1)

The Valley and Mountain

Near Huancayo, Peru

What do I seek, in the chilled! Mountains so bleak" In the Mantaro Valley of Peru (?) Perhaps, untroubled hours doing Nothing; or perchance"something Like listening to the sweeping: Far reaching, wide winds!

Here is where the deep culture is Not missing: if only I had wings!...

#963 12/15/05 Dedicated to Ximm

Mid-December Poems [In St. Paul, Minnesota]

2)

Winter" Box elder bugs (A Minnesota poem)

Winter has arrived and this poem

Is long over-due! I think Someone cut down a box elder tree

(Somewhere down the block), Because", they're all over my house!

(In every room.)

In the spring, they're not content

To stay at home"(I know); thus, Until then, I have urges to travel"

And leave them alone.

#964 12/14/05

3)

Morning Whiteout (In St. Paul, Minnesota)

An early snow, acclaims the light:

Brings forth its blinding haze" And a thin high-billowing wind

Brings forth, its chills all day"; No end to this whiteness, coming

The ashen sun remains hidden" And the snow: it just keeps coming.

#962 12/15/05

Strange Devouring Poetry

4) The Ash Dark Pyre

Cremated ashes on a dark Pyre Reptilian serpents everywhere; My soul is like some jaded vine, Irony supreme"a strange mind!

#960 12/14/05 Committed to CAS

5) Aforgomon's: Obliteration

I saw the god, Aforgomon There was something in his gaze Likened to a salty hurricane! Then he turned and swallowed me...

(head first)

"I have come," so he told me then" After peering from his abyss den

(where he had lived for eons when) Now on earth's surface:

"Death by chains" he said "of fire" he said "is simply a symbol; It Does Not Hold the Gleam Of Obliteration As in my Dizzying Gaze."

His eyes were like the sea"deep He had no pity for anybody".

My body veered before the wind, As he appeared"at my command

That is when: when He turned and swallowed me" With all his necromancy!...

#958 12/11/05 committed to CAS (Clark Ashton Smith)