excepts from my 1992 chapbook information age blues
Friends>
Welcome to the festivities
our feast for fools that feeds us
the spirit life
through invocation of the muse
we call for magic
and work it out like Crazy Horse.
Trust this:
the Ghost Dance does not go unnoticed.
As we release in our gyrations
the primordial scream
known by all life
there is comfort with connection
to a mythic past.
How sad that our connection
cause such outrage
in a culture divorced from its heritage.
How outrageous that our merriment
provoke the un-informed uniformed to violence.
Reality Stanza:
We as a tribal nation stand outside,
content with the wind.
Our sheltered family
wants to bring us back in.
And they shower their zookeepers with plastic rewards.
In Christ’s name
revisionaries have dwindled diversity–
Mayans, druids, Celts, witches
eagles, griz, buffalo
redwood forests, tall grass prairies, free flowing rivers
are now but badges for the conquering mighty.
The knights among us today
DEA, FBI, NSC, CIA
sent out for duty by priests, profiteers, and politicians.
Uncle Sam loves a tragedy.
Our strategy?
The hummingbird’s joyful reflex.
The dolphin’s will to play.
The lizard’s still invisibility.
The elephant’s loving community.
Many medicines
for our heroic circus marching on.
if
if
god
does
not
make
mistakes
and
everyone
and
everything
are
reflections
of
god
then
there
are
no
mistakes
white man struggle
–for Mutabaruka
would you cast me in your dungeon?
enslave me in your history?
would you?
white man struggle
to be free from spirit poverty
white man struggle
to restore his human dignity
white man struggle
to be a limb on the family tree
white man struggle
to grasp nature’s harmony
white man struggle
to bury his imagined superiority
white man struggle
for a home in Babylon Country
would you cast me in your dungeon?
enslave me in your history?
would you?
BOO
(January 15, 1991)
As dark men dance
in the old way cheek to cheek
they whisper and conspire
anticipating the hunt
you adopt the poetic posture
a wild man
and recipient of Whitman’s courage
you move fast into the Bekeley hills
away from the boxed crises
of tv and newspapers and signs
held by student actors in the war drama
these are vision hills
long home to the griz and his swat
at the running salmon of Wildcat Creek
today there is an unleashed dog
black and barking
stalking your back
entering the hiking meditation
with a sniff and stand-off
you find the sense to communicate
breaking down the confrontation
saying, “Be cool, I’m a peaceful being.”
tales spun in defense
tell no truths to the messenger beast
who serves you with a reflection
your friend–your mirror
today you both have fear
it is all too clear
a howl is all you hear
forget your career
we are all under the spear
of King Lear
and his glorious tear
so you move back with rock in hand
a potential dog brain basher
to a lower post where you cry out
the news
Dog Distrusts Man
Man Prepares to be Eaten by Dog
Language Barrier Chokes Agreement
Wars Loom
No Escape from Gloom
all rooms are tombs
as the air fills with boom/boom/boom
too soon
the crazed men croon
behind the shadow of a new moon
Corn
Corn
boiling in Berkeley
conjures this vision
of Sandhill spirits
riding the Niobrara and Missouri,
down to town
like cottonwood seed’s doing the wind dance
seeking fertile ground.
Found.
An old soul descends
on young lovers,
children of settlers,
fucking in the back seat.
Nine months later
poetic revenge is spanked into consciousness.
Plowed under in death
the Great Plains still yield.
Corn,
where buffalo grass swayed
and beasts were bouyed.
Corn,
in puzzle patches.
Corn,
drinking the crane’s water.
Corn,
in silos, like gold in the bank, rotting.
Dakota–beware, you have sent the elk running.
Nebraska–your knife has family blood on it.
Kansas–where did you put all the ancestral bones?
Plumb Line
Geologists have a science
to explain the relentless pull of gravity
centered in the mass of mountains
which daily brings your head into canyons
where white clouds dance
on the forest piano
But science isn’t broad enough
to validate this link of land to body
For that, you seek Zen
you give in.
Like historians who perpetuate:
Renaissance/Enlightenment/Age of Reason
You get into poetry
illuminate Dark Ages
crown the savage
celebrate the pagan
And, as a human (for now)
remember
your mineral base
keeps you centered
against the civilized positives.
