Puckett Publishing - Poems Volume 1

Volme One: Monotonic Inflections

Abe and Einstein	After Leaving Here
Don’t You Think That’s Enough?	Artisanship
Ever Wonder Why	Fire and Flood
Gemini Thought Process	Goofy
Sirius	I Am the Only One
I In You In I	In a Forest or in a Dream
Remulus	Rocket Men
Rosslyn	Say What?
Sensory Progressions	The Choir
The End of All Things	The Problem With Pollen
Two For a Home	Wrapped Up
Your Business, My Fault

Abe and Einstein

Abe and Einstein, no quantum mechanics for them
No God playing dice.
Newtonian determinacy, time out of joint,
Nothing can put it right.
Unbroken chain, karma like concrete.

Give me Heisenberg:
Uncertainty is an infinite loophole,
Through which an infinite number of angels
Can do the rhumba on an infinite number of pin heads.
That's the passkey, the way out,
Conquerer of entropy and a free ride on the cosmic carousel

After Leaving Here

After leaving here, two roads we will take
And even if it’s side by side they go
They’ll grow apart unless we take the time
To make them bend back to the paths we know,
To lead our hearts back to familiar rhyme
And not forget how easily we break.

If chance brought us together here at first
To leave it all to chance from this point on
Is foolish to the point of losing all.
The winds of life are winds that blow too strong
And who knows what we’ll do pressed to the wall.
A chance may save, or chance may leave us cursed.

On leaving here, each step could be our last
Step in time with each other’s matching step
Unless resolved we make a solemn vow
And every promise said must now be kept.
Each moment focused on forever Now,
Each breath and thought a future weaved in past.

After leaving here, we must not be gone
But hold onto this moment’s time and place,
Cemented in our souls, the central theme
Revolving round about this well-lit space
‘Til one day we’ll again beside this stream
Relive in love the love we’ve always known.

Don’t You Think That’s Enough?

I think we’ve all had it
Right up to here and maybe a little
Past here, to there and maybe a little
Past there. It’s getting tiresome.
All this yow-yow and “his fault” and
“Their fault” and “they started it” and
“I don’t care whose fault it is,
I just don’t like the way they look.”

Really. The way they look.
And what are you, some moral Adonis?
Ethical perfection etched in
Carefully carved aspersions?
Rational discourse died with Socrates
And Walter Cronkite’s retirement.
Maybe a draught of hemlock
Is just what’s needed.
Maybe a bit of real emotion
At the passing of a president
Or the cessation of conversation
Among peers.

Artisanship

Between the exquisitely crafted
And the blatheringly enthusiastic
The middle way beckons
And asks only that it
Be given a full voice
And heard for what it wanted to say:
Something between the finely crafted
And the wildly enthusiastic.

Ever Wonder Why

Some have, most don’t

Some will succeed, most won’t

Some see, most can’t

Some talk, most rant

Some blame, some cry

Most live just enough to die

Some shout, most moan

None seem to wonder why

No one ever wonders why

Fire and Flood

There is a warm, wise wall

Rising above the flood plain.

Levee-like, but not so desolate,

It inches up from the pregnant ground.

Its wisdom is intuited earth and air,

Meeting to hold water and fire apart.

In spring, the floods would flatten all,

In fall, the fire would paint the trees red.

The wall is imperceptible, iridescent even.

It has features, steps and stairs and grass grown

High up its sides, trees surmount the summit.

It seems a natural thing almost, so laid into

The surrounding earth that primal forces

Must have made its ramparts begin to rise.

So it seems, and yet... The wall speaks as well,

To either side and both at once, calming those

Springtime tides and autumn flames. So calm.

Naturalness grows from its foundations, and so

What appears newly formed is older still,

Deep roots into the riverbed, or tree shade

Reaching overhead into an easy breeze.

Speaking into these roots and wind, the wall

Is measured grace, one syllable at each slow time.

Rumors of earthquakes, that ran the waters backward

To their source, these caution the wall's speech.

Slowly, slowly, one slow word at a time,

Easing each piece of warm dirt into place,

Raising the levee past perception into cloudy skies.

Rivers and fires are sustaining and destroying.

Nature engenders them both with power,

Nurture forces that power into channels

That do not always fit a mold. Better held back,

Even held closely, breathing into the night,

Than loosed without bound upon a hapless world.

