If I were to describe my day
narrate my movements
write a poem about the bluebird on the fence,
call out my dead brother’s name,
decide to cook supper tonight,
or speak my feelings of jealousy,
who would listen?

And if before finishing my narrative
I decide it is not worth
anyone pausing to spend
the time or energy
to read or listen,
then how far would I get in my effort
to even write a word,
speak a phrase,
think deeper than a layer of dust,
or feel anything beyond the weight of shame
prompting my doubts?

But if I think
someone MIGHT read or listen,
then  it might be worth the effort.

If I think there is definitely
an audience of One
who cares to stop and really pay attention
then yes
I'll write it.
I'll speak it.

We take time
to read from our wisdom books.
We ask questions,
pausing to think
before we speak.
We tell stories from our journeys.
We laugh,
tears on the brink of our eyes.
We speak from the tulip bulbs
of the gratitude
about to spring from our *******.
We sigh
upon the fruit
of this interlude together.

You did not sing to me
in the cool of the evening
nor plant a lyric in my slumber at noon.

I did not breathe in the your joy
as I freely swung in the blue sky
peered upward in the pail of the balloon.
  
You were gone when my stomach tensed
scanning the spread sheet
my stocks trending downward.

Hammering on my patio project
sweat spilled from my brow.
You, absent from my now.

I blamed you for leaving me,
for my edgy mood and emptiness.
But it was I who slammed the door to the sweet  vapors
of your spirit as I absorbed myself
in the foggy persuasions of my evasions.

If we are obedient
we will be broken.

When I submit to my calling
as a human being,
if I am true to the ambition
of the puffy spear-shaped cloud,
to the voice of the smooth rock
formed as a heart,
I will stop
stay still
let their messages
sink through the borders of my brain
saturate the surging energy
within.

I will allow myself to be pierced
by her fears of being evicted  
I’ll feel the angst about her futility
before the indifferent landlords.

I will ignore my own heartache
about Uncle Jan’s fanatical raging
and instead
ask him about his son’s cancer
hug him when he breaks down sobbing.

Obedience
to the highest measures of my humanity
has its costs…

and rewards.

Hallelujah from the heart of Leonard Cohen
just took Leonard and his old scratchy voice
into my heart. What a gift my music app
just slung into my afternoon
to wake me from my late afternoon fatigue.

I do not take these tech gifts for granted
remembering when I would have to get the LP album
from off the crammed shelf and play it on a turntable.

Here in a moment of peace
I look up and see the trees
and the neighbor’s garden
beyond my windows.

And I thank God for this lovely peaceful moment
thank my old piano teacher
and the conductor of the Houston Youth Symphony
where I sang before my voice changed
and my parents who carpooled me from our suburb
to the old auditorium downtown
where my young mind and soul were nourished
by adults who cared for our young minds and voices.

Who knew that the gifts of these people
would spring up in my mind eight decades later
and mental images of Leopold Stokowski who directed us
at a grand concert in the Houston Music Hall.
He loved children but delivered high pitched hell
to the symphony players at rehearsals.

Before I woke this morning
this title was peeking through the cobwebs,
eventually waking me before dawn.

Now with Bernstein’s Grofe Grand Canyon Sunrise
is playing before first light, violins barely audible,
mules waking up with their weird wail
ready to hit the high trail.
Those magnificent odd beasts.

My old body still  dull,
my left hip protesting the early wake,
my brain puzzling with this title
me saddling the mules
for their trudge down the curvey canyon walls,
young adventurers on their old swaying backs.

Here I am looking out over the trees beyond the back yard
into the gray dawn.
I write with the thought of visiting my old friends
on the poetry website,
they probably wondering where I’ve been for the last several months
with  nary a word posted there.

Last night, the Beatles’ White Album played,
those young shaggy heads
awake with popping images
tunes and words tumbling from John and Paul,
they  too, like me, oblivious of where the trail would  lead.

