The Krampuslauf in Leavenworth



“As for man, he must be fully investigated and tested, for reason makes him capable of a high degree of dissimulation.” – Arthur Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation



The Wenatchee River runs through town

Like a writer of no mean ability. “What news

From Seattle,” I ask the streets. The men

 

In heavy makeup guarantee the total recall

Every day demands. Pickles are hidden

In the trees and memory’s kitchen midden.

 

Snowflakes fill the air with pixels. As winds

Full of empty feelings blow down Front Street,

The fire-breathing scent of roasted chestnuts

 

Guarantees a fait accompli of unsavory gluttony.

“Almost none are good, but most aren’t very

Bad,” I hear a woman sampling cheeses say

 

While people-watching. Some nutcrackers look

So lifelike… “It’s nice work if you can get it,”

Comes from the direction of the Clydesdale’s

 

Manure bag. Airing its dirty laundry in the winds

Of change, autumn’s end sounds like an American

Spouting anti-American sentiments to an ear

 

Warmed by one too many glasses of mulled

Wine. Dying without scars can hardly be called

A death, because what preceded it can hardly be

 

Called a life; so I don’t feel at all bad when I

Trip on the pure natural harmonic series of

The alphorns. Character is conduct, conduct

 

Character; the reindeers’ antlers belabor

This point when I visit their farm to feed them

What hatched out of raindrops. Eagles overhead

 

View what is platted more as a lipogram than

An amabilis insania. Quarrel makes a quarry

For the meanest men; and inquiry, real inquiry,

 

Can never dine with them: tonight, I’ll make

Lasagna in my AirBnB’s vintage oven. Morning’s

Red hoof will hit many a wet roof tomorrow.



 

Picking Freedom’s Lock by the Nestucca River



“Light is the pleasantest and most gladdening of things; it has become the symbol of all that is good and salutary.” Arthur Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation

 

There’s no ennui inside the gates

Of dreaming. Brindled voices from

Ball Bearing Hill anticipate

A ligature of light. My fate

 

Will always and forever love

Its special knowledge, like a man

(Religious beast). And goodness can

Forever justify its darkness.

 

This river’s coastal cutthroat trout

Say Haven’t I been good to you?

By swimming in deucedly full moons.

Uncommon as a plant with true –

 

Dare I say – grace, this river’s Abra-

Cadabra mimics the ocean’s Abra

La boca when my heart’s abrasive

And I’m drinking Prosecco and gin.

 

My lingam and catholicon,

I ask the oak tree, “Why MALToma?

What’s the true meaning of Multnomah?”

Multnomah County? I don’t think

 

About it, is her answer. Best

A stain sustained by growing stranger

Be left on something worn by hangers

Most of the time; like history’s dress,

 

The patron saint of windsocks wrecked

My outfit. Walgreens, in a fine-

Tuned universe, is not too far.

In day’s redshift, I’m circumspect.

 

[With eyelids and breathing growing

Heavier by the minute, beauty

Presents a truth he cannot grasp

 

To quiet his unworthy wasp.

Le temps découvre la vérité;

His wrath tells him, Don’t blink, or else!]



 

St. Johns Bridge Gives Portland Leave to Think Itself a Moon Flower
 

“With us everyone’s character is uniformly the same, because they are forced…nothing is heard but the voice of fear, which has only one language, instead of nature, which expresses itself so diversely and appears in so many different forms.” Montesquieu, Persian Letters: L. 63
 

Cathedral Park: they call you a monstrosity,

But what cares you for praise? It’s illusory;

   A noctilucent Extra! Extra!

      Selling like hot cakes: your Gothic knowledge.

You excommunicated the miracle

Of steel-suspension fortitude. Mockery

   Can trick itself when skate parks crumble…

      Northernmost bridge: Is your silence profound?

(The public’s screaming god is anxiety,

But answer there was none.) In a memory,

   Akeldama and earthshine tremble,

      Knowing a crumpled up map is human.

To justice-loving creatures, reality

Refurbished would be nicer than kayakers

   With IPAs, than histologic

      Methods for ballsier trips to Linnton.

 


 


The International Oregon Air Show

 

It’s perfect for a lady on

   The go: this sleepy runway

We set up something shady on

   To watch as shades of progress

   Pour a lemon shandy

For the sun. “Hegira now!”

   The Mustang’s cry for egress

   Cries that light’s too slow.

 

A sportful poem, not now extant,

   A day in ’44 is

Re-enacted. Doggies pant,

   As dogfights can’t fill August

   Skies with February’s

Chill. The Flying Fortress bangs

   A cloud to sling the ugliest

   Rock in David’s sling.

