092614

since contact, the
arc has gotten so much bigger
more will come out,
though
dead on
for some time

it is the alright
to be a sun
for this world
until a hint, unglued,
runs you to
other beings

moans will reverberate
in skulls –
bridging a code

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

092314

there were times
when punching
holes in the shroud
made the night whole

only then could
we
have stars
to guide our
paper schooner
through our
inner slide show

it
would not
be any different,
of course, even
if I were to icon you

it was
the best way,
it seemed,
for
bodies to blare unity

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

092214

how can we
end a up one bit
cornbread and dandies?
I work you, not fish
fields
a dune
a good bidding
taking cane very well
our easy plowman –
the same eye
concurrent with belief

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

092114

by way of rendering in the mind
a lament concerning lifting

right after
a brothers just dirge
– a cry viable
I don’t have views of
having been
died of heart

ending up
to get to
blinding to
bodies
seeking detachment

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

091814

there is endless
talk of virus
and I
am left
to ponder
nature of transmission

attempting
to Huck Finn
my way
out of the
St. Petersburg
of my mind

on a raft cobbled together
from ideas of those
far more insightful
than I

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

091614

striving for pure
unadulterated past
you swim faster

toward that aural coast,
unimaginably ancient,
rising from where
waters of disregard
and redemption merge

each hard drawn breath
counts a stroke
each stroke,
an act remembered

defined by exhaustion
unable to sink
the only option,
always,

is to
reach forward
and pull

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

91214

shackled to parameters
waiting for perimeters to ignite
ignoring illuminations
by monks
unbidden
and bettering inward as forewarned bitter conversion comes as would a storm
this is the challenge
the change
the charge this is the struggle
by which struggles are measured
the night too long
to live
through
as gone gives in to staying on laying down
on the wrong side
of rites
right
before dawn drowns the praying
in light
of cold realization culminating in frozen frenzy
flightless and still
flightless for the ever more

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

Sullivan County redux

should I worry
about how
road kill reminds
me of a long walk
to Neversink,
around the time
September threatened
us with
Thanksgiving and
all the ice
that was sure
to follow

elaborately constructed darlings
with stories of
the Island
or Harlem
willing to grant my
hand worthy
for an afternoon

you would think I
would find the
accents of
their laughter intriguing
enough so
at least
to stop
counting all of the
groundhogs
raccoons and
squirrels that
didn’t make it across
route 55, much less

all the way to the reservoir
and back before nightfall
like we were
attempting,
on a whim, because
they had never been
away from the city before
and they were as
foreign to me
as the Catskills
were to them

seeing a fox by the side
of the road today,
it’s tail curled
around its head as if
it was catching a few
winks in the gravel,
brought
that trek
back to me

not the voices or
faces or style
of my companions
mind you,
but the number of
fallen wild brethren

which, by the way,
was fourteen,
(this I remember)

upon seeing fox
in this particular condition
I said aloud
“well, that’s one”, and
drove on

I have
a ways
to drive
yet

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead

90414

is there
even
the faintest
of regrets –
living
on the edge
of a strip mine
while
covered
in gold

(c) 2014 Fred Whitehead