I have a few on whom I can depend Other people come and go and hurt me But I have three great kids and one great friend
As fickle and flighty ones desert me I count my faithful few and find these four Quite enough really and I ask no more
Of course one can never have too many Should you like to become my friend come on Years I wandered without having any None anyone could ever depend on
But I am blessed now and not complaining I wish those who have come and gone the best That these four know me without explaining Means everything and never mind the rest
Now that I think of him I should add Fred Without my fat old cat I might be dead By now but all of us made it somehow This far because of what great friends we are
As sure a thing as one can find in life A surer thing than wealth or health or wife And yet I am ultimately alone
But let me pretend now as I descend Now as I slip into the great unknown I have a few on whom I can depend
I realize that maybe tomorrow My friend might leave me and cause me sorrow So this is it then irreducibly:
My kids and my cat are just stuck with me Three kids a cat and possibly a friend Which is still pretty good if understood
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Dec 9, 2005, 4:01 pm
For Patricia Lance and Mildred Graham
My avocado tree is wide and tall Heavy and massive a hundred years old Here in December the great green tears fall When wind breathes warm or when rain drizzles cold I cannot bear to think it is in pain No they are tears of solidarity
I think of those I loved and lost again My tree knows this as trees know everything And lightly drops these green gifts down to me I gather them as the morning bells ring The bells which counted out the mortal span Of those who lived and died beneath this tree So we are all alone now tree and man And who knows of the future after all
I have never tasted merely gather These our green treasures dropped down from the sky From the soft bed of leaves and would rather Give them to somebody else who will die But who is alive now along with me I pass along these tears of man and tree
Under the lawn forgotten but not gone Evergreen avocado tree and me
+Steven Curtis Lance
When this you see remember me
Copyright MMV
Dec 9, 2005, 3:00 am
Cross the Rainbow Through the Sky
I have tried to seek my heart Words combined and recombined I have sought to speak through art Emotions defined refined
I have struggled toward a start Of a journey with no end Knowing that I am going With only one span to spend
Going yet not knowing where Showing as I am growing Hoping to share with a friend Words which fly away like birds
These pieces of me you see Blow away like leaves in fall When we get there we will share Shattered heart-shards after all
Having learned at last to fly We will know when we get there Cross the rainbow through the sky Taught to care and not to care
What it means to live and die When we get there you and I
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Dec 8, 2005, 8:43 am
Bush League Endgame
Once their best were sly spoke seductively And their hair was just-so no matter what Their lesser lights reasoned deductively Both worked from a script they never forgot Though they never governed productively Dividing us into have and have-not
But their complete control has frayed undone Scooter got in trouble and the bubble Has sprung a leak and is ready to burst The beginning of their endgame begun The Bush League's woes are about to double Three years to go from bad to worse to worst
What a fuss they once made of a blowjob! Small stuff next to this supersized snowjob
We can only guess as it falls apart The scope of their staggering corruption We always knew they were not very smart But now this unfolding interruption Will reveal how they lie and cheat and steal As well as their being incompetent
Not only to govern but to repent
Hey Bush! No one believes you anymore! You could have really done some good up there But turned out to be a ruling-class whore You got to the top then you went nowhere And you took all of us along with you To pay for every stupid thing you do
Time for the Bush League to leave the field now As the rest of us muddle through somehow
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Dec 7, 2005, 9:39 am
The Red Book of Lance
A spark in the dark to set the world on fire, words of flame cried in the wilderness by a madman who is damned to tell the truth, The Red Book of Lance is fourteen dozen of this modern master's meticulous poems introduced by his physician and illustrated with cover portraits by his son.
Darker than his other books yet brightened by flashes of mad humor, the work reflects the gravity of the times, speaking prophetically of political change and social evolution.
This seventh book of Lance is a distillation of deep meditation on life and madness, the world and the universe, the self and others, and the journey of the soul.
In The Red Book of Lance the poet breaks out, breaks through, and means to change your mind: burn baby burn.
