Susie Davidson

19 Winchester St. #806, Brookline, MA 02446

617-566-7557

Susie_d@yahoo.com, Susie@SusieD.com

www.SusieD.com

25 School St., Somerville, MA 02143

617-628-2313

ibbetsonpress@msn.com

http://homepage.mac.com/rconte/poets.html

This not-for-profit book is dedicated to Aaron, Bennett and Jeffrey, with special thanks to Doug Holder and Jack Powers.

Poems taken from It’s Only Life: Rhythmic Forays into Politics and Human Nature (1992); After Gary (1994); and new work.

Red Leather Halo

There's an angel in my stratosphere,

He freely floats, bound only to the air.

He lends a new depth to the meaning of muse,

Though his manner is modest, his scope is profuse.

He can't be connected to earthly-held things,

They'd only diminish and cheapen his wings.

And energy can't be transferred in his case,

For essence like his transcends time and space.

He appears on occasion as I'm out on my own,

When while biking I get that first line to a poem,

While sailboats and ducks on the river are gliding,

Then I know, like the sun, he's behind a cloud hiding.

He reminds me of things I've forgotten at times,

Like how fear of our hearts makes us speak through our minds,

And that love is the thread in the patchwork of being,

And how only believing can bring about seeing.

Though our planes are unequal they're still complementary,

To the world he revolves in I've not yet earned entry,

So I know just to gather the wisdom I need,

So the way can be smooth even as I proceed.

When celestial beings are thrown on your path

Don't put much concern towards the aftermath,

Just be grateful that you have been given the chance,

To bask for a time in Divinity's glance. 6.91

Cosmic Trend Magazine, Ontario, Canada, 6.93; Algilmore Magazine, Galena, IL, 11.91; American Knight, South Haven, MN, 12.91; The Advocate, Prattsville, NY, 3.92; Infinity, Castro Valley, CA, 5.92; Being, Oceanside, CA, 2.92; Se La Vie Writers' Journal (Winner, Hon. Mention), El Paso, TX, 11.91; My Legacy, Artemas, PA, 5.92; World of Poetry, (Winner, Hon. Mention), Sacramento, CA, 7.92; The National Library of Poetry's Anthology Whispers in the Wind, 9.93; Event: The Douglas College Review (Hon. Mention), B.C., Canada, 6.92; Moments in Time, Maryville, TN, 8.95; Poetic Eloquence, Elgin, TX, Spring 1995.

Where do the words go

that teeter on the brink of expression,

That amass on the edges of tongues,

In anticipation of oral liberation,

When they're washed away in the final moments

By waves of doubt and tides of fear?

Where do the words go?

And where do the thoughts go,

which rise up ripe and fully formed,

yet wind up choked off and dismembered

along the roadside of stifled communication?

Where do the thoughts go?

Do they lie together in a graveyard

of verbal carnage and buried intention,

While weak and watery chatter

and safe, innocuous discourse

Which say nothing and mean even less,

Attempt to convey a mere fraction

of original meaning and depth,

As the truths lie decomposing into the sediment of declarations unuttered and passions left hanging,

While the very elements which spurred their birth and powered their growth,

The fire, the winds and the rivers of emotion,

Now hasten their erosion and speed their decay?

Where do the thoughts go?

Where do the words go? 8.91

Cosmic Trend taped anthology Bottomless Chalice, Ontario, Canada, 6.92; My Legacy, Artemas, PA, 5.92; Poetry Journal Review, Oceanside, CA, 1995; Moments in Time, Maryville, TN, 10.94; Poetic Eloquence, Elgin, TX, 7.95; Poet's Fantasy, Rice Lake, WI, 1.95.

the untimely ending of circumstanced legion,

a friend recalls moments well spent in the daylight

the pavement enjoinders our wayward processions

the wayside envelopes esteemed indiscretions

to rewind the pastures of billowing sunsets

to frame the experience tearing through stone

we walk ever bent upon burnishing sadness

toward the cool daybreak, the pain echoes low

poetry chronicles mind-filtered living

personal wisdom is meaningless, guise

the heart holds its own bank of memories, stolen

from catacombs' crusted sequestering sighs. 1.99

Journal of Modern Writing,, jshea@fas.harvard.edu, www.modernwriting.com, 8.01.

No sights of revelation,

No art on Monday.

Aesthetics of regulation

dictate my course,

sanction participation

curate the source.

No art on Monday.

The week starts in void,

Perception interred

ambition destroyed,

Reaction deferred

Thoughts unemployed

imagination unheard.

No art on Monday. 7.91

Infinity, Castro Valley, CA, pending; Poetry Break Journal, Oceanside, CA, 11.92; Poetry Forum Newsletter, Erie, PA, 12.94.

Six Million souls are the soul of us all,

we of the blessed, born after the call

After the darkness was brought into light,

After a new day destroyed evil night.

Six Million souls are the soul of us all,

the darkest of ages, humanity's fall.

Children and innocents tortured and killed,

Six million visions and dreams unfulfilled.

Herded like cattle, stripped of all worth,

hungry and sick in the dregs of the earth,

parents and siblings shot down in full sight,

boxcars of bodies transported at night.

Six Million souls are the soul of us all,

now etched in stone of memorial hall.

Our own hallowed nation ignoring the pain,

Eleanor Roosevelt speaking in vain.

Six Million souls are the soul of us all,

frozen in bigotry, backs to the wall,

victims of genocide, subhuman plan,

centuries of ignorance, one evil man.

Six Million souls are the soul of us all.

Survivors and progeny, rise up, stand tall

For all holocaust horrors to finally end

Never to manifest - never again. 4.03

Iambic pentameter's got me in chains,

And ABAB's pulling tight on the reins.

