Poem: [you can’t see earth]

By Jack Brummet

1
You can't see earth
From the dark side of the moon
But maybe that changes

With the accelerating deceleration
Of the moon and earth.
A waning Gibbous moon

Dangles 1.3 light seconds away,
The Sea of Tranquility
A menacing sinkhole.

2
The moon
And the fog
Are in cahoots.

Fog slithers in,
Wrapping around houses,
Trees, shrubs, and churches,

Threading its way

Along the ground
Like horror movie fog.

3
Do the fog and moon
Trigger mayhem, madness, and murder?

Do our brains have tides?

---o0o---

Poem: Evil Konks Out

By Jack Brummet

1

The sun, and that sweet, sweet moon, cling to heaven.
Bugs, fish, animals, trees, and people
Cling to earth.

Power is like stapling
A target to your back.
Play dumb, play slow, play luckless.

2
Difficulty surrounds
You like a moat,
You persevere.

Spoof, lie, mislead, and spin.
Be a smiler.
Don't awaken their enmity.

3
In the end, evil konks out
Like a squid simmered in its own ink,
Because evil fails the moment

It overcomes good--
Consuming the energy
To which it owed its duration.
              ---o0o---

Poem: Frontier Justice

by Jack Brummet 

 1  
A roiling thunderstorm clears the air
Like Wyatt Earp's peacekeeper

 2  
A bad beginning can be overcome
But a good end lasts forever

          ---o0o---

Poem: The Walt Taborski Dream

By Jack Brummet

Walt Taborski starred
In a recurring dream
When I was eight years old.

I dreamed I was dreaming
And kept hearing
A tap tap tap.

I thought the tapping
Was the dream
And woke up.

The tapping started again.
I didn't know if I was awake
Or awake in the dream.

I dreamed I was dreaming
I slid out of bed
And edged along the hallway

Toward the tapping
On the kitchen window
Facing the big blowsy roses

In the backyard.
When I got to the kitchen,
His face was in the window.

Framed by the roses
And darkness
Was the unearthly face

Of Walt Taborski,
Peering in, moving his head
Side to side

In his steel-grey fedora,
Stiff wool overcoat,
And coke-bottle glasses.

His eyes bore down on me.
I coudn't scream
And I couldn't move.

I couldn't look at those eyes,
But with those eyes,
I had no choice;

I could only stare
At the Peeping Tom
Petrified anything I did

Would cause him to burst in.
I inched away
Nearly motionless

As if slow
Would buffalo him,
And he wouldn't actually see me

Drift from his focal point
Imperceptibly backing up
To the perceived safety

Of my room.
At the end of the hall,
I could cut and run.

The sheets in my bed were cold
When I climbed back in.
In the morning,

And every time I dreamed the dream,
I never knew
If it was him

Or me dreaming
Him in the window,
And I never told anyone

About Walt Taborski looking
In the window
Until tonight.
---o0o---

Poem: The Broken Chord (revised)

By Jack Brummet

The rain falls
As you practice arpeggios

Running out shimmering notes
In an ever-shifting

Pattern of music sifting
Through the caesuras between the notes

Forming a counterpoint
With the drumming of the rain

Thousand of patterns and polyrhythms
Weave around and through other patterns

The rain chicanes in the wind
Breaking up and merging again

Billions of drops in midair

Bump together in a choreographed ballet

We can never reproduce
But that's nature for you

We sing paint and write the same story
Over and over and over again

And nature trumps us
With her singular snowflake.
---o0o---

Poem: Into The Wind

By Jack Brummet



I watch three herring gulls
Fly South into the wind
And they're losing ground,

Tumbling and righting themselves
In the shifting currents
Scouring the air.

It's not that they want
To migrate South
So much as not go North.

Something in the gull's hearts
Tells them to stay clear
Of Ketchikan, Skagway, and Nome.
---o0o---

Poem: The Quest

By Jack Brummet

It’s all one story—
                           A ragged

                                        shape-shifting tale

Of incredible coherence and constance,
                                                           encompassing all you know,
                                                           all you don’t know you know,
                                                           and all you one day will know.
There is more
                     To be

                              seen,

                              tasted,

                              heard,

                              and felt
                                           than can ever be known or told.

Our myths flourish and spread,
Person to person,

And the mysteries of the seas and skies and stars
Fill our collective conscience

With mystical scenes,
Quests, and tales of greatness.

These myths, tales, and fables
Cannot be invented, ordered, or denied.

