Cold streets. cold people.
cold city of Oslo.
snowless, as pre-Christmas
winters have become.

I wave back at kindergarten
toddlers smiling at the filthy
man with the green hard hat
emerging from the hole in

the brick wall, jackhammer
shouldered, dust like fog following.
sometimes my job is to ruin. there's
nothing "-ish" about "demolish".

friday fatigue.
arms rubber, hands cold; numb.
her voice is my coffee.
her words, diesel.

I wait for her call, hand on phone-
pocket, expecting movement any
time. I hope she'll call me soon.
I hope to God she'll call me soon.

Sara not so plain and not so tall
Daydreaming in the shopping mall
As blond as a summer day
Speaking of herself in a peculiar way:

"I'm pretty, yes, but I wish to be better;
To be the admiration of a love letter."

But her beauty is the kind that lasts
And makes your heart beat especially fast.
Finland born but London found,
Lovely, sure, but greatness bound.

And the nights grow more tiresome,
as her chest beats a tattered drum.
Her mood too dreary for speckled eyes
that will dim if night blurs into sunrise.

"Sleep why do you run from me,
as my memories grow.
Eyelids, be a blanket,
And melatonin, a pillow."

Victoria Lucas in her head,
as the bell does ring until fed
by the words that sound soft to us
but are actually strong and thus
she is misunderstood-lips are red-
Like Greenwood inspired, kissed dread:
She can save herself before jarred,
Before feathered, before tarred.

And it is my faith that lets me know,
That her happiness will one day grow
Because Sara not so plain and not so tall
Is the strongest of them all

An old man whose lungs have felt the smugness of many cigarettes
Looked at me and said, "If you are a poet write a poem about nothing". I took out a piece of paper and handed it to him.