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Her Story

1/5/2020

by Bob Dougherty

As she laughed I was aware of becoming involved
in her laughter and being part of it, until (1.) I realized
her laughter was really a part she was playing;
the lead part in a script she was creating in real time,
the play evolving before my eyes
and I only
a prop.

Her eyes laughed, then pouted,
and then just as quickly
changed moods like a butterfly fluttering,
changes directions, on a breeze blown day.
I watched through her eyes as the scenery
appeared, then disappeared,
but I only
a prop.

I became caught-up in her drama
and suggested my thoughts for her script.
Abruptly her laughter ended
and a frowning dark cloud enveloped me.
I had broken the rules of her fantasy world,
where a four-year-old girl goes alone
and a grandfather is fortunate
to be only
a prop.

1. Italics are the first line of Hysteria by T. S. Eliot.

Giant Steps

1/2/2020

by Bob Dougherty

The passage of time has a steady gait.
Only you constrain the freedom of your brain.
What will you do before you meet your fate?

Will you hesitate or dare to circumnavigate?
Many treasures exist within your domain.
The passage of time has a steady gait.

Will you circulate and find your soulmate?
Affairs of the heart await to entertain.
What will you do before you meet your fate?

Will you abdicate and just dissipate?
Many waste their lives singing a feigned refrain.
The passage of time has a steady gait.

Will you help mitigate the scourge of hate?
“Russia”, “Ukraine” — we all know it’s inane!
What will you do before you meet your fate?

Will your thoughts reverberate and elate?
Cold is Coltrane’s reed — his recordings sustain.
The passage of time has a steady gait.
What will you do before you meet your fate?

Quantum Unentanglement

12/31/2019

by Bob Dougherty

I’m sitting still on my hill in Tiburon, California.
My only motion, my pen tracing on paper,
or should I include the rotation of Earth on its axis?
At this latitude my pen is flying
at 900 miles per hour.
Well — I suppose I could go
completely Copernicus
and include the speed vector
of Earth around the Sun, but the Sun
is just an average star orbiting
within our Milky Way galaxy and the Milky Way
is orbiting within a cluster of galaxies
and the cluster is ad infinitum…

Then to complicate things, the axes of all these
astronomical megastructures are not aligned;
so to calculate the speed vector
of my pen’s cursive temporal course
through the space-time continuum
would be a herculean endeavor with infinity
as an unreachable boundary
and the speed of light
as the limit of speed.

Chaos theory would imply my pen
is moving at all speeds simultaneously
as slow as zero and approaching the speed of light.
With one exception: it is traveling in all directions
and it is writing about everything
including nothing.

So Albert, what’s the point anyway?
Maybe the point is a point,
a point in time and space,
my hill in Tiburon.

Cento on the Soul

7/29/2019

by Bob Dougherty
the clouds are moving in on Tiburon
like a school of sharks (1)
the moon came up early   a pale orange (2)
before slipping back into a bed of silence (3)
what if my cold eye took in
the naked nymph in the fountain (4)
I dreamed over a picture
of the December behind me
the black rocks off the black cliffs (5)

something in me wants to believe (6)
in the peace that passes all understanding
and what I got was an axis of evil (7)
a dark god in need of a human sacrifice
smoothly turning its back on the earnest (8)
and I know about the best of intentions (9)
so I find the entrance to the
underground and descend again (10)

on the wall one of Blake’s good angels
holding a child just out of reach from
an evil angel   and the words (11)
man has no body distinct from his soul (12)
he wanted to know if that was how I felt
and I didn’t hesitate to tell him (13)
for so I created them free
and free they must remain (14)
then I saw a world in a grain of sand
and heaven in a wild flower
held infinity in the palm of my hand
and eternity in an hour   (15)

how is it we never tire of dreaming (16)
Notes:
Thomas Centolella: 1. Southerly Wind and Fine Weather 2. Loneliness 3. Piano 4. Simulacrum 5. The Lost Coast
6. La Purisma 7. Orange Alert Creeping into Red 8. Namaste 9. Spirit 10. Ave Maria 11. The Soul 13. Counterpoint 16. The Pacific
William Blake: 12. The Marriage of Heaven and Hell 15. Auguries of Innocence
John Milton: 14. Paradise Lost

Ratskeller

7/19/2019

by Bob Dougherty

there may be a place in this world for them
but I don’t want them around me
wouldn’t eat in a restaurant
that tolerated them   at all
trouble is   they’re everywhere
they are rats and breed like crazy
spread all kinds of diseases
they’ve invaded our cities and farm country
but never thought — my neighborhood
you do what you can to protect
your home — you know
but the town — doesn’t do anything

then last week it happened
I knew one got under my house
I could literally smell that rat
well   ya gotta do what cha gotta do
I grabbed what I needed
and climbed down in the cellar
followed my nose and trail of clues
found that rat lying by a hot air duct
dead   nothing gory   just a mummified rat
I couldn’t help thinking about
all his comings and goings down in the cellar
and how he never really bothered me   at all
well   ya gotta do what cha gotta do
the world’s sure a different place
down in the cellar

Waves on a Lake

7/17/2019

by Bob Dougherty

there rests a peaceful lake
the water is as one
then tempests fierce waves break
the water is undone
turbulence devours peace
crests cannonade the shore
yet cruel winds always cease
and water’s one once more

To Bits

5/31/2019

by Bob Dougherty

a bit is a coin
worth twelve and one-half cents — WOW
a two-bit haiku

Choice

5/29/2019

by Bob Dougherty

pick up a precious coin
it bears a head with pride
yet every bit integrally
it has another side

flip a coin in the air
chance knows how it lands
you can spend life flipping coins
or think and choose your stands

When Your Heart Stops

5/23/2019

by Bob Dougherty

I was on my back   shirt ripped open
people standing around murmuring
a worried smile kneeling over me
paramedics rushed in   I didn’t know why
it was like fog — but it wasn’t fog
in the ambulance there were voices
maybe to the ER
male   early forties   overweight
possible cardiac arrest
then more voices
yeah   he flat lined   at least two minutes
slowly I realized they were talking about me

          my heart was fragile
          diagnosis — elusive
          life became eggshells

now   years later   my condition
still with me is controlled
yet   I know I went through a door
many times and somehow came back

people ask what it’s like
and I can only tell them — It isn’t
then they almost always ask
you mean there’s nothing?
and I tell them I didn’t say nothing
I know I would have experienced nothing
and I didn’t experience

          time starts with your heart
     experience flows with its beat
          time stops with your heart

Song of a Clever Man

5/13/2019

by Bob Dougherty

I write a song of a clever man
who wrote with skill and flare,
conceiving a saga of every man’s
sense of life, love and despair.
He wrote through the eyes of an everyman
who lived his life in his poems;
yet, he thought, “I don’t like my everyman
bearing a fictitious name;
I’ll be my very Everyman
and write as I were the same.”

So, our clever man became his Everyman.
And his Everyman, clever man’s dream.
Our writer and his character
became more than just a theme.
Then every man bought clever man’s books
and Everyman wore the fame.
Everyman’s persona became
larger than life, as the twain
became selfsame.

Success grew great for our clever man,
but he greyed, inking Everyman’s life.
In time, an aged clever man,
pen in hand chasing his name,
lost his self to his Everyman;
a slave to his self-made fame.

Without all consuming passion
great works never rise.
The price of greatness is always great;
the artist for the prize.