SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION
In school we were taught
to look both ways before crossing,
not to talk to strangers,
and not to play with matches.
shouts to no one in particular,
talking to God on a first name basis.
might have some truth to tell,
some knowledge gained
from pain and hardship.
But whether fraud or prophet,
there is a heat in his eyes
that could singe your eyebrows
if you get too close.
a cat playing with a lamp chord,
vapors rising from an uncapped can
or oily rags stored in a cellar.
who hid in a Texas tower
to fire randomly into a scattering crowd,
as if shooting at distant candles.
who set his alarm
and arose one morning before school
to kill his Father, Mother and Sister,
still in their beds.
with his own lone obsession
who walked into a school
and shot children,
round after round
until sickened of the taste
of smoke and sobs and blood,
he felt the impact of the last bullet himself.
like calculated bonfires,
men crazed with a cause
with twisted justification,
who send the prayers of strangers,
the hopes of those who have known
some moment of happiness
into an eruption of debris and smoke.
carried on the wind were to land
hidden in your backyard garden,
to burst raging in the lilacs,
suddenly swallowing the night.
the artist
to paint flaming sunflowers
with the swirl of a brush,
who focuses all the more
to overcome solitary agony,
be similar to the one that smolders
in the demagogue
who sets a wildfire of fear
in the hearts of his followers
and fans the inferno of hate
until he himself is consumed
by his own blaze?
that burns in someone
torn by the love of life
and the ache of living,
one who translates a flicker
of beauty into tones on a piano,
be the same heat that flares
inside the mind of a man
who torches hearts with acrid lies
that blind the eyes of those
so eager to believe
and to be led
into the flames?
that for each Joan of Arc
who stands in the fire
with a prayer in her heart,
there is an inquisitor
fearing for his own power
who sets the spark
of her funeral pyre?
that for every Hitler
who deceives so well,
he deceives himself,
and brands humanity
with a searing iron of hell,
there also comes a King
who brings the dream of peace,
who teaches truth
to awaken our best placed faith?
c 1999 / Larry Simpson
Click here to audio page for Who Do You Trust?
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WHO DO YOU TRUST?
Do you trust your father?
Do you trust your mother?
Do you trust your lawyer?
Do you trust your lover?
Do you trust the government?
Do you trust the press?
Do you trust the president?
Do you trust the flesh?
Do you trust your judgment?
Do you trust your heart?
Do you trust the violence?
Do you trust the stars?
Do you trust in science?
Do you trust in art?
Do you trust the silence?
Do you trust your ears?
Do you trust your balance?
Do you trust your fears?
Do you trust your daughter?
Do you trust your son?
Do you trust your doctor?
Do you trust your gun?
Do you trust the water?
Do you trust the ice?
Do you trust your brother?
Do you trust your eyes?
Do you trust the weather?
Do you trust your wife?
Do you trust your sister?
Do you trust your life?
Do you trust your silver?
Do you trust your gold?
Do you trust your mirror?
Do you trust your soul?
Do you trust in nature?
Do you trust your dog?
Do you trust your future?
Do you trust your job?
Do you trust your teacher?
Do you trust the cops?
Do you trust your wager?
Do you trust your God?
© Larry C. Simpson 1999
More Audio:
Wowsville, Live at the Feelmore
WOWSVILLE
Like,
we took an ego trip to wowsville.
We hitched west
and like panned for bread with the freaks,
and it was something else.
We were high on sunshine and digging the grass.
Like,
The colors were cool
and the sounds were groovey.
We like met these barefoot chicks
in bells and beads.
They like shared their stash
and wanted to ball,
so we grooved to the beat of the Creame
Then took another hit and killed the roach.
We piled into their bug and dug the Beatles
all the way to their pad.
Like,
we flipped on the happening
and grooved to the vibes,
We got hip to how to cop
and dropped window pane.
We, like lived on the Dead
and sang with the Byrds
We rang the Liberty Bell in Straightsville
like every one else.
We tripped on the doors
and rocked with the Stones.
Like,
we fought for peace in the summer of love
and hated the pigs
when the bust came down.
But the dealers got to be bummers
and they lost their cool on their own.
By then we were fried on the sunshine,
like so wasted we peaked all night
then we crashed.
So we split from hipsville
to find a new groove,
like, somewhere else.
Audio: Tale of a Man With No Teeth
TALE OF A MAN WITH NO TEETH
I stay on
named for a tanner who used to collect
horse piss to cure his hides.
Got rich off horse piss like Grant’s old man.
There used to be a tree in the middle of the street
where Mad Anthony once tied his horse.
