Years Are Those Things With Feathers

Years Are Those Things With Feathers

That Fly In Nervous Weather.

Emily Said It Best

In A Back-East Poets Fest.

Scratches In Time.

Earth Has Its Own Mind.

Those Who Stray─

Find Notes With Ancient Signs.

Those─

Shake And Bake Alien Rhymes.

Mental Petals Do Survive

In Deep-Brain Dives.

So─

Nothing To Fear In Any Perception Year

When Truth Uses Main Gear.

And Squally Moves

Make The Body Groove.

Happy New Year!

H.T. Manogue

www.shortsleeves.net

In High Tide

Step Back In Time

Body

Has A Mind.

So, Stand On A Holiday Cliff

Watch The Air Drift

Two And Fro ─

Mental Wind’s

Magical, You Know.

Knocks And Frocks

Life’s

Full Of Midnight Tocks.

And

Nylon Socks.

There’s Plenty

Of

Pointed Toe

Clues

When Thoughts

Dream With You.

Get Out

Of The Way.

Enjoy

That Big Christmas

Payday.

Plenty Of Love─

Nowhere To Hide─

When Consciousness

Swims

In High Tide.

H.T. Manogue

www.shortsleeves.net

Bananas In The Snow

Crossed The Line. Weather’s Fine.

Running From A Dream ─

Ego Got Caught

In The In-Between.

Halfway Up Remembering Hill

Feelings Got Kind Of Chill

Like A Cook In Bed

Eating Frozen

Sourdough Bread.

Then

Brain Steps In

Call It─

Slippery Son Of Sin

And Its Twin.

Heart-Beating Glances

Lots Of Chances.

School Bell Rings

Choir Sings.

When Bullshit Burns

In A Smelly Urn.

And Truth Breaks Wind

While People Hang Low

Like Bananas In The Snow.

H.T. Manogue

www.shortsleeves.net

So Be It Thanksgiving

Pulitzer Prize winning poet Gary Snyder wrote the poem So Be It with help from an old Native American (Mohawk) prayer. The poem’s message keeps walking through my mind like an unleased dog looking for the right tree.

The words in the poem fill me with a unique awareness. And a connection to another aspect of my physical and non-physical presence.

So Be It opens a door to a new reality, and I feel that reality surround me. Happy Thanksgiving!

Gratitude to Mother Earth, sailing through night and day-

And to her soil: rich, rare, and sweet.

In our minds so be it!

Gratitude to Plants, the sun-facing light-changing leaf

And fine root hairs, standing still through wind

And rain, their dance is in the flowing spiral grain

In our minds so be it!

Gratitude to Air, bearing the soaring Swift and the silent

Owl at dawn.

Breathe our song

Clear spirit breeze

In our minds so be it!

Gratitude to Wild Beings, our brothers, teaching secrets,

Freedoms and ways; who share with us their milk;

Self-complete, brave and aware

In our minds so be it!

Gratitude to Water: clouds, lakes, rivers, glaciers;

Holding or releasing; streaming through all

Our bodies salty seas.

In our minds so be it!

Gratitude to the Sun: blinding pulsing light through

Trunks of trees,

through mists, warming caves where

Bears and snakes sleep- he who wakes us-

In our minds so be it!

Gratitude to the Great Sky

Who holds billions of stars- and goes yet and beyond that-

Beyond all powers, and thoughts

And yet it is within us-

Grandfather Space

The Mind is his Wife.

So be it

Thanksgiving

H.T. Manogue

www.shortsleves.net

Ageless Drug

Wash And Wear

Forget Them Cares.

Trust─ Not Fuss─

Swallows Foggy Air

With Smiling Stares.

Yeah,

All Is Good

Under That

Inner Hood.

Drop The Fears.

And Lonely Years.

Cause Life Is Born

In Cellular Form.

Grease

Your Inner Wheel

It’s Time To Peel

That Camo Rug

From That

Painful Mug.

Sit In Love.

And Be Your

Ageless Drug.

Wrecking Ball Ride

Write All Over The Sky.

Jerk-Off And Fly.

Like An Vulture

On His Way

To A Fish Fry.

Room To Cheat.

Laws Have Cold Feet.

Is That? ─

Having A Blast? Or Just Gas?

Cause It’s

Plenty Of Range

To Act Insane.

Hit A Note.

Fix A Vote

While The World Drifts By

On A Wrecking Ball Ride.

H.T. Manogue

shortsleeves.net

Crooked Signs

Toss It Out Sour Mouth. Spit It Up.

Take A Gulp.

You Can’t Choke On Diet Coke

In A Fit Of Fear

Surrounded By Hat-Wearing Peers.

Suggestive Crowds Act Really Weird

In A Casket Filled With Lawless Cheers.

Anger Talks Loud And Dresses Dirt Proud

In The Middle Of Democracy’s Shutdown.

What’s Hell And Counts In Time?

A Hate-Filled Suggestion Plane

Fit To Fly

Thanks To Our Ignorant Eyes ─

Yeah,

The Holy Scriptures Have Some Twisted Sisters.

They Trap Minds In A Cult-Like Bind

That Squeezes Thoughts

Into A Psyche Line

That Bends The Sublime

With Crooked Signs.

H.T. Manogue

www.shortsleeves.net