Letter to Amarisa

1. Letter to Amarisa

I feel like Hamlet, and you are Ophelia
And in some strange ironic twist of fate
The demon in me has found you, and like Althea,
Has left you, and I am only thwarting myself.

My soul, as Saint John had said,
Let it see prosperity. Shave off from me the grave
I ask God to take the knife of Circumcision
And cut the wicked thing from me.

I know that is not your name, Amarisa,
And I have only seen it once in a dream
When I saw that beautiful Amish Girl
Playing Frisbee in the woods.

Beatrice, Amélie, your face has inspired
Many poems, and so has your purity.
You have been heaven to me and Zion.
You wore God like Stephen did.

I have no memory of meeting you
Or seeing you, save that one time...
And I feel my Doppelganger thwarts me;
Is it a Folkstem of myself? Or some Magic?

Marry me... come find me...
But if I say, "I am born a Bachelor,"
Do not climb the willow branch
For that saber toothed lion is not me.

I have seen him in my dreams
And fear he is a part of me---
But I saw his canine teeth
In the mirror. Death, I call him.

Do not be maddened my dove;
For I wish only to have what is pure
And not be lonely. Stay strong, and alive
And know I--the conscious being who speaks--

Want love and matrimony.
But, Tyrants have placed death
As a veil over me, and I have become his puppet
As he teases the world with my vanities.

2. Cuddling

I lie with you, nude,—it never was—
And into your brown eyes—or blue or green—
Your heaving bosom beautiful,
I lay with you, skin upon skin,
Love exudes from my heart
And the opium of your love flows
Through my veins.
We made no loves, but slept in one bed
And lie in our nuptial bonds.
It was love, and skin, but not amatory’s sting
Simply love, full of friendship.
We said I love you.

3. Hope

What may be my last poem I ever write...

Let me never die, let me never die,
Do not let my hopes perish in this life.
Answer me swiftly, and give me Zion
And let me enter Everlasting Peace.

Let me love, o, let me love eternal
Souls, and let me feel compassion in my
Inward parts, and let me feel tender love
And mercies toward every person I meet.

Let me have desire; I will enter
My wife, and be knit with her soul
And create flesh tied with flesh, children
For us to raise and build a life in truth.

Let not riches corrupt me, poverty
Destroy me, let me not be foolish in
Giving, but let me uphold those whose needs
I have with me to fulfill; have and give.

Lord, let me learn, let me learn all there is
In Your Wisdom and Peace, and honor's might.
Let me be full of learning and wisdom
And let me teach many sinners the way.

Lord, I am sick in mind, and sick in soul
For I have doubts of myself, and sickness
In my very being. Yet, let me be 
Healthy, and an ointment on all others.

Lord, I have seen peace, so increase it well
And let me eat, drink, merry, but fast strong
And abstain from sin, and do good and well,
And  see good in the land of the living.

Lord, let me teach on the honor of God
And let me convert many sinners to 
Your paths, and let me build foundations strong
Of Christ's opal Diamond, red, green and black.

Lord, give me truth in my most inward parts
And give me truth in my inward being.
Give me faith, and truth, and honor's blessing.
Let me never be ashamed, and restful.

Lord, give me pleasant  labors, and good work
Which gives me rest in my inwardmost bones
And gives me health and flourishing, and feels
Good, and is not a strain to my body.

Lord, war is utmost evil, it is wrong
But sometimes what is wrong must be done. All
Things in this world have times and seasons
A season for all things under the sun.

Yet hope is perpetual. I shall live.

4. Gratitude

I sit upon my couch, and I ponder the blessings.
Cups I bought from the pickled peppers,
Perfect glasses for drinking.
Moana, which you see on my one book cover.
Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane.
A Father-clock. The palm from a Palm Sunday
Accents the portrait of Jesus.
A green poinsettia in Mid July.
A Hexagonal Fish Tank with my fish
On a hexagonal wooden stand.
I have the 1947 portrait of Jesus
In my room, with a globe, lantern
Sea Shells and in them Polished Semi-Precious stones.
My Dad's poems he wrote, framed well by me upon the wall
With that little newspaper clipping off to the side and perfect formatting
Of attribution font.
My bookshelves my Pappy made,
The cupboards and paper towel roll too.
My chess table, expertly carpentered by a family acquaintance from church.
My Nanny's plastic vase with plant.
My Mom's glass bluebird and my July Bear.
Paintings which relatives made, and photographs.
Pound Puppy and my Nanny's Afghan she knit
And my Mimi's afghans too.
My bird book by Reader's Digest that 
I used while bird watching with my Pop pop.
My Grandma's memory;
My Aunt Kim's judgment of aesthetics.
A cappuccino maker, every household appliance
Good cookware. Stainless Steel cutlery.

