Wealth of Whys

Sometimes I wonder when the why

Will reach the sky and touch

The embers of love,

When the scarecrow sings and heaven rings

The melody of a lost lullaby,

When white will waver and

Winter will wither away.

Today or tomorrow I caress my sorrow

And reconcile that it’s here to stay;

When all of a sudden

You reach in my puddle and stir

Up the muddle that lies in my mind.

You come out to say that

It’s time to play. No longer to pay

Attention to torture and realize my fortune

Of having you by my side.

But sometimes I wonder,

When wondering weathers

The wealth of whys in my mind –

That maybe this day brings

The answers to questions unkind.

And I feel the sun sting –

And I fall down burning –

With wonder that cries in my mind.

Sometimes I wonder,

I really do wonder,

Does anyone make it

Through this life alive?

 

-Dakin (Undated pre-1993)

Sitia

Succumbing to the scourge

That writes its name upon

My lips, I part from this place

And drive all night, All life

 

But a touch away from

Reality shining like the

Brick thrown through the

Mirror of Reflected time

 

And like a spit of wind

Supporting the sparrow’s

Wing, I am lifted and lulled

And brought back to my habitat –

 

The willow wisps that wear

Upon my forehead remove

Their twisted tourniquet

And at last the blood beckons

 

The thoughts of thousands of

Molten miles cascading

Down the sheer side of

Mountain faces, recalling

 

The facial form of your

Lips lifted in offering

Waiting for their return

From the edge of reality

 

-Dakin (Fall 1992)

American War Hero

War torn and ragged

I’ve done my duty

I sat

And I waited

I waited months

just waiting

Then a call came clear

And we went

And did our duty

And our duty was done

Done quickly

Done well

The waiting was over

The war was gone

And this life I live I see more clearly

As I fly home

Twenty-two years old

I embrace my wife

On American soil

And my new apartment in Detroit

Waits

Waits for me

As I drive home

And I get out to go home

A new home, an American home

I am stabbed, by a mugger

On American soil

And I die

Outside

My new apartment in Detroit

An American hero

killed

By an American mugger (on American soil)

War torn and ragged

I’ve done my duty

 

Didn’t anyone tell him

the War is over

 

-Dakin (Undated pre-1993)

Metamorphosis

As certain as a simple change forgotten for a while,

Never more and nothing less, a simple change in style.

The end result of simple change may not be found as best,

For test of test, from man to man, follows all the rest.

I stand to stand apart from you and stare upon your face;

The blood of men is in our hands to separate a race.

A case presented for all men can radically infect

But complicated scores of gods unto the rest infest;

Thousands more, thousands less, thousands they may be,

Thousands cannot buy their lives that once they caught for free.

While taught from infancy their lives are not theirs to destroy,

Now the power hungry gods will with their lives employ

To force ideas and policies that men don’t understand

As they fight to issue them, themselves undone, unplanned.

Fortunate to have regained a sense that one remained

Until the darkness smothers over everyone renamed;

Thought no longer true concern, as if it ever was,

Because the thought cannot connect amidst the throbbing buzz.

So aimless as we wander on to stumble into walls

That history has hidden from the gods who cause the falls,

Destiny can play its part as people part from home;

It sends them to a foreign land where they for sins atone.

The sins not from themselves, in fact, but from the ruling powers

Who toll the tones and ring the bells to signal death doomed hours.

A simple change, but not as quick as simple may imply,

For with the change the new may come, and thus, the old must die.

 

-Dakin (Undated pre-1993)

Here of There

Here of there I sit

And wait a timeless day,

That passes as a mountain

Crumbles and fills the valley

of Superstition that once

Sought its temple high

Above our stunted selves

of Reckless abandon.

Seeking the source –

Scanning the open sky

With a lie and a whisper

We shrink away from

Eternal charm,

To be locked within –

Disarmed of our defenses

And thrown through

The fire to return

Unburned and unmolested,

But does that now

Mean we must say

Goodbye and farewell

My friend?

 

-Dakin (Undated pre-1993)