Revolution

Revolution

So Christmas has passed and the new year has begun,

don't fold up your hope,

the resolution has renewal,

shovel coal in the furnace

and breath the belch of fight.

There will be no back down,

for I feel a push from them

and I want my saber sharp for the clash.

Dribble from the glom,

and nudge of others,

only slows revolution

and revolt from now.

There will be blood,

mine I'm sure and hope,

but it should pay sweet,

when the liars run and burn.

They've made us twist

and shit grimy days,

but the birth of their end will make a short lovely walk off a long plank.

GH 09

Fire's Place

Fire's Place

I poked the fire and it snarled,

it always does,

but it rewards with kiss of warmth.

toothless, yet it can bite hard, 

burn you.

Heat, I need it, but more needs more

and more I need,

hotter for now, now I need it,

just enough is not enough,

but more is too hot for now.

And,

it angers me, it always does when she 

paws at my thoughts,

she doesn't know it but she does.

The prodding infuriates me,

and I frost by the fire,

an ember in there with it.

Her flames lick me and fire does too.

She knows, she does,

but fire just is.

There, hot, It does what it does.

So does she, eviscerating, burning, it hurts,

I invest in closer, so I pick my pain,

warmer makes me hotter,

and in turn I know I'll burn.

I pine and whisper to me,

shirk the heat and win the burn,

but it's always for just a moment,

because you both will always burn.

gjh 09

Will, Of The Water

Will, Of The Water

Water waited in pipes behind the stone.

Moss panted in the shade

near a former splendid display of produce in the sun.

Lacinato once dominated its hold in the oak

and now the gold beets were above their sullen greens.

Spinach sipped its last,

and white chard wilted with the rainbow.

Radish had bristled with wet skin some time ago,

when bok choy had trumped them all,

over the grate in the grotto.

Daikon, carrots, and cilantro,

slumped above the broccoli and asparagus.

The brussels had had muscles, but not so much now.

Smeared in lost array, last in the bunch, curly parsley paused

before falling on shady moss below.

Will of the water took his hose and passed them by.

He lent water in the pipes to a fabulous bird's bath,

a byzantine basin, dry as some bones.

To the bottom went his hose,

and water gurgled forth with a slight soft glug.

It rose in time to meet beaks of thirsty birds,

more important thought Will,

than brown romaine.

Water was wonderful he spied to himself.

gjh 09

Slab City

Thrash Lab travels to Slab City, a squatters' camp, an ex-military base, a commune for runaway artists - deep in the badlands of Southern California. Watch this documentary to understand who the inhabitants of Slab City are and why they consider their home the last free place. 

Just Tell Her

Just Tell Her

She made me, pushed me,

I found her first and nurtured there.

Her eyes looking into mine,

drooling, dribbling, and falling.

Through nature's force,

I grew, changed faces.

Me became me at the pace of all of us,

and I swarmed to her.

I ran to her,

crashed and cried to her,

sparked by her and guided by her.

I watched as old came to her.

She cleaned and sewed,

took pain for us,

her life of giving and none taken,

the oven baked food, when the kitchen was cold.

Now, grown me,

with out her,

she magnifies me,

inside me, motivates me.

A single light still burns for her,

I shiver for her when I think like her,

she moves within me,

a power that will go on when I go.

All this, a ripple on an ocean of all the seas,

days gone by are grains in fields,

leaves beneath trees, over mountains under skies.

And now, is the only time you will never hear this:

Mom, you left just too soon.

gjh 09

Stimulus

Stimulus 

It occurred to me this morning as I

skimmed stray grind from the top of my coffee.

Today, and all others that follow,

will be different.

The politicians are gone, they've stabbed one another in the back.

The roaches in the banks have scattered.

Misplaced defaulters combed their hiding places

and turned over dirty desks,

millions of worthless dollars floated on precious air,

and now truth bristles above all their waste.

We finally understood, they, like dishonest squirrels,

kept lies in their cheeks.

Congress, nothing but a warehouse of bi-partisan lovers,

drones of the corporate lush.

But one bright day, under blinding honest light,

they pointed fingers at one another,

and ran down the halls.

Outside, the circus was in new hands,

and the clowns couldn't wash it off.

The sun seems to shine every day,

and we build wonderful human creations,

all is free from their worthless blather.

