Author: Don Iannone, D.Div., Ph.D.

Biography Writer, photographer, poet, and teacher. Holds doctorates in Divinity and Metaphysical Philosophy. Author of 20 books, including seven poetry books, nine photography, and four nonfiction books. Contact Information Contact Don Iannone by email: diannone@gmail.com

The Lake at Sunset

The lake is my sword
Cutting through life’s flagrant nonsense
Slashing its tawny leathered wrists
Spilling red sunset all about

At my side all night long
She beckons, begs, congeals a new reality–
One where purpose finally follows breath
And grandiose dreams fall aslumber–
Mere dormant volcanoes
Quieted by the watchful monks
On the flowered hillside

We must escape ourselves to find ourselves
So why not follow the lake’s hypnotic waves
Making us forget long enough to remember
the fleeting sunset, desperate scarlet flashes on the water

looking for more

at times we are at odds with others
folks who should know better–
we’re no pushovers for their lame incantations

at times we’re at odds with ourselves
struggling to find an answer
something to set us free

at times we look into the deep misplaced sky–
some place that barely exists
except for our imaginations of things to become

and always we are left to wonder
if there is any true goodness that can save us
when we’re in over our heads with no place else to go

To the Good Ole Boys and Girls in the World

In one sense
Entitlement is a matter of degree
Some expect a take far greater than others
In another sense
Entitlement is entitlement
Even those with nothing expect more
While doing little or nothing to earn it

Commonsense should prevail in these matters—
Frankly we should know better
That a day of reckoning exists for everyone
Regardless of their money, influence, other self-endowments
The world can only support so much taking
Without a commensurate or greater gift in return

I’ve come to resent entitled people
No matter their position, color, age, or persuasion
And I am so inclined to believe
That everyone potentially abuses
Their self-defined advantage
Because they’re not strong enough to make it
Without all the titles and entitlement

thoughts on the slumbering sailboats

summer has been swallowed
first by the playful autumn
and now by the brutal winter

the sailboats have disappeared
their colorful sails neatly folded
like large forehead wrinkles
frowning at the blowing snow
and the ice sheets gliding now
where the boats once sailed

just the other day
we watched a lone bald eagle dip and soar
over the boats along the lakeshore
before vanishing into the nearby woods
we marveled at his curiosity
and wondered whether he missed the boats
and the summer
as much as we did

the winter wolves

alpha wolf’s soulful call rides the bitter northeasterly wind
drifting between the driven snowflakes
through the tall dark timbers
into the stream valley, half-frozen and lonely
picked up, then finally returned by its mate
poised on the distant hilltop

only the ravens are brave enough
to allow the shrill howls pass over them directly
for them it is music for their teasing dance
to distract the wolves
breaking their concentration long enough
to grab leftovers from the wolves’ evening hunt

finally the hard white moonlight
ignites the pack’s glaring gold eyes
twelve unflinching beacons in all
eventually all voices are heard
and the haunting amber eyes disappear
having reclaimed the conifer forest for another night

Blue-Eyed Winter Child

Some are born
Amidst the cold–
Deep blue winter snows…

Tipping fences
Bending tree branches
Frosting cheeks–
Pale shades, pink attitude

Standin’ tall ‘gainst fair white Irish skin
Winter child speaks to me
’cause she’s born…

In the world between–
Frigidly tenuous place
Turbulent solitude

Her eyes sparkle
Sunlight glint, bouncing
off fresh snow drifts
Somewhere north of heaven…

Frozen world where we live, huddled
under broken evergreen branches
Ever wonderin’ why
Those ocean-deep blue eyes
Forever haunt me and you

sense making in an indifferent universe

on the heels of sandy hook
we stare into the universe, searching
for a cosmic answer, a shred of truth why
such horror exists in our world

we lie awake at night, hugging our pillow
wishing the world’s senselessness would end
and a predictable world, shaped by our good intentions
would overtake the universe’s insufferable indifference

no parent wants their child ripped from their arms
no mother wants her son to murder other children
yet these things happen–not for any higher purpose
but in an absolute sense everything is born, everything dies

these are harsh realities everywhere–
not just in newtown,
but also in littleton, aurora, chardon, tucson, harlem, watts, london, kabul–
because we struggle against the universe’s indifference

we are defenseless against the indifferent unknown
though we create probabilities through science
we are defenseless against heartbreak and suffering
though we believe, cleanse ourselves through religion

we rail against the world’s insanity and inhumanity
we beg for peace among all people, despite their differences
we cry out at night for justice–
anything but the universe’s intolerable indifference

