The Smell of Green: (An Innerspace, Outerspace and Beyond Space/Time Poetic Odyssey)

By Vernell Garrett

Through its 475 poems, “THE SMELL OF GREEN” explores the "Seven Days of Creation", "Adam", "Eve" and the
"Talking Serpent" as equations and personifications energy and mass that build the framework of our psyches,
everlastingly present in an ever present genesis.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Sep 1, 2016
• ISBN: 9781483578262

Book preview

DOOR

THE

SEVENTH

DAY

BEYOND THE REALM OF THE SENSES

Genesis 2:1-3

"Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.

And on the seventh day GOD ended his work which he had made; and he

rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And GOD

blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested

from all his work which GOD created and made."

*Zayn (no.7) guarantees that life is not a deterministic process, but is free to explore all possible possibilities. Number 7, is the achievement of every vital impregnation: this number opens the field of every possible possibility. It can be viewed (as in quantum physics) as the probability amplitude for anything. It may also be thought of as the primary principle of indeterminacy. - Carlo Suarès

THE DAWN OF HAPPINESS

Feelings, you can return.

Nerve endings, you can begin to burn.

The way of felicity one begins to learn.

The dawn of happiness one begins to earn.

My mind is so carefree, it’s busy doing nothing.

There’s no striving for a station or indulging in becoming.

Though it’s not Spring, my blinds are raised wide open.

Rays of light pour upon the face of everything.

Bell flower, I am whispering to you with my eyes.

Purple passion, I am serenading you with my chimes.

Naturally, it come as no surprise,

that organically you are responding to my rhymes.

Romance, shall I wear you out?

Vanity, shall I permit your mild flirtation?

Muscle and sinew, there is HEART-WORK to do.

Forays into fantasy forever look behind.

AROUND THE WORLD IN A DAY

Moonlight, lay in bed with me,

cover me in a blanket of filigree.

Daybreak, I pour out my intellect,

so you can reveal what is dark in me.

Sunlight, you douse out the lamp light of

my most palatial idiosyncrasy.

Dusk, let me down you at the end of

the day like a glass of fine vinery.

YOGA

Having no center, I inherit no circumference.

Inheriting no circumference, I possess no periphery.

Possessing no periphery, I inhabit no shape.

Inhabiting no shape, I am free to take any form.

I am advancing.

I am broadening.

Inside my something suit,

I am a pastel and paisley pastiche.

I am taking a meteor shower.

The stars have fallen into me.

The imperative is upon me.

My negligence no longer fits.

I want to grow young with grace,

not kicking and screaming into the age of transcendency.

I will let strength and endurance dissipate

and evolve with more flexibility.

I want to improve my reach,

into the stars if I must.

Self obsession dies hard.

It contracts the extremities.

I want to be more inward.

I want my content to be more contained.

I want to stare into the face of accusations,

sharing no expression, indifferent and refrained.

I want to be cool in the heat of indignation,

neutral in a storm of irritation.

I want to be nonchalant to vexation,

equally unperturbed in thought, word and deed.

AND WE WILL FLY

I was standing in a field of ten billion green blades.

The cloudy angels brought some shade.

A hundred dragonflies stood on guard.

Then a gull flew west and called me bard.

Birds are like beads, strung on a necklace worn by the free,

jewels, baubles and gemstones decorating the sky,

brightening even the most maudlin of days.

Birds are like words,

winged poems through skies both clean and foul.

A flock of poetry floats languidly from west to east,

with a message from the GOD in tow.

They greet the Spring morning in song,

bulging the dawn air with psalms of mirth.

As the Summer yawns, you pipe and resound.

From the trees at Sunset, you jubilate about the smell of green.

As the leaves began their downward spiral home,

you execute your exodus from the air.

I long to dematerialize like you,

vanishing from the coming of the first frost.

You make your way into a southern sky

when the air turns cool.

There’s a disorder in your orders.

There is an aerial free-for-all, a high flying, gratuitous

floating where-with-all being performed.

I sense the exercises are for the benefit of the undersized,

to know the necessity of moving in concert

or a solo subterfuge.

I yearn to circumnavigate and soar

as unimpeded as you compeer.

I yen to be loosed from any binds that tie,

flying with no strings to fulfill my mandate.

BUDDHA AND THE FORTY SKIES

The Buddha is high.

The Sword is low.

I sit inside safe from the snow.

The snow is white.

The Buddha is black.

