by
a dark hallway
opens through him
he is a door
an absence
like an echo
scratching anxiously
at a window
to be let in
he opens as an emptiness
a conduit for others
to shuffle one
fragment into another
in an attempt to align
fragility’s last tremor
(February 3, 2018)
a calm demeanor
belies the panic he feels
outside his window
(February 3, 2018)
by
there is always that moment which arrives
when the conversation has abated
and all that must be said remains unsaid
and our minds’ sharp intimacies depart
amid insincere handshakes and chaste hugs
in a doorway and what occurred that night
vanishes into small talk’s silent wish
and this wish is somehow always the same
which is somehow that what one says matters
enough somehow to whomever may hear
that they will somehow respond in a way
which will somehow equate as well to your
first desire and yet still somehow both will
mange to survive your disparate lives
(January 31, 2018)
by
A fire flares and flickers
As the dark embers pulse,
Keeping beat to the dancer’s
Feet twirling in a circle.
He hesitates to speak,
To throw his slow mind
Into relief against her quick
Laughter rippling the room.
His words bind him to earth
Like roots tangling underground;
Hers flutter like butterflies
Rising as one from flowers.
Flames, flowers, roots and embers
Turn, and turn, and turn again.
(January 30, 2018)
by
Never her lover,
Nor even a friend:
It cannot be over,
If it never begins.
Let me sing this song,
A tune for her ear:
It will not be long,
Before I am near.
I watch from the margins,
As she moves through her day;
I wait with chagrin
‘til I do what I may.
Without cause to my intent,
I won’t rest until I am spent.
(January 29, 2018)
by
Light, like gauze
Over skin, glazes
The forest floor
In mottled shadows.
As on other days,
One walks here
With a slow step
Along patterned trails.
What’s to discover
Depends upon the lens
One brings—The light
And the dark blend.
All paths converge
In each step’s shift.
(January 28, 2018)
“Our awareness leaves us defenseless”
–H.D. The Walls do not Fall, 27
Like an assassin’s garrote,
A grape vine swirls around
The surrounding trees;
It pulls itself toward light,
Tangling through the clotted
Branches, among the shadow.
At dusk, the edge
Of the earth’s present;
Unlike the dawn,
Where it’s disguised
In a radiant light.
To be aware is to vanish.
Totality’s moment
Slips past unnoticed.
(January 26, 2018)
by
I stand on a ragged edge.
My feet ache,
Crumpled like broken claws.
I am unsure:
Am I distorted
And blurred?
Do I sing
In some voice
Not my own?
Demands disallow
The silence
For thought.
Too often too much
Rips and pulls
Like tides.
Beneath this clamor
I listen—
My heart beats
Steady, yet wary
Like a rabbit
On a field’s edge.
I gather my doubts
And step out
Into air,
Until all
That falls
Falls away.
(January 24, 2018)
by
“wholly unremembered”
Yesterday’s rose is
As different now
As the one fresh cut
before me unfolds.
Memory’s an echo
Charged by distance—
Accurate as much
As a teller’s
Moment’s shape’s
Maintained:
My thoughts
Muddy my past,
Past even a passing
Resemblance of love.
(January 23, 2018)
“Gods make their own importance.”
–Patrick Kavanagh
All the passions, indecisions,
And inarticulate fears
Which seize you randomly
Throughout the day,
All the sudden moments
Of chaos, and clarity,
Of lust, anger, and charity
Are more than you, yet only you.
Reason cannot hope to contain
The gods’ whispered instigations;
Wisdom’s inherent in your skin,
And transcends all interior
Motivations like accomplices
Waiting nearby for the fall.
(January 23, 2018)
by
My world’s abraded,
Worn thin, roughly patched.
I’m often unsure what
I do; and, when I stand,
The ground bends and slides
Like a slow-motion
Tilt-a-Whirl
At a country fair.
To find a balance,
I write into the tatters,
To the frayed coherences,
Desperately spinning
New tales to old
As a balm against the cold.
(January 22, 2018)
by
the empty whiskey glass sits
next to a tumbler full of wine—
where did I become this?
at some decision, some acquiescence—
to change, or give up,
to let myself be, nothing
more than surrender
(January 20, 2018)
by
From the opening, one can see
Flickers of light and dark
Dancing another world,
If one places one’s eye
At a precise angle askew
To the present lived world.
This Vision’s dream pulses
Like an omphalos stream’s
Constant thrum of blood
Caresses a nascent life.
My eye’s curve opens,
As the horizon catches
The dawn, to a distant
Transcendence in your eye.
(January 19, 2018)
by
make a random reference
to some allusion other
than the one here now
and if one misses it
from ignorance or
one’s own obscurity
the dead grey eyes
hear in the fissures
more than conceived
in any normal conversation
in which one’s a part
minutes arrive like hours
and all the inhabitable
caves encompass the other
(January 17, 2018)
subtext 