1

A sunrise emblazoned in mist,
two travelers gone to make a wish,
tossing pebbles into a pond,
to watch the ripples until they're gone,
to love what fades like early dawn

2

Christ is not a cigarette,
your fifteen minute break:
extinguished under your heel,
returning to your desk.

3

Don't calculate, glide
to the rhythms of your heart
Follow its beat to its final measure
because

A tree cannot screw in its roots, and
A bird need not apprehend the mechanics of flight, and
The wind does not ask, "Where to?" —

4

I'm too far off in fairy land, my elders,
I can't hear you cry
You should know by now
my abiding reply:

I will not chase the scent of power,
the promise of one more hour —

power to create —my one ambition —
time enough on my shelf —eternity —

5

I saw the future and the past
spiraling into a cosmic whirlpool
and all the books flew off the shelf in my room,
sucked up as objects, and as moments in time,
thus Van Gogh and Christ, and all the memories of Proust,
collapsed like historicity as time became a sink,
blending into soup and shutting with a wink

6

        If words filled up the air. If words had a physical presence, a shape, a size, and if they hung
there. Gossip in one corner of the room, discovered, would then outrage blow more poison balloons
to combat. Words, valued but for volume, spoken but to seize up space, so that clarity is overrun, and no one is heard.
        Words fill up the air. Unclutter, speak to be understood.

7

There is a painter outside of heaven.
"Come, come in," are the calls from beyond the gate.
"No," he says, "for I have to paint with the fullest view."

8

To a Friend in Crisis

I have seen the sun persist,
breaking through dour, encompassing storm,
to wave its banner of molten gold,
and bless an Acre with its kiss.

And, though it went away, overtaken,
I am content.
I have remembered in the downpour
who owns the firmament.

9

Triangles

The lanterns hang in parallel strings of pearls along the road,
and, lengthening into the distance, suggest a triangle.

The lovers, the frail and wizened lovers, whose sparse hair curls angelic white,
move slowly down the sidewalk, tottering hand in hand.

10

View Through a Door's Peephole

He-he! Out! he yelled from the door.

She, naked besides the towel,
missing an earring and dripping wet,
walked barefoot down the hall,
praying no one would see her.

11

You are not my all —
You are an All —
You do not complete me —
You are complete —
You are not 'my love' —
My love is for —You

12

like dancing with a cracked heel, she tries,
staccato, awkwardly, every other note,
to possess herself with grace,
and flashes uncertain smiles,
a hand around her waist,
that, soon, she lets guide her,
as she succumbs to drought,
enters a dark doorway—and exits,
a token of depseration
planted in her mouth

13

the brain surpasses binary
it does not reduce to 1's and 0's
nor snap to circuitry,
its abundancy impossible to bind
to teeny metallic rails, neat grey lines

machines are brains dried up
too brittle to transpose
the teeming possibilities
inherent in a rose

14

the clock tower struck infinity
and its hands flailed like weather vanes in a storm,
desperately seeking an hour to grab hold to,
as the ground capsized beneath my feet,
punctured like a drum, formless, sinking into empty space,
I held to my mast and my mast dissolved,
I prayed for my life and my life was lost

15

wholly flesh

Valley's hillsides bent into green knees, blushing legs spread wide,
loosing her tributary into the sea, gushing in ecstatic tones of
knuckle of a rock protrudes the rapids —spray erupts —
wetting shore's cropped grass —aspergillum —
Sun's head bows, a tongue of light laps the quivering surface
gurgling along, riding into expanse —