Now

What can be said of this moment?

A soft coverlet pulled back

Gauze curtains riffling beside an open window

A single white chicken standing in the morning mist

A herd of spotted cows, heads turned as one
watching the milk truck on its way out
to the road

and let us not forget
forget
forgotten

I can remember

I can remember when there seemed to be an order to things

If I did this, then this would happen
I I did not do this, then this would not happen

Order has Mutated
Order was a Joke
Order is no More

Life is happening in crinkly bits
that make no sense
My soul has flown the coop
and left me bereft for my self

Realizing there are no mistakes,
only a jury rigged semblance of life ahead
The royal We plods on

Look!
My coffee is getting cold
time to hoist high my wind ripped sails
and get on with todays mighty living

Murmuration

I take a breath of the cool air
let it out to join the ocean of  molecules
that surround this day.
My thoughts rise up like
birds up from the weeds
thousands of birds rise and
turn as one
a great black whale of the sky
which turns and swallows itself
then up and over
a giant mushroom cloud
the birds turn as one to form
a question mark before
settling back into the weeds

Lighten the Load

Taking an inventory: what to get rid of?
Black faux seal skin coat from Mother, long in her grave
Black lace scarf now in tatters that she once wore to church
Hair from dead husband, cut from his large lusty pony tail
Nails used to hang me from the cross
Quilt made from petrified tears
Notebook containing dreams from 1982
Notebook containing dreams from 1990
Photos of people now long gone and forgotten
Skull of tiny seabird found on the shore
Mildewed bible with mouse nibbled corners
Pressed flowers from first and only prom date
Rubber band ball
Love letter from first abusive boyfriend
Love letter from first non abusive boyfriend
Letter from Father where he says he loves me and I should be a good girl
Tiny holographic eyeball that stares at me from a silver frame
Wanting none of these things, they are put in a box
and moved
yet again to my new home

Ballast

The boat chugged slowly
around the headland
cutting through choppy waves
on its way to the harbor
the customary seagulls
sat on the cliffs and watched
as if waiting for some dreaded event
the boat waddled low in the water
it would not clear the bar
the sailors were throwing
heavy sisal bags over the side
ballast to lighten the load
whatever it was the gulls just hissed

Faith

For my Friend Brian

Faith is the Ballast
Some use Water
Others use Dragonwood

Caricature of Lola Montez's departure for America

Rondo in F

The operator sits down
a piano becomes a time machine
she presses the keys
and a message
from the eighteenth century
enters the room

although buried in an unmarked grave
“Wolfie” as he was affectionately called
etched out his thoughts
into the wall of time

sitting here, in this room
listening to that message sent
over two hundred years ago
I write these words on electric paper
a message folded and stuffed
into a crevice in that same wall

Percussion

She is the Percussion

tick tock

click clack

jingle jangle

Come to rattle yer cage

Ha Ha no one is safe

Kakoosh kakoosh

swish swish

peasoup peasoup peasoup

Come to rattle yer cage

The Apron

I asked Mr. Google
if he knew her
if he remembered her
he shrugged
I’m sorry he said
maybe if she had
done something important
or she was the mother of
someone important
then I think there would
be a line around here somewhere

turning away I wanted to say
I remember her
the smell of soap and cooking
imbedded deep in her apron
as I grabbed on
to steady my feet

Mother and Son

I'm  sorry

Its OK

I was so young

I know

How can you ever forgive me

Maybe I never will

Its OK

I'm sorry

I know

The Stories We Tell

A group of refugees with
tired road-worn feet
gather under a shading oak tree
and after resting for a while
started exchange their precious
      stories of home
good soil, sweet water, old friends
the perfect proportion of
sunny days and gentle rain
and after taking time to
complain about their situation
closed their eyes
remembering days and places
that never existed

No Perfection

Today is a day like any other day in my postage stamp yard blinding with white sun
Iridescent hummingbirds, royal purple petunias, green aphids and rusted rose leaves
Exist side by side
Floaty butterfly's are in decline while the ants quickly take over carrying their precious
Jade like aphids from leaf to leaf spreading disease while they make sweet milk for the colony

My life is expecting perfection; No fuck ups allowed

I could have been a flower or bird or aphid or ant
but stuck in human form
watching—weighing—wishing
There is no perfection,
Only the acceptance of its non existence

On Reading Love Poems

a human heart reaches for connection
however brief, out of solitary exposure
a bridge emerges from the mist.
we set foot on uncertain boards
without any sense of purpose
the curtain stirs in the heat of promise
not the safe tomorrow, that never comes
“she loves me, she loves me not?”
why ask?

14th Year in Cherryland

In the summer of their 14th year
that warm endless summer in Cherryland Park
his steely blue jeans melted 
against her soft brown corduroys like hot metal magma

pushing her hard into the fresh cut grass
exciting her allergies
causing welts up and down her naked suntanned arms

Red lacerations, later to be explained away with

                     I dont knows

Absentmindedly itching the swelling cross-hatching's
until they bled
all the while thinking 
of his tongue
and how cold it felt in her mouth

Given Enough Time

there are fourteen crossings
between here and there
pick one, just one
you will, of course, regret your choice
you always have,
given enough time
we all do,
given enough time
but today is your lucky day.
this you will remember
until Thursday becomes Friday
by the weekend your joy
will begin to thin and
the face in the mirror
will question certainty itself

The Art of Closure

Walk
Don't run when you see the signs:
eyes that never really look at you
a luminous body that does not glow
words that speak of nothing

If you are young it will be hard
to see and read these signs

Age can help define
and justify the leaving

Walk
slow but deliberate;
if you run you will get away
too fast and wont learn the lesson

On the other side is
light and sound and air

Ice Blue Eyes

a single face among faces
in a crowd on the street
ice blue eyes, coffee colored face
my heart stopped
         an instant
then the blood began to flow,
         in earnest
she knew she had this effect
both on men and on women
but didn’t understand why

I didn’t look away
as almost everyone did
she didn’t blink, searching my face
for some indication, some sign
maybe I had the answer

El Capitan

Arranged idly on his face
two staring orbs of clouded blue

His hand confessed to nothing
while it pawed the ice cubed air

Down below his palsied feet
danced to a happy tune
only he could hear

"turn up the volume El Capitan"
he sang into deepest echoic space

His lift off was successful and now he was free

The Rubber Glove

“You pointing your finger at ME?”
a quizzical look on my face
“You pointing your finger at me?”
in my best imitation of DeNiro
while the doctor, smiling,
snapped on his rubber glove.

Raynaud's Phenomenon

With one small word 

all the goodness had been wrung out of the day

Her secret silver hair now covered in hennas of tobacco brown

and at other times natural brown or natures brown

 When wanting excitement

black or very black

Now hung lank and languid over the computer terminal

 Raynuad's blue fingers scratching at the keyboard

searching Google for the meaning of life

He walks by and coughs

her fingers keep moving

she does not even look up

Silver Seagull

The pure silver seagull
wrapped its wings
around my finger
“it’s your totem,” you whispered
     (we were into totems in those days)
as you handed it to me
it turned out to be a going-away present
I never saw you again
and thirty years later
I discovered where you escaped to
wrote you a letter
which you never answered