PERFECT TIMING

I have come so far,
but I am not quite sure
if I have arrived.

Travel and sleep
have not come easily.
I find my focus blurred
and my jet-lagged eyes,
weighty, but unlocked.

Although tomorrow
is promised to no one,
I always have hope
for what tomorrow may bring.
But without the splendor of sleep,
I feel worn down
by the accumulation of time
and the absense of tomorrows.
I am so tired from living my todays
all night long.

Sluggishly, I succumb
to the sanctuary of my chair,
too drained to overcome
the shadows of my own thoughts
looming in the distance.

At this moment,
the fine art of forgetting
seems off limits to my mind.
Just as I am about to be touched
by a smattering of regrets in the air,
I feel the welcome weight of Woodrow,
in his oh so graceful state
of feline completeness,
sink into my lap.

His timing, as always, is perfect,
and my sense of reality is restored.
I find comfort in his spirit,
because his spirit is yours.
Even though you are far away,
paradoxically,
you are so close at hand
that when I touch him,
I touch you.

He wraps himself around me
like a coverlet.
His third eye lids close completely
as he approachs nirvana,
and he kneads my stomach
in time to the synchronized
drips of raindrops
that spread like tears
across the pane.

He kneads and kneads,
but at this perfect
moment in time,
my need for him,
nourished
by my need for you,
is greater.

I close my eyes,
and like Woodrow,
I see nirvana
in the distance...

and I am at peace.

© JOHN PISCATELLA

LOST POEMS

I never tire of walking
unfamiliar streets.
But of all the streets
I have walked,
with the center
of my soul
at my side,
most I have walked
for the last time.

Untethered to responsibility
and enamoured by self-indulgence,
I move to keep moving,
at my own rhythm,
in novel directions.

Balanced
between the boundless freedom
of back-alleys and boulevards,
I discover and undiscover myself,
like meeting an old friend
for the first time.

I glide over fear
because I am fearless.
I can't be hurt
because I am numb
and feel no pain.
I have lost the irreplaceable,
and I survive.

I am resilient.
I am untouchable.

Like a drought anticipating rain,
I forage,
with utmost urgency,
for sustenance,
wherever I can find it.

I chase
after chrystalline prose
and dream
of the power of love.
I drift
through the glassless windows
of my imagination.

I listen
to the whispers
of the world
for the undulating silence...
of lost poems.

© JOHN PISCATELLA

HOW PERFECT

How brief the time
as it stood still at dusk.

How soft the breeze
that kissed my face,
as I left
my unaccompanied footprints
in Thailand,
on the white sands
of Patong Beach,
on beautiful Phuket Island.

How enticing a world
suspended in supple shadows,
while the colors of daylight
dissipate to darkness.

How bewitching a wavering moon,
that games hide-and-seek,
behind the shifting clouds.

How finished the focus
of an individual moment
of translucent silence,
while memories
slowly trickle away.

How wonderous
the poetry of spirit
that endures
long beyond our vanishing.

How flawless my dreams
that can never be disturbed.

How perfect my accumulation
of matchless yesterdays,
on my journey...

to matchless tomorrows.

© JOHN PISCATELLA

ANCIENT INNOCENCE

It is next to impossible
to lose my spontaneity
when,
like a jazz-like composition,
I am steeped
in the aromas of change.

My brain is on fire
with the sights and sounds
and scents of Cambodia.
I am alive, uncertain, but so alive,
and emancipated for the moment
from the known,
and totally seduced
by the richness of the unknown.

Undisturbed by space or time,
I move forward
like a sleepwalker,
but always with my love,
my twin soul,
at my side.
My years of having loved
and been loved
have prepared me
to ride the waves of transformation
and to savor the opportunity
to, repeatedly,
give birth to myself.

My air was always rich
with the fragrance of your smile,
because your smile was a reflection
of your soul.
So it is no surprise
that I search for mine
in an alien country of smiles
from those who have lost so much
and have so little.

I take solace
from ancient innocence
and find it to be a perfect, simplistic balance
to my world.

My path continues to meander
from country to country,
like the mystical Mekong River,
but I linger only long enough
to say hello to history
and goodbye to my baby.

In uninvaded silence,
as white as the spider lilly
by the water,
we are connected, as always,
between ourselves and the earth...

beyond the years and dust.

© JOHN PISCATELLA

THE YEAR NEVER TO BE FORGOTTEN

As I walk
through the dimness of daylight
as a solitary man,
I am here to confess confusion
for the year 2007.

I can only trust that the invisible
cloud of sadness that saturated my soul
the day my lady left,
will not drift in a strong wind,
across the sea and back,
for an extended visit in 2008.

I alternate between being
and not being.
Like a metronome
in need of repair,
my tick and my timing
are slightly off.
Even so, my music resonates
because it is Florine's music,
and my voice is wedded
to hers, soul to soul.

Although there were many moments
worthy of nostalgia,
the essential thing missed
in the year never to be forgotten,
is that hers is the only music
that I have ever understood,
and, without her poetry and mine,
she would be silenced forever,
like the dark side of the moon.

Her love song
will neither vanish
nor reach its final note
while I have her music in me.
You will hear her melody
and taste the symphony of flavors
that reflect a life of value and substance.

Her odyssey is mine,
and mine is yours, if,
among the multiple paths of life,
you choose to walk down
the streets of my world with me.

As I listen to my heart,
I find lost poems
that give voice to a love
that had a beginning
in a distant afternoon,
and an ending that never was...

or will be.

© JOHN PISCATELLA