I can't speak for lack of a structured expression,

My innermost fear is of metric digression.

I'm a slave unto rhythm; I'll say it with pride,

Tempo's my master and syntax my guide.

My thoughts are in stanzas with uniform flow,

Each line like the one that's above and below.

Those lessons in meter I never forgot,

Six years of English did not go for naught.

If good enough for Coleridge, Wordsworth and Blake,

Then measures and beats are the course that I'll take.

And though you say rhyming is no longer in,

Well, here I am wearing my tie-dyes again.

As things go full circle, why not poetry too?

So maybe I'm actually hipper than you.

Being outside the norm never gets me unhinged,

I'm always more comfortable out on the fringe.

If the last of the rhymers is truly my mission,

Then I'm willing to uphold the cause

(Ah – tradition). 6.91

The Advocate, Prattsville, NY, 3.92;

Infinity, Castro Valley, CA, Spring 1993;

Writer's Journal, St. Paul, MN, pending.

A dearth of grand ideas, a lack of communal vision

manifests in vestigal bodies lying between the cracks.

Horizontal reminders of others, who

while prosperity enraptures the few,

become gray-wool remnants of inequality, excess, singular this, singular that,

self-limiting silence,

peripheral sight. 4.91

Poetic Eloquence, Elgin, TX, Spring 1995; Abutilon, Longview, WA, 6.95.

as a banner-waving mcgovernik,

public radio devotée,

school lunch advocate,

federal health and safety regulations backer,

affirmative action aficionado

balanced budget realist

socialist media scribe

i say get thee to oz, newt

get thee to oz

perhaps the wizard's

got another heart

in stock. 3.95

those peripheral starry-heard pinpoints of wisdom

where flown off? what beckoned?

who sirensung onward?

atmospheric remainders of worded occasion

personalitied bearers of lyrical firelight

look in the cornersides, hark for the bootstepping

sound of the past purveyed scripted expression

that's missing in nonaction vocalized muted by

nobody ringing the memory silenced in

unfulfilled messengers sighted

no more in these hero-led harbourland shores

harken our denizen wordsmiths

no matter what causes propel them away

from our circles of seeking

and hope to partake in their sentiments

under a welcoming

heaven-blessed forum for all. 1.01

Please Don't (Looking For the Loft Space)

I don't want you there where facades jut upward;

Barren boxes aiming toward a heaven

for burned out artifacts of factory glory,

and asphalt stretches of heydays ago.

I don't want you there where gulls encircle gingerly,

as if they too question their place in this vacuum

while underneath them a lone figure strides,

with hopeful eyes and sallow skin,

with a look not of zeal but intent,

feeling free, unaffected and immune.

Please don't go there with color a mesh of sickly hues,

too somber to even be gray, beige or brown.

Where nothing is prominent but the absence of life,

save for the sparse shoots of flax, which sprout

grisly chin hair on withered bodies of brick and wood.

To create, you say, and it comes from down deep.

A stripped surrounding does inspiration breed.

But unanswered attitude whips around us, and

comprehension escapes me as you seal this fate. 3.91

My Legacy, Artemas, PA, 9.92;Poetry Break Journal, Oceanside, CA, 9.92;Se La Vie Jnl, El Paso, TX, 4.92;Poetic Eloquence, Elgin, TX, 3.95.

a great writer (for edge)

jolt the psyche inside your enscripted creation

syllabic collisions of verbal suspense

so few can approach the ethereal splendor

of synchronized vision engulfing the sense

unleashing thematic and imaged conjecture

lightyears from logic yet flawlessly pure

allegorical mayhem pervading perception

inundating reason with metaphored lure,

assaulting with fractions of morphemic motion

propelling us to the uncharted abyss

no drug-induced journey these letters can't counter,

no earthly-known pleasure those pages can miss

i anticipate, hearken the sound yet unheard

from your pen's lofty bounty, the wake of your word. 12.94

Born in '27 on a farm in Arizona

Evicted with his family when the state became its owner

Depression sent them westward in the Grapes of Wrath migration

Forced them to surrender into migrant exploitation.

Forty schools in 7 grades, he finally quit the 8th

Through cotton fields and shining shoes he tried to keep the faith,

To racist degradation he would cower in submission

Till one night in a theatre, when he made a bold decision.

Like Rosa Parks he sat down in the Anglos-only side,

and though the sheriff dragged him out

he held his new found pride

No longer would he stand in shame while rights were compromised,

Like Wobblies in the 1910s he marched and organized.

Strikes and fasts and boycotts were his methods of defiance,

Though growers rose against him

he would not resort to violence

And when dissent within his ranks

dispeled the union's mission,

He started yet another fast to gel the coalition.

The AFL-CIO and RFK endorsed him,

But Nixon's Teamsters plotted countermeasures

and enforced them

For every hard-won victory, for every small improvement,

The agribusiness giants fought to try and squash the movement.

And though the endless struggle left him weary from defeat,

and though the road to human rights is yet still incomplete,

His efforts can be realized in American conception

For he brought the migrant workers' plight

to people's comprehension!

And now this month another hole's been ripped out from the heart

And once again a source of strength's been stripped and torn apart,

and solace, if it's anywhere, can only lie in knowing

That on that final day he knew full well where he was going,

and when he got there all the gates and doorways opened wide,

and there arose a multitude to usher him inside,

Abbie Hoffman, RFK, Brothers Christ and Ghandi,

Sisters Emma and Sojourner, Ochs and Woody Guthrie,

Michael Harrington, John Lennon, MLK, Joe Hill, Romero,

All of those who lived and died the spirit of the hero,

Those who fought for basic rights wherever people roam,

Standing tall -- with fists held high – they welcomed Cesar home!

