The Hundred Bites

My great grandmother 
was a Cherokee squaw
whose son hid her from my sight
i never saw either of them in the flesh
but from the other side
she has made me seek the Shaman
through the See and the Danse
a swift eye quest for vision
his treatment of the warrior
the Sun Dance and fast
those hundred bits of flesh extracted
ceremonial rite of passage
Behind these blue eyes such a song exists

As a twenty-one year old falling
pool cue broken back of my head
cue ball smashed into my mouth
choking on my broken teeth
i looked up into a laughing face
broken beer bottle gouged into my eye
i heard her singing singing
and his adam's apple yuk yuk yuk
i lunged and had it at once
that chicken neck thing 
exhaustion exhileration 
as i dragged him to a corner
to drink his blood
The danse had begun for me

I
Friday afternoon
It is a long drive home
Woman on the telephone
Dead animal in a pickup truck
stiff legs pointing wrong way up
driven by an eater of venison
into the open trapped at once
Maybe she's talking to her man
Sure as hell can't drive
That thing is stuck to her face
Maybe she's trying to talk it off
Ain't no free rides
in a land of gypsies

II
This city rises up
His wife is asleep in the trunk
Too many reasons to leave her
It swallows people whole
Generations are lost
Dinosaurs tripping on ants
Where do the little people go
Sometimes you want to live in the hills
make a pile of dirt
just crawl on inside
We can pretend we is white folks
We got a history of uncles
sisters hanging from trees

III
Whom seeks to please everyone
fails miserably of course
embraces an ultimate failing
May be the loss of self
and that wandering peace
become a tone a whimper
a sounding of bone deep
Who am i kidding what
if we are found alone
the tiniest bit of wanting
verification of goodness
finally okay to be this way
for such are all roads leading home

IV
This woman seize portrait
A grain a cross the beach sand of life
Legs apart she sweeps them up
No single click flash click
What amounts to portfolio
Years spent and minutes passed
Nice work what do you do for money
Are we any less prostitute
Prices fixed and wares displayed
Selling whistles and paper airplanes
Mortgaged asses in a sling
They are pimped to mediocrity
Most whom judge a working girl

V
These soon are lovers born
Then torn from a sheet of night
Wanderlust a forest drift
A shadow wisp of smoke
What fire dream ignites such passion
Heated blood illusion or not
When skin is a flame to touch
Desire the fuel of innocents
And sinners alike so once begun
A hell is loose until fire
Devours fire and death only
These wolves who are born to run
A leash of feral fang and eye

VI
A window situated Western
No thing as perfect so television dawn
Echoes as sideshow four walls gone
A woman's eyes are closed
Ghosts play tag on her face
Hide between lines of age
The dawn she misses runs there
View screen reflected flesh
Blue-gray in the afternoon
This last promise a thing broken
Even the ghosts abandon her
Body slack and unvisited
No thing as perfect so television dawn

VII
There is no noble death
Living so singularly significant
Where only dignity may be found
In the acts of walking faces
Days tied on strings end to end
Our lives a dangle of fishes
Never meant to fly underwater
It just ain't Christian to lie
We all try to go outstanding
Twist ourselves some convoluted truth
Say dignity is the currency of beggars
Laugh about honor amongst thieves
Dead men don't want to be alone

VIII
i don't want to look at your photograph
You are not an image died yet
i sense a ringing of word
Ingots piled high in our brain
A pendulum of centuries
Pealing against our skulls
Until we are curiously aroused
There are those who consider mystery
An only true for ever
Certain knowledge of this implied
And tied to the tongues of dead heroes
Thank you i would kiss your flaws rather
Make mud on the dirt of your skin

IX
Standing up for pennies
All hail at a dollar down
These blankets a hundred pound weight
Strive to earn alive a shroud
A place to bury your worried face
O Children learn to walk away
Plant your seeds a garden of youth
Be tall and kind to yourselves
Those older whom look a way
Our kind and understanding
Ever useful in the odd circumstance
Such as surviving under siege
Construction of birthing and burial blankets

X
Power of father
Measure of daughters laughing
Definition by origin
Love predicated upon misunderstanding
Thus a proof of bond is made
Until she marries she will take him care
He may wonder at such creatures
So apart yet such a part of him
Sings to be loved by woman
These daughters hand on one hand
Take me with you he follows
Luxuriates in the myth of Daddy
Dissolves a bit she becomes a lady

These are ten of one hundred.
There are ninety more thirteen line stanzas.
What comes next...   




Esplanade (continued)

Maybe the Gods do not see them;  
maybe the God's eyes are blind
There is no end to their praying 
for surely the Gods must be kind
And they hide away from the madman 
who tells them they are betrayed
He waits for the full Moon to take him, 
then he howls, howls...  Esplanade


Dead poets speak through their silence;  
they whisper "Return never more"
A Child looks in the mirror, 
wonders, 'Why in hell was i born'
Some one has slain all his warriors, 
tortured the king of his soul
Mother and father are preying 
in the bar room for pots of his gold
Life is the constant reminder;  
death is the warrior who waits
Fate owns the face in the mirror, 
the key to the lock on her gate
So have you noticed her freedom, 
the laughter behind all her lies
where chaos and order go dancing 
and only chaos survives
i walked the shores of her oceans, 
soft and cold and afraid
followed the paths of her creatures 
cross her vast expanse...  Esplanade

Esplanade is continued on page 'Shadow Danse'