sandy hook didn’t have to happen, but it did
our hearts break to see the faces of those taken
what happened was unfathomably senseless, yet
it will happen again, and again, because…

all things are a part of the same–
the good, the bad, even the unknown and unjudged–
all parts of an unmeasurable indifferent universe, which
we create moment by moment, breath by breath

we despise our cosmic indifference, especially
when our hearts are full and overflowing
but with all our differences, even our similarities
the universe can be nothing but indifferent

each of us wants the world to share our purpose–
to reflect our hopes, dreams, and aspirations
sometimes we get lucky and it does, and
often and sadly it doesn’t

so when i ask myself why god permits atrocities–
like those at sandy hook, and many other places
i try to remind myself that god doesn’t take sides
and in all fairness, the universe must be indifferent

we have a choice how we live
how we treat ourselves and others
but there are no guarantees how it all turns out
because in all fairness, the universe must be indifferent

unopened christmas presents in newtown

soon it will be christmas–
so many unopened presents
under the darkened trees in the homes
of those massacred at sandy hook elementary

soon it will be christmas–
a time we all become children
but not those who lost their loved ones
whose hearts break tenderly

soon it will be christmas–
you wonder where they’ll find the strength
to light their evergreen trees, dare look
at the empty stockings with names by the chimney

soon it will be christmas–
a time for birth, hope for eternity
yet so many lives prematurely ended
because of everyday insanity

soon it will be christmas
so much innocence lost in sheer moments
something the world must remember–
longer than last rites at the cemetery

soon it will be christmas
a special time to remember
why shines the star
atop every christmas tree

Wanting

Short days, long nights
Thinking of you
Wishing for more
Settling for less
Coming up short
But finally finding–
Almost what we need

Some semblance of truth
Lingering here, dancing there
Playing games with our faces
Always we want
What makes us giddy
But never what we can have
What forever we shall want

Just Before Sunrise , August 14, 1969

Fall from grace
Tortured soldier’s face
Desperate brothers hangin’ on
Firelight sky, crimson dawn

Mortar fire, cancers grow
Claymore mines, bodies blow
Lucid dreams, tunnel runs
Thunder, lightning, heavy guns

Right side, wrong side
Too many reds, spirits died
Smokin’ weed, M-16 jam
No one home gives a dam

Flyin’ high, Jeff Aeroplane
You and me, totally insane
When will it ever end
Deadly turn, river bend

While Gypsy Lovers Dance

Were it not for the open window
The sound of the waves crashing on the rocks would remain
Unnoticed dreams, forgotten in the instant
Between sleep and awakening
And lost would be the dreams
That keep reality awake between dreams

In a far greater sense–
Though useless in everyday affairs
We’d see that were it not for something
Everything would be reduced to nothing
And were it not for a single breath
The universe would most certainly fail to exist

And while ponderous, these night thoughts
Tap but lightly on the soul’s closed door–
The one gypsy lovers hiss about
As they dance around their fading campfires
Praying morning will take their darkness away

The window, an opening to something beyond
Letting in the night air
Letting out the festered horror of loneliness–
The one certain thing making gypsy lovers dance
Till their fire goes out
And the light of morning turns them back into dreams

One Last Golden Sunset

Long ago ’round blazing campfires they sat
Hearts open to the heavens
Giving themselves over to their dreams
For the moment forgetting–
the forsaken space separating them
from the other side

No pretenders left
Nothing left to pretend
Rebellious spirits dancing
Past their time
Well past the point of return
Wishes for a shooting star lost
Nothing left but cold embers
Waiting for one last golden sunset

Just What Happiness Is

No need for happiness
when everything goes your way
No need for joy
when the day overflows with sunshine

No need for thanksgiving
when there is plenty
or when there’s no decision to make
about which direction to take

No need to tell your story
with the happy ending–
the one where things worked out
Tell that story another day

No need for Friday night poetry
when music and dance fills the air
Give thanks tonight for your loneliness
Helping you remember just what happiness is

Written in Tucson, Arizona, Winter 1970

Confessions Among Strangers

They said his poetry killed him
Actually not his poetry–
But the long sleepless nights
Filled with shameless darkness
The sort you only know
If you stare long enough
Into the abyss of your soul
Looking for something to confess–
Something to take away the pain

Good poetry isn’t easy
Unless it rips your guts out
Stripping you naked of the clothes
You wore to first communion–
That inconvenient place of passive confession
Where all the other strangers stood watch
As you took your first drink–
Tasted the salty blood of life

And where are they now–the strangers
When you need a witness
As the last thread of pride slips off your shoulder
Into the tall empty glass you call your life–
The glass giving you the courage
To mouth your pathetic confessions