Vaya con Dios, Cesar Chavez. 4.93

Lone Stars, San Antonio, TX, 3.94; Winner, Best Political Poem, Cambridge Poetry Awards, Cambridge, MA, 3.02.

those europine interludes

so silky symphonically

danced ago in the nightimes

of synthesized ice age

in a frequencied freeze. 1.98

Lean back and hurl those double-edged words

It takes a moment to shatter decorum, flatten esteem.

Draw back on that bow with your poisonous barb,

Send it along in its hellish direction to the innocent target whose misfortune was crossing

your angst-ridden path.

Analysis fails to uncover the source of

your daggers of malice.

What was it that prompted your chosen appointment

As Satan's disciple, delivering hatred,

espousing abuse?

Do those double-edged words fill gaps in your pride?

Is their evil embrace such a powerful force

That you slander your brother with venom and vice

As the ramifications escape your perception,

And the sin reproduces in your virulent soul?

And your innocent target, in confusion and shame,

Tries to salvage his honor, continue the night. 8.91

My Legacy, Artemas, PA, 5.93.

No war, no blood, no bombs in the skies,

Civilians and soldiers at risk for their lives

For illusion advanced on a faraway soil

A cowboy’s conjecture; lying for oil.

He wasn’t elected, he wasn’t the choice,

He’s latched upon crises to further the voice

Of the wealthy, the greedy, short-sighted, the vain,

He’d sacrifice life for material gain.

While offending the world and ignoring the source

Ethnocentric pursuit, dominant force,

With destroyed populations and lands in the wake

Environments trashed, ecosystems at stake.

Against all good advice he pursues his invasion

Words of caution fall prey to complete devastation

Vets and inspectors all viewed with derision

When the goal is not peace, but imperialism.

The trail of this saga leaves dust in its wake

I'm feeling your anger, your hurting, the ache

Memories litter serenity's path

The past is selective; we dwell in the chaff.

Though the marching of time dulls the edges of pain,

The duration's unique to each wrenching refrain

And while manner and style leave us all so distinct,

We grieve universally, suffer in sync.

Bucking the ride, we lie stalled in the mire

We circumvent failure by thwarting desire

We try to control that which only G-d knows

We know that it's useless to alter the flow.

We process millennia each passing year

Our sense of adventure lies strangled in fear

But don't let this trauma diminish your sight

For when we lose vision we darken our light.

Interaction yields knowledge and hope's never gone

You can shape your tomorrow and summon the dawn.

All that we're handed is ours to command

The only way through is to trust in the plan. 9.93

Lone Stars, San Antonio, TX, 1997; Omnific, Artemas, PA, 7.95.

i seek to uncover illusions of solace

which lie behind tinges of pink crested cloudwhirls

and velvety windswirls that tumble volcanic

from majesty's mountaintops beckoning, beckoning

i fear to inhabit the final horizon

if not for reunion with the angel who showed me

fall's eminent promise and summer’s bright glory

the season-swept rapture of hope's inner sanctum. 11.94

Cosmic Trend, Missisauga, Ontario, Canada, 1997 anthology; The Boston Poet, Boston MA, 6.95.

Arriving at the proper time, as muses often do

When once again ideas and verse begin to flow anew

companions leaving thought and inspiration much deferred,

so many mired in notes and songs and so few rapt of word.

Emerging in a moment's flash, as always they appear,

And now again the spoken word's resounding loud and clear

just when all that monotonal drone

had propelled me to other pursuits,

I encountered a bona fide reader espousing

in black dress and B-movie boots.

Muses and spirits, they float through the heavens

in graceful and grand imprecision

and then they drift down to the levels that call them

to come and rejuvenate vision

and somehow they're always so modest and humble

describing their own vast evolvement,

"I'm just this poet, trying to find the right words,"

he explains as if that alone solves it.

and it's not the identical line that we wrote

without either of us having known it,

It isn't his poem I found in NY

that was perfect to read at that moment,

it's not how we zestfully dissect our works

or the topical verse he's been churning,

It's that just when we think we know all about muses

We realize we'll never stop learning. 6.93

Poet's Pen Quarterly, Galena, IL, 9.93; Lone Stars, San Antonio, TX, 1.94; Moments in Time, Maryville, TN, 2.95; Poetic Eloquence, Elgin, TX, Winter 1995; Omnific, Artemas, PA, 1.95.

Oh, say, can't you see

Underneath the street light,

Once so proudly he hailed,

Now the twilight's on dreaming.

His broad sights now blight's scars,

In these perilous nights,

While the fat cats we watch,

Are so callously scheming.

With his pockets stripped bare,

They fund bombs, cut welfare,

As if proof of our might's,

That our flag commands fear.

Oh, say, doesn't that star spangled

Banner really wave,

Oe'r the land of the bereaved,

And the home of the depraved? 6.91

Struggle, Detroit, MI, 11.91.

jerry’s mythical stature shrugged deification

like innocuous armor, shield flaming guitar

conversation eclipsed with speech in remission

he joined generations and mesmerized minions

spanned circles and stratas, kept era alive

there’s fear for the future now that he's gone

picking sugar magnolias, ramblin rose in the dew

truckin down promised land

where the wheel’s now stood still

and the deal's done gone down

we hold now-broken chains

we're boxed in the rain

and there goes sunshine

In the wake of the flood. 8.9.95

When sweat and toil have laid new ground,

For millions of castles of mortar and brick,

With basic requirements provided by all,

And nobody needlessly hungry or sick,

Then we'll know it's Workers' Day.

