SamadhiMuse

         Why Rose has a right to expect me to work full time:
         Its because of the years she spent
         helping me thru college.
         Its true I was responsible for half of our income
         but that doesn’t mean I’m not obligated to her.
         I chose school for itself.
         She chose to help out and sacrifice stuff
         she could have otherwise had for the end result;
         my earning a good living.
         I can see now where my basic method
         of approaching life’s problems derives from:
         The successes I had in improving my self image
         and general happiness in high school stem
         from the strategy I employed then
         and its the same strategy I unconsciously rely on now
         to cope with most problems.
         Its a blind act of willfulness, direct and brutal.
         Its unsophisticated and immature.
         I simply know or think I know what I want
         and I begin to get it by simply shuffling priorities
         and commitments until I’m there.
         This always worked fine so long as there
         wasn’t anything I couldn’t stand to part with.
         Now there is and I need to learn compromise.
         Early on, because of my insecurity,
         I needed to dominate Rose.
         I did and she became convinced of her shortcomings
         as I became convinced of my superiority.
         I’ve always been very gifted verbally
         and whether my arguments were sound or not
         I’ve almost always been able to defeat her in discourse.
         In time, as the bullshit became more apparent,
         she began to recognize that logical discussion with me
         was a loosing proposition.
         If she listened I’d win and leave her bewildered
         or misled much of the time, and this,
         not on my argument’s merit but on my verbal skills.
         Later, as she regained her self esteem,
         she defended her mental integrity
         by simply refusing to listen
         whenever I suggested a logical discussion
         of this issue or that.
         She often knew in her mind what was right and she no longer
         believed that just because I could convince her logically
         that it meant she was wrong.
         She was right about this while I, for my part, still thought
         that the winner of a ‘logical’ debate had to be right.
         Now, wanting to be able to really talk to her,
         I realize that this door has been closed a long time to me.
         We have not communicated by real discussion in years.
         We exist with mutual affection when things are going smoothly
         and work out our differences by emotional pressure
         when they are not.
         She despises my logical approach to things intuitively now
         without consciously knowing why.
         And I’ve ridiculed her emotional responses as childlike
         blackmail…but only now do I realize she responds this way
         because I abused the normal and fair methods of communication
         with my domineering intellectualism.
         I’ve been in this rut so long that it took Ernie
         to give me some perspective on it and how it could be
         and should be.
         The worst of the situation is its near irreversibility.
         For me to make her conscious of the situation requires
         discussion of the problem and discussion is just
         what she won’t hear.
         She will emotionally block me to prevent herself
         from buying anymore ‘logically’ sound bullshit!
         Ernie said I would have to implement my insights
         without discussion and wait for her to directly
         apprehend the changes.
         When she has the things of me that are her right
         in all fairness then her resistance
         will fade away with time.
                            Ideas
            1.  Make a community fund for house and/or car
                downpayment.
            2.  Work on alleviating my discontent within
                the five day work week.
                a. Change jobs.
                b. Night school.
                c. Ignore my discontent on the theory that it is
                   my nature to become repeatedly discontent.
            3. Accept community purchases which lighten her load.
               I resisted the dryer as a community purchase
               because I was afraid it would cut into my three
               days a week concept.  It was irrelevant that she
               did all the wash and it would be a great time saver,
               even that she did all my stuff I ignored BUT it
               should have been a community purchase.
            4. Try to establish logical verbal communication,
               possibly with Kathy Naegeli’s help.
         Crazed fool at thirty racing across the land
         don’t know what I’m doing struggling thru the sand
         almost done with looking, never found the key
         to the anxious angry wanting, the questions filling me
         and all I’ve gained in essence is the brink of sanity.
         She says she’s going to leave me if I don’t catch my pace
         and I care more for loving than solving time and space
         hey, I’m going to go home and I’m going to take it up
         the burden left to everyman, I’m going to drink my cup.
         My omnipotent visions have led me in the end
         to choose the arms of she who was my very patient friend.
                                       gallagher
                                       1 Jan 77
                                       on a bus, returning from
                                       Eugene, OR

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

            Poor heroes we,
            moved across the stage by our animal parts.
            Lost and blind to what we move within.
            We’re children, growing, who’ve forgotten
            to laugh along the way.
            Could it be these forms have so little to do
            with our real experience?
            Rich men and fools all,
            cast within different parts, just we
            animal blind, I can’t see for how it changes
            rich man, fool, spiritualist, debaucher
            secure and alone, frightened and tangled.
            A million stories seem to run through me, together,
            half animal, half conscious,
            pressed between the rocks
            of my enlightenment and death.

                                 gallagher
                                 01-09-77

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

                    My funny valentine

         Endless days here in the haze
         looking out upon the gray
         and I can feel the strings that bind me
         beginning to slip away.

