i promise once having returned from the void i will have found a voice
something to say
a raid on the inarticulate
no,not just clever this time
but genuine,authentic
..silence might be another kind of rant i fell into
marking poverty of speech, gaunt vocabulary, the toll of meaning
all falling together into a clump, the abyss
tell me you know of this place,where i am
  -your much closer than myself
in saying it may really all exist
and might matter after all.

bee
panic buzzing, trapped in a bottle
afternoon skies,the colour of chalk
sunburned feet
sand clinging to sweat
i'd shower except i like the smell and taste of salt
a small fire...later you'll smell like smoke
all loose and lovely beneath a sweatshirt
a cool fog creeps and finds us
..later everything ..all that is and perhaps not
coalescing
coming alive
beneath a single moon.

i can untie the chimes from the trees now
take the willow branch and sweep
feather softly over
confuse the path to and from
dismantle the fire circle
wash and scrub
the scorched
blackened stones
and return them scattered with whatever else charred

i won't leave till the matted earth springs back

until the warm and thickened air cracks
into a final downpour
washing away every untold moment

inside a great green stillness
the vital field begins to reclaim itself
dreaming of having never have been disturbed
no trace of human purpose
or intentions
...and so i can leave you now my love
   my work here is done

in silence
our silence
we work my garden together
i watch him
crouched over yellow squash blossoms
does he recognize yet
how the vine is connected to me?
how everything grown and included here
have their days and nights
inside of me?
...he also is an aspect of my garden
added not as a afterthought
but as my first wish
the yellow squash blossoms
so tenderly pressed between his fingers
connects and brings him home to myself
..my smile is hidden and private
it is turned away from him
late afternoon now
the first of long shadows lower over my garden
i want to touch him
like he touches the squash blossoms
and tell him
it was prayer and imagination
that summoned this sensible creation
the same imagination
that brought and keeps him here
look how wonderfully alive it all becomes
clinging to the vine
...quick, come to me
while there is still time

i will tell you of the final and lasting secret
while there is still this moment
between us and the garden
...before it all wilts and withers
and passes away

i watch
a child racing his bike uphill
chasing a purple sunset
mercifully he will never catch it
unless i'm wrong of course
and he realizes meaning
and he comes to understandings
all on his own, before he is prepared to
bear witness to  his own sadness
his place in the world
awakening too quickly, too young
to the ineffable journey
before him

its already begun

i loved you
how i adored you
following you from city to city

it all nearly killed me

i moved through those mesmerized crowds
as a roaming shadow on the back wall
something to throw your voice against,
your life upon

the lyric predictably failed between us
long before
the music died


my heart instead
allowed to wander inside deaf applause.









































\\\\\\

t­he music ended
the lyric failed

i was everything but the applause