“Up above my head
I hear music in the air
I really do believe
I really do believe
there's a Heaven somewhere”
--Rhiannon Giddens

“Is that all there is?”
--Peggy Lee*

An old philosopher told me this:

“About heaven.
Let’s say there’s more than one.
There’s the one where souls
are lurid with perfection,
piled into bliss,
dreaming of change.

“There’s the one people search for
to fit the story they tell themselves.
I looked for it.  I watched the sky.
I found only words.  Blue sky is
a blank page.  Clouds are garish metaphors.

“Then there’s one that follows you.
Don’t look for it. You can’t find it.
It’s not a place or a path.
It dances at the edge of things
like old photos or a young face
that lives remembered in its older one,
an eternal moment always at hand
trailing like a thought balloon,
a shadow cast by nothing,
forever unfolding, never now.”

The morning was blue
And the world was endless,
The moon and skies watched from their fiery oblivion
And I sat on a porch drinking lemonade in the sun

The walls were blue
Claustrophobia and comfort
Tumbling into each other
Blurred and slurred
Forced serenity, forced to reminisce the sky
And fairy lights for stars in the dark


His eyes were blue
Filled with wonderlust and the heart beat of a hummingbirds wing
Ethereal sunlight hiding the smirk
Deception and beauty
Satisfied, spoiled and bored

The song was blue
A hopeful sadness too obscure for me to know
Marking the moment
Gathering the seconds among the staves

Those bluest of halcyon moments
Made up the darkest day
Whist the unsuspected turbulence
Lay offshore
As a storm at sea

Her smile was the most hurtful thing.
It suddenly awoke him from a perfect dream.
Swatting away razor sunbeams
from cutting him down to earth.

Coffee turned cold,
tray full of butts.
The play of her mouth
was a kick in the guts.
If somebody asks what's wrong
he'd make something up.
Truth be told nobody would.

At least being alone he'd only have to lie to himself.

She wasn't perfect,
he knew too well
though she was perfect for him
like a chime and a bell,
but now her smile could go to hell
so too her choice of another.

I hold my ears keen
Keep eyes opened wide
But can't solve the riddle
Of who's on whose side.

Today Tom heaps praise
Showers laurels too many
Tomorrow hell is raised
Tim is Tom's enemy.

How fast makes Tom amend
Finds Tim full of flaws
Pete is now his friend
Tim Tom unfollows.

He digs out wrongs of Tim
Finds him crooked and sly
So inducts in his team
Pete the nicest guy.

I can't hold back smile
Though at end of wit
How friendship is volatile
Sour turns a relation sweet.

I wonder why it's so
With life such a brief ride
We never really grow
Feel the need to be on same side.

run the halfway house.
the winos will be showered,
fed,
and then led
back
into infinite night.
they talk quietly to one another,
waiting,
and by the time
I have finished my 3rd cup of coffee
some of them are in the park
drunk already...

...eyes burning like a locomotives furnace,
eyes flutter,
a half spin,
the man kneels and then falls.
others just stand
and stare
as if already under the mortician's
knowing smile.

and yet,
some will rise
from bright mists at dawn,
cherubic and dew covered
survivors of the night's storm.
grim miracles
who will share a bottle with a friend
and then laugh
at the selective kindness of good men.

between the burning furnace and
the chill of the night
hungry strangers are waiting.

a new day begins.
all is quiet.

Night fell around me
like a wounded animal
in a garden of statues
closing their eyes,
not dreaming,

they are blinded
by the moon
as it cruised by
like a ghost ship,
or a sack of ashes,

the only sound
the quiet humming
of sleeping souls

and a shovel
clearing ground
for digging
the deepest dark hole.

I know paradise
has never been lost
and so it can never be regained
like the moon, a one-eyed girl
in sandles running from the Marines
and the stars are her sisters
hiding in the dark bamboo,
only sixteen dressed in black
falling out of a tree at midnight
a rifle in her hands, a bullet in her heart.

i.

branches of black night
the rain taps on the roof
everything is unguarded
a bird breaking open the sky like
a dark tear.

ii.

our love, rooted to
the earth, scattering
bright oceans
tender as a star.


iii.

dance of love
limbs wild and joyful
lull of a kiss.

iv.

ocean breaking, each wave,
flowing back to its watery song,
flooding and flowing,
flooding and flowing.