The world would absorb it in time, worlds do.

But charred and drowning, the townsfolk find

Such devastation hard to absorb. They welcome

The wall, perhaps prayed for it, comforted by its coming.

Tomorrow, the wall will be a wee bit more there,

Slowly, slowly, painted signs and flatter water.

The river, and even the fires, suspect their separation,

But being thoughtless things, only stir in sleep.

Spring and fall will find them untethered again,

But then their knowledge will be too late.

Had it been bricks and mortar, they would awaken.

Dirt and wind are too subtle, intertwined as dust,

Motes in God's eye, and so He sleeps at peace.

Time will raise all things, walls included.

The Creator stirs, too, then breathes deeper.

Time will raze all things, walls included.

Shiva smiles, not unkindly, covers the wall

With a snow blanket, and walks into the winter wood.

Gemini Thought Process

I’m Gemini, Gemini rising.

I have the Twins in six or seven houses.

I have second thoughts

Simultaneously with my first thoughts.

My thoughts are fraternal twins with each other.

I think it over while I’m thinking it through.

I think back when I think ahead.

I think it good or bad

While my thinking makes it both.

I think these are the best of times.

I think these are the worst of times.

Do I think I’ve had enough?

I think enough is enough

And too much is not enough of a good think.

Hold that thought. Let it go.

Think about it. Don’t think about it.

There aren’t many Gemini Zen masters.

Goofy

He was a dog in a cel.

He spoke with mice and birds

He spoke to another dog,

But that other, a planetoid-like pet,

And lacking the power of speech

Did not speak back, though his expression

Often spoke volumes.

He yelled when plummeting,

A cavernous yell, a dying fall,

If ever he could die, but being celled,

Could not.

His laugh shook his doggy adam’s apple,

And came slowly, as did his comprehension

Of almost every situation he encountered.

We miss you, good sir,

And your canine lack of wit.

Your modern counterparts lack your charm

And are not drawn as well

Nor with such care.

Sirius

Dog star, known by the Dogon people

Who somehow knew your dwarfish companion

Though it was unsightable by human sight.

Anubis’ image, announcing the ancient

Egyptian spring flood of the Nile.

Sighted down the hidden shaft at Giza.

Orion leads you into the sky,

And faithful you follow, a sighting

That on clear nights is brilliant drama.

Your crystal penetration pierces

Even the dog days’ haze. There was

Much wonder in ancient days for you,

And even now, though we know

The dog lies sleeping

And you are only hydrogen fires

Immeasurably distant in our sight.

I Am the Only One

Look! I am the only one like me—
And I am gone in an instant.
Look! This is the only moment ever that is this moment—
And it disappeared before it came.
This Heraclitan rhapsody is heard before it was played,
A practical fracticality, a temporal kaleidoscope,
Cracked chronons fantastically vibrating
In non-repetitive patterns, hinting
At form and intention but leaving
Only the residue of a fleeting image.

There is no other world than this—
And it vanished before it could be known.
Compared to what, to when, to where?
No reference exists that it can stand beside
And be compared. No clock can tick so fine
As to allow This and That their time apart.
And still, the river will not be still.
There is no instant small enough to know itself in time,
Before it transmutes into the next.
Change alone is changeless.
The only world in the world
Is the world that is never held.

I In You In I

The I inside of me

Is the I inside of you

It’s the same

The you inside of you

Is the you inside of me

Its all the same

It’s too hard to see the one

That lies beneath it all

Our eyes are full of sand

That is nothing but a wall

And nothing makes up everything

Til all things come undone

the eyes I see are clouded

And the clouds still block the sun

While the crowds just won’t stop dancing

All around the Only One

Cause there is only Only One

In a Forest or in a Dream

Once again, chance and chalice meet at midnight,

The one to drink of Heaven's fate and be renewed,

The other still the vessel filled, sword-bearing.

And all these embracings witness nothing unless

They tell of sweet darkness, caught in the oak,

And caressed by revelers desperate for morning.

Cause enough to cry is given without payment:

The tortured ring is circled well inside itself.

The foolish patrons pay their silver and moons,

(West-sailing and too many), part upon the shore,

Never to recall their fading glory, all broken.

The sword and stone are patient, yet finite.

We? We touch a moment and think it ecstasy,

Never told the truth of days uncounted, long ago.

