poetry

Ave Angeles

/ Daniel Swearingen / 82 Comments


Salvador Dali – Angels

“O’ what may man within him hide, though angel on the outward side!” – William Shakespeare

I watched them fly in early morning. Stern faces all, diamond like eyes reflecting a pinpoint brightness of eschatology. They pointed themselves toward the eastern horizon, daemons and angels, muses and monsters of mythology. I opened my curtain ever wider, and saw they were burning stars, blazing before the dawn. Reflecting the vitality of beginning and ending. The holiness of G_D’s names. And I wished to fly with them above November.

Said you, “born you were unto November, rise above it, it can’t hold you”. “Rise above it, it can’t hold you.”

Such a sweet day in November, with the sky an eye of blue, an occasional sun drop. Bouncing off my points of view. Woke myself to sweet surrender, of the purpose designed a new. From this vantage on this altar, laying naked before you. Cut all feelings from the shadows, those that are human accrued. Raised my shaggy head upwards. Screamed I am made from you. You are the author of my adventure, between the lines of light and hue. In the numbers of error, you found me, and led me through a timeless wound. Said you, “there is higher than you are reaching”. Said you, “Loose your thoughts and I’ll show you, you”. Said you, “Care for me and care for no other, for I am jealous for all you do.”

Said you, “born you were unto November, rise above it, it can’t hold you”. “Rise above it, it can’t hold you.”

Such a force of Citrine lightning, a picture painting of gothic rhyme. All though it is written I am a little lower than the angels, still above them I would fly. Bring myself before her presence in a question and a cry. Risen in the morning, with frost above my eyes. Tear myself from self-deception, that which lies accrued. Raised my shaggy head upwards. Screamed I am made from you. You have formed me like no other, cut my soul from roughen hew. Lifted me up from this dead garden, fallen Eden, no longer new. Said you, “unto you the choice is given, nothing hidden from your plain view.” Said you, “love me, and love no other, for between us life is consumed.” Said you, “I am breath and, I am numbers, time and mystery, ever new.”

Said you, “born you were unto November, rise above it, it can’t hold you”. “Rise above it, it can’t hold you.”

Above the Scorpius, beyond all air, below frozen water, all November’s share. In staring upwards, I stare no more, for I hear the summons, it is a silent roar. Your final gesture that defines my core. Said you, “born of the morning from when all comes, and innate by my word relative to all sums.”

We fly in early morning. We fly in the morning. We fly in the morning! – 11.18.2019 – דָנִיֵּאל

When We Travel

/ Daniel Swearingen / 75 Comments


“G_D moves in a mysterious way, and rides upon the storm.” – Jeremy Riddle

“People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.” – Albert Einstein

“Who were you talking with out there in the dark with it storming like this?” My dad ask me as I enter the downstairs door. He is standing there in his red stripped pajamas trying to look grim. “Just talking to myself”, I say back to dad, lowering my eyes, although the truth shines in them. Dad just shakes his head, and then looks back at me with a slight glint in his eye as if he has thought of a wonderful magic trick. “Don’t make a habit of it”, he says, it might be the only person who will listen to you the rest of your life”.

An inch between you and me in blood and essence, by G_D set free. For you are young without line nor gray, not sure in shimmer of what to say. To stand or kneel, to watch or pray in metaphysics the numbers they play. The Dog Star climbs in lovely breeze, it passes Shiprock in this desert sea. Be still thy mouth oh child that is me at twelve to thirteen the sights you will see. In faire of something of times to come, in many years to know this sum. This night the storm that rides thy way, it carries adventure in G_Ds worst way. In such I travel, I travel far, a future present by translucent stars. Time has been mine now to pass through them, those thorny angels that raise their din.

For stand you here, and stand me too. No air or seals between you and me. This night of nights, will pass us through. This night of night will pass us through.

There stands a target, a myth ahead, perhaps its true some ghosts have said. That do you good on what is right, and some time when, from here right now to way back then. I do it now I know not how, my person sent, that spark of passion will ride the wind. To see it happen to come around, there might be sometimes it might abound. For I have seen it through all these years what was born this moment, is someday clear. For as you kneel child, me to you, the sum of thunder runs us through. In your life certain, not straight ahead, you will live it full from what now you are fed.

For stand you here, and stand me too. No air or seals between you and me. This night of nights, will pass us through. This night of night will pass us through.