  

My friend: “That job is Stephen King’s”;

   A Dornier spins through wisdom’s

Jury. Rome, its seven kings,

   Would king this Black-eyed Susan

   For old times’ sake, as chasms

Above absorb each ace of spades.

   Let’s drink away a season

   Too drunk to play the odds!

 

The stereo speakers’ Off we go

   Into the wild blue yonder

Shakes my Acura. The glow

   Of accuracy – Moby

   Dick to me – is tinder

In the Raptor’s wake. Its roars –

   No surrogates for Maybe –

   Are Maybe’s gate to stars.

 

A noodle in transparent sauce

   Is less nude than what’s rolling

Above the mackerels’ maker’s moss.

   Blessed are the peacemakers…

   McMinnville hears what’s falling

To escape the memory-hole:

   The Luftwaffe’s ghostly ichor

   Ignites a ghost too pale.

 

Across the street, this plane or that

   Has made the Spruce Goose jealous.

The kids with ear protection chat

   With sugared ears like Dumbo’s.

   Like ultramundane pulleys

Or Peter Pan and Wendy’s flight,

   These frightened, shaking brambles

   Don’t shake for King Canute!

 

With crates of traces, a wind comes

   Into the viewing area.

The trees disguise ammonium’s

   True distance. Ammo’s pep talk,

   Its musical scoria…

¡Vaya con Dios! Thunderbirds

   Will even get what sleepwalks

   To get even with yards.

 



 


Diptych: After John Milton

 

I Caduti


 

Hence childish hopes and dreams,

…You devils that love to oversimplify

And flatter every eye

…That can’t see through you, go where self-esteem’s

A peak to dwell on; ski

…The myriad slopes that from a single spot

Descend through apricot-

…And hubris-scented air. The wise attack

Where the fools bivouac

…By steering clear of inner travesty.

 

That chain of being, being a chain

We call great, shackles the pain

Born in the madly swirling mist

Of each man’s heart. The naturalist

In me prefers to see what lives

Beyond my world; the poet gives

A view. When time began, both prose

And poetry were one. But clothes –

Some empty clothes – broke them apart.

Now the world is dressed in art,

And art is duty bound to bind

Them back together in the mind

Of man, or else it fails. The cup

Of Ganymede is too high up

For me to drink, and I’m not rare

Enough in the right ways to bear

It. What’s the right amount of things

Immeasurable? My inkling clings

To wisdom for the answer, not

Itself. You’ll cauterize what’s caught

By caution? I’ll keep earth between

Two vaster planes. Though too unseen

For some, their border ruffians

With ease deflect our master plans

Before they do us harm. We fell,

Hephaestus-like, but with the whole

Wide world our Lemnos. Moral fractals,

Men behave like pterodactyls

Most of the time. I’ve seen the orf

Virus infect what Nephilim dwarf

On earth. The truth is, paintings muzzle

My inner voices, singers puzzle

Me, swapping strangers’ inner eyes

With mine; I only recognize

What’s true with art. The artist in

The man is proof that with a hin

Of the divine we’re mixed! Each trope

Can be a tightrope and to cope,

Both things can be true. Men make

Allowances for the poor snake

To live in Ireland again:

This man could wash the rainbow’s sin

Away; that man has ass’s ears,

But for myself, the ass’s fears

I fear the most. So very Jan

Van Eyck, the hopeful light I shine

In daydreams under a Tupelo

Fails at twenty-two below;

The temperature at which passions freeze

Is measured, not by man’s degrees,

But rather, distance under God

And His decrees. My lightning rod

Is evidence: we’re less sileni

Than constant moral miscellany,

So flourishing is within reach.

There are no windswept fads, but speech

Is something else. A bagatelle

Can tell me all I need as well

As any bloody chronicles

Or timeless annals. Nothing fills

My day with angels…Promised calm

Has never been the sacred balm

It claims to be. Where metal meets

The wood, I’ve seen the saddest feats

Of sacrifice; a casualty

In fields where they’re too casually

Consumed. Too bright, too brief; our joys

Can seem, when Jesse’s seventh boy’s

The king of Yggdrasil, mere toys

To some. When dignity annoys

You, dawn-ful crimes and dusk-less days

Are coming. (Then mock-noon betrays

True midnight.) See: Aldebaran shares

An eye with me. Its freedom wears

Some falling snow, and wishes freedom

From itself. (It’s to flee Rhadam-

Anthus, I guess.) There is a snow line

Where goodness and love in a slow line

Move about as well. Some clothe

What mental storage units loathe:

“The girl I give all my best kisses,

She always chooses Spanish cheeses,”

Is my best effort; pretty bad.

