sketching your profile

i have taken some liberties
in tracing your contours
with the tip of my finger

the bridge of your nose
the line of your jaw
the back edge of your neck

now my soul has come unloosened
and i'm unable to shove it back
into that cloak of flesh i wear

come swim with me
in that sea beyond our cages of bone
unfasten the gown of your body

show me your luminous edges
let your unadorned presence
shiver the surface of waters

then before dawn
we'll step back into our skins
and i can start using a pencil

a quiet village

and where do you suppose this place you speak of is
beyond the wars of other countries
and their exiles without shoes

some who've traveled whole continents
counting off miles by the thousands
before they can find any trace of silence

curtains billow in an open window
you can still hear
the sea outside the abandoned village

a sound
like old men sleeping in the afternoon
with no one to wake them

the sky among shadows
of bells in a gleaming tower
with no one to sound them

here and there amidst the flies
that linger long on clods of clay
flutter still the unnamed sleeves

piebald

did you forget that ghost of a boy
who’d flit into the sunny spots
we’d sometimes find in forests
when we used to lose our way

funny how we seem unable
to find those places
anymore

he was always hungry
not for anything but light
he was thin

and his clothes were sun-bleached too
how he craved the billowing white
that dark haired boy with eyes of night

sometimes still
startled from sleep in some black hour
i see him

at the far end of the pasture
beyond the weathered stumps
and red-capped lichen

there used to be a piebald pony too

but now the fence is gone
and the barn’s been razed
there’s no place for ponies

or pale-faced boys

a momentary solace

i find the wind has taken down my favorite tree
and yet across the gray-skied bay
light unfurls along your slender peninsula--
a gown of ochers and reds

my brother

on that night they brought you up
did you tell them
how waves overwhelm the world
demand everything
how they rise against the unrelenting winds
and build with all their liquid weight
until they reach a height
that is unbearable
did you tell them
how they fall
full of what they are
and crash
a clamor of rage
did you say
waves are only water

beyond midnight

each word begins
         as a yearning

                 a wound

       each one a brick
                      a cinder block sinking

some surface too easily

                    he tries to be singular
                         but he's too tired to make anything
                                                                                last

       some chords composed by john cage are spears
                                                                         thrust into a sleeping man's side

                                                                         light cuts long
                                                                                         into the cockcrowed hour

beginning the second half-century

two women round the corner
they have nice asses
one pushes a stroller
they stand by the shore
and take snapshots of themselves

around another corner
the whir of electric wheelchairs
two boys their heads askew
their conversation is not unintelligible
they race each other and laugh

the sun is warm against this wall
the court is empty now
whirls of leaves are my companions
my constant companions
i speak the skittering language of leaves

a lapse of discretion

the street
once sunny in early october
maples’ orange leaves
the woman sits in a chair

her white collar and painted-on smile
how she looks out the window
at the fabric in the shop

the softness of her hand
a quality of cream
of linen as if it has no weight

only a scent of jasmine
a scent of hemlock
of lavender

the color of her silken blouse
a lilac purple
spruce green

a taste of powder
beneath her ear
behind her jaw

tight spirals
pressed dark
against temples

wavering breath
of parted lips
as if to speak a pleasure

over and over
starlings dot a sky that's almost blue 

persistence of vision

chair in a desert
every single day its shadow sweeps
from west to east

a young child kneels
forehead in sand
veil of skin covering ribs

a photographer frames the scene
weighs vulture against child
he has an eye for balance

he shoos the bird away
but the image remains
he cannot face it 

chair in a desert
every single day
a shadow

few know the sweetness of twisted apples*

on boyhood’s farm
my grandmother spoke a language
i never understood—
a winnowing wind among the apple boughs
gnarled fruit of a quitted land
her skinnied limbs her skull-boned eyes
i cawed to crows
in windmilled heights and maple trees
my father dug potatoes
a cow would lick my arm
the coarseness of its tongue
old john the lugan
the basement his home
a crooked table where he ate from cans
the bed of straw upon a metal frame
sunlight’s meager portion—
a pillar of dust across a concave floor
polished dirt beneath his shoeless feet
the stubble of a furrowed face
his only language a toothless smile
singsong of a sweet-wined drunk
displaced by war
his family lost
perhaps relocated
maybe never was
his hands weaving twine
carving tines
whittling away the wooden days
until nothing was left
of my grandmother
or the cow
or the ashes of the apple trees
my father moved him on
only the smooth earth
to remember the soles of his feet


