The Tibetan Sky-rite Ritual Obsequy Carve with rites becoming transmigration through the bardo. A body is carrion. Don an apron. Slice the prescribed pieces. Unbind the shroud before witnesses. Crush the biggish bones. Break the skull. Preserve a namshe's cap; tea cup for the monk. Call them to feed and fill their bowels, leaving the morsels, to drop from the sky. Tell the mourners: It is done. Build an effigy for coded fire. © 2006 E.D.Ridgell _____________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________ In Tandem Go Is change a pylon finite to a pier fickle In tandem to metered time a hand on sickle The progression so constant with end not found? Is change the feckless reckless rhythm unsound To mock in disdain divers worldly endeavors And falsely bestow hope on wants and pleasures? And caught at end of voyage spent and tired, Do we in harbor windless bind the anchor mired to finish wading hard and taxing tests? When through the gate we tricked find no rest Save discover change infinite do we unforeseen In whirlpools transformed accompany time too keen? To catch the sundry glory sunsets fore So warded do we sail afar the tempestuous shore For waiting horizons duly drowning down? A simple prescribed sojourn round and round- Embark from undulating mothers’ slips unkind Do we in tandem go with change and time? © 2005 E.D.Ridgell ___________________________________________________________ The Highwaymen They ride in tandem. The first out the gate, impatient to break ahead, with the other close behind; a chatterbox, to company track turns- round and round, until at the finish line they’re neck to neck to cross at breakneck speed oblivious to the dust. They mean no harm, tandem highwaymen to change and time; the coupled horsemen, eagar for the next race; the robbers’ meet with results the same, one always winning by a nose leaving the shorter footed heralder one step behind. © 2006 E.D.Ridgell ___________________________________________________________	___________________________________________________________ Like ‘Little Sparrow’ Please, please, don’t rehabilitate me, and try to bind this raven’s calls to forms and schemes so like the diagramed sentences exacted on me by the petulant, penguins of St. Bernard’s... padam…padam…padam. I can not conform. I was born to non-conformity. Let me be free to singsong happily rather than to wheeze breathless, dressed frustrated; straight-jacketed in iron, reinforced, and worn, corset-covers... padam…padam…padam. Like ‘Little Sparrow’, I lost a love long ago in one more tempest of life. Disagree if you will but give me my last Olympia, one more song to sing for you before a last shot high into the good night... padam…padam…padam. Spread my broken bits on the Palace Green before I grow Whoof-minded. Let the children run atop me playfully to the sounds of the fifes and drums marching... padam…padam…padam. It is in the poem I can sing to you sweetly or harshly as my intemperate mood swings back and forth to the meanderings of few joys and many sufferings... padam...padam...padam. Remember me for my words, my harmonies, my heart rung meanings, and like Maupassant’s heroine in 'Ball of Fat', do not ridicule or mock my movements to the gentle echos of my archangel’s wings fluttering...padam…padam…padam. © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell Picture Belongs to the Public Domain   There’s Something We Don’t like about Michele,   I mean besides the fact she’s white, White as the frock of the shot dead, abortion doctor She’s always telling us to get rid of!   It’s this little Miss Sichwaermerness A daughter of a mother who worked for The First National! I mean who’s your Daddy, some Wasp Dude Long gone to “Weedy” California, really?   How do we know you weren’t born On some chicken ranch in Texas, Abandoned in some Lesbos’s basket To become just another Medicaid recipient Brought up by share croppers For a fat, foster care check?   What’s the real deal? What’s the scam? Did they print a so called birth certificate on the back Of some Oral Roberts law degree? Excuse me! We want some real proof, something we can Take to the bank and have Mommy-Dearest deposit; That birth certificate, a hard copy DOMA Card, Un-fudged finger prints-this morning’s clean dip-stick- Something Proof Positive!                                                   © 2011 by E.D. Ridgell
