not close my eyes
knowing how fleeting
and fickle
reality is
i will try
and hold this state
hoping this perfection
forgets
to fade out

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Dark Night Of The Soul (My Version)

i am aching
down to my source
tonight i am a ghost
in this echo chamber
these unending nights
have left my smile
emaciated

what turn of events
made me have to endure
this deepest cut
the bloodletting
of my sense of self
the silence is so cruel
and the lack so overwhelming

all my rivers
have run dry
the fluids refuse
to course through veins
pulseless
nothing appeases me
the best advice
falls like dust to my heels

why is everything
so distantly close
i have run out of words
and i have run out of rage
just unconsolably deflated

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Rooted

i am sunlight captured
i am steadfast resistance
to weather and nature
and man’s self importance

i burst into colors
every autumn
just to laugh
at the joy to be alive
before i sleep

i am host
and i am fed
by my proximity
to the land
that feeds me
and upon me

i am born of a seed
and i die
and am returned
to the dance
of hosts and hosted

my passing no one heard
my life many homes
but i only noticed
the perfection of this space
and the sweet passing of time
i grew roots in my place

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

The Lies That Bind

the truths that were hidden
now in this awareness
i can see
and my memories
of that blindness
have a certain
nostalgic appeal to me

we have vessels
of a variety of needs
unconsciously defending
psychotic turf
the truth is
truth is as foreign to me
as your ears are accustomed
to hearing it

with judge and jurist
of Self awakened
we are naked
within noise
and revealed…
we are liars of faith
we are liars of love
we are liars of caring
we are liars that we have
anything left to give
and we are liars that we want
nothing in return

let us all stay unconscious
because only if we are
deaf dumb and blind
will there be anything left
to lie about
and thus communicate about
damn the annoying brains
that know
that truths
are sometimes the greatest
lie of them all

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Dreams Dissolved To Drowsiness

we’ve got tumbleweeds
traversing synapses
arid neurologically
speaking
and yet the fiction makers
keep spitting out scripts
and we keep lapping them up
like our taste buds
didn’t shrivel up long ago
from the shit storm

thirsting for a drink
and famished for a meal
we get artificial calories
in familiar originality
from a roomful of
short attention spans
we get bursts of inspiration
without any perspiration
and steady by degrees
we exponentially dummy it down

such a pretty production
pedestrian passersby
with averted eyes
and arsenals of excuses
for why they get up each day
to return to the same stage
always a handful of numbers
away from winning the lottery

and always secretly
welcoming any audience
to read their yard sale
paperback autobiographies
that will pretend
that they are interested
to sit through this long
tiresome releasing
of bitching
whining
and moaning

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Rebel Drought

as if you would accept me as is
selective inclusiveness i know well
i am a loner in a lonely world
dodging the posers and politicians
dreaming of a viable buffer zone

from freedom of speech for the ones
who don’t cross imaginary lines
of standardized political correctness
and even playing fields where
the emotional needy make the rules

there is no land of the free
it is a myth devised by those
who keep the masses asleep
and the fringes incarcerated
out of the sight of normalcy

i will pretend to play by the rules
but you will never lull me
into a state of meek acceptance
of the unconsciousness of many
evolution is driven by the few

testicular fortitude dissolved
into desultorious displays of impotence
rebels are again without a cause
chasing fashionable protestations
and intoxicated on celebrations of self

wake me when the revolution is over
i am too disillusioned to raise my voice
in support of our vacuous leaders
and their ass kissing followers
who at the smell of fame, fortune, or a fight
move on to greener pastures

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

The Mind of a Child

there are times
that i get trapped in a moment
the way light plays on the water
the dance of whispering winds
the background noise
and activity of nature
everything beckons me on to be
a part of a wider scene
and i experience this
through the mind of a child

were it easy to deflate the importance
and set down the weight of the world
i would find fields of laughter to lie in
and trees to climb in abandon
time would cease its stranglehold
and responsibilities would turn
into blowing bubbles
riding the winds of carefree afternoons
i would chase them down
to the ends of the earth
and learn to love again
through the mind of a child

i watch parents destroy this gift
making elastic minds into concrete
to match the nature around them
the children have haunted eyes
and attention deficit disorders
because they are plugged so securely
into electricity
and nourished on brand name
cacophonies
within this external nightmare
there remains an innocent child
waiting for someone to wake up
and remind them of what is real

can you bring it back to summer
with lazy days playing in the back yard
when we didn’t have to grow up so fast
or deal with adult concerns
take the time to see them
and take the time to hear them
and lose yourself in the wonder
of the mind of a child

