My song is simple / Because I am simple. / I need no complex language / To sing my truth / No adjectives or adverbs / No alliteration, / No similes or rhyme / I speak directly to your being / I use the voice God gave me / To sing His praise.
Category: Poetry
A Somali Mother’s Concerns in a Cradle Song
In this essay, I explore the Somali lullabies from a close reading of their texts. While singing their love to the babies, Somali women also express their sentiments towards social issues that reflect women’s traditional roles in the pastoral society.
#AI
Author’s Note: I originally composed the piece for Cosmos Café session on “The Spirit of AI,” where you can hear an early (weak) version of the poem, along with some of the discussion that informed later revisions. I then performed a more complete vers …
Quarantine NotesQuarantine Notes #8: Wisdom
The danger of cynicism is getting what you believe in: Nothing.
Quarantine NotesQuarantine Notes #7: Spirit
Strange, the power of the past—how our spiritual ancestors become our future masters.
Quarantine NotesQuarantine Notes #6: Reading/Writing
Never mind poetry or prose, good literature is the art of friction.
Quarantine NotesQuarantine Notes #5: Technology
In the age of information overload, our guides are curators.
Quarantine NotesQuarantine Notes #4: Creative Work
Anything freed from the marble is an angel. Never cease chiseling…
Quarantine NotesQuarantine Notes #3: Love/Loss
A working definition of Love: we started talking and never stopped…
Quarantine NotesQuarantine Notes #2: Balance
Birds don’t use their wings only to fly but, also, for balance―just like us.
Quarantine NotesQuarantine Notes #1: Art
Art for art’s sake is a dead end; art for heart’s sake is the way out.
Quarantine Notes
A collection of aphorisms by a contemporary adept of the form, these bite-size poems reflect on the nature of art, wisdom, love, technology, and spirituality through a modern and yet timeless lens.
Prediction
Prediction—or personal pose: / In the Age of AI / Poetry will be the last refuge / Of human language.
in under 500 characters…
Now that #ai is colonizing / #writing, my mind goes back / to studying theory in the ’90s:
Ars Poetica
There is no rest for the search engine. The unquiet dead play games with the subject/ object interface. It appears that our operating system is not a friend to Jesus. Logos flash through the sky of the Sinkiang Autonomous Region. Our wet dreams run through fiberoptic cables.
To the Cleft of the Mountain We Go
Fold up the linen and keep the receipts / Re-bury the boxes in earth. / Tight—shut the windows, hermetically seal / Let nobody see its birth! // Golden-brown bodies with Sun-kissed lips / Don silver-moon garments of old. / Hush— cool silence for raging and violence / Fire’s mouth must be closed to console. // To the cleft of the mountain we go!
Your Box Problem
“Think outside the box,” they say. What if your box is doing the thinking? Where does your thinking end and your box begin? How many boxes does it take to screw in a light bulb? The answer may surprise you.
Lo fatal by Rubén Darío – performance and translation
Marco V Morelli reads Darío’s classic in original Spanish, with music by Doug Duff. There is a new English translation as well.
18 Notes on Space
What does Space mean to you? Do you have enough of it? Too little, too much? How do you make space… for Space? This piece was composed for an evening of Poetic Alchemy held in Boulder, Colorado, in the spring of 2019.
Jupiter Square Saturn
“Jupiter crash landed into Saturn.” As above, so below. What follows is a short and bittersweet astrological allegory about the power struggles that ensue in the heavens.
Author Interview with Susan Evans
Susan Evans’s poem “Lucy” appeared on Metapsychosis website in Autumn 2020. During the following winter, we exchanged emails in which Susan told me about her creative process, her sources of inspiration, and what her hopes for the coming year.
A New World (Poems and Photos)
Going inward / I see my grey sleek wolf’s belly / moving forward on long legs striding / free, clear, unassuming / my natural strength carrying me / into the clear space ahead.
Studium Spiritus Sancti
but i often underestimate my husband / for he pointed out that i actually said schizophrigid / i had a kitchen dresser which contained crockery i never used / over- solicitude is display mothering /
Gasp
What happened, Miss Hooker asked–she meant my shock–so I said, Well, please turn around and take a look at Jesus there and tell me what you see.
Four Poems
The shrunken fighters, cheeks sunken and eyes Gibbous as praying mantis, like a god kept captive By some sick forest cult That provides sacrifice seasonally…
Lucy the Nun With the Green Socks
“Lucy the nun with the green socks / saw me hugging the oak tree / that summer I / hibernated in Spartanburg.”
Anatolian Dreams
“St Barbara, a poor white gloved icy ingénue, / Has long been a dusty piece of Black Forest wood // That grew out of the ashes of Sibylline books”
Soul Retrieval: Poems
they call it soul retrieval | when your essence | core | beingness | the skeletal|hole|body|brain that lives in your gut|liver|kidney|body| self|shatters | breaks its own skull|heart|body in its crumpled raisin|brain as the result of small t | BIG T | sOmE TyPe of tRaUmA
Sutra of the Computer Body: Questions for Karina Bush
“I’ve found a techno relationship cuts right into the core, the soul, brings out an almost more real version of yourself, makes you see yourself differently, your own potential to be better. It can achieve a level of emotional perfection. That’s also the problem…”
Animal Encounters
Following him into the darkest places taught me to never be afraid of the dark. / It’s full of unimaginable euphoric surprises…