when we ask, do we
believe, or do we ask so
that we can believe

sun peeks through the stones
first light upon the altar
a dagger rises

he left the floor first
and she danced on, until her
final note was played

to be a star is
to be a lonely sparkle
crowded by darkness

night's pale eye stares down
the shadows are long tonight
i. am. transforming.

old phone receiver
cord curling from the damp ground
a scratchy voice:  "help"

winter dreams of spring
dreams of summer dreams of fall
dreams of winter sleep

be assured:  the way
things are right now become the
way things were back then

everything's fiction
everything is non-fiction
everything's fiction

colors come in waves
moonlight steel drum reflections
*** lips.  fade away

tiniest fractions
of lost time, framed and frozen,
warped by perception

i started the morning like a champ by
spilling grape nuts all over my kitchen
and i don't know if you've ever done that
but i wouldn't wish it on my very
worst enemy because apparently
loose grape nuts are indistinguishable
from shattered glass when you step on them with
bare feet and i know no matter how good
a job i do cleaning it up there will
always be a random grape nut around
and that made me think about whoever
lives in this apartment next will wonder
where the grape nuts came from and that puts a
smile on my face so i guess that means there
is in fact balance to the universe

overcast, slight chill
theater popcorn scent drifts
my footsteps echo

music fills a room
like a heart fills up a chest

listen.  breathe.  listen.

got caught on a tree, just had to tell you
a branch drew blood, and on my arm printed
an entrance stamp to this special venue,
written in red: a place for the wounded.

“how are things going, i wish you were here
what’s the weather like and have a good time
how ‘bout a toast with your favorite beer
i hate to go now, it feels like a crime”.

something made me stop, i wasn’t yet done,
i looked back and saw, while nursing my scar,                    
the colors and shapes had blurred into one:
a singular vision, clear from afar.

the carved stones nestled in the grass, just mown
looked like lost feathers from a flock, just flown

i'm a midwesterner, born and bred.  but
i lived in the neon dust bowl for a
little while and learned that open space is
good for the soul.  souls need to breathe, and roam
like horses over the sands.  i loved the
drive from Las Vegas to L.A. because
there's nothing like the desert wind in your
lungs to make you feel like living again.
something pulls me back to that time and place.
i don't know exactly why, but i guess

you just have to return to be reborn.

blue-collar artists
that's what we all are, looking
for perfect beauty

it was cold and sunny
and as i drove into my parents' neighborhood i saw
my dad walking the dog
i rolled down the window and shouted, "hello"

(the dog was so excited to see me)

my dad helped me with my taxes
and my mom said her scar from surgery was healing well

i later went to see a play
with only nine people in the audience
but the two actors were on fire

they both were eating apples
and one was smashed on the stage
underneath an angry character's foot

i stared at that crushed apple,
white and red concentric patterns
flattened into the brown stage floor
like a painting yet hung

a work of art
at the end of a cold and sunny day

your hands are doorways to my home.  take a
look inside.  dawn spills into the hall, onto
the wall, splashing across pictures filled with
yesterdays and naked space left over
for tomorrows.  time pulls and pulls, stretching
and stretching until the shadows are so
long they cover everything and all light
has surrendered and retreated in shame.

i've never seen a new mexico sunset
the desert rocks like watchmen in silhouette
and a wax sky melting down in violet and crimson
like a secret ceremony from some forgotten religion

a new mexico sunset i've most certainly never seen
the clouds bowing their heads for the rising night queen
who comes in with the wind and kicks up the sand
and blackens the sky with a wave of her hand

the sun sets in new mexico
what a beautiful show
my dreams fill with colors
my eyes don't yet know

i wanted to write something about your
energy and how i like being in
its halo.  something about how i want
to dive beneath your sun-kissed surface and
feel what makes your heart beat.  the metaphors
aren't quite right and the flow is off but then
again, emotions often live between
the words so i guess this is what i want
to say after all.  please pardon the mess.

i think i'm going for something that is:

generally personal
and
monochromatically colorful
but
unaffectedly pretentious
yet
apathetically emotional
plus
elegantly ******
or
tastefully gaudy
despite
     being
crudely delicate,
idealistically realistic,
and
revoltingly beautiful.

behind her tear-soaked eyes,
a fresh memory as she slipped off to sleep:

with pink hues in the clouds,
she stood before the mouth of the night
there wasn't much time
before the swallowing of the light

so she ran to the waves
dragging her buddy, tracks in the sand
a chill and a splash as
the ocean leapt up and emptied her hand

he was ratty and ragged, but
stitched to her heart and stolen beyond reach
a lesson in letting go
on her first day at the beach

gloves, boots, eyes and breath
neon fingers grip the steam

time doesn't live here

your hot dust kisses stick to my sweat and
sink beneath my skin and melt into my
blood and rush through my heart and pour from the
cuts that you made with your tongue and dry in
the wind that carries them back to your lips
as

dust

deep inside the mountain tunnel

a needle of light

a dream cast all in blue
choked on trapped steam as
the rising roar of the train's whistle
blows stillborn from a weathered pen
deprived of ink for the final pages
of an invisible masterpiece

she said she didn't want to get old as
she danced in her red and white striped sweater.
i thought, "your eyes are young" as i looked down
and tried to keep the beat as the music
erased the seconds from our minds until
they passed like secret, unspoken whispers.

