Gonna roll me a ******,
and smoke the past goodbye

Gonna empty that last bottle of gin,
and kick this bye and bye

Gonna drink that woman away, Lord,
if I have to turn to ***

Gonna smoke that ****** till my fingers burn
—her memory on the run

(Villanova University Vespers: June, 2019)

Days beyond memory
born in perfection
Light unrefracted
teasing the sun

Time without numbers
thought unencumbered
Lost in beginnings
— never to end

(Dreamsleep: May, 2025)

The land of the free,
the home of the brave

Inclusive together
—America saved

(Valley Forge: February, 2021)

Auditioning for life,
a one-act play

Rehearsing my part,
to leave or to stay

The audience waiting,
the stage has been set

Opening night,
my birth or my death

(Villanova Pennsylvania: February, 2020)

Sutures of connection,
words tightly sewn

Seaming together
—closing the unknown

(Villanova Pennsylvania: September, 2016)

Is your best friend a dog,
a thesaurus is mine

As yours wags its tail
—mine forever sets me free

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)

Myth unlocks the question
—magic then affirms

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)

That which than nothing
greater can be said…
‘The Word’

(Devon Pennsylvania: September, 2021)

Did you do it,
Did you write about it
—or both

(Villanova Pennsylvania: February, 2017)

It didn’t matter what the titles were,
but that I read them

It didn’t matter what the author said,
but that I listened

It didn’t matter that his verse trailed off,
the pages yellow and torn

It didn’t matter that the world forgot
—what one man put to words

(Bryn Mawr Pennsylvania: October, 2020)

Full time poet,
part time novelist

Full time storyteller,
part time bard

The difference greater
than words will imply

Hemispheric divergence
—the why and the how

(Villanova Pennsylvania: February, 2020)

Abandoning
yesterday
haunts me
today
Interring
reminder
of what’s not
in play

Bypassing
my choosing
evading
my will
Each sight
unenvisioned
in blindness
— distilled  

(The New Room: February, 2025)

Do your lies hold as hostage,
every truth you never told

Has your heart become a stranger,
to the wishes it unfolds

Is your past if then forsaken,
free at last of its own self

Orphaned memories never spoken
—orphaned moments never felt

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)

Youth,
the perception
—of what time throws away

(Dreamsleep: April, 2020)

We said goodbye
the night we met
fate our child
to bear

Star crossed love
in orphaned time
betrothed stillborn
—affair

(Dreamsleep: May, 2023)

Raging against tomorrow
blaming yesterday
Running in place—admonishing grace
denial on display
Cursing the past indentured
the future waits in vain
No place to hide—the truth inside
the moment left unnamed

(The New Room: September, 2023)

Changing with each season,
voices come and go
what’s lost undreamed, ourselves demeaned,
in search of the unknown

Naked and left wanting,
fortune sires myth
impregnating its mystery
—with tales of the abyss


(Dreamsleep: October, 2021)

The psychic tattoo
of paternity
darker than
fate’s blackest ink

The guilted knife
of maternity
cutting you
near to the brink

A prodigy alone
in the shadows
offspring of
scorn and disdain

Begging for love
and acceptance
from parents
— called heartache and pain

(Dreamsleep: June, 2025)

Without our dreams
we sit naked and alone
Imprisoned by doldrums
adrift from our home

In fits of depression
we unstep the mast
Awaiting the storm
— of futures long past

(The New Room: August, 2024)

All the pure thinkers
are slave to the Poet
Their theories self-serving
whose quotients divide

With ‘facts’ that convict them
to prisons constructed
From every transcendence
— their numbers can’t hide

(Saint David’s Pennsylvania: May, 2025)

Is remembrance now a hidden tenant,
that lives throughout your home

Does it lurk in every corner,
to come out when you’re alone

Is the voice heard down a distant hall,
a lost child once left about

Does that face now staring through the dark,
draw you in—or turn you out

(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2017)

A proprietary hold on God,
religion does proclaim

Defining what we know inside
our souls will they reclaim

The Cross or Torah, Buddhist lore
each ritual decries

What can’t be owned or scripted pure
through centuries of lies

Divinity a birthright deigned
for those who search to find

What God embeds in every soul
—that structure can’t define

(The New Room: May, 2022)

Your say download
I say upload
Diametrically opposed

I look up
While you look down
The truth now juxtaposed

I step forward
You step back
Our choices thusly shown

I remember
You forget
  —the difference mine to know

(Villanova Pennsylvania: June, 2019)

The Genie is now out of the bottle,
and referred to as ‘The Net’

Where hackers are countries unto themselves,
empowered worldwide—great threats

Able to intrude and disrupt at will,
weaving a new kind of hell

With privacy ***** and freedom attacked
—barraged, our future imperiled

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)

There just below the surface,
more present than you know

A prophetic Jeremiah,
calls out to us to know

His message serves as warning,
“False idols block the light”

Our gateway through the darkness
—his vision gifting sight

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)

What determines genius…
an endowment or a choice

Is there destiny in all of us,
waiting for a voice

Is to reject your epiphany,
most used as an excuse

By those who pull the shades down low,
the darkness theirs to choose

Was Van Gogh so enlightened,
when he cut off his left ear

Or Joplin ever doubtful,
when she sang beyond her fear

Is genius so misunderstood,
its meaning false portrayed

That we see gifts in others
—as we let our presents lay

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)