HAIKU
Five syllables first,
Seven in the second line
Then finish with five.
It draws a picture
In the mind of the reader
Etching on the brain
Haiku, like a play
Opens, develops, resolves
All in just three lines
Haiku speaks a truth
That e'er was, but hasn't been
Said that way till now
The lowly Haiku
Aims to say something profound
Sometimes succeeding.
Ideas as Haiku
An interesting notion
Neat little poems
A Raw idea?
Then how do you transmit it?
Make it a Haiku
You mightn't b'lieve it...
Ain't nuthin' can't be expressed
In a Haiku po'm.
SOME HAIKUS
"My God I can fly!
Not only that, I can sing!"
Chirped the baby bird
The ground is soaking wet
Robins are searching for food
Worms wriggle for holes
Grind up all the skins
Mix with seeds on the feeder
Birds will be thankful
Birds eat just enough
From the feeder, then fly off
(More to life than food!)
If "this" should happen,
Then "that" must take place - or not
- Depends on viewpoint
Living to old age
We reflect on our choices
And how we survived them
In your senior years
Try to remain relevant
Do something that counts
Into our old age
Just remaining relevant
Will suffice, thank you
It is important
To do something at which you
Can be constructive
Obsessive regrets
Forget 'em, toss 'em away
Think of what's to come
Dwelling on regrets?
Forget traumas of the past
Work on tomorrow
Is that all there was?
I tasted all the flavors
Settled on none
Successful people
Make a statement to the world:
"I have been here, once."
We live forever
Ne'er-do-wells like us, because
We know survival.
Eternal pursuit:
"Liberative clarity"
Unattainable...
Ah, a worthy cause:
"Pursuit of enlightenment"
Endlessly distant...
Tacit agreements
Make a myth of competition
(How business conspires)
Happy to exist
We leave the competition
To the competers
Francisco Method:
Invention of our own way
No competition
Our disappointments
Make life more interesting
Than our successes
Success, who needs it,
When you can get to do lots
Of really neat stuff?
Life goes by so fast
You look back, say to yourself:
"Where did the time go?"
After all is said
You bear the scars of your life
Then Thy will be done
Human existence
Is about the learning how
Not just the doing
What then is success?
It's being happy doing
What you're doing then!
END HAIKU #2
HAIKU #3:
Not what you "become"
But what you do ev'ry day
That's what makes up life
You done everything
That you always wanted to?
Life marches onward...
One thing about life:
Once you say it, do it, live it-
No taking it back
D'ja do all the things
You wanted to at the time?
You only live once.
Life's an adventure:
Where you go and what you do
Decisions you make
A key to life is
Making the right decisions.
Wouldn't you agree?
I never went deep
Skimmed waves of experience
But was never bored.
Opportunities...
A matter of decisions
Based on good advice
Don't live to regret
All the things you could have been
Pursue all your dreams
Enough with kvetching!
Figure what you're gonna do
Tomorrow morning.
Your net life effect:
How many people did you
Help, hurt, influence?
END HAIKU #3
HAIKU #4:
One wants to matter,
To have his opinions weighed.
Otherwise, why live?
Rather than become,
Some are satisfied to do,
To play at being.
Secret of long life:
Remaining relevant, no?
("No shit, Dick Tracy.")
To live forever
It's prudent to plan ahead.
First comes the desire...
Embrace the good life
Eschew the unhealthy one
Down! Down, bad habits!
Subtract body parts
Dispense with extrania
That served only youth
Appreciation
E'en of the ridiculous
Develop that now
Here's the solution
To the rising food prices:
Eat less! (Look better!)
Out my bay window
Life passes by ev'ry day
I am a witness
Live your life as though
You're gonna die tomorrow
Guess what, you won't. Hah!
Don't care anymore
Done had my fun, ready to die
Burn me up, toss me.
What on earth saved me?
'Twas my imagination
Which could see beyond...
We can't imagine
Our spirits die when we do,
Thus Heaven, Hell, or...
One's inner mind says:
"Go where the spirit leads you"
That's where you end up
END HAIKU #4
NEXT
HAIKU #5:
Deal with the present
Tomorrow's another day
Que sera, sera.
Avoid Alzheimers
Do Not think about the past
Anyway, it's gone
To have relevance
Is the purpose of one's life
No matter to whom
Music is changing
Not just the way it's published
But how it's approached
(Music's a long trip
To destinations at which
You never arrive.)
(The pleasure is in
The journey and what you meet
Along its highway)
Music is a toy
Drum, horn, flute, lute, Toodle-loo
That's why we "play" it
Music is notions
Presentations of colors
To welcoming ears
Music's all habits
The teaching/learning, that is;
We play what we learn
Not what we think, tho
Nor even what we invent
Or can imagine
First you plant the root
Do re mi fa so la ti
Do completes the scale
Maybe my function
Is just showing that it's fun
Playing Piano
Music is my friend
One that never deserts me
Counterpoint to life
Music is our friend.
Where would we be without song?
Stuck in monotone.
When you play music
You are creating beauty
In the listeners' souls
The essence of Jazz:
Playing what occurs to you
Pulled along by sound.
What! no discipline?
(Isn't that the idea
Improvising Jazz?)
Chords: Merry notions,
Interesting enigmas
You solve in your ear
Using the 9th chord
(Third, fifth, flatted seventh, ninth)
There are no wrong notes
Remember the chords
Signature, accidentals
The key at the time
We weren't allowed
Even to answer the phone
We were practicing
I am sorry but
Mila's not available
She is practicing
Now she lives the dream
Of all of us. Practicing
Led to something grand!
Mila surely is
The grandchild I never had
Likely won't either.
"Help Wanted right now!
Be a singer who performs
As if you're naked"
A tune written to
An Original Haiku
Might even charm birds.
Haiku idea!
Could you paint an abstraction
Representing that?
Haiku dreams, alas
Areas that ain't been touched
In this way before
Henry Francisco
Became Henry John Henry
At the age of eight
Henry Francisco
Given the name of a clown
Henceforth played the role
Wherever he went
The center of attention
Swung over to him
I choose what I want.
I don't let fate interfere.
I go where I go.
Being someone else
Became my fate at age nine
Henry Francisco
Henry Francisco
Played with the cards he was dealt:
"Henry John Henry"
He became unmoored
He didn't know who he was
He lost the "I am"
He had to go be
Someone else who wasn't he
In a brand new place
A place full of kids
Whose mothers knew his secret
Unbeknownst to him
So he played the role
Did some real method acting
Even fooled himself
He played with the kids
You wer'n't allowed to play with
Then he became one
He was no fool, yet
He did all the foolish things
One could think of, then.
He's not who he was.
Before... He was someone else;
But now he makes do.
He's an imposter
Poseur more than an actor
Ever playing himself
He fancied himself
As something he wasn't
A real acting job
We all have stories
Of where we went, what we did
When we're growing old
"Partners in crime," they
Actor and insanity
One must BE t'other
Never really aimed
To do anything beyond
Having a good time
Easy to say now
By ego-analysis
Looking back on then
All the Franciscos
Were never the persisters
We are the doers
Raised on comic books
To seem the same but better
One cheated a bit
Ne'er wanted to do
Just one thing all of the time
Too much like the store
"I wanna be that
But only for the nonce
Then on to diff'rent."
What would you expect
From someone who was raised up
Reading funnybooks
My friends called my pop
Old philosopher Henry
I just called him Dad
Once upon a time
On Erie's West 18th Street
Henry's Ice Cream Store
Henry's Ice Cream Bar
Our Dad made deliciousness
From what he was left
Lesson to go by:
Fun is serious business
Not frivolity.
Born on 18th Street
Raised on comics and ice cream
Bound for fantasy
'Sbeen life on the edge
Goin' Doin' Bein' things
I never should've"
To be serious
About some frivolities...
No Peccadillo
END HAIKU #5
NEXT
HAIKU #6:
Go try ev'rything
In moderation of course;
Have all of the fun.
Ah, things I did wrong
I can't begin to count
But still I survived
That thing you MUST do...
When it's not fun anymore
Go do something else.
Performing is like
Getting naked in public
With all your clothes on
Store it on a hook?
Don't hang it in the same spot
Lest you wear a hole.
Words that make you fat:
"It does the thinking for you"
Relax, chill out, bloat.
Getting fat's easy
You don't have to work at it,
Just relax, consume.
Dance it off, Baby,
Put your body to the test.
Jiggle it, and strut.
Excuses abound
Like "I have a weight problem."
You're human, solve it!
A Black/White word deal:
You eschew the "MF" word
We'll drop the "N" word
Go be the dreamer
Thinking things that ain't been thunk
Till they come to mind
The mind is secret
Don't have to say what you think
(But watch what you say)
You! Do ev'rything
But whoa! Nothing to excess
To live a long time
END HAIKU #6
NEXT
HAIKU #7:
The basic pleasures
Not so simple anymore
Are they "right for you?"
Live it up, my friends,
Enjoy all of the pleasures,
But moderately.
"Did you live a life
That really meant anything?"
Said the father's voice
D'ja do anything
We might think significant?
Something inventive?
Life for some is just
A series of adventures,
Nothing more, or less.
Merrily, Merrily,
Merrily, Merrily,
Life is but a dream.
My final statement:
"Having sampled ev'rything
I prepare to die"
Burned all my bridges:
Now I be ready to die
Except that I'm not...
Burn all your bridges
There is no place to go but
Into the unknown
You look back and think
"Why didn't I do this, that?"
All in the past. So...
Look at it this way:
Life's a vacation from death
Ere was, and after...
When a baby's born
I plan to inhabit it
Live once more again
Did Ev'rything wrong
But I managed to survive
All of my mistakes.
Made ev'ry mistake
I possibly could have made
But hey, I'm still here.
We learn from mistakes
Whether they be ours or theirs
If we're sensible.
The mistakes we made
Are all in the distant past.
Now comes the future.
END HAIKU #7
NEXT
HAIKU #8:
The past was the past.
The present is the present.
The future will be.
The older one gets
The more relative the term
"Happiness" becomes
Henry just wanted
To be an artist,
Not a mover or shaker
If you're artistic
"Friends" can be a waste of time.
Your Buddy's your art.
Mom and Dad were right
So-called friends do nothing but
Waste the artist's time
To the true Artist
All his artistic thinking
Is "outside the box."
Art thou too decent
Unprepared to encounter
Big bad artsy worlds?
Bad dreams pursue us
Magnifying our mistakes
Make our lives messy
Tortured by his dreams
He greets the morning gladly
Respite into life
Born on Eighteenth Street
In back of an ice cream store
Bound for tasty life
I grew up in an
Ice Cream Store, readin' comics
Life's a lotta fun
Ice Cream Store childhood
Flavor: "You can't be ser'ious"
Life is but a toy
Read "Crime Does Not Pay"
That could lead one anywhere...
Life's a comic book
Comic Book people
At heart actors, not thinkers
Thus their influence
We had it all, Yo,
Discipline wasn't in our
Vocabulary
Do lunch at Henry's
Soup du jour with home made bread
Plenty of water
Nobody likes me
Everybody hates me
Guess I'll go play tunes
Drugs are the reward.
Yours after you've clawed and scratched
To that pinnacle.
Drugs are not the fuel
They propel only downward
Away from the top
Enough with kvetching
Figure what you're gonna do
Tomorrow morning.
When they stop list'ning
Then you stop talking to them.
Honto Desu! Is true!
Writing is naught but
Slowing down readers' thinking
To the speed of pen
END HAIKU #8
NEXT
HAIKU #9: Savoritz 4-Template
The older you get
The less you use teeth to smile
The more just to chew
Do the catalogue
You always dreamed of doing
We pass here but once
Each stage in your life
Is a brand-new adventure
A re-beginning
END HAIKU #9a
NEXT
HAIKU #10:
Music is magic
Transporting the agile mind
To remembered times
The melodic knack
Isn't realized until
Harmony chimes in.
Did I brush my teeth
Or only think about it?
Hard to remember...
Can't remember to...
Forget if I ever did...
Doesn't matter though...
There comes a point when
Mechanisms to survive
Take up one's whole life
All the pills and soaks
Kill you slow with therapy
Use up your
le day
You fin'lly get life
Reduced to its essentials
Then you up and die
Ev'rythings the same
Except moreso it would seem
When you toke a joint
No one knows the thoughts
You have when you fantasize
Go ahead, think them
Go pursue a dream
Foolishness tho' that may be
Till the day you die
You pursue a dream
Seldom knowing what it is
Or where it will lead
Life, alas, is but
A series of adventures
Good, bad, int'resting
The Storyville Stage
Port Whitman monologists
Original thought
In The Storyville
Songs are sung, acts are performed
Fictive drama rules!
"Watch me! Now watch me!"
People don't come here to talk
They come to listen
They have to assume
We have something to say
Untouched areas
So the world awaits
What are we gonna decide?
Is it us, or them?
The "End Of The World"
Wasn't the demise of earth
But of things we knew.
It's the day after
The "End Of The World" - Oh Good!
Now we can start new.
Henry's Ice Cream Bar
Wasn't the demise of earth
But of things we knew
We perform a play
Then take up a collection
With long-handled cups
A coffee refuge
Come lunch to live theatre
At Henry's Ice Cream
Famous soups and bread
Lunch with TV monitors
Comedy, drama...
At Henry's Ice Cream
Old philosophers hold forth
Like Santa, year 'round
I got bent to shape
An attitude adjustment
At Henry's Ice Cream
Re-do Port Whitman
With a casino down there
Play with play money
Not "Hard Work" people
We choose our occupation
To suit our bodies
Learn something new, then
See if you can make money
Doing it. That's fun.
END HAIKU #10
NEXT
HAIKU #11:
When work's to be done
You can make anything fun
Finding Better Ways
Seek the Better Way.
There's ever room to improve
Ev'rything we do
Life's an adventure
So don't let it pass you by
Without sampling it
Don't let growing old
Remind you of all the things
You didn't become
The future looms, but
How does one forget the past
And live in the now?
Don't blame Mom and Dad.
Under their circumstances
They did what they could.
As a melody
Passes thru your consciousness
Life goes thru us all
Each song's a dream that
At the whim of the singer
The audience shares.
Mister Henry plays
The American Songbook
The Bent Note Cafe
Melody, harmony,
Have limits.
Bass and rhythm Go anywhere.
What happened to God?
It seems He's abandoned us
Or us faith in Him
Really, how could have
An entity created
All we know exists?
God is but Ideal
Yet, "He"'s been represented
As an Entity
God is but Ideal
Thus to "Him" is ascribed all
We can't comprehend
END HAIKU #11
NEXT
HAIKU #12:
There's no Jehovah
No writer of Holy Books
Except by man's hand
Nor is there a God
Creator of Heaven and Earth
We simply became
A spirit exists
Some may even call a God
Connecting us all
Right there in my mind
God's a spirit after all
And here's what He says...
There's but a spirit
A taskmaster that makes us
More of what we are
God's word, continued
The new bible in Haiku
Rhythms, structure, thought
God has many Realms
Thus only a limited
Speck of time for yours
I am sent by God
To deliver His message
Unto the faithful
Time, then, is progress
Or regress, no standing still
Go save your own world
Believe in spirits
Then they'll surely come to you
Some time in your dreams
Millions of years old
Earth from a ball of clay formed
Grows, outlives us all
"Ve vill take over
Ze whole vorldt!" Seriously
Someone must play God!
Que era era
Que esta, por ahora
Que sera sera
What was once was then
What is now surely exists
What will be will be
Write down a poem
Say something significant
So we remember
Raise up a child
Who'll go out and make a mark
That'll mean something
Write down a word
That'll pierce the shell we've built
Then make us act out
The saddest thing is
Knowing that you're capable
But didn't do it
Hear the backup beep
Truck a'coming up the road
To collect your trash
When I lose my stride
Ceasing then, to be useful
Death Bienvenido!
When you realize
You don't "matter" anymore,
Then it's time to go.
Life fades, disappears
Like your breath on a window
When you turn away
You get to an age
When it seems your children think
"Hurry up and die."
When you realize
You're no use to anyone
Then you welcome death
When you're dead, you're gone
Where you go, nobody knows
Except those who went
Depressed with your life?
That's no reason to end it...
Just get a new life.
When dead is better
Than living the life you do
Then snuff it. Or change...
Open up a bar
"The Rehearsal" - Live upstairs
Actors, tryouts, plays...
Pure theatre:
Either they come or they don't
(Hookers know the gig)
Behold life's drama:
Comedy, tragedy, farce,
Then final curtain.
Actors by nature
Aren't afraid to indulge
That's just what they do
The Director is
An "Other self" to he who
Would perform well.
You're a captive
Waiting on "Hold" for someone
Who advertises.
Advertisers bray
Anything they want to say
On TV with cash
They are just actors
Yet we buy what they portray
In the TV ads
We're being enticed
To waste away our spare time
Watching TV shows
Saturday Nite Live:
Ordinary people just
Trying on funny
See if you can go
Without the television
For one week only
Politicians say
Just what they want us to fear
To get elected.
Money's the poison
With which our democracy
Is killing itself
Do we care what is,
Or is our only int'rest
What would seem to be?
Done been ev'ry place
Did it all before,
And now I be ready to die.
So if one of yours
Dies by radical Islam
Go kill one of theirs?
Bordellos, alas
Rob you of your illusions
Better dream at home
You are but a place
In a lifetime full of fun
Now but a mem'ry
It's all about fun
Of which life is a barrel
If you play it right.
Let's be serious
Are you havin' any fun?
Lucky, your work is...
Think on tomorrow
Yesterday is catching up
Bound to overtake
Hung with delinquents
Attracted by the bad parts
Of the good boys too
Bummed because she left?
Think of her taking a shit
Perishes the thought
Unisex bathroom
Where to leave the toilet seat?
Still down, boys. Sorry.
My teeth have lasted
Through yet another dinner
Aging Carefully
Formerly myself
I now grow old with caution
New aura daily
With luck one's age
Becomes justification
Of what went before.
People just up and die
Because they hate being old
"Just get on with it."
Oh how we boogied
When we were just teenagers!
We still do, up here.
Tax e-Mails one cent
For ev'ry one we open
Build trans-monorails
Gaming the system
Can't lead to anything good
Unless you beat it
Lose at ev'rything
There's something to be said for
Living a life of fun
Life's short; no matter.
Out! Responsibility
Enter me, laughing
A life of losing
But with other fields to plow
E'er looking ahead
Music's my buddy
One that never deserts me
Counterpoint to life
Music is my friend
Ever there when it's needed
To elevate me
Jazz is resolving
Starting out on the "wrong" note
Ending with a song
Pssst! Music Secret:
Let the melody go where
It wants to go.
Music Essential:
Inevitability
Or it languishes
Mas que el todo
Melody, rhythm, tempo
La! Resolution!
Lo! laugh as you dance
Face moving to the music
Along with your form
Tells it like it is
His songs are about himself
Dances while he sings
When your dreams, alas
Exceed your abilities
Express them as Art.
When you make it known
You expect apologies
They're always grudging
Gross expectations:
Overtures to suicide
When they come to naught
Insanity comes
Before suicide, I'm told.
(Regrettably so)
Suicide snuffs life
To a distant dimension
You could find right here
I pretend I'm sane
But deep down I know I'm nuts
(Self-delusional)
With "Pardonnez moi"
He bolted headlong through life
But to fade away...
"But wait a minute...
My bridges aren't all burned yet.
I can't die right now."
One life's all you get
To do or be what you will.
Make the most of it.
The Road to Success
Is littered with distractions
Disguised as shortcuts
But beware of all
That smack of anything but
Hewing to the line.
Focus on the goal,
Let it not out of your sight
Lest it disappear...
You gave me the kiss
That stoked a furnace within,
Igniting new coals
Kisses not yet felt
The burn of youthful passion;
Dormant, innocent...
Suddenly alive,
Aware of fresh connections -
Dances to be done
In a dimension
Yet untried but fraught with hope
Of life sublime
At some future time
With someone not unlike the
Giver of that kiss.
The better mousetrap
Attracts the world to your door
Once you invent it...
Build better mousetraps,
Soon enough, the world will beat
Pathways to your door
Heaven is Music
Deathless tunes that float about
Carrying our souls
When bodies wear out
Souls just up and take over
Makes sense, doesn't it?
You may have enough
Yet want more, deserve more, but
Enough is plenty.
This is my heaven:
Tunes that float in the ether
My God is Music.
Are you with The Spirit?
Do you seek The Better Way?
Be you your Ideal?
If a God exists
T'would likely be in spirit.
(Plausible then, eh?)
Our construct of God
Keeps our world in a balance
Sans which we perish
Patiently waiting,
Death claims us all, regardless.
No way to cheat it.
Death is gonna come.
Live your next moments as if
It were imminent
Once again she plays
The penultimate victim
Snug up against death.
When dying in bed
What is there to enjoy but
Being center stage
On the contrary
Death can be a happy time-
"I'm taking a trip!"
"I'm leaving this life
On to something different.
(Might well be better)"
Imagination
Tells me good things lie ahead
Beyond the rainbow.
My loving sister
I'll remember you always.
Your loving brother.
Two of us exist
One lives in our fantasies
Another in life
It doesn't matter
If your dreams never come true.
Dream them anyway.
Are You the dreamer
Whose dreams refuse to come true?
Why should they? They're DREAMS! (Duh!)
Flashes of brilliance:
Tale of a life of promise,
Unfortunately
A girl that I loved
Ran off with a sailor boy
Bon voyage, ma cher.
Whatever happened
To my old girlfriend Lola?
The world swallowed her
You got the girl
Of all of our dreams.
Resist the temptation to gloat.
We may not be one
But I am with you always
Somewhere in my mind
Don't think of me, fine.
I remember ev'rything
For the two of us
That was the game then
But now it's over, "the past"
Can't we just be friends?
Ev'ry love I had
Was the sole love of my life
For the time being
It sure must be nice
To have someone who
Thinks about you ev'ry day
Someone who'll love you
And remember things for you:
Growing old happy
Once a year I'd like
My Valentine to be mine
No one else's, see?
Don't think of me, fine;
I remember ev'rything
You prob'ly forgot
The secretary
Trolling to land Mister Right
SO nineteen-fifties...
High School and College
We're all destined for greatness
But it's elusive
Setbacks come and go,
Nothing is career-ending;
You just find a way...
Is what you're doing
Really, truly int'resting
Or is it just work?
A little Business
At which you don't make a lot
But you pay your bills
One you run yourself
No one tells you what to do
Make your own mistakes
Little tweedy signs
Are SO over, I mean Whew!
Express your business
Why would I want to
Become anything other
Than what I am now?
Desde la boca
Tutti e si facile
Miraculosa!
Coming from the mouth
Ev'rything's easy as pie
Miracles are spoke!
On the tree of life
We prune the branches early
Who'd reach to the sky
But branches unpruned
Spread to envelop the earth
Reaching out, not up
The object of all Art:
Produce something noteable
Where there was nothing
"In a dream I saw
A city invincible"
What was that city?
Municipal hoax!
Storyville section of town
Where stories are told
City on the lake
Port Whitman's not the real world
But a place apart
Port Whitman virus
Catch it in your heart, and it
Crawls up to your brain
It isn't death we fear
But losing life
No matter its condition
You who died so young
Look at all the fun you missed
By not being here
The mind is a tube
Through which ideas pass
And are re-formed
It takes a picture
Rearranges it and then
Out comes something new
Really changing minds
Pointing up new directions
Only writing does
I can only hope
Something I may have written
Has some mild effect
Life in the "country"
"Shall I mow or shall I not?"
That is the question
Think up things to say
And put them down on paper
For others to read
That's Blogging, by God!
Now I can say to the world
What I've said to me
But is it valid?
Is it, oh, enlightening?
Is it important?
I can't play sad songs
Without thinking then of you
Now sad all over
But life looms ahead
No time to wallow when you've
Someone to write tunes
Music is a toy
The most int'resting plaything
Man has yet devised
Being a writer
One can be brave, and then some
(Only ideas)
Present new ideas
In a plausible framework
To effect real change
The writer decides,
Viewing from his perspective,
Magnification
You love to read, so
Am I so poor a writer
My words don't reach you?
Life is to enjoy
Doing something that you love
Despite achievement
The accomplishers
Look down upon the funsters
From loftinesses
Superiorly
Saying "And what have you done
To improve the world?"
I never wanted
To get "good" at anything
But to do all things
Really it's their world
We inhabit currently
That needs improvement
I listened to me
Nobody else, I'm afraid
Thus ended up here
I am a body
Through which life passes now
Before moving on
I'm a lonely soul
Passing through an earthly form
Before moving on
I am a belief
Passing through a time and place
Before moving on
I am a window...
A life but seen through, alas
Before moving on
I am a blank slate
On which existence is chalked
Then I am erased
Existence: The Game,
Pitting you against the world
Hey, it's only life...
Fantasies of Sex
Better than the act itself
Abstraction triumphs
Vibrator and I
And my imagination
Release pheromones
There were girls who did
Then there were those who didn't
The boys? They all did.
With improper thoughts
And a working vibrator
Anyone can come
A good vibrator
And forbidden fantasies
Anyone can come
Can't do "sex" no more
I'm reduced to doing "friends"
Alas, fin'lly this!
The older you get
Ain't nuthin' like a good shit
Early in the day
The older you get
The more pleasure you derive
From a daily shit
A morning bouquet
The sweet smell of one's insides
Ah, to defecate!
Funny, I thought prunes
Would do the trick, but
Bananas do it better
Ain't nuthin' like it
A good shit in the mornin'
Start the day off right
Be in good shit shape
Have a movement ev'ry day
Eat right to make it
Aaah, nothing like it
A good clean healthy and large
After-breakfast shit
Can't get over her?
Just think of her wiping her ass
When you do the same
Comes a time in life
When a nice big morning shit
Flat beats an orgasm
As you grow older
You eliminate more things
Right down to living
Seriously do you
Care more about your vices
Than you do your health?
Doing exercise
Revs up your body's systems
'gainst pathology
Hmm, lemme see now
If I take this here wrong turn
Where will it lead me?
I've made some mistakes
That changed the course of my life
But then, I'm still here...
"Haikus by Henry
Francisco," who wrote them down
As he thought them up
Haiku Poetry
The medium for New Thought
Presents raw ideas
Haiku: Perfect spot
To float a new concept
Yet, but a launchpad
Got an idea?
Try seventeen syllables
That's what Haiku's for
Haikus are notions
Pure and simple ideas
Expressed verbally
Mere snippets of thought
Open, develop, conclude
In just three short lines
Aphorisms rule!
They plant a worm that wriggles
Deep into your brain
Stroke kills sector "A"
You develop sector "B"
It's a "No-brainer"
"Sonic Therapy"
Sound waves, diff'rent frequencies
For organs' ailments
To off it when you're
Running out of raison d'etre...
Easy way to go.
Dame in the parlour
Courtesan in the bedroom
Ah, the perfect wife.
I couldn't have wed
Anyone better than her
My good wife Helen
I have dipped my pen
Into assorted inkwells
To write my life's tales
Publish for Kindle
Exclusively that medium
The future of text
Don't resign yourself
To Becoming nobody
You are somebody
I spy death lurking
'Round a corner up ahead
It peeks and darts off.
When you're growing old
With advice and cash to give
Money is better
Had some this and that
Little Bits of Ev'rything
Cafeteria
Why pursue old dreams
Harking back to yesterday?
Tomorrow beckons
The past, ah, the past
The present is only now
But the past lives on...
There's something to say
For life as a wannabe:
Forever there's hope...
Just Remember this:
Heaven ain't such a bad place
Once you get to go
You don't understand dying
Drawing your last breath
Until you do it.
I'm mediocre
But in the dreams department
I'm grand, simply grand!
What you're wishing for
Is it really what you want
Or just idle whim?
Glad you got away
You're better as my dream girl
Forever the same
Ev'rybody needs
A great lost love to dream for
Who'd see you triumph
I have more fun with you
In all of my dreams
Than I ever would in life.
Screen porches are scrims
Through which the birds cannot see
Singing, frolicing
We are like the birds
Who get to try all the seeds
Relishing their fruits
Talented blackbirds
To be able both to eat
And sing all at once
The habits of birds:
Endlessly fascinating
Barest survival
We are butterflies
Enjoying fruits of nature
Then moving on
Didn't wanna bomb,
People's lives on my conscience
Just learn how to fly
I'm a sailing ship
Dropping anchor here and there
Only to sail off
I go to churches
Cast a lot with diff'rent faiths
Keep What pearls apply
What to believe in?
Faith's a spiritual thing,
Intransferable.
I do The Lord's work
Though I've yet to profess faith
In The Creator
The Lord on a throne
Equals God as only man
Could have imagined
Listen to the voice-
Of one who speaks as God might
To bring you closer
A religion that
Won't tell you what not to do
Only what you might
Church must spread its wings
Gathering in all people
Creating a flock
All the religions
Are the world's ruination
Their dieties frauds
Nice about Winter:
The cozy feeling you get
When properly dressed
Oft' it's easier
To endure the bitter cold
Than to light the fire
I'm a fire starter
Kindling blazes where I can
Heating up battles
Remnants of winter:
Dirty snow, deep potholes, mud
Spring is hovering
Fire burns in the yard
Goodbye Christmas, glittered tree
Hello new annum
Tall maples bloom
Big trees think the warm be spring
But not fooled for long
Man picks up some sticks
Bluebird scouts for last year's house
Spring creeps in, arrives
Yard birds, their homes gone
React in shock, cheeping LOUD.
The trees now beckon.
Hawk drifts on the breeze
Just has to extend his wings
Looking for a meal
I'm on vacation
Away from cares of the day
But I remain here
I stay where I am
But my mind goes where I'm not
To another sphere
My fountains of youth:
Tunes, exercise, attitude
Easy on strong drink
Got what I wanted
'Twas a taste of ev'rything
Van, choc, strawberry
Bikers are like birds
Fly here, there, hang out some, sing,
Fin'lly scoot back home
Bicycle riding
Gives the illusion of youth
Via naked speed.
Illusions of youth
Are granted you while playing
Music instruments
Be a kid again.
Get up on a bicycle,
A new perspective.
Get a bicycle
Bike to the shopping center
It'll change your life
Don't deprive yourself
Of the good things of your life
(...in moderation)
Where goeth the time?
Looking back it "flew so fast..."
Yet ahead it drags
Life has not the time
For doing all I want to
Though I keep trying
Remember the times
You thought you were getting so old
But you were so young?
The force of habit:
Ev'rything is ritual
When you're growing old
A slip in your sleep
You twitch to keep from falling
Tho' you're lying down!
Old contemplations
Are nothing but once-new pants
Out of which we've grown
Cars rushing to work
I hear them as I slumber
In my nice warm bed
Burn my body up
My ashes to an hourglass
Useful forever
The world accepts you
As you represent yourself
Until you prove them wrong.
You are what you are.
Sure it's no use pretending
To be what you're not.
I had to pretend
I was not Italian
(In truth, I wasn't)
You are the winners,
The ones who arrive there last
At the door of death.
Live the life you live
Then get the death you deserve
Poetic justice
Go 'long with the flow
Specialize in faking it,
Extemporizing
When a sibling dies
We're rudely reminded of
Our mortality
Home is a sculpture
We make by living in it
Our house is our life
A moment you'll know
Is that which comes to us all
When you say "I'm dead."
Life just fades away
Slips like a drowning victim
Underneath the waves
Were it only true...
"Pen is mightier than sword"
World would be won now.
Women run the world
Their weapons gossip, malice
Much better than guns
It might be nicer
Living how women want to
'stead of how men do
True action heroes
Do what no one else can do
In their place and time
Heroes of the world
Trade in the lives of others
And come out ahead.
To the warrior
"All wars are "necessary"
(Except those you lose)
We could aw pway "Wi"
In a "Wi" waw wif Iwan
Vewy popuwaw
Sample everything
Sans responsibility
(The Artistic Life)
Dilettantes survive
"Always something to pursue"
Needing yet more time.
I need someone to
Be all about me, but you
Are all about you
I'm like a flat rock
Skipping atop a smooth pond
Till I expire, sink.
It's only life, cher
Whatever happens happens
After that, you die.
The ways to compete:
Be bigger, faster, more, less
Or else be diff'rent.
If you want to win, work.
But if you only want to play,
That's okay.
Unwritten agreements:
"We compete on 'services'"
(But not on price).
Cyberspace, alas
What we leave there of ourselves
Is our afterlife.
When you play music
The listeners' emotions
Succumb to your art
Music exists but
In the minds of composers
And those who listen.
The rest is paper,
Notes, fingers, lips, instruments
Tools of transmittal.
Oh sure, on the air,
And then in the mind of God
Who is e'er list'ning.
Melody's trav'lin'
It's always goin' someplace
Just can't settle down.
I'm a melody
Leading you 'long by the ears
With songs for the nonce
Music that survives
Is the music that gets played
Or... oblivion
Don't be restricted
To the melodies of life
Live its rhythms too.
Music is messy
Not pedantic, not exact
Fin'lly resolute
Music is a hike
A wandering in the woods
Without returning.
Music is escape
A world that is only mine
Harmony possessed.
In improvising
Your mind must figure out where...
And go there right now!
Piano is a toy
Play it right now if you choose
Just push the right keys.
Touch the piano, George
Feel the sounds that you can't hear
To listen again
Your mind has got to
Figure out where you're going
And go there right now
Poetry's simply
Talking in rhythm n'est ce pas?
Just keepin' the beat.
Oreo our outside cat
Slept on the roof by the chimney
Then in the days, she'd soak up some rays
You'd think she was sunning in Bimini
Oreo our cat
Black and white, died yesterday
Ma feline amour.
Sun rises on dog,
Warmth shifts, dog moves, no dummy,
Sleepin' in the sun.
When you wipe your arse
Do you smell your body's fruit?
Dogs do, why not you?
We get old, we stink
It's all part of the process
So get used to it
Olfact'ry pleasure
Nothing can beat the odor
Of one's body gas
Dog sits at table
Farts loudly, other dogs sniff
Catching the fragrance
Dogs weave scent to scent
Checking the territory
Olfactorily
Bees sting you if you're
Confrontational. Be nice,
They'll leave you alone.
When they stop list'ning
Then you stop talking to them.
Honto Desu! It's true!
In my fam'ly we're
Used to interfering, but
If you like I'll stop.
Don't you ever need
To feel intimately with
Someone that's not you?
The Nature of God:
Circle's Center Ev'rywhere
Circumf'rence Nowhere.
God is a franchise
Passed from clone to clone
For millions of years
Convincing new Eves
And also Adams, of course
"Divinity lives."
It lives forever
Mortality dies, alas
One "God" kept alive
By assistant Gods
Who are in on the secret
Carrying it on
How did that happen?
(Aha! They made the mistake
Of making two clones)
A long time ago
An error was committed
And two clones were made
Maybe it takes old age
To finally understand
Why you're like you are
Relentless wind
Rips the branches from the trees
Nocturnal ambush.
