All that is Impermanent

The sky holds all that is impermanent

in the eye’s reflection.

Like infinite sand grains

a gaze through the

stained glass illusion

that if anything stays true

to the way we remember it,

it is in the quintessences.

If the pain of loss is

an empty beach,

the pounding surf is

soundtrack to all that is out of reach.

The tranquil intervals that

swim through the inner reef

are carried away

on waves of

galloping horses and white spray.

A distortion to the veneer

that faith makes

surface over

all that is unclear.

The sea ,the source of

both reverence and fear.

A clash of cymbals reveal

a pair of swallows

from the deepest recesses

of symbolic release.

A swoop and a figure eight

to trace memory,

to find a face in the waves

stranded like a moon

still plain in daylight.

Years later it still remains,

smooth as a shell

over the sea

symmetrical

as a drop of water,

a pule lehua landing

on the wild naupaka.

Each thread of cloud

ushers in the change.

Light and shadow,

the interplay of branches,

in the totality a sway

and the cut of a blade

that touches

but does not alter

the horizon or

the immensity of space.

The world has swallowed us

in this place of benevolent delusion.

The elements lending themselves

to the spirit’s intrusion

between moments

layered like dreams

over the creative streams

cascading like sand

into the fissures

of impermanent footprints.

Textures, Gestures

Textures, gestures

into the time lapse

haze of morning,

the spontaneous eruptions

of clouds forming within

what appears static and glass

reflecting the easiest passage

around obstruction.

A break in the rocks ,instruction,

swift action

to balance the rigidity

of thoughts

disguised as wisdom.

Sinking somewhere

unconscious

beneath the surface,

the river stones

smooth as tear drops,

far flung and sinking

deep within an archipelago of

birds singing.

Flecks of light like candles,

shadows and their cave mouths commingling,

each motion creates words

reinforced by moonlight

even after the flames of meaning die.

Textures, gestures,

the eyes in a painting.

Faces in the falls,

rock walls,

the profiles of angels in miniature,

ascending

from cracks and fissures

like the first idle thoughts

that spread

from Le’ahi to Koko head,

lighting

the first spark defiant rim

that holds all the dark within

a cloud fabric’s

somber poem.

Underscoring the bedding,

thresholds in the wedding,

dawn and dark,

a consummation in time.

It comes to penetrate the mind’s

El Greco sky.

Bridging storm clouds

with white shrouds of calm

in the perfectly

swirling turbulence that

contrast unites

in the overtures of this day

in what endures of this night

along the edges of impermanence.

you become aware of it

only as it changes again.

Thoughts and Rain

It begins with the wind

the tickling of chimes

a prelude to the rain

that unwinds

from this fabric of anticipation.

From Kolowalo

the sheets descending

in lost silver sentiments

with no beginning and no ending.

Corresponding thoughts

intervals of rain

a tapa cloth

left out to dry in vain.

Where the smallest drops accumulate

all the things that pass.

Still in your grasp,

yesterday’s papers

soaked through with words

of temporary relief

all the patchwork parched earth

experiences nourishment

though brief and never permanent,

a wet embrace won’t be held for long.

These sentiments,

rivulets of mist

left to describe

what swirls, breaks and disintegrates.

It is worthy to venerate,

in essence

this passage without pursuit,

a luminescence caught in street lamps,

a disappearing moon.

Nothing is fixed in the veritable fog.

When the rain stops

pendulous drops still

cling to wires like

amorphous fingers

plucking stringed instruments,

all the silent notes falling

to the pavement below.

Clouds pass over

the obscured picture.

The memory of an ancestor

drawn out by the scent

of wet bark and ginger,

nameless musk

in the movement of streams

that subterranean rush

of acoustic drains

and neon dusk

dreams stained

wet streets of smeared ink

unintelligible

in windshield silk screens.

The wipers cleared

the glass beads

of surface sweat

and heartbeat

in rhythm with the rain

over and over again.

The sudden deluge,

immersion

and then becoming.

Making a Painting of Memory

To process the unavoidable

in the best spirit possible,

in light of all that cannot be

so easily let go.

Childhood landmarks

for so long enclosed and tended,

like a terraced garden

in the yard that grows smaller

as you grow older

and the outside world leans closer and closer.