+ + +
The Red Book of Lance Is a most useful thing It shows how to dance Out of that suffering Which given the chance Eats away at the soul
Now I choose to live And to suffer no more Let destiny give Me something to live for Let there be someone To share this life with me
Since this book is done And I find myself free Now I dare to explore With another to love What I shunned before What I was afraid of
I open the door
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Fiat justitia, ruat mundus: fiat lux.
The Red Book of Lance is ready now, available all over the world on all the Amazons and other book websites, on order from bookstores, or you can get it from Lulu at these links:
Silent the Snow: A Christmas Carol warm wishes from my heart to yours
Silent the snow The song sweet and low Soft on the lips of the tender maiden mother Straw on the ground The beasts crowding round Offer their warmth to the Son of God our brother
O Alpha and Omega O Bright and Morning Star O Jesu de Maria How beautiful you are
Crystal the cry Of angels on high "Glory to God in the highest and on earth Peace and good will" Rang bright through the chill Swift ran the shepherds to see their Shepherd's birth
O Alpha and Omega O Bright and Morning Star O Jesu de Maria How beautiful you are
Splendid the song Of right over wrong Life over death and true love transcending sorrow Happy are we Who have eyes to see The light in the darkness that we rise tomorrow
O Alpha and Omega O Bright and Morning Star O Jesu de Maria How beautiful you are
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Dec 4, 2005, 2:29 pm
Universal Intimacy
At peace with the past The future unknown This moment alone First only and last
The observed interchangeability Of humankind seems to agree with me I live and let live with all or with none One person seems as good as another This one a sister that one a brother Without possessiveness or jealousy All are my family many and one As I would not a slave nor master be
Entangling alliances have hurt me In the past so at last I have evolved To where I enjoy them all equally No muss no fuss and the conundrum solved In practical pleasant propinquity No winners no losers no one to blame No means no ends and six billion good friends Nothing stops nor begins the world just spins
In our universal intimacy Getting up with Jack getting down with Jill Is one and the same except for the name If one will not love me another will
At peace with the past The future unknown This moment alone First only and last
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Dec 3, 2005, 2:43 am
Chicken Hawks
They are completely hollow And then they are filled with sh*t With just a little black hole Where most people keep their soul And no heart as you can tell
They order us to follow But they are so out of it They never know where to go As they march us into hell
The last hope for tomorrow Best and brightest led away Sent by cowards to the fray While we are left with sorrow
How many will die today?
Chicken hawks who know no fear Lead our children from the rear To glory six feet below Only leaving us the bones
Can you see why we throw stones?
The chicken hawks never will If they had a mind it would Be made up and locked for good Death the exit strategy Until everyone lies still
Snug and smug behind their doors I see Chicken hawks living dangerously
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Dec 2, 2005, 3:51 pm
Nobody But Me and Everybody
Reaching for personal intimacies Left for dead in an avalanche of debt Straining for everlasting verities Left alive with existential regret
Losing my money and feeling funny But not in a way which could make me laugh I am alone but the sky is sunny Better off free without a better half
The biological imperative To perpetuate and to multiply Would seem to last as long as we men live
But having played my part in this now I Enjoy the company of those who were Perpetuated so successfully
Back in the days of family with her The mother of my children who was wise Enough to remarry to my surprise
Which I thought I might do myself but no It was not to be at least not with she Who is someone else's trophy now so
Nobody here but me and poetry Nobody but me and everybody
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Dec 1, 2005, 8:03 pm
Of Diamond Stars on Blue Velvet Sky
I like to read poetry which asks me Questions and causes me to wonder why Things are as they are like a shooting star Crossing my mind to leave the world behind And I also like for poems to be Like meditations or ruminations About the nature of reality
Of diamond stars on blue velvet sky
Sparkling in autumn when the nights are clear A sky just meant to be for poetry When Santa Ana winds are blowing here For the lovers as their warm breath hovers Between those stars up there and you and me The breath of the desert from far away Breathing magic through the night by starlight
Warm and cool at the same time as in rhyme
I like poetry which helps make me free Which inspires me like that breath of the wind I want to share in this freedom with you A freedom no government can rescind And so I will write and so I will fight I hope you will come along dreaming too As we make dreams of poetry come true
