Category: Philosophy


Phantom Rendezvous

We set a time and place
Compass points in
an unending universe

It seems an easy thing
Finding you
Finding anything

The key is to be specific
Terra Firma
Objects in space
An embodied individual

But perception tilts,
The round world spins
What if string theory is only a beginning?

The shifting known
The ever present unknown

I believe in this future
One event after another
To keep a fragile mind fixed somewhere

They tell me there is no central intelligence
No consciousness observing,
overseeing the multifaceted psyche

No woman in the theater of the mind
Watching the movie of my life

So limited by my senses –
On second thought, it may be a miracle to meet you
On any road, anywhere, at any time

If I rejoice you’ll forgive me
These simple, containable plans
Go marching into the wild
To the deepest unknowns.

Protostellar Phase

We were standing in the
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
Here are painters who want to communicate
They show up on their canvases
Emotive, sensual, engaging,
Pouring over the edges with ideas

They are Hydrogen, capable
Of the complex chain of reactions
Required to fuel a galaxy
Rauschenberg, Mitchell, de Kooning
All Hydrogen molecules
Dancing, spinning, arguing
Contrasting the inert gasses across the hall
Nonreactive as Krypton,
From kryptos, “the hidden one”

It is actually a skill,
This art of invitation
Creating works capable of fusion
Viewer, artist, and painting,
Conspiring toward explosions
A dangerous, naked,
And frightening proposition
Can you blame the countless artists,
Hiding behind flat surfaces,
Incapable of combustion,
Unable to make the invitation?