The older I get
the less I search for

truth

because these days
a white face and honking nose

work for me

it's the simple and absurd things
in this life

that are all I need

the leafless tree branches.
clouds drift in the pale sky
and the deer leave footprints
in the snow

and all flowers fade,
so, throw the dead flowers
across my grave

and with time
winter's wounds will heal
so spring can follow
when the river sheds its skin of ice
and the deer footprints turn to mud

and the earth forgets the cold.
sunlight kisses, the flowers sigh,
tulips bruised red,
for-get-me nots whisper,
daffodils linger.

the sunrise whispers anew
and trembling in sunlight
the green leaves wave

as the wind dances with newborn flowers
that for tell of the Grace.

O, my wild garden.

After a while
I opened my sketchbook.

Holding the pencil
again felt so good.

I sketched the face
of a random girl—
it wasn’t very good,
yet it felt right.

It reminded me
of a lost love.

Art—
my first love.

Asylum



In the madhouse
on beds of daggers
we slept like crickets
chirping to ourselves
while they tried their best
to make us cannibals.

The nuns were worse than
lawyers, praying like accordions,
tracking their sins into our soft
wax skulls, wheezing like roosters
when one of us cried, laying the greasy ribs
of Jesus on our plates.

They kept you behind
door number six. I'd go to you
with a stolen key, when the noon
smelled bright as carnations,
when the nights were
more purple than the jacarandas.

You spoke of your father
dead of snakebite,
a clockwork marvel with
his million-dollar suit of skin,
of your mother
with the viper between her lips.

I remember your kiss
astringent with reason
as bitter lemons, and the way
your hair blew back from
your dog-brown eyes like poisonous
smoke from the oleanders.

I thought these things
as beautiful as angels
whispering in the dahlias
when I was lost in the asylum,
when the doctors did all they could
to see that we ate each other
down to the bone.


April 2022

What is love?
That ineffable feeling
Of longing, joy, of meaning
So deep, transcendent,
Pleasing, incandescent,
That keeps us going
Is the meaning of life
Comes in so many forms
A supernatural force
A belief in good
That provides hope and strength
When in need
What is love?
I surely know
It is you and me

I remember you as you were in the last autumn.
You were the grey beret and the still heart.
In your eyes the flames of the twilight fought on.
And the leaves fell in the water of your soul.

Clasping my arms like a climbing plant
the leaves garnered your voice, that was slow and at peace.
Bonfire of awe in which my thirst was burning.
Sweet blue hyacinth twisted over my soul.

I feel your eyes traveling, and the autumn is far off:
Grey beret, voice of a bird, heart like a house
Towards which my deep longings migrated
And my kisses fell, happy as embers.

Sky from a ship. Field from the hills:
Your memory is made of light, of smoke, of a still pond!
Beyond your eyes, farther on, the evenings were blazing.
Dry autumn leaves revolved in your soul.

by Pablo Neruda

Today is my birthday,
I’m turning eleven.
My one wish is that when I’m twenty,  
I still feel like seven.
I hear yelling,
An explosion of pandemonium.
I rush downstairs,
Tripping over them.
My smile stretches from wall to wall
I see my loving parents,
Knives in hand,
And at each other’s throats.
The smile fades.
No wishes of any kind.
I return to my room.
Take pencils.
And make myself blind.  

— from my chapbook Glass Three Quarters Empty

Time travel bandits
Einstein the fender ******
and black hole Hawking
H bombs and Exodus plans
Next level nevertheless