Posts tagged ‘poem’

March 14, 2012

Lazy

by jhon baker

and I look and think – I have not been so lazy but distracted by depression and various ideations which has led to some poetry and other rambling thoughts. This year has been a low of the past several where I have had little published and little written – even a rejection of what may be my best poem – alas! am I not a poet? am I only pretending? Is this ultramarine coloring my beard all in vain? no, I forget how subjective this field is and the whims and moods of a reader are as important as the whims and moods of the writer – or nearly so.
I hold no grudge.

I write anyway.

I am compelled by the narrator. the genius in the corner. the voice of the winds. or it could be the mania.

 

I prefer an easterly sun

 

I prefer an easterly sun before I go to bed.

I prefer a smashed finger before a project is finished.

I prefer coffee hot.

I prefer sex sweaty.

I prefer a major fourth under a sharp sixth.

I prefer to lie on my back in the gutter, looking out to the stars.

 

Cassiopeia

Ophiuchus

Ursa minor

 

these are things of dreams and sailor visions

 

– Hoc Scripsi

 

March 13, 2012

poem

by jhon baker

skies painted dioxazine, phthalocyanine,
violet, prussian, phthalo blues and greens
cerulean and sunkissed naples yellow

portraits of madmen at 35 and aging
midnight scenes on the arroyo
crossing the black waters of Lethe
held fast to the stern

I have ultramarine oils
smeared across my forehead
because of you

butterflies in my beard
and cadmium red
staining my fingertips
because of you

we have met under porches
moonlit nights
waltzing, caroling

my heart has broken
handheld and shopped for nothings
with birds singing
and faces picked up in backyards

 

– Hoc Scrispi

March 11, 2012

a poem

by jhon baker

This is intended to be read aloud – read quietly to your self and you may miss the point.

 

 

I am Lazarus

 

walking from the car

to the doctors office,

I am Lazarus.

sick, shaking, agitated,

waking up everyday,

I am Lazarus.

 

call for me at the window!

I’ll let down my holy beard,

read you a turn, a strophe,

carefully with open eyes.

 

look at my walk!

how I limp, sadly moving,

my feet crash to the ground!

 

Look at my chest, how it breathes

how my heart beats!

look at my eyes, they see,

emote, tell!

 

see you listening,

see you reading, see you

who have not died,

who are not blessed to live long.

 

pain! strife! peace! war!

goddess Aphroditie!

god Ares!

I am Lazarus! I know you!

 

death,

I’m addressing you.

I have died already,

you have already taken my spirit, soul;

I will not fear you any longer.

life,

I have already gone past you,

crossed to the other shore,

I shall not fear you any longer.

 

I am Lazarus!

call for me at my door!
there we’ll meet,

lock gaze and I’ll sing! dance!

Laugh! with butterflies in my beard.

hummingbirds at my ears.

 

– Hoc Scripsi

December 30, 2011

a busy day or at least a busy morning or how I learned to fill out medicare paperwork…

by jhon baker

Already having been here for an hour and a half and out of coffee but rich in apple fritter – the radio plays Steve Miller much to a lack of excitement about it from the general crowd gathered in the IV infusion lab at Sherman Hospital.

We started this morning at the wound care clinic and waiting for a surgeon to look at the near 7 cm wound in my MIL’s chest.

but for another topic – I have bought a copy of my own book for my wife’s first generation Nook – she now has a color Nook and I am borrowing her old one to read Mark Twain’s Autobiography as it is a rather large book and difficult to hold while in bed, lying down and preparing for restlessness in the dark. Anyway – I then got an app for my iPhone that makes available my Nook books on my iPhone – the line breaks are not correct on the iPhone and I cannot imagine reading something like a book on the phone that should really be for making phone calls and not playing games, checking e-mail, taking photos and all the other crap one can do with the phone. I wouldn’t be surprised if the next iPhone was designed to do everything including talk for you and organize your garage but not make phone calls – and they will change the name to what the device actually is – a handheld personal computer – desktop, laptop and the handheld – next real step is the implant singularity.

I am tangential by nature.

I like being able to carry my book, as in MY book, with me everywhere and have it take up no added room. This is especially handy as I don’t memorize my poems and try to forget that I’ve written most of them – now when someone says – tell me a poem, I can bust out my phone and do just that.

 

St Sebastian

 

walked, mid January,

through snowy woods

stepping lightly the tracks

of those travelled before,

leaving some for those behind.

 

no turns but trees to rest upon

no crickets to sing or call

no voices but those of

my companions

no impressive sigh

but that of our feet

crushing through

and impermanent

as I looked further,

down the path

we traveled,

it was Sebastian I thought of

and his arrows.

 

– Hoc Scripsi

 

that is one of the first poems written in this year and I wonder what will be the last completed. I wonder what will be the first of 2012 unless the earth comes to a mind bogglingly spectacular end tomorrow night.

I do not look forward to organizing my paperwork for the tax man/woman/alien.

my MIL sleeps lightly in the barcalounger while being infused – I type and listen to bad radio commercials.

I am informed by bad advertising and pulp and the slush pile which my poetry occupies.