Limits Winthin

cultural expectations completely control taste feeling reaction time limits
within which we choose define the self we prefer to project sense as real
our own privately held property disposed of obedient to implicit contract
entered into unwittingly fine print unreadable without inaccessible effort

cultural expectations hide in every corner window precondition of comfort
list of what occurs it can be recognized or programmed to forget imagining
a picture of nothing ungiven can be taken away by stealth wisdom magical
thought ritual enactment regularly repeated like the mantra of who we are

cultural expectations spring upon us from hidden reservoirs unremembered
even as we sink we rise vaporous wraiths of supposition circumscribed by
air continuous in and out replaced by more of the same memories rewritten
in different styles which changes nothing we dare invest with actual meaning

cultural expectations reaffirm what undermines direct perception via unique
self-invention as hippie communard corporate cog cowboy loner wary artist
gives back information synthesized from coincidentally simultaneous history
edited aggregate hardened perceptible only from a distant planet long extinct

cultural expectations remind recipient as sender returns favorable evaluation
we are one composite of each other in a range biology physics distance only
attenuates if we were there we would be other languages function differently
exchanging words connecting structures joining separate interior incomplete

More Hours

the town's noon siren is always a few minutes early meaning what
I mean to be on time for no appointments in this month or the next
at least we have our regular rhythms clean stalls free hens breakfast
nap after lunch before she rides Rocky while I look on read one book
after another takes me away to Germany Greece New Guinea together
in the evening after dinner before she sleeps I while away more hours
until my bedtime midnight join her in a bed full of sleep and dreams

Being Myself

nutmeg cloves and mace were the spices that drove exploration
drove over native cultures everywhere east of Egypt even China
for a while now that's over and everything we learned is changed

I can't help being myself with all my galling gaps and limitations
when I let my mind wander it can't find anyplace interesting to go
how can I surprise myself explode my style say a thing I never saw

Wet Grass

the sun had come out after days of rain I should have said
it sparkled on the wet grass the white clouds puffy against
blue sky in the west but I didn't understand the exercise of
looking and generalized instead of saying what I really saw
attention to the present not an impression I wanted to make

Only to Me

waves of fright lap at the shores of my tranquility
I am reading poetry now getting it for a change
later another line will come to me from the rain

boring is the word from Nancy Foster unsettling
mine for now anxiety makes me feel sick I am not
merely vulnerable no longer ready to feel strong

everything signifies but only to me when I'm gone
no one will remember these paintings' special ring
George Sand in the park boys picking raspberries