I close the window
So I cannot hear the storm
Destroy the rooftop.
Burn all your bridges
Then you'll have time to do all
That you want to do.
Done as many things
As I could. Not all so well
But some of them good.
One limps through his life
Altered, broken, repaired, scarred
Surviving in spite
Haunted by the past
But determined to live on
One plunges ahead
Haunted by one's life
One dreams yet of past misfires
Still hoping to win
Been around the block
A couple of times and more
Seen a few things too.
He never believed
In the traditional ways
Had to go it 'lone
Jolly old Saint Nick
Sliding down your "chimely"
Not a speck o' soot.
When you were my friend
I would bring my life to you;
Now it's brought to none.
Please forgive me, friend
Or I shall simply go die,
Be no more again.
Watching the walls now
Making sure they haven't moved,
Being reassured.
Think of a season
Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn
And a feeling too.
Sex alone is best
The thrill without committment
And dream what you want.
Weekly orgasms
Come with new technology
And those "impure thoughts."
When is the last time
You brought on an orgasm?
Tsk, Tsk, (Endorphins)
Of ev'ryone's life
Sex is a much bigger part
Than you'd imagine
Walking down the road
Enjoying the Autumn air
Winter's in the wings.
Dreams. I'm made of dreams
I've recently discovered
...Just wishing at life.
I've never been me,
But someone manufactured,
Mythical yet real.
Not enough water
Too much sewage and garbage
Too many people!
As I drift to sleep
I think another Haiku
Gone when I wake though.
I'm just a mystic
Spending life thinking thoughts
That might be of use
The leaves are blowing
Over to the neighbor's lawn
He can rake them up.
If you can't mow it
With a self-propelled walker
Then your lawn's too big
Nick Virgilio
I wonder where you are now
Heaven I suppose...
If you had to choose
Would you want "character" or...
Ingenuity?
Want to quit smoking?
Carry them around with you,
But just don't smoke 'em.
Your disappointments
May result from personal
Mistaken choices
You chose to do this,
Elected not to do that
Thus your present state
Constant media
Part of dumbing down of us
Where did quiet go?
I like my own thoughts
More than those I listen to
In the Media
Without empathy
Relationships are empty
Devoid of respect
To have a someone learn
What little you can teach is
Ultimate reward
Life is short and so
Do the things you love to do
No matter the cost
Here's the objective:
Live all the life that you can
Given its limits
Put your life on hold?
Marijuana will do it
If that's what you want...
Who you hang out with
What you try to prove to them
Determines your path
Time to start squeezin'
New routes from politicians...
"Where are we goin'?"
Give me a reason
Why I should vote FOR your guy
"Any ideas?"
The nervy sunshine
Stabs at me between the drapes
But I outsmart it
"Should have gone this way..."
However I didn't, so
On to other things...
Morning dawns and then
My ghosts come out to haunt me,
Refuse to let go
We are so blase
Witnessing catastrophes
Slowing down to gawk
I can write a check
For whatever I want now,
Since I don't want much
I am pierced through now
With stilettos of regret,
Delicious mem'ries
Everything I have
Is quite enough for me, thanks,
And mine, bless them all
I be the dreamer
Wond'ring the improbable
Before it's fathomed
I be the dreamer
Essential inhabitant
Of the world at large
Bless the curious
They shall be our salvation
By finding the way
Run after that dream
Till it gets too far ahead
Then chase another.
Burn your bridges first
Then never have to cross them
Nor find the way back
Wade into each pond,
Touch the depth but not too deep
Lest you have to swim
I aspired to be
Naught but characters in life
Thus becoming them
Life is too precious,
One cannot waste a minute;
Grab the most you can
We always succeed;
We never see ourselves fail.
Only others do.
Just hear yourself think,
You'll never see yourself do,
Nor taste of failure.
Not the end of life
But the beginning of death
Is what concerns us.
Someone is always
Barging into existence
Not leaving us be.
Life is rife with games
You play just to get along
Or don't; then you won't.
People drink all wrong
Gradually, sip by sip.
No, knock it back; stop.
Immorality:
Price gouging, obesity,
Too many children
There's morality
Or have we just forgotten?
We Capitalists
How 'bout price fixing?
Suppliers get together
Agree to soak us
Two things wrong with sports:
One: Winning over playing
Two: The pow'r of money
Ball hit with a stick
Kids' game, race to the bases
Beating the ball there
In his gradeschool days
Henry was a great pitcher
He threw the "thumb ball"
Baseball fame's secret
The Thumb Ball in or out curve
Port Whitman Sailers
Only I know me,
You may think you do, but then
Were you there when I...
While my hands still live
I'll play, if only for me
Solo audience
Deny so-called death
It only ends things here, then
Off to somewhere else
Death ain't no big deal
I been there for a little while
Welcome (when it's time)
I'm writing my own
Biography in Haiku
A poetic life
Been there done that, I
Can say that about more things
Than no matter who
Ran away from home
All the way to anywhere
Cold, hungry, came back
No regrets so far?
Well ain't you the lucky one?
But don't despair yet...
What is there to choose?
Money, fame, satisfaction?
Fun is in the chase
Happiness, talent?
Artist chases harmony.
(Perfection, alas)
Dad growing up old
Soul-dancing in jockey shorts
Son enters, stops, glares
"Dad, put some clothes on,
People will see, think you're nuts."
(Accurately so)
"Want a piece of me?
Gonna have to stand in line."
(He bumps) "Take that, girls!"
Music Exercise:
Scales in right hand, chords in left
Then switch hands, scales, chords
Talking percentage:
Which of our eye-rack johnnys
Signed to spread freedom
And what percentage
Signed up for weekend duty
And some summer camp?
Coupla weeks away
From houses, spouses, the kids?
Vacations with guns
Boys, girls, Over There
Sweating, scared, thoughtful, praying
Afgani roulette
Peeking in doorways
Then snapping back, guns a-point
To kill or be killed.
We obliterate,
Yet we charm, with candy bars
Destroy, yet befriend
Sensible people
Don't sign up to perform war
But to play at it
Rudyard Kipling's son
Old man behind him in writing
Playing war in print
Who want to be there
Want to play war like Bush did
"Mission accomplished!"
Who signed up to play
What percent to kill or die
Let's be serious
Brian Francisco
Chef who does mansions only
"Fare for your affaire"
Brian's not afraid
Life's not insurmountable
Bring it down to size
The key to stardom
Through the mansions of New York
Caterer performs
The Book of Henry
From a narrow point of view
Dealing with all things
I'm poet, know it
Ev'rything I say I say in rhyme
And also rhythm
Village Productions:
An online publication
About the arts here
Editorials,
Fiction as plausible fact
I'll be glad to write
"Wife Swap" - there's a show
Which spouse would you want to be?
Which mother too, kids?
Pope, former Nazi
Has the ultimate power
Tells you what to do
"How 'bout that, Hitler?
I am boss of ze whole vorldt!
Formula to rule!"
Ve arrre going to
(Vunce ve get reorganized)
Take over ze Vorldt!
Someone get it right
World must run as a unit
Thus be organized
Please, Death, surprise me,
Don't let me know you're coming
Just drop in some time.
Romance ev'rywhere...
Life is such a precious gift
Begging indulgence
My existence is
Living at the edge of life
Re-inventing - me.
Venture ye forth
To the edge of dizziness
But go not further
He's throwing it in
Didn't want to do it no more
'Less you invite him...
From your misjudgments
Consider the positives
After all, they count.
It's no sin to right
A trespass of omission
Rather a duty
The clouds are on fire,
Sun sets over the water
Burning up the sky.
Thank you dear Lord for
Allowing me to survive
Stupid things I've done.
Straighten out your teeth
Your smile is your calling card,
Their first impression.
He spent a whole life
Traveling down the wrong roads
Running after dreams
Being impulsive
Doing things you wouldn't do
It can change your life.
Ruled by impulses
One spends an entire lifetime
Chasing the rainbow
Raindrops pick up friends
Racing down the window pane
Toward their demise
Life in a rainstorm:
Cats and dogs and lightning too,
All intensity
The beauty of dreams
Is that you cast them yourself
All your "friends" play parts
Tears on my pillow
The love of my life's done gone
Married another
You're the very soul
Of someone once rejected
But yet, still alive
My rejecting love...
Her beauty remains the same
As we age, apart
Body looks for death
Mind is havin' too much fun
Doesn't want to go
Seventeen but once...
As it is with all ages
Yet, this one's special.
Excuse me but I
Mistook you for someone who
Might have understood.
There comes a time in
The life of ev'ry human...
Being In or Out
In can surely mean
A heap of trouble or fame
Out can mean the same.
Fame is there
Just beyond dreams
It's the transportation that's difficult
Wherever you are
You do the same things over;
Diff'rent scenery
"Drugs are the answer!"
"Ask your doctor" say the ads,
(Justifying dope).
"Get medical pot,
Disconnect reality"
Sez the evening nooz
Drugs are not the fuel
They propel only downward
Away from the top
Drugs are the reward.
Yours after you've clawed and scratched
To the pinnacle.
If you're stoned or drunk
ACT stoned or drunk. Don't pretend
You're normal, okay?
Dope may not kill you
But your reaction to things
When you do it can.
She's reduced her life
To where she can still exist
Yet smoke dope all day
When you're high on drugs
You become a crashing bore
To Ev'ryone else...
Do it without dope
Come, march your craziest self
Of your wildest dreams
Dope might be fun but
It distorts your perspective
Shows things all awry
Dermatologists:
"You are all pre-cancerous;
I can handle that."
Stuff goes right through you
When your body is prepared
You win the first round
Wait till you're ready
Then taste but moderately
Then you win again
Now it wants you back
Resist the urge to indulge
You're on a win streak
Finally Decide
Whether you really need it
Refuse. (Game, set, match).
You recall what you
Intended to remember
Forgetting the rest.
Oft times it's painful
To remember the moments
You'll never forget
You choose to breathe first
And everything after that
Till you gasp your last.
There comes a time
In ev'ryone's ev'ry day
For the sun to shine.
Yet comes night time too
Whether you're ready or not.
It comes anyway.
Life's so fragile, or
So you find when something breaks.
But then (Surprise!) it's too late.
Losers live longer
They get to try many things
And have way more fun.
You've gotta have fun
But you have to pull your weight
Life ain't free, you know.
If you're overweight
You wear your sin, and we look
To form our judgements
We miss so much life
Doing what we choose to do
Ignoring the rest
Geometric God
Circle's center ev'rywhere
Circumf'rence nowhere
I have spent this life
Trying to be somebody.
Anybody. Me.
My life in Haiku:
"Little Henry" to old man
(Very poetic)
I'll be God (As if)
Let's have a conversation
Pretend at answers
Opportunity:
Thinking while flossing your teeth
Mining crevices
I am playing God
Where the heck is my broad brush?
Ah! The Internet!
Dot com, not dot org!
"Non-profit" is just a ruse
I pay my own way
God is Perfection
That to which we all aspire
But never achieve.
Suicide Bombers
Deal with death to get over
To the better life.
Little do they know
The better life is right here
Just beyond blind faith
Lie in a hammock
Contemplate the universe
Let the clouds roll by
Very small are we
Yet how vast the universe
Nothing has "meaning."
My time is over
Now it's up to you, you, you.
Carry on, kinder.
Henry Francisco
Age eight, suddenly became
Henry John Henry
H. John Henry's dead
Long live Henry Francisco
In word, music, thought.
Enjoy what you got
Don't worry 'bout what you ain't*
*Key to happy life
Do what you can do
Avoid the things that you can't
(Only so much time...)
Dregs of life remain
To be consumed with gusto
Till they're all used up
When it's time to die
Move on. Another life waits
Yearning to be lived.
As the years pass by
We search for some relevance
Keeping up the fight
Artistic talent
Warrior mentality
Need them both. Too bad.
A life in Haiku
In seventeen syllables
Snapshots of a time
In Haiku-gawa
Everyone speaks only
Lyrical Language
The Haiku singer
Street corner wise man in song
"Notes of wisdom here!"
It's not the doing,
What's important is the myth
Of the enjoyment
A young man, I sang
"Ma, he's making eyes at me"
In gay cabarets
Storms of life o'er time:
Raindrops racing down windows...
Inconsequential
In a dream I play
The piano at the bank
Moolah serenades
Haunted by mem'ries
I wend my way to dreamland
Behold new visions!
Who needs memory?
Now we have hard drives, thumb drives
To store our thinking
Think with the rhythm
Ravings of a lunatic
Predict the future
I just pretended
To have Alzheimer's Disease
"I don't know nuthin'"
I just didn't want
To converse with anyone
In the time I had
Exercise guru:
He's ninety seven years old
Doin' funky moves
The ultimate drug
But only while you taste it
A Henry's Ice Cream
Haikus by Henry
Just click on the link below
(Mouse-click Imagery)
Artistic people
That's what the Francisco's are
No escaping it.
Never serious
About anything in life
Except performing
We are but artists
Who don't compete, yea, we invent
Thus the world sees
Her father's talent
Coupled to mother's morals
Success is assured
Think in your medium
Form what you want to express
Make it so we feel
Why do you want "Friends?"
Only a waste of your time
If you're an artist
Learn to dig yourself
There's more there that meets the mind
Nuggets of pure gold
Feel the need to talk?
Speak to yourself. After all,
You've something to say
Hooked on "feeling good,"
But the older you get
Fewer are the ways
Two exclusive things:
Where you are, and where you're at
So how about you?
You're an old man now
Stop trying to rescue yourself
You're already saved
Stay right there Henry
You've got where you want to go
Develop that thing
Where does the time go
When you're havin' all that fun?
To posterity
Songs about money
Now you have it now you don't
(Denominators)
Here's a new riffle:
Noontime piano at the bank
(Happy money tunes)
"The financial blues
Disappear at PNC
Celebrate your dough"
In the actor's mind
Stardom is the goal somehow
Good, bad, no matter
I know how he felt
John Wilkes Booth, that assassin
No one would listen
No one would watch him
Do Hamlet or Richard III
So he shot Lincoln
Believers in God
Conclude, based on naught but faith
Taught them by others
Let us say I'm right
There is no God or Heaven.
Then what e'er's the use?
My dreams were varied
Befitting an Ice Cream Store's
Flavors and colors
My Dreams were modest
Thus achieved regularly
(Multifarious)
The Human Body
Complicated mechanism
So much can go wrong
Francisco's are inventors
We don't compete
We come up with our own
"Inappropriate
Personal relationship"
(Tsk, Tsk, cavorter)
Make friends with the bugs
It's they who will devour you
As their final meal
Government needs dough?
Why not tax the Internet:
Emails that we read
If System X is
As far as you want to go,
Does your stuff? Keep it.
To FATHER DAN:
That we all would be
Someone's favorite something,
Remembered as such...
Surely to be wished
But it's mighty elusive
Mem'ry's Hall of Fame
Whose fav'rites are we?
Or have we seen the death of
(I should say passing)
"Favorite-ism"
Replaced by that old standard
Popularity?
I s'pose that's "High School"
Yet, that's how we live again
Recalling good years,
Best times traded for
Whatever was to follow,
If and when it came.
Thus we are here now
Casting our teacher in mind
Ah! There! Up ahead...
He goes; knows the way
As he did those years ago
Our English guru.
Yea his spirit lives
In our imaginations
He sparked 'way back then.
So, we'll get there too:
Class reunions in ether -
"The Bells" ring again...
END FATHER DAN
Running from the past
Can't be such a bad idea
Keeps you in good shape
"Give your mind over"
A form of insanity:
Alzheimer's
Alzheimer's may not
Be too bad. You'll remember
A bunch of NEW things
FLASH! to Mike Henry:
The neighborhood talent show
Cleveland and his friends
You get a chance to
Show off to the neighborhood
Getting up on stage
Tell a tale 'bout you
Something you did that made me
Love you even more
He sang boy to boy
Love songs, as Cole Porter would
And he meant them too
Sang in a gay bar
Tell me, are there still gay bars?
I've lost touch, it seems
Exponentially
You can be cyber-famous
Rapid expansion
Ideas are catching
Their contagion quite rampant
Good ones OR bad ones
But will they catch on?
Against inoculations
By their opponents
Tell you a story
It kinda jumps around
It's all in Haiku
I want to write it
Before I forget it all
The way it happened
So I'll tell you things
Just as I remember them
From my pinnacle
It is all in there
The Port Whitman Times dot com
Blogspot Daily Realm
Give me a forum
Where I can express my thoughts
And I'll change your mind
Marijuana's charge:
It makes you think that you are
More of what you are
Shave and a haircut
Luxuries of days gone by
Yet not forgotten
Charlene sure could dance
But she was a big girl, see?
So she sorta "cruised."
In rhythm, mind you
Smooth, coming in to the dock
Rhythmic motorboat
No, not Italian
The Franciscos have been here
Before Jeffersons
Temptations to do
Outweigh those to read about
Till doing is o'er
Blizzard! From inside...
The image of our front door
Top to bottom snow
Have you ever read
Anything I wrote, or heard
Music that I played?
Winter is comin'
Keep your feet warm, your neck too
Ward off sickness
Father, I have sins
Too numerous to mention
Please forgive them all
When someone dies young
Somehow he stays forever
That age in our minds
In The Poet's Mind
Ev'rything becomes Haiku
Singularly plain
In your oddball way
You long to be relevant
To mean something more
Music takes you back
To places you might not want
Ever to return
Want to be happy?
Be able to get into
Whatever you do.
You can be happy
Just don't court money or fame
Enjoy what you do
Chords are merriment
Really int'resting puzzles
You solve in your ear
We know how he died
But lo, what was he thinking
As he passed away?
"I've decided that
I'm going to be insane"
Speaketh the shirker
"Fuck the whole damn world
Nobody understands me!"
So saith the fool
Do insane people
Decide to go 'round the bend?
Do they make a choice?
Ev'rything's reduced
To Haiku, in precisely
One idea per
Haiku Universe
Comprised of new ideas
Expressed in verse
School defies PC
Political Correctness
Swims against the tide
Life's a controlled mess
Like bricklaying: mortar, block,
Formed into buildings
After you build it
Step back, appreciate it
You fade away, die.
One can but wonder
At all of Hitler's power
How it went so wrong
Somehow stay playful
And your youth is well-assured.
It's all "attitude."
Whorehouse pianist
Played tunes for getting it on
Picking one's pleasures
ONLINE TO DATE 10/9/11
Straight up bebop jazz:
Cotton Candy for the ear
Pure ephemera
Composing music:
Write what e'er occurs to you
Tunes snatched from the air
Purged of life itself
Coming down to the end now
No bridge left unburned
Death comes tomorrow...
What will you have left behind?
Something substantial?
Playing piano:
Master the "thumb-under" move
Along with triads
In my dreamland I'm
A pianist and composer
Inventing new tunes
Some night I'll decide
I'm gonna stay in dream land
Bridge to the next life
To live in dreamland
Permanently is my wish
Finally achieved
If I had my choice
Here is how I'd like to die:
Go. Sleep. Don't wake up.
Did a bunch of stuff
I had no business doing
But it was there, so...
A new way to learn
How to play the piano:
Chords, not scales, to start
Not a follower
Nor inclined to leadership
Just want to be me
Here's the idea.
Just create the dialogue.
(Shouldn't be too hard)
Coupla characters
A one-act play, maybe more
Controversial though...
God creates the souls
Men and women make babies
Not at the same rate
More babies than souls
Thus our essences return
Time and time again
After each demise
Heaven's gate requires a choice:
Go in or go back
Each time St. Peter
Explains the alternatives
To new arrivals
The Lord's gatekeeper,
Helps each candidate's spirit
Make the decision
Retire to Heaven
Or wait in purgatory
For the next body
The choice is random
Or go to the end of the line
How democratic
Take a body here
Reincarnation bingo
To go live a life
You think you'd recall
Having existed before,
Ain't gonna happen
But talents survive
Make transitions to the new
Unaware of death
"Think outside the box"
Don't fear exploring unknowns
"Walk on the Wild Side!"
Play a three-note chord:
Three white keys each separate
By a single note
Improvise a tune
To the harmony you'll make
With the three-note chord
Only use white keys
At first to learn mo' better
Play a well-known song
"Hey diddle-dee-dee"
It's a doctor's life for me
Healing the body
Outlaw lobbying!
Take the money interests
Out of Washington!
Ban the Lobbyists!
Their money is ruining
The United States
The Jazz Band players
From the Darktown Strutters Hall
Made it all special
"Occupy Wall Street"
Figure things out now
The way they might be better
For Some, things couldn't
Get better; and for others
They couldn't be worse.
Modern Confucius
Is what I'm aiming to be
Making sense today
I think extra-box...
Forbidden contemplations
...See if there's logic
...Educational
Playing in between the notes
Where the wild tones lurk
"Occupy Wall Street!"
Blog to save all from ruin
Owing to Money
Please, not to worry;
I'll be back, and when I come
You'll recognize me
Erie is best viewed
In luminous retrospect
Having grown up there
Ravel's Bolero
Smooth operator's version
Seduction music
Now that you're retired
What's to do to fill the days?
Well, you make things fit
Man needs a woman
Telling him he's her hero
Not a nincompoop
The person who writes
Is not the who you are, but
The one that might be
Onomodopy:
It sounds like what it's being
Broadcasting pictures
Life's a vacation
Away from what passes for death
When bodies wear out
When's the time to live
If you don't believe in God
Or Heaven? It's now
Life's a bit of fun
Heaven's long on promises
Hell? Let's don't go there
Look at what's coming
Death is a life after all
So don't ignore it
Listen to Mahler
Take a stroll on a green screen
Fill in your own scene
Mahler Symphony
It's like a walk in the woods
Without leaving home
Demagogue wanted
To take over OWS
"Communicator"
I'm saving the world
Trouble is, most people just
Aren't int'rested
Blogged to here
The anointed ones -
Some people are just special
With "star" quality
God creates spirits
Humans create more people
Souls? Reusable
Life on 18th Street
Comic books, cowboy movies,
Ice cream and the strap
Grand old tradition -
"They're all nuts" someone said
"The Henry's, I mean."
We, the survivors
Somehow have learned the secret -
How to make it last
Don't need any pills
To counter my excesses.
I just cut them out.
Mahler's music goes
Onward, into the abyss
Without looking back
Why not create jobs
That offenders can work at
For the common good
With a chain and ball
On a little cart attached
Picking up refuse
A sign on his back
Sez: "Your tax dollars at work"
(Con... Paying you back)
Con sorting the trash
Carefully; gets time off for
"Inconsistencies"
The bargain sentence
Five years - Or ten, but bonus:
Time off for "goods found"
There's an item scale
For ounces of contraband
Found in the garbage
Sleeps out ev'ry night
Regardless of the weather
Pack upon his back
The Mork Manual
Of Marijuana healing
Only in your mind
Don't get complacent
Keep on planning all the time
Stay ahead of fate
Overblown beliefs
In personal importance
Keep our hopes alive
This is not junk mail!
One can send fifty per day
(Personal contacts)
We fight for your eyes
To get our message across
Then fire scattershot
The annual cost
Of putting someone in jail:
Forty grand, easy
There is no answer
So, then, put your depression
Into your writing
I do what I can
Not the so-called "possible"
Sure things my oeuvre
We do what we can
And if we're adventurous...
Attempt what we might
To the wherever...
Music takes you on a trip
With the composer
Goodbye everyone
Enjoy the bread, soup, music
And read the Haiku
People love to be squirted
Sprinkled with dew, as it were
The spritzer can be a he or a she,
And the victim a him or a her.
Listen here you all
I got an invitation
To the Kahkwa Club
The Erie In-group
At the Junior Assembly Ball
The deluding dance
If I'd known there was
All that sex available
I'd have been a priest
Survival's about
Figuring out what to do
When it counts the most
Didn't want to learn
But just to experience
All life's offerings
"Won't you think of me
(Song of the broken-hearted)
When I think of you?"
Of course that person
Is wishing they were with you
Far away tonight
In playing music
Ev'rything leads somewhere else
Where you're led to go
My one faithful friend
Music, always there when I
Need a companion
Fin'lly realized
It's a sad state of affairs
All I've left is me
Use your handkerchief...
Lug your snot in your pocket
(Grand old tradition)
Hope you look upon
Life as a long adventure
You a pioneer
The true creative
Won't become mired in a job
Beyond surviving
Tra la la la la
Life is a barrel of fun
Why make it serious?
First we learn to speak
Then to write it down
Why not play it in music?
Wrote movie reviews
Composed a book of music
Thousands of Haikus
Peddled daily news
Picked papers on the roadside
Fin'lly wrote my own
I was butterfly
Cio Cio San tasting flowers
Ev'rywhere in life
Rode my bicycle
All the way to Aunt Mildred's
Got hit by a car
Avoided law school
Worked IBM for a week
Never wanted wings
Learned three languages
English, Spanish, Japanese
Well enough to speak
Lived in Tokyo
New York's "Yorkville" and
Camden New Jersey
Grew up in Erie
Watched the prettiest sunsets
From a Presque Isle beach
Catcher in baseball
Did tricks off the diving board
Round ball in grade school
Became two people
Henry John Francisco first
Then H. John Henry
Peddled newspapers
Sold the Bible in Spanish
Houses in Camden
To BE something, Nah!
But to credibly play it..
Aye, there's life's good fun
Life's a bloomin' ball
And think... You only get one
Make the most of it
I got to fly jets
Wrote articles people read
And played Harold Hill
I was a Psi U
And graduated Wharton
Toured with Mask & Wig
I have played the fool
Not only that but been him
Often in my life
When you've reached the stage
Where no one wants what you have
Then it's time to go
I've been there done that
More things than anybody
Another life awaits
National ID
Cards that show us who we are
And those we are not
God creates the souls
Men and women make babies
Not at the same rate
More babies than souls
Thus our essences return
Time and time again
When at last you see
Naught but life's imperfections
Adjourn to the next
We live in an age
Of things that seem elegant
But really aren't
"Nevermore" saith
The ebony raven high
To the lowly worm
Sing a song of cheer
Christmastime comes once a year
Whew! (Glad that's over)
Prosperity looms
Ev'ry country needs its own
Yule celebration
I wanna get fame
Show all those high school skeptics
Have the final laugh
"Strive" (Umoja) - That means work hard
To learn, know, to educate
Yourself and your own
"Strive" (Umoja) - Achieve
Don't stop moving till you can't
Budge a new idea
"Strive" (Umoja) - is Unity
Celebrate the effort that you
Put forth daily
"Strive" (Umoja) - Evaluate
Look in the mirror so you'll
Be a better yourself
Dreary drizzly day
You can just see the water
Hanging in the air
From Dreary Erie
"The mistake on the lake" comes
Henry Francisco
Perfect medium
For a brand new idea
Write it down: Haiku
All have Christmas joy
Dropping our doctrinal guards
We give and take gifts
...Don't think anyone
Enjoys life more than I do
It's an ice cream cone
To bike in Winter
Dress like you're going skiing
Keeping out the cold
When too old to fuck
Cunnilingus is yummy
Tick'ling the hot point
No one's easier
To fool than a person who's
Convinced that he's right
I don't wanna be
There when I die. And it's true:
I'll be somewhere else
What is life to do?
Is it to accomplish or
To experience?
Once ego is borne
Into this world, It has to
Shoulder principles
Bad premonitions
Have an amazingly high
Accuracy rate
There's just a thin line
Separating deepest faith
From intolerance
The older I get
The less deterred I am by
Something "disgusting"
You got leftovers?
Make 'em into bread or soup
Then that's all you eat
Haiku is a seed
Planted to grow in the mind
Of the scrutineer.
Where there exists light
There must also be shadow
Thusly shadow, light
Wait long enough and
Ev'rything will come to you
If you don't die first
Just the same as cars
Spirits ride on bicycles;
Maybe even more,
Pedaling away,
Making wheels go 'round and 'round
Generating life,
Which is where you'll find
Activity, existence,
Remembering, us.
Sandbox pianist
Building musical castles
Under them, tunnels
Improbables rule
In a world where dreams abide.
Reality waits.
The thing about fire
Is its ever-changing-ness
Rude pyrotechnics
Comes to a point now
I done worn out all my friends
If e'er pals they were
Mahler pushes on
Takes music to the limits
Of the Classical
After you are gone
With whom will I be able
To descend to the
Same low level of
Cynicism where we went
Betimes, and then some
Don't stop creating
Just because Cain killed Abel.
Life goes on. Death not.
Enjoyed the moments
I've got the greatest memories
Never ventured far
Alcohol? Pot? Drugs?
Take just enough so it won't
Affect your judgement
"Haikus! A quarter!"
Enter a subject and out
Comes an epigram
Make sure what you do
Is fun for you; after all
What's gonna be next?
If there is no God
Nor Heaven or afterlife
Look at all you missed
It isn't the speech
Nor even the idea
But how it's expressed
What things must you do
Completely by feel, blindly?
Pick your nose, wipe your...
Okay hero, fine;
But what are you doing now
That the war's over?
Listen to music
Melody, harmony rule
Rhythm's but adjunct
"Mister Henry, I
Ain't no dumb nigger, you know,"
Said Willie to me.
Still, muffled aspect -
The eerie quietness of snow.
Behold Wintertime!
Trying to construct
An alternate universe
(Is it playing God?)
I could never see
The point of competition
"I can piss farther..."
Any kind of drug
Makes you more of what you are
What e'er that may be...
Do you know one note
From another by hearing
It just in your mind?
All the news that fits
Suspension of disbelief:
The Port Whitman Times
You won't want to miss
The Cathedral Prep Minstrels
Satire, Humor, Song
You can't continue
To beat yourself o'er the head
Go, be successful
Not afraid to be
The utter fool, I went and
Clowned my way thru life
Problem of old age:
How to remain relevant
Yet not chaotic
My fav'rite wrestler
Mouse Ulrich, Comedian
Of the high school mat
Alas, computers:
God's gift to the creative.
(Resume from saved point)
Life is too much fun
Why consider something so
Absurd as dying
Failure can be fun:
Plunge into something about
Which you know nothing
Living on the edge
Of discov'ry of myself -
A constant pattern
The appellation "gay"
Has a bad connotation
A swishy inference
If you can play in
The style of Stevie Wonder
You'll just have a ball
Masturbatory
Oh sure, it makes you feel good
As it breaks new ground
The minimalist
Yet the maximum use of
The allotted time
Have you by chance made
The maximum use of your
Small allotted time?
Or are you selling
In spite of what you're thinking,
What the people want?
If drugs were legal
Spelling death to the profit,
They'd do something else
Killing is lethal
Thus, death is not an option
Black Jeopardy is
U.S. ID card
All your personal info
Right in your pocket
John Henry plays God
Purports to solve the problems
Of the Universe
Organize Black Crime
Protect innocent people
Who just want to live
(Let's us manage us.)
"You mean there isn't a God?"
(That's right. Only us.)
"Supposedly, then
Who made us what we are now?"
(God's superior:
Nature, by itself,
Space, wonder of nothing-ness
And Whatever's there.)
Who ought to be God?
In "God's world," problems are solved.
"What would God do here?"
Who would speak for God
And try to do the just thing
Circumstantially?
The year: 2Q12
Port Whitman is created
Its begetter: I.
"In my mind
I saw a city invincible"
Where is that city?
I say Port Whitman
Is the place which in his mind
Walt Whitman pictured
I'm happy and proud
With offspring who are:
Teacher, writer, pianist.
Is it playing?
What is the name of the game?
(It's naming the game)
Old age orgasms
Benefit body, mind, soul
Despite what you dream
The easy way out:
Faith. The belief that some One
Created it all
You pick out the horse
You think you'll enjoy riding
To the race's end
Children of Henry's
All influenced by the store
As were our parents
Henry became John
Thus a performer in life
As well as on stage
Charles made sculpture
Something from former nothing
That seems meaningful
Lois played piano
Accompanied performers
Shows, clubs, recitals
Nancy took pictures
Beautiful shots of nature
The lake's environs
Henry's Ice Cream Bar
Wonderful thing of the past
From nothing it grew
I'm trying to say
Something that really makes sense
To an open mind
I sit at my desk
Pick my nose and scratch my head
Searching for nuggets
Whatever happened
To your big date, the kid who
Took you to the prom?
Student, you will fall
In love with the piano
Travel down the road
It rarely comes, so
Take time for inspiration
You will be surprised!
Heaven: Behold the place
Where the good things that happened
To you here recur
I'm so creative
'times I think I'm gonna bust
So I write, I sing
Play White-key triads
Using fingers 1-3-5
Ev'ry other key
It only takes you
To gauge your relationships
Then go make judgments
Mahler symphonies:
Ev'ry emotion you could
Think of is in them
I did ev'rything
But nothing permanently
As was my desire
"Just Do It" they say.
So I did, 'most all of it.
(Great Variety!)
"Just Do It" they cried
Not win, nor make a profit,
But participate
You go down a road
Take whatever you encounter
Emerge with results
It's called "Pass it on"
Music is just a language
Turn on to the beat
Free online lessons:
About the piano, yet
Not how it's been taught
Ev'rything's grander
'neath the benign influence
Of my weekly squeeze
Notes "go" together
Chords are keys to harmony
To "hearing" music
You set the tempo–
"Rhythm Box" for the toddler
Baby changes style
I believe I'm shunned
Nobody will talk to me
Guess I'll go play tunes
WPW-FM
Celebrates Gus Mahler week
Plays his tunes only
There's a second life:
Alternate reality
Here in Port Whitman
A place that exists
Port Whitman lurks in the minds
Of its citizens
Part of elsewhere once,
But ultimately banished
For being outré
"Same old Song" cafe
Plays the same piece of music
All day, diff'rent styles
Do something useful
If not for ev'rybody,
At least somebody
The humble haiku:
Quintessential platform to
Float an idea
You have a life, but
Do you have an atelier
Where you create things?
Then... it used to be
Access anything quickly.
Now... Web ads intrude.
Remaining useful,
Purveying wisdom acquired:
The plight of old age
Here's a legacy:
Make sure you don't die slowly.
Eat right. Exercise
Obtuse people watch,
See typical lawbreakers
Caught on surveillance
TV News Programs
Create a stereotype:
Hoodie criminals
People in hoodies
Demonstrating? Then they ALL
Look like criminals
Wear your hoodie, yeah
But find another costume
To demonstrate in
My bank has a sign: No hoodies & sunglasses permitted. Stereotyping. For good reason too. Watch the evening news: Criminals surveilled in hoodies.
Babies push buttons
Playing with their rhythm cubes
Gettin' with the beat
A fraud's what I am
Pretending not to be one
Defining the act
I steal from the poor.
To justify my existence,
I give to the birds.
In order to win
You have to place yourself in
The realm of sure things
He be's the dreamer
Sometimes they even come true;
But then they might not...
Ah! You lived a life...
And what did you contribute
That others might use?