Oz was nothing once the curtain fell.

We forgot for a long while,

that we financed the show,

and all it took was a fresh coat of fire,

to bring the theater down.

But I arrest myself during this first taste of the coffee's roast,

back to the reality of this morning,

I bask in the glow, and heat of what will be.

gjh 09

Panacea

Panacea

Could they do a worse job?

They do every day.

Could you keep your job

if you did it like they?

They take from us, do a

bad job, they take, we don't pay,

they take.

They create law for us to abide.

They are our employees,

but they hold all the keys.

We sit and grow fat,

watch cancer bloom in friends,

see high definition cures,

while side effects kill.

They promise change,

it comes every four years,

wearing a different tie,

the soap box shines brighter.

Hope, bottled on high,

prosperity just around the corner,

but the rabbit is fixed to the rail,

and the race is rigged before it begins.

The losers vote for change,

and keep the grindstones close to their nose.

We never give up,

we have so much to give,

they hold all the cards,

but we have all the guns.

They commit crimes in tall places,

and arrest us down below,

bastards above the law

but we have eyes too.

They tell lies,

we accuse affiliations,

elephants and donkeys,

send us to fits,

while they loot,

and send children to battle.

Tell me.

When will the jailers hold the keys?

Revolution steeps as the rats begin to squirm,

human spirit is too massive to control,

the chug of change will be crushing.

gjh 09  

You...

You...

You, know who you are. You wonder why you're here, on earth, what's the plan for you, why were you born.

You wake in the night

and your mind runs,

for minutes sometimes, but also hours,

usually as a busy train station,

skewered direction, all at once concentration

then none at all.

A flower in a lump of dry dirt,

or a bull in a slice of escape,

you wonder of space and stars in the dark,

you feel alone in your place of alone.

You know there's a place for your need to fly,

but there's always a net in your face.

Your you cries out at the redundancy of our system,

the politicians and mechanics of this mayhem.

Because your you is the gem of us all,

the lighthouse of truth that runs in veins of ours.

Born of the born and pure as the prints on our fingers,

you, different as all snow flakes,

yet common drops in all oceans,

you are we, yet you.

You know who you are,

and as that, and all that is,

we can not be harnessed as a tool for them.

You are not a slave.

You are you, a being who knows there is change in your head.

You know the change is within you,

it will never be found on the outside.

You, is the power from within,

you is not mythical, but it is the magic we are born with.

You hold the power to move mountains,

all keys are behind your eyes.

Never look to the outside for help,

you are the engine of release.

You are what you feel is wrong,

and you are all the change.

You are the power of the future.

gjh 2009

On The Train

On The Train

On this morning I rode the train, more conscious this morning than most. Sheaves of sunlight strayed before me, knifing through smeared windows.

I felt a strange comfort afforded me, almost a drug, a cloak of utter awareness.

Outside those windows, winter’s cold shown on frozen faces of the weed filled meadowlands.

Last year’s dead grass went by in blinding waves of browns. The gray sky stood atop the horizon as birds navigated its face, and I could not help wondering why I was here.

Not here now, on the train, amongst the commuters, but here in this world, on this planet.

I looked down and my hands looked not like mine. They seemed of an older vintage, and my eyes looked back at me from the windows as rail trash swirled on an eddy.

People, some standing in crowded aisles, rocked to the rhythm of the steel, unaware of their hypnotic gazes. A sole whimper of someone’s baby broke the clatter of silence, and I remembered being born. It was similar to this, loud but silent all at once, light and dark and cold and warm, rocking and sleepy and new all at once.

Now, my hands seemed my own, and I watched a single particle of dust float as a speck in the sunlight, it drifted and fell to the white hair of a sleeping old man. It rested atop a new vessel inside this traveling train. We all rode together inside with the outside surrounding us, along the rails put there by men one day. We sped toward the city where others like us were, and I wondered why I was born, and what was my purpose.

It had to be more than what it now seemed, or I’d not be confused by my thoughts. Others in other places must be pausing in their places, looking up or down, wondering about the purpose in their shoes.

There are reasons for our here, our questions, our uniqueness. This morning I’m happy to find this on the train, a piece of a question I can tuck away and keep. I welcome the day when all the parts will settle and I’ll be a part of why I’m here.

GJH 09