The Sword stays sheathed upon its rack.

The table is black.

The Buddha is white.

A song floats effortless through the night.

The table is low.

The Buddha is high.

The rain drops merrily from the sky.

One light beams low, perfectly round.

One light burns bright with a silent sound.

Morning grey turns angry.

It is dark as the night in an instant.

White birds are tossed like confetti.

The Buddha remains calm and constant.

Five fly in circles, inside pale-blue squares.

Some fly east, some fly west in pairs.

My eyes strain through fatigue to maintain their sight.

The Buddha though dark retains its light.

The Moon is close.

The Sky is black.

The Buddha moves into the back.

Two fly east.

The day breaks clear.

The Buddha moves into the near

A storm has passed.

The sky is deep blue.

There is one white cloud above the new.

One dark moves near to kiss its face.

The One white cloud leaves with no trace.

Cottony clouds come racing by.

Two float merrily in the sky.

Patches of blue are peaking through.

The Buddha’s mind is smiling too.

The Sun is diving down.

There’s not a bird around.

The pale sky makes no sound.

The Buddha yields no frown.

Vanilla curls into the air.

The fog cloaks all in gloomy ware.

No cold, nor rains nor vanity fair,

can remove the Buddha’s peaceful stare.

There is no Sky.

There are no Birds.

Buddha refrains from using words.

Flakes fly merrily in the night.

Flurries without fury float from sight.

The Buddha wafts on inner light.

Five fly in circles inside pale-blue squares.

Some fly east, some fly west in pairs.

My eyes strain through to maintain their sight.

The Buddha though black, retains its light.

The Moon is behind the filigree,

with half its face for us to see.

A Buddha smiles inside of me.

The Moon is against the changing blue.

Its clarity is waning too,

but Buddha’s light keeps shining through.

The Clouds drift East.

The azure peaks through.

One soars west, the Buddha floats too.

Small ones move from left to right.

Big ones block the blue from sight.

The clouds open up a Heavenly eye.

A Buddha does but does not try.

Orange and low, White and high,

the Moon cast shadows on our thigh.

Brimming through the filigree,

coursing over my soul and me.

The Purple and Blue are muscling through.

A flock of confetti feels the vigor too.

Fluttering east atop the windy airs,

they fight against angry clouds in pairs.

The curtains raise revealing a cerulean haze.

The sparrow chatter and machines clatter.

The gulls head west at the Master’s behest.

A few gulls circle with an eagle’s dare,

in a sort of stretching of aerial ware.

In huge sweeps of ecstasy morning flight,

they shake off the sleep from the previous night.

Five fly west in a graceful way.

The Buddha grows dark like the end of the day.

The blue sky dims and there is a pearl of lights.

Two fly west and Buddha fades from sight.

Blank is the evening sky.

It’s pale blue and none fly by.

A gentle breeze blows all the while.

I sit silent with Buddha’s Smile.

It is a cloudless dusk. The wind's asleep.

The clock strikes seven, and four fly west.

Overhead are hanging trees.

There’s one flat sky and gentle breeze.

Then one flies east with the greatest of ease.

Four fly east made by the One.

One flies east made by Man.

Man’s bird leaves a tail behind.

The One’s four leave no trail to find.

It is a blank blue sky.

The sparrows chime.

The Buddha rests in selflessness.

One flies west. The air is warm.

Three more fly west. Buddha takes form.

A cloud as a parable way on high.

then three fly east, easing by.

The riddle changed shape in the pale blue sky.

From pale blue to black and white,

the thunder drums resound with might,

and rains from heaven cease all flight.

The sky grows gray without a trace.

Then one flew east at a hurried pace.

Buddha’s in black with a smiling face.

Three fly west and one flies east.

Two more fly west while Buddha conquers the beast.

The sky grows white as snow for miles.

Buddha’s smile lasts all the while.

The sun shines in and Buddha’s smile glows.

The light forms clouds and Buddha’s smile grows.

Two fly to the east, west and south.

The Buddha’s serene with smiling mouth.

The sun breaks through, Buddha is gold.

As it hides from view, Buddha turns cold.

The sky is white and Buddha moves back.

The back is light, the front is black.

In a sky of white heat, Buddha’s in full view.

One flies east and two flutter through.

Buddha sits in cosmic light.

White pillows move to block the sun.

As Buddha’s face recedes from sight,

clearly light and dark are one.

