I don’t write in a journal everyday, but I have accumulated many entries over the past 50+ years beginning in 1966. Some items evolved into longer works. Among the leftovers little pieces survived. I thought a collection of these with a piece culled from the same date in a past year would make an interesting yearbook. The consistencies and inconsistencies of mind, skipping back and forth across time, provide varied perspectives. It is difficult to remember the context of the past we’ve lived; we also make suppositions about times that predate ourselves.

The few alterations from original drafts were to improve clarity. The worst of my work is not included. There remains enough mediocrity and immaturity to make me feel humble and you feel smart. There are also moments of accidental insight and incidental humor.

Author Stephen Crane referred to his little pieces as pills…apparently they were small and somewhat hard to swallow, but good for you.


Comments Welcome!

Thursday, April 30, 2020

THE JAILS


April 30, 2011  (I was 66)

THE JAILS     An Adaptation of E. A. Poe, The Bells
                      (Hear me read both at JohnKallio.com  Go to: Audio)
            I
Hear the hinges in the jails -
County jails!
What a night of mischief their whining unveils!
How they grate and rasp and scrape
In the icy air of night
While the pimps that over-sprinkle
All the streets seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight.
Doing time, time, time
For a sort of Runic crime,
To the din incarceration inevitably wails
From the jails, jails, jails, jails,
Jails, jails, jails-
From the helling and the yelling of the jails.
         II
Hear the mad prison wails –
The penitent flails!
What a tale of terror now his turbulency scales!
In the startled ear of night
How he screams out his afright!
Too much horrified to speak
He can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In futile expostulation to the deaf from the barred.
In his clamorous appealing to the mercy of the guard,
Crying higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And his resolute endeavor
To invoke a now or never
From a mute and timeless moon.
Oh the jails, jails, jails!
What a tale their terror tells
Of despair!
How they clang and clash and roar!
What a horror they outpour.
Pounding heartbeats perturbate the air!
Yet the ear fully knows
By the twanging,
And the clanging,
How the danger grows and grows.
The ear distinctly details
From the screwing
And tattooing
How the danger nails and impales
In the wrangling and the mangling in the anger of the jails –
Of the jails,
Of the jails, jails, jails, jails
Jails, jails, jails –
In the clamor and the clangor of the jails!

III

Hear the moaning from the jails –
Foreign jails!
What a world of solemn thought their monody assails!
Of the tortures in the night
How we shiver at the sight
And melancholy menace of their tone!
For every sound that floats
From the rust within their throats
Is a groan.
Ah, the people that we accuse,
Detainees that we abuse
Are alone.
And who keeps the cagelings captive
In their muffled monotone
Feels a glory in so rolling
On the human heart a stone.
They are neither man nor woman -
They are neither brute nor human –
They are Ghouls.
And our country collects the tolls
Of their subhuman souls, souls, souls;
Souls
Sounding from the jails!
Our sense of justice fails,
Drowning in the jails!
We steal their time, time, time
for a sort of punic crime
Resounding in the jails –
Keeping time, time, time
In a sort of Runic rhyme
To the throbbing of the jails,
Of the jails, jails, jails –
To the sobbing of the jails;
Keep time, time, time
As he wails, wails, wails,
In terror, terrorist tales
Revolting in the jails!
In the jails, jails, jails –
To the jolting of the jails,
Of the jails, jails, jails, jails,
Jails, jails, jails –
To the moaning and the groaning of the jails.

Wednesday, April 29, 2020

That time


April 29, 1974  (I was 29)

That time
the train stopped at this unfamiliar station
(whose name we have already forgotten)
we stepped onto the platform
Through the transitory depot
we entered the stationary world again
But by this time we understood the subtleties of travel
We knew the lies of relativity
so we laughed at vehicle trees
In fact that thought remains most vividly
connected to our arrival-
vehicle trees

We are settled now into summer
What was apprehension is confidence
We are secure and we cannot be intimidated
There are no nightmares there is no darkness
The neighbors are polite they admire our garden
We’re giving all our money to the poor
The weather is amorous and the beach is secluded
We wonder now why it took us this long
Though the oaks have slowed
they remain reminders of our
recent travels

Tuesday, April 28, 2020

In an evolutionary manner


April 28, 2010  (I was 65)

