• HUP TWO

    We marchedfor hoursgoingnowhere We satswelteringin classroomspretendingto learn Six weekslaterthey told uswe werewarriors Our haircould beginto grow back Heavensave usfrom thisendless war,fromourselves.


  • HEAVEN CAN WAIT

    A Rabbi once told me thatif you want to get to heaven,something Jews don’t believe in,you must atone to those youhave harmed, or injuredbefore you die. I’ve started making a list,and it feels like I am insome wierd version ofHigh Fidelity, but mineis more than a top five. I’ve made a few efforts,some accepted, some…


  • WAITING FOR HEAVEN TO CALL

    He says he is waiting patientlyfor the arrival of heaven on earth. He is not sure what that will be likeand the descriptions he has seenare too fantastical to be believed,all clouds and angels and music He is hoping the things he lovesmost will be available in heaven,a good Alfredo sauce and Germanchocolate cake, for…


  • HEAVEN, UTAH

    We would sit around the small parkas evening made a hasty retreatto somewhere, anywhere more livelythan Salt Lake City in the heart of summer. We’d pass a jug of whatever wascheapest at the state package store,usuall Gallo this or that, and roll jointswhich made their way around our circle. The cops would drive by every…


  • POETS GATHER

    One deep and abiding beauty of dreamsis that it is entirely logical forMarina Tsvetaeva to be engagedIn an animated discussion withCorso and Ginsberg where none willacknowledge that the world theywrote and imagined is a total mess. Over in the corner, Mandelstam andReznikoff have agreed that for eternityevery game of chess they play willresult in a…


  • THINGS TO COME

    One morning last week I decidedto plant myself at a busy intersectionand begin reading poetry, mostlymy own, I have to admit. I was generally ignored, my usualstate, and that sadly of most poets,when a scruffy, bearded young manset up easel and paint next to me. The morning seemed to relishthe stillness of this urban way…


  • HEAVEN, ONLY SLIGHTLY OUT OF REACH

    God is fixed in the firmamentseen as puppet master by somepatrician uncle, small childendlessly shifting blocksin new, transitory universes.All things recede from a point,have since the creationand that point, dimensionlessis God, vast and infinite.It swings lazily, back, fortha needle in its cusp tracinglines in the bed of sandin constant motion as weand earth, and all…


  • 33,000

    As 33,000 feet, you want the smoothness that experience tells you, the sky will once again deny. Strapped in, you contemplate cursing the gods of travel, but no, they are simply meeting your expectations. Getting this close to heaven was once, she says, a mystical and spiritual experience, but then we transcended all of that…


  • HEAVEN CAN WAIT

    He said, “I’m looking forward to heaven for a reason you cannot begin to imagine, and, not that I want to rush my arrival.” She said, “It’s rather audacious to assume you’ll end up there, I place the odds as at best at 50-50 and I’m being generous because I’m still in love with you.”…


  • LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER

    My mother no longer speaks to me. It is not that she has been dead two years, that passage would hardly be an impediment for her. I would like to think she has nothing left to say, having said it all so many times in the past. Some say we will see each other again…