by Asher Black

As a friend.
As a brother.
I love you as…
Beyond reason.
World without end.
I don’t love you as.
And I can do it without sex.

by Asher Black

Proudly on the pond
I will not fly away.
Ripples for words
Will be enough.
Bodies yes,
But keeping ourselves afloat.

This was written
February 19, 2002

by Asher Black

Newspaper ad whining for attention
You can have him if he comes to you
(Did. Stayed and Jack took him.)
Years paled of camping and companionship
Up and died in front of Jack
from a failed heart that gave
it’s last tremulous heave to Jack
and settled in a fluff of time
Whittled away in splinters
like those of Jack’s army knife
caressing a big stick
thrown for Cotton.

by Asher Black

Not everyone who bleeds forever is Prometheus
Not all who are doomed to offend Heaven
Are heroes who have stolen its fire

Some of us bleed and bleed
And write with the blood
And that doesn’t stop it
And all we write is crimson and gore

This was written
January 7, 2002

by Asher Black

I will walk
Into the world with you
It can be any world
I will take no candle

I will stay
Where you remain with me
It can be anywhere
I will bring no time

I never will leave
Forever will pass me
I will not outrun it
Nor outrun you

This was written
November 26th, 2001

by Asher Black

A man passes the bread platter,
Having the courage not to take his share,
Listening with ferocity,
Swallowing pangs of saying nothing,
Despite the kicks in his groin
As she grates about his job;
This is how a man loves.

Out in the thorns
A bull struggles at the ropes;
He pulls and pulls,
Tearing the wood from the gnarled earth,
Breaching the hymen of the air,
His flanks of foam and minerals,
Smelling of sun.

This is royalty in the West,
In the seed and the spit that makes milk;
A man is not terrified of death
Because he knows his origin;
In fingers not made of clay
is clay made Adam;
His solemn life is din and youth
Under someone’s breath
that makes living stone.

This was written
November 10, 1993

by Asher Black

I am the onion uncreate
sensual reflections on a pond
easy to look at
easy

This was written
October 23, 1993

by Asher Black

What goes fast must be slowed
to compensate.
What is sudden must be long
to reinstate.
Who loves hard must hurt more
(commensurate).
Who dreams must lose sleep.
Passion awaits compassion.
Lust awaits trust.
I think I’ll just kick myself in the head now.

This was written
August 06, 1993

by Asher Black

Down… coming down
fragments hit ground
and aerosol fills the dome
the center lights the gas
at mach six the wave expands
and all implodes
crushed by giant hands
dust fine as glass
a whole fucking town

And those on the edge
eardrums split
eyes explode
organs collapse
and God help you
if you’re old
or a child
or carrying one perhaps

They call it dumb
that bomb
because it doesn’t know
whether you’re 3-years old
your ideology? doesn’t care
it hits the crowded square
at the busiest hour
air power
and there is no air

This was written
July 02, 1993

by Asher Black

Playing doubles in the rubble
Industrial trash and thrash
Coffee and herbal tea
Open mike and spikes

You’re very intelligent.
You’re different.
You’re sweet.
Am I?

This was written
April 23, 1993

by Asher Black

I do not curse the name of God
Or make it by my usage slight,
But neither will I fail to seize
some necessary blasphemies
To see if, in another light,
they explain the odd shadow.

I will not violate sacred space,
Or any holy place disturb –
Desecrate no altar,
sacred or profane.
But one that is not holy,
is considered structure only,
I cannot enter, cannot love,
And will not stain.

Conscience I cannot criticize,
Harmless culture not despise,
But foist a thought I cannot own
And, true or false, I stand as stone
And feel no need to fend or fight
Or champion but myself as right
– myself alone and not my thought.

I only fear the loss of fear,
of hopelessness I hold so dear,
of doubt that shelters far-flung faith,
of sadness that is mine by grace,
of mystery that swallows truth,
of wildness and of shameless youth

This was written
March 13, 1992

by Asher Black

Tiny, strong and fragile bird
perched on pointed misted jut,
who, as my solitary minstrel visitor,
does all the concrete park survey . . .

Small fuzz-moth puttering
across the fountain pond,
who, rescued on my finger,
does wash, vibrate, flutter and, triumphant, fly away . . .

Sweeper of the cobbles with a scoop,
bowed collector of my dust and ash,
who, with toothless smile and humble stoop,
does shine angelic when greeted with the day . . .

Do you all, however mottled, strange, familiar,
reveal in innocence one died who lives elsewhere?
What concealed beneath this mask and hideous in its love,
is through these, as through bread and wine,
simple majesty, quiet grandeur, very God?

This was written
December 01, 1990