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Dec 1, 2005, 12:01 am
To My Smug and Smirking Masters
You can haunt and hurt and hate Belittle me and judge me But too little and too late Now you can never budge me For fate manages this stage Nor can you eradicate That which I leave behind me You can never close this gate My children will remind me That long after I am gone In a better brighter age Truth and justice will live on Past your impotence and rage
You cannot stop history You are doomed to fail and fall And you never will stop me As I triumph after all
You imagine you have won The people hate a bully They will rise and turn on you They will study war no more Nevermore to be your slaves They will win what I fought for As the dead cheer from their graves And you will never fully Understand what hope can do Until this good work begun Which I undertake today Will be done with you undone When the stain is washed away
You cannot stop history You are doomed to fail and fall And you never will stop me As I triumph after all
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 30, 2005, 3:07 pm
Fighting Back
I won six dollars in the lottery today And I only spent a dollar so it was good The house wins unless you know when to walk away So I took it as a good omen understood And with a new spring in my step went on my way Marveling that this was only one of many Lucky breaks after a long time without any
The first paper-white narcissus of the season Bloomed beautiful and fragrant sprouting from a crack In the hundred year-old concrete of my driveway Before the winter spring has made an early start Another good omen and just one more reason To dare to dream again and begin to fight back
As now with all my heart I want to do my part Anything I can do to end my people's pain That is what I will do and I hope you will too Today I go out naked into the hard rain
The conservatives all turn themselves inside out Making such a to-do of the A. C. L. U. So I joined today and made a contribution That should give them something to rage at me about
Sick of oppression of the many by the few I decided it was time for retribution So I also became a Democrat again Moving from Decline-to-State to committed blue
I want to be free and with those who stand with me Shoulder to shoulder struggling for lost liberty
And even if we fail and nothing comes of it If this injustice reigns forever unopposed By those with the power to make the pieces fit And these minds like steel traps remain forever closed At least there were a futile few of us who tried Fighting back to honor the blood of those who died
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 28, 2005, 4:32 pm
Avocados and Pomegranates and Crystal Meth
On this startlingly sparkling autumn day I went out in my backyard and I found Two big ripe avocados on the ground
I never eat them but give them away Left in a shopping bag for my neighbor Who gives me pomegranates in return
I never eat those either but I learn Dynamics of friendship trade and labor Backyard fruit becomes currency exchange Barter economics if rather strange Practiced with green and red commodities
Avocados and pomegranates are Coin of the realm in neighborhoods like these Subtropical fruitful communities Trading in subtropical oddities Nobody here keeps their fruit in a jar
I only wish I had an apple tree Now there is a fruit on which we agree If I had apples I would eat them all
A crazy man came screaming down our street Pushing a shopping cart and pulled by death Shopping for something which we do not grow
And somewhere within his bone-chilling call I heard somebody who might like to eat A pomegranate or avocado
I also heard the cry of crystal meth
But he was so angry he scared me so For now it looks like I may never know
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 27, 2005, 4:32 pm
At the Brink of Time
The light of the sun is rearranging Reality by shadow every day From furthest point of east to furthest west Day for night and night for day exchanging Those exchanges the moments I love best
The world keeps turning I keep moving on The lotus unfolding before my eyes Led by the light I celebrate the sun Embrace the skies to trace its set and rise When day is best just ended just begun
When light has just arrived or has just gone The world seems more alive as we all spin There on the threshold at the brink of time Light manifests most lucid most sublime Where life and death as day and night begin
Sometimes I wonder who I am and why I find myself revolving on this ball What to do how to live and how to die And then there are those times I realize I rather wish I were not here at all
But I look to the horizon and sigh When light has just arrived or has just gone No matter what the reason I am here The world keeps turning I keep moving on The lotus unfolding before my eyes
So I hold on and look to dusk and dawn It seems the trick is not to yield to fear Light always returns although it may hide Each dawn each dusk is still a sweet surprise The coming and the going make the ride
At the brink of time on a spinning sphere
