What's the sound a rain drop makes
When it oozes from cracked plaster,
Splashing to wood at my floor
Wetting the paper and last week's

Now mostly finished crossword,
Distracting from latest distraction
Of some unread lines written
To marry ideas too absurd -

Clocks that can run backward, or
Knowing just when and where
In infinity one should stare
To see a shooting star soar

Pen bleeds from neat squares,
But with days left to dry
I could give it another try
Or perhaps use it now to
Sop up a puddle by the chair,

Nor will newest words ever be heard
I should listen to life that matters
These drips of dreams
Are drowned in inky water,
Sodden pages leave thoughts too blurred

as if by artist’s craft, that sky,
a painted bride blushing
her blaze of blistering crimson
like a blossom opened to
a blue black ocean’s kiss
colors bled in slender fingers
caressing wind-blown waters
and united, they melted into starlight

Bones steeped in storms
Feel them coming,
Past terrors remembered
In recesses of marrow.
There's no safety
Behind stone walls of homes, either;
Nor compassion for tears of children
Nor weary backs of old men
Who try to protect them.
Little ones hide fears in the cellar
Or deep in down pillows,
Drowning howling to low murmurs
While weary souls stare into eyes
Of the devil, bracing for battles
Never won, but survived
'Till sun shines once more,
Sweeping up pieces of life
As always, come morning,
When smiles and breakfast
Hide destruction
Of the night before.

today we celebrated pain

crowds gathered in the close hole they'd made,
and, too, in fields where once were harvested
anonymous body parts and broken luggage straps  
and, why do they still need to remember that ...

sad birthday

he stares ahead, piercing the lens with blue eyes,
apparent youth belying ancients inside
uncertain how to smile yet,
the tie uneven around his starched oxford collar
there will be cake later, one supposes,
laughter of other children gathered 'round the table

the pretty brown girl in a pink dress
accepted presents from those who'd gathered -
maybe her mother set her hair in those loose braids-
her brown eyes brushed him, lips smiled
and newspapers said it was wrong
because it made too much fire, burned whole cities to the ground
he never saw her again

until

bobbing hens got lost in a wailing Hammond;
they'd missed The End
it was spring again then, like in Eden,
when, unashamed and perfect, her ******* danced with music
and a yellow rose was
pressed between their unused notebooks to mark the occasion
Mother was mad, and derided the prospect of pickaninny babies
taking seats at her fine linen-draped table
until everyone forgot once ... again

Now

the New Yorker has finally canceled itself,
ever a meager meal, its offerings of pinto beans and metaphors
quickly swallowed in secret
in hopes that divine inspiration might ensue
as he picked ripened tomatoes and peaches, each in their seasons,
and ate of them lustily, too

and suddenly it's spring ...  again
but eyes weak and weepy,
his life lost in stone-walled sanctuaries that protected
imaginary pickaninnies and half-breeds
today accustomed to titles of "mister" or "ma'am"
because it's America, and at her own End,
Mother fell in love with so many other brown-skinned girls
it didn't matter anymore

Clayton leans on his push broom,
always remembers to smile
as he requests the odd bit of change
"if you can..."

the boy can't remember his own name anymore
nor her's
rubs broken dust with his black leather shoes,
wonders where they've been -
because bold hues loudly pronounced the arrival of spring again,
which revives nagging pain from the picture he'd saved
and not yet time for tomatoes or peaches
nor the pretty, brown eyed-girl, her pink dress and braids

which had always come and gone without celebrations

he took my last quarter and dime,
pocket lint, the missing *****
of something I’d meant to reassemble
if I’d remembered or had time

then wandered off
rubbing shoulders with the sidewalk preacher
searching for signs of end times in rainstorms
or faint rumbles of passing traffic,
holding high his Good News
in a half-folded forecast for tomorrow;

this exodus -
across a patch of crabgrass
following a diagonal path of earth foot-worn
into a thin gray line defining the shortest distance
from his concrete corner to the door of the liquor store
justified a sacrifice of hours, the cold lies told:

lost wallet,
old mother,
car just out of gas

practiced to passersby or filling station patrons,
their rumpled tithes
reborn into an afternoon sermon
wrapped tight in brown paper
still warm with silent echoes of amen