When the fruits of endeavor are harvested fully,

As storehouses bloat with provisions galore,

And profits and shares are just means of ensuring,

That all have the same, no less and no more,

Then we'll know it's Workers' Day.

When communal gatherings are welcoming venues

For voices on every side of the fence,

And no one's afraid to state an opinion,

In this new world order of the highest sense,

When laborers' monuments stand in the squares,

As societies are rebuilt with inhabitants in mind,

Arsenals are stocked with food for the people,

Respect is bestowed upon all of mankind,

When unions and strikes are a thing of the past,

and there's no need to picket or get in a line,

with health, education and welfare in order

There really aren't any demands to define,

When people have time to smell lilacs and roses,

Because there's no anger, no issues, no race,

When within a cooperative built upon honor,

Envy and greed just haven't a place,

When organization replaces dissent,

And it's only ourselves that we need to obey,

When with our needs met we can be who we are,

And Utopia's only a hair's-breadth away...

Then we'll know it's Workers' Day. 3.91

Struggle, Detroit, MI, 9.91; Randolph Mariner, Randolph, MA, 9.91; The Advocate, Prattsville, NY, 10.91; Poetry Break Journal, Oceanside, CA, 5.92; Omnific, Artemas, PA, 7.93; Leadoff. 7th Ann. Bread & Roses Labor Day Heritage Fest, Lawrence, MA, 9.2.91.

to capture that sorrow in faceted candor

the stark emanation the naked reprieve

from platitudes long ago foraged with ardor

yet piercing through current-timed breath of the day

while ripples trail soulfully, marking awakening

winding a rivulet's journey outlining a silent-screamed silhouette aching for sustenance, seeking a station

to rewrap in luminous sunrised horizons

an unshackled buoyancy heralding wonder

a rhapsodous denouement traversing decorum

a sacred ovation in divinity’s logic of mortal embrace 5.99

To Life - Through Life (For Joan)

Our paths have encompassed a lifetime or more

And we know of the triumphs and tears on the way

But of also the wisdom the journey provides,

And when all's said and done it is only ourselves

Who inhabit the places where others have stood

Who, although their importance diminished and waned,

Remain in our hindsight as always they were.

As candles can't count the adventures we've shared,

But enlighten the moments we've taken as one,

And the memories root in the depths of our souls,

Where they burrow and wind through the layers of time,

And with each year defined on a calendar's page,

There's still a green shoot at the other extreme,

Where our courses continue to merge and expand,

Where our brightness is felt in the dawn of the day,

Where with each of our breaths we replenish our cup,

As we say without words in the silence of times,

To life, through life, my friend. 8.91

Cosmic Trend, Ontario, Canada, 6.92; Being, Oceanside, CA, 8.92; My Legacy, Artemas, PA, 11.92;Celebration of Life, (Poetry Press anthology), Pittsburg, TX, 1993.

it's 2:30 am and we stumble through the lower east side in post-gig stupor

we being big-haired mexican-american street singer

german fiddle virtuoso, former bagel purveyor

new york citywise ex-bostonian and socially-oriented woman of verse,

and even in this concrete metropolis of sprawling squalor it's a starkly incomprehensible exposé

of the foreboding pavement and its populace

a no-budget less-than-cinematic revelation where

walking economically wounded social castaways en masse are wasted in this wasteland

soldiers of misfortune chaotically grabbing for sympathetic pizza

in a momentary interlude of evening ritual

amid this bleakest of day-to-day night-to-night

armies of the unseen and unheard battling for existence

you in a squat? asks martinez

hell no, man. i'm on the streets.

and off into the myriad clutching web of consequence

street steam enveloping his majestic stride

hell's angels headquarters imposing

ghoulish edificial dignity

upon its grey-brown neighbors

which shrink by default to a blander congruence

in a bar now, jukebox blaring undertones, pistols, buzzcocks

low rent, seth explains. people our age can be proprietors

ya, i guess so. but the environment the environment and the boxes folded and fitted together

accommodating the unaccommodated

dourly dotting this livid landscape

back at cb's dan wilson sang of anger's alley

"the final resting place, finish line for the human race"

but now it's me feeling the anger

and this poem doesn't rhyme. 4.93

Naked City Coffeehouse Newsletter, Cambridge, MA, 7.93; Lone Stars, San Antonio, TX, 2.94.

Emotional prejudice gets in our way,

Every act you commit, every word that you say,

Brings back other times in a faraway day,

We become mere performers in this ongoing play.

All thoughts are just sequels to an infinite show,

They dwell in analogy to events long ago,

Though each is unique this the mind doesn't know,

It keeps us suspended upon this plateau.

Our moments together already foretold,

Memories keep our reactions controlled,

The past has the future in a vice-like hold,

Things between us defined that have yet to unfold.

The slate never knew to be blank, but instead,

Recorded encounters on every path tread,

And with all of the past so securely inbred,

It's three steps backward for each one ahead.

There's no way that we can transcend this moot pace,

You have to be willing to stand in your place

Among all the ghosts who reside in the space,

And know that you too it will never erase. 5.91

dancing at man ray

dj plays bauhaus, sisters of mercy, cocteau twins, clash

dancing at man ray

new friend, old friends, like the eighties once more

dancing at man ray

"i wonder if heaven's gonna be like this," says joan.

1.95

cellophaned silhouettes shimmering, spiraling

twilighted interplays

barely cognizably trumpeting vigilance

following feeling each one a vissectitude

this is what happens when endings lie hidden

while lightning strikes intimate

stars fulfill vacuums and nobles unveil

and is it entitlement, is it reality

bringing these angels nocturnal preeminance

in summer's sweet sky? 7.99

The strongest blockade is of womanly will

Where intent turns to iron and motive to fire,

Feminine fervor defying all reason,

Bodies connecting in common desire.

