Keeping Time

measured moments by 

rain and the width of ripples in the stream

by the sound of porch chimes

in the pre-storm wind

by the length of a kiss

or the length of a track on a playlist

by the strength of my back

when shoveling snow

i am now the age of my professor friend

when he taught me Heraclitus and Parmenides

i am contemplating running again

he has acquired the third leg 

of the sphinx’s riddle

it’s easy to measure sand or

to segment into equal pieces

the clock face to the world’s turning by degrees

but control 

no

you may as well wrap your arms around trees

and wait for them to embrace you

Eurydice

the morning never came when the sun beams 

shown behind her hair revealing her 

as some saving angel

no there was too much damage from the many falls 

from agrarian climbs to monarchy’s apple fists 

to a myth of freedom so pervasive 

it would make an idealist’s wildest 

dreams come true

keep hoping keep reaching you’ll break through 

like a shot 

maybe even before the shot 

breaks you

i worry sometimes at that last conversation

i worry that my words made the choices seem too narrow

the outcomes of responsibility too real

i worry but 

laying that power at the foot of my words

is more than i can claim credit for

i worry but there’s no solution now

i don’t sing like that anymore 

and i never played the lyre anyhow

and i feel guilty only because

even if i unwittingly crossed the threshold

if i could return strumming on the strings of theory

i’d spend the whole trip looking backwards

to make sure you didn’t 

follow me home

Birth To Burn Pits

tear apart the courtyard fairies 

fairy tales from the starry-eyed start 

don’t hold your breath until you die

your rest is on the house 

the bill would never pass the last reservations 

smashed in the past buckets temptations

overflowing chum butter gutter scum 

fluttering butterflies sunlit cum 

taste the fucking rainbow 

these are the same men and women ilk

beetling about like an infestation

quibbling with the worms over vestiges of silk

the brutal crisis thrives on the flies 

eating eyes on mounds of composted soldiers 

requesting aid for the smoke inhaled 

the chemical sear of lungs 

the crawling corporate wars waged on wages 

arms and gasses for further forward passes 

of the armchair wealthy nasal grating

murderers and psychopaths inflating

in your nation’s capital

in your grocer’s freezer

up your ass around the corner

everywhere you turn

you burn

Change Music

in the brittle dim 

living silence of the fen

the dying pond’s song

Vignettes

remember making friends

sharing in and singing 

playing at songs and stories

spending time in make believe 

with age and isolation these memories

become compressed play scenes 

and this long life seems short 

for forgetting

August

the light has lost its honeyed gold

the forest green is dark

sweet summer’s song is growing old

the sun has slipped its arc

thank heavens nights are not yet cold

Apollo’s rays are stark

while autumn’s jailer bars her cold

until her colors are paroled

grapes sweeten leaves turn red and rolled

the season holds its spark

Metamorphosis

early spring morning puddle 

rimmed with rime of frost

saw the eggs days past now

tadpoles swimming slowly in the cold

squatted watching wondrous life

school bus passed and let it

caught it on the back swing

window watching tree shadows pass

dreamed of growing legs

Eden

begin like the gravel 

ripped from the stream bed 

coarse and shining like a new galaxy

strewn on the hard pack and through the grass 

trapped in asphalt for eons

or until next winter’s potholes

man believe me when i tell you

there is no way back to that home

retrace your steps 

to the water 

even to the garden if you must 

but you can never be happy there 

where you were cast out 

will always remember you 

under the surface the land 

is bulging trauma 

until it rips through 

and gulps down your heart’s blood

pull it out and plant that seed 

eat of the fruit of the tree it grows 

this is your destiny

For J______

she scrubs the dinner pans

absorbed in a show on her phone

nimble fingered hands moving

lost in thought at the task

ever at home in the Apollonian sun

around the backyard finding chores

golden hair shining smiling slightly

lines by watchful eyes on our son

craving closeness craving sleep

the day closes in quiet laughter

lover partner wife mother daughter

teacher tutor musician

roles faces those and others

but when

in the rare quiet unobserved

who is this woman

this wonder

Sinking

in that restless sink of time 

surfing the laptop

feeling the pull the drain

clock drum beats sounding 

remote in all senses

A Summer Night (In A Small Town) Sings

scene in the halogen lit market

by way of a gross gray bag sweating

greeting cards in the stall 

break open forever 

past the coffee cans and ceramic fandom 

out

green reflecting streets 

feet slapping crappy happy

gum-packed pavements

in a fart jar town 

lids on

we malcontents holding our noses

sang for want of a song of our own

and finally found some 

after years of fears spilling

we drank them 

there at the bottom of the glass 

the golden life of the whisky writer 

then the liver gave out 

good with onions though

don’t be one of those 

there’s no need for cliches

when the rich randomness of a warm summer night 

pours itself directly from the city-dimmed stars

into your heart 

and sings

Avalanche

the avalanche has not yet settled

i struggled until i made a space

and determined in darkness 

which way was up

before more ice fell in my face

now i’m kicking and i’m digging

to leave before i suffocate

is the brightness i see 

the surface or

will i soon meet my fate

King Of The Wood

from the hollow in the chest

where the blood boiled

and heart beat grew

a tree

that flowered only once a year 

for a single day

before the storm winds blew

the petals away

more than they bargained for

the grove they grew

an oak tree from their eye

that in the autumn grew

acorns that could see

an island surrounded by a sea

of flowing grasses

blades of shining green

bracken and broken branches

arcing out a loving arm

in the evening sun

the golden bough

The Hunt

the stream sang these from its vertices

turn ripple run ripple splash ripple run

the hunted then the dogs 

then a hunter and a gun

the wounded prey the leaves

rustle crinkle rustle shuffle hush

cold and wet and aching 

baying of hounds in the bush

in the echoing report the hunter reaves

singing blood a throat 

a thirst that needed slaking

turn ripple run ripple splash ripple run

Step

the whole chaotic universe belies

the myth of order crafted from our word

they say that space expands and time it flies

but questioning the purpose is absurd

no rule is absolute yet none are free

the closest we can come is to unwind

all meaning to a singularity

and make of every galaxy a mind

imposing order drives all artifice

creating art and all our poetry

the closer the center things fall apart

cohesion battered here flattened event

horizons split open reveal vistas

liminal one foot threshold take the next

My Armpits: A Haiku Written For A Game Of Quelf*

Hairy succulence;

Warm and wet as rainforests.

