of Taoist Formations and Van Gogh's Final Moments

              A harmonium paints the morning sky
            with a soft yawning cloud of awakening,
                a distant hill explodes with poppies
          and the singing desire of one million birds . . .
                                  In the air,
        in the impermanent broken wheels of humanity,
                            there is a sound,
    an echo that resonates from the womb of the earth . . .
        thus, I sit like Van Gogh in a field of crows
      and try to capture a fragment of the universe
                    with the uncertainty of words. 
              Oh I know that it is time to abandon
    the shadows of black and self destructive imagery
          and when I see the stars breathing inside
            the very heart of a sunflowered galaxy,
        I understand the endless circle of suffering,
                  can translate the wind’s song
        and when the October crescent moon rises
          above the cornfield and the scarecrow
              I realize that I have been betrayed
                    by a wilting god weeping
                      at the monastery door.
                  I cast aside my monk robes,
        I step over the discarded and dried out skin
            of the serpent who once captivated
                      with sexual overtones
        and become embraced in the ivory limbs
              of a goddess dressed only in ivy
                and the scent of wild flowers
                    that bloom at the edge
                      of an ethereal lake. 
                Oh the yin of the butterfly,
              the yang of the rock it rests upon,
        the imperial lungs breathing from the leaves
                            of the oak tree,
                the serenity of the salamander . . . 
                  all living Taoist formations
                discarded in the desolate stable
                      of the modern mind. 
    But they continue to paint the deserted landscape
                            nonetheless,
                    even if our eyes be covered
        by the unnatural toadstools of metallic spores
            that we plant beneath the aching breast
                          of moonlight. 
                And the whisper of the forest,
              the abandoned bones of humanity,
            the restless spirits hovering above us
                    like ghostly apparitions . . . 
    they can be heard in the ever changing symphony
                      that we try to ignore. 
                  But they are always there,
      in that place where pain and beauty are united
                      to form the mystery
                  that we sometimes call god. 

          Oh I gaze up to the breathing firmament
          and visualize Vincent on that final day,
        longing to become simply a natural vapor,
  a memory measured by those who truly understood,
              no longer battered and bruised
                    by the insensitive fists

                      wielded by mankind.