Robert, in hat, recites the poems of his youth at the Kyoto Journal event held on Feb 8 at the Terminal to coincide with an exhibition of foreign artists.

1980s Poems

I deal in demons
Ya know what I mean?
I see them in the daylight hours
In banks, realtors outlets,
Kiosks and inflatable houseboats.

Pan and Prometheus know about
The coming rain

Another uneventful day is passing
The man across the street white
In his cotton shirt
Scratches his balls and tugs at the restlessness
And his balding head.

Incense like backwards rain
In my hibachi
My thoughts like water sinking in sand
Silent
This day will pass
This day will never return

A man is trimming his hedge
Another waits
For the postman.
And lights up a stick full of bought images and ideals
He does not think
He is slowly dying

This day brings promises of rain
This day is indeed mysterious
This day that we never think about
Nameless
Dateless
November misty night
Steam and mumbles from the hibachi
Fill my room

I stare out at this paper world
And earth ware of Bizen
Filled with the golden harvest
This liquid swirl
Education and feet of clay
Propaganda defeats this day

This day of sad cold rain
It’s been said that one day
We can all live in a green house
Maybe then we can get past the
Sprouting stage
It’s time
Time to reach out to the centuries
The centuries of myths, appliances
And ocean dumping grounds

Something pulled me
Into the antique dealer again today
The feel of time
A four-hundred year old cobweb
A sake cup
And written scroll

(this and following pictures courtesy Robert Yellin)

Four hundred years ago in Imbe
Bizen earth sacrificed itself
In the fire of Life
So that we could see our reflections
In its shape
All truths unfold
All concepts
All symbols
All ideologies
Become useless
In the presence
Of her subtle beauty
And Truth
In the hills of the potters valley
It awaits us
What we brethren seek
The blessings of nature
In all her abandoned glory

I sit down in Takekura
After a day of trains and myths
And the resigned public
Watching crooked politicians
Resign
Your ego
Let it be trampled
By an oncoming hikari
Float back down
The earth of Mashiko
Brings me back to this room
This room of all truths
Where all illusions tumble
And are shaped into clay
The only truth
Is that truth that has never been printed
Nor spoken

Wrung out through the mind maze of games
We create
To anchor our lives

The Emperor’ funeral three days before
The rain stopped
Today late February
In the year of snake
Oil-salesman
Who lead the nation
In questionable paths
Went down to Abe’s hut
The art of living amongst clay walls
Bamboo grove
Scattered pots
The bitterness of a spring flower
Served on a fire-marked dish
Shigaraki eclipses time
The days of the storyteller are gone
People only repeat media finds
And never take the time
To think about rain forests
Corporate control
This disposable life

Drinking cha and eating sembei on the veranda