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)
-
-
Contact
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)
-
no one leaves the cave
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)
-
He Sees He Says
by
He resists his clichés
With their tiny reins
Guiding the blinder’s
Simplistic vision.
“Everything’s okay,”
he says, yet knows, as she,
it is all just a lie:
her questions, the feigned
interest, are too much—
too coy in their intent
for him to be okay.
He feels his answers
Thicken like cataracts
Clouding all before him.
(January 15, 2018)
-
Nothing Beyond
by
No words tonight to push back
Against the dark lurking close,
Nor books, with their comforting
Runes, to solidify the chaos
Which prowls about the house
Like wolves on the edge of a fire.
I desire affirmation—
A coherence to believe
Beyond the tremors which buck
And warp my life’s lassitude.
Yet, there is nothing beyond
My own shallow thoughts
To assuage the vacuous
Profundity of my days.
(January 10, 2018)
-
My Own Abyss
To resist
My
Dismantling,
The nibble
And nip
Of niggling voices,
I must stop
Listening
To myself—
The snide
Mocking
Laughter
Which waits
To eviscerate.
(January 9, 2018)
-
The Difference Between Plan and Execution
1.
Moonlight sparkles the frost
Across the Honda’s trunk,
As I pack extra warm clothes
In case my students fall
Accidently into the lake.
2.
The sun sparkled the day;
Town Lake centered the sky.
As ducks skimmed the surface,
The canoes slid through the water.
Today no one fell into the lake.
(January 7, 2018)
-
Ritual’s Slow End
As he has each morning,
Treebeard, the orange tabby,
Leads me down the stairs
For a first cup of coffee.
Today he shows his age
As he descends the stairs—
Something off in each soft pad’s
Touch upon each familiar step.
He stops at the end, and meows
To be let out into the dark.
I slide the door open; he sniffs
The cold air, then slips away.
I watch him move through the flowers;
I shiver, not knowing what to do next.
(January 5, 2018)
-
Vanishing Point
by
This is not me—
Nor a representation
Like a photo or a word.
I exist in the tension
Tearing at my heart:
The moment between beats,
A hollow space
drifting amid
Particles of dust,
The movement
From one syllable
To the next.
I am not here
Anymore
Than you.
(January 2, 2018)
-
Winter’s Onset
by
“Cold is desire,
cold
(being old):”
–H. D.
Speak to me,
Embers glow,
A fire stirs:
In dreams
It seems,
You come:
Approach—
Like a winter’s
Sun:
Frost pale,
Moon pale,
Still light:
Morning teases
The aging night.
(January 1, 2018)
-
Transient Stability
by
Some nights—too often now—I wake
Shouting, flailing from worry
Of someone lurking behind a fence—
Someone who claims to be no one
Who, when I wake to darkness again,
Is correct, if not mistaken—
I cannot find solace in sleep.
On the margins of the night, she sits
And knits in a rocking chair singing,
Weaving stories into the air. She’s not
Singing for me. Yet, I cannot speak
In dreams anymore. Night bruises
The day until my skin is broken
And blood spills as if in sacrifice.
(December 31, 2017)
-
Self-flagellation
by
The familiar voice, a constant whip, rips
Bits of metaphorical flesh to fleck
The truculent air like a moist firework.
If one listens— the recriminations
Claw, maul, snag and cut to reshape the past;
The pressure provides us old forms to drape
Like silk shrouds upon the dead and dying.
I hear the fears of my world, the cold doubt
Niggling each broken phrase, like a dry catch
At the back of the throat. I do not know
What to believe, or which patch can still fix
The tattered fabrications, or which will
Transform into the next tale to be told
Before the voice begins to speak again.
(December 29, 2017)
-
Orpheus and Eurydice
I find you in your eyes;
Why do I turn away?
(December 27, 2017)
-
magic
by
apologies to u-t-l
silence surrounds,
it spins, it grows.
beings sprout
in silence.
the secret’s
hope;
listen:
a snowflake
kisses leaf’s tip
at forest center.
(December 26, 2017)
-
To Hesitate
by
Always on the periphery
Of many misunderstandings,
She slowly dances alone
Along the firelight’s flickered edge:
Almost blind,
Almost about to see.
Shadows sway the light
Back and forth like a lover’s
First dance. Neither’s willing
To take the lead; both desire
To surrender. Their bodies
Cleave each to each. She cannot
Read his intent, nor its
Inevitable consequence.
(December 26, 2017)
