Preface to Angst—Angustia Collected Poems

Angst is philosophic anguish—sharp though sometimes vague. In Spanish it’s “angustia.” Possessed of some inner gyroscope that stabilizes my strangely happy life I don’t often, like plagued Job, rail out against life and God. I believe in God, but not churches or religions; and I believe in evolution’s impartial processes with man being no exception. In any case, a dark mood occasionally will wander in and sound a voice I scarcely recognize.

Often the visitor is a gentle and quite tame questioning; sometimes this ‘other’ tone might issue forth with dripping irony and cutting acid—with language sometimes quite profane. (All directional devices tumble on their gimbals now and then—and mind’s more unstable than most realize.) And, though I believe that words can, in fact, kill; and, though I believe what you think can pollute you—in the end it’s how you walk the talk. As a friend says, ‘watch how the dancer moves her feet.’

My angst doesn’t include personal ideations of cutting or suicide; but I will make comments about cutting and suicide—I’ve been responsible for hundreds of humans in my life and dealt with very, very unusual events. I do believe that ‘euthanasia,’ like my Amerindian ancestors practiced it, is OK; and, that a water fast, to let go at the end, is OK. Of death, well all I know is that we live and die—can’t prove much beyond that. So my angst is not so much about death’s certainty as much as life’s uncertainties.

Oh, another issue—sex. I am a man and love only women. But, I believe that there’s a spectrum of sexuality (both genetic and environmental) and everyone falls in a different portion of the sex rainbow. I can’t pretend to understand the travails of being one mental gender and inhabiting the opposite’s body; but, I do believe that emotions are expressed similarly for all humans. Yes, we all share the same love, hate and anger—so, in that sense I believe you can switch the ‘he’ or ‘she’ in my poems and apply them to other mentalities.

Sometimes the words lash out in unkind or ‘cutting’ ways,—dark sarcasm, deep depression, black moods, sour rants, foul words, searing anger and bitter cynicism. Corrosive agents that should be bottled with a warning; and, should only be consumed in small doses. Therefore I’ve labeled this section Parent Guidance (PG). I show and read these verses to my 15 year old daughter (and her siblings) and we talk about them—as we do about most of life. They’re words, ¿Can you look at the deeper grooves and past the superficial scribblings?

There’s no particular ordering to these postings. Again, I’ve loosed the stopper on noisome liquids with sublimated acid vapors—wear rubber gloves, eye protection and a mask.