Put me back together.
That’s what the Great Spirit is trying to do
between my synapses
while they still stir up there in the attic
among the dusty old books and broken furniture
and the all but forgotten dreams there
among the silverfish.

Recently Moses was trying to teach me and the new generation
in Deuteronomy
before they crossed the Jordan into the Promised Land.,
his old body still holding on in the mountains
where he would finally be laid to rest.
I  never thought I would get anything from that old book
but Moses had one more old mind to reach.
I am grateful his words were preserved
for me before I too make it up
beyond the top of the mountain
finally put together.

Dew collects on each tiny blossom
reflecting on
every pedal and sparkling
anger, blue, white and new
morning light multiplied
sapphire makes broken dreams worth it

I enter the sanctuary
my hand traces the brown skin
of the smooth wood
atop the last pew
where Saint James sits every Sunday morning,
his slender body planted in spit-shined shoes
that reflect the light of that sacred space
the light that pours from each tortured soul
that sings the praise, joy, pain, and love
inked in the green hymnals
that we open, feeling with our thumbs
the edges of pages
gathered over ages
from the fervent hearts and minds
of our faithful progenitors.

I will hug and touch
the shoulders and backs
of my fellow believers
who will grace these pews,
beating hearts scattered like red pearls of love
in the perfectly aligned rows
where each of us broken
beautiful brothers and sisters
will sit and listen to the Word
stand and sing
and breathe in and out the same Spirit
that cracked open his heart
and bled the universe.

I myself broken
and opened
am here where finally I belong
among my fellow travelers
pilgrims one and all
living our salvation
among each other
shoulder to shoulder
heart to heart
cheeks traced by tears
of joy, sorrow, faith and hope
we, tied together by Love.

Thinking of him flings me from these plains
to the nearest body
of water whose mist smells of salt and life
the unrestrained passion
and ****** of sea.

The book, Odes to Common Things,
a gift of a dear friend
who knew not the arousal,
the seed of near sensual desire
it would plant in me
like the buttery aroma of a woman’s hair
or the taste of her moist lips.

Even a thought of Neruda
takes me to the stormy stirrings
wrought from the ***** of the Pacific.
and sounding on the shores of Chile.

How could the writing of a man
a continent away
foment in my chest
a fervor akin
to a spiritual awakening?

I read him in English
but feel the thump
of his Latin heart
in my body.

Gathering into the hatchway
I push my breath from rest
in the clouds and adventures
into the city with my sister
who would rather walk and breathe
and push her body out and away
from convention and comfort
while I try to make up excuses
to use the car.

She stops to notice the police
trying to corral unruly homeless
while I seek refuge on a grassy *****
with a few of my elders enjoying the sun.

I know the city and the commerce
that has gashed through soil
of this once quiet prairie
to construct one steel obelisk
after another
making art and poetry sad afterthoughts.

Now it is time
for me to move my creaky bones
into a day yet to aborn
beyond my bed,
to wash myself in the infinite seed of creation
splashed upon me
with each dawn.

White Opulence

Days in the desolate plains
of my steady gray moods
have sprawled and engulfed
what I once called
and now barely remember
exuberance.

But walking along suburban alleys
I glance to my left and there it is –
amid brownish green leaves
shimmering with the clouded sun
are muscular white flourishes
which ****** me
back to my Louisiana childhood
and a neighborhood paradise
of blooming trees.

I walk over, bend down,
inhale and feel a near drug-induced high
by the alluring, inviting, tempting
fragrance of a magnolia blossom.

The errant thread in the rug
bothered me for two days
finally I stooped and cut it
but the rug is still wholly a rug.
It is not tile or skin or milk
not cashmere or silk.
I’m glad it’s still a rug.

Finally I can lay on my left side
that fractured rib healing
fell down walking  on the grass
uneven grass but I rejoice
in its grassness.

I’m a walking human mess
still a sinner after all these years
praying, reading the good book,
going to church, hugging
all my fellow sinners.
Elated that still
they are wholly human.

