Begin Each Morning

©2012 R. Burnett Baker

As Morning Rises...

©2012 R. Burnett Baker

A Meditation

Poem ©2012 R. Burnett Baker 

Photo ©2011 R. Burnett Baker 

What We Are. Who We Are.

"We hold what we are 

not only in our hearts and minds, 

but sometimes in 

our hands." 

-Rick B. Baker

Photo taken by Ronald E. Baker, 2009

©2012 R. Burnett Baker 

Part of a comment I made on a Facebook friend, Kae Angelo Prias' recent post. 

Today's Social Commentary

Image borrowed from Google Images

 old fashioned

      my life is analog

     there will be no 

    aching thumbs 

       on these fingers 

     no text needed 

        to grab attention

             to make eye contact

        or spell laughter 

        I still can speak 

         and hear voices 

    express cold 

and heat 

       upon my skin. 

Poem ©2012 R. Burnett Baker 

Political Discourse 2012.2

cult politics/minds 





addled is the best description,

by what, no one can tell 

but doesn't matter:  memes are 

colorfully coltish entertainment,

and minds, trusting by nature, 

consider no distinctions between

frivolity and fact, 

idolatry and intellect. 





Poem ©2012 R. Burnett Baker
Images borrowed from Google Images

Political Discourse 2012.1

Image borrowed from Dixie Swanson blog.

voting booth:

when all else fails 

so these are the days of molehills 

and lies, a time for each of us 

to decide the benefits of  falsity 

and cunning.  to think that 

individuals affect political outcomes  

is to believe in political outcomes: 

complacency and ignorance

have never seen 

finer lines of distinction. 

Poem ©2012 R. Burnett Baker 

Magpie Tales 132: Just A Room

Big Room, 1948, by Andrew Wyeth

Shared by Tess Kincaid

vacant house 

vacant house 

       sits alone 

occupants gone years prior. 

voices echo 

       in faded memories 

of lives long departed. 

hearts of souls remaining 

       to reflect 

serve only to  

       sweep away 

traces of lifedreams 

collected as dust 

       upon the 

       floor. 

Poem ©2012 R. Burnett Baker 

City Scenes XXVI: Waiting For The Green Light

Photo ©2012 R. Burnett Baker  

Taken by R. Baker, Monroe Ave. Rochester, NY

April 2012.

at the cross-walk: 

prodigal son

joy reflects one instant for those alive 

and counted, sharing the range

of emotion we cannot find in you 

for we can not find you.  was it two 

or three now, years, you vanishing 

like so many tales of devious millionaires

or young girls gone missing, but you

were neither (are neither)?  all children 

since are grown or growing, their 

laughter synonymous with fading 

memory.  captured in photos,  tempered joy 

is a hostage to truth beneath 

laugh-lines, those salient moments 

we cling to as life-lines for hope.    

Poem ©2012 R. Burnett Baker 

City Scenes XXV: Howdy Partner. Or not.

Photo ©2012  R. Burnett Baker

Church Street and Carlton, Toronto, Ontario July 2012.

(un)greetings

it wasn't always the case

diverting eyes along sidewalks 

glancing as if to indicate 

a point of interest only you

might discern (how astute) 

or regulating an expression

other than vulgarity (self-rewarding)

no it was once a hi hello

and howdy nodding of heads

as standard reference for 

threat aversion and civility . 

Poem ©2012 R. Burnett Baker 

Self Portrait?

cam-shot


one more layer to peel 

your fans will see what 

they never expected 

flesh sweat skin-tone 

colors swirling in their 

debauched imaginations. 






Poem ©2012 R. Burnett Baker 
Ball point pen/color pencil doodle by R. Baker, 2005.

A Flower. In PG17.

unattainable 



anyone would know it was you 

in contrast to every backdrop 

always in style (dress to impress) 

but mostly your words 

provocative tease that you are 

without one sound from your mouth 

a come fuck me glint in your eye 

hair flowing in  the breeze.  



Poem ©2012 R. Burnett Baker 
Photo ©2012 R. Burnett Baker 

All Light

Photo ©2012 R. Burnett Baker

quiescent

eyes 

imagine 

vision, 

a 

halcyon

mind 

sees 

all. 

©2012 R. Burnett Baker 

A Season In Flight

prologue

"V" formations 

have begun,

late August 

warning flights.

is it a practice run? 

could be the 

real deal.  it's 

often so: 

Great Lakes' late 

summers are 

tricks of mind, 

sometimes, 

down and woolen 

closet doors cracked 

open ever so 

slightly.

Photo © Arthur Morris

Poem © 2012 R. Burnett Baker

Arthur Morris photo from Google search. (True color altered) 

Magpie Tales 131: Bridging Reality

Under Windsor Bridge, 1912, by Adolphe Valette 

Shared by Tess Kincaid

delusion 


soot-coated dialogue, 
that invective political 
discourse providing 
fashionable moral certitude
for every open mind, 

is so fulfilling.  I am 
ashamed. 

ashamed of my willing 
participation in lauding 
the cobalt sky I 
witnessed today, (and 
many days previous) 

for it must be an anomaly: 

Orwell would not have 
me believe otherwise. 