* The title is taken from a line in Sherwood Anderson's "Winsburg, Ohio"

ode to a bird

this lone remnant of our conversation
white feather found on the floor
have i told you of the rain-beaten leaves
of how it rains nearly every day
lost little feather

its end has been clipped
its barbs undone
you at the next table over
all spun in cloaks and scarves
what is one feather to you

this thread of your vestment
opened wide open--
unfold before me
you flower of feathers
you bird
you song of pure air
all these leaves loosened by rain
it's already Fall
what are you doing
making a nest in my hair

exiled

amidst the hollow pieces of another night
dust owns everything
there is no help from stars
nor do books of stars carry any promise
I count my teeth
I don’t want to believe they can be incinerated—
the only remnants archeologists might excavate of me 
countless twigs scattered in the grass
is the oak even alive
or is it dying by an unperceived attrition
long after hammers strike
the notes reverberate
linger still in silence
nearly all my conversations are with the dead
many are foreigners
clinging to black bread—
leave us alone they say
we're tired of your soliloquies
go pester the crows

beyond the labyrinth

only the humming--
a monotone moan through a glass door
voice shaped by buildings of brick
held by a patina of rust
walls at right angles
a multitude of distances

beyond the labyrinth--
a small elm encircled by pavement
its yellow leaves roil
dark branches bend
preserve that which is rooted
it clings to the earth

pattern of etched mortar
chipped paint of white letters--
the severed clouds
sunlight framed by the shadows
once more the monotonous moan 
a meaningless outcry from nowhere to nothing

you hang over this small porcelain cup--
touched by how many fingers
mouthed by how many lips
whose breath was held here
and yet the wind
it speaks to you

look--
the leaves glisten with brilliance

burning bush

shadows of leaves on a burgundy curtain quiver
they move in muted sunlight across a Persian rug

you ache with things you shall never be—
the persistence of vision.

rise from this kneeling,
open the curtains of day.

among September winds
the leaves turn

redder than fire.

leaden

at dusk’s open window
a rushing wind—

oaks’ deafening herald

you stand before the dusty sill
a drumming echoes off your chest

a promise of sleep—

distant lightning

returning to earth

~ field ~

how green still clings to yellowing trees
and cattails bend over darkened waters
the blue-grey sky is violent with cloud
the slanting sun upon a knoll of beat-down hay
a few loosed leaves and branches lifted to wind

~ shed  ~

once the grey-grooved slats smelled sweet with pitch
the curled shingles smelled of tar
now the brown bent nails hold nothing--
round worn ends of bowing boards
outlast the carpenter's hands
his utilitarian plan given to the rootless moss

~ homestead ~

once there were potatoes and corn
white curtains rustling in a sunshined breeze
scent of apple pie
now the rusted rims of tractor wheels
the rotting harnesses of horseless fields
the odor of forgotten implements
clinging to the hollow of a broken barn

after the storm

mossy shadows
a hum through the branches
you say the mountain is cold
but I say it is still
water trickles over stones
leaves litter a rain-dampened path
the coarseness of pebbles beneath your pale feet
the puddle a mirror
the mirror a vision of sky
word you have forbid yourself to speak
breath slipped from tongue
dew sliding from leaf
translucent into a pool
a single circle
fragrance of chokecherries
in dusk you tell me
all you know of dissonance
how you crave the sound of crickets in cold
you wait in silence beneath the striated clouds

and this morning

is there sunlight
on your breast,

any yellow glowing amidst
your waking’s whiteness?

which wilted flower
lends it’s lone colored dab?

is it red, or orange?
tell me please it’s purple

you were draped in purple
in my dream,

purple in the sunlight
of my dream.