I pretended seventy plus years
I was somehow special
picked to do great things.
But here I am still fractured
but getting better and better
progress my favorite word.

Stop your regrets
sadness, worry, your presets.
Look up. Reform your mind.
Today is a new time
full of possibility
a festival of fertility
plug in to grace
quicken your pace
to the next frontier
put it in high gear
leave the desert of despair
breathe in the brisk fresh air
arise, emerge and begin
to believe again.

Amen.

When I stop
I notice your unwavering presence
your persistence surprises me
because I neglect you.
Lovers don’t do that.

In my dreams you are there
passing through my imagination
like a genie yearning to gift me.
Your stories teach me about your desire
to interrupt my ordinary.
I even remember a few of your tales
and try to figure out what they mean
for my dull self.

I know. You don’t like me discounting my self
because when I do so
I discount you my precious one
and the awesome power of your love.

Inspire me today
a day of needed and neglected work.

You are here my love
in every fiber of my body
every impulse of my mind.

I will dive into the river of your compassion
and be refreshed by it.

Why is the heart the icon of love?
Why not the finger or the thigh?
Would it be just as compelling to say
He loved her with all his mind?
The mind is surely involved in loving -
deciding to do the dishes rather than watch football
or to be romantic when she touches your cheek
while in the midst of writing the last page of your novel.

Why didn’t I ever make love to Mabs
in my twenties rather than discuss politics?
Oh! She was so cute
and smelled like heaven
but our kisses were dry.

I gave my heart to Helen tonight
and she gave me hers
we laughed and teared up
as we shared romantic memories.

And why can’t I feel the heart of Jesus in me?
Is it some spiritual vapid void?
I love and know him but having his heart
escapes my grasp.
I hope before I pass
I will feel him pulsing in my veins.

Maybe another poem
or five or more will help,
for I know my  muse knows
the springs and streams I seek.
And here on these pages
may be an answer…

Lightly my fingers rest on the letters
hoping to coax  out of them
a lyric or a prayer to end this day.
I love these letters
who open the universe,
who touch the cheek of God
and fall here like shooting stars
or small planets
for you to see.

I miss a stone and step into the shallow stream
like a child hoping for an adventure
from his misstep into the clear water
where he can fall into the sky
and ride a cloud to Odessa
Pikes Peak or north to the Cascades.

I remember when the soles of my feet
were calloused from running across lawns
sidewalks and streets to play
ball or adventure into the nearby field
where we fashioned a fort our of tall sticky ****
and made up rules for initiation into our club.

What a life I find in these letters
who surrender to my touch so easily
what a symphony to match the music of Mahler
coming across the net falling here into my ears
like undeserved grace.

I am here away in the dark.
Outside the winter trees
sway their million two hundred twenty five
artistic fingers
against the twilight sky
beckoning me to leave these shadows
and just for a moment
feel the black life coursing slowly
through their bodies.

They dance so quietly
no one but I
notices their intricate
artistry waving goodbye
to the daylight where throngs
of my species  made their
tiny marks upon the history
of humankind
in these northern environs
lost in the minutia
of us who scarcely
notice the human tragedy
of a suffering Gaza.

This morning before my body woke up
my mind was unleashed in a dream.
I was back in a classroom
at an college campus somewhere
in an inconceivable city.

Not totally unlike my actual classrooms
of decades past when the culture was in ferment
and freedom reigned
rained a storm of acceptance
beyond tolerance where everyone
had a chance to become great.

This dream was a pulsing field hospital
where healing permeated everyone present
where our combined body heats generated a sweet aroma
of intellectual and spiritual sweat
that transported each of us beyond
the confines  of our individual biographies
and stories of human suffering

We heard poems and songs composed
by students eager to learn from the oversouls
of everyone present there
students of every background imaginable
we were a single body
a collection of lungs breathing as one.

Thank you Great Dream Weaver
only you could extend my soul to the Universe
in one glorious magnificent moment
greater than time itself.

