v v-e?
Ilbf Self
DAVID JAFFIN
Throughout his career, Charles Seliger (American, 1926—2009) pursued an inner world of organic abstraction, celebrating the structural complexities of natural forms. Inspired by a wide range ofliterature in natural history, biology, and physics, he cultivated a poetic style of abstraction that explored the dynamics oforder and chaos animating the celestial, geographical, and biological realms. Seliger paid homage to nature's infinite variety and his paintings have been described as “microscopic views ot the natural world”.
Born in New York City but raised in Jersey City, Seliger never completed high school or received formal art training. In 1943, he befriended artist Jimmy Ernst and was quickly drawn into the circle of avant-garde artists championed by Howard Putzel and Peggy Guggenheim. Two years later, at the age ot nineteen, Seliger was included in the groundbreaking 67 Gallery exhibition A Problem for Critics, and had his first solo show at Guggenheim’s Art ot This Century gallery. At the time, Seliger was the youngest artist exhibiting with members of the abstract expressionist movement, and he was only twenty years old when the Museum of Modern Art acquired his painting Natural History: Form within Rock (1946). In 1950, Seliger obtained representation from Willard Gallery, forming close friendships with artists Mark Tobey, Lyonel Feininger, and Norman Lewis. By 1949, Seliger had his first major museum exhibition at the de Young Memorial Museum, San Francisco. During his lifetime, his art was celebrated in over forty-five solo shows at prominent galleries in New York and Europe, in 1986, Seliger was given his first retrospective at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, which now holds the largest collection of his work. His work is also represented in numerous public institutions including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art. In 2003, Seliger received the Pollock-Krasner Foundation’s Lee Krasner Award in recognition of his long and illustrious career in the arts. In 2005, the Morgan Library and Museum acquired his journals - 148 hand-written volumes produced between 1952 to 2009. In 2012, the Mint Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina organized the traveling exhibition Seeing the World Within: Charles Seliger in the 1940s.
The Other Side of Self
DAVID JAFFIN
First published in the United Kingdom in 2012 by Shearsman Books 50 Westons Hill Drive Emersons Green Bristol BS16 7DF
Shearsman Books Ltd Registered Office 30-31 St. James Place, Mangotsfield, Bristol BS16 9JB (this address not for correspondence)
www.shearsman.com
ISBN 978-1-84861-287-7
Distributed for Shearsman Books in the U. S. A. by Small Press Distribution, 1341 Seventh Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94710 E-Mail orders@spdbooks.org www. spdbooks. org
Copyright © David Jalfin, 2013.
The right of David Jaffin to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyrights, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved.
Production, composition & cover design: Edition Wortschatz, an imprint of Neufeld Verlag, Schwarzenfeld/Germany E-Mail info@edition-wortschatz.de
Title picture:
Charles Seliger (1926-2009)
Wind Blown (detail), 1958 oil on canvas
16" x 22", signed and dated
Courtesy of Michael Rosenfield Gallery, LLC, New' York, NY www.michaelrosenfeldart.com
Printed in Germany
Contents
Madonna of the Clouds (Donatello)40
Prepared?	19
Only one	19
Birth-pained	20
Flat-earth	20
Even in Giorgione	21
And sudden	21
Snow-dream (7)	22
a)		Ever	22
b)		Flash	22
c)		What	23
d)		Two sides	23
e)		Chemistry	24
f)		f:irst impressions	24
g)		Squirrelled	25
Helmut	25
For Rosemarie 1	26
He was the	26
Future	27
Helmut's end	27
For Rosemarie II	28
Humanism (Luther’s relics)	28
TrakT	29
Death’	29
Leaf	30
Autumn	30
At the cemetery	31
“Major poem	31
Oft have I	32
The Creed	32
INRI	32
For Lot and	33
"To thine own	34
“Serving two masters”
(Mozart/Goldoni)	35
Walking	35
Chandelier’ (for H. B.)	36
Chopin (Concerto 1, slow mvt.) 36 Donatello	36
Is	37
Donatello	37
He wrote	38
Self-control	38
Escape routes	38
Flower	39
Sick-time	39
If you look	40
Aphorisms (12)	40
a)		Ourenemie	40
b)		Time took	4 1
c)		In autumn	41
d)		The frog	41
e)		For Rosemarie	42
f)		I am not	42
g)		Those who	42
h)		The church-	43
i)		“Painter	43
j)		Really-seen	44
k)		She put on	44
l)		Noah's ark	45
This morn	45
Dream	46
If Goethe	46
Sin’	47
Even gold	47
These trees	47
These knots	48
Bach 2nd Violin Concerto
(slow mvt.)	48
That sound	48
Date-time	49
Consistency (for Warren)	49
Classically defying	50
The fogs	50
Why I pre	51
The light-con	51
Thomas Bernard’s	52
Dream	52
Are dream	53
After-phrasings	53
“Make-believe”	53
Taste	54
Foot-prints	54
For Rosemarie	55
Robert	56
“It-had-to-be”	56
At 74	57
When the	57
Used	58
Romanze (Karl Stamitz,
2nd Cello Concerto)	58
Marriage Portrait (Van Eyck)	59
Matthias (for Thomas)	59
The ink	60
2M>I Commandment (Moses)	60	
The slow	61	
Trouble	62	
And even	62	
When the	63	
They said	64	
That self-re	64	
Half-half	65	
“Right to the point"	65	
At the heart	66	
The inner	66	
Scholar	67	
The word	67	
Out-timed	68	
He knew	68	
For the need	69	
Quick m	69	
That penetrat	70	
Dementia	70	
Hommage a Eichendorft	71	
A vacant room	71	
Do leave	72	
The glory of English	-]->	
Proud	73	
Funeral	73	
Autumn	74	
Secluded	75	
“New lands"	75	
“On the brink"	76	
If life"	76	
Each word"	77	
A letter	77	
“The best"	78	
Clarinet Concerto		
(Mozart, slow mvt.)	78	
Te Deum (Haydn)	79	
Abusing history	79	
Can music	80	
Commemora	80	
Nonsense	81	
The real	81	
After 30	82	
The feel of things	82	
Early 1945	83	
Bigger-better	84	
Mystery-man	84	
After Cezanne	85	
Leaving the	86	
Sitting	86	
Falling as	87	
A medieval	87	
Make-up	88
Matthias Claudius" (tor Thomas) 88 The soft	89
Swan's song	89
Chopin	‘>0
For Rosemarie	90
These late	91
Woman 1940 (de Kooning)	91
Copied	91
Lesser-self	92
They turn	92
Autumn	93
One word a	93
Satisfied	94
Why do some	94
Berries	95
Harvesting (2)	95
a)		Hot-blood	93
b)		The List	96
For Rosemarie	96
Questioning Schmtzler	97
Zelenka"	97
Upended	98
Escape-routes	98
The magic of words	99
What seem	99
He lost	100
Utrecht Te Deum (Handel)	100
When foot	100
Erntedankfest (Thanksgiving) 101 The Great	101
Dried-out	102
Handel"	102
When Handel	103
“The law"	103
Sun-instinct	104
The river	104
Handel	104
At 74	105
To be old	1 < )5
Some succeed	106
Handel	106
Getting a	107
Only-now	107
October	108
Handel and	108
Butter	109
Remembering (3)	109
a)		Writing it	109
b)		11 one no	110
c)		One-way starts	110
Shaded en	111	
For Rosemarie	111	
Mendels	112	
At the end	112	
It's only	113	
Mendels	113	
Should a	114	
This room	114	
Does the	115	
3r,t Quartet (Shostakovich)	115	
Op 18,6 Quartet (Beethoven	) 116	
Weather	116	
A la Schnitzler (2)	117	
a) Flower-calls	117	
h) Those bee’	111	
The Sandras	118	
By chance? (AnsweringJ. B.	Bury) 118	
Time-being	119	
Those hidd	119	
1 )isguised	120	
Aloned	120	
Dark room	121	
Bright-eyed	121	
Talk-shows	122	
He squeezed	122	
October'	123	
Identical	123	
Differently	124	
You just	124	
Weathering	125	
Eb Mass (Schubert D. 950)	126	
Answering (Wallace Stevens)	126	
Dark silen	127	
The impress (for Neil)	127	
Brueghel	128	
The American	128	
Those haunt	128	
It rained	129	
Van Eyck’	129	
October	130	
When his eye	130	
Trees in	130	
Poets (to the memory		
of Wordsworth)	131	
The mind a	131	
Scientist	132	
Her voice	132	
Temptation	133	
Explained away	133	
The ideal	134	
It's one of	134	
The how-one-	135
Night cease	135
This harvest	135
Iflove’	136
At the end	136
“The rest is silence” (Shakespeare) 136 Handel	137
Sounds-sensing (for S. L.)	137
That unlimited sense	138
Secret diplom	138
Free will? (answering Schnitzler) 139 Traitors	139
He’s the type	140
A poet	140
Dark-day	140
These over-	141
It’s easier	141
My dear	142
Glenn Gould (Goldberg
Variations)	142
Reading bet	143
Yellow	143
Nothing	144
The “idea of	144
Still-stand	145
“Of two minds”	145
That cool	146
Is autumn's	146
Sweet	147
Of all month	147
John Sadowsky	148
Novalis	148
Mozart’	149
The truth	149
Pink	150
Rowing (for Ingo)	150
Question	151
Does art	151
A little	152
152
Darkroom	153
Night wind	153
Contrasts (2)	153
a)		Haydn'	153
b)		Beethoven	154
Morning	154
Van Eyck	154
Seeing	155
“I believe	155
Abraham M. Bartholdy (Felix
Mendelssohn’s father)	156
Art only	156	
They lower	157	
Sterile	157	
Ours an	158	
Heart-beat	158	
Ship-of-fools	159	
2nd Commandment (Moses)	159	
Guide-lines	160	
Goethe’ (Urfaust, Faust I)	161	
If Catherine	161	
The Great Gatsby	162	
The bright	162	
This train’	163	
Everything	163	
Long stret	164	
Uneasy	164	
October	165	
The poem	165	
Some per	165	
Two-levelled	166	
This night’	166	
Dark night’	167	
Lights on	167	
Winter’s	168	
Cliche	168	
There may	168	
Through	169	
This morn	169	
Dance-form	170	
Parallel tracks	170	
Window	171	
Fogs	171	
Inbetweened	171	
These fogs	172	
When in	172	
A long dis	173	
The train	173	
And what if	174	
Two identities	174	
If “the pen	175	
These autum	175	
He inhabit	176	
That little	176	
Rachael’	176	
He believed	177	
Rain incom	177	
Late autumn	178	
Where do	178	
Desk-light	179	
Stone-sensed	179	
For Rosemarie	180	
Can the	180
Carmen	181
Can one	181
No one else	182
Swallow	182
Praying	183
“Foolish	183
Mirroring	184
Whisper	184
Sabbath	185
The piano	185
Do we all	186
Only after	186
Audiences	187
If	187
Haydnesque	188
Flower	189
Dark beginn	189
Answering Tolstoy (5)	190
a)		The meaning	190
b)		The later	190
c)		It’s of	191
d)		“L ’etat c 'est moi ”	191
e)		Turgenev (1882)	192
For Rosemarie	192
If the blind	193
Puffed-up	193
Clouded	194
Gericault	194
On Chinese Art (for Neil) (5)	195
a)		The fine	195
b)		Chinese	195
c)		Nudes	196
d)		When the	196
e)		An elite-	197
Wheel-chaired	197
Crutches	198
As Macbeth	198
This clinic	199
It was death	199
Aging per	200
Only love	200
“Making	201
Sleep over	201
Morning	202
This over	202
Dual-identity	202
Lost	203
That late	203
“On the wrong side’	204
A lingering fear	204
Time-touch	205	Keeping a	227	
On Chinese Art (2)	205	The way a	228	
a) as if	205	We’ve not	228	
b) ati art	206	His invis	229	
Light-blue	206	Only one	229	
Prcvorst	207	Love and death	230	
Writing	207	When	230	
Warren	208	Those mount	231	
Through	208	Does the	231	
Sleep’	208	At the Queen (2)	232	
Family-tree	209	a) Elizabeth	232	
Do the blind	209	b) an almost	233	
That slow-	210	Autumn	233	
For Franz (4)	210	Haydn’s Sun	234	
a) Allegri’s Miserere	210	A behind-thc-	234	
b) Piano Concerto 2	211	If Shakespeare’s	235	
(Shostakovich slow nwt.)	211	Handel	235	
c) Air (Bach, Goldberg Variations)	211	Handel	236	
d) Romance in F (Beethoven)	212	Dual-image	236	
Autumnal	212	M. S.	237	
Those self-	212	Forbidden	237	
November	213	The stranger	238	
Writing	213	The yacht	238	
Our jovial	214	Does	239	
Something a	214	N ight-of-crystals	240	
For Rosemarie	215	Living-low	241	
"Words ofvvis	215	The lost hotel (at Feldafing)	241	
Honesty	215	Full moon	242	
The dead	216	An off-center type	242	
Faith	216	Some women	243	
Dream	217	Answering Adorno	244	
Piano Quartets (Mozart)	217	Holbein	244	
Medicin	217	Why that	245	
A hard night	218	Phantom car-	246	
Light-impress	218	So many	246	
Curtain’	218	Change-of-guard	247	
Such a beau	219	Hans Holbein jr.	248	
Too late	219	After season	248	
Sleepless	220	Anonymous	249	
After his	220	Hurt-pride	249	
When Christ	221	Some last	250	
Feelings	221	Moralist	250	
That	222	If it’s	251	
Shakespeare	223	Catharsis?	251	
40 rooms	223	For them (the Diirers,		
Down to the	224	Holbeins, DaVincis)	252	
The dream	225	“It all comes back to (haunt) us”		
When Vladimir	225	(Strindberg)	252	
Klee’s	226	Vacant	252	
Romance (Carl Stamitz,	226	Fog-night	253	
November 7	227	That unrecorded past	253	
Life-blood	254	f) For Christ	279	
Holbein'	254	Kafka out	279	
Holbein’	255	The last defense	280	
Minister’s house (Malmsheim)	255	Family roll-call (7)	280	
The nightly return (Ptorr 1809)	256	a) Two sisters	280	
On those	256	b) She read so	281	
‘Tailing asleep”	257	c) (hide Morton	281	
Dialogued	258	d) Aunt Sylvia	282	
Unexpect	258	e) Barr)'	282	
It was on	259	f) Grandpa Barney	283	
One friend left	259	g) Ftta	283	
On portraiture (3)	260	Poems are	284	
a) It isn’t	260	Rosemarie	284	
b) The best	261	The deep	285	
c) 11 lien ii pict	261	That window	285	
Personalized (2)	262	Colorings	286	
a) Good novel	262	Cain	286	
b) I erineer	262	Reattuned?	287	
S. S.	263	This land	287	
Poems ot remembrance (4)	264	Those stain	288	
a) Holding on	264	Stone-by-stone	288	
b) Danger a	264	After his illness (for Ingo)	289	
c) Firmly	265	Is time run	289	
d) That speech	265	A scculari	290	
The fear of winter	266	He walked	290	
A no man’	266	Those unex	291	
Those still	267	That silent	291	
The corridor	267	This late	292	
For Rosemarie	268	Buxtehude’	292	
Some leave	268	Exploring	293	
Does (as they say)	269	Frozen	293	
Life goes on	269	A higher church (official) I	294	
As we live	270	Human zoos (for Michael)	295	
You can’t	270	A higher church (official) II	296	
Her puppet	271	Attacked	296	
Only once	271	The German	297	
Big-stoned little stones	272	The creed	298	
Some of	272	A warning	298	
The sound	273	Songs without words		
A double-life	273	(Mendelssohn) 1	299	
She conform	274	Songs without words II	299	
He was dress	274	Waiting	3oo	
Child-sold	275	Unwanted advice (to a		
Kafka	275	Nobel Prize poet)	300	
All genuine	276	‘‘Dawned on him"	301	
Last Sunday in the church year (6) 276	Abbreviations	301	
a) The tree	276	For Rosemarie 1	302	
b) Today	277	For Rosemarie II	302	
c) Death ’	277	Ode .i Rogier van der Weyden	303	
d) Is death	27 X	Contrasts (2)	303	
c) Without	278	a) Tan F.yck	303	

b) Whereas	304	
Christian	304	
When the	304	
On Kafka (4)	305	
a) That-way	305	
b) Wider-framed	306	
c) Kafka’	306	
d) If Angst'	307	
The law	307	
Saymg	308	
Rain	308	
That chair	309	
How many	309	
Those ghost	310	
A lone Decern	310	
For Rosemarie	310	
Does the	311	
He heard	311	
Cornered	312	
A fter her	312	
Morning	313	
Christianed	313	
Interval	314	
No secret	314	
Special e	314	
For Christian Lehnert	315	
Mood-	316	
A rabbit’	316	
The dangl	316	
Sourced (in memory		
Charles Seliger)	317	
Recallings	317	
Knight-devil-death (Diirer)	318	
Mirroring	318	
“Copycat”	319	
Outsourced	319	
l'1 Quartet (Bartok)	320	
Op 76,5 (Haydn quartet.		
