[ARTS]: Big and Little Poetry--free verse, any verse.

[Tai Shi]

Brucef, thank you so much for your poem by Billy Collins, Poet Laureate in America; according to Bruce Weber in the New York Times, as America's "Most Popular Poet," "most famous for conversational poems." By the way, I made a one time donation of $2.75 to keep Wikipedia afloat, and you can too. That's where I get my information and this is good stuff given there by the Poetry Foundation. Please, please, all of you like brucef, give us a poem and especially one of your own.
Gassho
sat/ lah
Tai Shi

[Tai Shi]

Last night it began
The nagging voice
Belittleing all I am
What I have become
I ache inside heart
especially in me mind
I never sought
To rectify the earth
With Arterial Vevus
Malformation, average
Not I still write poetry
I sit a little each mornig at eight
Feel tired this day, see it is not
Exactacly tumor or egg
About sizing up,
Like hen's egg lump in my Right
Temporal Lobe si it far beyond hope
So far not larger than golf ball,
Too bad I could never look beyon
Crack of time spider leggs
I am not free, what kind of ball
Resides behind my right
Eye ball, bigger than
My eyeball its 2.2 centemeters
Of next to terrible meat
You mught bye in a cow,
Delectable to eat if carnivor,
I to try soy based morning
Treat, I do not eat flesh
Of humans, or pigs, or chickens
Wonder what kind of fish
My teacher feeds his family, his son
Like my daughter when
Wghen she vacataded
My AVM, I weep, but she Facetimes
Me now she knows faith grows
In her they will find solutions
For my brain, a treat, a message
Meaning some meaning as I look
Down my throat of death, entertain
My hopeful direction, oh surgeon
I see in one week.
Not exa

[Tai Shi]

Wire Forgives Gifts

Thus morning, almost 9:00,
Maurice Ravel once said.
"I am the gretest living
Composer. and I wil earn
$1000, while for an American,
In Paris you will be given
$50,000 this year alone, wheel
Of time will make me great, you
On different shore. I live reach
For shore in Paris, you in New York
City, forgive blunt knowledge
Someday you will know ignorance
As you forgive yourself, I forgive
You, absolutes have no place
In compositions, always tikered
Rewritten and slaved over."
Look at our own Walt Whitman
Your Valere. Malurme Great image
Poet reliving Plato renew, you
Finding Emily Dickinson great
With hearse, great after death,
With Rilke old Dutches, Tiger, Paanther
Only studentts rest of Songs of Experience
Songs of Death, love, hinting of wisdom
Love intertwined with two, wisdom
in Balzak if come Eliot as witness known
The Wastland with French La Mare
Reflect waters of infinite rolling wave
Ripple now we know of staineed pure inside
Outside, I kindly stopped for death without
Twierling wire in the blood, surgeon, rasp
Malfoformations of infinite wonder, rasp
Clean Brain of human desingm and
Rebirth HD more than she could write,
Images like flowers, simple Daisy falling,
Walnut sliced open in liberal reassurance,
Wonder not will sprouts within child mouth
Provider of foods, existance when poetry
Misspelled wonder of magesty like Whitman
Nurse misspelled three ways more of division
Accepted as wild roses, forgot me knotts
Real of Time withheld to understanding
Never fo into notes this falling piano
Wonder, rolling into disonance, pitsicato
Ravel; Piano Concerto in G major
We give back to our Platonic ochestra,
Most withheld the eight-year-old child,
Celebration trumpet Euquarist gone
Forgiving flowers, gone from hands
Undone in haste; Dickinson, I could
Not stop for Death, so she kindly stopped
For me, my deatth shall not in wild moss
Mosses and Lichens, chamelion of plants,
Growth on North while others turn heads
South gather sun red petals, pistol, light,
While green lives another billion years,
Human on from year to a million
Year old on rotting trees, skeletons,
Dandylions seed the earth, human heads
Leave us as global worms too much,
Humankind fortitude big V 8 pickups hawled
To garbage heap, French or American
US cannot vaccinate when they insist
On death, man takes his shots because he'd
Rather live without AVM be damned, wire
In brains, surgery, one gifted brainl survives.

Gassho
sat/ lah
Tai Shi
Calm Poetry
10/ 05/2021
11:10 A.M.

[Tai Shi]

Ravel in Morning Light,

Sun shining.
Beams through open window,
Pound never hands giving us
The key delight always
Trust even here, my message
One who follows, never divides
Welcome tidal wave, not
Destroyimg this monument
Seven years, rebuild time safer,
Japan, second quake, who
Besides those your
Compsitions, why don't
I know, do you know Ravel?