because they do not know

in the dead hours of night
you disassemble a piano

each shaped piece of wood a lever
the clutter of a pile of keys

beneath 87 and 88 a dime from ‘18
a bingo chip—  translucent red

the hidden edges of 63 through 75
stained from communion wine in ‘94

due to the chaotic situation
no consensus on the number

hammer 46
broken at the shaft

nearly lost
recovered from a potted plant

irreparably untunable
the piano cost a 100 dollars

to lay your fingers on the keys
and watch the hammers strike

for weeks you hear the silenced note
for years the ghosts beneath the bridge

like bamboo bells

once we watched the sunrise
through leaded window-glass

ate pheasant using silverware
inherited from aunts

now a spider waits for moths
among the toppled bricks

hollow husks of insects
rattle in the sills

harvest

i will walk across a field
with this basket i have made
the basket i was given
still some seeds to sew
empty basket made of woven thorns
i will walk across a field
dig among the roots
onions and potatoes
radishes
odor of dirt
how many years
beneath fingernails of hope
how white teeth gleam in sun

beneath my bed

a cigar box
i don't know what to do with
a volunteer firefighter badge
a 10 year pin from Harbison Walker
a 25 year pin

he used to give us pennies
flattened by 30 ton cars

all the jack knives bought as presents
now a tin of ground-down blades
all the watches arrested at random hours
what can they say of that hollow in time
all the Chinese money he brought back from WW II
unrolling across the floor

overtime

just solve this one last problem 
before going home for the evening... 

you round a corner
startle a thousand cowbirds

they lift into the sinking sunlight
their shadows climb a yellowed wall

you chase after them
running amidst their frenzy

you can't stop

if you do
you'll plummet to your death 

solitary

a small square hole
brilliant with light

     you are given what you are given
     the rest you take
     or leave alone
     abandon by the side of a road
     in some other country
     this place is not your own

sometimes they let you speak
other times they close the small square door

     you're left with what you can't abandon
     a few useless stones 
     from places you can never go back to
     a garden of poppies
     gone to seed
     crepe-paper petals
     a leather-bound bible reeking of incense
     you cannot mask the smell of death
     the raised scar on her sternum
     she addresses you as Jesus
     handfuls of dirt
     dislodged from a world of untruth
     two worn shillings covering eyes

the door opens
small square hole full of bright light

     her fingers perched upon the edge
     carmine color of lipstick
     mouthing inaudible words
     rounded edge of jaw
     what can you trade
     for the concept of time
     face buried in wind
     same old story
     woman and man
     how a glance lasts an instant
     you raise your head to speak

the small square door closes again

     a three tined fork slides off a white napkin
     rattles across a checkerboard floor
     a purple blouse
     her pulled-back hair
     consternation behind sunglasses
     somewhere a bent candle still burns
     a downpour washes away trash in Paris streets
     her swelled nipples
     cotton camisole
     everything ends at the ocean
     and its odor of salt
     how afternoon sun dries your face
     many years cannot kill the taste

a diffuse glow
through the small square hole

     she tells you to come to the house tonight
     asks you to bring your shoebox of moths
     she wants you to shake the dust from their wings
     rain makes a new kind of silence
     caught up in the heights of pines
     dew at 3am
     the whole night sky is yours alone
     long ago you named all the phenomena
     surrendered their wonder
     now you seek it through others eyes
     that's why they still keep you around
     you've learned to give them
     nearly everything they want

each new day

the threshed out
kernels of wheat
milled into flour

baked into bread
for strangers those
who would starve

without it who
always come back
in need of

more claiming it
with all manner
of hands each

misshapen by what
the years have
brought we all

must take this
burdened stalk of
wheat bent with

harvest broken for
us in every
field by those

whose names are
lost within this
silence of loaves

requiem

In this alley stinking of urine
littered with cigarette butts
waste-water pools,
mirrors the contours of clouds
blue sky
the sun--
a single point of brilliant light.

He could speak to this
until in shadow
beneath the bridge,
unacknowledged,
he was beaten to death
for a pint of gin.

