Still alone
We are not
Maybe Titan
All we got
Mine our way
Barge ore back
Build a bridge
Plutonium tack
Ceramic sails
On solar wind
Terminal shock
Butterflies pinned
On orbital ellipses
‘Gainst starry drops
Spun light and dark
Like judgment tops
Spendthrift starfish
Regenerate limbs
From primal screams
That eat our sins

It started with the writing desk,
    my friends:

                                                                               the Green Wolf

                                                                               the White Tiger

                                                                                        and

                                                                              the Black Horse.


I huddled in the claw tub;
   thinking of familiar faces

                                                                                    within
                                                                                       the
                                                                                 f u r r o w;

                                                                         how I adored them
                                                                         smiling back at me.


I spoke to my father in the mirage;
   my reflection stared back at me

                                                                          his lips mirrored
                                                                                 my own
                                                                                    with

                                                                               r i d d l e s.


I spoke to my mother in the mirage;
   my reflection stared back at me

                                                                        her lips mirrored
                                                                                my own
                                                                                   with

                                                                             a n s w e r s.


The water
r i s e s
from    the    spring;

                                                                                      b
                                                                                      u
                                                                                      r
                                                                                      n
                                                                                      i
                                                                                      n
                                                                                      g

                                                                      the withering shadow

                                                                               drowning
                                                                       in    the    claw    tub.


The water
d r a i n s
from    the    body

                                                                                          c
                                                                                          h
                                                                                          i
                                                                                          l
                                                                    &n

Autumn Dancer

Of the four girls whose parents
Be the Year, Autumn spends
Her quarter round in changing clothes
And riots life even as she slows.

Protesting greens that fade and run,
She riots best against the sun
In reds and oranges and yellows;
In slanting light her dancing slows.

Weeks before her dance is done,
She pays her homage to the sun;
Her stepping slow; she dresses down
For waltzes sad in somber brown.

At curtain call, her early temper loses sway;
Refined before the end, she dresses for ballet
And pirouettes in faded brown
A shadow now in dying light.
She pirouettes in faded brown,
Beside a sister white.