One thing I learned from psychiatry
They left one good piece of advice
Out of thousands of bad ones.
Gratitude is the elixir which remedies depression.

5. Poverty of Sentiment

I look at other households,
And see things.
But not real things.
I see fancy art, made cheaply on cardboard
I see stone tables, plush pillows
Couches made from leather
TV and Computers;
Good appliances, wicker chairs---but artificial ones.
Most houses I go to, that's what I see.
Not antiques handed down from four generations
Or art and furniture made by family members.
I understand why our country is frustrated.
Everything is new, and disconnected from the past.

6. The End of Enthymeme

The sages discussed, "We cannot touch it,"
When adding up infinities...
Thus, all engineering failed
And so with it all laws of physics
And so with it all laws of math and science
Beyond rudimentary geometry.
All because they couldn't accept
The Bible were true.

7. The Great Horned Owl

It looks like a hooded assassin
Upon the lamppost.
Its head and neck like a man's
And body like a monk's.
Then it flies, and you see
It's speckled chest.

It helps you understand
Why ancients were fearful of them
And they will make their perch in Babylon.

8. Crookes

I see you fail at making the Rifle Team at school.
Looks like you shopped around, looking for a mark.
'Prince Harry--maybe--Joe Biden, Donald Trump.'
I see you see Trump will be nearby.
I then see, to prove to the world you got the stuff
I witnessed you kill a fireman.

Though, the question still remains,
Why didn't secret service cover the sniper perch?

9. The Death Penalty

I am a supporter of it.
People did not indiscriminately kill men women and children,
Nor were our cities a warzone,
When it existed.
50,000 people a year die from Gang Violence.
They hide that from you, though.
The fact that there were such a penalty for it
Would certainly make them think twice.
Not to mention, it'd be more merciful
Than simply locking them up.
It'd give the criminals a chance to repent,
And quickly go to the gallows,
Where they could at least save their eternal soul.

10. White Rider

Your peace is false...
I see it... everyone cries peace.
There is no peace.

11. 

She loved him more than all else, 
And he touched her walls 
With the flower petals 
And the two made children 
In the eveningtime; 
For Ten Months the child 
Lay in the womb from conception 
For his seed had found her. 
The two were wedded by Wisdom 
In passion and honor and truth. 
 
Do not awaken love, unless she is ready. 

12. Dick Dawkins

No, I'm not making fun of you--
My grandfather was named Dick.
You beautifully summate everything I hate
About Christianity. But know, that's not my religion.
My religion is not a mind virus.
It is compassion, and something much deeper.
Something the rational animal needs,
Or they go completely insane.

13. Five Meditations on Logos

1.

Know the way, but do not depart.
See it, but do not say.
Speak it, but not to excess.
Know only to walk circumspectly,
And do not daggle by falling off the balance.
For if you soil your garments by straying to the left or right
You are monumentally off the path.

Seek, and you shall find.
Know, and you shall understand.
But that which is known is known
And that which is unknown is unknown.
But what is known, can only be truly understood
If it is seen by others—
That which is unknown cannot be known by others.
But that which is not perceived, is not known
And cannot be knowledge.
And that which is knowledge,
Cannot be known if it is unperceived.

2.

To understand is to see what others have seen.
To communicate, is to cause others to see what you see.
To know is to see what others have seen.
To communicate, is to know what others have seen.

Underneath language is truth.
Underneath words are substance.
There is a faith associated with substance
That what is underneath is understood.
Can we know the substance of other's speech?
We truly cannot, but we truly can.
Hidden in the mind is its knowledge
And shared in another mind is its knowledge,
And two minds meet, and find new dimensions of the substance of language.

