Poetry

Stowaway’s Ascent

The footsteps are unanimous, an urgent ovation which I took as the most wrong moment to show myself. If compassion struck the hull to pull us down, who could show compassion then to one such as myself? But eventually the storm moved on, silence proclaimed the shipmen gone and I lay on my back in…

Teahouse

In the dark field, The question is the same. Desiring to sit and not sit In one place. And write nothing about smoke, Flaring birds with diaphanous wings, A crow’s intent, how slow the elderly Beneath spangled trees—how thoughtful their retreat. One bottomless pot. But I can’t keep Roethke out of my thoughts, Tu Fu…

Caballero

Only symmetry harbors loss. —Lorna Dee Cervantes                 Throatlatch. Crupper. Martingale. Terret. My breath                         tightens around him,                                                 like a harness. Once a year         he eats a spoonful of dirt             from his father’s grave.                                                             In his sleep                                                 he mutters lines                                                             from his favorite flick,                                                 Capulina  …

I Would Live a Day with You

Walk with me on the carriage path where we have walked through the park to the cliff where the hawks drift in spiral streams, in clear currents. Sit with me. Read to me. Start at the beginning. Read steadily, we can finish the book, the chapter, the page, the paragraph.   I have no choice,…

Crosswinds Evaporation Gasping

If I bisect my head what grasslands might I find, what flecks of plaster what walls.                     What genuflects cracks to these streets, vacant lots. There was a sandal, a child standing in it, & dust. Each sequence a leather strap creasing.                     Each crossroads with arrowsigns, distances, placenames crossed out. There was a tollbooth…

Two Cranes

Not really knowing the difference between herons and cranes, that summer we named the two birds that came to Boehmke’s Cove (which were almost surely not cranes but herons because of the way they flew with their heads drawn in close to their bodies, and for their topknot crests of feathers) “Stephen Crane” and “Hart…

Sonnet

Old woman on the rocks you look so happy. I’ve been dying to tell someone I have no past but we share no common lexis for that. And anyway you don’t need to know more— everyone is eager to be empty. This is a nice breeze so let’s just sit here a while growing fonder…

New Year’s Underground

This subway map reminds me of the colored stripes on hospital floors that guide us to recovery or dead ends (I lift my glass to the Amber line), or the spacious room that overlooks a beautiful parking lot where the roofs of the cars are like tiles you’ll be walking on in the same sunshine,…