         Ah, I never thought I’d come to this
         watching my life trickle down…
         to here where my choices led me
         buying to chase the blues away.

         Corporate dreams, are now coming to me
         and I see how their webs can grow.
         Tying me down to possessions
         for what, I want to know?

         I’ve got a woman as true as they come
         and a son who needs my love
         but I’ve got dreams still raging in me
         that all their need can’t stand.

                              gallagher
                              14 Feb 77

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

        once I was younger and cut a broader stroke
         but the years wait insidious against these attacks
         and now I’ve come groveling back.

         I came from their service
         to slay the dragon of philosophy -
         how came I here then?

         Here, where the shutters swing vacant
         against the midnight blackness
         and I’m starting to become somebody by default.

                              gallagher
                              02-29-77

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

                       Helen

      The passage ended in our dance of form and enlightenment.
      In the afternoon, over tea cups,
      our warmth pressing us, without clinging,
      we spoke and smiled there, felt and saw feeling there
      and with simplicity, we never hid or hurt each other.
      Open and centered, the meal had been served.

                              gallagher
                              05-03-77 - helen k.ends us
                              long beach

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

         Here, where the center most gears spin,
         here is the distillation of what I’m doing here
         and I carry that moment timeless within me,
            though my passions may rage a thousand times,
         always … it is like a spark.
         A bit melodramatic, now that the band’s past,
            but there is something there.

         Else why can I here the winds go whistling
            in the midnight hour freight trains running
         through my soul?

                              gallagher
                              05-07-77 - acid tripping
                              long beach

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

         So lost on the path am I
            that I grow weary of the pleasures here
               my soul burnt out from my crossways drives.

         Sometimes my eyes get so old I can hear them say,
            ‘Let me smile again, young and clean,
               on something I’ve not seen before.’

         The human condition, mine, so burnt out and jaded
            I writhe against my soul and passions
               like an animal trying to get free.

         But the years and habits like mycellium creep
            through the brighter ways I’ve known
               until I scarcely know I’ve ever been otherwise.

         Until the face in the mirror is mine and its dying
            wastrel, I’ve chosen how to spend my time
               pressed against my senses like some tourist
                  until I can’t remember what I’ve bet.

                              gallagher
                              06-09-77

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

            End the crazy years and come down my friend
            you’ve turned from the task into fortune and flesh.
            There’s no money or smiles can ease your turning.
            Find where the wind blows the hardest and go,
            seek the source of all your losing.

                                       gallagher
                                       15 Jun 77

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

         How hideously quiet, the house waits.
         Our lives, here, churning beneath the empty moments….

           It gapes at the sound of our breathing
           and the incandescent lamps bring our still photos to life
         Again, our love is bending to form.

         She calls ‘derelict’ at me
         for the acid I take and I resent her pushing at my fun.

           She points at me as the deviant drug doer
           on my way to the imminent fall.

         And I feel like a confused young professional
         in need of a little direction.

           I’m sound…I just don’t care much.
           There’s too many deep currents
         running in me at cross purposes.
         Too many dreams and realities.

         Too many blessings and blemishes.
           I’m a bigger baby than ever at thirty
           about to fall out of the crib again.

                                 gallagher
                                 3 July 1977 - lsd

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

         What’s the cause, that I should think of leaving her?
           My eyes and heart, daily, pressing her and Danny away…
         Its here in my dreams that I’ve held all these years
           dreams held against all the waiting and poverty of school.
         I’ve been naive thinking that an education
           could separate me from our carnivorous reality.
         Its fighting at all levels in the under thickets of success
           and the dreamers and the weak are the fodder here.
         Its no wonder, then, that I look askance at my love;
           its easier, at thirty,
           than seeing myself as a dreaming fool.
         I don’t love how much less I am than the dreams I held
           but I can’t press her away because she does.

                                          gallagher
                                          9 July 1977

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

            Walking on pins and needles, I’m receding.
            Tense all day, I’m sure I must be bleeding.
            So thin…
              walking on the edge
                 of falling into bad times….

            Eggs shell smiles, eyes boring in.
            I’m uptight, my cover’s getting thin.
            So hard to…
              keep keeping on
                 when I think I’m losing in love….

                                 gallagher
                                 29 August 1977

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

         Its raining pain
           and there’s nothing I can do but take it.
              let it ache and wait.
         I’m twisting for relief
           empty mind, thinking mind
              waiting for this bad dream to pass
                 and beginning to know it won’t.
         I can’t imagine what my nights are going to be like
           for the next 3 or 4 months
              coming home to aching arc-lite rooms
                 waiting for salvation to call on the phone
                    and extend the agony of parting again.
         So many empty rooms in my mind and heart
           to confront me when I close my eyes.
              And all the hours will wait empty for love’s presence
                 and all the things I own will whisper to me
                    ’she washed me, she resented me, she fixed me.’
         Relentless pain with no promise of relief.