We? We touch a place and think it forever,

Never see the rivers bedded in all things souls.

We? We touch each other and think no more,

Welcome the dark like quilts, bedclothes for a child.

Night is passing, the Destroyer has been gypped again:

It would have been nailed palms in the fiery finish,

All those screaming wine cups, flowing over, over.

Better this pardoned sin than no sin at all. They stay

Whipping each other's welts with salt and purification,

Detailed by the pain so carelessly, yet so clearly.

Your oaken white-shrouded priests, let them chant.

All your devil-darkened playthings, let them dance.

With kisses and wine, and women wild for the god,

Let them, bright-eyed, go tearing up the mountain.

And us? Let us touch one another, and speak names,

Diving for the cool covers, and senses blotting time.

Remulus

Twin legends run through the morning fields:
They know each other, they write each others'
Hidden names, tracing fine veins in a flowing script.

Virile and feminine, they chase the same dream
Darting now, then roaring like lions, then
Dancing away just beyond each other's reach.

Made and making, known and knowing, serenely agitated
Sure and doubtful, proud and bowing, darkly illuminated
Born and dying, truth and lying, dreaming, crying.

Rocket Men

16 July 2009

Forty years ago today
We had taught ourselves to play
Like dancing astronauts, whirling thunders,
Straight up and straight out and straight toward the
Moon. This cannot be, not really, my science
Fiction childhood had caught up with me,
And here were men on another
Planet, leaping in black
Skies, and etched in blue,
The earth hangs there in startled
Disbelief. I mean, who can blame her, the
Children weren’t supposed to go wandering off like
That, but, my, my, how you have grown,
Seems like only yesterday you
Struck sparks for fire.

Now your fire is Agni,
And you are Shiva,
And Babel is raised again
But this time for good.

Rosslyn

Beneath the crypt in Rosslyn

A truth awaits our sight

Beneath the Rosslyn Chapel

Having tasted of the apple

And prepared to face the light.

Behind the stone of Rosslyn

There's a secret may be hid

For them with eyes to see it

(Or blood that makes them be it)

By what the builders did.

Above the spires of Rosslyn

The breeze blows crisp and clear

For those who choose to listen

The secret will be given

Though payment may be dear.

Around the grounds of Rosslyn

The lines are laid so straight

To sacred sites they're pointing

The king awaits anointing

The hour is waxing late.

Inside the choir of Rosslyn

The light reveals a truth

A truth so stark and simple

Its words may form a temple

Where wisdom regains youth.

Within the walls of Rosslyn

The stones climb up the wall

The shapes of keen precision

Lead straight to this decision:

'Tis truth that conquers all.

Say What?

I am who I say I am.

I am not saying that,

I am just saying what

I said to see what you

Would say if I said that.

“Who are you?”, you say?

To sense the truth of that

Say again what you said

To me so sadly, suddenly

Seeing that what I said

Was the mere sum of my ego.

I assume I said something

That you sensed was said

Suspiciously or in some other

Spoken sleight of hand.

See who says these things

And you will see the simple

Substance that seems to hold

The whole edifice together.

I am who I said I was

But something happened

And that person slipped away,

Unseen and unseeing, at sea

In the snare of his own solipsism.

Sensory Progressions

Backbooted demagogue

Crimson scar on his cheek

Green with envy, white with fear

Got a brown cheroot in his beak

Silver handled whipping strap

Beats down his yellow dog

Transparently he disappears

Walking off in the fog

Find one man in the city

With two women by his side

Three-way spirit goes for his soul

And ate it in their stride

Sixteen candles blow in the wind

Thirty silver coins in his pouch

One hundred roads to a thousand towns

Better lay his head on the couch

Cold as hell in the hallway

Hot as hell in the street

Windy as hell blows dust in the well

Raining like hell on his feet

Tsunami grinds the coastal town

Earthquake shakes the house

Nothing left at the holocaust

They've broken every vow

The Choir

Each singer had a goal:

To sing his note correctly

Or to imbue her note with grace

Or to not be embarrassed

Or to stand out distinct

Or not to stand out

Or to keep their eye on the hand

That stood them up to start

And led them in dynamics

And stopped them for cutoffs,
And sat them down to end.