Where the devil if not here
In the room with me.
Surprised
In the kitchen
I slide
The chef's knife
Far back on the counter
To hide
Lest she loose control lost
Again, else
Might become real, that image
Now swimming
In her own soup,
Of a chromium-vanadium blade
Gleaming, swinging
In glorious swoop
Home to this chest or head,
Imagining it dead,
Tainted crimson.
Not the first time
I could be a toreador
Fending off his bull
With nearby chair
To save flesh from the goring
Of its horns,
On the way to salvation
At the door.
Still, animal rage
Stands between instrument
And shields awaiting at table
As they are meant.
A lamb, I once used my hand
And it hurt
When steel first broke skin.
Tears weren't
First from pain, but shock
Life was so real and cruel.
Since then the whys
Have grown with our lives.
One or other medication
Will fail to stop the sensation.
Now, my life's exhaustion is
In pondering the question:
Can the coward present neck
As easy offering and end it,
Or continue cowardice,
Facing  the goddess
Conspired to destroy
What once was me.

there's a fat plastic tube taped sub-clavian carrying ruby fluid
from a clear bag that hangs overhead
draining mysteries of modern alchemy
into your body, its lifetime measured, silent droplets
inside a hermetically sealed hourglass we can only watch, not touch
but they don't change you

by protocol your nurse wore her nitrile gloves doubled-up
lest she get this stuff on her fingers - it's toxic -
advised you to flush the toilet twice,
making certain to eliminate stray molecules that might
be exposed to sitting innocents

i should be in the next chair, holding your hand

we might share complimentary raspberry danish,
stare at a silent TV on the wall
as it broadcasts flashing pictures of calamity from
the latest war or storm savaged country
but we’ve been living there for years already
our home not populous enough to draw serious media attention;  

we’d wrestle sips of anemic coffee from free paper cups
yours going into a red can when you've finished
because that brilliant color insinuates itself into saliva, eventually
as it does to blood and *****;
i could take mine home

i'd read moving captions at the bottom of the screen
to know what's going on in the images
while you'd feign interest in this tedious world and remind me, again,
how life is tenuous

ask me the name of that dripping liquid just to see if i was listening,
an appellation alien - if life were fair it would be easier
but i’d get the pronunciation wrong
maybe it could be a French word i remember reading to you from a menu in Paris
we might paste it thickly, soft cheese onto torn chunks of baguette
savored between sips of cabernet from long stemmed glasses;
pronounce it “good” as if we could own it

****** and gigolette -
we’d stolen the whole earth that moment,
grinning like a pair of cat burglars at a cafe table where i'd held your hand
but here we are, old again, bitter enemies
for the moment, i'm glad for Ativan and Motrin,
the only names i can remember from your tray of saltines and ginger ale

instead, i'm sitting alone at home with cigarettes and bourbon,
more congenial poisons
staring at a white, unmoving ceiling, pretending I’m working
we're like that, you know, tug and tow - where you go,
i'm heart-bound to follow
Doctor Jack insists i'll live much longer, a little sicker after
i might adjust expectations for a worn-out liver, headaches,
possible blood pressure elevations; short warnings written on the label

while yours smile, with more tricks than carnival barkers
they say, now, a handful - or only two - more tricks up their sleeves,
the grinning, white-coated thieves
Jack smiles, pats my hand, a warm man

smoking is prohibited in the clinic
i'd hang from the window ledge to get the next nicotine fix,
but it won't open to alive, mowed grass outside -
these proceedings always sequester hidden behind curtains in private,
a secret art of undertakers doctoring flesh to look still-living,
love making in mid-evening darkness we've long forgotten

i’d draw deeply chemically-treated air, forget it’s now happening
remind myself a paternal need to stay healthy for survivors
while trying to avoid living in midst of your horrors,
a preoccupation that subsumes my mind

if you’re right - and you always are - how could i bury you?
when the dog died,
i dug her hole in our garden myself, deep through tree roots to bedrock,
then beyond, depth a measure of devotion;
carved a stone with my own fingernails, her name in a crossed heart
and we two cried like shivering babies
as we shoveled all the dirt back in to cover her

these are words of a weak man, selfish ******* that i am
and really, all of life's slumped over in my lap right now,
just this little girl sleeping
but i should be in the next chair
if you'd only let me sit there
again

yeah, read an old poem again and remember sitting across a dark sticky table, pitcher of beer to wash down the fear of losing control. the guys told jokes - called them "brain droppings", like intellectual pigeon **** puked on the window -  but i was fighting not to get lost in the patterns of condensed water pooling from sides of the pitcher, laughing on cue because it seemed the right thing to do. i counted bright flashes, blue, a neon sign - froggy's bar open - for clarity, my fingers still melting into pencils at fine edges of the discussion. i carried a notebook to write in but nobody noticed. i thought i was a poet.