last mvt.)	320	
Op. 76,5 (Haydn, slow mvt.)	321	
Renaming	321	
Buber's	322	
The poem	322	
Late fall’	323	
Dr. Wallner’	323	
I only re	324	
Two Flemish masters (2)	324	
a) Van der Wey	324	
b) The brilliant	325	
He follow	325	
Too much	326	
That half-	326
Gryphius	327
There	327
Weimar and Buchenwald	328
Pioneer days (in memory
Willa Gather) (2)	329
a)		the unlimit	329
h) Pioneer	329
Question	330
This dried-	330
Why moral	331
The right-rev	331
String-Quartet (Ravel)	332
Clarinet Quintet (Brahms
!'• mvt.)	332
The viola’	332
Op 64,2 (Haydn’s Quartet -
finale)	333
On Brahms’	333
Light-fan	334
2,K| Advent	334
Rebuild	335
“Egged-on”	335
Between 2 worlds	(4)	336
a)		An interior-	336
b)		The Jew	336
c)		between	33 7
d)		between	337
Judging	338
Unchangeable	338
This wind’	339
In memory C. S.	339
When a poem	340
A money-thinker	340
It rained	341
“We Three Kings	of Orient are” 341
Karl Stamitz	342
“Its our	342
“O come all	343
The Jewish-	343
The Call (4)	344
a)		through	344
b)		That finger’	344
c)		The calling of St. Matthew
(Caravaggio)	345
d)		L’apiH'l (Gauguin)	345
Too explicit	346
Exposing (3)	346
a)		Love’	346
b)		Trom secretly exposing	34 7
c)		St. Anthony (Griinewald)	347
Alone	347	
He felt	348	
The land	348	
Seldom	348	
Prodigal Son? (for M. S.)	349	
Faith	349	
It	350	
Kafka’	350	
Over	351	
Those eye	351	
9lh Plague in Egypt (Handel)	352	
Those andante	352	
Come-on	353	
Short-timed	353	
Being watched	354	
German portraiture ca. 1500		
(Munich, December 2011) (11) 354	
a) discovering	354	
b) Woman with a Bonnet	355	
(Augsburg 1517)	355	
c) Holbein'sJane Seymour	355	
d) Holbein’s	356	
e) Diirer’	356	
f) Diirer’s portrait oj	357	
Jakob Mujfal (1526)	357	
g) Furtenagel	357	
(“The painter Burkmaier		
and his wife ”)	351	
h) Why did	358	
i) Wolf Huber’	358	
j) Portraiture	358	
k) Seeing and	359	
Time-eluding	359	
She had	360	
Listening	360	
Mozart’	361	
Schubert’	361	
Heavy	362	
Pink’	362	
These fount	363	
“Count your	363	
For Rosemarie	364	
For H. B.	364	
Is life then	365	
High school	365	
Otherwised	366	
Marked-off or down (4)	366	
a) A 2nd start	366	
b) Lot’s wife	36 7	
c) Boundaries	367	
d) The Lord'	368	
Humanism?	369
Karl Stamitz (born 1743)	369
3		Romances oboe and piano
(Schumann op. 94)	370
Pruning a	370
The sub	371
Looking a	371
White	372
Portrait of a Young Man	372
(Hans Siiss von Kulmbach 1520) 372 His dream	373
For Norman	373
Diirer’	374
Death’	374
Baldung Grien	375
4		Thought-poems	376
(December 15, for Ingo
and Solvey)	376
a)		Music	376
b)		Should we	376
c)		Those epoch	377
d)		Friends	377
Lonely face	378
His motive	378
The black	379
Purifying needs (3)	379
a)		After Auschwitz	379
b)		alight	380
c)		Keat’s	380
Alena’	380
Grammar (for Warren)	381
Her way	381
She	382
Handel’s Messiah (last mvt.)	382
"I know that my redeemer
liveth” (Messiah-Job)	383
Cranach’	383
One doesn’	384
So-much-of answering
(Robert Frost)	384
Many-flagged	385
When	385
The eas	386
Symphony HB 44 (Haydn
last mvt.)	386
Piano Concerto 9 (Mozart
k. 271, slow mvt.)	387
Those uncommon	387
Those bright-	388
Living a	388
Children’s games (Brueghel)	389
Suddenly	389
Identities	390
This bare	390
Space only	391
This house	391
So many	392
This winter	392
Some key	393
Early morn	393
They were	394
Why gift	394
The Lord’s	395
Snow	395
Light-sensings (Advent
poems) (2)	395
a)		Night-	395
b)		Winter	396
Oboe Quartets (Vanhal)	396
Gracean	397
He wanted so	397
If after	398
Is the still	398
His unfind	399
Advent-Christmas poems (5)	400
a)		Has Christ	400
b)		The world’	400
c)		It’s only	401
d)		If‘the	402
e)		Our always-now	402
When	403
Some Christ	404
He wrote	404
The Marian	405
Some women	405
These pearl-	406
If we deny	406
A silence	407
Christmas Oratorio (Bach) (5)	407
a)		Bright	407
b)		How often	408
c)		For Bach	408
d)		The choral	408
e)		Each instru	409
Her penetrat	409
“We’re all a	410
Christmas	411
At sea	411
Christmas Story (Heinrich
Schutz)	412
Israel	413
That bare-	413
The Jcwish-	414	
Israel	414	
The Adultress	415	
“Sticks and	415	
Christmas Eve	416	
O Magnum Mystcrium	416	
Weelke’	416	
Christmas	417	
Raphael	417	
This old	418	
This Christmas tree (for my		
Rosemarie)	418	
Candle	419	
“When the	419	
“O come all ye faithful”	420	
At the zoo (9)	420	
a) Flamingo’	420	
b) Tropical	420	
c) Kangaroo	421	
d) Lady-lion	421	
J) The “wise-old-	421	
g) Penguin	421	
h) The tiger	422	
i) Giraff	422	
j) The broad-	422	
More	423	
Thought-	423	
These day’	424	
That lone	424	
These naked	424	
A lone	425	
These out	425	
Not even	425	
Learning	426	
Can one o	426	
Aron	426	
Alena	427	
A Raphael	427	
He	428	
Checked-out	428	
“Keeping up appearances”	429	
Car light	429	
Playing with fire	430	
Night	430	
Still-standing	431	
Unnamed person	431	
Tunelessly	432	
Caught-	432	
New Year (3)	433	
New Year	433	
New Year	433	

He	434
My father’	435
How often	435
A bleak	436
He	436
The snow	437
A snow-	437
These	437
It’s those	438
Some friend	438
Meeting	439
Only pain	439
Rc-creat	440
A. B.’	440
A house	440
The snow con	441
There	441
Snow	442
Blood-cries	442
The rain	443
It’s too	443
Time-alert	444
How much	444
A lost poem	445
How many	445
Talk shows	446
“A cheap forgiveness"
(Bonhoetfcr)	446
Smiles (5)	447
a)		Those a	447
b)		Those prejkir	447
c)		Smiling as	447
d)		The natural	448
e)		Smiling at	448
Cello Concerto 1 (Karl Stamitz
slow mvt.)	448
A moon	449
Can I	449
Some	450
Lois at 78	450
Doris	451
Thanks to Marina Moisei for her continued help with these poetic manuscripts
I’ve been often asked why I break words between lines. As Lenore, one of my most perceptive readers said, “You don’t really break words between lines, but place them within the entire rhythmic flow of the poem.
As my poems are extremely condensed I don’t want words, especially the longer ones, to be “hanging out”, therefore this very musical need for such a continuing on. Word-break, if one wants to call it that, means that these words must be put back together again, almost as if they’ve become recreated, newly realized.
David Jaffin
Prepared?
Can one be prepared for
death Or is it prepar
ing for us the secret un
known of its secluded si
lences.
theme left
as when Diirer encircled
the exact place of where
the pain was taking the
life out of him.
Birth-pained
Do these
branch
cd-flower
s color at the pain of
sudden ly birth
ed.
Flat-earth
If the earth
became as flat as we
thought it
out then we’
d always be moving away
from undefrn ably distan
cing the never finding back
to self a gam.
Even in Giorgione
that black- blank back
drop where Christ birth
s a world out of the dark
nesses of our timeless
ly impend ing fear
s.
And sudden
ly there
That snake black emp
ty-eyed (if he had
any) star ing out the
impenetrab le void of
my mooned- cold shin
ing fear
s.
Snow-dream (7)
s with only
the winds as those tin
touchab
ly-vanish
ing remind ers.
a)		Ever
greens stand
ing out their own way of
taming the season’s change
able identity.
b)		Flash
ing color
s the sea in unrest dark
ly disturb ed repeating
unheard sig nailing
c)		What
children re
member leave their parent
s oft una ware of o
thcreyes and sensing through
their own self- limiting ex
posures.
d)		Two sides
If there are
two sides to every story
Why does his tory recount
such a time less variety
of ongoing possibili
ties.
e)		Chemistry
They call it
“chemistry” but we’ve
never found the true mean
ing ot love ready-prescrib
ed for exper imental test-
tubes.
J) First impressions
If first im
pression s merge in
to subtler realisat
ions It’s per haps because
we’ve been less ened down to
our own self- refining per
spective
s.
g) Squirrelled
You can’t
squirrel me in-to
those branch ed decept
ive lengthrunning
s.
Helmut
Years ago
when death at first took
its stead ied aim at
him a marks man precision
ed for blood It hit a
side though he remained
resilent ly time-endur
mg.
For Rosemarie /
Only when
you’re there This hou sc seems as if a oneness of place All that timeresolving word alive to what wasn’ t even said before.
He was the
type who took
the easy way s the usual
ly prescrib cd routes
until mapp ed-out dead-
ended to a nowhere
s that could n’t find him
back again.
Future
planning Man’s way of
satisfy ing his own
sense of what isn’t
his to de tide.
Helmut’s end
Death had sig
nailed its coining often-
enough before it arrived
at the side door unheard
expected ly there.
For Rosemarie II receptive
ly-mild as when the wind
s turn south wards and
touch warm s even more
than the light-refrain
of your voice- concealing
smile.
Humanism (Luther’s relics) How can I
believe in “man” when
I can’t be lieve in my
self s be ing better
than he really is.
Trakl
s melancho
ly word-col oring heav
ily what’ s wanting
for flow.
Death ’
s transcend
ing beauty only in au
tumn the leave s realize
their truly annointed
color’s
transform
the depth of scent-silen
ces.
Leaf
pattern
s a mosaic of transcend
ing light-co loring
s.
Autumn
feels a
far-off
incomplete
foreboding
released
in touch- scented dis
tancing
s.
At the ceme
tery those
post-war stones ris
ing ever-high er the length
of their life-long
shadow
ings.
“Major poem
s” (as Eliot
called them) oft too-inrport
ant to clothe those “minor”
incident s of a life-
breath scarce ly record
ed.
Oft have I
heard that at
life’s criti cal moments
It was those who helped the
most from whom we had good
reason to ex pect the least.
The Creed
left Godfather as only the Great
or devoid of His all-encom
passing bibli cal plan.
INRI
That water
ed christ ening may
have cleans ed me in
Christ’s cele brating pur
ity though it was only
the sacramen tal blood that
jewed me to His ultimate
time-exhaust ing presence.
For Lot and
his wife look
ing back meant the
death of a new-beginn
ing Is that why time’
s continual ly closing
so many chap ters to our
insufficient ly evolving
new wards.
“To thine own
self be true”
Two problem s hearing Polon
ius’ advice mirr oring a blemish
ed source What’s true may not re
mam so as the right train
newly rerout ed along a
nother a vailable
track.
“Serving two masters” (Mozart/Goldoni)
What remain
ed unfinish ed in the
score replent ished with
change able identi
ties masking an ensemble
of self-de ception
s unacount ably Mozart.
Walking
well-placed
steps those re flective e
choings left him
closer-tight
thought-in
tensed.
Chandelier’ (forH. B.)
s intricate
ly intertwin ing a light-
sceptre of lyrical in
terlude
s.
Chopin (Concerto 1, slow mvt.)
dream
ily touch ing through
the heart- reach of lyri
cal express iveness.
Donatello
at times
fiercely
pagan
though with visionary
prophet ic eye-depth.
Is
life
a picture- book the way
children learn to
read-out those unfam
iliar paged- faces.
Donatello
(however var
ied those person’)
s marbled to the exclus
ive realm s (so strong
ly conceived) of self-vin
tage.
He wrote
himself in
to the morn ing’s tenta
tively selfconceiving
though in creasing
ly light.
Self-control
can also mean
that hold ing-back form-
defining its thorough
ly inherent cause.
Escape routes
When there’
s no other way than that
turning in narrow
medieval es cape route
s breathless ly self-en
closing.
Flower
s lose their
colors shad owing on stone’
s death-i mage of man’
s unlimited self-resolve.
Sick-time
when that
room (in herentiy
there) now becomes act
ively known drawing its
colors into an indcscrib
able timed- oneness.
If you look
at a rounded-
ripe apple long enough
you may be drawing its
taste out of your inquisi
five eye- length
Madonna of the Clouds (Donatello) poetical
ly releas ing into
stream s ofheaven
ly gladness es.
Aphorisms (12)
a)		Onr enemie
s may mean more of us
than our own self-mirr
ormg apprai sals.
b)		Time took
its own self- disguising
routes until we realized
we’d been timed-out.
c)		In autumn
the leaves
change color s whereas
man leaves the same im
pression sea sonlessly
adept.
d)		The frog
hops the squir
rel springs from branch
to branch The birds fly
over the heights of
mountain ness shadow
ings And I
sit here only
wordfully-
admiring.
e)		For Rosemarie
without you
more than a rib taken out
of the center- ot-self would
be failing.
J) I am not
(answering Descartes) because I
think but be
cause 1 was
thought-out long before
my birthed- beginning.
g)		Those who
are lonely
should real ize how the
smallest of flower
s opens-out its very-per
son to the insistent
callings of light-
h)		The churcli-
bells sound
ing out a heavenly
brightness but few came
to realize why.
i)		“Painter
ly qualitie s” may have
minded the most of pre
sent histor ians But the
artists them selves oft
express ing how vis
ually-alive their faith
had become.
j)		Really-seen
He looked at
what he thought was The-Jew-
in-me Money- minded danger
ously clever But then he
looked a 2nd time to see
what he’d really-seen.
k)		She put on
a special
ly decorat mg hat for
the christen ing But still
her thought s remained
heavily
earth-bound.
1)		Noah’s ark
through the
floods follows a mapless
route Israel in the desert
without a compass to
direct its un disclosing
ways And we godlessly a
lone.
This morn
ing’s green e
volving slow ly into
the true-full ness of his
mind’s recall ing response.
Dream
became so
much the more of his time
lessly a float a
silent boat drifting
stilled-wa
ters.
If Goethe
and Schiller
became the spring-time
summer-
fulfilling
poets What be came of their
death-evok ing winter
ing thought s.
Sin
s become so
prevalent ly always-
therc that one can’t
find that word-fbr-it
anymore.
Even gold
of the pur
est kind’ s packed in
the dross of its unclean
sed appear ance.
These tree
s holding as
a mother would shadowing
lcafed-silen
ces.
These knot
s blemish
ing the 1938 wood Wounds
that only blood could
fully real ize.
Bach 2'ui Violin Concerto (slow mvt.) That tug
boat of slow-moving
push-sound
s its ex
elusive right- of-way.
That sound
less elevat
or stopped him to a
nowhere’ s place high
above that depthed
feeling
self-enclos
ed.
Date-time
If we knew
the exact date-time of
our own death Would life
(its half-bro ther) keep us
closer-yet to its deny
ing pulse.
Consisten (for Warren) cy of the
same-usage may deny the
right of each poem to
decide its own undivid
ed facial ly-adept
appearance.
Classically defying
Beethoven
even more than Schubert
sized-out forms beyond
their amen of only here-
for-now.
The fogs
as a maiden’
s chaste-mod esty only
lifted her skirts at the
timely-right to expose an
almost untouch ably beauti
fied presen
ce.
Why I pre
fer Macbeth
to Hamlet because
it says-it- all so pre
cisely classi cally-con
densed.
The light-con
tinuity of a
circular 3rd floor win
dow kept the night awake
by circling it into its
expression less void.
Thomas Bernhard’s
“Wittgenstein
’s Nephew” left him circling
round its con tinuously
repetitive style until (for
fear of los ing ground-
touch) stopp ed page 45.
Dream
s are those
silently un answering
voices a float upon the
sea’s spa ciously al
ways-inbecom
ing.
Are dream
s the shad
owings of what never-
could-havc- been time
lcssly re peating.
After-phrasings
It rained
the night through his
phrasing
s.
“Make-believe”
as if we
couldn’t shad ow our child
hood’s world into its
eye-closing
make-believe.
Taste
Is taste
of most-any- kind what
we’ve been taught to
see-believe Or is it in
trinsic to our own self-
realizing in tuition
s.
Foot-prints
Why are our
steps-insand so close
ly realized though all—
too-soon
impression
lessly wash ed-over Where
as those on stone leave
nothing more than need
less faint ly-sought
echoing
s.
For Rosemarie
Only you
and the poem have become
my constant ly-now in
these age-de termining
times of ir rctrievab
le loss.
Robert
may have left
all-that be hind that
never-again
Scarsdale
that formed him to his
own denial of nothing
less than his still—sha
dowing self.
“It-had-to-be”
why as if
that pre-deter mining “it”
more person ed than the
flesh-and- blood’s answer
ing that all- its-own.
At 14
the days no
longer num bered now
as those oc casional
clouds flow ing into
a unity of timeless
ly therea bout
s.
When the
star (however
bright it might have
appeared) grew into
those feared- impending
darkness es of death.
Used
Those who
let themsel ves be used
will soon be come used-
out as coin s with only
that dulled- imprint left.
Rotnanze (Karl Stamitz, 2"J Cello Concerto)
The full-flush
of coloring- sentiment o
verflowing the cello’s bright-
hued time-en trancing
s.
Marriage Portrait (Van Eyck) Van Eyck’
s jewelled colors
satiating even more
than that lady’s awaken
ing prepared ness.
Matthias (for Thomas) Claudius’
home-bred ly rics modest
ly assuming those everyday little things that
fashion life within our
own pri vate day-for-
day.
The ink may have
dried-down from its all-
inhabiting flow But life
kept recall ing him hack
to its phas ed but never
fully satiat ed appearan
ces.
2"A Commandment (Moses) The god of
only-love may have breath
ed-out the es sence of its
very-being when death
guilt and suffer ing call for
a holiness well- beyond what
man has so deft: ]y re-created
to his own self-design
ing image.
The slow
movement
of Shostako viches’ 2nd
Piano Concerto so romanti
cally conceiv ed that I
wondered what he was
hiding him self from.
Trouble
s bring more
of the same They multiply
as other liv ing things
do until sat iated with
their lust for much of
life’s eager undoing
s.
And even
its own people as with David
pursued by Saul’s king
ly power Or of The Christ
crucified for their
willing-to-
sell-him-out
Now Israel with its own
Bruteses’
daggered
for those fateful spoil
s.
When the
winds stopped
that autumn could take
on its own re luctantly
beautify ing colors
Marked as the Jewish star
with that in herent stigma
for death.
