Lighting the Way

Lighting the Way

at night
each lamp
lights its
own globe
against the dark
and then
one by one
like fireflies
lighting and
relighting
till there’s
an ambience
radiant
with its
own glow
and sense
of purpose
filling each
obscure corner
with hope.

Baseball Dreams

Baseball Dreams

The one-armed soldier has removed his prosthesis
and rose out of bed to greet the morning fog
He stares at the mirror until an arm appears.
Behind the screen, a smooth curveball dances
but he puts his own interpretation on the scene.

A catcher’s glove, two arab boys, and a green grenade
inhale his suspicion of sliding fastballs in haze
fogging the mirror between him and home plate.
But he doesn’t worry, or at least not much:
he still hears the crowd’s loud roar.

To the Old Man in the Rocking Chair

To the Old Man in the Rocking Chair

As you rock, an old hound leisurely
shits, staining the grass
ecru,

and as you rock, circus clowns
grimace at children: painted faces
are distorting tomorrow’s reality,

and as you rock
soldier’s blood is tarnishing the white sand,
tarnishing
the white sand.

Winter Regions

Winter Regions

Frigid, still as a grandfather’s funeral
The winter regions, the light
Settling and unsettling. Snowcaps
Extended wide over the hills, drape
Settled and unsettled in white sheets:
The sky a short mourning, the mourning
A sky, its time lucid and silent
As crystal, glaciers, blue gel.

As if heaven spoke in tongues.

And the whole earth draped sacred
In sheets and crystal, the still earth never
And always virginal and day erupts
Into the first day, dropped
Patches of first snow over
The wide hills. It was
Both sky and mourning, and the sky
Was shrill and ubiquitous, like trumpets.

wats up

Waiting Game

The interval between your question
.......... and my answer-the pause
that coolly ponders deviance of inquiry
..........like a suspicious mouse
sniffing cheese in the jaws of a mousetrap.

I think of days when my foot dangled
..........from a gaping lower lip
as I answered the obvious only to be snared
..........in the naiveté of my own ineptitude.

Today I wait, as you- a noisy impatient spider
..........dangle from a thread in your web
demanding a response that might not, just might not, if
.......... I hold my tongue, ever come.

Pondering the End

Pondering the End

When the end comes
like the final snow of winter;
when the end comes, and dials the number of my cell phone

to call me and quickly hang up;
when the end comes
like smoldering ash;

when the end comes
like a bullet between the eyebrows,
I want to enter the gateway devoid of fear, curiously:
what am I going to find there, in the house of shadows?

For that reason, I see the whole picture
as a fraternity and a sorority,
and I envision time little more than a concept,
and I believe infinity as another likelihood,

and I think of each person as a tree, ordinary
as mountain aspen, and as particular,

and each face a familiar visage in the mind,
seeking, as all faces must, a final destiny.

When the end comes, I want to say: always
I was an explorer seeking new wonders.
I was an adventurer, embracing the world with my arms.

When the end comes, I don’t want to doubt
that my chosen life was worthwhile, and true.
I don’t want to wake up trembling and afraid,
or filled with torment.

I don’t want to end up as a passing ship, forgotten.

An Ostrich's Conundrum

An Ostrich's Conundrum

Truth
Tricky and illusive
Hiding surreptiously
Like a sneaky spy.
If you only knew what I know!

From 5 Times a Week Down to Three

From 5 Times a Week Down to Three

Waning like a weak tide
the libido at 70 isn’t
what it use to be.

Not sure when things began
to change. Perhaps it was St.
Valentine’s Day, craving chocolate

more than your heart-shaped ass
or the sudden interest  in the red
hourglass on the black widow’s

belly as she wove her silken web
waiting for her man to come home
for their final meal together.

Or perhaps it was the naked girl of my
dreams running through fields of grain
calling out my name, over and over again.

Standstill

Standstill

I can’t live in this place
And I refuse to leave
Or let you dismiss me

The old dog lives, the computer
My cell phone, this chair
I’m going nowhere

I shall write my songs-
Open, a poet, discomfiting
Like tight pants, like bad manners

Like Disneyland.

My Angry Girlfriend's Voice Message

My Angry Girlfriend's Voice Message (Found poem)

Some
people
are like slinkies -
not really good
for anything,
but they still
bring a smile
to your face
when you push them
down a flight of stairs.

World Series Report

World Series Report

Nothing new today to report Sir! The villagers keep
Lobbing those damn bombs like baseballs and we keep catching em!

Baghdad Burning

Baghdad Burning

He hears the droning in the desert sky
again, quickening his heart again-sweat
pours from panic, suppressing silent cries.  
Again , petrified,  he craves a cigarette.

Damn planes! Like a swarm of cicadas,
they crescendo closer and closer
to the core of his fear
as cigarette ashes smolder

like residue of the crematorium
separating souls rising in black smoke.
He awaits his fate. (The funeral pyre?)
He hears the droning in the desert sky.