heart as lesser creatures

dots darken and swell on pages
of a library book–
i worry about the rain

she uses the words gently fall
when she can just say
fall

i lay my hand
upon the bareness of her shoulder
instead of on her bare shoulder

grey beneath pines
a hummingbird appears
circling with eager drone

i want to knock it from the air
ask it
just what the fuck it's doing

fireflies in the forest
of my youth

shadow of the hills

returning

how surprised i am to find you
in your neighbor's bed of iris
(left untended many summers
before their cottage in the oaks)
you're on your knees
among the purple blossoms
a mound of wilting weeds behind you
there is sweat upon your brow
you look at me and smile
your hair as red as ever
as if you'd never lost it
i cannot help but help you
i bend to pull the final weed
you carry a whole armful
i have only one
i say it is a wild carrot
you lay your hand on mine
no, not wild carrots
all the misplaced years

jonah to the fish—

i knew i couldn’t save myself
so leapt into the unrelenting sea

resigned to death
i was well-pleased never to return

but who can speak
of the vastness of a sea

its unknown places
deep within darkness

your shadow passed
in silence

your measureless form
hidden in many waters

i was drowning and swallowed by waves
when you were called to take me in

and bear me down
to the bottom of the world

there
where there was no light

no hope
only one voice speaking

those unstirred waters
no warmth nor subsistence for you

yet you kept me
all the given days

as if your whole being meant nothing to you
until those words were spoken

and then in silence you ascended
through some uncharted way

to birth me on the blinding shore
of a new and sunlit land.

lost

and now you come back
with the rain
following the path of lightning
you beat on the door
in a landscape of flashes
i see all the drowned kittens
returned to life
mewing for milk
amidst inconsolable night
the yard is unraked
the house empty
what can i feed them
he is already here
waiting with ball peen and sack
is it only the weather
the way your wet dress
clings to your body
strands of dripping hair
the slightness of you
curling against me
as day begins to break

a bear and a boat

there's an old story
about a rowboat abandoned at sea
it's the same story
as the one about a wounded bear
staggering on a crag--
the spinning of the world
has been arrested
stars revolve without it
there are no tears which are not made
from parts of other stories
or rather there is only one story
told again and again
about how an oar cuts water
excavates a certain volume--
how much is removed
how much returned
what do you do with what's left over
there are no waters
that can fill a cavity
dug from fifty years of marriage
a man of ninety
tries to fill it with stories
too often retold
a bear in a boat
crosses an ocean
returns to the forest
where it was born
at midnight
when the night is cold
and overflowing with stars
the bear is summoned
by voices it has always known
called back again and again
by a name almost forgotten
the boat is empty and oarless
rocking on waves
the boat lies on shore
overturned
left for many years
its gray wooden frame
long surrendered to sand

orginality

Take Larry for instance,
he opened a service-station
in the middle of nowhere
and then added a bar--
for don't we all know those
whose car problems drive them to drink?
The paint has flaked
those years of sun have bleached
but who besides Larry
uses overturned pistons as cups?
Though some will tell you
his whiskey tastes like gasoline.

my contract with light

tell me which of the stars
have seared holes through all of my things—
or is it just the same quantum of light
returning again and again
now demanding the only bowl I have left

I confess in a whisper it is too late
thousands of years have already claimed it
white shards entwined by roots
that refuse to surrender
clinging black soil

but light is incessant
immutable
and wants everything back

apparitions

all the ukulele players
appearing out of fog
they walk by with their black cases
maybe forty men with beards
they vanish the same way

a violinist in a white dress
shining on the stage
she slides her bow and plays
back and forth
and back and forth

she's young enough
to be her daughter
and maybe not
a mathematician
but it doesn't matter
we're just dancing in a haze

what then?

shall the fissures of Earth actually win?
shall new continents form without our knowing?
how many dreams have already spilled from shaking hands?
and where do these dreams go,
washed away by rain
rattled into crevices by thunder
planted to be re-born as apples?
maybe all gardens are just the first garden
and the creme flesh of woman
shall once again have no fear of scales.
I cannot imagine a forest without rain,
life that doesn't feed off those that came before.
which falling star can claim to be an angel
or a bluebird with a broken wing?
don't cats already know each sparrow is numbered?
where is the factory of birds?
which politician could tell me?
I would vote for her
even if all the other candidates were women
just as clever.

Can any of this be denied?

