Wednesday, November 16, 2011

After making love…

After making love

we are quiet,

breathless and exhausted

yet somehow we are born again

refreshed and reminded

of our first kiss.

our first touch,

our first hot embrace

that transported us naked

reaching out into this wild,

fleeting lifelong adventure.

After making love,

we are moist and dripping,

we are sometimes sweating profusely,

our hearts racing and yet

we are calmed

as we lay side by side

trembling with satisfaction

for a few thoughtful moments

before you run,

tattoo glaring and sexy

on your bare ass to the shower

through the candle light.

After making love

we breathe in deep breaths

in a sighing of understanding

that these two bodies in the universe

are still bound by the same unseen forces

the same inexplicable laws of quantum mechanics

governing planets moving in vast space

we are atoms and molecules of energy

finding one another among quarks, waves

and mathematical formulations -

yet, we have hearts, far more complex than

Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle

and we revel in their beauty

their mystery and their ultimate magic.

After making love

we are mountains,

we are rivers

we are cold streams

and we flow together –

always meeting at the same place

always meeting at the wide sea.

Mourning…

What is mourning

if it is not a kind of death

before death – a knowing.

And you say,

what do I know.

I know loneliness

without my children

two I have loved – half a life

which seems a lifetime – of years

in words not spoken.

Being heartbroken

by silence

this is mourning –

by day

by night

by candlelight

a loss is a loss

by death

or in life.

The loss of love

the lack of sweet kisses.

This is what mourning

truly looks like

even tears

that are wiped away

so friends do not see

the truth of it.

Doug Claybourne – inspired by “A Woodsplitter's Meditation” by Sam Hamill – from his book, “Almost Paradise”

Love is…

a single rose – or

the slender glass

cylinder

holding it - or

the tiny yellow orange buds

of miniature roses standing

side by side - now

three aging flowers

cut from our front yard

held in that same three inch

diameter perfectly round

eight inch container.

It soars

proud

clear

resilient

radiant

in the brilliant

morning light

of this crisp fall day

in Brooklyn.

Love is -

seeing it

smelling it

knowing it

moment by moment
breathing it in

holding on to the vision

as long as you can

like a child

gripping a special toy – a bear, a blanket.

Love is -

recognizing that joy

as we walk down the long tunnel

of understanding nothing.

Doug Claybourne aka J.E. Dorsey – for Sam Hamill

Saturday, November 5, 2011

Father and son...

We are the same

you and me

we come from the same blood

although –

we fought in different wars

we pulled the same trigger

looked through the same sights

we loved different women

laughed,

drank cheap wine

and hot beer

we cried,

we dreamed

and came to blows

in the backyard

ending up,

bloody with friends.

We are the same

you and me

leading drunken brawls in bars,

found in passionate embraces with female strangers,

yet – we are the same

you and me

we are father and son.

Today,

you lay struggling to live,

tubed

taped

wired

wrapped

blanketed

heavily drugged

but loved

and cared for

flushed with

Vancomycin and

Mycostatin

quieted by

Morphine or

Acetaminophen

when necessary.

And we sit attending

listening

helplessly sometimes

to the painful moaning,
brothers and sisters

hands on your arthritic hands,

or on your forehead

holding

cold wash clothes

hearing the sounds

trying to be words

coming from your mouth.

We can only soothe

with ice chips

or wet wash clothes

as when we were sick as

children, laid upon our own faces.

Father, we are the same

you and me

and I weep

for the loss

of the body

that carries your spirit

alive,

strong

and wiling

yet besieged to discover a

suitable place to sing again.

Yes, we are the same

you and me

father and son

joined by love,

sperm and egg

attached by birth and always death

children and grandchildren

the ever revolving

merry-go-round of life.

It began when

a man and woman

connected and

joined

attracted in some

magnetic and magic

moment that

changes one another’s history –

creates a life

and a certain genius…

Einstein

Neruda

Freud

Hemingway

Picasso

Frost

Michelangelo

Dante

Gandhi

Mother Teresa

We are the same

you and me

father and son

joined by love

and a grand mystery.

Doug Claybourne – for Wayne Claybourne – 11.01.11 In hospital in Oklahoma