Diamonds In the Rough

I wonder if things get bad,
if the economy dips
and the bubble bursts once more
if I can get back all the jewelry
and engagement rings I've given
to women over the years.
what if i'm living in the woods
in a pup tent heating up a can
of chef boy r dee chili over
a barrel of burning sticks.
damn i'd like to have some of
those diamonds back and locked
away in a wall safe.
most were given in some
confused state of anxiety
and fear, not out of love,
or hope, or admiration, no,
most were given in the heat of
some infatuated moment
because the sex was so good.
so shouldn't I have them back?
seems only fair. it's not
like they're going to wear
them again, most of these women
already have boxes of rings
and jewelry from other men,
other boyfriends and lovers,
husbands that
they've swindled and charmed
the pants off.
it's only fair. I mean it's
like stealing. dag nab it.
I want my rings back. please.
don't you women have any self
respect, self esteem, dignity
or class? well, that's a dumb
question, one I probably
shouldn't ask.

Ironing to Do

I remember watching my mother
iron
for hours. standing at the board
with a basket of clothes
at her feet.
she was there, but not there.
caught in the moment
of doing something so simple
that it hardly took thought.
each shirt stretched out,
the sleeves, the creases.
dress after dress, pants, even
sheets were pressed warm
then folded. the breath of steam
from the hot iron,
the spray of starch.
she was safe there.
the world was another place
beyond this tight laundry
room, with a dangling light
and a curious son on the floor
watching.
the world could wait, she
had ironing to do.

being imperfect

you do not have to be perfect,
not in word,
or work,
appearance
or action.
we are no less because
of our
imperfections.
look around you,
few if any
have it down,
being human is hard,
but it doesn't have
to be.
go slowly, love slowly.
forgive yourself
as you
would others.
trust your instincts and
be who you are
meant to me.
no more, no less.

wake up laughing

it's funny how you wake up
one morning,
and you have a wonderful epiphany
about where you are
now, that you no longer
care about someone
you once agonized over.
you almost start laughing at
the insanity
that person brought into your life.
instead of worry and anxiety,
fear and pain,
you feel nothing. the sweet and clear
cold
water of truth and freedom.
all that cliché stuff.
it's refreshing.
why it took so long, is meaningless,
what counts is that
you are no longer attached to
a lunatic, a wolf in sheep's
clothing. the poison
is gone, the dark cloud
has moved on.
you do a dance as you jump
out of bed, throwing your
hands into the air,
spinning gaily around.

The Old Suit

i have a suit in my closet that i wore
when i was twenty two
years old.

it's a pale grey, with cuffs, no less.

it looks like the suit for a small
skinny child. which i was.

i'd have to be dead for a month
in order to fit into it now.

but i think about the time gone by
since i wore
that suit.

the relationships that have come and
gone. real love, fake love.
imaginary love.

the jobs, the houses and apartments
lived in.
the cars i drove.

the places i went.
i think about all the friends
that I've had,

some still here, others, long gone.
i look in the pocket and find the ticket
stubs

to The Way We Were from a theater
on glebe road in Arlington.

it's hard to throw away a suit like
that,

something that reminds me of the beginning.
i hold it up
to the light,

then hang it back to where it was.
another year
and we're both still here.

the long distance call

I remember the long distance
phone call,

standing in a phone booth with a
pocket full of change.

the operator listening in,
telling you when it's time to
feed
the slot,

to gain more minutes to talk.
it was usually raining,

or snowing, or the wind was
blowing so hard through the creases
of the glass
booth

that you could hardly hear
the person on the other end.

they'd get half of what you
were saying,
and you'd get the same
from them.

you'd stamp your feet on
the slab floor trying to stay
warm,

dropping coins everywhere,
bending over to find them in
the flickering light.

it was strangely romantic though.
the gallant effort made

to talk to someone you loved
and to tell
her all the things

you needed to say, and then
to hear
her say the same

on that thin wire that somehow
connected two souls
together

in the pouring rain.

call your lawyer

i find a snake
in the shed.
a copper head.
curled, cold in the dark
corner.
stitched in it's familiar
pattern.
she eyes me
with a sinister grin
on her thin lips
then shows me her sharp
pointed tongue. she
reaches back in a stiff
coil, ready to strike,
as i stumble away,
unbitten, unharmed.
i shut the door.
trembling with fear.
I've dealt with snakes
like this before,
so i know what to do.
i call my lawyer.

the relationship totem pole

you look for someone who
can put you
somewhat near the top of their totem
pole.
as you have done for them.

a relationship
where you're not an accessory
for dates,
or holidays,
or to be paraded out
on festive occasions.

you want more.
you want to be above the ex husband
the married
boyfriend,
the priest, the parent.
the dog.
the therapist,
the nutritionist,
the treadmill or salmon
and avocados.

true love. equal love and compassion
for one another,
is what you want, not some
crazy half in half out,
convenient and lame relationship.

you're just barely a spot above
God on their pole
of affection. which says a lot.

you don't want to ninth,
or fourth
on the pole or even third.

second, at the very
least would be fine. you can
live with second.

new is not better

new
is not always better.

sometimes the old needs a nudge,
a push.

some oil
in the right places.

a twist of a screw,
or tightening
of a seam with glue.

a wire tied tight, if loose.

why go new, when the old
works
perfectly well.

outdated, perhaps, but
still
working,

stick with those who
will last.

lemon love

it's a bitter fruit,
sour
and strange,
a hybrid of sorts,
lemon, just the word
itself is
used
as a disparaging name.
the car, or something bought
that breaks
within minutes of
buying.
but even love can have
a lemon quality about
it.
so bright and yellow,
at first glance.
cheerful and gay in
color and shape,
but one bite will tell
to stop,
add sugar, use sparingly
for flavor,
or throw it away.

the first date

when our knees touched
I felt
a thrill,
and then when her hand
reached over
and took mine,
I thought I might pass
out,
and finally when
she moved
her lips towards mine
and kissed
me,
all worry left my heart,
there was no longer
any doubt.

fission and fusion

it's complex.
but it's not nuclear fission
or fusion,
or the theory
of relativity.
it's nothing compared
to science,
or mathematics.
astrophysics, no,
not even close,
but it is hard, no doubt
about that.
men and women.
love? that tenuous school
of thought.
will it ever work out?
we want
straight A's in that,
not C's, or even
B's. forget failure,
or being expelled,
no one wants to wear
the dunce
hat.

retreat

in retreat, I fall back, take
off
my clothes
and let the sun
arrive
upon me.
I have nothing left to say
that hasn't
been said
ten fold.
I fall back like the French
army.
the white flag
waving
in the cold air.
I lie upon the earth
and say
to God, okay.
I give up. now you
take hold.

the oil of tenderness

it's the squeeze of the can
of oil
onto the hinge,
the rusted gate
or chain,
or door
that won't close,
it's not unlike what
a smile
will do,
or gentle kiss
when leaving or
arriving.
the thoughtful word,
or gift.
a single rose
instead of a dozen.
we need this oil,
this tender
lubrication of love
to get
through
each day, or night
that enfolds.
a drop or drip
is fine, but
be generous with the can,
each dollop of affection
shown
is precious.

Spiritual Armor

I read in the bible
about
the armor
of God,
the belt of truth,
the breastplate of righteousness,
the shield of faith,
the helmet
of salvation.
so I go to my closet
to find
this outfit
before going out.
and instead I find
the shroud
of doubt,
the hat of fear,
the shoes
of worry. the umbrella
of anxiety.
so I yell up to my
wife,
where is my spiritual armor?
and she yells
back down,
in the cleaners,
should be ready by
Wednesday.

the deep freeze

there is frost on the pumpkin,
on the leaves.
a smooth silk
of ice
is layered thinly
upon everything.

even her, as she lies there
not sleeping,
but with her eyes close
so that she
doesn't have
to talk
or see me.

frost is upon us.
the deep freeze can't be
far behind.

popcorn and netflix

I make a batch of popcorn
getting ready for a night of binging
on Netflix.

I pour in a little oil,
then the hard tiny kernels
of corn.

I turn the heat up, but then
the phone rings

and I walk around talking as
i'm prone to do.

upstairs, downstairs, talking
with my hands. engaged
in the conversation.

catching
up with an old friend.

when I come back into the kitchen
the popcorn is everywhere.
on the floor,

the counter,
on the fan, the pictures.
on the window sill.

I forgot to put the lid on.
this is when I miss my dog,

the canine vacuum cleaner
that he was.

catch and release

it's a world of catch
and release.
we reel in love, or work,
places
to live,
cars and things, it's
all replaceable
temporary,
throw them all back
into the sea
if they don't fit
your needs,
rebait the hook,
and cast away.
the ocean is deep.

dead fish

only dead fish
go with the flow.

don't be a dead fish,
use those

fins, that tail, those
gills
and swim towards

your true life, don't
get caught
in the web

of other's wrong thinking.

dual citizenship

I apply for dual citizenship
in Canada.

