death will reveal that unknown world

beyond this one soon enough


I will continue to rage and lust and repent


with all the damage irreparably done


I'll just bear the brunt and play the string out

wine women and poetry true to the template


I will continue to love and be loved


or damn and be damned depending on which angel


or demon shows the most mercy

and I will bless in kind to be sure


since we're all under a heavy divine thumb


a smoking smudge in a padded digit of God


or a clean unbroken spirit slipping out from

under the pressure to bless and to be relieved...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the dullness of earthly existence

is the muted shine of the Light


as long as we're here

the Ineffable will be a smudge


of sun in an overcast sky

and it will consume our limited sight


while the dirt slants beneath our feet

to draw us to some edge




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I fold myself back into

my personal confines

no longer seeing an overlay

of shadows on every sunny street

mingling with bodies

alive in their day...

a lifetime's habit

has made me that way

and now as that lifetime

winds down

I fold myself back into

my personal confines

seeing now only the limitless 

concourse extending past the day...

Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

this is where the anvil fell out of the sky

and nearly hit me


farther on a safe did the same thing

and don't forget the piano


good Lord is this hell?

to be trapped in an eternal cartoon of cliches?


I'd rather You be Wile E. Godhead and get messed up

by the Acme Heavenly Host Company's variety of products


and I say beep beep and split like nobody's business...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the little treacheries of 'friends'

certainly do ease my conscience...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

many who live

to tell the tale

are reluctant to talk...


they still can't believe

what went down

and there's no way


others will believe

or heed





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

miracles are tiny things

the outcomes of ordinary process

bearing fruit at last


they are not spectacles

of divine special effects

but mere happenings occurring


they managed to manifest by outwitting

the uncongenial desolations of earth...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

boy do I get tired of being a blowhard

for realities I can barely cope with myself...


but all of us reach that point

where all we know and belief and love seems


no longer to be...and the actuality is enough to almost crush

the most enlightened entities (even Jesus on the cross


cried "Father, why hast thou forsaken me?"...not even Father...

but abba..."Dad") the Afterlife may hold all the wonders of God


but the earth...for all its beauty...is still the dark

dirty dangerous valley of desolation


and every second of every minute of every day

we in our forgetful skins must remember that


and draw strength from that...now let this blowhard

as put upon as you are get off his soapbox


and submit to the hard beauties of judgment and mercy...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All right reserved.

all the old structures are collapsing

no energy supports them any more


like it or not you'll have to be

living in the moment


acting in the instant

where no past and no future exist


like it or not you'll have to live in the Now

and know at last that this is all there is


and the new structures will rise and fall also

in their timeless pattern onto their timely ends


and how well you built will determine

what you face through lifetimes of these terms


now enough of this sorrow take the wine of your choosing

and drink to the past that is never totally gone


and the future that is always and ever in the present

and don't take these words as an end-and-be-all


whatever happens in the spirit realm is eternal

it's worldly manifestations are not


the old structures become the new structures for living

and only by knowing and living that


is your way forward...do you still need to be told

you don't need the grief of disdaining this?


take up your ruin and walk...like it or not

that is how it is and how you are...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

he's done with his old stale business

and is too sober-sided to loosen all ties


yet why is he giggling in a corner?

what fresh hell is he up to?


and what has he found out

that is pushing him to some mental hijinx


he'd have spurned while he was soooo serious?

you know those fools who get drunk only


on New Year's Eve and wind up acting

so boorish and so destructively obnoxious


they wind up wrecking everything for everyone else?

why is he giggling in a corner?


we'd better keep an eye on him


he'd better keep an eye on himself...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

how we fear the freedom we most crave...

only the careless know how to be brave


throw it up in the air and let it drop

and where it falls is where our hesitation should stop


pick it up and carry it on

let it join what's within with what's beyond


and find no difference and no concern

freedom being exactly the bravery we need to relearn...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

January 1, 2013 is already here


your own inclusive dates are already established


in the only moment we know in earthly life

past and future are already present


illusions that fade as all we shape

collapses into all we shape again


until the last shaping delivers us...

and January 1, 2213 is but


a few mere orbits of the earth away...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the eternal is in the material element

right here at hand

right here at your hand

my hand everyone's hand


as long as we think

in terms of here and there

we won't know where we are

except that we're there


and what the hell is this shit?


don't ask me

it's your pile


and kindly get it off

my lawn


'heaven' is everywhere so try not to abuse it...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philp Milito. All rights reserved.

well the chores are done

and I've a ton of money writing to do

(slipping behind schedule)


and maybe this afternoon I'll rally

but for now

fuck it


I'm going to space out

on this misty morning

and again come to terms


with what I have no clue





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

be as earnest as you know how to be

but it makes no difference you see


everything you do makes matters worse

that's why every blessing conceals a curse


be a surfer instead and ride what wave

you can manipulate your supple life to save


and slide into shore and walk upright

onto the beach snug and firm and tight...


(hate pushing the rhyme but I don't care this time...)




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All right reserved.

pardon me

while I go to tend to business...

yes I'm broke

and no one thinks enough

to want to publish me


but then I have a readership

and they take what they'll receive from these posts

and that's the point ultimately


I'm as lost as you are...

if you brought a jug with you

sit down and let's be lost together...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

holy is the ground

holy is the night

holy is the bread

holy is the light


holy holy holy

just like my underwear

I'll see you in the divine department store

looking for another pair...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

Happy New Day After anyway


a clock ticks past midnight

and a slew of resolutions

bites the dust


what new world? what new life?

we're happiest when

we embrace our sadness...our identities...


