Water flows across the forest floor
Slicking the moss and pebbles and earth

We dart above the shimmering surface
Shooting winks and diving for the minnows

We can't normally sing but today
We produce such a tune that the
Cardinals and sparrows and blue jays all listen
To our duet in C major

And even the wind stops stirring up
The clouds in the sky so as not to interrupt

For 3 days we soar and swoop and sing
And it could make up for 50 years

Whenever I went to the beach as a kid
I would count and number the lizards that scampered on the porch
They were like napkins dropped from the hand of someone hurrying down the street
After delaying their commute for a pastry
I wonder years later
Was ever a lizard counted twice?

I can’t help but number every poem I’ve ever written
As a kid I counted everything
Every time I clapped at a school assembly I clapped the same amount:
25 claps every time. I couldn’t stop myself
Children of divorce count more I think
I counted all my Christmases
One with mom, mom’s mom, dad, dad’s mom, and dad’s dad
5 every year

Looking at anything in a self-referential series is like living in liquid glass
Transparent but warped and shifting
The path taken is obvious but misguided
But the numbering freezes time
My first poem about numbering was how I felt then
This is how I feel now
Evolution

‘I ain’t tired!’ yells the homeless, old man begging for change
On the green line station me and my friends get off at to buy coffee
He turns and looks at us
‘I ain’t tired!’ yells the toothless, old man on that cold winter night
As we preemptively pull out our phones and look down at the ground
A defense mechanism
‘I ain’t tired!’ yells the hobbling, old man as we pass him by
Without making eye contact or even a sympathetic nod
If only I had cash on me
‘I ain’t tired!’ repeats the mentally ill, old man while we descend
The stairs down onto the pavement and into Chinatown
The snow continues falling
‘I ain’t tired!’ echoes the starving, old man
His voice ringing in my ears long since we’d left ear shot
The only time I had the courage to glance at him
He was a mess of wires and bone and cloth and paint and white hair
Older than the city I had just begun to explore and call home
Permanently on that train station yelling
‘I ain’t tired!’
‘I ain’t tired!’
‘I ain’t tired!’

most of the angels avert their gaze
a few stare, their glares embedded
in my bare chest and just one
watches quietly from the corner

what would Judas think about
the scarves? one wrapped around
my wrists and the other around
my eyes with my teeth clenched

my back is arched above the
towel you put on your sheets just
in case. did jesus ever think about
his safeword as he hung on the cross?

‘Do you like that?’ whispers Pontius Pilate
gasping I respond, ‘Yes sir,’

I toss and turn for you
   You surround me and subvert my thoughts
The operator behind the switchboard
   Changing the wires from stress to love
With the flicker of your eyes         I unwind
You let me talk and talk and talk
   About jazz and comics and magic and league
         And you smile
I see the stars get to know the fireflies
As I lay facing the night
   The grass cool         The air warm
                          I unravel
And dream         (about you)
And our conversations
and Paris and Italy
And your smile      God your smile
   The most potent drug God could dream up
Like nothing else      I can see it perfectly
Like looking through the windows
   Of an Edward  Hopper painting
      Clear

The warrior walks
Dawn's first light in the forest
A babbling stream

The birds are chirping
He wades through the tide of mist
Around his ankles

The stream is ahead
Dropping his weapon he falls
The battle was won

He saved his village
But suffered a grievous wound
He reaches forward

The ice cold water
Brings wet fingers to his lips
A slight refreshment

Savoring the taste
A bed of wild flowers
A perfect cushion

Weapon behind him
He thinks about his breathing
With grass on his face

Remembers, exhale
His wife and child, inhale
Beautiful, exhale

Remembers, inhale
The days long battle, exhale
His people saved, still

Remembers, inhale
Vibrant colors of spring, still
His daughter's face, still

Remembers, exhale
Cold water on his lips, still
Birds are chirping, still

Wild flowers, still
Rays of dawn pierce the trees, still
A babbling stream

Baseboards lined with spiderwebs
That shimmer in the slanted sun
Next to worn, wooden chairs
Feeling sturdier than ever
Shelves and shelves of
Outdated textbooks and encyclopedias
Crinkly and brown and yellowed
How many trees went into these pages
This forest rearranged
And defaced by movable type