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Emotional Vampires

we have shotgun tongues
and acidic accuracy
in our familiarity
we handed each other
an arsenal of stress points
and buttons to be pushed
because we needed an enemy
external from our needs

i know how to hurt you
and the pleasure it gives me
is only a pound of satiation more
than accepting the extent
of the climb that i am facing
and the clarity that this hole
will have my fiction buried
up to my neck in unmet needs

you’ve been gorging yourself
off of my emotional jugular
for so many tiring years
your heartbeat and mine
are becoming one tangled
deafening background noise
of empty vessels that thought love
was a feeding of our needs

i have awoken like a junkie
to a vast empty bed filled
with memories of the lies
we fed to each other for years
and as the detox shakes
begin to rake me over
i am faced with the horrible choice
of replacing you or finding me
in the sweating sheets of my needs

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Riding Off Shy of the Sunset

seeing the decay
of my untapped wonder
has frightened me
worse than any fiction

when the ambitious addictions
wear off and you wake up
to the decades in blur
you get a brief clearance
between taking another hit
of the bullshit trip
or fighting the undertow

where is that man that i once was
who insisted on blazing new trails
and not living a ‘what if’ life

a decade of seasons
and gravity recedings
have passed and i wonder
where that passionate rider
rode off to

these days it takes multiple attempts
to kick start a heart
that at one time
wouldn’t be tamed by words or worries

is this the fate of all trailblazers
that the trails fade away
to footpaths
that constantly need maintaining

the desire has nearly left me
in comfort in place
with no more adventures calling me out

thankfully that rider
never knew his fate
or he might have never
set foot on that trail
that i am standing on today
wondering and pleading
if i have one last ride left in me

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Smoking Momentum

sometimes
when i am quiet
and in bodily tuned
i feel the cellular world within
as a message is delivered
from the appetite
to the flesh that it inhabits
and in a flash
my arm lifts
to light another
cigarette in contemplation

and sometimes
i feel nothing at all
except the impulse
and in a flash
my arm lifts
to light yet another
cigarette in unconsciousness

and sometimes
i feel everything at once
and in a flash
my arm lifts
but i forget why
so i light another cigarette
to punctuate the moment
of forgetfulness

and sometimes
i have to remember
that i smoke too much
and think too little
for my own good

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Carefree

(inspired by the photograph of a starving African child)

i will be dead
and make the quick
journey to dust
before your film ever
gets developed
take a good look
at the ghost that i am

the portrait of life
before or after
the last breath
mattered not to me
as much as something
that could fill the emptiness
at the center of me

go and sing your praise
where are your gods now
banter your philosophies
about what is truth
i can not hear you
over the silent scream
that my lack of strength
could all but release

what of my suffering
in your lavish lives
can you eat and shit
so carefree
unless you look away
from the reminder
that all is not perfect
in this world

what good are your technologies
and your shining cities
and your shit heaps of things
that you fill your voids with
if you could not save me
you didn’t even try

as long as i am
half a world away
you can sleep tonight
carefree
like the passing thought
that I have become

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

A Stop Along The Way

I’ve come home
having beaten
horizons into hindsight
to lay foot and payload
upon the soil
of a people
long buried
like their hopes
of ever being
burden free

I am blood tied
to the topography
of this melancholy
should I join these houses
and their inhabitants
in peeling paint
and graying hair
and loss of vital signs
then all the miles
that I have behind me
would come to nothing

would you have me
still standing still
treading water in the dream
like the background
and the blood
that makes its way through you
trapped in the gravity
of whatever keeps you asleep

I know the road
that led me away
is the same road
that brought me back
and I know the road

there is no going home
to or from
a stop along the way
sometimes history corrects itself
by not repeating itself