Happy New Second Chance

in a world of limitless accommodation...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

thought I'd whip off a few lines

waiting for the laundry to dry


what flights of fancy grounded in

the mundane chores of our subsistence...


we should all be homebodies

relief being no more


than a medicine chest away

and a fantasy head to complete the cure...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

life is chaotic

and people are mad


that's my excuse

for slipping between the cracks


I love my own chaos

and madness will attend my death


and that's fine with me

happiness being at such a premium...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the world strangles on its sin

and everyone is the lynch mob

tightening the noose on it


where that fiery sword

to cut the rope and astonish

the blood-thirsty


how long must we grovel

at the mercy of creation?

as long as we're here


we fall and crumble

at the foot of something

that has nothing for us because we crumble


perhaps it's better we don't know when

that fiery sword comes swinging in earnest...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

much as I want to continue

my soul's journey

beyond this skin


I have to admit

whatever I've loved

in this unfortunate sojourn


has not been tarnished

by the desolation of being alive...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

FUCK YOU!!!!


sorry

just had

to let that out


there! that's better...

now what was that Horace said

about anger being

a temporary madness?




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I sitting here

typing out stuff

because I'm baking

some chicken in the oven


and I'm using the moment

to do this waiting for that


how mundane

the source of all our perceptions

and need for speech




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I love gray cold winter mornings

because years ago in my youth

I went with my father in early December

to get a Christmas tree or something

on exactly this kind of day

I really can't remember exactly what we were shopping for

nor why we were all home together

on a weekday morning

but we were and we were doing some common

family household stuff


and mornings exactly like this

bitter gray and cold (there might have been

some flurries...I can't be sure)

but something floods back into my consciousness

on mornings like this

that opens such a sense of that moment in time and space

that no longer exists

except in my sense-memory...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I'm hatching them all off again...

no wonder people laugh at me


they always saw there was

something wrong with me


while I thought I was storming

the Infinite and wishing people


would wake up and get it

and this post is just another blast hatched off


I came to my senses late in this life

and I worry the common sorrow


that it took so long to do so

so I send out these barking spiders


of some kind of experience

because it's all I know how to do in this twilight...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

what promises must I make to you

that I'll only break and feel bad

about disappointing you?


why can't we live fully in the moment

and so love in eternity?


our lives are passing rapidly

things we used to do we no longer can

despite the memories that make us think


it all happened just a second ago

why can't we live in that perspective

or have we not earned it yet


being too much in a worldly moment

that can only offer a mirage in the desert

or a mind wandering into its freezing polar moment?




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

all the loves I've ever wanted

are distributed among so many

sweet beautiful women

that I could help by play the fool


oh how our hungers

teach us everything

including dispensing with desire

to gratefully settle into the satisfaction of


the fleeting kiss the warm embrace

the soul's orgasm so to speak

delivering every love in parts

easy for a declining body to feel


lover by lover

heart by heart



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

grace must exist

or we'd all be dead by now


don't try to reckon

what's fair or foul


it's beyond our human scope

but we exist by grace's hidden power


and when a tempest passes

we only know by living to tell the tale...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

whatever grace and healing and salvation mean

God is nowhere to be found


unless He be in our desperate yet soothing embraces...

the only blessings of the little forgivenesses we bestow


upon each other...if Love has any meaning

it has to be grounded in this


otherwise you'll wander the Outer Darkness

hectored by your own phantoms wearing masks of God


may we all together find our way out

of this hell God calls creation


if our love truly delivers us and we can find it easy

to forgive ourselves


then forgiving God for His wretched plan of pain

will be an easy lesson finally mastered...may all of us


be strong enough for this...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

broken to pieces

will God glue me together again?


when my pain causes anger and bitterness

will the Universe turn from me


because I'm full of anger and bitterness and

grace is too weak to pierce this darkness


and help that pain? then what help is grace or God

when your aching wounds drive the cure away?


as ever...no answer...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

no mercy for those who go beyond the pale

who think outside the box

who stumble in the wilderness

facing every devil's temptation


you face these dangers

you call these shots

and if God is involved

it's only as weeping helpless onlooker...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

some seem to think I'm hopelessly pessimistic


I'm not

I simply woke up to the reality of creation


and am crushed to see just how much

I brought down on myself


and if there is forgive and mercy on God's part

it's as hard come by as my stumbling was easy


I'm hopelessly awake hopelessly awake hopelessly awake...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

hope is misleading

allows to to cling to bogus beliefs

have faith in phantoms of your own mind

will leave you broken on the pilgrim's path


live without hope

live without faith

live in the freedom you covet and fear

you'll be broken on the pilgrim's path anyway...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

Life has come and keeps on coming...

it's the same bullshit it always will be


and if our sins are our responsibility

and so is our salvation...


endure the shit...the unending hell

of the vicious world on this beautiful earth


let us forget our prayers

let us walk it like we talk it


if we truly believe this God is good

because all our beliefs just get in the way


(even the hanging Jesus stared up into the Void

and said "Father, why have you forsaken me?")


after all these lives of misery just take it on yourself

and stop wondering how Mercy is a visage of Judgement


just live in the Actual and fuck everything else...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

yes I know I'm embedded in the flesh

I've lost my way and no signpost

points in any useful direction


but I believed in a God of grace and mercy

and this God if that is stronger in vengeance

I thought grace mattered


but if it does I had a mistaken notion of it

and I'm suffering for that too...embedded in the flesh

I wish to flee but not without this hell of karma


that no grace supersedes...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

Merry fucking something or other


I don't doubt God turns from us

but if all this God can do is weep with us


and show no mercy or forgive

or deny us the help we need because we need it...

to say our bitterness and pain

blocks the grace that could save us


then truly what shield against evil what love that blesses

what the hell is life worth if this God of Love and Justice

is nothing more than the Top Gangster

"I gave you the gift of life...suck my nuts

or you're finished"


my eternal life is posited on pleasing a monster like this?