Now it’s gone like every thing else.
Somebody even got the idea to straighten Mill Creek
and put concrete where trees once were.
That creek never hurt no one.
Except for the flood of thirty nine.
You could paddle up
Used to be, they drove hogs down Spring Grove,
chopped them up for meat and boiled the fat for soap.
You never heard such a racket.
That was before there were more cars than hogs.
Even money ain’t the same.
Cash registers chirp like birds.
You gotta finger every Coke machine
or tote a bag of cans to make quarter any more.
They oughta make people keep holes in their pockets.
At least no one would go hungry who could pick up a dime.
You dip enough dumpsters and put your money on the right
number and you could be president,
or buy a bowl of chili.
These politicians, all smiles and flags, they don’t care.
If you could put all the stink of this city,
beer puke, roach spray and stale beans,
put it in a box and mail it to the politicians
instead of votes, they might once think of the poor people.
Too many lawyers.
More lawyers than barbers.
A barber gives better advice.
That spittoon in the junk store window
has more heart than a courthouse lawyer.
Listen over there! There’s a rock band playing
above the locksmith’s shop.
The whole building dances like it’s coughing up blood.
Kids don’t know better these days,
they just do what their radios tell them.
They throw their money away trying to get rich,
and tangle themselves up trying to be free.
A dog always circles a tree trying to get off a leash.
And the moms wrap their babies in plastic
and strap them into cars all day.
Even a drunk knows better.
But who wants to listen to a dead man.
Just gum on the sidewalk, that’s how much they care.
See that window?
There’s a naked woman in the tombstone carver’s shop.
She’s too big to get out the door
and doesn’t want to anyway from the looks of her.
Something needs to be permanent.
Can an old man be in love with a piece of marble?
I can’t look in her eyes too long.
Walk on down by the army surplus store.
In there you can smell the sweat of a dozen wars.
Now boys buy dead men’s boots so they can walk taller,
and ware camouflage to be seen.
Two blocks down, you can stop at a goodwill store
and buy a used memory, cheap.
It’s been raining forever and yesterday.
The gutters are full of snakes that tie themselves into knots
and hide in empty bottles.
Rainbows won’t even come out of oil slicks.
All the sounds that went down that sewer won’t come back.
Like the clankety-clank of a milk wagon on cobblestones.
Now you get milk in a store with beer,
and no one keeps a cow in the alley.
See that hardware store?
If they took the whole world apart,
he’d have the spare pieces.
Across the street there’s a florist who used to be as pretty
as the orchids she sells.
Weddings and funerals.
She’s seen so many faces, she thinks her flowers cry at night.
I know this town. I carried bricks for some of the buildings
still standing.
Dug ditches when my back was good. Held a plumb bob.
Swung a hammer till my fingers couldn’t loosen their grip.
I remember that work better than making love.
Where’d it all go? Hear that bell?
It’s the church across from the food stamp place.
It keeps trying to tell me it’s time to die.
How can it save me from hell when it don’t even know
when to strike twelve.
I only listen to Jesus,
but they're trying to run him out of town.
(C) 2007 Larry C. Simpson
With this kiss
you risk your lives.
With this ring,
you make the choice
that will decide the course
of the rest of your lives.
With these vows
you attempt to become one
with another
and yet to learn to know yourself
through the other.
With this union of flesh,
you must search
the depths of your souls
for the truth to forge
the trust
of an enduring love.
With these hands joined together,
you join in a journey
on the river of spirit,
through a wilderness
that is dazzling
in beauty,
yet foreboding
and mysterious
in its depths.
Though raging currents
toss and crash you
against the hardships of the heart,
threatening to capsize your faith
and drown your hopes,
you must pull together.
You must steer with honesty and trust,
to reach those calm waters of love
where each moment
is a breath of God.
With these promises,
you give the gift
of yourselves in service
to the other,
in the work and pain and ecstasy
that is a lifetime of love.
BOUQUET
You bring me a bouquet of grapes
to sweeten our kisses,
but I am already drunk on the wine of your eyes.
Your bosom is a meadow of clover,
my breath the whisper of bees.
Your fingers
are dogwood blossoms
drifting down into my nakedness.
Your skin is a warm lake of moonlight.
We swim into a dream that is ours together.
Somewhere on a hillside,
dew collects on a grape,
catching the sky up-side-down.
The droplet falls and I fall
into you,
dream into your dreams.
I rise in my falling,
a mist swirling in the forest of you,
mist lifting and falling
through maidenhair ferns
drifting in the birdsong of your sighs.
Light as pollen,
we sail the clear wine of dawn.