We deeply miss
What we never were
Other's lives - so appealing
So we emulate the best we can
In both becoming and reflecting
Do gifts of passions occur

lapsong souchong in hand
and writing
as the sun
blossoms
in the full
expanse of
the atmospheric prism -
a few shades
dismissed to a
short recess
to play
on their own

and the wind
sits still
only an observer now
joyfully allowing the
lake, the colors, the writing
these undisturbed moments
together

Sinking organs
Surrounded by unshared smiles
Failing in the center ring
Witnesses to my trial

NOW will be impressed forever
Dying my canvas shade
There are no corners to hide in
I am a fraud, I have been made

Seeking not high words
The cat refusing to release my tongue
Lofty clouds quickly vanish
Today's truth in the saddest songs

Grab a pint and sit with me
Tell me what you thought
While reading that short Hemingway
Or that sad one from Frost

Did you follow, or were you lost?
Do you care, or fell more blah?
What exactly did you see?
Did life reveal in raw?

How important is this art
But much more valued shared
Even if we don't agree
Together we rip the veil

early on the dock
the shipping dock

peaks peaking out atop
flatirons and boulders
still holding snowpack

some captains awake in their cabins
others guide their crafts to port
arrivals from madison, aurora, santa fe
hulls of soybeans, corrugate, and lotion

on the dock
reading efficiency and transit reports

quick greetings to the captains
then talk of black coffee
of nicaraguan beaches
of all that is easily accessed
by the regulated echoes
written on each soul

while small sparrows investigate
mullein and hawthorn
in tall yellowing grasses
and towering windswept clouds
move silently
across a dark exploding
dawn’s expanse
revealing the intentions
for the day
and all
start a new rotation together

Fellow lost soul
Share a flower-scented thought?
Or still bouncing through the dark
    A hawk scaring off flocks?

The world creates peculiar friends
Difficult lessons to learn
But also bright lights
    Third to the sun and the moon

Like writers and readers
Capable intimate exchange
Or fear-covered nonesense
    With lies for truth's sake

Science is
the magic
of our age.

I want
the old world
back.