Morning Prayer

I look outside and know things have

changed incrementally in ways

I do not see.  A new day slightly 

rearranged.  A refusal delicate,

strong to not remain as once was,

the gift of life, the death and resurrection

of small things, the holy rebellion 

the divine is made of, casts out over

this morning like a prayer that is heard

in the silence of listening,

in the sight my eyes take in,

in my heart and soul,

the agreement that things

are not as they have been

and the implications for me

as I live and breathe

the elixir-filled air breathed in

that clarifies for me the moment

and I repeat the prayer –

“I will be as I will be,”

the air filled with its echo.

-Byron Hoot

Art by Amy K.

Art by Amy K. @ https://www.instagram.com/picsbyamynow/ 

Just This Side

This evening stops short of paradise 

because it cannot hold time still.

The great fulfiller, the great betrayer.

The river we step in never twice

at the place we claim as “Here.”

The picture catches a fleeting moment.

A poem, a story recaptures what was

never caught.  The beauty of the evening

light in the trees, on the ground, 

the silence and stillness I take for granted,

is like a prayer to open the gates 

of what cannot be seen but felt 

in the beauty, the fullness of a moment.

And makes me think paradise

is nearly within sight.  I listen 

for a shadow whispering, “Follow

me.”  I am ready to say, “Yes.”

I know I am Moses just

this side of the Promised Land.

-Byron Hoot

hootism (stolen from my friend, STC):

 “Others, meanwhile,

Dote with a mad idolatry, and all

Who will not fall before their images,

And yield them worship, they are enemies

Even of their country.”

from Fears in Solitude, April, 1798, During the Alarm of an Invasion, Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Shine More Light In The Shadows by Will Found/Blundervan

blocked from the light of truth
the ignorance in the shadows is a shelter
in which hatred dwells
putting up umbrellas of lies

shine more light in the shadows
shine more light in the shadows

to make oligarchs cringe and cower
truth expressions 
truth expressions reflecting into the darkness
hate spewers deprived of power
oligarchs cringed and cowered

blocked from the light of truth
the ignorance in the shadows is a shelter
in which fascists dwell

shine more light in the shadows 
shine more light in the shadows

children starving so more yachts can host
more whores to join the man-whore chorus
calling for forgetting about the rights of all of us
blocked from the light of truth
the ignorance in the shadows is a shelter
in which nazis dwell

shine more light in the shadows
shine more light in the shadows

help help help the hate fed hate led followers of the idiot-antichrist
crazy for their bully clown to
bleed the USA dry in a billionaire circle jerk

shine more light in the shadows
shine more light in the shadows

make the deceiver's dwindling legions
come to grips with their folly

shine more light in the shadows
shine more light in the shadows
shine more light in the shadows
shine more light in the shadows

shine more light in the shadows
shine more light in the shadows
shine more light in the shadows

shine more light in the shadows

https://blundervan.bandcamp.com/track/shine-more-light-in-the-shadows

Art/Music by Will Found

 Art/Music by Will Found @ https://blundervan.bandcamp.com/

Art by Cory Tambourine

 

Roses in a Vase

Fresh red roses gifted crisp in a shiny crystal vase,

Deflated balloon danced gaily on its bobbing string,

Yet, spent no time or change for late night dates

Or other stale, male-female things.

Dry- bent stems flatter-chattered their small talk cheap.

Eyes saddened dull cried their cruel half-truth lies.

Stare-glare glances pierced hearts drowned in trance-deep sleep

As tender petals withered brittle, tumbled pity-parched to dry .

Gripping death shriveled crippled, dripping its unfelt cold,

Against a strain-wrinkled,  pain-crinkled face, 

As pink waned to brown, bitter romance  waxed old,

Mere dead rose tokens in a broken, ring stained vase.

~P.S. Colley

April 1989

Rev. Dec. 2024

Considering Living

I think about death more than I 

used to.  My death.  Nothing 

as grandiose as the planet’s

or democracy’s.  Something I 

can grasp.  I think of “Less is more.”  

Like all true statements about art,

it speaks of life.  If I have learned

anything, it is to discern what matters

to me.  Not as a selfish pursuit but

more like a prophecy.  A prophecy 

of love for this world, my life, those

I love.  The urge to be who I am

before I am a memory.  To leave that

legacy behind is to know “the kingdom

is among you.”  I’m in no hurry.   

I don’t mind my coffee

getting lukewarm as I watch a robin

walk across my yard.   Another prophecy,

it seems to me.