Gassho
sat/ lah
Taishi

[Tai Shi]

Don't recall his name,
Hardly twice, virtuoso
Great piano in World War,
Lost right hand, crushed,
From arm, smashed flesh
In war, heaved to give up
Life eternal, beauty gone
Given to ravages of Hell,
Men fight for land,
Then eyeing women,
On park bench, feeling
In cold fall preparation
Of memory, alone army
Of the night, seldom
Wonders through infinite
Life, away I was shot
Even to seal beer at dawn
Jitters for Glass of $.50
No money that was me,
Hard drunk, up the night
Before, no real job, defying
Monday on his time card
No real hours to keep,
Then young woman
Thrilled snow to him
Some peace of mind,
In whole teaching, he
Found her class teaching
First year students famous
Nothing to but heavy
Smoking round of jars
Of cigarettes in whip
Him, finding her, lived
Together love just playing
Concerto for One Hand,
Mental illness round
Like blood, psychosis
Bought him time, found
Surrender i Front Range

[Tai Shi]

How can a doctor operate,
To cauterize wounds, save
Life, brain, heart, or mind?
All patients risk death.

Family on every word,
Right thing to do? More
Than one third risk of life,
Life for giving over to life
Seeing surgeon's risk?

Patient gown worn five
Days, frive a.m. at Surgical
Tower Realizations, brains,
Bones and hearts; he's
Under from anesthesia?

Titanium in craniotomy
Two plates, bone in brain,
To neurology resting
ID, where are you?
Your full name, birthday?

Kitchen arrives with food
Hunger, eating, oh taste,
Diatician asks selection.
What date is it? What day
Of the week? Every time.

Cognition fine unexpected
Recovery more than years,
Understands his surgery
Sentiment clear
Lazerus, speaking,
Physical Therapy, walk

To his recliner, to climb
Simplicity one foot
Solid steps to home.
Clearity, actions
In recovery,
Impediment gone
Gratefully disappeared
Auterial Venus Malformation,
Wilderness of specimens.

Recovery smiles slightly
He lives, how he walks
Moves fingers of hands
Decades, clearity within.
Simple removal of shoes.

No damaged tissue,
AVM gone natural stance, veins
Closed off, oxygen deliberate,
"Can you walk up your stairs?"

Home for support,
Teacher Jundo there,
Micheal, Kevin, Allan Reike
To affected cranium, response
Relax tissue cannot see,

Family Comes agiain,
Rev Allan brings Flowers,
Rev. Michael Messamger,
Texting from Japan, daughter?
News of daughter
She brightens him FaceTime
Wi Fi from Tokyo, father I am
There for you, father I am here!

Finally father knows his role
As parent, is this because AVM
Removal as brain returns
To normal work. He's home
No fear. Life improved.

Calls his wife, his friend's iPhone,
Child Tokyo to South Dakota,
Messages, this is what
I did today! What did you do?
Reality isn't simple,

Action makes here for there.
Words diffifdent, healthy,
Sleeping nights deliberate,
Shakespeare Pukish everyword,
He Looks for ntural right.

In morning air,
Cane or walking stick, easy,
No push or pull,
Happened to you! Your are
Here. You know this day.
Date, birthday, oriented.

Fully present, good
Declarations of 70 years,
Relaxation truth, zazen,
Rakusu through poetry,

Arthritis not so cruel,
Operations don't cure age,
He knows deep exercise,
Neighbors know, remember
Twenty-sevre fear gone,

Present at birth, they grow,
Sadness, removed
Minimal, can read, writes
His poetry, Reading young,
Body scan, counting,
One to ten back again,

Organized,
Coordination, balanced
Arhtritis. Body captures stiffness,
Age, mind returns, fullness
Appears well.

None or all people
His life can find gratitude
Over, suple thoughts
Hot cereal breakfast
Medications to help
He gets old, age heavy
Mantal, middle path.

Notations on a Brain Surgery
Gassho
sat/lah

[Kokuu]

Where he is not alone, all people
In his life, he finds deepest gratitude
Gratitude, giving over, suple surrender
Simple things like hot cereal breakfast
Simple medications to help
Just he gets old but age is no heavy
Mantal, acceptane of middle path
Buddha way, he smiles he is there.

Lovely! So glad you are here to still write, Tai Shi!

Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday/lah-

[Getchi]

Waves come in,
I recognise One.
Now it's all gone.


Geoffrey.

[Angel]

I am

standing in the eye of the primordial forest;
dew-soaked grass crushed beneath bare feet;
the touch of clover flowerheads tickling toes.
Yet, I am neither grass nor clover flowers.

