Let the wind of the past

Roll him away

A weed of song

Euphoria and sorrow

Sung tumbling over his way with time

Heading toward tomorrow’s place

The great unknown.

Once there’d been a time to repair

A period of patience

Where a kindness was requested

When the soles of his shoes were silenced

When he lay watching and listening

It lasted not long before he up and left

The settled down

The fixed in mind and matter

Never minding he’d lose

In the dust he’d throw off

The stuff of everything there'd been.

Why should I care

Why do I even have to know

When what now is so visually perfect

In panorama and particular?

The river sparkles

And sails sprout here and there

Randomly ordered

Filling and flapping

Soundless to the river bank

Why does such beauty beckon me

To imagine those without god luck

Drinkers of dirty water

Roofless?

I turn my eyes

To the broad gray dock

A barefoot woman lies on her back

Taking sun and traveling in a day dream

Her skirt melts between her legs

Her ankles cross.

A pair sit

Lovers in waiting

Heads touching

Hands holding

A promise to come

And then I see

A well built man

A graceful good looker

A rower red as bronze can be

Standing and making ready

Shaded eyes and shaven hair

Wearing a tight suit of shorts and shirt

A wrist watch to measure his effort

And I think there may be diamonds

Tiny ones in each ear

He prepares himself

An exhibition of ritual

Paddling in air

Warming muscles

To slide over water

To propel his boat

Needle shaped and bobbing

Waiting like a racehorse

For him to ease upon.

Together they left the dock

Gliding on sunshine.

I never saw a butterfly

From such a distance fly

A fancy starlight bouncer

Flirting with the sky.

Just a speck

Of traveling light

Bending in flight

And winding up

Along the way

As substance form and surface

Carrying pigment a palette would die for

It fluttered there

And found a flower

To fill itself with sustenance

A durable marvel against all odds

Delicately strong

Ordered and intricate

Entirely lively and lovely with velvet wings of colored dust.

In the inner space of butterflies

Is the atomic plan of all things known and unknown

Revelation and surprise

And more

There is always more.

The ghosts of the smallest particles are simultaneously

The spirits they are born from

The parts and sums of atoms are like nothingness eluding itself

In the disguise of somethingness.

These emitting, darting, vanishing, vagabond charges of minuscule power

Explode into home run crowds

Into beats from a drummer’s hands

Into a valley of waving wheat

Into friends saying farewell at dockside.

Into more an more butterflies.

© Armell

This is a street

Of many trees

And now just now

The loud sound

Of a big wind

Blowing like a brew

Intoxicating the oaks and maples

Mingling like never before

Drunk from trunk to top with wind

Unashamed daylight lovers

Twisting wild and half spinning

Like plumed dancers on a Fat Tuesday

Quickly

Without hold

They stroke bark to bark

While leafy fingers sigh.

The sky behind

Neither bright nor dark

Makes like a bed

© Armell

It's the wind in the air

From where I listen

From where I stare

Inside a stand of trees

To the ebb and flow of rustle, rustle.

The overcast day

Holds the shadows at bay

Except my own

Which is my work

My chosen way

My things to do and touch

To change to act do much

It's time to leave

It's time I go

To the ebb and flow of hustle hustle

I lay in a pool off a path

Three days up and up and down and up again

Three days of twenty on the way to Jomoson

I'd gone from rice to corn to wheat

From valley to ridge

Collecting sweat turned dry and salty

Clothes unchanged except for socks

But today this day I lay

In a pool so cool to the hot sun.

So cool she dulls its burning advances

And waits for the dark of night

And for the air she knows as her cool lover

To move over her

And make her shiver

And become alive in the dark

Yet here I was

Mid day on the mountain

In the land of mountains

And I was hot

And hot for the sun

And hot for the cool pool

And with her lover absent

She took me.

© Armell

In a house of sorts in Portugal

Along the bar I met a man

Who said he came cause he couldn't sleep.

Talking and drinking in our common Spanish

We spoke of lust

And love

And women.

In English he whispered revolution

Of sorts in Portugal

It was then another time

And for me as well

A few days on my own.

Then a woman whose presence excited me

Asked if I would buy her a glass of red wine

I did and we toasted and we talked.

She smiled and told me

She held down two jobs:

One being standing and drinking

The other being laying and thinking.

She laughed invitingly

I laughed

I walked

Happy enough just to have laughed

It's late at home and almost morning here

There was a time when yes

Was the only answer
To the only moment

It's a different time now.