3.

To see is not to want to see.
To know is to want to know.
To see is not to want knowledge as you see it
But to see knowledge as others see it.
To perceive the words of other minds
Is more knowledgeable, than to see your own mind's knowledge.

Half of words are unperceived,
Until much later, they become perceived.
The mind has grown, and sees new things.
Do not let your mind darken
Into seeing the dark
But let your mind see light.
If there is no light in what another says
Do not be ashamed for hearing,
But shine your light upon it to brighten up what is cursed.

4.

Minds darkened by foolishness know nothing
Save their own desires.
Minds lightened by wisdom, see all men's desires are the same.
Yet, the foolish man, has foolish desires
And does not seek what he ought to seek.
For he is foolish, and desires that which will not make him happy.
Thus, the fool knows nothing but his own foolishness
And destroys the precious seeds of faith in others.

For all things are derived from substance and faith in that substance;
Not anything can be known, without the substance.
For, even the simplest thing becomes unknown, without seeing the substance.
Thus, the substance is lost, due to ill conceived desires
Which seek for the lesser pleasures of life.
The substance is found, by seeking the higher pleasures of life.
What are the lower pleasures of life?
Flesh.
What are the higher pleasures of life?
Trust.
Of the flesh, there is no trust or want for knowledge toward your fellow man.
Of trust, there is community and bonds and winsome agreement, and truth.

5.

Where there is no trust, there is no faith.
Where there is no faith, there is no knowledge.
Where there is no knowledge, there is no truth.
Where there is no truth, there is no compassion.
Where there is no compassion, there is no love.
Where there is no love, there is no mercy.
Where there is no mercy, there is no friendship.
Where there is no friendship, there is only self.
Where there is only self, there is only flesh.

14. Misunderstood

There is something about me, which isn't serious
No matter how hard I try to be.
People like me when I play the fool
Because I cannot trick or deceive,
But am a bumbling idiot they can lovingly condescend to.

I try... but my rude speech doesn't entice the listener.
My "Grammar" is bad, but it's that they don't want to listen.
My reasons for believing in God are not substantiated.
Though they are.
People see I am 35 and poor, and no job...
Success breeds success.
Fame, fortune, and popularity makes your word sound credible.
It could be I have solved mysteries,
But no one will care to tell.
It could be I am a silly genius which does my act in the woods---
I cannot perform for you. For I am silly.

I cannot hate Jews, or love Queerness, or wear Purple and Pink or tight fitted jeans.
Rather, people want there to be no good and to see no good.
For it is a mind virus.
Thus, life is about ingratiating the desire...
And no one ever sees there could have been more.
I am an anachronism, a relic, an artefact;
An imitation of older times.
I am new, and old, and modern, and archaic;
Futuristic and anachronistic and ancient.
Shall my time come in this lifetime? Where I can eat, drink and merry?
No... for all want to eat drink and merry their way
Which has no love;
I need love to be happy, and that resource is vanishing like the wind.

And that's all I ever had to say, was we need love.
Not John Lennon's love, but real love.
Not the Hippy's version or the Gay's.
Real love.

"Love is love."
Yes... and you know nothing about it.

15. The Feminist Cycle

For men to grow up,
We need women in our lives. 

Women don't want men, 
So we don't grow up.
Women become single parents,
Boys are their children's fathers,
A whole crop of brats are born who don't know love.

This causes more frustration, 
And frustration causes war and violence.

16. St. Broom

St. Broom came to town, and all the people did what they pleased.
He saw they knew nothing, and strove for all they could.
He showed them God and math, and reassured them with knowledge.
But they hated him and would not listen, thus were starved of good.
He died poor, but the people all saw they were unhappy, and saw he had told them the reasons why.

The people saw he was unhappy too, and saw they made it so.
They knew nothing but that they were all sad, and selfish.
They found God, and pored over His knowledge, and tried it, to see if it were better.
It was, and they all marveled, for they finally found knowledge.
And Broom gave them the knowledge of God and Math, and golden were the ages to come.

