in the mirror of everything
sky raining down around you
in a pattern of potential
with the fortitude of grace
dripping cold from
squared-off shoulders
as if sunshine
could be ordered and
magnificence
presumed
.
.
.
or if velvet could fly
and the way i watched that hawk
yesterday
brushing a new painting
of sky
as i tried to write a poem
that was not about death
and smiled at simple
impossibility
.
.
.
i’m dizzy all the time
and i’d like to say that’s metaphor,
(and it is, a little)
but i can’t seem to stand
in one place
long enough
to stop the spinning
i thought age
would keep me steady
strengthen roots
chart my course
but the world is cockeyed
and ambitious
and i get closer to antique
every day
rebellion is for youth
(or so i thought)
but here i am
(here we are)
fighting for things
i thought already won
and that’s just the way of things
isn’t it?
nothing is certain
we fool ourselves
into new beginnings and lit
lights and the mirage of
equanimity
but the truth is
it’s a never-ending battle
and i think understanding
that one simple thing
sustains us
i grow old on the banks of a river
running circles
around us all
.
.
.
i think that’s what she said while trying to smile
and i never was one to argue with deliverance
even after tilt-shift became a normal point of view
i wanted to hold you
at least your hand
but paper thin skin
kept rising between us
none of us means to die
even when we want to
trying to smile at her own lost joke
fingers scrabbling at the corners
of a crooked mouth gone dry
like the wind i drank
to forget your sky
.
.
.
you sing me songs of february summer
and i laugh at the absurdity
because
nothing makes sense anymore
and everything
is a tune
from those long ago years
when we believed
in certainty
still
i smile and i dance
at words
spilled from
wist and sunshine
so ripe with yesterday’s
short season of naiveté
when we were young
and you were golden
and i
was just a rose
.
.
.
there is gold and there is freedom
you say neither one
matters
in the grand scheme
of things
our hands are always left empty
i mention the scars
of experience
the stars
whisper something
of the moon
the way the sun
is always in your eyes
paper crinkled
and satisfied
or beckoning
i’m not sure which
.
.
.
just ask nature, she’ll be happy to let you know
that dance was invented by willows
weeping at winter’s impostor
and stars are made from moans left hanging
on a breeze in the corner of reflection
.
we are all mirrors on the same wall of eternity
chanting hope and charity with leavening
.
this circle this tree this mind mattering
tossed by cold gale and rent from warm earth
growth and decimation occur concurrently
it doesn’t matter where you stand
it doesn’t matter where you stand
.
darkness always returns
as does mo(u)rning
.
.
.
.
snow falls gently through a sky bleeding sunshine
through the closed door i hear geese
warming their way through a morning
most of them will survive
i cling to small things. moments, really
and wish i could gift them to you
i know a whole list of people with that name
the miracles gather and hover
hoping to land, gently
winter is coaxing autumn to bed
with an ever-changing quilt
of cozy promises
a patch of blue peeks through worn cotton batting
needs no mending
.
.
.
which is not the same as the kitchen sink
because that would mean everything,
and this is just a window.
and just now, there is too much everything,
everywhere,
every minute.
i want clear blue sky and calm cool morning.
but it’s autumn and the colors are raucous
and speaking of raucous,
i’m missing those crazy-loud geese parties
down at the swamp
that aren’t happening this year
because there’s no swamp.
and i’m not writing because there are no words.
so i wait.
and winter will come and i will miss all this color
and wish for things I don’t have
the same way as today
and that bird in the tree,
that bluejay who spends his days
as a beautiful bully
and the monkshood just starting to bloom,
in amidst all the kisses that need cutting down
and this could all be metaphor
for so many things,
but it’s not, it’s all true,
right outside
this tiny kitchen in
this tiny house
this tiny life
half-invisible
portal.
.
.
.
.
on a small lake in maine
i found the color of departure
.
.
.
.
.