They said
he loved child
ren because of their in
nocence as if they weren’
t as spite ful as those
grown to a need for such
innocent ly self-e
vading long ings.
That self-re
cording pict
ure of Hein rich Himmler
smiling death ly-seated in
his SS 1 car receiving
the records of an aging starr
ed-Jew Lodz- ghettoed me
into a Jewish past that’
s become irre concilably
a part of my own.
Half-half
That orient
al half-smile almost-laugh
half-embarr assing half-
conceal
ing from whom
of us both half-half.
“Right to the point”
He came
“right-to-
the-point”
ed edge a bloodless
dart that marked him
out tight ly shadow
ing.
of fear of
an impotent voicea-out
Nothing to say that had
n’t been bett er said be
fore.
The inner
and the out
er world of vision and
of fancy as Van Eyck’s
surfacing a new-found
beauty so visually
self-appar
ent.
Scholar
ly eyes no
wheres-else than those in
tricate pap ering detail
s of a recon ceiving past
that left him sourced to a
nother sensed- from-being.
The word
“glad” can
take on a smiling
form if it’ s more than
just a lip- evoking
sound.
Out-timed
When color
s fade out- timed as
thought s that could
n’t hold their prim
ary' bright ness-call.
He knew
those dark
ly animal- sides that in
habited the depth of his
own being kept him lifelong on that fugitive
scent for wo manly prey.
s of his ag
ing Grasped that coldly
designed rail ing his hand-
length balanc ing those
claims from his slowly de
scending
cause.
Quick in
sights from
a nowhere’ s-his press
ing for its sudden word-
response.
That penetrat
ing fear of
winter stream ing through
his heart’ s rock-bott
omed source.
Dementia
She couldn’
t relocate herself Knew
all the sign s and stop
s but routed- wrong from a
far-off All reclaim
ing source.
Hommage a Eichendorff
When he en
tcred the woods as if
approach ing another
sense of be ing darken
ed his selffelt shadow
s to a voice less though
all-consum ing silence.
A vacant room
bared wall
s with only the sound of
shadows in habiting
their scarce ly seen pre
sence.
Do leave
s realize
their impend ing fall’
s color ing tones
so beautify ing the final
ity of their deathly re
lease.
The glory of English
IfShakes
peare had been born into
another lan guage He
wouldn’t have been
Shakespeare
Language
makes the most ofus and
this langu age most-of-
all.
Proud
The way she
dressed prin cess-like
the super iority of her
self-assuming dignity while
selling roll s Proud but of
what remained to be seen
of that not thor
oughly known.
Funeral
Why so many
guards offic ially attend
ing Death’s regular half-
hour’s inter val’s careful
ly selected words the
preacher’ s assuming
gravity that solemn approa
ch to the o pen grave
swallow ing up the
last of time’ s thorough
ly rehearsed performan
ce.
Autumn
al sunrise
lifting the transpar
"of
darkness es to the
moonless
morning’
s breath- in.
Secluded
garden
s walled- in sound
lessly flow ering their
unseen though chastely-
bright color ings.
“New lands”
they called
it as a wo man alway
s in wait ing to be re
claimed from her anxious
readiness.
“On the brink”
of an unknown though scarce
ly defining fall into the consuming abyss of
those cold and ashened
remains.
s need of poem’
s revealing a sanctuary
of delicate ly refin
ing beauty.
Each word’
s not only shaped to its
inherent self but part
of a phras ing sound-
sense intuit ively rebirth
ed.
A letter
from my high
school day s as if I
could still find myself
out-closed from that
cold-imper sonal build
ing that left me much
as it self remained.
“The best”
They alway
s meant “the best” for me
Though as most usual
parents that “best” mirror
ed more of themselve
s than of my own o
therwise
person
ed.
Clarinet Concerto (Mozart, slow mvt.)
Dark wind s the beauty
ot a sadness encompass
ing the more of us than
we could poss ibly realize.
Te Deum (Haydn) The majesty
of the Creat or celestial
ly proclaim ing his all-
consuming
light-source.
Abusing history
Some culture
s adept at using history
in their own way to change
the course of “what really
happened”.
Can music
of the most
intimate kind so con
vincing ly achieve
a unity of selfless re
sponse.
Commemora
tive poems
of the poet- laureate
kind more a display of
their own word-enchanc
ing design s.
Nonsense
makes more
sense in a world de
ceptively
escaping
from its intend
ed orbit.
The real
protest a
gainst our- times should
not only pro tect nature
but more-so protect
us from the sovereign
domain’s of human-nature.
After 30
years of marr
iage and 6 children She
simply pack ed up and
left a free woman with
no more claim s on her find
ing anything or anyone ex
cept her life- enthralling
self.
The feel of things
One could
just call it the-feel-of-
things not where or why
but simply answering
one’s unspok en but al
ways inherent ly self-re
fleeting
needs.
Early 1945
Rosemaire
on the wood ed-run from
those low- flying plane
s that would have taken
her rest less blood as
a souvenir of accurate
killing
s.
Bigger-better
those late
19th century’ s big symphon
ies as loud as their own
dimension s would re
quire Or those big canvass
es dripping- down effus
ions of pulsat ing readi
nesses.
Mystery-man
We knew he’
d been a spy behind the
German line s Radio-Free
Europe rundown in the
bright day light of 5th
Avenue New York An ex
pert on the brush-stroke
s of the old masters met
iculously in life-long
love of a wo man married
to his best friend.
After Cezanne
A still-life
bowl-of-fruit held silent
ly by its self-enclos
ing surface s in the
subtle balan cing eye-
sense.
past behind
as Lot and his wife or
those so-many German Jew
s remain ed to the
fires heat ing up their
quest for a no-where’s-
else.
Sitting
waiting for no
thing to happ en The den
sity of a moment’s
space-breath
mg.
leep’s like
silently de scending
untouch able step
s into the depths of
darknesses’
all-encom
passing quietly en
visioned
realms.
A medieval
town submerg
ed in the en veloping
mist of a timeless
ly evoking past.
Make-up
models end
cingly ilium mating papercovering’ s their glim
mering eyes and most es
pecially those white-
creamed teeth of their
s.
Matthias Claudius’ (for Thomas) everyday
ed me to an escpecially
close-feel sense of those
daily little- things that
reclaimed more of our
unrealiz ing intima
cies.
The soft
breath of
wind caress ing the au
tumn’s re ceptive
leaves to a love-death
cycle of fall ing color-
finds.
Swan’s song
if it real
ly became the last and
only beauti lying voice
that even these self-re
hearsing wave s soften
ing-down to an accumulat
ing gladness of response.
Chopin
without my
mother’s more than
occasion al mistake
s left me with a child
hood feel ing his nrus
ic (however correctly e
volving) could never
become quite- the-same.
For Rosemarie
Our voice
s soften ing as the
lowering of light
s to a self- finding to
gether
ness.
These late
September
leaves spread ing out a
soundless
mosaic-ex
panse of self-protect
ive reassur ing enclos
ures.
Woman 1940 (de Kooning) Her eyes mis
placed from thought-
stream’s wind owed blue
fading.
ness through-

Sonre are so
inhabited with what
they’ve learned to
see think and feel that
they appear more like a
copy of that lost-origin
al.
Lesser-self
When he could
n’t anymore in a room
of self-chos en picture
s staring out the va
cances of his im
pending
lesser-self.
They turn
ed their e
yes away from what they
knew they shouldn’t
as if see
ing could blem
ish their o therwise “in
nocent” re spouse.
Autumn
’s decept
ive bright
ness as a wo
man sparse ly dressed
to keep one at those allur
ing interval s ofhand’
s length-a way.
One word a
lone bracing
the whole ness of that
newly “en lightened”
poem-sense.
Satisfied
Few are tru
ly satisfied as if that
“untouch able” fruit
had awaken cd the linger
ing taste for an always-
more.
Why do some
birds (and
not other s) feel that
urging irre sistible
need for flight over the moun
tain’s entomb ed-grasp
ing stillness es.
Berries
spare and
cool color ed to be
touched
classical
ly confin mg.
Harvesting (2)
a)		Hot-blood
ed and cold- hearted Many
of Schnitzler’ s personae
landscap ing those o
pen plains ani mailed with the
instinct s of their
lonely harvest ings.
b)		The last
of the sun
flowers Too cold to har
vest more light from
those aband oning time
ly cut-down fields.
For Rosemarie
when marr
iage still becomes
after 50 years that
one-timed room inti
mately held- through
these touch ed-silen
ces of ours.
Questioning Schnitzler
Can one be
come a some time moral
ist by mir roring through
others one’s own helpless
ly forsaken sense for
those lost but still
possibly
meaning
ful value
s.
Zelenka’
s Christmas
Mass bright ly alive to
that unearth ly light focus
ing this dark- down shadow
ing world of ours.
Upended
Putting “one’ s best foot
forward” as if those un
seen slipp ery surface
s could so easily upend
our less-fo cused though
timely approa ches.
Escape-routes
In-it be
fore a way- out as Alice
in Wonderland when life’
s become more a labyrin
th of intan gible escape-
routes.
The magic of words
Even if he’
s got noth ing to say
He says it in such a
way disguis ing its mean
ing-more.
What seem
ed the “every day” may
change with us its charnel
eon-like col ors that we e
merge as from a magic wood
secretly- sensed sur
prising ly renewed.
He lost
his fear of
death by living life
more persuas ively.
Utrecht Te Deum (Handel)
Handel rare
ly angeli cally light
but power fully strength
ened my sense of God’s creat
ing vastness.
When foot
notes start walking their
own sense-of- direction
leaving preformed impress
ions to a pa pering contin
uity.
Erntedankfest (Thanksgiving)
A windless
Sunday morn ing The field
s barren and bared to their
inherent naked ness Nothing
left to be offered now
except the reach of this
foreboding
stillness
silently a ware.
The Great
Divide as if
the New Coven ant birthed-
of-itself left the old
one as these barren devot
ionless field s earthed-
down.
Dried-out
dead-crumbi
ed leave s me with
that end-of- war-image
Life-deform ed corpses
piling high those untell
ing guilt-re sidues.
Handel’
s many-voic
ed strength as straightforward as a marching
cavalry re claiming
nothing less than the vi
tality of its pre-deter
mining source.
When Handel
turns his
voice with in lyrical
ly refrain ed to those
hushed-silen ces of an al
mostly other worldly de
votion.
“The law”
spiritual
ly fulfilled by Christ
Stone-faced for Paul
kept my peo pie spirit
ually alive those almost
two thousand years of e-
xile God work s wonders
darkly unimag incd.
Sun-instinct
ive insect’ s light-in
fusing midday vision
ary tract
s.
The river
slow-stream
ed into those soft
ly felt cur ves of time
less forget fulness.
Handel
and Holbein
German or Eng lish as if
transform ing their re
newed sense- for-identity.
At 74
When the day
s of the week have lost
their name- sense to a
scarcely re claiming i
dentity as if time-it
self evening out tideless
ly obscur mg.
To be old
and alone
when winter has kept one
tightly with in its bare
and barren grasping
the little left of those
lost and bright ly adorned
imagining
s.
Some succeed
as those self-
attuned grand mas and grand
pas through the wide-awaken
ing child- eyes and fear
s without es caping the loss
of their own needs for a
time-redeem ing past.
Handel
left me
littled-down by the grand
eur of his space-amass
ing self-as surance
s.
Getting a
head must
leave o thers behind
alone self- applauding
at that un timely finish
ing line.
Only-now
But a faint
reflect ion of what
had been so long forgott
en as if
time had dimm
ed to this moment of be
ing only- Now.
October
morning The
trees search ing through
their impend ing loss of
leaves me al most bared-
felt the co loring depth
of their na kedly impend
ing source.
Handel and
Milton faith-
cousins bright- darkly sourc
ed from The Creator’
s epic maj esty.
Butter
flics tilt
ing their ex pressive
ly color ing flower’
s instinct.
Remembering (3)
a) Writing it
all-out or
even all- off an im
perfect guide to re
membering those less-
explicit pap ering after
thought
s.
b) If one no
longer remem bers even
while recall ing only
those blank pages It ceas
es (however much) from
being.
c)		One-way streets
What other
s remember and I’ve long-
since forgott en as that u
sual tandem between par
cuts and chil dren’s recurr
ing needs for a one-way
street.
Shaded en
closure
s in the coolness
of that clos ed-in garden
that he could almost hear
the breath-i mage of his
own voice less silence
s.
For Rosemarie
It’s only
when love be comes a keepsake intimate ly attuned
to its own sense-of-be
mg.
Mendels
sohn’s Scott
ish dance as Dvorak’s In
dian one may have taken
them (for just a heguil
ing moment) off their
firmly-set seated compo
sures.
At the end
of the road that didn’
t endless ly blue a
no-where’
s-more.
It’s only
when dance
rhythms us to the thriv
ing pulse of its self-acti
vating blood- enthusing
s.
Mendels
sohn at his
best fine- sensing its
sourccd- through trans
parent awaken ings.
Should a
preacher ad
here to the needs of his
self-reali zing parish
Or should he stand above
both Godtending His
imperisha ble word-flesh
ed birthed- designs.
This room
(the poet’s)
has its own way of draw
ing me in to its dark
ly composed pre-ordain
ed silenc ings.
Does the
poet write
for his most ly unknown
audience Or must he
himself be poemed-
through for that
word’s (as yet) inde
scriba ble need
s.
3’d Quartet (Shostakovich) That mock-in
nocence of his circular
theme’s a lonely voice
walled-into its no-ways-
out.
Op 18,6 Quartet (Beethoven) A rhythmic
dialogue as Haydn (his
master) had done But an
almost off-bal anced intens
ing that melan choly slowvoiced flow.
Weather
talk’s not
small but a heavenly
reaching- down to cloud
our mood’ s self-corn
posing still nesses.
A la Schnitzler (2)
a) Flower-calls
When women be
come for some a self-satis
fying urge An untouch
ed landscape seeded with
one’s own self illumin
ating flower- calls.
b) Those bee’
s wander-
routes perfum ing their
daily round s with empty-
scented flow erings.
The Sandras
Those as
Sandra who know what
they want pressing to
have it now ever-sooner
losing it as a butter
fly netted to its own
need for flight.
By chance? (AnsweringJ. B. Bury) They may have
been seeming ly chance-
ways that led us either
here or e ven their side-
routes But only at the
end when time has evened-
out we came to realize
it’s always s having been
meant just- that-way.
Time-being
Life phase
s us (how ever obscure
ly sensed) into its
own perspec tived timebeing.
Those hidd
en faces Mask
ed as in a Greek tragedy
that couldn’ t see how far
we’d been search ing them
through.
Disguised
Do wc all
live disguis ed most-near
ly from our selves that
hide and seek through
blind-fold ing inreveal
ing darkness es.
Aloned
Those who
live alone Roomed to
those four- walled-in si
lences rare ly answer
ing back.
Dark room
s hollowed
sound thump ing at the
heart-beat of her fear
ed-exposure
s.
Bright-eyed
Her brighteyed “I know some
thing you don’t know”
as if my in knowing eye
s could brigh ten-out that
way too.
Talk-shows
talking out
those indwell ing silenc
es like hang ing old cloth
es out to be dried from
extra use.
He squeezed
the last drop
out of that orange nectar
until his hands harden
ed to an in sufficient
clawed-
thereness.
October’
s dark sun s when the
rains have left but a
wishful re minder of sum
mer’s ilium inating dis
tancing
s.
Identical
twins(des
pite appearan ces) not so
much the same if raised
and felt in to a differ
ing world’ s self-reali
zing.
Differently
He heard it different
ly this time Had he chang
ed or was it the music in
terpreted another way
Or what was performed be
fore or af ter his hear
ing it diff erently.
You just
can’t erase
that everpresent
blackboard from Miss
Dudley’s un apprecia
ble smile Mistakes
should stay right there
eyes-up keep ing you
long-time a ware!
Weathering
A rain-wash
ed Saturday away from
its usual free-time
appearan ces weather
ing in o ver-expos
ed monoton ed wetness
es.
Eb Mass (Schubert D. 950)
That fright
ening last movement of
Schubert’s last mass
fatefully
rehearsing
his own Day of Judgment
The calling of all flesh
from the depth of their voice
less alone liness.
Answering (Wallace Stevens) The poem
isn’t Godlike If so-
seen an em pty idol of
ungodly self- expressive
ness.
Dark sileti ccs only the
word can re veal those
vastly un touchable
distanc
es.
The impress (for Neil) ionists could
only pretti fy the mysti
cally masked- depths of
the snow’ s awakening
light.
Brueghel
alone help
ed us real ize why the
seasons deter mine so much
of time’s un touchable
awareness
es.
The American
dream (at
times closer to a night
mare) waken ing up now
to its lost identity.
Those haunt
ed images of
her past (however
hard she tried) could
n’t simply be cleansed away
kept return ing as dust
accumulating its own sense-
for-being.
It rained
so long it
seemed as if the autumned
flowers had been washed-
out of all their color
ing’s paled from scent
and touch.
Van Eyck’
s portrait
s closer to a still-
life inward ly self-in
yoking.
October
moon increa
sing the in tensity of
night’s ex posing dark
nesses.
When his eye
s simulat
ing that ap parent dark
ness as a cat’s lightawakening.
Trees in
visibly grow
ing the dark through the
height of its shadow
ing appear ances.
Poets (to the memory of Wordsworth) who don’t
love child ren become
sourced-out from their in
nate life-ap pealing
growth-in
stinct
s.
The mind a
lone is like
a kite aloft tensing hand
s without that flow-feel
of unspoken winds-adrift.
Scientist
s home in
their artifi cial labora
tories with the exactness
of papered e quations
Whereas a poet
breathes the life of un
explored
sense-feel
mgs.
Her voice
seemed to
float not really earthy-
grounded but as if life
was really where it
wasn’t an other place
perhaps e ven another
timed.
Temptation
’s that Adam
and Eve’s given- too-much for
wanting that otherwise
more off-bound’ s self-appeal
mg.
Explained away
Poems often
endanger ed from their
becoming ex plained a
way from their mysterious
untouchable
appearan
ce.
The ideal
ofbeauty
continuous ly chang
ing color s But still
standing-up to its time
lessly selfexpressing.
