CRAIG CZURY Poems for CLOUDBURST

                                          ANCIENT TEXTS & RITUALS

CRAIG CZURY

At night sneak around to the tallest tree in the neighborhood

hang curtains on the hole for a door

nothing happens until it breaks

It seamed like picker bushes wrapped around me

they were pulling me in then I heard that noise again

it had dead birds and a dead cat in it

there was a sewing machine and bullet holes in the rusty car doors

the coal was hard on my shoes and newspapers from 1937 only worse

something was holding me back but the door was open

there were no steps to get down there only a broken window against the wall

we were sending messages over the pipe but I couldn’t get through

I was soaked and my shirt got ripped

it was near the projects there were chalk drawings

and what looked to be a ribcage

#00119

write a poem on the back of a kite

fly it as high as you can

ask a passerby to hold the string

just a minute

you have to go to the bathroom

you’ll be right back

never come back

#82020

between the space of being here but not really here

write a poem

take off your clothes and dive in without holding your breath

#05466

write a poem

across your lover’s belly with your tongue

record this poem on your answering machine

#37429

at night wander around your backyard

with your eyes closed

randomly reaching for and kissing the dark air

the words of your next poem

will spell themselves on a oui-ja board

Charles Rossiter Poem for Cloudburst

Ceremony at the 42^nd Street Library

First go to the information desk

cross the hall to 320

talk to the tall black woman

in the red dress

fill out the application form

complete with personal reference

not a relative

show traceable ID

sign another form and get a card

go down the hall to 316 and

ring the buzzer.

When they let you in

show the card

sign in again and state your purpose

take a seat and adjust the light

while the attendant gets your package

sign a final form

hesitate a moment when the box arrives

Then slowly

        s  l  o  w  l  y

untie the red cotton ribbon

fold back the left flap then right

then top then bottom

there.  .  .

in the rectangle recess

framed in blue

hesitate again

now

take out the five 10-cent pocket notebooks

and read

Kerouac’s own penciled hand

OLD ANGEL MIDNIGHT---complete

SCRIPTURES OF THE HOLY ETERNITY---complete

dream fragments play scenes

and other scribbles.

Copy a line you’ve never seen.

“The moon is a piece of tea”

now

hold the notebooks in your hand

let it all sink in.

Charles Rossiter—First published in Chronicles of Disorder

Martin Willitts Jr Poem for Cloudburst

All pilgrimages are exploring 

from the inside (the known)

to the outside (the unknown).

All journeys begin in restlessness

and end with wondering

if the end had in fact been reached.

From out of Light into darkness, and the return

or the staying in the new discovery,

we can all be "heroes" in our own stories,

with our own adventures. The question 

of the quest is always:

What have we learned along the way?

If we have learned nothing,

than is the journey worth it?

Isn’t it amazing,

migrating animals always return to the Source?

Isn’t it more amazing,

we do not follow the Always?

Martin Willitts Jr.

THIRD CLOUDBURST COUNCIL METAPHOR LIKE A RUNAWAY BRIDE

The approach to the Third CLOUDBURST COUNCIL is well underway. The Journey, Pilgrimage, Passage  has begun and the remaining questions about arrivals and wayward wanderings  are tales to be first experienced and then told. Each Pilgrim’s flag will make its way up the driveway hill and will be placed

in a gathering of colors and symbols, collective memory on a common breeze. 

Now, let me get this metaphor out of the way before I trip over it. I have been involved in small press publishing for many years and as part of that, what I am doing now with that experience is advising new people who want to start a print publication. One of the things I tell them is that most new publications die after the third issue.  The fourth issue is the most difficult one to produce. If you can get past that fourth time out, chances are you will be set-up for a nice long run (guess that means you’ll be hearing from this metaphor next year as well! I am already getting my back up thinking… “There will be a Fourth CLOUDBURST!”)

So my metaphor  for this year’s  CLOUDBURST COUNCIL is it is like the third issue of a small press magazine. The First Issue is a burst of pent up energy and ideas. Stuff that has been collecting for awhile and people who grasp the partly formulated vision pushing this urge to get the work out there.Any thoughts of the future are wildly optimistic and resources have been gathered for awhile so there is no thought of them running out. The Second Issue rides the energy of the First. Not everything saved up for it was used in the First Issue so that must be used in the Second and the beginning of recognition and feedback can start to be incorporated. Many of those in the First are also found in the Second and there are some new people. At this place probably the new people seen as fitting in with the original vision. Resources are still available and there are some cost improvements just because of knowing what is involved and how better to share the work.

The Third Issue is both a transition and a continuation. This was helpful to me for increasing my understanding of the process of organizing this year’s CLOUDBURST COUNCIL.  At the Third Issue

the original birth energy has been largely used up. What propels the work at this point is self-referential, the beginning of a life of its own. Not all the original people and pieces are still in place. Along with a sense of lost, there is interest and there must be growth (in the form of new people and people enthusiastic as participants). How strong the Third Issue is tells a lot of the future of the publication.

Coming back out of my metaphor, the upcoming Third CLOUDBURST COUNCIL is one that will bring together a grand collection of poets.  The opportunity of getting together for a third year is the chance to meet with friends, share our work and celebrate.  I look forward to discussing with poets the tides and times of the past year as well as having fun and learning a lot.

                                                             --Alan Casline

Than longen folk to goon on pilgrimages/CLOUDBURST 2014

Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote

The droughte of March hath perced to the roote,

And bathed every veyne in swich licour

Of which vertu engendred is the flour;

Whan Zephyrus eek with his sweete breeth

Inspired hath in every holt and heeth

The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne

Hath in the Ram his halve cours yronne,

And smale foweles maken melodye,

That slepen al the nyght with open ye

(So priketh hem nature in hir corages);

Than longen folk to goon on pilgrimages,

To ferne halwesw, kowthe in sondry londes....

