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A WELL REHEARSED SILENCE
Of course there is something I oughtto say, moments like this require it,it goes without saying, painfully. I practiced lines for hours, rehearsedin my dreams for weeks, knewfor years I’d be rendered mute. My tongue swells, threateningto escape my mouth or take refugedeep within my esophagus. Your silence is only compoundingmy anxiety, how can I,…
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ARRIVE
She doesn’t arrive. We knew she likely would not arrive. We are not certain why she has chosen not to arrive. She is good at arrivals. She is good at not making arrivals. If she said why she didn’t arrive we would accept that reason. We would also question that reason. She is good at…
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REINCARNATION
In my next lifeI want to come backas a Great Blue Heron. I will majesticallystand by a lake, capturingfish, capturing the eyeof all who wander by,pausing in awe and desire. And I will havethe one thing I knowI now lack, that traitthat has escaped mefor far too many years,patience, the abilityto stand and stareuntil the…
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WORKSHOP
Grace settles into the chair,less an act of sitting thanof floating down onto the seat.She has borrowed my grandmother’ssmile, kind, gentle, inviting.She pulls a book from her bag,its pages or most of themdog eared, and I glimpsesome annotations in the margins.We sit around her like childrenawaiting presents on a holiday,as acolytes seeking knowledgefrom a font…
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HE WHO LAUGHS LAST
The moon was kind enoughto linger this morning,knowing that I wanteda photograph, and thatI needed sufficient ambientlight to allow meto fully capture her visage.Sometimes she rises earlyand shows her facebefore the sun retreats.I suppose it may justbe vanity on the moon’s part,showing off for her brightersibling, certain I will neverpause to photograph Sol.Tomorrow it will…
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CATHARTIDAE
They circle slowlyeach in its own tierof a near cloudless sky,their wings stillas if frozen, ridingthe breeze, dippingand rising, going nowhere,needing nowhere,riding, riding, lookingdown at the wetland,and circling, untilwith a shift in the breezethe vulture vortexshifts east, and youwatch them shrink,thankful that theyare simply outfor a flight, and notfinding a mealin the reedsand treeswhere allthe…
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DEMANDED TIME
I’ve made a practicewhich feels more like a demand,that each day I take a fewmoments or more and stopwhatever else I was, orshould have been, doingto write a poem. There are days, perhaps thisone where it seems morea short bit of prose to whichI have added line breaksdespite the protestof the words, condemning themto bear…
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FORGOTTEN SOULS
From the heart of the infernoDante and Lucifer grow boredwaiting, waiting for the ferrywhile Charon stops for lunchyet again at a Greek dinerin the heart of Hell’s Kitchen.They take up a game of catchtossing Molotov cocktails,raining fire onto the brimstone,setting the Styx ablaze.Each knows this is not necessary,for necessity is a creatureof heaven and there…
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ROBBIE
He left and we never saw the departure coming. We knew he would leave sooner or later, but not now. We had planned on his visit. We knew he meant he was coming. We knew he might just show up. He traveled on snap decisions. It might be here, it might be Paris or Italy.…
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EDGE OF THE ABYSS
He sits on the edgepeering down, shakingin the breeze, knowingthe abyss below waitsfor a misstep, a slip. He stares up, waitingfor her return, hopingshe will soon arrivebringing the meal, neverenough always wanting more. He knows he willsomeday soon haveto leave, but for nowall he can do is spreadhis wings, flap them, until it will seem…
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an old writer and his words 