Oxy Dealer

Oxy Dealer

High
on dope
her
slurred
words sound like
dolphin
chat
under
bubbles of
sea water as
she rides on
mellow
waves
searching for
innocent
sucker
fish
in the
deep

Pecker Tracks

Pecker Tracks

Pecker
tracks on the trunk-
telltale markings on bark
keep score in time with the tapping ,
the rat-a-tat-tat of
the woodpecker’s call
for love.

Arousal

Arousal

Something always reminds of past things,
Preserves memory like taxidermy art
A face, a sound, a smell, familiar rings

Those things that tell again our hearts to sing
Uncommon words, unknown in every part.
Something always reminds of past things

A mother’s gentle touch, which to hope clings.
A father’s gruff voice, that gives sudden start
A face, a sound, a smell, familiar rings

Which bind and tie with childhood’s strings.
Dreams held steadfast within the hurting heart
Something always reminds of past things

The sudden surprise each new day brings
Restores the senses so long broken apart-
A face, a sound, a smell, familiar rings.

The moon, a bell, some perfume, magpie wings
Reflections in dreams of the sweet and tart
Something always reminds of past things
A face, a sound, a smell, familiar rings.

Adam´s Legacy

Adam’s Legacy

No más!
End of the road!
Shards of broken promises, fallout litter
clutter the orchard where fruits of our trust
once thrived like apples in Eden,
bestowing God’s blessed bounty.
No más!

Jealous Rage

Jealous Rage

Your eyes
glaring and penetrating
frighteningly flashing
as in a horror movie.
If only I could change your channel!

Beginnings Ad Infinitum

Beginnings Ad Infinitum

Sleep cut short, and I awaken aware
again to fatherhood’s ongoing traumas,
nightmarish images of a lost son
wandering through sleazy shadows,
seeking solace, crying out
in pain: I read the letter before me, written
words scrawled on a dirty napkin, reaching
from a bottomed-out soul. A struggle begins
with a gentle tug, your pulling away
bringing only momentary escape
from the bonds of medicated misery this time.
Now, days of torture punctuate withdrawal.
In dreams I envision the healing;
My hands reach out, but never quite grasp you.

Trusting

Trusting

Telling treacherous lies
To those who
Trust your words
Tramples the very
Truth of the heart
Throbbing to
Take you into loving arms

Meeting the New Neighbors

Meeting the New Neighbors

I hear their moaning through my bedroom wall.
Tonight, restless my dream tonight-their heat
rocks the roof’s rafters, disregarding all.
Tonight I am exhausted, and without sleep

Hey neighbors! Even
though interrupted by pounding,
angry fists against the wall,
they hump on.

Unsettled, I pace the floor, supposing not
a peaceful bite of breakfast before work
tomorrow. Or the next day. Or the next.
I hear their moaning through the bedroom wall.

Ancient Wind Advisory

Ancient Wind Advisory

Singing to his aging horse, old Baldan
the Mongol, slowly rides back home
from the top of nearby Steppe Mountain

lighting incenses, making offerings,
worshipping nature. Steppe carpet
slowly rolling under hooves as his

sleepy-eyed mount hobbles on stiff,
old legs. Suddenly she lifts her ears
and softly whinnies, warning about

the gust of wind that keeps prayers
from reaching heaven.

Papa's Rage

Papa’s Rage

The children upstairs hear
the uproar. The yelling
reverberates the din back towards their room.
His wife is pleading with him.
Like mice, small tots scurry under the bed
Everyone hides in the shadow of their shame.

Montana

Click link to here reading of poem

Montana

I feel your rugged face,
coarse lines of aging grit
reflected in your somber eyes.

I feel your mountain tops,
jutting through the clouds,
silent peaks and valleys.

I feel the call of wild game
through the white woods,
the eerie howl of mating wolves.

I feel barns and silos, abandoned farms.
Strange smells of unknown flora,
the surprising flutters of pheasant

I feel the touch of the morning dew,
caressing your beauty every sunrise;
the sudden warmth of healing sun

I need your grassy fields Montana,
take me in your arms again,
An eagle, soaring in your big sky.

An Appeal

I Know

That the journey of my dream never quite abandons
deep hunger or thirst. That no oasis in the desert
can quench it, Not even the shade
can wrap its arms around. There’s too much emptiness.
There’s too much to need, crying to possess.
That the cerebral roadmap rises up through the distant
path that I long for, that I’m never too paralyzed
with fear to trek on: for the heart grows wearied
of wrestling with the moon. That the quest never ends,
each new step a journey, each voyage transcends,
each footstep carving new existence
from the earth’s fine loam. That the neurons fuse
together as a compass, plotting out the course
feeding my hunger.