from the bank
I see the ghost of a pier
old posts standing solitaire
a ramp rotted, long gone

moored to one stubborn beam,
a bass boat, tethered to time, rocking
with the whims of the waters
fickle, but steady

storms upriver may hasten
the current, bloat the stream
though the flow never ends,
lapping against the hull

hiding inside are more ghosts:
phantom footfalls of fishermen,
odors as old as Eden, sounds
which once made songs

by those who cranked the motor,
manned the rudder and cast the lines
into the depths, seeking a tug--a pull
that meant dinner, a small success

a simple surrender of one species
to another, from beneath the surface
into the sun, a sublime suffocation,
then stillness before the gutting

many a day ended this way
the boat buoyed again to the dock
bellies then filled from the sacrifice,
the waters licking long the wood

that's the road trip
the boy wanted, once he discovered
the universe was that big

he asked Dad, the closest
god he could find, what was outside
that 93 billion light years

the father did not know
but was open to the notion vast space
was but a bubble

one the lad saw in his bath water
the night before; a mystic mass the boy tried to grasp
but vanished with a finger's touch

he sat bedside with his great grandmother
stroking a hand laced with what he saw as
tiny blue rivers, flowing from a thin wrist
dammed by ancient knuckles

boulders chiseled by eighty-four years

he read from his book while Mommy
dozed in the chair, and nurses squeaked
in and out, all with half smiles he could
not decipher, for Grammy was sick

and when his mother was awake, she cried

he hadn't seen her tears before;
he tried not to look, preferring his book
with its pictures of the sun, orbiting
planets and mazy moons

and spaces in between where heaven might hide

he understood most of its words,
and none were of heavens--unless noxious gasses
and swirling clouds of dust were the winds which
whipped through the pearly gates

but his seven wise years knew that was not so

when he turned to the page of the
penultimate planet from the sun,YOU-ruh-nuss
he discovered it took four score and four years
to orbit our star once

math's mystery may have eluded him

though coincidence was not yet
in his lexicon, and now he knew Grammy
had her times around the sun, her eighty four
equaling one for the great tilting Uranus

proud buck
frozen, close
heart in my
cross hairs

I squeeze
the trigger.
nothing
happens

except birdsong

as if
they know
some doe was saved
from widowhood

by a
mystic
misfire

where will they take me
this thick, whirling cloud
of birds?

I lower my shotgun;
my targets were to be
a skein of geese

(corpulent, impertinent
avian freaks I have seen
peck children's shins)

these smaller birds
perform a choreography electric,
black against blue

now I know the meandering
meaning of mesmerize--my eyes
glued to the skies

more agape than the hunter
in me--wishing to watch this wave
undulate an eternity

but alas, the flock turns
into a naked sun; I am forced
to shield my eyes

my hand blocks the blare
of light, with it, the whipping tail of
their liquid flight

when I lower it, they are
but a haze near the horizon, performing
magic for another audience

Father comes to me in dreams
a night phantom with conundrums I never
solve in the light of day

still he is there, lurking, locked
in memory's vault--a safety deposit box
for which I have no key

but who I have chosen to be
is an untenable version of a me
he will never see

for a dead man did not truly write
my script--he's not even watching
as I walk upon the stage

though she sat only two
pews farther back, her understanding
of things was different from his  

she imagined the body of the woman
in the casket in quiet, pacific repose, spirit departed,
welcomed already in some beaming crystal sky  

he saw red lips painted on
a powdered white face--eyelids invisibly
sewn shut over empty sockets  

for he heard the big people say
she had donated her corneas, and someone
told him what those were  

she believed, as she had been told,
the woman would suffer no more, and live forever
in a place surrounded by benevolent ghosts    

he did not understand how this thing
called soul could be so hasty in leaving a body
where it had lived for eighty years  

he had watched water drain from a tub  
and smoke from fires leave stone chimneys
and long hang gray in white skies  

she had seen the same, but when it came
to this strange thing called death, the word
she heard conjured magic, not tragic  

he only knew Daddy was not smiling,
and Mommy’s eyes were dripping tears; not one
person in the big room laughed or played    

except for the girl two pews back  
who brushed a doll’s hair and spoke to it
as if it could hear

"We forever praise the artists for the paintings
that they display.
The beauty of their work as the brushes dance
while revealing the waves ocean sprays.
A sunset grabs two lovers hearts staring at
the portrait for them to see.
Holding each others hands their minds are suddenly
set free.
Yes, we've had our Da Vinci's, Picasso's, and
Michelangelo's, but without the creation of Canvas,
Rembrant, and Van Gogh would of also been
two lost souls.
Yet, the true artist whom seems to never receive
praise. His creation of HIS earth became HIS Canvas,
and HIS stage.
His immaculate visions of beauty were given
to the earthly artists to see, but as for the paintings, they
were originally God's.
made possible for you, and for me,"

others in the ****** ascended
to their white, breathing heavens
one by one, as if saying goodbye,
to them, was a solitary act

leaving him alone,
on the high branch--he did not fall
when gusts shook the oak, though
during stillness, he dropped

to the next leafless limb,
there waiting for him patiently,
drenched in sunlight that made
the crow's coat glisten  

soon clouds blocked the sun,
downdrafts pounded the tree;
he did not fall, until
the skies cleared    

then, to the lowest limb
he descended, now but feet above
a blanket of leaves, soon
to be his bed

other creatures would come, communing
with him in their way: his flesh becoming
their flesh, a sacred chemistry for all life,
after its pitiless descent to death

Look outside when you read this.

Let's scream from a hill,
It's your life that's on the line
Nobody can pay for the "future"
It's not a guaranteed luxury
There is nobody who life owes
I know today isn't the best
And tomorrow is a cup of whiskey
So, right now, for me it's this;
I want beauty in my sight, always
Now, not the flip through tv channels
Non-substantial beauty most need
I'm talking about different beauty
Beauty like James Browns' voice
The beauty of the strong helping the weak
The man who is considerate to man
The woman carrying her child
The rich aiding the ones in need
The beauty when loving someone
Is more that grouped words
But making sure their lover is warm
The beauty you feel when
The hopeless fight for hope
When nobody else will believe them
Beauty, when a man gives his hand
Even when the world eats their flesh
The beauty in the eyes of fathers
When we know our sons future
Will be a battle they won't see
But we will have the story to tell them

The beauty miles away or feet away
Of the strong who help those
When then have nothing themselves
Except their good hearts.