Importance

Importance

I am an old photograph

In a closet

Passed around electric

Torn upon the floor

In an old building

Filed in a discarded book

That slowly decays

Nothing can bring me

Back to life

By the time

You see me

Everyone will have forgotten

The way I laughed

The sound of my voice

The list of my loves

Or what I'd eat for breakfast

I wrote this already dead

My bones became dust

When the title was written

I'm sorry I can't touch you

Or caress your skin

With my rough lips

As we share our beds

I neither care about

Or listen to news

On the radio

In a video

I am not heard

I am not seen

I claim no grave

Nor space in the minds

Of my descendants

My dreams are all black

Printed on failed atoms

Split for new stars

Come here now

I call for you

Be nothing today

Evaporate into meaninglessness

We will be happy together

Barry G. Wick

Banned in Texas

This poem

Will be banned

In Texas.

It was written

By a person

Who has read

A book,

Seen modern art,

Hoped for alternative energy,

Can spell in American,

Has drunk wine,

No longer owns guns,

Thinks there's hope

For Hispanics,

And worst of all...

Has had sex.

I'm certain I could

Offer up some other

Shocking life experiences

That someone in Texas

Could find offensive

Such as having ribald

Dreams on occasion.

Mice in my home 

May also have had sex.

My neighbors might be

Lesbians.

I have electricity that's

Reliable in winter.

That alone will

Get this poem a

Triple X rating

In Dallas and Houston.

Far worse,

I write letters and poems

And have family in Texas

Who are literate

Just like me.

They might be

Sesquipidalians.

Thank you, Texas,.

For banning this poem.

You have boosted my career

To the emperean.

I expect to have,

At the very least,

Attracted one more reader

That doesn't pay me

For anything I've written.

I also put ketchup

On hotdogs.

Shit.

Now I'm banned

In Chicago.

Barry G. Wick

Black Time

Black times shine through 

Out from the days

Into the empty nights

Bragging their nonsense

With dreams and colored visions

That never can be possessed

I am tears that wait

To be brushed away

By a welcome finger

Not my own that reap

The sorrow of golden days

That never came together

The descent into this morning

Of promises begins lifeless

Seeds of caution expect

Their blooms of change

Overloaded with pillars

Of racing sun caught wild

Barry G. Wick

Before Long

Before Long

When was that?

Or when will that be?

I stand in awe

Of the colors I see

In those two words.

The yellow of the fall grass

Where I'd sit on the knoll

South of my childhood home

On Hangmans Hill.

What dark green ponderosas

With black and gray bark

Torn to rose by finger nails

Stands in the way of my eyes

As I spent time thinking

Above the town where I grew

With no plans or dreams

Of my own.

I satisfied the dreams

Of others hoping I could

Feel a love for which

I searched and still do.

Did the radioactive rock

Deep beneath my chosen perch

Burn the drive out of me?

I'd look down upon the town

The descending path

Behind me with its curves

From the skyline above

Ends here with the redwood house

On my right and my future

On my left where the rain

Would cross the bands of hills

I could see in summer.

Is it long now, as my mind

Goes there to rest

In these lonely years?

Is it before long

When life's longest rest

Takes me to the edges

Of the universe?

This reverie in limbo

Has me dreaming

Of sitting here

In a past where my mind

Was blank of everything

That was important

Or could be.

I'll never really be

There again,

Alone, so alone,

Watching all that tiny life

from above

As if I were a godd

Unable to control anything.

It is the same now,

Without the browned grass

To pluck and place

On youthful lips,

Or tiny stones to toss

To the edge of this gentle mound

That comes to me from memory.

Barry G. Wick

Realization

Today

I found out

Two great composers

We're lovers for forty years

Nobody told me in the wasteland

I needed to have water

In my chest was

A thirsty horse

Who needed

Everything

I followed paths

That took me to lost

Libraries 

When I couldn't read

It's too late to runaway

There's no hope of rebirth

I'm in a growing darkness

Full of shame and guilt

Looking back at all the people

I hurt

Destined as I am

I live to punish myself

Alone 

Barry G. Wick

Night Travels

Night Travels

My dreams give me life

In the dark

I search for home

And fail to find it

Or am turned away

By people I don't know

Sometimes walking

Sometimes on a bicycle

I then search the night

For another place

I called home

There is no feeling worse

Than waking up

Having found nothing

To satisfy the desire

To return

Welcome to my search

I've found you

Rummaging through my thoughts

For what answer do you search?

I don't have it

Barry G. Wick

Ten Thousand

 

Ten Thousand

Dance steps

the noisy kind that turn the head

through drifting picnics

on soft grass

The surprise of it

Note of music

soft passages with open windows

mixed dark dreams

lightning in clouds

water pressure released

Lines of yarn

blue and red on indigenous looms

to wrap a horse

with falls from grace

extended hands shunned

Frightened dogs

a pleasing yip of joy

the walkers stumble

climbers grab at straw

jars of beef broth

Wet finger tips

wrinkles in the cotton shirt

wilting chrysanthemums

squirrels chase in the yard

the vibrations of Bach

Barry G. Wick

It.

It. (For Nancy)

Have you selected your "its"

It is a bottle of vodka

Filtered and re-distilled

It is an eclair with choco icing

It is stylish clothes

Or your newest friend

Who has your heart in a skip

There will come a day

When it won't matter

Any it will not matter

Oh you'll seek butterflies

And unicorns grazing

In fields of pale blue flowers

Their hooves flinging gold

Into a spring morning

When some it grabs you

With muscled arms

That enfold you

Only for a moment

Until you remember 

It doesn't matter

This isn't surrender

Or giving up

This is acceptance

That this moment

Will be more important

Than the it that scrapes

Your remembrance

Of your first breath

And bright lights

In a cold room

When life became your it

Your focus changes

All those other its don't matter

They all release you

From your promises to them

This and that it doesn't matter

You are now free

To be

To be it

Barry G. Wick

 

Dear Readers and Friends,

Blogger by Google is changing.  Instead of allowing you to received my poems, as you are one of my subscribers, via email, they are no longer going to allow that.  I suspect the day is coming when I will no longer be posting here.  None, the less, if you wish to see my poems when I publish them, please send your email address to rikwrybac@yahoo.com and I will alert you when I've put a new poem up here.

You may or may not know that I am not a fan of the publishing world.  I'm certain there are people smarter and more refined than I who bring small magazines and books of poems to the public.  They are to be lauded.  I hate rejection beyond everything.  I've been rejected ao many times by editors that the pain of rejection is beyond my ability to stand it.    Now, some will say, toughen those tits, Barry.  Yeah, but after a life where I was always trying to be tough and never could be, well, maybe I hope you'll understand why I don't try an publish...sending out my simple ruminations into a dark world.  Thank you for being among the view who read what I have to write.  Remember, to send me your email address and I'll alert you.

Barry G. Wick

Ancient Wisdom

Ancient Wisdom

(with thoughts of Lao Tzu)

Little thoughts have bounced

around my head

for years

Lao Tzu figured it out

thousands of years ago

In my old age I understand

what he wrote

in another way

or the same way

depending upon his age

One failure becomes two

Two failures becomes three

and three failures becomes

the ten thousand failures

Anything I write after that

is just trying to keep your attention

which is another failure

because you'll go on

and never remember me

which is one of my

ten thousand failures

Barry G. Wick