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Masking Tape Loop

what experiences
have drawn out
these lines on my face
lines of addiction
and of disappointments
running a road map
of all my stumbling
through selfish
and selfless routes
the face of every man

i am so tired
but sleep
does not quench
this need
i am so weak
but with what strength
i am afforded
the desire to be free
has never caught up to
the pleasure of profit
in marketing my pain

trying to find salvation
beneath wet blankets
and behind dry eyes
because the rains
never let up
in my drama
and the tears
never seem to surface

i have known hell on earth
in this species
of lost souls and fictions
parasites for the dream
all of us clinging children
as we try to remember
how we had fallen
behind these masks
we never touch

my lines are eroding
to bare necessity
no one can trample me
better than me
a writer of fiction
a toter of shadows
it is an endless hill
that is climbed downward
death begat death
until reinvention
becomes obsolete
or no longer desired

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Deeper

tired of the hollow sound
of the medicated mundane voice
attached to what has never worked
is not working
and never will

the disillusionment has become
far too populated and familiar
i have lost my way
from mental mountain mobility
teasing thought debris uphill

we are a far deeper dig
than repetitive behaviors
or superficial contact
i need you to remind me
why i woke up in mystery

coping with rapid change
perhaps better to help create it
but doped up on social lies
dreams were confiscated
fuel and facades became
ineffective and expensive

stuck in this cycle
of having great ideas
with no will to manifest
i know i am not alone
is it a covert alignment
planets with bad attitudes

force feed one foot
in front of the other
gravity is not always friendly
even when predictable
but to evolve successfully
it is unidirectional
so climb a little deeper

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Porch Lite

should i feel panic
or should i laugh
until i cry
my reflection
in the window
has grown beyond
the pane
can there be joy
in being fat and happy
or will the commission
of acceptable body types
bust down my door
and force feed me
from the before photo
to an after

i am attached
to my belly
my beltline
like an equator
the northern hemisphere
very seldom contacting
the southern
but since my girth
has eclipsed the view
of my genitalia
my worldly problems
seem to have diminished
exponentially
out of sight
out of distracting mind

my head is a cue ball
set atop a forest primeval
i can grow hair everywhere
but where i want to
hair like dust and snot
seems to manifest
from the void
in copious amounts
and if unattended
draw the critical glances
of bypassers
can’t they see
that i am losing my battle
with the body

i sit on my porch
avoiding reflections
from conspicuous glass
surfaces
and watch the neighborhood
walk and drive by
they give me a look
of confusion
is he white trash
or eccentric
or a closeted scientist
working on a theory
that will change the world

no i am just a guy
whose lawn grows too fast
whose underpaid and overworked
whose melancholy
is balanced by wit and wisdom
and whose wardrobe
is measured in x’s
don’t get me started
or we sill sit here all night
talking about me
while you are employed
retrieving refills

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Waiting (With An Audience)

i’ve been lying on the railroad tracks
waiting in vain for your hyped arrival
drawing a crowd of ambulance chasers
discussing the finer points of survival

i know a whole lot of interesting people
plagued with information in their heads
who figure they hold the market on truth
sleeping within the void of empty beds

i’ve survived the unnoticed changes
guess i’m good at the nod and smile
sooner or later you face the enemy
i had a small role in that telecast trial

so please don’t mind if i sit this one out
you bury the justice if you bury the losses
the trend setters and trend followers alike
are making decisions in unfriendly coin tosses

now i’m standing by the road like a squirrel
gaging the odds of making it across
taking notes on the didn’t-quite-make-its
trying not to lose faith pondering their loss

never thought time would be so time consuming
i need to start over and break some new ground
but it is so hard to set a lasting foundation
with pieces of your past scattered around

been too long a self-destructive concession
years of painting tragic comedies for profit
self pity and denial are too strong a drug
a price apparent when you come down off it

spiraling down slowly to this reflection of me
may be what i chose – may be what i’ve adjusted to
trying to be able to look myself in the eyes
and accept the product’s uncertain overview

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

The Final Fact

we all die alone
going with ease
or fighting all the way
into the unknowable
yet often surmised mystery
of death

no one may be
known completely
even our closest confidants
never truly sharing
the private thoughts
the separate moments
that makes us individual

we all die alone
anxious for a witness
with proof of an existence
in the final fact
that we are not alone
in our yearning

