A POEM FROM MY POCKET

I wait for you
where the sun sleeps
and the moon laughs
at the night stars
trying
to out do each other.

In the soft sunlight
of the morning
when tulips waken
from winter sleep.

In the glistening dew
that bathes their faces
and with fantasies
blushes their cheeks.

In the living drift
of pollen and bloom
pronouncing
the season of creation,
I wait for you.

With spotted-winged monarchs
drunk like gods on nectar
making rounds
garden to garden.

With the ebony twilight
tucking in the sun
from a day of summer work,
prompting the night jasmine
to let out its charm,
until, the sun yawns
stretching itself out
across the broad sky-
I wait for you.

By golden fields
brindled in cocks of hay
for four-legged dwellers
where it is home.

By the trelliswork
sloping along the lane
and towards the stream,
the leaves rust and gold
soon to shrivel and die.

By the gathered vintage
marvelous to the eyes
and joyous in the stomping,
but pricking to the mind,
I wait for you.

Beneath the naked trees,
the bare fields,
the sulking sun
who barely whispers hello.

Beneath the smile
the frown that grows
with each chilling frost
and each swing of snow.

Beneath the quilts
pied with tulips and hyacinths
made with a mother's love
though warm-
I am cold-

On the porch
of far away places,
in the window
of imagination,
at the door
opening
to the soul-
to go with you
through the seasons
of dreams.
~~
Copyright 2010 Francis Don Daniels.
All Rights Reserved.

THE PLAYINGFIELDS

My world
what does it mean.
Is it only this playingfield
of Earth?


This body
that bears a name
saying it's me,


or something
more intimate
as the spirit me.


The game
of make believe
when we were small
seemed
so easy to play.


Remember-
when you played
in the yards
with friends or alone
imagining
yourself a Knight,
Damsel,
a King
or Queen.


The wonder,
the freedom
of those moments
that seemed to go on and on.
as if there were no time, no time.


How all
would banter
back and forth
exclaiming their imaginings
to be the best-

I can hear it now-
"No! Let's play Knights!"
"No! Mine's better. Let's play Pirates!"

(Look at my universe.
Can't you see it?")

When the playingfields changed
by others more powerful
who by age or status elected
to tell others what to play.

In places like schools
and churches and chomes-
and rules- agreements marching
to the beat of the clock
going
tick-tock,
tick-tock.

To grow old and arthritic
our youthful bodies
once fearing not
a leap,
a risk.

But now to feed
on daily prescriptions
just to stay even
with the next
tick,
tick,
tick...

And pray to God
our souls to take
to the banished worlds
cast beyond
where meaning's trapped
on the playingfields
of our dreams.

You say,
Why do you write such sad verse?

Very well.
Say no more.
Look no further-

than for your Pirates,
your Kings and Queens
who wait for you
on the playingfields
of your dreams.
~~
Copyright 2010 Francis Don Daniels.
All Rights Reserved.

BERRIES AND THE WINE

Take my hand.
No, no don't let go.
We'll fly the heavens high,
sail the oceans far and wide.


You and I,
we go together
like colors and the rainbow.


As we sleep on sugared sands,
the wind and waves
refresh our dreams,
like sunlight warms the earth.


For they and we
we go together
as salt goes with the sea.


At dawn
let me take you in my arms,
two souls fusing worlds,
two hearts beating as one.


For yours and mine
they go together,
one blood
in space and time.


One Universe.


Like berries
and the wine.
~~
Copyright Francis Don Daniels 2010

THE FORK

I stand alone
in a state of nature
in an open field
on a mountaintop

beyond tghe fork
I paint the frailty of spring
dream in subtle glints of snow

when all the while
to tunes of the wind
I sing.

I stand alone
in a garden of roses
in a flooded marsh
on a pebbled shore

beyond the fork
I'm a giddy bumblebee
a stoic-stanced egret
a weathered dream treasure trove

and to riffs of the wind
I sing.

I am the joy
of sentience
of all things

a fleeting space
a touch away
fron infinity.

In the other direction
matrices of signs and symbols
equation predicted nature

all-encompassing
Nobel Laureate stuff
Einstein and Pavlov
invalidating
all who dream.

Engineered nature pegged
to sets and subsets
urges and fixations
instincts and reactions
suppressing the spirit.

Identity
a single lifetime
pinned to a body
of certain death
and no future.

Rock, planet, atmosphere,
plant, ocean, animal,
man, child and gene
disemboweled
the same and soulless.

The woof and warp
of a world
fleshed machine.

Like Frost
how glad I am
I chose the fork
less traveled.
~

Copyright 2010 Francis Don Daniels.
All Rights Reserved.

I Cieli di Novara

( Author's Note: These lines are inspired by the magical band of the Summer Of Love of 1967, It's A Beautiful Day, and by the magic skies of North of Italy, the great space where dreams play between the snow-capped mountaintops and the warm, blue Mediterranean Sea. )



I miei occhi
e il mio cuore
sognando
con i colori delle nuvole

matuare
nella fontana di cristallo
dei cieli di magica
di Novara.

