Poetry for and by Philomene Long
• America - Philomene
Long
• Untitled - Jack
Foley
• It is not the end but the
becoming - Philomene Long
• They are
already ghosts - Philomene Long
•
goodbye little nun - Rex Butters
•
Manifesto of Al-Cadence - Jim Smith
•
Untitled - Hillary Kaye
• For Philomene
- Hammond Guthrie
• For Phiolmene: Muse
of Venice West in sad/glad memory - Bill Fleeman
AMERICA
(her last poem)
By Philomene
Long
America
The
light from your Statue of Liberty
Is being
blown out
And your ears are so deafened by
lies
You can barely hear
yourself
America
You were young for two hundred
years
So very young with
“The Blessings of Liberty to ourselves
And our Posterity” and “We, the
People”
“Yearning to breathe
free”
Beginning, always
beginning
Your power, now being smothered
By the age-old will to power for a few
America
Your sense of truth and justice
Is being snuffed by those
Claiming truth and justice
Sending “The poor, the wretched”
to prison
Often to “cruel and unusual
punishment”
By ones who themselves
should be jailed
America
You
are dying
Lying on a floor in a jail cell
Gasping for
air
Calling out for
yourself
America
We are
America
We are calling for
ourselves
When things fall
apart
Our center does hold
America
America
hears you
We will begin
again
----------
Is
it possible to imagine a smiling tidal wave bearing flowers and a
guitar?
And rushing into a room to give them
to you?
Is it possible to imagine
Philomene
Who imagined herself so
beautifully?
Is it possible to
imagine
The love she bore to her husband
John
So that his death was only the slightest
interruption of their conversations?
Death,
pooh!
“I do tend to fill up a
room,” she said.
What happens really is
that the room suddenly feels cold.
Whatever
happened to the sun? it asks. Will it ever return? it
asks.
And then it sees
Philomene
So it wraps itself around her,
curls up at her feet like a kitten, covers her like a
cloak
It becomes a MUCH livelier
room,
Offers witticisms, flirts with
everyone, quotes Rumi (its favorite
poet).
Philomene could make a room
talk
But she also
listened
Is this not the first lesson in
compassion?
What waves of intellect come from
Philomene when she speaks
What flowers of
poetry
What echoes of music as from
instruments.
There are no smiling tidal waves
bearing flowers and guitars.
Everyone knows
that.
But there was
Philomene
There was
Philomene
–Jack
Foley
----------
It
is not the end but the becoming
It is not the
beginning but the becoming
It is the becoming
the becoming the becoming
The seed sprays the
scent
the scent the
mystery
the mystery the
unraveling
the unraveling the
unraveling
It is the seed
unraveling
the
dissolve
the
cut
the
pruning
the opening flesh
flower
seed inside
seed
womb within
womb
becoming becoming
becoming
the joy is
becoming
the joy is
becoming
It is coming it is
coming
the becoming is
joy
the becoming is
joy
the seed. the opening, the scent, the
spray
the mystery raveling, unraveling in the
joy of
the
becoming.
–Philomene
Long
-----------
They
are already ghosts
John and
Philomene
As they
pass
Along the
Boardwalk
Where ghosts and poets
overlap
As they pass, the
gulls
Ghosting above their
shadows
Everything’s haunting
everything
Already
ghosts
John and
Philomene
Under the ghostly
lampposts
Of Venice
West
Their
cadence
The breath of
sleep
At
rest
Lost at the edge of
America
Already
ghosts
And each
poem
Already a
farewell
Everything’s haunting
everything
The sea is the ghost of the
world
–Philomene
Long
-----------
goodbye
little nun
black unseasonable
skies
over
Venice
gray grief rain
streaked
oppressive
humidity
overwhelming
yin
gulls
cry
no dolphins
leap
has no one cued the
ravens?
palomas reel
flock and
search
thunder monks rumble
chant
dorje tongues
flash
a bell rings the empty
sky
the boardwalk boasts more
ghosts
lurking near disappeared
benches
the restless
walking
ancestors/artists/hermits
poets/people
uncanonized
haloed,
nonetheless
their ritual
march
imparts our
blessings
our
village
our
elders
someday
real
estate erased
goodbye, little
nun
gone for the strong
coffee
of Venice West’s Summerlands
location
drinks it black with Stuart and
John
a bibliographical
Boudica
wielding Manjushri’s flaming
sword
in the beginning was the
Word
daughter of
poetry
daughter of
fire
daughter of
Brighid
Goddess and
Saint
we never
met
I read to her
once
an inept jester before a
moody
brooding
queen
another
time
we sat opposite table
ends
too noisy at
Danny’s
in the old St. Mark’s
today
mother
ocean pounds funereal drums
and Mannanan
parts the veil
–Rex
Butters
----------
Dear
Philomene, you got me thinking of poems as
pistols....
Manifesto
of Al-Cadence
We will no longer
accept your war,
your TV, your goddamn
rents
We would rather live in huts on
the beach
than be herded into your condo
reservations
Fuck your electricity,
curse your cars
We’ll piss in the sea
like fish
We’ll regress one
hundred years, 1,000 years
for what is time,
when freedom is at stake?
We will wield
our pens, our brushes, our words
until your
pillage is nothing but a song of
legend
Set this poem on
fire
and hurl it at the
invader
-Jim
Smith
-----------
For Philomene
Years passing her and
her sister on the
beach
wondering
and
later in passing sharing a poem
at a tribute
to John Thomas
in
passing
and later inspired to hear her
reading
and telling her i loved her fucking
poem
and her signing her fucking red book for
me the color
of
red
blood
and
thinking on what kept us apart
in passing
when i knew i loved her and tried to be her
friend.
after the
deluge
after the
rain
after the second coming of
age
could we meet on the same
ground
“Everything that rises must
converge”
so we find
ourselves
together
on a
path
though
narrow
well lit by her
words
and
presence
–Hillary
Kaye
----------
Sadness
with joyful understanding -
loss with
blissful transformation
my dear friend
Philomene Long
passed away night before
last.
A sudden event - just a breath
away,
but then it always does comes suddenly
-
however long it
takes.
In loving memories time -
namasté
–Hammond
Guthrie
-----------
For
Phiolmene:
Muse of Venice
West
in sad/glad
memory
It was just like
you
to leave that
way,
same as you left
the
convent
unannounced--
and
why?
to run barefoot
across
Venice
Beach
to feel the
ocean
tickle your
toes.
I
know.
Peace,
Love,
Bill
Fleeman
Posted: Sat
- September 1, 2007 at 08:10 AM