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Randy Old Me

don’t bother making points
right now
just keep maintaining
that mouth
i’m on a lanolin landslide
watching you apply
that lip balm
even your pissed off frown
is sexy and turning me on
no matter how we proceed
you have already lost
me to this erotic
facial disarray

let’s get geometrical
muscles to muscles
and see which combos fit
i know a fight
is in your
emotional universe
but i just can’t quit
reducing you to calories
finger food
and salty snacks
and sweet dreams
for me
when i roll on over
your agenda

you wouldn’t be so dour
if you realized
how great i am
before during and after
i accommodate
my appetites
the physical
trumps the emotional
when the intellectual
gets distracted by the sensual
let me try
to make you forget
why you were angry
with randy old me

~ DC Vision

+++++++++++

Quenched

though this night may seem
to be the end of me
these bruises you deliver
and that i have carried
bring me to the floor
and again
i will survive you

i am not a weak woman
though sometimes
you made me feel as if i were
my strength has been buried
underneath the shock
that underneath that mask
that i fell in love with
stirred this monster
waiting to feed

from this vantage point
in a scattering of my own blood
know this new look
for both you and i
have crossed an emotional landmark
the raw pain
has broken through
my fear of you

like an animal caged
berated physically
senselessly for years
that finds their mental door
left ajar
the master shall know
the true meaning of rage
and of release

there is a resolve born
of my relation
to countless women
through the ages
that found themselves
liberated in the dawn
from a long line
of worthless
men

~ DC Vision
+++++++++++
Unattainable

has the smoothing of stone walls
been attained by the passage of years
your heart was close to the surface
but mine was lost in a current of fears

if i had known our destinies were
diverging on that river boulder scene
small talk would not have stolen
the chance to show what you mean

to me

i have always been
unattainable
the fear runs so deep
from where from when
i have never discovered
but there is hurt
as yet uncovered
because i am adeptly
not for keeps

i had come closer than anyone before
to baring my soul without any pretending
edging towards being more than friends
ending up with a less than perfect ending

one turn of seasons seems so wanting
i was in awe of safety i felt in your hands
someone i believed would never hurt me
the peace that only hunger understands

don’t underestimate
the impact you had upon me
you are the ghost of my unmet needs
hoping my days are not quite washed up
in the search for one more river boulder scene
where the current takes me somewhere
attainable

~ DC Vision
+++++++++++
Still In Love With You

in a flash i am transported
to the high school junior dance
i had finally worked up the courage
and decided to take a rare chance

standing awkward in my acne
palms sweating like they always did
my fear and attraction to lisa
drove the butterflies of a lonely kid

she readily accepted the offer
and that meant i had to follow through
my knowledge of how to dance had left
the building as soon as i touched you

we both led at the same moment
you could have knocked me over effortlessly
because the gods had granted me this wish
that tonight you would notice me

then you laid your pretty face against mine
and consciously pulled me closer to you
my ability to dance diminished quite rapidly
as my thought process dropped from view

you pressed against my rising teenage need
and then exhaled a hot breath into my ear
testosterone insanity erased all insecurities
and my hands began to explore without fear

what a cool perfect moment of bliss
everything inside and outside melted into you
and for one brief forgotten 80’s ballad
i responded in ways my mind could never do

we were caught in the song’s final fading stretch
you turned your face and looked me in the eyes
you leaned in and i kissed you like none other since
then the spell was broken as they turned on the lights

twenty plus years have passed since that dance
new year’s eve 1982
you’re a world away with a husband and two kids
but i am here tonight still in love with you

~ DC Vision
+++++++++++
Fallen

creation has again fallen
and been spilled and spent
on such little loaded words
and little unloaded acts

this is far less holy now
than this moment deserves
and the hard-earned tears of loss
are shed for the deflation

jesus wept as he stayed
the tide of the human race
spiralling divinity asunder
in unending consumption

buddha wept crocodile tears
for egos who found their nirvana
at the center of narcissism
and forgot they had brothers

mohammed wept for those
who believed that sky gods
thirsted for the spilled blood
and terrorizing of innocent children

a long line of holy people
cried for how close grace was
to every cell at their birth
and in their death incomplete

~ DC Vision