Two still shadows one young, one old. The kid looks nervous, the man too bold. Antares glowing with red guiding light, the future starts this night. The peaks in the distance lead to off somewhere, a journey so bold that I would, I could share. To take this inner child who wants to dare, and fly into the sky. The storm it cometh upon us soon, righting our way until we are left with no room. The unknown behind us, with the mystery still to bloom. How the thunder booms, and how the thunder booms.

For stand you here, and stand me too. No air or seals between you and me. This night of nights, will pass us through. This night of night will pass us through.

An inch between you and me in blood and essence, by G_D set free. – 09.23.2019 – דָּנִיֵּאל

Iiná Joe

/ Daniel Swearingen / 62 Comments

“In my time of dying, want nobody to mourn. All I want for you to do is take my body home. Well, well, well, so I can die easy.” – Led Zeppelin

“Cry, little sister! (Thou shalt not fall).” – Gerard McMahon

“This one goes out to Iiná Joe”, I say as I release the cued needle to play its art. “My Navajo little sister lost a lot today”, I say letting my voice override the magic of the first chords of finality. “From “Physical Graffiti”, I say, “Led Zeppelin, “In My Time of Dying“, I say. “Cry little sister”, I say.

Iiná Joe comes around, just as the August, sun has lost its crown, and it sets itself in message, in an altered degree, sending signs of mourning for all to see. And it spills out red across the sky, sending farewell tears to a million sighs. “That’s what makes me cry”, Iiná says to me, standing just my height, dressed in the color of her grief. It is a visit of timing it is a look without a word. As if in the world of symbols, we are the witness to the earth. Iiná Joe says, “I heard it, the song you said you’d play”. I say, “You mean “In My Time of Dying“, is that the meaning you wanted relayed”. She nods her head in the affirmative, and then we both look away, just a disc jockey and newly minted widow at the end of a funeral day. Standing in the foyer at KWYK, all the world is moving with us as actors on its stage.

Iiná Joe says, “The darkness falls upon us as it fell upon my man, as he drank his way from Gallup, into the desert and the sand.” “When they found him out near Sanostee with the cuts upon his face, he’d been sitting in his pickup truck for forty nights and forty days.” It grew very quiet between us as we thought about her words, the quiet that conveys meaning from our words to other worlds. Like the transmitters nearby us, cooling from their five thousand-wattage heat. We wandered through Iiná’s pain filled loss, looking for comfort to keep. And as a boy of seventeen with all my wishes draught unpaid. I was humbled by my friend’s sharing of the greatness of her loss, and the grieve it built and made.

Iiná Joe walks around, the darkened radio studio looking at me, with her eyes filled with amber tears, a reflection of a man she no longer see’s. “Will you play the song again”, she asks. “I think I’ll wait outside, the night is coming quickly, and the chindi is nearby.” “I would not have my man’s blackness upon you, as you do for me what’s kind.”

“This one goes out to Iiná Joe”, I say as I release the cued needle to play its art. “My Navajo big little sister lost a lot today”, I say letting my voice override the magic of the first chords of finality. “From “Physical Graffiti”, I say, “Led Zeppelin, “In My Time of Dying“, I say. “Cry little sister”, I say.

Iiná Joe went her way a few days ago. She passed into the darkness after the August sun had gone down, forty-one years to the day; she visited a seventeen-year-old disc jockey to make a special request. That seventeen-year-old disc jockey pictured above thanks her for the honor, those many years ago and wishes her G_D speed ahead. There is no more to cry for little sister. – 09.03.2019 – דָּנִיֵּאל

 

For the Lack of a Map (Roads)

/ Daniel Swearingen / 87 Comments


Artist Samy Charmine – Almost Time

“New roads, new ruts.” – Gilbert K. Chesterton

For the lack of a map, I took roads, some with steep inclines, most ended with no right of way, leaving me lost beyond timberline.

So many roads into Denver, so many anecdotes without fact. So many dreams left along the front range, gasping. They are a memorial, a delusion, inside, that’s not fact. Treasures at altitude, a once upon a time, a “Rock of Westies“, a vision above Nederland, a realization that 1975 is never, ever coming back. And maybe that’s a good thing, a very good, good thing. I think I can dig it now, “Portishead” driving me on this road, Beth Gibbons taking the wheel, right out of my hand away. Strange when I stare into my rearview mirror, I still see the mountains, shimmering above Boulder, some angel somewhere, whispers, “find”. Just another road, here, made up inside me. And I feel it takes me where I need to go. I know it takes me where I need to go.