This old teacher was young again
in a mutually creative minute of sleep
regenerative  and artful
beyond the confines of flesh and blood.

Gratitude is such a weak word
for what I feel
now for this marvelous scene
more than any puny fact or actuality.

Oh how sweet it is to be in your presence
to have our minds intertwined
if only for a few minutes.

This love making refreshes my spirit,
lifts me from the windup mechanics
of my daily waking up moments.

Watching the smoke from the candle’s end
rising, twirling, twisting
in the final gray waltz of its life
was a moment of joy.

I was grateful for its small life,  
for its beautiful final breath
an artist’s farewell leaving
of its finite tapered brilliance
that leaned my soul
to the pulsing sojourn of the universe.

Oh what a journey it took with me
as I reached into the animated depths
of my self
for the short pausing pilgrimage
of this composing.

A poem is like a tickle,
it gives both joy and pain:
with blissful tears and tearful giggles,
you'll read that poem again.

A poem is like a damaged heart in need of surgery:
a cut that heals,
a line that leaves a scar
along your heart.

Francie Lynch
From his portrait on HelloPoetry.com
https://hellopoetry.com/francie-lynch/

I feel it creeping up on the outer margins of me
like one cloud trying to overtake another
or dusk draping itself onto an old oak,
a dream trying to invade the probable.

Uncertainty seems like home to me
because when I think I have the truth
I find my way back home
where I can be the dismembered me
and grace seeps into the interstices of my mind
reflecting light in the puddles collecting there.

Doubt seems a dangerous companion
but I take its hand and pull it along with me
because it awakens me from my dusky comfort
and beckons me to the sparkling lagoon of inquiry.

Uncertainty is a favorite cousin
who on occasion texts me
with a pithy Punjab proverb
revealing a mystery worth chasing
to the dark side of the moon.

Tonight after an isolating illness,
propelled beyond my darkness,
I walked into a universe of light
where stars are swallowed
into black holes
spreading their energy and light
into and beyond the shame or blight
dragged along by each
stumbling with the baggage of their histories,
then recovering
his balance.

On my way to the car
I glanced at the sage’s leaves laden
on what had been ground dried
by two dreary desiccated months
of a blustery autumn
aching for the  moisture of winter.

This rainy cold night
seemed to be saying don’t go out
but there was something
that beckoned me beyond the warmth.

Wet streets magnify the lights
dancing on the pavement
as if to deny the darkness a victory
******* up the day’s grim mood
into a mass of grass and mud extruded
by the slow mushy pace of my boots.

The changing seasons
have the mysterious mission
of rustling us
out of our fatigue or ennui
hanging mosslike on our battered psyches.

Maybe the seasonal shift was that beckoning
into the rainy night
to transform me by its cavorting light
to come here and write  
on these pages rich
in dreams, imagining, and flight.

The breeze stretches and cools the season
along the country road
variegated light, leaf-filtered
from trees that lean
in rivalry for my eager eyes.

Their foliaged arms dangle, then drop
an amber snowfall all around
as if to awaken me
to the autumn creep
into my bones that click and tick
with each tottery step.

Earth awakens me to the beauty
in this splendorous season
of the gliding swaying passage
of life in alteration
and spiritual invitation
to bathe in the slow current of creation
along this road
and its cool and bright possibilities.

I dropped the pencil
had to pick it up
bent over my big belly
with a huff and a grunt.

Late for church
forgot to shave
with three days of stubble
I stood in front to sing
a sting and a red face
when I felt my cheek.

Didn’t feed the cat.
Forgot to get the eggs.
Left the lights on all night.
Forgot her birthday.
Oh me!

Each small thing
mounts a minor chord
sheds a shadow
of fear
what’s next?
       .       .       .

For all the little things
and the big ones
every day’s a hunt
running from the hound
in ceaseless pursuit.
I drop scraps from my stride,
dive into the river
and go with the flow
to yet another innocence.