In an evolutionary manner
something misplaced becomes lost

like a favorite bowl for cereal
   or a pocket magnifying glass
      a sweater worn every winter
         an important poem friend
the perfect size and curved to serve the spoon
   precision crafted life enlarger
      warm wrap of retention
         layered revelations a shared complexity

What at first is simply not at hand

a disengagement from routine encounters
   adjusted agenda, procedural shift
      a temporary displacement
         officially missing as soon as questions are asked

Inquiry into the habitual haunts
turns up nothing

      empty washers and crowded cabinets
   whatever it is shrunk out of sight
powdered to ceramic dust
     frayed to wind-born lint
         forgotten words of forgotten promises     

Monday, April 27, 2020

Morality of Homeland


April 27, 1979  (I was 34)

         Morality of Homeland
Does anyone remember
we do not come from here,
we are not of this place?
The thing that binds us
is what makes us all aliens
come no matter how long ago.

It is not necessary to believe
we are of this place
nor to believe we are
of the same place
nor to believe we will return there
when we leave here.

It is unnecessary to give a shit
we’re so many generations removed.
We were put here;
we did not make a choice,
so it’s okay if we fuck up the air
and the water and the ground.
It’s okay to pollute the fire
if that’s what we choose to do.

Sunday, April 26, 2020

In your lifetime I was never young


April 26, 1999  (I was 54)

In your lifetime I was never young
Yet when you were young
your eyes were not fixed beyond my life
and we looked at things together
and a common vision could make us laugh

That changed at a pace I failed to perceive
and it has been some time since we laughed as one
Our interests are kept in different rooms
What we see now are distinctions
in clearer focus from a distance

The example of my life has been no match
for the hot clarity of youth’s magnifications
Smoldering thoughts and vocal flames
extinguished to charred ash
by the searing beam of your vision

Saturday, April 25, 2020

The most valuable of lessons


April 25, 1969  (I was 24)
 
The most valuable of lessons
teaches the difference between implication
and explication

A teacher conducts a class
   (the verb is a good one)
Conductors must be musicians

A decent score is necessary
   (the adjective is a poor one)
It takes more to inspire great music

you gotta know how to wave your arms

Friday, April 24, 2020

We sinners can know


April 24, 1985  (I was 40)

We sinners can know
no righteousness
We dare not judge
We dare not discriminate
We may not be morally bankrupt but
we may be morally impotent
unable to cast an individual mold
upon the small society in which we move

Thursday, April 23, 2020

Is the crisis mode of the world


April 23, 2011  (I was 66)

Is the crisis mode of the world
indeed more severe than my life has seen
Or has my awareness grown acute
by exclusion of ordinary perception
We remedy symptoms pray for cures
out of fervent habit
and subdued expectation
Youth is allowed to drive
the insignificant used vehicle
we magnanimously passed on
once our parents died
They drive to trivial music they memorized
as we did to Disneyland
where the dresses of Snow White and Cinderella
have faded and Prince Charming
is some guy with a foot fetish
who still lives with his parents
Perceptions do change with the times

Wednesday, April 22, 2020

Video Game: Grandpa’s Walk in the Park


April 22, 2013  (I was 68)

      Video Game: Grandpa’s Walk in the Park
         Grandpa must make his way through the park
while encountering and evading dog crap, dogs off the leash
(annoying or vicious), young children on tricycles, skateboards,
scooters, teen-aged nuisances, the oblivious, damaged
walkways, baby carriages and maintenance equipment, to
reach at last the tranquil path to the Enchanted Grotto and a
meditative perch (of many and varied from which to choose).
Once there each aware breath brightens foliage, increases
bird songs, the sound of water flowing, light fragrant breezes
and artistic inspirations in all genres.
         When overcome however, Grandpa must spend real time
back at a recovery area to slow down enough to once again
make the walk the goal.

Tuesday, April 21, 2020

Behind the screen:


April 21, 2009  (I was 64)

Behind the screen: 
no audience

A profiler
looks at me sideways

nylons are removed
& draped over it

another cubicle

Behind the screen:
the original face

subtext of pretext
strategy meetings

accusation of instigation
smoke fibers

The high priest
Scourges the vestal virgin 

Inescapability is a meditation

Behind the screen:                   
hand claps loud laughs
jeers and regrets

the guard
goes up for his jump shot

you see a different pitch
you hear a different pitch

Monday, April 20, 2020

If Rosa Parks had a car


from this week in 2019  (I was 74)

