ANOTHER FLOATING DAY, ANOTHER CHANCE

another floating day

with images of my past

and the sounds that preserved them


caught in the tapping tangle

of bare branches and certain plays

of light against the buildings


and how could anything matter

on this day beyond our mere control

that can only chip and nick


surfaces we chosen for our contact

with the matter that encases us?

you can lie with your mouth but not with your heart


our petty damages hurt only us in the long run

and will not happen if you but float with the day...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

AT THIS TABLE

the slightest glimmer of enlightenment is:


God runs the game...


it is you who chooses whether

to hold or to fold




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

NO USE SAYING A THING

we all have our various stratagems

for dealing with this inhospitable world


you don't hurt me and

I won't hurt you


how much more basic

can it get than that?


it's only when we think too much

that we fiddle with small perfections


and ruin the masterpiece over which we slave...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

STONE KINGDOM

the street corner cranks say

we live in the Anti-Christ's Time...


barring only the florid mythology

I can't say they're wrong


you can't do anything...can't walk down the street

can't go to the store without some spy camera


recording your every move...making note of your license plate number...

tracking you by computer to every place you visit


to target you for prizes...giveaways...interagency probes...


and they got there and control all infrastructure

by the indifferent consent of the average joe assholes


who'll never in this life master his hungers and feed his starved brain

grooming his children instead for a servitude to some infernal machine


that would take more to bring down than some naive idealists

suiciding themselves against the corporate fortresses


to become a useless symbol of opposition...

yes you can tell I am from another age when there were possibilities


to damage this complex...but even then your average joe asshole

sabotaged every effort to instill justice...and even helped the conquering powers


stay in power...and so on this Good Friday we remember

the ultimate rebel who was brought to death by these very traitors to life


and it is our lot to live in their clueless CEO's idea of a Millennium

in this treacherous conformity many truly think is Oneness


it's always been so...there have always been scabs...there have always been Judas...

but the technology these days make them truly invincible...


I'll waste no more time wondering why God allows this or anything

if the liability is truly on each of us then damn it do what you must


for this too shall pass is mighty cold comfort when it is your time

to endure this seemingly undefeatable evil...


cash in your soul why don't you for a heart of stone...

and a promotion code that will give you the chance to win


a million shares of dead soul points toward a heavenly reward

a limited time offer...void where prohibited...and certainly


a chance to shovel shit in some other bracket...Happy New Age my darlings...




Content (c) 20082013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

ASKING FOR TROUBLE

I was honest and fair and kind and forgiving

and all I got for my pains was a three-inch-wide asshole...


go ahead...do the right thing...

just know you'll be asking for trouble...





Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

FACING ULTIMATE REALITY

if I were God

I'd like to think I'd be

a lot sweeter about things


less the tyrant who demands

total obedience and no questions brooked

lest I plummet in grace


we have complete liability for our acts

and it is on us to judge and repent of ourselves

and God lifts not a finger but to enforce the penalty


I love consciousness so I had better swallow my pride

if I want to live forever

even knowing I am the least of men has a certain arrogance


to it that disqualifies me from grace

that comes only when it is not so selfishly desired

oh One is this how we accept mercy as


a visage of judgment? as if it were possible for any of us to know...

if I were God

I wouldn't be this sad soul projecting his meek desires


on the vast processes of creation

that are the very heartbeat of Life itself...

one day I hope to be wise...and strong...and brave enough


to understand I am always part of the God I wish to join...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

SO EFFORTLESSLY EARNED

is there someone here I cannot respect

for destroying all he touches and congratulates himself

on the unseemly horror?


the world is ever filled with these unholy selfish

who are so empty of spirit all they can do

to feel any worth is to kill another for their peace...


let them come after me...my blood on their hands

will give them the hell they've so effortlessly earned...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

NO LONGER YEARN

my nostalgia is exhausted


what was actual only once in infinity

is preserved in the mind and on the soul


of who experienced that blessed (or not)

singular event and in that


it lives as long as the participant does


so I can no longer yearn for what has been...

how can I when I have it within me always?