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 26, 2005, 4:38 am
Resolution
All of the same difficulties remain Which had vexed me so a few days ago They have gone nowhere they are still right there Where I left them where they had caused such pain The difference is I no longer care Having found my sense of humor again By which to laugh at frustrated folly
If educated I am "elitist" If I ask questions I am "defeatist" Not idiotic? "Unpatriotic!" They have found their problem and it is me
There is no logical explanation Why I should feel such a jolly Chahlie Except what my mother old-fashionedly Referred to as "righteous indignation"
Which is simply another way to say That I refuse to be dragged down today To where their nattering inanities Wheedling would lure me to degradation But my faith in my friends and family Life's virtues instead of its vanities And my love for you will carry me through
I resolve to get up go on the town And never let the bastards get me down
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 24, 2005, 7:09 pm
Fasting on Thanksgiving
Perception is reality What we believe is what is real Existing in the way we see Reality is what we feel Just as we discern it to be Your truth while absolute to you Is only relative to me
Illusion is that deception Subscribed to by one who believes Being the myth agreed upon Because of hope in what deceives A dream by which to muddle through Most often no real harm is done It seems the dreams sometimes come true
Reality is perception Falling into the mind like leaves Of many colors in the fall Fluttering life down from the tree These days of our lives one by one Passing before our widened eyes Pieces of you pieces of me
Beautiful truths beautiful lies Beautiful chosen parts of all And then it ends to great surprise We know death comes yet never see The mirror of mortality That unrelieved that unbelieved Last unperceived reality
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 23, 2005, 10:21 am
Happy Thanksgiving
White moon winking through newly naked trees Sparkly stars Rusty Mars Friendly voices like windchimes on the breeze Fuzzy hats Cozy cats
Coming together on evenings like these Through the miles Our shy smiles Tonight are mixing up good memories Old and new Me and you
Stars and Mars and the moon likes what she sees
Loving and living Happy Thanksgiving
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 21, 2005, 7:43 pm
The Light of Autumn
The days are short but sharp and shining Brilliantly bright and perfectly clear Before the smiling sun reclining Welcomes the moon as the stars appear The sky itself deftly defining The clarity of this time of year When the heart is called to contemplate Answers of life and questions of death Matters of faith fame fortune and fate In every heartbeat on every breath
We wonder but it is not too late No never too late to leave behind The mistaken notions of our past We can think a new way change our mind We can make the dream come true at last
In the light of autumn we can see Reflected there in the sparkling sky That we can do better here below Better than this and we have to try We look within our heart and we know:
The future is up to you and me
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 20, 2005, 12:16 pm
A Love Song for Thanksgiving
At the turn of time on an eve this fair With the sky this open the night this clear The scent of windblown sagebrush on the air And the intuition I belong here Feeling strangely now I should be kissing I find that old existential despair At least for tonight has turned up missing
What do you do when this happens to you? A situation I do not know well Wary I wonder if this could be true Since most often I spend the night in hell I can only conclude a change of mood Along with the season is the reason The scent of windblown sagebrush on the air
Seems like Advent might be the advent of Something like hope even something like love At the turn of time on an eve this fair As Thanksgiving comes I am thankful for My life and I would like to live some more What do you do when this happens to you? I take what God sends and see how this ends
What I will be as this happens to me
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 18, 2005, 6:48 pm
Hollow Stone
I keep filling myself with emptiness Diet cola from the grocery store If I am not dead already I guess I might as well wait around a few more Days for a few more ways to go crazy
If reality is it is hazy I used to be so sure of things before Which now seem to me to be meaningless If that is not too decided a word Perhaps a better term might be "absurd"
What the hell was all the drama about? Flopping around like a fish on the pier Death-throes of innocence? Birth-pangs of doubt? The hour is late: time to get out of here I would go home if I knew where to go
Holiday hearts echo like hollow stone Fear over here over there the unknown I guess you have to die to really know Flopping around like a fish on the pier The hour is late: time to get out of here
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 17, 2005, 10:47 pm
Mirror
