When the Evenings are Silent

Watching the moon
over the lip of a wine glass,
feeling the grass
below my feet, sleeping
at the feet of a giant dune,
the evenings are silent.

When I can't sleep
I listen to cars passing
on the avenue, there is silence
in their tread
and passangers
stare at buildings passing by
each with an untold story.

On the fourth of July
we watch fireworks
where silence takes off
its clothes between our oohs.

Mornings where a husband
makes coffee, a wife
finishes the crossword puzzle.

At work, in the closure
of a long meeting, people
chat regarding summer plans
or weekend yachting trips
up to the "old club."

In sanctuaries across
the world, people mourn the living
people celebrate the dead, confessing
in silence, the many sins of many
people.

Somewhere in the plains
wipers sweep the drizzle
off the windshield, like
waving goodbye to the fields
of crops practicing a gospel
of silence.

A man slips a paper
into a file, soon
forgotten due to an account
we now call silent.

Looking across the restaurant
I eavesdrop on the couples,
but in one corner, there is no
conversation. Years from now,
with moments of regret and
nostagia for something misplaced
between lovers, they'll probably
pass this restaurant and remember
savoring the flavors, the passions,
and finally the lack of dialogue, which
resulted in the loudest conversations
a pair of unmoving lips
ever experienced, broken
only by a kiss, and one of them
turning out the light
before sleep.

The Stone Dream by Stephen Saul

i dreamed
i was a wooden horse
a gift to trojans
and then
a broken pale
on a wooden step

i dreamed
i was a poem shredded
scattered like waste
in abandoned rail yards

i dreamed
i was a whore a saint
a drag queen a wild thing
lost found confused enlightened

i dreamed
the stone dream
where a bad wind rages
our city streets
leaving our young men
to howl in ruins of stone
and to scream obscenities
in the flesh and blood
of birth and hard-on
only to weep
the tears of mothers
and of madmen
against mausoleum walls
in shadows of bronzed glory

once again the beast wanted nothing
but the death of everything we love

i dreamed
the dream of wise men
old
long suffering
who sit like death on their balconies
at twilight
and vouchsafe the eternal flame of silence

and i dreamed
the dream of wild horses
that rage hill and valley
where rings of pale fire
ignite the starless night

i dreamed
the waking dream
god in the darkness
impenetrable silence
fucking myriad of names
words of blasphemy
spilled like water from my trembling lips
i have worhipped in all YOUR temples
now come die in mine

and i dreamed
the night dream
old men rising
from the neon shadows
to stand lonely sentinels
at deserted gates

i dreamed
the dreams
of starry-eyed dreamers
on the subways
and the sidewalks
and the ferries
from brooklyn to the golden gate
where the steam rises
and the waters swell
and the sweaty masses press
only to weep
in the end
with the young men
and the old men
the mothers
and their daughters
all quiet
all hands interlaced
in candlelit fields of night

stephensaul.com

I dream of wine and vineyards

When Sophie Returns Home


Moving the barrels will require
her support, and bottling
syrah will change my life with her
and in the evenings
we'll sit with two
glasses on the stone table I made
in the rear orchard,
under the trees we planted
in our youth. Our parents
will be spirits by then
and returning from college
in California, Sophie might
feel them in the trees,
the vines and hear their
breathe on the wind. She'll
notice the leaves talk
to one another and occassionally
to us, and the ivy
growing on the fence
recalls the evenings
they sat here on the south
facing slopes
looking for nothing
in the green of the earth
and the blue of the water.

Maybe she'll hear the stories
passing through the rustle,
but by then I'll have forgotten
how to listen and when I pass
all the land becomes hers.
She might realize that the land
never blonged to us, that really,
we belonged to the land.

Inaugural Post...

Drunk Poets' Society:
Thank you very much for your kind invitation. Thank you also to Karen for such a fine introduction. Although, I now have something to live up to! I welcome anyone's comments, criticism, or suggestions. I also have a xanga site that I periodically post poems, pictures, or opinions if you are interested. The adress is: www.xanga.com/ir0ny

Here are a couple poems that I have written:

Fasten Seatbelts For Descent

I'm going back to meet myself
So he can tell me how it felt,
To be the one without wings.
Yelling into the depths of the gravel pit,
Voices echoing, echo, again.
Reflecting off the granular memories
Piled high in the depths of his mind.
Circumstancial consequence, irreversible.
Fading into an air of normality, take a breath
Not enough to trigger the alarm to
Whisper its plea, smoke, no smoking please.
It calls out to the foolish,
But I fly with Icarus, transcontinental.
Take a picture for the memories, but as for now,
"Attention passengers, this is your pilot speaking, we will be flying at 37,000 feet."

Here is a poem I wrote that I was featured in the Holland Sentinel for reading at the Herrick District Library.

As the Sun Shone Down He Professed, "Scrabble King I am"

Shadows long, fingers bent
Prodding, asking, growing still.
Hopes of summer erased as the
Temperature retreats unarmed,
Back to the way things were before.
Things that wishing can't erase,
But too many of them leave to me
Pencil lacking the
Eraser, my saving grace.
Grin and bear no more
Re-do's or mulligan’s.
Look it up in the dictionary, a word with y and z
Scrabble King I am.
Live my life like the game
Formulate, calculate, rearrange
Until I find the perfect words
The simplest, but score so low
With only an:
I love you
And then, the winning words revealed
I know you see the shadows too
And feel the chill upon your cheek
The wind chime sounds, the grass is already
Greener than before, summer hopes restored
Stay, smile, Scrabble King I am
And I love you.

=adam