gershon hepner Poems

“Ogden, gnash your rhyming teeth! ”
the scholar of religion that’s comparative
declared, and gave me laurels, him a wreath,
ending gnostically this narrative.
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Losing themselves as in slow movements
great performers must be lost
attempting to define the moment,
composers must become compost,
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His subject was fame;
he courted the famous
whose fame is their name,
proclaiming: Do name us.
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Refinement of a pot appears effete
if you don’t like irregularities.
Once baked inside a kiln the searing heat
preserves forever angularities
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In Yoshiwara courtesans
were influenced by Zen,
whose masters were their greatest fans,
and proved that they were men
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Down my ladder to my moon,
landing on my lunar berth,
I’ll descend to meet you soon,
in the sunlight, down on earth.
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When I see the milkman coming,
I don’t experience an intending.
That logically is the upsumming
up messages that I’d be sending,
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Of depression now I sing:
hear the bad news that I bring,
falling arms of that great man
who says: “I hope, and therefore can! ”
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Men die each day for lack
of poetry, a bard
declared, though for a hack
life may be far less hard
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What if God were one of us?
Joan Osborne asked, and so do I;
I think He would make fun of us
and make us laugh until we cry.
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