BURIED GOLD©

ELOCUTION

there is no sense of disorder

just a lack of the usual order

tonight's full moon stirs no ghosts

there is no explanation for this

there is none for my work

these words flow one after another

as feet follow an afternoon stroll

aimed nowhere in particular

spring buds pushing out everywhere

with no unique intent

it would behoove Shakespeare

suppose all the actors on his stage

were speechless

OIL RIG

college days:

gas, $0.19 a gallon

price war!

Sam Crow's Shell on Castlemont Drive, San Jose

unbelievable?

take the word of a seventy-five-year-old

and so?

today's prices vary by that much in a day

anyone remember when the attendant who pumped your gas

also checked your oil, cleaned your windshield

all as a matter of course?

a thing of the past

and now we're hooked

what next?

imagine the gas disappearing

which of course it is

there being a finite supply of oil in the ground

and when it's gone?

the price war will get real

suppose you can't get home, take your kids to the beach, go shopping

how much will that be worth?

oh, electric everything

not to worry

but it has to be generated and stored

there's coal, gas, hydro, windmills, solar panels

for hot water and, yes, electricity

(well, strike coal and gas)

(green house gasses)

the amounts generated without fossil fuel, even including nuclear power

fall short of present consumption

and now we're hooked

and climate change doesn't stop when fossil fuels are gone

rock and a hard place

not to speak of wars, migrations, pandemics

fuel running out, climate changing

these are certain

the disaster is already upon us

what to do the certain question

technology will save us!

but it got us here

paeans to progress notwithstanding

remember when it was the most important product?

soon to be replaced by profit

if indeed there was any other important product

can technology change climate change?

will fossil fuel last forever?

rock, scissors, paper

a game older than me

and certainly less relevant

THE UNBEATEN PATH

this legacy of language

honorable heritage

fabric of human life

closely woven in thought

means of communication across generations

across the room

across treaties, declarations of love and war

and slavery

to shorthand definitions of the flow that never ceases

with such an introduction, surely

words must rank as generals and leaders

saying do not follow leaders

did Bob Dylan really know

what he meant?

politics is buried in the dust

of definitions

as Dylan Thomas wrote

do not go gently into that good night

surely he knew that the next day

would follow anyhow

and the path that seems to have appeared here

where does that lead?

not to disappoint

it leads nowhere

and where is that?

it's right here

in the heart of unknowing

go there gently

BAGATELLE

magic of language is hocus pocus

like any other

it is trickery

including these words

which debunk it

a self-referential conundrum

ah but rhythm and rhyme, which ride along

these

are prior

as the chicken which precedes the cow

descendant of small birds found perching upon

water buffalo

hidden in the DNA of sea gulls and mussel shells

even mistletoe

there is a certain felicity

it rallies the mind

so there is no excuse

logic must bow

like a flag at half mast

on a misty morning

as nasturtiums gather dew

in jeweled spheres