Tweeting a suburban wandering

I went into town recently (one of the major cities in Israel), and had many interesting experiences on my trip. I tweeted about some of them. Here's a list.

A pretty but very 'dead-faced' girl sitting on the bus:


her smoothest face / 
to hide behind, until / 
betrayed / 
it slit with lines and broke / 
into a smile.
(tweet)

... and in haiku form:

lipstick plastic pink /\
face unearthly smooth and flat /\
pretty in her shell
(tweet)

... a bus meditation:

sitting still on rumbling bus.
thoughts rolling under the roar.
wondering, wondering: a silent chasm cloaks me.
(tweet)

... on the bus was a very tired-looking old man who sat opposite me:

I saw the old man /
droop and fade /
slump and shrink /
eyes dim /
face grim. /
so tired; so old and tired.
(tweet)

... the sun hit my eyes as the bus turned and moved:

the sun skipped out from behind a tree, blinded me;
I closed my eyes, dark inside, felt collapse calling me.
(tweet)

... the sitting writer, an island in the swirling masses of humanity moving past around him:

he sat and swirled it all around;
ducked out of the race and watched it all go by;
pen in hand, open sparkling eye.
(tweet)

... and a musician trying out a guitar in a shop window:

sat young man /
behind glass shine /
strings in hand /
faraway eyes /
dance his fingers /
watchers pine /
walking by.
(tweet)

writing jam/rainy day - part 1

Making muddle of baking puddles, screaming curdles with bitter whey.
Climbing a ladder of I don't want to be here, crunching an apple, in the uncomfortable constant of whirligig roundabout change. Castles in the air, a ferris wheel with flapping legs; safety bar to hem you in, protect your head from falling out, out -- smack onto the tarred concrete, the bubbled cobbles, the unfriendly sharp-stoned flatspread, pierced deep with the mighty roots of steel.

---
I wrote this piece, and its continuation, on a heavily rainy day.

A Way to Make You Smile

Here's some simple - but perhaps profound - words. Not mine.

I've found a way to make you,
I've found a way --
A way to make you smile

I read bad poetry
Into your machine.
I save your messages
Just to hear your voice.
You always listen carefully
To awkward rhymes.
You always say your name,
Like I wouldn't know it's you,
At your most beautiful.

Yes, this is from 'At My Most Beautiful', by the great R.E.M.
Give it a listen.

Actually I always thought it was describing a guy trying to get a reaction from his beloved, who was hooked up to medical machines, perhaps in a coma.
Reading the lyrics, I see it's not about that. It's just about leaving a message on someone's message machine.
But the simple sadness in the music is profound at any rate.

who'd have thought?

who'd have thought
    the man could teach me?

my soul-calming river-rushing moments came back to me,
and I relaxed, and let down my walls
to look beyond his smell and his shabbiness.

and then he began to sing. I coaxed myself to be calm,
to remain opened, to look beyond...
perhaps he's one of the hidden ones,
who challenge us to see greatness, if only we will look deeper,
look beyond...

he sang an ancient melody,
and it warmed my soul, as I sat there motionless,
listening, and keeping down my guard.

he sang and the holiness in what he flickered towards,
in what he aspired towards,
touched me and soothed my soul with comfort.

I wondered after he had gone -
and I barely knew what to wonder.

The Pain ("Killing Me Softly")

A poem about expressing what's truly inside, and how that process can be sparked by music. Inspired greatly by the song, "Killing Me Softly." For more info, see the footnoote.

And the pain
Speaks, in the space between;
where the buildings loom not, and the trees sit in the lonely silent emptiness;
where space flowers and spreads,
germinating in a cloud borne on swirling wind.

The pure pain
speaks out, vision spoken out on prophet's tongue,
played through, on fingers of the musical mathematicians,
sung out, sung out gently,
in throats of foggy-grouped singers.

The pain
Slips ballroom sideways,
in that agonizing quiet grace,
bare of the vulgar matted overgowns,
coats and wraps,
screens and veils:

The pain
tears at its onlookers's heart,
upon his eyes' fall to it, lying naked in its pooling blood,
ghastly face to be once beheld
and never forgotten:

The pain
becomes eye-flowingly beautiful
in its plain simplicity,
in the consequence of simple step after
simple step;

She dances
in simple grace;

The beautiful pain
Is too much to bear.
-----------------------

This is a song, inspired by a song, inspired by a song.
I was in someone's car today, and heard a cover of the beautiful song, "Killing Me Softly."

As Wikipedia tells it, Singer/songwriter Lori Lieberman saw Don McLean singing his composition "Empty Chairs" in concert. Afterwards, Lieberman wrote a poem titled "Killing Me Softly with His Blues", which became the basis for the song written by Norman Gimbel and Charles Fox.

I listened to Roberta Flack's (Grammy-winning) version of the song just now, and it really moved me in its simplicity; in its directly described pain and anguish. As I interpret it, the songwriter expresses the dumbfounding, bewildering, overpowering experience of having her emotions and deepest, most inner experiences suddenly laid bare by a stranger:

... And there he was, this young boy
A stranger to my eyes
Strumming my pain with his fingers
Singing my life with his words
Killing me softly with his song
Killing me softly with his song
Telling my whole life with his words
Killing me softly with his song...

She speaks of her intense discomfort at being laid emotionally bare: vulnerable and helpless, at the mercy of the "young boy" with the words that penetrated into her heart like a knife:

I felt all flushed with fever
Embarrassed by the crowd
I felt he found my letters
And read each one out loud
I prayed that he would finish
But he just kept right on

Strumming my pain with his fingers
Singing my life with his words
Killing me softly with his song

I really found there was a lot of pure, frank emotion expressed in this song. A lot of pain.
And that inspired me to write my poem above. Joining as a link in the chain of songs...