The oak trees that stood watch and held hawks,

were helplessly felled by the years to come.

Will there be any left to land

when houses pass hands

and open space becomes a commodity?

Progress fails to mention the casualties

of feathers and roots beneath tire marks

when expansion becomes Walmarts

on the outskirts of bulldozer scars.

What will become of our own shangri-la?

In my mind undisturbed,

the backdrop of table and rock stack

forms the rough hewn first layer of the terrace,

preserved there in this parallel existence,

weighted against the swirling impermanence

that moves in like a storm.

In years to come who will sit on the porch

just to smell the rain,

relieved that the parched earth will drink again?

Will subsequent visits find the inevitable weeds and overgrown grass

where dahlias once passed summers between the fences?

Will they still enclose all of the references

when obscured by ivy and choked with vine?

All the memories like scattered leaves

that the wind interweaves with the present,

gather at the base of the hill in a sodden pile

with no one to reconcile.

There remains some vivid colors.

My grandfather in his red sweater

that matches his glass of wine,

sitting beneath caps,

with hands folded permanently at that table in time.

Where are the kids of the neighborhood,

who made strongholds of foundations

and built forts by the old pine?

Who climbed fences with ease,

knowing every inch of these quarters.

They probably have their own sons and daughters,

strung out on screens,

did they sacrifice their sense of adventure

to growing older in the American dream?

I listen for the voices of kids playing outside.

Will there be any left to call in by streetlight?

Any dog racing up the hill first freed from the leash?

Whatever light is left can only emphasize

the emptiness of dead end streets,

shadows filling in the contours of rooms

where once paintings lined walls

to distinguish the decades,

extinguished as darkness falls.

I can still hear the sound of our footsteps on the creaking stair,

the cacophony of our lives behind the walls of Evelyn,

where our voices and movements have settled in

like a barely audible whisper beneath the passage of time.

I can still make a painting of memory

to temper my mind

into distinguishing all these changes

from what will endure.

Like a Mark still Visible

Like a mark still visible

after the rain

the light in yin, the shade in yang

a moment’s reflection,

an obscure meeting,

the temporal sky

the armored sea

merging in alchemy.

Shadowplay through a pinched valley,

a quality of light

that will not last on the surface

but goes down

like a ship in a storm,

a squall and a gasp,

the drowned dead on driftwood raft

to isolated coasts abiding tides

feasting bonfires, glowing eyes,

the glinting edge of river carved lines.

Moors illuminated

cliff face that finds

lifting veils, precipitous falls,

gathering cloud stalls

on cathedral peaks, impermanent.

In the pasture the meditative calm

of watchful sheep

against wild hills unsheathed.

Wind works through the imagination,

through trees that bend,

disintegrate on piper’s notes

that find you in the end

impermanent.

Akin to smoke

off the surface of lakes

early light through the steam

of sipping dark coffee

and dream

for an hour, the writer

ponders the theme

from a corner,

a chronicle in the change

of action into thought,

each becoming the other

shadow absorbed

into the white walls of its lover.

The message of marks

destined to be erased

is the beauty

in what does not last permanently.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Red Petals of Remembrance

When a bead of rain

within the outstretched palm of a fragile flower

becomes infused with light,

it is a butterfly being plucked away by the wind.

As it begins its climb, you observe its significance,

like a ray in the sky beaming directly

towards that sublime height.

Like a ring in the eclipse,

you’re transfixed on the other side

needing certain eyes to perceive

what it briefly reveals of shadow.

The ocean, like a vast blanket of patience,

receives our red petals of remembrance,

grasping for words, let loose and

inching forwards with radiant acceptance

in the swirling chaos of everyone’s remorse.

As you push towards the void that peers

through a transparent film of tears,

you can see within

all of the sorrow and reverberation.

This raw material evaporates

like a mist from a wave that hits you head on,

like a train from out of nowhere

pulling you from the comfort of your own

and into the sudden intrusion

of unkempt and uncontrolled emotion.

Grasping for empathy in the recesses the past processes.

Red flame, like a blade that cuts through regret

at what you could not change,

seared into an embrace of impermanence,

slow dance between the living and what is pending.

