Down Town

A poem about Occupy Wall Street. 

Down Town

“If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.” – Thomas Jefferson, 3^rd President of the United States

Clink clink. Clink clink.
E PLURIBUS UNUM. “Out of many, one.”
A face-down nickel mimics the passing sound
of let-loose subway wheels grinding in the dark.
Clink clink. Clink clink.
The conductor calls the stops in monitored tandem:
“Essex, Bowery, Canal, Chambers, Fulton…”
Clink clink. Clink clink.
Two dread-locked hipster girls angrily make-out
between surface piercings and grad school loans.
The more distant girl shifts her weight to one side,
her arm warmly tattooed:  “I watched your 9 to 5s
wash away your dreams.”
Clink clink. Clink clink.
Google’s street-view shows 98 people interweaving
to chainlink arms akimbo, inherit the fat of the land.
Clink clink. Clink clink.
The conductor willingly pulls to a stop.
“Sorry folks. Train’s out of service.
You’ll have to transfer
for the fare of 99 cents.
Do not hold doors for others.”
Clink clink. Clank clank.

1 year ago  /  1 note

021. Shower Petals

Draft 1 of a new poem! —KH 

Bloom

8 April 2007

You turn seventeen and a half today. 
It’s Easter, too. Somehow less important
to you every year – Easter, that is - 
not your birthday. You see your family, 
you eat ham, appreciate that it isn’t raining. 
This was the first year you admit 
you no longer believe in God
but still in the Resurrection. April is hard
and you wonder if you’ll ever be an adult. 

20 April 2008, 9, 10, 11 and counting… 

You don’t care to move. 
All your friends are here. 
You pass hands in silence. 
You laugh. 
You laugh again. 
Someone’s laughing at you. 
You close your eyes. 
You sleep.

22 April 1994

You plant a seed into a pot
because your teacher tells you
you must love the earth. 
Cupped gently in your hands
you take it home where
your parents water it for you.
This stops. 
You don’t water the plant. 

30 April 2011

Your poet friends write thirty poems
in thirty days. You write maybe five. 
You wonder if failing on purpose
is easier the second time around. 

1 April 2011 

He said he loved you
right before you came. 
You didn’t come. 
You don’t love him
anymore. 
Who’s the fool? 

12 April 1934 

The strongest wind ever measured
on the surface of the earth blew
across at 231 miles per hour.
You weren’t alive to feel it. 

1 April 2011

I was foolish. 
I do love him. 

10 April 2072

Easter passes like any day does. 
Time, too, has taken its time. 
You close your eyes. 
A plant grows. 
The wind blows. 
You still believe in the Resurrection.

You’ve celebrated ever since.  

2 years ago  /  0 notes

020. There is a Garden

Here’s a relatively new slam that I just memorized!! -KH 

The Kindergarten Model

Intelligence is a gathering
of loose-fitting particles.
Keep them all.
Think of the differences between
having good sense and
having good senses,
of other and brother,
between knowing words
and knowing people.

By 5 we learn how to share,
how to stick things together with glue,
how the connection between bodies and art
is as obvious as fingerpainting,
how to be conscious of one another,  
and then how to work together.
My favorite game was always show and tell.
I’d like to show you something.

By 8 we’d learned how to divide,
how to use a computer,
how we’re different from each other,
and how to work alone.
My friend Marcus had to leave the classroom to read.
My parents got a letter saying,
“Your son can read at a sixth grade level”  
while my best friend is in remedial reading –
the same people who sent the letter say he’s special,
they say he’ll have to repeat the third grade.  

By 14 I’d learned not all numbers are real,
how to stay in touch via Facebook,
living between screens of our past
then how easily children get left behind.  
I remember exploring the creek in his backyard,
how he knew the name of every tree,
could raise snakes, turtles, birds with broken wings.
You see, he knew the words, just couldn’t spell them.
Why is this forgetting so encouraged,
his interest in primal sounds ignored,
his knowledge of nature somehow less human?
I haven’t seen him in at least a year.
The only thing we have in common anymore is our age.
I was just a kid when I heard Marcus
got arrested for selling weed.
The same people who wrote that letter
say I’m going places.