"Enjoyment" - Does it
Serve utility, or do
We owe something back?
In music, as life
One thing leads to another
In "composer" logic.
Mahler: perfect music
For any Hitler movie.
Rising above plot...
Took all the chances,
I have made all the mistakes
And paid dearly too
Music's magic hath
Charms to soothe the savage beast,
If it's listening
If I but knew then
The lot I've realized since,
Life'd be diff'rent
Happiness ain't the
Art of being well-deceived,
But of knowing truth
Ain't much in prison
But two things: Hate and Power.
Learn to deal with them
Tall dark and handsome
Always seems to get the girl.
(Hmph. First impressions)
Compromise, no less
Is the refuge of scoundrels
Who'll do anything...
The meaning of life:
Go have a whole lotta fun
And live a long time.
"Don't hurt nobody"
Especially not yourself
In your odyssey
A slave to the muse,
I stop what I'm doing now
To write down the tune
Since I'm someone else
My life has ne'er been simple.
"Becoming's" hard work!
The "Top Doctors" do
"Minimally invasive"
Procedures. (Yeah, right)
At some point in life
You stop keeping score, or else
You'll never have peace
My whole life's filled with
Things I wish I hadn't done.
Still, I survived them
Better or worse, but
Hey, whattayagonna do?
Existence happens
You there, ballplayer!
No one's really int'rested
In your touchdown dance
Our attention spans
Are being dumbed down
By Television
We're falling behind
The world's traveling too fast;
Solution: "Upgrade"
Brood not on winter,
Shorter days, light's fading, nor
The coming of death
When in growing old,
You call up friends from back then,
You're both young again.
Dental dilemma:
How long will they last? versus
How long will I last?
Henry Francisco
Is who I am; John Henry:
More than I could be.
But Now, attention
Is the name of the game, so
A vile act results
So now I fin'lly
See things as they are, and not
How I wished they'd be
Getting to my feet
Each time is an adventure
Unlike younger days…
Catholicism
Forsakes creativity
For those who conform
The world is wrong, thus
Requiring one's commitment
On many levels
Had no time for sports
Being HIM kept me busy
Henry Francisco
I had to become
A new and diff'rent person
And didn't know who
Not Elmer Gantry
I coulda been somebody
In Erie, PA.
Did the hardest thing
Of anyone in my class
Tricks off the high board
Off the diving board
Me, Tricks, half-gainers
"Whew!" Well, that's over
On to newer tricks
Staying in The Wharton School
Avoiding the draft
A bratty rich kid
But not rich. Just to keep up,
Tried to act the part
Raised on comic books
To seem the same but better
One cheated a bit
A Philosophy
Just like an eternity
Only goes so far
Ne'er wanted to do
Just one thing all of the time
Too much like the store
My friends called my pop
Old philosopher Henry
I just called him Dad
I'm poet, know it
Ev'rything I say in rhyme
And also rhythm
Writing is naught but
Slowing down readers' thinking
To the speed of pen
The writer decides
Magnification, looking
From his perspective
Haiku is a leaf
Bearing a fresh new idea
Floating to earth's pond
Mister Dilettante
Tasted everything in life,
Never ate his fill
Have all of the fun
Sans responsibility;
Ah, the perfect life…
Living on the edge
On the verge of falling down:
"The End Of Life Blues"
So now I fin'lly
See things how they are, and not
How I wished they'd be
Of hiding I know
Behind new identity
Just nine blocks away
Marijuana smoke
Just makes you more of what you've
Already become (!)
Twilight of my life…
Treat me well, let me enjoy
The time I have left
Take the other road...
Cease to be who you might have,
Had you stayed at home
The lessons you learn
Are not always the same ones
School thinks it's teaching
The things I had thought
Were important at the time
It turned out were not
Trivia mattered,
Not what I deemed relevant,
Much to my surprise
Brood not on winter
Shorter days, lights fading, nor
The coming of death
The one who knows not
And knows not that he knows not
Is an arrant fool
Life in a state of
Uncomfortability…
Hey, it beats dying.
Serve society...
Confer kindness, on those who
Are closest to you
Something's to be said
For ending up exactly
Where you started out...
On the contrary…
Haiku's not poetry, but
Ideas, alas
Aspire to wisdom
Contributing to the world's
New paths to travel
I was John Henry
For most of my life, but here:
Henry Francisco
Neither a mover
Nor a shaker, Lord, did I
Ever want to be
Maybe I'm Jewish.
I get along much better
With Jews than Gentiles
If no God exists
There is, alas, no "God's Law"
Except in spirit
Lo! God must take some
Credit or blame, if you pray
And He gives – or not...
I can't get used to
The ultimate concept of
Dying. Do we go…
Somewhere else or come
Back here for more of the same?
Encore would be nice...
Can you remember
When you were the golden boy ?
Did you seize the day?
Up on the top floor
I can only see the sky
Not a bad view, tho...
Arguing about
Politics and Religion:
Classic waste of time.
Ice Cream Store childhood,
Flavor: "You can't be ser'ious"
Life is but a toy
Rock Hudson's sex life
None of anyone's business
Ditto yours and mine
Made ev'ry mistake
Yet I've survived until now
How 'bout that for luck...
All of life you know
Happens in your constant mind
Not so your body
There are no limits
To which imagination
Permits our going
In other words, you
Can contemplate anything
Worth doing – or not
Like changing the world
Using available tools
In a diff'rent way
Let us be as one
Yoke our spirits together
For life's survival
The world beckons change...
Thrust to accommodate it
Now, while time remains
Music without roots
Goes along to where it wants
Ignoring the rules
'Fin'lly realized
All of the best of my life
Happens in my mind
Sure it's not for sissies
Growing old is a challenge.
Better than dying, tho
Maybe, now I'll just
Get the chance to live a life
All over again
Make the same mistakes?
How could it be possible?
There're just too many...
Is one to be damned
For what thoughts pass through the mind
In idle musing?
Is mere conjecture
Sinning, without carrying
Out the act itself?
Or are we allowed
Total freedom of fancy
In all areas?
Think about all the
Contemplate-able whimsies,
Barring none at all
Foolish things I've done
Haunt me even now, but I
Somehow survived them
"Cash equals success"
–The American Disease:
Married to money
Dreaming of the light
At the end of the tunnel
Illuminating what?
Politics, money:
Two great ways of avoiding
The creative life
You're the fair-haired boy
Don't waste your time on grunt work
Do what you're meant to
Music is not the player
Nor the instrument,
But the idea
Music is itself –
The very notion played out,
Composer to you.
Run an ice cream store –
Show you can be serious
About playful things
The further you go
The farther the horizon
Yet achievable
I looked all around
But didn't find my ideal
Until late in life
My body bears the
Scars of all the foolish things
I've perpetrated
In comics you get
Ultra-reality, with
Characters to match
Tales told out of school
Most exciting to relate
But devastating
Pity the patient
Lo, at the system's mercy
Or off to the Gods'…
I never wanted
To be successful at things,
Just to DO them all...
When you're growing old
Get used to the smell of piss
Finding its own way...
Fools that we may be,
Despite opportunities
We blunder onward
Without empathy
Nurse tends to her daily rounds
(Serves the patients right)
By just admitting
What we are, we can get to
Who we then would be
Do you wish you'd done
A whole lot of things in life
That you chose not to?
Then you might have missed
The whole array of stuff you
Actually did
Quit smoking? Easy:
Carry them around, take one,
Light the match, toss both
Intercourse is for
Making babies. Better to
Learn to masturbate
Bad people use Faith
To persuade stupid people
To do their bidding
Ah, life, adventure…
Down many roads, exploring,
Never looking back
Choose, in the bad times
However it hurts the least,
Live on down the road
Lady in the parlor
But a whore in the bedroom
Husband's ideal wife
XXXXX
XXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXX
CLASSIFIED TO HERE
Suicide bombers
Bargain with death to go on
To the "better life"
Mother thoughtful,
Dad artistic, Me?
A combination of the two
There's no Jehovah
No writer of Holy Books
Except by man's hand
Nor is there a God
Creator of Heaven and Earth
We simply became
Believe in spirits
And they'll surely come to you
Some time in your dreams
Haiku #12
Haiku #13
Write down forceful words
That'll pierce the shell we've built
Then make us act out
The saddest thing is
Knowing that you're capable
But didn't do it
Hear the backup beep
Truck a'coming up the road
To collect your trash
When you're dead, you're gone
Where? Nobody knows for sure
Except those who went
When dead is better
Than living the life you do
Why snuff it? Just change...
Open up a bar
"The Rehearsal" - Live upstairs
Actors, tryouts, plays...
Purely theatre:
Either they come or they don't
(Hookers know the gig)
Haiku #13
Haiku #14
Behold life's drama:
Comedy, tragedy, farce
Then final curtain.
Actors by nature
Aren't afraid to indulge
That's just what they do
The Director is
An "Other self" to he who
Would perform well.
You're a captive
Waiting on "Hold" for someone
Who advertises.
Anyone can bray
Anything they want to say
On TV with cash
They are just actors
Yet we buy what they portray
In the TV ads
We're being enticed
To waste away our spare time
Watching TV shows
Saturday Nite Live:
Ordinary people
Trying on funny
See if you can go
Without the television
For one week only
Do we care what is
Or is our only int'rest
What would seem to be?
Done been ev'ry place
Did it all before,
And now I be ready to die.
So if one of yours
Dies by radical Islam
Go kill one of theirs?
It's all about fun
Of which life is a barrel
If you play it right.
Haiku #14
Haiku #15
Let's be serious
Are you havin' any fun?
Lucky, your work is...
A good book is one
Where you can't wait to find out
What will happen next
Mystery novels
Are books about deduction
(Educational)
He laughed as he danced
Face moving to the music
Along with his form
Titillating kiss
Stoking a furnace within,
Ignited new coals
Once a year you'd like
Your Valentine to be yours.
No one else's, see?
The object of all Art:
Produce something notable
Where there was nothing
"In a dream I saw
A city invincible"
(And where was that, Walt?)
It's not death we fear
But losing our precious life
No matter its state
The mind is a tube
Through which one's ideas pass
And are thus re-formed
Being a writer
One can be brave, and then some
(Only images)
The writer decides
(Viewing from his perspective)
Magnification
Haiku: Perfect spot
To float a new concept
Yet but a launchpad
Had some this, some that
Little Bits of Ev'rything
...Cafeteria
Why pursue old dreams
Harking back to yesterday?
...Tomorrow beckons
Until you do it
You Won't understand dying
–Drawing your last breath
What you're wishing for...
Is it really what you want
Or idle whimsy?
I have more fun with
You in all of my dreams than
I ever would in life
Screen porches are scrims
Through which the birds cannot see
Singing, frolicing
We are like the birds
Trying to get all the seeds
Relishing their fruits
Talented blackbirds
To be able both to eat
And sing all at once
The habits of birds:
Endlessly fascinating
Barest survival
We are butterflies
Enjoying fruits of nature
Before moving on
Didn't wanna bomb,
People's lives on my conscience
Just learn how to fly
I'm a sailing ship
Dropping anchor here and there
Only to sail off
I go to churches
Cast a lot with diff'rent faiths
Keep What pearls apply
What to believe in?
Faith's a spiritual thing,
Intransferable.
I do The Lord's work
Though I've yet to profess faith
In The Creator
The Lord on a throne
Equals God as only man
Could have imagined
Listen to the voice-
Of one who speaks as God might
Bringing you closer
A religion that
Won't tell you what not to do
Only what you might
Church must spread its wings
Gathering in all people
Creating a flock
All the religions
Are the world's ruination
Their dieties frauds
Nice about Winter:
The cozy feeling you get
When properly dressed
Oft' 'tis easier
To endure the bitter cold
Than to light the fire
I'm a fire starter
Kindling blazes where I can
Heating up battles
Remnants of winter:
Dirty snow, deep potholes, mud
Spring is hovering
Fire burns in the yard
Goodbye Christmas, glittered tree
Hello new annum
Tall maples bloom
Big trees think the warm be spring
But not fooled for long
Man picks up some sticks
Bluebird scouts for last year's house
Spring creeps in, arrives
Yard birds, their homes gone
React in shock, cheeping LOUD.
The trees now beckon.
Hawk drifts on the breeze
Just has to extend his wings
Looking for a meal
I'm on vacation
Away from cares of the day
But I remain here
I stay where I am
But my mind goes where I'm not
To another sphere
My fountains of youth:
Tunes, exercise, attitude
Easy on strong drink
Got what I wanted
'Twas a taste of ev'rything
Van, choc, strawberry
Bikers are like birds
Fly here, there, hang out some, sing,
Fin'lly scoot back home
A positive place
Showing the way to travel
To destinations
Get a bicycle
Bike to the shopping center
It'll change your life
Don't deprive yourself
Of the good things of your life
(...in moderation)
Where goeth the time?
Looking back it "flew so fast..."
Yet ahead it drags
Life has not the time
For doing all I want to
Though I keep trying
Remember the times
You thought you were getting old
But were yet so young?
The force of habit:
Ev'rything is ritual
When you're growing old
A slip in your sleep
You twitch to keep from falling
Tho' you're lying down!
Old contemplations
Are nothing but once-new pants
Out of which we've grown
Cars rushing to work
I hear them as I slumber
In my nice warm bed
Burn my body up
My ashes to an hourglass
Useful forever
The world accepts you
As you represent yourself
'til you prove them wrong.
He went with the flow
Specialized in faking it
Undeviable
Be like a flat rock
Skipping atop a smooth pond
Till You expire, sink.
Two ways to compete:
Be bigger, faster, more, less
Or else be diff'rent.
You want to win? Work.
If you only want to play,
Well, then, that's OK
Be a melody
Leading us 'long by the ears
With songs for the nonce
Music that survives
Is the music that gets played
Or... oblivion
Don't be restricted
To the melodies of life
Live its rhythms too.
Music is messy
Not pedantic, not exact
Fin'lly resolute
Sometimes you just need
To feel intimately with
Someone that's not you
Convincing new Eves
And also Adams, of course
"Divinity lives."
"He" lives forever
Mortality dies, alas
One "God" kept alive
Through constant cloning
And passing down of knowledge
Thru generations
A relentless wind
Rips the branches from the trees
Nocturnal ambush.
Sex alone is best
The thrill without commitment
And dream what you want.
Haiku: Ideas
Unburdened by existence
To pick up or leave
Go be the dreamer
Essential inhabitant
Of the world at large
Just be curious
You shall be our salvation
By finding the way
People drink all wrong–
Gradually, sip by sip.
No! Knock it back; stop.
How 'bout price-fixing?
Suppliers get together
Agree to soak us
Two things wrong with sports:
Winning over playing, and
The power of cash
Be you not afraid
Life's not insurmountable
Bring it down to size
I'm poet, know it
Ev'rything I say I say in rhyme
And also rhythm
Village Productions:
An online publication
About the arts here
Editorials,
Fiction as plausible fact
Go, write, and be glad
"Wife Swap" - there's a show
Which spouse would you want to be?
Which mother too, kids?
Pope, former Nazi
Has the ultimate power
Tells you what to do
"How 'bout that, Hitler?
I am boss of ze whole vorldt!
Formula to rule!"
Ve arrre going to
(Vunce ve get reorganized)
Take over ze Vorldt!
Someone get it right
World must run as a unit
Thus be organized
Please, Death, surprise me,
Don't let me know you're coming
Just drop in some time...
Romance ev'rywhere...
Life is such a precious gift
Begging indulgence
My existence is
Living at the edge of life
Re-inventing - me.
He's throwing it in
Didn't want to do it no more
'Less you invite him...
From your misjudgements
Consider the positives
After all, they count.
It's no sin to right
A trespass of omission
Rather a duty
The clouds are on fire,
Sun sets over the water
Burning up the sky.
Haiku #30
Haiku #31
Straighten out your teeth
Your smile is your calling card,
Their first impression.
He spent a whole life
Traveling down the wrong roads
Running after dreams
Being impulsive
Doing things you wouldn't do
It can change your life.
Ruled by impulses
One spends an entire lifetime
Chasing the rainbow
Raindrops pick up friends
Racing down the window pane
Toward their demise
Life in a rainstorm:
Cats and dogs and lightning too,
All intensity
The beauty of dreams
Is that you cast them yourself
All your "friends" play parts
Tears on my pillow
The love of my life's done gone
Married another
I'm the very soul
Of one you once rejected
But I'm still around
My rejecting love...
Her beauty remains the same
As we age, apart
Body looks for death
Mind is havin' too much fun
Doesn't want to go
Seventeen but once...
As it is with all ages
Yet, this one's special.
Excuse me but I
Mistook you for someone who
Might have understood.
There comes a time in
The life of ev'ry human...
Being In or Out
In can surely mean
A heap of trouble or fame
Out can mean the same.
Fame is there
Just beyond dreams
It's the transportation that's difficult
Haiku #31
Haiku #32
Wherever you are
You do the same things over;
Diff'rent scenery
"Drugs are the answer!"
"Ask your doctor" say the ads,
(Justifying dope).
"Get medical pot,
Disconnect reality"
Sez the evening nooz
Drugs are not the fuel
They propel only downward
Away from the top
Drugs are the reward.
Yours after you've clawed and scratched
To the pinnacle.
If you're stoned or drunk
ACT stoned or drunk. Don't pretend
You're normal, okay?
Dope may not kill you
But your reaction to things
When you do it can.
She's reduced her life
To where she can still exist
Yet smoke dope all day
When you're high on drugs
You become a crashing bore
To Ev'ryone else...
Do it without dope
Come, march your craziest self
Of your wildest dreams
Dope might be fun but
It distorts your perspective
Shows things all awry
Dermatologists:
"You are all pre-cancerous;
I can handle that."
Stuff goes right through you
When your body is prepared
You win the first round
Wait till you're ready
Then taste but moderately
Then you win again
Now it wants you back
Resist the urge to indulge
You're on a win streak
Finally Decide
Whether you really need it
Refuse. (Game, set, match).
You recall what you
Intended to remember
Forgetting the rest.
Oft times it's painful
To remember the moments
You'll never forget
You choose to breathe first
And everything after that
Till you gasp your last.
There'll come a time in
Ev'ryone's ev'ry day
For the sun to shine.
Yet comes night time too
Whether you're ready or not.
It comes anyway.
Life's so fragile, or
So you find when something breaks.
But then (Surprise!) it's too late.
Losers live longer
They get to try many things
And have way more fun.
You've gotta have fun
But you have to pull your weight
Life ain't free, you know.
Haiku #32
Haiku #33
If you're overweight
You wear your sin, and we look
To form our judgements
We miss so much life
Doing what we choose to do
Ignoring the rest
Geometric God
Circle's center ev'rywhere
Circumf'rence nowhere
I have spent this life
Trying to be somebody.
Anybody. Me.
My life in Haiku:
"Little Henry" to old man
(Very poetic)
I'll be God (As if)
Let's have a conversation
Pretend at answers
Opportunity:
Thinking while flossing your teeth
Mining crevices
I am playing God
Where the heck is my broad brush?
Ah! The Internet!
Dot com, not dot org!
"Non-profit" is just a ruse
I pay my own way
God is Perfection
That to which we all aspire
But never achieve.
Suicide Bombers
Deal with death to get over
To the better life.
Little do they know
The better life is right here
Just beyond blind faith
Lie in a hammock
Contemplate the universe
Let the clouds roll by
Very small are we
Yet how vast the universe
Nothing has "meaning."
My time is over
Now it's up to you, you, you.
Carry on, kinder.
Henry Francisco
Age eight, suddenly became
Henry John Henry
H. John Henry's dead
Long live Henry Francisco
In word, music, thought.
ON PWT TO HERE
Enjoy what you got
Don't worry 'bout what you ain't*
*Key to happy life
Do what you can do
Avoid the things that you can't
(Only so much time...)
Haiku #33
Haiku #34
Dregs of life remain
To be consumed with gusto
Till they're all used up
When it's time to die
Move on. Another life waits
Yearning to be lived.
As the years pass by
We search for some relevance
Keeping up the fight
Artistic talent
Warrior mentality
Need them both. Too bad.
A life in Haiku
In seventeen syllables
Snapshots of a time
In Haiku-gawa
Everyone speaks only
Lyrical Language
The Haiku singer
Street corner wise man in song
"Notes of wisdom here!"
It's not the doing,
What's important is the myth
Of the enjoyment
A young man, I sang
"Ma, he's making eyes at me"
In gay cabarets
Storms of life o'er time:
Raindrops racing down windows...
Inconsequential
In a dream I play
The piano at the bank
Moolah serenades
Haunted by mem'ries
I wend my way to dreamland
Behold new visions!
Who needs memory?
Now we have hard drives, thumb drives
To store our thinking
Think with the rhythm
Ravings of a lunatic
Predict the future
I just pretended
To have Alzheimer's Disease
"I don't know nuthin'"
I just didn't want
To converse with anyone
In the time I had
Exercise guru:
He's ninety seven years old
Doin' funky moves
The ultimate drug
But only while you taste it
A Henry's Ice Cream
Haikus by Henry
Just click on the link below
(Mouse-click Imagery)
Artistic people
That's what the Francisco's are
No escaping it.
Never serious
About anything in life
Except performing
We are but artists
Who don't compete, yea, we invent
Thus the world sees
Her father's talent
Coupled to mother's morals
Success is assured
Think in your medium
Form what you want to express
Make it so we feel
Why do you want "Friends?"
Only a waste of your time
If you're an artist
Learn to dig yourself
There's more there that meets the mind
Nuggets of pure gold
Haiku #34
Haiku #35
Feel the need to talk?
Speak to yourself. After all,
You've something to say
Hooked on "feeling good?"
Dig this: the older you get
Fewer are the ways
Two exclusive things:
Where you are, and where you're at
So how about you?
Stay right there Henry
You've got where you want to go
Develop that thing
Where does the time go
When you're havin' all that fun?
To posterity
Songs about money...
Now you have it then you don't
(Pecuniaries)
Here's a new riffle:
Noontime piano at the bank
(Happy money tunes)
"The financial blues
Disappear at PNC
Celebrate your dough"
In the actor's mind
Stardom is the goal somehow
Good, bad, no matter
I know how he felt
John Wilkes Booth, that assassin
No one would listen
No one would watch him
Do Hamlet or Richard III
So he shot Lincoln
Believers in God
Conclude, based on naught but faith
Taught them by others
Let us say I'm right
There is no God or Heaven.
Then what e'er's the use?
My dreams were varied
Befitting an Ice Cream Store's
Flavors and colors
My Dreams were modest
Thus achieved regularly
(Multifarious)
The Human Body
Complicated mechanism
So much can go wrong
Francisco's are inventors
We don't compete
We come up with our own
"Inappropriate
Personal relationship"
(Tsk, Tsk, cavorter)
Make friends with the bugs
It's they who will devour you
As their final meal
Government needs dough?
Why not tax the Internet:
Emails that we read
If System X is
As far as you want to go,
Does your stuff? Keep it.
To FATHER DAN:
That we each would be
Someone's favorite this or that,
Remembered as such...
Surely to be wished
But it's mighty elusive
Mem'ry's Hall of Fame
Whose fav'rites are we?
Or have we seen the death of
(I should say passing)
"Favorite-ism"
Replaced by that old standard
Popularity?
I s'pose that's "High School"
Yet, that's how we live again
Recalling good years,
Best times traded for
Whatever was to follow,
If and when it came.
Thus we are here now
Casting our teacher in mind
Ah! There! Up ahead...
He goes; knows the way
As he did those years ago
Our English guru.
Yea his spirit lives
In our imaginations
He sparked 'way back then.
So, we'll get there too:
Class reunions in ether -
"The Bells" ring again...
END FATHER DAN
Running from the past
Can't be such a bad idea
Keeps you in good shape
"Give your mind over"
A form of insanity:
Alzheimer's
Alzheimer's may not
Be too bad. You'll remember
A bunch of NEW things
FLASH! to Mike Henry:
The neighborhood talent show
Cleveland and his friends
You get a chance to
Show off to the neighborhood
Getting up on stage
Tell a tale 'bout you
Something you did that makes us
Love you even more
He sang boy to boy
Love songs, as Cole Porter would
And he meant them too
Sang in a gay bar
Tell me, are there still gay bars?
I've lost touch, it seems
Rapid expansion:
You can be cyber-famous
Exponentially
Ideas are catching
Their contagion quite rampant
Good ones OR bad ones
Haiku #35
Haiku #36 cb8
But will they catch on?
Against inoculations
By their opponents
Tell you a story
It kinda jumps around
It's all in Haiku
I want to write it
Before I forget it all
The way it happened
So I'll tell you things
Just as I remember them
From my pinnacle
It is all in there
The Port Whitman Times dot com
Blogspot Daily Realm
Give me a forum
Where I can express my thoughts
And I'll change your mind
Marijuana's charge:
It makes you think that you are
More of what you are
Shave and a haircut
Luxuries of days gone by
Yet not forgotten
Charlene sure could dance
But she was a big girl, see?
So she sorta "cruised."
In rhythm, mind you
Smooth, coming in to the dock
Rhythmic motorboat
No, not Italian
The Franciscos have been here
Before Jeffersons
Temptations to do
Outweigh those to read about
Till doing is o'er
Blizzard! From inside...
The image of our front door
Top to bottom snow
Have you ever read
Anything I wrote, or heard
Music that I played?
Winter is comin'
Keep your feet warm, your neck too
Ward off sickness
Father, I have sins
Too numerous to mention
Please forgive them all
When someone dies young
Somehow he stays forever
That age in our minds
In The Poet's Mind
Ev'rything becomes Haiku
Singularly plain
In my oddball way
I long to be relevant
To mean something more
Music takes you back
To places you might not want
Ever to return
Want to be happy?
Be able to get into
Whatever you do.
You can be happy
Just don't court money or fame
Enjoy what you do
Chords are merriment
Really int'resting puzzles
You solve in your ear
We know how he died
But lo, what was he thinking
As he passed away?
"I've decided that
I'm going to be insane"
Speaketh the shirker
"Fuck the whole damn world
Nobody understands me!"
So saith the fool
Do insane people
Decide to go 'round the bend?
Do they make a choice?
Ev'rything's reduced
To Haiku, in precisely
One idea per
Haiku Universe
Comprised of new ideas
Expressed in verse
School defies PC
Political Correctness
Swims against the tide
Life's a controlled mess
Like bricklaying: mortar, block,
Formed into buildings
After you build it
Step back, appreciate it
You fade away, die.
One can but wonder
At all of Hitler's power
How it went so wrong
Somehow stay playful
And your youth is well-assured.
It's all "attitude."
Haiku #36
Haiku #37 cb8
Whorehouse pianist
Played tunes for getting it on
Picking one's pleasures
ONLINE TO DATE 10/9/11
Straight up bebop jazz:
Cotton Candy for the ear
Pure ephemera
Composing music:
Write what e'er occurs to you
Tunes snatched from the air
Purged of life itself
Coming down to the end now
No bridge left unburned
Death comes tomorrow...
What will you have left behind?
Something substantial?
Playing piano:
Master the "thumb-under" move
Along with triads
In my dreamland I'm
A pianist and composer
Inventing new tunes
Some night I'll decide
I'm gonna stay in dream land
Bridge to the next life
To live in dreamland
Permanently is my wish
Finally achieved
If I had my choice
Here is how I'd like to die:
Go. Sleep. Don't wake up.
Did a bunch of stuff
I had no business doing
But it was there, so...
A new way to learn
How to play the piano:
Chords, not scales, to start
Not a follower
Nor inclined to leadership
Just want to be me
Here's the idea.
Just create the dialogue.
(Shouldn't be too hard)
Coupla characters
A one-act play, maybe more
Controversial though...
God creates the souls
Men and women make babies
Not at the same rate
More babies than souls
Thus our essences return
Time and time again
After each demise
Heaven's gate requires a choice:
Go in or go back
Each time St. Peter
Explains the alternatives
To new arrivals
The Lord's gatekeeper,
Helps each candidate's spirit
Make the decision
Retire to Heaven
Or wait in purgatory
For the next body
The choice is random
Or go to the end of the line
How democratic
Take a body here
Reincarnation bingo
To go live a life
You think you'd recall
Having existed before,
Ain't gonna happen
But talents survive
Make transitions to the new
Unaware of death
"Think outside the box"
Don't fear exploring unknowns
"Walk on the Wild Side!"
Play a three-note chord:
Three white keys each separate
By a single note
Improvise a tune
To the harmony you'll make
With the three-note chord
Only use white keys
At first to learn mo' better
Play a well-known song
"Hey diddle-dee-dee"
It's a doctor's life for me
Healing the body
Outlaw lobbying!
Take the money interests
Out of Washington!
Ban the Lobbyists!
Their money is ruining
The United States
The Jazz Band players
From the Darktown Strutters Hall
Made it all special
"Occupy Wall Street"
Figure things out now
The way they might be better
For Some, things couldn't get better
For others
They couldn't be worse.
Modern Confucius
Is what I'm aiming to be
Making sense today
I think extra-box...
Forbidden contemplations
...See if there's logic
...Educational
Playing in between the notes
Where the wild tones lurk
"Occupy Wall Street!"
Blog to save all from ruin
Owing to Money
Please, not to worry;
I'll be back, and when I come
You'll recognize me
Erie is best viewed
In luminous retrospect
Having grown up there
Ravel's Bolero
Smooth operator's version
Seduction music
Now that you're retired
What's to do to fill the days?
Well, you make things fit
Man needs a woman
Telling him he's her hero
Not a nincompoop
The person who writes
Is not the who you are, but
The one that might be
Onomodopy:
It sounds like what it's being
Broadcasting pictures
Life's a vacation
Away from what passes for death
When bodies wear out
When's the time to live
If you don't believe in God
Or Heaven? It's now
Life's a bit of fun
Heaven's long on promises
Hell? Let's don't go there
Haiku #36cb8
Haiku #37
Look at what's coming
Death is a life after all
So don't ignore it
Listen to Mahler
Take a stroll on a green screen
Fill in your own scene
Mahler Symphony
It's like a walk in the woods
Without leaving home
Demagogue wanted
To take over OWS
"Communicator"
I'm saving the world
Trouble is, most people just
Aren't int'rested
Blogged to here
The anointed ones -
Some people are just special
With "star" quality
God creates spirits
Humans create more people
Souls? Reusable
Life on 18th Street
Comic books, cowboy movies,
Ice cream and the strap
Grand old tradition -
"They're all nuts" someone said
"The Henry's, I mean."
We, the survivors
Somehow have learned the secret -
How to make it last
Don't need any pills
To counter my excesses.
I just cut them out.
Mahler's music goes
Onward, into the abyss
Without looking back
Why not create jobs
That offenders can work at
For the common good
With a chain and ball
On a little cart attached
Picking up refuse
A sign on his back
Sez: "Your tax dollars at work"
(Con... Paying you back)
Con sorting the trash
Carefully; gets time off for
"Inconsistencies"
The bargain sentence
Five years - Or ten, but bonus:
Time off for "goods found"
There's an item scale
For ounces of contraband
Found in the garbage
Sleeps out ev'ry night
Regardless of the weather
Pack upon his back
The Mork Manual
Of Marijuana healing
Only in your mind
Don't get complacent
Keep on planning all the time
Stay ahead of fate
Overblown beliefs
In personal importance
Keep our hopes alive
This is not junk mail!
One can send fifty per day
(Personal contacts)
We fight for your eyes
To get our message across
Then fire scattershot
The annual cost
Of putting someone in jail:
Forty grand, easy
There is no answer
So, then, put your depression
Into your writing
I do what I can
Not the so-called "possible"
Sure things my oeuvre
We do what we can
And if we're adventurous...
Attempt what we might
To the wherever...
Music takes you on a trip
With the composer
Goodbye everyone
Enjoy the bread, soup, music
And read the Haiku
People long to be squirted
Sprinkled with dew, as it were
The spritzer can be a he or a she,
And the victim a him or a her.
Listen here you all
I got an invitation
To the Kahkwa Club
The Erie In-group
At the Junior Assembly Ball
The deluding dance
If I'd known there was
All that sex available
I'd have been a priest
Survival's about
Figuring out what to do
When it counts the most
Haiku #37
Haiku #38
Didn't want to learn
But just to experience
All life's offerings
"Won't you think of me
(Song of the broken-hearted)
When I think of you?"
Of course that person
Is wishing they were with you
Far away tonight
In playing music
Ev'rything leads somewhere else
Where you're led to go
Your one faithful friend
Music, always there when you
Need a companion
Fin'lly realized
It's a sad state of affairs
All I've left is me
Use your handkerchief...
Lug your snot in your pocket
(Grand old tradition)
Try to look upon
Life as a long adventure
You a pioneer
The true creative
Won't become mired in a job
Beyond surviving
Tra la la la la
Life is a barrel of fun
Why make it serious?
First we learn to speak
Then to write it down
Why not play it in music?
Wrote movie reviews
Composed a book of music
Thousands of Haikus
Peddled daily news
Picked papers on the roadside
Fin'lly wrote my own
I was butterfly
Cio Cio San tasting flowers
Ev'rywhere in life
Rode my bicycle
All the way to Aunt Mildred's
Got hit by a car
Avoided law school
Worked IBM for a week
Never wanted wings
Learned three languages
English, Spanish, Japanese
Well enough to speak
Lived in Tokyo
New York's "Yorkville" and
Camden New Jersey
Grew up in Erie
Watched the prettiest sunsets
From a Presque Isle beach
Catcher in baseball
Did tricks off the diving board
Round ball in grade school
Became two people
Henry John Francisco first
Then H. John Henry
Peddled newspapers
Sold the Bible in Spanish
Houses in Camden
To BE something, Nah!
But to credibly play it..
Aye, there's life's good fun
Life's a bloomin' ball
And think... You only get one
Make the most of it
I got to fly jets
Wrote articles people read
And played Harold Hill
I was a Psi U
And graduated Wharton
Toured with Mask & Wig
One can play the fool
Not only that but be him
Often in this life
You've reached the stage when
Nobody wants what you have
Then it's time to go
I've been there done that
More things than anybody
Another life awaits
National ID
Cards that show us who we are
And those we are not
God creates the souls
Men and women make babies
Not at the same rate
More babies than souls
Thus our essences return
Time and time again
When at last you see
Naught but life's imperfections
Adjourn to the next
We live in an age
Of things that seem elegant
But really aren't
"Nevermore" saith
The ebony raven high
To the lowly worm
Sing a song of cheer
Christmastime comes once a year
Whew! (Glad that's over)
Prosperity looms
Ev'ry country needs its own
Yule celebration
I wanna get fame
Show all those high school skeptics
Have the final laugh
"Strive" (Umoja) - That means work hard
To learn, know, to educate
Yourself and your own
Umoja (Strive) - Achieve
Don't stop moving till you can't
Budge a new idea
"Strive" (Umoja) - is Unity
Celebrate effort that you
Can put forth daily
"Strive" (Umoja) - Evaluate
Look in the mirror so you'll
Be a better self
Dreary drizzly day
You can just see the water
Hanging in the air
From Dreary Erie
"The mistake on the lake" comes
Henry Francisco
Perfect medium
For a brand new idea
Write it down: Haiku
All have Christmas joy
Dropping our doctrinal guards
We give and take gifts
...Don't think anyone
Enjoys life more than I do
It's an ice cream cone
To bike in Winter
Dress like you're going skiing
Keeping out the cold
When too old to fuck
Cunnilingus is yummy
Tick'ling the hot point
No one's easier
To fool than a person who's
Convinced that he's right
I don't wanna be
There when I die. And it's true:
I'll be somewhere else
Once ego is borne
Into this world, It has to
Shoulder principles
Haiku #38
Haiku #39
Bad premonitions
Have an amazingly high
Accuracy rate
There's just a thin line
Separating deepest faith
From intolerance
The older I get
The less deterred I am by
Something "disgusting"
You got leftovers?