E sono nato
e sono libero
impaurito nessuno piu'
per creare le mie fantasie.

Il mondo gira in tondo,
la neve copre il suolo,
gli alberi dormono dolcemente
nel letto di inverno.

Ma solo,
l'uccello bianco canta
il suo sogno,

volare,
alto con le nuvole
volare come me.

Quando, tutto subito,
il sole fuso la neve
a ha scaldati gli alberi,

ed il vento
scorrere
come un fiume,
scorrere le ali di magica.

E l'uccello bianco vola
la montagne,
i mari
ed i cieli di magia

dove
per sempre,
errare i sogni.
~~
Copyright 2010 Francis Don Daniels
All Rights Reserved.
~~


The Skies Of Novara


My eyes
and my heart
dreaming
with colors of the clouds

growing
in the crystal womb
of the magic skies
of Novara.

And I am born
and I am free
no longer afraid
to make my dreams.

The world spins round,
the snow covers the ground,
the trees sleep softly
in the winter bed.

But, alone,
the white bird sings
her dream,

flying,
up high with the clouds,
flying just like me.

When, suddenly,
the sun melted the snow
and warmed the trees,

and the wind,
flowing
like a river,
flowing with magic wings.

Now the white bird flies
the mountains,
the seas
and the magic skies

where
forever,
wander our dreams.
~~
Copyright 2010 Francis Don Daniels
All rights Reserved.

Gypsies Like The Wind

The bracing air eddied
past the sliding glass door
left ajar at the corner of the room,
as I scrambled to retrieve

the swirling pages and clips and nicknacks
upset by the sudden flurry, thinking
a visitor may be calling, or more likely,
the gypsy wind looking for respite.

I eased my way through the opened door
out onto the porch, and as I imagined,
no night callers there, nor
any reason for concern, when I heard

a peculiar stirring in the wind.
Not cries or voices familiar or unknown, but
faint rumblings, quaint and curious, with power
not unlike a magnet, drawing

me closer and deeper into the night.
Giving in to the charm, I
dawdled along, the sounds as my guide,
stronger and louder, until

a few blocks hence came the park,
the one I often haunted
on winter evenings like these,
where on the teardrop-shaped pond,

fringed with hunched cypresses
bent over from years of devoted shading
the waterlilies and grasses and reeds,
and residence to a chorus of riant frogs-

each one in its own way was my repose.
And grandest with full moon and starry sky,
as glancing moonbeams shown
the waterlilies sleepy faced-

hallf-opened, half-shut, tuckered out
from a full day's pose, giving their all
waiting up for the gala- and,
the cypresses, their shadows whiffling

across a silvery-glazed pond, conducting
a jocund choir of amphibians.
Though hearing them go on for hours, I
never once laid eyes on them, too shy

or scared to show themselves, hiding
somewhere deep in the reeds, blending
with the floating pads, unsure
of address or stay- as tomorrow,

when construction crews break ground
on a four-laned highway straight through
this amphitheater that's now called
home.

And where will they go-
the lilies and reeds and merry music-makers-
when this moon-illumined slough's no more?
Many years it took the cypress trees

to shape their bending love. I'd forgotten
tomorrow was the day. I
wanted to- wanted to forget
even the joys of this night,

the impermanance of this world-
that we are gypsies just like the wind
with home somewhere else not yet found,
lest we ever regret its ending.
~~

Copyright 2010 Francis Don Daniels.
All Rights Reserved.

A Question of Beingness

A poem sticks deep in my throat.
I cough and cough, yet
it will not rise.

I ask the poem, Why do you rebuff
the poet's embrace?

Comes the reply, Why do you not
disrobe and go naked as you are?

I say, Out of the question- I am a man of Earth
and depend on this body.

The poem, And insist on hugging a corpse
when a Universe is there to court?

Such is the enigma baffling
a poet humanoid- a question of beingness.

Vacant in a motion like wind,
set and established like time.

Intangible as love,
manifest as a sugar maple
spurting forth spring syrup
and consumed by sweet lickings,
each and every one.

Like sun, doling out alms for the needy.
Like a painting, guardian and trustee
of the artist's beauty.

But some only worship ugly,
and scoff at you who seek perfection.

They lack the truth which is
you are soul and sand,
a spirit WITH a body.

You are the light making sky
and the seer of skylight.

You are words making verse
and the poem making words.

The beams that fall ahead,
the shadows stretched behind,
each sealed by your signet.

Enough of this silly argument!
I come to my senses and wave the white flag.

The terms of surrender are,
indeed, benevolent.

The poem tust the pen with its whimsey.
The pen trust the poem to show the way.

The flood gates of consideration open wide,
freeing the living stream to run its natural course.

And I, resolved, as one again,
the boat and the guide.
~~

Copyright 2009 Francis Don Daniels.
All Rights Reserved.