waiting: (to want)

 

 

i.

the chair faces a corner
where I sit and contemplate the crack.
to live I am made to work,
so I am not going to satisfy them by saving it.
   -I'm not going to savor it either.

I am a sieve. a holey device in transition.
only the thick will remain after the passing.
I am a crack in the sieve.

I'll spend it as I get it
   -so it may run out.
I will starve to death, for life,
but at least I will keep busy starving.

I cannot just sit.
I'll feed those trying to make me run out.
   -they are everywhere and proud.

they are not going to die. they think.
we must all buy.
   -we must all sign in ink.


ii.

the work space I am in is holding back
my mind which wants to become a rainbow.
this inadequate freedom.

rainbows are slow and crawl along slowly.

I know I can be forever here.
you understand that. it is disciplined imagination.
it is saying "yes".

this forever is a memory of the future.
in this place, if I blink once, I've crawled along.
time has flown away.

they are not going to die, they think.
we must all buy.
   -we must all sign in ink.


iii.

I want friends
so I can have a reflection without mirrors.

I want to be negative
so others can feel positive.

I want to move quickly thru life
so death will come slower.

I'm starving to death because I can’t say "no".
I want.
I'm sitting here waiting, waiting to blink.

   -waiting to sign in ink.


iv.

I'm waiting to want more.

trying to look like someone - I can find myself.

changing the way I do things - I can be accepted.

ironing my clothes - I can unwrinkle my soul.

working hard - I can have things I don't need.

taking pictures - I can remember things.

cutting my hair - I can wear a smaller hat.

growing old - I can be wiser.

dying - I can avoid rent.

I'm here waiting to blink. We must all sign in ink.


v.

denying I am here to work,
I am trampled by the effects of change.

it cannot wait for me to starve.
I'm on a rainbow moving slowly.
I am the rainbow.

my eyelids are heavy. I'm lacking sleep.
they are nearing a close, about to blink.

they are not going to die. they think.
we must all buy.
   -we must all sign in ink.

Mark David Jordan, 2010

Comfort

Comfort in a

Shadow


As time passed i saw my father
through the more detailed light of thinner eyes,
realizing who he really was and who he had been.

The earth bathes its way into the starlight of the universe
like my father cut a path into the bits of my life.
I did not know it growing up a self-indulgent person,
nor could i have, when the bits of my own life
were scattered.

I did not know him yet, other than as my father.
I could not complete a love until i searched for the end
of the path i myself had chosen.

The soul can hide a curious reality behind one's self-indulgence,
and our reasoning can zigzag through various paths
seeking a better reason, or a shortcut.

My father was a walking path cross-hatched by sunshine and memories.
I cut an enigmatic pattern across the hatches in front and behind.
He did not notice or care.

I pictured my father as in a dream
with a folded heart. arms outstretched, fingers to clasp.
His keen eyesight was overtly hawkish,
steadily pouring love into my tin-can heart.

Behind the minds abstract ideas
a straight stream of conscientiousness lies,
a beacon to the enlightenment from released pressure.
The soft touch of fortitude usually prevails.

I neared the end of my path in expected victory. cheering.
My father as a stone sat on the crest of a hill
his arms reaching like strings attached to the universe.

He whispered from the crest of the hill,
about seeing me unexpectedly on the same path.
My eyes grew thinner from the light rising.
angry. relieved.

My walk was staggered. My father's quiet but steady voice
dropped debris in the way of my walk.
These were spring buds i used to step on,
but now over.

His shadow obscured my path then vanished
and i stumbled off the way, finding myself at a rock
I sat. Heart open, arms stretching, fingers clasped.

Mark David Jordan, 2010

Squirrel

Squirrel

& I

In the fall and early winter months
A squirrel wonders near our back steps
To retrieve the peanuts we leave,
  So routine for him he thinks they grow there.

They are in the shell still,
  So he works very diligently
  To get to the goodies of that single peanut.
Simple movements efficient at the ancient task.

On hind end turning it about
  It is precious gift of a ball given to a rugby player.
The only thing to concentrate on
Except for a head turning so rapidly
To see if a robber is approaching
For other peanuts untouched on the ground.
  He claims them as his own
  During that quick interlude with his fuel.

I spy from the nearby window.
  He does not see me with darting eyes,
  My eyes obscured by concentration
  And outside glare.

He doesn’t even notice the birds nearby
Trying to figure out what benefit they can get.

I am on one side of the glass, he is on the other.
  These worlds are different.
In a brief lonely space of glass
I glimpse my own ghostly reflection.

I thrive on the single brief moments
Of interaction with my children.
  This makes me somebody on one side of the glare.

The squirrel looks up.
  I and the squirrel are somebody.

Mark David Jordan, 2010

Life in the, Cold

Alone
  i almost died while you were gone

Certain things happened
  that overtook my life

You were not there to stop them
  i didn’t have a care

I was in a bleak mood
  that struck me every hour

I was floating around my room
Contemplating singularity
  i was possessed by a shadow I called doom

It followed me from corner to corner
  it asked me why I had not marked the hour

I told it this simple fact
  the shadow that had no mind

The coldness of life is death
 the warmth of life is life

Live life to avoid the cold

Mark David Jordan, 2010

Love Poem #2


Did you kiss her?
  i did kiss her.

Did her skin touch yours?
  our skin did touch.

Were you fed by her?
  i ate of food and breast.

