Hours– almost a possessive. None of these nights are quite the same, a passer-by, rain showers, and here, a startling scent of spring– something blooming early and unseen, untimely, free from that tie that binds so tightly, so coarse a cord– it’s morning, already, again
The sky just before dawn is dark electric, expectant. In almost every sense the word progression means progress, except here, at the margins. The sky is blue as airless blood, as secret blood, as all the terrible beauty that I’d rather not know.
All these words are easy to write: In the grove, purple orchids delve into air, at night, the squat palm by the door is a fistful of feathers. But you, mi amor— Bird calls bubbling, water around a drain, even inland from Hanelei the world is water, breezes like rain among fat rubber leaves. I sit and watch stray cats prowl beneath the lanai like soft gray afterthoughts, impervious to my calls. All day, big waves, heard even from the taro fields. Some things remain comfortably beyond me.
Princeville, sleepless, the breeze in the curtain the only other soul– even here sometimes the night finds me wanting
Napali coast so easy on the eyes hills softened by mist waves blunted by distance except sometimes falling like a rifle shot a retort and then that silence that so underscores the drama that preceded it high surf warning we watched it glut dry coves appetites whetted for destruction the ocean rampant avenging and we argued about the height of the waves breaking far offshore and if any were whales and it may be tempting to think clarity with distance but […]
An ending is forcibly also a beginning– On the train from the airport, distant mountains under alpenglow, the air cold and friable, and all these memories like shards, catching the light and so irreparable– a minute passed is gone. [Thank you for all your kind comments while I was away– looking forward to catching up on everyone’s posts]
Hope clinging tenaciously like the burrs on the carpet on the floor of this beach house, small impalers, causing us to jump and curse loudly despite children sprawled everywhere, not mine. We spoke in French, they said those birds we saw were not pelicans but I insisted they were, these the birds of my childhood of all my coasts. Then grown tired of conjugating tenses and drinking wine I just sat silent, listening, imaging the […]
What settles? You. A draft. The foundation of a house. This wind picks up but never gets alarming. And I can’t tell disappointment from lack of inertia, as they’re both so drab and gray and boring.
Even though and still the trees are making new leaves don’t act as if you expect it you’ll ruin the surprise look even now they are waiting for the perfect moment avert your eyes don’t look until they shout their green shouts
Lilac streaks this sunrise against the dusky mountain the floor moves on with plans for discharge or work for the M.E. it does get lighter earlier now I panic in traffic thinking I’m late staring at the mountain and what does late even mean if not that we take so much for granted
OPTIONAL POETRY 