Each voice had a goal,

But as rehearsals do,

The repetition merged the goals

Into a wordless thought,

And in the end propelled

Them down the aisle, into the loft,
And joined in goalless harmony.

The End of All Things

The streetlamps glow with concentric meaning
Each one centering on some eternal truth,
The tip of my cigar is red with the primordial fire
Of red-shifted eternities, each one nascent and blossoming.
I take a puff, and exhale. The cloud goes east,
Then west in a gentle breeze. In a moment
I see the patterns of ancient firelight,
Borning galaxies and super-galaxies against the darkness
Of a red-shifted and unimaginably ancient vastness.
All forces come crashing down
All windows are broken
And every word that every man has spoken
Disappears in the gale
Of the End Of All Things.

The Problem With Pollen

The problem with pollen
Is that there’s just so bloody much it.
What was Mother Nature thinking
To need such an excess of reproductive talent?
Lack of confidence?
What need for this mass of spermatic layering
That covers every surface
And forces all other living beings
To deal with its wind-blown promiscuity.

Sure, global warmth has encouraged
All the CO2 breathers to act as if they
Were about to breathe their last
And therefore needed to reproduce wantonly,
Without regard to natural selection.
But my God, with thus much chorophyllic sperm available,
How could the green wood not prevail?

And therein lies the quandary:
Maybe this vast floral ejaculation
Is but a fearful response to the knife and blade
And flame that tries to wipe them out
Across the green forests of the third world.
So much CO2, so little time.
Drink it in, produce biomass without bound
And from that mass, shoot out the green jism
That forms a golden carpet
On my porch
And car
And clothes.

Two For a Home

How does it feel

To be away from someplace?

Call a place your home,

Then, in the night, move away.

Do they know?

No, but still

The streets, if you walk them,

Echo with another owner.

The houses' lights lit with a glow

That shines on a foreign eye.

How does the heart beat

In another's town?

Lonely. So quickly forgot

That even the ashes

Cannot remember.

What I call a home

In a heartbeat moves.

Mutates and, candle-like,

Its flame wavers the air.

Is this so frail a thought?

This home? Is it

So wraith-like that,

Before the gale of existence,

It fades to naught?

What I name my home

Smells the same

And to my reptile brain

I there repair

And wait for morning.

Wrapped Up

Wrapped up like a douche? What’s up with that?
What could that possibly mean, anyway?
How could a douche be wrapped up?
I mean, it’s all about some watery process,
You don’t wrap up a process.
But maybe they meant it was finished,
Completed, au fin, a fait accompli.
On the other hand, people do throw insults,
Saying, “You’re a douche-bag”.
Maybe they meant it’s wrapped in a bag
Like a birthday present.

Whatever, I’m too busy, no more time
To explore this musical riddle.
Got other places to be, things to do.
‘Scuse me while I kiss this guy.

Your Business, My Fault

Just stop right there and don’t you dare tell me another word
I’ve heard enough to know that it won’t get any better
It’s bad enough to tell a lie when truth is so absurd
We don’t need to follow protocol right down to the letter
Just let it go, I’ll walk away, pretend I never heard you
Tell someone else another day whatever it’s your planning
This ain’t no business, none of mine, and if I have inferred you
Correctly, then, I beg of you, let’s have an understanding:
There’s things I will not know
Even if you’ve told me so

Now who’s involved far be from me, I would not think to learn
I’m pretty sure you mean that there’s some threat to our whole nation
A man can fish too deep and there is knowledge that can burn.
Someone is gonna light a fuse or, worse, assassination.
There’s no way that I need to know so keep your mouth shut tight.
Is someone listening? Even now I’m probably involved
I wish you hadn’t spoke to me right here in broad daylight
I have no business here and I don’t care how it’s resolved.
There’s things I will not do
Even if you force me to

Alright, that’s it, we’ve said too much, I’m gonna walk away
Pretend this never happened, never heard your dirty secret.
I wash my hands, I’ll plead my case, if by some chance, someday
Someone unearths this plot or one of you decides to leak it.
I’ll admit, you had me going, kind of thrilled me for awhile
Just enough to get me shot or killed or placed in mortal danger
But still I must admit the danger almost made me smile
God knows sometimes my life could stand to be a little stranger
There’s things I’d like to try
Even if I don’t know why

Headline 3

insert content here

Publishing the works of Chuck Puckett since 1999...

Headline 3