The Missing
~
without warning they were simply gone
we were left bewildered, to carry on
the entire family strangely disappeared
what happened here is truly very weird
they were taken in an instant long ago
to where, we will likely never know
midst this kitchen clutter, it abruptly ended
was life concluded, or just suspended
~ ~ ~
rob kistner © 2019
~
it can slip right through the tiniest hole
it can fill a room
it can fill your soul
the power of music has great potential
its power to fill
is exponential
feeling deflated — hope won’t float
music will fill it up
note by note
it can fill the void in an empty life
it can obliterate sadness
eliminate strife
it can flow into the remotest part
filling full
a lonely heart
score or lyric in your favorite style
will fill your face
with a bursting smile
music is powerful and invasive stuff
but in this angry world
can there be enough
rob kistner © 2019
Gratitude & Balance
~
Precious mother Gaia, you embrace us with your love. You carry us safely as we hurtle thousands of miles, every hour, of every day, through infinite space. You provide for us our every need. You sustain our bodies with your abundant bounty. You nurture our spirits with your beauty and endless wonders.
Your need is simple. That we live in balance with your rhythms, and with our fellow travelers on this amazing journey. You ask that we know gratitude, as humble stewards of your countless gifts. That we live in harmony, attentive and reverent. But we’ve grown arrogant. Foolishly we believe we have dominion over you, over all in your realm. In pursuit of intellect, feeding ego, we have lost our sense of equilibrium, lost our way.
Now we suffer, as we watch you suffer. Please forgive us. Be patient, do not forsake us. We can learn, as we must learn. Precious mother gaia, grant us time to again find our way, our humility, our center — to again find the gratitude, the balance.
rob kistner © 2019
~
you hit like a downpour
a thunderstorm of love
your kisses hot as lightning
striking from above
your passion was a tempest
I was swept up in its force
but now the winds have died
this storm has run its course
your moods now chilled and cloudy
no warmth after the rain
my heart puddles in sadness
this bad weather’s bringing pain
the fair winds may return
as might the clear blue skies
but my heart will ever yearn
to see the sun rise in your eyes
rob kistner © 2019
This was not a moment in my life when I was speechless, searching for the right words. I had no awareness of words, nor even of language. I was suddenly completely untethered, falling through a frigid void, with a building primal scream, roaring through my soul, fighting to escape.
~
the disembodied voice on the other end
asked into the silence that followed
“sir, are you there?”
all that finally came forth
emanating from the pit of my being
was a coarse choking guttural wail
like the keening of a wild animal
rob kistner © 2019
”Drinkin’ Thinkin’” by: rob kistner © 1997
DayBreaker
(hard-drinkin’, jazz-lovin’, workin’ man’s lament)
~
day breaks
on
a new week’s
sun
putrid
as the stains
on my
flesh-soaked
mattress
damp
as my sour
mat
of fevered
greasy
tangle
hot
as my
whiskey-foul
breath
another
un-commuted
sentence
6A-6P
’til
merciful dusk
delivers me
jack-knifed
into
my
jack and coke
don’t obsess
in sorrow
drown
all
‘da-way
down
a bottom-dive
to comatose
no virtue
feigned
nor
implied
mad goes
the struggle
‘til
saved by
jazz
48 over
‘da
dub-ya
hump
2
debauched
24’s
then
the hissing
sting
of monday
and
the mindless
6-6 grind
120 n’out
cruel numbers
game
goes
round round
and ever round
’til
the tombstone’s
tender
solace
~ ~ ~
rob kistner © 2019
Modified Tennyson imitation — nine lines with a rhyme pattern AABBCCCCC, and using four trochees per line, with a touch of surrealistic humor.
