lesson plan

  The knot in the string
is easy to unravel
     but our eyes won't see

   our palaces rise
think they're better than flowers
   but they're dead inside

 turn my glance downward
       I see something that's not there
   pebbles look like worlds

      sometimes i forget that i
have the power to save and to teach
       surrounded by noise and
    small minded assholes
who mock a poet and praise
          a thief..

  the kids come to us as
  magnificent butterflies and tiny dragons
       the rulers want us to turn them all
 into ants and frightened mice

          I am starting to learn from
 the little ones
          and stand on my hind legs
                to grab what's ours.

travail, the mother

She brings cake
when everyone else brings plastic spoons
She has rain boots
all the others squish and track
She turns the light off
 when she leaves, she takes out the trash
       Where would we be
       without her?
The living incarnation of Parvati
    the goddess who rides a tiger
 holding a mirror and some kind of blissful tools
      looking to do some good.
Look around you
    you can catch a glimpse
 on the bus or in a classroom
        of her ordinary majesty
 perhaps you knew her
          as a child.

Noble Strength

 I guess this is it.
         You would be
     suffused with relief if
 you thought about it at all
         a tiny sunset

       through the prism of
         your indifference
you see people as they are
    not how they want themselves
           to be.

At best, a moment of nostalgia
     combined with the look
           you give a hired cook
when the party is over...

       I guess this is it,
pointing to your nonexistent faults
      would make it hurt less
  though it shouldn't even scratch
         or bruise

  There are vessels to be made
        and places to go
         people to fall in love with
  playful romps across the furniture
         
        me too, me too

eye phone

when you see some
ordinary thing, that
  makes you want to sing,
like the shadows of parking
meters dancing in the
   streetlights
faces staring out
  from dried weeds
 in the sidewalk
  the hundreds of floating
        candles in the
   sky,
     this means you have
 a human soul
       and no part can be
            bought or sold
and no machine can understand
         the freckles on your face
      or the wrinkles in your hands.

Reveal...Assume....Dunk

You have the right
      to remain
         innocent.

Anything you say
    belongs to you
       alone.

  You have the right
      to believe
    in something greater
        and more wise

  you can be free from
       the greasy taint of
              the thrusting stench.

        while what they call love
      does not uplift you
         ripping claws of
             desire do not
        ennoble you


            The door to your cell
  is not even there
           the chains that
        keep you between
          demons
         on the way to the
              magistrate
      not even there
         the original sin
            that sticks to your chanklas
                  and stinks from within,
            not there at all

  Don't be in such a hurry to
           jump in the cage
just because it's so lonely
     on the  outside.
  

The cove.

barking dogs protest

 and rockets blast in the sky

   who's the real dumb ass?

      At night we forget
the world is burning outside
       love is a cool spring


      we ride bicycles
our shadows run alongside
    kissing your face, dear..

Here's looking at you....Emily Dickinson

I can't tell where your eyes go
when we whisper in the hall
there's something about the window
  the pale light only you can see

The first time you put your ivory fingers
        on my arm and told me about your flowers,
your little breath like petals on my cheek
       I felt like I was flying

 I pray to the arch of your back
     I swim in the glossy dark
in my arms, you are like the bird
     your bird that sings all night

 and when you speak, oh my divine
I hold air in my grizzled beard
  and my heart is a shooting star
       my love for you is made of clouds and starlight

Watching you do your baking and conjure your garden,
       apron and shielding hat become relics
I am old, not young and between the pillars of truth and experience,
     I see clearly the valley and river that line the difference

When I have found myself up high on tower or cliff
      I do not stretch joy from looking down
save for walking by your side
         uplifted by your faunish stride

when you make your blunted puns
or eat little onions right from the ground
    I could not find it odd or ill
 and love you all the more