Sunday, October 30, 2011

long lost to mercy

I followed her into every dream

I disowned because I fooled myself

into thinking there were second chances


how sweet and polite

being beauty and bred for deference

even as she played her beauty

on numberless rivals


none of whom meant anything to me

since I being older and useless

was exempt from the head butting

of young morons in heat of pride


I looked into each secret story

told in the hush of clandestine moments

stolen from the noisy awareness

of our society's nabobs and toll booth guards


the delusional clerks who quantify

lovers as easily as statistics on office workers

and their CEO bosses alike

we hid from them head to head


and defied their profiles their resentment

their desire to crush us under their thumbs

we hid in plain sight in our nakedness

invisible to the sensation seeking daily throng


it was now she praised my maturity

as I worshipped her youth and her beauty

she pleased I was too old to ruin anything with an advance

and I pleased I didn't have to try


better the deep sharing of souls

tender talk and tender embraces

and small stolen kisses against

blazing auroras of overactive suns


so easy now to let go of tiring lust

so much better to see the angelic soul

moving under the translucent skin

and reaching out through each opening


even as the eternal moment of joining fades

and what sustained in the moment

energizes for a few minutes

the memory preserving that only instant


our kisses our embraces

so long ago now there is nothing to say

except on nights like this

when she comes in a veil of folded mist


and the memory reactivates

and again I follow her in each dead fantasy

lost to mercy

and reliving this one and only shot


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Saturday, October 29, 2011

what I stop now will haunt me later

what I start now will see me through


or not

stopping may free me and I may regret starting


my famous sixth sense is failing me

along with my other facilities


but all I know for sure is how to say

what the fuck!



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I could tell you the most wonderful news here

and how much you want to bet

that all the angry hurt stuff gets more of a reading

that the rest


what people must think

when they meet me and don't find me

in rags and bleeding sores and long-nailed fingers

clutching a cup and preaching

or leching or whatever the hell other


misconceptions spring from our most

feeble attempts at honest communication...



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.



I'm racing every clock

though I know better


just living gets you sucked into

so much dreck


and only so much time

to clean the mess


to anyone else's satisfaction

but my disallowed own



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
there's little I can tolerate any longer

let God punish me

for lacking infinite patience


I'm called to as they say 'See The Light'

but all I see in that Light

is all the wreck and ruin

God seems to demand of our penance


again in a heap at the bottom of an abyss

and

again wondering what the hell mercy is


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
to Daniel

the 'Miracle Dog'

who survived

the gas chambers of Alabama

(fuck you Lynard Skynard)


may you live long

and rip off the head

of the cracker who tried to put you down


that dog's turd has more meaning

than that whole load of shitfuckers

let some one else love y'all

let Dylan write a song about yew...


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
we have nothing to say

we go home

when we are called home


and we are always called home

through many lives and deaths

and despite the pit stops on the way


we assume are final destinations


no wonder everything looks familiar



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I have gone a new way

to get where I'm going

to end up one day or another


but it's as pitted and rocky

as the road I left

as booby-trapped with my intention


as if I had put false faith

in how to get there and no thought

as to why it has to be



Content (c) 2008-0211 Philip Milito.

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

THE MOON HIDDEN BY CLOUDS II

we go out the way we came in

surely every turn of the corner tells you so

every child will grow old watching their children grow old

until we all go in the way we came out


*


the sky has changed

the earth a pale travesty of its supreme glory

I've lived long enough to see

leaves falling in my dreams

from trees that no longer reach for the sky

everything has changed

except what sees through my eyes


*


hectored right to the end

I endure her bewilderment her frustration

her resentment her disdain

we sought bonds in some forever promise

though we knew better the fragility of desires

we failed each other

we saved each other

our worn love is frayed but holding

what but death will finally break us?

what small dyings have begun that process?


*


Saturn has ruled my life

more deeply than I thought

every last failure

every last qualified success

has instructed me on the delusions

of faith and left that ringed turd

lodged up my ass like a proctologist's finger


*


I don't understand what I once knew by heart

what changed my heart?

what changed my mind?


*


all that I could tell you is suspect

where I see dark clouds

you'd see the sun glimmering behind them

all that you could tell me is needs proof

and there is no proof in truth

there is no truth in proof

each reality is another dimension

and our loves and aspirations

unknowable breaches of black holes


*


I got nervous when I looked into the Void

and the Void looked back winking

is this what Nietzsche saw?