green sat there, slack jaw acid jockey, dead eyed silent fish out of water. educated somewhere. not here. it was hot. i think he'd had too much magic mushroom or that black sticky stuff we smoked in the bathroom that made me choke like a dying newborn, or maybe the pale colored microdot collage on paper rolls we all shared at a concert hall earlier. the humidity.

cool, man - i quietly pined for some brown-skinned chick away at college, home again but still not calling, so i wanted to forget my own name and split in some dime bag fog when the sugar slipped out over my lips; i spit, he didn't, i drank. green was hungry, brain-******, out of time, dreaming about some key lime trees in florida, ogres in fairmount's forests, the dealers from new york who wanted to **** us, then gut  laughed at something funny he saw in his sneakers. we hefted him by armpits to the stairs and left him there; it was too hot to walk all the way up to the flat's front door. green **** himself;  we left. green, by any other name, got lost like smooth longhairs on motorbikes, that girl, the pretend hit men from uptown, none of whom ever cared who i was, because i wasn't  really anywhere.  but i didn't realize green could fly. it was a secret he'd left on the pavement outside. i'd wished i could fly like green. but he died. i'm still here, bluffing i'm living.

hope's breath was spent-
broad shoulders wiped tears in
bruising pools, skin flayed raw
colored more lifeless gray
than black and blue in the mirror
amid clouds of nicotine blankets
their weakness hides beneath;

blood encrusted nostrils,
newly immune to floral smells,
told their ringing ears
which found sounds of acrid words
tolled loud and certain,
making children cry to hear them
like promises made but forgotten,
pillows framed aged eyes,
devil-weary, blurred furrows
in which to sow sorrows

saccharine love bound,
secured, in smoky rings
of siren song’s early death -
for a moment, soul fled flesh,
where even soft heart
felt dark, strangled in
its tangled vessels,
left for dead, to glimpse
an imagined pulse of brilliance
its refuge for the morrow,
as that  anticipation’s
life’s only worthy pain

I remember you from the dream
Face wet not with summer's sweat
When I awoke
Didn't think a man could cry

For the softness of a moon beam
Tomorrow's promises unmet
Death of hope
I'd see God in your eye

That day of autumn was to be
Farewell - unplanned and awkward
Two young lovers
Wrestling with goodbye

I tried to understand the need
To move life, career onward
But consoling prize
Under covers, soft thighs...

And you were wrought by accident
Tsar's serf and African queen
Triumphant, WE!
For the moment...

Then dire message from heaven sent
On lost souls' ether carried,
You were buried
And still my dreams you haunt

Post Script
I would like to dedicate this thought to Blaise Brown, poet, who passed away August 2, 2009. I regret he would only read the first two stanzas of the then unfinished work, and hope he would approve of the final form.

Drunk from words poured over ice
melting in our empty glasses;
giddy as children discovering passion
for the first time,
in a kiss under
warm summer's rain -
we elated in wetness
given to clothing and dried lips
yet still held it secret
'lest in telling it might end,
life become ordinary again.

it's another autumn
migrating geese bark like dogs in distant clouds
marking their journey for earthbound creatures;
tree-crowns browning in rust
frame liquid skies neither of us reached,
though, our younger selves tried

from shelves of every Beatles' album ever made
organized alphabetically by noon after a vetted maid left;
we imagined rock stars strumming guitars,
turning our godawful poems into even worse lyrics
to make us feel important
in hungry aftermaths of disappointments

five star dinners cloistered within the entourage
of strongmen your father sheltered;
they would close restaurants for us
he spoke hushes of business from a stead at the head of table,
and broke men like you,
ordering salads made only from tender hearts of lettuce,
the rest set on plates of those less demanding

