The toad! It looks like
it could belch
a cloud.

Poetry is like sculpture;
one removes everything,
that is not poem.

Know love, know loss
No love, no loss.

I want to pour into you
Melt to softness,
Like butter turning oil.

It started with nights
It ended in years
You brought me up
I made you better
We spent so much time
Conscious within each other
Sharing our bodies
Except for one tiny place in your heart
You kept that for you
Just in case
Plan B
And that part of you
Became that tool
That broke me time and again
But hey
You're really good with that sledgehammer

I think of something I'd like to tell you
in my bedtime voice, from a shared pillow
into your warm ear, but can't – so

I hide our secrets inside verses and
I author universes where, despite love's
disappointments, you're still here.

My friend says I was not a good son
you understand
I say yes I understand

he says I did not go
to see my parents very often you know
and I say yes I know

even when I was living in the same city he says
maybe I would go there once
a month or maybe even less
I say oh yes

he says the last time I went to see my father
I say the last time I saw my father

he says the last time I saw my father
he was asking me about my life
how I was making out and he
went into the next room
to get something to give me

oh I say
feeling again the cold
of my father's hand the last time

he says and my father turned
in the doorway and saw me
look at my wristwatch and he
said you know I would like you to stay
and talk with me

oh yes I say

but if you are busy he said
I don't want you to feel that you
have to
just because I'm here

I say nothing

he says my father
said maybe
you have important work you are doing
or maybe you should be seeing
somebody I don't want to keep you

I look out the window
my friend is older than I am
he says and I told my father it was so
and I got up and left him then
you know
though there was nowhere I had to go
and nothing I had to do