I am

breathing slowly, deeply; inhaling all the wonder;
the scent of wildflowers, damp moss and conifers;
permeating my body and saturating the stillness within.
Yet, I am not wildflower, damp moss or tree.

I am

teased by the swirling upon my tongue as it settles;
tasting the last vestiges of heavy, mist-laden smoke;
bringing moist hints of earthiness and terpenes.
Yet, I am neither the earth nor the majestic pines.

I am

ever-present consciousness filling with nature’s harmony;
a symphony of soft birdsong and distant rushing waters;
accompanied by the verdant forest’s more subtle melodies.
Yet, I am neither birdsong nor the distant rushing river.

I am

opening lids warmed by the rising sun to greet the day;
a rich palette of yellows, purples and greens materialize;
revealing the kaleidoscopic masterpiece on visual canvas.
Yet, I remain aware that I am not a yellow, purple or green.

I am

filled with awe and wonder; mind completely overwhelmed;
until the thought, “I am blessed,” follows “I am undeserving”;
awareness recedes as the echoes of mind obscure the stillness;
and I foolishly believe myself to be blessed and undeserving.

[Tai Shi]

Angel, you are such bright and natural images, and we see you are the earth, and natural and light. You are light with repitition, and all that is light becomes your beauty.
Gassho
sat/ lah

[Rich]

Very nice,Angel

Sat/lah


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Tai Shi]

Sentient Being

Blue days of Ango
Slipped away, my head
Scar at first so much
To touch, ago was yesterday
There should be snow,
December 1st, 2021, I will
Forever remember October
29th at 9:00 a.m. today
Never far away, white clouds
Tears clear from both eyes
Not just left, Right Eye in front
Of place where AVM behind,
Is gone, Surgery saved my life
Remberances miracles never
Happen my life, this is One,
Making arrangements
On phone brain oxygen,
There is this white chord,
From wall where I Breathe O2
For my Right Temporal Lobe
All is mixed for my Brain, I don't
Feel white music, alphabet,
Mixed with white, blue words.
Comes into my heart, left effect
From Tonglen I realize, I breath
For others, I sit again. How did
I come one month two days,
I feel my days slidding as care,
Nurse Asked every two hours
This year, white edges, date
Of sheets on my blue ICU
Every half hour they ask again
What is my name, easily date

Where I am, I look
Out my hospital window,
Reality sets in, I am sentient
Being, I have been freed
There's some Higher Power
Must ask why me. Why silver
Operating Table, srgeon asks
First, "Do you want to close
Your eyes? It's alright
If you do." He speaks again,
Silver words as tools in room.
Nurse has shaved my head
Dressed me cold, naked
In paper gown. I know
The surgical team has walked
In will take gown off when I
Am under. I start my count

One, two, three, four
One, two, three, four
Is this zazen? I left my light
Go out, vein slides with sleep
Im slipping under, reduced
To sleep? Dressed in recovery
"What happened, am I

Rolling down white halls?
My eyes are fixed on ceiling
Tiles, cotton gown wrapped
Around my limbs white this year
I am winding into my ICU
Room, for first time Reality
Check, free at last, all
Sentient beings, me I ask
I am alive? My name, date,
Location, why I am here?
Every half hour nurses
Ask simple questions, I am
Lifted my to radiology
Angiogram third time I'm,
Somewhere date is the 29th
I glance at clock, it's 3:37,
Six and one half hours,
How did this happen? I
See again, the silver tools
Upon creamy walls, surgical
Suite, and there are three
I know I could not see
Room filled with six, eight
Ten people, One, two, three
Four, zazen, I was under,
Now I'm here, my life, friend
39 years, tells me then
AVM is completely gone
Was not so deep, surgery
Was only four hours, recovery
Two hours, two small titanium
Plates, my head is wraped
In white bandages, fitting
Loosly around my head,
The under garments,
My blue shorts, blue Tee
Replaced paper gown, I see
Green paper gone, clean
White blue stipes, hospital
Gown, My wife is relieved
I see it in her eyes, her
White face has changed
To relief, color returned
To both of us, they ask
Again, location, name,
Birthday, why I'm here,
Date written on white
Board, I laugh as nurse
Asks once more "How many
Days have you been here?"
They slip my mask over
My ears, then I am helped
To wheel chair This room
Will have better view
White lights line the street,
How is it that I sleep? Hospital
Helicopters whirl in, then out
I don't see it coming remove
Bandges removed from my head
Free at this time, every six
Hours, clear fluides my hand
Feels nothing, told I'm
Getting Insulin and steroids
To reduce sugar before I eat,
To reduce inflamation of my brain.
My blood sugar above 200, only
189 lbs, how many kilos?
The surgical follow up
Takes every vital evening
After move, I'm to remain
Then OT, PT, Speech Therapy,
Cleared for discharge, no insulin.
Steroid pills continued at home,
Miracles do not happen
To me, I survived, angiogram
Showed perfect surgery,
I am well. I don't feel change
Yet it's there. clean shorts, shirt.
Pants, coat, It's November 3rd
Of course I know the date
As I slip on my athletic shoes
Nurse wheels me through
Great lobby with cool air
November 3rd sweeps by.
I slide into car seat
Simple chatter, white frost
Into air. Days, my primary
Doctor right again, don't
View my sanity, I'm sane,
More like smooth stones
Man of thirty years ago
An illusion, a 70-year-old
Man, Now white is black
Seats of car, cold imprint
Hospital, gone, onto 18th
Street. She's carefu November
17th I return, walk
Into same room where
Miracle began after Kyousui
Implored my wife to drive
Me to the ER, no more .This
Began, Nurse weighing me,
In ER, Now Nurse Practioner
Gently pulls my staples
From my scar, then says wait
Your surgeon, who I know
Spends 30 minutes, shows
Before and after angiograms
I know my surgery well
It was perfect, I listen, details
Explanation, At home To
Ravel's Piano Concerto
For The Left Hand, my music
Yes, there, my words slip
White before my fingers
Healing this of course writing
On white paper, slow blue
Pen over, over, over
I'm sentient being, free.