I’ve been thinking about death
almost obsessing on it.
Then I decided
obsessing is stupid.
A lesson I’ve tried to avoid
as the decades piled up
on my skin and bones.

Coping with my stupid compulsions
a mountain I climb daily
surely I should have muscles
to show for it

and I do

but you can’t see them
can’t measure their mass
or flex them for cameras
they are noticeable
to those who know me.
Friends and kin are the ones
who detect the trace of my thorns

and

the sum
of what I’ve overcome.

But what of this muscular brawl
with death?
My best conclusion-
let go
and daily do
what God has led me to.
Love the ones I’m with

and

my enemies.

Death is not punishment
but a chance
to be make sparks
and dance with the divine
in the mansions
here and after.

Down from the gray mountains
you caress the emerald foothills
bejeweled with low lupine and lilies.
Storming across the plains
and fields of lively grain
you rain your glory on red winter wheat.
Barley and corn
spring up from ancient soil
eager to be young again.

By the time you ruffle the hair on my arms
you have inhaled gold
vital essence
spread it lavishly on the land
and so you arrive inside me
and sow your quiet liberty
and wisdom in my soul,
you my lovely magnificent muse.

Welcome back.

If I were blind
I’d still be able to enter the deep cavern of my mind
filled with eight decades of your creation,
and sensations as deep as earth and high as its sky.

Here am I Lord ready to jump as high and as deep as you will.
The layers of my life as uneven as the thrill
of color in strata of the Grand Canyon
as sure as you, my dear faithful companion.

Here in the green meadow of your peace
I find a place to release
all the conflict and pride I’ve amassed
in this long life passed

in the blink of your eye.

In the soft tinkling of the piano
I hear the gentle peace
of the meadow
and feel the breeze
tickling the hair on my arms.
In the coffee the rich warmth
and wisdom of my muse
trickles down my throat.
The noise of the day
switches off
reshaped into the fullness
and unbridled breadth
and splendor
of the universe.

When I pause here
in this private spacious room
and allow the silence to swirl around me
I bathe in love and anticipation
of finding a free spirit
in the small details of my day.

Here I don’t hear the sounding horns
the low moans of trucks
the frenetic exclamations of TV mavens.
All I hear is a quiet voice
calling me to stay here
my attention undivided
if only for a few moments.

In this quiescence I discover
the depth and the richness
of just being.

I can decide if I will let go
and enjoy the moment
with the crepe myrtle across the way
and swing in the breeze with the sunflowers
or
if I will pull the shade of fear over my eyes
and attach to my feet the weight of worry.

On the news I see video
of fallen trees and devastated homes
wrought by a tornado -
too late for damage control.

But I have in me
fallen trees
crumpled garbage cans
wrecked plans
vertical vehicles
dead pets
stacks of regrets
and borrowed sorrows.

So here I am displaying my damages
spilling my darkness in this light.

Thank you
for abiding for a while
in this modest attempt at damage control.

Two birds
waiting for seeds
squirrels hog the feeder
boy girl cardinals a patient
red pair

Looking out the window I see
in the cup of a single holly leaf
a drop from last night’s rain
gazing glinting into my eyes
sun beams in that little drip
as if to herald the cosmic curator
of the visible.

I dive nose first into your inner essence
there in your yellow *******
your mighty flowering all the way from your roots
in the succulent whiteness of your blossoming being
you reveal to the world what it means
to disclose, expose and surrender
your deep secrets
to all who stop to take notice,
to him who planted and nurtured you
to your magnificent wholeness
to the creator of the universe
in which you flourish.

Your scent is a hint
of the mystery which is you
my sweet magnolia blossom.

The old man stooped down
in his veiny swollen-knuckled hand
a box smaller than a tennis ball
wrapped in silvery paper
the child took it
raised it to his ear and shook it
no sound at all
without a thought he cast it aside
and turned away in a desultory stride.

Even at this young age
the silent shiny gift bored him
as did the kindness toward him
he seemed unaware
of the elder there
or his value
not worth even a smile
or a flicker of respect.