Make 'em into bread or soup
Then that's all you eat
Haiku is a seed
Planted to grow in the mind
Of the scrutineer.
Where there exists light
There will also be shadow
Ergo: shadow/light
Where there exists life
Death must also play a role
Polarity rules
Wait long enough and
Ev'rything will come to you
If you don't die first
Just the same as cars
Spirits ride on bicycles;
Maybe even more,
Pedaling away,
Making wheels go 'round and 'round
Generating life,
Which is where you'll find
Activity, existence,
Remembering, us.
Sandbox pianist
Building musical castles
Under them, tunnels
Improbables rule
In a world where dreams abide
Reality waits
The thing about fire
Is its ever-changing-ness
Rude pyrotechnics
Comes to a point now
I done worn out all my friends
If e'er pals they were
Mahler pushes on
Takes music to the limits
Of the Classical
After you are gone
With whom will I be able
To descend to the
Same low level of
Cynicism where we went
Betimes, and then some
Don't stop creating
Just because Cain killed Abel.
Life goes on. Death not.
Enjoyed the moments
I've got the greatest memories
Never ventured far
Alcohol? Pot? Drugs?
Take just enough so it won't
Affect your judgement
"Haikus! A quarter!"
Enter a subject and out
Comes an epigram
If there is no God
Nor Heaven or afterlife
Look at all you missed
It isn't the speech
Nor even the idea
But how it's expressed
What things must you do
Completely by feel, blindly?
Pick your nose, wipe your...
Okay hero, fine;
But what are you doing now
That the war's over?
Listen to music
Melody, harmony rule
Rhythm's but adjunct
"Mister Henry, I
Ain't no dumb nigger, you know,"
Said Willie to me.
Still, muffled aspect -
Eerie quietness of snow.
Behold Wintertime!
Trying to construct
An alternate universe
(Is it playing God?)
I could never see
The point of competition
"I can piss farther..."
Do you know one note
From another by hearing
It just in your mind?
All the news that fits
Suspension of disbelief:
The Port Whitman Times
You won't want to miss
The Cathedral Prep Minstrels
Satire, Humor, Song
You can't continue
To beat yourself o'er the head
Go, be successful
Not afraid to be
The utter fool, I went and
Clowned my way thru life
Problem of old age:
How to remain relevant
Yet not chaotic
Haiku #39
Haiku #40
My fav'rite wrestler
Mouse Ulrich, Comedian
Of the high school mat
Alas, computers:
God's gift to the creative.
(Resume from saved point)
Life is too much fun
Why consider something so
Absurd as dying
Failure can be fun:
Plunge into something about
Which you know nothing
Living on the edge
Of discov'ry of myself -
A constant pattern
The appellation "gay"
Has a bad connotation
A swishy inference
If you can play in
The style of Stevie Wonder
You'll just have a ball
Masturbatory
Oh sure, it makes you feel good
As it breaks new ground
The minimalist
Yet the maximum use of
The allotted time
Have you by chance made
The maximum use of your
Small allotted time?
Or are you selling
In spite of what you're thinking,
What the people want?
If drugs were legal
Spelling death to the profit,
They'd do something else
Killing is lethal
Thus, death is not an option
Black Jeopardy is
U.S. ID card
All your personal info
Right in your pocket
John Henry plays God
Purports to solve the problems
Of the Universe
Organize Black Crime
Protect innocent people
Who just want to live
(Let's us manage us.)
"You mean there isn't a God?"
(That's right. Only us.)
"Supposedly, then
Who made us what we are now?"
(God's superior:
Nature, by itself,
Space, wonder of nothing-ness
And Whatever's there.)
Who ought to be God?
In "God's world," problems are solved.
"What would God do here?"
Who would speak for God
And try to do the just thing
Circumstantially?
The year: 2Q12
Port Whitman is created
Its begetter: I.
"In my mind I saw
A city invincible"
Where is that city?
I say Port Whitman
Is the place which in his mind
Walt Whitman pictured
I'm happy and proud
With offspring who are:
Teacher, writer, pianist.
Is it playing?
What is the name of the game?
(It's naming the game)
Old age orgasms
Benefit body, mind, soul
Despite what you dream
The easy way out:
Faith. The belief that some One
Created it all
You pick out the horse
You think you'll enjoy riding
To the race's end
Children of Henry's
All influenced by the store
As were our parents
Henry became John
Thus a performer in life
As well as on stage
Charles made sculpture
Something from former nothing
That seems meaningful
Lois played piano
Accompanied performers
Shows, clubs, recitals
Nancy took pictures
Beautiful shots of nature
The lake's environs
Henry's Ice Cream Bar
Wonderful thing of the past
From nothing it grew
I'm trying to say
Something that really makes sense
To an open mind
I sit at my desk
Pick my nose and scratch my head
Searching for nuggets
Whatever happened
To your big date, the kid who
Took you to the prom?
Student, you will fall
In love with the piano
Travel down the road
It rarely comes, so
Take time for inspiration
You will be surprised!
Heaven: Behold the place
Where the good things that happened
To you here recur
I'm so creative
'times I think I'm gonna bust
So I write, I sing
Play White-key triads
Using fingers 1-3-5
Ev'ry other key
It only takes you
To gauge your relationships
Then go make judgments
Mahler symphonies:
Ev'ry emotion you could
Think of is in them
I did ev'rything
But nothing permanently
As was my desire
"Just Do It" they say.
So I did, 'most all of it.
(Great Variety!)
"Just Do It" they cried
Not win, nor make a profit,
But participate
Go down a road, take
Whatever you encounter
Emerge with results
Haiku #40
Haiku #41
It's called "Pass it on"
Music is just a language
Turn on to the beat
Free online lessons:
About the piano, yet
Not how it's been taught
Ev'rything's grander
'neath the benign influence
Of my weekly squeeze
Notes "go" together
Chords are keys to harmony
To "hearing" music
You set the tempo–
"Rhythm Box" for the toddler
Baby changes style
I believe I'm shunned
Nobody will talk to me
Guess I'll go play tunes
WPW-FM
Celebrates Gus Mahler week
Plays his tunes only
There's a second life:
Alternate reality
Here in Port Whitman
A place that exists
Port Whitman lurks in the minds
Of its citizens
Part of elsewhere once,
But ultimately banished
For being outré
"Same old Song" cafe
Plays the same piece of music
All day, diff'rent styles
Do something useful
If not for ev'rybody,
At least somebody
The humble haiku:
Quintessential platform to
Float an idea
You have a life, but
Do you have an atelier
Where you create things?
Then... it used to be
Access anything quickly.
Now... Web ads intrude.
Remaining useful,
Purveying acquired wisdom
–The plight of old age
Here's a legacy:
Make sure you don't die slowly.
Eat right. Exercise
Obtuse people watch,
See typical lawbreakers
Caught on surveillance
TV News Programs
Create a stereotype:
Hoodie criminals
People in hoodies
Demonstrating? Then they ALL
Look like criminals
Wear your hoodie, yeah
But find another costume
To demonstrate in
My bank has a sign: No hoodies & sunglasses permitted. Stereotyping. For good reason too. Watch the evening news: Criminals surveilled in hoodies.
Babies push buttons
Playing with their rhythm cubes
Gettin' with the beat
A fraud's what I am
Pretending not to be one
Defining the act
I steal from the poor.
To justify my existence,
I give to the birds.
In order to win
You have to place yourself in
The realm of sure things
Go be the dreamer
Sometimes they even come true
But then they might not...
Ah! You lived a life...
And what did you contribute
That others might use?
"Enjoyment" - Does it
Serve utility, or do
We owe something back?
In music, as life
One thing leads to another
– Composer's logic
Mahler: perfect music
For any Hitler movie.
Rising above plot...
Took all the chances,
I have made all the mistakes
And paid dearly too
Music's magic hath
Charms to soothe the savage beast,
If it's listening
Haiku #41
Haiku #42
If I'd but known then
The lot I've realized since,
Life would be diff'rent
Happiness: not the
Art of being well-deceived,
But of knowing truth
Ain't much in prison
But two things: Hate and Power.
Learn to deal with them
Tall dark and handsome
Always seems to get the girl.
(Hmph. First impressions)
Compromise, no less
Is the refuge of scoundrels
Who'll do anything...
The meaning of life:
Go have a whole lotta fun
And live a long time.
"Don't hurt nobody"
Especially not yourself
In your odyssey
A slave to the muse,
I stop what I'm doing now
To write down the tune
Since I'm someone else
My life has ne'er been simple.
"Becoming's" hard work!
The "Top Doctors" do
"Minimally invasive"
Procedures. (Yeah, right)
At some point in life
You stop keeping score, or else
You'll never have peace
My whole life's filled with
Things I wish I hadn't done.
Still, I survived them
Better or worse, but
Hey, whattayagonna do?
Existence happens
When I fall asleep
New worlds open up to me
Such as ne'er I've seen
You there, ballplayer!
No one's really int'rested
In your touchdown dance
Our attention spans
Are being dumbed down
By Television
We're falling behind
The world's traveling too fast;
Solution: "Upgrade"
Brood not on winter,
Shorter days, light's fading, nor
The coming of death
What good is honor
Ranked even more than life, if...
In the end, you're dead?
When in growing old,
You call up friends from back then,
You're both young again.
The human spirit:
Not done when it's defeated
'Less it surrenders
He hated reading
Always preferring doing.
So what's wrong with that?
Dental dilemma:
How long will they last? versus
How long will I last?
Henry Francisco
Is who I am; John Henry:
More than I could be.
Does it e'er occur
To you righteous people that
You just might be wrong?
That things you thought were...
Were not, ev'rything being
Topsy-turvy, what...
How would you react
If you suddenly found you
Were on the wrong track?
Once in awhile comes
An original voice, with
A new point of view.
Haiku #42
Haiku CB8 #43
But Now, attention
Is the name of the game, so
A vile act results
So now I fin'lly
See things as they are, and not
How I wished they'd be
Getting to my feet
Each time is an adventure
Unlike younger days…
Catholicism
Forsakes creativity
For those who conform
Complicated world…
Requiring one's commitment
On many levels
At the end of life
All who can, should write a book
Telling how it is
Had no time for sports
Being HIM kept me busy
Henry Francisco
Best not to dwell on
Ev'rything that you did wrong
'Fore you pass away
I had to become
A new and diff'rent person
And didn't know who
Not Elmer Gantry
I coulda been somebody
In Erie, PA.
Did the hardest thing
Of anyone in my class
Tricks off the high board
Off the diving board
Me, Tricks, half-gainers
"Whew!" Well, that's over
On to newer tricks
Staying in The Wharton School
Avoiding the draft
A bratty rich kid
But not rich. Just to keep up,
Tried to act the part
Being so naive
It's conform or rejection:
Survive the milieu
Raised on comic books
To seem the same but better
One cheated a bit
Ne'er wanted to do
Just one thing all of the time
Too much like the store
My friends called my pop
Old philosopher Henry
I just called him Dad
Haiku is a leaf
Bearing a fresh new idea
Floating to earth's pond
Mister Dilettante
Tasted everything in life,
Never ate his fill
Have all of the fun
Sans responsibility;
Ah, the perfect life…
Living on the edge
On the verge of falling down:
"The End Of Life Blues"
So now I fin'lly
See things how they are, and not
How I wished they'd be
Of hiding I know
Behind new identity
Just nine blocks away
Does your faith permit
Total freedom of fancy
In all areas?
One doesn't adapt
To his own mortality
Lightly, or quickly
Coming to the end
Finally bereft, my friends
Are all in my dreams
The future isn't
What it seemed to be back then.
It's what it was now.
Haiku #47
Haiku #48
Quit smoking? Easy:
Carry them around, take one,
Light the match, toss both
If your job becomes
Your passion, you'll never work
A day in your life
Dame in the parlor
But a whore in the bedroom
Husband's ideal wife
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CLASSIFIED TO HERE
Living "en moment"
Perceiving "la vie total"…
Wildly o'errated
Image, Sound, Feeling…
Funny, what you remember
From times long ago
Suicide bombers
Bargain with death to go on
To the "better life"
Mother thoughtful,
Dad artistic, Me?
A combination of the two
In my fondest dreams
I'll go to sleep one fine night
And I won't wake up
Guys play cards to win
Women, on the other hand
Like to socialize
Uphill and downhill
Living in the Victor Lofts
The floor's "The Limit"
Growing old, moving
Further from reality
(The pleasure of it!)
Words are the colors
With which writers paint pictures
On the mind's canvas
Growing old alone
Memories of better times
Bodies that don't work
My dream is of you
Lying there dreaming of me
Dreaming about you
Haiku #48
Haiku #49
Mother, wife, sister...
There to listen, help and love,
A traveling friend
Tunes/life: no wrong notes
Just lost ones seeking to be
On their way somewhere
We arrive, grow up
Live a life of what we do
When all's done, depart
We don't cease being
Just because our bodies die.
Somewhere else beckons
The essence of "me"
Cannot be contained, alas
En corpus unum
Death's not an option
"I was" won't ever happen
To any of us
We go on. There's more…
Elsewhere, new place, new people
New Life among them
Ever hopeful, we
Redefine our very souls;
Greet new challenges
Where, what, to go, do?
Would that we could have choices…
("Ah! Now, let me see…")
I pick this, and soon
In a dream I'll let you know
How I'm making out…
Meanwhile, just enjoy
What you've got there, and I'll see
What's up where I am
Hey, it's only life
You learn, work, play, beget, die
(Don't miss the fun parts)
Don't let it get you
Times when you become upset…
Go out, buy some fruit
Haiku #49
Haiku #50
To sing jazz, just be
Able to go anywhere
From a random tone
The Haiku arrow
Is aimed at profundity
Sometimes succeeding
Where would you place your
Sense of Humor quotient, on
Scale of one to ten
I play at my life
Essay roles, create new me's
Not that that's all bad
Two shades of bitter
Sweet thrown in as a bonus:
Choc'late and coffee
The love of money
Is the root of all evil
Where does love begin?
Flower of the earth
Springing from lowly dirt
Into great beauty
Piano General
An army of eighty-eight
Marching to his tune
Looking back, I see
Life has been a series of
Naught but adventures
I wanted to do
Something no one else could do
Or would have dared to
He who partakes of
The vanities of the world
Suffers Heaven's tears
I cast before you
My "vow of eternal love"
Till the clouds roll by
Haiku #50
Haiku #51
One looks forward to
The profound peace of the grave
With trepidation
While there are known knowns
There are also known unknowns
And unknown unknowns…
We live in a world
Of unintended results
Of our own making
Life is about fun
That's its ultimate purpose
Nothing more or less
Felled by great beauty
One is at the mercy of
Music, Song and dance
The trains roll on by
Going from here to somewhere
Diff'rent life, alas
New life environs:
A diff'rent place to reside
Camden's waterfront
Eating an ice cream
No matter what the flavor –
Life can't get better
One could look forward
To the silence of the tomb
Or just sing a song
Guys: How to treat girls:
Unconfrontationally
But yet playfully
"Music is an art
That exists in point of time"
(Copland)
Now you hear it, then…
Music is whimsy
Shot right from composers' minds
To listeners' souls
Haiku #51
Haiku #52
Treat others as you
Would want them to do to you
...Were the roles reversed
"Two kinds of music:
Good music and bad music"
(Duke Ellington)
Train your ear to tell
The only mammal
Capable of amusement
Thus of torture: Man
Dentist designers
Of the sweetest of candies
Drumming up business
Somewhere in your mind
Lies the place of all your dreams.
Any chance you'll go?
Express your visions
In your most potent language
Lest they remain dreams
A piece of music,
Stirring up something in you,
Ends, you continue
I spends m' spare time
Thinkin' up perfundities
Fer th' world t' use
Pleasures of a nap:
Middle-of-the-day dreams play
While doing nothing
You came in my dream
(We kissed, caressed, made mad love)
When I woke, you'd left
Haiku #52
next
Haiku #53
Happiness: a delusion
Of whose emotions
Are Superficial
Yelling and screaming:
No substitute for thinking
Or taking action
Acting in a show
Gives you the chance to become
(Temporarily)
I did not become.
Why Become, when you can be?
Living is being...
Being is living…
You can be, then be again.
But... will you become?
The judiciousness
Of knowing when to shut up
Sometimes wins the fight
See the "fun" people
Make their way entertaining
Presenting viewpoints
Jazz is all about
Where the music's headed for
Not just where it be's
You can't not listen–
Turn your mind off to music
While your brain functions
Your mind and your brain:
Two disparate entities
Working together
Mom, at ninety-nine
"Far away and winding down"
Loved doc's joke-cracking
American Health:
Care isn't the issue that
Making money is
In conversation
Anything can be fair game
To the open mind
Life's a comic book
A little this, some of that…
Variety wins
When you reach old age
You've learned to laugh in death's face
Having cheated it
Good conversations
Brook nothing as out of bounds
Yea, even bad taste
Do not be surprised
If sensitivities rule
The minds of others
You may take offense
But you don't chastise the host
Who gives you dinner
My Tourette's makes me
Blurt random vulgarities
(Boy, what a relief!)
Worrying's our fun
'Cause we're old and decrepit
After all, what else?
Ev'ry loaf of bread...
A new baking adventure,
Gustatory treat!
Thanksgiving dinner
Gratitude expressed by all
Except the turkey
There are lines for tunes
Of type, dope, headlines, lineups
By-lines, and deadlines…
Piano general
An army of eighty-eight
Marching to his tune
Nobody likes me
Everybody hates me
Guess I'll go eat worms
Big fat juicy ones
Itty bitty skinny ones
See'em wiggle and squirm
I bite off the heads
And suck out all the juice, then
Throw the skins away
Old geezer pissing:
Urinate in dribs and drabs
(At least it comes out!)
Kiss me one more time
Before I pass away, love
While my lips are warm
Life partner, kiss me
Another time 'fore I die
While my spirit lives
God speaks in your mind
Put there by other voices
Whose own minds believe
A Haiku Poem:
The perfect mechanism
To impart wisdom
George Cohan called life
“A Funny Proposition”
(You can bet on that)
Rather than grow up
I remained ever the boy
That I am today
Medicare: A doc
For the old and sick people
Whose health is failng
Our ears liven up
To a wisp of melody
Floating on the air
Heather on the hill
Rising to the occasion
Meeting life head-on
Prospects of dying
Other than by my own hand
Seem unthinkable
Your workplace beckons
Whether you like it or not
— Better to like it…
Entice new Viewpoints
With thoughtful words and actions
Displayed publicly
We’re free to perform
A bricolage of actions
To make life better
I ain’t gonna do
This or that, even if you
Beg me on your knees
Lie horizontal
Thoughts come to mind that might not
When you’re vertical
If you don’t “become”
Then you’ll never have to “be”
And you can seem on…
Macht nichts what’s written
If you will but read and think
You’ll be the wiser
Don’t make the mistake
Of imagining you’re more
Than you really are
Still alive, near dead
Ruminating, composing
(Thought wards off demise)
Sought variety
So I tried ev’rything once
What’s left? Well . . . dying
Do consider that
“Verboten” place in you mind
(Hey, only dreaming . . .)
Things acquired mean less
Than knowledge gained over time
And then transmitted
Stare at life’s blank screen
Then cast your own characters:
A play, starring you . . .
One does not “become”
Alone, without life’s helpers
‘Long the fearsome path
Walls inhibit life,
Contain, crowd it within bounds
Begging surmounting
We need be equal
With all of our equipment
To mine life’s answers
Doors seal off spaces
We might want to get into
thus beg unlocking
A chair is to sit
Desk to work, table to eat
Things are to be used
Take it or leave it
A Haiku says what it says
And life rumbles on
The ceiling’s above
And floor’s below, walls surround
Our lives are contained
I’ll be hangin’ ‘round
See what they do with my corpse
After I be dead
Try to do something
That might help to change the world
go ahead, dream on. . .
We soldier on in
A crippled society
Do the best we can
We begin simply;
Life’s rhythms complicate us,
Make us cynical
Life’s music plays on. . .
You come upon a Rhythm
That suits you, now dance
“It had to be you”
Meet the inevitable
Fin’lly come to pass
Firmly committed
You’re heavily invested
No going back now. . .
Draped o’er all our lives
Wires tune us in to power
Sans which we perish
Look! See how your hands
Reflect the activity
For which you use them
Brighten up your soul
With considerations of
What might come to be
The Boardwalk Empire
Is laden with treachery
At every level
Ev’rything exists
In our imagination
Thus under control
Electronics thrive
On humans’ ability
To keep them going
Government holds us
Up at the times we need it;
Down in our excess
To the sounds of life
We kneel, though somewhat able
To moderate them
The insistent past
Pounds at the doors of our minds
“Let me in! I count!”
Go where? What to do?
The future is never clear
A gamble at best
Gamble the future. . .
Pick the horse you want to win
Or play trifecta
Light through the window…
Sun shines on piano keys
Igniting a tune
We breathe of the air
Drink of the water, trusting
That they give us life
Performance: the proof
That there is something within
Worth demonstrating
Advice of others. . .
When to take it, when to not:
Dilemmas of life
Brushes clean us up
Lead us to a Fuller life
(Legend had it once)
Machines rule our lives
Make everything go when on
¿Under our control?
We thrive in boxes
With security code locks;
(Then no one can see)
Speakers tell it all
Truth, lies, tergiversations
We hear, act/ignore
Life’s so myster’ious
Just a bowl of cherries, yo
Don’t take it ser’ious
“Life is but a dream”
Funnybooks say it perfect
In vivid cartoon
The outlet in doubt
Brings naught but tribulation:
Unpredictable
Open the portal
Peer, take note of what’s within
Make your assessments
The older you get:
More frequent dental visits.
‘Last. . . pull ‘em all out
In life, as piano
Playable choices exist:
Melodies. . . rhythms
In ev’ryone’s life
The rhythms knock us about
Scarring our psyches
Melodies soothe us
Patch our scars with beauteous tunes
Lead us by the mind
end 59
Haiku. . . A plain thought
Aspires to be meaningful.
To whom? That depends. . .
I was delivered
Of a large bowel movement
Clearing my system
Floors support our weight
Give us limits below which
We Dare not venture
Floors are for trading:
Open arenas with cash
Flowing at full tilt
Floored is what we were!
That is, shocked at what happened
Right there, in plain sight
Floor of the ocean
Deeper than man has gone, yet
Higher than earth’s core
From my floor I can
climb to heights of which I dream,
Scaling walls of doubt
Floor is overlay
Covering on earthen clay
Protecting our feet
Floors are but stories
Levels of life on which we
Pursue existence
Dance floor capers show
That of which we fantasize
Acting out caprice
On the killing floor
Shock! Then a river of blood.
Meat is created
Floor leaders control
Strategies of their party
In House or Senate
Writing is naught but
A form of insanity
For the talented
Economic law:
“Charge what the traffic will bear”
(Collusion’s corrupt)
Doors to afterlives:
Predicted but not proven
To be celestial
To ward off whether,
Simply close the door to it
Ne’er have to decide
Doors open, thus show
New sets of circumstances
With their challenges
Doors yield to money
How far depends on how much
Or wherefrom it comes
Slam the door? What for?
It shuts just as good if you
Ease it into place
Doors are entryways
To inner sanctums of which
We fathom little
The doors to riches
Sometimes have locks that might’nt
Yield to decent keys
Opportunities. . .
Doors operate in or out
Forward or backward
Though quite limited
My sole talent artistic
Still yet I persist
Haikus are useful
Because you can say something
That’s naught but message
People’s surfaces
Expose but one dimension
Limiting our view
Surface tension tends
To contain itself until
It dries or explodes
When surface mining
We don’t dig deep, ignoring
What might lie beneath
Surface runoff goes
Just where it wants, no matter
Whose bailiwick floods
Surface area:
Obvious, Often hiding
Buried treasure troves
Purge deep, you might find
What surfaces from below
Not what you suspect
Surface structure hides
Underlying eloquence
Oft’ purposely vague
Feeling what we touch
We hope rough surface might bode
Dense meaning beneath
Some musings surface
Of their own accord, un-lured
Infelicitous
Yo! skim the surface
Ride the waves of circumstance
Grab the thrills of life
Henry Francisco
For the first nine years of life
And now for the last. . .
See a rock-bound coast
Behind which an island sits
Inviting study
Climb the rocks of thought;
Looking down, perceive the path
That brought us knowledge
Craggy rocks invite
More durable souls to climb
Nearer to Heaven
Rocky marriages
Frequently lead to burdens
On heads of offspring
Whiskey "On the rocks"
Beats neat, making the effect
More tolerable
Rocking to and fro,
We sometimes adulterate
good sense with excess
If a meaning seems
Elusive, cryptic, Just Think:
“It means what it means”
Got rocks in your head? Mine them,
Who knows, you might find
Diamonds in the rough
Rock bottom tells you
There’s no place to go but up
A new peak to climb
One rock tumbles down,
An Avalanche is started.
Taking us with it
Going? To what end?
Doing? Are you satisfied?
Life is adventure
Things fit together
If you can engineer them
To their harmonies
Life is fitting in
Finding a niche where one can
Suit talent to work
Fabricating thought
Smoothing over performance
Working out the kinks
Spend part of your day
Working up your joie de vivre
You’re dead without it
Work at what you love
Even though it doesn’t pay
As much as you want
If a plan won’t work
Take an alternate approach
With another tool
Get up! Get going!
If you don’t work at your dreams
They’re just illusions
Get life with “the works”
You can always peel away
What doesn’t suit you
If you work them out
Situations can resolve
To satisfactions
My top half works good
But from belly button down
a daily struggle
Music’s Fakery
When played interestingly
Massages the ear
We be what we are
But what can we do with us
Aside from exist?
Made to seem like truth
Good stories are naught but lies
Compellingly told
Art is vivid fraud. . .
Naught but pleasant fakery
Shedding light on life
Music: a sweet lie
Telling us that what we hear
Croons reality
Music is a thief
Stealing us from where we are
To a plane it rules
Proposals abound
Leading ofttimes to action
Repairing frailty
A scheme finds its way
To the heart of innocence
Tainting its nature
A proposition
Is but a hypothesis
Thought out more clearly
The road to success
Is littered with proposals
That never caught on
Need to get it on?
Masturbate on the piano
Play the feel good tunes
Spurred by impulses
We think thoughts, ergo do things
Precipitously
Trembling of the air:
Music touching the body
As well as the mind
Emancipation
Of dissonances occurred
When Schoenberg composed
We shall have no rest
As long as we have not solved
The problems in tones. . . (Schoenberg)
You know, you’ll pass on
But do not believe in death
Thus welcome new life
There are no wrong notes
They just play on and resolve
Into harmonys
There was no bad life
It progressed much by choice and
Became what it did
Life expectancies
Being what they are, we can
Make them suit our needs
Life’s cycles take us
Though battlefields of conduct
Becoming manners
Is life fate, or what?
Are we destined to perform
In plays of others?
Life-or-death is it?
Ev’ry day we choose to go
Forward or backward
Look in the mirror
Do you enact a life - style,
Or mere survival?
How many lifetimes
Can be crammed into one soul
Depends on outlook
Hey, it’s only life
You live you die, so think how
You’re gonna do it
Life begins at nought
Goes to ought-to, resolving
In thought, thence a plot
If you're creative
You will find a medium
That suits your talents
What is the point of
Writing a pleasant story
they read and forget?
Music goes forthwith
To the soul, not pausing to
Be read by the mind
Music is a hike:
Wandering in the forest
Of sounds and textures
Ride the waves of sound:
Tunes that carry you along
To fanciful depths
Music’s instruments
Present euphonious airs
To discerning ears
Musical godsend:
Harmonic diversity
Vibrating the ear
I’ve spent a lifetime
Acquiring experience
To write about now
More of life’s to live
So don’t dwell on your failures
Purge them and move on
Purge yourself of doubt
Strike out for the ultimate
At which you’re gifted
I've e'er been the sort
Who likes being where I am
Keen on status quo
To a naif like me
Ev'rything's an adventure
Including old age
Life's ice cream cab'nets
Boasted assorted flavors
I tasted them all
Hey, what do you think:
Life: a good natured joke, or
Just a nasty prank?
Organize being.
Present a certain structure
As part of your day
Learn productively
What will contribute to life
As you find it now
Produce something new
From the raw material
Of which life is made
Respect others' thoughts
Wander among the ideas
Mine their benefits
Others' thoughts and things
Deserve all of your respect
Treat them as your own
Reason. Think things out
Beyond the superficial
Pursue subtleties
Conserve the vitals
That make up the life we find
Reproduce its souls
Share nature's bounty
Made available to all
Who would use it well
Solve the conundrums
Besetting society
Making life better
Change, from within, or
Without if necessary
Leaving improvement
What's more important,
That which we produce here, now
Or what's left behind...
One tests and observes
What passes or goes awry,
Cure-ables are fixed
Row, row, row your boat
Gently, merrily downstream
Life is but a dream
To be a writer
Access your insanity
And proceed from there
Two odd points of view:
Life – a good-natured joke, or
Just a nasty prank?
As a point of need
You are not born creative
But you become so
Life in a wheelchair
No fun, but it makes you think...
As opposed to act
Drugs need be legal
So you know what you're taking
Then death is by choice
Need is the parent
Of your creativity
Far from your blood lines
I buy all my clothes
Except socks and underwear
At the next-to-new
O spirit within
Help to guide my current life
To constructive ends
Building upon blocks
Already provided me
By mortal bounty
From the present day
To a worthy conclusion
Thence to my reward
Natural rhythm
Is what you've got, but I have
The kind that's acquired
Which one is better?
The kind that you develop
Into a cadence.
Get a good night's rest
To put the past behind you
Tomorrow is new
My soul's a virgin
Inhabiting a body
Here for the first time
This trip I learned how
Next one will be different
Using what I know
When you've nothing left
But the will to live, don't fret
That is very strong
Haikus are like flies:
Imagination-enticed
Ephemera. Drat!
You take a notion
Turn it into a thought, then
Draw a conclusion
Viewpoints beckon you:
"Look at life this unique way
See a pathway there."
The closeness of death
Spurs thoughts of one's legacy
...Bequests of value
What to leave behind?
Cash? Things? Ideas? Worthiness
Entreats for judgement
Narrative is fine;
Ideas as currency
Buys tickets to minds
Go buy all your clothes
At the next-to-new; then you
Know they've been tested
Not just for thought, but
You write what you can publish
For readers to heed
Demise's future:
Something to anticipate–
From there, you pass on...
Life full of promise
But empty of redemption
Leaves one wanting more
Wanna get ahead?
Read the papers, watch the news
Assess your options
Life flies by so fast
One barely gets occasion
To correct; so plan
Where and who you're from
Count heavily in the way
You end, and as what
Haiku deserves more
Than flowers and elegance.
Say something of note!
Perfect medium
For Expressing a notion:
Haiku! (Efficient!)
Be-ing your ideal
Takes do-ing, not fantasy
Words, sure, but ACTION!
It was what it was
Life lived, doing what you did;
So, on to what’s next…
Now I’m old and rich
Can have anything I want
Since I don’t want much
Good Haiku says this:
“It is the way that it is,
Despite what you think.”
Crabs in the basket
Reveling in misery
Capture escapees
I’m being tortured
To death by my own body
’Tis a fitting end
Did we deserve to
Live so long and die so old
When they went so young?
Relax by playing
Anything you want to play
Within the structure
Follow The Path to
Righteousness and your reward:
A good life well-lived
Think on anything
Nothing wrong with fantasy
Make your dreams come true
Something of value
To contribute to the world
–An aspiration
A New Truth for now:
Path to take to salvation
Of the world we know
Bienvenido!
To the Church of the New Truth
A path to pursue
Beyond religion
Into daily behavior–
The beckoning path
Perfect medium
To impart profundity:
Haiku poetry
Everybody gets
The chance to bequeath something
Before passing on
Thoughts of novelists
Lie in juxtapositions
Of Their characters
Here’s a big surprise:
Obstinacy, not talent
Oft can save one’s life
Existence entails
Choosing paths then to pursue…
Following where led
Inevitably
Bowed by blurred moral vision
We can choose wrong paths
Avoidable harm
Springs forth from the rude touch of
Terrible surprise
“Who am I?” you ask
“Who I don’t pretend to be”
Surely the answer
God’s admonition:
“You’re not what you think you are;
I chose you to be.”
Repellent living:
Where nothing keeps its promise,
All’s perishable
“Unique perspectives”
(Something quite unusual
To the TV eye)
From birth to death’s been
A series of adventures,
So, off to new worlds…
Books transmit values;
Probe common humanity,
Thus paths from or to…
Nothing comes from naught
Nor goes anything away
Thus: Tear down to build
Scribes vandalize lives
To provide material
For essays and po’ms
Writers turn their lives
Into artistic fodder
(And those they meet too)
What you can behold
Comprises here, now, but scout
From this point forward…
Here’s an opinion:
I hate to break it to you
But it needs saying
From someone who’s been
Away from it for two years
About to go back
For medicinal
Purposes only it’s true
Not looking forward
‘Cause, realizing
It only makes you more of
What you are, and if
That is something you’re
Not happy with, then your choice
Alone to change is
Something you have to
Live with, knowing that you could
But then might refuse.
The delusion is
You’re being productive, but
Really being fooled
And that’s the danger
The lure, the false illusion.
(Humble opinion)
Refuse believing
In it and go with yourself!
No help but your own
It is quite enough
To believe that within you
Lie tools of success
Pick them up and start
Using them as they were meant;
The future’s open…
A writer defined:
“Someone who has taught his mind
To misbehave”–Wilde
You’ll always fool some
Even sometimes fool all, but
All always? Never!
Your tools of success…
Either to use or ignore
(‘Depends on your goals)
Conservatives think
Ev’ryone should be equal
As they were at birth
Liberals still think
Ev’ryone should be equal
At the finish line
Write better stories
Soon enough the world will trod
Footpaths to your door
Are you sorry you
Didn’t become a writer?