But I’m no poet, and I’m glad

To know it! My Andersonville

Prison is next to my free will,

Where some corrupt officials, ill

With pride, demolished wisdom’s hill

For to build foolish houses. Girls

(“Daughters of dagger-damage”), pearls

And other influential lights:

Would that I could not see those heights

Where powerfully value is flowing,

Where strongly value flows for knowing.

A fount of idiocy, I’d ask –

‘Who killed perfection?’ – in a mask,

Alcibiades-like, and lisp

So I’m not hated to a crisp.

The clouds have anasarca; spring

Will come again. She’ll always bring

Reminders Notus blows away.

In Buchenwald, our memories say,

‘This isn’t us, and that’s not us.’

To know itself, forgiveness prays

For help. There’s sulfur in that gulf

Between each self and what its Delph-

Ic dreams portend. I mow the lawn

To force equality. To yawn

At beauty’s spontaneity:

It would make the meanest and greenest tree

Plaintive; be the most painless death.

There’s knowledge in the eyes of Seth

That vice won’t let me see. That apple

Eris threw in me; I’ll grapple

With myself until I die.

Sallow was this morning’s eye…

There’s no one free; this semi-scourge

Lives in every demiurge,

And can’t be killed. Don’t look to fate;

None mitigate time’s magistrate.

There’s sucrose in the rose’s red

That I won’t hear until I’m dead.

The Garden of the Hesperides

Appreciates disparities

In peacetime and when bullets fly.

No one here but God knows why.

One small ‘shall’ is no big deal

To some. But when a flaming wheel

Goes by, you’ll seek the special spear

Of Finn MacCool, in case you hear

The goblin singing, “Let me Blow

You (Mostly Peaceful) Kisses.” Go,

Go visit history’s lair, then quarrel

With your friend self-crowned in laurel.

The guillotine’s favorite color mirrors

The shape of deadly nightshade’s ears.

(That’s fire’s word for man.) A king

Getting chased by the rifles of spring

Discovers karma likes a geyser:

Mary’s there; see how dawn eyes her. 

Bitter is the dark and deep

The individual’s right to sleep

In labor’s peace and quiet won.

To lasso the abyss, my gun 

Looks forward to snow, and with good cheer!

The day and I, in Joseph’s gear,

Stay out of trouble telling jokes

To men who know how laughter yokes

Forgiveness, so they never laugh,

Unless my act is wisdom’s gaffe.

(The fool has got the best shot at

Perfection; what is most shot at

By man.) When tempted not to own

Mistakes, quoth goodness, “Get you gone!”

When nachas leaves its seven gates

Wide open, goodness radiates.

With flaming laws, genetic fire,

Some believe what they desire

To be true too readily;

Fanatic genealogy

Won’t admit it’s wrong. We live,

Therefore we sin, and must forgive

The marriage – poetry and prose’s –

For ending. Nothing decomposes

More than hate. Capital Hill

Will try to match that healthy hell

In Menlo Park, and light a match

For gradual eurekas to catch.

In Handel’s Water Music, said

Promoters claim they’ll raise the dead.

Destiny’s resin, in its prime,

Drips from time, rabbinical time.

Stubborn ingratitude befalls

The holy wounded when God calls.

The lord is one, and He’s most high:

I live this truth; for it I’d die.

 

 

 

L’Utopico

 

Hence inborn sinful stain,

…You clear and present flaw that mars each goal

And ought to be in jail,

…Go dwell on Mars; by eminent domain

You’ll grab that planet way

…Before you wrench my target from my aim.

You’ll dye your counterclaim

…With colors none can see, but I’m no fool;

I’ll steel the golden rule

…So none can break it after yesterday.

 

I have no limits! Now I’m free

As God! No incivility

Within, no chains without. This ale

Brims with more knowledge than does Yale.

And yet my cup half-empty stays

Full of injustice, a disgrace

In paradise, whose capital

Perfects what every dream makes whole.

Let’s go there, where love’s artisans

Draw pictures nature’s partisans

Eat up. Let’s go and meet their queen;

I hear her: clean calls unto clean.

She’ll laugh at hell and worldly things;

Be kind to all; abolish kings.

Though some may see the blackest boot

Paint their whole kingdom black as soot

Before they go, what’s fair is fair:

The queen just cares too hard to care

About some pesky incidents.

It’s heavy with experiments;

Her purse, which from the commonwealth

Will unlearn greed. (If greed learns stealth,

She’ll crush it, loving-husband-like.)

She’ll teach each spike how not to spike.

She’ll find that by reversing dawn,

The sky’s Raynaud’s phenomenon

Gives her a wound to heal. She’ll ban

The consequence of a great tan.