Merry fucking something or other indeed...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

welcome to another era in the earth

so far it looks like the worst of the old

why elaborate?

school children are cut down by a maniac

and other maniacs cry for more weapons

in America our fundamentalist lunatics

are going to continue to destroy our economy

as if the whole world were their private

pig-fucking communities

and their reactionary defenders actually have the nerve

to think they're entitled to an opinion

tell Jesus didn't waste his blood

I dare to tell me we are One

on some metaphysical level perhaps but in this world

it's another era of life in some blood-stained killing floor...

Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

alone in a dark room

on this cold cloudy twilight

on the day before this cosmically

posited winter reveals the so-called future


I let the early night soothe me

when I'm done typing this out

I'll turn out all the lights in this apartment

and sink into stillness and silence


and even if I manage to fully forget myself

even if that peace lasts mere seconds by a clock's reckoning

it will still be me fully lost to myself and so more truly me

than I've been in longer than I can recall


let the peace be...let Life come

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



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I'm sure in a few hours or days

my anguish of earth will reassert itself


but for the moment this precious lucidity

is the only window into the heavens I possess




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the Laws of Life

are harsh to those who made it so

for themselves and for others

ignoring our essential Oneness while


the Laws of Life

are soft and easy to those who knew

no distinction in our shared essence

and did what they'd have done to them...


in every instant of living

these Laws of Life must be restated

if only because of all conditions in creation

the densest and hardest to reach


is ego itself...breaking endlessly

the Laws of Life



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

whoever yearns to be delivered

will have to deliver themselves


whoever sat and waited for miracles

will have no miracles to receive


whoever thought any effort was futile

will have no help in their time of need


whoever complains that life is nothing

will have to settle for nothing...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I searched for my guru

but found my soulmate


the names didn't matter

they were one and the same...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

when next I speak

what language will issue?


will I be heard?

will I know what I say?


will there even be words left

to convey the mere symbols we'll leave behind?


when next we meet

will we know who we are?





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

a last salute

to the Piscean Age


dark and humid

and vivid in the imagination


oh how some of us

will miss those lusts of spirit and flesh


and mysteries that only now

in this fresh Aquarian dispensation


are unfolding and being revealed

but still beyond our weary mental limits


like Chinese boxes opening one

into another until the very last box reveals


the effigy of the God

at which the Piscean Age could only hint...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

peace beyond any happiness

that can be imagined

or any imagining

that can be understood


and it will come

beyond our endeavors

it will come

whether we want it or not




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

and so it shall be

in this new dispensation


the blessed more blessed

the bereft more bereft


and so it shall be

until the Great Reunification


when what's saved is saved

and the rest won't be left




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

there's a demon in me

that shits through my mouth

and calls it profound utterance


it entered me when I was 12

and I chose the flesh over the spirit

so I embraced what Leonard once called

the alibi of the artist


and now a demon mocks me

and all the utterance I can make at the moment is

ain't this the shit?




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

oh never mind...

it wasn't important

it had no power to alter reality

it is not the utterance of some god

or big bang or black hole

or whatever mystery animates creation


oh never mind...

it didn't matter at all


and so much so

I'll skip form

and not repeat the upper sestet

because even I am bored and tired

and wonder if my last words in this life will be


oh never mind...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

wow

I have a lot to say today...


you'd think by now

I'd know better...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the desperate are always

a reliable indicator


of the degree of self-sabotage

with which the world is frustrated


in its organization...

how many ersatz mystics longing


to escape the earthly societies

that invent crime to keep themselves


in business

or the reformers who'd overturn


the earth and never suspect

how much of the damage is thanks to


their projected self-hatred...

and the cause of so many desperate worlds...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I am not here

to keep anyone enthralled


I just pass some word

never knowing


what ear will hear...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I think I'm accepting

my failures very well


at least I learn

from my mistakes


would the same be said

for the bearers of woe


who never quite get

where and how they err...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I sent off the last

of my salutations


greetings to each

faceless entity


who rules my life

to death


wishing them the same


in gratifying solidarity...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

poor humankind

who won't understand

that to win

they must lose


what will poor

humankind make

of the gifts they

wrecked in their greed


the gifts innate

that were useless

because no one knew how

to utilize them


and that this is how

what they had they no longer had...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

so whom do I bless

and whom do I scorn


and how am I diminished

by such a choice?


in a void where silence

condones all activity


do we uphold all we are not

and abandon all we are?


with becoming the only alibi

we can summon in our defense


whom do you receive

and whom do you dismiss


and is my own fullness

an answer to you?




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

if all you needed was a delusion to roust you

then you've truly overshot your intention


life will always be what it's been

and the struggle of our souls remains as ever


to escape the material world even as it holds

your heel as you try to ascend


to enter what we call heaven

and hope it is not a hell to us who think too much


and live too little...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

what can be more depressing than seeing

the object of your abject dreaming


become nothing more than what they ever were...

lonely and at the mercy of their loves and their failures to love?




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

where will you go

when your tits knock against your knees


and all your sisters mock you

for your vanished beauty and


for your queen bee bitchiness?

enjoy your power while it lasts


your sexual preferences don't matter

everyone waits to take down the once-mighty....




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

again I'm mistaken


love is a joke

played on the lonely

who don't know how

to trade themselves for courage


sit silent at the other end of the phone

you think you're denying me...


you should only know how many loads

I've delivered to the paper towel over you


go play with your girl friend

you'd better be sure strong enough


to see the rest of your life out alone


in that you are no different than anyone...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the world begins yet again


new illusions replace old ones

old faiths are subsumed in new ideologies


and for all the hoopla of hosannas

we still aim for the stars


with the same binds that hold us to earth


my time may be gone

but at least I'll die in a world I know after all...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

Nietzsche reduced to beats


some young diva

(this month's flavor)

sings a song over

the diner's muzak


spreading the word that

whatever doesn't kill you

makes you stronger...


can you imagine?

is it right for Nietzsche

to be heard on a dance floor

of some club in Queens...or wherever?


and if it is who's to say otherwise?

only those who haven't seen the world

resolved to their satisfaction have a beef


somehow or other

someone's reality is bent by the news

irony aside for those of us who do remember that source...


and if the oracle is forgotten

the word somehow isn't...and endures...


listen up...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the man who has lost all delusions

suffers from the harsh truth of actuality


but if all he has lost is his delusions

he will not suffer so greatly


that he will forget gratitude

or lose the ability to forgive


who has lost all his delusions

will gain the emptiness of his own fresh start...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

with the rising of my consciousness

goes the best excuses for failure

I had for my life


now I cannot fall back

on weeping manipulation

or trying to get grace like caging a meal


like some beggar...I've exhausted my pleas

I have nothing left but what I can actually do....