Then start writing now
Composing thought that
Has meaning beyond whimsy
Alas, no mean task
“Just do as I say
Avoid the things I did wrong”
– A parent’s advice
Intrepid now, we
Assume that there is no God.
(Then what’s Perfection?)
List’ning to the rain…
Swishing of cars thru puddles
The seething of clouds
To build a Haiku
You introduce a notion
Then make it resolve
I know what you did
You made a Haiku poem
Wrote it on a wall…
Develop a thought
Into a logical view
Draw a conclusion
Thought, not hard, leads to
Imagining, conjecture,
Theory, Plan, Action!
Why do Plan A when
The alternative might be
A better option?
Ah! To have choices…
“Ultimate humanity”
For which to give thanks
Look around, you’ll find
Worlds of opportunity
Begging creation
Look down and behold
At the ends of your arms lie
Tools of creation
What's a writer say?
"This is the way that it is."
(Or was, or will be)
Look back o'er your life
Do you wish you'd had more fun?
Well… No time like now
Hate to leave this life!
'Cause you're havin' so much fun
Don't let go; live large
Wanna be happy?
Make work your avocation
Then it's all pleasure
You can come and go
As you please, sans permission
From Anybody
On the contrary
Haiku is not poetry
It aims for wisdom…
Life's an ice cream cone
Enjoy it. What will it mean
In a hundred years?
Life is but a theme
Stretch it, toy with it, amuse.
(Think transitory)
When the music stops
You go to Heaven or Hell
Hurry up, decide
I cannot not write
My brain is always cooking
Up new recipes
So write if you must.
Your brain is always cooking
Up new recipes
Looking for trouble?
"What in the world?" is something
You are bound to find
"What does it all mean?"
You ask when reading Haiku
–It means what it says
With our civil rights
Come responsibilities
Freedom has its price
Water runs downhill
'Til it collects in a pool
Where swimmers cavort
Worthwhile objective:
Be of some use to the world
Other than your own
The nature of song:
Ev'ry note goes somewhere else
It hasn't been yet
Tunes' stimulations
Take you where you want to go
In their fantasy
Solo piano…
Go where your fingers take you
(Digital ventures)
Morbidity traps
The spirit that might arise
To create new worlds
Words dilute music!
Lyrics can be enemies
Yet also best friends
Music is release
From bonds created by thought
Flight from the mundane
Trapped amid four walls
Two doors: To life or to death
The voice remains mine
Trapped in nowhere land
Food my only enjoyment
(And writing to you)
Trapped in a mindset
Is nothing you want to be.
You're destined to soar!
Trapped in a body
That will not let me become
Ary but its slave
Trapped in a new name
Welded to identity
That I can't dismiss
In any Haiku
It isn't the poetry
But the thought that counts
You take a notion
Turn it into an idea
Draw a conclusion
You can say something
In a paltry three lines
And make it pungent!
I've always needed
Someone tho loved me enough
To put up with me
A rating system:
"On a scale of one to ten,
Where would you rank ___?"
Things are different
When you hear them as poems
– Easier to take
In an ice cream store
The outside world disappears
For the sweetest nonce
"But what of the world?"
You might say as you pursue
All your lofty goals
Haiku poetry
Could save the world, its structure
Resolution-bound
Living Here on Earth:
Only a matter of time
Then off to elsewhere
Politicians live
In the "land of promise"-es
Made to get your vote
Say what's worth heeding
If they don't pay attention
That's their own tough luck
To be successful
Do what you're good at doing
Irrespectively
What happened happened
Learn from your own part in it
Pursue the future
Dredging up the past
Ruminating history
Is a waste of time
Story of my life:
I never wanted to be…
But only to do…
"Reasons why not to"
Crush down creativity
Before it is born
There's so much to do
Why would you want to just be?
Go! Pursue your dreams!
Life will pass you by
Unless you pretend to care
Even if you don't
When you're in Podunk
Soaking up the local life
Act accordingly
The Bible's next book
Won't come out in printed form
But in cyberspace
How to give advice
On many subjects: Try and
Fail at many things
Haiku: Medium
For putting advice into
A poetic form
A kind of advice
Better than how to succeed
Is how not to fail
New Biblical text:
The book of The Plausible
Read it 'fore you die
Alone with your thoughts
You ruminate on the past
Put it to good use
You have to give up
All the things that are harmful
If you want to live
Kicked the extra point
Caesar Montevecchio
Wound up in the joint
Life goes by so fast
You hardly have time to blink
Keep your eyes open
If you don't want to
Learn anything anymore
Just try to conclude
As your life proceeds
Look back, view all your mistakes
And where you went right
Consider your hands
What they do, how they do it
Utility wins!
Consider your feet
Where they go, how they get there
To what ends they lead
Your life is flashing
Right before your very eyes
Future realized
Henry Francisco
Had an opportunity
To be somebody
"No God, no Heaven."
Non-believers try to get
All they can right here
How much do you need
To buy the happiness you
Think you ought to have?
After you get rich
Is rich-er an apt option?
Consider others?
Talent for something
Is simply proclivity
To work hard at it
To Hell with all pride
Shred the bonds of dignity
Opt for realism
What you lack in strength
You can compensate for with
Imagination
Idealists are not
End seekers, but forgers-forth
Toward perfection
The best of one's life
Is forever yet to come
In this fate or next
Waves break on the shore
Then creeping back under toe
They rise oe'r and o'er
Foes of religion:
Logic. Rationality.
What can be proven.
Haiku logic is
A salvation for the world
Forcing common sense
Haiku's simpleness
Aiming for profundity
Oft hits the bullseye
There's a Haiku fare
Reducing indulgence to
Seventeen bon mots
Haiku contagion
Conditions society
Sagacity-wise
It's going around
With no inoculation–
The Haiku virus
Containers of things
Weigh in by their density.
(Philosophies too)
Promises of now
Oft become anticlimax
When futures happen
Flat planes give full view
To what's happening above
While lower depths roil
Frames, formalizing
That which they are built around
Confer soundness
One life objective
Is to have as much fun as
You possibly can
One person's fun is
Another one's work, but then
It's all perspective
You who don't believe
In an afterlife, just wait,
I'll be in touch, when…
If you're a writer
You are who you say you are
In what you put forth
Haiku poetry
Aims for the profundities
(Philosophy Lite)
You'll know you have died
When your shadow catches up
And passes you by
Pick thee a winner
Then ride it unto the end
To prove you were right
When it is too late
We rush to justify lives
Lived up already
Opportunities
Present themselves constantly
Along life's pathways
Some of us still run
After the race is over
As though it weren't
Rushing Existence?
Racing to the finish line?
Not so fast, podner
Deadlines set limits
Beyond which one dare not pass
Without risking all
Determination:
Races are tests of the will
To triumph right now!
Livin' the fast life
People racing to their graves
'Fore their time is up
Death comes at a price:
Existence, such as it was.
So live your life well
God-inspired, I write
Wisdom in poetic form
Read ye, and observe
Live in the present
The past is already gone
Look to the future
Figuring life out:
Haiku, perfect medium
For thought transmittal
Connect to The Source…
I am but a medium
Through which His thought comes
Sinners fathom all
Thus presume to know the thoughts
Of God Almighty
From the Mind of God
Through the Haikus of Henry
To human insight
I cry for my life
For all of the things I missed
But…Oh what I did!
When the minuses
Of life outweigh the plusses
Death comes lurking 'round
Jazz: nowhere music
For when you want to go there
Get away from here
Jazz: somewhere music
That's not a place you've been yet
Yet might long to go
It's all in the mind
If you think strong and healthy
Then that's what you'll be
The lives that we lead
Are the results of choices
Made for and by us
Our lives are like jazz
Improvised within structures
We find before us
Much as we want life
Death intrudes, sweeps us along
Into afterwards
Jazz is all about
Improvisation, but then,
That's what music is
Haiku is meant for
More than paeans to nature
– Perspicacity –
Jazz throws naught but curves,
Deliberately mis-leads
Into its un-known
When Death comes around
It's best to let it hang out
Don't feed it, stay cool
After death, then what?
Some say Heaven, some say Hell
Meet God or Satan…
A barrier sits
'tween us and the hereafter
Called "Death" – but is it?
Tap your fingers, wait
Something is bound to happen
The world won't stand still
The light that is God
Illuminates our beliefs
Piercing the darkness
Before she was your
Mother, Grandma, Great Gramma
She was mine, all mine
The body interred
The Soul is a prisoner
Awaiting decay
The soul, e'erlasting
Levitates near the body
Till it is no more
Sexuality
Is no one's business, nor God's
Let privacy win
Bottles hold some keys
That open or shut the doors
To aspects of life
The unconstrained life:
A round-bottomed bowl with its
Contents rolling free
Planning your voyage:
Flat is easier going
No bumps, waves – or winds
Containers with lids
Conceal what's hiding within,
Inviting snooping
One's world, closeted
Remains the property of
Its inhabitants
Things that we play with
Remain acting as toys do
Until we shift gears
How high you can jump
Depends on preparation
Combined with mindset
Don't neglect thinking
About tomorrow's crises
They will soon arrive
How to be alone:
Think something original,
Tell it to skeptics
How to do penance:
Grow old, remember your sins
Forgo atonement
If the keys to life
Don't fit the locks presented
Make some adjustments
Cyberspace holds all
That there is to know, and yet
More remains to get
What a waste of life
Indulging in the pleasures
Not feeling the pain
Have you got a plan?
Do you foresee success, or
Will you take what comes?
When you have nothing
Give yourself to ev'rything
Something will come up
I've done so much bad
I feel as though I must do
Something constructive
All that has happened
To me is my own damn fault
(Character defect)
I try to make up
For my own deficiencies
By writing ideals
In living your life
Don't be satisfied with less
Try a bit harder…
Something is burning–
People power longing to
Attract attention
Waves transmit the news
Directly through open air
To attentive minds
The soul e'erlasting
Hovers around the body
Till it is no more
In playing piano
There are no mistakes, just
Notes leading to tones
The Victor Follies
We've young girls and guys plenty
Let's put on a show
Chairs beckon sitters
Beds sleepers, floors promenades
… Ascribed purposes
What you came in with
Then how you used it for good
That's the take-away
Life is about fun
Having it, making it work
For the duration
Believe in Haiku
The language of The Divine
Salvation in words
Inspiration comes
To those who seek it and will
Put it to good use
Laughter, a device
With which we acquiesce to
Whatever happens
Answers will appear
To those who seek to find them
In the right places
New music comes forth
In your humming, whistling, e'en
In your ear unsung
Just sit and think, then
What will come to mind - Surprise:
You'll have an "Aha!"
Brush after you eat
Save your teeth for later on
You're gonna need 'em
Keep using widgets
Until they are all worn out
'Ere choosing others
Prove how smart you are
By doing what you want to
Not think you ought to
Gadgets are keys that
Open doors to horizons
Toward which to yearn
Minds are containers
Of the wherewithal to do
What ought to be done
Don't despair at death
I'll see you when I get there
Together after
"What's the takeaway?"
– Ever the burning question
To the analyst
Inspiration comes
When you go fishing for it;
(Even when you don't)
What one ought to do:
Then perfectly obvious,
Now not so much so
Life's levers abound
With which we can jimmy loose
Jammed panaceae
The world comes around
To new dawn each rotation
Offering options
Good plays expose you
To parts of yourself that are
Like their characters
Good plays expose you
To parts of their characters
That are just like you
Burn up the old ways
Spread their ashes on your mind
For future reference
Music has context
From notion to symphony
All the way to trash
If the dead appeared
In our dreams, there would be no
Reason to join them
Wisdom comes to those
Who seek it regardless of
Their station in life
The benefit of
Living here on Earth is that
It's not someplace else
Life such as it is
Might be no bargain but then
What else is there, hmm?
A good book will tell
How it is there, but also
How it might be here
To achieve wisdom
One must aim to acquire it
Thence its benefits
Round and round they spin
Wheels, worlds, all merry-go-rounds
Coming back to "start"
Be patient, because
What goes around comes around
(Opportunity)
Flatness sometimes works
In your favor when you think
To cruise, not to climb
With bricks and mortar
You can build something real;
With words, ideas
Reality be's –
A train for you to jump on
And become part of
Train leaves the station
Bearing a world of its own
Passing through others
See cars, trains, boats, planes
With lives accommodated
To circumstances
Sounds of life abound
The music of existence
Without which no way
Beneath the path trod:
Trampled vegetation from
Another stratum
Looking up one sees
What might be, or just exists
Yet available
Aiming for wisdom
Open, develop, resolve
All in just three lines
The dilettante's dream:
A taste here, sample there. Ah,
–The well-rounded life
You are a mystic,
Proving it when you utter
Mystifying things
In biblical terms
One thing begets another
(Careful how you act)
Some things around us
Invariably stay put
As we move through them
Contemplate the screen
Showing life as 'twill become
Incrementally
The music of life
Whose harmonies might not fit
Plays on anyway
Tall buildings might hold
Short answers to life's hurdles
With medium gains
A view exposing
Intimate situations
Invites secrecy
See what you can see
Learn what you can learn and then
Put them to good use
Old people ought list
The wisdoms gained in living
For the good of all
There are episodes
You're lucky to have survived
Give thanks, change your ways
No trumpets will sound
When you put forth objectives
Save for in your mind
We find our own moods
In the circumstances which
Somehow find us first
When we walk about
We find new destinations
Materialize
When we look ahead
We perceive new horizons
Beckon us draw nigh
Nearer one's own God
Is found eternity where
Life proceeds anew
Spaces exist where
Abstractions beg hearing
Inner voices cry
In pursuit of of truth
One faces up to mirrors
That reveal the self
Windows grant seeing
Without experiencing
What lies external
In poking within
One finds nuggets and fungi
From which to choose life
Share your treasure trove
For appropriation by
Opportunistics
Words pollute music
Tunes debilitate logic
Ne'er the two should meet
Take any subject
Try to say something profound
Ending up useful
All of the planet
Belongs to each of us in-
Dividually
Love is dangerous;
Its implications often
Connote commitment
Walls that protect us
Often insulate us from
Beneficial thought
Words get in the way
Of thoughts while hearing music
Where notions abide
Light serves its purpose
As counterpoint to darkness
"Oh say can you see?"
Melodies abound
Like hanging fruit for picking
By lyrical souls
Door opens a crack
Reveals a partial picture
Of that which might be
Angles betray what
From a diff'rent perspective
Might be something else
Hidden crevasses
Could conceal treasures of note
Dark profundities
Even sinners get
Divine inspirations to
Do the proper thing
"Why didn't I then?"
Rings hollow when it's too late.
Seize the moment now.
When I was a child
I was Henry Francisco
And him I remained
If you believe
The world can be saved
Then the only question is how
Serious subjects
Need to be tackled today
And dealt with for e'er
The older you get
The more memories you have
Make sure they're good ones
Playing the piano
Is all about knowing which
Keys to push and when
How do dentists brush?
They plainly see things we don't
So pray tell us now
Don't be looking back
Yeah sure, there's lots you "should've."
Think of what's to come
Light the way ahead
With knowledge and counseling
Plunge forth to kismet
Meet some new people
Absorb viewpoints not your own
Broaden your purview
Listen intently
To the harmonies of life
How they clash or square
"Seizing the day" means
Much more than just waking up
It's exploitation
Warning! "Way beyond!"
You've ventured to the point where
There's no going back
Messages appear
Along life's way to tell you
Proceed or rein in
Life's mistakes cannot
Be edited out, but stay
In the mind's hard drive
Life's mistakes, pasted
Over in the mind's hard drive
Plead to be ignored
Ignorance is bliss
Deflecting thought from duty
To random pleasure
Toxicity lasts
Latching on to nuclei
Enticing cohorts
Baring compassion
Can invite harsh ridicule
In the wrong quarters
Ridicule: a tool
Prophets of doom employ to
Expose their real selves
Tools are meant to fix,
Not tear down, unless of course
Aiming to rebuild
Implements of want
Cloud situations of need
Blotting out fortune
Say something germane
To subjects worth discussing
Or remain silent
Right the wrongs you can
Left are those that need fixing
By somebody else
Do you really need
Friends who'd judge your life based on
Their criteria
Live until you die
Right up to the very end
Think, plan, choose, act, write
The cows are mad now
It's a bovine rebellion
A high-steaks revenge
The good times were then
When 'twas as good as it gets
Remember them well
When you fail to find
Things to care about, then you've
No reason to live
Un-impressable:
Those whose passions are sought yet
Fail to register
Poetry can stand
All by itself saying things
Music cannot help
Words get in the way
Of pure music; tunes enhance
Lyrical meanings
I'm good at writing
But lousy at rejection
So I don't submit
Life is a blank slate
Having borders within which
We create its scenes
Saints extol Heaven
To which they've recently gone
Bidding us join them
"Heaven" – Where is it?
Up? Down? Within or without?
Those who've gone there know
To be considered:
God's point of view–Now, today?
(Act accordingly)
For us to save it
The world must be won over
With guns? No. Ideas…
Church, mosque, synagogue
Organizations now but
Items from the past
Inspiration comes
To those chosen in order
To do the Lord's work
God cannot be killed
Religion is in the mind
From its conception
The world is cyber
All of the great religions
Are now of the past
One is born to be
A writer not a fighter
To win wars with words
So, go tell the world
What to do, how to run things
But will they listen?
Though necessary
Unfortunate militance:
Sad commentary
Emotion of tunes,
Interpretation of chords:
Essence of Music
One can't imagine
Being dead, not existing;
Thus Heaven or Hell
Life is in the mind
Existence a thing of thought
The world but a speck
Democracy's ruin:
Wide unchallenged opinion
(Media-muscle)
In order to vote
One must be literate and
Consider issues
Wealth over-rated
World overpopulated
(Sharing essential)
Shading of the truth–
Advertising, the ruin
Of Democracy
Ads frame messages
Democracy needs debate
Of current issues
Obsolete for news,
Newspapers can be forums
To debate issues
Fat, dumb, happy us…
Money can sway opinion
Thus elections bought
Rather than do good,
Lobbys peddle influence
For their point of view
Daily debating
Addressing all the issues
Is a no-brainer
(Voting potency
Literacy-based on a
Scale from one to ten)
This is the way that
It IS, regardless of how
You think it might be
You've made decisions
How to run your life within
Found circumstances
Life begs to be lived
Out to the farthest limits
Within which it's found
Music is as far
As the human consciousness
Can allow itself
Cover what you see
Think but what you imagine
Consider what comes
Oh, Anathema
Thy name is cable TV
Getting your money's worth
You will be surprised
How creative you can get
When you scratch cable
If there is a God,
Not His existence but the
Belief is what matters
Say you're a writer…
The most important choice is:
What's your medium
Don't e'er be afraid
To go on to the next phase
Of what life can bring
Do not be afraid
Imagine profundities
For others to mull
Where then is life's fun…
In the recognition? Fame?
Or in the doing?
Cultivate your thoughts
Prune them into little plants
That bear potent fruit
Lying down, look up.
Shadows cast upon ceilings
Reflect what's below
Lie Down, eyes covered
What appears in repose might
Prove enlightening
Disappearances
Indicate shortcomings of
What might have been there
One can kill many
Quite easily, it would seem
With today's mindset
Things also have rights
But they do not extend to
Animal conduct
As fast as it's made
Media now gobbles up
Creativity
Creativity:
Over-rated quality
(Ev'ryone has it)
Notions are conveyed
When Haiku gets personal
Cornering credence
Tossed into a world
Ill-prepared to handle life
One improvises
Writing down your thoughts
Making something out of naught
Aye, there's a fancy
When you're old, you'll find
This is what dying is like
Get lucky. Go quick.
Achievement is fine.
Making it the point of life
Is futility
Life is all about
What you get to do in it,
Not what you achieve
Once you're a cripple
Ev'rything then is fair game
From your lofty perch
One does many things
Some of them well, some not so
But, that one does them…
Go write, compose, rhyme,
Snatch some perspectives from naught:
Your musings, airs, thoughts.
Capture perspectives
Then write, compose, rhyme, publish
Those you think have worth
You'll never grow old
If, with outlook directed
You open your mind
Outlooks unconstrained
Give a total spectrum view
(Opportunities!)
Ceilings co-exist
For protection and control
Floors then for support
If you had to choose
Achievement? Experience?
Which then would it be?
You're not grown up 'til
You become who you will be
And if never? Fine!
In league with your thoughts?
Loneliness: a state of mind
Only you can cure
Clouding of the mind
Sometimes brings new clarity
To erstwhile outlooks
Amazing Grace is
Oft shown to those who seek it
Working miracles
Sweet to some folks is
Simply less than the sour taste
Of mistakes they've made
Wretchedness pervades
Societies that ignore
Guiding the less apt
Songs that tell feelings
Commit the delivery
To sincerity
What's stuck in your craw's
Oft' worth communicating
In poetic guise
Prefer make believe
To a reality that
Pretends importance
Items pass thru us
From one end to another
Digested between
Brains harbor substance
Containing it for the nonce
Until it's needed
What is "decency?'
The "Golden Rule" hath said it
(Begging refinement)
No Heaven or Hell…
If this were the only life
Could "decency" rule?
Human resilience
Snaps us back from perils that
Would pull us to doom
God would be surprised
At what is perpetrated
By human stand-ins
Naught but here and now
Is the net effect of what
We believe and do
Believe what you want
Yet, assume there is no one
Here on Earth but us
Protection? Granted,
Walls are built to enclose us
(From which externals?)
Cuteness offers much
To utilize when you are
Up against a wall
"Look before you leap"
"What you see is what you get"
(Don't forget to change…)
To do or to write
Which is the more rewarding?
(To you or to them…)
Fancy in your mind
What your Heaven would be like:
Are you sure it's there?
Think on a subject
Then say something about it
From your point of view
Some airs are meant for
Breathing, some for putting on
Some just for playing
If you burn each bridge
The road goes only forward
Across new rivers
Pretty things can lift
Spirits as long as they last
…And that includes both
Ideas gob-smack you
A lift above complacence
To stunning import!
Hands' dexterity
Take us to levels of art
Fathomed by fancy
Love's inspiration
Lifts life's enthusiasm
To piquant extremes
Improvisation
Within life's structures can blaze
Unknown pathways forth
Endless parades of
Viewpoint and speculation
Beg our scrutiny
To the spirit world
Where many souls float about
Newborn lives beckon
Reincarnations
Of many diff'rent spirits
Can live within us
Lie thee down and think
Of what might be if only
A way could be made
Things set forth in print
Lend a legitimacy
To their perceptions
Thoughts swim consciousness
Glowing with erudition
Begging to be fed
Books shall be no more
When thought can be transmitted
Directly (If e'er)
Will the assurance
That God exists ever come
Beyond one's own faith?
Round and round we go
In a world spinning beyond
What we might control
Maintaining restraint
Of life in a bad milieu
Requires diligence
Sex: recreation
And procreation to bring
New generations
Our Democracy:
Founded by idealists
Hijacked by cynics
The naive nation
Buying ev'ry new notion
(No skeptics be we)
Pain is part of life
So avoid it if you can
Or "Offer it up"
Tiptoe to the edge
To experience limits
Where dark perils lurk
The shadows of life
Hide details that inhibit
Possibilities
Paint pictures using
"The art of the possible"
Sans regard for scorn
Lo! What is art but
Using imagination
To create notions
Setting forth one's thoughts
On subjects for all to see
Summons eminence
No taboo subjects,
Nothing then beyond the pale,
Let's consider all
So there! Take this life!
Then do with it what you will
Mine its ups and downs
Way back in your mind
There is a you that will be
Able to fare all
Deep within your soul
Resides a Divinity
You can access now
What you are doing
Can e'er be improved upon
By creative thought
Life's an ice cream store
Made for the having of fun
Tasting of flavors
Sex: Act I – Prologue
Developing in Act II,
Denouement in III
When you're all alone
Warble on your instrument
Assault the silence
Is war obsolete?
Depending on Faith moreso?
Law works, but then, whose?
It is written, true
But of that set down for all,
How many observe?
Someone must do it:
Go lecture humanity,
Take on the issues
Whatever you do
Make use of the tools you have
Manipulate life
When you've done your do's
Continue on, write them down.
Experience speaks!
Be alert for a
Contagion of ideas
That might alter thought
The life of Henry
Entering the great wind-down
Death slyly peeking
"Divine influence"
Via Haiku poetry
Oft' deals in good sense
Romance leads us past
Hopelessness, lest we succumb
To melancholy
Desolation loves
Dejection, so improve your
State of mind, posthaste
Tweet tweet to yourself
Send a melodic message
Tunes improve outlook
Clinging to habits
Doesn't always get results
Flouting tradition
Self-contemplation
Sometimes loses perspective
By magnifying
Around corners see
Reflections of images
If not the real things
DONE TO HERE (106)
Collect your wisdom
In your old age write it down
For posterity
Quoting the poet:
"Better to have loved and lost"
Than to never love
We suffer pressure
For lack of alternatives
(Explore unafraid)
Revelations clear
Paths ahead for directing
Life's expedition
Readiness signals
Ability to accept
Whatever turns up
Willingness to dance
To the tune of the moment
Kindles elegance
An old epigram
"Good things come to those who wait"
Might sponsor false hopes
Nature of Haiku:
Invention of epigrams
That stir emotions
A simple notion
Translated into a thought
Voila! Epigram!
Call yourself "writer?"
What did you put forth today?
Is it readable?
Stars shine and winds blow
Functions of Earth continue
Retarded by faiths
People of the world
Ruled by power-gatherers
Want only to live
Go, be the dreamer
Catching wisps of fantasy
Hoping they light fires
One still feels a hurt
Inflicted many years past
Where love is involved
Traveling lightly
Allows room for observance:
Gathering rosebuds
What the world begs for:
New characters that are bound
To lead it from mire
Death accumulates
Souls once meant for great fortunes
In their times gone by
Warning! God is now.
Then was then and won't return.
Observe, change thy ways
None, nevertheless
As a number, means absence
What's where there once was
Sans rhyme or meter
Haiku isn't poetry
But an apothegm
Numbers only tell
Statistics, percentages,
Leaving sense untouched
Touch your innermost,
Roam your marrow for awhile
Explore your essence
Essential senses
Rescue us from harm's way, yet
Hoodwink us ofttimes
Don't be fooled
By false claims of potency
Seek results, count gains
False maturity
Confronts those who think ahead
To solve new problems
Homecomings are hard
Accepting where you came from
Comparing it now
Blues express cafard
Dredged up from your memory
Sing 'em, discard 'em
Gladness revs spirits
Puts one in the now, thankful
For what is; what's not…
Improvise in thought
Propose what might, if only
Things came 'round to you
"Be a man," but then
What kind? And by whose yardstick?
Why, your own, of course…
Laughter is the cure
For whatever's the matter
At least for the nonce
We're controlled by things
That light up when they're working
And rue the darkness
When you've sold that thing
That you used so much, you'll muse
That you might need it
Where goeth effects
Of words aimed specific'lly
At recidivists?
Be a loose cannon
Say and write what needs telling
Flaunt propriety
Swim the deep waters
For the most elusive view
Appropriate it
Someone has to say
Something universally
Applying to life
Some blunder through life
Ignoring sages' advice
Learning the hard way
You think you're swimming
With fish, but find out they're sharks!
Caveat emptor…
Pawn your valuables
Find out what they're really worth
Is it what you thought?
The tambourine tops
All sounds in the orchestra
(Rhythmic insistence)
Cheaters 'ever win
'cuz nobody catches 'em.
They trap themselves tho'
Paralyze the thought,
You'll find the world moves ahead
Run to play catch-up
Laugh at your mistakes
Chuckle at the past and learn
Then turn, surge ahead
On hinges of fate
Swing doors that open and close
To proprieties
God is now and here
Don't be deceived by something
That might be then, there
God is still making worlds
Like ours – Even better ones
(Perfecting the art)
Contemplate ceilings
Above which there's only sky:
Space with no limit
One is oft inspired
To write down points of logic
Disguised as poems
Explore inner space
Existing across your mind
Think limitlessly
The essence of life:
Intercourse variations
How being happens
Go here or go there?
Get this or get that? Decide.
(The choices of life)
How much? How many?
How well? How far? How High? Low?
Lucky us. Choices…
Electric gizmos
Rule our lives now. So, could we
Exist without them?
Without helping aids
We exist in a forest
Of actual things
There are some things that
Need to be said, so writers
Set them forth in print
Go, aim for wisdom
Write down thoughts conveying sense.
See where that leads us
Some kill their neighbors
Because their God is diff'rent
(Murder for theory)
Even God is shocked
By what is done in His name
Enslavement, murder…
My dream doesn't die.
'long as the dream stays alive
I keep breathing too
Heaven is here, now…
Then comes icing on the cake:
Afterlife – With God
Zoom! went your whole life
Looking back it seems that way
So plan while you can
"Fragile!" "Delicate!"
Covers protect ev'rything
(Reality too!)
Humanity floods,
We kick the can down the road
While one still exists…
Whose God? Mine? Yours? Theirs?
We agree there's only one.
Playing diff'rent roles
Music bespeaks class
If you play "classy" music;
If not, the other…
Life has to move fast
Or your genes feel neglected
(A sign of the times)
Plight of idealists:
Seeking the world's absolutes
Though they're rarely found
Please pass these words on
You with influence above
(You know who you are)
Contrive to perform
In right places at right times
For success to bloom
When things go awry
Consider it opportune
To try radical…
Escapades occur…
Records beget memories
(Posterity's gems)
Seek ye The Ideal
Search in every corner
Do not be deterred
There is only one
Of any ideal you seek
Jewel of your life
Humanity needs
Idealists who will show
Destiny's highway
The most powerful
Weapons at our disposal
Lie within our minds
Not to controvert
Whether God exists or not
Act accordingly
Ev'ryone has brains
Go, use yours to make something
Besides a living
The savants agree
Wars destroy the mines of minds
Crushing openings
Reflect, Improvise
Ideas beget progress
Have them fearlessly
Toil in the vineyard
Pick the grapes, fight off the bugs
Develop, invent
Stand up to drivel
Facing the consequences
Call it what it is
Women of the world
Unite, communicating,
Reject oppression
Thought involves process
Summoning use of logic
To reach conclusions
Within your own mind
Shut out the shouts of the world
Coming to reason
Choc'late cake, chili,
Corn-on-the-cob, griddle cakes,
Mexican sundaes
Get up, into it,
Ev'rybody, get involved
Otherwise… Accept
Oh, love me to death
Lest I perish all alone
Wanting for your warmth
Ain't it good to you
This life you seem to possess
Don't throw it away
Stand up, say your piece
Lest you get left in the dust
Unrepresented
There is but one God
How you worship, if you do
Is your own business
Trying ev'rything
Left me with experience
I pass on to you
Look up, down, around
See what exists there, and form
Your own conclusions
What's mental illness?
Isn't it the belief that
"My God beats your God?"
There is but one God
God's rules and God's promises
Exist in our minds
To human problems
Revolutionaries pose
Novel solutions
Fish, bugs, plants, germs, us…
Ev'rything thrives on something
Blessed parasites
Places of worship
Stir the emotions of those
Who both love and hate
Without religions
The world would be better off
(No competition)
Ethics are logic:
Some things just are, or not, done
You, think about it…
Bugs are without fear.
Would that we could be the same
But we think too much
"How could you do that?!"
Mother nature says, viewing
Man's devastation
The birds know quite well
How fickle we humans are
Thus keep their distance
Jump up and down, then
See your perspective gain depth
From differing heights
Trees tell silent tales
To one another thru winds
Harassing their leaves
Kill everyone
You don't agree with? What kind
Of answer is that?
Power boats, cars, bikes:
Trips that noisy people make
Into our psyches
When you have the chance
To say something to the world
Seize the medium
DONE TO HERE (116)
All alone? Don't fret
Keep company with your thoughts
Explore what might be
Why wait? Get moving
Go find what you want in life
Ere it vanishes
Be loved in return
Enjoy all the benefits
–If you love up front
Only you can change
That way you were up to now.
The future looms large
Losing all your friends
Can't be all bad; no one left
To impress. Just you…
Old friends sit outside
Knowing all, nevertheless
Discuss the weather
Noise, or its absence
Rules our lives whether we hear
Or shut it outdoors
Turn life to poems
Give them rhyme, rhythm, insight
Unlike concrete things
Search in the darkness
Seek the light of perception
Unearth the "Aha"s!
From earth we all sprang;
Thereto shall return anon
When our mission's done
When you reach old age
Record what life has taught you
For others to heed
Plan Reminiscence
So you can look back later
And say "I did that."
Authorized users:
Make sure you have your info
Ready to input
Books tell their stories
You draw your own conclusions
To heed or refute…
Among the diseased
Remain morally immune
See, hear; duck contact
Musical essence
Travels briskly to the soul
(Spiritual gash)
Essences denote
Inner qualities of thought
Lasting beyond now
Steering existence,
We've just so many choices
Seek advice, think, act
It's a tired old tale:
One's life always ends too soon
Yours is not unique
Ere death at twenty
Robert crammed in all he could
Grimly predicting…
Ignoring life's joys
Religion, all about death
Spreads itself like muck
Ingenuity
Captivates with ideas
Quells opposition
Do "they" think for you?
Or have you your own ideas
Impelling action?
Dangerous notion:
Spreading of faith by the sword,
Demanding conflict
As a man, I thus
Welcome a male point of view
In the books I read
"Point-of-view" affects
All that we see, hear, feel, speak;
Pitcher and catcher
What's it all about
Existential conjecture?
– You figure it out.
The only concepts
Worth considering are those
That advance mankind
Believe what you will,
Hypothesize all you want
No one offers proof…
When you speculate
You are laying a bet on
One or the other
Invest in sure things
And you'll never be let down
But then… Adventure…
Hazards befall us,
Make our lives miserable
But we live through them
Appear at the door
Ask to come in, accepting
Fate's warm reception
Geniality
Often spurs underlying
Magnanimity
Murdering people
Citing what they don't believe
…Oxymoronic!
Sometimes subterfuge
Is the last thing left to use
To get the job done
When down in the dumps
Search around, treasures abound
Cast away by fools
A likely escape
To euphoria from guilt
Remains indulgence
Plausibility:
The gold standard of gossip
Superseding truth
Always know the score
Keep track of where you fit in
And chances to win
Lobby the Congress
But don't expect them to do
Without getting paid…
Write down all your thoughts
Cast them out to the airwaves
See what develops…
Think yourself elsewhere,
Imagine how you'd fare there
Circumstantially
Oh yeah? So prove it!
Illustrate beyond a doubt
What would happen if…
Till your final breath
Retain shreds of dignity
Propping up bearing
Say something profound
If you can think up the words
Not to mention thoughts
From out of the dark
Come thoughts, inventive concepts
That could save the world
Illness – A blessing?