I wondered
if this was a child
of abundance
or neglect
too much presents
or not enough presence.

And what was in that shiny box?

flame jumps and waltzes
reaching for the heavens
pointing there
not entire here
it can’t contain itself
its inner being too wild
for this air.

I am its cousin
kindred energy
in our genes
our lives short but full
the future not our thing
we burn now
knowing we live
in this moment.

But does a lover ignore his beloved?
Do I think you get used to it?
Like a flute playing in the distance.
Do I think you blind or deaf
to my silence
to the bustling dreary me?
Do I think you are immune
to my flight?
Do I hope you are dough waiting to be kneaded
assume you are accustomed to being unneeded
or do I wear
a dark cloak glad you don’t see me there?

How often do I blithely
utter, I love you
while wrapped secure
in the loaf of self?

Countless songs sing your might
and your brawny romance with us.
The kiss, the sigh I return in moonlight
seems so weak.
But that is my puny judgement,
for when I am in the clutches of love
when I allow its vast waves to overtake me
I can get up from my sleepy lazy state
and stretch my muscle and bone,
walk toward your pain or joy with a stride and demeanor
no masculine actor could ever emulate.

Yet you are the mortar full of feeling
the octane of which clamors a symphony of sound
I cannot even hear
but feel it in my chest and biceps and thighs.
Your sadness clouds the stars
your joy makes them beam
your anger burns bright and hot in them.

So how can I hurt you?
Above all, by my indifference
when I break free and flee your embrace
when I strike you in the face
and punch you in the gut
with my pride, lust
and magnitudes of madness
my shame brings tears to my eyes.
It is not a shame that disables me
but awakens me to my limits.

How you must fear my freedom
because of what I have done,
what I do with it in my life?
How lonely you must feel when I abandon you
in favor of pleasure or hubris!

If you are invincible and lord of the cosmos
how would you make yourself so powerless
and vulnerable to emotions?
Because you sparked the creation
of my species and my planet
and even became human
to show us the profusion of love,
sensations and sentiments possible.

Including hurt.

One of its legs was broken
right atop the spring’s coil
the edges of the old wood
rounded and stained from rain
and oils of veined hands
hands of lovers who chose to toil
for a month of years
for their sweaty families
in from fields and factories.

This fallen veteran of wars
its leg broken in battles with the wind
and the weight of wet sheets
battles for dignity and respect
walking tall in clean clothes
to Sunday church.

Church where the broken are joined
bound to brothers and sisters
in union with their God
hanging together on the silver spring of faith
and their resplendent love.

Your voice crackles like red logs in a camp
singes the tiny hairs in my ears
burns in my numbered parts
eddies over the big stones
rolls pebbles left and right as if looking for a place
to lodge and rest, away from the pounding environment.

Your long and insistently unruly hair
tickles the tiny places inside
that never thought of being tickled
never figured to be touched by your hidden wildness
the disguised untamedness
stirs my groggy languid waters
your wild, full flushed heart pounds
rhythm into my flat languid and resistant plains.

I am a sandy arid desert dotted with cacti and pigweed
thirsting for the fluid you excite with ease
and draw up from my depths.

Songs erupting from the well of your faith
come forth from your sober mouth
and waft over our sallow selves
over our normality and our implacable comfort.

Your vocal chords echo Leonard Cohen
a pursuer who never found the object of his quest
but you do not deify the journey
like so many traveling troubadours.
You rest assured of your place up yonder
the place safe and secure in green planet that is you.

“As a Royal you were always taught to maintain a buffer zone between you and the rest of Creation” – Prince Harry

I was a working class boy
from an oft-reeking neighborhood
there south of Greens Bayou
where a north wind
made us breathe rotten-egg air.

I was no royal.
But when I read the Prince’s quote today
I wondered if my mom’s childhood-induced fears
imposed a buffer zone on me
to protect me from the tough guys
whose dads ground pipes and did wiring
in local industrial plants.

