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THE
DREAM POLICE ARE COMING
“The Dream Police” are
coming. Everything you don’t put down
will be snatched away from you"
Deena
Metzger
To live forever
Becoming immortal
The jade and gold of
living and working
Never giving up
So much to absorb, to
inhale
Yes, even to spit out
The voices that lurk
No specters
No holds barred
Why not?
Impossibility drops from
my vocabulary
To work, to write
To sing and dance
Even if bunions cling
And misshape your feet
Causes are just
To free Mumia, Leonard,
Marilyn, the San Francisco 8
Losing sleep is not a
crime
I can jail myself if I
want
But I don’t want
I love even without a
partner
Ben and Sasha stare at me
When I get down on the
carpet
And pretend I’m a red
motorcycle
The joy incumbent in
breathing
No snatching, dream
stopper
No barricades that I
don’t jump over
Even plow into you, a
bulldozer with eyes
That stare you down
The mountains are full of
moisture
The chrysanthemums of
youth
The lead of “shoulds” and
“can’t’s” rain
And melt into the deep
turquoise sea
Too old? What’s that?
Too technologically
challenged?
What’s that?
Don’t need to be
proficient in iPods, do I?
Just give me a pen, but
no pencils
That are short and stubby
I’ll write in my head
When paper runs out
Ride the Fillmore #22
The BART train to
serendipity
Talking to strangers
whose wisdom surprises
If you listen between
moans and curses
Strangers who I’ll not
see again
Memories tango, rumba
Nourish the whole body
Nightmares become the
face
Of what fear demands
To stop you, stop you
But songs of breath,
songs of breath
Keep you a shadow
becoming light.
BAU SEE MOON
Leslie and I snore
lightly
In the back seat of the
’39 Dodge
We know not whether we
are flying
or dreaming or just tired
Ma pays no attention, her
eyes focused
On the bright lights of Ai
Fow
Bah Bah is driving us
home to Oakland
after a grand day of
eating cha ngow
and drinking po-nay
cha
Uncle, Ah Chenk,
brother-in-law
of Ma, slender in his
three-piece suit
treated us to dinner of
prime rib
and mashed potatoes
Leslie’s and my bellies’
growling
halted by a sumptuous
feast
Suddenly Bah Bah cries
out,
never taking his eye off
the road,
“See the bau see moon?”
His voice waking up our
tender ears
We rise and peer out the
window
beyond the arc of the
silver bridge
and spy the stuck-up moon
glowing in the midnight
sky
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