Arm-azonian?

*Quelf is a board game where you draw from different colored decks depending on the color your piece comes to occupy on the board. You perform the action or ask the question on the card. My card came from the purple "Show Biz" deck and instructed me to write a haiku about my armpits and read it aloud to all the players before the beginning of my next turn. Failing to do so would result in a penalty of moving my piece back several spaces. I succeeded, completing this haiku in about 4 minutes. My family implored me to post it on my blog.

Childhood

they made puppets 

of purple snapdragons

mesmerizing the child

whose clumsy fingers

broke the delicate petals

they would never try again

it rained all summer

his hair was a black river

through the mud

his head on the sidewalk

to hear the storms fingers

stab the earth

summer evenings on the porch

the horizon pink and orange

his children laugh running

chasing fireflies

as he braids dandelions

to crown them

Downtown

they flash in my eyes 

so i don’t idolize

the bright lights downtown

being trapped in the grid

like a ghost in Pac Man

gobbled up with the pellets

gods vampires capitalists

the city doesn’t live

without channeling our power

Summer Is A Hungry Time

summer is a hungry time

i bite black flies out of the air

and gulp down clouds of gnats

uncork the heads of fat mosquitos

and sip the blood from their thin straw forms

a well-fed tick bursts like a grape in my grin

and i love the crunch of a clutch of fleas

though their legs stick in my teeth

pests and parasites yes

summer is a hungry time

Boogeyman

while in the dark it grinned and said my name

upon a lump of fear i choked a cry

it sipped my terror like a brandy wine

then melted into shadows winking a goodbye

Tested Mettle

once fine filigree

wound to the point of breaking

ornamental nerves

Worm In The Apple

get New York out of me

exercise this fallen myth

the filthy wealth of 5th

the gridded symmetry

the cold relentless attitude

the fetid smelling streets

Times LED vertigo repeats

spread the news delude

some wear the city as a suit

some bear it on their back

whipped and withered by its flak

some eat its poisoned fruit

Responsible

respite is fleeting 

with swarms calling your name 

dragging you into the fray 

when you would rather remain 

at the fraying edges 

stepping back from ledges 

pulled by the shirt tails 

tooth and nail kicking and screaming 

to plummet anyway into 

a daily dose of paid imprisonment 

don’t feed the hungry lions in their lair 

righteous indignation thriving 

forces gaining traction 

which faction is truthful 

no one knows only when

common sense rules the day but

sense is not so common

Untitled 7.9.22

rushes pouring out my fountain pen

along with leaf edges borders 

the focus of the landscape

sun up in the tree

opening hands

stomata stigmata 

same thing

coarse grain

in the brain 

makes of memory a pearl

The Birthday

pieces torn confetti thrown

windborne and pasted

to humid pavements

the wasted refuse of half a life

in anticipatory celebration of 

an unknown half

Movie In Your Head

off the path through the trees

leaves tinged red from dawn sun

sideways down the rocky slope

wading through green sea of ferns

to the sand and gravel edge

of the stream running clear

magnifying the soft brown bottom

and the music of water on rocks

fills your ears until you know

the world is the reel and you

are the projector

Weeds

around the garden

weeds bloom and the humming bees

promise the harvest

Anniversary

a figure stood waiting at the corner of my sight

when i turn no one there nothing there

the cat is sitting staring at the very same spot

but still there is nothing there

someone whispers softly next to my ear

when i turn no one there nothing there

the dog barked and growled hackles up

but still there is nothing there

the deadline’s coming up and bills coming due

when i turn no one there nothing there

one year gone and now all that’s left of you

but still there is nothing there

DIY Make A Lantern From Your Fear

locate the dread 

that pervasive pulsing dark

cut a circle in its head

scoop seed and pulp 'til hollow dead

put wick in wax in in its stead

carve a face as you drink its marc

then light the candle with a spark

Anatomy Of A Naturalized Construct

the light dripping crimson 

on the malodorous monotony

man-made trees like hives in honey 

bees in the leaves 

reason is out the forested window 

make mangroves now to rest in their purple shade 

yes we can rest here 

and drink in white noise

creeping vines designed striking 

light from the sky in anxiety 

fuck piety when

we are not at parity you and i 

the very law forbids that choice

but i can look in your eyes 

and we can come to an understanding 

the hands and hammers of powers that be 

buzzing up and up on the rising crimson tide 

to the tops of the trademarked trees and then 

sublimate into air 

we made the roots 

come out of this dissembling ground

let them fall 

fingers in ears la la la

deaf to their despair

and maybe 

be free in the forest

Sundown After The Storm

a red sky washed the solemn glade 

after the rain dissolved the dust

then amber fingers pierced the bellies 

of retreating black and cobalt clouds 

and the purple of dusk washed down the sky

revealing the stars as though

someone had poked holes in a screen

the trees shook the droplets 

from green leaves in a breeze

so the earth could drink

and the whole night sighed

as it settled to sleep in the grass

The Danger In Loving

the danger in loving

is only obliteration

it is all that is worth doing

destroy your self 

every day