rob kistner © 2019
SURREALISM: Pure psychic automatism by which it is intended to express, either verbally or in writing, the true function of thought. Thought dictated in the absence of all control exerted by reason…
you may have seen me
silhouetted against your sky
in coldest January
howling
with the frozen moon
a duet
to make coyotes
cower in their dens
then moon and I run
from room to imaginary room
your whole world
close enough to touch
we eat a midnight lunch
perfumed with foreign lands
and your thoughts
onion layered
your thoughts
are too heavy to hold
show mercy
peel back the layers
peel me away
thin by thin
skin by skin
to my quivering soul
my thoughts
bonewhite lies
of morality plays
open for you to see
hope they’re not hideous
in your sight
hope they do not
make you cry
as you peel back
all the layers
onioned thought layers
held firm
like a carapace
to which
I’m stitched
and welded
and can no more leave
than you can enter
they tie me down
sometimes
but sometimes
barely so
survivor that I am
the inescapable optimism
in my barebones grin
flashes
in the brittle moonlight
exposing forgotten creases
and clandestine gateways
to your mind
someone can learn
a thing or two tonight
if someone
will ignite the light
rob kistner © 2019
I sit quietly
close by this fire
soothed by its crackling glow
warmed by memories
that huddle ’round me
soul settled
heart full
rob kistner © 2019
a bewildered boy-child
conceived in chaos
lacking heritage
moment man
in freefall of frustration
searching for foothold
abandoned nomad
longing for clarity
for a sense of identity
Moon on 2/18/47, my birth night.
~ ~ ~
NOTE: I was born in 1947 in a post WWll Catholic orphanage. Mother unidentified and likely unwed. Father unknown. Having been abandoned from birth was a matter of much confusion for me in my troubled childhood, and into my young adult life. With the birth of my children I stopped looking back, and started looking ahead, finally understanding of, and thankful for the support of my adoptive parents.
It’s quiet in our home. Darkness has fallen early, as it does in deepest December. We cozy into the comforter, warm across our lap, gazing out our window at the moonlit forest. The fire quiets to ember in the nearby hearth.
Midnight’s snowfall shimmers through the boughs of old growth, invitingly elegant. As if spread by star clusters, it blankets our high-mountain meadow in crystal down. This night lay quiet and crisp. A great white owl echoes through the frosted cedars.
Lover and beloved, we entwine ‘neath winter’s window, with our dreams, and one another. You enfold closer, in gentle snuggle, a peaceful smile upon your face.
I’m remembering another resplendent December night. You, warm in my arms, the night we first kissed, embraced in darkness. Softly I whisper, “if it’s darkness we’re having, let it be extravagant, as is our passion, my love.”
“Original version of this poem posted here on October 25th as “Come February”. It was in the 1st person. Rewriting this one in 3rd person, from my perspective, shifts the essence from feeling personally sad to feeling empathy for another.”
how he does desire
the damp dreary days
of february
when his forlorned
fallen face
is commonplace
when no one intrudes
to question
what’s the matter
when they see
the tears he cries
there come no why’s
because all around
are caught up in the blues
oh if only
she could find it
in her heart
to forgive
this sadly lost
and broken man
who much too late
understands
he was a fool
and in his sorrow
understands
love will not stir
but how he wishes
ill-tempered weather
would occur
to drive the joyful
all around him
to indoor spaces
so he’d be spared
the pain
of smiling faces
and the bitter
bitter memory
of losing her
“Originally written about a proud wild beast, I changed the perspective to being the beast. That change made the poem empowering for me, rather than just powerful.”
No — I will not be confined
always in motion
restless is my spirit
perpetual like the seas
my wild heart
challenges constraint
defies boundary
to bolt at will
I will not be defined
my nature is fluid
my essence turbulent
deep — ever changing
reach not for me
I will not be held
do not name me
I will not be yours
*
rob kistner © 2022
Poetry at: Earthweal
bones against the cruel clay
of an arid
barren mind
littered with the harsh forgotten
like the bones of the dinosaur
I’m becoming
struggling
with what letters are made of
my words crack and crumble
my thoughts
parch and wither
lonely silhouettes
against an unforgiving skyline
fading visions of my past
of my life
my home
of yesterday
harder and harder to remember
the degrees of separation
growing ever greater
smoldering in the fog
of my reflected past
splashes of vivid color
on scraps of paper
blown in the mounting winds
of my confusion
dread rising
that I will soon not remember
what it all meant to me
a stirring fear I will forget
lost in tormented emptiness
that all will go black
this is not just a poem
it is much more
this is a light
searching in blackness
for familiar things
for persons beloved
that I do not recognize
this is a fractured tome
a cry of frustration
a tear of loss
a whispered prayer
an epitaph
to my fading map of then
of cherished memories
that now falter
and dim
slowly slipping
unintelligible
into the cacophony
of the crows of castle keep
they have kept it
the keepers of the secret
and now
with great fortitude of will
to safequard frail truth
they must keep it still
rob kistner © 2019