	Dead David   I recall now, David, How much I tried to help; An entire day to hear you say no, You were not buying it!   I left feeling angry, Angry that you had taken the prize- That the claw behind the glass had served up to you One more night, For one more risky, black out.   Then you'd come drag assin' back, Another notch further down; a priest with no flock, Your family fading for want of hope- Another false start, more empty prayers, Rote steps really. They're promise's unanswered.   I didn't go to the funeral. No one else ever knew I had tried hard and that we had both failed. We buried Walt recently. Harry's most likely dead now, clutching Wall Street reports. Al's been to hell and back, only to do a second tour. The Supreme Court; well its busy Slammin' dream-doors lately.   And me? I'm slowly killing me, With that dog assed tenacity That I share with you! David, Damn It, Go to sleep! I'm tired. Come back and haunt me another night!                                   © 2011 by E.D. Ridgell
A Red Maple Leaf [version 111] Who struck you-- Left you to hobble A rain-soaked road? Do black eyes peer From nervous grass? It pains me to pass. Traffic askew, Avoiding you. Why care? Is this confusion at pain, Sadness at a wet crosswalk? Each day falls, A red maple leaf. It is innocence Unintended. You, a common goose, The symbol of bliss Are a mother dying. O Canada! © 2006 by E.D.Ridgell Humpty Dumpty Pock marked Sun burnt Hair ablaze Choking on smoke Feverishly Sweating in cracks The Old Ozone Holed Orb Orders Horsemen attack Whimly winds change Waves walk high heeled Hovels into sea Homeless forests flies Leave locusts starving Hordes horde the little left All the kings horses And all the kings men… © 2005 E.D.Ridgell Gods, Come Out and Fight!   I dropped into the meeting, A hot house tomato, Not for any slipping but needing picking, Ripe on the vine for some intimacy- Someone to hold me again, someone to Mean a “how'ya doing?”   It had been a long journey and I was only A little ways through the lonely wood. In a room of some ten misfits on the range, Your testosterone drew me like a bee to the comb- Not in search of anything queenly. This was man to man. I knew that you knew, but that you were nursing a whole garden. You were hung on that chair just as sure as mortal sin.   With time, I came to meet one already holding An earlier claim and so I, a Southern Gentleman, Jabbed my pick in another’s heart and, all in all, All were content with the leftovers, friendships. Soon enough you tested that man. Men like you always do. And I was there to conspire against your testing, helping Your man to understand that men are no damned good- How else would you have them but damned hard.   With time you condescended to him and I won my own knight, And together we all watched our Dearest David, a gay priest, Destroy himself one drink at a time. We developed a friendship… Heard Joan Baez sing on South Street-Settled into hypnotic fantasies. We shuffled and moved all the pieces around and landed in abodes That are all too bourgeoisie for men who endure too much for too little.   And then Al lost Matt, his only boy, and evil stuck him hard- The Westboro Baptist Group, and this shaped Al into the strong Gay man who will carry this all through to the end. The Senate will hear the Case soon, and I’ve already told Al he has won in the trying- And for all this, what do the gods conspire to do? I learn just some twenty Minutes ago that you lay dying with three maybe four months to live. They ended Don’t Ask. Don’t tell today and I thought it was a good day For a warrior to die. It is not. It’s a sweet and sour day, and I'm one Drag assed tired warrior. Let me at the gods so that I might take scalps And just ride into war with war paint on and let it be done. Let it be done!                                                                                        © 2010 by E.D. Ridgell	On the Death of al-Zarqawi Poems are oft times pretty prayers, sweet songs sung for something or to someone; pleas for pity or peace, promissory notes of passion, sign posts to mark starting or parting points. The death of my enemy brings no solace, It is the pendulum of grief homing home to consequences of words and deeds, of clockwork oranges. They are ripening fruit, sprout from the seeds of self fulfilled prophesies. Zionists absent yellow medals, bejeweled within the crescent moon; stand ‘side wavers of the stripes that border pentagon shaped stars on a field of primary blue; both the allies to an amnesic, downing down a street with sewers running red-- all with offerings not pretty. Their words proselytize, spew spite, portend further strife, and ruin the rare opportunity. The children play upon floors of linoleum, marble, and sand, unaware of prejudicial parents, borne on the backs of steely beasts forever cruising warlike clouds amidst the sooty skies. Repetitive wails resonate with the lamentations of grieving participants, rising like dirges sung in an age old sacrificial rite. They sing no lullabies to these babes. Amidst the veiled clouds of universal smoke, their songs are salient sallies of ugly deeds, untempered, unpoetic, and ungodly. © 2006 E.D.Ridgell ___________________________________________________________