High
High
on the mountain
trees speak
and I listen
Get Real
Real freaks wear Lycra
and drive from L.A. to Moab
to pedal mortgaged bikes from Marin
on slickrock
which has seen weirder
dark cocoon
disect history
and you will find
the dual spheres
of his
and story
that reveal in segregation
the true meaning
which is His Story
just another tale of domination
told in print
and held in
the imagination if you receive it
which you won’t
after you see its open body
revealed
there are only
stroies of war
cast in bronze fear
that did rule the race once
now apart
his story
suggests a new form
born as a butterfly
with winged vision
tearing out of the
dark cocoon
Brazil
from the forest comes a rising tide
reminding Babylon of common roots
and the past we are defeating
the old way has its greeting
with listeners transformed from mutes
together there is only one side
dreams that were fleeting
under the heel of regimental boots
come true when all have finally cried
history had tired and lied
in its wake comes buds and shoots
and life is furthered with a kind treating
this is why i am here
this is why i am here
to bury history
with the present
dirt in my shovel
collected in a thousand reincarnations
every bit of the war trash is here
and i give it back
dust to dust
this is why i am here
to bury history
with the present
manifestation of indifference
to expectatrions of me
as your savior, son, warrior
who will pick up the battle cry
against
against
this is why i am here
to bury history
with the present
dropping to my knees
where i face my god
between your legs
and harken for rain
on the crops
which need love
and get it
this is why i am here
to bury history
with the present
meditation in words
born from the mother of creation
like children
to pursue
faith forward fun
this is why i am here
to bury history
with the present
extraction of divine laughter
from the vial of science
the same science of atom separation
echoing on itself
chemical integration
this is why i am here
to bury history
with the present
collection of one
people/planet/galaxy/universe/imagination
that gels together the cacophony
and renders it
music
this is why i am here
to bury history
with the present
rememberance
of the continuity
of human development
and the millions of years of agreement
that provide some perspective
on the warring aberration
of the the last 40,000
this is why i am here
to bury history
with the present
dirt in my shovel
collected in a thousand reincarnations
every bit of the war trash is here
and i give it back
dust to dust
Mormon Girl
see her suffer in the gap of gray
where white and black fade away
and decisions couldn’t be tougher
see her hair blonde as hay
bob above lips and eyes full of life
but cast down in strife
holding it all in, when there’s so much to say
see her wait to be the wife
of a bicycle mission boy
his return brings expectations of joy
but his member unused enters like a knife
see the beauty of Troy
and the foreign men, hunters who hide
in the beast’s belly they ride
poisoning the host, what a ploy
see the Mormon girl open wide
her legs to the music spread
released she finds herself in bed
the morality program has died
see her fineness fed
and her respect for the body build
a home for the spirit filled
with multiplication, not divisions of the head
see her cultivated sorrow spilled
and it’s replacement–love
here now, sharing a future above
where matter will be energy distilled
see her when push becomes shove
choose the kindness of touch
she does not ask much
just to be stripped like a glove
Heart of Gomorrah
the pillage of the village
let blood like wine spew into splillage
yet no reports of those without fear
who stride clear
in the heart of Gomorrah
extremes of love
saddle with dudes who shove
both parties seeking to gain
sun from rain
in the heart of Gomorrah
the messenger gathers the flock
listeners enticed by the shock of rock
dance like a set of waves
breaking into a chorus of joyous raves
in the heart of Gomorrah
restricted flows of anger and hurt
release like a dam, in a spurt
sending carriers of flowers
to the ground of higher powers
you are the primordial being
you are the primordial being
seal barking in the hotel swimming pool
at your kin in the night sky
languages swim together in the pool
where you posess every human tongue
and your ear is open to every beast’s private cry
there is no science
to cure this regression into the pre-literate
the power is in you
you are the primordial being
who sees music’s spatial dimensions
expand like your body which is the life of 10,000
the Ghost Dance is not dead
it invades castles and vexes the children
stealing them from CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN, HBO, TNT
insanity is insane when the rational world is rationalized
fear is funny when you have been over the edge
you laugh the ecstatic laugh of the dead
you are the primordial being
drumming eternal like the ocean
plapitating an ancient rhythm known by heart
the life song comes gurgling
like a river in canyon country
which is your voice too
when you dance in concert with the tribe
your wild gyration is the color of the Amazon’s belly
your sweat bead is crystaline desert sand
you are the primordial being
on a working trip through waves in the pool
which is a pool inside a pool inside…
©1992 David Burn