I remember blinking away teenaged intoxication like fever,
a world without rules for behavior,
a sixty mile drive to buy Italian hoagies in Atlantic City after midnight
because there was no one to deny an urge
to bend night to daylight; they reopened business for the son...
you knew they had no choice...

you showed me how to climb to my second story window once home again
leaving me hanging from the sill 'till Mom woke to let me in -
mind spinning, mumbling my drunkenness -
goodfellas never worry over consequences
she thought she hated you then,
I learned a measure of self-assurance

but there, in a too-small pup tent
you bought one summer by the sea
to work a job flipping burgers at the boardwalk for money
otherwise spent like water at the public shower
you bathed in

to be near any nagging mother
who set out an extra plate at dinner, because she secretly loved you, too
to be close to broke, dangling brothers like me
I felt the poverty of family

this morning I found the black suit and shoes in back of the closet-
abandoned search for lost yarmulkes that lived among mated socks
and wondered when my shadow disappeared
so many agos, this beard gray, time a dead skin I live in today

we'll lower a set of mortal remains into yet another Gethsemane -
under the cemetery canopy,
covering a carpet-rimmed hole still moist with yesterday's rain
I'll see the blue tent you sheltered in that season at the beach
feel closeness again as if there were no
intervening ocean of living between

there will be neither memorial service nor repast, after ...
only this

Leaves stripped bare,
The clump of a nest
Now so obvious, but since abandoned
Past residents won't care.
This morn, winter flavored branches
Sweet confections that beckoned.
Black in twilight, the silhouettes
Look again as barren,
Swaying spindly fingers
And counting stars
Which today seem so far.
Once I reached up and plucked
Those winking sparkles to sprinkle
A pillow I shared,
Though glowing duller amid dreams
That shined in young eyes.
Their beams became beacons,
Joining hearts across oceans
So that distance wouldn't matter.
It was in absence dread fate dared,
Soon setting ancient lights to falter,
Dimming, dying through time's haze.
Oh, how long ago did I last gaze
Upon exciting skies as this!
Certain of the hopes and promise
Avowed within those sparks held.
T'was briefest of life's moments,
Most rare and intense,
Never again finding its day
Save in ambush of memory
On a night like this
When wind blows bitter and swift.
Brilliance still dances, but ever so far away

In the garden we danced,
My eyes and the butterfly,
Singing among the colors
Grace alive, a laugh
Kissing sun draped blooms


Too soon came the chill of fall
When wind-flung loose withered leaves
Mimicked the movement
They'd eyed in envy
The butterfly now gone.


Winter brought its ballet
In showering flakes of snow
When frigid ground braced against
Swirling pirouettes
Of beauty in ice


I hurry past my garden
With no time to linger by
Only in dreams still see
The butterfly dance
Her gentle waltz of summer

these things are yours:
the leather sofas, paintings and mantlepiece chachkas
marked with pink post-it notes
that defined this houseload of secrets to outsiders

as I wrote glories for you in forced smiles garnishing
black and white stories for a world you craved
our home groaned beneath the weight

pink notes

they feel like garottes, the
crafty complaints to strangers
duly noted in a ledger somewhere...

I never noticed 'till now
that even our children have been plastered with them,
sorry little heads bobbing under their wires,
stiff armed puppets, like me
facing ruined toys or threatened death of a pet,
love served contingent like dessert after dinner

my powder blue lips were ever too meager to say anything

I suppose the sofa your cat peed
on is mine to sleep in,
though bleach wasn't enough to get her stink out
no chairs around my foldout dinner table

I never had a stack of blue paper to paste on furniture or people

my meager parts were abandoned by curbside at night:
clothing, computer, tools;
broken finger, blood-crusty nose,
bruised psyche;
memories of a mother and father;
old desk, contents drenched in murky wash water
treasures to be gathered in an Easter egg hunt
before morning

I'm *****, broken on the street
to live in the van again and *** in a cup

yet I elate in this paucity of things; it makes me lighter
I embrace its freedom
like when I used to sleep in park trees
to avoid river vermin, hungry
(yes, pate´ in Paris was divine - I ate the serving you’d have wasted )

or on train station benches with foul-smelling vagrants
you wouldn't understand that interaction …
this devil knows names, shared their bottles and pains
(the view of Prague’s rooftops from the castle veranda -
marvelous over glasses of wine and slivers of brie)