[above sent by Albert Glover to CLOUDBURST in response to RE:PILGRIMAGE?]

http://pages.towson.edu/duncan/chaucer/duallang1.htm
In a Modern English translation 

When April with his showers sweet with fruit The drought of March has pierced unto the root And bathed each vein with liquor that has power To generate therein and sire the flower; When Zephyr also has, with his sweet breath, Quickened again, in every holt and heath, The tender shoots and buds, and the young sun Into the Ram one half his course has run, And many little birds make melody That sleep through all the night with open eye (So Nature pricks them on to ramp and rage)- Then do folk long to go on pilgrimage, And palmers to go seeking out strange strands, To distant shrines well known in sundry lands. And specially from every shire's end Of England they to Canterbury wend, The holy blessed martyr there to seek Who helped them when they lay so ill and weak

PAULETTE SWARTZFAGER -- INTERESTING!

Interesting! I am finishing a new book and have a number of poems in this vein. See this one:

Let us

in these days

of old stones

of harsh sands

of sounds white hot

of searing sun

fill empty wells

dig deep into hard earth

Let us circle

this or that

punctuate our paces

leave this land of olives

depart before the departed

Let us be pilgrims

uncovered

pray against

Allah or Yahweh

seek our own light

in these ruins

hide under crumbling arches

paint new languages

scar our souls into mosaics

Let us silence songs from our ancestors

plant wild wheat

find new waters

in lands undiscovered

Let us take our own gods by force

baptize ourselves

with our own hands

lie together on foreign soil

in tent or yurt

under open night

 ---Paulette Swartzfager

Re: WHAT ABOUT PILGRIMAGES?

 Re: WHAT ABOUT PILGRIMAGES?

(Planning for Cloudburst Council 2014)

acasline@aol.com, jzbard@gmail.com , stachu14512@yahoo.com; mldeed@verizon.net; helenruggieri73@gmail.com 

Pilgrimages and relics and symbols and rituals

Helen's haiku

below zero 

a little bit of gold

in the finches

         --Helen Ruggien

               2/4/2014     2:34 pm

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They always had trade fairs next to those pilgrimage sites. And taverns.

                                                                     ---John Roche

                                                                        2/4/2014  6:08 pm

*                        *                          *                         *

My poem..has pilgrim in it.

                                      --Alan Casline

                                              2/4/2014   6:12 pm

CARRIED TO ST. BLAISE’S WELL

 healing spring flows out of circle basin

 eternal outpouring

 water sought

 by train ride

    limping sore-foot walk

 pilgrim to St. Blaise’s Well

 bright cloudless sky

 from fountain-filled pool

 over brick wall water drops

 to reflecting pond

 dark and light shared balance

 daffodils yellow and white

 violets spread beneath holly trees

 family of ducks on small islands

 my wife and son with me

 afterwards I realize I brought small wants

 sip water, close eyes

 wish for healed throat, pain to leave foot

   and deeper prayer

   to heal a bruised spirit

   voice of the Spring speaks on

to heal the bruised spirit of All,

        go on, taste my sweet water

         and go on—

                                                    --Alan Casline

                                                                     March 29, 2012

                                                      Bromley, United Kingdom

*                        *                        *                        *                          *

well we actually had a pilgrimage last year: to the Long house and to the Seneca sipapu (place we came out of the ground)

                                           --Stephen Lewandowski

                                                                       2/5/2014   8:02 am

*                     *                        *                          *                             *

Both were highlights of the weekends! Any other close-by pilgrimage sites we could visit?

                                                           --John Roche

                                                              2/5/2014  8:53 am

*                        *                         *                         *                          *

                                                             

We could pilgrimage to the Burning Spring in Bristol, less than 10 miles away (north) where first Frenchman was taken in 1669 (18 years before other Frenchies trashed Ganondagan) as a wonder. I dunno if it still lights but we could give a try.

                                                              --Stephen Lewandowski 

                                                                      2/7/2014  10.06 am

Burning Spring maybe O.K. but with a different story. Is there anything from precontact days associated with the Spring?

Catching a Frenchman doesn't hit me as reason to Pilgrimage.

I'll google and see if there is anything? Maybe it was a natural gas leak that bubbled up through the water and the peace pipe went up in smoke.  Maybe Joe the Poet was there and his beard GOT BURNED OFF


Hey Guess what I made up the real story!

The region was visited by the explorer Robert de LaSalle in the 17th Century in order to see a burning spring (natural gas) known to the natives, members of the Seneca tribe

                                                                 --Alan Casline

                                                                                            2/7/2014
Note: Lewandowski tells me I had it wrong.."taken" doesn't mean captured but rather taken to visit a place of big magic.

*                     *                     *                       *                      *                             *

I reverse engineered it and put Fire(Li) over  Water (K’an ) and got the 64th Hexagram of the I-Ching,  Wei Chi / Before Completion

above   LI        THE CLINGING, FLAME

below   K’AN   THE ABYSMAL, WATER

this hexagram presents a parallel to spring, which leads out of winter’s stagnation into the fruitful time of summer

I think we all better prepare for a pilgrimage with maybe trials and tribulations on the way. I can already get a sense that for all of us making the journey to CLOUBURST COUNCIL the travelers’ tales and the stories of those fallen and risen will fill the quiet hours till morning

                           --Alan Casline

                              2/8/2014  8:45 am