Witness the last breath,

like the receding of the ocean’s edge,

that uneven line of lengthening tide pulled tight,

until the pale face of the horizon’s sky

settles into the grey of night.

A peaceful process, this loss of light

in the turbulent spaces of holding on.

The beeping of machines

shifts to swarths of green beneath majestic peaks,

prompting a transformation in those of us there to witness

the simplicity of workers turning dirt,

different machines now laying him in the earth,

a reunion of sorts

beginning with white cranes

who come to usher his spirit away.

 

 

In Memory of Ka Yick Yu

7/25/40- 12/2/17

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Clear Isle

For those who the beacon was a beginning,
coffin ship sailors,
for many it was simultaneously an end.
You’ll have to decide
letting the unseen guide
and manage the rest.
Even amidst the trials of travel
one is blessed.
With wind in the hood
and rain dripping from a pack,
pause in your tracks
above coves and inlets
and behold this wayward stroke,
the road making its way
through a grove of spring gold,
this draft of the unknown
is told to the sea
rippling below Baltimore
where thoughts foam
where momentum of will
can roam all the way to Clear Isle,
where not much is said
between the whisper of wind in the grass
and the hush of the calm sea
beneath the tranquility of its landscape.
Distraction seems shaved from shear cliffs.
The spirit remains to walk bends in the high pastureland,
known to the sheep and their wizened expressions
of pastoral eloquence,
the quiet, immediate to access,
to ask “Have we changed or receded backwards?”
Towards this backwoods in time.
Time, that stood still as a Yew tree
the steady boughs
through which the wind at night manifests itself in howls,
where nothing determines or obstructs
the land from the sea,
where the Fastnet Beacon decrees its light
to flash across the sky in illuminated intervals
like lightning enlightening utter darkness with caresses,
furtive expressions of something haunted and otherworldly.

Clear is an island of amorphous green,
seeming to punctuate the extremes,
thatched stone and endless sky,
scenes to include the migratory
who thrive along edges,
beyond walls and expectations
we anticipate crossroads and come and go.
The essence of our nature is continuous, eternal,
but parallel paths seem choked with doubt,
muddled by pursuit
of power and influence,
it is a river running red until drought,
it is the ego’s omnipresence fed the marrow of dreams,
its shadow is larger than it seems,
constructing its fascade,
wall by wall,
we’ll rebuild it,
brick by brick
after every fall,
nothing remains permanently
whether completed
all will dissolve,
all is cleared here,
in the wake of impermanence and dissolution,
I cast a clear eye on Clear Isle.

Canvass Transparency

Focusing on a point in-between

all the moments that came and will be.

A blank canvass

for the transparent vision

that if not for these columns

would be a decline into confusion.

A pondering of illuminated strands

stretched and torn

where hobbies are born out of the illusion

of sewing them back together.

A life picked apart.

A progression that picks up art

as it goes

until the last breath poses the question,

“What is left and what is worth bringing?”

For a collector of scenes,

becoming aware

of how they thread themselves into dreams,

like a canvass transparency

so that light can filter through in words,

a luminescent dial pointed towards this possibility.

With spasms of inspiration,

like an electric current,

climbing the spine.

A direct circuit

that feeds into the divine,

shines like a beacon’s light

across the night to suspend time,

like a bridge that connects no land.

 

The sun returns to fill in the cracks

between the cold and the blanket.

You feel eternity in the warmth alone,

when prone to consider

the thin veil between us.

Most days you lay hidden in variable weather.

So seeking diversion elsewhere,

you try to forget her.

Like a divergent thought

splitting paths

leaving traces

like shadow on the open spaces

or skin on the pillows of cloud,

a canvass, transparent

passing without a sound.

Another curve suddenly,

with no segway

(distant railroad whistles)

Only the lonely longing

that is evident in a melancholy heart

bound to an excess of feeling.

Warming to a kind of spontaneous animation,

the dancing flames,

the wrist that weaves its keening

into addresses and names.

It is stamped with a charred scent,

another goodbye,

post cards from a starter fire

inspires impermanence

with a burnt edge and a piece of paper.

Drifting up with sparks of insight,

dancing flecks moving aimless

into the dark of the night.

Fireflies in oblivion

you could almost grasp

as the last gasp of the hearth

crackles for all it is worth

in an amphitheater of shadows.