Years of drinking beer sitting in the rear
I watched bar fights and felt Mom’s fear
as surely as if she’d been sitting near.
I didn’t stay in the Scouts long enough
to learn the stuff of being a man
didn’t hunt with my brother
and learn from him how to take a stand.

Now an adult, I’m sorry I wasn’t wild,
too bad I became too shy and too mild
shunned risk and danger, stayed too clear.

Was it some thin metal strand from me to my mama’s fear
that robbed me of things that make a man?
I know I learned empathy and gentleness from her
and hold not a shred of anger
for her or Dad who worked so many hours
away from that field of dreams.
I know their love saved me from violent extremes
and made me cherish God, music, and art,
tragic, as well as sensual, and exquisite scenes.
So here I sit writing
reflecting with preludes, green plants and memories.

Harry, Prince the Duke of Sussex, Spare, Random House, 2023, p. 54

When I witness your beauty
mingle my soul in your galaxies
bathe in your sweet fragrance
see the piercing tumescence
of your desire
your passion to scatter your seeds
in waves of wind
upon the earth
into the most protected regions
of our minds
I know you are a poet
who cannot resist reaching
beyond the confines of your self.

Traveling the dusty winding road
I reached the rain forest
heard the Macaw sing
saw its flash of glory in air
and I mused what I’d missed
in the dusty doctrines and dogmas
leather volumes
safe and secure at home
a home I feared might morph
into a wooly gulag
or a colonial province
where freedom groaned
and dragged like an anchor
in shallow water.

The cloudy mucky morning
portends this winter’s end
whatever dawning light
needs importing from within
to burn away
the showers aborning.
That’s why I’m here with you
so you can hear and I can read
the plot arising.

I’m awaiting
a vessel fit for floating
a song worth singing
a fire to light the candle
to connect the spirit in me
to the flame in you.

I’ve said only half-jokingly
I’m a slow learner
of life lessons.
I was wondering about snails
if they learn as slowly as they move
but does our species
ever learn
really absorb
even the basic how-tos
of saving ourselves and our planet?

I might never sate my appetite
for ice cream, tenderloin, or fried fish
but sometimes
it’s hard to empty myself
and make room
for the other fella’s little world
or for God.

My slightly shaky fingers
rest steady on the keys
poised to open my heart
to make room for  
a deep dive into the red fibrous
muscle of the cosmos.

I hear the deep soft clanging windchimes
and catch their movement in the wind
a sad flute sings an elegy
the green plants gently strain for rays
the sound of the heater
its warmth on my left leg and thigh
the wide body of the hawk
gracefully swoops down beyond the windows.

These seconds abiding
in the intense present
make long hours and ennui days
worth any minor miseries.

The flute played a lullaby in the distance
calling the man and his horse into desert’s blanch
where even tumbleweed had vanished.
He saw the streaked banks of the arroyo
that told a tale of currents
whose power clashed and hurled taut soil west
where the sun was going gold.

His face etched by storms
in many forms
he tried to ignore joint moans
by whistling Cohen’s Halleluia
that wiggled forth a salty mist
in his eyes.

Halleluia for all the years.
He hummed the line
he heard Leonard say:
don’t dwell on what’s passed away
or what is yet to be.

The flute again cast its spell
not a knell but a psalm
of praise to make
and create what he could
be it on paper or carved in wood.

I took the train into the tunnel
the car lit with candle glow
there standing just so
my brother with a wan look and a slight grin
I leaned to kiss his forehead, felt the taut skin
Mom across from him,
I placed my cheek against hers
two tears from the deep cavern of her sadness
fell on my constant brow  
Dad faced me with dazzling cheer
eyes full of joy that his son was here.

Awakening from the abyss of night
I arose with a smile inside
grateful for an intimate ride
with that poignant cast
an interlude to abide
and flutter in the sails of family
arrived from a pulsar of the past.

That day visiting with friends
I hugged every one tight
cherished the lush
precious
present
of the living.