I've never been there, but I
like the look of it.

and I like maple syrup on my
pancakes in the morning.

they look happy up there in
the cold.

all that ice skating and hot
cider.

they seem to be more relaxed,
more down to earth
than we are

down here.
I have a little French
from high school under
my belt,

so that helps. it might
be a nice place

to summer. get a plaid shirt,
some boots,
a hat with ear flaps

and an axe. they don't
seem to care about the rest

of the world, which fits
in with my thinking too.

just leave us alone, we're
fine.

ask me if i care

you have nineteen new messages
on linked in,
sixteen people who you
might know,
seventy two
notifications on
facebook,
ten new friend requests.
a hundred and twenty one
unanswered e mails,
a thousand in the spam box,
sixteen phone messages,
and there's a note
on your door asking you
why you put
the trash out early,
before the sun went down.
ask me if I care.

making a decision

some decisions are made
in anger,
when the coals are hot,
while others are rational,
cold
and calculated.
things measured out,
the balance sheet
the good, the bad drawn
onto paper.
some decisions are
made in the throes
of emotional
turmoil,
grief or heartbreak.
to stay or go.
to fight for love, or let
it fade
without hardly a thought.
just reacting
to what's
going down.
it's hard to tell which way
is best.
in the end
they all seem right
in the moment, where
there is little regret,
or little doubt.

talk again soon

I draw
a sketch on a piece
of white paper
while on the phone, I have
no interest
in the conversation, but I
can't hang up.
I doodle,
I draw lines intersecting
lines.
circles upon circles.
all in black ink.
i'm certain that a psychiatrist
could take one
look at it
and declare me crazy, or
depressed, so I turn
the sheet over
and make a heart,
then draw a ragged line
through it,
but I digress.
I say yes on the phone.
then no.
then okay.
then, talk again soon.
we'll get together,
let's.

the dark side

what difference
does it make, she says,
tipping the bottle skyward
after blowing smoke
rings. in fifty
years
we'll all
be dead.
who cares, why wonder, have
fun.
eat drink
be merry.
don't be afraid, the worst
will happen,
it's guaranteed.
no one gets out alive.
so far
it's one hundred per cent
deceased.
there is no heaven,
no hell.
this is all we have.
so come here and sin,
kiss me.

the warmth of home

there is warmth in familiarity.

the scratch on
the worn record,
the tear
in a favorite sweater.

your finger finding
the hole.

the stained page of a cookbook,
finding an
old letter,

tucked back into the envelope
it was sent in.
farewell words.

that creak on the step
when your weight
steps on it.

the rattle of pipes,
when the water goes cold.

there's the suit worn
once,
the shoes covered
in dust, set neatly
below.

the pillow, blue and faded
from the sun
propped up
to where you read,
and ponder
a new poem.

the sunday visit

i can still hear
my mother's voice on the phone.

that Wednesday
call.

that guilt. why, she says, haven't
you come over
lately.

come sunday, i'm making stew.
i know like stew.

bread, salad. i made a cake.
it's no
occasion, just

visit.

what time, i ask her.

five she says, but one is okay too.
bring nothing,

just you.

The Rocking Horse Woman

when i'd find her curled up in a ball
in a darkened room,
crying, her tears making jagged lines
down her mask,
she'd say I wish I had the courage
to kill myself.
to do myself in like those people on
the news.
then all would be well. I wish I
was brave like them.
I'd touch her shoulder, sit beside her,
as she rocked back and forth, nearly
in a catatonic state
and try to comfort her. what about
your son, i'd ask her, what would
that do to him, what about the people
who love you? who, she would say.
who really loves me? I had no answer
for that, for I didn't even love
her anymore, not who she really was.
my love was for the imaginary person
she created to snare me into her
sick world. look, i'd say to her,
i'll leave you alone.
i'd stand up and watch her rock back
and forth, back and forth,
then i'd close the door,
and go the phone to call her therapist
to see what she could do.
which was nothing, because this was all
a game.
this was pretend town once again.
and the therapist would say something
like, we've been down this road
many times before, not to worry.
she'll be fine. she's trying to find
a way out, because you've discovered
her, you see the truth, and now
she needs to get out and find
a new supply to worship her. she'll
be back to her old husband and
married boyfriend in no time.
be calm, be patient, your life is
about to change for the better.
your nightmare is almost over.

on eggshells

so much of your life,
the happiness, or sorrow
found,
has been through others.
their affection
or lack of.
it's been
a wrong
road. long and tedious.
you've grown
weary
of
the pulls and tugs
of heartstrings
held in someone else's
hands.
it's a curious path
of insecurity, always
walking
through the world
on eggshells,
your smile
or frown dependent on
someone else, not you.

the snow engagement

I remember my neighbor,
Linda,
a music teacher at the local
high school.
always banging on her piano
with some little
kid.
i'd hear it through the walls,
the ping
of keys being struck
by small hands, and her loud
voice, saying
no, no, no.
then one day it snowed
and she introduced me to a man
she met on catholic match dot com.
he was tall and quiet.
this is my fiancé,
she said in the cold
sun, shoveling.
we shook our gloved hands
and I said congratulations.
he smiled
and said nothing.
by spring, she was gone,
as was the snow
and the piano against
my wall.

no one in the middle

don't forget to vote
the boy
says,
standing out in front of the school.
handing out
leaflets
for his choice.
blue, red.
is there any green
I ask?
any middle.
anyone with a lick of common
sense
and decency?
the kid looks at me,
and scratches his head,
no.
of course not.
this is politics, what are
you crazy.
if you like guns, and money,
oil
and racism,
go over there, but if you
want to ban abortion,
save the whale,
and give food stamps to
everyone
and free health care,
well, go to the other
door. vote there.

little green men

she talks in whispers,
leans over
to the table where we're gathered,
a stranger
wanting to join in,
and says,
do you believe in aliens.
my friend says,
you mean people from
other countries, no, no,
she says, obviously
deep into a bottle of
red wine.
I mean aliens, she points
to the ceiling and twirls
her hand around.
from outer space, she says.
then makes her fingers
wiggle on top of her
head as if to indicate
antennae.
sure, we all say. why not.
come and join us,
if you'd like. so she does,
then we listen to her talk
excitedly
about the time she was
kidnapped by a group
of aliens, examined, then
let go. she shows us a little
scar on the back of the neck
and says,
I think they put something
in me. she whispers. they're
watching me.
she's serious, so we don't
laugh. she looks sleepy,
exhausted from the alien story.
the bill comes, and we all
walk her out to the curb,
where we call an uber for her.
and wave, she puts
a finger to her lips, rolling down
the window in the car
and whispers
don't tell anyone. they're out
there, she says,
pointing to the sky.
be careful.

it was a clean room

it was a clean room
with a view, as requested,
over the outstretched lot

to a bulging sea, neither green
or blue, but a
whirl of violet
under no sun.

the squared room was

tidy, hardly a speck of dust
on
the dresser, or sill.

a simple sink,
a toilet. a black comb
left behind
by someone.

a mirror to shave in.
a rented room on the way
somewhere.

his suitcase on the bed
opened

to the next shirt he would
wear.
the black pants, a tie.

dress shoes,
polished before leaving,
still holding
the shine

of yesterday.

it was not a plan he saw
coming. the gun, a fist curled
black
in its case,
the silver pill he slid into
chamber.

it was just time to end things
there,
in this clean room,
with a view, as requested.

the factory of us

the hum
of our brains can be deafening.
the machinery
of thought.
the wheels churning
oiled by
love
or hate, despair
or joy.
what will tomorrow bring.
what have
we lost?
even in sleep the factory
of us
goes on.
the smoke from
the chimney apparent
in each dream
formed.

in need of a miracle

there are days when you need
a miracle.
a parting of the sea,
the blind finding new eyes,
the healing
of
cancer, or a broken heart.
you need
to see beyond the drudgery
of work.
the mundane,
the everyday hustle we
endure.
you need to see someone
walking on
water, or a simple
thank you,
when opening a door.
a miracle, you think, would
set things right
for a while.
but only for awhile, you
do believe.

summer cottage

it was a summer cottage,
abandoned
with an unlocked door we
found
off the screened porch.
no lights, no heat, no
sound,
just the moonlight leaking
through
the ceiling rafters
as we made our
bed upon the floor.
two lovers, hardly born,
but sharing
the wealth of youth,
making love as if only
that was all the world
held as
truth.