A different beat

A different heart

© Armell

The Joker is out in our village

Dressed like Ripley believe it or not

Spinning tales to dilute our awareness

And tie our time into multiple knots

He walks and talks us through our day

On a square of light we own

And flashes tales so clever

Making sure we're not alone

And with decisive elocution

He might read a written line

And add a photo for our vision

Then beg off for selling time

Ripley's got us figured out

He holds our eyeballs tight

As he fastens us to fictions

Of titillation and delight.

What we learn is serious

If it helps us form a bond

To a world of insignificance

And ignore the great beyond

© Armell

CARIB WATER

Slow me down

Oh slow me down

Give me Carib water

Green and blue

Give me mango and papaya

Give me beach

Give me playa

Slow me down

Oh slow me down

Give me Carib water

Give me Carib water

Green and blue

Give me fish and sweet plantain

Give me sun

Give me rain

Slow me down

Oh slow me down

Give me Carib water

Slow me down

Oh slow me down

© Armell

Thank Goodness for the average one

Whose greed is satisfied by a solid roof

Whose lust is met by a loving lover

Whose big lie is unpaid taxes on a $1000 lottery win

Whose disappointment at the big game loss

Is welcome news to his priorities

Whose anger is over quickly with a fuck it and goddamn!

Whose sanity is the only thing between us and oblivion.

When the sun comes up
I see what it does to a day
Making it sparkle.
And I and my bike
Roll on two wheels
On a quiet morning
In a shimmering summer
Without speed
No need for speed
Surrounded by heaven on earth
Down the spoked streets of my spoked city
Into the hub
I go rolling
Roll roll pedal pedal
Then roll and roll

And roll some more
Over shadow and sun
Under tree and sky
Pedaling and rolling

Hands free
The balance of memory
May keep me from falling
From losing an eye
From breaking my face
I ride like I'm twelve

©  Armell

What are the chances for one last barefooted summer?

None really but I’d like to imagine the full 90 

Enough days to prepare my feet to meet their maker

To walk thru the pearly gates

Shoeless and strongly calloused

That’d be my choice

In case the sands in heaven were just a bit hot

And the trails were topped with large uneven boulders

Honor the living

The dead are done

Where war wages 

None are won

Victory in life is in waking fearless

And sleeping well and learning.

Honor the living to honor the dead 

Forsake the magic stories of stars

And the bitter legacy of scars

And the songs of them and us

And the science of accumulating numbers.

Profit from peace and clean waters.

A lump of life all wiggly with giggles

A rhythm of bending knees and bouncing legs

My daughter repeats her own song

And shakes my bed

My pillowed head

And wakes me up

Not from the dead

But from their solitude

© Armell   

The river’s in a roar

The roar stays loudly in place

While the town

Yes the town

The very place

That never moves

Rushes by in bits and bursts

Of brick and mortar

And mortality is assaulted

By its very nature

In quite an extraordinary show

Of fast and dark power

Flooding out the expectations

Of a normal day……

Oh tragedy

Put me with a stranger

For a second or sixty

Let’s share a nod or smile

Agree to the beauty of the day

Or how Spring comes so late

Even with a higher sun

Let our meeting last

For however long

Then moving on

I’ll know again

The gift of wakefulness

And the glory

Of standing

On two feet

Erectus,

Sapien,

 © Armell 

Here it is

Morning

On a pond

To the East

Here it is

Time

In the form of a day

Here it is light

Reflecting away

The blue in sky

The green in evergreen

Earth brown and red

Rock white

Here it is cold as a morning can be

Because of the month and in spite of the light

I listen with the patience of trees

To all the sounds around and about me

Things singing dropping jumping scraping springing

Waving rippling rustling humming humming humming

I listen to things being and their passing.

© Armell

Wow, look at you

All full from a child’s life

Adding more and more

Now big as a man or a woman

Brave as a stargazer

Child of the comet

Breathing life from its tail

A trail of stuff ending as

Wow, look at you!

© Armell

Winter’s long over

I’d thought

Before this new snow fell

But I was forgiving

Because it was light

And easy to the eye

And memory tells me

It will be gone

The Spring sun’s time has come

Its will be done.

.

© Armell 2009

I stepped loudly

And the cat ran off

Hips weaving

Not a  straight line runner

Knowing well its way across the grass

Avoiding the ants and prickly seeds

A bouncy trot full of confidence

With a purpose as simple as

Stopping for a different view.

© Armell 2009