*


a permanent knot in the stomach


*


the past is an instant ago

and now has just gone past


*


you would love to hear me recite apologies continuously

your reality insists on it

demands it

I would love to be elsewhere

my reality demands quiet and if it gets that quiet and peace

it does so at the heavy price of bearing your contempt


*


to end up like this

a lifetime of suffering endured

only to have it all rise up to smother me

a last time

and it still wasn't enough to placate

the Judge


*


were that death a true release

but it is only a transition to other griefs of quest

life after life until it goes forth no more

the soul has its work cut out for it


*


let each face his ultimate demons

sufficient onto the life he is in

as long as life is

is as long as it takes great age to turn

and be young once more


to be as children once more


*


my love we've harmed ourselves

to the same degree we've healed each other

no greater love than sacrifice

to lay down one's life

in the face of all illusion to save to preserve

the ways we've helped each other

how this fact rankles

how sore and heart-breaking this truth

to know through whatever sorrows and joys

the ways we've helped each other


*


we don't know

we've ceased to care

it's about time

I was beginning to think

this bird around my neck

would awaken and fly off

with me in tow


*


you like to hear the words 'I love you'

I do also

but words mean nothing and that's why they're dying

we learn hard to live in that love

because it is hard


*


so we go

under the bare branches

under the cold wind

as if no one in flesh could see us

all we've loved preserved in consciousness

and a part of our identity now

and as whatever vistas blurs as the last unexpected sight

in the life that had such hope and expectation

only to be cursed by what reckoning would hock

even when some positive development occurred

it's no matter now

the sight blurs to gray

then blackens

and there we are

all our scenes

asleep in another skin


* * * *

Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.





Tuesday, October 25, 2011

well you win

I will not endure

I will not avail

you'll stop me dead in my tracks

(as they say)

cliche for cliche

your lack of forgiveness

against my acting-out

how could you care?

how does it matter?


you win

my expiation

is not enough

my sorrow and contrition

a joke at my own expense

and all the atonement

is laughed out of court

the judge has made up

his mind

it's no forgiveness

and repentance is futile


you win

you're bigger

you're stronger

you break wind

and the hillsides jump

you belch out souls

on whom you've gorged

and the trees bend

like flavor straws in a glass

of rancid milk

oh no use to plead

no use to lie down

and play dead

(as they say)


you win

tracking us with our own scents

measuring our strides

postulating the directions

in which we will flee

and you will open a way

booby-trapped

but opened

and undo our best efforts

to gnaw at the paw

(as they say)

and nothing will dissuade you

nothing will distract you

nothing is forgiven

so you put us up

and take me down

you crush us under your heel

and I sink bemused

under the weight of my affliction

because now as always

you daunt me in my littleness and

you win

you win

you win




Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I don't have to share everything


you have plenty to find out for yourself

but don't hoard what you know


if you come across someone who needs to know

being a teacher is one thing


being one who holds those back who

seek entrance to heaven is quite another


I am what I am...be what you are



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
everyone takes their chance


but not everyone owes up to craps


life is holding dice

and only the brave score...


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
no one wants to be made a fool of...


too bad no one remembers

the best way to avoid that fate


is to shut up and go their own way



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
you will love me once I'm back on my feet


solid and steady as a rock beneath your feet


may a couple of million years not pass

before this is done


may we live to see our progress resume

and carry us until this time is done



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I rush

but there's no need to do so


I will arrive on time

and all I'm chased by

will soon be left behind...


at least for now


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
a new way opens

and while I'm weary


at least fear is no longer

part of the consideration


I step forward

knowing I'm in


the last of the home stretch

in the race I have been running



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I had a notion

but it slipped away


good riddance

I have enough on my mind today


without adding yet another

outlandish hope


to the debacle

of my spiritual improvement


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
help us if you can

leave us if you can't


we've enough on our hands

without your vanity to contend with...


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
little baby in the cradle

new to this world of sorrow and pain

you know these things without understanding

looking for an imprint to which you can conform


your mommy and daddy

have been been through this and their love for you

is as painfully tender as all love of life can be

and lead you through the maze of the World saying


I see you...can you see me?


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
seek these words out


make the effort

you'll either see what I' getting at

or not and dismiss them

as the ravings of one


who has seen too much...


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
how well we knew our places

in the old regime


I give

everyone takes


and all of us praising

some idiot notion


of a merciless God

whom they say knows better than we do


what's fair or foul

or what we owe or what we forgive


what to do now

when weak manunkind (sorry e.)


takes it on him to judge

the reality that for him will not budge...



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
so what if what I do stands or not


it is always there somewhere

on the skein of time and space


and so what if it endures in its form or not


it is there for those who can receive

with whatever grace they need to believe


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.