No Forgiveness

how do you forgive someone
who wasn't real.

a figment of imagination.
a charade,
a mask,

an actress in a play.
the devil in disguise.

how do you
forgive someone
once you have seen

straight through to who
they really are,

and realize
it was all a sick game,

how do you forgive evil?

you can't, is the answer.

instead you erase, delete
and burn
and vow
to never
be fooled again.

the plant on the sill

the green plant bends
towards
the warm light of morning sun.
accepting the water
I pour
with a thirsty
mouth of dirt.
what a simple life she leads.
master of no
one,
full of no regrets,
no remorse.
she just is.
green and wonderful
in her short sweet life.
she wonders not
when i'll
return, where i'm going.
there is nothing
she needs to know, or to learn,
just water,
just sun.
settled, and rooted
in this old glass
urn.

on the dole

on the dole,
in line with john
at the low brick building in
Bladensburg.
the cold hands of wind
screaming through
our thin coats, our thin
shirts.
gloveless and hatless
as the line crawled
forward.
bad times
to be out of work.
but we were young. this paltry
sum
of money,
government cheese
would see us through.
give us a log for the fire,
a dozen
eggs and pint
of milk.
we shivered below
our smiles, our jokes.
stamping our feet on the iced
sidewalk,
seeing the old folk
in line
behind us, happy that we
weren't them.
for what did they know now,
about hope.

what brave souls do

we tend to think
that without the work we do
we'd be less,
without her or him in our lives,
what next?
without how we look, once age
takes hold,
what then,
how will we go on,
possessions taken away
by fire, or flood,
it makes no difference, we're
still here,
despite all things gone,
no different within,
nothing has changed or truly
gone wrong.
we get up and start,
as brave souls do, all over
again.

no doubt

the body will fail,
no doubt,
the blur will come.
the colors
fading,
the voice retreating into
murmurs.
bones will
break, as memory
cheats us
of what was,
but inside is still
the child
your mother gave birth
to.
that will never end.
no doubt.

autumn

it is true
as Tolkien writes that all that's
gold does
not glitter
and that all who wander are
not lost.

it's a powerful poem of few
words.

sung to the old.

deep roots not being bothered
by frost.
dead ashes stirred
bringing the fire
to life again.

it would be a shame to give
in
to wrong turns of the world,
the narrative
not one expected,
to set
the book

down and read no further.
fear not the autumn of life,
instead
go bravely,

be bold.

bathing with Sylvia Plath

I know them well,
my favorite books,
you can tell
which ones
I favor,
whether poetry or fiction,
biography,
or play,
by how
they've wrinkled and aged,
with sun
and water, steam
from the hot tub,
softening the binding,
each dogeared page.
we bathe well together.
Sylvia and Anne,
Larkin and Strand,
Bukowski.
old salinger goes in,
and updike
and cheever. Henry Miller.
Grace Paley,
wally lamb. ray carver,
there's room
for phillip levine too.
some old
some second or third buys,
and occasionally
I take a dip with someone
new.

the snow fall

can you think of a snow
where you haven't bent over

to make a snowball
and then throw it at a tree

or lightly towards
a friend or loved one in

play, or glee?
if you can think of such

a snow, perhaps it's time,
it's way overdue.

fun, has nothing to do
with being old.

another path

there are moments in the haste
of day, when going in hustle from
one place
to another, that we see a face,
and wonder,
what price they've paid.
we see our own reflection
in a plate glass window and turn
away.
our homes behind us, our loved ones
safe.
we have hammered down
the nails upon our roofs, made
sure of so much.
we think about all that we have
earned in school
or in pay, and think how life may
have been different if we had
chosen another way.

older and wiser

my oh my,
how time flies.

a year, just like that, gone by.

the blink of an eye.
sweet Jesus,

how the clock moves on.
the calendar pages turn.

four seasons
in the rear view mirror,

as well as a few toxic people.

all of them,
water under the bridge.

older and wiser?
yes.

a resounding yes.

the way i like them

I see the neighborhood
cat
has made it through another winter.

she purrs
and comes out from under a car,
approaches me
as cats do,

slowly. uneasy.
but she comes and sits on
the porch with me.

her green eyes are bright
shards
of glass.
her coated a matted black.

I bring out a saucer
of milk.

she laps it once or twice,
then rubs
her back
against my leg.

she has very little to say.

she's a strange cat. aloof,
and wild,

distant.

the way I like them.

it's all we have

life would be easier

without a clock, a watch.

a calendar. it only reminds
you
of what's
come and gone.

throw away the sun dial,
the measures,

the orbits and revolutions?

who needs a number to designate
an age.

lets ignore time altogether.
let's live
as if today

is all we have and there
we'll stay.

last rites

I see her
in the hospital bed.

white as the sheets.
the bones of her

are sticks without flesh.
the blue
veins,

roped in her hand,
sewn down her
slender neck.

her brown eyes set deep into
her skull.

not young, not old.
but nearing an end.

there's numbered breaths. she's

brittle as if left out in the sun.

what waits in the next life
must be
better,

she's told, as the priests
come. the parents,

the son, all
bewildered

with doubts of their own.

stir the pot

we have to stir the pot.

mix what's cooking
or else it burns,

the stew, or soup will

stick to the bottom.
nobody likes that.

the dish is ruined, the pot
hard
to clean.

so be patient at the stove,
as in love,

go slow
and stir the pot, be careful

with the flame,
not high,
not low.

the two hour marathon

she could talk and talk and talk.

mostly about herself. her work, her
life, her kids.
her dog.

her illnesses, her ex husbands.
where she wants
to go next.

not a question for me.

after about an hour I left my body
and ascended into the air.

I floated above the table,
watching her, watching me.

I saw myself fidgeting, bored
out of my mind. not saying a word.

hoping it would all end soon.
praying that she wouldn't order
another drink,
or god forbid, food.

I wondered, as I often do when
meeting people like this,

what in the hell am I doing there.

the cake poem

I sat down with all the intentions
in the world of writing
a serious poem,
but I got up and baked a cake
instead.

it took a longer amount of time,
but at least when it was
ready, I had something to show
for my hard effort.

something that I could share
with others and make them happy
instead of sad
and sorrowful, depressed or
mad.

once it cooled and iced, I cut
a slice for me, and went back
to my desk to try once again to
write a serious poem.

something, that i'll go back
to later, and shake my head at
and
probably regret.

quick sand

there are quicksand
jobs.
quicksand
beliefs, quicksand loves,
quick sand
house
and cars.
towns.
relationships.
the world is full of
quicksand
if you don't watch out.
soon,
you'll be up to your
ankles,
then knees,
then hips and before
you know it,
thirty years have
gone by
and it's not where
you really wanted
to be.

how to get out

you know you're way around.

the back roads,
side
roads,

how to avoid traffic.
how to avoid the lights.

you know the road not taken,
the alleys,

the over, the under pass.
you've been here

long enough to not get
stuck.

you could navigate this town
blindfolded.

you know everything there is
to know
about this

congested world you live in,
everything
but how to get out.

the odd marble

I have a brown marble,
a cat's eye
a nearly round piece
of glass,
but it's unbalanced,
different.
it rolls on its own
uneven and
wobbled path,
never straight through
the dirt circle
to strike the others out.
an odd fellow
a van gogh of sorts.
that's why I kept
it all these years,
since a child.
it need to be saved.
it's precious,
too good and different
for an earthly
world.

true love

some cars you fall in love with
the second you see
them.

the second you turn the key
and take it for a test drive.

it's everything you ever wanted
in a car.

the shine, the gleam, what's
under the hood, those
soft leather seats.

the contour of her body,
the curves, so sleek.

how fast she was when
I pushed her pedal,
how she sang
to me.

some cars are your true love,
your roadster
soulmate,

your destiny. she never failed
to turn over
on a cold winters morning.

she was built to please,

those headlights, that grille,
I miss her so,
my hands upon
her warm
steering wheel.

she was everything I dreamed
she would be.

a golden leaf

a single golden
leaf
arrives
on your arm.

it's fallen and become
part of the wind.

you sit
and wait for more,
perhaps
another, a once
close friend.

trees and life.

all change, all move,
the world
goes from darkness

into light.

love like weather
is not
for us to decide.

i see a red door

i paint my front door red.

not the dull burgundy red
the condo board insists on, but
a wild cherry red,

a Christmas red, a Chinese red.
i nail a red wreathe of berries
onto it as well.

i know i'm in trouble.
eva braun will be coming by
with her storm
troopers

at some point, as they make
their rounds with their clipboards
and cameras,

and i'll get a notice,
a warning, another warning
and then a final warning.

but i like my door, and i want
to see how long
it lasts, before they

hang me in the public square.

Hello, Welcome to Walmart

when lynnie was alive
she used to tell me that she loved
going to Walmart
on the weekend.

she said that it made her feel
skinny
and beautiful.

there was nothing there that
she wanted to buy,

no ten pound bags of marshmallow
peanuts,
or snow tires. no polyester
underwear,

or fishing tackle, no.

she just wanted to walk around
amongst the other shoppers,

to stroll about the aisles

and feel good in comparison,
like a queen on a float
in the Easter parade.

she said she felt like
Elizabeth Taylor
before all hell broke lose
in her life.

the cat on a hot tin roof
years. sexy, sassy and slender.

when we get to paris

when we get to paris,
she says, let me do the talking.

and take that beret off,

what's wrong with you?
and that horizontally striped

black and white polo shirt.

are you a mime now?

no, no. just trying to fit in.
look I have these
pointed zipper boots too.

oh my god, she says, packing
another suitcase.

just try to blend in and walk
behind me a little.
and stop chewing gum.

can we get a baguette when we
get there? sit outside
a small café and sip espresso.