That depends; it gives you time
To collect your thoughts
Find your metier
And the sooner the better
It's never too late
On the contrary…
God can inspire anyone
Even bad people
Trapped in a body
That doesn't work anymore
I compose Haiku
Spread the religion
Not by the sword, fool, but by
Internet e-mail
The Bible's next book
Consists of the Haiku Truth
As it is today
Sleep please come quickly
Let me enter your dream scape
Reality gone…
The human body
Is a producing machine:
Work, ideas, kids
Imagination,
Lets us think in the abstract
But then… what we think…
God speaks through you too;
Therefore think: "What would God say?"
Then go write that down
Look ahead, time drags;
Thinking back– "Where went the years?"
Exist in the now…
Suicide is said
To be the most genuine
Form of self-censure
Happy Birthday… Now
Recall "How the years shot by."
Look ahead, prepare…
It's not like it was
Nor what might be whenever;
Regard life here now
Words only spell out
Ideas of what is or not
The do-ing remains
Spring forth with ideas
Cast them out over airwaves
Watch them come to life
If we wish for things
To happen, and they seem to,
Check, see who's in charge
Cyberspace, alas
Isn't the world of free thought
But controlled viewpoint
Go forth, check, see if
What's there is what seemed to be
Or but promises
We live where we are
Plus where we would seem to be
In our inner thoughts
Look back, note how fast
The years went; now look ahead
Act accordingly
It's the first day of
The rest of your life, so hey,
Make the most of it
Here's a bit o' news:
Things never are quite the same
As you thought they were
How fast went the past;
Bank on now to go as swift.
Act accordingly
LIMERICK TO HERE (191)
Why are we surprised
When the news is nothing new
Just ads plus promos
Why are we surprised
When "Made in America"
Lies in our faces
Why are we surprised
Girls can throw fastballs and curves?
We know they have them…
Why are we surprised
Waves are higher, rising tides?
Earth is fighting back
Why are we surprised
When our children join ISIS?
Adventure beckons…
Why are we surprised
Young girl checks out on Uzi
Kills her first victim
Why are we surprised
At flauntings of opulence
No matter the source
Why are we surprised
When drugs o'ertake children's lives
Replacing parents
Why are we surprised
That doctor advertises?
(Gold in them thar ills)
Why are we surprised
That healthcare is expensive?
(Your cash or your life)
Why are we surprised
When people are smarter than
We judge them to be
Why are we surprised
At what is done in our name
When we didn't vote
Why are we surprised
When folks who once were civil
Become savages
We blunder blithely
While our lakes are cesspools of
Runoff and sewage
Education costs…
Doc charges an arm and leg
To fix your tum-tum
I have but three lines
To convey significance
So… It's In Your Face!
Ah, altruism,
The gold standard of caring,
A do-gooder's guide...
I've led a charmed life
Survived despite my blunders
(Must be a reason…)
Don't look now but you
Might be falling off a cliff
With no parachute
Don't look now but you
Might be in for a surprise
That will change your life
Docs don't advertise
Drug makers do it for 'em
Either way, we pay
Flashes of brilliance
Indicate veins of precious
Mine-able logic
When in "Rome" do as
The Romans do, i.e., be
As though you lived there
Is Rome any place
Where you can do as Romans?
What's that anyway?
Never took advice
Nonetheless lived long enough
To give it. Lucky.
Let's get something straight:
There is no them – only us.
Human Beings. Folks.
Abandon culture
Adopt the ways of the new
Just to get along
Believe what you want
Stop proselytization
The world will survive
Art is the outlet
Sought by the young, but denied.
Rival: survival
It's all in the past
But it got stuck in your craw
Let it blow away…
You can do something
Very few are able to:
Make sense in three lines
Sickness: a bother
From which you might recover.
Death, another tale…
DONE TO HERE (125)
If you had to choose
Who you would let reproduce
(Mentally select…)
I think I'm done now
This is all you're gonna get
If it's not enough…
Art is visual
Writing is literal but
Both can speak ideas
Teaching the faithless
How to think for themselves is
A job for prophets
If, as some believe
Heaven is right here on earth
Are you getting yours?
Think to cut and run
Before you get too involved
Lest you must commit
Suicide: The most
Democratic form of self-
Determination
Educating docs
Needs to be gratis to those
Who can qualify
Self-determining
Is a matter of option
Coupled with desire
What to leave behind?
Thought? Money? Collectibles?
Or just memories…
There's a better way
No matter what you're doing
(Open the portals)
DONE TO HERE (126)
If you're an artist
Be prepared to go too far
Stretching the limits
To have dimension
Each phase of life must have more
Than simply breathing
We measure it all
How many, much, high, low, deep?
Then what, distribute?
Music hath its charms
Soothing up the savage beast
What? Teach him to dance?
When you have become
More afraid of life than death
Alas! Time to go…
Friends, to the artist:
A classic waste of his time
Better spent doing
To be an artist
At whatever you do, just
Think up better ways
Don't keep it secret
That better way you thought up
Tell it to the world
Come on, think of it,
A choice: be tortured to death
Or just beheaded?
The violent game:
Think, is it worth the hurt to
Satisfy the crowd?
Now ev'rybody
Googles ev'rybody else
Nosy sorts are we
Something will kill us
If not Ebola then what
Lurks around the bend
Making love is fun
Till you find out it's incest
Then it becomes sin
The day, upon us
Demands we do something, ere
Life passes us by
A Haiku opens…
Develops in the next line
Finally resolves
How deep is the lake
Of one's emotions which lie
Only at bottom
In water we have
That which quenches, washes, cools
Threatens if not watched
God has many worlds
Over which to watch, so why
Should He favor ours
When the brain stands still
And the muscles stop working
Only the soul lives
Haiku with its charms
Faces the savage varmint
Bearing salience
Alex Fekula
The ultimate party guy
At Psi Upsilon
The Haiku Challenge:
Who can make the most sense
Three lines seventeen
Five syllables first
Aiming for profundity
Then settle the hash
Just hold up your side
Of any conversation
By acknowledging
Society’s not
"What you gonna do for us?"
– Just the opposite...
Not to blaspheme, but
Think. If this were the only
Existence you get…
Being induced to
Kill those who may not agree?
(You are being used)
Which will work better
In opening locked-up minds
Bombs or ideas?
DONE TO HERE 128
Pursuing stardom:
Lifetime preoccupation
That rarely pays off
Drop leaflets to send
Suggestions of better ways
Bombs just won't do it
Fence off Ebola
On an island far away
'Til a cure is found
So, which is stronger
A plague or an idea?
No match? Think again
Why shilly-shally?
Don't we have technology
For spreading the word?
Wait! Think about it
Who's smarter? Us or the germs?
So then, hop to it
American bane:
Kids! Smart-asses playing tricks
(Naught better to do?)
Take the dough from bombs
Spend it on education
Inspire, don't destroy
Our good qualities
Outshine those of which we should
Be truly ashamed
"Those" folks are humans.
Fight nihilism with concepts
Spoke within their grasp
DONE TO HERE 129
Fantasies aren't sins
In spite of what you might think
So dream what you want
Thinking and doing–
Two diff'rent things completely
Note the distinction
Comes a time when Death
Backs you into a corner
No out. Go along…
Go, surprise yourself*
Explore your creative side
*Not to mention, us…
Is it wrong to kill
That which harms the world?
Who decides then, what "harm" is?
Rain falls down on us
Flows downhill to rivers, seas
Rising to air, clouds
We play our life tunes
Improvising upon them
Lo! Finding new riffs
Find something to do
Beyond observing others
Go play in life's game
Life comes like the rain
Drip drip on the windowsill
Falling thence to earth
Lived on the same block
But then we were miles apart
In how we thought, did
DONE TO HERE 130
Eschew violence
The internet is the sword
For spreading The Word
WHEE! War is naught but
A deadly game played by those
Devoid of options
When your party wins
Resist temptations to gloat
Get down to business
Blow your nose today
Your fingers go right on through
The tissues (cheap junk!)
I believe, alright;
It's just that I don't accept
The way that you do
Our worlds don't need more
Diversion, but yearn to be
Told just what to do
Look around, decide
Find a niche, inhabit it
Learn to live within
Life is like playing
The piano, just feel, find
The right keys and push
There's a time and place
To do just what you're thinking
(When and where's the rub)
Think it up, write it,
Publish on the World Wide Web
See who notices…
What you're thinking up
Find out if it works, then go
Sell it to the world
ONLINE TO HERE 11/13/14
We've learned to ignore
The words that go with music
Unless we're list'ning
Suicide bombers:
The end result of fervent
Religious belief
What would Jesus do
If He were alive today
That's what I'm doing
How would Jesus act
If He were alive today
That's how we should too
Find yourself a niche
Inhabit it until you
Can stand it no more
It would have been nice
To have done what you wanted
But, c'est la vie, cher
As the curtains close
All the foolish things you've done
Can be forgiven
How many times were
Those you cannot recover
But wish that you could?
Friends out of the past
Haunt those of us who survived
Making us better
When machines murmur
They are but doing their jobs
Listen to yourself
Original thoughts come
To us all the time, yet, we
Don't acknowledge them
END HAIKU 132
Christmas is a time
When we all get together;
Express happiness
Do you like to smell
Your personal excretions?
Well, you're not alone…
Creativity:
Is it writing one's memoirs
Or coining the new?
Old bodies wear down
Get ready to take a trip
Into Everland
To be resisted:
The absoluteness of Death.
Live it up, have Faith!
How disappointing!
Things I once thought mattered
Amounted to naught
When your head is warm
And feet too, ev'rything else
Takes care of itself
Rhythm takes you to
Where you might not otherwise
Dare to gallivant
Rain has rhythm too
Like hail, thunder, windy snow
The weather in charge
Faith is a matter
Of deciding plausible
Versus fanciful
END HAIKU 133
What is, surely is,
What seems just might be, but then
…When you think of it…
Pointing the ideal,
What society needs is
A new Messiah
Here's how it is, world
Straight from the mouthpiece of God
Revelation spoke
You're creative, eh?
What did you devise today
We can take away?
As humans we all
Choose respectability
No matter our rank
Not made corporeal
The Messianic Spirit
Inhabits us all
Wanting expression
The Messianic Spirit
Resides in the soul
Search within yourself
The Messianic Spirit
Implores arousal
Arousing the mind
Humanity's own conscience
Stirs undertaking
Go. Behave yourself
Just as though your afterlife
Depended on it
END HAIKU 134
Your sex life is none
Of Anybody's business;
Don't talk about it.
Relax when you fall
'Cause if you're tense when you hit
Something's gonna break
I can still do this
Maybe even still do that
Not nearly dead yet
Ice cream, popcorn, nuts
Henry's, selling the good things
Candy, comic books…
When you run out of
I-can-still-do-that's, then it's
Time to pack it in
END HAIKU 135
I'm no one, but then
I am somebody, ergo…
I am who I be
God The Creator
Resides in all that we see
Proof of existence
The Son of God came,
Showed The Way, gave His Body
Rose again to live
The Holy Spirit
Unseen of the Trinity
Resides in us all
Not what you become,
Contrary to what you hear
Life is what you do
There's a difference
'Tween the way you wear your hat
And the way you think
Wear your hat backwards
Only looks like you don't know
Which way your head's on
Some of us live just
To create beauty, or else
Die in the attempt
Beauty is… itself
Regardless of they eyes of
Beholders thereof
Pick, make a choice of
What you want to be, that we
Then can see you as
END HAIKU 136
When memory goes
Whimsy is there to step right
Up and take its place
But then, with what can
You use to be whimsical?
Words? Tones? Paint? Action?
I always wanted
To do a whole lot of things
So that's what I did
I never wanted
To do one thing well enough
To be chained to it
Variety is
Truly the spice of life, so
Taste all the flavors
"In your face" Gay rants
Accost us without warning
Forcing reaction
"Fake sincerity,
And you've got it made" they say.
(Hmm, calculating)
The full life advice:
"Keep going until you're dead"
(Goes without saying)
END HAIKU 137 (8)
Go ahead, do now
What you're later gonna say…
"I coulda done that"
Funny how we can
Look back on our lives and see
What brought us to here
Best to look ahead,
Choose a reasonable path
Then proceed that way
The puzzles of life
Demand solutions that use
Available tools
Bible tells what was,
Media tells what's goin' on,
Life is what could be…
To the ear, music
Is what it seems to evoke.
Words get in the way
Poetic ideas
Flow to the mind like music
Sans tunes to distract
Burying the past
Is not easy, as it seems.
The mind resurrects…
Snobberies emerge
Dripping with condescension
Offering gloved hands
Playing piano
Making harmonies emerge:
A matter of choice
END HAIKU 205
I resolved one night
I had had enough of life's
Full-blown adventures,
Its uncertainties
Weighing heavily on my
Doddering corpus,
Communicating
What I have to say, all done;
More but redundant.
I put me to sleep
In a bathtub full of blood
Never to awake,
Except in a new
Place and time that's surely now
With fresh life to live;
Then lo and behold!
My Heavenly dream came true
To be transmitted…
Existing again
Another world, which I find
Not unlike the old,
Though now containing
Challenges I hadn't thought
Would arise again.
"Bring them on!" I said
Eager for experience
Yet to put to use
In novel ways with
Brand new casts of character.
(To be continued…)
END HAIKU 138b (Not published)
Being damaged goods
Since a tender age doesn't
Mean one can't function
End Limerick 206
Grab hold of your life
Use your situation's tools
To get where you want
The psyche bears scars
Of many foolishness-es,
Marked until the end
There comes a time when
Mechanisms for keeping life
Displace its pleasures
Executives hire
Communicators, thus use
Available tools
"Life is just a bowl
Of cherries." So it is said.
(Beats dyin' too, eh?)
If one can't find what
One thinks one is looking for
Best check what else is…
A beautiful smile
Radiates; yea dominates
The rest of the face
Eyes exposing truth,
Lips utter circumspect words
To keep from offense
Guarding your psyche,
Avoid situations that
Could inflict distress
END HAIKU 139
When you have to think
The strength into your body…
("Hey, I can do that.")
Secret to success:
Look just like everyone else
But do it better!
Learn to give advice
Then to heed what you have said
Confirming your point
Feel the delicious
(Even if temporary)
Rattle of courtship
A generous man
A reasonable woman
…A peaceful divorce
Kind words are like salves
Soothing hurts, placating nerves
…Just what God ordered
"Who knows what evil
Lurks in the furtive mind of man?
Hah! The Shadow knows!”
Words once spoken are
Therefore un-retractable
So they best be good…
Echoes of statements–
Mountain hollers in the night
Arise with the sun
Proverbs are inscribed
On organs that hear, and send
Them to those that think
END HAIKU 140
Think, yes, and infer,
Casting shadows, or dramas
Whose characters live
My sex life is none
Of your business, as is yours
Not a care of mine
I don't mind dying
Just do not want to suffer…
'Zat too much to ask?
Catholicism:
Obsessive compulsive Faith.
Partly ritual
Writing sentences
That end in prepositions
Shows one doesn't care
People that I love
Do not keep secrets, at least
Not of which I know
Lord, you must be tired
Of my contrition, saying
"Okay, I get it."
I wanted to do,
Not be chained to becoming;
Thus: experience
If there was a goof
To be made I made it, yet
I somehow survived
My savior is you
Who read these offbeat thoughts then
Take the hints therefrom
END HAIKU 141
A philosophy:
"Life is a series of games;
Avoid what's called work."
It's better to fail?!
(Then you get to do other
Different things in life…)
Religion can be
Turned into something good, or
Something destructive
Steering Religion…
What driver is at the wheel,
Down what road, to where?
New Democracy:
All can vote for ev'rything
Or against something
With the choices made
We've ended up where we are;
So… What to do now?
Ev'rything done wrong
In one's life comes back around
Later for revenge
Life has its revenge
Coming when least expected
To exact payment
"If only I had
Continued with this or that,
I could have become…"
Be a loose cannon
Speak frankly, no matter what
Accept consequence
END HAIKU 142
Life disappointing?
Find something better to do
– A matter of choice
Become or aspire
Chasing the dreams of others?
Consider your own
Which one is more fun:
Becoming, or just doing?
Life, alas, is short
The body needs sleep
But if it won't allow you
To get some, you die
Lying, not sleeping
Fluids running in my head
Death lurking about
Surefire life advice:
"Don't tie knots, until you're sure
Bows won't do the trick."
In my life to come:
Hope I'll remember how to
Play piano and sing
Noting the era
Hurrying by as we live
My my, how days fly
End of existence…
Backed up into a corner
(Come, death, I'm ready)
You get to the point
Whatever you do, it hurts;
You're ready to die
Being old and sick,
Dispensing acquired wisdom
Is all one can do
Life-ending? Choices
Gradually restricted?
Alternative: die
END HAIKU 143
The only thing that
Will become of everyone
Is death's aftermath
Bulletin to all:
Your hair is not "important"
It's just hair. So there!
Deja vu moments
Pop into one's consciousness
…Notifications
Consider feces
Where it comes from, what one ate
Then draw conclusions
In the know, go to
Cognoscenti corridors
To find out what's hot
Doing, if one can
Is much more fun that being.
Then, a doer be…
(Peripatetic)
One never wanted to be
In life just to do
After all is done
In life, there's only one thing
Remaining: To write
Being where one's at,
Circumstances what they are,
Continue to next…
Writing things down is
Creating reality
To be remembered
END HAIKU 144
In society
The capabilities that
You need… develop
Make Black lives matter
To society-at-large
Get woke, stay that way
A simple question:
"Are you useful to the world?"
(Figure out a way)
So many jazz groups
Not making up melodies
But practicing scales!
Personal attacks
In political campaigns
– Un-democratic
Listen with your ears
But decide with your stomach
Digest completely
Choosing this or that:
The democratic process
Hmm. ("Eenie-meenie…")
The ideal hotel:
Hospitality, safety,
Location, Menu…
Symphonic chording:
A combination of things
With which ears agree
Hillary Clinton
Breakthrough female candidate
Women… Run things right!
END HAIKU 145
Learning from The Past
Anticipate The Future
Indulge in The Now
We all have genius.
It's a matter of tapping
Into its locale
Choosing to do a
Lot of things acceptably
Is surely no sin
Who sez life can't be
Totally, playfully, an
Enterprise for naught?
Playing at a life
While living another one:
Wreck-reational
To be for awhile
Then go on to something else:
Venturesome living
Wanting to become
Giving up wanting to be…
(Experimental)
At some point you keep
Pushing the life envelope.
If not, start dying
Drugs are for seeming
Life is for doing, but the
Choice is up to you
One nice thing about
Being unloved: You can say
Anything you want
END HAIKU 146
When you play music
You become it, regardless
Of that who you were
Where is adventure?
Is it in doing, or thought
That you leave behind
You think I need you?
I don't need you, I have me.
What more could I want?!
An original
No one else has seen as yet–
That is what to be
Y'can spend yer whole life
Collecting experience;
So then ya can write
Simple decisions
At the beginning of life
Change its direction
The world is a dream
So always be a dreamer
Then it's yours come true
There is a diff'rence
'Tween inventing ideas
And implementing
Death comes forth, peeks
Its head around the corner
Pulls back, awaiting
God surely exists
But it's man's concept of God
That screws up the world
END HAIKU 147
Once you are married
You come at things diff'rently
Thus change perspectives
Wisdom doesn't die
But passes on to the next
Logical juncture
One last hope: To die
Before you suffer what could
Kill you too slowly
The way that it is:
Chaos must be created
It won't just happen
Life's an ice cream store
For tasting all the flavors
It has to offer
Life, like a good meal
Is all for the tasting of
Flavors that entice
To write how-it-is
Hitting the target smack-on
Is winning a race
It has been a life
Of doing, not becoming
Purely adventure
Why not adventure
Forgoing accomplishment?
One life's all you get…
Learn the scales, the chords
Then improvise melodies
To suit progressions
END HAIKU 148
Live until you die!
Just because you fail at this,
Don't give up trying
I'm not sure but I
Think I tried ev'rything once
(Experimental)
Thine is the kingdom
The power and the glory
Forever, Amen
Prime marital rule:
Learn to forgive and move on
To better endings
Great art comes, presents
Before the judgmental sense
Of the beholder
"I can still do this
I can even still do that
So I'm not dead yet."
Countries of the world
Shackled by histories – Snap…
Figurative chains!
If you can hum it
Note it on the music staff…
Look what you've composed!
Oh Henry! How you
Write those limericks that say
A truth for the nonce
The taste of ice cream
On perception becomes a
–Sample of Heaven
Flying in your face
Audacity elicits
Final conclusions
Simplicity breeds
Contempt for subtle thinking
Drawing conclusions
Silence affords thought
From which to draw conclusions
Leading to wisdom
END HAIKU 149
Drugs say "Hey, give in
To brisk impulses," therefore
Affecting judgment
Drugs just make one more
Of what by now has become;
(Y'can do that yourself)
Engage! Be fearless!
Yield to doing what you do
Spurring a tirade!
"Whirl!" The dance of life
Ripe for choreography
Within your milieu
How many thoughts file
Through fate's constant parade
Inevitably?
Ballets concocted
With various attitudes
Display elegance
Read the signs, observe
What they say that's relevant
To life as it's found
"Times change" – Tis truly
Aphoristic, until bang!
They come back again
Obstacles beckon:
"Come jump over me and see
To what you can soar!"
Tables of plenty
Exist somewhere in the now.
Finding them, the task
END HAIKU 150
Exercise the mind
Creativity needs work
To lubricate it
The ultimate sin:
Refusing to imagine
When one's capable
Choices to be made:
A living flipping burgers
Or purveying thoughts
Looking up, one sees
What could fall, but what's down could
Rise up and getcha
Harmonies abound,
Hang around long enough if
You encourage them
Poetry that counts
Says something well-worth heeding
Plus… remembering
From all directions
Come what could be confections
Perhaps corrections
Drop some thoughts like bombs
On whole civilizations
Destroy shibboleths
To be a poet
Compose your novel thinking
In a metric way
Angles hide shadows
Doppelgängers of the real
Waiting to emerge
END HAIKU 151
Kill people with bombs
Or change them with poetry
– Luxuries of choice
I cannot help but
Wonder if you'll miss me
Or not when I'm gone
Snobs are people with
Limited intelligence
Who fear for their place
Our dads existed
In times of small businesses
Then bigs took over
The good candidates
Constantly expose themselves
Figuratively
Life is a notion
We get when we're born, and yet
More is still to come
Clouds hover over;
Loom, as if waiting to strike
When the moment's right
We are born blank slates
Upon which we are written
By circumstances
Be the one crab that
Escapes from the basket with-
Out being dragged back
Don't think small, think big
Thinking small will get you small
But BIG – Well, maybe…
Dream big-crab because
Your friends will try to drag you
Back in the basket
Believe forth your life
In as grand a scale as you
Can manage to live
END HAIKU 152
Get education
Sufficient to do what you
Want to do in life
Exercise can be
Physical, mental, even
Spiritual, no?
Brain surgery, done
Externally, with ideas:
No blood, pain, free thought
How to manage death
So it won't hurt or linger
Preparation counts
As the mind ages
Memories grow in numbers
If not pungency
Lying down, blink, watch
Spots drift to peripheries,
Slowly disappear
To offend someone:
How many ill chosen words
Does it take? Just one…
Anticipation:
Just around the corner lies
The unexpected
Sit upon a throne
Ruler of all you survey
Just don't look too far
Life: a series of
Angles, corners, doors, dead ends
To negotiate
END HAIKU 153
Polyphonous sound
Permeates the atmosphere
Ev'rywhere distinct
H. John Henry Spent
A life of learning to be
Henry Francisco
How much wood would a
Woodchuck chuck, if a woodchuck
Could chuck wood? That's good!
Puns: for the clever
But intellectually
Unadventurous
Jesus might have said:
"You go, do what you can do…
Rest is up to them."
When you write as much
Stuff of which you're capable
Go on…write some more
That which hangs, swings
Subject to prevailing winds
For inclination
Influences change us
Even when we refuse them
They have their effect
Change? Suggesting change?
Someone does the dirty work,
Takes consequences
Once upon a time…
It's now, is it? (Fairy tales
Begin at some point)
Whenever stuff gets
In the way, brush it aside
Go on to better
END HAIKU 160
The real scribe says
"This is the way that it is."
–Lets it go at that
"If the chord feels good–
Play it over and over
Again."– Is that Jazz?
Just 'cause it's written
Don't mean we're gonna heed it
Or even read it
Only beautiful,
Lacking curiosity
Isn't quite enough
To the creative:
What remains is to go, look,
Find a medium
Go, be this or that
While avoiding becoming…
Boy! will you have fun!
With caution, go get
Little bits of ev'rything
But excess of none
Silk purse from sow's ear?
No, but showing the best side
Make what's there look good
Sow's ear to silk purse?
Well, no, but you surely can
Make the best of things
Seek and ye shall find…
What's apparent; go further
For gems to treasure
END HAIKU 161
Seeming: just the food
For intellectually
Unadventurous
Seeming or Being–
Which would you prefer if you
Could choose between them?
In your life you get
Little bits of ev'rything
But excess of none
When life disappoints,
Move on; jump to something else:
Recourses spring forth
How many? How much? How
High, low, far, near, to, not to?
Ah! Choices abound!
At points in one's life
Alternatives appear to
Choose between, then act…
Lie down, be quiet
Listen to voices within
Calling for action
Act upon impulse!
…After consideration
Of consequences
When the brain dictates,
Using reasonable sense
Spur the heart to ends
Ends, means, tools, vision
Used together in concert
Make progress, maybe…
END HAIKU 162
Rubber balls bounce back
Like rumors begun, although
Still undistorted
At bats produce, or
End up as experience
For judging pitches
Words, with their meanings
Transmit messages pictures
Can only present
Words show verbally
What images indicate
But can't deliver
Variety brings
Innovations of genre
Along with flavor
If not you then who
Will come to the aid of Earth
In direst of times?
A gift from God to
Be capable of great things
Must be advantaged
There's so much to do
With little time to do it
Get up into it
Being where you've been
Capable of greater things
Don't sell yourself short
To write and advise
Is one thing; to read and heed
Is quite another
END HAIKU 163
Summoning wisdom
Come up with aphorism
To suit the moment
Washington proxies
Influence legislators
Pushing cash around
When writing, one says
"This is the way it is, now!"
…Until the next time
Imagination…
Take it, crack it like a whip
Provoke attention
The animals fight
But man, capable of thought
Has alternatives
War, about winning
Loses rationality;
Life, about fun– dies
Wars of weapons win.
Where is the war of ideas?
What's it about? Fright?
War is obsolete…
Acting rather than thinking;
Vision, thus, loses
The power of speech
Aimed, overcomes explosives
Demolishing walls
To see far, one must
Peer through lenses of logic
Drawing conclusions
END HAIKU 164
Record discov'ries
New ideas, ere they depart
Appearing elsewhere
Real thought blossoms forth
With blooms of good ideas
To show, fade and die
How many puzzles
Does it take a life to solve?
But one: Existence
Life is about fun
If you're not having any
You're doing it wrong
Life: An adventure
While strolling through the jungle
We… are animals
Life is like cutting
Something with scissors – Gotta
Watch where you're going
Life is like a tube
Of toothpaste: you squeeze ev'ry
Bit that you can get
When you sing words, they
Take on a super-meaning
A hum-hit home-run
Life proceeds apace
Doesn't wait for catching-up
So hop on, go ride…
Walls enclose, prevent
What's threatening one's treasures
Buttressing safely…
END HAIKU 165
We are all results
Of what we came from and were,
Going thus equipped
Verbal proposals
Lobbed o'er plates like slow pitches
Invite batters’ strikes
Tinged with sex, sound some
Invitations to indulge
That tickle the mind
Fancies respond hard
Conjuring up ideas of
Pleasures thus indulged...
Sex pills can't do it
But there's imagination...
GOOD ideas! Hmm…
Raw innovation!
Gives overwhelming pleasure
To those who use it!
Double-guarantee:
Having fun works, moreover
Fancy will improve!
Mind-blowing ideas
Come infrequently, sometimes
When you least expect them
Triple sensation!
Get more out of what you do!
Think "Out of the box!"
To think you might be
Taking a Heavenly trip
Bends the mind upward
END HAIKU 166
Register knowledge
When you learn it, then tuck it
Away for later...
No life refunds there.
Do what you do, accept results
Continue. Or change...
If it tastes good, then
Remember for the next time,
Anticipating...
Pure power expressed
Gathers attention when it
Affects witnesses
Many times it seems
We are bigger than we are
But then... Who isn't?
Often times it seems
Verbiage, a sort of sport,
Captures our fancy
New cream works! But then
Didn't the old cream too? Well,
Jump into ice cream!
Open up your ears
Listen. Is what you're hearing
Worth attending to?
Rhythms entice us;
We step into them heedless
Of their risky ends
END HAIKU 167
Many times in life
Come 'long days to up and die
Go. Do it. Or don't…
Life was what it was
(Sure could have done it better)
But there you have it
Enjoy the gay gene
Pass it along, have children
Life goes on, somewhat
Maybe don't become
But to do a lot of things.
That counts for something…
E'er be the dreamer
Being the dream for awhile
…Promise not to hurt
Radio lesson
In how to lose listeners:
Conduct fund raising…
The name of the game
Is trust, not only among
Animals, but us
You would think by now
People would have enough sense
To govern themselves
Notes sung to hear are
Made to up and charm the ear
Produce reaction
Reduced to bare truth
Words' meanings will indicate
Directions to take
Upon looking back
Accomplishment– Okay, but
Life is about FUN!
END HAIKU 168
Trying many things
Over the years, one might find
Some succeed, some fail…
Franciscos, alas
Possess the adventure gene
Going out afar…
Important matters
Triumph over trivia
Asserting themselves
Sampling many things
Go, experiencing life
Like an ice cream cone
Go, get to be things
Never having to become
Play abounding roles
When pills stop working
God takes over the body
Thence …To Kingdom come
Please Lord, remove us
Far away from suffering
Signify the way
Be a notion-eer
Ignite minds with ideas
Spark innovation
Cremation: the fire
Igniting what was once live
Into helpful soot
Anomalies show
What might occur, appearing
When attention lags
END HAIKU 169
"Life is like a dream…"
Tomorrow another, then
After that yet more…
Do things that are fun;
But when they turn into work,
It's time to move on…
Hip-Hop: Doggerel
Set to music and purveyed
As art – So it be's…
Life, such as it is
Beats death, as it just might be
(Well, usually)
Dilemma: Do what's right
Or run for re-election—
Politician's choice?
What's more important:
Cash spent on War? Or Healthcare?
(Obvious to some…)
The brain, being part
Of the body, comes apart
Right along with it
Browsing for links to
What you want to access beats
The yellow pages
You get to the point
Tired of being alive, so
You just want to die…
When you preach to them
Do they listen? Observe? Act?
…Depends who they are
END HAIKU 170
The older you get
The more expensive the pills
To keep you alive
Human destiny
Aspires to create beauty
From plain components
Make a sow's ear look
Like a silk purse by showing
Only the best parts
An idea in jazz
Is concocting a new tune
From old harmonies
He sang "Save the world!"
Other people listened…
Or didn't. Pity!
Who wouldn't listen
To another's melody?
…Auditory gift!
Oft' times songs emerge
That one wants to sing again
Then to someone else
Sounds have "character"
Representing feelings, moods
Spreading them around
"Playing" is a game
No different with piano
The keys are the toys
Make up a song phrase
Then see if you can play it
Then sing it again…
Whistle, hum, scat, sing,
Then play it on the keyboard
Start with any key
How to play piano
Start with any key and then
Do Re Mi Fa So La Ti…
END HAIKU 171
The primary tools:
Basic maneuvers. Get them
Out of the way first
Learn the thumb-under
Or middle-finger over–
Piano procedure
How to play a "chord"
Do Mi So, or Do Fa La
These are the basics
So you lose a tooth
It's not the end of the world
Although… less chewing
When you write, you say
What needs saying to those who
Might pay attention
When you sing, you hide
Behind a lyric that might
Carry a message
People need be told
If not what to do, then how
To approach ventures
You're a good singer
But with the New Camden Times
Be a major voice
Imagine what could
Eventually become,
If not already
What chu gonna write
To stimulate the minds of
NCT Browsers?
Artist: Please yourself
But spare us your indulgence
Till it's made into art
Do not fall in love
With your "style" for it might not
Be what you think it
Marijuana makes
You think more of what you are
While making you less
Were I younger, I'd
Concoct a way to make you
Fall in love with me
Cures without doctors
Exist, but you have to make
Them happen yourself
END HAIKU 172
Whether to dictate
Or perhaps participate…
(Write, publish, or meet)
Reach too far and lose
But you've stretched the dimensions
Of where you can go
What did you become?
Something useful to the world
Or just existence?
When you compare them,
Life and opera are the same
Just diff'rent sizes
Marijuana makes
You dream, but in doing so
Subtracts what you do
I hung out with
All the wrong kids, observing
Diff'rent ways of life
Desirable: to
Die quick and unexpectedly
In a state of grace
Imagine, see what
We discover much later
Concluding therefrom
When I lay me down to die
I don't want then to wonder why
I lived my life the way I did
To be denied a Heav'nly bid
Scribe: seek to provide
Leaders in search of ideas
With material
A new World Order
Is called for: Re-organize
Morality now
Shoot for perfection
Or will acceptance suffice?
Make profit, move on…
You take what you can
On the merry way of life
Giving back in kind
Something comes along
Ending life as you know it
A "graduation…"
When the music stops
Angels search for something else
To provide the airs
END HAIKU 173
The music of life
Plays on harmonically
Contrapuntally?
Life is about fun
Nothing more, so whatever
Amuses one… works
Do you contribute
Anything to the world you
Live in ev'ry day?
To ration yourself
Is a discipline Harvard
Should have schooled you in…
You've been cast by God
In the role of a lifetime;
Take the part, perform
Now is the time for
All good women to come to
The aid of the men
Job? You want a job?
A mission suits you better:
That of a firebrand
Good things e'er await
Requiring exploration
Then exploitation
Do not let yourself
Get down. Leave the past and go
On to the future
It's a tired old tale:
One's life always ends too soon
Thus is not unique
Holy as they be
Spirits await, imbibing
Souls to their milieu
END HAIKU 174
The Lord calls; but first
To say “Goodbye” in a way
That counts for something…
To be or not be
Thus the question arises
In life to decide
Melodies of life
Save us from our destruction
At hands of tyrants
A self-delusion:
What I say or write can mean
Something to someone
A common language:
Music, alas, by which we
Can communicate
A way exists, so
Find it to get to the end.