I learned hope is thin, frail skin, aetherial
my scars are hard, heavy, battle-earned wings that will never fly

as to things I do own:
love of self left after your half-portion spent;
poems scorned because
you never understood how they could be born without you

soon enough
we'll both be ashes or dust;
I’ll go in puffs
of swirling cigarette smoke and cheap bourbon
you under soil, I think
while words and our children
will both outlive the good sofa you sit on

I want them to be happy

Working here in the alley just off Thirteenth Street
I heard echoes of "Clara" amid soul-piercing sobs -
A woman shambled over, arms glued to her sides,
Empty hands holding invisible sand bags.
Tear-streaked, wet cheeks, still crying,
Paused, wailing "Have you seen my Clara?"
I wanted to help her, really I did
So pathetically lost, sad, hopeless and desperate.
Yet I answered with truth, "No, I didn't"
Who was this woman, and Clara, at that?
Maybe a child, wandered away ages ago,
Mother, gray, tormented, still searching...  
"Then *******", she yelled, shuffling away
Toward Thirteenth Street, unconcerned
She wore just one slipper for two ashy feet.
A simple reply could've tendered new hope
Of holding dear Clara
Before death finally stole her

Then an old sod danced his odd waltz,
Legs still unsteady, he stopped here
To water the wall -
Swore he knew me - two soldiers in 'Nam -
But I was too young.
Remarked my health must be failing,
He'd never seen me so pale, suggesting
Medicine from the brown bag he held.
He offered to hold the long ladder steady
So I wouldn't fall again like I did in Saigon.
"No!", I held firm, but we commiserated
Our hard times since then;
Dayday, and Niney, our friends
Never came back, though we see them
Sometimes in this alley.
Then Matty, my brother, stumbled away
In search of lost buddies in bottles of gin.

Tiki, so skinny, ever the beauty, insisted
We go on a date right there in the alley,
Grabbing my crotch to punctuate
Her proposition, as if words weren't enough.
I offered she was quite pretty, but then
"If only I wasn't married," I lied, so she settled
For the cigarette I lit for her instead;
Wondered when work would be done-
Get to business, making used condoms,
Repaving the alley just off Thirteenth Street.

Perched high on my ladder, I could just see
Distant Broad Street, latex expressions of love
No longer sticking to treads of my boot.
Out there on that corner,
A man from The Nation selling bean pies,
Ignored me for days when I passed him by;
Asked me this morning if I'd like to try
The healthy delicacy he'd held high to God.
I felt blessed, accepted, he addressed me.
Rastafari, camped on the other side,
Still passed out free samples of Passion and Bliss,
Names he gave to incense he wished
Would transform shattered glass and trash
Into the heaven his dreams said might be.
I wore his fresh gifts, sticks behind each ear
Perfuming the stink of stale *****, used condoms
And I wondered if they walked here, too,
Through this alley just off Thirteenth Street.

the sharpening steel
slid across blackened blade
in rhythm like rapid
even breaths
in the dark
leaving a thread
of gleaming silk
at its edge
new, polished, perfect
the only aspect
of a life detested
this had
purpose and value
making order of chaos
erasing those
imperfections too minor
for the eye to find,
work day assaults
from the sinews
of soft animal flesh
Blood, death' s smell
ever sating nostrils
and under nails
though scrubbed white
at closing time.

grand those fortunes
which still pour,
grains of purest sugar
from sores in sacks where it's kept

they never bother the floors -
hillocks at times swept
for country club dues,
or spent on jaguars
the youngsters will drive -

it refills from endless supply,
now out of ransomed dreams
a rabble may dare,
repaid in their knees
and knuckles worn bare

bleeding tremolite lungs of old men
lending respectability to old names,
ensuring children's safe distance
from wizened brown limbs
of people forefathers traded,
broken black bodies hidden
in mounds of white wealth,

heathen souls saved at the altar,
naked but for irons they wore
lives mortgaged for
their good Christian deaths
all for sweetness
of more.