It’s one of
those dark-
dismal day s so-much-
so that e ven words
seem used- out before
they inescap ably come-
to-mind.
The how-one-
says-it’s e
ven more so of the what
ofbeing’ s said.
Night cease
lessly incom ing as dark
waves shored from their
restless ly uneasing
rhythmic-
flow.
This harvest
moon bright er than the
mind can real ize awaken
ing those pre voiced rest
less tide s of mine.
If love’
s the mea
sure and mean ing of all
things Then Christ was cru
cified as its most intimate
ly self-reveal ing.
At the end
he aged in
to the dark ness of night’
s unrequit ing all-envel
oping time- flow.
“The rest is silence” (Shakespeare)
a return to what isn’t
by always s being
there.
Hcindel
may have chang
ed with the musical fash
ions of the time however
opportune It still real
ized his unmistak
able voice.
Sounds-sensing (forS. L.)
Does a pian
ist finger that music
to life Or is it the
music finger ing him in
to its tonal ities of soundsensing.
That unlimited sense
It’s that un
limited sense that can size
us down over stepping those
bounds from what-should-
have-been.
Secret diplom
acy’s more
the way we talk inside
ourselve s so incon
elusive ly overhear
mg.
Free will? (answering Schnitzler) If there’
s a no-turn ing-back
(who can be certain of
that) Why not route it
otherwise it’s forcing
you (fully a wares) to-
the-brink.
Traitors
The real trait ors are those
who sell-out on themselv
es Not real ly turncoats but as nakedly in
dined as Adam and Eve.
He’s the type
who couldn’
t recognize his own pic
ture look ing back at
a touch ed empty-
eyedness.
A poet
doesn’t re
cord new i deas But he
idea’s word fully inre
vealing.
Dark-day
s that childlike fear of the unseen
unknown per meating
the depths of his very-
being.
These over-
satiated
green leave s as person
s who’ve seen too much of
life fear ing death by
holding on to what’s be
come only less secure
ly known.
It’s easier
to advise from the min
inister’s self- adorning ped
estal than taking that
lesson for one self as if im
niune to those down-below
back-staired
problem
s.
My dear
Rosemarie
pillowed in the soft
ening cloud- flow of most
ly angelic dreams.
Gletlfl Gould (Goldberg Variations) realizing
that music’ s a dialogue
of more than fingers have
known hum ing back to
Bach’s inter ior-spacial
sense-of-mean
mg.
Reading bet
wcen-the-line
s as if scan ning a face
that says more than
it appear s to mean.
Yellow
mg leave s as those
time-lost
wrinkles
that age by one’s
just look ing at.
Nothing
starts from
the begin ing’s alway
s imperfect ly pre-ordain
ed the final form self-
creating anew beginn
mg.
The “idea of
progress” still inhabits our
own cultural preception
s The new (as with Beethoven)
not a better-be yond the classi
cal Haydn and Mozart but a
differing
aesthetic
only to be measured by
its own self- calling.
Still-stand
If time could
stand-still as an appre
ciable monu ment What
would become of our own
timeful ly evolving.
“Of two minds”
He may have
been of “two minds” but the
other-one del icately re
fined to those scarcely touch
ed snow-felt moment
That cool
mid-autumn
al lit Pink in
to one of his rarif
ied secret ly enlighten
ed self-encom passing mo
ments.
Is autumn’s
but a soul
less premoni tion of win
ter’s death- haunting si
lences Or a beautified
summer’s
longing
s colorful ly describ
mg.
Sweet
thought
s and ten der leave
s gardened in spring
left him re motely Schu
bertian brae ing for the
cold winter s death-
spell.
Of all month
s only Octob er realize
s that hard- touched berr
ied claims to a classi
cal trans parency.
John Sadowsky
I remember
him still as the first
who found his way to my un
touchable
sensitivi
ty Opened its blood-vessel’
s merciless ly time-en
thused.
Novalis
realmed
the night’ s brooding
stillness
beautify
ing its un fathom
able distan cmg light-
source.
Mozart’
s Queen of
the Night voiced with
all our light- threaten
ing unresolv ing darkness
es within.
The truth
may hurt e
ven blood-re leasing
But if it is n’t love-
sourced it can’t justi
fy its own self-decid
ing aim s.
Pink fashion
ed that bright Oct
obcr day se cured in his
own sense of self-import
ance braidcd- colored de
signs of his knightly cost
uming claim s.
Rowing (for Ingo) those even-
handed rhyth mic claim-
routes for a still undecid
ing though self-emerg
ing finish ing line
s.
Question
ing whate
ver one will revive the i
mage of that scarcely un
known source.
Does art
at its best
change the taste of the
time Or is it a reflect
ion of that transpar
ent image on water or
glass.
A little
top-of-a-
tree bird listening
to the still
ness of its
own si lently e
choing
voice.
but that
small child balancing
her bicycle’ s eye-awared
to a stead ily for
wards-ahead.
Dark room
night-inhabi ted so that
even touch seems silen
ces awake moon-intent.
Night wind
s softly im
mersing the darkness
cs of time- spell.
Contrasts (2)
a)		Haydn’
s adagios
so intimate ly spoken
and yet dis tancing us
from the true source
of its crea tive time
lessness.
b)		Beethoven
at the storm’
s center so closely per
soned that we seem
totally un able (even un
willing) to loosen his
grasp for getting us
out.
Morning
mysterious
ly awaken ing its mut
ed light-be coming pre
sence.
Van Eyck
with his
(at time s) wing
cdless an gel’s earth-
bound beauty heavenly-
jewelled.
Seeing
(as Shakes
peare) with “the mind’
s eye” reveal ing even more
of those un spoken si
lences.
“I believe
(Lord) help
my unbeliev ing self’
As if faith had become
momentar ily losing its
hold on the needs for our
self-renewing.
Abraham M. Bartholdy
(Felix Mendelssohn’s father)
Changing
names as if your “higher
culture” en abled you to
deny your low ly Jewish
ness The Hit lers will find
you out what’ s behind the
name hiding from that o
ther-side-of
self.
Art only
becomes arti
ficial as self-anoint
ed flowers when the scent’
s been taken out of their
color’s per meating phras
es.
They lower
ed the light
s until those dark water
s began slow ly rising
through the tideless
waves of our mind’s in
coming depth.
Sterile
Nothing’
s more ster ile than a
clinic chos en with arti
ficial flower s and their
accomodat ing self-fash
ioning smile.
Ours an
agnostic
age assuming a superior
ity of earth ly claims
yet vaguely mirroring
only that pale image of
a lost-pur suing faith.
Heart-beat
he rarely
heard it speaking a
loud but then suddenly real
izing its on going not
quite time lessly lifeconceiving presence.
Ship-of-fools
They could
hardly remem her that final
on-board call ing them to
a common i tinerary’
s manned-full flying its
own porten tuous flag
ged skull and bones.
2nd Commandment (Moses)
Those parent s creating
their child ren in their
own unfulfill
ing image of
a differ ing age and
personed o therwise
than they could scarce
ly find-them- out.
Guide-lines
as there were
no guidelines left
(not even the 10 command
ments) e mancipated
from all but their
self-pursu ing aim’s crea
ting an allsurrounding
and yet inde finable lone
liness last ly from self.
Goethe’ (Urfaust, Faust I) s Gretchen
though pupp et-like
too naive to be more than
a child-like symbol outgrew
her growing up lost from
a self she’ d never real
ly become.
If Catherine
in Hemingway’
s A Farewell to Arms was
really his first love
secretly fern inine-seclud
ed Why were his afterward
s-women only of those sporty
superfi dally mascu
line-type.
The Great Gatsby
It’s those
specially sensed plac
es that peo pie longer
and lasting ly like Jay
Gatsby’s glass palace or
that dead-end no-place of
death and se duction.
The bright
coloring
s of these death-confin
ing leave s but a mir
ror of these sun-exposing
days darkly self-conceal
ing.
This train’
s moving a
head while leaving be
hind as if time’s two-
direction ing its us
ually uncer tain future.
Everything
about her im
plied a dull ed sense-of-
being more there than any
where else still-stand
ed.
Long stret
ches of sound less street
s that one could almost
hear that dis tant echoing
of feared pre monition
s.
Uneasy
sleep as if
those unremem bered dream
s living a live his phan
tom escape- routes.
October
cool clear
and cleans ing its vast
ly color ing-down ap
parition s.
that only-es
cape in a sha dowless money-
minded world of facts and
figures that don’t even
add-up right.
Some per
sons seem to
look through me to that
other-side of self-de
ception.
Two-levelled
Arc we (then)
two-levell ed person
s The one streeted to
surfacing
artificial
inclinat ions while
the other most-al
ways im mersed in
substrated
self-dia
loguing
s.
This night’
s beyond its
depth of see ing where
so encompass ing that e
ven dream s have lost
their own sense-of-feei.
Dark night’
s shadow
less presence as if we’
d become en veloped in
to the depth s of a per
sonless self.
Lights on
suddenly
across the way before the
morning’s dawn awared
me to how ar tificial
our own sense- ofbeing’
s become.
streams dy
ing-down to that untouch
able pulse of where si
lence reign s.
Cliche
s that thought
less process oflcvell
ing words down to that bar
ed image of their once
minted-value.
There may
be other plan
ets out beyond the reach of
our knowing where But this
one’s so myster iously guiding
my eyes through its undiscov
ered darkened- phrasing
s.
Through
those darken ing tree
s he heard a seldom un
seen bird coloring
its chosen sense-insong.
This morn
ing’s slow
ly spread ing itself
out as a spider webb
ed in the realms of its own en compassing
self.
Dance-form
These soft wind-express
ive branch es interweav
ing the leave’ s forgotten
memories.
Parallel tracks
These alway
s parallel tracks beyond
the length of seeing where
distance s would be
defining them selves out.
s lining
these va cant street’
s frontal view of al
ways self lessly watch
ing.
Fogs
clouding
his sense- from-view my
sterious ly time-en
closing.
Inbetweened
Man or woman
she or he seemed some
where inbet weened two-
sided possi bly self-creat
ing.
These fog
s so untouch
ably measur ing the depth
of those un seen distan ces of our s.
When in
the secrecy
of night’s prevailing
darkness did those
first fresh ly-October
frosts reaff irm the beauty
of death’s unrelent
ing source- claims.
A long dis
tant view of
a lone per son spreading
his shadow a cross a field
of seed-down harvesting
s.
The train
started as
if from it self sound
lessly ahead to a nowhere
s of last ly finding-
out.
And what if
they didn’t
reappear Per ennials bloom
ing each year same place col
oring a rout ine of un
changeable
thcreness.
Two identities
that should
have merged at the center
Christian and Jew the
one speak ing through
those blood- streamed a
wareness es The o
ther all-of- a-person’
s more-than- that unrecon
ciling.
If “the pen
speaks loud
er than the sword” It
must be a gilely adept
sharpened to a time
less sense- of-meaning
Inked even deeper than
that blood ed freeflow.
These autum
nal trees
rising to the silent height
s of their mysterious
ly light-awak enings.
He inhabit
ed an official
look about his wcll-groomcd
cloth-through smiled an offhand though all-the-more
steadfast
appear
ance.
That little
dog’s outstand
ing ear’s thoughtful
ly self-atten ding.
Rachael’
s eyes diamond- crystal allur
ingjacob’ s soundless
ly fathom ed depth.
He believed
what he want
ed to believe usually the
best of a sit uation But he
could become so critical
ly intent that 1 couldn’t
believe it was the same father
who tried most unsuccess
fully to grow- me-up in like-
manner.
Rain incom
ing thought s however
distant clouding o
ver that feel of unresolv
ing quietude
s.
Late autumn
the sweet
smell of smoke as this fad
ing moon’s re mcmbrance
of what can’ t quite be
brought-
back-to-
mind.
Where do
those overreaching black birds die o
minously cir cling the
sky within their time-
forsaking deathly pre
monition
s.
Desk-light
woodened
touch of an elusive
poem felt- down to
form its pregiven size.
Stone-sensed
city absorb
ing the per cussive
sounds of shadow
ing sensi bilitie
s.
For Rosemarie
Ifbcauty’
s become its only proof
speaking for itself a wo
man must prove that worth
of chaste- modesty ap
pealing to the density of
its truly intrinsic
form.
Can the
night real
ize its own successive
waves of darkness
es within.
Carmen
voiced from
a differ ing culture
and time-a wareness
sang herself into those
remote dream s of my fath
er’s longing for a peace
able rest.
Can one
hide as Adam
and Eve from the naked
life-source of one’s own
shadowing
being.
No one else
How much can
one take Not wanted but al
ways return ing to a lady
who didn’t need her until
there was no one else.
Swallow
ing one’s
pride heav ier even than
lumped-cereal causing a
residual blockage of
the main streams of
one’s tenta tively reviv
ing sense- from-being.
Praying
for one’s e
nemies as Christ slow
ly shadow ing those hid
den depths of one’s own
alter-ego.
“Foolish
consisten
cies” implie s a self-con
cealing gramm ar of one’
s own less-sel ective being.
Mirroring
Only the i
mage of him self mirror
ing back a no-way-
through those glass
facades as if he’d
become only an image
of where he wasn’t.
Whisper
ing secret
ly under-brea th as shadow
less smoke e vading the
form of its very-being.
Sabbath
The candle
s’ lit an in ner unbespok
on darkness as if some
thing more than silence
indwelling
there.
The piano
attuned to
the needs of her finger
ing a word less depth of
self-discover
ings.
Do we all
need a pro
tecting an gel often a
gainst our own will Wing
ed from the realms of a
higher sense- for-being.
Only after
the wind
ing ways of a rivered
self-becom ing could he
realize an unseen fore
ing the now of a not-o
therwise-be
mg.
Audiences
Was Haydn’s
London more sophisd
cated to his oft-self-iron
ical wit than that
star-studded
one-of-our
long-winded to finger-
feelings and emotional
over-lease.
If
“no man’s an
island” why do we so
long for an island-se
elusion from a world
that still re mains outside
the realms of our predescribing landing-
rights.
Haydnesque
as he realiz
ed that theme’s intri
cacies from e very end
playing it so deftly
self-conceal ing that it
seemed even- the-more anony
mously his.
Flower
s so soft
that even touch melt
ed into streams of
dreamful
coloring
s.
Dark beginn
ings as the eyes become
accustom ed to what
they can hard ly envision
reaching-out that seldom
void of space less silen
ces.
Answering Tolstoy (5)
a)		The meaning
of art’s deeper view of life’
s realizing
the always known
as it wasn’ t quite just-
that-way be fore.
b)		The later
Tolstoy oft
religion ed his art
beyond that invisible
line of self- expressive
ness.
c)		It’s of
not-so-much
what one has-to-say
but more that way of
saying it' s rightly-
true.
d)		“L’etat c’est moi”
Dictator s create
their own people in
to a self-siz ed kingdom
as Tolstoy dimension
ed his later art beyond
the bounds of it’s own real
izing where.
e)		Turgenev (1882)
with his
smaller yet precisely
sensitive
self-suffi
cient art would have
death-bedded the greater
Tolstoy to a vow of
much-the-same hardly again
realized.
For Rosemarie
Love is be
cause there’ s a continu
ity of timechanging
always that intimate
sameness of becoming
ours.
If the blind
could only
dream in col oring those
musical tone s escaping
tenuous ly through
their near ing flow.
Puffed-up
Exceeding
oneself as a blowfish
puffed up to its ever-expand
in:
self-in 'iting con
cerns.
Clouded
She didn’t
know which way out or e
ven if there was an out
of her cloud ed no-other
place of be ing there -
now.
Gericault
at the face
of a nrad- killer could
n’t eye- through his
own self-re fleeting
thereabout
s.
On Chinese Art (forNeil) (5)
a)		The fine
ness of a Chinese
bird slend erly touch
ed to its coloring-
finds.
b)		Chinese
landscape
space-reveal ing not only
the seen but its in
dwelling trails parencie
c)		Nudes
often meant
to glorify man’s almost
celestial beauty Where
as the Chin ese pre-dress
ed ever-so- chastely-
time-felt man’s decora
ting ever- daily being.
d)		When the
poet color
lessly paint s and the
painter word lessly in
scribing a sense-unity
of timeless appearan
ces.
e)		An elite-
aristocrat
ic communal art that rare
ly discern s the street-
levels of the poor and
hopeless ly disposs
essed.
Wheel-chaired
Holding on
to the wheel chaired
her thought s around until
she was grasp ing on to
more than space could
possibly al low.
Crutches
walk us
their own rhythmi
cally adept at sound
ing the floor s out dir
ection-wise.
As Macbeth
realized
the woods merg ing into
their dark ly foreboding-
nearness as if time it
self had been calling them
successive ly forth.
This clinic
on the Starn
bergersee a house of
out-used
body-parts
as skeletal bones renewing
their claim s of an arti
ficial life- renewing
wellness.
It was death
they couldn’ t face on its
own terms Tolstoy Goethe
and the o ther-such un
willing to cede their
living-claim s for a
vast sense of self-super
iority.
Aging per
sons heavy-
down with their thought
less mentor ies of an ir
retriev able past
forming dee per shadow
s than their lessening
life-feel could bare
ly support.
and faith
not fame and renown can
redeem a timeless
sense of life’s in
creasing ly self-fill
fillment.
God his part
ner” (the last on a
long list of business as
sociates) left God
little choice but to bless
his daily deeds money-
wise.
Sleep over
comes as death
darkness mg even dee
per than time can
possibly
realize.
fog a ghost
ly world phan toming un
touchable
silence
s.
This over
flow of leave
s immensing colored de
signs of all-encom
passing sound- depths.
Dual-identity
as a poet
for the sel ective few
of mind and more than com
mon sensibil ity As a priest
bending to Christ’s love
for all and any who have
been called to His redeem
ing word.
Lost
in the crowd
until he be came as the
others indis tinctly sha
dowing a voiceless
sense-from-
being.
That late
October
light-invok ing moon
mirroring the tides'of
a darkly dis tant shore.
“On the wrong side”
She got“on
his wrong side” as if
he had be come room
cd-through all those
many door s that may
have left him vacant
ly center less.
A lingeringfear
(perhaps once
dreamed through a
moonless
night)
that he’d found the
wrong way out and could
n’t realize the where of
having-been-
lost.