the sun in Scorpio

transforms my soul

transforms my heart

transforms my mind


the sun in Scorpio

takes my dross

transforms my body

into dust



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
if anything I did matters

I wouldn't know it

since it is not my fate

to share in the benefits

of those who prosper

by my doings



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Monday, October 24, 2011

where we wind up

depends on where we think we're going


choose your destination well

we may not recognize our ideal

if we can get to it



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
this time in the earth

isn't the end of all I've loved


it's just the end of my time

loving them here



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I'll hear you

as long as my ears can hear


then I'll hear the silence

after you've passed out of range



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
they say everything happens for a reason


that would be reasonable

if we knew what the reason is


they also say a tub sits on its own bottom


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

an opening in the air

invites me to go forth


even as my mind hesitates

my body's on its way


I have no faith

that this is a good move


but it beats the wrong ones

that got me here



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
all right so I was wrong

but there are plenty out there

who still don't get it

that they didn't do it right



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
some end is nigh

and I am high

unable to begrudge

the judgment that

condemns my chat

to the judge whose grace will not budge


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Sunday, October 23, 2011

what to leave and what to take


and how much how little

how soon or too late


you never know what you'll need

you hang on the something for years

and say the hell with it

then a month later you find you'd had kept it

for just this situation


but just that thinking is expendable

along with the junk we toss

and wondering later whether a diamond

is lurking in that mound

we were too careless to retrieve


how many ways we bind ourselves

how many ways show too much cautious

then throw all caution aside

and wind up hip-deep in shit

or acting stupidly out of frustration

or sitting in front of your flaming accident

dumbfounded that you screwed up yet again


oh I will not hock you

at least not today

I'm too aware at this moment of some

of my own 'dunce-cap' moments

and would be more of a fool

than I am if I were to say anything


it's always too close to the bone

always too tight a noose

we loop around our own necks

blaming everyone else

for our miscalculations


and when you get one huge group of humanity

doing the same thing

well you know there's bound to be trouble

of some kind


so we pick and choose among our blues

raging one moment and strangely calm the next

one part of mind swearing repentance

while another part says why bother

when consequences ruins all ways forward

and grace is too weak to allow amendment

and happy clear to toss the dross

happy to be unencumbered if only for a few moments

in active contemplation of

what to leave and what to take


what to do and where to go...


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.



all knowledge

all doing

is an echo

of what has happened


and all that follows

that action is the reflection

that gives its meaning

as our identity


as we hear that fading tone

blending into the now

of our living and all that remains

just the conditions


into which we will go

with what we know wherever we are


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
time to put away the thoughts that darken the mind

seal the heart in its misery


time now only to say the words that fade into silence

and find their fulfillment in silence



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
you must face the utter terror

of realizing you are truly on your own

in creation


before you can face the utter terror

of knowing each of us face that realization

and that we are all united in that terror


welcome to the World

welcome to the harrowing



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.


oh these endless assholes and their poisonous religions


did God put us here to get used to hell

or try to prompt us toward heaven?


I'm never sure

putting the business into our hands

isn't a colossal mistake



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
people rush to finish their work

put a closure on efforts

and take bows for themselves


and that's why their work is always spoiled

accomplished or abandoned

their work isn't finished until they are...



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
fantasies of fairness

seduce the simple-minded

into believing

all will work out in the end


and it will

but the reality is

it will not for

the simple-minded



Conent (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I never met

a professional politician


having been huckstered

plenty by those

who 'love' me so much


so there was no need to...


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
you can never ever argue with an idiot


they are protected by unreality

and when they talk you could almost believe


milk comes from the asses of angels



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
rave on Bill Knott


the opposition is endless

their conspiracy of status and ignorance

is a fundamental state of the fallen world


but endurance is ours

who grow strong on despair and disdain

and in a future where our stuff will a common language


and known by heart by every child in a schoolyard

or around a campfire or is engraved into the cornerstones

of temples and street corners


there will still be a bunch of ignorant elitist snobs

who'd wipe their asses with our poems

let them and let them get

anal herpes when they do...



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
a quick learner

leaves teachers and disciples in his slipstream


and not get ahead of himself



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
some of us never learn to shut up


that's the price others have to pay

when some of us demand attention

and don't know how else to get it


the others have to endure this shit


and my sympathies are certainly with them



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Saturday, October 22, 2011

all done things

stand on their own

in the Clear Light

of some terrible evaluation


and for the doer

the blinding glare

lighting every fingerprint

of process on it


the tracking through time

of the proactive identity

eternal as night for the sighted

eternal as day for the blind



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.


if I knew then what I know now
I wouldn't have bothered


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Friday, October 21, 2011

laughing my way

to the end of the line

I thought of solemn

admonishment

from the mouths of

righteousness


and thought

thank you Lord

among all my faults

at least I'm not guilty

of this high-minded vanity


at the end of the line

all the lines end

and so do the laughs


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Thursday, October 20, 2011

hungry cold frightened

snatching what we can

from whomever we can

making sure no one is hot on our trail

making sure no one can identify our outline

in the fog

lie to the friend

lie to the loved one

but kiss up to the cops


and all we want is peace and light


stick it to our enemies

stick it to our friends

wear one face for the office

and another face for a date

and another face to bring home

and another face to hide behind

looking in the mirror

cower before any face looking back at you

face up face down face out face off


and all we want is peace and light


joke your way through catastrophe

do not linger too long over the remains

never never think too hard about who they were

or where they were going or coming from

or what they did to deserve this

they could have been your neighbor your pal

your own family or person or persons unknown

but forget what relation they are to you

forget all but the fact you survived it wasn't your time


and all we want is peace and light


as one world ends and another begins

account for no one else's mistakes

put a lid on

let it keep until the muck sinks low and deep

but do not pretend you do not know

do not imagine the tell-tale signs will not show

it is all in the way the eye stays steady

while the mouth moves in a dozen directions

all of them leading nowhere


and all we want is peace and light


for you who think loyalty trumps all

for you who think faith binds you in some imaginary brotherhood

for you who wish everyone else would play fair

for you who try and fail and figure out why so easily

for you who knows the deceits that create our truths

know your isolation from others is a miserable fiction

know your crying hopes are the misunderstandings of a child

know that in our daily murders and betrayals and denials

we all know what loss gains us and exposes our sullied prayer


while all we want is peace and light...



