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Patrick Frank


I am a published poet-songwriter and essayist from Middletown, Connecticut, USA. I have served as a counselor and advocate for the poor and disabled in New England, the South, and on the Zuni Indian reservation in New Mexico. I published a periodical of Eastern forms of poetry, and aesthetic philosophy, Point Judith Light, during the 1990s.

 

 


Drifting Away 

I am leaving, peeling my self and my creation
away trying to explain to the stragglers why we will
never see each other again. There are a few words
spoken, at the end, but faces are shrouded in mist,
and everyone simply drifts away

In waking, my friends of the past I cannot forget,
like me and my best friend from high school. I
remember how we sat in a tree, talking about girls

Years later, in my last memory of Jim, he was sleeping
in his car behind a tavern, at dawn. There was
something wrong he could not share with me. We had
moved away from each other and forgotten how to
confide

So we both drifted away

 


Liberation

At two AM I cannot sleep. In the dark, the rumble
never ceases: an invisible train. Yesterday, you led
me down stairs, to a place concealed by the
administration, where gifts for children are stacked
almost to the ceiling

I spoke in my true voice because you smiled at
me. We conversed in the language of zigzag song, but
you did not question, or look at me strangely. And you
had no fear of being alone or close to me in the
basement

Now
everything in the universe is transformed. Now we
can throw a party for true friends. We can have a
great party, in the end.

Everybody can take off their shoes


Show Me Your Eyes

show me your eyes
the truth, and your spirit

if you are blind
touch me with your hand

convey strong passion
so I can believe in you
and humanity again

I feel
darkness advancing
Over the planet

ponder with me
our fate

the end of our beginning
the beginning of life's end

 

 

 

 

 

 

copyright © Patrick Frank