POEM: while all the while searching

while all the while searching

I want to be a wandering monk
carrying my bowl in one hand
a staff of yew wood in the other
sandals on my feet, dusty from
the roads and roads and roads
that cover our world like a web
I will sit in silent meditation
beneath the Washington Monument
and atop the peak of Mount Rainier
I’ll read Dōgen on the bus station bench
write haiku in a canoe in Tennessee
while all the while searching for my Sora

I want to be a wandering knight
carrying my broadsword in one hand
my heavy wooden shield in the the other
metal boots on my feet, dusty from
the roads and roads and roads
that cover our world like a web
I will free the oppressed from tyranny
in the glare of the lights of Times Square
and at the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge
I’ll read Chaucer on the bus station bench
write epistles to my lover in the French Quarter
while all the while searching for my Sancho Panza

I want to be a wandering poet
carrying my Moleskine in one hand
my Pilot G2 size seven in the other
Chuck Taylors on my feet, dusty from
the roads and roads and roads
that cover our world like a web
I will scribble till the pages are full
in a cafe on the jagged Village streets
and on the banks of the Susquehanna
I’ll read Whitman on the bus station bench
write love poems in a borrowed bed in Alabama
while all the while searching for my Charley

23 July 2012
State College, PA