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

NO PRAYER

none can give you a guarantee

that salvation will be smooth and light


you'll struggle with your own misery

in the darkness of your own fight


pray for nothing that is not yours

to have or to covet or to receive


if destruction is all your heart adores

then expect no prayer your pain to relieve...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

IN THE EARTH

long and slow

hard and dirty

yet we're told nothing

is unclean of itself


weakened and beaten

soft on the ground

we die of ourselves

in dying of each other




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

THIS ONE

this one hates that one

and each prays to God

to kill the other


such brotherhood

makes one wonder why

Christ even bothered


out of this weave

what hope to believe?




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

CONVERTS

converts are so hard on others


because even though they've converted

their hungers and their weakness

still rage under the righteousness


take them with a proverbial grain of salt

even if they get nasty about it

take what you need to hear from them and leave them


to their struggle...as you'll be left to yours...





Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

YOUR HEAD SAYS NO

your head says no


but every fiber of your being

ignores the head and reaches

for its liquor its drugs its cunt its cock

its pillow to clutch and corner to suck


you follow your heart down to its pit

and think it's your own choice

but sometimes the heart says one thing

and the head says another and it turns out


your head was right...could you bear that


if you sought an answer to your hunger

fed by griefs and doubts and fears beyond mastery

because you waited for something else to happen?

nothing happens but this...what you do and how you'll do...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

NEW DAWNS A-PLENTY

the reformers and the 'feel-good' philosophers

mean well (let's give them

the benefit of the doubt)


but each 'brand new dawn of your life'

follows some old night ending

and will itself be an ending night some day...


so it's no pass...what are you

going to do today?




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

A COMMON STATE OF BEING

the constant vow

of the weak


"I'll be strong tomorrow

but let me have


today to repent and pity..."

and oh yet again


each day when

tomorrow never comes...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

ODD HEROES

Isaiah

Jeremiah

Hosea

(just to get

personal

about it)

would not believe

the shit I've endured


or maybe they would

and that's why

they sound like

they do

and why I listen

and emulate too (where I can...)





Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

THIS YEAR'S WEATHER

5 days into spring this year

is but an extension of winter...


the light kitchen light dim

as I look out the window


at the dim gray morning


I love mornings like this...


but I also like the seasons

when they are supposed to happen...




CXontent (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I PLAYED...

I played with the idea

that I was invisible


then realized I could not float...

have I got time on my hands!?





Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

RIGHT NOW

I was given a choice

between living in the past

and projecting into the future


there was no need to choose...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

SURVIVAL

the wise man hides his wisdom...





Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Miligto. All rights reserved.

COMMUNITY

no one awake

but that's o.k.


I need all the wiggle-room

I can manage


I steal out at dawn

to watch the sun rise


but someone finishing

his night shift


is always around

sticking a nose


where it should not be

keeping an eye out


on his walk home

for anyone who's not going home...



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

BLACK-AND-WHITE

I miss the black-and-white world

where judgment is easy

and justice is a tool for vengeance


but at some point I strayed

over a line and found myself

praised for what I failed at


and blamed for what I did right

there's a reason I keep

my own thinking to myself


just walking out in the open

is both good hiding and an invitation

to catastrophe at once


and my occupation of the gray zone of some void

is no help or pardon...




Content (c) 20080-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

VICTIMS AND OPPRESSORS

victims and oppressors

share a common face


and circumstance dictates

who is who


in any given situation


so your friend and your foe


may be one and the same

depending on what's given and received...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I WANT TO SLEEP

now for sure

the long day takes its toll


hard thought

and long heartache


with every desire resolving itself

in the fading twilight


I know now what I want

I want to close my eyes and dream




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

GREAT MINDS

great minds

have nothing on my mind


we all ponder the terms

we all draw the same blank




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

WHEN YOU KNOW HOW IT IS

such futile rage

when you become aware

of the complicity of all

in the wreckage of the earth


no matter what each

individual mind thinks it's doing

the breakage is huge with every

careless sweep of the hand


and that is the dismay

when you know how it is


rage and awareness

complicity and wreckage

thinking mind and careless hand

that is the dismay




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

GOLD AND FILTH

I have no love

for the world as it is


but it is what it is

and I suffer because


I have no love for it...

within this layer of worldly filth


is the gold of the divine

and the more the shine is hidden


then I and the world

remain blind...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All right reserved.