I want to write poetry
with the Eiffel tower in view.

I want to have an epiphany
while i'm on the Left Bank.

shut up, she says. i'm not
talking to you anymore.
did you pack? one bag
for seven days?

oui, I tell her. stroking

my new magic marker mustache.

many chances

we get many chances.

second, third, plenty of chances.
but to do what?

to go where,
to be with who?

to live where? at a certain age,
no one
instructs you

on what to do next. you're
on your own.

school is out, you're off
the chain.

you decide which way to turn.
there is no
parent, friend,
or school

shadowing you. there is no
one left to blame.

rigamarole

I spend the morning

picking petals off a daisy.

she loves me, she loves me not.
then I switch over
to I hate her, I wished i'd never
met her.

obviously, I've lost my mind.

what do to about that.
I ponder the prospects.

be alone, see out the string of years
in a blissful state of
solitude
and quiet,

or find someone and go through that
whole rigamarole again.

I look up the word rigamarole,
to see if it's an actual word.
apparently it is, but i'm not using
it in exact definition
of the word.

I don't care.

I flip a coin. peace and tranquility,
heads.

or another possible nightmare
relationship?
tails.

I flip it high into the air
and wait for it to land in my hand...

like you wish

there's not a cure for everything,

although you can
placebo up just about any
disease
or ailment,

or maladjusted mood.

put on a red dress and let's go
out,
I used to tell her,
when she rested her cheeks
on her hands,
depressed,

elbows dug into the couch,
staring
glumly out the back window
while squirrels
swung sideways on the bird feeder.

is that your answer, she'd
say, without even turning
her head
to look at me.

I'd sigh and reply, okay
well how about you

put on a red and dress
and let
me slowly peel it off
you,
then bite your neck,

how's that, better?

to which she'd say something,
to effect of
like you wish.

botox

i hardly recognized her,
her face
was so stiff with botox injections.

she was 63 without a single wrinkle.

her brow was clean of lines,
her mouth, around her eyes, nothing.

it was like she was wearing
a porcelain mask,

not forever young, more of a
still life, stuck
in neutral

without a past.

a life unlived, no emotion, no
joy or pain,
no wisdom
seen. her skin shone
like an

apple, darkened within,
but on the outside
was a perfectly smooth
and empty sheen.

Ditto

what are you looking for
a complete stranger writes
to me
on the dating site.
becky from Toledo, ohio.
she has one picture of her in
a blue and white checkered dress.
she's fifty seven
but has pigtails and is
holding a small dog in
her lap.
I think of Dorothy in
the wizard of oz.
I see that her profile
states that she loves to bake
and that christmas is her
favorite time of year.

i'm looking for a soul mate,
she writes before
I can answer.
i'm looking for the love
of my life. someone I can
grow old with.
someone smart and has a good
job
who will love and adore me.
someone I can do things with.
someone who loves to laugh,
loves to travel and eat out.
someone who is adventurous
and loyal. who likes to kayak
and hike.
not too much baggage.

are you still there? she writes.
I look at what she's written.
my fingers on the keyboard
but not moving.
I want to ask her if she's
on any medication, or is delusional,
but I don't.
I write.
same, same as you. ditto.

winter love

for years I preferred summer.

spring and fall were fine,
both still warm enough
to be outdoors and play,

but summer was everything.
the sky seemed bluer,
the sun
warmer.

the girls in their summer dresses.
the moon at night.
fireflies
and dandelions.

the windows were open,
the top down,
there was the beach, the sand,
the curl of waves.

but I've changed.
I've learned to love winter,
finally,
which in looking
back
is strange.

ice and snow, that cold
wind.
being inside for days
at a time, unable to get
out, unable
to go.

I like the way the trees
are bare.
grey and empty. the icy stream.
I like the way the roads
are closed.

how the snow has narrowed
life down,
has kept us together,
kept us home.

dead horses

you're really hard on your ex's
she says,
she being a non romantic friend
that was never an ex.
she's good at holding the mirror
to my face.
I know, I know, I tell her.
it's the child in me, the anger,
the ego, the lack of self esteem
rearing its ugly head.
when someone hurts me,
when someone is a fake and a liar,
I have tendency to lash out.
fire all the barrels in the pen,
and reload.
she nods. I get it she says.
I really do, but you have to let
them off the floor at some point.
ever heard the term, beating a
dead horse?
i'd never do that to a horse,
I tell her.

The Calvert Bridge

the future is not what it used to be.

it rarely is.
once you get childhood
out of the way.

things change quickly, and the world
you envisioned
is different
than you imagined.

but you stick with it. what
are the choices.

I talk to my friend cathy about
this on the phone.

I ask her, kiddingly,
if the net is still up on the Calvert
Bridge.

she laughs, and says. I think so.

there are days like that, for everyone,
she says.

and nights too, I tell her.
and nights too.

seeing the pattern

she used to tell me
each morning when I woke up
that today
the sheriff is coming to arrest you.

at first it was amusing,
but as she kept it up,
I began to worry.

I wondered what I had done.

she continued on as we were separated
in the house.
still sleeping
in the same bed.

she had a boyfriend on the side
which I slowly began to find out about.

if you don't leave, she'd say,
i'm going to accuse you
of horrible things.

I remember staring at the ceiling
and thinking
i'll never ever be with a crazy
woman again.

twenty years later, it was worse.
this one too had a boyfriend,
and an ex husband still in her harem
of losers
that adored her,
and once again
I was staring at the ceiling,

saying, never again
will I allow this to happen.

I began to see a pattern.

a fresh start

I start with a plant
in the window.

green, healthy. new. just
bought
and carried in
from a grocery store.

I give life a shot.

it's a new beginning
having been
kid free,
pet free
wife free,
girlfriend free
for a while now.

maybe a living breathing
thing
in the house will
reboot

the system. build trust.
something I can care about
and be responsible for.

i'm rusty at that.

I give it a sweet talk.
welcome home
I say.

well, your new home. I turn
it towards the sun
and give it a drink.

she's quiet and green.
she looks hopeful in her
little red pot.

it's a good start.

my agent calls me

my agent calls me early
sunday morning. i'm shocked.

hello, I say, puzzlement
in my voice.

it's me, Jeremy, he says.
your agent.

yes? this is a surprise, I
tell him.

I read your script he says.
I was up all
night going through it
line by line.

as usual, well written.
the characters are well fleshed
out.

I like the plot, the story.
it all rings true, but...

but what I say, sitting down.
the dog comes over and licks my hand.

he wants to go out and looks
longingly at the front door.

well, he says. you need more
sex and violence.
there's not enough chills and thrills
in it.

but, it's a story about two
people that fall in love
and the woman gets sick
with an incurable rare disease she got
while feeding peasants
in India.

yeah, yeah. but that's old.
we've all heard that story.
remember Love Story, Ali Macgraw
and what's his name.

schlock.

what about a car chase, or an
ambulance scene with sirens
and all that. getting the girl
to the hospital
before it's too late. the cure
is being flown in on a chopper
in bad weather.

maybe the guy's a cop
instead of a poet, a hard boiled
guy who lost
his job because of drinking,
and cheating on his wife with some
hottie who became his partner.
maybe he still carries a gun
because the mob is after him.

are you still there?
we could do this 3 D thing...

yeah, i'm listening. Keep talking.
I put
the phone down and grab the dog's
leash.

it's walk time.

sex at the drive in

we discovered
sex
at the drive-in. well,
it wasn't exactly like
Columbus
finding the new world.
we knew it was there
all along, and on the shore
there were
no Indians, or scratching
of our heads and saying,
what the hell, where are we?
but I remember the steam
being so
thick in the car
that we couldn't
see out the windows.
which was fine, because
the movie was a horrible
three feature
festival of vampires,
ghosts
and Frankenstein.
we really didn't get anywhere,
not even to third
base as it was often
called.
the bucket seats,
the stick shift, the cramped
cockpit of
the camaro made it nearly
impossible. but I remember
how raw
our faces were from kissing
while the tinny scrabble
of sound from the speaker
hanging in the window
blurred the air.
we gave it a good effort,
with the no's becoming
yes's, but
the complications of zippers
and buttons,
clasps and tight jeans
saved us
from sin, going all the way
home
would have to wait.

fine and dandy

there are days when
nothing happens.
when not a single
bad
or good thing
appears on your plate.
it's just a blah
sort of day,
neither good or bad,
just so.
no memories haunting you,
no mental traffic,
no troubles in
your way,
which is fine and dandy
as
my uncle louie used to say.

carefully happy

she was carefully happy
in
her faith,
which had the ebb and flow
of a river,
always moving in
one direction,
a direction that she figured
to be heaven, a final home.

