LEAP OF FAITH (Revised, 12.31.06)


The woman on the bus
yanks the cord with
the intensity of her
life, it's comical, how she

hangs onto that line
and yells at the driver to
stop as we cross the bridge,
we are suspended

above the abyss.
STOP THE BUS NOW
she shouts PLEASE STOP
THE FUCKING BUS

until we pray for the driver
to give in and the bus
jerks to a halt
we all lurch forward

as if bent in prayer.
The woman scrabbles off
with her black trash bags,
her ballast, she means to

take her life, and as
the accordion doors
seal shut with a shush
an ambulance screams by--

she means to fly
down below down into
the valley of death and
transfiguration, we


cannot even imagine,
we smoosh our faces
against the undersea glass
as she mounts the bridge

wall and spreads her arms,
and for a moment she
floats in desperate space, she
flies, and falls, and someone

shouts HALLELUJAH!
for her soul, and ourselves
as well. The bus moves on,
a blessing for these

pilgrims bearing witness,
seeking redemption in
a sign, a symbol,
anything to live on.

LEAP OF FAITH


The woman on the bus
yanks the line with
the intensity of her
life, it's comical, how she


hangs onto the line
draped atop the smoke-
tinted windows like some
abject garland, she


yells at the driver to
stop as we cross the bridge
that spans the valley,
we are suspended above


the abyss, she shouts STOP
THE BUS NOW PLEASE LORD
STOP THE FUCKING BUS in
a shrill monotone until


we pray for the driver
to give in and someone
shouts LET HER OFF FOR
CHRIST'S SAKE and the bus


jerks to a halt and we all
lurch forward as if bent
in violent prayer and
we all grab something to


brace ourselves, the woman
scrabbles off with her black
trash bags, the weight of
her life's belongings, her


ballast of her last will
and testament, she means
to take her life, and as
the accordion doors


seal shut with a hush an
ambulance screaming with
siren whips by in a mad
rescue, she means to fly


down into the valley of
death and abandoned
train tracks and brick smoke stacks
far below, so far we


cannot even imagine
what life down there is like,
we all smoosh our faces
against the undersea glass


and watch as she mount the
concrete wall and stumbles
on the edge, she spreads her
arms and she floats in the

desperate space, she flies
and falls and we stare
grim-faced and silent
before we return to


our seats and someone shouts
HALLELUJAH we all,
each of us in our small
voices whisper a prayer


for her lost soul, wherever
it may be, and for
ourselves as well,
and the bus moves on, a


blessing, a relief, we
are pilgrims seeking
redemption, a sign,
anything to live on.

WHEN THE MUSIC'S OVER (TURN OUT THE LIGHTS)


And so the performance
was over, the last words

of the tragic opera
fading, the tambourine

still chillingly alive
and shimmering like God's

breath, I lay on my cot
in the dark and waited for

it to come, in one void,
a wave of nothingness

crashing over me,
the room drenched in drama,

but there was no God
moment, no God consciousness,

no light, no stellar scream,
no cosmic swirl, instead

the room filled with dark matter,
a muffled absence,

not a terror or dread
or even an onrush

of regret, just a darkness
spreading its terrible weight,

no relief from its anguish,
just nothing, nothing,

nothing at all, until
the mind drifted away on

this dark matter spreading
in the nooks and crannies,

just diminished and lost
in the great blindness,

it was all black gravity,
I did not expect to

awaken, certainly
not in the closet,

fingers scraping plaster,
head clunking the wall,

the edge of death, the brink
of life, a trap, and the

long moan, the 3AM
freight droning, my eyes

cold stones and blind, dead stars,
I did not expect this,

this gulf, this muffled need,
this persistent voice

at the heart of something,
this anger, this stupid rage,

this lone whisper of light
shouting. For days I sat

alone, a lump, an
insubstantial substance,

something, consciousness
watching as the ghosts

appeared and whispered
in some unknowable tongue,

voices of the dead and living
indistinct, smothered,

the weight of lifelessness
itself, I had almost

joined them, these ancestors
waiting all around us,

drifting in orbit, my mind
a dead star, a cold

stone in my head slowly
warming, returning to

the grand opera, the carnival
of the senses and the

absurd roar, the theorems
and proofs I once understood

slowly unraveling into order:
a point, a ray, a line,

the universe was giving way
to tiny chunks of routine,

and soon enough, a
reprise, an encore,

the show must go on, you know,
the opera never truly

ends, the last shuddering
note gives way to the first,

you remain in motion,
only the direction shifts.


,

What would your life be like if, as in "Branded," you had to constantly, daily, prove that you were a "man"? How might you do that? Like Sisyphus, forever fated to accomplish what cannot be achieved. An eternity of doubt, fear, self-abnegation, self conscious inadequacy.

EXISTENTIAL MOON


The streelights
a string of blue
milk moons above
the snow, votive
candles, a prayer
vigil for you.

The streelights
a string of blue
milk moons above
the snow, votive
candles, a prayer
vigil for you.

NOTES FOR A POEM ON A TV SHOW THEME SONG


Wherever you go
for the rest of your life
you must prove you're a man.

from "Branded" theme song


It seems
they will

not take you
at your word

or just
your sex,

they want
something

more, a sign,
a proof

that you
are not

something
they fear

and yet
something

they need,
a promise

of where
you stand,

where they
stand so they

can breathe
freely, so

the world
they shape

makes sense,
so they

can go on
living with

men.

PRAYER WRITTEN ON THE 10 BUS IN DECEMBER


I love mornings like these
when the snow moon stares down
and the sky is milksnow
and moonlight, the air so
cold and pure it hurts
to breathe and your skin
shrinks to ice and you gasp
with wonder, a prayer
that the world is buried
and it's all so deliciously
cold and milk blue and
empty, so quiet that
you hear your blood
quicken, your breath
a miracle, you're
alive after all! And
for this blessed moment
you are a holiness,
a ghost haunting all
the loveliness.