Gassho
Tai Shi
sat/lah

[Tai Shi]

Beyond Directions

Waiting room
Before surgery
I prayed, I was,
I am fearful, my
Heat sings
Under chair,
With Concrete
Floor I have now
Dharma sharing
Most elated
With fear, how
Just to feel
Firmament, be
Nothingness,
With something
I cannot touch,
Feel. How dare I
Another answer
10 thoughts
Signs or actions
Prescribed like
Spoonful's capsules,
Needles, gas
Steroids, insulin,
Am I interventions,
My tubbing, Ah this
Is after surgery. How
Did neurology know
When to wheel
Me into room, Sangha
Friend of 39 years,
Is 41? do we count?
We made our own Sangha
Relatives nothing
Two years bedding
Fact finding tries
Until one knows
She is "the one,"
Wait says, unless
We could have
Endured together
My head warped,
Staples pulling, in
Weeks will remove,
Scalp, realized
Success. I know?
Alive. I know this.

sat/ lah

[Tai Shi]

DAI ZAI GEDA PUKU
MU SŌ FUKU DEN’E
HI BU NYO RAI KYO
KŌ DO SHO SHU JO

Robe of liberation boundless
Field beyond both form and formless
Wearing the Tathagatha's teachings
Vowing to save all sentient beings

[Tai Shi]

Vessels Removed in Song Of Hands

Yes complex tissue operation,
Removal of vascular tissue, hands
Reaching into his skull, doctor skill,
Staff in operation asked only beyond

Would you prefer to closed Pain
Your eyes, the instruments as wood
Working of life looked awake, sight
Awakened, he says no more, he has

Seen none before surgery's tools
Like workbench, like carpentry building
Hands, digits can build next his life
Again, he counts Zazen, one

To ten, back again, on counting
He calmly sleeps, his pain in throat
Slimed to nothing, air his breathing
As slipping into slumber without

Pain he was not afraid as surgeon
Told me him all could remove blood
Vessels clogging mind, concentration
As he he six books, novels with ease

Then Thich Nhat Hanh, Fiction showing
Skill of Surgeon, four nurses handing
Tools, Nurse assistant, radiologist,
Heart and Lung Technician

The entire consort together as orchestra
Surgeon, giving me life, hands take and cut
Off, give Future of this seventy-year-old
Man simple he is given to to life

Which we hold dear, with renewed
Vitality, happiness sings success
Dr knew his hands gave five,
Ten, fifteen more years, his old

Age secure. This patient his wife in-fact
Knew life into brain not taken, given
To, as carpenters build, skill more grouped,
Houses for this life, unusual protection,

This check after all, hospitalist conception
Says he success, the surgeon's hands
Success, our living testament life
Removal of Atrial Venus Malformation,

AVM is gone, October 29th then
on November 17th, 2021, shows patient
All perfect as angiogram showed veins
Will die, Completely removed, final check

Six months away, another angiogram,
Will show success, still doctor checking
Then blood mass removed, veins ceiled
Off, O2 to brain tissue, air flows again

Surgeon's hands before his final
Board certificate , oral tests, far knowing
Beyond our poetry, yet poetry, we all
Sing as patient talks, last successful test.

Gassho
sat/ lah
Tai Shi