NEW POEMS

Sheets of Music and Linen

It’s playing
The music is playing
She’s swaying
Swaying to the beat

I remember standing next to her
Couldn’t believe my luck
Standing near a young woman
Who believes in personal freedom

We hugged
I handed her a bootleg or two
Ever since then she has been
Etched into my heart brain

You make the difference
You always have
Everyone near you knows
You are on fire with love

Let’s build a fort out of
Blankets and old tires
Whisper to each other
About revolutions still burning

There is no tear gas in our love
Nothing to hang onto but the
Brilliance of your words and kisses
And that’s a very good thing

The wilderness was cold and empty
You brought me back from this graveyard
Gave unto me patience and consideration
Irascibility a virtue I’m learning to do without

Our hands clasped together in prayer catch God’s tears
People who try to redesign religion are fools for it is
All there in the hymns of yesterday and the book sales
Happening in the basement like all great happenings do

The music keeps us happy
The music delights us with its ability to grow and grow
We were driving and you were doing a Howlin’ Wolf
Imitation and I couldn’t believe how much you sounded like him.

Charlie
For Lisa Lisa


Dictionaries in the shape of hearts and things..

Her excitement about a book she is reading or a song she is listening to is infectious
Our dance parties have made me a better man if not a better dancer

When we are close it opens up universes of expansion that I never would have believed existed before holding her hand
Watching movies with her turns me inside out and pushes my mind to see and feel more

I’m swimming in shark infested waters only thing is all the sharks are dead killed by an inability to act quickly and efficiently
Are you a dolphin or a mermaid or a sailor exploring territory lost between the spaces of words that should have been said

Her joyous rapture like none I have experienced before as she brings Milton to life with the body language of a Saint
The photographs she scans maps to past, present and future worlds we mustn’t lose sight of as night unfolds all around us

She sings and I listen, she walks and I follow, she smiles and I smile, she laughs and I laugh, she dreams and I dream
We were sitting in a bus talking about TV dinners as we choked on exhaust and the day welcomed us again.

Charlie
For Lisa Lisa

East Lansing musings...

It begins - many connections in this light of beginnings and I am transfixed, bewitched and beguiled by all that is represented - a presentation of free thought - I knew all of the slaves on a first name basis - I was a slave - my roots like ivy clinging to this or that building - temples floating in the air - the first thing I noticed was your symmetry - how like a ballerina you were so good on your feet - an outlaw who keeps their pistols under wraps like a threatening Christmas present - a brand new red or blue bicycle no life in its dispirited tires - I'll never forget the black squirrels running around your campus like minstrels always searching for nothing so formal or orchestrated as a Gershwin tune - Chopin playing the black squirrels could feel it in their bones - it ends on all fours like an animal - many connections disconnected and connected over and over in this black tie ether - remember that bookstore in Ann Arbor how I left my heart in a Shakespeare Folio or was it instead rediscovered..

Charles Cicirella
September 4, 2006

Imploding

There is nothing wrong
What is right remains
What is wrong stains

There's blood everywhere
Covering the mirrors
Our reflections bloodshot

I'm not taking responsibility
My emotions look the other way
Accept the wreckage as your own

I am cold head to toe
The pain I feel secondhand
I am resigned to this dead body

Poetry an investigation
Something I must learn to nurture
Where are the facts?

There is something that remains alive
Behind the mouth and eyes of every passerby
I witness it chained to an unsolved mystery

We slammed against a wall
To assign blame is never the point
To persist in life both a privilege and our right.

Charles
September 7, 2006