What’s True
Note: This poem was written shortly before the birth of my oldest daughter What’s true in this warm and rowing cave I move I see quite far despite the darkness The light I feel is strange to this tightness and constriction growing in me I moved once so freely all around danced and wound and […]
Games
My Baltic house may be seedyNot up to your blue BoardwalkSince I don’t charge you rentYou can judge my intentBut now you own my whole block we play games My right foot Twists to blueYou rise with a hand on greenI counter. You lean.I wonder: Are we falling?Red, and both of us are sprawling I […]
The Room is Quiet Now
& Backstory
I sit on the patio where thefine delicate scent of her flowersdrifts in the airThe hospice nurse’s hand on my shouldertells me the machines and tubeshave been removedWhen I entershe is lying quietlybut her eyes seek me outIt is time I don’t want to get the ring past the knuckleBut she opens her eyes, insistingI […]
The Shape of Death
What the shadow line leaves behindlingers, leaving shapes now defined I wander among the curved thoughtsPush gently on the rounded memoriesand watch their surfaces distortStanding still, I wait to be impaledby the sharp points of regret My mistakes cloud the evening skybringing the rain pouring down my faceBut the kindness in the windrouses my feet […]
The Judge Wore Pumps
& Backstory
It’s hard to look people in the eye whenyour hand and foot shackles drag youdown but you see plenty on the scuffedlinoleum of the corridors checked inschoolroom patterns of light anddark not white or blue anymore becausenothing here is the way it started but isworn by the passing of the prison chanclason your feet and […]
Rocky Peak
Nice to earn the viewfrom my favorite peak againWriting this from one ofmy sitting rocksThis one is at the topIt’s JulyFirst time I’ve pushed itsince April Every time I call my youngestdaughtera few rings go bybefore she answersThere was thatearly morning phone callThe one her fingers remembereven when her brain forgets“Sweetie, I had a heart […]