Before he died
He whispered with stinking breath to his only sister–
Something about an idea for a new poem–
One about an bitter old man who died
Because he drank his own blood
Hoping he might live through one more night
And at the break of dawn
Confess one last time to a stranger

Mysterious Encounters

At year end, the mystery returns
That sense of timeless beauty
Memories of things we’ve longed to know
Inexplicable things, hovering about
Like smoke from a burned out candle

It comes in the earliest morning hours
At times, starting in a dream
Lingering in our eyes
And other untouchable places
Not destinations, but places tugging at our hearts

The candle’s flame lasts only so long
Soon it turns itself over to the darkness
Leaving us to wonder about the mysteries
Born into us from the beginning
Dying at each year’s end

Winter Paints December on Lake Erie

If you look closely, you will see
The masterpiece Winter painted
Along mighty Erie’s shore
In the darkness, well into the early morning light

You will see his fondness for ever so subtle shades of gray
How one by one he bends, sheaths the tall ornamental grass
In rounded silvery whiteness
And how he paints ripply footprints at the water’s edge

If you look closely, you will see
The fluttering gulls in the distance
Seemingly small, yet not insignificant
Every detail a pixel of life

There’s more, if you look closer
If you’re willing to brazen the biting wind
Like the pile of jagged sticks, and mossy green rocks from summer
Now a single creamy white ice sculpture

And if you hold your eyes and heart wide open
You can read the painter’s signature
Written in the battleship gray sky—
December

First Confession

Sometimes I question myself–
Whether I can ever live up
To your expectations of me–
That unfulfilled part of you
Which you foist on me

Sometimes I’d rather be a stranger
To you, everyone, even myself
Then I could stop being the chameleon–
The pretender that pretends to be
Whatever you or I think I should be

I hated my parents for the longest time
Because they wouldn’t let me be who I wanted to be
Then I stopped hating them
When I realized my ideas for myself
Were even worse than those they had for me

My vision grows more blurred each day by all the notions–
Lame ideas about who I am, what I should be
That’s a good thing–
Sometimes we spend too much time looking for ourselves
When all we need is to just be

Thanksgiving Memories of Martins Ferry

So much, maybe everything, is lost in translation–
those tiny steps we take between heartbeats
Like the steps I’ve taken backward and forward on holidays
in those worn out shoes I wear on special occasions only–
trying to remember myself, and Martins Ferry–
that place this life remembers as its beginning, and
that place I loath and love like some hopelessly confused clown
dancing in the headlights of strangers’ cars–
cars running over my dreams
which know no way to die on their own

We forget it’s all an illusion–
every last blink of experience
flowing into and out of us
like some forgotten river–
maybe the Ohio, and
then again maybe not

Martins Ferry clings to me–
some terribly worn, out of style suit of clothes–
in synch with my special shoes, but painfully dull and empty
like the now abandoned house on Indiana Street
where my winter dreams began in the warm family room
where a short-needled Christmas tree stood every year–
the same corner where I cried in quiet desperation
hoping a dream would some day carry me far away

Now I want to go back–
this time by choice to wear those shoes and that suit
Something tugs at my heart on Thanksgiving and Christmas
Making even the sadness and loneliness look good
Just one more time to sit on the family room floor
and play with my toys
while Mom and Dad argue in the kitchen about money, relatives
and so many other empty things filling life–
things that are also part of love

Memorial Day Remembered

I remember as a young boy loving Memorial Day
because of the small parade in our town Martins Ferry
honoring those who died serving our country, and
the family picnic when family members usually at war with each other came together, and
how the holiday symbolized school would soon be out for the summer, and
how the sun lingered and dallied much longer
allowing us to play early and late in the day, and
how we felt eternal like childhood was forever

feelings beyond words

we feel things at times
that go beyond words
exceeding that something inside
that wants to express

yet we know
deep down inside, we know
that we’re alive–
feeling beings–
sensing our way through life

we never know when
it might come back to us

an old high school photograph
could whirl us back in time
helping us remember what we forgot
at times, things we never knew
had become a part of us

it’s always in the silence
when the mind is still
and the heart is free to roam about
mending itself
knitting back together lost parts of us
forgotten things that long to be remembered
giving back to us
that sense of who we really are

impermanent empty being

there is a reversion, aversion, mystical illusion
that we somehow fall upon, then into

there is an ephemeral elation
no relation to the weak-kneed conclusion
about life, and what it’s all about

there is a sadness, madness
utterly ridiculous gladness
we allow to lull us to sleep each night

there is an emptiness
a profound parsed instant
when we realize we are nothing more
than a faint whisper in a universe ever changing