Synapse

 

S Y N A P S E

 

As it happens

A first blink in the synapse

Begins three moments

A trilogy forming ovum.

 

As it happens

In trimensions

A second binary Blink

Blends the homogeneity of empty space

 

Such as chaos of expanding;

Contracting existence -

A tertiary Blink

Meanings of light

Cascades in isotropic wends.

 

As it happens

The ovule Blinks

In the synapse

A muse contends

 

Her wands as brushes;

Paints as music-

The interlocution

Is isolated by survival.

 

As it happens:

Blink into plasmatic

Oceans of luteous forms

Changing and evolving spectrums

 

From flavous to blue; to pink; to swallow

The muse whirls and spins her vaulted universe

To save a way

And breath for one more day.

 

 

 

 Written for Old Court House Art Center Exhibit - As it Happens

by Bert Leveille "Synapse"

https://vimeo.com/showcase/7795629 

Synapse

"As It Happens" Gallery Installation (Now thru December 31st)

https://www.atrociouspoets.com/

Trial and Trail of a Pretender

The trial and trail seemed purposeful yet, his feet walked mindlessly along

while he dwelt upon the detours of all his good intentions.

 

For the toils of beauty are not equal nor just -

 

It is a vindictive enemy -

the more you resist the more insistent it becomes - demanding full fare for your life

and this, for many is not as much of a question - as it is a promise to some destiny at the next stop.

 

He became less his ideas and more the ambitions reflected by his place, his status, his money,

his friends, his haughty collections but mostly, he was a myriad of all his doubts and insecurities.

And, in the end, even the mirror could not recognize him.

 

That gifted box sitting in the closet -

contains all the compliments, real and perceived, he once numbered.

And the box wrappings with all the blossomy ribbons?

Those are the self-denials to himself as the best possible ornament. 

A Fire in Tercet

Virgil’s question, “What fears - thee

When the garden is in plea

For a bee to rest upon thy breast?”

 

I dread the beast’s silent quest

And too; when words will not rest

To fill upon a line nor form into a page.

 

Virgil’s question, “Is this a poet sage

Or a fanciful lunatic in a rage

Waiting for flowers to blossom?”

 

Neither winsome face made handsome

Or plain; shall keep sins hidden behind loathsome.

Waiting to wait - a loud adore; or the quiet abhor!

 

Virgil’s question, “Is the door on fire

With flames that create an empire;

Or is it merely a pyre – laid deep with fears?”  

  

Castings at the Fringe

If you were there at the place

where the moon sits

And if I were here at the edges of its beams,

crossing distances of time and space,

would we be casted in shadow splits;

Together as one at the fringes of existence?

(photo by Johnna Calvillo)

A Path Not In Vain

The path's veins
Bleed Light
And nothing lives in vain.

I Can't Breathe

I Can't Breathe

November ‘63; a bullet explodes

Filled with bad odes

Blood fills a titular head -

A frame too sad.

The news freezes all

And too, I can’t breathe.

Cities implode into a churn

As the song pleads, "burn, baby, burn!".

The dogs growl at the bridge

And police hold the ridge

Against a minister’s prayer call

Of a dream where all can breathe.

Brother Robert teaches hope

And then, an LA interlope

Stills Camelot’s last gasp.

Another favorite son will lapse

And, the Summer of Love will fall;

Napalm is in the air; we can’t breathe.

Young men drafted - abide

The country's outrageous ride

Into a false war's reason;

Soon, too many sons lost to a country's treason.

Students shot at campus mall;

She cried “he can’t breathe!”.

In a faraway place of ancient origins

Revolution is in the air against Americans.

Iranian students despise Western ways

Holding embassy hostages in secret stays

Insisting for a Shah’s royal pall

As the clerics claim, “We may soon breathe”

A man lurking about at the Dakota.

Imagine - John ending a sixties’ coda?

In Houston, one good heart replaces a failing one.

In LA, Rodney is beaten and killed by justice’s wand.

In Texas, David takes seventy-five into fires enthrall.

Poets and songwriters tell of a turgid air - we can’t breathe.

A quiet September morning sit two towers

As the life of a city awakens to last hours

Before hate strikes at the twin emblems of the free

And suddenly - their collapse kills all lost in flee!

Mongers of fear bite at the nation’s throat with deadly appall;

The ribs of the towers swirl with toxicity; no one can breathe.

Three men of justice stand on a man’s neck.

Perry pleads for his life not to be taken in check

And, his black color assures that he will never be set free

From the knee of injustice; and he pleads for his momma to see.

