Anam Cara (Soul Friend)
The sound deep down
Quiets my soul
The music I strum
Like something I know
The words on the table
Her face in my head
A place where I can go
Anam Cara
Talks to my soul
Hear my laughter
O hear me cry
I’ve been to the mountain
And tasted your wine
I’ve stood on your shoulders
And fallen behind
But you never let me go
Anam Cara
Keeping me whole
Anam Cara
Lights up my soul
Anam Cara
The clay and the stone
Anam Cara
As deep as it goes
Anam Cara
Anam Cara
I don’t fear the lightning
I don’t fear the storm
When I shake in the darkness
You keep me warm
Your love is a candle
When I’m alone
Anam Cara
Lights my way home
Anam Cara
Lights up my soul
Anam Cara
The clay and the stone
Anam Cara
As deep as it goes
Anam Cara
Anam Cara
Anam Cara
Anam Cara
She quiets my soul
today
today,
you look fucking gorgeous
you look gorgeous
today
today,
you look
you
today
you
Morning Musings
Eggs and Honey
You are like eggs.
As scrumptious as you are
sunny side up,
the very next morning
I get an intense craving
for over easy.
Saturday’s Love
The kitchen table
toast crumbs float
on coffee puddles
like sawdust bogs.
A milk-drunk cornflake
flops unconscious off
my spoon into the slough.
We stretch, then sag…
tangled fish-line hair,
night’s crinkles still deep in our skin.
Then the morning glint of your face—
I want to kiss your corky lips,
and devour my toast.
We Are Love (Poem Version)
We are love
We are children
We are seeds from stars above
We were made to love each other
Come on people, we are love
We are howls in the jungle
We are dolphins in the sea
We are grass, deserts, mountains
We are insects
We are trees
We are, we are love. We are we are love.
Guns are gods on the altar
Sacrifices must be made
Sandy Hook to Columbine
Trigger fingers digging graves
Fill bread baskets with dead children
The metal gods must be fed
How much blood will it take
Before the wailing turns your head
Greed is bad, so feed the hungry
Hatred eats away the soul
We are all the same religion
Breathe the love that makes you whole
Stop the bombs, stop the terror
Stop the rage at home tonight
Imagine all our children
Living safe in peace and light
Bunny
Did a sweet wind blow you into my life?
Once a friend said,
“She’ll warm you forever, if you don’t screw things up.”
Did you see a cocky angry tempest of an unsure boy
or
the man inside, desperately trying to breathe the stormy air?
Do flowers have passion because you see them?
When I said to myself,
“I want her with lava fever in my veins!”
Did you see a hard, angry boy
or
the man inside who made love to you?
Is friendship the skin you wear?
They told me,
“Don’t take life’s soft treasures for granted.”
Did you then see a careless, hard, angry boy
or
the man who needed your skin to survive.
You are the night’s gentle hand.
I was in black water, screaming.
You saw a frightened, careless, hard, angry boy
and
stilled the howl with your touch,
and loved the man you awakened.
Transcendence
You have touched me
below my breasts
where I do not remember feeling
Only what just passed between us
like a soothing storm
Tingling drifts into stillness
Our bed stops me
from floating to the floor
or dropping
like an anvil
from a high dream
Your face
a lamplight
washed with rain
showing pure in darkness
You held my soft hands
and lesser arms
You urged their soft stroke
and found me hiding
in my lame mansion
You watched my crazy dancing
cried with me when I lost my step
Awakened me
On this bed we sleep
Three Pearls
It is an honor being loved by you.
You bring smooth luster to my life.
May that love somehow outlive
the earth and the stars,
to shine in some forever with a light of its own.
Always giving what I’ve had from the start
My girls
My pearls
The pearls of my heart.
Tsunami
When love
like a tsunami
goddess
Washes over
your
eyes
ears
heart
and caresses
to the surface
the purity of you
You cannot drown
Its flood
will buoy you
to need the
waves of
words
passion
lips and
skin
Slowly becoming
warm ripples
to swim freely in
the goddess
Of yes
Promise
You’re not alone
Don’t be afraid baby
I am yours
Always will be
Nothing, no nothing nothing’s gonna hurt you now
It can’t end this way
You know me darlin’
I am yours
It’s all I can be
Nothing, oh nothing nothing’s gonna to hurt you now
Kiss the sun
Feel the warmth on your face
My lips are here
To kiss and talk the blues away
Nothing, no nothing, nothing’s gonna hurt you now
So open up my soul
And you will see
Our love is waitin, waitin’
Come on home to me
Nothing, no nothing, nothing’s gonna hurt you now
Quilt From A Woman’s Heart
Love
Woven in from beginning to end
Empathy
The strong thread of kindness
Nurture
the soft fabric of caring
Pain
her hard-rain tears
Pleasure
shared like the smile of a child
Suffering
carried like rocks inside
Joy
the luminous sister of love
Grieving
gripped deeper than words
Laughter
the sound that fills the soul
Anger
Sewn in just in case
Lovemaking
as close as I can get
Secrets
I never need to know
Trust
like eyes that see the real me
Resolve
forged into iron over thousands of years
Wisdom
stitched into each
Truth
the warmth and challenge inside
Human
every inch
Perfect, no… but as brave and beautiful as morning
Put Your Love On
Take off your face
Put it under your chair
Your poison breath is wilting the air
The scowl you’ve been drinking
Isn’t what you’re made of
Take off your blinders
And put on your love
Take off your banner
Take off your sway
Take your bullets and throw them away
Take off your trousers
All splattered with blood
Scrub off the hate
And put on your love
Take off your Christian
Take off your Jew Take off your Islam
Your atheist too
Take off your cloak all covered in mud
Take off those beads
And put on your love
Take off that hat
Take off your seethe
Howling at rainbows is no way to breathe
Strip yourself naked
With black and brown gloves
It feels like peace when you put on your love.