17. Literature

The place our good letters play
In the country--Mr. Lewis, 
I am not expressing self
But trying to save many souls--
Is to be a beacon for a better world.
It is not expression of self
But expression of what's true.
It transcends our bodies
And our minds, and communicates
The eternal Providence which guides
Nations, which Indians call Dharma
Greeks Logos, Chinese Tao.
It is so mystical, but it shouldn't be.
It is the eternal truth beneath our language
And the substance of our thoughts
Of which, if there were no substance
There could be nothing of which to say.
Thus, my substance is to save the soul
To save the country, and to save myself.

18. WASP

I am white. I cannot help it.
I am Anglo-Saxon--Scotch-Irish, PA Dutch-Polish--
I am a Protestant. That I can help, but do not see any other religion which fits me.

Do you wish me to appropriate your artform?
Then let me have mine, won't you?

19. The Meaning of Life

So much ecstasy in meaning
So much… but it is now all gone.
Silently, I muse upon nothing;
My mind is a quiet well.
All roads lead back to melancholy.

It shows there is an end to wisdom
And a beginning to folly;
Beginning to folly...
Let us just live and experience,
Yet not do so foolishly.

There is meaning in life
And it is to dance,
And rear children with one you love,
And it is to pluck the wildberry 
From the stem in June.

Yet, no one can attain this joy
For all alike go the same
Working tirelessly like I have
And putting their meaning into it.
There I have found little.

20. I Am A Plain Man Like Jacob

I am a plain man like Jacob---
So said the scripture, now,
Time has wended and bended
And brought us this story---

My performance is plain
My words austere and full
Like an Amish Maid
More beautiful than any other.

Yet, I am a plain man like Jacob.
And the audience looks, and sees
My butter churning upon the oak barrel.
It goes upon life, like bread, which though plain

Nourishes the soul with a slight hint of grain
And that flavor is best among all others.
For, it is not tainted with spice
But rather is a deep, satisfying wheat.

21. The Children

The children are left
Behind, in a winding wood.
I gently say "Don't
"Fall behind, children, for the
"Woods can be a maze. Don't stray."

22. All About Me

Give me one good wife, with good love
And riches not, I need them not.
A field to plough, and a farm to sow
And cattle to milk, I’d grow old.

Give me a little activity, games not a few.
Chess, Scrabble, Pinochle, Cribbage,
A few of the modern ones too.
I’d be happy with my ilk, playing in the rainy days.

Give me a bright virgin with red hair
And beautiful face, and bosom too;
Who loves to help me with the chores
And loves to live with amenities few.

Give me a chapel nearby with a good preacher
And a little beautiful art in my life as well.
Good novels, good poetry, good essays,
But the whole world would rather be hell.

23. The Unachievable

They say only a true master can write
A Petrarchan sonnet, Dear Beloved---
And they say syllabic meter is dulled.
I, a stupid, homely, and unschooled wight
Not schooled in the modern nonsense, will fight
To free pretentions of pedagogues, called
Weighty, and heady, and awesome, which led
To our modern art, where all verse is light.
I pause at every line; I see the pause
They say which interrupts the lay reader
When verse should be read like prose, naturally
Aspirated in our thoughts, for just cause
Have I to say they know not what tender
They deal in---all dealt artificially.

24. Chiquihuite

The Chiquihuite, the Clovis--
You disappear. Why?
Aye, a global flood?

25. The Raging Atheist

They called me a "Hypocrite" and a "Liar"
And said I had no righteousness.
My lie was that Christ is testified throughout history,
The gospels are witness, and there's direct
Corroboration of the events in the Bible.
Of which, I've found many.
I'm a hypocrite because I call out
People's sin, and don't want them to go to hell.

They were right I have no righteousness, though.
Of that, Christ is my righteousness, and no other.

26. The Mystery

I really don't understand the mystery
Behind knowing what something is.
It seems like we've lost everything
By forgetting how to do that.

27. Oh Pelagius

Oh, Pelagius, do you not understand?
By human will we are condemned, 
And not in restful Sabbath?
Man striving after the law
Loses his love, so said Ignatius
To the Philadelphians,
And Asceticism is not good.
Original sin, is that we understand sin
That is our original sin,
Is we chose to have knowledge of it.
Thereby, choosing a different path
We, even as infants, attain the Nation
Not that of Israel. But by choosing 
God, we walk in His rest
And thereby do what is good always.

