Poetry from Duane Vorhees

WHEN THE DAY WAS DARK

My toes were my eyes till

sunrise. It’s then that the

dawn lit beyond where my

footprints knew. But the true

Isness remained hid like

it did when the day was

dark. There’s no Hark! and no

Eureka! I’ve no law

which can explicate how

my fate operates, or

why there is life, or when

time began, where it ends,

who I really am, what

is scam. That sun is a

blimp. It just limps through the

defined sky, lets me eye

the way of my tracks – all

in back, and none move to

head off sunset: Daylight-

and-shadow’s status quo.

MENAGERIE IN E MAJOR

The monk cast that day’s third I-Ching

and then he made his turkey sing

to entertain the drunk heathens.

And the Turk had his monkey dance

in his red sequined funky pants.

The monk’s turkey and Turk’s monkey

showed them both they were worth money,

so Monk and the Turk joined forces

and purchased two purloined horses

that they taught to play bass and drums.

They toured as The Amazing Ones,

led by a jazzy pachyderm

who blew triumphant saxophone.

FURNACE AND FREEZER

My world is hermaphrodite.

A dimension where moral

coexists with the evil.

It grasps equal opposites.

Down is just as good as up.

Yes, there’s gray, but black and white

occupy the selfsame sites.

Oceans are the desert’s cups.

A vacuum comprises all.

A freezer and a furnace

work to serve a like purpose.

A dwarf is considered tall.

And your wanton naked face

is expressive as your ass.

FRANCIS DRAKE

My hands are caked and yours are so fine,

but somehow they fir

trim together like ships of the line.

Marry me, oh carry me, sign your name mine:

I’ll be Francis Drake and you’ll be my Golden Hind.

I’ll fill up your hold with all of the gold

that I can find, all of the gold that I can find.

We’ll dance naked, if you’re so inclined —

just billow our charms,

wrap our sheets round yardarms entwined.

I’ll ride you of I’ll guide you, make your name shine.

I’ll be Francis Drake and you’ll be my Golden Hind.

I’ll fill up your hold with all of the gold that I can find.

I’ll fill up your hold with all of the gold,

with all of the gold,

with all of the gold

that I can find.

I’ll be Francis Drake and you’ll be my Golden Hind.

MY FINGERS

Visit me in my mushroom tower and I will come to you

down this deep dark ditch amid tinder black flowers

down to the buttercups and dew.

My fingers have ridden through the forests of your hair

and slept on belly-gold prairies.

Have explored your hidden valleys, climbed snowcapped breasts,

and on your beach hips have rested.

Tanned your naked stands, strata in the earth in layers of

dark

light

dark

light

dark:

while (miners in anticipation) my fingers tremble….

And then it is we who are the layers in the dark, quaking among bedrock,

hardness melting into darkness, joining in new formations,

stalactite buried and unearthed buried unearthed buried unearthed

through the long geologeons of night

till finally separated by a fault

…and our sky becomes snow on coal.