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I am a voice

howling in some wilderness


I join other voices

and we sound like a pack of wolves


baying at the edges of our territory

the snow shank deep


and the moon gliding through a dark blue sky

casting tree shadows as if they were bars on some cosmic cage...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

anything can happen here

I hope you understand


because I certainly don't

but take it as I can


hoping you're the same...


really hoping your the same


because that's the only way you'll get through

and that's all that's happening here...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

gather around children


an ass-blast I'll deliver

flutter buster of revelation


to clear the room and let those

who remain know


their patience and fortitude

will be rewarded


disperse quickly children I ate beans last night


there's lesson #1...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I treated people like gold


and now the dross piles up in the heart

I can't wait to die


so I can look back over the lifetimes

that led to this incarnation


so I can see for myself and recall

what I did to deserved this ungodly sojourn


there's the alchemical gold

seeing the destruction I had to endure


so I could be what I was supposed to be


(which I'll never know as long as I'm in

this unholy lifetime's skin...)




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

o.k.

now what?


we are ready

but the One takes its time


everything in its time

whether it's time or not...


I'm done with spreading dying words

I wait with everyone else on the moment....




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I wish I still believed in faith


but no one's childhood lasts forever

and now after a lifetime of regret


I wish I had a faith to believe....


ah what am I saying? I do I do

all liability is on us and we fail


to the degree we suffer by not

making our own choices....


stop praying to the imaginary god of your mind

and get down deep and dirty with the rest of us


we're all at the mercy of the unforgiving Source of Life

and not a single one of us is exempt

I wish I still believed in my delusions


but a truth has wiped them out

with the compassionate sweep of our shared reality...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

as fast as I crank out these posts

someone out in the world

is picking up on  them


I wish I had something joyous to share

some kind of good news to bring

but frankly the news is always the same


it doesn't matter what you think

do wrong and you'll suffer


do right and yet you'll repent...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I feel ill all the time

and no hope lights my strength


I guess I choose rightly

this is the way of repentance


the hard penalties piling up

each and every single day


and even when we awaken from our delusions

to the bitter end we endure our consequence...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

let's stop talking about God


there is only the Ineffable Source of all life and love

and when we talk of God we talk of our delusions


our errors and our folly...

we have complete authority


to make our choices and if we cling

to a notion of some of a God it serves us right


to fail in our call to make moral choices wisely....




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

on this journey

of this alleged soul


I see that the world

and the empyrean


are one and the same


I wished so hard

to leave the world


but leaving creation itself is harder


and frankly I love consciousness too much

to condemn myself to the Unmanifest


if my sins are my responsibility

so is my salvation


with no hope of help from the Ineffable Source

I stumble on whether God likes it or not...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

this is as far as I can go in this sojourn


maybe you'll hear from me again

maybe you won't

what difference either way?


mercy the visage of judgment?

how can I affirm anything?

in my broken run I scramble to the finish line


as God's fists pound me more heavily...

oh what did I do to get it this hard?

knowing is not supposed to matter


and whatever I had to say probably did me

less good than it would for others

but is still just another crying echo in infinity


the last echo marking where I stopped and my journey continued...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

watch me as I fall

drifting down circles of hell

to the cold monster at the bottom


watch me as I panic

to see that face and find out it is

what I imagined to be the face of God


watch me before I disappear

and note the way not to go...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

oh how brief all happiness...

how often we miss it by anticipation before

and strained remembrance afterward

instead of living it while it happened...


eventually we'll reach the end

of this particular life's endeavor

and the happiness and how we lived it

and how we abused it will be one deep happening...




Content (c0 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

60 going on 14...

Christ haven't I learned anything?


or did I learn too much at first

and remain petrified for the rest of the way?


either way I became old

and what was done or not no longer matters


like most everyone else

I commit suicide by staying alive...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I can add no more

up to this point


I must stop and see

where I am and where I go


my heart is so sore

with no heir to anoint


my mind so fouled in its falsity

I can only stop and consider the woe


I do not pretend to teach you a thing

I've always spurned learning myself


how's that for balls?

hubris led me to an insight


and the insight said "you lose!"

and so I stand back...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

first to come

last to go


afraid to be alone


charming charming

and so desperately witty


afraid to be alone


then out in the pre-dawn

again alone...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

drill holes in your skull

to let light in


like a shaman on crack

who did not veil his face and now raves


blinded by the face of the One

head exploding with realities


beyond the capacities

of a mere human head to contain


drill holes in your skull

and plead apologies left and right


then lie still on a pallet

and stare up at the hole


of the longhouse roof

dancing moccasins in a vision visible only to you...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

how stupid to think I could make you happy

when I'm so unhappy myself...


