"more like light" (rubai)

If sound were more like light
would silence equal night?
would accidental clamor
prove infinitely bright?

==========

If light were more like sound
would sunlight so resound
you'd seek sweet quiet shadows
and silence underground?

road rubai: "deep cloud" (9 verses)

1.
Cruising at 75
having survived you're alive
nectar's been gathered down south
bees must return to the hive

2.
With latte & morning’s cigar
rubais are composed in the car
it’s already bright on the road
the miles to go yet are far

3.
Your thumb hits record on the phone
you hear a confirmative tone
fresh words you recite fill the space
when traveling far & alone

4.
the autos & trucks on the road
all bearing humanity’s load
are powered by carbon the sun
transformed with antiquity’s code

5.
With radio lyrics in Spanish
the miles will gradually vanish
with fog on the road growing thick
the heart its obstructions will banish

6.
At Meherabode you first sat
to have with your Lord a soft chat
the wine that the Sufis describe
is stored in the quietest vat

7.
With thick fog befilling the sky
you wonder if rain may be nigh
the pilgrim accepts all conditions
and says Meher Baba ki jai!

8.
A blanket of fog has descended   obscuring the way
the landscape ahead is a prospect   of billowing gray
you move through a cloud though you’re not   on a mountainous road
the lines of the highway describe   how a pilgrim might pray

9.
The fog soon disperses   and gray becomes blue once again
the sun is behind you   the land become new once again
the lesson seems hackneyed and yet   in illusion’s deep cloud
it’s hard to discern   where the false becomes true once again


==========
January 15, 2011 (Interstate Highway 5 heading north through California's central valley)

note on line 1: 75 miles per hour [not 75 years old]

This poem follows from one blogged earlier:   HWY 5 revisited

HWY 5 revisited

Fixing to hit the road back south anon
efforts to land a job here've not yet gelled
who knows in what far realm life's lines are drawn?
he who the deck of cards has always held

wandering's been my mode by time's decree
where I might land remains unknown to me
stone after stone besteps one seasoned pawn
fixing to hit the road back south anon


==========
January 15, 2011 [early morning, at Meherabode, Los Angeles]

notes (for what worth):
1) Presumably the verb bestep might be a neologism.
2) Generally the rhyme-scheme I've used for a boomerang poem has been either ABAB BABA or else ABAB CACA. But in this instance, I've opted for ABAB CCAA.

"on a bench" [shi]

I sit on a bench in Walnut Creek on Sunday
a tiny bee on a green leaf perches briefly
soon I join the stream of ambling souls who someday
will attain life's nectarean bliss serenely


[a mobile-phone composition]

"cellphone self-portrait" [quatrain]

Snap your cellphone self-portrait at 10:28 pm
after day in the city a'drumming up work on Drumm
& old Market Street (Sarbucks & agencies) wonder when
the itinerant lifestyle may simmer itself down some?

rubai with apologies to Aadi Shankara

An a cappella zoo
(no instrument in view)
whose denizens declaim
all things are trembling dew


========
[and w/ additional apologies to the eponymous literary publication]

[gnomic verse] after Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.

If you can't fly, run
if you can't run, walk
if you can't walk, crawl
if you can't crawl, talk

if you can't talk, cry
if you can't cry, fly!

HWY 5 rubai (LA to Walnut Creek)

hitting the north road soon
lighted by stars (no moon)
deep though the dark of night
dawn will array her boon

Operator!

Does ubiquity obviate significance?
is air less precious being everywhere?
Operator! get me Jesus on the line
as the song goes -- but who's the operand?

============

[alternate version]:

Does ubiquity obviate significance?
is the air less meaningful for omnipresence?
Operator! get me Jesus on the line
alas the operand I cannot find!


============

responsive to this:
"there was a time when a telephone call had meaning and significance."
(as tweeted-to-FB by John P. Matthews)

Kabir says

Hope counsels the life-breath:
patience is required!
pearls you can find scott-free
while grain's got a price-tag!

=========================

aas kah rahi shwaas se, dheeraj rakhna seekh
bin maange moti mile, maange mile na bheekh

your tweet

your tweet declares you've moved
& chicken curry dined on?
the twitterless reproved
they wot not who've not signed on!


[responsive to Priyanka Joseph]

blank slate

surprised by significant snowfall
arrested by meaningful winds
the blanket of white -- is it awful?
blank slate's where the story begins


[1st line borrowed from FB status msg. of Ariel McClanahan Watson (of Nova Scotia)]

irresolute

My writing resolution?
to write a resolution
when the resolution's right
I'll call it good year (good night)


[responsive to the inquiry, "What is your writing resolution for 2011?" (from Places for Writers [via Facebook])]

one one one-one

Whereas one has run & won
& arrived at one / one / one-one

or around the ambit spun
having dived in one / one / one-one

or has trod & lost in fun
& survived till one / one / one-one

their travail yet far from done
who're alive in one / one / one-one

what with puzzling conun
-dra that thrive in one / one / one-one

(tacitly unsolved & un
-advertzed in one / one / one-one)

spread as thick as jam on bun
by the knives of one / one / one-one

deep discursive inklings com
-ing alive with one / one / one-one

the effect could not but stun
near the hive of one / one / one-one

(myriad bees of being's sun
all derive from one / one / one-one)

would you wait to weigh the ton?
or archive the one / one / one-one?

Raphael behold the hon
-eyèd jive of one / one / one-one

a 1/1/11 invocation

The world begins anew
the day begins afresh

new work awaits to do?
bestow your grace Ganesh!

pinioned within a mesh
betwixt the false & true

inhale happiness!
the world begins anew