all her nails, freshly painted,
the smoothed shaved legs,
seasonally and saintly nick free,
the eyeliner,
A+ student penciled in,
eye shade applied with lightest of touch sensual,
threaded eyebrows, 
curvaceously straight,
streaks of red,
the appliqué upon her head,
parfume strategically dabbed in spots near where any
body's  lips might invade,

and yet,
not one primped place upon her
was safe!

all turned awry,
when knocked I
upon bedroom door,
bursting to read a poem freshly made,
the oven's writing warmth,
still faint discernible,
giving off the aroma of heated ink,
upon a skin-smooth page,
a bakery smell irresistible

presented her with my best,
a man's rawest essence
refined, honed, then, honored, favored by her
she, overcome!
weeping pleasure at the pleasuring
of my words so gentling,
all by my soft speaking tongue applied,
that  engendered this response

she,
in a slow pouring, half turning,
presented me with an act of counter-balancing,
no embrace, no equality of caressing,
nonetheless,
a weighty visible estimation of
her physical esteem and appreciation

presented me a bill for repair,
a body's bodyshop estimate,
undoing the undoing damage done,
by my careless, thoughtless,
ecstatic reading of
only love poetry

she added a weary, seasonal, lyrical
claus(e) of some folk familiarity,
by way of apology

*"that's what you get for loving me"

~

~ for my knowing friends~





~~~
so simple the notion,
that healing's potent potions
are non-directional portents
coming at you
like a Bob Dylan, Avettt Brothers,
rhythm and rhyme,
tunes injected from the outside knowing,
from the first time
that they were residing inside,
all the time

in, on and under the skin

the conflicted battle rages between the
coursing forces of

I believe

and the low grade infection, incurable return of

faithless disbelief and irreconcilability

a parental entry knowing,
despite different routes of administration,
there is no pharmacology for a limb lost,
any prosthesis healing supplanted
from without,
never achieves
anything approaching next to normal

but from within,
the heart can heal itself,
trying a natural bypass,
doing its imperfect best
to correct the uncorrectable,
resigned to accept the unacceptable

the slight edge felt from
cutting a garden's new growth for replanting
an act of belief in the future,
witnessing a sunset's nightly color sky's return rebirthing,
knowing, admitting to oneself,
that miraculously better than all ever seen prior are

medicines that come from the outside,
and inward bound daily injections,
they are:

"healing, from the inside out...
just as it was meant to be!"

soul brothers from other mothers,
fellow city dwellers,
one up downtown
one down uptown,
fellow riders,
of the underground
of the by-NY-ways
of America

we met years ago ruminating on poetry,
late one night/early one morn,
just like us,
there is no difference,
call the hour what you want,
we spoke one language,
long long ago
in the early days here at HP

the I, lion of gray stumbled on me,
with a smiling, stunning midnight crosstown compliment,
kindred instant

he stole
my breath, with work that..
declaimed notions of
quiet unshouted artistry excellent
and a new appetite was birthed
in my head, in my bed
one night

the young black man-father and the
aging white-grandfather
so little in common,
but in the early morn,
we both haunt the hallways
of the city of poetry,
speaking the poetry of the city,
where blood is but
two colors

black and white,

like the poem words we share
that you are now eye-reading

and

in our torn,
but not yet shredded country,
we find ways to speak

I am long done, past being the past,
he is the dapper father of the future
and the river boundaries we share,
on different sides
are lines of connection
not demarcation

when the perennial essential question I proposed,
a temperature taking surely,
a simple request re loving me, yes

it was a dueling pistol shot,
a returning, pressing, single firing
interrogatory of a burr of a bullet  
"how"

she stood in weak opposition

she demurred, evaded, jooked,
pre-tensing with a faint, a feint,
a desperately disguised,
claiming of the fifth,
a refusal to self-incriminate,
with a childlike repetition
 "unsure..."

but was she ever,
ever sure,
ever knowledgeable

for the poem was
"of the people, by the people, for the people,"

we, me, she,
of course, being "the people"
-
that our love
"shall not perish from the earth..."

this particular poem,
this particular address,
was about
the struggle to maintain
our union
-
"our unfinished task"

it was the
first shot and the
parting shot

it was the
warning shot,
mesmerizing,
metastasizing
into a
death shot

simultaneously

the poem was,
this poem

the acknowledgment,
of the beginning
of the
perhaps epilogue,
maybe even the commencement  
of a eulogy

a  breathewell,
a fare-thee-well of this,
as well,
one of his
happiest guises

writer of
*only love poetry

crisp atmosphere, special ordered
for perfect pumpkin patching, apple picking,
stout sweaters all, a blueish autumnal sky,
orange 'n red leaves delivered on time

the old uber-man-grand-pa,
hired as a day driver,
saddles them up,
three generations all tucked in a
repeating mise en scène

a replay of some thirty years earlier,
when the now-father
was about the same age,
as his boy, three years aged
and yet so impatient

asking the same question
his father perfected,
in the same sweet voice,
at about the same time,
in the same way,
a little voice from deep in
the cavernous back seat,
sighing, squeaking with an
I've-seen-it-all ennui,
some mere five minutes into
the hour's plus journey
to the 'country' bound

"are we there yet?"

titters 'n snickers from assorted adults,
but grandpa weeps words with composition instant,
so many answers to such an important question,
so serious that an admission, confession
required, due you,
grandpa still asks the same question

every day of his life

it's Sunday and longish poems per Yeoman,
strictly verboten,
God knows there's an essay unwritten
as the answer, a symphonette with
a thousand opus, by-your-command repertoire,
a pumpkin for every patch,
some answers that even may be a
young prince's carriage in hiding

but for now let this suffice,
sometimes yes, sometimes no,
and sometimes, the goal line just goes and moves on ya

so with utmost seriousness
a purposed thoughtfulness proposed,
posing said inquiry knows no age limitation,
if you have not asked of yourself this day,

"are we there yet?”

then the answer is surely,
not yet