spring has taken
the shape of a wounded coyote...

forcing a layered film
of something very dangerous
to hide in the bulb of each joss flower…

a brutal coercion made pure
by the ghost of the ending winter...

each day has forced warmth
upon me as if it were a ritual,

the annual harvest of my sanity.

These sounds of silence
Rumble and roar
I’m in a constant state of questioning
Asking what love is,
Filling in the gaps between all my questions
With the things we saved for March
Relishing in the idea of spring
And what it means to bloom
Peeling away at citrus,
Reaching for the plums and nectarines
In the icebox, scarfing down cooled melon
Picking at peonies and daffodils
Thinking about tea but hating its taste
I was never a morning person
But the sun these days is so new

But it’s when the winter creeps back
And I awake to a morning frost
Bits of past, pieces of December
Pine trees and heating cars
I remember the worth of remembering
And the reality of how time moves
And how all these questions
Sprinkle down with snow, rain,
sun rays, or leaves
never leaving, never eased
only knowing that I don’t know
and that seasons don’t return; they just pass

step to the threshold
love is pulled away with the door
       into the ice night
replaced with mewling horror
exposure   invites my death

It's still cold outside,
so why are the birds singing
so joyfully and so loudly?

Still freezing out there,
so why are the flowers blooming?
I don’t understand.

The hope is still cursed,
so why am I writing this poem,
like it was my first?

Loves of my December,
frozen from the beginning
of my endings,
and the fall of my anguish.



In the winter of my solitude,

I trace the wrinkles
of fainting memories.
Breathing out a sigh of surrender
for the unspoken, the paths
unwalked, the doors unopened,
and the ghosts of love that remain
draped in the painful cloak of longing.

Yet, amidst the cold, I find grief
blooming like a flower in the snow.

For in the mirror of my December
I have found not just
the echo of what was lost,
But the prayers of April—
the goddess of renewal,
the angels of spring,
and the dawn of new beginnings.

How can I not rejoice?
For in this darkness,
there is light…

sunrise:
watch the owls take their
last flight,
say goodbye to the
night time;
morning’s begun.
fog hangs
a little longer on
the window pane,
chicks are chirping with
their hunger pangs;
here comes the sun.

Saint Tropez is a summer town.
Smaller than it ought to be, really.
Like when you realize the French quarter,
in New Orleans, is just three blocks wide and long.

In the fall, there’s a feeling of disuse in Saint Tropez.
A turquoise bike leans haggard against a stone pine,
and summer leaves gather in gutters like trash.

Your appearance in a bar is treated like a surprise.
The wait staff gathers, like they might take your picture
and not your order - one brings napkins another the menu.

Summer memories are indistinct now, from disuse.
You aren’t sedated by sunlight and warm ocean airs.

Was summer some French, romantic, cinematic fantasy,
like "La Belle et la Bête" or "And God Created Woman"?
Or was it deliciously bright, seductive and real.

You find yourself saying, “In the summer, when the thyme,
lavender, rosemary, citrus and jasmine bloom, the aromas
are strong, actually physical, like going into an Ulta store,
where a thousand delicate perfumes vie for attention.”

But it’s like describing ghosts or deserts under glass.
You search for the words, like a poet or an actress, unable
to remember her lines - lines that would make it real,
invoke it, precious and immediate - like a spell.

The Saint Tropez of summer.