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
here I move and here I go

soft in the work-a-day world

keeping body and soul together and functional

until God has mercy enough to call body and soul apart


at any moment

on any day or hour or minute

that call will come with no recourse

and I will be on my way


and the poor loved ones left behind

awaiting their call

will be obliged to clean up after me

as part of what they must do


until body and soul are sundered

and they race is through



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
what I wish is for you

to find what will give you peace


fragile and fleeting as it may be

it is all there is


and all that is yours


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I'm at the end of this run

I still can't believe it


what joyous memories

few as they are


still reverberate

as if they happened


mere seconds ago



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
another day shot to hell

another day wasted trying to keep up

so much to do

so much that won't come together

and the simplest things

you need to achieve

lie fallow for months on end

then come to little or nothing

when the flow picks up

and you're not ready

because of the mess left from maintaining

your focus

on cheap little goals

that amount to nothing

when you've dropped exhausted

on the heap of your construction



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

the problem with dying

is living through the long time

it takes to get here


impatient spirit

that moment will come soon enough

and soon enough at that


to make one wish one'd

lived that time better



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
it was too quiet

things were going too smoothly


I swear

God must see us trying

to take a breather and decides


that's the time

to send a landslide down

on our nodding heads


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I sit in my occasionally humorous decline

looking out rain-streaked windows

(like I was a teen-ager again grasping to handle

my deepest convulsions of emotion

with the blunt claws of cliche)

at the wet Autumn day


this season wasn't as colorful

as the drenching summer led me to believe it would be

but we did get the brightest yellow leaves

full and first with russets and deep reds appearing now

later in the shortening daylight


the early cool and gray skies did remind me

of going back to school after the long (to we children)

hiatus and all our lives long we're imprinted with that

sense that September is always the start

of the New Year (the Jews certainly know what I'm sayin

L'Shana Tova belatedly)


there's no need to belabor the perpetual designs

and reduce them to a trite simplicity

no need to do that

as the deep reds of age flush the bloodstream

in the dark of the coming solstice

that three days hanging turns again to the light


which one of these turnings of the year

will be the last one I see with these eyes?

which one of these windows into Infinity

will be the one I look through and follow

my vision into...?



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
new worlds quaking beneath our feet

coils of time and prophecy flexing

under the facade of appearance

that is the concourse of our daily living


to radiate up

in silent penetration

all manner of change

that morphs each moment of our condition


and those who struggled

patiently in diffidence or outright resignation

lie still to feel rise up in full of

the evolution of their subjective knowing


to a fulfillment of their weariness desire

for transcendence

well wherever they think they're going

they're certainly on their way


and may the destination even half-way

resemble what they sought in their dreams

may God at least be softer there to them

than He is here to us


and for the rest let them wonder

what plunges up through the broken concrete

of their long accustomed streets and walks

these limits of imagination


entombing them in their circumstance

most of us barely if rarely get away

we die with the place we know best

while some new land of distinctly different people


rise up to replace the dilapidated world

and the style of neighbor we're accustomed to

it is their turn to wreck and ruin

all shiny new intent


and with the same bloody ignorance that abused

all that came before

new world quake under our feet

and arrive without us knowing it


staring at the emptied out storefront

trying vainly to remember what was there before

while new sound fills the air and we as prophecized

acquiesce to the new worlds materializing before our sights


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
so it is ordained

pre-destined and cosmically mandated

I must die here

in my hometown

the city I hate with my whole soul


the Capital of the World

the place where

"everybody comes to ball baby!"


the place where the Masters of the Universe

plot their next move to squeeze the Living Juice

out of those who wish for concord

neighborliness and just plain getting along

(oh don't preach to me the evil that's in

even the least of them

we're all evil

all our hands are dirty

that's mere human nature

and you'll need a better excuse than that)


not to mention the town mice

who stream here to be

a part of this conundrum of bullshit

the little wannabes from the heartland

who believe the movies

who think Cary Grant walks into every fancy restaurant

looking for Ingrid Bergman waiting

at the assignation point

the little town mice who sully their own dreams

with their pomposity and delusions


and we here

real beyond acceptance

suffering on a day by a day

having to listen to these power-mad nobodies

who are ruling us to death


(and again don't preach to me about

tolerance and acceptance

I will not bless their circus

and the hell it makes for those

who could care less

who have more important things to ponder

like survival)