NO...I'M NOT READY AND WHAT OF IT?

there is some mastery of my emotions

necessary to move forward


in my soul's progression

but I cannot do it yet


one moment I rave and curse God

and everything in creation for being foul and false


and the next moment the anger passes

and remorse reminds me I've again failed


to master my hurts and all it means to God

is a tally of plus and minus I must balance


if I am to achieve some measure

of forgiveness and grace...


bearing all liability even though God created everything

set all patterns and is the very life force


flowing through and sustaining all of us

though we cannot say so without 'falling from grace' as they say...


and so each day...ready or not...a damnation or salvation

swinging like a metronome to the tune of each


ordinary eternal day...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

U.S. GUN CONTROL

the ravening power-mad neanderthals

of the National Rifle Association


the evil brutish mongrels of low soul

and less spirit


and all the spineless cowards in the U.S. Congress

who kowtow to these mongols


to keep their jobs of fleecing the very constituents

who elected them to look out for the common good


and each individual 'citizen' who espouses this

unmitigated hatred


uncaring of all civilized concord...

I wish each and every one of them to rot


in their own hells

and if God Almighty Him/Her/Itself


will not forgive me for not being enlightened enough

to turn the other cheek and bless my enemies


then let it be so...if I have to suffer for doing the right thing

then be damned for doing the right thing


then let God be alone at the end of creation's term

demanding the impossibilities we cannot rise to...


there may be some ultimate judgement on these evil bastards

but it will come too late to do any of us


any good...who try like fools to do good

only to be done down by tricksters from God


down to the least of his...oh who who who

help us when we ourselves  who must help ourselves


are denied?




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

AN EASY MOMENT

all has gone well lately


connections made

no misunderstandings


accord in love

and social concourse


and I savored the moment

fleeting as spring snow


with no thought for what hell will follow...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

BRIDGES FROM HERE TO HERE

bridges aid us in crossing over


but not from here to somewhere else


wherever we go we are still here

and the bridges are still here also


so go through stages and look at them

different and familiar at once


you are only crossing from here to here


on bridges that are nowhere else...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

THE PERMANENCE OF NOW

for you thought in terms

of somewhere else

and sometime other


know the only instant

in which your thought

and your act fuse


into one doing

that is your choice

whether to do it or not...


in what moment

you make your choice

know that it is permanent


with such permanence as permanence has

in the only now there is



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

ALL OVER AGAIN

and now to start all over again...


because I thought I knew better

in my delusion of a life


I'm told God is patient and merciful

but I know it's until patience and mercy


run out...and then we stand with our burdens

like someone who got to the dock


in time to see the ship pull out and set off...


and now to start all over again...


thinking only of 'might-have-beens'

with the occasional joyous memory


popping up in mind

to remind us in wasn't all in vain


and it is on that that we start over again...



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

RENEW

to renew

to be reborn


just let go

of your total past


and actually do

what you must


exactly when you must...

think it's easy?


a snap of the fingers?

a trembling in the knees?


it's so simple and easy

no one can help but fuck it up...


and somewhere in that ruin

renewal...rebirth...if you can do it...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

SOMEONE

someone's awake and tracking me


whoever you are

I hope your day


turns out better

than mine


you have plenty to see

I've nothing left to do


I should be following you...


whether you're better off or not...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