If Rosa Parks had a car
she’da run down old Jim Crow
History determined her a star
It’s just the way karma go
Inevitable’s inevitable

Sunday, April 19, 2020

I suppose


April 19, 1972  (I was 27)

I suppose
everyone walks around with many pains
I once took a pill to relieve pain
and it did
One by one I could count
each joint loosening limbering-
such un-preoccupied awareness!
Muscles relaxed also anxieties
My spine straightened
carried energy like a hose
The pill wore off of course
Then the completeness of its relief
was most strongly felt
as each injury returned
torn fingernail muscle pull in neck
also fatigue guilt cynicism
anger despair and insomnia
causing supposition

Saturday, April 18, 2020

notes for The Poetry Class, day 39


April 18, 1976  (I was 31)

                  notes for The Poetry Class, day 39
         The period was given over to a tangential topic.  I explained
why I hadn’t read the four notebooks I had taken home last night.
I said a friend asked me to accompany him to the Alameda County
Courthouse Lock-up to visit one of the prisoners who was due to be
sent to Death Row, San Quentin.  I described the courthouse building,
the disinfectant odor of its polished hallways and the apprehensive
atmosphere of the visiting process.  I talked about the elevator ride
to the twelfth floor, the officially courteous guards, steel walls, viewing
slits, cell-like cells, echoes, the tinny sound of the visitor phones. I
told them of the crime of the prisoner I visited –pushing a guy off the
San Mateo Bridge after a drug deal gone bad. I described some of
the other visitors there.  I mentioned the victims and the sense of
depression and tragedy.  When I asked Rick if he met any prisoners
whose cases he had read about, he pointed out Eldridge Cleaver three
feet away at the next phone.  Cleaver leaned over for a look through
our view slit.  On his white overalls he had inscribed HELP in marking
pen across his right breast.  Rick said many prisoners wrote prison
poetry and he was a captive audience.

Friday, April 17, 2020

Senate Hearing (a Generalization)


April 17, 1972  (I was 27)

         Senate Hearing (a Generalization)
Senator:       Mr. Secretary, is it our intention
(Foreign       with the bombing
Relations      one of intimidating the enemy
Committee)   into a situation where they must
                  release our prisoners
                  or fear the wrath of our continued
                  and prolonged assaults?

Secretary:     No Senator, I think rather
(Defense)     it is our position that bombing
                  reinforces our commitment to continuing
                  tactical support for a friendly nation.
                  Isn’t that right General?

General:       Actually, the purpose of the bombing
(Chief, Mil.    is to kill the enemy
Operations)   and to destroy his habitat.

Thursday, April 16, 2020

reading some poems and other poems


April 16, 1973  (I was 28)

reading some poems and other poems
         Some poems proceed outward
from an essence like the controlled
progression of ripples from a dropped stone-
even as they diminish they intimate
existence of further ripples.
The unseen ripple becomes discernible.
         Other poems stab in any direction
lines like refracted and reflected rays of sun.
The effect is often blinding;
the eyes do not adjust until
one rocketing shaft pierces the balloon of darkness
to dispatch a map of illuminations

Wednesday, April 15, 2020

Where Our Taxes Take Us


April 15, 2007  (I was 62)

      Where Our Taxes Take Us
Somewhere April is the bitch of months
new snow whines to ice underfoot
sloppy spring stays coyly undercover
I have lived there and chose to leave
Now tax day
the sidewalks of Pleasanton fill with flowers
lavender blown from fragrant trees
I am royalty strolling the royal path
in the vernal warmth of prosperity

In the green zone of Baghdad
a roadside bomb blossoms
calyx of concussive smoke
odor of purple flesh scattered
over the stones in deranged disorder
across a path none would choose to walk
where one could bless a land frozen pure
and never comprehend a path of petals
in a town where blossoms stain the gutters

Tuesday, April 14, 2020

Testing Teacher


April 14, 1973  (I was 28)

         Testing Teacher
Don’t hold your bated breath teacher
this student is not interested in your colored paper
your film strips records and tapes
He will not plot your graph nor find his point
not even search at his own speed
Tell him who owns the legs at table 2
and you’ll have given what he needs

Let’s put up a front of educational freedom
Let’s offer alternatives within the scope of our goals
Let’s give our charged subjects choices
Let them assume we care even if we cannot
(After all we know we should)
If we let them truly choose
they may shock us with their acumen
They may find us unaware
They may leave us holding our IQ tests
and run off to measure the air