Frozen Words

How to phrase, what's not out loud
These words are made by water clouds.
Direct to your heart, center my life,
Letters carry weight, or try.
Words alone will swamp you,
A hunted seal, you could drown.
I'm not the orca, circling
Or a convent of hooded hashishins.
I am the raft that keeps you above water.
Losing you would come around.
So melt frozen love, I am patient,
For rays to turn ice, into ocean.
And bring you to your senses.
I'll warm the level of your sea,
And flood your city to its knees,
And when you see the water rising
Please do call and advise me.

Nile

Sing me awake with English names.
Cowled Ra, stork of the Sud,
On your blue lips I place my longest kiss.
Play sticks on your belly of stones.
Thoth, my Ibis-headed party-self.
Dips his pen to you,
   He writes on papyrus words of smoking water.

On a reed raft, I'll ferry you to my island,
We cross the lake to Tis Issat,
Carry a shell into a branch,
   and sleep there overnight.

We bathe in fountains, listen to the world.
Read by light you created,
Words that worship your flesh,
Songs that revere your bones,
Poems set in meter, to your dances,
   That praise your every invention.

                                           [to N____R___]

The Gypsy U

From the vast midwest,

Came one thought I loved best,

Without explanation, without occasion,

Sent a U . . . through postal invasion.

All was said and done, and lost

Though I tried, I got tossed!

In what way was this too true.

Was Y  the reason our love fell through?

Names? Just three,

All gave me a U, one sent a Z.

Of the other two, one gave a Y,

The last, a B, remade my life,

The second U came from old Japan.

Shall I mention she gave a Z, then ran?

We prowled New York, just her and me,

Who is she . . .  I'll not tell U !

We searched Kyoto through, ate fine sushi.

Her letters read - 'Dōmo arigatō! Oishii!'

Then she fled, not to Tokyo,

But to Italy, . . . to Milan-o.

Two letters later, U and B,

Given by my Kabbalah lady.

I met her in Brooklyn years ago,

Her husband then was awfully shady.

They lived in a Jersey city, though.

23 equals U plus B,

What's this got to do with me?

Or for a girl from a forest town -

It's true you've grown. your age was 23,

I've since drunk your letters, drank them down.

I gave an Aleph, made my ageless bed,

The trouble and strife got previously wed.

Oxen gifts, a bear for boons,

Interpretations, made anew.

U-Boat 23, about 1917,

Sank 52 ships, herself went down.

UB's a postal code, of old London,

Southall, Ealing, and Hillingdon.

Biscuits, breweries, universities,

Belgrade and Basrah drink Burgundy.

Could UB stand for Mongolia?

Ulan Battor in Asia? Maybe?

I read your letters every day,

You'll return to me, don't say no, 

Say someday!

Belgrade?, . . . . through Serbia flows the Ub

Gosh my gypsy's got wandering curls.

With Roma eyes bright, not fair,

So have gone, to play guitar.

Know I'll love her from time afar,

The question's not when, but where.

NAMA - Marsyas 2007

Six Letters

On a scant atoll,
six letters, caught my soul.
I cast those letters in ink, not brass,
 . . . arranged them there to hold you fast.
A nib dripped ink,
so those letters made me think . . .
of the ruin of kin,
 . . . . Oh how the soul does rub it in.
A ribbon until the end of time,
arms I knew, would soon hold mine.
So in words I set our souls . .
stories to contain us all. . . like bowls,
 . . .  be good, and call me soon . . .
 . . .  let's Muse beneath the moon,
and with me, write nighttime poetry.