not enough distraction
to stop the rain
from falling
like knots
another thought bends
back obsessively
there is nothing
to let go
even if I could
(August 15, 2016)
-
Dusk’s Quiet Rhythms
Mountains at a distance blur the horizon.He tries to explain himself like scarecrows,through dance, explain themselves to the raven.He mistrusts the shapes of this common worldpresented with such precise clarity,as if lines like these can be so thin andimpermeable to divide us allinto differentiated grains of sand.Another wave tumbles along the shore,he cannot wait for the water to clear.Along the edge of the fog, figures dancebetween the trees weaving a patterned lace.He watches the moon rise above the hills:Who’s there waiting—the widow, or the bride?(August 12, 2016) -
Now
there’s always a dooran emptiness to crossunknown spaces on mapsfilled with dire beastsa perpetual thresholdto move love throughlike a bearded iris unravelinginto a crisp spring morningwith no latch except hesitancya hand lingers on the jambas if time can framea portrait on a wallcontaining as a thoughtthe next step and fall(August 10, 2016) -
A Map Distorts
Spreading the map out flatacross the hood of the Ford,she fingers the route homelike a vein along his arm.Nearby, he watches the night sky.The distance draws closerthan the stars’ mythologiesallow in reason’s smudged light.He resists the part he plays.She recognizes the distortionas a vague interpretationof where he once belonged.She sees where they’re going;he denies there is a destiny.(August 9, 2016) -
negative space
silences fill the shapesbetween the wordsmold to contoursclosing and openingframes like windowslisten as water movesthrough the substrateto the crevice’s deepshifting structuresin my laconic speechpatterns in patternstesselate the airwith each shared breathwith each trembled kiss(August 6, 2016) -
I Wake Into Myself Yet Again
by
Memory’s fickle nature turnsall nuance into fragments.I hold the trembled bitsbetween my fingertips,as if I could discernone moment from the next;separating fine gradationslike diamond dealers sweepingstones one pile to the nextwith an easy dexterity. I shudder,like an old bull to the yoke,beneath the variables framingall the doors within doors,until the still life’s vanishingpoint collapses into oneI must be for my time left.(August 5, 2016) -
no beginning no end
each morning we wakecontent we have begunin the middle somewherelike Dante wrote onceso distant now to bebefore time to our dayto day commutes andcolleagues commentswhispered beneaththe raging lions lurkingalong the forest’s edgesentangled in the storieswe tell like roots drivingdeeper into the cliffas we begin our leapgulping after air(August 4, 2015) -
worry the past
turn the earth a littleand see in the crumblelife’s turbulent seethethe curl of wormand oak leaf mulchamong the rooted dirteasier there than herein the patterned dayto ignore the ubiquitous airto find any causeto simple seewhat’s there beforeI said what I saidand you went away(August 2, 2016) -
The Meek’s Inheritance
by
The relentless bludgeonbrought to any talkseduces with blunt precision.The bullying accusation, dismissive,condescending, bends alongtrivial lines, until yesis the only reply possible,regardless of what countsas truth or kindnessin the quiet worldwe desire. Submissiondoes not ask permission,any more than the jackalfeeding on the dead.(July 29, 2016) -
At One Stroke
by
summer 2005The curtains hang slack,I know. Yet, I see them flowundulant along the threadslike glaciers retracting north.As if under water, I watch the wordspainted on our walls ripple, divide,and replicate: parallel, yet askewto any rational point-of-view.I open my notebook, and pull back.What I see of the world cannot beanymore than a saint’s dry visionclawed across a cavern’s wall.What I know is what I see,and everything is blurred.(July 29, 2016) -
Dance Mused
by
like a measured metaphor turnedback upon itself, each foldof the dough rolled out squarethen folded again creates the thingesteemed in itself, the layerssavored for the complexityof flavors which dance alongthe tongue so eloquently,as Dr. Williams once dancedalone in the morning lightbefore his mirror when his houseslept in the folds of their dreams,so you, one morning, alone, willcarefully step from the bathwondering just what to dowith that beast before youstaring back with a jaundiced eyeknowing you are not alone(July 27, 2016) -
Pass Sentence
by
I’ve been told to write a sentence. Not a sentence which tells, but shows what you intend to tell. I am a hapless sinner, I confess: I do declare, within my declamations, sentences, which tell in their telling. After all, sentences tell things as I’ve been told, but these sentences I’ve been told to write must be good sentences, alter boys strung along the edges of high mass like rosary beads, the words curling toward heaven’s judgment with burnt incense and candle light. I’ve been told to write this way— this way is to write into salvation. There is no other, except the other. No statements, for that would be to tell and one must not tell, like now; for that would be to expose oneself in too prurient a fashion. Statements create expectations too blatant and crude for seduction. Instead epiphany’s show’s burlesque, a hint and tease toward desire, to come on one’s own, as it were, to grace. To have no idea is best. Causality is acceptance and love, an open marble hand held out simply, pointing coyly to the side away from its intention. This way is the way, a direction embedded in the sign cut into stone on the side of a road, but never the road. It points. It shows. It tells. We know. Follow here this line of thought, this sentence, through the maze. Follow this thread to escape the meaning, which lurks, still not slain, at the center of the poem. Trace with your hand the image inlayed like marble decorating the side of this tomb, until there is no difference between the telling and the told, the image and the word, and the dark glottal bark we use to point at the world before we can pass sentence on our crimes.(July 24, 2106) -
Fortune Teller’s Hands
She holds future’s tracesloosely at her fingertips.Ribbons of sibilant lightstream from her hands.Each strand, a different color,opens into our possibility.She can sense the pull and slackon the reins, as each momentvies for a breach in the present;even as one occludes the other.So many patterns to account,so many desires to entice,so little time to control, untilnothing that cannot be can be so.(July 23, 2016)
subtext 