Poem © 2012 R. Burnett Baker 

A Grandmother's View

farm girl 


a wall-sized picture window played the view 
of geraniums in a large brick planter box in 
her back yard.  

a few feet beyond, slender trees dressed from 
tip-top to trunk danced under hot Texas sunshine.
further up to, and along the horizon of farmland - 
flat, treeless, and pregnant with crops - the sound 
of wind played telephone wires on highway violins. 

she sat straight-backed, rigid on her sofa and watched
this mosaic of her life, of every life that passed her 
window through decades of birthings.  

she sat alone, memories her only fading friends, 
their voices muffled, muddled and vying for 
attention - no - screaming for recognition in 
waning light of autumn.  

she knew her children, grandchildren, and 
great-grandchildren would remember - 

remember if even her own recollections 
scattered on prairie dust along ancient, 
ever changing highways, as those trees
undressed under heaven for a lingering, 
dreamless sleep. 



Poem © 2012 R. Burnett Baker 
Photo © 2012 R. Burnett Baker
Photo of Ina Wilkins Stovall taken about 1922, photographer unknown.  The photographer who took this photo of my grandmother may have been my great-grandfather, Robert J. Stovall who was an avid photographer in the early 20th century.  This scene was painted on canvas by my aunt Ina Jean Stovall Garner in 1972.  That will be another story!  

Hey Shorty, It's Your........

"Every day's your birthday. 

We just don't always 

have cake." 

- R. Baker 

Stasis

"One rosebud is not spring. 

One falling leaf is not autumn." 

- R. Baker

Magpie Tales 130: Illusion

conch


you were my 
desire. 

breaking free was 
your dilemma, but
one without a spirit

of deed, like a shell
in the sand.

"hold it to your ear," 
they say, "and you'll 
hear the ocean," and 

motherofpearl I did - 
felt your breath, 
tasted sea foam and
salt, swept along a 
rip-tide of cresting

waves that whetted
paradise and 
skin, 

striking echoes of 
hollow illusion and
emptiness. 





Poem © 2012 R. Burnett Baker 
Photo by Francesca Woodman, shared by Tess Kincaid.

City Scenes XXIV: After Hello

x

mannequin hearts


your favorite 
part of me isn't 
the part craving 
the fragrance 
of your flesh 

but, rather, the
mental screwing
of talk and 
verbal intercourse
that many wish
existed within the
fervency of their 
sanctified 
bond. 

even then, 
discourse is 
limited: 

eye stalking 
and imaginary
"ex"- ray vision
become mothers 
of invention. 




Poem © 2012 R. Burnett Baker 
Photo © 2012 R. Burnett Baker 
Photo taken by R. Baker, University Avenue, Rochester, NY.

Magpie Tales 129: Small Talk

A Dinner Table at Night, 1884, John Singer Sargent, shared by Tess Kincaid.




               small talk 




               between slicing
               whirs of air and 
               feathered edges 
               there is restraint.


               storms, too, have 
               that characteristic, 
               a raging/abating,
               that keeps you 
               off your mark,


               reminding you 
               that control is 
               not always 
               what you do
               with your life: 


               to appreciate 
               dominion and calm,
               is to also be 
               prepared for 
               alternatives between
               cocktails and 
               the feast. 




Poem © 2012 R. Burnett Baker 

On Life, On Afterlife

Copyright (C) 2003 Chiharu Shiota All Rights Reserved.

continuity equation 




his ashes 
were scattered 
at sea, and 


charred timbers 
of home 
          gathered 
          on the 
          jet stream - 


circled earth - his 
face a thousand
times framed on 
memory walls;  children
grow 


and become 
timbers of lives
always on 
display for 
posterity, 


always forgotten
in name, in 
time. 




Poem © 2012 R. Burnett Baker 

In Plain Sight, Hiding

outcast(s) 

mantled 

is the conscript 

of that nature,

called into 

service, not 

without reservation,

and not with a 

conscience of 

selflessness, 

but shamed 

every waking 

moment: 

witness 

your eyes 

between splintered

pickets, never 

fence-sitting, 

but hanging 

pan-faced for 

the world to

revile. 

Photo by Michele Bressan

Poem © 2012 R. Burnett Baker 

Drink Your Milk. DRINK YOUR DAMN MILK!

Some Things Are Just Too Obvious

Ok.  This is supposed to be a poetry slash art blog.  I try to refrain from ranting here, rather than on my other blog, BakersTake, but sometimes I can't help myself.  

Sometimes, some things, like stupidity, are just too obvious.  This morning I read an article about how the Physicians Committee For Responsible Medicine (PCRM) has said that milk in school lunches is bad and is demanding that the USDA remove said bad milk from the National School Lunch Program. 

I won't go into details here, but you can read the blog post I read about this on oh so omnipresent Yahoo this morning.  As pointed out on the post, PCRM is a non-profit that promotes a vegan diet, and has ties to Peta (OH DO NOT GET ME STARTED ABOUT THOSE TERRORISTS), and is not without controversy itself. 

Ok.  Kiddies, DRINK YOUR DAMN MILK.  Then hit the gym with your fat little fast food-asses and do an hour of exercise like we used to have to do in school.  It was called PE.  Sheeesh! 

Now, as for poetry, and keeping on point with this being a poetry blog, here's a milk poem by Christina Rossetti, (1830 - 1894):

   

Brownie, Brownie, let down your milk,

White as swansdown and smooth as silk,

Fresh as dew and pure as snow:

For I know where the cowslips blow,

And you shall have a cowslip wreath

No sweeter scented than your breath.

 

From “Selected poems of Christina G. Rossetti” (1913) By Christina Georgina Rossetti

RB. August, 2, 2012 

Another Icon Passes

Gore Vidal 1925-2012

"Style is knowing who you are, what you want to say, and not giving a damn."

-Gore Vidal