Don McLean ("Empty Chairs") -> Lori Lieberman ("Killing Me Softly With His Blues") -> Charles Fox & Norman Gimbel ("Killing Me Softly With His Song") [Performed by Roberta Flack] -> Me ("The Pain")

To really get my poem, I recommend you read it while you have "Killing Me Softly With His Song" play in the background. That's what I did as I wrote it.

singled out late

and there they all stand
already begun,
and here I come,
late and the clock ticks with every step
I take, making me late, making me late.

the shame and the pain
of sticking out so plainly,
in front of them all,
in front of them all, innocently guiltless,
passively okay, done nothing wrong,
all's good, all's fine,
but who's this guy
coming up late? who does he think he is,
bringing up late?
can bend the rules? disobey
what we all keep to?

who said he can be late?

and the unthought thoughts,
that I plaster onto their foreheads,
brewed and fomented,
frothed and hydrated
in the panic of my fevered mind
crash cymbally onto my face,
into my ears,
and my pain mounts, I am chastened
by
myself in the lonely silence
of coming late and
sticking out so sorely,
like
a bruised thumb.

---
Image from here.

graffiti -> kids

my answer to graffiti is
have kids.

so you're concerned;
something inside you pecks at
the transience of your brief time here:
in this school, in this tunnel,
in this freaking world.

so you want
to feel safe in knowing
that your name will be remembered,
that your memory will linger on 
-- such strange common thoughts
in the soul of a party-lifed teen --
wanna feel comfortably legacied,
not for nothing have you suffered your existence.

so you take your name,
carve it,
dip it,
paint it,
scratch it,
they won't forget, no, you won't pass on
pass by into blankness,
into unexistence, no;
your name will outlast your presence.

my answer to graffiti is
have kids

have a kid who'll
know you, who'll experience you,
who'll learn to know your name,
who'll be planted with some of your very soul,
who'll live on with it long
after you move on out,
long
after you pass on by,
long after they paint over your
carved, sprayed, etched name
with a new coating of
plastic for the new kids who'll
never read it, never see it, never know
who you were.

become a real-life legend,
not a label of a name, connection forgotten,
context overwritten,
faded into the dusty oblivion
of time and time and passing time.

be brave, and live life,
beyond a brief etching.
become the legend
you want remembered,
and pass on your awesomeness
to generations to come.

my answer to graffiti is
have kids

---
Image adapted from here.

suddenly I'm overcome

and suddenly it fills me,
thrills me,
bleeds my heart open, all revealed of a sudden;
tears spring to escape, push to dive
out of the corners of my eyes:
suddenly I'm overcome.

and now I have
images in my mind,
sounds ringing, ringing in my ears.
I've got the sweet saddest guitar of years ago
coming at me, in to my heart;
suddenly I'm overcome.

now I just want to cry,
throat burns, as it all bursts forth.
cry? why? I
don't know; don't know the tune
of the song singing in my soul, the melody that bursts, now,
bursts out, aching to be set free:
suddenly I'm overcome.

and now I ask myself,
as the crowding of the crusty outside noise
comes sliding back like mud,
over bare exposed cracks of
soul,
what I'm going to do,
what to do
with this song in my soul,
with these words, this tune, this pain;
I ask myself, but - stop thinking! - here come tears:
suddenly I'm overcome.

I don't know!
I don't know what it is, that's got my heart aching, bursting,
got my eyes streaming,
so full, so full of
... something...

suddenly,
I'm overcome.

---
Just a small note: this really happened. Helped to have some amazingly emotive and heart-tugging old folk music playing.

your selfishness; my pants

selfish
or just blind to the thought
that other people may exist,
beyond your own eyes and Freuded wants.

I left my pants, harmlessly hanging,
neatly creased, doing you no harm.
You want the bed, so you take my clothes
and dump them in a creasy crumple.

I understand you want the bed.
But what
did I ever do to you?
what did my clothes ever
do to you? that you drop them like that

and the added kick
of the fact that in the end,
you never did take the stupid bed
frustrates me just a little more.

Inspiration: Leo Buscaglia

Here are some powerful quotes from Leo Buscaglia.
What I've read of his works, and what I've seen quoted from him, is often highly inspirational. Never mind inspiration, I do believe the man knew what he was talking about, and that the world is in desperate need of his kind of teachings.

What love we've given, we'll have forever. What love we fail to give, will be lost for all eternity.

So true. And what a change from our readily accepted definition of "love" as being something that "does it for me".

Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow, it only saps today of its joy.

True, isn't it? Here are some more.

Your talent is God's gift to you. What you do with it is your gift back to God.

Love is life. And if you miss love, you miss life.

Love is always open arms. If you close your arms about love you will find th
at you are left holding only yourself.

Only the weak are cruel. Gentleness can only be expected from the strong.

The easiest thing to be in the world is you. The most difficult thing to be is what other people want you to be. Don't let them put you in that position.

What I find beautiful about these sayings is that they're so simple, yet so deeply true. Why don't more people talk like this?
-----
The quotes are from this page. I found a brief description of Leo Buscaglia and his approach on this page. Happy reading

glued

glued to the screen, yeah,
you know what I mean.

outside the sun dances all along the horizon,
but that doesn't touch me.

inside my face flickers, two-step in time with the tiniest pixels,
flushing and pulsing,
washing me with eery palest light.

inside I slowly
wither and die,
get old and dry,
and my back slips out, shoulder droop
to where they shouldn't go.

outside things go on, life carries along,
people love and hate and dance and sing and cry and get
frustrated,
anguished,
pained!

but,
inside I am at one
with the gentle constant hum,
glued to the screen,
you know what I mean,
slowly dying in the unearthly zombie silence.