I tired to escape but there was none to be had

God for some reason insists

I die here in this sad cesspool of dreamer's dominion

maybe I was one of them once

in some other time

and God is mercilessly extracting His price

this unforgiving God of Love


does it matter now

as the whole world goes down a third time?

as their lame ambition and foolish mendacity

sinks them as they sit in their fancy restaurants

waiting for their entrees?

no sour grapes here

I never wanted those things

and I was called on that too


no we are here to face whatever music

of absolute Apocalypse

tinkles out if the piano bar

or blares out of every jukebox

in whatever trendy bar

the happy mindless hedonists of Pompeii

waiting for the last call

and not knowing it's the last call


God demands I endure this

God has denied me my wish

to die in Maine

in a shack over a lake at twilight

ruminating on the ruin of all things

(my own fantasy

go ahead and hector me

my fellow assholes in creation)


we all want out

and will get it but not as

we imagined or wanted it

and that includes His self-appointed prophets


we His own wondrous lop-sided Crown of Creation

so it is ordained

enough rope

for myriad necks


and plenty to spare



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

life is a drug-addled awakening

from deeper nightmares of stunted conscience


from brains exploding

from too much distress


to hearts bursting from sorrows

and dazed surrender


life is tough medicine for the healing of souls

awakened from shock and loss of good


in this world it is such to be alive

where only the decorticated will survive



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
now I lay me down to weep

I pray the Lord for judgment steep

if I should fly after I ache

I pray the Lord my death to fake



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
"humility?

what the hell is that

to a Master of the Universe such as I?"


first of all it's "me" not "I"

second hell is what you

make of it


and third

humility is the one thing

you shouldn't have jettisoned


from your arsenal of idiocy

because now you don't even have

an excuse for your isolation


from all that would have preserved you

from being the conquered conqueror



Content (c) 2008-201 Philip Milito.
you will understand little at first

then less and less as time goes on


the more we apprehend even the smallest fraction

of the Infinite


our own limits do not shrink

but rather reveal the smallness of our bounds


and that is all you will understand

and less and less so as time goes on



Content (c) 2008-2011 Phiulip Milito.
all my best

is as nothing

compared to

the worst that men do

and that women applaud


I must be good at something

but it is not evident

to my time or in my place



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
goddesses by the dozen

have mesmerized me

through my time here

in this skin

and each and every one

of them crowd my brain and my lions

when the moon is full

I can feel their pull

and I follow their trace

like a vapor rising

from a pool in the soft night

of desire


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I hold the thought

but it disappears

supplanted by data

that amplifies fears

so my heart keeps beating

and I hang on 'til when

what fresh hell makes me

start over again


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Monday, October 17, 2011

I could not stand my ordinary mind

nor endure my routine fate


the years wasted in faith

turning me ugly in my servitude


took their toll on every intention

slipping away like greased ball bearings


out of the hands

of a drunken mechanic


I do not come as a later upgraded model

I am strictly as is


so with every forgotten reason

for pursuing every purpose


I did not change or improve my quality

I bought the rah-rah talk and kept trying


which only made everything worse

for me and all who tried to love me


tow me and sell for spare parts

that is my legacy to nothingness


the routine fate that tuned me

to despise my ordinary mind



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
"..............................." he said

"..............................." he replied

"..............................?" she interjected

"...............................!" he answered

".............................!!!" he scoffed

"..." but she was interrupted

".....................................................................

.......................................................................

...............!.................!!..........................!!!

they both shouted in unison

dismissing her


ah now it's beginning to make sense...



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I talk to the ceiling


at least that way

I'm not interrupted



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
the Dweller on the Threshold

has crossed into my abode

and has become

the Angel of Presence

crushing my feet

under the weight of my sins


no mercy

all is accounted for

Saturn

Kronos

Ol' Father Time


the celestial

Customs Clerk

to whom we're all in debt

as long as we're in

our earthly abodes


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
if I sound like I'm lost

then leave me be


I figure out my story

when I remember the way home


then it really will be

an excuse



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I passed the word

then I passed it again

but I thought the echo was a response


what can be said?

the next problem will be

trying to believe my ears


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
speak up before all words are gone

say it and mean it

before the New Age telepaths

bust you and you won't have

a lie to stand on

or behind or up to...