                                 gallagher
                                 30 Aug 1977

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

        Ah, I’m walking in a dream;
           the silent shadow of my own long scream.
         Pain and hurt mingle and I seem
           to be in an empty and full,
         at the same time, dream.

         I want to call out or talk to someone, but who?
           She’s pulled away, my strength and security, she,
         for reasons I understand no better than my own
         The things she wants, I don’t
           But, without her I want nothing.
         Have I come here against so soon?

                                 gallagher
                                 31 Aug 77

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

                                            to the cadence of
                                            Paul Simon’s
                                            “I do it for your love”

         We were young, she was just a teen
         we fell in love in some distant dream.
         I remember the hours then
         full of love of a younger ken.
         Tumbled dreams of another day
         houses where we lived, the things we’d say,
         all gone down in the endless play.
         I do recall her love.

         The years we had now seemed so smooth
         but memories always seem to lose
         the edge of what really happened then
         when we learned to love and we had to bend.

         But people never really lose themselves
         The benders bend and abuse themselves
         and at some point we have to choose ourselves.
         I do recall her love.

         We were young, she was just a teen
         I remember her, my distant dream.
         She loved me then when love was all
         and I never felt I could ever fall.

         But through the years the bitter lines
         formed where love, …her love met mine
         and she came to see I was not her dream
         and all our years were not as they seemed
         and I remember all I’ve lost.

         Her dreams have woken, our stars uncrossed
         but if I ever get the chance again
         then I’d fall in love and start again.
                                 gallagher
                                 28 September 1977

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

         ever lasting conjunction
         we walk through each other and melt
         into the next moment
         we wait, on the move,
         form ourselves and change
         all in anticipation
         that something will come of it
         the weeks and months and years
         are the backdrop to this now
         which we ever wait for
         surely there must be more ….
         Godot once told me this story
         but I had lent my ear to Gautama
         who was giving away poses
         to pass the waiting, with a smile.

                           gallagher
                           10-02-77

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

         Seven years ago today I got out of the service
         and I can remember, like it was yesterday.
         Rose and I, driving north through central Texas,
         eating the fried chicken she’d made for the trip.
         We were going to Barry and Carol’s in New Mexico,
         we were going to L.A. to visit,
         we were going to Eureka to live and go to school.
         Freedom on that day from four years of service,
         I was walking tall.
         Now I’m here in a laboratory,
         looking out at Palos Verdes
         and its like a time jump from there to here.
         How did I come to be here and where did Eureka go?
         What became of all my dreams of freedom
         and why are Rose and I living apart now?

                                 gallagher
                                 20 Oct 1977

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

                          Helen

            Not much to say … we just smiled
            no explanations for our passion
            she told me a long story
            about a Korean soap opera
            and between riots of orgasmic laughter
            I loved it.

            Her eyes from half way round the world
            are Asiatic brown, hooded
            against the Mongol winds
            windows into someone else
            with no need to explain.

            with all the culture of the east
            she enters into our spaces
            and waits for the tides to roll
            and when she leaves again
            its without drag or remorse.

            She shares what’s free
            and asks for nothing more
            our passions and smiles are enough.

                           gallagher
                           11-03-77 - about helen k.
                           long beach

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

           Saturday morning…rain coming down
            what do I feel here
            inevitable hurt mixed with centeredness?

            Rose grows and I’m hurt
            but why…Suzanne and Lee and Helen’s lives
            all press mine.

            The rain loves me no matter what…
            page days turning me;
            lover, friend, husband, loser, and winner.

                              gallagher
                              5 Nov 1977

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

            Conjunction, for weeks growing
            and I could suddenly scream from the press of it
            washed clean of all I called mundane
            pilgrim to a madness I cannot name
            I’m here and growing
            wash me life, with your joy and pain
            and leave me stumbling, dumb,
            if you must, once again.

                                 gallagher
                                 6 Nov 77

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —

                                            To the tune of
                                            Stevie Wonder’s
                                            “Always”

                       On ending

         Its ending now, the story of those years,
         the love we shared, the laughter and the tears.
         I feel it down inside me, the rising of my fears,
         I’ve got to make a stand now, against my heart and tears.

         So easily said, but when my sanities undressed
         and all my insides crying out for her caress
         then all the hours of the evening come to press
         then, the telephone won’t ring or ever give me rest.

         I’m torn…I’m torn upon her love
         my heart lies open and I cannot stem the flow
         I’ve got to make a stand against my heart and go.
         I’ve got to learn to live without the loving glow
         of her mind and her time, …I’ve got to go.

                                 gallagher
                                 12 Nov 77

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —