idiot moon
what better time for poetry
with a sickle moon askew
like an idiot's smile -
what casual indifference!
i'm thinking about winter's early darkness
the wind outside hindering homebound workers
the typewriter's all set up paper the time
but nothing much comes
just vagrant words adrift -
this paper is a snowfield
and I'm making tracks like a wounded fox
i could write a haiku
but the iron discipline of seventeen syllables!
Charles Bukowski thought waves in
the booze the down and outs hookers race meets
the classical music street wise poetry
ah - to have hangovers as poetic as Bukowski!
and Hemingway -
all stories end in death he said if carried far enough
(he wrote his last line with a shotgun)
yesterday coming home from work:
blue lights in the half dark
police ambulance
crushed metal cold and hard in the rain
the ice in my gut
the closeness of death - i could feel it
there's a movie screening
my eyes projecting inwards:
Zorba the Greek
and Zorba was right -
a man needs a little madness
Copyright © Mike Williams 2000
Basho's clock
walking home with the urban moon smoking silver
& the yellow windows pouring out
music television & conversation
past the hotels & cappuccino
cats prowling sad lanes
dogs leaping at the fence tops
the sky is pressing its darkness into the streets
& the streets cold comfort to the homeless
& the less than that
I am floating in the dark city
where stars remain nameless
they are not important here
one more face passing through the maze
alive as anything that breathes moves survives
yet curious at black & what that dark coat offers
& while i walk void of grand schemes
a little dulled by wine & dead cigarettes
(future poems elusive)
i find the moon a cold fire
a white stone hanging
& for one haiku tick from Basho's clock
I am above the blue earth
& how the night has filled my shoes
(Basho: Japanese haiku master 1644-94)
Copyright © Mike Williams 2000
i have candles
kitchen &
moon on the floor
trees tap the window
black fingers
i'm at the table in half dark
my coffee steams
i sip
i smoke
old Dylan songs captured in my head
the night is wine i'm drunk
rattling like a freight
thundering through suburbia then out
i know about those quiet places
& how wind moves there
along dry river beds
& those night birds
& how they moan in darkness
where haunting light distorts this moonlit kitchen
i'm some Dali painting
my face a melting clock in the window
splashes of rain
& storm blows in from the coast
it speaks of distance & wild ocean
all the lights go down but i have candles
Copyright © Mike Williams 2000
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