And she’ll adopt the child of Mount

Cyllene. The country will lose count

Of all the stars up in Heaven’s lake:

We’ll shake them until they’re half-awake;

Stone, seaside ideas and wood

Encased in silver, gold and good

Misfortune. (That last part is key

To art, but not reality!)

She’ll banish any person “blessed” –

Too sober or too neatly dressed –

Like all true art. She’ll never deal

With any child of Semele

Directly. She’ll claim Tony Hawk’s

A beast on wheels; electroshock’s

Her mode of moving. Acting young –

Reading Ayn Rand and Carl Jung

Will be examples – she’ll make fate

Less glamorous; a fourth estate

Third-party-like in every way.

Mister Non-entity today

Will be tomorrow’s Captain Kidd.

We’ll do what Epimetheus did –

Just the good stuff! A Cambrian

Explosion only queens can plan

Will happen; the majority

Will will it! History’s prophecy

Will vindicate itself and clone

The savior (a complete unknown);

Time’s gal pals will fulfill it! Snugly

In my heart, I’ll bind each ugly

Feeling, so none are ever felt.

Smelters will teach us how to smelt

Society for gold. A pure

And vegetarian allure

Will satisfy mysterious needs.

My nose will find whatever bleeds

For reasons I don’t like, to save

It from an audio-tactile grave.

My chatelaine’s electric eyes

Will never burn out or despise

My happy love’s dictates. Her limb-

Dissolving rays will dissolve time

Eventually. She’ll never be

Sad-mouthed, tough-nosed, rough-eared; you’ll see!

Disasters will fill no more books.

The royal science’s “Gadzooks”

Will lift what’s too terrestrial.

What’s not too intellectual

Will be arriving on three mules.

They’ll plan to break the molecules

In our electric vows: half-men,

Who’ll make the greatest simpleton

The son of Leopold Mozart by

Comparison. She’ll pornify

The drabbest jobs. The queen will dress

My darg in drag, make time confess

To work schmerk in a body bag.

Declaring war on every plague,

She’ll never lose a man, a dime,

Or single battle. Pantomime

Supreme, we’ll kill it. Loneliness

Will only walk in twos and threes.

She’ll bury every blunderbuss

In a mass grave. Oblivious

To dumb implausibility,

The past should pawn its chessboard; he-

Said-she-said only happens there.

“You’ll legislate beyond repair,”

They’d plead. As if our guide is hate,

Or fear. I won’t see them create

Creators like our queen! She’ll sink

Her teeth into groupthink and drink

Its energetic death. “Reform

What you cannot possess”: that warm

And happy phrase knows vanity

Peaks at the height of sanity.

Our glories will be pristine seas

And hearts; the teal and the tall trees

Will be the most pure they’ve ever been.

“A hygge with Hygeia then?”

You joke, but that’s not too far off,

My friend. It’s gone on long enough!

These fields let flowers bully flowers;

These clocks let days oppress the hours.

I still feel hunger’s scaphoid pain;

I still see poverty, its rain

Deferred. I can’t sing Don’t Debunk

My Kisses without getting drunk

On jealousy first. Sir Jealousy, meet

Madam Not-yours. On beauty’s feet,

No more glass slippers; the truth, gloved:

Be loving, lover; you are loved:

The lies we tell, half-jocular,

That slowly slice my jugular.

Some question me, I answer with

This comeback: Knowledge is a myth.

In Delos, Leto’s children will be

Delos’s property. Astilbe

Will grow for everyone. We’ll read

The poetry that can’t succeed

Without great readers, and preserve it.

We’ll argue, ‘This and that deserve it,’

Only for the right reasons! Grass

Will ink our desolation’s mass…

It loves a paradox: our god;

Imagination’s kind of odd!

I’ll leave my natural load behind,

Forgetting vice with all my mind.

(How could we be knee-deep in wrong

And neck-deep in a happy song

At one and the same time? Man was;

Some ran here like a sailor does.)

My dreams will be predictable

As life; my judgment, perfect still.

And here’s the queen: I needn’t kneel;

She knows exactly how I feel.

“My scientists cry Gaia weeps,

Beseechingly, and doomsday creeps

Closer. Tomorrow’s preachy mood 

Will not allow the lassitude

Which has corrupted duty’s soul

In all who came before us. You’ll

Be so content with brotherhood,

Commandments will seem simply rude

If not the majority’s command

Or written in each voter’s hand

On something more alive than stone.”

She loves tomorrow, that I’ll own;

She loves it more than earth and sky,

So for this queen, I’ll gladly die.