sometimes the water receded
and other times
it overflowed the banks,
but she stood by it most
of the time, her feet in it.
whether warm
or cold, she felt it move
under the current of
life, seeing the lightness of
sunlight on the surface,
but always
wondering about the darkness
that rushed below.

the unexplainable,
the tragedies
that appear in all our lives,
would take her breath away,
and she'd put her feet
to the fire
and ask all of those
unanswerable questions
about how God could allow
this happen.
What kind of God is this,
that permits
such things in our world.

but in the end,
exhausted by no answers,
she'd give up, and
back to the river she'd go.

a few simple things

it truly is
the simple things
that hold us together,

that tighten the bond.

the kiss at night.
the words
i love you, or i'm
sorry,

i was wrong.

a warm embrace, a note
left on the sink.

a vase of flowers.
a gentle nudge,

a held hand, a wink.

of course there's
more.

but in the end it
truly is just
a few
simple things.

old man

i remember thinking
how brave he was, saying what he
wanted,
yelling in a restaurant for
someone to close the
goddamn door
as a cold wind blew in.
he was old.
at an age that i'm fast approaching.
but he didn't care
anymore
in being quiet, being unheard.
speaking his mind,
not suffering fools gladly.
not to say he wasn't good,
or wasn't kind,
just fed up with the fakeness
of so many,
having endured
so many lies. he was torching
every rotted
bridge he crossed.
the veil had lifted,
and now
his voice
was heard, for better
or worse for those that
he was around.

nothing in return

the pain of other's
brings you back.

your problems are less in
their light.

as it should be.
one never knows where another
one truly is.

how deep their troubles
are,
how broken.

we're too self absorbed.
too
inward with our thinking.

it's a hard thing to do,
to give
and give and expect nothing
in return,

but it's the only way to
cure
the darkness within us.

to use the lessons that
we've learned
to help another get up,

get going,
get whole once again,
or to

touch them with love
before they leave
this earth.

it's still her house

a past love of mine,

aren't they all past

at this point,

died in the house
I live in,

fifteen years ago, almost to the day.

they took her body
to Manchester, but the ground
was too cold
to dig.

the burial would wait until spring.

we listened to the words said
at the memorial
for her short life.

just forty three years.
she was told as a child that she'd
never become an old
woman.

a doctor's prophecy fulfilled.

in a way it's still her house, 

she's here.
despite the changes made.

the different paint.
all of what she owned is gone.
her garden,
her wreathe upon the door.

but
I see her at times
in the shadows,

coming up the stairs.
I hear her voice, her laughter,
her honesty.

I feel her tears.
I see her standing beside
me
looking at the snow laced
woods

beyond the gate,

her wondering if this would
be her year.

a cold glass of water

what do we want out of a poem?

clarity

directness, truth?
why wrap
a mystery into the ordinary.

why disguise the pain,
why
hide between the words,
the allegory,

the lie. if there's joy,
say joy.

if the day is hard, write that.
your heart is broken?
bleed
onto the page.

why pretend that all is okay.

we do it all the time in talking
to one another,
so rare

to say what we mean.
but in a poem, we have a choice
to make.

forget who reads what you write,
who you might offend,
or what
they'll say.

just write. be honest,
be direct,
be a cold glass of water
on someone's summer
day.

one for the road

a burglar breaks into the house
while
i'm asleep.
i hear him, or maybe it's a her
going through
the drawers in the kitchen.
i see the wave of a flash
light
swing in the hallway,
up the stairs.
i yell down.
hey. who's in here?
no one, she says. a woman's
voice, a familiar
voice.
i just left a few things,
and I've come to take them back.
i hear her open the knife
drawer, the rattle of knives,
then it closes.
i must be dreaming, i think,
my heart is beating
like a rabbit.
what are you looking,
for,
i yell down? how did you get
in here, i had the locks
changed.
it was unlocked, dope, she says
coming up the stairs.
i place an extra pillow over
my lower abdomen.
she comes in to the room,
a large knife in her hand.
what's with the knife,
i ask her.
oh, this, this is mine,
my ex husband gave it to
me thirty years ago so i'm
taking it. is that okay?
it's a ceremonial knife that
Saddam gave to him when
he went to Iraq on business,
before the war.
whew, i say. sitting up.
yeah sure take it. it looks pretty
ordinary to tell you the truth.
in fact i cut a pork roast
with it the other day.
yeah, it's a good knife, she
says.
so how are you? i ask her, what's up?
miss me? she comes over
and sits on her side of the bed,
or rather,
what used to be her side.
she lays down, the knife
still in her hand.
yeah, i do miss you sometimes,
not the fighting, the crying,
the chaos, but the sweet
moments. ah, yeah, i say.
few and far between. i could
never get enough of that, i say
emphasizing the word, that.
she looks at me and laughs.
i laugh too.yeah, we did have that
going for us, but it just wasn't
meant to be, we both say at
the same time. i look at
her, she looks at me.
one for the road, i ask.
sure she says, why not?
the knife falls to the floor.

two ticket stubs

I find two ticket stubs
in an old jacket. the jacket
doesn't fit anymore,
but I try it on just the same.
tight. I have too much muscle now
I say to myself,
and laugh.
I look at the date, the movie.
it takes a few minutes,
but it all comes back to me.
it was a bad movie, we almost
walked out.
ahhh, I remember her well.
we went to one movie together.
I didn't know it at the time
that it would be our last.
i'm not big on sentimentality,
but I put the tickets back
into the pocket and hang
the coat in the closet. I'm
tempted to look into the other
old coats hanging in there,
but I don't. No need going there.
I shut the door.

the boy on the trampoline

you really should get curtains,
I remember telling her
as I watched the strange boy
next door
jumping on his trampoline,
looking into her second story
bedroom window.
the sun poured in as she rubbed
her eyes, pulling the blanket

over her bare legs,
she looked over at the wide
red face of the boy
as it came bouncing into view
then held her hand up to wave.
and he in return waved back

on the next bounce up, smiling.

the facts

just because we ignore
the facts
does not
make them untrue.
which holds true
for bad food,
or drink
or smoke, or being
reckless
with one's body or soul.
don't ignore
bad behavior. don't
forgive
and forget.
don't listen
to the words, but watch
what they
do.

doubt is truth

there is so much
in a kiss

that reveals.

so much in a word spoken
or not said

that tells a long story,
in short form.

what we leave
behind

says more about who we
are

than in staying put.

doubt about love is
the mind
being truthful,

the gut is never wrong,
trust it.

listen to it,
listen well,

or fail.

to better things

do not fear being alone.

embrace the quiet,
reflect
and let go of those that

were not meant to be.

they were stepping stones,
as you were
to them

to better things.

be whole without someone.
there is no one
that will

complete you if you are
incomplete.

find peace within and love
will find
you.

knocking on heavens door

it's a dark hall,

a bad band. grey haired
and pony tails,
with old man voices,

but people are dancing
just the same.

a woman from across the dance
floor comes to my table
and says to me.

you look just like my father.
you two could be twins,
separated at birth.

she's maybe sixty or so.
she doesn't seem drunk, and yet,

it worries me.
he was a handsome man, she says,
trying to take
the puzzlement off my face.

I pick up a spoon and look
at my reflection
in the curve of stainless
steel.

is he still alive, I ask her.
oh hell no,
he's been dead for thirty years.

I feel relieved a little.

dance? I ask her, as the band
makes a valiant
attempt

at Knocking on Heavens Door.
sure, she says.
come on dad.

a light snow

just a light snow.

a sweet icing on the cake outside
the window.

the wind keeps it afloat.

kids are rolling in it,
dogs are barking.

sleds are being pulled up the hill.
and I sit here
and wonder

about you.

proverbs with coffee

eat while you still have teeth.
pray while you still believe.
sing while your lungs are open.
watch each sunrise as if it was
the first,
each setting as if it could be the last.
hold onto love until it hurts.
embrace new love, it will
quench the hearts thirst.
run while your legs are strong.
listen to music and children
while you can still hear their wisdom.
write and paint, create while
the mind is free and able to think
without fear.
let go of the past, don't let
it weigh you down, it won't
take you anywhere.
be young, even if the years say
differently. do not go gently into
that good night. life is to be
enjoyed, not endured.

to each a turn

visiting the sick is hard.
for them
for you,

for the nurses.
it's lunch time.

soup. a sandwich.
jello.

a plastic fork, a plastic
spoon.

the smell of antiseptics
clouds
the bright air.

the starch of sheets,
the metal basin, the rail.
the cold
feel
of everything.

I put my card
and a bouquet of flowers
on the tray, then
I look out the window.

I wonder if there is anything
I can catch in here.

I go to the sink and wash
my hands.

so when you getting out, I ask.
but she's asleep,
or unconscious. it's hard
to tell.

I touch her hand. it's warm.
I see the long vines
of blue veins.