ITEMS

philosophy

ethics

psychology

hunger


the inner realm

the Outer Darkness

the stubborn resistance

the simple obedience


the way in

the way out

in the way

which way now


acquiescence

peace



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

FINDING THE WAY TO WHERE YOU ALWAYS ARE

I was expecting something else

when I crossed over


but it looks no different than here

and all the time in creation


to strip away all the misconceptions

that diminished what I knew to be true


and guessing with all the confusion of flesh

just what it was I was expecting...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

EMPTY

empty hands


but for the stains

of previous mischief


self-bloodletting

and other outrages


against those who loved me

but I couldn't believe it


until my hands were empty...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

YOU WILL FIND ME

you will find me

right where you left me…


blank in the morning sun

with visions


of endless nights

still alive in my nerves


and dull in another life

as you again approach




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

TODAY

today

a touch of rage

blind hatred against fate


still a little bit

of resentment

at wising up to Reality


cannot accept it

at this moment...



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. all rights reserved.

HARRYHAUSEN

why

in the name of all that's 'allegedly' holy

is there no scheduled release in America

for the film

RAY HARRYHAUSEN SPECIAL EFFECTS TITAN?


I know what's wrong this sickening country

that denies its own birthright

every opportunity...but why this?

son of O'Brien who together with him worked out

some of the basic concepts of cinematic magic?


is Harryhausen yet a prophet without honor in his own country?


and what about the big shot talking heads in the film?

the Jacksons? the Spielbergs? the Camerons?

these high and mighty jerk-offs can't work

a distribution deal for this man they so claim to worship?


maybe I should say the hell with it and hope I come

across it at some point before I die...


because I am reminded in this

that the true greats are not fully respected

let along understood


and being left to the side like this

can only re-affirm his greatness...praise being

such a false self-serving thing to the disciples

who can never hope to really measure up...



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

THAT"S HOW IT IS

nothing ever completely finished

done and dusted

accounted for and dismissed


we have threads to unravel

well into what is to be


and how we unravel them affects

how it is to be...


no

nothing is ever really finished

at least until the amendment is complete


the price paid

the lesson learned


and all the bitterness of ego dissolves

into the healing power of the One...see you there?


I hope so...for me...for you...for all of us...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

THIS ENTITY AT THIS POINT

Once again among you

I have wailed and denounce and lamented--

now I must return--to repent--to confess--to atone--

hard as this transition will be--may it not be worse than what we've known previously--

life will continue one way or another and what is to come

will reflect what has been--but not to be repeated--nor reinstated--

I've been outcast too long--will I be forgiven my ingratitude?

will I finally forget the price of disloyalty to those who trusted me?

finally forget the sufferings and loneliness of my separation?

will I be taken back in, and go out no more?

our time in the earth is ending and the term is closing--

it's a long way to go if you don't know where you've been--

I await the final word of my liege--may I not doubt my own words

of confession--may I no longer abuse the grace that has protected me all along—



that was me—ages ago—an outcast—a Wraecca as the Olde English would call the wandering exile—

pompous even to himself I was—

and oh what do I have to show for it but a ground’s eye view of a misty park this fine late winter evening—and lampposts like lit dandelions—ablaze with spores of seed-snow trembling to join a breeze through the deserted night
as he—I that is—felt pulling in the brain clashing memories that resembled each other in the guises of various times—

all this agitation in the soothing dampness of  a night—where now a cleft forms in the air over the park—a glowing sheen of moonlight surging brighter then dimming—brighter then dimming—radiates in that pocket of fog—then fades away as the air again comes together and the mist again dominates—

and in all this instant—I who was he—and I who was she—but always always I—we all stay in this moment just a moment longer—but before again I must move forward—before I again must move on—


how much I’ve longed to escape the physical world—how much I wanted to flee the pain and the suffering of this lowest level of creation—with the densest concentration of energy and the heavy drag of flesh and matter destroying any hope of transcendence—

but no—it’s not like that—oh poor deluded ignoramus I am—here is here and now is now and oh so much illusion to strip away to even begin to live as we should—






Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

THE CHOIRS OF ANY DAWN

good morning...

I know I'm keeping you awake


but once you're up

you'll join the chorus...


be alto to my bass

be complimentary counterpoint


to the main theme...good morning...

love smoothes all our wild peeps


into grace notes...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

THE DESPAIR THAT IS HOPE

love is never lost...


how own bitterness and hatreds

must somewhere along the line


be given up and forgotten

be atoned for and forgiven


our liability is our crushing burden

but while our regret and bitterness will fade


love at least will never be lost...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

WERE YOU EXPECTING SOMETHING ELSE?

how long and hard to change one's mind...


all one believed needing to be

overhauled


reevaluated

set to realization


their is no other 'world'

no other place


than right here right now...

there's no escaping anything


this is what it is to be alive

to be in all the snares of perfection


that rule us beyond our ability

to remember and continue...


and how long and hard it is to awaken to the fact and live it...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

CONFESSIONS BY THE POUND

oh how hard (at least for me)

to overcome pride and intolerance


of other's shortcomings when I myself

am at the mercy of my own unfailing faults...


I claim no superior position

I know I've done wrong


but it is so entwined with what I knew

(or thought I knew) had to be rightly done


that I'm as flummoxed any other soul

facing all the righteousness that turned out to be


bad disguise for ignorance and selfishness...

oh what to do now that won't add to my error?


all I can do is keep as honest accounting as I'm able...

and (woe to my inner control freak) just let it be...



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

THE PLAN, ALAS

I'm still paralyzed

by the realization...the actual realization...


of my immortality

and all the dense responsibility that goes with it...


never are we off some hook...

never are we excused from any consideration...


we are One and we are All

and oh the despair of enduring those not awake to this ultimate reality...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

OH LORD...OH "US"

having awoken to reality


there is much in mind

that must be adjusted


I too believed in a merciful

God of Grace and Forgiveness


but I did not know

that God does not judge...


it is we who judge ourselves

and an entire change of thought


must now be in order to even begin

to atone because eternity is here and now...always...


even released from the material world

life is no different 'there' as 'here'


we are always responsible for all we do...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

ZANZINGER

so fifty years on


and this cracker scumbag

may be rotting in the hell of his own making


good let him suffer like all crackers before him

bigoted hateful white Christian scumbags


who murder in the name of Jesus

and God gives them a pass...


but damn it damn it DAMN IT

that we live in a creation that demands we judge ourselves


and we think we owe nothing to anybody

I'm not begging God for my life


my own inability to forgive is my own striggle

and a work in progress for who but this God knows


how many more lifetimes...

but damn the evil of righteous bigots


damn the evil of their murderous egos

they won't be brought to heel soon enough to suit me


but then...I put faith in  a cartoon god

when I should have put faith in myself


my road to atonement is long

but Zanzinger and his ilk have a longer tougher row to hoe


damn them damn them DAMN THEM

for the hell they make of the earth


and let the God who sits on His hands

and leaves all liability on us


have NOTHING to say...

we face our own shit...but Lord will YOu allow


flowers to sprout????



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

HOW DO YOU LIKE THEM APPLES?

no waiting for miracles

not of our own making


no help or love

unless we have given help and love


as given time and time before

we make our own heavens and hells


to be brave and strong and wise enough

to understand and correct lies all and only


in our help and our love

for all beyond ourselves...


oh the toughest test of the ego

to acknowledge our Oneness


and find one's own salvation

in the loving of another...




