I told her to try saltwater, it heals everything I’m about to soak my hand myself, having jammed it full of splinters while transplanting, never realizing it at the time I was so caught up in nasturtiums that volunteered themselves the pain only announced itself today, rubor, calor, dolor, tumor, always too much, always too little, always too early, and always too late.
You stepped into a dream; at least in sleep I can reach you. I got a splinter in my foot while gardening today but am now used to someone being under my skin. Heard a clap of thunder but the storm never rolled in. I’m unsure as to whether it will build up or move on, but tied the vines to their stakes, just in case. (Might you read between those lines of twine? Yes. You […]
I cannot deny the very sound of a slowing jet engine or the futuristic tone of the light rail train elicits some sort of dopamine response, just the thought of not being in one place provides a subconscious lift, even while waiting in an airport cell phone lot for a late arrival, I know that sooner than not I will leave again, still unsure if I am chased myself or giving chase, but that the […]
Them birds weren’t wrong– sometimes it’s best to relax and let a thermal carry you along We sat on the rooftop for the most of the night a bird-like perch a bird’s eye view of a neighborhood we both lived in years ago but never knew and as the talk turned to the past night settled over the tops of buildings, humid and thick a comforting weight draped like a blanket laying doubts to rest.
Already the heat pours in from the East, the recently-shorn willow hanging lank over dry grass I think I’ll have to leave the windows cracked as music from the apartment upstairs bleeds down, gentle and at odds with The Clash song that I am dancing to — we both have our ways of dealing with setbacks, I’ve learned from chatting after she’s put her kids to bed, she believes if she seeks she will find, asks, will receive, while […]
It’s a bargain I suppose, no need to swim, just float, no self, only part of the flow, encompassed by ocean, a greater whole, but today I am struck by the loneliness of the jellyfish. A man o’war is beautiful even washed ashore, fluorescing, dream-like, not of this world. But even in death it can’t be touched, is ever armed, never safe. More Midas than Medusa, it is never just exquisite, is always bubble fin and pain.
Behind green alder curtains the bay pretends to move abetted by the breeze and three gulls feigning stillness. Beneath, their slabby feet beat time against the current. It’s only a yacht that disturbs the flat placidity, churning the surface and showing depth but in turn hiding keel and ballast and obscuring its true weight. I’d forgotten how deep duplicity runs in the course of new acquaintance, with no more malice than a blade of grass– an edge nonetheless, couched among clover and stands of […]
Silent hill, sparse dove, an elbowing of swifts this morning colder than all the rest How do you feel? We ask with trepidation How deep into the hill this warren must go, masked they must think by dawn and tumbleweed no longer prey to a pill-round moon but I hear it now faint as bird wings and wind caught in sagebrush the night is stalking the day. Something kept pulling me from sleep your open […]
You explained: If this stadium is an atom the nucleus is a speck on the pitcher’s mound and we are the orbiting electrons. Do I repel you? Having made some comment about the lunar effect, admittedly unscientific, a bit too loony. You don’t believe in the stars, well neither do I really, but you must agree the moon exerts a pull, or, we’ve really got a hold on it. Another pop fly. I was talking […]
Hours from the ocean and yet I am the tide, longing for return and mourning slack. I am a draft that haunts this house, measuring hours by rooms, minutes by pace, and prone to sudden rains. I am not myself but am a force of nature, the orchard is not an orchard but is a sea of white and fragrant pink, millions of blossoms unfurling overnight to comfort me with apples for I am sick, sick, sick of love.
OPTIONAL POETRY 