28. My Life

I wrote volumes nobody would publish.
I rely on others for even the slightest morsel of bread.
I never had a wife, children, debts or money.
I will soon be without an automobile.
I sleep in my childhood bedroom.
But I wrote volumes. And everyone tells me that is no good.

29. School

Seek knowledge first
Character second
Honor third,
Only, make sure it is truth
Of a sort that shall give you wisdom.
Lose none of it.

30. God's Judgment

How might God persuade you,
That you are bound for hell?
I believe, He will give you the full peace
You might have enjoyed,
Should you have come into honor.
The full love, the full blessing,
And then He shall show you
Starting with your ancestors
Their sins, and crimes, which were passed
Down, and the King's sins, too,
Over the land, who wish to corrupt their people,
And then finally, your decisions.
He shall show you every moment
Where you had recourse to better your life
And change, and make way,
And He shall show you all the people
You would have met, and all the people you did
And their crimes, and what God
Would protect you from, should you believe.
And at the end, He shall say,
"If the world chose me, you could have entered this peace.
"And being that perhaps you would have mourned 
"In this life, for a little while, by making the choice
"To follow me, I would have given you this peace
"You feel right now as an eternal inheritance.
"Which you rejected, because your knowledge
"Puffed you up, and so did your sin."
Therefore, you will understand
Why you deserve to go,
And shall enter into torment 
Without protest, but rather a dejected sigh.

31. God's Design

Sine and Cosine, you little angels,
Legs of a right triangle,
With hypotenuse of a radius of one.
You determine so many things.
You shape the formula to get the real answer.
It is not a thing we invented,
But an inherent law in the universe.
To say, "We use it, because it's useful,"
Is teleological, for the cause springs forth its use
That the cause is its self subsistent nature
In the bedrock of all reality.

Calculus, you little angel,
A very difficult curve,
Just like a circle's circumference,
Determines the area of what's underneath you.
And in that area, we can derive
Anything that is the quadratic relation
Of two variables.
And it always works.
And through your infinite series,
And the rates of change,
And the slopes of  the curve
We find a real area,
That determines a real thing.

Quadratic Equations, you little angel
By observing the square,
And fundamentally understanding it,
We can reduce the area of any two dimensional
Object into one dimension,
And thereby, understand the linear functions
Of any area. And that area represents any exponent
To the second degree. And it is,
And this comprehension leads to other laws
And other truths about the universe,
And the logic subsists that it can derive
The substance of anything it relates too--
Including the arcs of a ball falling by gravity.

Infinite primes, you little angel,
We do not "know" there are infinite primes
The same way we do not "Know" there is a God---
Yet we infer in the logical next step,
Just like Calculus solves, that it must be.
For, we only know the infinite sums add up
Because we measure it in its limited dimension,
And see it solves for the rest---
We can know, just like we know there are infinite primes
Due to the nature of infinity,
That God exists through the coherence of the universe.
For we understand it is real, and it all works interrelated,
That a mind had to develop the reality
For us to truly understand and describe it.

I see a design, so know it only can be if God made it so.

32. Metamorphosis: Be in the World but not Of It

Flesh

First, there was the Big Bang
But before that all the cosmos was without form, and was void.
It was utter darkness. God moved among the cosmos.
Then He made Light.
Light was day, and dark was night.

Then, the earth congealed into a ball of magma
And it was liquid rock.
And an atmosphere surrounded it.
Below the firmament were the waters of magma
And above the waters of space.

Then the comets came, and gathered waters
And they fell upon the Earth,
And made the cooled earth an ocean;
And the dry land appeared from the magma.
From the vents of the magma, there began to be life
The first vestiges of green. And they multiplied by war
And violence, and strife.
But it was good.

Then the moon and stars began to form
And so did the sun, for they were dust.
For life began, before the stars,
Billions of miles away,
Were formed, and the sun too,
And the moon, and the constellations.
The life did burgeon forth from the beginning.
And the stars and sun and moon were for the signs of the seasons.

Then the fish, and the birds appeared---
The seabeasts, the seamonsters, and the land monsters---
They strove with one another, in violence,
And killed, and evolved.
And the flesh world was created, through strife.
But, it was good.

