One letter that follows,

if added will deem


To separate the real

from what’s referenced or schemed


“Honor from honors,

love from loves


“Truth from truth’s,

and self from selves


“God from gods,

time from times


“Vision from visions,

and life from lives”


The singular, the plural

what is, what is not


One small trailing letter

—true meaning leaves off


(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2019)

Hiding their poison,
colleges feign

Promising sunshine,
delivering rain

Knowledge infected,
politics vile

Lambs to the slaughter
—Athena defiled

(Villanova Pennsylvania: September, 2019)

Leaving behind excuses,
the reasons close at hand

No longer distracted by the ism’s of truth,
or what protocol demands

Living outside the fences,
no longer looking in

The horizon waiting as my dreams set sail
—safe harbor there within

(Bryn Mawr College: February, 2020)

Diminished
but ennobled,
the soldier came home
his two limbs
traded for the
sanctuary
of a deeper peace

Broken
in completeness,
his braces held proud
each battle
medaled
in the memory
—of his finest hour

(The New Room: November, 2021)

Seeing truth...
in the blindness of others

(Dreamsleep: December, 2019)

The temperature frozen
Old sticks in the mud
New tracks are untrodden
Lost dreams from above
The raisins in darkness
All pits buried deep
The moon shines unfaithful
Recounting of sheep
The doctors watch broken
Your time shorter still
His prognosis a token
Beyond suture or pill
He asks if you’re ready
You say that you’re not
He asks if it matters
You ask if it ought
And into the night
You begin once again
To hurry the ending
To reach beyond blame
And all of the hate
You then leave behind
To warn all those jaded
Of what they’re never to find
"Partisan dreamer
Audience of one
Killer of grammar
Words on the run
Paragraph’s jilted
The undotted ‘I’
The meaning now freed
All language denied
Rhythm of opportunity
Children of hope
Seizing the moment
Not dropping the soap
Stretching the limits
Crossing the line
To beat a new cadence
Time begs to shine"
You want it to make sense
You want it to seem clear
As your feigned self importance
No longer precious or dear
But the only one caring
And that still in doubt
A mirrored reflection
Of what time has cast out
You head off to work
Your laser untagged
The morning unvetted
Coworkers who brag
The lunch break upon you
Again eating alone
The steak is served raw
Chewed right to the bone
The banter around you
Seems damning at best
The shroud that surrounds you
To defile or to bless
“You gain nothing by trying”
You gain nothing you say
As you then begin crying
For that one gone away
That girl in the tall grass
That girl in your arms
Went to be with another
When you bartered your charms
Her daughter is grown now
Some say looks like you
Could it be then you wonder
When the times were so few
You pay the cashier
As you walk slowly out
This bill had been dear
More than you had allowed
With the bone in your pocket
You head back to your desk
As the cry of a mockingbird
Decries and behests
Your pen running dry
As your mind starts to write
On your third eye a sty
Melding vision with sight
And its then that you notice
Hanging pink and in front
And you know that your future’s
A dog that can’t hunt
So you walk to his office
And sit down in the chair
You look at him soulless
And try not to care
He explains “That he’s sorry”
That “The timing’s not right”
He says that you’re valued
But be gone by tonight
As you clean out your desk
A new feeling partakes
You look up to the ceiling
Lost in all that’s at stake
And that feeling is good now
That feeling seems right
As the feeling then pushes
As the feeling alights
You decide now emboldened
To stop on the way home
At the house of that one
You left forever alone
You heard of divorce
You wonder how bad
The damage it left her
Was it worse than you had
As you slow down your car
She stands in the yard
As you speed up your heart
She says “Directions, how far”
She does not recognize you
Have you changed all that much
She looks at you puzzled
As you long for her touch
And you drive away empty
As you drive away cold
And you drive away blackened
From your heart to your soul
But your path is now clear
You’ve just one place to go
As those things that you feared
Have now falsely been shown
And you walk in her kitchen
The door never had locked
Standing there and still smitten
The one you thought had forgot
“Was that you in the car earlier
Was that you, really you
I couldn’t believe it
Because I still love you, I do”
A reward wrapped in burlap
The priciest kind
Where if never rejected
You are never to find
So make just one promise
To then promise again
To be true to your feelings
From beginning to end
"Sages and broomsticks
motherless pearls
Witches who threaten
fatherless girls
New curse of the ages
old grudges remain
A coven of stages
to hide from the rain
And the mark then of Satan
the touch of the Lord
To the death plated sunset
and the winner forlorn"
The trap in this quandry
which you must break out
As with all ***** laundry
to first burn and then shout
As the truth is not distant
a true word never feigned
And the peace that you’re seeking
still inside and unclaimed
So let go of the dogma
and the medals will melt
Your deck full of aces
all cards are redealt
But the moment is now
and the moment is clear
Once the moment is chosen
new joy spun from fear
So to those who will threaten
with eternity ******
Say “Away with your blasphemy
stop where you stand”
Your wings have resprouted
your eyes looking in
A new life has been started
—you’re blessed to begin

(Villanova Pennsylvania: June, 2017)

Light
bids me welcome
darkness retreats
Alas
poor death
thou must be alone
His gate
reopens
before yours has locked
The harp
of an Angel
— calling me home

(The 1st Book Of Prayers: August, 2023)