The Celestial Serpent Slayer Regal father and king of day emblazzens me with fireworks, hot lit; quick to capture that daughter of the wargoddess on such a bright lit night as this. From blue, green sphere there that lies central to lunar orbit, star gazers watch bemused and dazzled by my trajectory. From out my sling I send a comet to pierce the snake’s eye, meteor to maim a subcircular pupil and lay low the night intruder. In a starry serpent’s realm I fly triumphant. The celestial son silhouetted on the moonlight’s glow, I slay this lunar queen’s tormentor. Daybreak comes to celebrate my valor. A maid is won and turns wanton on the sunrise to ride astride the rising desire of the son of the sun god. © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell	The Box    [dedicated to Al & Matt Snyder] See the box? That's the one. It contains my riddled little soldier, my one and only boy. He never liked to fly. On the flight o'er he was so relieved to have made it so safely. No fear, on the flight back, still- We fear nothing after going stone cold. See how gently they carry him? What design this gentleness, now? If only I could feel nothing. If only it didn't touch. The swing in the backyard; it grows rusty. It seems like only yesterday he wanted pushing. Don’t offer me condolences - Stay! Relieve me of your war-born weight so that I may plant my boy,  that one in the dead-weighted box___  © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell www.matthewsnyder.org
A variation on the Ghazal without the radif – instead I’ve put repetition at the beginning line to each couplet. The makhta is retained. I think it gives it an interesting 'ear'. I Am a Room I am a room with one lone chair, The rush of weaver worn with wear. I am a room with rackrent fair For forespent groom like harried hare. I am a room just next the stair An open wound in neon glare. I am a room from window stare, To herald doom and so prepare. I am a room full of despair, In gloom obtuse he pauses there. I am a room caution forbear, And hasten bloom condition rare. I am a room Ed does not dare To assume for him be anywhere. © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell	It is Like Jumping after Wirkola                    [It is Like “Hoppe Etter Wirkola] A dredging sweat skies down my mug’s lift to leap and freeze dormant in anticipation. In wakes, it awaits an awakening, an uneasy sequel to such coarse caressing. After wintering to whispers, Demeter willingly comes. She brings her burgeoning in with gossamer skins of faintly risen relief, the scoring of thinly grains. Her charms quickly fade and drop upon a rippled sheet, recently white, smoother now from the waxing of my finger scratching. The circumjacent shapes swirl among the veined wings, around her windswept form, falling victim to the bright hot light. Awestruck and wary, with empathy, I rescue her into a cool captured light, snapping her from sight, fixing her, here, immortal. It is like jumping after Wirkola, and I can shoot her no higher. © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell
I am a Strong Mule Deer   A rude shard shot through a sunrise’s solitude, shocks and catches me unawares, penetrating my warm, sienna coat, piercing and spurting red its fur: forewarning nothing, no hint to my big ear, no nostril’s intervention; an unforeseen advantage, alacrity, unnatural, attends the surprise.   Who ruptures a hart‘s hide, draining it of its liquid too tart to taste, too quick to lick; running down in ruddy falls, downing me down upon the ground in a hush to the dying brush of my black-tipped tail?   I am a strong mule deer, whose bleating echoes ever fainter along the canyon’s walls.            © 2007 by E.D. Ridgell	Puyi Puyi, Heavenly One; Rising, whithing... morphing. Serpent... celestial and sublime. Manchu! © 2007 E.D.Ridgell ___________________________________________________________