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
minute by minute

instant by instant

the past recedes farther back

into the psyche of the World


it's useless to say anything

as words are deconstructed

back into their original utterances

groans and grunts and exhaled gibberish


and the mind trained

in its symbolisms follows suit

all constructs as we've known them

collapsing into a junk and bone yard heap


the champions of progress hail

this evolution as spiritual growth

humanity stumbling out of 10,000 years

of servitude to abstraction


while the conquered remnant

mourn all they've loved on their own terms

in their own understanding

and project their perpetual loss as universal doom


and in among these perpetual dichotomies

the frail thread of human limit

each past eon a forgotten tomb

with each future the end of a long chain of process


but when hundreds of years hence

the unchanging human nature reasserts itself

what will all this new thinking be

but the passing abstractions of that stage of organic time?


the old will always cling to what is already gone

in the instant of its apprehension

while the new will exalt itself as an ultimate in freedom

that has never been known before


I mourn the past but let it go

but I dread the future for all I see

are the old tyrannies in new dress

yet another band-aid on some wound of growth


imposed and impressed from the outside

rather than healed from the inside

and the evolution we all fearfully or delightfully praise

will continue underneath all this soul progress


eons after eons until some cumulative point

some 'Omega' point is reached

then will the divisions begin to merge and close

and then you will either be or not


until that endgame to end all games

this move on the face of ever vanishing history

that will swirl like a slick upon

the Eternal Now that always is


until that awakening let us take the stillness

that is our spiritual essence

let us allow these pains of night to fade into

the silent song the Morning Stars sang


when we are back to the beginning...



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Sunday, October 16, 2011

whatever Life is

it isn't helpful

it isn't gracious

it isn't friendly


and if God so vicious

and merciless in judgment

is the image we reflect in our being

what grace is to be wrung from that?


if I were happy to live in the earth

even that would not mitigate this appalling state


whatever Life is

it isn't the source of all joys

it isn't the conclusion of all sorrows

it isn't the fulfillment of all you'd want or need or love


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito
no worldly endeavor

prevails against or within

the Plan


and we're supposed to burst out

in hosannas

about this?


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
don't tell me 'as above so below'


I don't want to find out

heaven is filled with

belligerent egotists


whose bellowing is on a par

with heavenly choirs

or the song the Morning Stars sang


that would destroy my soul

more quickly than any curse

of God could do



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

loose ends keep slipping undone


how death will spare me that annoyance

when I'm done with being done

and those knots will either stay knotted or slip loose again


but I won't be there

to give a damn



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
oh how annoying


I know each day brings me closer

to the release from this world I carve


but having that dangle before me

is pissing me off wading through every day's shit


while awaiting that golden moment


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
how happy you must be

that no one needs you any more


now you can say what you want

insult every star-of-their-own-movie


who disdains you and you'll be so insignificant

you can put the tack on their seat


and get away with it evenas you stand

right there beside them


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
why did Jesus waste his blood?

in servitude to some absurd divine command

to be beholden to vanity?

to dance for every self-important dunce

who thinks he deserves respect

he hasn't even begun to earn?


what megalomaniacs will people

the Aquarian Age

what simple horrors of daily sloth

and mendacity will take all the good

from so many worthless attempts at blessing

the fatal ignorance of the proud and the lame


why did Jesus waste his blood

pleading forgiveness for the consensus of clowns

that rule us all to worldly death?

maybe one day I'll be strong enough to forgive

the ones who hold their knives to my throat

and demand a blessing that gives them liberty


but that silence from the heavens is particularly galling

oh what's a Christ to do?



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Saturday, October 15, 2011

the weight we carry from life to life

grows heavier the closer we get to 'heaven'

(for lack of a better word to describe some

indescribable 'place' for yet again

a lack of a better word)

see how useless words truly are

and that is part of the gaining weight

of consequence we lug on our quest


I cannot do otherwise

(nor can you or you or you)

than to try to gain strength

from that miserable load

so that the bigger and heavier the load

the more strength we would have to carry it

Rexroth used that very phrase in one of his plays

and he's right about it


you can only do

what you can do by virtue of what you have

in you to do

and the more you are broken

by your own strength the easier it

will be to handle it

in my deepest sufferings I'd heard that said

and cursed the sayers pointedly


how easy someone else's burden looks

compared to your own

and how we comfort ourselves

with that illusion

if we truly gathered without a qualm

drew laughter from our pains

we'd put every comedian out of work

putting our devils behind us


but at what 'heavenly place'

or what 'earthly place' or whatever 'place' we block out

with our shadows in the sun

will we find that overwhelming strength to heave

our burden clear of our centers of gravity and description

and assume our rightful positions

in the line-ups of interactions and the definitions

of our self-formulated identities?


oh no need to say or to wonder

as one instinctively knows where one comes from

so it is each one of us grows lighter in step

so it is we drop our sack of troubles

and leave it on the roadsides of our choosing

where every direction leads us on to what 'place'

we know to be the solution of our salvation

the 'heaven' that is where we belong...