-Byron Hoot

https://www.facebook.com/hootnhowlpoetry/

Art by Zach Baker

 

From Artist Zach Baker @https://www.instagram.com/studio.zachlectic/

Art by Zach Baker

Pride #1 2024

Untitled 2024

Some Music

Moon happened to listen
as I tried to organize my consciousness
while the wind danced
like a whirling dervish
beneath the aleppo pine

Yesterday was like a movie
without end
bits of information
scattering across space-time

then there was love
like a gathering,
making shape out of chaos
into something like a moonstone,
secret and delicate
peach and blue-grey

-Nancy Pontius

https://soundcloud.com/ketogah

ON HEARTSONGS

Remembering Philip Church & Mattie Stepanek

Thank you Jeni Smith Stepanek for reposting this poem

ON HEARTSONGS

Dedicated to Poet Mattie J. T. Stepanek

PHILIP KENT CHURCH

~

There’s a wondrous place, when seen in context,

Which exists and then passes, before the speaking of a word,

It lies just beyond what’s occurred, and what happens next,

And if one listens carefully – it’s where ‘heartsongs’ are heard.

The notions of past and future are merely what we insist,

Both the last moment and the next are beyond our affect,

The truth is, this moment is the only time we actually exist.

And only have the here and now where we can have effect.

Vain-glorious pursuits can become so self-defeating.

When a heart’s songs are recorded, be wise as sages,

Bearing in mind - both riches and fame are fleeting.

Heartsongs must be inscribed to stand the test of ages.

Be still and listen in your heart for the echo from above,

Listening close in a peaceful moment of no fear or panic,

You can hear the heartsongs - recognized for their love,

And join the ranks of ‘peace-makers’ –

Like MATTIE STEPANEK!

https://www.facebook.com/Philip-Kent-Church-1409887615889348/

On a Curve

Once and only once, on a road I

drive with a certain frequency,

and I am surprised that the coincidence

has not repeated but what do I know,

a beautiful woman sat on the steps 

of a porch in need of paint, her long 

legs almost reaching the sidewalk,

a rendition of Rodin’s The Thinker,

relaxed, the house on a curve close 

to the road beside a bar where it’s said 

David Allen Coe once played.  Her beauty

in sharp contrast to everything around.

Her presence, her beauty, 

ordered that place and time,

embedded the moment in me

like a glimpse into eternity.

Maybe I didn’t know how great the contrast

was, her dreams of leaving or staying 

in a different way, the grace that emanated 

from the moment I passed by and she

caught my eye, she neither young nor

old the way beauty sometimes teeters 

in time.  Yesterday, I passed that curve,

that house, that bar, that porch empty. 

-Byron Hoot

https://www.facebook.com/hootnhowlpoetry/

Black mouth Prophet

Black mouth prophet growls vaguely

in the languishing silence,

destroying the peace

of a sleeping homeless person.

 

He conceiving a grudge against sparrows,

an old assessor of a million city,

shoots a passer – by’s dog by eye.

***

A prickly scout

in search of forest truth

glistened with little eyes,

He raises a sharp nose.

 

Having limped on the dorsal spears

of red – cheeked apple prey,

the prickly animal disappeared from the horizon.

-Vyacheslav (Slava) Konoval

Radio

She searches the radio
for a night song
a blend of Texas and new age
her room lit up by holographic bingo lights

she plays dice
emptying her woe out the window
singing along:

“Be kind to your disguises
Be kind to your sins
Be kind to each other...Amen.”

-Nancy Pontius

https://soundcloud.com/ketogah

Earthbound

It may be smoke from a wood stove

inside the house across the road

on the other side of the pasture

lingering in the air like prayer 

incense not certain how high it 

wants to rise, as if there are some

prayers only the earth can answer.

I like the way smoke or fog or mist

gets caught in the tops of trees

like Eros grasping after Psyche,

clutching the edges of the cloak

saying, “Stay.  Please stay.”

So I think of the prayers I have

wasted offering them to heaven

when they wanted to be earthbound,

the answers before my eyes, under

my feet, already in my heart.

-Byron Hoot

https://www.facebook.com/hootnhowlpoetry/

No Reply

My body knows the lullaby of eight hours.

Less or more shows in the waking,

the tone and tenor of the day,

the accord or discord.

Which brings me to how does the body

know what the mind can’t seem

to grasp?  This quickly replacing 

any other koans I know.  

Which draws out the question 

of spirit.  That place of other 

sense, of where logic lies 

gasping for breath.  Where words

dissolve into laughter.

I don’t even know the words 

to the lullaby.  My mind asks, 

“What are you doing?”

I reply. “What are you doing?”

No reply.  And that tells me something.

 

Hootism:  you can’t deny where you’re from and still be who you are.

-Byron Hoot

https://www.facebook.com/hootnhowlpoetry/

Art by Eleph Myrrh

 

Art by Eleph Myrrh  https://eleph-myrrh.mailchimpsites.com/painings 

Pity The Champions by Will Found

"Pity the champions of the idiot-antichrist for lifting greed's puppet to power once again, pulled by lies that hook their hate-disposed hearts, their reason put to sleep, the harm to the world inflicted by their ignorance inflicted by their ignorance  

inflicted by their ignorance “

*Rap generated using a poem and AI @

https://suno.com/song/be6d4b23-c073-45b0-84c9-8431fa8d50b2?sh=mhfSTqiUfisq6kPq