Holy Women
I heard of a guy
Who could look you
In the eye
And say,
“Follow me I know where you’re going”
He had a beard
It is said
A face brown and red
Never seen
With a white collar
And robe
There’s a woman too
Sitting on a bar stool
Singing her legacy of
Blues
Into my soul
Like she’s welcome
Holy men pretend to know me
Holy women always seem to
After all
We are children of
Star storms
Delivery screams
And quiet caring
The wild side of Eve
Is hard
To get to
But I always
Feel like staying
When I get there
Her eyes speak
And say stay
Then sings
You’ve been a long time comin’
A long time running
A long time comin' fast and slow
You’ve been a loser and a winner
A longtime beginner
Come follow me all the way home
Come follow me all the way home
Yes, follow me all the way home
Hey Mom
Hey Mom, we’ll be right back.
We’ve been kicking and screaming forever.
You gave us the blankets of our being,
but did we even notice while attacking life naked and unarmed
that you were our warm fortress?
Hey, Mom, you worried for everyone but yourself.
Those scary nights always melted with your soft touch, and
we always got brave again in the light of day.
Eat your vegetables.
Supper is getting cold.
Where have you been?
What?!
The years marched by like soldiers who blindly obey.
You still hear us calling in our quiet times
after the world has spanked us and sent us to our rooms.
Hey, Mom, who cried with more joy and sadness than you?
A loaf of bread and a gallon of milk...
We leave for the store for the very last time.
Walking safely on the scent of your soft embrace,
we start to understand the meaning of love.
Hey Mom
Catherine Jean by Don Hooper
Hey Catherine Jean
Sure seems like a long time since we talked
You’ve been gone so very long
And you’ve missed so very much
Just seems like a forever since we talked
I’m so sorry
that I wasn’t there for you at your darkest times
Had I understood what was going on
How bad you must have felt inside
I would try to pull you through your darkest time
Jean, in my dreams I see the image of your face
Catherine Jean
Growing up at the park
Playing tag in the dark
Scared and cold and
Coming home to you
Safe at home
Warm with you
Jean, in my dreams I hear an echo of your voice
Catherine Jean
Swimming at the creek all day
Late again
Supper’s put away
You turn and smile
And say, you’d think you’d learn
You'll never learn, Don
Catherine Jean
Your little man Chad has a brother and sister of his own
Mom, you would be so proud
Of all the things they do so right
Living their lives straight and strong
Just wish you could see how much they’ve grown
How they’ve grown Mom
Jean, you stood alone and went toe-to-toe with life
Catherine Jean
Four hungry mouths to feed
Taking care of all our needs
I stand in awe of the strength you had inside
You’re a hero – Catherine Jean
Jean, your sacrifice gave us all a chance at life
Catherine Jean
Sons and daughters yet to come
Will never know that you’re the one
That every breath they draw they draw from you
Live forever – Catherine Jean
Rest in peace Mom
My Catherine Jean
*This is a special one written as song by my brother Don who died August 15, 2021 before he could record it. Dave Nye put music to it, but I couldn’t do it justice when I tried singing it. I ended up recording it as a poem. Rest in peace Bro
Where We Come From
The James Webb cosmos photos
swallowed my eyes with depth and beauty
made me think…Love
How big and small it can be,
the depth
the inward outward expanse,
bright beginnings explosive ends.
Love, like galaxies and stars, comes and goes in all sizes.
Star-crossed passings,
nebulas of confusion
trying to see supreme light
our senses scatter,
hormones jump like frightened fish.
“Better to have loved and lost
than never to have loved at all,” writes Tennyson.
Grief might disagree, M’Lord.
Some say love is learned,
not seeds growing in stardust.
If you don’t believe in the love particle,
you haven’t felt its gravity on you like
the weight of a thousand suns,
needing to be inside someone else’s being
an implosion of
white-hot passion
lighting up the night.
Love can burn your wings or
warm your soul.
Like the dust we come from,
it may be too small to see
But it can bake or break your sanity.
I feel close to the fire
when I see eyes that know me,
not the pretend me, but
the me who talks to the stars
those mothers and fathers of me up there
showing themselves
from where they no longer are.