Time-touch
When the fish
dead-float ing their sur
facing color s and the dc
sert sound lessly increa
sing its ster ile advance
He may have looked twice
in the mirror realizing
his own a ging time-
touch.
On Chinese Art (2)
a)		as if
each flower however common
ly distinct scenting
an inner life of its
own.
b)		an art
without sha (lowing or
mirroring and yet so
poetical ly refining
a pre-given landscap
ing one’s most intim
ate interior preception
s.
Light-blue
times finely
dressed in wind-trans
cending ap pearance
s.
Prevorst
He didn’t
know that town had been
haunted But as they drove
nearer a strange fear
overcame him as if
there would n’t be a way
for getting- out.
Writing
in the dark
though the lights hadn’
t gone out of these poems’
inwardly form ing their
self-quiet ing reflect
ions.
Warren
why should
1 write on poem when
poems rights (writes) it
self out.
Through
the morning’
s late dark ness these
shadowless trees slow
ly merging into their
silent a wareness
es.
Sleep’
s imagin
ary world voiceless
ly a live to those sun
ken realm s of ship’
s abandon ing treas
ures.
Family-tree
The day they
cut down his family-tree
to its stump ed bottom
ness He felt that lonely
branchless
personing
its own self- being.
Do the blind
feel the touch
of color ing through
their own dark ly apparent
presence.
That slow
down time-of-
life measur ing even the
length of our indwelling
moods though always reali
zing those slow-timed
musical ly spirit
ual depth s.
For Franz (4)
a)		Allegri's Miserere
as if the
need for giveness ans
wering it self heaven
ly-attuned.
b)		Piano Concerto 2
(Shostakovich slow mvt.)
A change of
time even of person Shosta
kovich assurn ing an unlike
ly pose of long-outdat
ed romantic puritie
s.
c)		Air (Bach, Goldberg Variations)
Glen Gould
out of his deeper/dark
er instinct s for touch
ing an almost numbed voice
humming re sponsive ac
cords.
d)		Romance in F (Beethoven)
The “roman
tic Beethoven”
(heroics a
side) attuned his violin
to an almost longing sweet
ness heaven ly aspiring.
Autumnal
moon darkly
voiced through those forest-
depths of im pending self-
denial.
Those self-
secluded morn
ing fogs my stcrious
ly awaken ing their
hidden in-be coming light-
voices.
November
trees half-
nakedly assem bling the
rest of their death-taint
ed leave s a broken
army retreat ing from its
down-fallen
loss.
Writing
out of the
darkness words lightforming as these tree
s sunken in reverie
s of dream- contemplat
ion.
Our jovial
face-find
ing doctor smiling a
transcient cause of his
own self-find ing satisfact
ions.
Something a
bout her depth-
imploring eye s insist
ing a message not yet quite
self-reveal
ing.
For Rosemarie
Those most hid
den of all treasure
s may be found in the depth
s of our own self-reveal
ing love.
“Words of wis
doin’’ are most
ly those we’ ve realized
too late for living-them-
live.
Honesty
can only
fully real ize itself
when love’ s at the
true-source of its very-
being.
The dead
should be
seen as if they’re still
living no bett cr or worse
Otherwise we’re simply
writing our own inscript
ions on their uninhabit
ing dead-down stones.
Faith
may be follow
ing some as a stray dog
without a master oft
wordless ly unseen
but then sudd enly reappear
ing when we thought lie’
d lost track on us.
Dream boat’s water
s easing one silently in
to the wave s of time
less forget fullness.
Piano Quartets (Mozart) The piano
so intimate ly voicing
Mozart’s own lyrical soul
fullness.
Medicin
al rooms as
artificial ly sterile as
mannequin’ s clean-teeth
ed touchless smiles.
A hard night
she had of
it pain-shot through mem
ories of an ice-down fall’
s long past a wareness
es.
Light-impress
ive clouds
streaming the horizon
s across morn ing’s short-
leased appear ances.
Curtain’
s transpar
encies moon- dimmed into
their seclud cd interior
realms.
Such a beau
tcous death these sound
less color ing’s infold
ing quiet udes so gent
ly death-re leasing.
Too late
We came too
late (time often offsets our own self-plann
ing scheme s) Dead at
the bottom of stairs
not a word left only
that blood less self-ac
comodat ing smile.
Sleepless
nights as a
boat drift ing from its
moorings with only a pale
moon to light its unknown
course time lessly recurr
ing.
After his
wife’s pro
tracted dy ing He too
left all be hind except
an indistin ct but alway
s plaguing sense-of-
guilt.
When Christ
died at the
cross a dark ness over
came that land that
no one ex cept Christ
himself could fathom
the depth of its unseen
cause.
Feelings
Some as El
Greco ecstat ically answer
ing a special need within
their own o verwrought
psyche Or the late 19th cen
tury bombast over-felt with
its special display for
feeling ness I per
sonally pre fer contrail
ed feeling s turned in
ward spirit ually spaceinvoking.
That
small size
spider hung to the wind
dow’s finely woven
hours-on-end
time-holding
his invisib ly-apparent
appetite.
Shakespeare
the best of
us after turn ing life from
the ups to the downs in
versely so retired to
his little hometown an
honored citi zen in a world
quietly same d and for him
(perhaps)
seductive
ly too real to be true.
40 rooms
in rows-of-
four black- wooded to a
sameness of view as
if the pat ient’s pain-
length had also adapted
to such par allcl intent
ions.
Down to the
depth of that
soundless deep a dark
so complete that only
those strange ly light-in
habited fish could reveal
the close ness of one’
s own touch- sense.
of a house
that could fulfill their
loving need s for a fut
ure together ness After
years of plann ing and hard
work It fin ished them
off that em pty house and
their love emp tied of all
future mean ings.
When Vladimir
Putin a KGB
man kissed those sacred
icons even the heavenly a
flamed candle s blushed-
for-shame at the very-sight.
Klee’s child-mind
cd color ings as if
its world a play-thing of
possible future em
bellishing
retreat
s.
Romance
(Carl Stamitz, 2ml Cello Concerto, slow mvt.) Some melodie
s carry us a long as streamexpressing currents of their far-off continuous ly sound-call mgs.
November 7
This day
standing
motionless
there The trees half-na
ked blemish cd at their
coloring source Time
itself rest lessly still
ed.
Keeping a
live remembran
ces with re curring half-
forgotten i mages of the
dead lively re newed.
snake with
its cruel and watchful eye
s stares an innocent
frog in its tracks So does
the fear of death claim
that all of what we are
or could possibly be
come.
We’ve not
the least of
a chance a gainst that
immortal e nemy of our
s timeless ly prepared
to strike at now or any
other tenta tively with
holding those lasting mo
merits of our s.
His invis
ibly time was
up That clock stopped o
ver night couldn’t be
rewound for even a soli
tary moment left him help
lessly alone.
chance left
the power of love and faith
transcend ing the utter
darkness of death’s blind
mg claims on us.
Love and death
in the trag
ic theatre almost as i
identical twins perhap
s (also) be cause love
must kill our lone sensc-of-
identity.
When
what one most
ly wants to say over-bear
ing the mean s of say
ing it poem s out-ofreach.
Those mount
ains ring us with their im
movable archa ic sense of
a pre-history not ours but
their dead-a lively
ness.
Does the
fine light—
transpar encies of im
pression ism reflect
the true na ture of French
sensibil ity Or was it
above all sourced by
Monet’s a cutely aware
eye-sense.
At the Queen (2)
a) Elizabeth
(Sissy) hotel in Feldafmg
heavenly four- stared admira
bly silver- set an almost
enchanted pre sence The wait
ers dressed e veil finer than
their Sunday best keeping
watchful eye s on every dish
as if a sacred offering from
their hidden but apparent
ly elabor ate god-send.
b) an almost
unspeak
ably chosen place for the
selective few candle
s whisper ing a world
that isn’t anymore its
still rarely attired mo
ments-of-now.
Autumn
brightly
thinning down that na
kcd appear ance of lost
children (those ash
ened fire s) that
couldn’t be called back
Homed.
Haydn’s Sun
rise quartet’s
1st movement as if the morn
ing’s light a process of on
comings until at the last
fully claimed.
A behind-the-
counter girl
who could only think in
dollars and cents When she
heard that pleasing ring
ing up of a nothcr sale
She mostly smiled some
where deeply inside but
scarcely no ticeable
for other s.
If Shakespeare’s
plays (the
best of them) are timeless
ly always-now Why bring them
up-to-a-dat cd one-sided
rehearsal of minor pre
sent day pro blems.
Handel
so robustly
self-assured
sturdily
striding a length of
never-a-doubt of saying it
otherwise
Rightly!
Hein del
needs no in
traduction He’s there
fully-so e ven before
the beginn ing arouse
s a sense of total complet
ion.
Dual-image
That pain-
felt picture with Ardon or
Ernest waiting behind the clos
ed-door as an errant child
sternly to be audienced at
my father’s law office
Whereas 1 (just for a
moment) my father’s only
son really proud or what
I didn’t e
ver become.
M. S.
warned “you
don’t have to say every
thing” But when I did
It hurt the- most those
closest to my self-en
deavouring
tongue.
Forbidden
fruits as
with Aesop’ s fox too
high for-the- reaching Or
those tasti est Faust and
Gretchen to an eternal
loss-at-self.
The stranger
It’s often
the stranger who realize
s the most DeTocqueville
that French- aristocrat
’s deepest A merican guide
Handel the tru ly “English”
Purcell-succ
essor Or as
I’ve become in mind as in
spirit “The last of the
German-Jew
The yacht
(though not
the most-mod ern-best)
still luxur iated their
smaller dis tanced need
s for wavc- frccd thought-
excursions Until one night
they return ed a bit pretimed to find another fancier-
full had taken their always
docking-place.
Does
(as they say)
“grass real ly grows o
ver” the blood- ruins of per
sons and pla ces still haunt
ed with a depth of unrealiz
ing life-view.
Night-of-crystals
the beginn
ing of the end a warn
ing to get out even if
they couldn’ t stay either
A brilliant- bright late
autumn day with the
leaves burn ing aflame
higher than even death
could poss ibly record.
Living-low
the time
s more than apparent
not a word too many as
they’d find him out so
secretly that he’d al
most lost
that named-birth
ed sense-to self.
The lost hotel (at Feldafing) a strange
wood-terra ced window
ed house six storied a
late 19th century
time-escap ing enclosur
ed view.
Full moon
through half-
barren tree s mirror
ing a depth of express
ive loneli ness.
An off-center type
He was an
off-center type One had
to rebalance one’s own
sense-for- view to dis
cover a straight
ness about his walk-
thought s or what
ever he could n’t be direct
ly exposed.
Some women
must be care
fully watch ed-over
(if not ex actly caged-
in) because their feminine-
softness may seem inviting
ly-malleable for other men’
s use She was a singer be
queathed with more inward vi
brations than most could ac
quire in a life-time But
it was sure ly her vast
ly alluding eyes that kept
her off-track to a mostly
unawared hus band.
Answering Adorno
If the Ausch
witz fire s have still
ed the poetic- beautifying
ones as well That hate and
fear remain un answered in a
world that needs more than
ever beauty prayer and a
truth be yond that
evil encom passing Ausch
witz one.
Holbein
Junior’s Self- portrait at
45 looking us past its
self-conscious willful strength
fully self- acquired that
certainty of future oncoming succ esses.
Why that
need to de
fend (as with Klee’s self-
satisfying
middle-class
bourgeois
life-style)
True artist s (not those
so-success ful posing
ones) aren’t outside the
scope of trad itional value
s but inside the hypocri
ses and incon sistencie
s of their own fabled o
therwise
ness.
Phantom car-
lights cruis ing through
a deepening fog myster
iously awaken ing those for
gotten realm s of sunken
pre-histor ic silence
s.
So many
today(not
only in Anier ica) with
blank char acterless fa
ces as a tree without
its ringed- growth deep
ly embedded Earthed!
Change-of-guard
It’s only
when life isn’ t ours for-
the-hold ing unknown
hand of o thers as
those flesh- blooded sur
geons watch ing ever-so-
carefully the continu
ously for eign life-
streams.
Hans Holbein jr.
His work so
steady-secur ing form arti
culating per son and the
symbolic con tinuity of
place But as Caravaggio
passionate ly alert
quick with the knife blood-a
rousing.
After season
on the lake
the silent shore listen
ing to our very-step
s as if e choing its
timeless re solve contin
uing.
Anonymous
Some person
s will alway s remain anon
ymously sha dows of them
selves out-ofreach untouch
ably sound less.
Hurt-pride
wounded to
that untouch able source
Swelling a pain inward
ly unresolv ing.
Some last
ing moment
s persistent ly-there sur
facing those deeper water’
s restless ly wavc-in
tent.
Moralist
s asserting
a protect ive word-pow
er Walled a gainst their
latent adulter ous instinct
s.
(fit’s
all-been-said
before It lose s its said-
for-being as cloth weared
down to a thread-bare
ness Those al ways-truths
to be true to themselves
must reword the feel of
their being- so anew.
Catharsis?
Boxing the
body out of its animal-
led instinct s only in
tenses those war-killing
desires.
Foy them (the Ditrers, Holbeins, DaVincis) penctrat
ing the blood and mind of
man sourced in the image
of their crea tor’s will.
“It all comes back to (haunt) us” (Strindberg)
those ghost
s of the un written past
November ed through
the fogs of in decipher
able day’s e lusively re
creating.
Vacant
sounds spac
ing the depth of these
wind-ooen
i
ing times.
Fog-night
ghostly appar
ent that e veil our most
chosen and intimate
words hollow ing out touch
evasive ly unreali
zing.
That unrecorded past
Does even the
unrecorded past retain
a presence of its own
as these used clothes my
father gave for me Are
they unknown to him inhab
iting that unrecorded
and mostly forgotten
past of his.
Life-blood
If life’s in
the blood-trans fusions a soulful part of my selfbeing Have I exchanged per
sons secret ly reclaim
ing the i dentity of
another.
Holbein ’
s self-portrait
at 45 tight ly hard-boned
visagcd one just as ready
to the knife as the paint
er’s intent ly self-defin
ing.
Holbein s Erasmus from
Rotterdam
closely
mind-eyed the touch-
feel of that scholar’
s invisible awareness.
Minister’s house (Malmsheim) When we mov
ed into our half-millenium
old wood-up holding rever
end’s house fully alive to
our own presen
ce as it
took-us-in (as it had
so many be fore) to its
centuries of time-recurr
ing faith- needs.
The nightly return (Pforr 1809) A mysterious
silence o vercomes
the darkness of that night
ly scene while a single can
die awakens a brighten
ed recognit ion of his un
expected re turn.
On those
highest of
mountain s where the
snow never melts an in
visible time lessness has
taken perman ent hold even
of our hand'
s scarce
ly touching for their
forgotten
warmth.
“Falling asleep”
or is it a
distant but
scarcely
heard call ing that
sleeps us in to those
realmed a wareness
es at that vacant other-
end of self.
Dialogued
The portrait
ist as the therapist
rarely real ize that im
pending space between what'
s seen and that unknown
looking in sisting
ly back through
them.
Unexpect
ed tiny flow
ers touched- in-blue part
ly hidden as if unrecon
ciled to a gardened dom
estic indwell ing.
It was on
an unmarked
deserted road that a
one-eyed
stranger
caned to the rhythm of timetelling him through to a
fear sudden ly there
that left him soundless
ly behind.
One friend left
Only one friend
left but he became more
than a soul- keeper as
willing al ways to hear
to comfort a voice that
reflected the depth of
her own self- pity.
On portraiture (3)
a)		It isn’t
so much those objects defin
ing one’e pro fessional inter
csts or even symbolic
inner accord s But the
eye-depth the hand’s
touching ex pressive
ness that source those
deeper realm s-for-being.
b)		The best
portrait
s are not those abstract-
distancing ones at fear
of exposing too much of
one’s own self-express
iveness.
c)		When a pict
ures start talking back
— She must have thought
her late 19th century hat
could impress my smiling
at her time- hidden but
so-seen pre sence.
Personalized (2)
a)		Good novel
ists can so
personal ize the his
torical back ground become
s “truc-to- life”.
b)		Vermeer
personal
ized those objects of
every day living
that they be came as the
facial fea tures of that
not-so-direct ly observed.
5. 5.
at sweet-six
teen pretty bright Jewish
and somewhat richly endowed
with an alcoh olic once play
time mother She knew what
she wanted Him who happen
ed to be Me a “lot-of-
fun” kind-of- life child
less but es pecially money-
sound.
Poems of remembrance (4)
a)		Holding on
that tight-
grasp of a mo mentary self-
assurance The boat over
flowing with unknown per
sons twice- changed dir
ections from a most-certain
death if ever turning back.
b)		Danger a
head he could
feel that rousing
blood though those warn-
signals so distinct
ly written in a strange
ly foreign tongue.
c)		Firmly
stanced at
our back those shad
owing figure’ s cruel in
tendons We kept on
shovelling the soft-down
earth the depth of our
own warmth- blooded impend
ing death.
d)		That speech
less train
slowly mov ing through
the fog-flood ing night-
rhythmed through our
always-now
impending
fears.
The fear of winter
Winter’s clos
ing in our no- way-out the
days shorter the nights dark
er imprison ing in an ironclad fear e ver tightening
its grip on
our flesh-warmed
and soothing softness
es.
A no man’
s elevator
that seemed empty of where
we were go ing as if it
had been preplanned and
we soundless ly ascending
a vastly un known oast.
1
Those still
unexpect
ed moment s when time
slows to the very-pulse
of our selfintending
quietude
s.
The corridor
At first
the corridor seemed short
but strange ly enough
the further we went the
longer it be came as a
snake wind ing itself
out.
For Rosemarie
You’ll always
continue to charm me with
those softly melting
though less- revealing
touching eye s of yours.
Some leave
s not crumb
led and dried- down to an
exhausted
life-sense
have kept their color
ings bright ly flowing
through the wind’s soft
ly evoking silence
s.
Does (as they say)
“grass real ly grows o
ver” the blood- ruins of per
sons and pla ces still haunt
ed with a depth of unreali
zing life- view.
Life goes on
but death as well that end
less cycle of
time’s irre versible
sense-flow.