Your very flesh
lying against the spillage of day
sky refusing light
promise of apricot--
a blush of red
against some yellow
never again to taste
pressed between lips
breaking taut skin
perfected edge
of worn down teeth.
They tell how kernels will settle
into August earth
long before autumn makes its claim.
If you do not believe in time
still it lays its reach of days
sings its strained melody.
Breathe its soft air
open your hungered mouth
to the nectar of lost fruit
apricots lifted into sky
beyond time's tale of centuries.
Who counts all these useless years? 
Why do so many demand them back
as if they could be bothered
for one last meal of love,
another's soft skin
pressed against your naked flesh,
can you not be warmed in any other way?

for those now dead

between a native's stone found in fields my father plowed
and a broken bough from a pine on a hill I climbed as a boy
I grind this fragrance from sprigs of lavender my mother planted
red stalks of rhubarb dug from her yard--
these I grow for pie 

sand

Rid yourself of all shattered glass
all the fucking bones
remove all the mirrors
excoriate all wood from the wastes.
Let the desert in
let winds eat everything away
even sound.
Let there be only sky
light
and crystalline sand.
Allow one single insect
a beetle clicking its wings
dying from want of water.
Let the poem contain only the word was
which indicates the past tense of to be
no more struggles with hope in the future tense.
Fill your mouth full of sand
spit it out
open your lips and breathe until they become
flakes of translucent skin.
Is it God that is nascent in desert?
What is this patten of shadowworn by a wandering Sun?
Nothing but light crossing an infinity
grain after grain
shifted by wind
into transecting crescents
rippling on and on.
All words are spelled there
and buried—
footprints eroded.
A young antelope
separated from its mother
finds her tracks and follows
but in the wrong direction.
The world itself is not cruel
hasn't God painted this desert?
The whole universe can be mapped
into a single grain of sand.
This is only circumstance.
We sift without knowing.
Not one is righteous.
Even the Moon
riddled with junk
is no longer holy.

passage

I was not given to the keeping of time
minutes   hours        days
continually spilling out of my pockets

I break a branch
and years bleed away

frozen lake
grey beneath a grey sky

water once flowed--
a visage

of a grandfather clock
deep in the cold

time

time beaten into a broken watch
rattling among branches that would not bud
a time of blood
tasting of burnt dirt
that kept spilling
out of my pockets
out of my hands
and into that part
of the past we both have discarded
time which no longer turned
which could not be seen
which shot like a wobbling stick
into the heart of a dog
that kept running
long after it was dead

dead like a bone
hollow and gray
carved into flute
carved into holes
through which no water flowed
holes that held air
holes holding breath
letting it go
but not without sound
offering only a path through the sands
a hollow    that shards used to bound
a hollow   which hands used to cup
a hollow  nobody whispers
half-tasting of fractured sky

if not for dust

if not for dust
settling on everything
how could I understand
this passage of days

scattered amongst time
that no longer keeps anything--
a few kind words

someone who lingers--
just to ask
to lay a hand without asking

even my phone is a minute behind
doesn't anyone see--
these minor anachronisms

a day ago
a week
this very same spot

just last year
pressing our legs into each other
as if in oath

the girl behind the bar
never sees a thing
I take back our glasses

she fills yours with water
I drink from it
as if you were still here

now   where there is no dust--
no measure of either
days passed nor days yet to come

remember the game

we used to play in June
while the maples were greening
and the sweet-cherries ripe

how one by one
I’d take those shiny dark—
the inside of your thigh—

each ripened fruit
worked cool in between

my fingers flat
easing the warmth of your—

when Christ was crucified
each red tributary
told of how they—

over your white—
against your—
until you’d squeeze them together

how juice of sweet-cherries seeped
from the press of your legs
soaked into dusk

how Mary did bathe
His tattered flesh
water and blood

beneath greening maples
I would suckle this juice
from the shade of your—

Magdalena as hollow as the tomb
tell me where they have taken him
and I will bring him back
there will come a day
maranatha!
when the dead shall rise into the sky

why can’t you remember
the game we used to play
when the maples were greening
and the sweet-cherries ripe

maranatha!
there will come a day

rake

how many seasons of grass
wound in spokes
and rusted rims

hollow hubs
where once-black grease
clung thick with odor

silent row of iron tines
rarely now do children come
to sit upon the high-raised seat

a long un-coupled hitch
settled into earth
gear and lever seized into a curiosity

poplars have taken back the fields—
when you slit the bark with fingernail
you loose a scent like fresh-cut hay

you were never meant for plenty

but to walk among the windswept pines
to pause before the swelling of wave after wave
sea washing over each solemn stone
to lose yourself in hair you shall never caress