So many roads into ageing, so many stories that still are to unwind. So many numbers numbing my mind, the physics of heaven, still these many, many ghosts aren’t changing any time. Driving, diamonds dancing on this road, in the summertime. High table, that’s still glowing now “Rocky Flats“, in nuclear time. That which is buried, still stays on my mind. And whispers, low tones, syllables that barely rhyme, still they encourage on this road, “seek and you will find”. “Seek and you will find”. On the road now, that which is with me, never that which is left behind. Going further then I need be, watching mountains left behind. And I wonder, as I wander, what it is that I will “find’, what it means to really unbind.

So few roads out of Denver, so many anecdotes without fact. The sun never sets above the “Mummy” Range, the snow never melts and that’s just a part of my mystical Colorado, that’s a part of these roads. A paradoxical fact. I suppose this might seem like nonsense, an ageing man rambling who has lost his tact. But there is something here, something shimmering on these worn roads, something well beyond 1975. For the lack of a map I free wheel, for the lack of knowledge I try. There might be a road that is headed for what I have to “Find”.

For the lack of a map, I took roads, some with steep inclines, most ended with no right of way, leaving me lost beyond timberline. – 08.11.2019- דָנִיֵּאל

Innocence (Hedges & Fireflies)

/ Daniel Swearingen / 82 Comments

“I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows. Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows. Quite canopied over with luscious woodbine. With sweet muskroses and with eglantine. There sleeps Titania sometime of the night. Lulled in these flowers with dances and delights.” – Shakespeare

“But I know a place where we can go and wash away these sins.”- Henley & Hornsby

Titania watches him with interest before the dawn breaks, a round of leaves within her mussed hair. She thinks to let him go might be a good thing, but she cannot. He has come to her on a mid-summers night, at the end of his innocence and he is alone.

Oh his childhood, cries his childhood, stolen by the name of ruin. Hips withdrawing, pants still falling, injustice by these fates not bloomed. Oh his childhood, cries his childhood, finite too soon. Find the hedges for your hiding for the nighttime is coming soon.

He hid among the hedges, in a tunnel of which rabbits made, a long leaf filled burrow between the house and the gravel roadway. In his mind, he pictured safety, a sanctuary of play, and though he hid his body, his soul was on display. The world of summer was risen, with the night falling in, and somewhere there were angels. Watching in interest over his boyhood den. He looked through tiny windows at the darkness. A world so warm in gloom. He interlaced his fingers, and felt himself traveling further outside his self-induced cocoon. So, it was there in the twilight, far from his desert moon. He thought of all that had happened, an indiscretion born so soon.

For he hid among the hedges, in a tunnel made of thought, watching fireflies dance outside, for in truth they are more than spark. Near the point of total nighttime, when monsters bare their teeth. Silent shadows, silent wisdom, all is hidden beyond display. Not a sound in all creation, like the very first day. He lays himself still burdened lost in thoughts of the afternoon. Oh his childhood, cries his childhood, stolen by the name of ruin. Hips withdrawing, pants still falling, injustice by these fates not bloomed. Oh his childhood, cries his childhood, finite too soon. Find the hedges for your hiding for the nighttime is coming soon.

He hid among the hedges in a place of hideaway, watching fireflies go to heaven for a purpose in which they stayed. In the glooming, in the hedges, came the silence of the break. Just a moment there is reason, nothing happens by fair mistake. He wraps his arms in loneliness and watches his soul begin to fade. For the want of its own amusement, it hides away. Softly crying to the nighttime such a movement of a score. Led by mercy, thoughts emotions and the life we are purposed for. In the hedges, in the hedges, a place of no mistakes. In the hedges under fireflies, asleep as the dawn breaks. – 08.01.2019 – דָנִיֵּאל

The Dragon by the Dump

/ Daniel Swearingen / 81 Comments


“No, I would not want to live in a world without dragons, as I would not want to live in a world without magic, for that is a world without mystery, and that is a world without faith.” – R.A. Salvatore

The night sky ripples in my dreams, a mixture of sun, moon and stars. Something stirs in my bloodstream, and awakens me to whom I am to become.

The spine went from west of the dump in a half circle, unapologetic in its bending latitude, king like, under sun, moon and stars. The jagged edges whispered to us as we climbed them by day and moved tilting inwardly as our feet touched them by night. Although the rains almost never touched our hidden sacred find, the winds often came ripping away the night clouds that formed a curtain on the summer sky. We ran, we walked and we sat upon the back of a dragon, and its form entered our bloodstream, creating all life that we would forever be.