Content (c ) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

AS IS

you live in eternity


there is no here or there

there is no heaven or hell


there is only here

profoundly here


no God on a judgment throne

meting out punishment or reward


your own conscience calls the shots

your own conscience sees clearly


when all the confusion

of flesh lifts from your mind


and you see you are no different

than you were in the flesh


your quirks your procivilities

your personality all and always the same


but without the material attachment

as if this world of sorrows were all there was


it's here it's real

but only the densest from of energy


a 'black hole' for our souls

to be drawn into for testing and fine-tuning


but more merciful than a 'black hole'

because the material plane you can


work your way out of...

all liability is on us


and no questioning why life is formed

the way it is...


and knowing this isn't enough...

life is active and continuous


until we atone and amend enough

to leave these processes behind...


the choice is yours...stay bound to the wheel

or free yourself to what is...so easy it's almost impossible


for no matter where we are or what we do

we do it here and now on all levels of creation


living...as we do...in eternity...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

THE LAST OF THIS LINE

here in the earth

or above in the finer dimensions


my load is my load


and the only judgment

is my own


maybe now I'll find out

where I erred and where I advanced


but I'm the only one who knows

where I was true or where I was false


and where I end up is my responsibility

God gives you more than enough rope


so you have the choice of hanging yourself

or tying everything up and be done with it


moving beyond any idea of heaven with which you've fooled yourself...





Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

LEONARD

Cohen is a King of Poetry...


fuck Academia

and their approved vasemakers


their art is trivial beyond consumption

fit only for high-minded liars


who'll write a poem to your suffering

while you sink into the bog...


Leonard got loose

Leonard got free


and he's lived a real life

at the mercy of border guards


and chiseling managers

and nights in prisons of heart and cunt


he knows the root where spirit and flesh

tussle in a holy scrimmage


wherever every slip could deliver you

to an abyss or the Almighty


Leonard I see you shining

on a holy mountain of merde


trying to lure the energy of certain saps

out of the ground these bodies will embrace


after every stratagem fails

and all that soothes the pain is the burn of desire


transmuted to aspiration for the eternal machinery

grinding out the processes that give us


our fields of memory where we were love in action

now as Leonard winds down in his time


I see a glowing around his body that suggests

his beginning to take shape and his crown


left for his progeny who will aspire and pass after him

let's hope God will be gladened by his arrival


I'll follow soon with a mouthful of song

I could never quite manage before


a King of Poetry paving our way for us...



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

ALL

in flesh or in spirit


whittling down

the load of karma


in the Eternal Now

is done in pure service


to others...

I'd forgotten that in this skin


and now will probably start

all over again


in genuine contrition

to repent and amend


atone for all the foolishness

that led me from my path


sorrow and remorse

unless as ice in the sun


and replaced by the souls I've loved

coming to help me across...


it's true...all true...

and the pain fades to wistfulness


as the shadow world of earthly reality

is subsumed into its pure idea...


and we are here...all here...

we are never anywhere else...


in flesh or in spirit we are here...



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

PASSAGE

letting go

a lifetime of error

a lifetime

of confusion and doubt


I stand

empty-handed

not sure if I've given all

or can now truly receive...




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THIS PARTICULAR AGONY OF DESIRE

I howl in my frustration


I can't be near you

I can't be with you


and I don't know

whether you'd want me to be


but you haunt every waking hour

more grandly as we're apart


you stand before me a million miles away...





Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

WE ARE DEVILS WE ARE ANGELS

dark nights of the soul

I'm totally accustomed to...


in fact I love the darkness

more than the light


the light shows plain the impossibility

of God's mercy


while the darkness soothes the hurt

by letting you imagine mercy...


and oh either way leads you forward

it's an instant's choice


whether we sink ourselves or rise

the way up or down being one and the same


will it be our sense of reality leads us to perdition

while our imaginations forge a way to heaven?



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

FACING IT

I accepted a greater load than I can handle


and there is no divine mercy

for such an error of well-meant atonement


what good I've realized


I have no damned idea of...

but I know additional burdens


have been weighed with me...


had I but known god was not love

but judgment beyond bearing


and sin beyond atoning...



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

THIS VERY INSTANT

I can be gone in at any moment

and you could also...


let us rejoice in this instant

and not worry about


what more to come...

all time and space is in our embrace


and we stand in the very spot

where others have and others will...



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

GURU MAROONO

who follows after me

will learn nothing fresh


other than what we all learn

on our stumbling path


our progress is up to us

and so is our backsliding


no one else's foolishness should matter

when we have our own with which to contend...






Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

WHY IS IT?

why is it

the more I feel like I'm dying


the livelier and happier I feel?

the body's last stand


is the soul's first move?




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

HARDY FUCKIN' HAR HAR

I've pushed to the edge


looked over the precipice

to an abyss that dropped me

a moon


God is one wicked joker

I'll give you that

I feel like Sarge holding a shrub in the cliffside


waiting for Beetle Bailey to bring a rope...





Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I'm busting to talk


but so few are on this wavelength

I might as well talk to myself


yet for all the stray off-channel signals

that drift in


I'm persuaded to keep it up

I'll never know who hears but then


it may not be mine to know...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

I'm amazed I'm still on the earth


people say I don't take good enough

care of myself


but does it matter when no assaults

on the self


can defy whatever time has been allotted

for this time in the worldly prison


where self learns its worst and must rejoice...




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BROTHERHOOD

beasts run free


but are unopposed

because they walk on their hind legs


a courtesy and an acknowledgment...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

GET IT YET?

we laugh

we cry


if we knew why

we'd surely die


the weight is too much

and it will not lighten


and after a lifetime

an escape can only frighten


it is not in our hands

it is beyond our control


no one wishes to understand

all want to push it past all bounds


they all want it whole

but they'll get is their  plot in the ground...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

BARNYARD BEATITUDES

I'm fascinated by

the extent of mass hypnosis

that keeps people

content in their chains


not that being a

free-range ersatz mystic

has any great perks

but it is simply


another large yard

in which to shuffle and peck

little red rooster

strutting among the hens


this is what I get for resisting

the line drawn in the dirt...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

TOTALITY...TAKE IT OR LEAVE IT

I've no idea when I'll be called

out of this skin and away from this time


it could come in the next 30 seconds

or the next 30 years...


I hope it will be on a mild sunny day

like today is in this neck of the world


but then March is always so changeable

and they're calling for snow tomorrow


any day I go will be fine...

I'll still be here...profoundly here...


as poets and mystics have always said

all is always here and now


then we'll be here wherever we are

and all doubt is unfounded...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved

SEE YOU THERE?

hard to accept

one's place in the mess


ever one's ego in the way

of one's own place in one's self


which is it's true place

in All That Is


how much illusion to peel away

before one stands eternal in the everlasting day...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights resrevd.

REPENTANCE IS LONG

how sweet to read

of repentance and redemption


while your life of error

drags you habitually back


into the very shit you're trying

to transcend


and the grace you thought a miracle

is something different


a sustenance through lifetimes

as you work your way


up through matter's residue

to cleanse the soul...make it new...


very well may you transcend

but with much effort and not until the end...



Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

LOVED AND ADORED

loved

adored

such veneration

of deep penetration


is sign of surrender

is the prayer from the sender


of meaning assured

to the loved and adored...





Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

LESSONS

nothing changes...

only our view

only our capacity

only our grief at the crushing facts of

our complicity in each’s downfall


such is the world

such is life

we learn our lessons

and each of us

is the other’s lesson.




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

GOD PROBABLY THOUGHT

God probably thought it

a good idea to have us love one another…


but you must admit

there’s something about good ideas

that get swamped

by the very evils they are meant to counter…




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

A CONVENIENT CONFESSION

I have something to tell you

but I've forgotten it


something to do with getting

real and facing your shit like an adult


ah I remember what made me forget...

that part about being an adult...


heh what horseshit...

we're twelve years old our entire lives


and promises of heaven sound like tall tales

told  by a drunken uncle who wants to squeeze your peeshe


and be absolved by the rest of the family

for being the wastrel...the barfly disgrace...



shit...what hooey people come up with to excuse themselves

and call it self-forgiveness...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

ACHING HEARTS COMMON AS CLAY

why are you crying now?


don't you know

everyone gets it and everyone's tired of it?


your sadness and heartache

are not unique


and people you look down on

have managed better than you have


stop crying...you haven't discovered anything fresh...





Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

DUSTY IN MEMPHIS

I'm listening at this moment

to Dusty Springfield...


God what a powerful voice...

subtle shaded but absolute tonal control

to bring the soft whisper up to

brilliant flare without any loss

of impact


as if all sides of the emotion

were side by side

waiting for their turn to speak


but not polite about it...

just the pure essence at full volume

graceful in its placement of expression


(how pedantic this sounds next to the experience)


but the girl is always in the room


even when Adele and Winehouse stand up in their voices

and knock us on our asses


somewhere in there Dusty is the measure they attain...


happy to have been alive while she was...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

ONCE AGAIN MERCY AND JUDGMENT

it's never as you imagine it to be


you think there's smooth sailing or

nothing at all...you find out (surprise surprise)


shades from your past gather

to welcome you over


or an absolute darkness subsuming you

as consciousness disappears...


maybe you treated people like shit

because you didn't believe there was anything


afterward and now find a reckoning so heavy

you'll wish there was an absolute death


or you expected a hellfire so absolute

and you thought you'd be roasting for an eternity


the smell of your rotted burning flesh

forever in your spirit nostrils


(how inventive people can be when they

put their minds to torture...others or themselves


no matter...) regardless of what judgment

you think awaits you...never doubt


you're not that big and the size of the reckoning

will be proportional and appropriate...


there'a a reason for the saying "Let God keep the books..."




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

ALMOST CLOSING TIME

I thought I was done

I was not done


I thought I gained my goal

my goal turned to lead in my hands


I thought I would turn aside and bless the trees

I saw the leaves curl and brown as they fell


I thought I'd stand still and not move for a while

and that's where I stand as a dark shadow advances...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

DESOLATION FOR THE TAKING

how easy to read a holy book

or someone's commentary

on a text explicated over and over

for generations


each era's voice claiming

a staunch authenticity and authority

as if the cosmos could be made definitive

to mere mortal understanding


how different to be stumbling outside the gates

with a voice crying woe for being misled

by one grand misunderstanding

of a cobbled-together phrase given divine provenance


while in the cold night's moon the howls

of wolves teach a truer reality...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

say God is Truth

and we must love

and forgive ourselves

being varied jagged pieces


but if I tell the truth

about those pieces

and the fractured Oneness

we all claim for ourselves


and am just another

shard of some infinitely broken thing

then why bother the saying

of what vague ambiguous truth


and of what holy sutures

hold this vast head together?




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

DOER AND RECEIVER

it will take no time

to finish up

the things I must do

to settle my affairs


but it is taking

all my time

to work up the bother

to do it


because these are

earthly things

and really don't matter

to eternity


the value is other's benefit

the responsibility for it is mine going forward...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

DO NOT HOARD

Now you see for your own self
And still cannot believe

The less your love tends to reach out
The more there's cause to grieve

Do not hoard this precious stuff
Or it will turn rancid in your keep

Disregard your disbelief
Or watch love spill down cold and steep




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

HOW WE SHOULD MOVE

The bird’s wing adheres
To the vectors of grace that
Conduct its lone flight





Content (c) 200802013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

MY LONGING

my longing is fresh

as that first touch of a breast


and the stomach spinning in the gut

and high-headedness


beyond drugs and dislocation


that juvenile weakness of the knees

like childish first love


my love how do you take me back so?


me old and tired and so done with it

yet sometimes you'll make a liar of me


and I'll tumble like a young fool


not too much different than an old one

but for all the mileage and the heartbreak and yet


there we are...fools for love...and glad of it...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.

WHICH ONE?

it may not go further than this posting

this need to reach you all with my dismay


and find common ground with others

who feel like I do...but who knows who knows


I send out these words who but God and who receives them

knows the worth of it?


we may all be One and find fellowship there

but how lonely sometimes to be each individual one...




Content (c) 2008-2013 Philip Milito. All rights reserved.