Many nights there were no new dreams,
so I borrowed from the old

Resurrecting the scaffolding
of what lay unbuilt—untold

(Dreamsleep: November, 2020)

This poem I read
  at the end of my life…

As I bid you adieu
  from the joy and the strife

A verse filled with hope,
  and with love from within

To carry inside you,
  my song on the wind
  
I’ll try not to preach,
  as others have done

But rather beseech you,
  your songs yet unsung

To love with the strength
  that’s God given inside

And to love even more,
  in an unending rhyme

These words are my gift,
  I bequeath you today

In the hope you’ll remember
  what I last had to say

For I loved you all deeply,
  your kindness I sought

And remember now sweetly,
  those blessings you brought

So I leave you this morning,
  and bid you farewell

I leave you together,
  pledged hearts here to dwell

All strength in your sharing,
  my love to remind
  
Your redemption awaits
  —its salvation divine

(Villanova Pennsylvania: September, 2016)

This poem I read
at the end of my life…

As I bid you adieu
from the joy and the strife

A verse filled with hope
and with love from within

To carry inside you
my song on the wind

I’ll try not to preach
as others have done

But rather beseech you
your songs yet unsung

To love with the strength
that’s God given inside

And to love even more
in an unending rhyme

These words are my gift
I bequeath you today

In the hope you’ll remember
what I last had to say

For I loved you all deeply
your kindness I sought

And remember now sweetly
those blessings you brought

So I leave you this morning
and bid you farewell

I leave you together
pledged hearts here to dwell

All strength in your sharing
my love to remind

Your redemption awaits
—salvation divine

(The 1st Book Of Prayers: September, 2016)

A shadow hides behind your smile
in the Riviera sun
Parisian moments long ago
our love had just begun

A child born then lost to time
whose laughter still we hear
As life took back its greatest gift
—his memory to endear

(Mayenne France: April, 1978)

Judging opinions
by their age
proscriptions
lie in wait

Consensus stained
with fear and guilt
folly
overstates

Knowledge of others
unknown to self
deception points
one way

Value weighed
in layers of dust
the truth held
—far at bay

(Dreamsleep: October, 2024)

She never kissed you
till she hated you

Her feelings deadly
—her motives dark

(Aldwyn: March, 2021)

Are you digging a hole
you will never crawl out of,
a prison self-made by your hand
The metaphors mix
as you lie there betwixt
—the bars sinking into the sand

(Dreamsleep: April, 2021)

Without
the conception inception
connection
Life
is a desert
—of lost possibility

(The New Room: March, 2023)

A bevy of censures,
to hit and strike back

Each written reprisal
to ward off attack

A mother-son warning,
once truant come true

Her words now my weapons
—to **** and renew

(Beaupre: February, 2021)

I dress up every Sunday,
but only in my mind
My coat and tie in tattered shreds,
the past and future bind

To celebrate in peasant rags,
as memory dances free
Imagining in formal garb
—what only I can see

(Dreamsleep: May, 2022)

In addition to the slogans...
"Save The Whales,"  
"Save A Tree,"
and
"Save The Oceans"

We need a new one...
    "Save A Poet"

(University Of Pennsylvania: July, 2019)

Silence is charmed
disaster avoided
New breath to infuse
fresh words on the run

Tomorrow disarmed
the instant unleashing
Each moment a present
—time gifted becomes

(Dreamsleep: June, 2022)

Nothing cuts as deep
as a back that’s turned

Denying your existence
—all bridges burned

(The New Room: October, 2022)

What are we but relics
of time gone by

Where painful encounters
stay undenied

The wounds may scar over
but never heal

As memory is martyred
its blood congealed

New skin tries to cover
what sutures can’t hide

Each moment recovered
a falsehood decried

With strength built on pillars
of fortunes disdain

From deep in the shadows
—our essence remains

(Dreamsleep: January, 2023)

Good girls ask permission
bad girls seek forgiveness
Sins two faced till time erased
—sisters of injustice

(Dreamsleep: August, 2022)

Cultures dissected …
structured refusal
Cloistered eruptions
dearth to accept
  
Rising triumphant
they steal from each other
Defining their existence
—by what they reject


(Septa R5: September, 2023)

In most things a fledgling
to some degree
A novice at love
and what’s not to be
Indentured forever
beyond my leave
And only an expert
—at being me

(The New Room: June, 2021)

Seventeen children
on a highway to hell

Thumbs out—noses down,
perdition rings their bell

Seventeen children,
their backs now fully turned

The piper calls them blindly
—their futures scorched and burned

(Villanova Pennsylvania: November, 2016)

They don’t **** politicians anymore
though some might say they should
Those vermin breeding malcontents
all worms in rotten wood

To feast on dreams of hope and change
and sell what pain has bought
They **** our souls in daylight scorned
—no punishment when caught

(The New Room: July, 2022)

Writing …
first last
and always  
—its own reward

(Dreamsleep: October, 2023)

Free verse…
  a forest without a path
    —a direction without an end

(St. Davids Pennsylvania: June, 2019)

As a Poet I’ve been everywhere,
  while living in the void

As a Poet I’ve written about time,
  while living outside its deception

As a Poet I’ve watched your hopes and dreams,
fade into dark memory

As a Poet I’ve searched and waited
—for what tomorrow never brings

(Villanova Pennsylvania: June, 2019)