NEW BOTTLE, NEW WINE

My vision was once blurred by Her apple in my eye.

Before She was the Sunshine of my life,

now merely partly cloudy.

No longer my favorite book to read,

no longer my religion or philosophy,

I am free from Love's cliches and hangovers.

I was listless about life, till You.

I was impervious to Love, till You.

The blood and this body are both new.

I was old wine in an old bottle, till You.

IN THE BELLY OF THE WHALE

I descend the stairs into the belly of the Whale

and survey the Rogue’s Gallery of tenants there.

How disquieted and disfigured they seem.

Salvation is absent from their vocabulary.

I was born during a hurricane,

which explains the ferocity in my work.

I am the guilty till proven innocent.

The World is poised against me body and soul.

What exactly are my crimes? What happen to due process?

Three days and three nights is enough time spent here.

I blithely ascend, untouched but heavy hearted.

World, I will not deny myself.

World, study my Cosmic Dance.

World, are you ready to be shaken?

World, prepare your foundation for my tremors and quakes.

LIKE SHIVA

I dance fear from my face to beats of the solar drum pulsing.

From outer spaces to inner, I stand empty.

A new smile is planted that creates and sustains.

The World's temple in me has been deconstructed.

The One's temple in me has been restructured.

The bound door is loosed, the loosed door is bound.

Like Shiva I am slaking, my four arms snaking.

The World's ignorance is my footstool.

I shake its dust shook from my feet.

INGENUE

Stay Oh heart!

Fancy, go not leaping!

Once and for once, breathe in this day!

Felicity, Serenity, call me by name!

I am gleeful that World is belated!

Away with mirrored images of self!

Below, beneath, I’ll be your Ingenue;

Moppet, Naif, Novice, Babe.

POCKETS OF LOVE

No comedown from grace shall cease him.

No forlorn trumpets refrain we’ll keep him hush-hush.

He disdainfully calls the roses again and again.

His prose comes tumbling headlong and majestic.

He's serving another season with pockets full of Love.

He gives it gratis. The 'GOD' should not be sold.

OSMOSES

I stretch the staff out beyond my own to outward commodities.

Scholars, Institutes, erudite discourse are now in the rear view.

I swap atoms as jots are drawn in for an out-of-body acquaintance.

I morph into and through this death bed into an exodus.

MESSIAH INSIDE

In me like an audience, You mend my thousand yard stare.

You finish sentences I haven’t started.

Was it you who spoke or was it me?

Oh flaming Good Samaritan,

You are ensconced to thaw transgressions,

and forgive them which do trespass.

RETURN OF THE HONEY

In my mouth is the weaponry,

the munitions, the hardware and the heat.

I've the amplitude to diffuse all bombs rolling from my tongue.

I dismiss impassive people, places and things.

Away with you thrifty and penurious with feelings.

Whoever has courage to become, declare yourself.

Crooning from the core with my Elephant E.S.P.,

I groan erotic in sea song like the Humpback male.

I am living on, loving this place despite the weather.

Why did I hesitate to plunge in inebriate Joy?

Why should I remain seated applauding,

hiding the hurt that has fallen here?

I walk through windows down to the streets below.

Like musical notes from a musicians horn,

I saunter coolly into the dawn,

each tone announcing that the Honey has returned.

SHINE ON SON, SUN SHINE ON

Escorted from on high,

with exactness you arrived,

for the benefit of those choosing Life over Death.

I felicitously gain these talents from

your outstretched universal hand,

to store in the Hearts of your human likeness,

for the sake of posterity to find Heaven on land.

I enfold the ego with a sacrificial pivot,

revolving on an axis and bold as Love.

I move away from bent ears and societal leaning,

directly into the face of the Son.

Mankind, let me turn off the lights made by you.

They are of no effect against the twinkle of the Cosmic One.

Awake Ornithology, present your Air Ballet.

There's enough light to fly your furthest,

to bask in the setting Sun on the other side of the Earth.

Turn on Sun, but slowly.

Away with you harsh, cosmetic light.

Earth, lift the Sun’s lids but piecemeal.

Give us Sprouts horsepower to know height.

ENIGMAN

I read a leaf.

I close the book.

I turn to write and distill the writer.

My body lay barren.

I drink and loaf.

I fill my soul and empty my cup.

I am a poem.

I am a leaf,

felled from the One,

like a leaf from a tree.

I pirouette over the moon.

I continually change my costume.

I am jester, scholar, ruffian and priest.