Was her mind given to you?
  i shivered when we met.

Did she call your name?
  i heard my name.

Did you recall a dream?
  i thought in contemplation once.

But did you kiss her?
  our lips brushed.

How did you talk?
  our knowledge was silence.

How did time pass?
  i sat still on the kitchen chair.

She asked for divorce in a bathroom?
  i pissed in a public stall.

Once she was somebody. I was somebody.
  she became somebody else.

Mark David Jordan, 2007

What Does Love Give?

What does love give in return for itself?
A thorough piercing of the heart
Or a slow mend to a previous wound?
What reward awaits the eager traveler
On the road to love?

Love can be
Pity united with meaning.
Stinging to faith.
Naturally weighty in its burden.
Deep Red in its reward
or light blue in its touch.

Clouded with doubt yet merciless
Love may be given as an afterthought to seduction.
But this is corrupted seduction
And not the achievement of great thought.
The love returned from seduction is sensual.

Is love a reward for passions
Struggling with the senses?
Passion is in a tug-of-war with long-term love
Because of their differences.
They exist together in a parallel bond or
Perpendicular lines.

Raindrops are love-like
Spreading dewy tentacles as they hit
The concrete and join together
Running down a slope
To form a larger pliable puddle.

Lust and love are ferocious combatants.
Lust is stronger, inconceivable, innocent and free.
Lust has more resources but they deplete easily.
Love wins.
It is a fearless steady arrow without drag.

Love is a permissible achievement
That travels on a plateau.
It seeks to be apart from Passion and lust.
It weakens the knees and normalizes the strong.
Unbent to your will it can cause pain.

But unyielding resourcefulness is what is given
In return.

Mark David Jordan, 1995, Revised 2010

Beauty of Calm

The priority of a motionless evening can exceed
The ability to accomplish anything.
With this idea in mind and action pending,
We proceed to sit quietly,
Last bird song and warm squares of light on the sofa.
We are in a living Seurat.
Our eyes glazed more with every slow breath.

This comfort dims darker moments of the day.
Dimming the dark makes it darker,
But less realism doesn't come without reservation.
Without the darker moments
We would have nothing to beseech calm.

Creating a calm with obligations pending
Is a heavy feeling of lightness.
Forced lightness can be a viable method to change.
Reality.
We can be elsewhere whenever we want.

It is with chaotic disorder that calm is present
As we relax, sitting or lying. Nightfall is eminent.
We glass over the days events and forgive loved ones.
Rejuvenation feeds us. Probability evades us.

The essence of calm is the pleasure,
Not the body's limp state. For a body is a body.
To love without the body present is calm.

This is love beyond the chance to conceive
Love is for this. Time is against this.
Yet time must give birth
To the inevitable memories forcing us to love.

We are reposing with a purpose. We sit quietly.
The bucolic evening pierces us
In a different place than the day did,
Taming us and regrouping our life,
Giving us the ability to accomplish everything.
Giving instead of getting.

Mark, 1995, revised 2010

Speak Love Speak

Unfettered and not tethered
Love cannot be controlled,
Nor see itself in its own sticky freeness.
It may exist unchecked and forever powerful.
It carries uncatchable secrets.
Love may be on the verge of dissipating
Yet not give up its meaning.

I heard love speak:
Summon me from the cliff edge when you see me.
Wake from the confluence of dreams when you feel me.
Come in from bitter wind when my meaning is to be.

Love is unattached, surrounding, un-accumulating
and quickly passed on.

Once I was summoned at the edge of the cliff
Love called and embraced me,
This warm encompassing womb.
This was my archway to go between two free paradises.
When tired of freeness I could return
Surrounded by the womb.
A slow clutching hold on happiness.

This was delirious love for me.
The exposed and expanding comfort of love.
I passed on its happiness
And instead brandished my soul.

Love is unattached, surrounding, un-amalgamating
And quickly passed on.

I heard love say:
Eyes do not easily give up information
Unless one's soul has been swept away by love.
Unfettered love I cannot see.
But revealed love is a captured soul I am free of.

Mark, 1995, revised 2010

Teenage Spring Evolution

In the late afternoon of a spring day,
School out, I lay on my bed. My temporary reality.
Taking a break from the accumulation of social stress.

In and out of a somniative state I would hear birds.
Mocking birds with their comprehensive repertoire.
Eastern Blue birds with a delicate lighter tone.

The faint collapse of rose branches against a window.
The breeze through a dusty screen,
Rustling against my exposed motionless finger tips.

In the distance I could hear
Two large wild cherry trees. The
Leaves rubbing back and forth.

This symphony of sound would propagate
Into my light sleeping state.
The leaves clinging onto what life was left.

Fading in and out of sleep I
Dreamed of distant memories of the day
And the day before. They came with ease.

The future was near and far.
I thought of a time with friends who would be gone
Someday. I thought of early crushes.

Girls who liked me or I might imagine they did.
Nature was a lullaby and a reminder.
How good childhood felt.

I did not think of spring as having a beginning and end.
It was a minute that borrowed vestiges of my day
And laid a warm path of this light across my chest.

I awoke to a fit of supper smells and time.
I was stifled awake in confusion. Voices.
It felt like life would better fit into tomorrow now.

Spring sounds and air rearranged my sleep.
My soul changed, temporarily refreshed.
In the afternoon on a tepid day I lay.
Awake in a typical position.

Mark, 1996