What is one more life when black is the voice that calls?

“I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe”  -  And now, we gather to breathe.

The Last Couplet

The Last Couplet 

Feted and decorous jesters of spoken sound 

Gathered a circle of romantics into a round 

To initiate their exiguous songs 

Crumpled into verse, sonnet; all sort of doggerel wrongs 

Written and sung with plaintive tone so to disabuse 

The objective of the critic’s tongue of stinging refuse 

Flavored bitters and morsels of disfavor and condemnation 

Offered as the last course - at the table of predation.

A Man and Door Perception

It’s an old door now with longing splinters.
The frame it hangs on has seen hard winters.
The key that unlocks it from dogged ways
Has been lost, misplaced like so many days.


Perhaps forgotten or traded for dreams
The story? Doesn’t really matter - seems.
The portal views are cracked and unclear
Do not see too well; it's fine no one near

To hear the rusty hinges groan and creak;
Telling stories of good years left to speak.
Door is a bit swollen and hard to close
Or open; doesn’t matter, no one knows:

  Why the door sits at the cave’s perception -
  Neither agape nor refused - to inception.

River

From an ancient place where once glaciers kept 

A small spring sprouts from loins of Earth Mother. 

A birth of pure, clear fresh pools forms a waterbed 

Over small pebbles that were once source to mighty mountains. 

The baby spring strengthens into a fountain of youth 

With a curiosity that spreads out into riddles of a brook; 

Seeking knowledge and wisdom to flow and stream 

Over the ground into rivulets; forming path and way 

That will someday channel itself to a beloved bay 

Far to the western coast; at the edge of a continent. 

The River Johnna, will find the ocean

Where both her beginnings and her destiny - fulfill life.

Distention of Apprehension

Distention of Apprehension



There is a moment when all dimensions seize

To maintain their expected condign within human seas

Where right and left; up and down are not brought to question

That is, until the peccant crown orbs bring apprehension

With their tendrils of tiny protein capsids wondering

Seeking to invade by evading the platelet’s plundering.



You have now entered the twilight zone.

Where strangers are best left to be stranger; affinity is not a condone

Keep a distance by distention of six by six

Time no longer holds to the clock face’s fix.

No flowing; no gathering allowed without hiding behind a casque

Otherwise, you will be assimilated; breath taken by a death in red mask.



And the whole of the planet shall stop

While the dead are counted daily like the corn crop.

Why does the nurse collapse in exhaustion and fear?

Why do they regret lack of a healthcare warrior’s gear?

The twilight zone is no place -

For a beautiful angel’s uncovered face.

#atrociouspoets #poetrycommunity #poetsofinstagram #artistsofinstagram #woodstockil #collaboration

A Still Painting

#atrociouspoets Prompt 25
#nationalpoetrymonth
#aprilpoetryprompt

A Still Painting


Standing; stilled at the mountain’s ledge
The extreme height and depth below strike
Fear at the gut - like a sharp knife’s cutting edge.

A 2 AM ringing call alarms awake
The slumber as stillness flees into fear
And each word forth strikes at heart ache.

Two tall military men dressed in blues;
Arriving Marines strike at the door
Fear stabs the mind still; a-son-is-lost-news.

A silent room frozen in time;
Mobile hangs still; a lone bassinet
Stands empty - life has lost all rhyme.

Fear looks like the lost in darkness;
Fear is the tender heart held to stillness:
Fear is the vacant eye lost in madness.

Rhyme Alaska - Alexa

#Atrociouspoets Prompt 24

Rhyme Me Alaska - Alexa

Spake to me dear Alexa!
My dearth hearth is dark
And my thoughts are in a lark.
Give me warmth; that I not be wretched.


Master, what relief do you seek?
Free verse, Old French ballade, love poem or prose?
Do you seek a sonnet, a quatrain, or a couplet of repose?
Should there be golden orbs or a dark mystic?

Matters not - ye foolish gutless voice!
Just give me words of wisdom or advice
For my skin crawls in fear of unseen lice.
Know you not a helpful rhyme choice?

Would you prefer served in Cartesian dualism
Where replete in abstracts of a living Tree?
Or set in concrete forms of what is to be?
Shall I facilitate the poem into existentialism?

Just do it! You cylindrical formless beast;
Give me comfort and joy
Without further respite or employ!
If need be - “Alexa rhyme Alaska”, at very least.

Very well, seeker of solace and cheer:
   There was once a man of trumpery
    With quite a dumpy way in his buggery
     With affairs and slump around in leer
      He sold his soul for the bestest robbery.