Destinies abound
The soul! Ah, that thing
We have but alas know not
Its direction, yet…
When the body fails
The mind continues to work
Indulging in dreams
Music’s in the air
Tunes waiting to be captured
Caged up and set forth
When your pencil runs
Out of lead, go get some more
If any exists
I never wanted
To be, but only to do
All the things I did
Of all the things I
Could have done, I did the ones
That were the most fun
Fraternities need
Some adult supervision
Helping kids grow up
Fantasy—Dreaming
Your dreams in a way that you
Want to dream them. Now
Art is saying what
You want to say in a way
You want to say it
Life is about fun
Having a lot of it says
You love what you do
END HAIKU 175
Life is simple, ne?
Asking little, giving much, while
Going on, or not
A good day to die
Comes but once in a lifetime
So go on, do it
Haiku sayings are
Ripe for turning into verse
Just find the right rhymes
Choice: Experience
Or Responsibility
(Writers: Number “One”)
Let the men invent
Let the women run the world
(Good general rule)
Women: Run the World
Men: Stick to inventing, build;
We’ll be better off…
Lord I thank Thee for
Giving me what Thou bestowed
Life, being, doing
Invent a thing to
Do, thus keep from becoming
Old shoe, old hat, old…
Becoming— Old hat
But doing— Now there’s a life
Worth ev’ry minute
Life: So many things
To do. Why then just become?
Then be artistic
Never wanted to
Be, only to do, thank you
That was quite enough
Take advantage of
The times to be creative
Write, compose, invent
Create. Make what you
Can as long as life remains.
Leave a legacy…
END HAIKU 176
Comic books give you
A perspective not normal
But caricature
Go play many parts
In life, also on the stage
All of them are fun
Write down what you know
So other people can learn
Without DO-ing it
Hurry up and die
Growing old’s not any fun
Unless you’re healthy
There is nothing worse
Than feeling avoided by
Someone you admire
If your impulses
Win out, surely be discreet
To a fare-thee-well
On getting advice:
If the shoe fits, then wear it
If not, walk away
Feeling avoided?
Hmm. What on earth did you do
To incur such wrath
The fork in the road
Comes but a few times in life
(Directional choice…)
Being avoided
Punishment worse than dying
…Strong feelings prevail
Dreamgirl Svengali
Leads one to “Hello Dolly!”
A leading lady…
The power of words
To convey meaning and thought
…Yet to be surpassed
END HAIKU 177
Is more civilized
Better than less civilized?
Alternatives beckon
Racial bitterness
Is largely a waste of time
Think forward, progress!
Gone are the old days
Don’t look back; think what’s coming
Prepare for the best (worst?)
Ideas come and go
As if they owned the road that
They travel upon
Fat, dumb ’n happy
We wend our way, disaster
Looming ‘round the bend
Impulsiveness gets
You somewhere new, but is that
Where you want to go?
Chances come and go
So grab the brass ring when it
Comes around again
Keep your eyes open
Opportunities for which
To take advantage
Helping yourself to
What is available, go
Do the best you can
Take time to enjoy
Being alive now because
Dying is no fun
Help me to enjoy
The pleasures of living, and
Endure the pains too
On the contrary
Marijuana is reward
Not means to an end
END HAIKU 178
There are those of us
Who deign to be anything
But live just to DO!
What a wonderful
Life I’ve had, from growing up
In an ice cream store…
There were many things
To do in order to write
Telling to the world…
In the pantheon
I never wanted to be…
But only to do
When it’s time to say
“Adios,” to a someone
Go find someone else
You write what you can
Depending on your training
And inclination
If you’re creative
Producing then what you can
Depends on training
Gimme a flat price
To pull all teeth and replace
With useful dentures
Alzheimer’s Patients—
There are two realities:
Write = Fancy — Real = Do
Life miserable…
Death better, welcome in fact
Whatever comes, comes
END HAIKU 179
Suffer while ye may—
Life exists, the condition:
A comfort matter…
Bequeathing my soul
To Tony, Brian, Mila…
What talents I have
Omni Reductive
Converts junk to usable
“Remanufactures”
Looking for answers…
A great “Why?” needs a great “How?”
Sensible reply
Done been ev’ry place
Did it all, and now I be
Ready to go forth
Haikus are but thoughts
Expressed in a written form
To make readers’ sense
Words go directly
To the thinking part of us
Stirring reaction
Art goes deeper yet
Stabbing its meaning direct-
Ly into the heart
Writing words that mean
Something to the reader’s mind
Is its own reward
Words as dialog
More than descriptive, speak thought
Directly to minds
From an ice cream store
It’s been a wonderful life
To a limerick
La: A world without
Forgetting: Eternal Joy
(Ceaseless suffering!)
When God created
Adam, then Eve, what was He
Thinking? More? Or less?
Don’t all humans want
The same things: Health, Happiness?
Then what’s the problem?
Trapped in a new name
Bound to an identity
That I can’t dismiss
Behold: world without
Forgetting: Eternal joy,
Ceaseless suffering
Raw wisdom uncouched
In stories or articles
Is for the taking
END HAIKU 180
What girl wouldn’t flirt
With a producer who casts,
Coming on to him?
Jazz: Combination
Of rhythm and melody
Just one won’t make it
Jazz combination:
Rhythm, harmony and tune
Just one won’t do it
Ran away from home
On a lark with Tom Hanley
Stole a car, wrecked it
Not wanting to be
I only wanted to do
So never became
Take hold of a pen
Think up a new idea
Write it down in verse
There is a ceiling
Under which we all survive
Over which God rules
Once in a while there
Comes a time when ripening
Fruits require picking
Floating down river
On my back with a hard-on…
“Open the drawbridge!”
When you just want to
Do, not be, resist the urge
To fully commit
What the world needs are
Standards of intelligence
By which pay is gauged
Need: World-wide standards
To be paid accordingly:
Olympics’ Know-how
WAR: a game big kids
Play when they don’t know how to
Keep score otherwise
Trump: Salesman-in-chief
Made to persuade the whole world
How to get along
Some people learned their
Manners from the pigs, others
From their own parents
Some people push each
Other out of the way so
They get what they want
City boy knows better
But lets it slide, thus towns
Deteriorate
Country boy don’t know
No better, puts his feet up
On The furniture
Creating thought is
The ultimate act of will
After which: Action!
Speculating it…
Every thing and every one
Is useful somehow
Jazz is music that
Goes nowhere purposely, so
You go right with it
Knowing what good is
Is a part of life that can
Make or break careers
In order to write
Have to have lived long enough
Experienced things
One gets to a point
Where all there’s left to do is
Suffer till one dies
Little did we know
The Electoral College
Would come to bite us
Reader’s choice:
Ev’rything that’s right/wrong
With our society is
What’s right/wrong with it too
Camden isn’t owned
But inhabited by minds
Possessing Image
To discover who
One can be—An exposure
To notice then heed
When one wants to die
How to do it? Quick and neat?
Or slow and messy?
As I am in pain
Allow me the dignity
Of killing myself
One just wants to die—
Is that such a simple thing?
Go on… Stop breathing…
Lotsa luck with that
—Not just a matter of will
But of means, a gun…
God says “Eat the gun,
I look forward to meeting
You here once again.”
A means to an end
Is a welcome finale
To a life well-lived
Dearest Helen, life
With you has been my pleasure
Beauty… Intellect
Tony, Brian, James,
Mila: Pursue Life and Love
What better than that…
Death is hanging ‘round
Judge? Feel? Think? Fear? Imagine?
All of the above…
What wisdom retained
Is all set forth succinctly:
Haiku, Limerick…
Urinary pain constant
Antibiotic no help
Future Bleak…
Death better.
Love to all
H
Antibiotics
Don’t help urinary pain
Recover or die
Final love to all
Helen, Mila, Brian, Tony
Y bon voyages
Life not worth living
Constant urinary pain
Might as well end it
We are not actors
In someone else’s drama.
Francisco’s create
If you’re night people
The World exists during the day
You’re missing a lot
Life, come to an end
Constant urinary pain
Then will be over
You are a singer
Mila an accompanist;
Figure out something
The highest calling
In life is to imitate
The Lord. To create
Get to the point
Wanting to die, then transmit
What you have to say
Thinking? Don’t reduce
Parameters to minor
Items. Go for it!
Enough can be said
On a small piece of paper
To change one’s thinking
Can you imagine
The joy that a bug feels when
Finding a dropped crumb?
If I can but write,
Let what happens to me go
On until I die
Small town growing up
Even big minds thereupon
Do smallish thinking
Hey! You late sleepers
Wake up! The World operates
On its hours, not yours.
If you’re a writer
The idea is to write
What’s not been written
Why would you believe
That God created all this…
Couldn’t it have… been?
But then… It couldn’t
Have just happened. Something’s up
Ah, “up” – There’s the key!
With marijuana
One has to do too much with
Impaired equipment
Okay, so you’re Black
Don’t let your Blackness use you
And, don’t use it up
There are team players
There are individuals
…A matter of choice
Be a writer. Write!
Deciding what’s wrong or right
Later, editing
See gardens of words
With logical birds pooping
Musings over Earth
Implement of death
At hand, pain ever present
What’s the choice? Easy…
Loving life with pain
No easy task, but then it’s
Absence (and pain’s)… Hmm…
Life, even with pain
Beats thinking’s cessation… yet
Hurry up, Death. Come!
Life is about fun
And when it ceases to be
One can welcome Death
Urinary pain
No relief, constant distress
Alternative: Death
I have said my say
If you’re listening, pay heed
I love life, living…
No alternative
When drugs, therapies don’t work
It’s a one-way street
As long as I can
Stand it, I stay alive to
Say what I have to
Medicine Business
Make life a helluva mess
Docs no help (“Cash-Cows”)
U.S. Medical
Run by doctor Iago
Just a bloody game!
Urinary pain
Making life a mess again
Death preferable
Still some life to live
Still some thought to give, and yet
Too colored by pain
Making life a mess
Urinary pain, distress
…Alternative: Death
Obsessive thinking
Needs aiming, direction:
Constructive targets
Some things one can’t stand,
Urinary pain constant
Suicide better
Imagination
Thinking about other things:
Welcome distraction
Urinary pain!
Thinking about other things
Precluded for now…
Drugs are lotsa fun
But then, so is just plain life
Hmm, take your pick, cher…
Founding parents die
Organizations live on
Spur sons and daughters
Urinary pain
Fever, distress, life a mess…
Death alternative
Pain main character
Playing a role in my life
Better it exits
Urinary pain
The worst kind, unrelenting
Prayers, pleas no help
Pain main character
Playing a role in my life
Better it exits
Urinary pain
Remains. Never goes away
Persistent bugger
Cash Cow for Doctors:
U.S. Medical System…
By milking patients
The dead soul awaits
A new body to which to join
For a new life then
I’ll play my music
As the child of Mila and James
—Another living…
Knowing where I’ll go
My soul shall then inhabit
James and Mila’s Child
I lie down to die
But I know where I’m going
A next life to live…
I bequeath my soul
To Mila and James’s Child
Live in verse and tune
A soul does not die
But lives on in another
Body, mind, spirit
May my soul go to
The child of Mila and James…
Musician, poet
Or to the child of
Anthony, Brian, my sons
When they have offspring…
Life is quite the mess
Urinary pain, distress
A Bitter ending
Life’s a precious gift
And with it sometimes comes pain.
Tradeoff? Really not!
Life ceases to be
Constant urinary pain
Afterlife welcome
A choice: Die or Write
As long as thought and words come
…Easy to decide
U.S. Medicine
All about making money
At patients’ expense
Life a distraction
Constant urinary pain
Alternative: Death
A choice: Die or live
As long as one can think, write,
Continue, go on…
Doing what I can
I be not long for this world
Hope welcome the next…
“If it feels this good
Getting used, keep using me
Till you use me up” (Bill Withers)
Once, someone taught me
“You can be bigger than life!”
…Valuable thought
I am who I am
And I be what I can be
More can not be done
At the Wharton School
We Learn how to teach people
How to run their biz
Who gave you the right
To tell people how to run
Their lives, Henry, God?
The same old routine…
With constant urinary pain
Suicide surcease
Urinary pain
Distress, making life a mess
Solve by suicide…
American Greed:
Money grubbing medical
Industry. For shame!
Opportunity
Knocks, and when it does, answer
Or it goes away…
Burning up, and not
Yet even in Hell, but then
No final note sung
I am burning up
My Hell occurring in bed
(“Oh Lord, forgive me…”)
Pain keeps one awake
And when you can’t sleep, you write
Thinking to do so
Only a conduit
Through whom ideas can pass
To readers from God
Born to write ideas
For readers to take or leave
Judging their value
Suicide answer
Takes to “you know-not-where,
Besting constant pain…
Pain taking over
Living minute-to-minute
Aspiring to… die
Words are only words
Thought, even inexpressive
Spurs further action
Sweating the bedding
Fevers can then be soaking
Sheets before croaking
Addling one’s mind
Fevers have a way to spur
Further imagery
If only to draw
Conclusions artistic’ly…
Words have their limits
Wise people write down
What occurs in their musing
For future use… then
Burning up right now
Instead of afterward, when
It’ll hurt much more
Writing poetry
Instant gratification
(Body dies, mind wins)
Take your life, use it
(Heavy with advice, I die
Dispensing wisdom)
Think until you die
Inventing new ideas
To be considered
Sorry ‘bout the mess
At least no stinking pee-pool
Clean it up, live on…
Still think to compose
Ideas into Haiku
Notions from nowhere…
Thoughts are my brushes
With which to paint images
On one’s consciousness
Middle-of-the-night
Pain, a waker-upper with
No leeway for sleep
A discoverer
Of new ways to look at things
Deserves some credit
No need for a hat
To keep the head warm. Fever
Does the trick, thank you
At the end of life
Constant urinary pain
…Cause for suicide
Unending assault
Constant urinary pain
…Suicide excuse
Living by minute
One thinks at a slower rate
Considering fate
The word is the way
To ultimately convey
Innovative thought
Covering the eyes,
The mind is able to see
Past reality
Where to go, what do
Without a life to pursue
In Heaven or Hell
If Heaven exists
One would aspire to go there
Post haste, after death
If Heaven exists
One would aspire to go there
Existing again…
A Biblical tome
Conveys “The Word”—Thought coming
From the mind of God
A mask covering
My eyes from reality
Permits a vision
As Illness pervades
I have nought but time to think
A pencil to write
YOU! Go ahead, write
Finding a venue to spout
What thinking comes forth
Get ready to die
No matter the time or place
After which, You’ll go…
My end is near, so
Looking over horizons
Not un-think-able
Hope the end will come
Trying not to kill myself
But then, living Hell…
I have had a taste
Of the best things in life, so
Death ventures welcome!
If only Death would
Appear unexpectedly
Like a grim SURPRISE!
When it’s time to “buy
The farm” the price is always
Non-negotiable
Real misery comes
In Little bits and pieces
Sneaks on like a cat…
Suicide and pain
(Antibiotics failing)
My work here all done
My own crown of thorns
If only crucifixion
Would come, I’d be gone
Urinary pain
Enervating constantly…
“Hello Death, welcome.”
Going somewhere else
Spirit to inhabit a
Nother soul somewhere
Who in Hell needs sleep
With fires of thought inspiring
Imagination
I believe in God
Know that He is there to help
Inspiring my thought
Poetry might lurk
In your imagination
To pleasure and use
Cover eyes, be blind
Seeing then what lies within
Where musing might lurk
Avenue of pain
Is one that bears exploring
To see what’s ahead
Pain stimulates thought
Forcing one to contemplate
Rather than suffer
Transplant my thinking
To another brain, as though
I could live again…
Intruding upon
Thinking, suffering can be
An unwelcome guest
Intruding upon
Thinking, suffering can be
An unwelcome guest
Transplant my thinking
To another brain, as though
I could live again
Urinary pain
Enervating constantly
“Hello Death, Welcome!”
My own crown of thorns
If only crucifixion
Would come, I’d be gone
Urinary pain
Antibiotics no help
Only one escape…
Martha had Henry
Dad had the right idea
A little store, home…
Going somewhere else
Spirit to inhabit an
Other soul somewhere
Various people
Friends, acquaintances, lovers
Meeting, knowing them
Ice cream beginning
Life of doing, not BE-ing
Finally, writing
Two beautiful wives
Beautiful talented kids
What more could man want…
Life has sure been fun
Got to do a lotta things
Fly, sing, perform, write…
Dying for a “cause”
One wonders if it’s worth it.
Pain? Now you’re talkin’
A Camden platform
Where one can truly inspire
Folks to “Get on board!”
We all have a dream:
“A City Invincible”
Where they can come true
Time to kill the thing
That just won’t leave me alone:
My old sick body
Mind wants to go sleep
Body won’t let me alone
Time to take control
When one’s time runs out
One knows, seeing the signals
That it’s time to go…
Speaking to the world
One never runs out of words
To say, only time
A sense of humor:
An invaluable tool
For dealing with life
What to write about?
Subjects abound. Now here’s one
Urinary pain…
Things to tell about
Never cease, but the writing…
Another story
Once my pencil runs
Out of what to write about
I cease here, move on…
My aim is to get
Another body to live
On to the future
When bodies wear out
Souls decide where to go next
A welcome journey
Suicide’s reason:
Constant unrelenting pain
Permanent relief
Natural cures for
Some medical conditions
Vaccine exposure
Attract attention
Be the life of the party
Say something worthwhile
Have you a lust for
Life that creativity
Spurs to greater heights?
Ending one’s own life
Is not a light decision
But… Choose to suffer?
To consider death’s
External phenomena
Is admitting God
Pleading for death won’t
Bring it on unless something
External happens
To go on and die
Begins a journey to a
Place unknown as yet
Urinary pain
Interferes with everything
Invading thinking
“Why not just go die?”
…As if it were someone’s choice
Not fate accepted
Covering the eyes
One sees in a diff’rent way
Without distraction
Direct from the mind
To the page comes a wisdom
(Lying down, look up…)
After death, what comes
Might then be a great surprise
Then again, might not…
Urinary pain
Is unlike any other
—In pleasure’s center…
Give up indulgence
In actions unproductive
To your aimed-for goals
Go and preach The Word
Messages in limerick
Entertaining, Tell!
Go and preach the word
Straight out of Port Whitman Times
For those a-come-ing
Be a Messiah
For which the world is ready
To be saved again
Give up maryjane
Spend your life constructively
Improving all things
Brain still working good
The rest of body dying
From the bottom up
Family members
Take The Port Whitman Times, do
With it what you will
After death, a trip
To a new place for the soul
To exist again
To Heaven or Hell
One can only imagine
Until going there
I hope what I wrote
Means something to somebody
Who reads and observes
The train goes somewhere
The train of thought somewhere else
Select: travel, dream…
When pain gets too great
Then divorce mind from body
Go separate ways
Thinking, writing down
What one wants to say worthwhile
Considering then…
Thought comes straight from God
To take and use as one might
For good or evil
I flatter myself
By thinking what I might write
Could influence thought
Someone needs to say
What needs to be thought about
True-ly and observed
Still time yet to write
Say what needs saying once more
To hear, read, observe
The Wharton School mind
Thinks in terms of do-able
Things then to be done…
To my progeny:
Don’t take your eye off the ball
Pursue destiny
When Death comes knocking
Either answer the door or
Pay no attention
Urinary pain
Distress, making life a mess
Death a solution
Invent ideas
For readers to think about,
Consider, accept…
Oh my God help me
In the life I live the most
Best that I can be
Antibiotics
Not working, urinary pain!
Frequent, intense
Constant pain, no sleep
Still alive, enduring Hell
Now, not for later
Writing what you know
Will resonate in the mind
That reads, considers
Practical advice
From the Penn Wharton School Mind:
—Use Availables
Being alive is.
Being dead is not being.
Choosing is pleasure
I accuse U.S.
Medical industry of
Greed posing as good
Today is as good
A day as any to do
What needs to be done
Today is as good
A day as any to up
And terminate life
Giving up nought but
Thinking and writing affords
Telling how to DO!
What pleasure it is
Growing old enough to think
Anew, and write it
Paper, pen exist
Begging thought to use them up
Before they shrivel
When it’s time to die
Just go ahead and do it.
What chu waiting for?
Man, an objective
Being old enough to think
And tell, cogently
Pain, no matter which
Non-negotiable item
Having it—Kill it
Pieces of paper
Beg for a pencil to write
Thought from a muser
Writing down your thoughts
Not as easy as you’d think
Them up, imagine
Wanting to die is
Not as easy as you’d think
There’s the where, when, how…
Even with suff’ring
Suicide not an option
Unless pain weighs in
You don’t have to be
A Christ in order to tell
How to run the world
Not invent a thought
Say it in five syllables
Then seven, five more
A Black Messiah
Lifts the Black community
To its potential
Vedra, your job is
Lift the Black community
To its potential
The world needs telling
How to approach and run things
Lest it slip-and-fall
Wandering thru life
I then became a writer
Telling what to do
Go to sleep and die
Everybody’s dream demise
Not always the way
When living life, don’t
Let things get in the way, but
Push them to the side
Once, back in Erie
Grew up in an Ice Cream Store
But Mom wanted more
I love life so much
The imagining, writing
Telling how it is
Nerves won’t let me sleep
Whiskey & pills might do it
Otherwise, the gun
One kind of knows when
Things are coming to the end
Prays, seeks forgiveness
Transmit the message
Saying what needs to be said
Before it’s too late
Children, my children
Go have children of your own
So they can then too
“My Biography:
What I Finally Became”
For the world to read…
What ever happened
To acquaintances of youth
Who we remember?
Lying flat awake
Affords the luxury of
Thinking not doing
A truth set forth in
Poetic thought might ring bells
In the readers’ mind
Haiku: naked thought
Set forth as truth, possible
Advice to readers
We who can write do
What we dream, imagining
What then we all could…
What did we become
Who graduated back then
In the class of yore?
Helen, I just can’t
Love you enough to say a
Final prayer to you
What have I become?
What will you become is next
And they after you…
Peeing in the pool?
Which weighs less? Pee or water?
(A major factor)
I am not perfect
But hope what I write rings true
(Theory, after all)
How to run your life
See my Haiku, Limericks.
Make your decisions
Helen I love you
Tony, Brian, Mila, James
Make me proud, have kids
Death come take me now
Constant urinary pain
Fever, nausea…
A publication
Related to what you do
Satisfies fully
Tony Produce lunch
Brian, Mila, James perform
“The Port Whitman Times”
Use the limericks
To teach not only words but
Thought to go along
Sing the limericks
Improvising tunes to say
What they mean and how
Brian: Performance:
Lincoln Center Limericks
Original Thought
Say something worthwhile
With brains, imagination
Go, tell it somewhere…
Urinary pain
Frequency, constant distress
Ruins existence
What is more to say
Limericks, Haiku, Essay
Review, Opinion
Die, body, die now
While still breathing and alive
Stop going. Soul: LEAVE!
To think, muse, to write
Give advice painting pictures
With words or colors
Have an idea
Develop it furthermore
Publish it for good
In advertising
The LAST thing you want to be
Is cryptic. Be blunt!
Middle of the night
Constant urinary pain
How to deal with it?
Lying and thinking
Truth rises to the top, floats,
Available there
Thoughtfulness, a quest
For innovation in deed
Inventing new paths
Henry’s Ice Cream Store
A thoughtful place given to
Contemplation, plots
Middle of the night
Constant urinary pain,
Fever. Deal with it!
Money for the kids
Freedom from me for Helen
For me from life, pain
If I’m so hateful
Not worth communication
I’ll be what I am
If you hate your Dad
So bad, don’t answer his calls
Then you’re on your own
Children who refuse
To communicate with Dads
Or Moms deserve less
When you WANT to die
Fate is a recalcitrant
Elusive lover
A father so bad
Whose child won’t answer his calls
Rates a lonely death
To be what you are
To the point where it pays off
Is living a life
Go, dream something up.
What are you creative at?
Spark! Innovation!
I think, imagine
With a mask over my eyes
What could possibly…
I live but to write
So, suffer an existence
Contemplating. (Pain)
It’s a living Hell
I never thought I’d go to,
But here you have it…
Henry uses pain
To spur thought speculation
As to what comes next
There is no pain like
Constant urinarial
It’s a living Hell…
I went for a ride
In a stolen car, knowing
Not whose car it was
An alternative:
Choosing to die, not easy
But then, why to live
A choice to suffer…
(The alternative: To die)
(Hmm) Worth considering
In the right places
Opportunities abound
Pick them up, use them
Start online paper
Publish relevant info
Sell advertising
Start an online pub
Not a blog, legitimate
Informational
When I was a boy (girl)
Dancing school was held where we
Partnered, with white gloves
Think, contemplate, muse
When you have an idea
Write it down for us
Burning up, Hell here
Purgatory awaits, then
Finally Heaven
The gun or the pen
Two alternatives beckon
The finals of life
Air conditioning
Life-saving temperature
Keeping hope alive
Finishing up life
A chore not granted to all
Be thankful, write…
Haiku: Nought but thought
An idea organized
Tersely presented
Dying, the ending
Of this life, the beginning
Of another—There
Suffering—a drag
Thinking, then the antidote
Writing, the revenge
Urinary stress
I don’t mind the frequency
But can’t stand the pain
Body, cure thyself
With a daily miracle
God will show the way
To the New York Times:
Consider hiring twelve scribes
For grade and high school
Middle of the night
Thought when one can’t sleep brings forth
Novel verities
Despite what I think
My pain is of no concern
To anyone else
The pencil’s lead begs:
“Use me, use me, I’m right here;
Tell it to the world!”
Urinary pain
Fever, no sleep, thus adios
Creativity…
Urinary pain
Fever, distress,not sleeping
Death preferable
Pencil out of lead
Life run out of usefulness
Death a solution
Please God, take my life
Having written, composed, played
I have had my say
Interestingly
Penile pleasure, penile pain
The highest, lowest
Fourth of July BANG!
Celebration of a life
Lived well, ended QUICK!
“Oh my God my God
Why hast thou forsaken me
In my hour of need?”
A final favor:
Dying quick, not lingering
Have a happy forth…
Nothing like humor
Upon which to end a life
Laughing all the way…
Urinary pain
Frequency to go along
(Life before Heaven)
Good morning my world
Constant urinary pain
Alternative: Death
Figure out a way
To make yourself actively
Useful to the point…
Distractions welcome
From constant self-absorption
(Now then, where was I?)
Almost asleep, then
Suddenly yanked awake by
A nerve reaction
“Holding forth” - An art
Practiced in print by the few
For many to heed
One stops writing things
With paper to run out of
Wisdom goes begging
Here’s the way it is:
Read it. Clap your hands or weep
Then go do it, or…
An “Aha!” moment:
Discovering one can write
Or being told it
Some smiles make us glad
Some make us sad
But those that lift us
Gift us. GAD!
Haiku says something
Penetrating into thought
Exiting as acts
Aspiring Haiku
Hoping to be Limerick
After that—Who knows?
There’s a way to be
That’s above and beyond us—
Heaven with The Lord…
Saying anything
One can put into Haiku
Then Limerick verse
Gauging world’s progress
With time and motion study
—Not a bad idea
Writing directions
Telling the world what to do
—The Wharton School Mind
Hearing the rain beat
Hard against the windows is
Nature’s insistence
Urinary pain
The bane of my existence
Where once was pleasure
Halfway thru the night
Is as far as I can get
Then pain takes over
We each have wisdom
Unique logic to pass on
Nourishing others
We each are destined
To do something meaningful
For the rest of us
Something meaningful
Can be said on a small scrap
Of paper to keep
Some bugs eat boogers
Or turn up their own noses
At trash from others’ skull
Advice is easy
To give, to take, but to do…
Another matter
Find “How to do things”
By doers who’ve adventured
To unknowns and won
Here it is, reader
In print, musical, cartooned.
Observe what it says.
In writing, one tries
In some way to be clever
Getting points across
Times change, thought remains
Changing behavior - Or not
Affecting results
Many things remain
(And as such need to be said)
Benefiting man
John The Baptist told
Jesus what to go and do
With His Divine Gift
“Holding forth,” declare
“This is the way that it is!”
(Look around for “No’s”)
One who holds forth bares
Opinions to consider
Subject to dismiss
“Holding forth” in print
Elucidates opinion
On worthwhile subjects
A one-trick-body
Staying alive just to pee
Robbing me of sleep
The zest of power
Overcomes debt of duty
Unfortunately…
A gift from The Lord
Is the wisdom to discern;
From there, deciding
Aspire to wisdom
Then achieving it becomes
A matter of time
One never thinks one
Will ever get to the point
Where one wants to die
Wharton School logic
(Depending on perspective)
Can take us far. Or…
Imagination
Surpasses thought’s boundaries
With its own logic
A Hitler has a
Point, just going about it
In a clumsy way
Narrowing one’s thought
Haiku brings a perspective
To a pungent point
Verbal therapy
Words have the power to cure
With new perspective
Moving one’s pillow
To a cooler spot offers
A new perspective
The morning arrives
Bearing optimism’s glow
—Platter from a dream
Tired of suffering
One considers suicide
(Considers) Reasonable end
Pain has a way of
Taking over existence
Dominating life
How to run your life:
Do what’s right, flirt with what’s not
Experiment. Be…
A garden of weeds
Nothing of use up-growing
Time to buy the farm…
Dietary tip
Don’t drink whiskey lying down
…Burns the esophagus
Think of something else
Nothing like good food to take
Minds away from pain
If it can be done
Transplant my mental process
To someone to use
Teach my heir to read
Using what I have written…
Francisco logic
Quite a consignment
Constant urinary pain
“Oh my God, I am…”
Haiku is but one
Thought set forth in but three lines
To then be observed
Haiku is nought but
Thought set forth as truthfulness
To then be observed
A skinny body
Brain raised up on comic books
(Good combination!)
Comic book logic
Imagines idealistic
Solutions to use
Realism, Ho-hum
Set forth as historical
Fact to be followed
I am imperfect
But my mind can imagine
How it ought to be
What I try to set
Forth is now the way-it-is
How it ought to be
Don’t forget Henry
Read what he has written down
Inspired by The Lord
I don’t want to go
Any place or see any-
Body from now on
My soul lingers to
Inhabit a Francisco
When one comes along
Life, not worth living
Constant urinary pain
…Going somewhere else
Souls come and they go
Seek bodies in which to live
Institute new lives
Death but a blank slate
Despite predictions of what
Might then be coming
Constant distressing
Pain singing my life refrain
Death you are welcome
Reincarnation
I.E. re-installation
Into another…
Do what you can do
Till you can’t do anymore
Then lie down and die
One only needs a
Vocabulary enough
To speak or write thoughts
Urinary pain
It’s hard not to concentrate
On anything but…
Urinary pain
Urinary frequency
Urinary distress
Writer sham battle
Displayed in time for dying
Before going on
Needing to presume
Writers need to imagine
Readers read and heed
Writer needs focus
On something besides himself
To speak uniquely
Writing needs a form
‘long with imagination
Thought artistic’ly
Fever receding
Pain comes on and takes over
For the daytime shift…
Writing, distraction
From suffering in old age
(Still contributing…)
Paper there to write
Thoughts even while suffering
…Opportunity!
We who give advice
Try to think of optimum
Ways to live a life
How to live your life:
Consider advice. Take it
Or go on your own
A blank slate exists
Upon which to write one’s thoughts
Advising others
Burning up now, so
Scorch my soul before I die
Equaling Hell’s fires
A final message:
Do the most of what you can
While you’re still alive
Let’s see… Pain, fever
Urinary frequency
Thus no sleep, so…Death
Think of something else?
Laughable. When pain grips you
Nothing else exists
I am burning up
Urinarily, the fire
I cannot put out
If to do one thing
You were sent here by The Lord
What would that thing be?
Some people live for
Things, others purely for thought.
There are those who DO
Independence pays
As long as one can remain
“Head above water”
I am burning up
Hell on earth my punishment
Better Hell later
Cannot sleep again
Constant urinary pain
Solution: The Gun
Do just what you want
Regardless of what others
Do, then accomplish
To live then to die
Simple. Having seen the world
As it was, now is
Speak up! Write it down
What you have to say is worth
Consideration
Writing solution:
Finding the exact words to
Write down and be read
Wisdom dispensing
The Henry Family Business
Nee the Franciscos
Culled from conscious thought
Wisdom emerges to be
Now considered, then…
Wisdom emerges
When one thinks and writes it down
For the world to see
Finally we have
A forum for the world to
Consider, “Thinking”
Thinking up wisdom
Write down what you have to say
For the world to heed
Paper, pencil, write,
Publish, saying to the world
“Listen up! Observe…”
Haiku’s are but thoughts
Expanded to conclusions
Noting relevance
There is always “IF”
“If I could this or could that
Then this or that would…”
I love existing
It’s just that when hurting comes
I want to cease both
Opportunity
Knocks only infrequently
So, when it does, GO…
On the verge of death
Grammar dustbin phrases go
On to oblivion
The pen my revenge
Against end-of-life with pain
Writes H. John Henry
Idea sham-battle
Explodes early in the day
When thought’s ignited
Many parts in life
Are played, transmitting thinking
To be then observed
Ability to
Write down messages is a
God-given talent
Brain still functioning
Even though the body fails
Thus “Raison d’être”
To live is to write
Thus transmitting messages
To those who can read
Haiku has a way
Of replacing existing
Discomfort with now…
Stated in Haiku
“This is the way that it is!”
(Not to be denied)
To live is to write
Thus to transmit a message
From my God to you
We spend our whole lives
Managing to avoid pain
When and if it comes
I am burning up
My Hell is right here, right now
(“Please God, forgive me”)
Plenty of subjects
No point in ignoring pain
Dwell on something else
When a pain persists
Try then to concentrate on
Something constructive
Living jut to write
Enduring pain, ideas
Brought to the forefront
History arrests
Evil, saves it from itself
Then time marches on…
Urinary pain
Un-relenting, no relief
Solution: Kill it…
The penis pleasure
Can easily turn to pain
By a little germ
American Med
For the sole benefit of
Doctors, not patients
Pain, nought but hurting
Full time 100%
Vida finita
Burning up Hell here
Final sin to come right here
I love you Helen
Pain, distress, no sleep
Pray the Lord my soul to keep
Goodbye to the world
Brief respite, now pain
Is back with a vengeance
On life lived before
I am a writer
Saying what needs to be said
At least in my mind
Thought that comes to mind
Deserves expansion, or then
Again maybe not
Nervous twitching
Keeps awake all night
Answer: Suicide
Hanging on to strands
Of life in order to write
Has its benefits
U. S. Medicine
Capital sin, by the way:
A matter of Greed
Take the money spent
On Health Care advertising
Give Health to people
Antibiotics
Held hostage by the doctors
Ransomed by patients (suckers)
The Mafia could
Not have done it better than
Our Health Care racket
Words are the weapons
Civilized people employ
To right wrongs, wrong rights
Controlling people
Is preventing from harming
Allowing freedom
The seer says, till
Running out of things to see
And say to BE seen
When you can’t sleep, write
Things you might be seeing in
Dreamland’s perspective
One can learn to find
The things that thinkers think when
Out beyond limits
What is creative?
