Ryokan's Thief

I’ve always loved hearing
Stories of hard travel
From people who’ve scattered
Like ghosts across the earth
Whether fugitives or followers
It’s their journeys I’d rather judge
Knowing, somehow
That our differences are mostly circumstance
And that condemnation is misunderstanding
But to hear a man out
Humbly, in good faith
Is something far more essential
To the development of decency
Than adherence to laws
However exalted
And that, shown compassion
A guilty man’s face
Will betray him absolutely
Fearing, as he should
No worldly harm
But only what conscience can deliver
The gentle reminders
Of his buried other
That part more enamored of the hardships
And solitudes of life

Sabi

I am sick
With the poisons of my culture
And if I ever succumb
Or happen to become
A thing which serves it
Be a friend
And affect my end

Neon Rain

It's a stroll through the city
And it's toe to toe
With king kong billboards and vampire clerks
Roaming hungry for hidden money
That last twenty bucks you keep tucked behind your I.D.
Like a shield against final poverty
And you almost wish for the honest brutality
Of Old World thieves
The mug and stab
And leaving to die
In fog-dark alleys
And the bliss!
To look your killer in the eye
Feel the blade go in
Put up your fight
Spill your life
And stain red the guilty hand

Broken Windows

Some mornings, the bastards are already in your head
You sense them just before waking
Eroding whatever gentleness grew there in the night
And you know
That today, you'll have to fight hard
Just to keep a smile on your face
And your finger off the trigger
Because you understand
That the collective human spirit
Is so fragile right now
So thin and frightened
That the smallest pebble
Incautiously thrown
Could shatter the works
And maybe that's alright
And maybe that's your light
Beginning to dim
Like young love
Like a sunset
Like glass

The Streets You Remember

This is for her
Lessons, graces
And the way she changed me
One summer morning
When I tried to use words
Instead of wisdom
And how she looked away
Knowing better than I did
What yes could mean
And saving us both
With her perfect caution

This is how sunlight
Across a bathrobed body
To a sixteen year old boy
Feels like dying
The way I could feel then
Too much and too fast
And always that way with her
How even now
Years later
I can still feel lost
But never forgotten
In daylight dreams

The Well Wisher

You know
When people explain
How they'd like to die
It's somehow soothing
They get calm
Close their eyes
Sit back
And describe
In beautiful detail
Summer mornings
Or, more dramatically
Autumn evenings
Saying, if they could
They'd choose
Such serene contexts
To depart
Then, with a start
Uncomfortably adding
"Hypothetically"
As if you were taking notes
And not simply listening

Rabbit Hole Blues

On the nighttime stage
Vice becomes vision
Righteousness exhausts its appetite
And sanctity visits the flames
Our dreams are easy freedom
They flesh out the fight
Tracing bloody ultimatums
On the barren dust of a day

Visions can touch that deepest need
Where your dull identity stumbles
Humbled and small
And all sleek philosophies
Are stripped down for syllables
Embarrassed by silence
Shamed by unconscious strength
And denied the final word