each petal of crocus
surrenders its purple
each rose-colored tulip—
lost before summer

you come home to the shore
a familiar odor of death in the breeze
you come home but never arrive
you are always departing—

how to make a killing machine

start with a child
(the child you once were for example
before your twelfth birthday)
make him witness someone murdered
preferably from his home-town
preferably while his home-town is burning
—by someone I mean his mother, your mother—
threaten to cut off his arm
if he refuses to kill his sister
shoot him full of drugs
before the sun goes down
preferably amphetamines
keep him up all night
early the next morning
teach him how to shoot a rifle
first at empty tins of cooking oil
then at gunny-sacks of straw—
use people instead
teachers from his school and church
give him more amphetamines
until half the fucking country’s gone
then dump him by an open sewer—
let someone else try to turn him back
into a human being

scrawled on torn paper

a little further on from Spain
you'll find Morocco

an all-day taxi-ride from Marrakesh
takes you to a village in the south

from there travel far into the Atlases
toward oblivion and wind

I must surrender

all the colors of that place in time adorned with holly hocks, and chrysanthemums where my mother and father were younger than me, their sky-blue corvette, black revolvers and beagles— burned by chemical processes into cracked emulsions I cannot repair; a drawer of dead watches that have lost their war against unquantified time; pocket knives, blades of tempered steel ground down to impotent points and turned to rust; boxes of pencils sharpened to stubs, depleted by the manufacturing of words and diagrams lifted to sky in ash; all the promises I once made, attempts to do better. I keep reminding my hands that burning candles has nothing to do with the diminishing wax. They never learn about light.

gusts

why are these children running across a red-painted bridge—
they laugh at petals of a locust blowing in the breeze

I sit at this broken table made of wood
far away from here I taste spices on the wind

it is warm and sunny
and our eyes have met again

I am here with my tarnished brass scale
weighing this dead fish of forever
against all the paper moments

they blow away
lifted high into the blue
like many yellow maple leaves caught up in a whirl

this crevice i have stumbled into

how can i not be thankful—
in darkness everything returns

the world’s many fields
wavering in sunlight
and shimmering with dew

understand

there comes a time when everything is taken

give what is asked
empty all hope
all will
all of what will become

he was also despised

empty yourself
of what you've been filled with
a vessel poured out

this is not your home
you must learn this yourself--
hope deferred makes the heart sick

but a longing fulfilled
is a tree of life

gasoline

a scientific term i don't recall
many colors in its sheen
that shimmer on a hot day
how fire burned inglorious
my father's brother--
uncle i would never have
fuck the Philippines and war
which can't be waged without it

half a world away

riding his bicycle down a country road
he is still on Zanzibar

Stone Town behind them
they’re headed to the east beaches

he coasts beneath mango trees
seeking shelter from equatorial sun

in the afternoon's silence
she pedals just beyond reach

Stone

One day he found a grain of sand
among the lint in his pocket.
It had a curious feel
he kept rolling it around
between his fingers.
He didn't notice
that it had grown into a pebble,
smooth and almost burgundy red.
When it was the size of a gemstone
he had a jeweler set it in a ring
that he was fond of wearing
until it bent the posts
and he had to wear it
on a chain around his neck.
It never occurred to him
that he should discard it
and when it grew too heavy
he carried it on his shoulders.
One day they found him
dead beneath it.
They buried him with it.
Now his grave is a hill
where strange mushrooms grow. 
Do not pick them
for they are poison.

Rusumo Bridge

but this migration of possessions
is familiar

one day at the soldiers quarters
wives and mistresses begin to smile

all the china plates
silverware without tables

nearly every man in the border-unit
with a boom-box on his shoulder

UNHCR tarps
US vegetable oil appearing in the market

belongings carried across kilometers
over ridges of rock and swamps

borne —by remnants of families
whole neighborhoods—

through relentless rain
the river swelling

with those whose passage
required more

dispossessed of heads and hands
they accumulate beneath the falls

a modern lesson

his mother taught him math--
instead of using x, y and z
she used a pig, cow, and fly

only later did he understand
what she was showing him

his father was a pig
his mother a cow
he was the fly

unlike Isadora

you shall bear no photo of your dead
nor twice wound scarf
about your own broken neck

how a single cloud consumes the evening sky
loosens each heavenly body
from its assigned place

without intent you remove furniture
in nearly the same way
the mirror's tarnished light

ask yourself which is worse
losing one who goes unasked or one who chooses
to go on without you

a hanged poet
farewell friend written in blood—
both of these from lack of ink

a drawer of dry fountain pens
bottles of dust
irreparable stains of blue

whose desk is this anyway
whose has it always been—
this was never your home

a few more things

so many empty rings
all the gemstones gone
I find a few scattered in snow
under moonlight at 3am

