Category: poetry

  • roots

    digging in the dirt
    i discovered roots
    someone buried long
    ago

    with an ear to earth &
    a strum with a thumb,
    those old roots still
    sung

    of a time
    running through a forest
    always towards nothing
    again & again &
    again

  • arrival

    i fold to forest trails
    in a meander with grey stone
    drone under feet and
    red wing cattail dancing

    oh dragonfly...
    please don't take flight
    we only both just
    arrived

  • delusion

    waking up from dawn's
    dining table daydream
    to the rattle-bang
    of mourning doves
    trying to fly into
    picture-window suns

  • 自然

    there is only this —

    i grasp for words,
    those gnats dancing
    on the quiet morning
    between the perfume
    of uncut grass, clover:
    impossible to catch
    or wave away

    — a stillness, the only
    act remaining

    i let the gnats do
    what gnats will do
    leave the catching
    to those who are
    prone to catching,
    whiling my time in
    the weald

    Note: 自然, or ziran (tzu-jan), is a Chinese word for the Taoism concept that refers to a state of “just-so-ness” or “as-it-is-ness”.

  • scuff toe waltz

    we pad toe shuffle
    we scuff shoe waltz
    wet cobbles of night
    hush now shush
    be quiet or those
    cats’ sharp claws
    will rend, bite

    thieves are we
    of scuff shoe waltz
    slick in wet cobbles
    toe shuffle toe
    toe shuffle we

  • m.o.o.n.

    how is it theft
    when someone
    gives another,
    of their own
    free will,
    the moon?

  • wounds

    quit telling me of wounds, but
    show me the blood and pus
    pouring out of each puckered ulcer
    peppered across your war-ravaged flesh

    for it is then
    we can speak of poetry

  • hollow of tree

    i was hollow of tree
    all chicken wire & song
    come that october country
    of hoarfrost & dream

    rime burnt leaves stained
    gold to vermilion & bole
    crumble wake perfumed
    i waited there alone for
    that coming of you

    rook & madder
    flint & score
    crow & calling
    bone & fall

    i was hollow of tree
    all chicken wire & song
    waiting mists alone for
    that coming of you

  • throwing hands

    why write poetry at all
    when there is the wind
    that carries 'hallo hallo'
    of the crow, high up in
    the cottonwood tree, to me?

    i throw both hands away
    and reply with the same

  • toad shit

    cleaning toad shit
    off the front stoop
    under the threat
    of rain;
    a reflection of my
    over-polished mirror