Now by 18 we’re broken into 5 phases,
based on individual level of performance,
from advanced placement to needs help.
We need help.
I got two letters today.
The first, a college acceptance letter;
saying I’d gotten perfect scores in Calculus
when all I wanted to do was take Art History.
The other, from a friend’s mom,
“Marcus was pulled over for suspicious driving this past Tuesday. You know he’d gotten into a rough crowd a few years back but I thought my boy was doing okay. I mean, I still love him. Apparently, his friend, I didn’t know his name – and neither did the cops – had several bags of dope on him. Marcus, in hopes that his friends wouldn’t get in any worse trouble swallowed the bags of heroin. He didn’t make it through the night. I’m sorry. P.S. I heard you’ve applied to college.”

By 22, I didn’t get letters anymore.
I was about to leave again.
I still hadn’t reconciled everything I’d left behind.
I hadn’t gone to Marcus’ funeral
and I never took Art History.
If only, if only, what if.
There is a garden that grows in the light.  

I want to show you pretty words;
I wrote this poem for you, for Marcus.  
“Butterfly his kindergarten ribcage
moonshine mariposa moonshine again.
Fingerpaint the details of his life.  
Tomorrow’s children will be
a cooperation, a travelling exploration
of what it means to be both human and kind,
writing “Yes” deep into their bones,
‘We must, 
we must tend to this garden.’ 

2 years ago  /  4 notes

018. Icarus

This poem first appeared in Issue 4 of Main Street Journal!! Enjoy -KH
I apologize for the formatting. 

Sky-stained

sunbeams burst twilight-remnant clouds as wrinkled patterns of dust skirt across the powdered dawn,
particles of gold rivet stained-glass airwaves as pockets of crystal ozone crackle into crunched light,
electric dreamcatcher sunlight sparks like lightning in a desert: pink-orange, flashing, blue-violet;                                 ignites orchid explosions, a vibrating kaleidoscope of cobalt flame stretching the distance of youth. 
amethyst rhythms meld into a rebirth drumbeat, the voice of painted canyons, a honeysuckle sunset,
indigo arias relenting to the distant footprints of wind, eternal slumberlight, a lunarsoft crescendo.

beyond the                                                                sky—                                                              illuminates
radiant                                                                    falling                                                                     Icarus;
shore                                                                     becomes                                                            sky-stained
where                                                                        sea                                                               sky-bound—
tides,                                                                      folding                                                                            as
the sea                                                                   a falling                                                                      angel
collapses,                                                                 into                                                                           wing
kisses                                                                       sky;                                                                      feathers
sky                                                                           time,                                                                     choice;
heaven                                                                    falling                                                                horizontal
found                                                                        just                                                                       dreams firefly                                                                     space;                                                                             of
bodies                                                                     space                                                                         light:                                                                       
                                                                               falling
                                                                             into time;

burning gold feathers, red-orange drops of amber—burst like nascent flames as the earth-torn boy    
splits the sky in half —the sky reeled— his glimmering body slipped through waves of sudden motion;
through cloud and light, skydives of water, breathed just once before the impact—like all things, returned.                                                                               Light, like other people, sails on, touches the face-body of a boy who like a comet remained in space—                      a boy borne of earth-sky met by oceans blue spiraled green, the forlorn sting of salt, sank into sleep,    

2 years ago  /  0 notes

017. Refrain

I’m quite fond of villanelles, I hope you are too. —KH 

Unto You

unto this life, unto this now, there is a certain weight
to sudden things, like undreamed love and thought,
let these moments give the context, from them, create.

think the world of love, proud of love, lightweight,  
get hold of love, part of love, silver and gold-wrought,
think of love, talk of love, still, somehow the weight,

in front of love, take hold of love, in love, ornate,
the world of love, that love naught, that love ought,
a thought, a moment gives you context, from it, create.

in terms of love, made use of love, an old soul mate
let go of love, fell short of love, out of love, distraught,
walked out of love, the end of love, suddenly, the weight,
 
devoid of love, empty of, disposed of love, translate,
the likes of love, suggestive of, first taught then taut,
like knots in fate, you are your moment, from you, create.

felt by love, consist of love, write of love, re-create,
hand and glove, hand in glove, love revised, re-thought,
love is thought, sudden, you, the dream and then the weight,
this, all contexts, all moments, you, from them, create.    

2 years ago  /  0 notes