I possess many magnifying glasses
an enormous pine cone
all this amplification of scale is wonderful
but I seek to diminish

the art I'm interested in—
miniature landscapes
painted by dead artists
a dirt road leading to a pond that isn't there anymore

all colors are muted
the light grown frail
the distant hills
have turned into shadows

more and more I write
about nothing
about only a few crows
rising from a scribble of branches

I undertake a journey
trying to discover some answer
I come back
with a only two pieces of turquoise

there's not much left—
small wooden canisters
where I collect fragments
of things I have broken
 
my wife tells me trivial things
keeps filling my pockets with stones
she's heaving me out
of this boat we've made together

even I'm getting sick of myself
knowing what I've seen
of my rare attempts—
trying to be human

counterproductive

They were going over
areas of study
I kept saying that's about the human body

the other day I forgot my hat
and when I found my hat I lost my gloves
and when I had my hat and gloves
a friend came running with my backpack
she said what are you thinking so much about?

her hair had caught in my beard
I said so
now there are many days between us

It is February and I am old
I have way too many notebooks
piling up in my room

my room is so dusty
I keep stepping on stones
I've collected them over the years
I bring everything in
I sleep in a forest

recent excavations

what remains
at the edge of town
where all the numbers are gone
from the only mailbox you’ve ever known

where no cigarette’s touched
for a thousand years
a handmade ashtray wrapped
in newspaper

and all that’s left
are holes in the carpet
where a reclining chair once sat
during the era of television

what do rose petals signify
especially now
the bush is just a few grey branches
and worn-down thorns

wheat pennies and peace dollars
end up in other places
scattered
among foreigners

why is it
everything you’ve ever made
or given
is now returned

do you know
going through shoeboxes of letters
where the others are
the ones you were supposed to save

what disparity
between something given
and a taken thing--
oh such absence of hands

let us lie down

how many times
have i asked the stars
without any need of answer

i am certain it is i
and not you
if blame is required

in the lawless winter night
clouds part
Arcturus claims the east

i pause in summer too
just to face some evening breeze--
there's also room enough for you

don't bother dividing
all these things that will outlast us
i've already surrendered my portion

primrose

Can you bundle up the sea
everything in it
and send it back home?

Once I found a tuft of buffalo hair
and mailed it to my lover
how could I not?

It had such a curious quality
both fuzzy and coarse.
I stuffed it in a box made for a ring--
imagine her surprise.

When you see all the color
in an instant of sky
you want to keep it.

Mom used to grow evening primrose
it bloomed when the day was through
such a pale yellow flower in the dusk.

lipstick

red lipstick on a white cup
red lipstick
on a white cup
her lipstick
red lipstick
her lips
on a cup
red lips
her red
red
red

toppled

wind carves the sleepless forest
lifts in tumult
then lies down

it wanders among pines
bears no voice
of malice nor praise

the last vase broken

sprigs of lavender scatter across dark ice
too dull to mirror the moonless stars
surrendering in droves

as if what cleaves ice
also tears a sequined gown
from the frigid breast of night

vestiges

Calciferous stains still ring
rocks overgrown with briars.

How many years have emptied
that lost creek?

Vines entwine all evidence
of an old traveled way.

Were there ever any arbutus
growing among the pines?

Smooth stones once paved a path
back to the ruins of an inheritance

stolen by shadows of crows
hording echoes in crevices

beneath moss-covered cairns
where once stood statues

now desecrated by the anarchy
of a failing mind.

bare now many winters

the sun burns everything to dust
the faded colors
petals flaked to powder

with what shall i dye the answer
which word offers peace
how long ago the basket emptied

willows cut from living tree
a blade against the circling bark
sweetness of the verdant turned gray