Then came the cattle, the little lizards and mice,
The insects grew tiny, and the land animals went to the sea
And the sea animals went to the land.
Some of them, and they made after their kinds.
And they fought, and strove, and evolved.
But it was good.

And then God, from the ape,
Brought forth mankind.
Not Adam and Eve, but men---
And if one wishes, they can be tied to the earthly strife and earthly passions
And its wars and strife.
It is good, but shall not always be.
And man ruled over everything,
The kine, the bugs, the plants, the sealife, the birds and the earth.

Spirit:

The plants are made first, and they are beautiful, the fruit trees of life.
There was mist upon the ground, and no rain,
And the LORD formed man from the dust.
And He breathed into Adam's nostrils,
And gave him life.
Then, Adam wandered, and ate, and was merry in the heavenly Eden
And then there was the Beasts made, who gave Adam company.
For they shall be in heaven, also.
And then there was fashioned from Adam's rib, Eve.
The two lived in worldly paradise,
And ate, and drank, and slept with one another for many days.
And their breath was from God, and given to them by God.
For this paradise had no strife, but was born from love and tender mercies
And man had lineage to their Creator.
And thus, being breathed into by God
On the first day of Creation, Adam and Eve were given everything!
But, they ate from the Tree of Knowledge, so therefore knew sin.
And were cast into this world, this fleshly world, born by strife;
The world created in six days, when God rested from its sorrows on the Seventh for us to be given example.
This world with sorrows, and strife, and famine, and pestilence, and disease,
And murder, and sorrows many.
And Adam and Eve had to clothe themselves, for they knew sin.
Thus, their lineage was directly to God, and they knew Him,
They and their ilk who passed down the stories over generations.
And upon the Ark their stories were passed down,
So men can flee this world of strife, this world separated from God,
And they can be breathed into by Him, 
And live in a garden paradise like these two once did,
Only for eternity, and with no threat of sorrow or sin ever again.

33. Radical Jihsade

Your dirty religion is to dirty 
The world, with your rugs, yes, in real time.

You are in hell, you violent, gay bastards
Who in your Keffiyeh, break in real time.

You ally with gays, and mobs and violence
And wish to purge the world, in real time.

You travel in rambling mobs with hatred 
You do not even know why, in real time.

You're disgusting and liars, and of gall
And your poisoned, green hatred, in real time.

Think about what the world did to me
You stupid fools; what you do in real time.

You are an evil brood, of philistines
And shall perish like Sodom, in real time.

This isn't about Islam or even
Hinduism, but bad faith, in real time

Blood drips from your jowls and your stupid fangs
The bile runs from your lungs in real time.

34. Gods of the Copybook Heading Part II

Then there came the Prince of a New Peace,
The gods they raged through their desire,
They wished to make their Brave New World
And to consume it with unholy fire.

"Men ought to be paid for existing
"Thus we will damage all he has done;
"We will make him a pauper and savior
"Of the world, for we wish only to have fun.

"All deep topics are annoying
"All deep arts are the same;
"Piss and a crucifix in a jar
"Is the only art that isn't lame."

Thus the gods went about their business
Named Athena, Abaddon and Thor,
They grossly laid out their planes
And they scaled a world, no more

Concerned for the worker or his rights
For a writer cannot be paid his dues.
The dog returns to its vomit
Thus they determined Brandon shall lose.

Yet, his work was truly important
And no it was not insane.
It was what would beat the gods
And the world they make, which is lame.

A small income from this art form
A couple hundred a month
Is all he'd need, that
And also a woman to love.

But instead the world went broke
And decided its lusts were grave
They shamed him into deliverance:
For the worlds gods they were made.

The marketplace was demanding
And it wanted no salary earned
Thus Muslim and Chinese terrorists
Flung into a rage, and so spurned.

They hated the truth, they loved a lie
They wanted their squalor back
Thus they took their knives and daggers
And they held it behind Brandon's back.

And at the end, the world was broken
And at the end no one was paid.
At the end they burned the world
And at the end, it was those end days.

All because they wouldn't listen
All because a writer couldn't make a buck
Not even five hundred dollars
A piddling salary earned in a month.



©2024 B. K. Neifert
All Rights Reserved