But something's gone wayward in Mostar today,

Croats convening in hatred and grief,

A convoy of women united in thwarting

27 trucks aiming for Muslim relief.

Driven by rancor, they vow to prohibit

The cargo from reaching a beleaguered site,

Where 55,000 have two months been held

In a place all sides claim as their holding by right.

How could such horror exist in this age

Where countrymen feud in eternal dissent,

With dry milk and baby food weapons and ploys,

Where conflicts unveil genocidal intent?

Yet a faraway region becomes our backyard

When we honor our ties to our brethren, our kin

Realize we too have a share in their plight,

And see it won't lessen until we begin. 8.93

Lone Stars., San Antonio, TX, 12.93; My Legacy, Artemas, PA, 8.95.

I thought I saw masses being fed in Somalia,

And boat people everywhere welcomed ashore,

While treaties were signed in Croatia and Israel,

And Native American pride was restored.

But I guess it was only his luminous eyes

And the sounding of peace in his Midwestern twang,

The triumph conveyed in his innocent smile,

The harmony and hope in the lyrics he sang.

I thought prisoners of conscience

were freed by the thousands

And women united to take back the night

As oppressive regimes fell apart through the world,

And nuclear arsenals vanished from sight,

But I guess it was just conversational flow,

Where the most mundane chatter was somehow profound,

In an equal exchange without scheme or designing,

Person first and then woman,

not the other way around.

The pathways to justice are rocky and steep,

Sometimes hope for the future lies only in song.

But new rays of sunlight from voices who join us

Make the load a bit lighter as we struggle along.

4.93

Poet's Pen Quarterly, Galena, IL, 12.93;Lone Stars, San Antonio, TX, 2.94; Poetic Eloquence, Elgin, TX, Fall 1996; Omnific, Artemas, PA, 10.95.

One Less Car

Immersed in the gap between living and life,

The wind is the chassis, the road is the source,

I'm a traveler in space and a voyeur of flight,

On an infinite ride through a borderless course.

And though hell hath no fury for nature's resolve,

We are one less car on its highway of fate,

One less adherent to custom and form,

One less disciple of time, place and date.

And the honking hordes pass as our destinies merge,

Though the path and the journey are lightyears apart,

They who measure evolvement in mileage and pace,

Who accelerate to finish as they barely reach start.

They who keep to their lane in determined assent,

They who travel on only roads taken before,

They who yield to the chains of opinion and view,

With their feet on the brakes, their locks on the door,

While endurance and sweat are my fuel and my fire,

And if breakdowns result in both bruises and blood,

There's no restitution, recount or repair,

But to rise from the muck and get out of the mud,

And although the terrain’s neither steady nor smooth,

We travel the untaken road of the quest,

And if only we witness the sun as it sets,

We're with Kerouac, Emerson, Frost and the rest.

Where public dictation falls silent and still,

Where social pollution can't poison or maim,

The voice of the spirit sounds loudly and long,

And the road leads wherever adventure lays claim.

And the traffic moves on in directed advance,

In a choking and sputtering, powerless crawl,

While we on the sidelines must blaze on, alone

Knowing the way's not a choice, but a call. 9.91

The Advocate, Prattsville, NY, 3.92; Alpha Beat Soup, Lambertville, NJ, 1.92; Poetry Break Journal, Oceanside, CA, 9.92; My Legacy, Artemas, PA, 2.93;Breakthrough! Book of Poetry by No. American Authors, Calgary, Canada, 1993; Poetic Eloquence, Elgin, TX, Summer 1996.

Rob told me yesterday

That he'd been listening to Phil Ochs.

And here I am now, doing the same.

Just that small mention brings all of it back.

And the marching goes on, and the struggle remains.

The harder we cling to Phil’s words

The more we cling to Phil’s memory.

That circle of friends was too small to save him,

and 500 out of 300,000 showing up in Chicago

Fed his frustration and sealed his despair.

But we look around, at those

who barely show up for life, but we can't let it kill us,

We can only persevere, as Phil could not.

Like Ian Curtis Phil's image hangs with us still,

but where love tore him apart, the world did it to Phil.

And I wonder

If those who feel the most suffer the most as well,

Why is it they who leave the most behind?

Why is it they who ignite and inspire,

Then snuff themselves out

and extinguish their essence,

While the flames of their impact burn brightly as ever?

And we, who look for guidance in a leaderless world,

Who search for the road to freedom

In the thick forest of oppression,

Who hold to visions of equality

While injustice crashes around us,

We, who dream of that better world

While living the nightmares of reality,

Know that sometimes all there is s that

Collective spirit which those like Phil have left us,

And we somehow continue, as the marching goes on

and the struggle remains. 8.91

Squawk, Cambridge, MA, 9.91;The Advocate, Prattsville, NY, 3.92; Struggle, Detroit, MI, 3.92;Celebration of Life (Poetry Press), Pittsburg, TX, 1993; Only poem read at 18^th Annual Phil Ochs Song Night, Cambridge, MA, 11.92; Moments in Time, Maryville, TN, 2.95.

Give me your ego, I’ll put it aside.

I just want to see you with nothing to hide,

To see how your soul looks without a stitch on,

Commune with your spirit in the pure light of dawn.

Halloween's only one day in the year,

But a costume and mask you eternally wear.

Let me remove them and see your true face,

Allow your persona to shine in their place.

Then maybe you'll see that your feelings have merit,

And shame and misfortune you did not inherit,

And the innermost thoughts that you hide out of fear,

Are the very ones others are dying to hear.

Maybe you'll realize that how you're perceived,

Is proportionate to the amount you're believed.