As we live
on through
the memories of others who
die out that lasting linger
ing moment of our self-in
habiting
sense-for-be
ing.
You can’t
bury those
innocent corpses deep
enough They all keep co
ming back un earthed to
haunt your very-being.
Her puppet
finely dress
ed up to but a transient
image of her mirroring
self But when it stopped
talking back a mute silence
permeated all her very-
thought s and wish
es.
Only once
did he real
ize those hate- your- enemy-
psalms When those self-de
fying words mirroring
the depth of his very-be
mg.
Big-stoned little stones
When those
little Jewish stones gather
ing a parish of collect
ive memorie s of the Big-
stoned dead inscribed
with less life fully decid
ing words.
Some of
those perfum
ed sweet-smell ing stores
left him with that ethereal feeling of irn itating sugar
ed light-wing ed angels.
The sound
s of waiting
alert to each telling mo
mcnt so dense as if colorappearing.
A double-life
She led a
double-life as if the
one wasn’t e nough for
the other A two-sided
street runn ing through
her every thoughts in
counter-dir
ection
s.
She conform
ed so much
to her hus band’s other wise taste that one won
dered if she continued
to hear her selflisten
ing aloud.
He was dress
ed to his own
sense-of-import ance that brief-
cased certain ed smile of
previous (and most assuredly)
coming accom plishment
s.
Child-sold
icrs (some e
ven seven) learning
to kill out the meaning
of their own having-
been.
Kafka
so personal
ized the depth of his own
being hidden behind those
shadowing
self-decept
ive facade s of his.
All genuine
artists (the
uncommon few) suffer through
the imperfect ions of their
own limited sense-for-be
ing-
Last Sunday in the church year (6)
a)		The tree
s bared naked
ly exposed to that no
where s to hide-from
the depth of our overcom
ing shame The leaves down
as these un spoken words
fallen from their very-
source.
b)		Today
Death reign
s supreme worshipped
with the flo wering hope
s and remem brances at
its speech less altars
of enduring stone.
c)		Death’
s that most perfected
form of demo cracy Daily
magnetical ly pressing
good and bad rich and poor
to its eter nally stone-
bred silen
ces.
d)		Is death
then the
true source of these night-
mared fear s That naked
untold loncli ness mirror
ing our face less final-
end.
e)		Without
prayer there’ s no hope
left Christ lived but to
die at the crossway
s of his death-over
coming bless mg.
J) For Christ
ians the loss
of a close- one signall
ing two complc mentary dir
ections The one facing back
to what we’ ve shared of
life’s common- ground The o
ther Christ wards heaven
ly calling.
'a out
fathered
me His loom ing ever
stronger a hove those
faint shadow ings of his
son’s guilty self-apprais
als.
The last defense
The fear that
words the last defense had
failed him in the center
ot an unspok en void the
nowheres of not-being-
there.
Family roll-call (7)
a)		Two sisters
She took the
upstairs-way as Kafka to
a roomed-in- world only
hers but hard ly shelter
ed against that other
world down be low bottom
ed to her un timely fears.
h)		She read so
much of the
best Henry James Jane
Austen that her aloneness-
world revolved around a soc
ial setting foreign to
Iter very-na ture.
c)		Uncle Morton
that Esau-of-
a-rnan big- strong-hair
y-wooded-hun ter always
on the prowl but daily
dentrified to his do
mestic in habiting
domicle.
d)		Aunt Sylvia
Morton’s unwoman
ly aggressive darkly-beauti
fying wife so competit
ive even on her deathbed as if she’d been
born only-yes terday.
e)		Barry
their only
son quarter backed his
high-school team as a
woman-wanter
cat-incbriat
ing his al ways shadow
ing-selved
mother.
j) Grandpa Barney
our self-made-
man brought up his New-
World child ren on a King
Lear’s diet of do-what-your-
father-wants or he’ll do-
you-in-and- out thorough
ly- g) Etta
his wife so
soundly-pack ed with do
mestic goose rocking and
rolling it down the ais
les of Elvis Presley’s new
est hits.
Poems are
not those
press-the- button kind-
of-thing These dry per
tods expose one’s sap-
down word-re surfacing
needs.
Rosemarie
I’ll still re
member that starless
late-autum nal night
The lake more the out
side of dark ness extend
mg even be yond its out
lasting reach- for-sound.
The deep
sleep that
leaves me soundless
ly awake to recurring
(though soon dissolving)
images.
That window
ed light a
cross the way sudden
ly realized voiceless
though e ver-watching
through the vanishing
night’s last moments of
immens ing dark
ness.
Colorings
That tiny
bird branchholding its
fragile touch ing my through-
coloring
s.
Cain
too marked-
off but pro tected from
an alien world mask
ing his own While we Jew
s long ex iled return
ed to the distant land
of our fear- felt call
mgs.
Reattuned?
Is happiness
(a true sense of fulfill
ment) a blem ish from this
self-suffer ing world of
ours Must we suffer then
into the very- grammar of
our self-sus taining love-
attune
ments.
This land
dried-down
its very-sub stance The
trees thinn ed to their
leafless shad owings Only
the holding- touch of love
can help rc claim this
sapless land of our
s.
Those stain
s the fallen leaves us
with moment s of a blood
less regret.
Stone-by-stone
When the
city bombed- down to its
very-being Nothing left
but our bare hands rebuild
ing its ex hausted-na
ked frame stone-by-
stone.
After his illness (forlngo)
only a dim-
light left But even
that-enough to realize
the faint touching
s of an al ways new be
ginning.
Is time run
ning out on us as a ri
ver dry-sea soned its
bared-down
currents
breath lessly stepfinding.
A seculari
zed Kafka
daily plagued with the fear
s of his own insuffi
cience s but lost
from his my sterious
longing for that always be
yondness-
light.
He walked
his late-after
noon shadow increasing
ly the more- becoming of
his always lessening
self.
Those unex
plored region
s of the soul as vastly
darkening as the deep
est breadth of these late-au
tumnal night
s.
That silent
one all-be
coming shame of one’s na
kedly exposed bodied the
fear of death’ s all-inclus
ive claims on us.
This late
November
day as a Span ish galleon
lost-down to its sunk
en silenc
es.
Buxtehude’
s Christ-bod
ied passion as Rubens’
exclusive ly flesh-orien
ted crucifix ion the in
carnation of His one-of-
us death-o vercoming.
Exploring
the heaven
s for lost- possible plan
ets expose s the more
of our earth- bound God-
insufficien
ces.
Frozen
moments the
tight-close ness of those
feared but unspeak
able word s.
A higher church (official) I
They’d like
to be known as tolerant
peace-maker s popular
ly smiling their own in
sufficient need of a
cause the slight soft
ness of their indwelling
cheeks more than that
steadiness of claiming
outside the closed-in
circle of their own
self-appre
ciation
s.
Human ZOOS (for Michael) Are those
cagcd-in
prisons
really noth ing more
than human zoos protect
ing the ani mal-in-us
from those fierce in
stincts that might
flare-up the impending
night-light s of our own
indelible
fears.
A higher church (official) // That harm
less post- christian
smile of his always pleas
ant well- meaning
salvation-
wishes
taming all of the dead
ly instinct s that led
Christ to
the cross.
Attacked
She was at
tacked in bright day
light help
lessly a
lone Only the mute stone
s cried out her need as
many passed by attend
ing to their own daily
wants and wishes.
The German
church after
closing its doors to the
suffering Jews has now
discover ed that Christ
was one-of- them-Ours not
theirs those un-Christian
Israelis.
The creed
It’s that com
mittment to a “holy
church”es’
centuries
ofjewish
(Jesus)
hate that un holies most
of those “dev ilish” in
stincts of mine.
A warning
If Christ’
s words and deeds are da
ted then the spirit-of-the-
times become s holier than
the-spirit- of-His time
less word-en compassing
bei no-.
Songs without words (Mendelssohn) I at time
s so intimate ly voiced
that we could hear our own
breath rhy med to those
self-enchant ing moment
s of his.
Songs without words II
At other
times his voice over
came its own descript
ive nearness and left us
cliched to romantic
ally overflavour
ed send ment
s.
Waiting
for what did
n't happen as this bar
ed-down late November
landscap ing a recept
ive need for the first
snow’s timeenhancing
complete
ness.
Unwanted advice (to a Nobel Prize poet) It’s only
when words so seldom re
fined that they realize
their own in herenti
dentity.
“Dawned on him”
It “dawned
on him” as a subdued
candle light ing the en
tire scope of that room’
s inner dark
nesses.
Abbreviations
In this
strangely foreign world
of unknown letter-ap
pearance s We must
blindly touch- our-way to
a nowhere s of find
ing those not-words
out.
For Rosemarie /
It’s only in
this aging world of a
peaceful to getherness
that we’ve realized the
intimate voice of a
timeless u nity.
For Rosemarie //
Those prett
ily designed dresses of
your hungup to their
most intimate ly creative
calling
s.
Ode a Rogier van der Weyden
when space
and the fa brie of sound
realize a world of un
touchable
purity.
Contrasts (2)
a)		Van Eyck
may have de
tailed that freshly-seen
for its own sake quiet
ing an appre ciably spaced
still-life.
b)		Whereas
Van dcr Wey
den surface d a sense
of God’s hid den but my
sterious ly aware-pre
sence.
Christian
Lehnert’
s poems keep-close
to a person ally sound
less obser vance.
When the
“always-now”
had become an always-
then as if time’s contin
uity washed upon strange
and uncertain ed shore
s.
On Kafka (4)
a) That-way
If what al ways seemed
so unreal in Kafka’s word-
aware vision ary mind act
ually happen ed Or was
what he de scribed
only real ly so because
he realized it no-other-
way than his own.
b)		Wider-framed
It’s often
that deep ly personal
subjective view of a
world wider- framed than
our own.
c)		Kafka'
s so Jewish
ly idealized view of marr
iage only be came most tru
ly his own while writing
out his self- causing un
fulfillment’ s sake.
d)		If Angst’
s at the
heart of mod ern man It
realmed Kafka firmly-first
in its pro phetical
ly tentacl ed grasp.
The law
God’s ulti
mate domain evilly usurp
ed as with Kleist’s
Michael Kohl haas closed-
out always be yond man’s
unreacha ble cause.
Saying
what one
should isn’ t saying
at all
Silence how
ever remote ly speaks
louder than such words.
Rain
drops touch
ing the loss of leaves im
itating col orless
ly why.
That chair
in his office curved and ele
gantly arm- holding him
into a dig nity of self-
assuming im portance.
How many
men use “the
best years” of their wive
s as a guar antee for
their own self-satisfy
ing appear ance as
clothes fresh ly exhibit
ed fashion ably display
ed until
worn-down for
closeted-for
getfulness.
Those ghost
ly fogs phant
oming the wood’s dark
ly reclusive ness.
A lone Decern
her apple hang ing hard
for the cold taste ofwint
ter’s aspir ing claim
s.
For Rosemarie
The warmth-
softness of your hand
infolding the depth of
my very-be ing as a
rose sound lessly color
ing.
Does the
tonality of
our speak ing voice its
innerrhy thmic accord
s imply cer tain charact
cr traits Or have we
learned all— to-well to
simulate the appeal
of our voic ed-toned ap
pearance
s.
He heard
only what
he wanted to hear So as
his world grew ever-dark
er and left him a no-way-
out he began to hear noth
ing at all.
Cornered
He forced
a no-way-out on his longtime friend Cornered
him to those speechless
darkness es within.
After her
husband
left her and the children
grown-away into their
own life-sense She started a
new as if life itself
was an ex changeable
item She tried to real
ize to-the- full its re
newable down- payment
s.
Morning
street-light
s still stran gely awake
to some scar cely decipher
able darktime message.
Christianed
When life
started closing- down on that
many-roomed house of his
light-by-light space upon
his space less need for
a never-relin guishing hea
venly-more.
Interval
s of sound
as the eye- levels of
your thought ful voice
spaceful ly within.
No secret
s kept ex
ccpt those of these
timeless waves origin
ed from a con tinuing un
known source.
Special e
vents as our
“golden anniv ersary” may
mark time out as those num
bered stone s that often
seem misplac ed in an o
pen field of increasing
forgetful
ness.
For Christian Lehnert
Listen
ing to the inner voice
(as if we could hear
what isn’t ours to
know) the image of those
soundless ly inert sha
dowing
s.
Mood-
pocms as atmos
pheric paint ings realiz

ed-intcrior s of our
own self- searching
s.
A rabbit’
s pre-deter
mining taste- awareness
of a carrot’ s self-defin
ed calling s.
ing and still
recurring i mage of that tree-snake’ s taste-in
volving a predator
bird’s in creasing
appetite’
s-fill.
Sourced (in memory Charles Seliger) Is color
sourced in the visual-
mind’s need for inher
enttouch- finds.
Recallings
The sapless
cause of these naked
ly defining trees as ag
ing men’s de sires for a
spring’s re calling.
Knight-devil-death (DUrer) Only then
did he real ize Lost in
a wood of all-surround
ing fears without e
veil the slightest light-sense
to finding a way out.
Mirroring
That distant
panoramic view of the
heavens be ing swallow
ed up in to black-im
mersing void s that left
a shallow ing depth
somewhere in his heart’
s contract ing range.
“Copycat”
I don’t really know
what cats might be copy
ing perhaps those almost
soundless
secretive
paw-ways that echo ever-so-
slightly its repet
itively approach ing nearness
es.
Outsourced
She felt the
fields flow ing her a
way beyond the grasp of
holding those elusive mo
ments secure ly-tight.
V Quartet (Bart6k) From the
stilled and intimate to
the continu ous over
flowing of waves immens
ing their un realizing
height
s.
Op 76,5 (Haydn quartet, last met.) Tongue-in-
cheek All- starts—at-once
circusing life’s puls
ing-interlude ’s through-
moment
s.
Op. 16,5 (Haydn, slow mvt.) Ifheaven
could be told earth
ly-bound then here a
transform ing beauty
landscap ing unimagin
ably peace ful quiet
udes.
Renaming
what doesn’
t change what’s al
ways been there before
word-disguis ing their re
newing sense- appeals.
Buber’s
“spiritual
Israel” im plying a state
beyond the state’s al
ways-need to secure the
real border s of its
very-being.
The poem
continu
ously dialog ing that inn
er inescap able world at
the darken ed-depthed o
ther-side-of
self.
Late fall’
s quietly de ceptive warm
th as some persons we’
ve known mask ing a pleas
antry of arti ficial appre
citation
s.
Dr. Wallner’
s Freudian
over-shadow ings silen
ced me in to the dead-
dream-fears of his noanswering length-of-
being.
I only re
member Dr. Lander’s
slight limp and the Godlike picture of Sigmund
Freud domin ating much of
his lesser presence.
Two Flemish masters (2)
a)		Van cier Wey
den’s lyri cally dress
ed-color ings the in
terior world of each and
every self- designing
personed-ex
pressive
ness.
b)		The brilliant
ly preform ing stillness
es of Van Eyck’ s surfacing
realms of self-contem
plation.
He follow
ed his own
lesser (but still prevail
ing) instinct s as a dog
leashed to the scent of
its elusive self-find
mgs.
Too much
King David given too
much of his wanting-for-
more overstepped that
invisible line out
side even the expand
ing claim s of his pre-
Messianic
kingdom.
That half-
moon focus ing the early
winter heaven s but still
signify
ing the blind-
dark-side to our own sense-
of-being.
Gryphius
poet of the
30-years-war reclaimed
his life’s re newing source
in the tight ly committ
ed sonnet-form and through
a faith tower ing above that
daily rhythm of death’s con
tinuous har vesting
s.
There
We were there
to be ignored as desolate
ly alone as the island
of their choice Delos rock-
stone and barren-space.
Weimar and Buchenwald
so physical
ly near but spiritual
ly distant' ing two world
s of the mind and spirit
and that of hate and viol
ence But near er than ever-
realized The young Goethe
(“Prometheus”)
emancipated
man from God setting those
other spirit s loose Man
as the niea sure-of-all
things that then measured
out the cruel ty of his
own very- being.
Pioneer days (in memory WiUa Catlier) (2) a) the unlimit
ed call of all those un
fathomed land s soiled to
the very close-sense-
feel of our most intimate
being.
b) Pioneer
days when
sun moon and stars so a
lone in their heavenly
escape ur ging a prim
eval light upon our
first-sens ed time-rou
tes.
Question
ing Goethe
For your love and
nature have replaced the
need of a God whose es
sence is love and whose nat
ure is the creating
source of all that’s be
ing-
This dried-
down fall
as some per sons so emaci
ated that e ven a boned
handshake
echoing
through what was left
of their lifereclaiming
person.
Why moral
ists are a
dultery- prone Because
they position themselve
s so as a word-wall pro
tecting a gainst their
instinct ual other
wiseness.
The right-rev
ercnd P. seld
om right in
his wife’s
pre-order ing eyes re
dressing those half self-bal
ancing words of his into
a tottering Moses-like
stutter.
String-Quartet (Ravel) Light-sense
stream ing shadow’
s banners of sound
less express ion.
Clarinet Quintet (Brahms V' mvt.)
A flow
ing express iveness
silver-sens ed escaping e
ven time’s im ploring sha
dows.
The viola’
s mostly lost- in-the-midd
le enchant ing-seductive
ly calling us to its renew
ing harmon ic pleasure
s.
Op 64,2 (Haydn's Quartet -finale) Haydn’s presto-
finales each voice redis
covering its own express
ing a togeth ernes as a
shimmer of light’s just-
revealing.
On Brahms’
Clarinet Quin
tet’s incolor ing harmon
ies as juicy- delectable
as the taste of ripen
ing fruit’s in herent touch-
values.
tasies faint
ly through these still
ed shadow ings time’
s recreat ing oneness-
accords.
2"d Advent
Winter’
s cool raininvoking
shadowing s of those
summer-bird’ s coloring-
renewal
s.
Rebuild
ing after-the-
war’s almost total ruin
s down to those very-
depths of a vanquish
ed evil-em pire.
“Egged-on ”
They “egg
ed him on” perhaps be
cause he was the immovable
“hard-boil ed” type or
because they’ d “chicken
ed” him now surely “egg
ed-on” for signs of cour
ageous be havior.