I believed falsehoods of the Almighty

and now we both pay for the delusion


no grace to preserve

no faith to strengthen the dying bones


how stupid to think I cold make you happy

when all that is left is an echo of enticing whispers...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

poor men...the dogs...

whip out their rods

and draw the various "ohhs" and "ahhs"

from every woman who wants

to be protected and supported

as they feather nests and their beds


poor women...the pussies...

love their big strong breadwinners

while mocking them to their girlfriends

or keeping it warm with the usual

round-up of strays because for all their homing desire

they need it fresh sometimes...wet warm gaps...


and the gays and lesbians who trade

plus and minus taking turns wearing

the apron or the jock in the house

accordingly and finding gender has nothing in this

just one who needs to dominate and be boss

the other to be dominated and answers to "serf"


a free and equal love?

where's my "Bwahhhhahaaaa!?"

poor heads all who think they transcend

when all they do is affirm...who brings the bird and who basts it...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

we hear what we want to hear

so when we hear a truth

we assume it's wrong

or that we thought of it first


(however near to one's vanity

the content must resonate)

but what served you well

has lost its power


the field has changed and ever will

your grace exhausted

your luck run out

you'll hear plenty then and it will be true


and your assumptions will stop

and your shame be as a last confession...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

something leaves us to dangle here

a bit in the ceaseless wind


plenty of time to ponder

each error that drove us here


oh like it or not

we are in this together


and so much of our trouble comes

from each ignoring that cold fact...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

are you happy

now that you've pushed

everything too far?


now will you repent

and say "I'm sorry I'm sorry

I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry?"


just as our sins are our responsibility

so is our salvation and what will you say

after the dramatic death-bed conversion


shows you only a calm way to pass

ignorant of the reality you've shaped

as you've craved your way through the wood


a true Aspen shaking in the wind or stock-still

in the waiting for the outcome that already is?




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philp Milito. All rights reserved.

no freedom

except

the acceptance

of your limits...

Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

early middle of the night Monday morning


the black hole of a red skies

and slick wet streets drawing in the eye


always the shaking vividly scoped void

separating the peace of rest and Lord's-Day reflection

and the gray plunge back into the daily shuffle


past Monday midnight

always the most desolate time of the week

to have to crash out of place every day

the common condition that puts us

in the worse possible places


(oh I lost a good thought when I tried

to retrieve it) but it is our governing matrix

and it is just about time for that blank stare out


the window at the wet red cloth of the bleeding night...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the delusion that humanity

can command it

is the last delusion now being broken

by every process


resolving itself

in the vasts of all creation

and the unlimited spaces

of the heart...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

Not done!

Not done with me yet!




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I will miss the tumbling words

even if I'm the only one

who ever truly understood them...


but truly the thought that moved

the lips and quivered the throat

to produce the sound will allow me


long to grieve the fading habit of speech

I will miss nothing that's already there...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

everything in pieces


and we gather them

and stitch like mad


and come up

with some new design


as faulty as what's gone before

as rickety as every hope


for a future that is always here

and at some point


in all this scramble

we lose the particular thread


and let the pieces drop

and how they tumble together


is how we'll stumble along...

see you behind some ruin


that must endure by grace of God

because nothing we can imagine


or manage will do us any better

than to acknowledge the parts


that beyond our will make the wholes we endure...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

you get serious with me

talking my ear off

about sorrows

you project on my angers

by claiming I dump on you

take all my misery out on you

get snarky and shit on your little happiness

when all I'm doing is sweating the next job

like everyone else I know these days

this is no metaphysical shit

just plain old worldly how the fuck

do I pay these fucking bills?

hock and smother me tell me I'm worthless

then apologize after you've seen

I've cleaned upon upon mess

and now I'm so sorry I did

get serious with me

I haven't laughed in at least two weeks

get serious while your denial

establishes a framework for your fears

while I take care of business

and turn on my side to sleep....

Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

no one believed it

until it came true

breaking into all theories

and messing with notions of security


now all truths bit hard and deep

and old ways out of trouble

lead nowhere any longer

we were stuck in our cages


self-made and rigorous

while maniacs threw us meat

and sometimes snatched children

away before they could learn


the cold dark way of earth

and to disbelieve all they had learned...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

oh such heavy metaphysics

for one pea to contemplate...


pretending not to know

it was faking

(not intentionally...

never intentionally)


but as much buffoon

as the next clown looked down upon...


digging hard digging hard

in the Mysteries of Life...heh...


the next clown exemplifies this foolishness less

than the earnest questing mind does...


the Big Top empyrean in three to nine rings

Alighieri Barnum and Bailey with Vico as ringmaster...


oh so heavy for such a light brain...and therefore...the laughter...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

new moon won't shine

in the blaze of the sun


but hidden in that fire

is this darkened returning one


now free to re-define

the day and the night


and to give over entire

to our past's twilight flight


to be reflected in two weeks time

in the glimmer of the full moonshine

that will be when and will be where


a brightened glow will draw a stare

of bewildering comfort and some deliverance soon

one of the unending dreams for the next new moon




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

like amnesia

the illusions of an era

evaporate in an instant


and you're standing

blank and bewildered

on a flat unlit road


the stones beneath

naked soles poking

in tiny jabs


the awareness to waken

in the entranced mind

and be the present


surrounding the understanding


but like a dream upon awakening

who remembers anything?


feet bleeding

and no recall how

but forgetting all we were


as we face the vast empty void


as so many before have

and so many after will

stumbling on this Only Way


to learn new identities for nothing...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the next trail begins where this one ends

cross some imaginary line in your mind

to mark a before and an after

but what but Ineffable Mind

knows the exact material point this occurs

if humanity's pride would focus not on things

too vast to be attended...maybe then our race

would be run on a trail that neither stops or starts...

where we're going nothing hinders

our progress but our own limits 

erase that line since what's to come has already been

and we're already there and gone...

Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

blessed be the one who praises

even if he is unaware how much

his praising celebrates all beyond

his brief beliefs...


long long long

the Vastness of the All

and so quick the praising

full of peace even in its ceasing...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

if I were the fool for wisdom's sake

how wise would I be in the folly


of thinking I knew what I would do

if I were good for wicked cause?


glorious paradox shades quickly

into gross contradiction


and I'd be foolish not to be wise

enough to ignore the evil that goodness would fade...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

if we were capable of saving ourselves

don't you think we would have?


or do we try so we'll earn the right

to lose the lives we try to save?


nothing we do is comprehensive enough

we lack the totality of the All


to do anything at all about anything

including the acts for which we'd atone


though we'd suffer the consequence anyway

and if we were capable of saving ourselves


would we get it right? only if we did so

without thinking it right or correct or pleasing


to our idea of a deity...only if we did for another

without thought for ourselves


yes we've heard this perpetually throughout every crisis

of life and still our error's our only excuse


for try it yet again...unquenchable will to live

that would be no waste could we save ourselves...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All right reserved.

all plans washed out

as the Universe resets

all its dials to zero


we must stumble forward

God as reticent as ever

on the Way and how to follow it


no plans anymore

just follow your trial

with no win or loss


just the fact of being there...


and where it leads

is no concern

just get there


as the dials move forward yet again...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

count yourself lucky or fated or blessed

if in all our worldly turmoil

you can find some rest....



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

Light grows almost imperceptibly

and Darkness dwindles accordingly


against the feelings things will be alright

is the dread of knowing how long this last night....




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

another dream last night

about leaving where I am

to go back to where I came from...


home never specified

not even envisioned...


just the leaving

just the rushing around

making sure I have all my goods...


I've had dreams like this my entire life

and was never sure whether they were

omens of death or promises of redemption


now that I'm old it hardly matters

I still have those dreams


knowing God speaks to us in dreams

but in a language we can never understand

so I sleep and I wake


and I scratch my head

befuddled in another morning

dark as any night...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

ALL

resolves

in

darkness

and

silence


this

I

...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

if you're tired of this whining sadness

think about how I feel

sitting in this very flesh


watching this half-wit try to stage-manage

his destiny and frustrating it

by ignoring every authentic call


to action by imposing a willfully

constructed Plan that took for granted

the Universe's cooperation


his acknowledged confusion

distorting divine hints

with grumbling shame and hard defense


I'm one with my kind over the pains and joys

of drawing breath and struggle as hard

not to envy or hate a one for what they get


is the awarding for what they've done

and if mine by a paltry ruin

what is there left but let out a cry


oh I refuse to...better I rest my nerves

and my mouth and sing no more

unless it be to praise...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

here is my accomplishment

my fortitude my grief


here is the endless living

that spurns any relief


one day when death will finally come

and I'll be released from this sojourn


I'll be delivered to another

where my faults will give me another turn...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I wish I could call up

whatever happiness I've known


let it sustain me in my privations

and give me a chance to go on


but I've lost that ability

I've seen it all and it's done


and now I gather with the so many others

who aren't the only one...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

waiting to die

is like living each day


you know it's coming

but you don't know when


and life continues

to involve you in merciless dreck


until unawares here it comes

and there you finally go...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

pushing myself along a road

that ends only in the All


I wonder if all this bullshit of living

is worth a necessary fall


to maker futile attempts at amendment

for a god who won't forgive


is there anyone who can tell us

that there's some good reason to live?




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

so I accept my fate

die under my price


the Lord has no mercy

no forgiveness or love


but justice that kills

the penitent clean


and grace that revives it

with a higher price


there's no reunion without penance

and amendment absolution and mastery


of every lesson every hardship taught

beyond our human comprehension


and such are all our fates that there'll be

no rest until reunion...good luck...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

if all I've perceived is uselessly and void

then what sad excuse for the wrongs that I've done?


it's strange how even trying to do right

lands you in the hell you've tried so hard to avoid


my imaginings of destiny are foolish tokens of

a selfish drive to save my own life


which I must lose as scripture says

there's no escaping that we're always in the wrong...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I've been saying good-bye my whole life

all the while not wanting to leave


but my time and my place

are winding down


and now the time approaches when

I'll finally be shown the door


and all I've failed to do

will build me my next world....





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I trust in nothing


everything I've believed

has been shown a hoax


atonement a delusion

to ease the inescapable pain


and consequence the last tamp

of the shovel on the dirt


of the grave of everyone's folly

if some have escaped this


then it's luck of the draw

or hidden reserves of grace


that no one without it can comprehend

but I trust in nothing so I'll hope won't land me


out the small end of the horn...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

what power-that-be

that shows no mercy

permits no amendment

forgives no slight


is laying me out

my soul to release

any more of this love

will kill me surely


why go on hating myself

because this source of creation

has no remorse?

I no longer do either


and am as ready as I can be

to face this vengeance in the name of love...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

this rainy night

seals my past


my poems are said

and done at last


now I can

give up my pride


turn all weariness

neatly aside


I spoke in the sunlight

I saw the grass shake


I spoke in the moonlight

with all silence at stake


now on this rainy night

the last poem uttered I turn out the light




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

love and karma and process

and all of us in it

and each of us thinking

we can outwit

love and karma and process


makes me eager to be done

makes me eager to be gone from here

where love and karma

and process are our raison d'etre




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

there's a reason

the dead are grateful

that living cannot

comprehend


being half-dead

I'll tell you

as soon as I

find out in full...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

last time

I was through here

my limbs were strong

my mind alert


this time

may be the last

my limbs withering

my mind in constant


retrospection

any time

I come through here

is ever the same


my limbs missing

my mind full...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I feel my way along

the walls of the world


inching forward

in impenetrable darkness


oh nothing there but air

I must've passed a portal


I enter that space

and feel my way along currents


the waving flutter of

the walls of the empyrean...


as the darkness brightens

my fear grows


after all this maze gliding

I will see where I am and faint...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

a happy violent people

are entering the world


it is their time to purge

it is their time to dance


no matter how high

the spirit aspires


flesh will draw them

again and again


down into the blindness

of the vision they inhabit


a love of earth so intense

they'll never need fear


redemption nor the loss

of the dust they'll ever be





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

maybe in some highest heaven

Light shines on an absurd mildness


but is what is above

reflected below?


