Lying here rewinding us
while you sleep
Reflecting on where we've been
and where we are
Pausing here and there
feeling for effect
I look at you and wonder
just how much more
I could  ever hope to have-
to hope to live-
that's more than this.

Fast-forward to last night
and there we were
loving like there'll be
no tomorrow
Loving away all of those angry  
yesterdays
Now it's 2 a.m. and my heart
is wide awake
hoping you'll dream us
back again
Rewind us back to where
our love began.

r ~ 6/8/14

Alone in his dark apartment
black dog asleep
the sound of children playing
in the street outside his window-
children of color, his housekeeper says,
not quite seeing the distinction
only hearing happy voices-
an old jazz number on the radio
as he stands and dances slowly
with his cane tap, tap, tapping
to the beat and dreaming of a girl
he once read about named Helen
in a book of braille.

r ~ 6/6/14

She spreads her yellow wings
To sun and sky an offering
Gold nectar dew she brings
To Ruby-throat a'humming
Sweet song of waning spring
And lily in the morning.

r ~ 4/6/14

Ours was less an Arab Spring
and more a half-hearted coup d'état.
There was no immolation,
no burning desire on your part;
no passion in the streets of you.

You stole in at night
through a window I'd left open,
a crack in my need
for something more than mere
existence.  From me there was
no resistance.

I let you lead, and followed blindly;
my voice I raised on your behalf
against all that I had known before.
Your words, your whispers
alone could incite me to storm
against the strongest walls.

Now, as summer comes
and this sectarian affair,
this spring uprising
that we called us has ended,
I sweep the streets of our debris
and wander down
the empty avenues
of you, half-hearted.

r ~ 6/5/14

Painted ponies of the Paiute
Run against the sky
Cracked lightning lights the orange fire
Desert winds stoke whipping flame
Eagle flies blind to the sun
Scorpion strikes out in vain
Antelope leap crisscrossed arroyo
Coyote calls across the sand
Thatched huts explode in maelstrom storm
First People’s shadows smoke the ground
Clay pots crack and break in time
Fire-cracked stone in communal circles
Markers of forgotten stories
Great Basin parched to cracking lines
Full moon wanes to yellow bone
Awaiting dark clouds quenching rain
And painted ponies once again.

r ~ 6/4/14

Baseball was my passion
that year when the world
still seemed like a safe place
to hang my hat.  Dad was
buying horses left and right
while Mom shook her head
and kept her silence knowing
this was just another one of
his wild-*** hairs that seemed
to get a little crazier each year.
Credence Clearwater Revival
was hot and singing songs
about rain on the radio.  
School was out and I would
go over to the creek to swim
after I finished whatever chores
Mom had me doing those days.
Sometimes I would lie on the
Devil's Bed rock next to the
little falls where the biggest
trout liked to feed and listen
to the bugler from the Army
burial detail playing taps for
that days funeral. I wondered
what it would feel like to be
the son of the soldier getting
buried up on the hill having
to wear a suit and not cry. It
always gave me a lump in my
throat. My brother said it was
a shame and Johnson should
be shot instead. I always agreed.
We all watched the nightly news
together after supper and before
Hogan's Heroes came on.  The VC
were handing it to our guys in
a place called Hue and Mom cried
when a South Vietnamese officer
pulled out a pistol and BANG
shot that dude in the head
right there in front of god, me,
Mom and everybody. I went to
bed that night and  decided that I
wasn't going to pray any more.
We lost every game for the rest
of the season and I didn't care.
I've never forgiven that officer
for shooting that guy dressed
in black right in front of me,
god, my Mom and everybody.

r ~ 6/3/14

The carpenter builds
Spilled blood on a board
And under his nails
Smashed black and blue
Indigo on a page
Words sharp like a saw
Cut to the bone
Twice measured then honed
On the streets
Alive with a beat
A rhythm and rhyme
He's counting time
With a rat-tat-tat
One nail at a time
Straight is his line
He drives it on home.

r ~ 6/2/14