I look at the tubes,
the wires all connected to
some hospital brain

somewhere.

i'm not looking forward
to my turn.

the argument

we disagree.

me and the weather, she insists
on being cold,

windy.

she's unresponsive to my
desires,
my needs.

almost heartless
in how she changes and lowers
her temperature
by a dozen degrees.

we are not seeing eye to eye
on things.

I want it warm
and bright, she wants it dark
and wet.

she is the face of gloom,
a blue fist
on the horizon.

i'm holding my ground though
as I stand outside
in
a thin jacket,

barefoot and hatless.

but she's winning this argument,
I don't think

we'll ever get past this.

box of chocolates

the box of chocolate
analogy
is
a good one
when it comes to online
dating. you truly
never know
what you're going to get
until you
take one from the box
and take a bite.
what's inside that little
clump
of chocolate, sitting
in a cute
little dress
of paper.
what kind of nut,
what kind
of horrible goo
lies within.
raspberry, butterscotch,
or god forbid
a stiff old raison
that breaks your teeth
when you nibble
and bite down.

the new car

I don't need it,
but
I ponder the new car. two door.
a low
to the ground model.
fast as hell.
sleek.
hear the growl.
six on the floor.
two seats, no kids allowed.
no dogs.
no trips for seed or
mulch in this one.
it's for flying.
for the beach, for those
winding roads
into the hills,
the country, to all roads,
north or south,
west
or east.
I've got room for one,
come on.
I'll pick you up.
life is to be enjoyed
not endured,
it's time for fun.

the long night

there are no ashes
to sweep away,
the wind took care of that.

no embers hot with
flame,
no debris from what was
left
to sweep.

it's all done now.
all words
have faded, all images
gone
white.

it was hard, but it's finished
forever,
that long long
night.

her blue eyes

I remember the brown dog
in the window.

the white cat
in the alley. the fox
in the moonlight,

on soft feet.

the panther, the lion,

I remember, the woods
full of flashing eyes.

the blue
of yours, that animal
within

come alive.

the dr. phil show

I start flipping through the channels
and get stuck on a dr. phil episode.

it's about a married man and a woman,
both cheating on each other.
pathological liars, narcissists,
but good cooks.

she knows her way around the kitchen
always with a hot plate of cookies,
and he's no fool in the barbeque pit.

but he catches her with the neighbor
and they have a fight, so dr. phil tries
to smooth it out and get them back
on track.

You people need to stop hurtin one another,
Dr. Phil says, leaning forward in his chair.
Now i'm dead serious here.

when she picks up a steak knife
and stabs you in the hand with it,
you don't pick up one too, and stab
her in the arm, or hit her over the head
with a jar of texas hot sauce.

you need to stop reacting and start
responding.

what the hell does that mean, the wife
says, standing up, and moving closer
to her husband in the other chair.
she clenches her fists as the veins
in her neck bulge out.

now, calm down, calm down.
sit back down, Darlene. Let's all
go to a happier time, dr. phil says.
now Frank, do you love your wife?
be honest.

sometimes, he says, I mean i used to,
but when she cheats
on me, I feel minimalized.
I feel small.

maybe cause you are, the wife says, getting
a laugh and long applause out of
the audience. maybe if you were more
of a mister man I wouldn't have to go out
and get me a young stud, like the boy
who cuts our grass.

but he's in the tenth grade, dr. phil,
the husband says. she's a floozy,
a jezebel.

we have laws in this country, my dear. you're lucky
you're not in jail, dr. phil says, wagging
his finger at her.

damn right, the husband says. damn right.
lock her up.

the audience begins to chant, lock her up,
lock her up.

all right, all right, now settle
down. i'll clear this studio if I
have too. now look, here's what you two need
to do. he rubs his mustache from side to side.

first of all no more stabbing each other
with kitchen utensils, can you both agree
on that?

the wife crosses her arms and reluctantly
nods yes. the husband, says, okay. i'll
try, but I can't make any promises.

okay, okay. that's a start.
second of all you need to stop lying
and cheating on each other.
it's just plum wrong, what would
your children think of all this infidelity?

I don't even know who half these kids
are anyway, the husband says.
she sleeps with every tom dick and harry
that she runs into.
yesterday I found the mailman taking
a nap in our bedroom.

the woman laughs and throws her long blonde
hair back, then adjusts her low cut sweater.
maybe he had a special delivery for me,
she says, smirking.

the women in the audience let out a loud shriek
of laughter.

okay. dr. phil says. let's settle back down.
none of this is funny,
but I get your attempt at trying
to lighten things up. now,

I know this is going
to be difficult, but why don't we
bring out the children and see what they
have to say about all this domestic turmoil.
let's bring out all seven of them.

the kids come out, each of a different race
and color, all different sizes and shapes.
none of them look alike.

now, dr. phil says to the wife, pointing
at the long row of children, tell
me. Just how in the world
do you explain this?

I don't know, she says, adjusting her
fishnet stockings under her short skirt.
maybe I am just a tad frisky at times.
oh and by the way,
I baked you some cookies Dr. Phil,
I left them backstage in the green room.

thank you, thank you. very kind of you.
i'm sure my WIFE and I
will enjoy them.

okay, before we take a break,
we have one more person to bring out
to join in our discussion.
Let's bring out Brad,
the boy next door who cuts the grass
for these two.

a skinny young man in shorts and grass
stained tennis shoes comes out, he's
wearing a torn t shirt, he takes
his ball cap hat off and waves
to the audience as they applaud wildly.
he's chewing gum and smiling
ear to ear.

how it ends

she's a silhouette,
a shadow,
a slender
link of bones
and flesh.
starving.
all eyes
and hair.
a mouse nibbling
at crumbs,
loping towards
tomorrow.
the next day,
then the next.
up the stairs
then out
twelve hours
at a desk,
then home, then
down
the stairs.
alone.
alone.
alone.
staring out the window
across the yard
to him,
remembering her
yesterdays,
all
of it in her
phone.

the middle of the month

January moves
like an iceberg.
an inch at a time
dragging you along with it.
the slow parade
of white,
of wind, of blue
ice
pulling the world
along.
you ride it out.
dig in, build a fire.
wrap the bear skin
rug around you
and call for help.
tomorrow always
seems like the middle
of the month.

the bald eagle egg

I see on the news
a man
arrested for breaking open
the egg
of a bald eagle.

there are laws,
the cop says.
we need to protect our
wildlife.
our precious natural
resources.

but it was just an egg,
the man pleas,
it wasn't even born yet,
I wasn't killing
an eagle,
no, just an egg,

there's barely a heart
beating inside
that thin fragile
shell.

yes, the cop says, but
it's more of what
it could have been,
it's our national bird
for God's sake,

it's not like a real
baby.

emotional vampire

she wasn't a real vampire,
no.
there was no sucking of the neck,
biting
into a vein
to drain
the red stuff
from your body. no.
she was more of an emotional
vampire.
which was actually worse.
death would come
daily.
sucked dry
of life, of fun, of some
semblance
of normality.
she did not fly on bat
wings,
nor roam about when the
moon was full at night.
no.
she wasn't that kind of
vampire. no,
not at all,
her nature was to prey
on her
victims with charm,
in the broad daylight.

The Dating Pool

this dive into
the dating pool once more,
won't last long.

it's murky and cold.
the women flail their
heavy arms
to stay afloat, everyone giving
it one more shot
to be young, act young,
and not limp.

everyone is blonde and on keto.
a yoga mat in the car. a botox
appointment set
for tomorrow.

the baggage is endless,
luggage
strapped
to so many backs,

stacked by the altar of hope.

lawyers, doctors, waitresses
at ihop.
teachers and those living off
the fumes
of someone long gone.

I open their medicine
cabinets to see the other side.
the dark
side of who they are.

the amber prescription bottles,
half empty,
too many to count.

I peek into the ice
box to see their ex husbands,
shivering
in rows. their monied teeth
clacking with fear.

I pick up the phone when it
rings,
and it's a room of children
ungrown,
in need of mommy.

under the bed, I see more secrets.
the dust balls of lies,
of inconsistency,
deceit. a black cat
with green eyes.