how often good Christians offer to hold us in prayer
friends of the ill, they intend well
I don't refuse, of course

Father catechized He was everywhere -
in flowers and butterflies, even all living things

so when He seemed never to notice the obvious

I'd squeeze my brow tight
as if the effort might shine invisible light
bright enough to be seen at universal distance...
my prayer

awaking mornings still cradled
safe in the branch of a tree
or folded in the back seat of our van,
alone

in the dark, no more a devil,
even I've heard the whispered words
of "Our Father..."

but we both know Jesus gave up his practice
of psychoanalysis long ago
so I wasn't surprised - just disappointed
when each resurrection of hope died

now I'd rather mop,
having collected an assortment
of surfactants and disinfectants suitable
for a wide variety of household surfaces

killing the unsuspecting bacterium,
allergen or virus

I set blossoms in a sterile vase at bedside
by her arrangement of amber pill bottles
they'll wilt; I'll empty
a prayer she doesn't notice

How casual he sounded,
The son who told me.
Her death, years ago,
Was to him as old
As news to me.
She was mother to he
But came lover to me
And there on the street
As strangers just passing,
The glimmers of past
Stoked my memory
But I couldn't remember his name
'Till we parted.
Searching his face,
Now a man's same as me,
For signs of some hatred
Or blame -
There was none,
Still smiles were awkward
And relieved, I walked on.
Was it his grace
Or mature understanding
That I, too, was a boy,
When she took me abed,
Still chasing young butterflies
And playing with toys,
Never paying a thought to
Replacing his father.
Lust kept secret for seasons
Before reason came bother
Lost in our thighs,
Or her ancient demons,
But a family shattered.
And I, only prize,
'Came ***** to new friends
Like a cheap bottle of wine
To pass among lips,
Psyche eroding with each of their sips.
With naive trust battered,
The sweet fever broke.
I awoke,
Summer already over.
So bittersweet, this sentiment
My sin with forgotten lover,
A son who lost his mother.

fire's gone now

humid air relieved in wash of heaven
to cool aching asphalt
by the tree

steam rose

it looked like steam, but may be fog
and the branches hang low
with the load they still hold
from a broken sky

why rain rather than days forever
heavy, humid, expectant
pregnant with maybe
despite their misery?

I now wonder why
I wasted this perfect summer
worrying over weeds
that will never die,
sip death from another cigarette

they'll dance in my ashes someday
my treasures of memories
grown the arrogance of a fool

fire's gone now.

I let ivy try the trunk, green all winter
yet buds haven't come with warm weather
it'll rot and drop this summer
or next, if it's too dry

I'll pretend surprise
as I oil the saw again, strike teeth with a file
left on the old tool bench downstairs...
one last time, I think, as we're all showing our wear

it's still tall, met the sky once
when it left - I heard the sigh
but turned and went back to sleep
imagining nothing but cutting until morning

Poetry is poking through the ashtray
for the lost word I spit away
on the the last cigarette to make sure it was out
(because I sicken from smoke of burning cellulosic filters,)
distracted, tapping another growing ash
into a glass I'll surely sip from later
It'll cough out dry and chalky
from my fingers
they all go to the same place -
whiskey, cigarettes, words -
and presume to have meaning
when it's late,
making a game of speeding clocks
until they're bored and stagger home
to their closet under the stairs,
leaving me to wash their empty glasses
and sweep off the dusty pretensions
they've left on my desktop,
wishing I'd gone to bed earlier
or repotted some geraniums instead.

inside weeks now, first frost warmed off, a *** watered
but still sere; her leafless twigs stand here ... pointing accusingly

(she'd promised us limes someday)

hope's a careless gardener with deep roots
resurrection imagined, coaxed to new shoots, green flecks ... some sign

(and lime fruits some day)

or any season grander than aged bourbon and ginger ... sipped
the crystal decanter bides quietly with gilt china

(for our harvest of limes)

a dusty cabinet counts reasons in neat rows
plant and man await parting, those pursed lips of time

(and dream, both, of limes)

Morning woke to a sky cloaked in white
as mist rose, smoky, from snow
now shedding its innocence
for smoldering, bent cigarettes
left to extinguish themselves overnight