It is summer; it is winter, always springtime or fall. Just a boy then, just a boy now, when I hear the dragon call. Draco rising in a north star, that constellation, oh stars of all. A voice a whisper, a sound that comforts, “I lift you up boy, forever tall”.

“The fires never go out”, my friend say’s from the shadows of the dragon’s tail. He signals towards the dump with his nose, but I know he is talking about the warmth beneath his feet. “They never shall”, I whisper not sure, if I am back then, or here now speaking in my sleep. The sky seems to ripple, perhaps the fathoms of the days heat being released, more likely it is gravity protesting the movement of great silent wings. “Is it a ghost”, I whisper, thinking it might be. “No” my friend whispers back, his voice beyond my reach. For a brief moment, a bit of time that is deep in me, I see us moving upwards upon the spine of a great sand filled sea. A dragon has entered our bloodstream, creating all life that we would forever need.

It is summer; it is winter, always springtime or fall. Just a boy then, just a boy now, when I hear the dragon call. Draco rising in a north star, that constellation, oh stars of all. A voice a whisper, a sound that comforts, “I lift you up boy, forever tall”.

The head of the dragon, resting so still, one eye glazed over, under moonlight, may be it is granite but still. Sometimes it was more than just a rock on that hill. Guarding that dump, that manmade swill. “Sometimes it was us”, I hear my friend whisper, and it gives me chills. For now as back then, I can still feel. The rush of the dragon, the knowing so real, there in my bloodstream, from then on until. From then on until. – 07.18.2019 – דָנִיֵּאל

War and Times for a Gentle Man

/ Daniel Swearingen / 63 Comments


“We are all ready to be savage in some cause. The difference between a good man and a bad one is the choice of the cause.” – William James

The ending of a Sabbath for a gentle man. The signs and the lessons for a gentle man. The sun rises and sets on the gentle man. When the day arrives and I seem to die, play Led Zeppelin over me. For not in a grave I will ever be. From the beginning to what is to be…

A gentle man’s immortality.

A gentle man dances in the dark, behind a curtain, oh his mind is stark, thinking not on that which brings forth love, nor does he even consider if the sun will rise above. For that gentle man thinks of worlds to be. Has he done what is right to blend a destiny? For to care outside of self is instinctual not, to hold hearts close, where they are not tied in knots. Yes, that gentle man moves with not much ease, for a train calls a sound from his inward prairie. Indeed, a gentle man is not sweet or good, baring strong sentiments of what most think he should. Not a great cut figure drawn is he, still a gentle man will he be.

There’s a mirror chained in deep waters on a ghostly sea, it reflects certain attributes a gentle mind can free. Without strength or power, or ghastly deeds, moving strong cogs of iron through ocean reeds. A gentle man can breathe, can breathe with belief, part the water of doubt with ease. Indeed, there are moments of immobility, when movement unexpected changes everything, and a gentle man looks to find someone holding a key, someone that is a she. That someone is a she.

The world becomes full of whispers for the gentle man, caressing private moments in places that he thought he would never understand. Movement in a symphony a chart of notes, a minor key in sixteen rhythms on his weakening knees. A monotone turned to a stereo vision. Six pointed seals of such mysteries. An entrance given for the mind that was not living, a thought becomes a decision. Suddenly there is something slight, a spark or two in one for the gentle man. And yes, he sees, for the rest of his life with clarity. Only the beginnings, the very depth of gentleness is G_D’s vision for he. A gentle man he will be. A gentle man he will be.

But then, and then….

The rains come down, and the war does start, and the sky turns ghastly with unimagined art. From the day well given for the night has come, and the rebel man yells, give us your father’s and your sons. Comes the battle for many, is there a man not even one? There are terrible instincts in lives of men, when their nature is built on the greed of sin, turning each woman till she can’t be turned again. For the culture rages, and it sums its end, saying there is no redemption needed for we will always win.

But give me no prophet, or new age spin. Just a sword blessed by G_D and a gentle man.

The ending of a Sabbath for a gentle man. The signs and the lessons for a gentle man. The sun rises and sets on the gentle man. When the day arrives and I seem to die, play Led Zeppelin over me. For not in a grave I will ever be. From the beginning to what is to be…

A gentle man’s immortality. – 06.23.2019 – דָנִיֵּאל