Between 2 worlds (4)
a) An interior-
poetic world freshly re
vealing sound image and
thought and the “real”
world that holds me
tight to its always ground-
based fear s.
b) The Jew
in my endanger ed look-out
Towering those ghett
oed breach ing walls
And the Christ ian Churched
in what re mains close-now
to my very- being.
c)		between
the truly invisible
church con cealing its
Christ-chosen ness And that
physical ly exterior
one walled- high against
its callen-
message.
d)		between
the Herbert ian culture-
designing conflict And
the word be yond the
word’s time less remote
ly-calling
s.
Judging
through
the half-blind
eyes and
sense of o thers Or the
cycloptic focus of one’
s own very self-reveal
ing.
Unchangeable
We knew
they’d never change-course
Holding-on to what’s alway
s-there while intently look
ing for what daily isn’
t.
This wind’
s darkly in
visible mess age as the
flow of wave’ s unknown
but alwavs- intended
course.
In memoiy C. S.
He kept
his secret ly paper
ed impress ions (where
I may become more found-
out) in a safely-secur
ing relia ble place.
When a poem
becomes
those alter nate route
s of unrecon ciled dis
tancing
s.
A money-thinker
She was from
childhood on a money-
thinker evalu ating person
s and purchas es in dollar
s and cents Even check
ing out gift s she’d re
ceived not ac cording to
taste or choice but to
their very-re levant value.
It rained
so hard so long that we
could hard ly decipher
our own voice retreating
into the shadows of
those unheard silence
s.
“We Three Kings of Orient are”
a hymn of
such distant- longings
that even “the field
s and fount ains” sustain
ing their e ver-search
ing for the star-anoint
ed king.
Karl Stamitz
es’ pre-Mozart ean clarinet
concerti al most as se
ductively fluent and
yet pre-dat ing its epi
gonal sound- describ
ing presen ce.
“Its our
turn now”
she said (as the eld
est of their ever-lessen
ing family)
Her mother bur
ied from the sovereign
age of time’ s always but
ever-slowly pro ceeding
s.
“O come all
ye faithful”
’s resound ing call to
the ends of time and of
the earth’ s expanding
spheres for life the
real-life of Christ’
s now-becom ing in vis
ible king dom.
The Jewish-
Christ mark
ed with the Star-of-David
His people’ s oncoming
death-blood of their se
cretly with holding re
demption.
The Call (4)
a) through
the night’ s compelling
darkness es that watcheyed train tracked to
its sensed- distanc
ing sound s.
b) That finger’
s boned but voiceless
ly pointing its no-where
s-else than at his so in
nocently-ap pearing there
ness.
c)		The calling of St. Matthew (Caravaggio)
Even that
room (symbol of a rest
lessly await ing world)
closed-in to its no-ways-
out from Christ’ s magnetic
calling.
d)		L’appcl (Gauguin)
Was it her
hands or those intell
ing eyes time-evoking
still un folding
distance
s.
Too explicit
What become
s too expli cit as a mor
alizing sermon or a Lessing-
inspired play leaves its
word-bound audience too
small below such over-an
swering height s.
Exposing (3)
a)		Love’
s insist
ent need s for an in
spoken near ness through
those ag ing years of
occasion eci time-sitt
ing aloneli
ness.
b)		From secretly exposing That suddeneyed fear of being read-
through what ever safely
enclosed her from se
cretly expos ing.
c)		St. Anthony (Griinewa
exposed to a
wilderness of fears in
devilled with more than his
lessening cause could
hold.
Alone
with the per
soned dark ness of that
night-consum ing house.
Hefelt
the quiet
ing foot steps of his
nearing that elusive
self-image.
The land
breath
lessly still waiting for
the gentle ly consuming
touch of that first
enlighten
ing snow.
Seldom
even in that
16th century parish house
could he sense an a
wareness of all-those-o
thers who’ d lived-this-
house-through.
Prodigal Son? (forM. S.)
His mother in
vested more of her self
less love than the mea
ger returns of her son’s so
otherwise-
personed.
Faith
is not that
kind of a possess
ive thing As love it
must be con tinually re
born to satis fy its tenta
tively real izing claim
s.
It
was never
outspoken ly said but
always se cretly im
plied as if knowing
had become the more of
a speech lessly there.
Kafka’
s light-o
pening door but always
closed from entrance
Not-only an unapproach
able God but even bet
ween us you- and-me.
Over
night in a
strange house an always-
closed behind- glass book
case But the more I asked
the less they could find
of that al ways-lost
key.
Those eye
s their glar
ing-stare turn ed me off a
round a cor ner until my
feet could re find their
correspond ing time-ac
cords.
9th Plague in Egypt (Handel)
“A darkness
came over the land” as if
the Pharaoh and his peo
pie would be plagued with
the depths of their own self-
shadowing
s.
Those andante
s of Mozart
that continue a flow of
never-ceas ing streamlike sensibil ities.
Come-on
It was a com mon come-on
that ad tor a penniless
safe and e asy way of im
proving ... as those kind
s of indraw ing spider-
webbed look s caught in
their no-ways of possibly
getting-out.
Short-timed
Little boy s with those
freshly-a wared look
s self-remind ing me as
if time had been condens
ed to that short-distan
ce between.
Being watched
They knew
they were be ing watched
through that narr
ow light of their from-es
caping step s.
German portraiture ca. 1500
(Munich, December 2011) (11)
a) discovering
the true beauty of man’s reali
zing his God- created like
ness.
b) Woman with a Bonnet
(Augsburg 1517)
a lyrical port
rait pre-dating Corot’s young
lady embedded in herself-en
closing quiet tudes of light
colors open spaces reflect
ing what only her withhold
ing thought s could real
ize.
c)		Holbein’s Jane Seymour
so vastly de
corated that even her eye
s seemed-like jewelled-in
flection
s.
d)		Holbein’s famed “doubleportrait” so o ver-filling
that room with symbol
ic object s that more
than-define the depth of
their posed- from-being.
e)		Diirer’
s “Wohlgemuth”
unrelentless ly unveil
ing the blem ished face of
his aging thereness
so unbeauti fyingly true-
for-us-all.
/) Diirer’s portrait of
Jakob Muffal (1526)
at once so
realistic ally room-
near expos ing the inner
realms of those abstract
silences of his.
g) Furtenagel
(“The painter Burktuaier and his wife”)
a great master piece from a
little known “minor art
ist” reflect ing the mirror
cd sameness in life as in
death of the oneness of
true-marriage.
h) Why did
Diirer three-
finger his father’s
not quite cloth-enclos
ing appear ance.
i)		Wolf Huber’
s all-sided
studies of the same person
ing him to a unity of selfbeing or sim ply implying
the many per sons beyond his
outward appear ances.
j)	Portraiture
Arc the sym
bols of their outstanding
position more of those
persomng hands and
face or paint erly attribut
es excessive ly self-de
fining.
k)	Seeing and
after-see
ing as if those port
raits were be coming a con
tinuing part of my own
self-reveal
mg.
Time-eluding
The room
not enter ed by still
being there time-elud
ing.
She had
the look of
once-being- young Dressed
that cause in to an express
ive time-simu lating remem
brance.
Listening
through those bare
and shadow less sound
s ofa lone but branch-
defining bird’s com
pelling an almost
echoless re spon se.
Mozart’
s violin con
ccrti between the virtuos
ity of sound- sensing and
those most intimate ac
cords of selfcomposure.
Schubert’
s 5th as if
“I’ve-heard-
it-before”
and the melod ic flow of
time-forget
fulness.
Heavy
snow weight
ing my thought s down to
their earth- sustaining
whiteness
es.
Pink’
s hung his
longest
through-flow
ing self-en veloping
stocking while Christ
masing his own apple-
red prepara tion-cheek
These fount
aincd parks summerly
dressed-in their usual
pleasur able green
ness Now dried-down
vacant ly haunt
ed wind-si lences.
“Count your
blessing s” Pink merr
ily adding them all-up
that sidewinding smile
of his longdated type
writing e ver so care
fully-chosen
blue-ribbon
ed.
For Rosemarie
Those love
ly designed prettily
dressing me into the
more of that always-yon.
ForH. B.
A room at
the top of the stair’
s each up wards prolong
ing steps c choing 35
years of time’s recept
ive thought fulness.
Is life then
an upwards- way of reali
zing a dimin ishing sense
of timeful completion.
High school
reunion
s however time-recall
' ing-
the usual out side of those
always selfreserving in
tuition
s.
Otherwised
What I still
remember of those o
therwise high school
days were those long-
extending
corridor
s even be yond my own
self-increa sing shadow
mgs.
Marked-off or down (4)
a)		A 2"‘‘ start
as if that
almost lifeconsuming
one could sim ply be e
rased as that 3rJ grade black
board water ed-down with
out even a trace of its
chalk-mark ed remind
ers.
b)		Lot’s wife
as so many
German Jews marked even
with the star ever-holding
to the end cing richness
of Sodom and Gemorrah’
s time-decay ing calling
s.
c)		Boundaries
He sensed
the boundar ies of his
pre-given and limited
domain as if one step be
yond that still unmark
ed line could release all
those haunting fears mhabi
ting the depth s of his
very-being.
d)		The Lord’
s biblical
time-scheme can’t be plac
ed in man’ s marked-down
time-ensuing
calendar
s It’s more like crossword puzzl ing all those
darkened
closed-off'
non-answer
mgs.
Humanism?
If man’s
not the mast er of him
self still plagued with
those recurr ing vices
of lust hate and power-in
tent How could he then be
come the last ing measure -
of-all-thing
s.
Karl Stamitz (bom 1743)
caught right
in the mid die between
Haydn and Mo zart blending
his own lyri cally concerto-
voice and peppy Haydnesque
finales with a symphonic
assurance only a true-
master could claim.
3 Romances oboe and piano (Schumann op. 94) Music with
an unknown message deep
ly shadow ing its ex
pressive
time-invok
ing loneli ness.
Pruning a
tree however finely-finish
ed is like cutting
these poem s down to
their source- growth a
wakening
s.
The sub
way here in
Munich cloth ed in strange
and foreign dialect
s inhabit
ing (each
his own) separ ately uncag
ed moments of this multicultural zoopark.
Looking a
way from what one
shouldn’t see Tensing
the moment s of this
always-now
presence.
White
house-paled
impression s faintly re
vealing this winter’s color
ing bareness es.
Portrait of a Young Man
(Hans Siiss von Kulmbach 1520)
A sadness as
a web spread ing from his
eyes and in concealing
face to the fineness
of his cloth- felt self-in
habiting ap pearance.
His dream
s left him
soundless ly landscap
ing a famil iar but yet
untoucha ble sense-
from-being.
For Norman
terminal
ly sick yet without a
self-expir ing date He
lives each day as a
marked-man as those Jew
s starred to the final
ity of life’ s ultimate
exposure.
Diirer’
s best portrait
s so secur ing a self-
assurance of pose and
person that (however much
one tried) it couldn’
t have been otherwise
duely-felt.
Death ’
s always
been so se cretly self-
conceal ing-shy (c
veil hidden from its own
intent) to meet one’s
ncaring-end
face-to-face
or even more directly-so
eye-to-eye.
Baldung Grien
3 years im
pressed with the unmistake
able stamp of Diirer’s so-
directly no- ways-out
took to the side-ef
fects of re- editing those
most fain iliar scene
s so u n fore seeably and
strangely un known.
4 Thought-poems
(December 15, for Inga and Solvey)
a)		Music
(the how of its being
heard)
more than the
conductor-
performance
Or his own night-causing
transient mood But the
before and after of its
own self-re vealing sound-
length
s.
b)		Should me
judge a poli
tician by what he’ll be
come in those always-chang
ing histori cal tide
s Or by his closer-felt
Now and no- where-else.
c)		Those epoch
s of great
art with its inter-play of
more-than-one depend on a
master-teach er or else
they’ll soon time-themsel
ves out.
d)		Friends
with an a
genda or caused by a
common togeth erness Friend
ships rarely sail under an
unchange able flag-de
signs.
Lonely face
s (mainly men)
Hopper-like staring their
vacant thought s through the
glass reflect ions of long-
lost irretrie vable time
s.
His motive
s were main
ly masked e ven from him
self as if dialogued
from an everpresent though
apparent ly otherwise-
self.
The black
bird left its
vaguely dis tinct impress
ions on these snow-felt
fields of wind-breed
ing forget fulness.
Purifying needs (3)
a) After Auschwitz
the world
needs even more a beauti
fying poetry sound-sensing
the wind’s mo mentary timetouching ex pressivc
ness.
b) a light
snow scarce
ly purify ing our need
for a Christ mas of Christ’
s always be coming.
c)		Keat’s
timeless
truth of beauty’s re
curring need s to purify
the depthed- interior
s of our mostly dar
kening self.
Alena’
s lost friend
s at such an early age
unquieting the very-be
ing of her most-inward
self-imagin
mgs.
Grammar (for Warren) as the choice
of dresses re mains naked
ly uninhabi ted until re
dressed in a personing
self-dialog
ue.
Her way
As she al
ways had to have it her
way’s like a one-way
dead-ended
street.
She
always need
ed to tell you “the
truth” as if she’d become
totally in habited with
what couldn’ t have be
come other wise.
Handel’s Messiah (last mvt.)
slow amen-
fugue as pil grims ascend
ing securely be yond the final
ity of this world’s only
ground-levell ed short-time
ed truth
s.
“1 know that my redeemer liveth ” (Messiah-Job) intimate
ly so person ally-express
ing Christ’s universal
triumph over those self-de
termining fore es of sin evil
and even death.
Cranach’
s portrait
s lacking the spiritual
ly intense- realism of
Diirer while poetizing
the touch of hair-flow
and land scaping
those inter ior worlds of
personed-
place.
One doesn ’
t speak bad ly of the
dead because they may still
be listen ing in for
the after time’s un
easing rebut tal.
So-much-of answering (Robert Frost) The ambigu
ity of lang uage opens
out those so- many road
s (even the dusty-obscur
ed ones) in habiting the
many I’s we’ re becoming
so much a part of.
Many-jlagged
Friend
ship’s differ ing flags
hoisting a loft the chang
ing color s of our so
many person ed selved-be
ing.
When
the mind run
s quicker than the word’
s catching up on its
self-reali zing phrase
s.
The eas
ing snow
felt-down soft remem
brance s of a
time scarce ly brought-
to-mind.
Symphony HB 44 (Haydn last mvt.)
It began by
being voiced for an oncorn
ing rush of repeated
through-find
ings excess
ively thereabouts.
Piano Concerto 9 (Mozart k. 271, slowmvt.) as sadly
transform ing as a
snow-touch cd world
at the depth of its heartlevelling pulse.
Those uncommon
ly strange sound
s of religious- medieval music
bringing back- to-mind a
world turn ing about its
own far-away but religious
ly nearly- felt axis.
Those bright-
resounding sun-snow re
fleeting ac cords of win
ter’s more gracious
ly sensed-at tuning inter
ludes.
Living a
self-appeal
ing nightlife of e
qually attun ed artifi
cial light s went out
to those inner dark
nesses of time-fore
boding fear s.
Children’s games (Brueghel) as if they
could winter- down from its
death-threat ening pulse
to their own gameful
ly prepared pleasantr
ies.
Suddenly
in late Oct
ober snowed- into those
endless field s of time’
s accumulat ing thought
s.
Identities
The Jew-in-
mc histori cally bound
to that his tory of
high-rise
ghettoed
fears While my-Christian-
being remade through Christ’
s personal guide-
star.
This bare
ly touching
grasp-of-snow as the light-
fragrance of firstly-
felt spring flower
s.
Space only
realize
s its own- true-self
while con cealing
those oft: unspoken
thought s of our
s.
This house
at dark voice
lessly alive to its shadow
ed self-be coming near
ness.
So many
Renaiss
ance artist s have por
traited Jacob Fuggerthe
rich that he’ s become rich
ly endowed with those
many facets of his all-
too-familiar
facially-
tensed selfcertainty.
This winter
ed dawn
raised from the very-depth
s of these snow-accumu
lating still
nesses.
Some key
s while flee
ing for their very-life
are better lost or at
least no long er fit for
their refind ing lock.
Early morn
ing snow re
fleeting those untouch
ed moon-felt silence
They were
perhaps marr
ied to anoth er cause less
love-binding but more se
parately self- satisfying
realms of each-his-own.
Why gift
s when He has
given all E ven those orna
mentally expos ing “gifts”
of the orient al “kings”
only symbol ic of the long
ing forgive ness of His
kingly-priest ly realm.
The Lord’s
all-knowing
will and our less-sublime
freedom of choice Two
roads with only the one
invisibly
marked-off.
Snow
the child
hood of our time-awaken
ing dream
s.
Light-sensings (Advent poems) (2)
a) Night-
snow field
ing the wind s impercept
ively lightsensing.
b) Winter ed snow-se
eluding dis tances lightsensing him transpar
ently through.
Oboe Quartets (Vanhal)
If music can so de
light enchant ing even the
lesser train ed ears with
its appeal ing-persuas
ive fluenc ies Why must
it also be considered
“important”.
Gracean
apollonic
beauty refin ing man to
his god-like light-conceiv
ing origin
s.
He wanted so
much to say what he want
ed to say that at the
end only si lence could
answer that self-plead
ing unquiet ing voice
of his.
If after
years of soli
tary conceal ing at a
sudden al most unheard
moment of what she al
ways knew but never
dared touch the bloodstreams of his very-be
mg.
Is the still
life silence
prevading Van Eyck’s paint
ings inward ly contemplat
ing a newly- seen fully
realizing world or be
cause God’ s holy but
also unseen presence
can only be answered
in reveren ce of his
humanly un fathomable
being.
His unfind
ing future
wife needn’ t assemble
the inquiet ing beauty
of a woman ly warmth-
poise but created more
out of the i mage of his
mother’s
word-rush
ing emotion ally inhabit
ing idea- sense.
