Goodnight, sweet bird

goodnight, sweet bird
the moon has left our hands
wanting much more
the blue December doldrums
white feathers on the wind—
you sing, you call
through the window pane
through the walls, my worries
my infinite mind
you echo through my marrow dreams
alone, your voice keeps
the breath breathing
the weak wandering
and though I crave the winter
gale, my heart
offers you a cage free
of bars
if only you promise to never
leave again



Juleps

I got birds and knees and spiders
they come hard
and my heartaches, they come
hard; my winter blues
my internal contusions
my thinning socks
they come hard with holes,
with faded grips and damn those girls
the ones with short stunning
hair and hips—bangs, bangs
bangs—in the hottest memories
against the backdrop of willow
trees, siren silent in the heat they stare
from photographs held against the sun
under those wailing willows, holding mint juleps
three of them per hour so the hips
fade and the eyes and all sorts
of wonderful glorious womanly things
the birds sing, sing, sing to me and reflect
in the thin ice in my glass in the setting sun
we can be these things, have been these things
will be these things, and in your heartbeat for me
please see that it is never too late
to help me get out of this chair of grass
and throw my arms around at least one of you


James H. Duncan is a New York native living in the southwest by day and dreaming of New England by night. A graduate of Southern Vermont College, James recently released Ballast, his third collection of poetry. Plainsongs, Reed Magazine, The Aurorean, and The Homestead Review, among others, have welcomed his work.