20151125

Pat Nolan


ANTECEDANT

Luxuriate
                there’s not much to tell
fun guy
one rung up the platonic ladder
tribute
                               the triple giving

the light is gorgeous
rather
                I am gorgeous
in this light

dead calm white wash at
the crispy edge of summer’s end

civilization is the story of man’s demise
not a hardy species hardly a species
at the peak of mechanical arrogance
code cracked the great unraveling begun
as easy as slipping the knot on a bow

every experience leaves a chemical signature
some brand undiluted as a burning impression

vultures above the ripe hillside
something dying in the heat



DROUGHT CONDITION

A fugitive mist flees
before the bright yellowing
green redwood hillside
overripe the scent of season
spend too much time
wondering whose cup that is
the exception to the rule
back to showering with a friend
if it doesn’t rain soon



INITIAL CONDITIONS

Something of a poet

being alone brain works overtime
no one to share the daily energy with
inevitably get all worked up

just a working class trog

“you’re nothin’ but a dick on a stick!”

thinking is not actually believing
those stray packets of cognitive photons
cross the conscious threshold no matter what

“A world ruled by the irrationality
of chance and unmitigated by
knowledge of the laws of causality”
Erich Neumann insists

just another voice crying in the wilderness

misguided hominid wants
the cat not to be a cat
as if the illusion of no longer
being an ape warrants such interference

that we talked our way down from the trees
doesn’t mean the trees aren’t still there

muggy grey of a late cloud afternoon

on the side of the ancient
brushed ink mountain
I have no idea where to begin

my view mostly through
the wrong end of the telescope

speak anciently even in the now
with special dedication to the word
and the voice

meaning an emergent property



TWO TRANSLATIONS FROM PHILIPPE SOUPAULT'S Sans Phrases

GIFT

Who’ll give me quiet
demands the inquisitive man
nameless silence
serious as a heart attack
authentic and definitive
And above all won’t play the bad guy
certainly not motorbikes and rag pickers
grating silence
heavy as fog you can cut with a knife
paper fog
And also who’ll follow that fellow
who left to go cry in the desert
at least he’ll know enough to stay quiet
Quiet please
and even if you don’t please
silence for the dead and for the living
for those trying to sleep
deeply
Quiet for those who love silence
white as snow
blue as the moon
eternal as the firmament
A silence I live breathe forget
Silence must live
like flourishing plants
and their flowers who keep mum
even as they suffer
Silence like the smile of the beloved
when she forgets I love her



PLENTY OF TIME

Time passing
time that doesn’t
the time I kill
time it takes to count to ten
time I don’t have
the time that has to do
time to be lonely
time to dream
a time of agony
a time to love
a time to lose
cherry blossom time
bad times
and good and beautiful
and cold and hot times
time to go back
a time for goodbyes
time that’s about time
time that isn’t
a time to blink
relative time
time for a drink
time to bide
time to tie one on
immeasurable time
a time that shouts look out
dead time
and then eternity



OWED TO DAY

Snarls of hair plague a dream-eyed morn
sheets of dust created in silent accumulation
the dark shapes of crows fly past a window
small birds flit with the unerring of missiles
in the den the din of overdue vacuuming
to reawaken the urgencies of necessity and
channel dawn’s stirring as the imperatives of day
a writer writing writes alternative realities
of what could be of what was of what isn’t and
can’t think of anything that hasn’t been said before
to capture it impossible indistinguishable
from golden haze of swarming life low in
the trees as a spot of unimaginable light
and touching the transparent edges of leaves
unsettled trembling at the fading attraction
a cloudless sky all the more naked in passing
hardened to the cool blueness of evening



SLAPSTICK COMEDY

The slapstick comedy of brighter days
and their inevitable resolution
swirl of cloud above tip of pine
bounce of light off stark white garage door

work to subvert the dorsolateralprefrontalcortex

hyperpriming in that there are abundant
neurotransmitters ready to launch on command

availed of a greater demand for all options
what passes for day reflected on flat surfaces
colors framed by curtains like
those of Matisse and art is life
centered rooted in a vast tradition
whose basics are in perception of shapes

anomalies successfully challenge
the prevailing view in finding acceptance
thus requiring further anomalies to
redirect attitudes toward a mutant future

how does something become part of tradition
in culture language is mutable and subject
to competition myth of the thing spoken

the shape of the mouth speaks volumes
the ache of rapport the murmur of utensils
being returned to their pens

a flame entered my eye and burned
its impression behind as a flower reinventing
itself endlessly as pulses of color

bright page blinding enforces a darkness inside

at a loss for new words I retreat to
an earlier language that resides as faint
echoes of a long ago speaking and listening
to lullabies in the arms of adoration

don’t underestimate mental life
it can be as sweet as anything tangible
wide open to the wild blue that inhabits this frame
no more an addict than each breath would assume
atmosphere a soft grey before the fall of rain

it’s not like I’m trying to express something
something is being expressed through me
a sheer naked vulnerability hits home
the fear driven scenarios of daily life
sweating like a monkey with a tiger by the balls
lockdown stare of one too many cups of coffee
“don’t blow smoke up my ass unless I call a powwow”

in yoga it is given that human personality
does not exist as a final element
it is only a synthesis of psycho-mental
experiences and it ceases to act
as soon as revelation is accomplished

the imagination wills its way
little cycles of attention play out
as long or short threads undulating
at a specific frequency

all body all mind all the time
now cycles every fifty three milliseconds

believe in poetry as a special personal force
incant the word decant the meaning

my great pleasure expands to fill the universe
contracts to a single point at the thought of it



 
 
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