When you strip away

The stage flats, makeup, and costumes,

It’s all one story
Starring our private heroes and dreams.
                 ---o0o--- 

Poem: The Cloud Endures (from the Poetry Generator)

By Jack Brummet & The Poetry Generator

1
The cloud endures like a red sun.
Winds calmly rise like a dead captain.

2
Love, adventure, and anger.
Work, anger, and death.

3
Laughter, anger and death.
The dusty skyscraper grabs the truck.
       ---o0o--- 

Poem: Sailing to Naxos

By Jack Brummet

Sailing the poly-blue Aegean
On a hot day in a steamy haze,
Our ship makes a wide looping turn
A few kilometers off
The white house-dappled shore
Of Naxos, parked in the sea
Like a gem in a finding,
The houses and villas
Strung along the shore
And two layers above
Like a three strand pearl necklace
On the stout and broad neck of a Cyclops,
Waiting to leap from the sea,
And use our ship to beat the sea
Into a churning and foaming
Soup of whirlpools and funnels
That suck everything in sight
Into a sapphire blue vortex,
The water cooling each meter,
As it swirls down and cascades
Into Neptune's drain and picks up speed
As it descends into the dark
And lonely bottom of the sea.
         ---o0o---

Poem: Dodgeball

By Jack Brummet

---o0o---

Poem: The islands from eight miles high

By Jack Brummet

Beneath a chiseled frieze of cerulean blue
Islands recede into the water
To settle on the sea floor

Like an archipelago of Atlantises.
Islands come and go,
Bobbing up and bobbing down

Like lost corks
Drifting seven seas,
Treading continents,

Threading between islands and straits.
They crest the waves
Beneath gathering clouds

As flocks of birds
Circumnavigate the globe,
Shuttling from landfall to landfall.
     ---o0o--- 

Poem: The Grey Ambassador

By Jack Brummet

Flybys, crop circles, and other maneuvers
Were executed
To demonstrate their capability.

After the flybys, came landings, and contact.
The visitors
Did not appear hostile.

Some say we were softened up
By E.T., Klaatu, and ALF
And thought this was a mission of mercy.

If they figured out how to get here,
And have come to make war,
We can't stop them.

If they "come in peace"
To teach what they learned
The Hard Way,
Let’s get started.

        ---o0o---

Poem: [you can’t see earth]

By Jack Brummet

 1 

You can't see earth
From the dark side of the moon
But maybe that changes

With the accelerating deceleration
Of the moon and earth.
A waning Gibbous moon

Dangles 1.3 light seconds away,
The Sea of Tranquility
A menacing sinkhole.

2
The moon
And the fog
Are in cahoots

And the fog slithers in,
Wraps itself around houses,
Trees, shrubs, and churches,

And threads its way

Along the ground,
Like a horror movie fog.

I wonder if the fog and moon
Really trigger

Mayhem, madness, and murder?

3
Do our brains have tides?

---o0o---

Five Poems: The Golden Rule; The Glass Is Not Half-Full; It's Getting Crowded; Limits; Surviving

By Jack Brummet 

The Golden Rule

Listen to the songbirds

Trill

But keep an eye 

On the buzzard section. 

The glass is not half-full

I saw our dreams

Disappear 

Like a white pony 

Over 

A low grassy hill. 

It's Getting Crowded

We cover the earth

With Venn Diagrams

As our steps

Bisect old steps. 

Limits

We like to believe

We could endure anything for five minutes 

But that theory, cooked up 

In your hermetic study or bedroom, 

Comes apart at the seams 

When you imagine being on fire 

Or having crows feast 

Upon your eyes. 

Surviving

Salvation lies

In remaining unblinded 

To the treachery 

Massing around you:

The enemy without,

Calculating your fall 

And the traitor within,

Beating in your chest.

---o0o---

Poem: Instructions to the fetus

By Jack Brummet

Buff up

Before exiting the host;

On the surface,

They eat the wounded.

        ---o0o--- 

Poem: [Let the blue turtle go]

By Jack Brummet

1

Let the blue turtle go
Train your eyes
Like a bobcat

2
Leave the knife beneath your cloak
Let things pass

Because all things must pass

3
Awareness of danger 
Brings fortune as you cross 
The cold cold sea.

      ---o0o---

Poem: Fall

 By Jack Brummet

The problems arise when falling

Becomes not falling,

Or, the uncontrolled landing problem.
           ---o0o---

Poem: Mission Statement

By Jack Brummet

You don't need to see
A discounted cash flow analysis.

You only need to know
If the right people are in your pocket,

And, if not, whom should be bought off,
Scared off, or bumped off?
           ---o0o---

Poem: Potential

By Jack Brummet

In your chest beats

The heart of a Good Samaritan

Who never quite got off

The starting blocks

          ---o0o---

Poem: Resurrection

By Jack Brummet

He was ready to live again

Even if living just meant running

To keep ahead of the ghosts.

          ---o0o---