She screams and yells.

I look straight through.

She sees herself and gets a clue.

This race I run,

I always win.

I sacrifice and lose my skin.

The Priest sees me,

born from the One,

from inside me,

one like the Sun.

I DISAPPEAR

I descended into the earth for three years,

immersed in the deep with deaf ears.

Dining with none of my fears,

I lived a contrary life and disappeared.

I've become a bed of flowers, a row of young leaves,

a tree trunk ambushed amongst herbage and thicket.

As men and women glance at me with immodesty,

rubbernecking for brief moments of pretentiousness,

they soon turn back to their flights of fecal fancy.

But divine things are invisible things.

So I disappear with sunshine of the mind,

a giggle and a titter.

Birds come when I beckon,

and the wasps refuse to bite me.

My energy explodes beyond race, creed and construct.

I’ve become a man who lives inexactly,

preferring intuition instead.

Guided by feel and pulsations,

I am instructed by data airborne.

Wayfaring amongst the democracy,

I absolve myself of omnipotence.

I know not, nor care what the countrymen

and women are saying, doing or thinking.

All exists as it is and that is enough.

I emancipate myself from being perfect.

I become shapeless and formless.

I live from the doppleganger inside me.

I gladly, serenely, disappear into you COSMOS.

RIDERS ON THE SUN

Way Oh glorious Way, your path I do address.

Way Oh generous Way, my humblest gratuities extended.

There is winding and spiralling for us early risers,

we early riders winding and weaving to destinations

unknown and unsung.

I’ve met many new brothers and sisters on this Way,

each pointing to the Sun, steering past their fleshy home.

Aligned beyond societal default, we press the precipice.

Hastening beyond glad hands and self-congratulations,

we improve the shining hour toward the benevolent One,

into the shimmering philanthropy of the Cosmos.

I GO SAILING

To my body, to my hull are assembled the spars and rigging.

I stand firmly on the raft, firmly on my vessel.

Firmly on the hermaphrodite brig, I complot my course.

I spread canvas, wing my way and plow the deep.

I walk the waters and the smooth royal waves.

I march quick-time as a suckling in the womb.

I ramble as the muse in the thick of action.

I tread as the velocity which works wonders.

BOLD AS LOVE

Oh new fresh Way! Oh new fresh Morn!

On the morning path I trod.

Littered leaves of days gone by loiter on new paths to be trodden.

As I stroll ahead, they sweep aside to the margins.

My vista is crystal clear as I stride toward inner Kashmir.

I wade into a bouquet of giant leaves.

Each are velveteen heart shaped elephants.

They are vast, hulking, lusty ones.

I greet them with the greeting of a forlorn brother.

"Ho my brothers, Look not cool upon me.

The Prodigal Son has returned!"

I have descended from the mount.

The grey hairs adorning my temples are the proof.

I now choose the Way of Obscurity.

Bestowing myself to silence,

there can be no bile fruit from my lips.

Here there is no negotiation,

no veiled honesty or dishonest decorum.

Here there is no morphing, contorting or decay.

Do not ask of me why I wear such a Cosmic Face.

Do not ask why I seem at such great ease. Leave me to bliss.

Do you think this laxity of pose is a loosening of the reins?

Do you think it means I am at peace?

Quite to the contrary friends, foreigners and countrymen.

This face means war!

I take up arms against all human shortcomings.

I plunge these words like weapons into slackers and thieves.

Someone must be Bold as Love in times as these.

Dare I say I’ll do it? I dare to say, I'll do it indeed.

I have no fear of hermitage.

I am unafraid of estrangement from the world.

I waft home like effluvium from a pungent lily.

I float aloof, reduced, bold and unfurled.

All statues, towers, obelisks, sepulchers, pillars and steeples,

all you superincumbents made by the hands of man,

do you believe that you are more magnificent than I?

Do you believe you are more supreme?

I say, I am a leaf fallen from the Supreme.

I proclaim, I am crafted in the very image of the Supreme.

I maintain the babe and the bird are

both more maximum than you.

Dear Sir did I hear you correctly?

Did I hear you say you’re concerned?

Your flummoxed that your child

is impartial, equable, even and just?

Dare I say that your child has more sense than You?

Dare I say It? Yes indeed, "I do".

I take fear and paranoia as an insult.

It is time for the preachers of terror and death to stand down.

Despots, come out of the pulpits and disrobe.

This reformation sermon is