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10th
& 11th November, 2008
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Photo by Jay Hagan,
7/12/08 Burbank, CA
A Thought for Today
Old men were never young, older women
always will be.
FROM the¨BOOKS
Discovery
Hold on to me
as no one has
while we settle
soft and simple
amid the city grass.
I ask that you
stay long enough
to help me prove
that I have worth
of some kind.
You decide.
Am I narrow as the
noontide,
am I high enough
to touch a single star?
Will I ever reach
the far field?
Do I have worth enough
to occupy an hour
maybe more
within the frame of reference
you call time.
Two people living
giving out the best
to one the other
a
handshake
or a double handstand
taken to its farthest
and most perfect resting place.
The corners of your eyes
but just the corners--
frown.
Your nipples now erect
nudge your dress
as if to burrow through.
You haven't smiled
and yet you do.
I wish that I were
plain enough
to show you I'm but me
or as fancy as I feel
you think I should be.
Can you carry me
across the water,
turn and run
along the sand
with me
our feet not touching even spray
this time.
Help me.
Sort me out
while I divine what's real
or make believe
in you.
Better still deliver me
if not to your own self
then to the midnight's
other side.
I could now be saved
by hearing you say no
as surely as salvation lies
on the velvet forehead
of a yes.
-from
"Coming Close to the Earth," 1977.
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McKUEN APPEARANCES
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Monday
10 November
Vanessa Angel o
Bob Ashley o
Marilyn Bergman o
Richard Burton o
Francois Couperin o
Matt Craven o
Donna Fargo o
George Fenneman o
Jane Froman o
Oliver Goldsmith o
Chris Joannou o
Greg Lake o
Dave Loggins o
Martin Luther o
J.P. Marquand o
Billy May o
Mackenzie Phillips o
Claude Rains o
Ann Reinking o
Tim Rice o
Jack Scalia o
Roy Scheider o
Johann Schiller o
Pippa Scott o
Karl Shapiro o
Sinbad
Tuesday 11 November
Mose Allison o
Bibi Andersson o
LaVerne Baker o
William F. Buckley o
Rene Clair o
Vince Colosimo o
Leonardo DiCaprio o
Fyodor Dostoyevsky o
Howard Fast o
Narvel Felts o
Calista Flockhart o
Vernon Handley o
Alger Hiss o
Stubby Kaye o
Susan Kohner o
Demi Moore o
Pat O’Brien o
General George Patton o
William Proxmire o
Robert Ryan o
Sam Spiegel o
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. o
Peta Wilson o
Jonathan Winters o
Jesse Colin Young |
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Silence like a scythe divides all reveries.
Genius doesn’t need to jitterbug.
You win if you think you've won.
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TWO NIGHTS PAST THE FULL MOON |
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Finally no one
lives here.
Echoes, wind, climate climbing
or falling down -
rain rains while no one listens.
In the night, as in the day,
nothing moves, turns, climbs, runs,
jumps, or even is caught
standing still.
Passion seeps
below the bedsprings
to the slats and imperfection
in the
sagging floor.
Truth hides back
behind some bolted door
that no key fits.
At least not one I own
or loaned to me
and now in my possession.
Not even the legitimate lie,
if there is such a thing
is bothered with,
trotted out and dusted off
to slide past silence
into something.
Strangely I’m complacent,
not predisposed or looking.
Anxieties that I have lived with
day into night for years,
seem less important now.
This must be some new kind of peace -
demanding nothing.
What I have done
was done deliberately.
I placed my sensibilities
in some blind trust
like a presidential candidate
who takes his new influence sincerely.
I do not expect
that one day
things will change
go back to what we’re told
is normal.
( And what is normal
certainly one man’s definition
is too simple
as a hundred guardians
of what they call normalcy
confuse, conspire and even
trap the word
until it has no meaning).
There must be reasons
for this unnoticed disappearance
of nearly everything I prized.
Disappointment with myself
is surely one,
another might be
some new culture
that crept in
while all our backs were turned.
Indifference,
some new strain
that no vaccine has been
invented for
must bear responsibility
for so many changes
or so much I cannot figure out.
I only know that even ghosts
would now call this land uninhabited.
Do not expect people or a poltergeist
to enter through an archway
or from behind a hidden panel.
Let go.
Do not be disappointed.
No keys are jangling
and no door is left ajar.
Figures. People maybe -
move about behind barred windows,
stalk as shadows
past drawn blinds
and newly shuttered screens.
Two nights past the last full moon
and all the streets
are lunar landscapes.
-from Folio, 1974. |
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1970, 1986, 2002, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008 by Stanyan Music Group & Rod McKuen. All Rights Reserved |