Is it the brain or spirit
Freed from Earthly Bonds?
Some Brains consider
Anything, going on to
Speculate, create…
The addled brain has
Its perks able to venture,
Think outside the box
The World and what was
Passes on constantly to
Become what will be
All one has to do
Is open one’s eyes to see
What is going on
“Crooked Hillary”
Name-calling President Trump
Try it on Putin
New Ideas come
But then are hard to capture
Need a mental net
Constant pain not good
For the attitude of life
Makes one want to die
Try to contribute
Thru pain, illness, discomfort
To life’s duration
Is there somewhere a
Natural urinary
Cleansing food or drink
I am merely a
Pipeline through which the word of
God is transmitted
I imagine what
God would say if He now spoke
On how to run things
When our God inspires
Communication, it
Matters not who writes it
Someone needs to tell
In an acceptable way
How to run The World
Perform the hymnals
There’s gold in Them There Heavens
Begging to be mined
How much suffering
Is required to atone for
One’s committed sins?
There comes a time when
All one can think about is
Moving to new life
Reincarnation
No matter where one’s spirit
Can go to make good
Reincarnation:
I’ll go on to the next life
Get back in touch then…
Mila play my tunes
Brian spout my limericks
Tony Teach Haiku
Helen don’t allow
The Port Whitman Times to die
Paying it forward
Irregardless of
Constant urinary pain
Life can still go on
The mind imagines
What could possibly be, then
Communicates it
Going to next life
Wondering what exists there
Guess I’ll find out soon
My Hell here on Earth:
Urinary pain does it
Better than later…
Saying sensible
Things in an entertaining
Way is ones metier
When pain strikes bear it
As though you don’t even care
That it claims your life
When living with pain
End it in whatever way
At your disposal
To my people (!)
I love you all, even you
(You know who you are)
Burning up, fever
Urinary pain, no sleep
Unending distress
Life with no limits…
Existing on the edges
Of a disaster
It’s not a matter
Of who you be, but the terms
Upon which you think
Possibilities:
A matter of terms upon
Which one is thinking
To preserve the world
Think on operatic terms
Then go and do it
Hitler had the right
Idea: “Be a Messiah”
But something went wrong
Not “literature”
I grew up on comic books
But… I read them all
What would a writer
Say if he (she) were called upon
To write… The Bible?
God speaks through Henry
Who writes down what The Lord Says
To be read by you
Vedra, attractive
Well-educated, hip, faux…
Be a Messiah!
I am not a saint
But those who wrote the Bible
Were but writers, no?
Many are smarter
But no Son Of ’51
(Cathedral Prep, Erie, Pa)
Is more creative
Mila play my tunes
Brian recite my poems
Tony spread my word
Healthy, one can do
Whatever occurs to one
In circumstances
My words cry out to
Be performed, so those who hear
Can be enlightened
At age eighty-four
My brain thinks, imagines things
To be written down
Inventing a thought
Say something in a new way
Spurring conjectures
Write haiku, make sense
Saying something in a way
Unstated so far…
What better to do
In old age than to transmit
One’s acquired wisdom
Words, transmitting thought,
Suggest some alternatives
To consider first
Lyrics, limericks
Haiku… They are something to
Think about, ponder
Giving things away
Is one of life’s great pleasures
Not to be denied
Writing lying down
Has its advantages for
Thinking things up
Urinary pain
Distress making your life a
Mess to be dealt with
Twenty-four hours
Available for sleeping…
What more could one ask?
Wharton School minds think
Alike, or do they just muse
On how to make cash?
Urinary pain
A choice. Lucky to have the
Way to end it now
Writing eases pain
Forcing concentration on
What to say and how
Urinary pain
A choice (!) not so much for some
Who have to endure
Hell here burning up
With fever, and no relief
Seppuku my choice
Novel thoughts that come
To mind expressed logic-ly
Are inspiration
Last chance to compose
Eight o’clock is coming on
Hurry up, say it!
High in the stirrups
The jockey, riding above
Is merely a guide
God continues on
Creating worlds, perfecting
Species, like people…
Morning arises
With opportunity to
Make significance
The start of the day:
The best time to go become
What you’re gonna be
Lying down thinking
The blood flows right to the brain
Creativity!
Haiku thought opens
Develops a point of view
Concludes with a slant
In writing, one can
Eliminate circumstance,
Concentrate on thought
Life be’s what it is
Making its own way along
Through circumstances
Thought of the moment
A prey in a place and time
Capture it… or not
Other than pain are
Better things to think about
Food, fun, sex, writing
Urinary pain
Just the usual again!
Why-on-Earth-live? But…
Lying down, look up
Standing up, look out, and then
Perspective appears
The New Bible tome
A book of inspirations
In this time of hope
Mister President
Go forward, not in reverse
Travel heights unknown
What would a writer
Say if he were called upon
To write The Bible?
Milo, play my tunes
Brian, recite my poems
Tony, spread my word…
Urinary pain
Distress, making one’s life a
Mess to be dealt with
Write Haiku, make sense
Saying something in a way
Un-stated so far…
“Crooked Hillary”
Name-calling President Trump
Try it on Putin…
Some brains consider
Anything going on to
Speculate, create
The world and what was
Passes on constantly to
Become what will be
The addled brain has
Its perks, able to venture
Think outside the box
All one has to do
Is open one’s eyes to see
What is going on
Hell is here! I am
Burning up right in my bed
At home, in comfort
Regardless of the
Constant urinary pain
Life can still go on…
Helen don’t allow
The Port Whitman Times to die
Paying it forward…
Milo play my tunes
Brian tell my limericks
Tony teach haiku
Reincarnation—
I’ll go on to the next life
Get back in touch, then…
Reincarnation
No matter where one’s spirit
Can go to make good
New ideas come
But then are hard to capture
Need a mental net
When logic exists
Beyond that, inspiration
Lurks waiting for use
Circumstances lead
Through logical progressions
To apt conclusions
Things be what they are
Situations existing
Result: conclusions
When it’s time to move
Lose sentimentality
Adopting good sense
There is no one else
Who grew up reading nought but
Comic books, then wrote
Anything can be
Comedy or tragedy
Resting on viewpoint
Comics are funny
Through a process of leading
To absurdity
At age eighty-four
My brain still thinks, imagines
To then go write down
Healthy, one can do
Whatever occurs to one
In circumstances
My words cry out to
Be performed, so those who hear
Can be enlightened
God speaks through Henry
Who writes down what The Lord Says
To be read by you…
Constant pain not good
For the attitude of life…
(Makes one want to die)
Life with no limits
Is living on the edges
Of a disaster
Burning up, fever,
Urinary pain, no sleep
Constant distress
When living with pain
End it in whatever way
At your disposal
Try to contribute
Through pain, illness, discomfort
Poetry, advice
It’s not a matter
Of who you be, but the terms
Upon which you think
Possibilities:
A matter of terms upon
Which one is thinking
To preserve the world
Think on operatic terms
Then go and do it!
Hitler had the right
Idea… Be a messiah
But something was wrong
Not “literature”
I grew up on comic books
But… I read them ALL
I am not a saint
But those who wrote the Bible
Were but writers, no?
Many are smarter
But no son of ’51
Is more creative
Inventing a thought
Say something in a new way
Spurring conjecture
Wharton School minds think
Alike or do what they muse:
How to make money…
Writing eases pain
Forcing concentration on
What to say and how
Giving things away
Is one of life’s great pleasures
Not to be denied
Foolish to condemn
Sexual preferences
Being what they are
The subject of pain
Not so pleasant to address
Comes, nevertheless
Is there anything
Worse than urinary pain?
(At least the pee comes…)
Do we know we have
A quixotic president
Who could destroy all?
Running government
Isn’t a game that you play
To win or to lose
This Trump is in charge
Of making a decision
To blow up the world
Impeachment needed
When officials overstep
The bounds of good taste
An idealism
To fight practicality
Needs peoples’ support
A dangerous man
In charge of a government
Can ruin a state
The art of the deal
Could therefore spur an ideal
Brought to state level
Ev’ryone born is
Given a gift to be used
For the good of all
The body is a
Manufacturing process
—Food to energy
A messiah is
Not a person but a thought
From God to people
The World clamors for
A messianic writer
Ere it wrecks itself
Sans John The Baptist
Jesus would not have emerged
As The Messiah
Thank you for the gifts
And the ability to
Use them ere I die
If you don’t do it
Someone will take the challenge
If it’s to be done
Dream, fantasizing
Go beyond reality
Stirring hearts and minds
Vedra Chandler, The
Gospel Singer, purveyor
Of The Word of God
You’ve sung for thousands
Once stung by your performance
Ever effected
Go, speak. For money.
Groups pay you to deliver
A meaningful word
Jesus had John The
Baptist who started Him on
The Messiah Road
One has to go be
A Messiah, not wait for
It to come around
That voice can sing, preach
Awaken souls to action
Having an effect
Your mission in here
Where your voice is needed now
To stir reaction
Why spend your talent
Going afar, singing for
Itinerant crowds?
This Messiah is
Something one has to go out
And BE without shame
This Messiah starts
With the people around her
Arousing, stirring
Then to constructive
Action, behavior with a
Road to travel down…
Come to your senses
Giving up what affects them—
For the good of life
Think up something new
To distract from pain distress
Haiku? Poetry?
Distraction, the key
To counteracting pain, the
Mind goes somewhere else
If only to have
Enough room to write down thoughts
Strength to think them up
Cannot remember
From one moment to the next
Gotta invent new…
Henry: Think about
Something else to assuage the
Urinary Pain
Urinary pain
Strong, constant, unrelenting
Distress, life a mess
The Book Of Henry
With haikus and limericks
Suitable to quote
In teens and twenties
The age of raging hormones
Use them to create…
Noises of the street
Reverberate through windows
Into peoples’ minds
Messiah wanted
To preach God’s word to people
With receptive minds
To be able to
Write—A God-given talent
To use in His way
Erie, small enough
Social levels visible
From one’s bicycle
Live, observe, indulge
Grab knowledge from what you see
Draw apt conclusions
Erie PA, the
Perfect place to encounter
All levels of life
Writing: something to
Think about, distracting from
The pain of illness
Holding pain hostage
Doc’s hawk for drug companies
For a commission…
Pleased with what I’ve done
If my heart would only stop
That would be enough
Sounds of life emerge
As any city starts up
It’s daily routine
Thoughts occur, don’t they?
Write them down if you think they’re
Worth remembering
Lie awake and write
So who needs sleep anyway?
It’s only life, death…
They’ve figured a way
To get into your head when
You go search online
Lie there and write thoughts
So, who needs sleep anyway
Perspective wins out
Written, in the drawer
Thoughts have come, shined, then
To posterity
To be a person
Then, in midlife change to be
Another person
Ah! Life’s great pleasure:
To lie in bed and write what
One sees as wisdom
Concentrating on
Other than one’s maladies
Allows perspective
Life’s totality:
Perspective, how one sees things
Then acts upon them
Life: Drama, ice cream
Adventure, pleasure, some pain
All-in-all great fun
Having said my say
I bid you all adieu now
Bon chance, have fun, live!
Yeah, so what, Henry
You went here, did that, lived long
But then…What you wrote!
La vie de Henri:
Adventure, going where few
Might dare to trespass
Creativity
Absent when pain takes over
C’est la vie, Henri
To be a success
Zero in on exactly
What you want to be
NCT concept:
Immediacy, what the
Courier can’t provide
Think I’m old? Feeble?
I don’t think about sex? Wrong!
Thinking’s the best part
To be a success
Give up every thing but
What you want to be
Think I’m a dirty
Old man? Of course! We can still
Imagine ourselves…
Flouted with beauty
We touch as much of it as
We possibly can
What will life after
Life be like? One can only
Muse, if one believes
Pain can only be
Tolerated so long, then
One wants to end it
Thought needs to be said
To everyone whose logic
Can comprehend it
Wanted: translator
Is there a program for that,
Is it yet to be?
Now it’s time to die
I did my do, had my say
What is next will come
The world needs writers
To conceive for do-ers to
Go and accomplish
I try to create
Thought out of thin air, where God
Exists for us all
Time to die gone by
Have to live another day
Telling how it is
Lying down, look up
Why preoccupy with death?
Just do it or don’t
Same forty-two, my
Birth time and my death-time too
Then to up-and-go…
Pages still remain
To then be written upon
Saying, telling to…
Que sera sera
Whatever will be will b e
Hoping for the best
Closing up The Store
My Henry’s Ice Cream in print
My do, done, say said
It’s getting boring
For you too, I’ll bet, reading
Thought about my pain
Done what I wanted
Said what I wanted to say
…Re-incarnation…
Write, play, perform, teach
Tony, Mila, Brian, James
Live long and happy…
Starting to repeat
Myself saying things I said
Many years before…
Pillow full of sweat
Constant urinary pain
Living just to write
Writing: distraction
But constant urinary
Pain returns. A drag!
Pain isn’t so bad
It’s cure-able, bear-able
Unless it’s constant!
Writers: Figure out
A way to say what you want
Lying down in bed
Opportunity:
Tony: Use my limericks
In teaching English
Opportunity:
Mila (James) play my music
None other like it…
Brian go recite my
Poems in Lincoln Center
Opportunity!
Write till you run out
Of thought. But waitaminute…
Thinking won’t stop till…
Henry’s final words:
If you haven’t read me by
Now, you never will
American Doc’s
Money movers, us to them
(Unconscionable)
Love to all: Helen
Mila, Tony, Brian, James
Earth (Read what I wrote)
Just unrelenting
Constant urinary pain
Says “It’s time to die!”
Haiku is nought but
A single thought with a twist
Contained in its gist
There is a reason
Two brothers don’t get along
Differing viewpoints?
Hey! Death, anytime
You want to make yourself known
Welcome to my fate…
Nervous energy
Only lasts so long, and then
Sleep finally comes
Who will care for you
When you get old and infirm?
Better have someone…
Writing: distraction
From any kind of a pain
(Mind over matter)
Creativity
Is something acquired and used
Throughout existence
Adolescent choice:
Who to become in one’s life
Then going ahead…
“How to run your life”
Hmm… Advice easy to give
From afar. Take? Or…
Idea—Haiku—
Limerick—Article—To
Spark a reaction
Writing’s distraction
Makes suffering easier
(Thought substitution)
“Here’s how to live life…”
Saith the philosopher
(Easy to think up)
Dilemma with pain:
Whether to keep on living
Or end it right now
Burn up in my Hell
Body, then Heaven awaits—
There to be gone to
Death cannot be smooth
In old age one lingers on
Nix-ing giving up
To write, create thought
For a reader to perceive:
Ultimate reward
Bodies come apart
If they live long enough to
Just disintegrate
Life becomes a mess
Urinary pain, distress
Solution: End it!
In living, give in
To impulses that donate
Benefits to flesh
How to run your life
Safe to tell, but go figure
How to manage Death
It makes common sense
To kill one’s self in private
Un-spectacular…
Who’s the idealist?
Tony? Brian? Mila? James?
To run with the ball…
Now’s Jesus would have
Started a publication
Message-ing online
The Port Whitman Times
Saying what needs to be said
To the world-at-large
Anything can be
Said in a haiku poem
For a grain of sense
“Do unto others
As you, then would have them do
Unto you” — Jesus
Limerick music:
Some combination of a
One-six-two-five-four
Spend some time lying
Listening to melodies
Playing in your head
Lying down, look up
At ceilings, skies, attitudes;
Get a perspective
The wrong way to look
At things might sometime give
Unique perspective
The way to get to
Heaven is do-the-right-thing
When it comes to choice
He’s got smoke coming
From his exhaust telling us
“Where there’s smoke there’s fire!”
Demise management
A wide-open field right now
Especially one’s own
Go do what you can
The very best, no matter
What the prize may be
How to run your life
Easy to say, but not so
How to do your death
“Hello Death” I say
“Hello” trepidatiously
With my head spinning
Death doesn’t barge in
But peeks around the corner,
Says: “Are you ready?”
I lived to have fun
You should too, finding something
To fascinate you
Oh Lord give me strength
To bear the life I’m given
Right up to the end
At Henry’s Ice Cream
We made a living out of
The good things in life
When pain takes over
Can’t think of anything else
Only answer: Death!
Thinking up new things
Is what life is all about
Ev’r day a boon!
Life is on its way
Other things to think about
Living, inventing
Sleep won’t come, but thought
Continues, plodding away
Plotting solutions
Answers to problems
Lie in Haiku pronouncements
“Tell it like it is!”
Thinking up, I am
Creative in my own way
(Cosmic solutions)
The nervous system
Yanks one’s consciousness awake
From dream-land to pain
With paper and pen
One can create what one thinks
Will benefit man
Art triumphs over
Mundane living, giving spice
To bland existence
An endless supply
Of Haiku is a resource
To pluck ideas from
Penile pleasure puts
One on a different plane
At least for the nonce
Free to roam about
The morning mind can delve in
To any subject
Original minds
Come up with new solutions
To old dilemmas
The mind is prodded
To sheer inspiration from
Omni Stimuli
The world is prodded
By external stimuli
To act thereupon
Inventing new thought
Available. Anyone
Can participate
Inventing new thought
On a whole range of subjects
—Man’s prerogative
If only to have
Enough paper to write on
—Ideas spring forth
Pain! Urinary…
The worst kind, hurting to pee
Answer: Suicide!
When pain invades life,
How to alleviate it
Becomes a mission
When one can’t think of
Anything to cover pain
One’s life is over!
Civilization
Said to be mankind’s reward
But what about pain?
Worrying fever
Lying there concentrating
On it makes it worse
Starving a fever
Using nought but will power
Imagination?…
By using the brain
One can counteract fever
(Mind over matter)
Writing cools the brain
Creating efficiency
Thinking-out fever
Using my fever
Writing with a heated brain
Henryfficiency
I am, therefore write
When I will be, or won’t be
You can still read me
No matter where I
End up going after I
Die, Okay… Aye-aye!
Urinary pain
Too much minute-to-minute
Stabbing my penis
Writing, creating
Thought reduces fever, pain
—Natural relief
Lying in the bed
Worrying, concentrating
On pain makes it worse
Thinking, using heat
Creating mental pictures
Fights pain and fever
What ever happened
To this one or that one?
Gone up There… or down?
While the rest of the
World lives on, one dies, one’s born
Heaven takes, Hell burns
Hurting, burning up
Pissing keeping me awake
Ready to die now
But then, things to do
Keep popping up demanding
Attention be paid
To write, be able…
Express opinion, fancy
Directing the world…
If only one thinks
It then leads to expression
In words or action
So-called jazz players
End up merely doing scales
Uncreatively
One does what one does
Afterwards having regrets
Of guilty pleasure
My body wants to
Hang on a lot longer than
The rest of me does
Don’t linger too long
In lyrical indulgence
Lest subjects get bored
Henry rhythmic licks
Accompany limericks
—Musical background
Just not good with pain
Intellectual stuff: “Poof!”
I can handle that
Sleep refuses me
I seem to be burning up
My Hell is here, now…
Hard to write Haiku
Telling things the way they are
Pain gets in the way
Stick a pin in me
I’m sure the juices will spurt
When properly cooked
I am burning up
Being cooked to the limit
Of my endurance
Act seriously?
Not on your tintype, buddy.
Life is but a dream…
Unable to sleep
Burning up with a fever
Urinary pain
Said what was needed
Wrote it down for folks to see
Then observe or not
Too old for suff’ring
Had all the pain I wanted
Now on to the next
Eras of sunshine
Accompanied by rain, snow
—Summer and Winter
New Ideas came
And went but first were written
For posterity
Burning up, my Hell
Happening right here and now
…Saves God the trouble…
Life has surely been
A tasty fun smorgasbord
…Would not have missed it
Death welcome, pain gone
My ideas all stated
To be considered
There will be no me
Once I’m gone, but what I said
Remains to be seen
Forgive me if I
Subtract my body from this
Life and ceaseless pain
An ideal outcome:
If one could will oneself dead
“Heart! Stop your beating!”
Life is a blank page
Upon which we write a tale
Of our own design
Urine, like syrup
Accompanies final thought
Slow but sure—painful
My hell here burning
Body afire with fever
Doctors hold hostage
Mila: Henry genes
Say with talent “Improvise!”
Explore tonal roads
I did everything
Till it got to be boring
Then chose another
Let me make this clear:
My choice: life without distress
(But not in the cards…)
I’m being tortured:
Fever, penile pain, no sleep
I’m going Elsewhere…
Tired of being sick
Look forward to being dead
Then to get some peace
Let me see, which ones
Of my contemporaries
Have I now outlived
Can’t sleep, lie awake
Urinary pain the boss
Answer: Suicide…
Flowers stand up straight
Emerge, bloom, emit perfume
Persists, wilts, then dies
Creative writing
Requires editing to shape
To read-able ness
The mind is sharpest
Imagination peaking
Upon awaking
If only to die
When pain and old age descend
Leaving thought behind
So what! Only pain
Not as if you’ve gone to Hell
Suck it up! Think! Write!
My pen is my gun
Firing thoughts into the minds
Of those who’re victims
Kinder: Life is an
Adventure. Take advantage
Sing prima voce
Not a great writer
But thinker, imaginer
Stating fact as truth
The fires of my Hell
Are burning me up right here
Before I escape
I have been stirred by
The Spirit of Walt Whitman
My own remains here
What I think I write
My thinker-upper active
Early in the morn
Left behind: the voice
Of a Henry Francisco
Written down to hear…
To write, say one’s say
Publicly entertaining
Is Heaven on Earth
To take one’s own life
A decision of import
Not taken lightly
Please don’t feel sorry
If I decide to kill me
…My own decision
My soul longs to go
To Heaven but my body
Refuses to die
Pillow soaked with sweat
Unable to get some sleep
Death come rescue me…
In the acting game
The secret is “becoming”
Different, unique…
Actor’s way to fame:
Giving away limericks
In New York City
I believe my soul
Transcends my body. Up? Down?
Better another…
Urinary pain
Distress making life a mess
Alternative: Death
Even if Jesus
Was only a man, does that
Lessen what He did?
There is nothing you
Can do with the help of drugs
You can’t do without
Old-age ravages
Befall those who survive to
Enjoy or suffer
My Dream: The Henrys
Singing, playing Gospel Songs
Starting in Princeton
Medicine no help
Always back to the same thing:
My Hell here on Earth
Ideas are like kids
There are none so wonderful
As one’s progeny
Life here is over
There must be a better way
To travel with God
Women: Run The World
You can figure out a way
Without killing us
I’m ready to die
But just haven’t figured out
How to do it yet
“Fly me to The Moon”
So I can live among clouds
Along with spirits
I’m waiting to die
But with modern medicine
It’s a long long line…
Seppuku: A death
Dictated by life’s owner
Controller of fate…
Urinary pain
Distress make my life a mess
Alternative: Death
Think up something new
Relating to what you do
Write down its advice
Antidote to pain:
Thought expression written down
Now sense goes onward
Thoughts come, go away
Unless you capture them now
Cage them, written down
Sense! Think. Imagine
Go to forbidden places
Come to conclusions
Let a thought pursue
Its own direction, going
Where it wants to find…
Drugs steer behavior
They let you be what you are…
Cards fall where they may
Innovation strikes
Sometimes when one least expects
Providing answers…
Imagination:
Creating blank slates, writing
Thought to contemplate
Urinary pain!
Making life not worth living
Panacea: Death (Hmm…)
Worry a booger
Till it finally becomes
A ballagoola
Nothing like ice cream
To stir the thinking process
Gilding the taste buds
Pain comes with thinking
Part of a mental process
Grinding metaphors
Solutions exist
Any and all conundrums
Beg resolution
Upon thinking, doubt
Cogitate, consider sense
Then come to conclude
Things to think about…
A wide variety exists.
Upon thinking, write!
No relief in sight
Constant urinary pain
Seppuku Honto!
No relief in sight
Constant urinary pain
Sleep is but a dream
Some thought comes from the
Silver tongue of The Devil
(To be considered)
Musing, cogitate
Attempt to capture wisdom
Ere it flies away…
Writing, all over
(Constant urinary pain)
A Dios… I hope
Poetry cures pain
Proposing reason for thought
Entertaining words
I seem to be good
At thinking up and writing
Down good ideas
Go, be Franciscos
Creators of thought, word, tune
Then writing it down
Being what they are
Things proceed to where they will
Lacking decision
Even in pain, one
Can think, oft even better
Using avoidance
Haiku is thought thought
Out to a poetic form
Writ to consider
Hmm. Oddly enough
Writing counteracts disease
Thought replacing pain
I thank God for my
Gift: being able to write
Making common sense
Even with pain, life’s
A precious gift to thinkers
But then, aren’t we all?
Thinking, creating
Enjoying. Giving it up?
A reluctant choice
The thing that keeps me
From dying is writing down
What I am thinking
I write better when
I suffer, the pain bringing
Forth raw thought to bear
Cruel worlds beget
Bitterness as by-products
Spawn unhappiness
Things to think about
Can replace pain ev’ry time
Concentration works!
I have lived a life
Flown, sang, wrote, composed, produced
Which I now bequeath
To die to music:
Heavenly ambience brought
Forth as audition
As I pass away
The waft of my bread communes
Between me and God
When all I can do
Is lie in bed and suffer
Then I welcome death
Once your say is said
Let the words take their effect
Sit back, see results
Urinary pain
Unrelentingly constant
(I have had my say)
There’s a time to die
When life has ceased becoming
And winds down to not…
There’s a time to live
It’s now while wheels are turning
Even losing speed
Good music makes sense
With a logic all its own
Entice-ing the ear
Don’t let go of life
Now with still a grip on it
Clutch it by the balls
What does one do when
One gets to the point where one
Simply wants to die?
We enjoy being
So to die and be no more
Goes against our grain
Just wanting to die
And killing one’s self are two
Distinct reactions
When dying, dealing
With pain is a quandary
To be avoided
“Represent the king!”
Holding radio hostage
To his point of view
Getting through the night
Arriving in the morning
One greets a new day
To kill or to write:
A choice for those who run things,
Care about people
The time to write: NOW
When ideas come before
They pass, fade away
Pain comes with movement
So, playing dead, just thinking
Is its own reward
To be other than
What one is when constant pain
Presents: A new role!
Think of more pleasant
Things rather than pain, distress
(Sex, Ice Cream, Helen)
There seems no relief
Constant urinary pain:
My Hell here on Earth…
Surgeons: mechanics
With body parts instead of
Nuts and bolts, nor thoughts
Dying can be fun
Even if its slow, as long
As pain stays away
One sees what one wants
To see regardless of what
There is or might be
Lying in bed, one
Only has to think and see
What one can conjure
Are you capable
Of thought sans any limits?
Then imagine. Think!
With eyes closed, one sees
Beyond horizons to thoughts
Of what there might be
There are many things
One cannot be forever.
Writer is not one…
One grows up, becomes
Something more, or another
Spirit unforeseen
Ideas come, go…
Written for posterity
Or not. Found, or lost…
A light switches on
In the philosopher’s mind
…A new Idea!
Seeing things as they
Might be, one has to sepa-
rate them from one’s life
In order to write
I had to separate My
Self from my conscience
Thinking is something
Writing, what I imagine
—The comic-book mind
Nought but only thought
Which ought to be enough taught
But then… There’s a plot
Pencil: Golden Wand
With which to do wordy tricks
Verbal magic (Poof!)
Remember my life
Read my writing (Says it all)
That I could think up…
Helen my angel
Companion, lover, muse, mom
What more could one want?
Thought is only that.
But writing, composition
Sets forth what needs told
Golden pencil, say
What’s in my mind set forth words
Truth or fantasy
Verbal sonata
Spins a tune that plays something
To both ears and minds
Imitating God
Create that which humans can
See, hear, touch, smell, taste
Titans of tunes compose
Melodic phrase to hum, play,
Stick in hearers minds
The things we do when
We don’t know what we’re doing
Come back to haunt us
The killshfot or jump
Meeting The Lord afterwards
“Why couldn’t you wait?”
Suicide—easy
But deciding—There’s the rub
Leaving what’s here—gone…
Do it yourself death:
Not that hard to accomplish
A shot, jump, poison…
Maybe God only
Made so many souls and we
Must seek new bodies
In our new bodies
We exist where we are born
Living there, and then
Like Plants, our souls’ seeds
Regenerate in bodies
Seeding them at birth
Environment’s seeds
Sprout, grow, mature, develop
Into what to BE
When we BE, we ARE,
Choosing roads to travel down
To destiny THERE
Destiny beckons
Each of us to choose to go
This way, that, or not…
World! Here’s what to do:
Set forth poetically
Enjoy, live by it…
The book of advice:
Here is how to run your life
Thought out, written down
Other ways of life
Exist, from which to go choose
Thus a path appears
As you live, a path
Appears, which then is chosen
…With consequences
War: unthinkable
Faced with today’s weaponry
Somehow get along…
Telling truth in verse
Stating there what needs be said
Entertainingly
From the moment we’re
Born we are waiting to die
But while we do, ACT!
I have preached my word
Wrote it all down for reading
Now, it’s time to die…
So I take my life
Given 1934
Used for good purpose
Bombs are obsolete
Thou Shalts and Shalt Nots remain
So wherefore art they?
The Port Whitman Times
Is God’s communication
Advising The World
Kinder, take this gold
Pencil and write what the world
Needs to read, and heed
Things need to be said
Tony, Brian, Mila, James:
Explain to the world!
To love life is to
Exercise the five senses
See, hear, taste, touch, smell
My body’s broken
But my heart remains alive
Kicking, pumping blood
Too much pain to bear
Tired of dealing with distress,
Going onto next…
Going to being
Another person with a
Brand new body there
Life, like a Haiku
Opens, develops, ripens,
Finally concludes…
When rain is over,
Earth is washed and time proceeds
Anew to what comes
Brian: Perform my
Limericks somewhere with grace
There’s gold to be had…
If only spirits
Could go on to new bodies
That would be Heaven
I believe my soul
Deserves another body
Here, or there, and NOW
Haiku: Ideas
Which open, develop, then
Finally conclude
Take that which I wrote
Turn it into a drama:
“Contentious Poems”
What more can one say
In one’s feeble attempts to
Edify, inspire?
A magic pencil
Goes where it wants, says what it
Needs, to edify
I take my life now
To give to God whatever
He should choose to do…
Touch the DNA
Of the Henry Francisco
In the stone he wears
I have said my say
Written down advice to take
(Poetically too!)
Tony:
Use my written word
To teach and preach biblical
New inspirations
Mila:
Play my music comps
Pianist extraordinaire
Somewhere to be heard
Brian:
Be the character
Who preaches and gives away
Henry Limericks
The magic pencil
The inspirational ring
The creative mind
Tony, Brian, Mila, James
Teach what I have written to
The world you know there
Yet able to think
I compose and write Haiku
Thus somewhat useful
Helen:
I will always love you
Invent new cadence:
Tony, Brian, Mila, James
Blues for Limericks
Brian: Plenty of
PWT material
To go and perform
Tony
Put it where you want
Take the Port Whitman Times
Teach it, edify…
Folks, loved ones: keep the
Hymnals, tuneful harmonies
Melodies to sing
Pain, distress, no sleep
Pray The Lord one’s soul to keep
Heaven’s Joys to reap
A blank page invites
Stated thought, written down for
Acts to be taken
Thank God for my gift
Maybe you should thank Him too
For yours, using it…
The Port Whitman Times
Tries to state a truth from a
Camden point-of-view
Pain keeps one awake
Alive enough to exist,
Transmit a message
Hoping to find life,
A worn-out body searches
For raison d’être
If you own a home
What NOT to put down the drain
Is a no-brainer
Talking to one’s self
Ruminating on a shelf
Won’t bring any wealth
Haikus that can rhyme
Bordering on the sublime
Stop thought on a dime
Plumbing backing up
Bathtubs and sinks filling up
Drink ye not a cup
Old age is no fun
But if you get to live one
Grin and bear it, son
Now God is my Guide
Steering my direction to
Somewhere I belong
Instagram writing:
Promoting one’s word online
To be read by all
I can walk again
It’s a matter of muscle
Control, will, desire
Urinary pain
Constant and unrelenting
Death preferable…
The word is a sword
Chop down, cut into, stab through
Stimulating thought
Writing, to the end
At least that’s what I can do
Instead of dying
Being a burden:
Never been my cup-of-tea
(Exit stage of life)
But then, off to what
Heaven? Hell? (Speculative)
At least here I write
Writing soothes the pain
Physical, emotional,
Filling up the nonce
Life is a piano
Melodies, harmony, chords
On which to compose
I’ve done many things
Managed to avoid BEing
Enjoyed life’s ice cream
I’ve had a good time
Looking back over my life
Learned, done, paid, written
To Gross Boys:
Your father gave me
A golden pencil with which
I’ve written “The Word”
(Q.V. http://www.portwhitmantimes.com/)
Never rose to be
Chairman, President, but Muse…
Now there’s an office
Old age is slowly
Coming on, going nowhere
Except for writing…
The utmost in stuff
Is what to have, growing old
To allay the pain
Living a fast life
Deserves having a slow death
Thus balance matters
Life is a pencil:
Turn it till the lead runs out
Reload if you can
At what age do we
Realize we get pleasure
Just for its own sake?
To die is my wish
But not my action yet, that
Has to to come later
“The Way That It Is”
(The next book of The Bible)
A New Testament
The Backstrom Sisters:
Mildred, Martha, Mabel. Art:
Finally A Boy!
Imagination
Father’s Ring, Shelly’s Pencil
Voila! Comes Wisdom!
Rub the tiger eye
To turn thought into output
Feel lines of wisdom
To think, imagine
Words to put into Haiku
Is a Divine Gift
If only to die
When one is suffering pain
And can write no more…
I shall be no more
In this very place, but wait…
Heaven (or Hell) looms
Poets cannot help
But compose rhythm or rhyme
For recitation
U.S. Politics
Has now degenerated
Into name-calling
Urinary pain
Distress makes life a mess
Option: suicide?
I shall be no more
In this very place. But wait
Another spot looms…
Poets cannot help
But compose rhythm or rhyme
For recitation
When you think on it
Ev’rybody’s common sense
Remains singular
To think, opine, write
Then be able to transmit
…Civilization!
Dispensing wisdom
From one’s imagination:
—A final resort
Consideration
Of suicide an option
When BEing is pain
Constant pain, distress
Makes one’s life a bloomin’ mess
Better go beyond…
“Rulers”—Obsolete
Online information rules
Access is the key
World: Communicate!
Give everyone everywhere
“Universe” access
Surely the world sees
If we just get together
Universe is One
War is obsolete…
Thought, concept, word transmission
—Now we have the way…
With Sheldon’s Pencil
I transmit inspiration
To internet worlds
I’ve written a book
Opinion, poetry, fact.
It begs to be read
To die in peace is
A fate we all can wish for
Therefore: Live in peace