I see the dust on the books
they read,
or don't read, that line
the shelves.

but we meet and

I feed them, I buy them drinks,
I make small talk into wee hours
of Tuesday nights. ten p.m. .

the check comes,
they all get up to
go to the bathroom.
their purses strung tight with
cob webs.
feminists with no shame
in them.

the apples

the apples,
serene and washed
in their red jackets
sit
like fat buddhas
under the bright lights
of the supermarket.
they await for
what comes next.
the worst has already
happened. like us,
so often,
they go with no
resistance, plucked
and placed
within a basket.

in search of

i think about moving.

getting far away from this town.
i got nothing
here.

parents are old or dead,
siblings
dispersed,

most of my life long friends
have checked out,

either passed on, or about to,

despite what facebook says.

my son's three thousand miles west.

it might be time to cash in the chips.
put it all on the table
and hit the open road.

but it would be more fun to do
it with a significant other,
a love interest.

someone low maintenance, perky
and bright. low on the crazy
med pills.

no kids, no pets, no ex-s clinging
to their skirt. someone who doesn't
mind not talking

when it's time to be quiet.
smart, funny, clever with kissing
skills.
is that asking too much,

probably.

what's for dinner

you know you care about someone
when
you have a good knock
down, crazy
fight. tossing words
and accusations around like
punches
in a heavyweight fight.
if you don't care, you sort
of sit there
and wait for the storm
to blow over,
then say something like
what's for dinner tonight?

the shape of us

is it the circle of life
or more of
a square, or triangle,
I don't see
the roundness
of it all, at least not
yet.
I see a parallelogram,
an obtuse
triangle,
a rhombus, or two lines
running side
by side into infinity.
there's so little closure
in the lines
we draw,
the shapes we form. maybe
we're just dots
of light on a black sheet
full of scribblings
with no true
rhyme or reason.

the morning walk

the trees are of less interest
these days,

each branch known, each crest of wave
on the full pond
against fallen
trees.

the green stench of it all
awaiting new rain
to make
it clean.

the crisp air, a startling blue
between
branches, forever grey,

birches shedding a cream
colored bark,

but it's those who walk
that I see.
cameras in tow, in ones and twos,
a child
in hand, making three.

what brings them here
so early
in the day, lost in thoughts,

walking alone,
taking pictures of a bird
in flight.

what are they remembering,
who
have they lost, who
has strayed,

leaving them quiet in
this walk.

it's an old story

it's an old story.

you enter the room, she's with you.

you both set your bags
onto the floor and look around
at the empty rooms.

this will do, you say to her.
yes, she says.

you are in love, and she with you.

this will be our home. we will have
children here
and live our life.

that's the beginning.
the middle is different though.

boredom sets in.
the children are unruly. work
is hard.

the lawn reminds you each day
of what tomorrow
will bring.

love dissipates. anger surfaces.
long faces
are made. sadness
sets in.

old age never comes.
one moves, the other stays.

it's an old story.

don't be late

don't be late
I tell her. I won't wait.

i'm here now,
early as usual. having a drink
at the bar.

let me know
if you can't make it, or
if it rains

or if there is no
parking,

or the dog needs to be
walk, or the kid
is sick.

don't be late.
i'm tired of waiting.

exhausted by the needs of others.
i'm selfish now.

I've earned the right
at last,

it's all about me, done
with indulging
others,
forgiving, being lenient

with
their issues, their chaotic
present,
their gloomy past.

i'm tired of
being last.

don't be late, I won't
wait.

Going to Goodwill

i take three enormous
green
lawn bags full of old
and new clothes
down to the local clothes
depository, the goodwill store.
some with tags still on them,
never worn.

why i bought an orange shirt,
and green
pants, i'll never know.
a suit with gold
stripes? what the hell.

the woman at the counter
pours everything
out and says.
these all clean?
yup, I tell her.
have you checked the pockets?
no sharp objects?
nope, i don't think so.
this shirt has a stain on it,
what is that? lipstick, mascara?
take it back.
it'll wipe off, i tell her.
i don't care, she says,
we want clean clothes.

and this sweater has a loose
thread. look at that, one pull
and the whole thing unravels
and someone freezes to death.
i can't have that on my conscience.
we'll can't you just cut
it with a pair of scissors?
no.
i'm not a tailor, and
what's the deal with all
these shoes.

you got a shoe fetish or something
some of them look brand
new.
dude, you got some issues,
don't you?
and all this underwear you
stuffed into the bag.
men's, women's. you've got to
be kidding.

what happened to what's her name?

whatever happened to what's
her name, she says,
while
washing her little red
sports car in front of
the house. the hose
is in her hand,
with a bucket of suds
at her sandals. it reminds
me of that scene
in cool hand luke.

who?
I say, sitting on
the porch, looking up
from the paper as she leans
onto the car,
scrubbing
the hood in her daisy dukes.

you know, that woman
that lived here for
a few months, Sheila, or
Betty, that jezebel
you were seeing for awhile.

oh come on, you know.

string bean, lanky
sad kind of girl
with the haystack hair.
big pair of oversized
glasses
hiding her face.
she seemed terribly
depressed. always carrying
four giant handbags
on her shoulder.

oh, her.
I have no idea.

I watch as
she sprays the windshield
with water, having it bounce
back onto her white
t shirt, soaking her.

I clear my throat, cross
myself and try
to think of baseball.

I think she went back
to her ex husband,
or married boyfriend, or
her mother's basement.
out of sight, out of mind,
she disappeared.
packed her few
belongings and adios.

by the way,
you know you missed
a spot
on the door. right down there,
no there, lean
towards the tire.

there, you got it.
don't forget the bumpers.

refillable glass

it means little
that the glass
is half
full,
or half empty,
for what's true,
is that
no matter
what the case may be,
it's refillable.
so do that,
and relax.
there's more where
that came from.
trust me.

visiting her grave

i visit her grave,
despite the fact that she's
still alive.
i go to lay flowers
at the stone
that bears
her name.
i say a few words, rambling,
trying to find
some semblance of peace.
trying to figure out how any
human being can
be such a liar, so full
of sickness
and deceit.
i stare at the ground,
the dirt
covered in green.
i look around at the other
graves.
some fresh, some
well kept, some, like hers
rarely visited
or seen.
but i'm here, so relax
old girl,
and quit
nagging me. get off my back,
out of my life, my brain.
at some point, i'll
be healed and i won't
be coming by
again.

a girl from mars

I meet a girl
from mars, she's interesting.
different, green skin,
and almond eyes.
medusa like hair.
she's something to behold
in the light of day,
but is there chemistry?
does she like to read
and do fun things like travel
to the beach
or new York city for
a few days.
does she like to binge on
Netflix and stay
in on a cold winter night
and eat popcorn,
snuggling on the couch.
is she on any crazy meds
or in therapy
because she wasn't hugged
enough as a child,
but she's from mars,
so things are different
where she's from.
we're in the honeymoon stage.
taking it slow,
nice and easy,
plus she needs to adjust
to our gravity, not to mention
the traffic
and getting from point
a to point b
flying around in her cute
little spacecraft.

back into the crowd

you spend
an afternoon under the spell
of tom waits.

in between love.
I hope that I don't fall in love
with you.
closing time.
back into the crowd.

he sets the table, the mood.
it's like
he's been in every room.

been in your attic, your cellar,
your kitchen,
your bedroom.

sometimes you think he's there,
at the piano,
a hot cigarette burning in an ashtray,

the blue smoke a genie
out of the bottle,
a tumbler of amber whiskey
nearby.

a woman you once loved,
on the doorstep,
crying.

ghost world

we disappear.

but I repeat myself. I've said
it so many times
before,

with the same words, but
arranged in a different order.

the field is empty.
those once loved, or almost
love have wandered
away,

into the woods, into the sea.
they have
gone,

faded into shadows, into fog, into
ghosts,
transparent in the haze.

they have gone away.
not a word spoken, not a word
written,

not even a look
backwards to meet your eyes,
not even a wave.

nothing left behind.
what's done is done.

right before the dawn

how easily
we are fooled by tears.
by sadness.
by fear.
we think these clouds
will never part,
this rain
will never stop,
that tomorrow will never
come,
the heart will never heal.
how wrong we are
when in the dark.
how foolish,
unsmart to not know
that the darkest
hour is right
before the dawn.

home sweet home

my mother rarely saw a plate
that she didn't
want to throw at my father's head.
whether it had food on it
or not, hardly mattered.
he became quite adept at dodging,
ducking, sliding side to side.
the next morning was like
a war zone, broken glass everywhere.
a coffee pot thrown
threw a window, lying
in the yard.
forks and knives,
red sauce on the ceiling,
the phone cord
cut, a door knob broken,
a hole the size of a fist
straight through the other side
of a door.
fun stuff.
she'd be on the couch, asleep,
a strip of white adhesive tape
holding her
glasses together,
a new cast on her arm.
and he'd be gone, somewhere.
sobering up in someone
else's arms.

that is not love

I bend to the power
of water, let it flow into my mouth.
quenching
the thirst I've carried with me
for so long.
but it isn't love.
I lie in the warm sun, exposing
my skin
to the radiant heat
more generous than one could
hope for,
and yet,
that isn't love.
what's on my plate, seasoned
and filling,
a king's meal, I finish it with
bread,
with drink, but still,
as you might expect, that is
not love.
the book upon my lap,
the last page read, the satisfaction
of a story well told,
one I will forever
hold, and yet, that too
isn't close to being
what we're looking for, but
perhaps it will be
enough.

her snake boots

i see her now in her plastic
boots
white with small umbrellas painted
into
the fabric.
red, green, yellow, orange.

to say she was eccentric would
be an understatement.

