Mornings
as you shower
before work,
I hear you:
frustration
ripping through
wet lungs,
such deep sobs,
as if your heart
were evaporating
into steam.
(December 19, 2014)
-
Power’s Flow
by
You ask another questionto control what I haveto say, in a manneredway; for to be impolite,would be to cede somesmall slice of doubtinto the staid provenanceof your steady gaze.If honest, I simply mustsidestep your thrust,move past the assumptiontargeted toward my heart,and answer with a wordso clean it slides throughyour emptiness to exciseall of you in me I despise.(December 19, 2014) -
Echoes of my Father
my shoesbadly tiedlaces dangleI shufflethrough the darktired and agingbecoming you(December 19, 2014) -
Stock Answer
best to be quietespecially after a drinkor threesit back watch yourselfsilence your voiceyour judgmental witwhen questionedlistenfor the tracesbeing tiedthe harness the blinderswhich will leadinevitablyto an answertheir answer(December 18, 2014) -
mirrored
Everything I see reflects,and refracts, what echoescan only seek to say:a partial phrase unparsed,a face in studied pose.So, I turn, and returnagain, to words I’ve said,or heard, with hope suchseed will grow and flowermore than my vain need;yet, know the crows, who cawfrom fence and field, watchwith darker eyes the shadowtwine and twirl about us all.(December 17, 2014) -
Eros Always Dances on the Edges
by
Out of deference one demursto polite overtures with intenthidden in the folds of a teasing wit;such subtleties, usually reservedfor would be lovers, or ancien regimeFrench aristocrats sipping cognac,are not the best patterns to inscribethe confession of a reticent heart.If one whispers to an absent loverhas one really transgressed at all?And if I think of you, as I do,each day after so many years;yet do not act beyond these words,can I still say, I am in love with you?(December 15, 2014) -
a patchwork god
entering the darkthe ground we walkupon fragmentslike lake ice in springepistemes multiplylike white blood cellsfrantic to fillthe fractaled rabbit holeslacing the I between you and mea corset of stories to telllate into the nightaround a firesurrounding a viewno one seesas frogsa cacophonysounding one voicecroak out their songsbeneath multitudinous stars(December 11, 2014) -
Dustings
All manner of imprecisionsamong my daily sloppishness,another line erased;scantlings brushed away.I’m never quite sureif what I thought happened,or if I rewrote enoughthe palimpsest’s vanished.Causation was no morethan a butterfly landingbriefly upon her bookas I fell into her eyes.Even now as I write,the strands dissipateloosening my holdon the storyline:if anything bloomedit faded beneathmy vague meanderingsand memory’s dust.(December 8, 2014) -
What Am I Afraid Of?
of what I amleaking into whatI hide withinso that I am openedof failing to bewho I need to befor the people whoneed me to be meof becoming my fearsin such a mannerI am broken likea sack of sandof never being morethan a frightened fool(December 7. 2014) -
Dinner and Wine
Full December moonbathes our yard in cool silence:the comfort of friends.(December 7, 2014) -
bilingual
by
I savor the words you offer,roll them around my tonguelike chocolate meltingin slow syllables;until I becomesome other languagespoken in placesonly we understand.(December 6, 2014) -
Self Portrait in a Broken Mirror
If you are me,and what I seebecomes itselfthrough infiniteunfoldingsand refolding,an origamiconstructionpressed flatupon this pagelike Braqueor Picasso,then whose eyesdo I fall intoeach momentI bend towardyour kiss?(December 6, 2014) -
Delphic Skeltonic
now there right therefinger jabs airwe look but whereso there and theresomewhere not herethe world adheressinging cold feara bear lurks nearI leave my lairan ancient seerwho sees elsewherein every tearmy mind is clearI hold you dear(December 4, 2014) -
processing the guest speaker
apologies to Frank O’Harait’s 11:18 and the astronaut is talkingI wonder if my students will have timeto write their essay when we get backas if it matters more than just somethingto do as the astronaut says “you betterhave a plan for stopping” in some contextI missed because I am writing this poemeven though I still look up fairly frequentlywith an interested expression like nowso that it will appear I’m taking notesor reflecting on the astronaut’s speechinstead of writing as if I’m Frank O’Haraat lunch in New York casually tossing offone of those now fifty year old classic poemsI’ve been carrying around in my pocket latelyand suddenly I think about Rene Charand his Leaves of Hypnos and what differenceif any exists between writing processesof O’Hara’s wondrous wanderings in New Yorkmy surreptitious scribbles my students’ groansif we get back in time to write and Char stalkedby the Nazis across the French countrysideas the astronaut speaks of re-enteringthe atmosphere and how the heat shieldis on fire “It burns up so the rest of you doesn’t”and how last night I misplaced my notebookI carry everywhere for just a few minutesand I could feel the flames begin to flare(December 3, 2014)
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