THOSE WORDS
rusty lyrics croon their way
through neon windows
and naked moonlit streets,
they are sprayed on brick walls
in quiet alleyways,
and strummed under street lights
by blind prophets,
caps at their feet.
whispered at night
and dreamt of all day,
they hide
in dumpsters,
behind diners,
on third story billboards,
in sewer pipes.
what lovers scream
in rainy regret,
scratched on the prisoner’s cell wall
beside his daily count.
the man on the park bench,
and the one at his desk,
they think them too, those words.
not here, they say, not like this.
TRANSITIONS
may shudders with leaving
and climbs into spring's twilight cocoon.
"you can't hide from the end"
cry the soapbox prophets
"when it hits you'll know."
well i'll be fine
as long as i have some good music.
"you'll see"
they say, crawling back into cardboard solitude.
the air is turning now,
that dank summer stew.
i'll hide in the lake
and wait for the fall.
"you'll hide in the lake
and wait for an end!"
i'll wait for change
"change is an end."
then i won't fear it.
blinking in the budding sun
may begins to emerge
and smiles at me content.
i sit and turn up the radio
watching the heat pass.
TIME
the garden is small
a few trees and benches,
bushes line the border
between life and time.
i stop here for coffee
when the weather permits
but sometimes its too hot.
WINTER
i'm walking through a poem
where everything rhymes
and there are no illusions
though nothing is real.
i'm drifting through fog
the distant moon
aimlessly floating;
a lighthouse over a glassy sea.
i'm walking on memory's
mirrored crypt
reflecting a shapelss
glowing face.
i'm sitting in the kitchen
fixing a turkey sandwich
speaking with a friend,
more content than i could know.
OUTSIDE
the clouds and i
meet to watch the sunset
the difference between us is
i don't turn dark purple
WALLACE STEVENS
my father's scribble
lines these bare margins
shivering with confusion.
they scream of memory
though their ink fades.
THE WHY
i've lost myself again.
scratching at reason
bleeding for its cause
crawling through the dark;
my beginning no more than my end.
WHAT REMAINS
i must have sat watching the still spider
for at least an hour,
dozing and stirring,
its porcelain body frozen like a graveyard
falling so lost in its care
i didn't even notice the crowd of commuters
storming by, shifting and stumbling
hurrying to empty lives
and in their wake,
the red smear on the ground
floating just above the floor tiles.
BLOOMINGTON, INDIANA
the heater in the room is broken
and it only blows cold air,
my mind is numb
but my thoughts are somewhere else
CAN'T HE SEE
he must not feel the window's breath,
cool and blue it blows.
surely he sees the widowed leaf
swirl to the ground below.
is he blind to eden's shape,
mother's longing call?
or does spring change into summer's sun,
while all he sees is fall?
for lest these truths be frayed and false,
his actions know no reason.
for here he sits with foolish tasks
while passes each sweet season.
TIMOR MORTIS CONTURBAT ME
even as i ride
to my fleeting end,
i shall still know refuge
in that warm bed
where memory's sweet maiden lays,
where i have spent many
a thankful night,
where my dreams were woven,
are woven still,
where i walk through the grotto
and see not stones,
but merchants and children,
scorn and fulfillment,
longing,
lustful eyes,
and where i shall rest
as night veils the blushing pole,
stars replacing assumptions,
a million points of light
converging into one.
ALRIGHT
he was a taxicab warrior,
amidst city madness,
swinging his briefcase
like a sword
from atop his yellow steed.
and did anyone notice,
did anyone care?
they just kept walking
down busy sidewalks,
blinded by the neon of store windows,
not even seeing the fire-breathing dragon
sitting in the middle of fifth avenue.
THOSE LETTERS
those letters i read,
though i should have not,
grew dusty in drawers
and in mind,
they tattered, scattered,
shattered forth
from infinite to hind.
those words that filled
each longing page,
addressed "my dear",
"my love",
had seen their sons
and daughters grown
and returned to days above.
those letters i read,
though i should have not,
have all grown tired
and dry,
for now the love
they shared has gone,
and surely
so have i.
OR MORE
a year away,
or ten.
and the springtime
seems so far away.
and the winter's
growing calm and still.
AND THEN
i just wanted to fill space
so i asked her for her name.
she smiled and strummed her
velvet blue guitar,
and i was left
in a dream,
a book of wallace stevens
in my left hand.
FREE
it had been a dry season
until tonight,
and now the rain falls
with the frustration of
a lover lost by age.
sitting, shivering
under an old wooden shelter
waiting for a hitch
is the furthest thing from mind
when i awaken on gray mornings,
the lilt of a steady shower
on the roof above,
and shift in my bed
with two hours to the alarm.
but the wind is fierce
and the road is empty
and the assumptions of walt whitman
laugh through my ear.
my bed now is nothing more
than a soaked knapsack,
the thundering storm harldy a lilt,
and yet i've never
been more content.
and yet i've never
been more content.
INTIFADA
the snail grew weary
of the tourtoise's boast
that he was the fastest of all
so he called on the hare
to prove tourtoise wrong
and the hare said,
i'd love to friend,
but some fucker
blasted my legs off.
STILL
i ventured out to run
but could not find my breath
and in searching it,
found none the same.
so i sat for a while,
aside the street,
watching cars pass by,
headed for the country.
i sit there still.
AGAIN ATOP A HILL
the trees in my sight
form the reluctant barrier
between the mountains above
and those below.
for somewhere beyond
the creeping white
and her slumbering mate,
a tuft of wind is expelled
that shakes through
the trembling green sentries,
stirring their intent
and waking their long forgotten
fortitude.
this scene lays its course
before me
while to my right,
a disgarded shopping bag
clings to a bush;
i watch intently
as it rustles and bends.
SHE GREW THEN
the afternoon choked on fog;
cigarette breath and cow smells,
i was wearing my corderoy jacket
that she laughed at.
trying to remember how she looked, when
i looked up to the door
just in time to see her
coughing on a blade of grass,
and i went to water her face
but she was already gone.