she called them her snake boots.
and out she'd go

into her broad wooded yard,
the winter sky
mirrored in puddles,

wearing close to nothing,
to fetch the paper at the end
of the gravel
driveway.

a rake in hand, just in case.

the far wall

I see the smiles
dropped
and left upon the lawn,
side stepping them
as I move
towards the far gate
where the wall
needs fixing.
I see the rise of
clouds,
banks of memory, promises
made
and unkept.
the trees are caves
of words
unsaid.
silent as if holding their
breath.
I reach the wall and lift
an old stone
into place.
I tamp it down with
cold hands.
it will hold through
winter,
then i'll be gone.

shades of brown

shades of brown.
mud, wet along the bank.
beige off the boot,
crumbles, now
dried
and set aside
by the door, the worn
floor,
once glossed in wax
on polyurethane
now faded
almost into yellow, or
harshly
scuffed towards black.
the withering trees,
near grey.
the brown dead leaves,
matting the earth floor,
heaps
of paper mache.
all color gone.
it's the browning of nearly
everything, once
green, once fresh
and new. a world of unlove.
the mood,
forlorn.

not so intelligent design

I meet my friend jimmy over at the local
Fridays for lunch and we start to have
a deep discussion on evolution versus
creationism.
first we get an order of onion rings
for the table and a couple of beers.

it's the big bang, dude, he says to me,
making his eyes go wide, staring at me
like i'm a moron.
there was this big explosion, boom.
he spreads his hands apart and shakes them.

that's how it all got started, then
lighting hit a puddle of mud and water,
and voila,
that's where we came from. don't you
ever watch carl sagan, or listen to
that real smart guy who uses that robotic
voice thing?

So, fish, birds, apes, men, women, rhinos
and chickens? I ask him. everything
came out of that one single puddle?
just like that?
hell yeah, he says, dipping an onion ring
into some ketchup.

we all came out of the same puddle, me
you, the waitress, like where is she,
i'm starving here. Michelangelo, Einstein,
Madonna, everyone came out of that
big pile of goo, after it was hit by
a bolt of lightning.

Madonna? I say. Never mind.
come on now. and who made the lightning?
the earth, stars, the universe?

what about trees, and plants, fruits
and vegetables, insects. microbes.
there seems to be some sort of intelligent
design going on here. don't you think?
there seems to be an order to life,
a set of scientific laws that are immutable.

huh? he says, and grabs another onion ring,
so look, here's the deal, Darwin,
you know who Darwin is right?
white beard, kind of creepy looking guy
and all that, well, he
said it in his book, you got your puddle and
lighting, then bam, lighting strikes the goo.
the goo gets stirred up with electricity
then a few billion years
go by and voila.
fish, birds, monkeys, apes and then us.
next thing you know, here we are
having lunch.

he snaps his fingers at the waitress,
hey hon, he says, two more beers here
and a plate of ribs and slaw.
you? same, I tell her. same thing.

okay, she says. got it.
she walks away while jimmy shakes his head
looking at a tattoo
of a butterfly on her leg.
hey, he says, i'm thinking
about giving her my number.
she's kind of cute, don't you think.
girls with tattoos are on the crazy side.
I like that.

ummm, yes. she is cute,
but she might be twenty three
at the most, you're fifty two.
fifty one, he corrects me. but I
feel a lot younger, ya know.

okay, so where were we, he says. you
know I got an uncle that sort
of reminds of a gorilla. uncle Max.
I think I have a picture of him
in my phone. this dude looks
just like an ape, but without
all the hair. he looks just like
that guy in the evolution time line.
Here, take a look.
is he from the Bronze age, or what?

the honey jar

you can get lost
in an amber jar of honey.

holding it just so in the morning
light.

a world unto itself.
the thick
wobble of it all.

the color, the way it
slowly
goes
from side to side,

majestically thick.

a bee's life and work
caught inside.

and when opened, touched
with a finger,
then taken to your lips

you go even further into
that world,

a place that wonderfully
exists.

radio preaching

i listen
to the radio preacher for a short
spell
in the car. driving
somewhere,
the wipers slapping hard
against the glass.
he's going on about abortion.
the deaths
of millions of babies
since that law
was passed.
it's a hard topic, a hard subject
to deal with,
to digest.
we take a life, to save a life?
i don't know.
he talks about remorse, regret,
sin and salvation.
i break out into a cold
guilt filled sweat.
after a while i switch channels.
then again
then again,
and finally turn it off and listen
to music
of the rain
instead.

the bloom is lost

she closes herself
as petals
do on a rose
in darkness,
she needs light
and air
and water to keep
who she thinks she is
alive.
the admiration of others.
but the dirt is cold
she sleeps
in. her shallow breath
a desperate
effort to be relevant.
the weeds are at her
feet,
she's stuck, she's awake,
she's asleep.
the bloom is lost.

sugar is the devil

I talk to my nutritionist,
Shirley,
no relation to hazel,
Shirley Booth, but she knows
her business
just the same.

you need to cut out all
sugars, she tells me.
all carbs,
no meat, no fish.
but sugar is the devil.

hmmm, I say. shaking my
head.
sugar is the devil?
I thought joel osteen was
the devil.

well, yeah, she says, him
and his cupcake wife
are both demons in disguise,
but we're talking about
food right now,

not prosperity preachers
who really don't believe
the bible to begin with

and live an opulent life
style, pretending to be holy.

okay okay. I can cut out
sugar. it's going to be hard,
but i'll give it a shot.

what about a donut once in a while?
no.
no sugar.

lost in the woods

you wonder if you could survive
in the wilderness

with nothing, no food, no water, no map,
no knife, or axe.

no coffee.

could you rub two sticks together
and build a fire.

kill an animal and make a jacket
out of the skin,

eat the rest.
would you know which plants
to chew on.

what pond of water is safe
enough to drink.

could you follow the stars
for direction, or know the basics

about slapping together some
limbs and branches to make a shelter?

probably not. clueless, you'd
be dead in a few days.

so you start yelling as loud as
you can for help.

the dream inside the dream

as I stand here shivering
in the falling
snow
waiting for the bus,
I think about my life
and how it's come to this.
being cold and alone,
my shoes soaked.
my body shaking to the bone.
a few dollars in
my pocket, going nowhere.
just catching a bus
to get off the street
and get out of the cold.
but it's only a dream,
and I wake up
and look next to me
at my mail order bride
from Russia, natasha,
curled up tight on the pull
out bed in our trailer
in west virginia,
and I realize
how lucky I am.
outside, hanging on
the window I see a raccoon.
looking in, so I throw
a shoe at him,
and go back to sleep.
it's hard to tell what's
a dream and what
isn't anymore.

jesse james on the high seas

we want you to paint our house
the email says.
having found me on some site
like yelp

or angie's list, or some other
hackable advertising site.

he's a mysterious stranger who lives at some
undisclosed location,

who says he's on a ship at sea in the north
atlantic

making it impossible to talk by
phone.

what's the address, I ask for
the third time. what exactly do you
want done?

colors, etc. inside, outside? I can
meet you there tomorrow.

no reply.
I want to deposit the payment
into your bank account, he writes.

and when it clears, you can
begin work.

no name, no address, no scope of
the job. nothing, just give me
your bank account number.

another jesse james on the high seas.

baby steps

we talk of baby steps,

but what baby can actually walk?
few
in the first year.

it's mostly a long crawl
anywhere
across a room.

not to mention the crying,
and drool.

that's more of what we do
at first
when the time to leave
is past due.

we crawl
out of the muck,
but in time
we rise to our feet.

we grow in truth,

no longer crawling but
running as fast and hard

and as far away
as one can get from you.

The Mistress Gets Everything

we use the word so carelessly.
love.
I love you the boy says
to the girl.

but does he mean it.
or does he just want to make
to love
her.

does the bouquet of flowers,
the card,
the poem,
the heart carved in a tree
say more?

perhaps. or maybe it's done
out of fear, out of having
no self
love,

from some deep parental lack.
hoping to not lose
their prey,
they try harder.

it's why the man gives so much
time and affection
to the mistress
while the wife at home,

gets less, crumbs, if anything
at all.

she's already taken,
her life is just another day.

the later wins out

many days
are caves that we live in.

holding the canary in the cage
to see
where air
is or isn't.

we take our torch and go
forward.
pick and axe in hand.

helmet secured. striking at
the walls around us.

will there we a diamond
in the black stone of this hard

mountain, or will we bring
back just enough

to go home, to eat, to be
with the ones we love, or
don't love,

and start again tomorrow.

the later seems to win
out for most.

we bargain

we bargain,
we haggle and squabble
with ourselves
over what to eat, what to spend,
who
to be with,
deciding how the day
begins, how the day
ends.
we choose which book
to put into our hands,
which words will tumble
out of our mouths
into phones, or
through cracked doors,
when knocked upon.
we decide
whose lips to kiss, if
such an option
does exist.
what memory
to revisit, in what
chair we will sit
to ponder all of this.