Advent-Christmas poems (5)
a)		Has Christ
ianity really
changed the world Only the
few his true disciple
s and their mapped-out
world His sc cretly-known
encompass ing plans.
b)		The world’
s still at
war with it self Even “The
Church” consum ed by world
ly lust In justice reign
s now as al ways before
Yet there’ s a hope as
singular as that single
star that guided those
foreign “king s” to a new
and always becoming.
c)		It’s only
because we’
ve failed as Jews as
Christian s that
that single star the e
ternal light of this world
in a heaven s full of
our over coming dark
nesses.
d)		If “the
sun also rise
s” it's be cause this
self-cnclos ing darkness
has been clos ed-otf as
that original chaos tamed
to its limit ed hold on
all our self- embracing
sins and weak nesses.
e)		Our always-now
It’s only
when that Christmas
becomes our always-now
that we can celebrate
that Christ mas through
Christ’s
timeless
ly self-re vealing.
When
“the church”
no longer triumphant
ly brought- down-to-size
realizing the Jewish
ness of Christ’ s calling to
a world (e vcn its own)
foreign to His very-
cause.
Some Christ
ians so heaven
ly climbing the daily hold
of that Jacob’ s ladder that
each private joy might
disconcert them from
that final so opportune
goal.
He wrote
that inner- tensing si
lence out in-to word
s delineat ing their
truly calm ing source.
The Marian
purity of
most medieval Christmas
songs Where as Christ (e
ven in en fant-human
form) untouch ably holy
almost un reachably
beyond man’ s earth-bound
but ascend mg light-
tonalit
ies.
Some women
so dominate
their domestic ally caged-
in husband s that even
the appropri ate key couldn’
t quite fit just-right
for all their emancipat
ing endeavor s.
These pearl-
like rain
drops shin ing na
kedly-held trees to a
shimmer ing remem
brance of their first
ly-felt leaf ed-touching
S.
beauty an cmpti
ness will soon overcome our
inward being realized
in light and purity and
sense.
A silence
before Christ
mas withhold ing what could
n’t be said as if our
words could imitate a my
stery of div mely-felt
calling
s.
Christmas Oratorio (Bach) (5)
a)		Bright
ly-recurr ing heaven
ly-aspiring
faith-intona
tions but then with soft
ening voice s a unity of
God’s purify ing glory and
mildly in voicing human
spirit.
b)		How often
must these
arias insist on repeat
ing a message we’ve long
since become fully intoned
for.
c)		For Bach
father of
20 children exploring
a mother’ s inward
ly caress ing gentle
ness more than the fin
est of music al-phrasing
d)		The choral
s answering
with one voice for and
with us that inexpress
ible mystery of The Lord’
s flesh-and- child-like be
comings.
e)		Each instru
ment individ ually invok
mg its own musical
faith-tonali
ties.
Her penetrat
ing look
ed right through the
flesh and bone of his
very-being louder express
ed than any words could
possibly
realize.
“We’re all a
like” he meant cultural
ly liberal Jews espous
ing mainly social caus
es with a feeling for
the poor though per
sonally mostly rich
ly endowed We’re all
that-alike he meant
I wasn’t.
Christmas
the birth of
the “new fain ily” in Christ
now more be holden to
that old same- fleshed fam
ilies’ drift ing slowly a
part.
At sea
They’d never
been at sea before with
those wide vistas of
wave and wind but now-felt
the chang ing tides of
their direct ionless
course.
Christmas Story (Heinrich Schiitz)
es’ simplici
ty purity and biblical word-
closeness of this mid-
30-years-war s longing for
a lasting peace only with
in the true realms of
Christ’s birth ed-through
redeeming pre sence.
Israel
survived
centurie s of Christ
ian misuse only because
“The stone death-breed
ing Law” kept it perpetual
ly alive to the hopes of
a messian ic return.
That bare-
open space
windowed a winter
ed empti ness of
light-touch ing precept
ions.
The Jewish-
Christian
s (Book of Acts) insist
ed on “The death-bring
ing law” for pagans to
firstly be come Jews
foreseeing
centurie
s ofjew- hate again
st the basis of their own
life-renew ing faith.
Israel
fashion
ably replac ing those out-
used forms of impending
Jew-hate “The Church” again
on the wrong side of its
world-redeem ing message.
The Adultress
They kept
their dis tance but
with stoneeyed revenge
against their own illicit-
desiring s of their
law-defying
ends.
“Sticks and
stones can break
my bones but words” eyed
with evil-in tent can strike
even deeper to the heart
of our own very-being.
Christmas Eve
Night-beginn
ing days (in the biblical
sense) can birth a light
even intens er than the
morning’ s self-reveal
ing bright nesses.
O Magnum Mysterium
Victoria’ s richness
ofsound- depth wave-
encompass ing spirit
ual here-be yondness.
Wed fees’
s highly color
ed spirit ual music mad
rigal-like
interchange
ably through- pulsing har
monie accord s.
Christmas
alone inhab
ited by an un fulfilling
though self- encompass
ing past mer ging into
the future now if no-
wheres-else.
Raphael
our retard
cd son rare ly focus
ing a music al intensity
of voiced- through pre
sence.
This old wood 1938
knotted with the pained-
scars of its freshly cut-
through
blood-scent.
This Christmas tree [for my Rosemarie) personal
ly no-wheres- other than
ours ornament ing a touch
ed-precision of intimate
light-aware
ness.
Candle
s forming
the inward flow of her
hands muted in light—as
cending pre sence.
“ When the
saints go march
ing in” left me through
a very unsaint ly if milit
ary impress ion of I’ll
keep my dis tant-waiting
for the quiet of His soli
tary call.
“O come all ye faithful”
A multi-cult
ural credo- hymn calling
together what’s un
known even to itself
their Bethle hem-longing
s.
At the zoo (9)
a)		Flamingo’
s long-length
preception s feet-fme
ly aspir mg.
b)		Tropical
ly multicol
oring fish swimming
through a soundless
sense-of-
case.
c)		Kangaroo
s hop-jump
ing an earthlike touch-
and-go.
d)		Lady-lion
ess’ eye-o pening her
comfort able winter-
sleep.
f)		The “wise-old-
owl’s constant ly look-out
appearan
ces.
g)		Penguin
s astute
ly form-em bracing
their mili tary-like
upholding as signment
s.
h)		The tiger
rhythmic
ally prowl ing the stripe
s-length of his instinct
ive forebod mgs.
i)		Giraffe
s measur
ing those a bandoning
heights of my untold si
lences with in.
j)		The broad-
sided expos ing rhinocer
os like rereading those
hidden page s of ancient
history.
More
Man knows
that he need s more Some
where beyond his mind’s
steadfast
grasping
through those last
ing tonalit ies of mood-
persuasion
s.
Thought-
poems need to
be clothed in the rhythmic
coloring s of their
self-evas ive but tin
denying ex posure
s.
These day’
s increas
ing bright ness of win
tor’s finali zing death-
calls.
That lone
street-light
dream-flow
ing through its fathom
less being.
These naked
winter branch
es dead-a live to their
timeless-breed ing light-call
mgs.
A lone
lithe bird
branch-touch ing its wing
ed coloring light-sourc
es.
These out
seeing in win
dows reclaim ing time’s
voiceless
release.
Not even
this less-in
voking celes tial moon
could dare en lighten these
down-bred win ter’s immers
ing dream s.
Learning
the lesson
s of history is like re
reading its used-out
yellow page s.
Can one o
vercome gen
eration s of recycl
ing other wise exper
iences.
Aron
wording him
self back with that lithe
ness of foot- from those
years of va cant express
IGiiIiCSS.
Alena
at 10 color
ing in those phases of
life-see ing what’s
becoming that elus
ively-now.
A Raphael
Madonna so
softly and secretly inre
vealing His many facial
certainty of that way
and no o ther.
He
was a one-place
one-time kind of per
son no extra s or expend
able aside s as a wo
man without frills or rib
bons but as much herself
by simply be ing there.
Checked-out
A poem must
be diligent ly checked-
out its col ored shadow
ings the pulse of its
rhythmic ap peal and if
the way of saying it’
s no other wise than
that.
“Keeping up appearances”
so much thor
oughly so un til she began
to appear o therwise
than that keeping-up-
for.
Car light
s sudden
ly illumin ating these
tidal realm s of dark
ness.
Playing with fire
Most child
rcn should know that play
ing with fire’ s a forbidd
en game for those burn
ing needs of self-find
ings.
Night
only happen
s to help in tensely des
cribe the origin s of light’
s persist ent calling
s.
Still-standing
So dark that
I couldn’t appear the
house across- the-way must
have been there’s no
proof stillstanding?
Unnamed person
She forgot
his name but remember
ed so distin ctly as if
it was yester day still
more about his unnamed
person.
Tunelessly
Recalling
what happen edthen
(those year s of child
hood’s forgott en memories)
As if time had forgott
en as well self-releas
mg its time lessly-now.
Caught-
fish’s brill
iantly design ing the sur
face of the face of its
darkening
deep.
New Year (3)
s celebrat
ing die e vcr-morc of
those lost and irretriev
able time’ s past.
New Year
s and termin
ably ill (aren’t we
all) a
feared his
time was running it
self out.
New Year
s still too
young to e ven realize
the full-leng th of a year’
s becoming as those blank-
opening page s indelib
ly marked to their
only-now.
He
neither
game nor Friend-orien
ted never fully realiz
ed those child hood year
s roman tized for
his child ren’s hard
ly growing out to a world
(much to that other-side-
of self) s really being
s.
My father’
s “long
long trail a winding” in
to the Ameri can dreamed
out without c ver really
facing-up to those un
mirroring
self-inclin
ing persuas ions of his.
How often
so many good-
wishing par ents living
through their child ren’s so o therwise
ness from their-own
A bleak
December
day’s flurr ied-snow
neither here nor there
as some duly- awared child
ren quick to their so-be
ing other wise.
He
always had
to be the- best But
when he failed his
driver’s test a third
time They found him at
the bottom less pit of
that stoned- down quarry.
The snow
birthed
through those silent-
distant cloud s leaving be
hind only realms of
their untouch able remembr
ances.
A snow-
certain day
brightly ass uring its
time-holding
presence.
These
slight birdlike impress ions in snow
barely deciph ering their
own sense-for- touch.
It’s those
fore-felt
feelings of what’s not
certain
ly known that
awaken world s of imagin
ary sound-dis tancing
s.
Some friend
s (however
distanc ing in time
or even space) remain close
to their al ways having-
been while still-being
there.
Meeting
them the first
(and perhap s) last time
more like chang ing trains
at mid-stop to those cur
rents of dif fering dir
ection
s.
Only pain
can consume
the more of us than we
could possi bly have
realized
before.
Re-creat
ing in mind
of those pla ces we’ve
been no more moods a ton
ality of dis tant express
iveness.
A. B.’
s shutdown world of self-ex
elusive ly withhold
ing.
A house
freshly pain
ted either realizes
its once- sense-of-be
ing or cover s over more
than it could right
ly clarify.
snow con
tinuing its deepening
life-breath ed silence
s.
He was there
in the back of the car
because he’ d been there
for almost a week But now
only by sha dowing some
still darken ing paths of
my self-con cealing past.
Snow
breeds a self-
creating si lence the way
of first flow erings as
it time had just discover
ed its true blossoming
s here.
Blood-cries
It was the
poor humble disinherit
ed that they crucified
with Christ Have their
blood-cries been heard on
the way for Israel’s com
mg redempt ion.
The rain
s came o
ver night washed the
last remnant s of snow a
way those lost memorie
s of an un told ever-dis
tancing time- sense.
It’s too
late now for
The Church to cleanse
itself of a guilt gnawing
at the very- basis of its
own sense-for- being.
Time-alert
Sunrise January 1
2012 not a sound left
in sight he’ d slept
through those soft
pillows com forting a
lingering fear always
there but now time-alert.
How much
(or little)
do facial ex pression
s person an unseen (but
rarely account able) past.
A lost poem
(perhaps one
amongst many) either part
ly conceiv ed but never
written- through or
lost in a crowd of o
thers (as many of us)
trying in vain to find-
back that spec ially attuned
voice-of-its
own.
How many
interchange
able faces however separ
ately color ed can we
claim as our-own gen
uinely person ed.
Talk shows talk them
selves out until words
become as cheaply sover
eign as a monarch sell
ing his king dom for a
single horse.
“A cheap forgiveness” (Bonhoeffer) The ever-
smiling church always well-
wishing attun ed to a common
place forgive ness at the
cost of its own unreconcil
ing guilt.
Smiles (5)
a)		Those a siatics
smiling their
self-conceal ing secret-
access.
b)		Those prepar
ed papering-
smiles she brought to
the threshold of her await
ing client
s.
c)		Smiling as
a seductive
means of en ticing their
more or less innocent
prey.
d)		The natural
and good smile
of present ing oneself
pleasing ly there.
c) Smiling at
being amused
but not quite to those swell
ing boundar ies of hearty-
laughter.
Cello Concerto 7 (Karl Stamitz slow nwt.) The emptied
well depthed with more
than that un speakable
sadness could hold.
A moon
less night
irretriev ably dens
ed as a for est held-within
the scope of its self-en
closing dark nesses.
Can I
freshly ex
perience those flesh-
enduring Ren oirs or Degas’
finely-felt dance step
s knowing now their anti-semet
ic anti-Dreyfus antipathic
Some
thing miss
ing as a cross-word
puzzling a vacant-empti
ness or a room with
out your be ing at the o
ther-side of feeling my
self complete ly there.
Lois at 78
from all
sides lessen ed from her
tenuous hold- on-life Loss
of friend s and health’
s declin ing certain
ties.
Doris
at the age
of Lee’s death (81) widow
ed to a glass house of self-
reflect ing loneli
ness.
Poetry books by DavidJaffin
1.		Conformed to Stone, Abelard-Schuman, New York 1968, London 1970.
2.		Emptied Spaces, with an illustration by Jacques Lipschitz, Abelard-Schuman, London 1972.
3.		In the Glass of Winter, Abelard-Schuman, London 1975, with an illustration by Mordechai Ardon.
4.		As One, The Elizabeth Press, New Rochelle, N. Y. 1975.
5.		The Half of a Circle, The Elizabeth Press, New Rochelle, N. Y. 1977.
6.		Space of, The Elizabeth Press, New Rochelle, N. Y. 1978.
7.		Preceptions, The Elizabeth Press, New Rochelle,
N. Y. 1979.
8.		For the Finger’s Want of Sound, Shearsman Plymouth, England 1982.
9.		The Density for Color, Shearsman Plymouth,
England 1982.
10.		Selected Poems with an illustration by Mordechai Ardon, English/Hebrew, Massada Publishers, Givatyim, Israel 1982.
11.		The Telling of Time, Shearsman, Kentisbeare,
England 2000 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
12.		That Sense for Meaning, Shearsman, Kentisbeare, England 2001 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
13.		Into the timeless Deep, Shearsman, Kentisbeare,
England 2003 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
14.		A Birth in Seeing, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2003 and Johannis, Lahr, Germany.
15.		Through Lost Silences, Shearsman, Exeter,
England 2003 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
16.		A voiced Awakening, Shearsman, Exter, England 2004 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
17.		These Time-Shifting Thoughts, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2005 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
18.		Intimacies of Sound, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2005 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
19.		Dream Flow with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2006 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
20.		Sunstreams with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2007 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
21.		Thought Colors, with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearsman, Exeter. England 2008 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
22.		Eye-Sensing, Ahadada, Tokyo, Japan and Toronto, Canada 2008.
23.		Wind-phrasings, with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2009 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
24.		Time shadows, with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2009 andjohannis, Lahr, Germany.
25.		A World mapped-out, with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearman, Exeter, England 2010.
26.		Light Paths, with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearsman, Exeter, England 2011 and Edition Wortschatz, Schwarzenfeld, Germany.
27.		Always Now, with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearsman, Bristol, England 2012 and Edition Wortschatz, Schwarzenfeld, Germany.
28.		Labyrinthed, with an illustration by Charles Seliger, Shearsman, Bristol, England 2012 and Edition Wortschatz, Schwarzenfeld, Germany.
Book on DavidJaffm’s poetry: Warren Fulton, Poemed on a beach, Ahadada, Tokyo, Japan and Toronto,
Canada 2010.
“David Jaffm is a scrupulous weigher and weighter of words — by which I mean that a poem is, for him, always a matter of collaboration with the true spirit of the language. Every word is given its value, neither more nor less.”	Edward Lucie-Smith
“David Jaffm’s Preceptions is a fine book. Jaffin’s poem, slight on the page, entice, engage, amuse. Yet their brief touchings often reach wholeness, and they are poems of philosophical consequence out of keeping with much of modern poetics. The poems catch perceptions in the act of happening, to be, the short-line verse appropriate to what becomes.”
Paul Ramsey, The Sewance Review
“Jaffm’s poetry is as ‘modernist’ as abstract painting while still poetry in the traditional sense, whose purpose is the verbalization of basic human experience and whose form derives from a serious exploration of language ... it is remarkable what depth of experience Jaffm manages to relate through his severely limited vocabulary and imagery.” Victor Terras (Brown University)
“Mr. Jaffm uses words with a real fineness of diction which emphasizes a characteristic understatement of emotion. One recognizes a cultivated sensibility. He adopts a theme and mode which one cannot help but admire. He writes very well indeed.”	the late Norman Holmes Pearson (Yale University)
“Jaffin’s Through Lost Silences offers a rare display of manifold poetic variety. Succinct and challenging enforcers of new insights and deeper understanding, his poems soar in far higher realms than those of prosaic description and rational analysis ... There is sincerity and conviction in Jaffm’s crisp, multi- sensory poeticisation of ideas. Existential and philosophical shapings of language, simple and complex at the same time, draw out the true nature of his chosen subjects in an original way overwhelming the faint echoes of older poetic traditions and leaving behind profound aftertaste of experiences lived through for the first time.”	Edward Batley (University of London)
“David Jaffm is a master of the restained but purposeful statement. If his poems do not have quite the briefness of the haiku, they have a good deal of its light-dark inflection and rounded perfection of form ... Jaffins’s poems almost always give an impression of light ‘light reflecting light’. The fact is that if one wants restraint and elegance, he will find it in abundance here. Jaffm’s subtleties are, in short, dazzling.”
The Library Journal on Conformed to Stone
978184861287790000
ISBN 978-1-84861-287-7
www.shearsman.com ISBN 978-1-84861-287-7