Content (c) 2008-201 Philip Milito.
it's lonely here in the future


I came early

like a party-goer who allowed

for congested traffic and wound up

hours before the appointed time


and now my flowers wither

waiting for the host and hostess

to show up at their own affair

and welcome the other guests


I think I'll kill some time

watching the grounds keepers

as they spruce up this apocalypse



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
nothing at hand

but attended by everything


we live toward the time

when time will not dictate


our modes of being

which is how Life has always been


but we are now becoming awake enough

to apprehend and to disregard


our imaginary clocks

our poor approximations of consciousness



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I have crossed over


nothing is the same

yet it all looks the same


even we want still

surges beneath


the imagination



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
musings from the heart


such cacophony

of confusion


ignorance

and wish fulfillment


as nothing compared to

the Ultimate Reality


we imagine we yearn for...



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
all I want to tell you

has already been said

to the point

of insincerity


wait a couple

of centuries

and I'll have mouth

purer enough to say it


for real



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.



the channels are closing

all we know is past tense

what we see

happening now

is the naked throat

wailing its distress

at its material

limitations



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
writing will be gone

in the next 200 years or so


so in the meantime

let us keep struggling


through the fiction

of representation


a necessary loss in the evolution

toward truer communication



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Friday, October 14, 2011

the fabric of life

is transmuting

into something our race

has never encountered before


some next step up

the evolutionary ladder

with the best of us left behind

for something else


there'll be no more linear thought

that's good but then

there'll be deceptive unbalanced emotion

that's not so good


now I know it's a process

to be worked out

a little conscious mastery

to mitigate if not explain all mysteries


and much that could

have carried on and been

vital will be lost in the rush

to imagined transcendence


because people will have yet to learn

there is no perfection to be had

in this conditional reality

regardless of how the conditions are altered


but explaining to any ersatz mystic

the difference between dream and vision

is like trying to enlighten the literal-minded

that selfishness does not rule and mere objects


are of limited benefit

even the crazed admixtures

of rational and irrational will be lost

from what content gives their rituals meaning


totems turned to trinkets

and trinket denoting value

while value wastes away in novelty

the accidents of every clumsy clash of objects


history suffers most

when the do-it-yourself-ers

try to comprehend the incomprehensible

and thus continue the old history


this new condition we seeing being born

around us is about ending history's misery

or so we presume

what would also end history would be


the laying aside of all our notions

and acting in the instants

that will arise in these fresh dispensations

creation as such will not change


but only end when it has fulfilled its term

all this passing of the old and beginning of the new

are only phase changes in what always is

and that will see the passing of all we are familiar with


which goes on every second of our earthly time

and if words go then they go

sad news to me and other writers

but only to aid the ascendency of other talents and gifts


mental abilities heightened

the visual accentuated and underneath it all

music the sound filling all consciousness

with the substance of being


the Word of God and the Music of the Sphere

all One with the singing Morning Stars

always fundamentally present but Its Fullness

not quite apparent yet except in fleeting suggestion


to our senses saddened and weary

but sweet in its sorrow

and happy in its rest

the rustling of this fabric of life


this particular spread never encountered before

but a memory and a set of laws

for those of us yet to come

and those of us returning so we again


go



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

reading dear Sylvia again after a long time

and thinking of the sisterhood that holds her blameless

for everything in the world

how tiresome after all this time

to recall the little (after all) domestic tragedies of the anointed

to be reminded that while Ted may have been standard-issue

male brute his darling wifey was also 'no walk on the beach'

as the trendy Masses now put it


as everything from our collective past

disappears into the blood and menses of this new era

being painfully brought to birth

I can do better than relish the equally bankrupt

academic and cultural institutions

manned (if you'll pardon the expression)

by its own trainees who draw their identities

from their degrees ("Don't tell me what to do!

I graduated from Brown" or Yale or fill in your own blank)

rather than the knowledge they neutralize in vainglory

or missed out on altogether while polishing any number of apples

or turds and to see the canon in exhibits or heard at conferences

curated by some eminence's hysteria


nor need I play the imaginary outsider

coming out of some convenient desert to denounce

these enterprises as blights on the heart and soul

of seeking itself or

be a kept clown for their enlightened group prejudices


everything's going to blow

everything's gotta gooo...

and it is going

rapidly

like snow in the sun

(thanks John that was a great turn of phrase

you one of this described bunch who great and quirky wrote

and paid for his industry following his father

into self-destructed continuance

which brings us back to Sylvia...)

haunted by her own ghost as we all are by ours

but not not quite up to it


oh do not take this for disappointed judgment

I do not judge but simply observe

and isolate what given lesson for myself

I will not take their way

nor the way of their champions

I will be remembered or forgotten

in the coming dispensations

and they shall be also

as time and decay clear us and our works

to make room for all the incoming


even us when the inexorable laws demand

our return

on and on

until we return no more...


