JOURNEYS:
poetry   by
david joseph sawin

1.
gifts

i gave you the last i had
seeing you
from the wide corridors of open mind
frozen now in flooded fields
of thought
passing into an empty cup,
never remembered
but for your pink party dresses
we danced away
and were gone
to gather up all the
sheep in the meadow
where you made pure sweaters,
left broken skin,
glanced away and went
with memories already starting
to flake and fall
i gave you the last i had
and danced my way on
with music of the spheres
in my ears
knowing nothing was lost.

2.
spaced
 spaced out of circles
 we make squares into pegs
and tomorrow's young girls
all want to come along too
but the stars reached
 meanwhile seem to hurt
too much
with words
not saying
a meager hello
amid our goodbyes

3.

origins

the Lord operates in sundry ways
making all the religions
of have been and will be
into living alone
with all of yourselves
meeting everyone within
your smiles
(and tears are for all of them)
and  we
give fruit
for this morning
is almost
HEAR
[all you have now is your signature to make you different]
and feeling flows
 between our lines of music
and music flows between our words
bringing have been and will be
almost
 here
now
wait and see.

****

and feeling wait and
see
coming into being every minute
grounded
til the powdery past
became us
tumbling and spilling
with the night
 before
making it to the sunrise.
calls, requests, and demands
mean nothing
all we need is our eyes to
reach now
before sun's poor excuse
 for a moon
means you have said yes
and you
 become a flower to make a sun
and give it a moon;
along with your eyes glowing,
speaking,
 so intensely and fiercely,

words choke understanding.


4.

(sighs)

serene of rest
soul of rising
sun of eating
cones of sugar
riots of sons
of  revolutions
supreme of recognition
sap of roots
says rise
since ripe
 salvages rot
so rebounding of
(sighs) with reeds
of sadness mean
today will last forever
in between
 a yesterday
and
 a tomorrow
with growths of inner heat
will be yours
though your cold circles
 cover only you
til they reach a
sun
of their own
and become
a rainbow after rain-
soaked streets of summer
bring all your life
to rise above the sky
with the cosmic hope
of today
 lasting forever
in all your children.

5.
try now

try again to
present
presents in
presence of
past
time
past all time of
pastimes
to be present
 between then and when
pass on to
presence,
spilling  time
  past

into thought-full
intensities of now.

6.

go
A.
a poem always starts with a question
and ends without one
period.
will i never see
i will never see
see will never me
me will never see
i will never
i will see
i see
ever.

B.

ever will become
faces in a crowd
ever will become
stars and books
to bring a word of Bibles
ever will become
me will ever become
faces;
 to know me.

C.

lights will always
bring music
will always become dark
will become light.
will you
will light
my
way.

D.

beyond a flower
beyond a table
a candle
and a can
can you
i can
not light
 you, too
to be
beyond
me
will never see
never see you
will come
and go
beyond me
standing, unseen.

E.

a way to come
away
away
a way to leave
away, away
and leave
til my eyes  have a light
of their own
to spread stars
 in one raindrop.

F.

meant to happen
with such a swift-
ness
in a jar
of emp-
ty people
we went
to see you
off the train.

G.

in a cream filled
car
go and see
if there's
a jar
of empty people
and stop.
where do you
want to get
off.

H.

How?
many ways
can you see
a moun-
tain
on your
back
with a rain
in your face
how

I.

do you do it
with one small por-
tion of rice
a day
How?

J.

a couple of years ago (yesterday
to be exact) i spent a long
time by a lake
near a pine
tree and tried to find
every
one
in you
yesterday in a haystack
i tried to look
at everyone's sun
shine
in you
and yesterday
in an empty tube
of all people
i found me.

K.

two boots
to kick you
over a frown
in a foun-
tain
found
an eye
ball, bare
as a rock,
below my fore
head
under the wing
of a robin's
blue egg nest
where i flew
once
for a time
and fell
today.
tomorrow i will not learn more.

L.

than a ghost
will kick you under a
log and roll
to the sea
in a can
vas back bag
and move
along to his
next victim;
i can wait.

M.

i am not
a will
or a was
but merely
a wait
til you see
my eyes
and know
a face
fright
ened and lost.

N.

a diff
er
ent
song will be played
to the tune of
Life Never Ends
in a day
long shower
of words
but will
when the rain
 drop dries
from my win-
dow.

O(h).

Hate to
love you
will not
be a both
er
some
heat to me
when you go.

P.

at last
when
an answer
spread out on the wall;
Be.
fore i had a chance
to ask
i went.




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