And you just might confirm what you always have known,

That the only opinion that counts is your own.

I even have faith that this person you've found

Will be someone you're comfortable being around,

And it follows that others will feel this way too.

When they see that your ego can't beat the real you. 6.91

heard a song on my bike

fnx was the source

and i don't tune in often

i prefer college stations to the screaming

and the playing of short lists of hits

but the tune was intriguing

so when i got home i called up to ask,

they answered quite loudly,

i chastised resoundly

it somehow evolved to a two-hour discussion

with the dj nik carter, who in verbal contention

called me bitter, elitist, and angry, unhappy,

but nonetheless listened to my thoughts and suggestion

that the station could trigger

its hordes of young listeners

to begin to restructure the mess that the world's in

by exporting more logic and less inane raving

we harangued and bombasted

we wrangled and brawled

over songs of the '80's

if the jam or fascist groove thang were political or pop

if accolades mattered

if ratings ruled airwaves, if big backing was all

in the end i believe we convinced one another.

heard a song on my bike

fnx was the source

next time i'll hit tower and just look it up....

(by the way, it was the gin blossoms). 8.95

Bound For Glory (The Phil Ochs Story)

It started at Ohio State in 1959,

John Wayne, James Dean and Elvis

were his heroes at the time,

But spurred on by Jim Glover

he began to write and play,

While Jim's dad introduced him

to the issues of the day,

And now he's bound for a glory all his own,

now he's bound for glory.

He filled the student paper

with his essays and his views,

But they deemed him controversial

in his coverage of the news,

And when they passed him over

for the editor that year,

He left the role of student for the role of balladeer.

He went to New York City at the age of 21,

And wound up in the Village

where the folk scene had begun,

In hundreds of his songs

he put the headlines into words,

And to a larger audience he got his message heard,

And now he's bound for a glory all his own…

Like Joe Hill he sang about the rights of the oppressed,

And just like Woody Guthrie

he befriended the distressed,

And though he sang on stage

and not the farmlands or the train,

Workers' rights or Vietnam, the spirit was the same.

With Paxton, Blue and Dylan

he would spend his nights and days,

And with Baez and Seeger Newport '63 they played,

Elektra Records heard him

and they knew they wanted more,

And All The News That's Fit To Sing came out in '64

And now he's bound for a glory all his own…

His musical career took place upon the social stage,

A study of his life becomes a portrait of the age,

And though his disappointments

Were imprinted in his eyes,

His values and his visions

Simply knew no compromise,

And now he's bound for a glory all his own…

When rock outstripped the folk scene

he could not keep up the pace,

The glitter pushed the protest song

outside the public grace,

Though shunned by TV hosts, the FBI was on his tail,

And on a beach in Kenya he was brutally assailed.

He kept up with the struggle;

it was all he'd ever known,

The demons that possessed him

were the only things he owned,

But through the tribulation

he retained his faith and pride,

Until Chicago '68, when something in him died,

And now he's bound for a glory all his own…

The changing of the era in his life was symbolized,

The ending of the movement

paralleled his own demise,

Like Elvis, Hill and Dean

with whom he most identified,

Death became the rebel in the form of suicide.

Although his loss is something

that is hard to understand,

No one said the spirit has to go down with the man,

And if we stay together and we keep to our ideal,

The world that he envisioned could just finally be real,

It'll be the Phil Ochs story in the end,

It'll be the Phil Ochs story. 8.92

Struggle, Detroit, MI, 3.93.

Every day The Boston Globe brings sorrowful events,

of disasters, immorality and criminal offense,

But though horrifying they all are,

to me they can't touch bases with the tragic news

I read about that day in "Names and Faces."

There he was, a 2 x 4 of him in all his glory,

And shocked outright I truly was

when I saw the accompanying story,

It seems my idol Michael had contracted the big C,

Inoperable it was to boot; this sealed my misery.

I thought of all the nights I had spent when, as a child,

I tolerated Hoss and Ben just to catch a little Joe smile.

Sundays at 8:30 p.m. in the TV room I'd hide,

As the brand burned through the map,

and then towards me he would ride.

Later on I'd stay at home

as my shades were fully drawn, the lights on low,

the bell ignored and the phone machine turned on,

While I sat there watching Little House

and Highway to Heaven in glee,

Charles, Jonathan, I didn't care - all the same to me.

I then read in the Globe that he's holistically inclined,

And to the letters from his fans he paid a lot of mind,

Through them he chose his treatment

and was giving it his all,

He saw it as a challenge and not as his downfall,

But the picture in my mind is a depressing final scene,

And if the worst should happen

and he's taken from my screen,

At least I know that he'll meet up with Hoss and Ben,

At the Ponderosa in the Sky

they'll ride together once again. 5.91

Squawk, Cambridge, MA, 7.91.

James and John are a' jammin',

And Peddlar can't get past the intro.

I've brought them along to his Poet's Cafe,

Where, although it's surreal and illusive,

They're forming a timely alliance.

James leads in frenetic staccato

John adds in a rhythmic succession.

One a traditional plucker,

one state of the art balladeer,

One activist coffeehouse comrade,

The other adventurous cohort.

James and John are a' jivin';

James branches out on a tangent,

John hesitates, hits and they gel.

And I'm back to that Christopher's evening,

Where one voice echoed those of an era,

Reviving their ballads and protests,

I heard chords of my own inner visions,

Saw multitudes roused by the effort.

Then I'm back at the Middle East Bakery,

Near the only unoccupied table,

"Can we sit here?" I asked him politely,

"No," he said sternly, then smiled.

Now sincere to a fault, he’s a genuine sprite,

In the magic and lore of the highlands.