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Thursday, October 13, 2011

no support no doubt

though you love so much and so freely

or so you claim

feigning every emotion

you've learned to corrupt

for the sake of your needy control


I'd bet you still believe

I meant it when I said I carried the world's

largest torch for you

and that we were secret loves somewhere somehow

in creation

and this because you were close


to divorcing your husband

and I hoped for nothing more

than an opportunity to fuck

the body you were married in

that ass-tounding piece of architecture (sorry)

well an insincerity for an insincerity (sorry?)


and like all manipulative women

you'll hand on your feet

like un chat (and please do not accuse

me of stereotypical thinking

when I watch the outlandish identities

you body forth in your absurd fashions


killing the messenger won't help you now

especially when he has nothing else to say)

however that does not mean

you'll get away with anything

you CTs pay for your sins

in tiny increments


over as long a time as you have left

on your clock

small repayments of lines and sagging

skin and legs ruined by high heels

breasts so firm in their natural uplift

descending more closely each year to knocking your belly


and that prize-worthy keester

drooping like a hope on payday

and the gray steel wool thatch of muff

no one doing somersaults for you any more

you've buried most of them by now

and wonder who'll do as much for you


so you see there are really no hard feelings here

how could there be when we're both such good liars

we didn't know it or better still

did but didn't care and I don't know the depth

of your disdain for styles of conduct but for me nothing

but the cold reality of these kind of love won over


and savored...



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

I long for the future I will one day live in

where details will dissolve into an amazing whole

words will be gone

sequential thinking will cease

and we will walk back and forth

between dimensions like we did before

we were too immeshed in this conditioned creation

and have yelped every couple of eras for an avatar

to shake us up again


when I awoke my headache was gone

but I felt sadly and sweetly at peace

as I looked out the window

at the ordinary gray morning of October



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
I am tired and frightened and want to go home

I want to go home and am tired and frightened

I want to go tired and frightened and am home

home I am tired and frightened and want to go

go home and I tired and frightened am


and oh oh oh so such shit

Gertrude Stein passed the butter passed the butter passed the butter

and that was a load of shit is a load of shit is a load of shit

let that be enough

I want to pass the shit but end up passing the butter

I want to pass the butter but end up passing the shit

I passed tired and frightened at home and want to go

shit some butter or butter some shit


human automata deconstructing their context

is still a context for human automata

no script or program for tired and frightened

I want butter and shit and Gerturde (ha) Stein

to go home...



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

I couldn't resist

the lure of desire

so I made sure I

didn't enjoy it


that's why

I didn't miss religion

when I discovered

crazy women


I was

ahead of the game...



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
thankfully

I've drained

the last drop

of aspiration


before

winding up

with a mouth

full of sand



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
now

now is

now is the

now is the time

now is the time to

now is the time to stop

now is the time to stop this

now is the time to stop this bullshit

is the time to stop this bullshit

the time to stop this bullshit

time to stop this bullshit

to stop this bullshit

stop this bullshit

this bullshit

bullshit


[there won't be a third in a series

ye may relax...]


Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
let nothing deter

your anger


it will power you

beyond


any satisfaction

your ego can accommodate


thus this world

saves what


it

aggravates



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
words

words are

words are disappearing

words are disappearing into

words are disappearing into thin

words are disappearing into thin air

words are disappearing into thin air and

words are disappearing into thin air and I

words are disappearing into thin air and I am

words are disappearing into thin air and I am also

are disappearing into thin air and I am also

disappearing into thin air and I am also

into thin air and and I am also

thin air and I am also

air and I am also

and I am also

I am also

am also

also




Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

I wouldn't doubt life's ability

to heal itself

if the process could be

apprehended in one's own lifetime



too slow by a mortal measure

does the harm disappear

much too much time spent

mourning the ache slow to fade



when even love itself is laden

with dark and broken vows

how long until the fractured heart

mends and beats its steadiest rhythms



this time is hard and brittle enough

to make anyone forget

these things that keep us whole

except in the privacy



of their own vulnerability

not everyone learns to process

not everyone learns to forgive

but most everyone knows how it feels



to get tired and in their decline

see all that came before

as prologue for some further

length in some continuous race



whose finish line

is far too distant to see

from any one stage of living

but knowing enough



that though the healing is slow

the recovery is speedy

even downright miraculous

as if the dark were laden with the light of love



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.
because I found you

not too late

I knew again

the soft promises

I feared would never be kept

and each kiss you blow my way

each x and o or heart

signed on every happy note

remind me how much doomed

is not so when it is lived

to the fullest

and given its 'forever' in our love


so I see it after all

weary from a ponderous life

where I presumed

to teach the silly asses

a thing or two about suffering

(even alas if I had

to bring the damn stuff myself)

no wonder I had no love

or hope and even the friends

who loved me pitied me

for the grief I brought on myself


and you my love

were such a one

who reached through the gloom

to grab me by the scruff of the neck

and pull me out

of this renegade spite

against all love

weak and frail and pained and mistaken

that still had heart enough to desire

though it be fugitive as errant time

oh now I share the common pain

that levels all of us

to our shared souls

our mates right or wrong

but all to teach and learn and love


so it is with you

dear one who found me also

not too late

we a lifetime looking in all the places

we weren't

until at last chance or fate

as with you and me

so it is with all

in each other's arms

not too late



Content (c) 2008-2011 Philip Milito.