down here particulars

wildly morph while essence


remains inscrutable

as one's own imagination...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

oafs run free

bigots belie the profiles

the psychotics need

you hoisted on a pyre


God blesses

one and all

and He will love you

even when you fall


destruction assured

fairy tales bless

raving lunatics

under duress


their heavens

bogs to suck them under...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I pick up my pieces

like a fussy beggar

examining the gutter

for specific butts

(not too short

ah just a filter left)


and all of this

to assemble myself

just so I can tumble

on down to the corner

loiter at the end of the block

and stare across the street


at the opposite sidewalk

as though it were a new world




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the last transmission came in clear


it said abandon all posts

the end is truly near


and what fresh start

you yearn for the most


will only be just the merest part

of what it is that's left you


that hasn't fled just to bereft you


give it up kindly

be glad to be done

only a fool spurns rest


no further transmissions likely

be happy to be on your own


with nothing further to attest...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

but DAMN IT!

all awareness of error

sorrow and desire

to repent to atone…

but oh no grace to transform

no mercy for failings…

yet no forgiveness in the Judgment?


I begin the trek out of this muddy trench…

and I’ll be trudging still…

long after the concerns of this lifetime have passed…




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I'm dying

but not quickly enough


having lived so long

loving all the rough stuff


cock sucked hard

all black and blue


by women as lost

as I am to You...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

damnable life

wasted


and never more so

than trying to do what's right


oh sickening One

tyrant of all tyrants


You bred the faults

and blame us for them....




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

oh mouth

oh serious and concerned mouth


shut yourself

in your incessant moan


keep it quiet and moan alone

you don't need it

and no one else does


blood gap-toothed mouth...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I'm ashamed to be part of this farce



if the alleged Holy One deems this the way

life must unfold


then we truly are fucked...


by Divine Design...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

stupid assed technology


when the grid falls all our knowledge goes


there is no sin and evil

like Man's hubris


his vanity

his stupidity





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philikp Milito. All rights reserved.

low sun

early afternoon

the darkest part of the year


soon the night will reclaim

its dominion and hold tight

until the blackest moment turns


and slowly the year begins the climb up

from this pivot of spirit




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

my ‘evil twin’

held at bay

I’ve pondered him much

wondering who is the real me

the one who blesses

or the one who curses


pondering too much

how much harm

how much healing

how to tell the difference

I feel that ‘twin’

scratch inside my skull


best give him a wide berth for now

so many little things that will grow if left unattended…




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. all rights reserved.

something lurks behind the veil

it waits on me to part curtains and pass through


is it family or friends

who've gone beyond


or old enemies who've yet to learn

the hurts they maintain


only hurt them

or even the passing stranger


who could've changed the tone

and meaning of my earthly living?


is it a gang of guardian angels

henchmen of the One waiting to give me


a last painful send-off? I tread the chosen path so

it hardly matters what lurks ahead of me...


I part curtains and pass in somehow no surprise...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

on awakening my mind

grasps at fading dreams

and claws only images

of some forgotten whole


and the peace-beyond-peace aura

disappears into the external world

this smooth-sided pit

a dim sun shines into...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

sheep in the meadow

sheep tired after a hard day's grazing


goes home at night to lie

with drugged sheep in the pen


sheep will fall

sheep will rise


sheep will make good mutton

once he's been cast aside...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

another day in eternity


waiting on a street corner

under a slight drizzle


thinking of bills and delayed checks

and angels lining amber shining


corridors of the Empyrean

and when I'll see my love again


in all of her blinding beauty (o cliche hoedown!)

and when the rowdy men will pass me by...


waiting on a street corner

under breaking clouds and patches of blue


another day in eternity

that I'll forget until some Culmination


in eternity focuses on every part of the Continuum...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

all is accounted for

to this instant of my life...

to move on and go forward from this

I must dig deeper into myself

whether I’m ready or not...


this new infusion of energy

to go down the home stretch of this sojourn

this race that has been run

with such scattered patience.




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

fools are tools for the wicked wise


everyone scrambles for their place

among the rowers who on the galleon of state


deliver these ersatz kings of the world

to some wild unrecognizable shore


where they cannot control the response

where they will find their place among the stones


the fools steer the soon-to-be wreck

tools to some larger justice


leveling whole worlds where

the wise repent of their misuse of wisdom


and the fools tool with their loot...the remains of emperor dross....




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

you stand with me on the precipice

and ask me what will happen next...


as if I knew...


we step off the edge

and gravity delivers us

to our blood-smeared release


after that it's every soul

(in God of course) for itself...


step with me if you have to...

I'll go down with you...


and upward afterward...

well...that will become evident soon enough...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I've settled my business


and the front door of this life-long house

swings wider open than it ever did


have I wore out my welcome?

did it ever matter if I was here or not?


there's no concern in it

I did my part and prepare to leave


and whatever happens now is someone else's business...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

you will be loved

I almost guarantee it

and wish to live long enough

to be able to see it


I'm so sorry I hurt

and disappointed you

but for what it's worth

I suffer for your true


salvation

at the hands of love we hold

misused but contrite

on the the failure's rigid cold


you will be loved

I will spend all my prayer to make it so....






Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

a New Age for some

another day on the wheel for others


one earth supports

so many worlds



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

apocalypses come and go


even the Great Solstice of 2012

will happen then pass


and the earthbound will continue

their death by matter


while the ersatz mystics will claim

a higher vibration and their own theories


of support will also come and go




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the misty sun goes down

and the humid twilight's slate-gray


wisps of fog

flow like fingers of the breasts of the hills


I stand vacant on a street corner

mind a blank


being the content of this sundown

and all the wreck of the day it takes with it...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

my head blew up

and all these words spilled out


well it finally happened

the peeking under the veil and its consequence





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I make no boast

and no plea


I'll save you

if I can save me


if I can't

then we're both screwed


let us each call songs our rants

and on our failure let us coast




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I'm not stopping

until I'm stopped...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

you rode away on a bike

in my dream

distant on a gravel path

by a river

blocked by lumbering figures

Seurat would not have noticed


and turn of the head

and I'm looking down a tree-lined

dirt road also with figures

dark and indistinct as if wrapped in

black shawls like fevered nuns

a lantern of sun hanging low over the treetops


and somehow I wind up

in a house looking over packed bags

and listening to an unintelligible voice

on the other end of the phone line


one of my periodic dreams of leaving

alway going back to where I came from

so many dreams like that through all my years

God how I wish I were finally gone...finally back...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

just because I despair

doesn't mean Reality is changed in any way


my despair today is just one facet

just as my joy another day


also fills a color

in the spectrum of longing


just because I feel joyous

only means Reality doesn't change


nor do we

in our own multiplicity...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

only when the One inside me

joins the One inside you


can we stand against

the deaths of all the no ones


what prayer to save them?

none but their own


may they met the One

inside of them





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

these posts spill out of me

like salt


as if I could talk my way out

of whatever


end I've made for myself...

oh I'm a fool


who thought he was wise

and now I'm an idiot screaming at the sky...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All right reserved.

I'm sending my best wishes

to you my dear


my blessings and love

like a tongue in your ear


oh how I need you

oh how I want you


oh how sorry I feel

to look like I haunt you...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I cannot hope

but that's o.k.


hope only got me

in trouble anyway


I thought I

was doing good


but nothing amended

as it should


now I know better

after a wasted life


no sins are forgiven

and atonement is slow


and you'll see no mercy

wherever you go...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

it isn't easy to rectify mistakes


the world does not forgive

God does not forgive


oh...fix things all you want...

but expect no mercy


expect no grace

perfection is like an evil in itself


tight as a snare and implacable as death...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

a whole day and night of anguish...


and in the following morning

a body lying in bed


still as a corpse but for the eyes frantic with twitching...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

what will you do when I'm no longer here?


just what you've been doing...


if nothing we do matters

then it doesn't matter what we do


and only a megalomaniac

could possibly believe


his work will matter to anyone...


another fool wrapped in his vanity...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the warm hazy December day

will be followed by winter

cold and uncompromising

as the Law...and we take some heart

in the false spring

the brief reminder

of all the hopes with which we enter

the world and leave it bereft...

Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

oh I am stopped in my tracks

but a life's worth of debris


if I'm absolved

it won't matter until


some other life and it in service

to all the wrong I've added


to my burden...

oh Christ...to have to repeat this horrible form...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I've been trapped

by my own aspirations


I know my amends

and I know my intent


why it doesn't matter

to the One who demands restitution


I'll never know in this skin

this poor ignorant skin hanging in a divine tannery...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

are you happy?

are you free?


if you think you are

think no further


because you're not

but oh what we can do


in ignorance

of the hard cold facts...





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I'm at the end of my rope


I've been here before

and the One is pleased


to have me here again

you make your plays in life


and the One weeps...

help that is no help


every idle word lynching me divinely...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

grace is like vapor


a wisp that scatters

in the first hard wind


of the Mystery that

dispenses grace


nothing matters

in the face of this delusion


grace disappearing into the mist of our hopelessness...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

when this round of life is over

I know we shall be together


your lips and arms and thighs

all the heaven I ever wanted


so we rise so we fall

and the beautiful eyes


of your blinding face

are where I have been heading


for my own judgement

oh sweetest sister


I will love you forever

if you let me be your beard


and even if you do not it is you

I've searched for all this life...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

it’s times like this

make me wonder if all the striving and trying

to amend and do right is in vain…

I speak and I know I’m not being heard…

but when none can understand

or accept the communication

then how can the connection

be reattached and made whole again?

Or must it be? Should it be?

It’s time like these that make me doubt

the power of words and all that anyone has to say…






Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

so this is how lives end…

the fading light…

the failing powers…

the surrender to some end

whose arrival is unknown to the earthly mind…


the despair at all the situations

overwhelming you because

your luck and your time have run out…

and all the life you’ll lived

and all you’ve loved far behind you now…

nothing left but now…as ever…




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

domesticity

is the

killer

of love...


run free

while you can

be ignorant

of consequence


your death

will only

deliver you

and from the hand


of a love that once

wanted the same freedom you wanted...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

like the chattering of birds

are the foreign women of those who’ve made this Queens neighborhood their international settlement…Spanish Turkish Korean Japanese Indian...alluring at one time but now all dialects meaningless and indistinguishable to this worn-out American ear that in its youth felt his cock grow hard at such chattering and now is old and tired and used to this chattering….womanily concerns the same in all languages…the bills the children the macho philandering husbands the treacherous best friends who entice the the weak and mighty male…oh oh oh so tired tired of this endless world of endless bullshit bullshit bullshit bullshit bullshit….





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I hate the backtalk…

and I hate enduring some bombastic ignoramus

having his say…

and I hate all this noise noise noise…


cacophony of egos…

now do you see why I LOVE LOVE LOVE the silence?





Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

Every time my blood pressure rises, I’m stoked—I’m fired up—I wanted go blind and tear down house like Samson—

Then the mood changes—the anger passes—and all I can say is “What is the use of righteousness, if everybody’s entitled to their own reality? What does it matter if everybody’s right ‘from their side’?”

You’ll wind up playing your own part in the sad charade of Life and have nothing to show for it but your own tears, and your own deluded error!

What vile, tricky temptations await those who try to enforce righteousness, when they themselves are full of their own wickedness?




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

the age may be ending

but we are not


whether we stay or go

our desire in unending


let the Power-That-Be

give us all the worst for it


our love will be the gold

that God burned dross away from...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.