As bare brown feet dance for rain,
a wind stirs the distant leaves.
I move lost as usual
through the slow everyday tasks,
as if it is some place new,
some place I have never been;
a place that rises from the dust
of drought-dry caliche roads.
In between where we are, and
where we were in history,
I move against the dark sky
and watch clouds form like old maps
which leave space for new monsters
to thrash in violent seas.
I did not know him
as the child I was
anymore than the man
I have become—
He was a shadow
sifted in story
his deep voice laced
with decades of smoke
before dying
into mom’s revisions
I still don’t know
what I was afraid of
(Father’s Day: June 21, 2026)
It is three forty-seven in the morning;
my eyes are closed, I am still not asleep.
The old whispered violence collects
like spittle along the corners of my lips.
An anger suppressed by custom
and obedience waits with patience,
its old friend, for others to gather
from their day of quite rage.
The night cannot go on unbroken;
the day will surely return to itself.
Yet there is no reason to assume
the moon will fall or the sun will rise.
My eyes are closed, I am still not asleep;
It is three fifty-one in the morning.
(May 14, 2026)
my resistances arise
through the day
in the way
I see
the trees leaf
the roses bud
and bloom only
to let go
their petals
to the ground
and here
as well as there
in the streets
filled with anger
is a beauty
and a love
which must be held
with all our arms
and named
with all our voices
no matter how small
or fleeting
we feel our hearts
to be
no matter the terror
slithering nearby
laugh as well
as mourn
sing as well
as scream
see more
than is allowed
see what we were
see what we are
and see what
we can become
(April 29, 2026)
Maise, our dog, lounges on the over-stuffed arm
of the old leather chair which squats squarely
next to a bare window in the front room.
The late afternoon sun pours bright puddles
of warmth on the floor for her to bathe in;
and from which, if inclined, she may muster
yips and growls at people slowly walking
their sweatered dogs on the sidewalk outside.
I fear falling on ice still lingering
on neighborhood paths, so we stay inside.
But that is just an excuse, I hate cold
weather as much as I tolerate heat’s
dominion during the long summer months.
Even when I, like this poem, go nowhere.
Our two dogs don’t like the cold rain today;
they huddle deeper into the blankets’
warmth still tangled across the bed upstairs.
I watch the neighbor’s small duck flock parade
behind his fence squawking their displeasure
with the world’s cold misappropriations.
Much farther north of here an ice hardens
quickly into a fiery discontent.
The TV weathermen predict winter storms
will settle darkly across the country
with dire warnings of icy roads to come.
We live out our lives in dangerous times:
where we must brave the cold outside to live,
but any warmth, like love, is hard to find.
(January 24, 2026)
I want to worry
about our dogs
barking randomly
along the back fence
at shadows and leaves
while the occasional squirrel
fusses at them
from the safety of a tree.
Instead wolves roam the streets
fur stiff with dried blood;
and eviscerated prey
muddy the snow,
while neighborhood dogs
howl through the night.
(January 14, 2026)
“the world is too much with us”
-W. Wordsworth
no longer the getting and blind spending
though that is still here teeming at our feet
like low-level radiation leaking
into the spongey ground we walk upon
but the powerful’s thick drooling anger
flailing curses wildly on everyone
that does not resemble their idea
of a pastoral past they never knew
this is the time I have come to live in
a time where the soft smell of hope lingers
like a dusty corpse left alone at home
when to be cloaked in ironic disdain
is to disguise an intellectual
self-revulsion that equivocates death
(January 10, 2026)
storms rage without rain
like shrouds across the dry earth
trees drop their dead leaves
each night grows longer
one more minute of light less—
incremental death
i’m tired of trying—
too cynical to pretend
darkness has not come
it is ironic
with the weight of centuries
nothing can be done
the sycamore’s branches fall
I fear spring will not return
(October 21, 2025)
terra incognita, terra pericolosa
We run from shadows
to shadow
without explanations.
We are here:
for a moment;
to wait,
to watch,
to worry.
Yet, here now,
light flows
in shadows
only here.
So, be wary,
be warned, and run.
(October, 5, 2025)
Night continues to fall, dark upon dark,
unrelenting, cold as eternity.
Yet, tonight a half-moon hangs in the stars.
I try to ignore the fear on the wind,
but it eats its way in, splintering bone.
Ice, like a steel knife rusting at our throat,
parses words to an elemental degree.
What can be said contains but small nuance.
So I write pinching syllables like rice
to keep starvation one more day away,
hoping without hope that what I can say
is enough to carry hope through this dark,
that whatever bit of love which remains
is enough to hold our world together.
(October 3, 2025)
earth turns towards the sun
trees abandon their crisp leaves
the kidney wood blooms
the heat in texas
hangs heavily in the air
summer will not leave
lizards sprint sprightly
across the back patio
no rain for weeks now
they warn it will end
even now summer lingers
like a slow sickness
everything unfolds slowly
we are here then we are not
(September 22, 2025)
Just another day:
the children go off to school;
students are gunned down.
The adage goes
To save for a rainy day,
But the rain doesn’t rain much
Anymore. When it does
I watch the grass, trees,
And flowers left dance,
A hollow ghostly dance.
I look around the circle;
To see ritual filled eyes
momentarily hope. We are
Lost. The moment’s all
That is left. Tomorrow’s
Too late. It rains
For hours. the air cools,
At least ‘til morning.
Nothing’s changed;
All is as it has been. Yet,
The streets dry quickly,
And the earth cracks
Open like an empty kiss
Bestowed upon a corpse
As a last blessing.
(August 22, 2025)
I want to believe
magic exists,
that somewhere
the clicks and clacks
of reason drift
free of determined
divination to finally
fall away like leaves.
I want to believe
some small gods
dance in scattered copse
and sing such songs
that might save us
from our future fall.
(July 9, 2025)
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