I tell him he's crunchier than I am,

Though that's my generation; he's a slacker.

James, and John, and all fellow souls,

We meet in the realms that we ride in,

We give out and take in; we gain and we win

Endlessly jammin' and jivin’. 3.93

Cosmic Trend, Ontario, Canada, 6.93;

Poetry Break Journal, Oceanside, CA, 2.92.

30 years later a tie to a time when love broke away,

when the mightiest force was allowed royal reign

set a musical pace of historical measure,

revolutionized patterns of pre-60’s regimen

wearable wonder in rainbowed regalia,

now grains flash remembering hendrix and morrison

and denizens draw rasta, sikh, aztec, afro

notes and voices flow high, jade, pearl golden hued

in the lengthening plume of exalted enhancement

on an eminent shoreline and here,

where once love ruled high,with eyes closed,

breath drawn, one can listen, recall. 1.98

strange days as it were revisit and gather, return

to the source breaking haste, making waves 1.98

so we sit as we glance at the valley of days

to silence and strengthen the glow in the haze

the virtues upon us sing in succession

barely diminish the striking impression

a tablet immortalized now in the dawn

o! willful submission to this never gone,

the paths that are crossed in fruition so breed

and all etched in memory lingers in deed. 1.98

repentance lines this path, desert wind tugs tired heartstrings and o! such a blip in eternity is life

in this holy ground in this time in time

like so many grains of this sacred sand

are we and always will be here now here always

in a word shalom. 11.93

Lone Stars, San Antonio, TX, 12.93; My Legacy, Artemas, PA, 3.95; Poetic Eloquence, Elgin, TX, 9.96.

rockport, ma series

seas of rocks, sand and ripples

mounds of earth, water, minerals

surfacing madly, inspiring the

motions of life at its noblest

in quietly fluorescence; please wake me in silence

as harborland sings of infinity's glory

we sit, draw it into the depths of denial

of our overworked psyches,

as concerns and commitments

fade faster than daylight

in the midst of the moment

up here at the shore. 7.01

marshy brine scent tingles

olefactory wakening in

urban filled vessel aromatically shut

to the nuancing bandwidths

resonating at levels

of sea's sunsoakng breezes

lilting, freqencing

vibes of untraveled sublimity

here on the shore the tune plays to receivers

who give to the senses passivity due. 7.01

stone-topped salt-scented stadium

is so picturesque in

divine –swept surroundings.

what inspired these deft strokes

of hue, texture, sound?

rolling water is crashing on mossed, spongy sand,

white points dot azure skyline

rocky thrones in gull palace,

white sails split horizon in nautical outline.

all still, yet pulsate reminders

of all that can be

when free moments or days

intervene. 7.01

europe 3d time, although 1st on these shores

always makes one feel youthful amid relics and ruins

can't bring enough film, paper or pens

this fodder for soulwork and chasms within.

architectural marvels fill focused reflection

bridged masteries of grandeur span liquid green arteries in unearthly finesse

while cathedraled epiphanies drip stone, metal annals

gallileo and michelangelo fitting residents beneath

parks paeon past eras in reverent renown

statues intertwine flora and in seas of ethnic pageant

romans, venetians florentines wave vowels,

shout hands, bike crowded cobbled passways

beggars bespeckle plazas spew multi-tongued venom

aged women vend flowers by dwellings and alleys

freshly scrubbed doorsteps frame blossoms and herbs

postwar judaic ghettos breathe spirit cognition

memory meets memento in infinite eras

shuttleboard court young and old camarardic

roadway steps concrete icons lure ascension of wonder

harken heightened tomorrows of exalted todays. 3.96

i'm here in the land that you dreamed of invading

with '93s fodor's book for '94s trek,

your words painted bullfights you'd run by yourself

and consume all the liquor the rituals held

it was hard to imagine such wanton abandon

i never saw you that way, only gentle, pristine

yet spain was the feather, the quest, your ideal

you, me and michael would siesta its shorelines

now michael serves G-d in missouri, his calling

and i've got the fodor's book up on my shelf

while i witness the pyrenees' stuccoed surroundings

and await barcelona's majestical spell,

the seat you would fill holds my misty-eyed baggage

and the rays of the sunset reflect you below. 3.96

scenic glory awakens drooping lids scattered memories

mediterranean vistas spectre tunnels and windows

a damp, foggy farmland resplendent in rainbow

the sun's late emergence to majestically wane

feisty seafaring riptides frame mountain panorama

a lone castle arching clouded peaks of mossed meadow

railroad schedules sound order in a chaos of time zones and twilights and daybreaks

and the life that lies smoldering in ashes

where phoenixes summon the dawn. 3.96

Bombed-out, shell-shocked, socialized shrapnel.

plans, dreams and visions now larger-scaled settling

of dust rising anew in the grey, dingy air

within singular canvas muted in yellow

proletariat aspiring is

a stench of disappointment lingering still.

Reconstruction of brick is rarely of spirit. 6.91

Halves and quarters of churches and palaces.

Pre-1945 splendor, now shocking consequences

of human aggression. US and British aggression.

German and Russian aggression. Gothic ruins.

They sell bratwurst below in gaily-painted booths.

Tourists gather, eating and talking. 6.91

Poetic Eloquence, Elgin, TX, Winter 1995

Life is deeply etched in the faces of these Berliners,

Who wear their recent decades and embody that which we can only read, much less comprehend.

Who, yet, extend the Smile, the Hand.

All this in balance with the sentiment of the squares

In that universal glow which is humanity.

Here I stand now, in this place,

Blue gaze toward brown,

Half a world lies between our eyes,

But I know, as we know, that all that is

Is everywhere. 6.91

There's mayhem tonight

on the streets of the new capital.