memory is a story.  it's not a
clean story.  it is a story without
a beginning, middle or end.  it has
many words and pictures that are unclear.
plot points can be revealed at awkward times.  
supporting characters become leads and
leads become extras.  the narrator can
be unreliable.  rising action
can build to an underwhelming ******.
quotes seem to appear from unknown sources.
it is full of story threads that don't go
anywhere, like romances that never
bloom and confrontations that won't happen.
many problems are never resolved and
there are stories within the story with
no discernible meaning.  the hero
confronts many obstacles, but it is
uncertain as to whether a goal was
achieved by doing so.  despite these flaws,
the story reveals a truth, like all good
stories do.  the reader is the author,
and the author the reader.  "and so on".

saw a movie once where a submarine
went into a tunnel underneath a
glacier and surfaced in a tropical
paradise full of dinosaurs and cave
people, then a volcano erupted
and destroyed a bunch of stuff.  i thought to
myself, "this movie is really about
people's hearts", but i guess everything is.
sometimes the world speaks to you in weird ways.

sometimes you make a picture in your mind
of someone you knew or someone you lost
it's torn and the colors are faded but
sometimes a picture is all that you got

"what is it like to think of a poem?"

"it's like walking down an empty street at
midnight, listening to your footsteps, then
hearing a song way off in the distance,
somewhere around the corner, maybe from
an old radio in a windowsill
and you only hear certain words, certain
phrases, so you write them down and hope that
in some broken way they read like music."

always seeking the
exact words to marry for
the perfect haiku

looking at the trees through a hole in the
ceiling as i feel a breath of air from
a dream i had where your skin was warm and
was it really a memory i don't
know because it felt real in dusk's half-light
before sleep pulled me away from time and
into a bed of leaves where there is a hole
in the floor that i'm afraid to look through

the valley of gold
closer and closer, always
just over the ridge

breathe in the colors of the city and
exhale into a steel morning.  taste warm
sprinkles of sun dust on your tongue as dawn
plays a flaming concerto.  the shrieks of
winter like a newborn's howl sail
above the frosted sands of an empty
coast as a vision of blackbird sirens
in formation, rippling like ebony
keys on a player piano.  this is
what it feels like to start over as the
longest song's final notes brush past your ears.

night snow
silent snow

hills like white waves
of rough paper
sprinkled with diamond dust

moonlight ribbons
flutter with the pines
as a gentle rush of winter
tickles our window

warming your hands
with mine

i daydream of watching
the night snow
the silent snow
with you

knowing you is as
easy as knowing the shape
of diving raindrops

poems are lyrics
to the songs inside my head
you will never hear

grizzled sentries pierce
curved blue ceilings, watching a
blooming floor of souls

red-and-white polka dots
float, twirl and fade across the floor
like glimpses of apples
through the falling snow

we are good as friends
probably bad as lovers
but i want you still

looking in the mirror he thought
when he wore his checkered suit
he resembled an unfinished skyscraper.

after the disastrous meeting on the 61st floor
he skipped the elevator
and took the stairs all the way down
until he was huffing and puffing his way
onto the sidewalk.

he took off his gray checkered jacket
and let the rain sculpt his brow
and carve through his fingers.

thoughts grew lighter
with each slash of watery wind across his cheeks.

soaked on the curb,
he knew he must seem pathetic
to the sinking eyes of passersby,
but he was calm.

content to be
a soul

under construction.

midnights in the hidden smoking rooms
and reading lounges
tucked deep in the crevices of Manhattan

the distant honking of tuxedo cars
and shiny-clack footsteps
through scattered manhole steam
that swirls like silver pinwheels

all the soundtrack noise in my head
as i move across the silent room
everyone's eyes in their books

except ours

a pile of old tvs at the edge of a road
below a "dead end" sign

some upright
some sideways
some upside down

still tuned

through their cracked screens
and broken dials
and crooked antennas

to a red, white and blue test pattern

drowning in the leaves of summer
when past loves are like attic ghosts
conjured from blood and sunlight

air sticks to your tongue
and the moon rises late

then the night breeze blows in
and flutters the sheets
as you flow downstream

under the leaves

a walk in the colorless city
shadowed by charcoal clouds

a dahlia hangs over the sidewalk
loose petals tumble with the rain
littering scarlet spots
into the black-and-white air

as the feel of your fingertips
cascades softly through
   my memory

i've cut myself on
your keen tongue too many times

*but the blood dries quick

The old giant sat on a green grass bed
between two mountains
and pulled a cloud right over his head.

But just before his eyes closed for a long, long night,
he knew he wasn't going on alone.
For he gazed upon a final graceful sight,
angels swimming in the colors of the

distant
  
  waning light.

to dream of a sea beyond white cliffs
where water bends around a pale sun
only to awake and stumble onto the living land
and feel the dirt between my toes

again and again and again

Two women.  A dove.
Barren trees.  A winter kiss.
Iced wings thaw in spring.