The leaves which had turned To flame have been burned Away in the ire Of the wind's cold fire Impatient to sweep In a change of scene Harvest will not wait
The trees go to sleep Knowing that the lean Time of year has come If only for some While others grow fat With secrets to keep As the hour grows late
I think about that Feeling like a tree In a change of scene Swept impatiently Something which has been A season before A once present date
But not anymore It is not for now Yet will be again As time will allow To bloom when the rain Wakens everything At the turn of spring
No doubt no debate Darkness encroaches Winter approaches And as it begins Becoming clearer Mortality grins Back from the mirror
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 16, 2005, 11:12 pm
Transcendence
When you have nothing to lose you have nothing to worry About anymore and there is no reason to hurry So people like me find ourselves living calmly content Beyond having and holding profit and loss continent Within the irreducible borders of our remains
*Accepting I have nothing I inherit everything
Beyond caring anymore past the passions pathos pains Which spin the normal self in a personal tornado Of ego up down round and round until away they blow Like dry leaves in autumn when it is over just like me In the end the fact I know this is that which makes me free
*Accepting I have nothing I inherit everything
Deep in my heart I have always known to let it all go Is the only way to break free of the things which weigh me Down prevent me hold me back my possessions betray me The material world would bury me in its embrace Smothering and entombing me in context held in place
*Accepting I have nothing I inherit everything
Very well then destiny take me: I let it all go I must die to the earth if I would be born to the sky The flower must dry away the seed must fall away to grow This caterpillar would at last become a butterfly Very well then destiny take me: I let it all go
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 15, 2005, 10:32 am
Out of the Dark the Magic is Rising
Tonight beneath a soon full rising moon A crackle of excitement sparks the air On this eve of a full moon rising soon A surging energy as it expands Draws you and me and the sea everywhere
Everyone feels its magnetic demands To open our hearts our minds now to dare To offer our spirits with open hands "Open" it beckons us: "open again" Love will fall in the full moon's light like rain
Out of the dark the magic is rising May you be one who shines who understands That the moon's rhythms are real and remain Up there outside down here inside of you The pulse of life which no one need explain
Come open with us now we happy few The favored who do not find surprising That the moon is alive is filled with power And never more so than the full moon hour Love will fall in the full moon's light like rain
When the moon unfolds like the lotus flower "Open" it beckons us: "open again"
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 14, 2005, 4:07 pm
Shared in a Kiss
A posse of paranoid preachers runs my government Fingering strings of their figurehead puppet-president I might be out of my mind but humankind should be kind So it would seem to me but that is my insanity Though I might be as Christian as my judges I am not Worth listening to since I remind them what they forgot
Should these overlords cut off my Social Security To punish me now for speaking my mind That way when I die in the gutter I will die for free Medi-Cal and Medi-Care just like life remain unfair
They talk about us being left behind All I know is those who have been the most unkind to me Say the least loudest have seeing eyes blind Because they dare not open them to see us as we are Their religion and politics mix to hypocrisy The love taught in the gospels dried up in an airless jar
Or is it that we lesser creatures lack humanity? Some of us live in this world here and now and their rapture Which will whisk them out of the mess they made Leaves us in their plan as prisoners fit for their capture
They huff and puff but I am not afraid I trust in you and me and common sense My peace of mind sufficient recompense To fight with my last heartbeat to the end My love for humankind my last defense My last breath shared in a kiss with a friend
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMV
Nov 13, 2005, 4:24 am
Orange Public Library Construction Site at Night
Where the new library will be Massive iron arms rise facing The racing avenue and me
I stand there before them under The shadow of their embracing Sculpted soaring wings with wonder Knowing they will embrace me soon
Iron sailing November skies Rising by the light of the moon Flight of fancy literally
Literary and otherwise Third incarnation library On this same patch of earth to rise
Place of pilgrimage where I learned That which I know and where I met So many pretty girls and earned A name some fame as poet where On youth's impatient heart was burned In me the love of learning there
"Recall it all and none forget" It calls to me "but come and see That we will be our best here yet"
There I will be found where paperback bound We will share umbilical connection In the Local History Collection