"Now ve are home,” says the old man,

Explaining through broken teeth and glassy stare.

He thinks that Berlin will now be the starting and ending point of convergence for the world.

All around flags, horns, voices, arms

All emanate approval of the decision

made by 337 members of Parliament on this day.

They're jubilant; they're hopeful.

They see their future in their importance.

Their Western influence is alive. 6.91

We pile on; I carry too much.

We share our compartment with a man and a woman.

Both are advanced in years; they don't smile.

The woman has an intolerance for open windows.

The man can only handle a very little air.

Magnificent fields fill the eyes as we pass small towns.

There's an occasional horse and rider,

Lots of bicycles and manicured farmlands.

"The world's not so big," Joan says.

We're out in the hallway with the windows way down.

I've got a Feelies tape on, gaze at the German countryside amid riff after riff joining together

In crescendos of layered multiplicity,

and think, "I've never really heard this tape before."

The woman is delicately peeling an egg,

I effortlessly open Joan's stuck peanut butter jar,

She laughs. 6.91

A random glance upward began an affair

A vision of grandeur appeared round the bend,

A masterpiece framed by the sun's setting blaze,

You would try not to blink lest this image would end.

As high on a hill in the fog's velvet veil,

Flanked by spires of a church too surreal to behold,

Was a castle right out of a Grimms Brothers' tale.

We had entered a region where time was remote,

Where custom and manner were centuries deep.

Into this dream we prepared to embark,

And completely succumb to the throes of romance,

For all sense had departed back then on the train

When Prague at first sight drew us into its trance. 6.91

A place in time with coral roses in every roadway side, faces wide with virtue mix humility and pride, Baroque and Gothic merge

with old distinction in the squares,

castles, clocks and stately spires

untouched by all the years.

Cobblestone lanes, moonlit alleys shine

inswans, ripples ,reflections,

in every direction's spectacular view.

Copper and bronze saluting all faiths in this place for all persuasions, this place for all centuries.

Violins mourn, tubas bleat while puppets and paintbrushes dip to their beat.

Sights and perceptions make senses complete.

Immortal suspension in cultural space.

Infinite homage to humankind's place.

Arms outstretched in welcome embrace.

Farewell, Prague. 6.91

My Legacy, Artemas, PA, 8.92

Eyes are shaped like fallen leaves, overflow in mirth,

With each pair seeming similar, yet also still distinct,

Manner steeped in old world style

that reaches toward the new,

They talk to us so readily of recent tides of change,

Economy constrains their lives

but leaves their souls untouched.

I watch them as they gather

into little groups on trains,

Their faces and their words seem strange,

but then again, they don't,

And all around are tributes to their legacy and hope,

Structures which personify their glory and their pride.

As carvings span the Danube in elaborate finesse,

And statues jewel the mountainsides

with sparkling grace and charm,

While blossomed air evokes

a fragrant interlude from life,

Underused senses have risen anew

in Hungarian quarters this day. 7.91

My Legacy, Artemas, PA, 8.92.

rolling seas and prayers are rising up

into sunset dotted islands here in this great lake where blue and white cloudshapes echo colors of the flag we uphold in troublesome times where its cousin v cousin in suicide bombings and after fact strikebacks in blown away horror, each leader advancing a friction filled fear, a day to day terror where loyalty’s checkered and certainty’s gone.

and here in the currents and dips of crystalline waters,

with clear understanding, we hold braided candle

sniff spices sip wine and always hold heaven

as high as our hopes. 8.01

Susie D (Susie Davidson; www.susied.com), a weekly correspondent for the Jewish Advocate (thejewishadvocate.com) who has written for the Brookline Tab, the Cambridge Chronicle and other local weeklies, is a Boston-area poet with over 150 publications to date. She won the 2002 Cambridge Poetry Awards’ Best Political Poem Award and was nominated for the Best Political Poem Award for 2003 and the Best Love Poem Award for 2004.

Her 2005 book, “I Refused to Die” (Ibbetson Street Press, Somerville), a compilation of 30 stories of local Boston-area Holocaust survivors and WWII liberating soldiers, received a 2004 Massachusetts Council for the Arts grant, has liner notes from Congressman Michael Capuano and has been featured on Greater Boston with Emily Rooney, WBUR’s “Here and Now” and in local media. See www.IRefusedToDie.com.

Susie has previously authored the poetry volumes It’s Only Life – Rhythmic Forays into Politics and Human Nature (1992) and After Gary (1996). She founded and managed Jamaica Plain’s World Stage and Cambridge’s Small Circle of Friends coffeehouses, hosted the poetry show “The Spoken Scene” on WZBC-FM, and has performed at First Night Boston, the Bread and Roses Festival in Lawrence, CBGB’s in New York, and other locales. She reads poetry at various Boston/Cambridge poetry venues.

Her poems appear monthly in Massachusetts Mensa’s The Beacon in “Susie D’s Poetry Corner.” She has written articles for other local newspapers and music magazines including The Beat! and Boston Rock. She fronted a postpunk poetry band, Sound the Word, and moderates the internet discussion group ProgressiveChat@yahoogroups.com and LiberalsAndLeftistsForIsrael@yahoogroups.com.

She is a member of the Jewish Alliance for Law and Social Action and The Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life. She owned My Type, Inc., a Harvard Square-based typesetting and graphic arts company, from 1984-92.

Her late father, Bernard Davidson, wrote the official Patriotic Massachusetts State Song, “Massachusetts, Because of You Our Land is Free,” (certified in 1984 by Gov. Michael Dukakis).

Susie can be contacted at Susie_d@yahoo.com or Susie@SusieD.com.