Infinite blue was lost under cover,
down shroud erasing each page
of tales that reveries replayed,
myths of forever and love
rubbed away in a new day's color

Haze bound dreamers by cords of reason,  
who surrendered their searches
in surges of x-rays weighed
for presence of a life’s tuned waves
to prove existence an ancient season

Like a fragrance they vaguely remember,
confusing a vapor trace  
painted nostalgic - the face,
arching brow, how soft her hand -
and wished magic had lasted one more hour

her voice, in imagination,
is a moonlight sonata
to which I listen
when I'm alone, eyes closed;
covetous heart unwilling to share
painful beauty of the adagio,
explaining pain only angels know;

then, effortless transformation into
playful allegretto, delicate hands
already caressing bruised soul,
nestles fingers into mine;
we stroll, entwined as lovers will,
along lonely paths together,
each holding up the other,

building to passion of presto;
pace quickened, chastened steps
abandoned as flesh echoes
electric crescendos of bliss,
all that's real ceasing to exist
save sweet sweat,
fragrant breath of the other;
then I listen again,
to impossible moonlight,
and imagine.

Remember that afternoon on the ferry
Ride to Nantucket
The labrador who fell asleep on my foot
And the kid who vomited
As we stood at the rail,
Mist in our faces
Foam that curled
From the keel in swirls
A whole world in that turbulence
That no one would ever know of -
Focused on the Grey Lady's
Promise that a warm comforter
Would melt us together again.
And it did, amid the strangers
We brushed past
On the cobbles at the wharf.
Back at the dock,
You greeted old demons
And so did I
But kept them secrets
From each other
On the long ride
Through pine forests
As you slept, I drove
Back home.

Where to put the corruption -
fluid-filled half-lungs
choked on their coughs;
until fatigue made them
tentative motions
lived on knives' edges
slipped to flesh too often;
medications eased our pain,
tubes ******* up questions
we didn't want answered.
there were no more procedures -
clinical masks hiding fears
under dry medical terms
could finally be abandoned,
traded for tears shared with the window

Death waited to steal in the room
when our backs were turned;
we let lights burn in daylight
and night to scare away demons
even for a mind too tired to read.
every word yet put to page
had been made irrelevant -
she read mountains in distance,
climbed apple trees
at home again in Pennsylvania,
savoring redness of skinned knees;
sat on dusty mesas and prayed
for things no men had seen.

The child, still afraid of darkness,
begged "if only you would eat?"
but she smiled weakly,
as if embarrassed her secret
had been discovered
and asked me to flip the switch
so she might sleep;
son, always the obedient one,
turned off the light before he left.

twilight  piles its scorn on sun
dim where we usually live
not in light nor dark
just that in - between part
that's gray, which is real life,
now's life,
death's life,
not bright
nor black and white,
good nor evil
just civil;
but how drab it feels
not to drink warmth anymore,
those glows,
afterglows,
after wet kisses
after summer rain
caught us laughing
quivering skin
still remembering
blood lingering
thumping heart beats
her heart beats
my heart beat
beautiful, musical beats
two beings synchronized
recalling breathless copulations
replayed ever in imagination
as new days unfolded,
unencumbered by fears
our floors were never sterile enough
and must always be washed
just once more
because it's too hard to see
dirt in twilight
and real life,
real love,
reality
is always messy

Where's the heroism
In the folds of sheets
Tubes and wires' maze
Pads, sheaves of gauze
Rhythmic beating bleats
Of a mechanism

A last hope stand-in heart
Running on AC,
Chest grotesquely heaved
Each breath achieved
Like death's ecstasy
Young actor played his part

Defending hollow honor
On familiar streets
As if he had to
Live the credo
It's first love life cheats
Son won't mourn his mother

Wondrous passion, in fury found
manic strokes of oil
never thick enough to cover
burning doubts that cloud
the soul of genius;
we merely ponder
that which angels
finally plundered,
lingering over lunch of crumbs
left aside his table turned over,
wondering why he never
loved himself as much as we avow,
now grasping at tendrils stars leave
as they fall from his sky

I gave you the steel -
Hopes, thoughts, fears,
Reforged,
Honed to jagged spears,
Turned against the flesh
From which they were wrought.
But blood won't flow
From the piercings
Anymore.
The corpse, complaisant, yields
From a lifetime of wounds.
Those razor-edged words
Drained joy
Like the ******
Of a shattered wine glass
Once cut painful and red-
Nails pressed through skin -
We veiled those marks
From family and friends
While I learned to hide
Behind vacant eyes,
Mute lips,
Mind dreaming of water
Running from oily feathers
Off a duck
Imagining words were rain
And ears coated with
The magic stuff
That would shed the pain
If only I believed hard enough.
Tomorrow
I could find another smile,
Know
The world hadn't really changed
Much,
Find new words to alter
Anger to love.
How did psyche falter -
Those few unshed drops
In incidental increments or
By catastrophe,
A failure like a levee
Rupturing, leaving land awash -
Doesn't really matter.
Frame now basks in your cascade,
Absorbing and accepting,
Soul long lost now wandering
Wondering when will body follow,
Missing the mate with whom to share
That steel from which love
Should be made.

useless, this skyward nightblind stare
was it there, from lost flecks of  stardust
that God wrought
this species of heroes and heathens?
these eyes don't see much anymore

I've tired of my own sophic nonsense,
pretenses ****** to any screed that might buy words
to publish under slews of anonymous names...
real life is not vague
we chew it, hard crusty bread

before dinner, my own fingers rummaged deep
planted within loose root shards, chewed chicken thighs, other things
we've eaten,
ever since days as young children...

Our Father consumed simply

like a banged and dented '57 Chevy
adorned pretty with loose bananas and oranges
freed from paper cartons,
his rusty wrenches tucked in my toolbox
built solid, still colorful, if not as useful anymore;
a ***-stained carpet too good to throw away
left to rot in the driveway; I called a tow to haul it all
yesterday

Oh my Brother...

when it rains
I drown in his rolling wheelchair
and rubber-tipped canes, set out plastic buckets

... and I think to drink them in...

the stories of glory or warning,
conquests and war,
apple pies left to cool on a sill
awaiting harvest by the bravest soldier

today:
gifts of old shot glasses saved in the cellar
(I drink from the bottle)
a box of fine cedar from the back of the closet
(though odor not telling, for a decade at best)
more stories...

but still
we're both grown men now, and safer for past efforts,
the lawn neatly mowed if not always ****-free.

does it matter?
winter's soon coming.
what could it save me?

it's a cold wind -
in time enough, some men
newly minted, will gaze inward - outward, too
search for food left in the pantry
the paltry stocks I put up:
canned spaghetti, dollar store crackers, salty powdered soup mixes...

they'll wonder whether a father ever listened
cared enough to spout useful advice...
weigh one heathen,
the *** who wrote poems only for himself

Always a gray sky
Filled with something
That'll stay there -
Rain or snow -
Could be thunder
It won't share.
Whatever
Would come cursed,
Pain or joy not to know.
Though when it
Empties
Even barren hearts
Sometime see beauty
In soft snow flakes
Masking dull landscapes;
Springtime downpours
Clean
Staleness from air
For hours,
Making amends for trouble.
That release
Could connect us.

I wonder what the speed of dreams is
can we outrun them
or catch up when we dare,
latch on to the ones
we would care to live in;
are they like sounds
rippling through air -

or rather more stars' light,
in flight 'cross wide universes,
like mighty, galloping, wild horses
'till caught by the eyes,
tamed rides for tired minds ...

... do they travel through ethers
known only to souls,
who keep them as secrets
when daylight unfolds
else we might stay there,
forgetting our chores,
just us two lying
on the bank of a river
under the willow
that binds us together

Did I care then, were they
Real, those stories
About some other
I talked about,
Though hardly knew.
Saying aloud
"What a shame,
She was so young,"
Shook head
No feeling, really,
A window shopper.
Was it wife or mother
Touched, too, who
Finally made real
Life-choking fear,
Overwhelming dread of
Deathly growth
That was of them.
Proclaiming love through tears,
I cried all the long ride
To claim she that bore me
While at home new bride,
Yesterday learning
Sleep amidst my snores,
Burned, cold poison
Now swimming
In bruised veins
Free spirit aging
Before my eyes
All life lost childish gloss,
The delightful lightness
Youth should be allowed,
And I cursed God
How dare You, we were so young.